Blackbird Crowned (The Witch King's Crown #3) - Keri Arthur Page 0,114
to throw myself down and away. I heard a crash as the door was flung open and saw booted feet run in, accompanied by the unholy screaming of a blade. Luc, wielding Hecate, in the room and wiping out the remaining dark elves in a furious, bloody whirlwind of death.
I hauled the fire back into the blade, back into the earth, then crawled across to Max. He was, unsurprisingly given the wound I’d inflicted, dead. Shock and surprise had forever been etched onto his now skeletal features.
My gaze went past him.
Saw Mo.
No longer surrounded by that dark web of magic.
No longer breathing.
Fuck it, no.
I wasn’t going to lose her. Not now. Not after everything we’d been through.
I pulled Vita from my brother’s neck, then crawled over to Mo and cradled her head in my lap. After tearing open her shirt, I placed a hand under her breast, over her heart, then thrust Vita into the flagstones, gripping her tightly as I made a connection between the earth, me, and Mo. Power surged—the earth’s, mine, Vita’s—hitting Mo with such force that her spine arched. The red mist of pain descended, and my eyes bled, but I didn’t break the connection and I didn’t give up. I kept the energy flowing, willing her to breathe, to live.
Time slowed to a crawl, even though my heart raced and a blur of motion and noise surrounded me. I paid it no heed, watching Mo intently, willing her chest to rise, her heart to beat under my fingers.
For far too long, neither did.
Then, with a body-shaking gasp, her eyes snapped open. She sucked in several great gulps of air before her gaze came to mine. Pride shone. Pride and relief.
“My darling girl,” she murmured, her voice hoarse and wracked with pain. “You did it.”
“Yes,” I whispered as bloody tears fell. “I did.”
Was the price I’d paid a fair one?
In the end, the answer would always be yes. At least in the cold light of day.
But in the deep silence of the night, when darkness and regret came out to play? When the heated echo of my twin’s blood once again pulsed across my hand and I saw again the shock and reproach in his eyes?
I suspected it was a question that would haunt me for many years to come.
Epilogue
From the highest point on top of King Island, the scope of the damage done to Ainslyn was very evident. While the business sector and the new port had come through the attack relatively unscathed, the residential and business areas surrounding the old town wall had basically been decimated. Max might have died unceremoniously on the floor of an old farmhouse, but his forces had taken a while to get the memo.
Or perhaps it had been my brother’s last gift to us. A final fuck-you.
I raised my gaze. Dusk was settling in, and the sky was the color of blood. Memories stirred, and tears stung my eyes. I took a deep breath and blinked them away. Despite the doubts I’d had in that old farmhouse, I only had to look at Ainslyn to know the price had indeed been worth it, no matter what the night’s demons might otherwise whisper. It would take months to clean up the mess in the outer sections of the city and years to rebuild. And while in the end there’d only been a dozen or so deaths here, London had suffered a far greater toll. The grand old city would never be the same, though that in part was not only due to the destruction of her many iconic buildings, but because the High Witch Council had officially been granted sitting rights in the House of Lords. For the first time in centuries, witches would have a hand in the laws governing the land they’d lived in—and at one time ruled—for thousands of centuries.
“You okay?”
The soft question rose from the darkness behind me, and I smiled. “I will be. Eventually.”
“Well, that’s a definite improvement.”
“What is?” I turned and loosely wrapped my arms around Luc’s neck. The ragged scar that ran from his left temple to the edge of his mouth was the only visible sign of just how close he’d come to death when Max’s lightning had struck that grove of trees.
He wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me closer to his big, warm body. “I mean you not automatically saying you’re ‘just fine.’”
I laughed. “Expect a return to form sooner rather than later.”