he saw her chest slowly rising and falling. She still breathed. Wasting no more time, he summoned a regeneration potion and poured some into her mouth and some over the wound.
Gan walked over to see what he was doing, so Will gave him a new job. “Protect her.” Then he went back to inspect the hole and its collection of body parts.
The last troll arrived carrying fae pieces and bits and Will recognized one of them. It was Elthas’ head. Somehow the arrogant lord’s head had survived mostly in one piece. That made him feel better. Dropping it into the hole with the rest, Will summoned a large number of the vials of alchemist’s fire he’d kept stowed away in the limnthal since he’d made them over a year ago.
He had begun to wonder if he would ever find a use for them, but Will was certain that this was the day. He poured the first directly over Elthas’ bloody face and then dropped the rest of the vials in the hole around it. He quickstepped away from the hole as white-hot flames roared upward.
With nothing to do for a moment, he looked over to check on Aislinn and Tailtiu. His grandmother was still staked out, smoking and hissing, but Tailtiu had moved away. Turning his head, Will spotted her kneeling beside a tiny body. Lrmeg tried to retrieve the pup to put in the fire, but Tailtiu’s tear-stained face was enough to warn him away.
Throughout the bloody collection process, Will had kept his eyes open for remnants of the goddamn cat, but none had been brought to him. As he watched the fire burn, he spotted something pink in the grass to his left. Bending over, he picked it up and saw that it was a small pink bow, stained with blood.
He recognized it as Sammy’s work. One of the many bows she had lovingly used to adorn Mr. Mittens. Will slipped it into his pouch then rubbed his face in an attempt to scrub away the emotions threatening his composure. There was still much to do.
Chapter 61
The void turyn was spilling out of the city once again, and Will worried that in her unconscious state, Selene wouldn’t be able to keep it from poisoning her. The battle around the Terabinian position was still raging, but the part facing the city was almost finished. He needed to enter the city and do away with the spell-engine, so Selene needed to be taken to safety.
Interrupting Tailtiu’s mourning, he asked his aunt to carry Selene to safety.
“I’m tired, Will,” she said sadly. “I may look fine, but that explosion shattered my bones. Healing them took most of the energy I had. I’ll need to return soon.”
He nodded. “Just carry her for me. I trust you to be gentle. The trolls will protect both of you until you reach the army. After that, you can go home.”
“Mother needs to return too,” she replied, keeping her gaze away from the sight of Aislinn’s smoking flesh.
Will’s expression was unforgiving. “She can take herself home, once I’m done with her—assuming I like what she has to say.”
Tailtiu nodded, then clambered up into Gan’s basket. Will lifted Selene into her arms, and then at Tailtiu’s request, he brought Dinner’s limp body over. Summoning a blanket from the limnthal, he wrapped the pup carefully and then gave it to his aunt, who settled the tiny canine against her chest, atop Selene’s unconscious form.
Something about the sight brought tears to his eyes. Will waved them away, and after they left, he walked over to his grandmother and began removing the knives. He didn’t store them, though, since he wasn’t yet sure whether he would need them again or not.
Aislinn’s body stopped smoking once the last piece of iron was removed. She couldn’t yet speak, but one eye focused hatefully on him, promising retribution. “Keep staring at me like that and I’ll grind you up with a bucket of iron slag and bury you in a hole,” Will warned. There was no humor in his tone.
Never one to act foolishly, Aislinn didn’t tempt him. She found a different direction to stare while her body gradually restored itself. It seemed to take forever, but eventually her chest began to move as her lungs started drawing air in and out. Will judged she would soon be able to talk. Picking up the largest of the knives, he knelt with her hair under his knee and put the point an inch from