Promise of Dusk (Endings #1)

Chapter 17

The next day passes in pointed silences. Fionn seems as content as I to ignore what happened. It confirms my suspicions that Fionn was picking the low-hanging fruit. He wouldn’t be the first man to say what a woman wants to hear to get what he wants. What could someone like him possibly want with someone like me? He could find a more beautiful woman in any town in Suri. Not to mention my droll and depressing personality. How did he go from that to I want you ?

It’s irreconcilable.

So I put one foot in front of the other as we walk through the bustling streets of Tristram. I pretend that I was the one picking the low-hanging fruit. I have nothing to be ashamed of, I was just a person seeking some human touch. You’re fierce. And spiteful. And challenging. Echoes of his beautiful lies reverberate in my ears. They felt so sweet when they brushed over my cheeks, yet so bitter as they ring in my memory. I keep my face forward and pretend that I’m not drowning in self-hatred and embarrassment .

Now, as the sun is dipping below the horizon somewhere far beyond the clouds and seas, I sit in the sand above the lowering tide, where the sand is soft and dry. My bare feet burrow under it, marvelling at its softness. The grains run through my fingers like the days I spent too sad to remember. The only proof of its existence is the grit on my skin, on my soul.

The rest of the group pairs off, aside from Elva, who disappears giving no explanation. Konan and Aine are splashing in the tide pools. Deri and Dealla are off doing…whatever mated couples do best, I presume. Armund and Fionn have wandered into the woods, jostling and laughing with one another, brothers in all but name. I guess Fionn’s crimes are easily forgiven, more palatable when they come from one with so much charm and influence. He is forgivable, but Armund wouldn’t even look at me today.

As the waves break over and kiss the sand, earth in its finest form and water at its wildest, I feel small. So infinitesimal that nothing matters. I don’t matter. My life is a waste, and every breath in my lungs is too. No wonder god is so apathetic towards our suffering, if he too can see the might of his creation in every wave and gusting wind, every wildfire and towering oak. I am beginning to understand how he could think so little of me as I reach for the great trees and feel their ancient hum of life. I would care more for them too. They are not petty or spiteful. They do not kill mercilessly nor take for the sake of taking. They don’t get stuck on a beach, immovable in their sadness. They don’t—

Flickers of movement flash in the corner of my eye.

I barely have enough time to spy the shrouded group of people as they make their way single-file along the beach. Someone grabs me under the armpits and drags me backwards into the trees. A hand is slammed over my mouth. My feet peddle wildly underneath me, trying to gain solid ground. I fly around the second I am released within the cover of the tree line, meeting the warning glare of Fionn. Armund is beside him.

Fionn presses his fingers to his lips.

His proximity disarms me for a second, flashes of shared breaths and want play in my mind. From the way his eyes flicker to my parted mouth, he remembers it too. I shuffle over to Armund, warmth emanating from where our shoulders brush, and peer through the spaces between the leaves, begging myself to become shadow, as Elva does.

Where are the others? I whip around to ask Fionn, but he just shakes his head. Armund places a hand on my shoulder, to soothe my still-wild breathing. Fionn marks it. I look away.

The group of strangers is picking their way along the rocks. They move with a human clumsiness, garbed in all black.

My curiosity becomes an extension of me, a limb on the wind.

I find myself reaching for one of them.

It feels like slipping into a haze of malice, oil running over my skin as I pass through the aura of him. This night-shrouded man. I feel the core of him, the hum of his vile existence.

Adrenaline and excitement still thrum in my veins, in time with my heartbeat.

Shivers run up my spine in a slick, oily anticipation.

Vile hunger saps at my energy, feeling like a pot over-boiling—

It’s like falling in a dream and jerking awake.

Finding myself back in my own body, but feeling the remnants of that other soul still coating my skin, in my chest...

Armund is lightly shaking my shoulders, warm brown eyes running over my face in concern, whispering my name. I must have been looking at him for some time, but I only now begin to see him—

I sigh in relief, at being away from that man; his soul makes me want to retch. His existence feels like a stain on everything. How I slipped straight into his mind without trying much is concerning.

Armund looks relieved too as he runs his hand over the back of my head, stroking my hair. It feels nice. His eyes flicker over my shoulder. I can hear the group walking quietly right in front of where we hide in the shadows.

He tenses, and I follow his gaze.

The strange group has stopped, looking at the sand. My footprints. The place where I sat and dragged my feet all the way into the tree line. Their gazes track it all the way to where we stand in the dark.

They can’t see us. I know they can’t. But they are looking right at us, and the man whose energy I just felt is smiling, eyes alight with excitement. His face is ordinary, just like any other man I would pass in town, but he is a monster, and I don’t need to know exactly what he was thinking about to know that.

We cannot move, the ground is too covered in twigs, rocks, and brush that makes sound.

Fionn seems to know something I don’t, as he takes a step forward into the light, casual and unhurried.

Armund hesitates, but takes a step forward with him, hand extended back at me telling me to stay.

Fionn’s voice is full of bravado as he says, “What do we have here? A group of snivelling marauders I would bet, judging by the reek of you. ”

The sneer on the monster’s face does not waver as he sees Armund come to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Fionn. The two Fae are still outnumbered by eight.

“Feeling brave?” the monster asks. “Looks to me like you should keep your heads down and pray to god we are merciful.”

“You aren’t merciful,” Fionn states blandly. “Something tells me you make a habit of destroying family homes for fun. Killing children for sport. All in the name of your Dragon King.”

The monster chuckles. “You Surins are so self-righteous. So it’s okay to let the children die in the streets of Raith, when there is plenty of food for the Pretty King and the wealthy, but you draw the line at us ending them now. Action versus inaction, the ends are the same. I find it more virtuous to stop the scourge on the land now, while they’re young. Those little shits would grow up to be the Pretty King’s army, would see my own home burn.”

“How very selfless of you. A true patriot,” Armund sneers.

“If anyone’s a scourge on the land it’s you. Maybe I’ll exercise the same mentality. I could use a good bonfire on the beach.” Fionn unsheathes the knife at his side as he says it, surely running it over the palm of his other hand as he always does.

“Where’s the little woman you have with you?” another raider asks, clearly impatient. I can see the gleam in his eyes from back in the shadows, hopeful for more spoils.

“Woman?” Armund asks, cocking his head to the side. The lie is so convincing, I would believe him if I didn’t know.

The man gestures to the sand between them. “You didn’t make an imprint that small. Are you trying to keep her to yourselves?” His eyes somehow become more wicked in the silence. “We don’t blame you for sharing her. We share too, sometimes.”

Fionn chuckles, the sound wrathful. “You just keep making this better. This is my favorite game.”

The raiders chuckle with him, feeling comfortable in the majority.

The laughs break off with a flash of motion. One moment Fionn is there, the next he’s gone.

Armund pulls his own knife and attacks the one monster, who has escaped the doom that awaits his comrades.

A whirlwind of sand, rising from the ground by a phantom wind, surrounds and obscures. The wrath of its master makes it thrash and slice through the marauders as they panic, shrieks of surprise and agony tearing from their throats. Flashes of Fionn’s blade, his lithe powerful body, peek through. Blood paints the sand beneath their feet the darkest of maroon as their screams paint the air around us.

Armund is more evenly matched with the marauder he has taken on. The two grapple, knives flashing between them as they both twist and contort to dodge attacks, teeth bared. Armund uses no power. He is half a head taller than the man he fights, and seems to be far faster and more graceful, but the monster has quite a bit of strength and weight on him and seemingly more experience fighting.

I’m not a fighter.

His first words to me.

They send a shiver of fear down my spine, and I take a step towards them.

I fight within myself, tearing through everything in my body, searching for a kernel of power. The pathway to that thing inside me that turns Crows to icy bits of flesh and bone. I grasp at something within me, but it is like grasping at sunlight. Feeling its warmth but not able to hold it. I push at it, make it tangible in my muscles, the feeling in my fingers. I breathe through it, willing it to obey, to suffuse my marrow with power.

Something surges, like a breaking of some barrier.

I am it and nothing.

All within myself, this body.

I am a raging force with a singular purpose.

To eradicate this thing. This monster who takes and takes. Who plays god with any shred of power he finds himself wielding.

Armund is thrown from the monster, propelled by some merciful force away from the destruction I wreak.

The oil of his soul, his very existence is within my fingertips as I destroy it. It freezes and screams as I crush it with everything I have.

The power ebbs and eddies in my veins, but I cannot stop it. It just drains and drains.

I see people running towards us with inhuman speed—allies.

My vision blurs but I have a singular focus on that thing now lying in the sand, its grip on my subconscious is unyielding.

Somewhere in the haze, I process that the monster is dead. They’re all dead. The monster is nothing but shards of frozen flesh chilling the ground beneath it. It is nothing now. Anything remaining has left, abandoning the flesh that held it. It is nothing.

“Easy. You’re good. Armund is good.” A honeyed voice says in my ear.

The power is searching, fury and fear holding its reins. Everything is so far away. I am so far away.

“Come on Alyx, just let it go. Let it go.” That voice .

Somewhere, in a different plane, I can feel that warmth surrounding me, holding me.

Somewhere so close, I could swear it was right next to me, I can feel something soft press against my pulse. Something softly rocks me back and forth and I tear my eyes away from the destruction I created.

I jerk back into my body and turn my head, making Fionn move his face from my neck.

He surrounds me, holding me in his arms from behind, arms pinned to my sides, soothingly rocking me back and forth. Both a restraint and a comfort. My breaths are coming out in huge bellowing pants.

I am raw. Every nerve exposed. My arms are so heavy I could not tear myself from his arms if I tried.

“You’re fine. Keep breathing.”

I do. I still feel adrift, but I can feel my toes and hands again, can feel his heat at my back.

My voice is a rasp as I say, “That was an interesting trick you did out there.”

He barks a laugh. “Right back at you, frosty. I’ve uh… I’ve never seen someone do such a thing. Creative.”

The comment sends me back into that dark place, far away.

“I didn’t mean to.”

“I know,” he says gently.

“I was scared.”

“I know.”

“I hated it.” Am I a monster too?

“I know. It’ll get better.”

“I don’t want to do this anymore.” Overgrown herb gardens, scraggly and unkempt. Falling asleep on cold flooring. Flame-less hearths. Nameless hurt.

“You’ll learn to control it. It only feels like this for now. We will help you.” His voice is smooth and gentle for once. He squeezes me a little tighter.

I stay silent at that.

He doesn’t understand.

Armund’s voice is the thing that makes me tear my eyes from Fionn’s.

“Alyx, you didn’t have to do that. I was fine.” Resentment twists his face as he pushes into the tree line, the rest of the Fianna with him.

Konan scoffs. “From where we were standing it looked like the girl saved your hide.”

Armund turns to fully face Konan, scowling. “And where were you? You were just going to leave us to our fate, then? What good is a half-feral brute from the Scar if he doesn’t come to be the muscle when he’s needed?”

The words find their mark.

Konan moves to tower over Armund, who, to his credit, does not cower, “And what good is an idiot scholar who cannot wield his brain nor a blade to get us off this goddess-forsaken realm? Fionn took on nine men to your one. One human, who was too much for you to handle on your own. What a waste of resources you are, Armund. If you were born in the Scar we would have dropped you directly into the Wastes.”

“Stop it. Both of you.” Fionn’s command rumbles against my back. The two males quiet but make no move away from one another. He addresses the others, “The rest of you did good. We were fine, thanks to Alyx. We didn’t need anyone else getting in the crossfire. Staying back and waiting was the right call.”

The rest of the group is watching wearily, Aine tucked behind Deri and Dealla, looking between the two quarreling males with disappointment and apprehension. Elva is watching only me, as if I’m a riddle to solve.

Her stare reminds me of my position in Fionn’s lap and forces me to slide off of it. Limbs the weight of boulders barely hold me up. Fionn keeps an arm around my waist, steadying me. I clamber to my feet.

“So the raiders aren’t a lie?” I ask, wrestling my face into neutrality against the black splotches floating through my vision.

Fionn replies, “No, though the Pretty King certainly does nothing to stop it.”

“Well that’s…” I stop myself from saying ‘good.’ Good that not every single thing in my world is a lie. “Better than the alternative, I suppose.”

Elva chimes in, “We run into them on occasion. The ones with enough hatred in their hearts to venture all the way here are usually vile creatures.”

Nausea churns my stomach as I say, “I know, that one in front was horrible.” I close my eyes against the memory.

“You reached for him?” Dealla asks.

I nod.

Concern flares in Dealla’s eyes, but it’s Elva that addresses me.

“You need to be careful with that. Some beings here do not take kindly to lurkers. Most humans don’t know. But there are others here.” Other than human.

“I know.” I shoot Fionn a narrowed glare at the reminder of his lesson on this issue the other day. “I just… I was clueless, and they couldn’t tell me who those men were. So I… looked.”

Silence follows my excuse for a beat. Fionn breaks it.

“It’s impressive. That you can do such a thing so soon. That you can discern what you’re seeing, target someone already. You’re doing well. But I think you’ve had enough for today. We need to deal with the bodies and find a new spot to rest for the night.”

I try not to care that Fionn is coddling me. That he normally would have been my harshest corrector. Would have normally taught me a hard-learned lesson. Perhaps I look as fragile as I feel.

I don’t care that it’s impressive. I don’t want this. But we rarely get what we want