Promise of Dusk (Endings #1)

Chapter 47

It takes time to relay all the information. About myself first—then to argue with Konan as to why he should not kill me outright. He seems to share Fionn’s stance about my trustworthiness, unsurprisingly. He eventually stands down, unwilling to upset Aine. His eyes follow where I go now.

Armund takes it in stride, seeming to take every scrap of information and file it away for later study. I notice him observing me more often now. I try to ignore it. I try not to think too hard about what he’s thinking.

Gwen steps in for the rest, briefly discussing Annwyn, and how we are planning to go back. Nobody takes much convincing. The many years spent in this realm seem to have no sentimental value to them as they rapidly pack up their measly belongings and we set out to meet the others.

We walk along the sea-cliffs, Aine walking along them without effort or fear. Something about her blindness allows her to ‘feel’ the world around her more keenly. She reaches out with her mind, like when I reach out to things with my mind, but on a grander scale .

“I should warn you, we in Annwyn have some new companions,” Gwen starts. “I have a feeling you will be charmed. They will be traveling back with us. They can be a little… disconcerting, at first.”

“That’s what that was,” Aine gasps, unseeing eyes wide. “They’re across the bay. They feel… like power. Like more power than anything I’ve ever felt.”

I pretend this comment doesn’t set us all on edge for differing reasons. I assume the others have grown used to Aine’s eerie comments, but I have not.

“Who?” Armund asks, sidling up beside me.

“Dragons,” I state, watching his brows draw down and eyes blow wide.

“Dragons. Like—"Armund begins.

“—yes,” I cut him off. Like the one Fionn fought. I won’t be the one to let it slip to Gwen about Fionn’s past with the dragons. Neither should Armund.

As the rocky cliffs change to crawling grass and soft, coastal dirt, I spot two figures, hidden within a thicket of trees. Erron and Fionn.

They’ve settled along the edge of farmland, the sheep flocking on the upper ridge of the property. Most of those sheep live to feed the king and his militia, the gates of Raith sit only a few leagues away from here. They are taken as taxes while their farmers live off their measly leftovers.

I had thought the Crows were a necessary evil in the beginning. They protected us, even if they also hurt us—killed us, on occasion. It was the lesser of two evils, or so it seemed.

Now I know better.

What does a king, with men that don’t eat, need with all those sheep?

He needs to keep his people too hungry to fight back. Keep them too desperate to survive the day that they’re unable to worry about a year from now.

Now, I wonder how I never saw it for what it was. That their justifications were only a plight to establish a firm grip without too much push-back. It only succeeded because we were unable to stomach the idea that the worst-case scenario was the one we were in. Nobody wants to believe that they are sitting on the edge of destruction. Nobody wants to believe that their king seeks not to serve them, but to break them. Because if you believe that, what are you to do? When you’re already feeling small, hungry, and powerless, what should you do when soldiers—armed to the teeth—traipse in and demand obedience?

We never were anything but a flock of sheep led to slaughter.

I can run. Escape to a world across the rift and hope to never be found.

What of the world that raised me? Can I leave them to their fate? And what about those across the sea, that won’t be aware of what is happening when their soil runs dead and dry? When snakes begin to swarm in the grass, will they know to fight back while they still have the chance?

What am I to do?

That question haunts me as we step under the cover of trees.

When Erron catches sight of us, he squares his shoulders.

Fionn runs his eyes over our three recovered members, clearly reassuring himself of their wellbeing. I wonder what I could ever have done to earn such love from him.

The bruises around my throat are proof enough that I never had it.

Fionn struggles to his feet, unable to put weight on his left leg. When the males reach him, his face has risen to sheer amazement, like he never believed he would see them again. As he clasps arms with Konan first and pulls him into a one-armed hug, Konan freezes, never one for affection. Armund waits, eager and elated, before Fionn pulls him all the way in. Their reunion fills the air with sweetness, two brothers thanking god that the other lived long enough to embrace one more time.

They release, both handling one another roughly in that odd, male way of affection. Slowly, a sort of solemnity falls like a blanket over the joy. Aine approaches, having walked at the rear of the group this whole time.

Fionn staggers to her, pausing and leaning on a tree beside him.

He rubs a hand down her raven hair, settling his hand on the nape of her neck. She doesn’t look up at him. I wonder if she’s doing it consciously, trying to hide her condition. Or if she just sees no point in trying to aim her face up at him.

He sighs, seeming unsure of his next words.

“I’m so sorry.” He flounders for a second, searching the tree canopy for words. “Your parents were the greatest and most noble of us. I should have—” He swallows harshly. “I should have done more. I should have protected us all. You paid the greatest price. And for my failure, I will never be able to atone. But I will spend every day of my immortal life trying to make this right for you. You will want for nothing. You have my word.”

Her shoulders shrink with every word, surely the worst of her memories playing back in her head. Still, despite her anguish she looks up at him and whispers, “Thank you.”

Fionn’s brows scrunch a bit in confusion.

As if she can feel his confusion, she quickly explains. “I can’t see. For now. Maybe forever. But I’m okay. I can still ‘see’ things, sort of. I can see their energy. I know what water is, ground, air, people. I can still see the light…” she trails off awkwardly, as if unsure what else to say.

The rest of us shift on our feet, pretending to be paying attention to other things, letting the two have their interaction. Everyone other than Konan, who’s wandered to Aine’s side.

I look over at Erron, who has yet to move towards the rest of us. He’s staring at Aine like he’s seen a ghost of someone he loved. He walks slowly, as if in a trance, coming to a stop beside me. “Deri’s girl?” he asks solemnly, brushing his shoulder against mine.

I nod. “Do you want me to introduce you?”

He looks afraid of her in the moment before he looks down at me, searching my face for something, those dark eyes catching on the bruises collaring my neck. “Everything went smoothly?"

Caught by the changing of subject I stumble over my words. “Yes. Yes, everything went well.” I think about Konan, his altercation with Gwen, and his siding with Fionn. “Well, Konan, the big pale male, he wanted to throw me off a cliff. He almost threw Gwen off a cliff, but we managed to sway his opinion.” I shrug, making a joke of it. “He almost didn’t have to; I almost fell on the way up. Elva wasn’t kidding that Fionn wouldn’t have made it.”

Erron’s face remains flat, perhaps even losing some color. Not finding it funny.

“It wasn’t that serious. Gwen wouldn’t have let him push her off a cliff,” I clarify, feeling foolish for trying to laugh about it. Of course, he wouldn’t find that amusing.

“I realize that,” he says, nodding stoically. He looks at me seriously. “The greater danger is that Gwen would begin to chatter ceaselessly until he threw himself off a cliff. And then the others would never trust us. ”

His face remains so unchanged that it takes a moment to process that he’s made a joke. I choke on a laugh, drawing the eyes of everyone else.

Erron finally acknowledges his own joke with a slight upturn at the mouth. When I look at my new audience, my eyes clash with Fionn’s first. They darken as he looks between Erron and me.

I step away, creating more distance between the two of us before I introduce Aine, Armund, and Konan to Erron. Armund’s eyes go wide, Konan grunts, unimpressed, and Aine tilts her head as if tuning into him.

“You’re my dad’s cousin,” Aine states with all the bluntness of a child.

“Yes.” Erron looks sick as he looks at her. “I’m glad to meet you, Aine.” He pauses. “When we get back to Annwyn, as I’m sure Gwen explained, there is someone else I know who wants to meet you, when you’re ready. Your grandfather. Deri’s—your dad’s—father. He still lives, back in Annwyn. He is one of my most trusted councilmen.”

Her eyes grow wider.

I step in beside her, feeling the current of hatred directed at me from Fionn, who still stands near her. “Only if you want to,” I state firmly, flashing Erron a glance.

“Of course,” he says gently.

Elva melts out of her place in the shadow of a tree as she says, “There are things we should discuss before heading back. Things I’ve learned of when I was in Clio’s employ.”

We turn to listen. Armund comes to stand between Fionn and I, slinging an arm around my shoulder. I’m relieved that he hasn’t completely abandoned me, even when he knows that Fionn hates me.

Even with the hateful glances falling my way from Fionn, being back with all of us together feels as though a piece has finally clicked back into place. Like there was something grating on my nerves for however long that I never noticed, and now it has been set to right.

“In exchange for use of her birds in the palace, Clio sent me to follow the king. To Gormes, where he is overseeing the mines. He had received some visitors in Raith just before he left. They went with him. Two of them looked familiar.” She looks to Erron as she continues, “You are the Queen’s son. As the ambassador of my people, I had met with her days before the fall of Danu. Met with her and some of her visitors. Surely you remember their leader.”

Erron’s face is dark in remembrance. Looking every bit the avenging prince, the shadows of the grove falling ominously over his face. “I do recall a few of their faces. And names.”

Elva nods darkly. “Ethalor was with the king. Along with his advisor, the pious piece of shit that always follows him around.”

Hearing such language come out of Elva’s mouth is shocking.

“Balor,” Erron says his name like a promise of retribution.

Fionn speaks this time, steeling himself first, “They were there. They brought me to him again. In the throne room. They were there. They watched.”

Nobody has to ask what they watched. Fionn’s broken and bruised body is enough description of what was done to him after I left.

His words dig into my open wounds. His pain like salt burning in fresh cuts.

Armund’s arm squeezes a bit around my shoulder.

“He seemed to… answer to them,” Fionn finishes, blinking rapidly to clear his mind of memories that ring pain. “It was like he was trying to please them.”

I add this new information to the puzzle that is the Pretty King.

I wonder if I’ll ever discern his agenda. I try to reconcile the seemingly benevolent act of releasing me—seemingly without a tail—with everything else vile he is a part of. Nothing fits together.

“Well, he probably was trying to please them. He is their agent. Perhaps, given what Alyx and Fionn claim he said to them, he is one of their offspring. That will build-in the need to please,” Elva hypothesizes. “Whatever the case, we have a much larger issue. They didn’t kill them all.”

The silence is heavy.

She continues, “The Fae. They’re still alive. They’re still in Danu. They’re enslaved. Many died during the initial takeover, but most were kept alive, to this day.”

My mind whirls, trying to piece it all together. I knew that a few were still alive, but most of them?

Gwen is the first to speak, blinking back astonishment, “Why would they do that? What are they doing with them?” Her eyes jump to me. “Didn’t you say that the king said there were only a few of you? They can’t have kept them all for breeding. Right?”

I search mine and the king’s conversation, looking for answers. “I—I don’t know. He made it seem like there were some who lived, for a time. But he only spoke of my mother—of how she was killed. He gave very little away about the state of Danu. He wanted me to join him before he gave me the details.”

Erron looks as though the ground beneath his feet gave way. “They’ve been there—all this time. And we just left them. I thought they were doomed.”

Elva continues, “Whatever the case, they are establishing a foothold here, with the king and the Crows. But Ethalor and Balor remain in Danu most of the time. Which means there is a rift. Between here and Danu.”

“Or they walk through worlds like you,” Armund suggests.

“They don’t,” Elva says firmly.

“How could you know that. They came from seemingly nowhere,” he argues.

“Because, boy, I would know.”

They bicker while I search through my memories. I watch a bird soar high above the bay.

Aine whispers something to herself.

“What?” I ask.

“Are they going to try to kill us?” she asks, quietly.

“Who?” I pull out from under Armund’s arm to lean closer to her. Surely, she isn’t referring to the Fomorians who, she’s aware, are going to try to kill us.

She only points out, at the sky over the bay.

At the bird.

No, not a bird—a dragon.

I can just barely make out their four limbs and clubbed tails as they soar far over our heads.

“No. They didn’t try to kill me at least,” I say, mostly telling the truth.

“Why do you sound like you’re lying?”

“They’re not going to try to kill you,” I say firmly, craning back my head as they soar past us.

“We should be going.” Erron steps up to my side, following my gaze. His voice is that of a king as he addresses us all, “We must return to Annwyn. Discuss with the council. I will not sit in my home while my people live in chains.”

Fionn is ghostly pale. Not taking his eyes off the sky as the others begin gathering their packs .

I bump into him on purpose, drawing his eyes, which quickly narrow. I shake my head at him, wide-eyed. Don’t tell them about you and the dragon.

He swallows and jerks away from me.

“Would you let me set your leg before we leave?” I ask.

He laughs bitterly. “No. I would rather not have the hands of a leech touch me again.”

The name is like a hit, but one I was expecting. My heart only stutters a little

Erron snatches his hood, jostling him roughly. He snarls, “Remember my words, faeling. I’m not above putting you in your place, even if you are crippled.”

Fionn snarls back at him, flame licking up his hands, which burn into the tree behind him. It’s his first show of strength since we rescued him.

Erron quirks a brow. “Adorable. Maybe once we get you back and healed you can learn how to wield correctly. Until then, watch your filthy mouth when you talk to her. She’s the only reason you weren’t left to rot in that cell.”

Erron shoves Fionn away with more force than necessary, causing him to suck in a pained breath.

Fionn’s eyes, glazed with agony, find mine. The agony melts into a glare. I’m not sure he will ever let this go.

Armund wraps his arm around Fionn’s waist and helps him limp away.

Erron rubs his chest, hard, as if ridding himself of the aggressive energy, then heads to the front of the group without looking at me, clearly eager to get moving.

He says something to Gwen who heads back to us, addressing the group, “Rignon will fly ahead and scout. He’ll let us know if anything is awry. They cannot carry everyone, so we will have to walk. Fionn, you need to see a healer. You and I will fly ahead to Annwyn. ”

Before Fionn can protest, we all hear it. The billowing flaps from above.

The dragon.

Vyrain, in her verdant glory, sweeps down, agile as a dancer, landing in the field in front of us. The wind she creates throws leaves and branches and flattens the grass.

The Fianna shuffles backward, nervously eyeing the creature before us. Aine stays beside me, mouth agape.

Fionn scrambles away, peeling himself away from Armund’s arm, and falling onto his back, wide-eyed.

“No,” he says. “No, I’ll walk. It needs to be re-broken and set by now anyways.”

“I’m afraid you’ll slow us down too much,” Gwen says blandly as she walks up to her dragon, running a hand down her scaly nose.

Vyrain’s claws flex into the ground in a feline show of pleasure. One that destroys the ground beneath her claws.

“I cannot get on her,” Fionn protests again, staying on the ground even when Armund offers him another hand.

Vyrain’s green eye opens, zooming in on Fionn. She inspects him closer, sniffing at his boot. She lets out a bone-chilling growl that can be heard across the plains.

Fionn’s face drains of blood.

I thought I had seen Fionn afraid, but it had been mere echoes of this very real fear that now consumes him.

I think I should be enjoying it, but I don’t. I know that fear, and just watching it play out is painful.

“I doubt she would let you anyhow,” Gwen says. “But she will carry you in her talons; you just have to try to hold your leg still.”

Gwen takes a running leap onto Vyrain’s saddle, her brown hair tossing in the coastal wind.

Fionn only has time for a muffled shout before Vyrain grabs him with one talon and leaps for the sky. Her wings, beating in the air, carry her high enough to pass for a bird in a matter of seconds.

To his credit, he doesn’t scream.

The others stare after her in awe.

The sheep in the pasture bleat and run for cover.

I find myself longing to fly again, even if it is terrifying. To escape this doomed place on the wings of freedom. I fear the thought is a lie.

Ever since that day when Diana died, I’ve been running. Trying to find safety. Trying to find peace in a peaceless world.

I fear that evil has legs, and it’s coming for us—in every world.

Rotting flesh in the body of our world, it cannot be outrun. You either succumb, or take a blade to it.

I can think of no greater purpose for a bastardization of nature, such as myself, than to be the blade that removes i t.