Seduced by Moonlight mg-3

by Laurell K. Hamilton

  The pain and fear translated directly into power. I didn't think, Bleed, I thought, Die. Her throat exploded with our mouths still pressed together, so that we both coughed on her blood.

  I thought she would let me go, but she didn't. Her hand was still wrapped in my hair, and all she had to do was call her power, and I would die. I focused on the wound in her wrist, and she tried to scream with her ruined throat. Her hand fell away from my head, and the hand flopped almost completely torn away from the arm. There was no hunger in her eyes now, only shock and horror, and the panic that only the truly immortal can show at death. That puzzled fear as they feel it begin to take hold.

  She threw me away from her body, and I couldn't catch myself with only one good arm. The arm she had pulled behind my back was useless, numb and aching at the same time. I could not feel my shoulder, and distantly I knew that was probably a good thing.

  I lay on the floor for a second trying to decide if I was too hurt to move. Then I saw her stagger toward me, trying to get her hand in line with her wrist, as if she was having trouble using her hand of power with her hand torn away. I had to do something before she figured out how to use it.

  I stared at the gaping red mess that had been her throat, her spine shining wetly in the lights. I could see the bones of her clavicle just over her breasts. With all that damage, she was still struggling to kill me. She should have been dying by now. Why wasn't she dying?

  I shoved my power into her. I could feel it like a huge balled fist just under the bare bones I could see in her upper chest. I squeezed that power, squeezed it, concentrated it.

  A bolt of energy raised the hair on my body, and scarred the floor just beyond me. Miniver had torn her own hand off, and was trying to shoot energy out of her bloody stump, but she was having trouble finding the range.

  I felt that huge fist of power in her upper chest, in the wound I'd made, and I opened it. I spread the fingers of my magic wide, and her upper chest exploded outward in shards of bone and flesh and blood like a crimson rain.

  I had to use my good hand to wipe the blood from my eyes so I could see Miniver on her back, her arms scrambling at the stones as if she was trying to breathe without a throat, without a chest, without lungs. If she'd been human she would have been dead. If she had been mortal, she would have been dead. But she wasn't dead.

  I heard the queen's voice distant, more distant than it should have been. "I declare this duel over. Do any of you argue this?"

  There was no sound.

  "I declare Meredith the winner. Do any of you debate that?"

  I heard a voice, though I couldn't place it. It was a woman. "They are both on the ground. I think the princess is as hurt as Miniver."

  I understood then that I would have to get up. I managed to push myself upright with my good arm. The world swam in colors, but if I braced my arm, I could sit. I looked up, slowly, and found it was Nerys who had spoken against me.

  "Are you content now, Nerys?" Andais asked.

  "The law says that to be victor you must leave the circle under your own power."

  I was really beginning to dislike Nerys. I pushed to my knees, and the world swam in colors, but finally I could see again. I wasn't entirely sure I could stand, let alone walk. But if you have no pride to defend, then there are other methods of moving. I crawled on one hand, and my knees. I crawled toward Nerys. I crossed the magic circle just in front of her table, then I used my good hand to grab the edge of that table and pull myself upright.

  I stared at her from not so very far away, and said, "Doyle."

  He was beside me, and probably had been closer than I knew. "I am here, Princess."

  "Tell the queen to tell the court what Nerys did."

  He called to Andais, "The princess requests that you reveal what Nerys has done."

  The queen did, and I watched Nerys and all her people push away from the table, and stand there. They could not run because the guards held the only door, but the moment they pushed to their feet in a mass, I knew they intended to fight, and not as Miniver had fought, not within the rules. They intended to fight everyone.

  "Demi-fey," I said.

  Doyle leaned close. "Let me carry you, Meredith."

  I said again, "Demi-fey."

  He didn't seem to understand, but I suddenly had a small cloud of winged people around me. "You called, Princess?" said the one with a voice like bells.

  "I offer you sidhe flesh and blood."

  "Yours?" she asked.

  "No," I said, "theirs."

  There was a moment where the cloud of bloody butterflies hesitated, then almost as a single mass they fell upon Nerys and her people. It was so unexpected that the demi-fey got their bit of blood and flesh before the sidhe began to swat at them, and use magic to burn one small winged creature out of the air.

  Nerys's face was a mass of bloody scratches. All of them had been bloodied, hands, necks, faces, breasts. The demi-fey had done their work well.

  It never occurred to me that I shouldn't try. It never occurred to me that it wouldn't work. Shock is a wonderful thing. I didn't even hurt; I just couldn't feel my arm. But I could feel my power. I whispered, "Bleed," and blood began to pour out of their wounds. Such small wounds for so very much blood.

  That burning bolt came our way, but an armored knight was there to take the blow, to send the heat shattering into sparks.

  "Goblins," I said, and the Red Cap Jonty was there, with Ash and Holly beside him. "Bring your brother Red Caps."

  Jonty didn't argue, but brought back a wall of huge Red Caps, and they lined up around me. They helped keep me safe while I called blood from Nerys and all her nobles.

  Some of them broke ranks and drew knives against the swords of the guard. I think they preferred to be cut down rather than go the way Miniver had gone. Then one of her nobles dropped to her knees, and called out, "Forgive us!"

  Andais said, "You would have killed me, and made me slaughter my guards. What mercy do you deserve?"

  The woman crawled out from under the table, and Doyle moved me back, out of her bloody reach. "Please, Princess, please, do not destroy our entire house, all that we are."

  "Nerys must die, for she has led you into betraying your queen."

  Nerys's voice came, all arrogance gone. "I will pay the price for my actions if you will spare my people."

  Andais agreed, and Nerys came out from behind her table, to stand where Miniver and I had begun our fight. The circle was gone. It was not a duel. It was an execution. Except how do you kill the immortal? Miniver was still struggling on the floor surrounded by guards. How do you kill the immortal? By tearing them apart.

  I had Ash do it, because I needed Doyle to keep me standing, and I would not have asked any of the other guards to do it. Ash cut her at her throat, chest, and stomach, and I thought that was enough. The Red Caps encircled her, and the demi-fey hovered overhead. I threw the hand of blood into those wounds, and split her open like a ripe melon thrown to the ground. The Red Caps and demi-fey were drenched in her blood. But she did not die.

  My legs wouldn't hold me anymore, and Doyle carried me away from it. He carried me to the queen, and I was crying, and didn't remember it. "I can't kill them any more dead than this."

  She handed her sword, Mortal Dread, to me, hilt-first.

  "She cannot stand enough to wield it," Doyle said.

  "Then I will give them to your allies, the goblins and the demi-fey. I will let them be eaten alive as a warning to our enemies."

  I looked into her eyes and hoped she was joking, but knew she wasn't. I held out my hand for the sword, and she gave it to me. Doyle carried me back with the sword resting across my lap.

  The queen stood and announced in her ringing voice, "Miniver drank of Meredith's blood, yet she has not died from mortal wounds. It seems to disprove her theory that Meredith's mortality is contagious."

  Silence met her words, silence and faces pale with shock. I think that the Unseelie Court had seen more of a
show than they'd bargained for this night.

  "Meredith begs me to kill the two traitors and not to leave them as they are. I told her that they were her kills, and that I would give them to the goblins and the demi-fey to feast upon. Let them be eaten alive, and let their screams echo in the ears of my enemies."

  They stared up at her like children told that the monster under the bed is coming to get them.

  "But they are not my kills, and if the princess can bring them true death before they are fed to the goblins and the wee ones, then so be it."

  Doyle carried me to the floor, then hesitated a moment before carrying me to Miniver. Her throat had begun to heal, the flesh filling back in. I realized that she would survive this wound. In fact, the hand that she'd torn off to try to kill me was half attached again.

  "Doyle," I said, and he seemed to know what I meant, because he called my guards to me. If Miniver was healing, then that meant she was still dangerous. It would be foolish indeed to get myself killed doing an errand of mercy.

  Andais called, "Why do you need extra guards, my niece?"

  Doyle answered for me, "She heals, my queen."

  "Yes, be careful that your act of mercy does not get you killed, Meredith. That would be a shame." She said it almost carelessly, as if it truly didn't matter to her. "You will find, niece, that no one here will respect you for being merciful."

  I said too softly for her to hear, "I do not do it for their respect."

  "What did you say, niece?"

  I took a deep breath and did my best to make myself heard. "I do not do it for their respect."

  "Then why?" she asked.

  "Because if I were in her place, I would want someone to do it for me."

  "That is weakness, Meredith, and the Unseelie will not forgive it. It is a sin among them."

  "I do not do it for their pleasure or their pain; I do it because it matters to me what I do, not what they do, not what anyone else does, only what I do."

  "You are like an echo of my brother. Remember what happened to him, Meredith, and take it as caution. It was most likely his sense of mercy and fair play that got him killed." She stalked down the steps, holding her black skirts out, and she looked as if she were waiting for a roving photographer to snap her picture. She always moved in front of the court as if she were on display.

  "Strange then, Aunt, that it was your violence and love of pain that was nearly your undoing."

  She stopped on the last step. "Have a care, niece."

  I was too tired, and the shock was beginning to wear off, and my arm was beginning to hurt. I wanted to be somewhere where I could pass out when I could feel my arm completely again. The first twinges promised much, none of it good.

  I looked down at Miniver. "Do you wish true death? Or would you go alive into the pots of the goblins?"

  I watched thoughts slide through those blue eyes, some good, some bad. Some I couldn't even begin to understand. "What will they do to me?" she asked, at last.

  I leaned in against Doyle's chest, and didn't want to answer the question. I wanted to be done with this. I did not want to be sitting here talking to someone who should have been dead. Someone who was, in a way, already dead. Miniver still held hope in her eyes, and she should not have.

  "At the rate you are healing, the goblins will most likely use you for sex before they begin to cut off pieces of you for food."

  She stared up at me, and I saw the denial in her eyes. She didn't believe me. She was rebuilding herself, not just her body, but her sense of self. I was watching that arrogance begin to take hold again. She did not believe that such horrors would befall her. She believed that she would somehow survive, as she'd survived my attack.

  "You will wish for death long before it comes, Miniver."

  "Where there is life, there are always possibilities," she said. The skin of her chest showed white and whole through the blood, as if this was new skin, freshly made, that the blood had not touched.

  Doyle put two guards on her and carried me back to Nerys. She was not healing as quickly, because I'd been more thorough, but she was healing.

  I gave her the same choice that I'd given Miniver, but Nerys said, "Kill me." Her eyes had flicked up to the circle of Red Caps, and Holly and Ash. Seeing them stare down at her had convinced her she did not want to be alive when they took her.

  "Ash." I had to repeat his name twice more, before he turned his green eyes to me. "Take the Red Caps and stand around Miniver. Let her see what fate awaits her if you take her living into the mound."

  "We will be staying here with you, so we will not be touching her."

  I sighed. "Please, do not split hairs with me, just do what needs doing."

  "How convincing do you want us to be?" he asked, and there was something in his face of anger. I'd spoken dismissively to him, and that is not a good tone to take with a goblin warrior, especially one who will share your body soon.

  Saying I was sorry would be seen as weakness, and would make it worse. I did the only thing I could do: I grabbed his arm —not as hard as I would have liked, but as hard as I was able with the inside of my head feeling so fragile. "You and Holly are not to be convincing at all. You are mine, and I will not share you. Let the Red Caps be convincing."

  Ash gave me a smile that managed to be fierce and lusty at the same time, a look you wore if slaughter was your idea of sex. "You played the first sidhe well, Princess." He leaned in close and almost whispered, "Helpless little noises. Will you make helpless little noises for us?"

  I felt Doyle's body go very still, as if he didn't like the question, or what it meant. But truth was truth. "Helpless little ones, and probably great big screams."

  He chuckled, and it was that masculine sound that all men make when they think of such things. It was almost reassuring that he made that laugh. Male was male, some of the time.

  "Your screams will be the sweetest of music." He took my hand from his arm and laid a kiss upon the back of it. Then he motioned, and all the Red Caps, save Jonty, followed him away.

  Jonty looked at me. "My king ordered me to guard your body, not hers. I got distracted by this one's blood, and let you get too close to that other one just now. If she'd killed you, I'd have never heard the end of it."

  He was well spoken for a Red Cap, but I didn't say so out loud, because that would imply I was surprised that any Red Cap was well spoken.

  "You must strike the death blow from your own two feet, Meredith," Andais said, "or Nerys goes to the goblins as she is."

  Real fear flared in Nerys's eyes, and she mouthed, Please.

  Doyle pressed his mouth against my ear. "Can you stand?"

  I laid my face against his and gave the only answer I had. "I don't know."

  He set me on my feet, and steadied me that moment I needed. I looked at her chest. I was short enough that I could rest the tip of the blade over her heart. My legs began to tremble, but that was all right. I gripped the hilt with my good hand, took a deep steadying breath, and let my body fall upon the hilt of the sword, driving the point through her chest and into that still-beating heart. The blade rested against bone for a second, then slid home. I collapsed to my knees beside the body, my one good hand still wrapped around the hilt.

  Nerys's eyes, almost a twin of the queen's, were open and unseeing. I'd done what I could for her.

  Screams came from behind us.

  I leaned my forehead against my good arm. I wasn't sure I could stand on my own. If the queen insisted on me walking to Miniver, then I could not do it.

  Galen knelt beside me. "Take off the high heels, Merry."

  I turned my head just enough to see his face, and managed a smile. "Smart you."

  He slid the shoes off my feet while I stayed kneeling. I realized that I was swaying on my knees. Shoes or no shoes, that didn't bode well for walking. "What are they doing to her?"

  "Playing," Doyle answered.

  I raised my head enough to meet his eyes. "Playing?"

  Doy
le and Galen exchanged a look. That was enough. "Take me to her." Doyle lifted me as gently as he could, and the sword trailed from my hand. It felt so heavy. Apparently being dead once today, and nearly having my arm ripped out, was taking its toll. I was beginning to look forward to passing out, the way you look forward to sleep after a long, hard day.

  The goblins had moved so that the court could see what they were doing. It was a show—and what good is a show without an audience? One of the smaller Red Caps was kneeling beside Miniver. His fingers were playing in the healing flesh of her chest. He traced and tickled her flesh, as if he were touching her genitalia. A touch here, a caress there, and it showed skill, but his fingers weren't between her legs. His fingers were inside the meat of her chest. He was caressing the top of her heart as if that would finally bring her to orgasm.

  Doyle carried me around to her head. "Don't let them take you like this, Miniver."

  "Get them away from me. Get them away from me!"

  I looked at Ash, and he motioned the rest of them away. The one who was playing in her body left reluctantly, and squeezed her breast as he moved away.

  Miniver lay there gasping on the floor, her eyes wild. She looked up at Jonty, still standing over her, and said, "Get him away."

  "No," he said, "I am her guard, and I will guard her. I have no interest in your white flesh."

  Doyle put me on my feet, but my legs did not hold this time. I collapsed to my knees beside her.

  Miniver reached out toward me with her healed hand, beseeching. I had a heartbeat to realize that she lied with her eyes and her body. Doyle hit her hand away, and the bolt of energy sizzled outward to scar along the table on the other side of the room. Jonty trapped her arm under his big knee. He was shaking his head. "Do you want me to tear her arm off?"

  I thought about it, then shook my head. "Bind her, and let them take her."

  "No," Andais said, "for that last, I think we should see some of her punishment." The queen came in a hiss of black silk. She looked down at Miniver. "You are a fool. Do you not understand that the very fact that you are alive and healing means that Meredith is no longer mortal? I watched her die today, and breathe again. You have lost everything you are, for nothing."