It felt as if fabric brushed the skin on my arm. Goosebumps followed in the wake of the invisible touch.
Wolfgang stared past me, his face desperate with hope. ‘Is she here?’ he asked. ‘Is my Litty here?’
‘Yes.’ Santanas didn’t take his eyes off the ghost. ‘She’s here. She says she was always here. She loves you, but she wants you to be happy. For her,’ he turned his head toward Wolfgang, ‘you have to be happy for her.’
Wolfgang bowed his head, sobs shuddering through his body.
Santanas turned back to where his wife stood. His face held peace as he smiled up at her. Then, like a puppet whose strings had been cut, his arm fell to his side and dull eyes stared at the stars.
***
We stayed like that as the moon crept towards the horizon and the first blush of morning appeared above the trees. Neither of us talking. Both following the path of our own thoughts.
Santanas’s body cooled as we sat beside it and I struggled to come to terms with all that had happened. In the end, he had gotten the very thing he had wanted, but he had sacrificed all other love along the way.
I sighed and put my palms on the ground, groaning as I pushed myself up to my feet. I was stiff and sore and cold.
‘What should we do with him?’ I asked.
Wolfgang started as if he had forgotten I was there. He stared at me for a moment before his eyes refocused. ‘We should take him back.’ He also groaned as he pushed himself up. ‘I am guessing you can get us back?’
‘Yes.’ I bent to help him lift Santanas’s body.
‘I’ve got him,’ he said, repositioning one arm under Santanas’s shoulders and the other under his knees. ‘You concentrate on getting us home.’
I closed my eyes and thought of Aethan, my sudden urge to be safely cocooned in his arms almost overwhelming. The connection was immediate. I reached out for him, pushing back the fabric of reality and opened my eyes.
‘Dark Sky help me Isla.’ Aethan’s back was to us as he waved his arms in the air.
Isla looked beatific in a white robe as she faced him, a smug smile appearing on her lips as she shifted her eyes from him to us. Wilfred’s smile, as he stood at her side with his arms crossed, was broader. They were in a tent. Their tent I was guessing by the flowing fabric draping the roof.
‘I don’t care who or what you are, if you don’t tell me where she is I’ll…I’ll….’ He froze with his arms in the air. ‘She’s behind me isn’t she?’
He spun around and I launched myself through the gateway and into his arms. He pulled me to him, burying his face in my hair. Then he pushed me back till he was holding me at arms’ length. ‘Whose blood is this?’ His eyes searched me, looking for injuries.
‘Santanas’s.’ Sorrow shook my voice as I turned and beckoned to Wolfgang.
He stepped through the gateway, his face solemn as he viewed Isla and Wilfred.
‘What? Who? How?’ Aethan’s voice stuttered to a stop as he stared at Santanas. His head spun to stare at me. ‘You killed him?’
I took a step back at the accusation in his voice. ‘Urrrr. I kind of thought that was the aim of all this.’
His nostrils flared and he took a deep breath, running both hands through his hair. ‘Not by yourself it wasn’t. You could have been killed. Dark Sky, Izzy. I only just got you back.’
‘It had to be her,’ Isla said. ‘She was the only one with the power to do it.’ She glided forward to Wolfgang and pressed her fingertips to Santanas’s cheek. ‘She was the only one who could break the curse.’ The glow around her intensified as she stared down into his face.
‘Uhh, babe.’ Wilfred threw a hand up in front of his face. ‘You’re doing it again.’
Isla looked down at herself and tutted in disgust. Her wattage dimmed till it was barely visible.
‘She’s like a firefly,’ Wilfred said. ‘You should see what happens when she gets really excited.’
‘Wilfred.’ Her voice held admonishment, but the smile she shot him spoke of other things. She turned back to Santanas and sighed. ‘It had to be. He saw to that.’ She sighed again. ‘Come. We should take his body to Tamsonite. He will need to see it so he can officially call an end to this war.’ She turned and pushed out through the tent flap, holding it to the side so that Wolfgang, still cradling his son-in-law’s body, could fit through.
Aethan and Wilfred led the way as we threaded our way through the tents. I fell into step next to Isla, while Wolfgang took up the rear.
‘Where’s Samuel?’ I wouldn’t have thought he would let her out of his sight.
‘He’s with the Ubanty. He has chosen to stay with them and train my new priests and priestesses.’
I saw Aethan’s eyebrows raise as he looked over his shoulder. It would take him a while to get used to Isla’s new status. He turned back to Wilfred and shoved him in the shoulder. ‘Never thought I’d see you as a priest.’
‘Priest?’ Wilfred let out a huff and smoothed his palms down the front of his vest. ‘My official title is Demi-God, thank you very much. The way I hear it, that out-ranks Heir to The Throne any day.’
I rolled my eyes as I shared a look with Isla. Some things never changed.
Tamsonite was out the front of his tent issuing orders. He turned when he heard Aethan call his name.
‘Prince Aethan. Just the man I was looking for.’ He turned back to a table he was standing in front of. Books held down the corners of a large sheet of paper that was covered in scribbles. ‘ I’ve been going over some plans and I’d like your opinion. I think we should extinguish the goblins first before they can regroup. Then we can go after the dark faeries.’
‘General Tamsonite.’ Isla’s voice rang like a bell. ‘It is over.’
He started in surprise when Isla pushed through between Aethan and Wilfred. She was doing the high-wattage glow again.
‘Over? My dear, Princess,’ he said the word uncertainly, ‘the threat is still out there. We must strike while we have the upper hand.’
‘The threat has been eliminated.’ She waved her hand and Wolfgang walked forwards and lay Santanas’s body down at Tamsonite’s feet.
You had to give him credit. He kept his cool as he stared at Santanas’s body. ‘How?’ was all he said.
‘Isadora broke the spell that bound his soul to his body. She killed him.’
His gaze moved from the body to me and back to the body. He nodded a couple of times and then smoothed his moustache down with his fingertips. ‘Right, he said. ‘Well that answers that question. It will take the goblins a while to regroup after losing their Queen and their battle leader. We’ll go after the dark faeries first, then swing back for the goblins.’
‘Nooooo.’ Isla’s voice sounded as if a universe of people were crying out in agony. ‘Enough pain. Enough death. This ends now.’ Her glow flared to dying-star brilliance as the earth shook beneath our feet.
I clamped my eyes shut and then wrapped my arms over my face.
My admiration for Tamsonite increased as he continued his argument. He was either the most brave, or the most stupid man in the world. ‘They will come again. It may not be for years, but they will come.’
‘Yes, they will come again one day. And we will respond. That is the difference between good and evil. We respond to violence and death. We defend our lands and our homes. We do not start it.’
I cracked an eyelid, slamming it shut again when pain pierced my eyeball.
I heard Tamsonite sigh and then he said, ‘You are right. I apologise. Thank you for reminding me of who I am.’
My next experimental peak revealed Isla had returned to normal. Well, her version of normal.
‘Athol, is that Santanas?’ Grams and Lionel stood a few metres away, a crowd of soldiers behind them.
I swivelled to see that we were surrounded by our army.
‘Yes.’ Tamsonite nodded. ‘He is dead.’
Sorrow filled Gram’s face. The last time she’d seen him would have been when
she had been pregnant with Mum.
‘Might I make a suggestion?’ I said. I blushed when hundreds of eyes swivelled to look at me. Up until then they had either been staring at Isla or Santanas. ‘I think we should bury him with his wife, Littiana.’
Isla clapped her hands together, looking for all the world like a six year old just advised there was to be a party. ‘That’s a wonderful idea,’ she said. ‘I will oversee the burial.’
Tamsonite shot her a nervous look and then nodded. ‘It seems the best option. How far away is it?’
‘I can take us straight there.’
He pulled himself upright and brushed at his moustache again. ‘Let us gather the Heads of State and then we will see him buried.’
It took another twenty minutes before King Arwyn, King Bladimir, Queen Gladaline, and Turos were gathered in front of the tent with Rako.
I used that time to wash off the dried blood and change into a dress that Isla supplied me. She also brushed my hair and redid my braid but I couldn’t remember the last time I had washed it, so I was glad we didn’t have a mirror big enough to see my whole head at once. I must have been a mess.
Aethan’s eyes said he didn’t think I was a mess when I reappeared. I blushed and looked at my slippered feet.
It was only when they were all watching me, waiting for me to open the gateway that I realised my mistake. Always before I had used a connection to someone I knew to direct me.
‘Uhhh, Isla,’ I whispered out of the corner of my mouth. ‘I’ve got nobody to concentrate on.’
‘Santanas,’ she whispered back. ‘His soul is still there.’
I nodded and closed my eyes, praying to, well to Isla I guessed, that it would work. My shoulders relaxed as I felt a connection, and then my gateway opened up onto the meadow with Littiana’s headstone.
I left it open so everybody who wanted to watch this phase of history unfold, could. It seemed that the whole army poured through, standing at a distance as Aethan and Wilfred started to dig a grave next to Littiana’s. The sun rose over the tips of the oaks and the heat in the meadow increased.
Sweat formed on Aethan and Wilfred’s brows and they stopped to undo and remove their vests. Turos joined them, pulling his shirt off over his head and taking up a spade.
I stared at the three sweating, half-naked men as their muscles flexed in rhythm with the movement of the spades. It looked like a cover for a Mills and Boon novel.
Grams sidled up beside us and nodded her head at Isla. ‘Unseasonably warm for this time of day,’ she noted.
Isla flashed her a smile.
‘I like your work.’ Grams chuckled and rubbed her hands together as she turned to her fiancée. ‘Lionel. Why don’t you help them.’
She waited till Lionel was picking up a spade before calling out, ‘Don’t you dare get dirt on that shirt.’
Lionel sighed as he put the spade down and pulled his shirt off over his head.
I felt my eyes widened as I viewed his muscled torso. I raised my eyebrows and turned to look at Grams.
‘I know, right.’ She chuckled and rubbed her hands together. ‘So Isla,’ she said, ‘do you do weddings?’ She blinked and put her hands over her mouth as she giggled. ‘I do apologise. That didn’t come out quite the way I meant it.’ She cleared her throat looking almost nervous as she said, ‘Lionel and I were wondering if you would marry us?’
‘Well,’ Isla said, with a deadpan face, ‘that’s an awfully kind offer, but I was kind of thinking I might marry Wilfred.’
‘Oh no, no,’ Grams stammered, ‘I mean would you be the one who….’ Her eyebrows lowered as she stopped talking. ‘You’re teasing me.’
I burst out laughing. It was the first time I had ever seen Grams blush.
Isla reached out and took one of Gram’s hands. ‘I would love to be the one who joins you and Lionel in matrimony.’
Is it true? It was the first I had heard from Emerald since the day before. She and Lance had been off having some ‘adult time’. I had been pleasantly surprised to find it didn’t affect me any more. I was guessing it was because I was totally committed to Aethan now.
Is what true? I turned to find her head poking through the gateway. I could see Tiny’s legs beside her.
Is he dead?
I winced. It was information I should have given her. After what he had put her through she deserved to know. Yes. I followed him last night and killed him.
She huffed in my mind.
Would you like to come and see his body?
She huffed again, too annoyed with me, and too proud to admit it. No, she said, I can see him in your thoughts. That is enough.
I pulled at the gateway, opening it up to allow her to come through if she wanted to but only Tiny pushed through. He waved at me, but moved very slowly to the back of the meadow. It seemed he was finally learning how to walk without causing a minor earthquake.
Aethan and Wilfred climbed out of the hole and stood to the side while Turos and Lionel lifted Santanas and lowered him into his grave. It seemed a bit undignified when they began dumping dirt on him straight away.
Nobody spoke words over him, nobody cried for his loss. But then what did I expect? The man had terrorised the country for years and was responsible for the loss of tens of thousands of lives. Why would anybody be anything but elated to witness his burial? It was a surprise nobody was trying to spit on his grave.
Finally, it was done. They beat down the dirt with the backs of their spades till only a slight hump showed.
Isla drifted forwards, bending to run her hand over the stone marking the grave. When she stood back up I saw that Santanas’s details had appeared under Littiana’s.
I waited while the spectators filed back through the gateway, then I crossed to stand by the freshly-turned dirt. I had to say something. I didn’t know why. It just seemed wrong not to.
‘Goodbye Grandfather,’ I whispered. ‘I wish I could have known you in a better time.’
Grams patted my arm as she moved to stand beside me. ‘Goodbye Santanas,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry you never knew your daughter. I’m sorry I couldn’t find it in my heart to trust you. For whatever it’s worth, I did love you.’
‘And so we enter a new age,’ Isla murmured. She bent and picked up a handful of dirt, letting it flow down over the grave. ‘An age of peace and love, when all things prosper.’
As she spoke she walked around the grave, a seemingly endless supply of dirt snowing out of her hand. And where that dirt landed, green began to grow. Wildflowers wriggled up out of the earth. They climbed up the side of the stone and cascaded down it, a waterfall of colour.
‘There.’ She stopped and dusted her hands together and a rose bush pushed up towards the sky. Buds swelled and burst open, red roses releasing the heady scent of Turkish delight.
‘Thank you.’ I squeezed Isla’s hand. ‘It’s perfect.’
Grams took my other hand and the three of us stood like that, each with our thoughts, each with our memories, that if woven together, might manage to capture the complexity of the man that had been Santanas.
17
Mia
‘I don’t know Sabby, it’s going to be dangerous.’ I twisted my head to better look at the buckle I was tightening on my bicep. ‘We may have beaten them, but it doesn’t mean they won’t attack when we enter their territory.’ I picked the next sheath up off the dining room table.
‘I’m coming. And that’s, that.’ She put her hands on her hips as she glared at me.
‘Sabby.’
‘No.’ She held a hand up. ‘You’ve had too many adventures without me. Unless….’ She paused and tears flooded into her beautiful green eyes. ‘You just don’t want me to come?’ The last was said in a horrified whisper.
‘Dark Sky, no.’ I let go of the dagger I was about to strap to my calf and crossed the room to her. ‘Of course that’s not it. I worry about you.’
‘So I can come?’ She looked up at me though tear-drenched
lashes.
I bit my lip. I really didn’t want her to come. There could be fighting. Lots of it. What if something happened to her?
‘Please.’
‘Okay. Okay.’ I took a deep breath. ‘You can come.’
A chuckle came from the arm chair behind us. ‘Works every time,’ Thomas said.
Sabby threw me a broad grin as she ran across the room to jump into Thomas’s lap. ‘Did you hear that? I can come.’ She planted a kiss firmly on his lips. ‘Finally. An adventure.’
‘She’s right though, love. It might be dangerous.’
‘You’ll look after me.’
‘You know I will.’
I turned away as the love birds’ words turned to whispers and then kisses. I was quite sure that Aethan and I weren’t that bad.
‘Ready.’ Grams and Lionel emerged from her wing. I wasn’t surprised to see that she had on her customary camouflage pants and military issue boots, I was surprised to see that Lionel was dressed to match. ‘Shall I brew us a pot of tea while we wait?’
‘I’ll do it.’ Mum appeared in the doorway. ‘It’s the least I can do.’
‘I think all the food you’ve packed for us to take is more than enough,’ I said. ‘We’ll probably only be a few hours.’
Mum sniffed. ‘The last time you told me you were just going for a little dragon ride you came back months later.’
‘She’s got you there.’ Grams shoved my shoulder. ‘When are the others arriving?’
‘Any minute now.’ I looked at the clock over the fireplace. They were late. By a minute. Not that I was counting, but I hadn’t seen Aethan for a week now and I was starting to feel the strain.
Scruffy let out a happy bark and raced to the door, scrabbling at it with his front paws. A second later there was a knock.
I tried to remain calm, but I found myself running to open it. I turned the lock and threw back the door and there he was. Isla and Wilfred were there with him, but if it wasn’t for the fact that Isla was still glowing, I probably wouldn’t have noticed them. Aethan filled up my whole field of vision.
Faery Revenge Page 42
