ILYAS
Ilyas took the chipped mug Willow handed him as he looked down over the village at the base of the valley. They were situated in a small room near the top of the fortress. The reason the two had chosen such a chamber was because it was the only one with the view they wanted that still had all four walls. “To the peace of Binding Day,” he said, offering a sober salute to the holiday before taking a long sip of brandy. It had earthy tones from Herb, and warmed him from the inside out. The fire in the hearth took much of the chill out of the air. It had taken the last of his essence to light it and give them the heat they’d need to survive the night.
Willow, who had returned with a pile of moth-eaten blankets, took his own mug and raised it as well. “And not being frozen solid.”
Ilyas’s chuckle was devoid of any mirth. “I have some blankets stored in Elsewhere that are… substantially warmer than those. Once my reservoir refills with essence, I’ll pull them out.”
“Eh, I hardly notice the holes anymore. Besides, I thought all you stored in your Elsewhere were weapons to chuck at me when I least expect it.” Willow sat down next to Ilyas, on the opposite side of the fireplace. From below, the faint sounds of holiday music still drifted on the wind. “Like that damn spiked chain you got me with a decade or so back.”
Taking a sip of his brandy, Ilyas shook his head. “Consider how large a weapon actually is, and then how large a couple blankets are.” He sighed softly, remembering the fight. “You know, that battle was the victory when Maevian decided she would allow herself to get pregnant. The news of you being carted off the battlefield mostly dead made her the happiest I had seen her in decades.”
Willow gave him a tired smirk. “Oh yes, so glad to know my sworn nemesis gets off on me almost dying.” Then, more quietly. “What’s it like, having a Ruler you’re bound to?”
The Vine Warrior stared into his mug. It wasn’t a Soulbond that had claimed him, but the threat of more pain that had led him to agree to an Earthbond in the center of Vine’s Ring. There wasn’t much he could remember about his life before that day, just the terror and pain that had come again and again until he had submitted to Maevian and made her the core of his existence. “It… I am not the person to ask that of…” he said softly. Had Ilyas any more tears, he would have shed one.
Willow took another long sip, looking out the window. “Asherah, I assume? The woman who dies over and over, only to come back to her Queen? Does the Mad Queen torture her too? Or just her Earthbonded?”
Ilyas did not respond for some time. In the quiet, the sound of cracking wood within the fireplace and the drums down in the village seemed louder. Peaceful, in a way neither of them had ever known. “How I understand it, for Maevian to torture her Soulbonded would be to torture herself. Considering what Asherah and Maevian have been through already… There is no need for her to torture any of them.” Ilyas stared deep into his mug before drinking the whole thing straight. He spoke again shortly after, “You won’t need to worry about Asherah anymore. I have the feeling she’s not coming back. Not this time.”
Willow’s whole posture sharpened. Then, like the lingering high note of a song, it broke. His shoulders hunched, and he leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Lucky her.”
They sat without speaking, the high-spirited drumming down in the village shifting to a melancholic choral tune. They were too far away to hear the words, but Ilyas recognized it. It was the song for the darkness beneath the Mountain, where the earliest Fae had cowered, waiting for the light of dawn for nine interminable days. At sunrise in nine days’ time, offerings would be made and families would gather to give thanks for the Lands of the Mountain, and the Rulers who gave them life.
“What will she do to you, when you return without my head?” Willow asked.
“Honestly… I cannot say. Her moods are quicksilver these days.” A deep sigh followed those words. “There is a different option. You could always join her. You are the only thing standing between her taking Herb. You could end the war and give her the Lands she needs to scale the Mountain.”
Willow looked away. “You know I can’t do that.”
Ilyas sighed and reached for the bottle. “Yeah. I do.”