ILYAS
‘Oathbreaker! Murderer!’
Maevian’s voice continued to whisper vileness into his head as Ilyas tried washing his hands for the fifth time in a river. They were clean, and had been clean when he’d started, but he couldn't stop feeling like they were coated in blood.
His allies' blood, those Maevian had forced him to kill for her amusement.
Her blood.
It wasn't just the loss of Maevian that caused tears to stream down his face. It was the way the hole in his very soul where the Earthbond had been tore at Ilyas, breaking itself open further and further with each heaving sob. That void threatened to swallow him. Why did he want to survive? He should have let the warriors of Vine slaughter him when they had the chance.
Now, he was so… so desperately alone, and hollow.
Pulling his hands from the stream, he stared at them. They were clean, without a speck of dirt or blood. Yet he felt it. 'That’s how you killed me. With those two hands. Oathbreaker. Murderer.'
His wings curled around him as he dug his fingers into his scalp. The words were searing brands upon his soul. Never had someone been able to break an Earthbond, and since breaking his, Ilyas knew why. The oath he had sworn—to protect and serve Maevian—burned through his flesh and stabbed into his mind. It had been days since he had done the impossible, and he felt like it had been years.
“Ilyas?” A voice broke through his spiraling panic. A voice he recognized. One that had tried to kill him time and again. Ilyas didn’t put up a ward. He welcomed Willow’s voice. The peace it promised. Release.
Arms wrapped under his and hauled him to his feet.
“Up you get. We have to go. You left a trail an idiot could follow. Time to disappear.”
Ilyas didn't even know where he was, but he was too weak to fight. There wasn't anything left to fight for. "G-go?" he asked between gasping breaths. Where would he go, and why? It didn't matter. He was limp in Willow's arms, neither fighting nor helping.
It was fortunate that they didn’t have a long way to walk. Willow guided Ilyas into a dense patch of trees, where Ilyas saw a wild faerie ring of mushrooms. As soon as the two men stepped into it, the world around them grew misty. A few minutes later, it cleared and they were no longer standing in Vine.
“Hmm… looks like we’re in Grass. Might be far enough,” Willow muttered, dragging Ilyas out of the ring. Helping him to the ground with his back against a warm rock, Willow crouched in front of him. From Elsewhere, he called in a bulging bag, and placed it next to Ilyas. “Food, some clothes, enough money to get you started.”
When Ilyas didn’t respond, Willow snapped his fingers in front of Ilyas’s face.
“Stay with me. You just ended the war. Your side might be hunting you, but ours is celebrating you as a hero. You’re still alive. Your son is alive. You’ve spent your whole life fighting to live. Now’s not the time to stop.”
None of that was right. He was no hero. He could feel Maevian’s cackling laugh, recalled from when she would flay the flesh from his body. He shivered, imagining the feel of her knife. Yet as painful as it was, he wanted to feel it again if it meant she were back. "Leave me…" he moaned, openly weeping for his lost Queen.
“Can’t do that. I’m the only one allowed to kill you. If you waste away out of grief and guilt, I will be seriously pissed.” Willow pulled out a flask of water and pressed it to Ilyas’s chapped lips. “Now drink some damned water, eat some food, and stay alive. I refuse to be the only one of us that has to figure out how to live beyond this war.”