Page 103 of The Savage Queen

And yet, Aisling was physically unable. Her body paralyzed, her heart thrashing inside her chest, stomach churning. Not only could she not stomach it, but she also found her soul would shatter. Not because of a bond or fate or prophecy. Something else. Something ravening, chaotic, and bonded to her.

Aisling bent over Lir.

She ran her fingers through his hair, watching as he leaned into her touch, still overcome with torment. She brushed her lips against his ear.

“Do you trust me?” she whispered.

The corners of his lips curled despite himself. “No,” he managed.

The sound of his voice sweetening her hate. Her loathing an addiction if inspired by him.

Aisling pressed a palm to his chest and closed her eyes.

I wish to summon you, she spoke to thedraiocht, watching as it stirred inside its abyss, angry it’d been woken after its recent battle.

I wish to summon you, Racat, dragon of power. The form herdraiochttook, living within her since her union with Lir, perhaps even before, unbeknownst to herself. A magic unnamed until now.

The basilisk moved, popping its primeval bones and creeping into the light.

Enough to burn whatever poison threads through the fae king and no more, Aisling added.

Racat growled, rattling the interior of his lair.

You will kill him, it said.

This isn’t the end the Lady prophesied for him. He will not die, Aisling replied.

And you believe her? Have you considered it was all a deception? A trickery to ensure you unbind yourself from the fae king by slaying him yourself?

Aisling had already weighed this possibility. The Lady bore no motivation to speak the truth especially if it conflicted with her own goals. And so, what Racat suggested was likely.

I’ve made my choice, Aisling said, focusing her magic like Lir taught her and opening her eyes.

Embers bloomed from her fingertips.

Peitho sprung for her.

“Wait!” Filverel shouted, grappling the princess of Niltaor. “Let her do this.”

Had Aisling been aware of her surroundings, she would’ve been baffled alongside the rest. Filverel, who’d abhorred anddistrusted Aisling since her union with Lir, desperate enough to let Aisling attempt to save Lir’s life.

Aisling burned all which had no place in Lir’s body. Finding the poison with herdraiochtand devouring it. Precise magic carved by unsteady hands.

“It’s feral, wild, seeking to either be dominated or dominant. It will learn from you which role it prefers.”

Aisling rehearsed Lir’s lesson from the apple tree in her mind. Her temples pulsing with pain in her concentration. Hardening herself against thedraiochtwrinkling its muzzle and snarling.

Lir bared his teeth, finding her wrist and gripping it till Aisling believed he might crush it. Turn her bones to dust, as the fire seeped beneath the skin and traveled. Weaving, knotting, folding, tangling inside. Reviving the fae king. The remaining forest thrashing around them, monk’s moss, clovers, fresh mounds of emerald growing from where he lay, spreading, and transforming Fionn’s winter into everlasting green. The woodland exhaling in relief as the northern gale danced and new trees sprouted from the earth, spreading their branches like limbs, yawning and stretching after centuries of sleep.

The poison squirmed, leaping from his body and bleeding into Aisling’s own, crawling up her arm and scalding her bones.

Aisling screamed, releasing her hand and falling backward. An angry scar wrapped through her fingers and up her forearm. The poison burned, leaving its mark regardless on she who expelled it.

You didn’t think such precise magic came without a cost, did you? Racat chuckled.

Aisling stood waist deep in a river: water gargled by this northern land. It ran from one side of Fjallnorr to the other. A corridor the Ashild had dug into the earth.

It was cool, speckled in fallen leaves and lined with precious stones made more vibrant by the life Lir’s healing inspired.

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