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moment.
I ripped the sword free. Grief saddled me and rode me into the foray. I raged across the field, killing all before me. They ran when they saw me coming, and I chased them down, and I killed them before they could take someone else’s friend away from them.
THE NIGHT HAD FALLEN. THE FOMORIANS WEREdead. Their corpses littered the ground, mixed with human bodies of the fallen. In death, witch, shapeshifter, or regular Joe, they all looked the same. So many bodies. So many dead. This morning they spoke, they breathed, they kissed their loved ones good-bye. And now they lay dead. Gone forever. Like Bran.
I sat by Bran’s body. His midnight eyes were closed. I was very tired. My body hurt in places I didn’t know existed.
Someone had made a funeral pyre. It glowed orange in the oncoming darkness. Thick greasy smoke tainted the night.
I had taken Bran by the hand and dragged him back to humanity, back to free will and choice. And it, no,I , had gotten him killed. The fire had left his eyes. He’d never wink, he’d never call me dove again. I didn’t love him, I barely knew him, but God, it hurt. Why was it that I killed everyone I touched? Why did they all die? I could have fixed almost everything else, but death defeated me every time. What good is all the magic if you can’t hold back death? What good is it, if you don’t know when to stop, if all you can do is kill and punish?
Someone approached and tugged on my sleeve. “Kate,” a tiny voice said. “Kate, are you okay?”
I looked at the owner of the voice and recognized her face.
“Kate,” she said pitifully. “Please say something.”
I felt so hollow, I couldn’t find my voice.
“Are you real?” I asked her.
Julie nodded.
“How did you get here?”
“Bran brought me,” she said. “I awoke in a lake. There were bodies everywhere and a woman. He pulled me out and gave me a knife and he brought me over there.” She pointed back to where we had originally formed our lines. “I fought.” She showed me her bloody knife.
“Stupid girl,” I said. I couldn’t muster any anger and my voice was flat. “So many people died to save you, and you ran right back into the slaughter.”
“I saw the reeves eating my mom’s body. I had to.” She sat next to me. “I had to, Kate.”
I heard a faint jingle of chains. Then a crunch of metal under someone’s feet. A tall figure came through the smoke.