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The monster sprang at me with a howl, going in for the kill, jaws gaping. I fell backward, bringing my sword up as the manticore lunged over me, sinking my blade deep into its shaggy chest.
The creature screamed and collapsed on top of me, pinning me to the earth. Its body smelled of blood and rotten meat. I tried shoving it off as it twitched and kicked in its death throes, but it was too heavy and I was in too much pain to move it. And so I lay there, pinned under a dead manticore, knowing I probably wouldn’t walk away from this. I could feel the venom working its way through my leg, the spine still piercing my shoulder. Ash the Winter prince would have healed from such wounds, his fey body instinctively drawing in glamour to throw off the sickness, repairing itself with an unending supply of magic. But I was only mortal, and had no such power.
As I fought for consciousness, I became aware of Kierran, grunting and crying as he tried pulling the dead manticore off me. “Get up,” I heard him sniff le. “Father, get up.”
“Kierran,” I called softly, but he didn’t seem to hear me. I tried again, but a shout echoed through the trees, and Kierran jerked his head up.
“Over here!” he cried, waving both arms. “Glitch, we’re over here!” Familiar voices surrounded us. Glitch’s voice, frantic and angry. The clanking of the Iron knights as they pulled the manticore away. Kierran’s sobs as he tried explaining what had happened. I tried answering the questions that buzzed around my head, but my voice was as numb as the rest of me, and the shapes crowding my vision were blurry and indistinct.
“That leg looks pretty bad,” I heard someone murmur to Glitch as they bent over me. “We’ll try to save it, but he is a mortal, after all.” 313/387
“Do what you can,” Glitch muttered back. “I’m just glad we found him alive. The queen is not going to be happy.” Their voices became garbled after that, blending into the background.
Eventually, sounds, people, voices, all blurred together like ink, and turned into darkness.
I thought I would die, but I lived.
My leg was never the same. The venom had damaged it too badly.
Luckily for me, the barb in my shoulder had passed clean through and come out the other side, leaving nothing behind but a puckering scar.
But forever after that fight, I walked with a limp, and if I stood on the leg too long or put too much weight on it, it would give out from under me. The sparring matches with Glitch and the knights came to a halt, and I had to lean on a cane when traveling or walking any distance.
I didn’t mind…too much. I still had my son, my wife and my health, though that last fight demonstrated yet again how fragile mortality was. A fact Meghan made painfully clear once I was on my feet again.
The Iron Queen had been livid, blue eyes f lashing as she ripped into me, demanding to know what I’d been thinking, going into the wyldwood alone.
“You’re human now, Ash,” she said, finally calming down a bit. “I know you think you can take on the world, but that isn’t the case anymore.
Please, please, promise me you’ll be more careful.”
“I don’t really have much of a choice now, do I?” I sighed, grabbing my cane to limp out of the room. Her gaze followed me, sad and concerned, and I paused in the doorway. “Don’t worry, your majesty. I’m aware of my limitations.” I tried to keep the bitterness and pain from 314/387
my voice, but it slipped out anyway. “I won’t be fighting anything for a long time. I can promise you that.”
“That’s not what concerns me,” Meghan replied softly, but I was already out the door.
Time passed, and in the Iron Realm, the great clock tower in the center of the city kept track of its march. Kierran grew into a fierce warrior, deadly, light on his feet, possessing a speed unnatural in a human.
And when he reached a certain point in his life, just past his seven-teenth birthday, he simply… stopped aging. As if he’d decided that he was happy as he was and refused to grow up any more.
Meghan never changed; though she matured with the passing of time, becoming shrewd and wise and a truly formidable queen, her body remained as young and beautiful as the rest of Faery.
And I, as a human in the Iron Realm, where time did pass and seconds ticked by the years, did not.
“What were you thinking?”
I turned my head at the sound of Meghan’s voice, seeing the Iron Queen paused in the doorway, her arms crossed in front of her. Though she was stunning in a long evening gown, her hair hanging in glittering curls down her back, she did not look pleased.
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“Thinking?” I asked, hoping to derail her by acting bewildered and innocent. Unfortunately, that rarely worked with the Iron Queen, and tonight was no exception.
“Don’t give me that, Ash.” Meghan came into the bedroom, glowering at me. “You know what I’m talking about.