“And kick. Again.Again.” Irian’s low voice, stark with command, sent delicious warmth skeining through my belly. But his intensity, for once, was not intended for me. He held his palms angled at chest height while Sinéad landed a flurry of targeted kicks, her feet smacking with concentrated force against his hands. Irian shifted his weight backward, urging the human girl to rock onto the balls of her feet while rooting herself with her core. “Find power in your hips. Keep your shoulders square.Again.”
I shoved away the plague of apprehension my dream had seeded in my mind, leaning one shoulder on the doorframe to watch them. They’d already been training for a while, judging by the sweat darkening the back of Irian’s tunic and dripping off Sinéad’s brow. Sinéad had visibly improved since the last time I had trained with her—new muscles stood out along her bared upper arms, and her footwork was far steadier. She fought with a dogged determination that spoke more to her mental resolve than any innate talent for combat.
And Irian? He was flawless, effortless, and fluid, even as he ducked and parried Sinéad’s sometimes unstudied strikes. His compassion for Sinéad’s skill was evident—he corrected her mistakes with ease if not humor, instructing without punishing.
I thought, with a pang, of something Chandi had said to me lastyear.Irian was like a strict older brother. When he was kind, it felt like too little; when he was cruel, it felt like too much.
Maybe he had found a way to be a little softer toward one of the maidens he had once treated so hard.
Irian finally noticed me lurking in the doorway. His eyes fastened on mine; his sudden inattention earned him a hard kick in the gut from Sinéad.
“Oof.” He grunted and doubled over, holding out a hand to Sinéad, who looked less chagrined than triumphant. “A moment.”
I met him halfway across the room. His hands lifted toward me; I swayed toward him. We both remembered at the same moment, the distance between us less an arm’s length than a chasm. I swallowed brambles as I thought of Wayland staring at his unblemished hand.
It saw me. It tasted me. And it told me…soon.
“How are you?” Irian asked softly.
“Fine.”Except for the celestial radiance that means I can’t touch you.Onlyyou, I added silently. “When you’re finished here, I wish to speak to Laoise about her encounter with my sister. Will you help me find her?”
Irian glanced at Sinéad, who was letting down her damp hair and peeling off her sweaty wrist guards. “We are finished. Shall we go now?”
Something about Sinéad’s demeanor snagged my awareness. Her eyes were downturned; her posture, stiff. She reminded me of—
“Give me a moment.” Eala be damned.
Irian followed my gaze. Understood. “I will change my tunic.”
I sank onto the ground beside Sinéad. She looked up from tying on her boots, faint surprise ghosting over her expression.
“How are you feeling?” she asked, dropping her eyes.
“Fine.” I supposed I was going to have to get used to people asking me that. And lying about the answer. “Irian told me how you helped care for me, watch over me, when I was… Well. I’d like to thank you.”
“It’s nothing.” She inspected one of her daggers, reached forthe polishing rags heaped beside a stack of old greaves. “Everyone pitched in.”
“Sinéad. I made a mistake, with Chandi.” The other girl visibly flinched at the name of her sister. But she finally looked at me, her gaze bleak. “I was so consumed with my own dramas and difficulties that I refused to see what was staring me in the face—my friend, hurting. Maybe it wouldn’t have changed anything if I’d shown more care. But maybe it would have. And I intend to learn from my mistakes.”
Sinéad’s mouth made a flat, unhappy line. “I didn’t see it either.”
“Neither of us is solely to blame.” I reached to touch her arm, but despite Wayland’s experiment, I couldn’t risk it. “But we should try to be better nonetheless. In both directions.”
Sinéad’s eyes burned cold as a winter morning, less in defense than in consideration. “I killed her. Eala. Or thought I did. Did he tell you that?”
Her vehemence took me aback. Irianhadtold me, though I had felt little save passing regret that the slaying hadn’t stuck. Sinéad’s bloodthirst toward my sister seemed well earned and eminently rational. I myself had imagined brutally murdering Eala more than once. But Sinéad had not been raised a warrior. I wrapped my arms around my knees and carefully considered my next words.
“I killed for the first time when I was eight.” I could still hear Caitríona’s cruel words, still feel her hard slap on my cheek. What I’d witnessed in the Deep-Dream had changed my perspective; it had not lessened my regret. “I didn’t mean to. But my nursemaid died nonetheless, her human form sprouting branches and roots and vines, because I could not control myself. The guilt made me so wretched I blocked away my truest nature for over a decade.” Sinéad slowly resumed polishing her daggers, but I knew she was listening. “Before too long, killing became quotidian. My—the queen and her druid made me murder rats in the kitchens, then a brùnaidh who wished for nothing more than to tidy bedrooms in return for scraps of food or milk. Soon, I was executing púcaí whoterrorized farmers in the borderlands; slaughtering leipreacháin for the terrible offense of stealing sips of ale from taverns. Every death became easier. At least, that’s what I told myself.”
Sinéad jerked her daggers into their scabbards. “So I must simply kill more, until I grow inured to it?”
I shook my head. “When I was sixteen, I accompanied the high queen on a diplomatic mission to a neighboring kingdom. We were ambushed on the high road by bandits stupid enough to think they could take on the queen’s fianna. One of the thieves broke through the shield wall. Charged straight for me, where I rode beside the queen. I had no time to think. My training took over—I flung myself from my horse, tackling the bandit to the ground as I plunged my blades into his neck. It was a bad miss—instead of severing his artery, I tore his tendons. He screamed as he slowly bled out, reaching for me as if I could save him, when I was the one who had mortally wounded him. He cursed me, begged me, wept at me. In the end, the queen had to climb from her horse and sever his head with her own blade.”
Sinéad blanched ashen, all the pink in her complexion draining away.
“For months, I dreamed of him. Nightmares where he again cursed me or bled all over me. Where I was the one dying in the dirt instead of him. I never even knew his name, but he held a power over me that took a long time to shake. When at last I confessed all this to Cathair, the queen’s druid, he told me, ‘Death is easy. Life is hard. We carry all those we have hurt inside us. They do not grow weaker; we simply grow stronger.’” I still often wondered whether he was right. “So you tried to kill Eala. So you failed. It is less important what you did than how you feel about it. Your penitence does you credit. I hope you never lose that.”
Sinéad sat perfectly still. In my periphery, I saw Irian stalk back into the Armory, wearing a fresh tunic. I ignored him, keeping my focus on my friend.
