She was alone and the smoke was filling the cellar, seeping from above, robbing her of breath. She could hear the heavy footfalls above, men saving themselves, running, escaping.
Elizabeth screamed, but the door to the cell remained closed. She tried to reach the keys hanging on the wall opposite her, the bars bruising her already battered body, the shackles piercing her skin. She tried to focus, to call on the craft, but she had never been as strong as her mother, and she was so, so tired. Screaming again only tore her throat, and she fell to her knees, wrapping a dirty rag of what was left of her skirt around her bleeding mouth.
There was no escaping. She could feel the heat of the fire above her. It would eat through the ceiling and collapse on top of her, burying her in ash. She had only one regret. All these weeks she had held on to her secret, had carried it like a bandage over a wound, had cherished it, and had never thought of confessing. And now it was too late. Now she’d never say how much she loved?—
“Elizabeth!” The door to the cellar burst open, and her angel stood there, encased in fire and power.
It made no sense. Power?
“You have the craft?”
“Elizabeth, there’s no time. You need to get out of here.”
Before she could say anything, the bars were thrown open and she was almost lifted off her feet and pushed up the stairs. She heard the old boards above give before she saw them. The awful, soul-sucking sound of death, of loss. Of her loss. Elizabeth turned, the floor shaking under her feet as she took one more step to safety and watched the room collapse behind her, taking her love with it. The last thing she saw were the gray eyes. Sad, tormented, kind eyes looking at her with so much longing.
“No! Ophelia!”
Rhiannon shuddered and felt the world tilt.
It finally all made sense. The erstwhile Elizabeth Crowhart saved by a Fowler. Prudence’s great-great-great-great ancestor giving her life to ensure she lived. As Elizabeth Crowhart watched the wood and bricks collapse was the love shining in the gaze of Ophelia Fowler sacrificing herself. Rhiannon knew that gaze. Prudence had looked at her every day with this love. With this devotion.
They had never made it. Ophelia perished in the fire, and Elizabeth despite escaping that, had been caught by bounty hunters on the eve of her forty-fifth birthday years later. They had never made it. All that love, all the words and all the hope murdered on the altar of cruelty. On the altar of hatred. Ruined by men who believed themselves gods, who thought themselves above everyone else’s lives, loves, fates.
Ah, history, you finicky bitch, and yet no matter how finicky, you still always repeat yourself.
But Rhiannon’d be damned if she’d let it do so this time. When all was said and done, she had been damned for decades anyway. And Prudence? Prudence would live no matter which the circle of hell Rhiannon had to resign herself to. Their foremothers were never given their happily ever after, and judging by the fire tearing her veins to shreds and the one chewing up the oak and the brick, neither would Rhiannon, but at least Prudence would live. And that made everything worth it.
Rhiannon threw her hands up, the chants of her mother, her grandmother, generations of women living and dying by the craft on her lips. And the craft answered her, roaring to life in her fingertips, throwing off the decades of shackles, free of all barriers, lightning parting the sky, embracing her as a daughter lost and returned. Rhiannon was the eye of the storm.
“Come wind…”
Ceridwen and Lachlan’s arms fell off her like twigs. Rhiannon smiled and tasted blood on her lips. Around her, the storm raged, falling on the fire with fury.
Someone was screaming, someone was crying, someone was praying. Rhiannon didn’t dare turn around. If this was her end… And surely it must be, the power breaking free in her body slowly tearing her apart, blood in her mouth telling her as much, the coppery taste of it foretelling her fate. Still, nothing mattered but the fire. Nothing mattered but Prudence.
She took a step, then another, as her skirts billowed and the wind around her swirled. The acid in her stomach would spill any moment, choking her, but she had to endure, she had to do this.
“Reign rain…”
Her voice was a howl. She bared her teeth like a wolf, daring the inferno, and as it threw itself out of the doorway, billowing death, as her rain fell, her storm now unleashed.
She swayed, stumbled, her body ready to surrender. Her vision grayed with the pain of being consumed by the craft set free.
Rhiannon struggled to keep her eyes open. She needed to see, she needed to know… As her wind roared, under her feet the earth shook, and she felt suddenly propped up. Steadier. To her left, Ceridwen stepped next to her and extended a hand. It was Seren who took it, and Rhiannon felt her rain intensify, the water now a flood splitting the sky.
She felt it, the coven, the power of her sisters surrounding her, keeping her up even as she threw everything she had into the torrent. It was a veritable monsoon now, extinguishing all in its path, and still she kept her arms up, kept calling it. She had to. Prudence, her mate, her love, was in there, and a Crowhart wasn’t going to lose another love to fire.
“I… will… it… so…” She could barely speak, but the familiar, comforting words tumbled out one by one, each one on a cry. She felt her sisters’ power surge into her, and from the corner of her eye saw the three of them holding hands, gathered around her. Three? She must be delirious—Deryn couldn’t be here. And yet there were three figures, three voices, and three pairs of arms lifting to the heavens amidst her storm. She was hallucinating.
The last thing Rhiannon saw, as blood trickled down her chin and she felt the power split her in two, in the middle of raging pain and deafening hurricane, was fire dying, flames disappearing, and Prudence running out of the husk of the destroyed Crow & Cat with Patches and Boleyn squirming in her arms.
She’d done it. She had broken the circle even if it meant her own end. Rhiannon closed her eyes, her own blood choking her and let herself fall.
Darkness surrounded her.Darkness and a strange yet familiar sound. A sound so dear to her, so sweet, she could feel tears roll down her cheeks. Prudence’s breath. Steady, level, even. Deep asleep.
Rhiannon never gave afterlife any serious consideration, but if this was it, she’d gladly take it. Just lying on what felt like satin sheets and listening to Prudence breathing.
“Yeah, you’re not dead, Rhy. And trust you to believe you deserve satin.”
