“Turn him on his side,” Yanna suddenly burst, watching from between her fingers. “He’ll choke!”
“Thatisthe point,” said Myrddin.
Gwendal’s rasped breathing quieted. So did his gurgling on Garin’s blood.
“Oh, Gwenny,” Yanna sobbed, rubbing his shin.
“Well?” Lilac slipped her hands off of Gwendal’s shoulders, picking at her nail beds. “What happens now? Is he dead?”
“Not yet.” Garin scooped the knife at his side and rose it high, sinking it into Gwendal’s chest, drawing eruptive screams from Lilac and Yanna. “Now, he’s dead.”
36
With a sickening squelch, Garin yanked the blade from the battered guard and tossed it aside. “It’ll take up to three days for your Gwenny to awaken.”
Lilac crawled over to Yanna, who actually allowed the queen to embrace her.
She was trembling like a frightened hare. “He will wake, won’t he?”
“I nearly asphyxiated him with enough of my blood. I’d say he’s got a good chance.”
“And what of him?” Myrddin nudged a finger at the twisted body laying just beyond the charred remains of the farmhouse. “How long will it takehim?”
Not Artus. He was nearly flattened into the earth.
“Rupert?” Lilac wiped at her eyes. She’d been too distracted to scrutinize him before, or even remember he laid there, off to the right of the porch. Maybe she hadn’t wanted to, especially since learning he’d been working for Artus. “He’s gone.”
“And he’s no vampire,” said Garin curtly.
“But he’s on the verge of it, isn’t he?” Myrddin pressed, striding over to Rupert.
Garin would never—ever— turn Rupert, especially knowing he’dtouched her. Well, it was Lilac who’d done most of the teasing and touching. She expected Garin to deny it just as quickly as he had Myrddin’s first inquiry.
Instead, Garin didn’t answer.
Lilac froze mid-pat, Yanna still sniffling into her shoulder.
Myrddin bent to stroke the matted hair from Rupert’s forehead. He gazed quietly into the corpse’s frightened, open eyes, then looked up at the endless night they stared into. “You pitied him, even if for a moment, didn’t you? You saw something in him, so you tried. You wouldn’t have, otherwise.” Myrddin straightened. “Isn’t that why there’s a hawthorn arrow in the middle of his chest? Because you changed your mind?”
“I used him as a human shield. That’s why that arrow is there.” Garin winced, rocking onto his haunches before rising to his feet.“There’s also one through his stomach, marking him definitively dead.” His fingers flexed at his side, for a second it looked as though he meant to stride toward her and Yanna.
Lilac’s muscles involuntarily tensed, her arms curling protectively around her friend.
Myrddin squinted, scrutinizing Garin’s tender movements. “Are you unwell?”
Garin stopped to fix the warlock with a withering glare. “I’ve beenshotin thearmandleg, Myrddin. Of course I am unwell.”
“But are you not healing? Perhaps some of Lorietta’s magical pottage would help. Or, more readily, some of your beloved’s blood from the vein,” Myrddin added from the corner of his mouth.
“You and I both know why that is a bad idea right now.” Garin began to stalk toward Myrddin with a lethal grace in his step that Lilac had never seen before. Like a ghoul, his boots made no sound as he slinked up the hill. “Forgive me, if it takes me a tad longer to recover from the ammunition lodged deep inside my body, by weapons no pea-brained mortal should ever have in their possession in the first place. I doubt the ancient, unholy arcana that made me what I am ever considered cannons and gunpowder artillery. Especially in violent, colonizing hands.” He came to a halt, glaring down at Rupert. “He is a useless bastard’s son. Whatever I tried was done in a moment of weakness. I have no need for him.”
“You might not.” Myrddin stood his ground over Rupert’s body, hisprobing eyes darting over Garin’s shoulder to Lilac. “She will need allies within her courts. Your coven serves you well. Now that she’s enthralled to you, they will serveherwell. Still, they are foot soldiers, scouts, swordsmen and archers of a bygone era. With everything to come, her Majesty will need those able to pass as human and Daemon, maintain their ranks and exist between worlds as creatures once did long, long ago. She’ll need those able to defend, sleuth, and assess—she could stand to hire shifters onto her court, too. Our glamors don’t work on you in the same way they do others whose physiologies bind to illusory magic.”
“What do you mean, ‘with everything to come?’” Lilac asked. It had sounded both warning and plea.
Myrddin shrugged in a helpless gesture, his face scrunched, as if the mere thought of telling her caused him great pain.
“What my queenneedsis a court she can trust,” Garin bit back, his anger growing more volatile with every word. “Furthermore, she needs none amongst her rank so willing to bed the traitor.” His laugh was chilling when Myrddin’s face fell. “That’s why you want him back so badly, isn’t it?”
