35

THE RECKONING

PART II

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It stared through Ember, uncomprehending.

That black-ice eye rolled.

Blood bubbled on pale lips as they moved to whisper one last word…

Mohe’na.

The beast toppled, and Ember fell down with it. They were bound by the sword—the dying siren and the man who held the hilt. A terrible intimacy pressed upon him: the powerful rush of taking a life, and the grim knowing that what he was doing had consequences which would ring into eternity.

It gurgled, but Ember mercilessly stabbed Fishbiter deep into that sunken chest, crying out with effort and the repugnance of his actions, then—bracing one foot on the ground and planting a knee on his torso—pried it loose and slashed the blade across the siren’s throat.

Gore spattered him from head to toe.

He knelt there panting for a moment, watching in morbid fascination as the siren wriggled in its death throes. Only when the body had ceased all movement did Ember dare relax his hold on the sword.

All was silent, as before…

But the ground no longer trembled, and he could feel his own heart beating again.

Until that moment, there was a part of Ember which had hoped, wished—even believed—the siren was merely a figment of the mountain, like the lady of the oracles. But the carnage he had wrought lay before him, immutable, death written in the ink of the siren’s brackish blood.

Dark liquid—almost blue in the light—pooled around the corpse.

Ember withdrew the sword and took a step back, droplets flying loose from the quivering blade. He couldn’t look away. It had appeared to him as a monster, a twisted shadow, but something had vanished from that body. It had been alive, possessed a consciousness… which he had extinguished forever.

With his own hands.

He had plunged that sword into the siren's heart.

And for the first time in all his one and twenty seasons, he grappled with the understanding that Ember Jarelsson—a mere boy in the eyes of these immortals—was capable of dealing death.

He closed his eyes and fumbled away, letting the sword fall from numb fingers, but the image of the siren's pale body had already been burned into his mind. Ember dropped to his knees, placed his palms on the rough, wet stone, took a heaving breath—and retched.

Nothing but bile remained in his empty stomach, but he retched all the same.

It was a siren. Not a man. A siren. Not a man.

A siren.

Not a man.

The chant brought him some degree of comfort…

Until he thought of Ky.

Vivid memories of her soft voice, intelligent eyes, and quick wit both convicted him and venerated him: for if Ky’s soul was equal in worth to that of a man’s, then the lonely siren was also equal, however wicked he may have been. It also meant Ky's life was worth saving—even if that meant plunging a sword through the heart of her assailant.

Thus, Ember arrived at the inevitable conclusion: he had done perhaps not the right thing, but the most fitting thing—indeed, the only thing—that could be done. And no one else was there to do it.

So he wiped his face with the back of his hand, fumbled for the water flask, and rinsed his mouth, spitting several times on the damp floor. Then he crawled away from the body and curled over, wrapping his arms around his knees, sheltered by the silence and the darkness of his closed eyes.

An unexpected calm whispered through his mind, like a warm breeze drifting through a snowstorm; the whirling thoughts and fears slowed, and a few melted away entirely. Most of the fallen warriors he had encountered beneath Sisters Mountain doubtless killed many sirens, and thought little of it. All had been killed by sirens in the end. But none of them—Ember ventured to guess—had ever held a sirena's hand. They had never fallen asleep with such a creature keeping watch over the hillside, or traveled through tangled woods and thickets to the rhythm of her soft, fey humming.

In that way they were as much strangers as kin.

By the time the urge to retch had passed and the tears had ceased, he had taken stock of every bruise and open wound on his body. The muscles over his left shoulder twitched sporadically, and even his knees now ached from being sat on for so long.

Ember took a deep breath—which he'd hoped to be cleansing but brought with it the stench of mildew and blood—and sat up, opening his eyes.

It took him a moment to spot Ky.

She huddled alone in a corner, near the trickling water, and had abandoned the stone-light. It now shone at a reasonable brightness, casting soft shadows on the wall behind her. Her nimble fingers were busily refastening the laces which had been ripped loose from her jerkin. One of the strands was broken, but she tied it together with a little knot, widening the hole with a single claw so that it would fit through.

Ky? he rasped, disconcerted by the silent vibrations of his own voice in his chest.

Her chin lifted slightly.

Are you hurt?

Her fingers flew faster and she gave a short shake of her head—allowing him to spot a bit more blood under her chin. Groaning, Ember crawled across the stone, each movement costing him more of the precious energy he had so little of. It was tempting to mutter another oath, but he bit his tongue instead.

Ky's head twitched upward and she quickly fastened up the jerkin, brushing strands of black hair out of her face and peering at him in the dim light.

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He hesitated, sitting back and watching her for a moment.

Something stirred in Ember's heart…

It was not an affection, exactly, nor pride in his own accomplishments. It was something a bit more complicated, perhaps a mingling of the two.

For he understood then the dreadful fate from which she had been freed, and how rare and precious a creature was she. He decided at once that he would do it all over again, if he had to: he would battle a thousand men and sirens, he would kill until he could kill no more, until the mountain ran black with blood, if it only meant that she would be spared.

She murmured something—his name, he thought—and crawled across the stone to meet him.

He remained perfectly still as she approached, unable to hear a single word. Ky's face hovered close to his, her slimy skin glittering very faintly where it had not been smudged with blood or dirt, and before he could pull away she had opened her mouth in a little cry.

Her fingers twitched to his ears, brushing crumbles of dried gore from the sides of his face, her lips moving rapidly. Ember blinked and squinted, trying to make out the words. When he could not, his eyes wandered to her breastbone. The gash he had seen by the first light of the stone was somewhat pinched together by the refastened laces, but much deeper than he had at first thought, and tainted with grime.

It had not stopped bleeding.

She drew back—to his immense disappointment—and observed him expectantly, soft hands brushing the sides of his face. He blinked again, and then realized she must have asked him a question.

What…? Never mind, Ember muttered, shrugging her hands aside and gritting his teeth as he unfastened a scrap of leather from under his belt.

The last healing crystal from the oracles' sanctuary lay just under his fingers, still warm from his body heat, and the mere touch of it through the animal skin made him shiver. Before he could dream up any arguments to keep it for himself, he held it out to her.

Here…

Ky's eyes flicked to the object in his hand, and then back to his face. But she said nothing and made no move to take it. He flipped the leather aside, revealing the glowing crystal in his palm, and set it on the floor between them.

Her lips moved tremblingly, but Ember shook his head.

Take it, he urged, lifting his hands.

Ky reached down, fingers hovering over the dimly pulsing gem.

She hesitated for only a moment, and then seized it with a desperate swiftness. The stone swirled, glowing more brightly, and the particles began to separate.

Then—without warning—she pressed her small palm into his, snagging his wrist with her other hand and entwining their fingers; he flinched but the dust, clear and white and pinkish, was already swirling up his arm. Through fresh tears of relief, he saw the sirena tilt her head back and close her eyes as the healing washed over them both.

His ears itched horribly, but before he could jab his fingers into them the world of sound popped back into existence.

Ember swallowed several times, allowing himself to enjoy the return of his senses: rushing wind above the ceiling, dust falling afar off, water trickling over stone nearby, Ky's steady breathing, and the rustle of his own clothes as he shifted in place.

They were soft, soothing sensations after all that had transpired, and he could have sat listening in silence for a full hour or more.

But he had to know for certain.

"You're not hurt… are you?" he whispered.

Ky's throat flexed and she slipped her hand out from between his.

Her eyes darted away.

"Did he—"

"No," Ky assured him, and he was shocked by the ragged edge to her words. "I am my own."

Blushing awkwardly and rubbing the back of his neck, Ember glanced away. The body lay crumpled in his periphery, like the last remnants of a particularly disquieting nightmare.

Then she added, the words tearing a bit more, "You came."

Ember glanced up again, letting his hand fall to his knees. He wondered how long she had been screaming, alone in the dark, desperate to keep the mad siren from tempting her down with his ravishing voice or snatching her from the rocks.

"Of course I came," he managed, somewhat breathlessly. "Why would I not come?"

Ky swallowed several times, licking her lips and hemming quietly. She touched her throat with a finger and winced. Before Ember could say another word, she whispered, "Ah, Ember. I am sorry, Ember. I… I am very sorry."

He took a breath to speak, but she stopped him with a short, pained noise.

"Do not say—no, do not look at me," she pleaded, and her eyes gleamed in the light of the stone. "I am wrong to be keeping so much silent. I know it, now."

With the suddenness of a thunderclap, her words in the treasure room returned to him—along with a familiar pang of betrayal.

"Yes," he said tersely, too tired to be upset and too relieved to say more.

Another wince flashed across her face.

He attempted to soften his expression, but whatever he managed must have struck her even harder, for she looked down and hollowed her cheeks in dismay. "I will be telling you everything. I promise Ember, I will tell. But it must wait until we are sleeping and waking, for I cannot gift this story in such a state."

"I'm not moving from this spot until you tell me," he challenged, crossing his arms.

Ky gave a weary sigh, and he noticed how sunken and tired her eyes appeared in the stone-light; it was the first sign he had seen that their journey had taken its toll on her as well.

"I am in no way for storytelling tonight, Ember."

"Well," countered Ember, as lightly as he could manage, "I am hardly learned in the arts of siren storytelling. Besides… I've waited long enough for this. Don't you think?"

She reached out and grasped his wrist in both her hands, tugging it loose and squeezing his fingers very tightly. It made his heart skip a beat.

"Then I shall tell you all at once, but please—"

"No more of this," he warned. “You must tell me everything, now.”

"Please, Ember, let us do it away from this place," she finished in a whisper.

As dry and rattly as her words were, they still sent a shiver through his bones—and whether by her persuasion or his growing revulsion for the body which lay all too near to them, he found that he quite agreed.

Refreshed by the healing crystal, Ember found his footing again and trudged back to the place where he had dropped Fishbiter, trying hard not to look at the mangled corpse.

A faint grunt of effort and a rustling echoed in the hall as Ky arose, and then her sticky footsteps as she padded after him.

After a moment of grim hesitation, he retrieved the bloodstained Fishbiter—truly his sword, he felt at long last—and cleaned it as best he could on the siren's ragged cloak. Only after he had put away the weapon (which he beheld with a newfound respect and abhorrence), retrieved the stone-light, and cast a longing look at the fragments of his former fishing spear did he reply.

"Agreed."

A cold hand slipped through his, gritty with bits of stone and a spackling of gore.

Their fingers found where they fit best, and together they started away from that foul bend in the hall. An unfamiliar feeling of warm satisfaction kindled in his chest—for it was the first time since leaving his cabin behind that he felt certain the river-woman was being forthright.

As the bloodstained hall faded into darkness behind them, Ember couldn't help one last glance at the body on the ground. It appeared much smaller than before, perhaps by some trick of the light, and he wistfully admired the rings glinting on those broken fingers. It seemed somehow wrong to leave them there, but he would not touch that thing again.

Not for all the gold and jewels of Sisters Mountain.