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Not dead, not yet.
I raised the sword to finish the job, but the Rakshasa’s scream swung me around. This time it was more than fury. This time it was devastation.
And this time it wasn’t just the exotic Rakshasa who came at me, but every damn one of them.
Fight, Amaya said. Now.
We did. With a ferocity and skill that wasn’t mine, we charged into the middle of them and tore them apart, piece by piece. It was a bitter, bloody battle that had blood pouring from almost every scrap of my body, but soon five of them were dead and only the exotic Rakshasa was left.
I expected her to attack, but instead she stepped back. I raised the sword, fighting Amaya’s urge to attack, my limbs trembling with exhaustion as I watched her warily. The Rakshasa’s gaze swept the destruction around us, then moved to the shattered remains of the urn. Something close to grief moved across her ruined features, then her gaze returned to mine.
“It is done,” she said softly. “The dark god is dead. I have failed in my duty to her.”
She bowed low, then dropped to her knees before me and didn’t move.
Waiting for me to step forward and finish what I’d started.
Kill, Amaya said, and my fingers clenched tight against the hilt as I raised the sword.
But I fought Amaya’s desire and stared instead at the Rakshasa. She just knelt there, waiting for death. I shivered. My task had always been to kill this spirit, but it didn’t seem right to do it like this—in cold blood rather than in the heat of battle.
Kill, Amaya said again. Will I?
No. I had a feeling that if I acquiesced to her in this, I’d somehow be handing greater control of my body to the spirit within my sword. Besides, this was my task, not hers, not Azriel’s. In the end, I had to be strong enough to do it.
To prove to everyone that if the need arose, I could do what was necessary to survive.
I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, then raised the sword to full height and swept it down as hard as I could. The dark blade cut through the Rakshasa’s neck with ease, but as her head plopped bloodlessly onto the stone and rolled away from her slumping body, I staggered and lost what little there was in my stomach.
After which I fell to my knees and sucked in great gulps of air. It didn’t help the buzzing in my head, the trembling in my limbs, or the burning in my lungs. I needed to get out of here—and get help—quick, or this place might become my tomb, as well.
I sheathed the sword, then said wearily, “Amaya, you need to return to the blade.”
Better here.
Fear snaked through me. “No,” I said determinedly. “This is my body, not yours. Your place is in steel, not flesh.”
One, she retorted. Here.
“No,” I repeated, and closed my eyes, picturing the dark energy of her, imagining my hands encasing it, forcing it out of my body and back into steel.
She fought me every step of the way, until exhaustion trembled through every part of me and I was all but blacking out. But if I did that, she’d win.
Damn it, this was my body, my life, and no matter how much it sucked at the moment, I wasn’t about to give it up easily!
It was that determination that kept me going, and slowly but surely I forced her back into the sword. But as her energy and spirit left me, I felt a glimmer of almost reluctant admiration.
My sword respected my actions, even if she’d fought them.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, and in the end, probably did a bit of both.
Time to go home, I thought, before either the Rakshasa’s poison took effect or I collapsed from blood loss. And the dizziness sweeping me suggested I was closer to blacking out than I needed or wanted.
But how the hell did I get home?
That odd buzzing heaviness no longer rode the air, but I was weaker than a pup and I doubted I’d have the strength to become Aedh.
Which left me with only one option—chance the gray fields, and hope like hell Azriel found me there before anyone else did. Not that the Aedh had any reason to be hunting me given the tracker they’d placed on my heart, but my father was still out there somewhere, and it’d be my luck that he would choose a moment like this to hunt me down.
