Swan on the Moor

Chapter 22

The almost overwhelming flood of sorrow and pity in Aine's heart froze as she heard the cawing sound. Jessie was crouching next to the slumped figure of the Dusk Lord, trying to support him under an arm, make him stand. She lifted her head, ponytail falling over a shoulder, and hissed,

"Come on, Aine, help me...we can't stay like this..."

Aine hurried to the Lord's side and tried to support his other arm as he stood, armour creaking, cracking, from years of disuse. The fae healed with speed, but nowhere near fast enough, surely...

And then in a whirl of rage she was there, shrieking, her cloak of feathers and gristle thrown back to reveal sleek fitted battle armour and a pair of swords, curved like the beaks of crows.

"Intruders!" she screamed, and her voice was the shriek of battle, waves of bloodlust and war pouring from her like perfume. "Traitors, filth...now, die!" Her clawed hands tore the swords from their sheaths at her waist and held them with deadly precision towards the three of them.

Aine saw Jessie stagger back, clutching at her heart, as the wave of magic washed over them. A snarl was starting from her throat, and Aine shook her head to try and clear the mist that was threatening to pull her under too.

"No," she whispered. The crow woman was moving forward, slowly, warily, eyes on the Dusk Lord, almost dancing as the heat of battle began to take her over. She was a thing of battle and destruction, and her eyes held nothing that could be reached by plea or empathy.

"Use...the iron..." whispered the Dusk Lord, half-kneeling at her feet. "Nothing else can stop her in the flow of battle..."

Aine glanced around and remembered – the whip, the daggers. She ran for the cell, but even as she moved, Badb Catha was there, swooping down on her,

swords flashing, and Aine screamed as she was flung by the force of the arc aside. The crow woman's wild laugh rang out as Aine grasped helplessly, terrified, at her left arm to find it limp, blood pouring from a long wound down her forearm. She fell back, cowering as the faerie raised her swords again, her crow screaming above her, preparing to dive. She covered her head with her arms, preparing for the strike.

"Never!" came a screaming roar from behind her, a half-mad cry, and the battle crow, lips pulling back in a smile as she fed off the searing rage from behind her, spun, swords raised, as Jessie, her eyes burning with blind fury, leapt at the warrior with nothing more than balled fists.

"No!" screamed Aine, her pain forgotten, grabbing with her good arm at Badb Catha's legs, but the scald-crow simply sprung over her, twirling past Jessie, bringing the flat of her sword down on her unprotected back as she staggered past, not even getting close to the faerie.

"Ahhh, human," she breathed in her harsh cawing voice. "Delicious. Your rage...you are capable of such fine fury..." She brought a sword round in an easy arc, pinning Jessie against the wall by her throat. The human's fragile body slammed back against the filth, eyes rolling white in their sockets. She didn't even seem to notice the sword-whip wound on her back, blood spreading into her shirt at an alarming rate. Badb Catha pressed the sword just a little further into Jessie's dark skin, watching her pant with rage and helplessness, even as she brought the other sword down to point at the Dusk Lord, not even turning to look at him.

"Don't think we don't see you crawling, Lord," she breathed with contempt. "You cannot touch me. I could have your head, now, and you would be too weak to stop me." Aine only now noticed he had been pulling his iron-weakened body towards the warrior, his face even now without expression, but as the tip of the sword pressed towards him, with the pained growl of a lion at bay, he held back.