The screams of his people dying are deafening. She had told him that the second war would be twice as bad as last. There would be no survivors. Not this time. There would be nothing left but ash and ruin, and the hollow shell of an empire that had once stood tall and proud. His kind do not die so easily, but theirs... Their bodies line the streets, broken, bloodied, battered, washing the cobblestones in a sea of blood. This isn't war. This is a massacre.
And where is she?
He whirls around desperately, unable to take in the carnage even for a moment. All of this is nothing but a distraction, keeping Ruadhán's forces busy while he... No. No, he wouldn't be that foolish. He'd heard that Ruadhán's old allies had been telling the boy, but it would be suicide.
It would condemn the Daoine Sidhe forevermore.
They had come back from the last war, fragmented, broken, their cities in ruin. It had lasted a hundred years, had nearly destroyed everything they were fighting for. The war only ended when she offered herself as a tribute of peace. And for what? So they could return, in peace, to a land decimated by a century of bloodshed? To empty houses and ruined palaces, haunted by memories that would wake them in the dead of night?
"Was this worth it?" she'd asked him once, in what feels like another age ago. "Countless dead, if only for a few more centuries of peace. We will war again, and this time, it will not end in peace."
He still did not know the answer, unable to even consider one as he takes off in a sprint, feet pounding against the stones that have been stained with the blood of his people. If this was all a distraction, then he knows exactly where he'll be, knows exactly where he'll find her. The din of the battle raging around him is muffled beneath the sound of his heart pounding in his ears. Their bond had long since been broken, shattered the day she'd sworn herself to another. Still, he clings onto the scraps that still remain in his heart, following the tattered bond all the way to the centre of it all.
The Autumn Court had once been a place of great beauty but now it is aflame, washed in golden fire. It doesn't stop him. He charges in without a second thought, magic forming a wall of solid wind around him as he pushes through the blazing inferno into the once-beating heart of her kingdom. The wall of wind does nothing to keep out the smoke, and he chokes on it as he stumbles blindly through the palace that had once been so unwelcoming to him.
Please, he begs in silent, fervent desperation, let her be alive. If there is any good in this world, let her be alive.
He follows their tattered bond in desperation as it leads him through winding passages, even as the ceiling threatens to collapse down upon him. If the bond yet remains, perhaps she is still alive. Perhaps he can take her far away from here, and make them all pay for their treason. He would raze Tairngire to the ground himself if it meant keeping her safe. Then—
The courtyard seems to be the only place that is untouched by the fire that had already consumed the rest of the Autumn palace if not for the embers that occasionally drift across his vision. A thousand tiles make up intricate, swirling paths that snake between the flower beds like a river of molten gold. They all converge in the centre of the courtyard, surrounding an ancient elm tree. And there, beneath the copper and orange leaves, stands Cormac, wielding a blade carved of gleaming white bone that drips crimson blood onto the golden tiles.
The prince's back is to him, but he doesn't need him to turn to know what he'd see; he's the spitting image of his father, inheriting Ruadhán's dark skin and coiled hair, but his eyes are as golden as his mother's.
"I was wondering who'd come for her," Cormac says without turning around. "My father or... you, but then he had never loved her half as much as you did."
He wants to say that the prince's taunts fall on deaf ears, but he's driven solely by desperation and fear right now. He doesn't have the strength to act as cold and as composed as his title demands he act. "What have you done?" he growls out through gritted teeth.
Cormac turns to look at him, and for a second, he almost sees regret in those haunting gold eyes. "What needed to be done," he says. "What you were too much of a coward to do."
His hand curls into a fist by his side, magic thrumming beneath his skin, all ice and frost and dark. "Watch your tongue, child. You forget your place."
All the young prince does is laugh, but the sound is bitter and hollow, lacking any mirth. "I always forget why my mother liked you so much. I should give her credit for that, at least. The fearsome Winter King kneeling for nothing and no one except her, but you are just as much of a coward as she was. This is how we survive."
"If this is how we survive, then we do not deserve to live," he replies as he takes several cautious steps towards him. Where is she? The blood on his blade must be hers, but—
"She got in my way," he says simply, as though they speak of the weather, of taxes, of anything but the fact that he had cut down the only person that had kept their people standing for so long. "I suggest you do not do the same."
He bares his teeth in a snarl so fearsome the prince flinches before his cool mask of composure settles back into place. "Where is she?"
Cormac waves his hand behind him, and there, in the shadow of the great elm, she lies. She clings onto life yet, but hot, wet blood pours out from a wound in her chest. It floods the gaps between the golden tiles, but he hardly notices as he rushes towards her without a second thought. The magic that had been thrumming beneath his skin releases, seeking out her wounds and desperately trying to close them, but something prevents him. There's something cold and sharp, cruel, bitter, and poisonous, that keeps him at bay. She barely has the strength to open her eyes as he pulls her head into his lap. When she speaks, her lips are stained with her own blood.
"You came," she says in a voice barely above a whisper, trying to summon the strength to reach up to cup his face. She barely manages to lift her hand before her face contorts in agony.
"I came as fast as I could," he says, fighting back the hot, angry tears that prick at his eyes. The great General of their people, the Flame of Summer, is... gone. She had once been their best warrior, their kindest leader, but now she is broken, shattered by her son's betrayal. Every breath she takes is ragged, her warm golden skin ashy, and her velvet vermillion robe stained by her own blood. She doesn't seem to have a weapon, but he knows she still could have killed her own son without a second thought.
Why didn't she? Why did she spare his life? She must have known, and yet...
He's her son, he thinks in pained silence. The son we never had. Even at the end, she couldn't bring herself to kill him.
"I know," she says hoarsely, leaning into his touch. "I knew you would."
"I'm so sorry."
She hushes him, as though he's the one who barely has enough strength to breathe. His magic isn't working. Nothing he's doing is working in the slightest, fended off by whatever foul poison Cormac had coated his blade in. All he's doing is buying her a few precious moments to say goodbye.
I won't let her see what I will do to them for this.
"We both knew from the start—" She is wracked by coughs, choking on blood. His armour is coated in it, bright hot red against shining silver. This armour has been stained by blood many times before, but never by hers. The only person he would never have dared to stand against. "We both knew from the start it would come to this, but we bought them peace. Bought them time."
Like I'm buying you time now, he wants to say but the words catch in his throat. "Themisia, I'm—"
She hushes him again with an ever so slight of her head. "Stop apologising," she says with a broken laugh. "I did what we set out to do. I am sorry that you must now continue it alone. You will continue it, won't you? You made me a promise."
He clutches her hand, pressing her knuckles against his lips. "I promise," he says. "I'll protect them."
A relieved sigh escapes her as her eyes manage to meet his. Once as gold as the tiles on which she now dies, they are now dulled with pain. "I never stopped loving you."
He feels the moment she dies more than he sees it. The tattered remains of their marriage bond dissipate into ash, leaving a hollow empty space inside of him that had once belong to her. He doesn't even have the strength to cry, doesn't have the strength to mourn.
Cormac barely has the time to summon a shield as magic explodes from his hand, pinning the prince of the Autumn Court against the wall of the courtyard. He struggles against the ropes of shifting dark, failing to summon his mother's fire in his hand. He is a child compared to him, nothing more than a pest, an inconvenience. He is older than the tree under which his only love had died, older than this entire city, and Cormac is nothing.
Eyes of iron and steel burn with fire as he clenches his hand, the ropes of dark tightening against the struggling prince. "Am I in your way yet, prince?" he sneers, voice as cold as his kingdom. "Or did you forget to whom you speak?"
Cormac has the audacity to spit as his feet.
He laughs, but the sound is like howling wind on a cold winter's night. "She was the only thing that kept me from burning all you petty children to the ground. You think this is war? This silly, childish tantrum you've thrown? Thousands dead and it is nothing compared to what your kingdom was built upon. You were not there. You did not fight in the war. You did not see what your mother sacrificed her freedom for, binding herself to your father if only to save what little we had left. I am older than you could possibly understand, you stupid child. I could wipe you from this plane without a second thought."
The prince lets out a cry as the ropes of dark sharpen their tips into knives, carving their way beneath his skin. "You promised her to protect the Sidhe," he manages to gasp out. "I am her son. You must protect me, you promised—"
"You are no son of hers," he snarls. "You cut down a woman who would never dare to raise a hand against you, and then dared to launch an assault against your own people."
"This is how we become stronger—"
"You are nothing more than a child, playing with toy soldiers and saying it's war," he interrupts, leaning in so close he can feel Cormac's breath against his face. "If it is war that you want, then let me grant you your wish."
"Your promise—"
"My promise was to protect the Sidhe," he says. "It said nothing about our kind."
"You are—" He groans as the dark pierces his chest, a mere hair's breadth away from his heart, but their kind do not die so easily. Had it not been for the poison, no doubt of iron dust and ancient magic, Themisia might have recovered. But he is the Winter King, and he bows to no one.
Not anymore.
"You are a fool," Cormac says, a merry hatred burning in his golden eyes, "if you think this will change anything. What will killing me achieve? Do you think I am the only one who believed my mother is what kept the Daoine Sidhe from being as powerful as they could be? You cannot protect the Sidhe from everyone forever. There will always be those who desire what you will not allow them to have. If you seek to end them all, you will be alone. Always."
I don't care, he wants to scream. She was the only one I wanted. The only one whose approval I craved, and your father stole her from me. The Daoine Sidhe are as bad as they always were. I will not let them ruin anything else. I will make them all pay for your crimes.
"So be it," is what he says, but even he cannot hide the way his voice breaks. "I will kill every Daoine Side if I must."
Cormac still clings onto life, but only barely. He manages to cock his head to one side, eyes narrowed as he studies the ancient King of Winter. "Look at yourself. You will be no better than we are.
"Do you not see what you already are?" he says. "And the Sidhe will die free, not enslaved as you so desire, bound to their Daoine Sidhe masters until their dying breath."
"It is a sacrifice I am willing to make," says Cormac.
"So is this," he says, and the Crown Prince of the Autumn Court is torn apart, the traitor's blood staining the golden tiles just as his mother's had. Despite being the King of Winter, despite all the rumours that his heart is all ice and cold, something stirs within him: fury. Fury as hot, fierce, and as vengeful as the flames that she had once controlled so easily.
Fury and rage.