Resistance (28 page)

I’ve seen this before — cutting off someone’s air
supply. It’s a violently painful thing to endure, and takes longer
than it should. “Don’t!” I try, but he’s not listening. Fi’s words
have angered him into hearing nothing but white noise.
“Quincy!”

But he’s too caught up in watching Fi struggle. He’s
enjoying this far too much, and I realize he’s turned into
everything I hate about the Fae. He’s become the same as all the
other psychopaths I once shared a home with. He’s in the same state
of mind my father lives in.

“No, no, no,” Eir chokes. He tries to move again and
punches the ground beneath him, screaming for Q not to hurt her.
When he receives no response he meets my eyes. “Stop him!”

I feel panic rising in my throat and look around for
an answer. Quincy is long gone and the faery standing in his place
isn’t going to stop hurting Fi by choice. He’s honed his skills
with air and fighting him with fire will only piss him off, and
against his element I’m not sure what I can do. I look at Eirnin
when he slams his head against the tree and screams again, and I
see Fi’s knife above his head.

My stomach churns at the thought. I have two choices
here; I can kill Quincy, or I can lose Fi. I’m startled to realize
the second isn’t even an option for me.

I rush to Eir and rip the blade from the trunk and
hiss a curse when the iron triquetras on the hilt burn my palm,
leaving wounds I know will scar. Eirnin looks at me in shock and
tries to say something to me, but I don’t have time to listen. Fi
is curling in on herself and Quincy looms over her, oblivious to
the fact I’ve moved. “Come on, little one,” he says crudely. “Stop
me from scalping your brother now.”

In a few large steps I’m right behind him, and I hook
my arm around his neck and slam the burning weapon into his chest.
His concentration is broken instantly and Fi swells with a gasp,
jerking into a sitting position. She looks like she’s about to
lunge at Quincy with what little energy she has, and then her eyes
find me yanking my hand away from the knife. She’s staring at me
the same way her brother was, but Eirnin is suddenly there by her
side, freaking out and asking if she’s okay.

Quincy stumbles and falls back into me, his hands
shaking as he touches the handle with his fingertips. Smoke flares
up around his hands when he touches it. “Keeg…” he rasps. He sounds
so lost.

“Easy, easy,” I tell him and slowly lower him to the
ground. I kneel beside him and try not to look at the knife in his
chest—the knife I put there—and instead look right into his eyes.
His eyes are foggy and have a caged look about them, though, and I
find they are no easier to look at. “I’m sorry,” I tell him.

Quincy gasps in pain and eyes the blade sticking out
of him. He meets my eyes and looks so confused and hurt that I feel
uneasy. I fight the urge to cover my mouth when his head drops
against the ground.

“You changed, Pansy,” he chokes around a mouthful of
blood. “You couldn’t stomach road kill when I last saw you, and now
look — downright murder.”

I look away from him. His face is pale, his shirt is
soaked with blood and the iron in his chest is burning at him. The
smell of burning flesh and blood is overpowering and I breathe
through my mouth. My hand is hot from the iron and sticky from his
blood, and I try to ignore the feeling. “Yeah, well,” I cough. “You
changed, too.”

He smirks. “You might survive this after all.” I have
no idea what he means but I can’t think about it right now.

“I’m so sorry,” I say again, but when I look back at
him, he’s already gone. My breath hitches and I remind myself I
shouldn’t feel so guilty. I didn’t kill him in cold blood. I gave
him every opportunity to leave…didn’t I?

I grind my teeth together to keep quiet and look over
at Fi, who is swatting Eir’s hands away and insisting she’s fine.
The tightness in my chest loosens a little and I clear my throat.
“Are you okay?”

Fi’s head snaps up in my direction but she doesn’t
say anything. She’s staring at my hand, bloodied and burnt, and I
clench it in a fist before hiding it behind my back. She drops her
head and looks at her lap. Eir is looking over at me with pity and
I hate it. His sister nearly got killed. I should be the last thing
on his mind. I clear my throat again and gesture to his sister.
“We, uh, we should get her home.”

Fi is still ignoring me, but Eirnin picks up on my
need to get out of here and nods. He slowly shifts onto his feet
and scoops up Fi, who flushes furiously at being lugged around like
a baby. Eir silences her attempt to say she’s fine and looks at me.
“Are you okay?”

“Fine,” I answer bluntly. Eir frowns but doesn’t
push. I don’t want to talk about this right now and he knows
it.

“’
Kay…” he says quietly, and starts
back towards the house. I look at Quincy again and close his eyes
with my clean hand; muttering a small prayer that he ends up
somewhere better than this hellhole. I grasp the knife and slowly
remove it from his corpse, not even wincing at the burn this time.
I wipe it clean on my shirt and stand on shaky legs.

“Put me down, Eirnin!” I hear Fi croak from behind
me, and turn to look at the Dolan siblings.

“Christ, okay!” Eir says, setting Fi on her feet.
“I’m just worried.”

“I appreciate it, but I assure you I can walk,” she
tells him. Her voice is raspy and I can see her shaking from here.
She tugs at her clothes and tries to make herself look presentable
again, like that makes the fear she just felt go away. I know her
better now — I know when she pulls out bigger words she’s hiding
the urge to hide under her bed forever. I remind myself I did this
to save her and force myself not to look at the lifeless body at my
feet and move over to them, handing Fi her knife.

Her eyes widen when she sees how badly burnt my hand
is and that her blade did it, and snatches it away. She opens her
mouth to say something but no words come out. I speak before she
can. “Let’s go.”

Eirnin squeezes my shoulder and I make myself smile
at him. He sees right through it but still doesn’t question me, and
we head back to the house.

Chapter 19—Fi

July 2102

By the time we get back to the house, Eir is
practically pushing me through the door ahead of him. He hasn’t
taken his hands off me for more than a second since we left the
clearing where the faery is still laying. It’s like he’s afraid I’m
going to disappear if he lets me go. I find that I am having
trouble following one thought through to its conclusion. I hear him
tell the guard in the backyard to wake Seamus and send him over. My
lungs are still burning from their time without oxygen and I am
shaking uncontrollably. As soon as we are in the kitchen, I turn on
him and point a trembling finger at the kitchen table. “Sit, now —
I want to make sure you’re okay. Don’t argue with me.” But my voice
comes out as a rasp; my throat still raw from being deprived of
air. Although I know no one actually laid hands on me, I feel as
though I was choked rather thoroughly.

I turn to see Flint looking at me with an unreadable
expression on his face. “Love, I think you should take a seat
before you fall over.”

I scowl and take a few steps towards him. I want to
look at his hand right away but my voice just isn’t working, and
suddenly there isn’t enough oxygen in the room or maybe in my head,
because I see the floor coming at me fast and then there are strong
arms around me; catching me and laying me down gently. I hear
voices telling me to breathe and shouting orders, but everything is
fuzzy and sounds like it’s coming from far away. All I really want
at this point is a cold drink of water for my ravaged throat and to
sleep for a while. Then I feel a hand brush wisps of hair off my
face and tap my cheek, and I see Flint’s face hovering above my
own. “Fianna, take a breath. Breathe, love, breathe.”

“I want to look at your hand, damn it,” I manage to
say in my new raspy voice before everything goes black.

When I wake up, Seamus, Flint and Eir are all
situated around me and I’m lying on the floor in the kitchen.
Confusion washes over me first, and when I struggle to sit up,
three pairs of hands press me back down on the floor. “No, no,
lass. Stay down for a moment, please. Breathe. We have water for
you, too.” Seamus seems to be the spokesperson for the group. Eir
pushes a glass of water at me and I lift my head a little to drink
some gratefully. Some of it dribbles down my chin and I feel it run
back into my hair. I open my mouth to thank him and Flint covers my
mouth gently with a few fingers.

“Don’t try to talk just yet, love. Just breathe and
relax. We are fine,” he says firmly, motioning to himself and
Eirnin.

I hold my hand out to him and he slips his injured
hand into mine with the palm up so I can look at it. The skin is
burned away in the triquetra pattern from the hilt of my dagger in
two different places. The wounds look red and angry, and his skin
is stained rusty brown from the other faery’s blood. I feel tears
prick my eyes, hating that my dagger did this to him. I look up and
find Seamus ready with a wet cloth and the aloe. I smile at my
uncle — of course he knows what I had in mind. My brother is
suddenly behind me, supporting my weight, and Flint sighs
resignedly as I get to work cleaning the wounds on his hand while
I’m still half-lying on the kitchen floor.

“You really do run things around here, don’t you?” he
says with a tired version of his normal smirk.

Humoring his ‘no talking’ rule I nod as emphatically
as I can without passing back out, and get to work spreading aloe
over his wounds. When I’m content that the wound is treated to the
best of my abilities, I look up into Flint’s face and croak out,
“I’m sorry you’re hurt because of me.”

He shushes me immediately. “I’ll be fine. It’s not
your fault, Fi.” But I can’t help feeling that he’s only trying to
make me feel better.

It isn’t long before my Aunt Ruth comes bustling
through the back door with my youngest three cousins and baked
goods. She has Eir help me into a chair at the table and sets to
brewing some tea she says will help with the pain in my throat. “It
won’t be long before people start arriving, Fi. I brought a few
things in case anyone’s hungry. I don’t want to see you out of that
chair, young lady.”

I let out a groan. I didn’t think of the inevitable
visitors who will crowd into our kitchen and demand answers and
most likely justice, even though Flint has clearly taken care of
that already. I look at my aunt, pleading, “Can’t you tell them all
to come back tomorrow? I need a day off from them all.” At least
four people yell at me to stop talking and I sigh; dropping my face
in my hands and massaging my temples. “If I have to sit here, so do
you, Eirnin! Don’t even think about running away! Has anyone
checked his head?” I say without lifting my head.

I hear someone pull a chair out and drop into it and
look up to see my brother shaking his head at me. “You couldn’t
just sit there silently, could you?” He lets out a gargantuan sigh
as Ruth sets the steaming mug of tea in front of me. “You are—OW!”
he exclaims when Ruth starts probing his head with her hands,
looking for bumps and blood.

I hide a grin behind my mug and take a tentative sip
of the brew. It feels like heaven going down my aching throat. I
look around the room, realizing that the people most important to
me are all present. Flint is leaning against the hutch taking
everything in silently, as I’ve learned is his way. Seamus has
tasked his ten-year old twin sons, Cormac and Dillon with helping
cut up pies and cakes that they brought over, while my aunt looks
over Eirnin for any injuries. I motion to Neall, Seamus’ youngest
and pull him into my lap. I am busy tickling his side and kissing
his chubby cheeks, listening to him giggle when I realize Aodhan
isn’t here. I open my mouth to ask Ruth where he is when I remember
Lumi and look up in horror. What if the faery attacking us was just
a diversion?

“Someone needs to check on Lumi,” I croak out, trying
to be calm so I don’t alarm Neall. My voice sounds stronger but
still isn’t normal. My fear must be evident, though, because Flint
straightens and crosses to me.

“Don’t worry. I’ll look in on her and send Aodhan
down,” he says quietly; laying his uninjured hand on my shoulder
and giving a squeeze. “You stay here and listen to your aunt.”

I watch him stride purposefully away and exhale a
breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding. I don’t even want to
consider what would have happened tonight if Flint hadn’t been
here. I blink the moisture from my eyes and return my attention to
the squirming happy child in my arms, rather than the morbid
possibility of what could have been. Aodhan comes galloping into
the kitchen a few minutes later and I sigh with relief. He takes in
the scene quickly, goes to his mother first and kisses her cheek,
then comes to sit at the table with Eir and me. Only a few moments
have passed when the first knock sounds at the back door. I sigh
and sip some more tea. Something tells me I’m going to need my
voice for what’s to come.