White Stag (Permafrost #1)(93)

I didn’t expect the stag to respond to my thoughts. Only you can know that, young one. The future is frightening, I know. The choice is the hardest of all. But it is a choice—who rules and who lives and who dies, who hunts and who mends and who heals. It is your power to choose.

“Then why did you let Lydian kill you?” I shouted, voice echoing into the empty sky. “Why let such a monster drive his blade into your chest?”

He was worthy in a different way. But he is dead, as am I—and if you had not come, the mantle of my power would remain so. But you have come, and that is what was written. The world that bowed to me is the before, as you are the after. And the remaining life on the border grows stronger with your every breath; his power is hard to deny.

I smiled a little. Soren’s power was hard to deny and so, I found, was mine. If I’d given him the strength he needed to be the Erlking, I could continue to do it. And when his time came, in thousands of years, I would be able to deal with that too, and I knew he would accept his death as I accepted a new life. This was the way the Hunt worked—the weak were weeded from the strong, as the old died to make way for the new. Like a fire burning away a field and the land growing back twice as strong. I remembered the sunken eyes of the last Erlking; when his throat finally was slit, somehow I knew those eyes closed peacefully.

This was what I was meant to be. Not a human, not a goblin. A being who straddled both worlds, who chose the best and worst from them and decided which she would follow. I was meant to run in the wind and fight in the fire. I was meant to be as calm as water and as cool as earth. I was chaos and darkness and balance and light. I was not human, not goblin, not halfling, not a mixed creature meant to die in a mercy kill.

From the time that my body had slid out onto the earth, I’d been a survivor. Now I would choose from the pools of the strong who the survivors would be; not out of vengeance or spite, but because I was the only one who could see past the outside of a monster and see a person who cared, the only one who could see through the harmless face of a human to the murderous beast within.

I had to do this; if not for the world, if not for me, then because there was no one else who could.

“Tell me what I have to do.”

The stag rested his head in my lap and let out a long sigh. He breathed out silver light that rose high into the sky and mixed with the stars until it was a swirl of the black night and the white starlight; then the two swirls of mist engulfed me in their embrace, so much like another creature’s power would.

Blinding agony hit me full force until slowly a mixture of coldness and warmth spread through my body in a delicate balance. The power I’d absorbed in the fights before mingled with the dark and the light, coloring it with its touch until the stag’s spirit was all the colors of the rainbow.

The stag rose from where he lay at my feet and dipped his head toward me. Then he walked out of the hollow, and as he did, his figure shrank from an adult stag, to a young buck, until he was a fawn that disappeared on the horizon.



* * *



THE WORLD RUSHED back to me in a flood of sound and color. The first thing I noticed was the weight that pressed down around my collarbone, reminding me of the collar I’d worn a hundred years ago. The second thing was the lack of pain and the smell of goblin blood in the air. The third thing was I was lying where the stag had been, the pressure on my neck a torc of white antler bones.

I stood, slowly, ignoring the hands that reached out to help me. I couldn’t tell who they were or even focus on them. The world was an explosion of new colors and sounds and smells. The bright lights that filtered through the treetops reflected off leaves in golden and brown and silver waves; the stark grayness of the Permafrost gave way to a million different shades of greens and blues and purples. In my ears, pounding like blood, were the heartbeats of every living being. I closed my eyes, focusing on one in particular. It beat stronger than the rest, as noticeable as if he’d said my name out loud.

Soren stared at me, clutching his wounds. They would heal, I knew, as the power from the lindworm and young lordling and Helka fought within me. I let it seep out slowly, wrap him in its warm light, and I watched amazed as the power healed the broken, bloody flesh.

Soren stepped toward me and knelt by my feet. His strength was my strength, his pain was my pain, and I could feel his muscles quivering with a strange type of joy, his mind racing in a way that I had always been so sure a goblin’s never would. With curiosity and questions and emotions ready to spill out to anyone who heard.

I could feel everything about him.

Soren looked at me, his lilac eyes shining, and I knew, yes, he felt the same with me.

From the distance, covered with the blood of enemies, Seppo came out of the trees. The spirits of the dead goblins rose behind him to kneel beside their king. To kneel for me. In the distance wolves howled and three furry faces peered from the ashes, bowing their heads. My vision rose beyond the trees and into the sky where I watched the Hunt slow and stop as if the goblins knew instinctively that their leader was found and the stag was reborn.

For a long second, all we did was look at each other and take in our ruined clothes, burnt hair, and ash-smeared skin. I couldn’t help but laugh as pieces of Soren’s tunic fluttered away into the breeze. At that, he cocked his head to the side and smiled his ridiculous smile.

“You know, your hair has white specks in it. You’re like a little fawn. It’s actually adorable.” He struggled to keep his face straight.