The Vampire & Her Witch

”...Heila and Virve will be relieved to hear that Ollie is well,” Nyrielle said when Ashlynn had finished. Her fingers hadn’t stopped their gentle movement through Ashlynn’s hair, but her touch had grown slower and more contemplative as the weight of everything Ashlynn had described settled over the garden like a second canopy. ”They’ve been worrying about him ever since he left. Heila especially.”

”He’s been extraordinary,” Ashlynn said, gazing up at the stars that shimmered between the branches overhead. ”I never would have imagined he’d come so far so quickly,” Ashlynn said, still somewhat taken aback by the extent of the injuries that Ollie had dared to heal. ”Or that he’d be foolish enough to risk as much as he did.”

”And who do you think he gets that last part from?” Nyrielle said, playfully tapping the tip of Ashlynn’s nose as a light, musical laugh filled the air. ”The boy has more courage than half the knights I’ve known in two centuries,” Nyrielle agreed.

”But he’s nothing compared to the woman who made him a witch,” she added. Then her fingers paused, and when she spoke again, her voice had lost most of its playfulness and gained a sharper edge. ”You’ve already used one of the Blood Acorns.”

When Ashlynn reached that part of the story, she’d been honest with her lover about the need. There would have been no point in hiding it, after all, Nyrielle had lent her blood and power to the making of the three precious wells of magical energy that Ashlynn carried with her in case of a dire emergency. Whether Ashlynn admitted to it or not, Nyrielle would have known that one of them was gone.

”For Ollie,” Ashlynn said. ”I could have sent him home,” Ashlynn said softly. ”But... Not really. I, I need him at my side. Or, rather, I need him at Jocey’s side while I deal with Owain. I need someone I can trust, and I trust him more than almost anyone else,” she said, snuggling closer to Nyrielle in the darkness of their shared dream.

Nyrielle nodded slowly, accepting Ashlynn’s words without argument. They had created those acorns together, she and Ashlynn and Virve, drawing on the vast power of the Ancient Oak for precisely these kinds of emergencies. But each one spent was one fewer that Ashlynn would have when she needed them most, and she still hadn’t even reached Lothian City yet.

”Have you reconsidered allowing Thane to join you?” Nyrielle asked. ”Or Zedya? Either of them could reach Lothian City before the ceremony if they left tonight. Thane knows the city from the days before I took him in, and Zedya...”

”No,” Ashlynn said firmly. ”Nyri, we’ve discussed this. Vampire in Lothian City, while Owain has it sealed with Inquisitors and Templars at every gate? It would be like lighting a signal fire. If Thane or Zedya were discovered, it wouldn’t just compromise the plan; it would give Owain exactly the excuse he needs to rally the barons behind him for an immediate war.”

Ever since the night of the Midnight Massacre, when Nyrielle slaughtered Cellach Lothian in his bed, the Church had made Lothian City into a fortress that was difficult for her or any of her progeny to enter. Sacred wards along the wall, blessed icons at the gates, and enough templars to man them all every hour of every day.

Among all of her progeny, only Marcel’s Cloak of Darkness could allow him to enter the city completely undetected. Whether or not Ignatious’s relative immunity to the sorcery of the Church extended to bypassing its wards was something they were already taking a risk to discover. For any of the others, however, Ashlynn and Nyrielle had decided that it would be too risky to try.

But just because Nyrielle had agreed with the conclusion they’d arrived at didn’t mean she liked the answer any more now than she had at the time, especially now that Ashlynn had already used up one of her Blood Acorns.

”I know,” Nyrielle said, and the frustration in her voice was quiet but unmistakable. Her fingers resumed their movement through Ashlynn’s hair, but the strokes were firmer now, as if she could press her protection into Ashlynn’s skin through will alone. ”I know the reasons. I helped you to build the plan.”

”But knowing that you are sailing toward that city with a weakened witch and one less Blood Acorn than you should,” Nyrielle said with a heavy sigh. ”I’m just frustrated, my darling. I wish there was something more I could do to tip the scales back in your favor.”

”Ignatious will be there,” Ashlynn reminded her. ”And Diarmuid. Plus, we’ve gained Baron Loghlan and his five knights, and Isabell, and Ollie...”

”None of whom can face Owain in single combat in your place if the need arose,” Nyrielle said flatly, even though she knew that Ashlynn would never call upon a champion to represent her. ”That burden falls to you alone, and it terrifies me,” the ancient vampire admitted in a voice that was smaller and more fragile than Ashlynn had ever heard her before.

The ghosts of flames flickered in her eyes as she recalled the night her parents and her grandsire, Torbin, had fallen to Lothian blades. They hadn’t fought fairly then. They’d filled the night sky with a second sun, and they set the world ablaze as the Church lent power to their ’hero,’ Cellach.

If the Church did something similar again, empowering Owain enough that he could genuinely threaten her Ashlynn’s life... Just the thought of it would steal the peace from her slumber until the last in the long line of Lothian Lords was finally dead at her lover’s hands.

Ashlynn reached up, curling her fingers around Nyrielle’s wrist and drawing her hand down to press a kiss against her cool palm.

”I know you want to help,” Ashlynn said softly. ”You already have, more than you might think, just by helping me today,” she added.

”But, if you really want to do something more,” Ashlynn added as she considered something that Nyrielle had offered once, and Ashlynn had given up on when Bors Lothian died, and they had to rush their plans in order to respond. ”You could always show me what you know about Owain, and the way the Lothians would have taught him how to fight...”