“Unenthusiastic.” But she gave his hand a squeeze. “Besides, if we can’t negotiate it now, daylight, no pressure, we’re not going to do very well at night, in the heat of battle.”
Plenty of footholds, she discovered as they started down. And the ground was too mean and stubborn to crumble away under her boots. Maybe she’d have preferred a nice flat field for the mother of all battles, but there were ways to use what they had to their advantage.
“Some of these crevices, shallow caves could be useful. Hiding men and weapons.”
“They would.” Larkin crouched down, peered into a small opening. “They’d think of that as well, as you said back in Ireland.”
“So we get here first, block off some strategic points. Magically maybe—we can talk to Hoyt and Glenna about that. Or with crosses.”
He nodded, straightened. “We’d want the high ground there, and perhaps there.” He gestured as he studied the lay. “Flood down on them, that’s what we’d do. Flood down on the bloody bastards, keeping archers on the high ground.”
Blair climbed up on a shelf of rock. “We’ll need light, that’s essential.”
“We can’t count on the moon.”
“Glenna conjured some sort of light the night we went head-to-head with Lora in that skirmish back at Cian’s place. They’ll slaughter us like flies if we fight in the dark. That’s their turf. We can’t lay traps here,” she added with a thoughtful frown. “Can’t risk our own men stumbling over or falling into one.”
Larkin held up a hand for her as she prepared to jump down. “She’ll come here as well, at night, to study, to work out her strategy. She may have been here before, before we were born. Before those who birthed us were born. Spinning out her web and dreaming of that single night to come.”
“Yeah, she’ll have been here. But…”
“What?”
“So have I. I’ve seen this place in my head as long as I can remember. From up there, from down here. In sunlight and silence, in the dark with the screams of battle. I know this place,” she whispered. “I’ve been afraid of it all my life.”
“Yet you come to it. You stand on it.”
“Feels like I’ve been pushed here, closer and closer, every day. I don’t want to die here, Larkin.”
“Blair—”
“No, I’m not afraid to die. Or not obsessed with the idea of it. But, oh God, I don’t want to end here, in this hard, lonely place. Drowning in my own blood.”
“Stop.” He took her shoulders. “Stop this.”
Her eyes were huge now, and deep, deep blue. “You see, I don’t know if I’ve seen it, or just imagined it because of the fear. I don’t know if I’ve watched myself die here. Damn gods, anyway, for their mixed messages and unreasonable demands.”
She patted her hands on his chest to ease him back, give herself a little space. “It’s okay, I’m okay. Just a little panic attack.”
“It’s this place, this evil place. Slides under the skin and freezes the blood.”
“So, advantage them. But you know what? You know something that tips onto our side? The people who’ll come here, who’ll take this ground and fight on this place, they’ll have something inside them. Whatever it is, it’ll already have given evil the finger.”
“What finger?”
She hadn’t thought it possible, not in this awful silence, not in this nightmare place, but she laughed until her sides ached.
She explained as they walked the broken ground. And it seemed easier then, to cross it, study it, to think clearly. When they climbed back up she felt more steady, more sure.
She brushed off her hands, started to speak. Then simply froze.
The goddess stood in a stream of light. It seemed to pulse from her white robe, and still it was dim compared to her luminous beauty.
I’m awake, Blair thought, so this is new. Wide awake, and there she is.
“Larkin, do you see—”
But he was going down on one knee, bowing his head. “My lady.”