Beautiful Salvation (30 page)

“Ivy!”

The raven-haired warrior was shouting again, this time directing her attention to a glowing beacon standing on the ground in front of the castle. The figure looked up in time to see the bow-woman drop a heavy sack from the tower window. It broke open when it hit the ground and a wave of small stones flowed from the torn pouch. The beacon bent to gather some of the stones, and Aiyana realized it was a woman. A woman glowing like the flame of a candle, lighting up the area around her as if she were a small sun. She held the stones in her hands and they burst to life like stoked embers, glittering scarlet in red veins. The woman wound her arm back and waited as a cloud of
kanontsistonties
swooped down towards the castle. When they got close enough, she hurled the stones into the cloud. The
kanontsistonties
screeched, some of them hovering in midair before going still and falling dead to the earth.

The tide of the battle turned, steered by the fighting princes and the women warriors who had joined them.
The wendigos howled and ran like frightened dogs back to the forest. The
kanontsistonties
erupted in a series of squeaks and shrieks and flew off as one sparse cloud for the darkness of the trees. Aiyana rose up higher and higher, her head rising above the trees even as her feet remained firmly planted in the earth. Power like nothing she’d ever experienced before had been building inside her as she viewed the battle, and now it surged through her veins until she felt as if she might explode if she didn’t use it.

She immediately sought Saamal. She found the god kneeling on the ground beside the pit, his left leg a bloody stump. He had Chumana pinned to the ground, her green-scaled body writhing, her tail lashing against his body like a metallic whip. She hissed, raking her claws down his arms, struggling to get free. Saamal tightened his hand around her neck, but didn’t crush her throat. Aiyana felt a small rush of satisfaction when she realized he was killing her slowly. He must have discovered what Chumana had tried to do. He was avenging her.

“My love!” Aiyana called out, raising her voice over the roaring winds. Instead of muffling her voice, the wind caught it, carried it to Saamal and flung it at him. The god reared back and raised his eyes. He froze when he saw Aiyana, his entire body going deathly still.

Chumana took advantage of his shock and wriggled free, claws digging into the ground and tail lashing back and forth as she tried to scramble away from Saamal. Aiyana extended a hand, letting some of the power churning inside her flow down her arm and out toward the goddess who had tried to kill her. Twisting emerald vines that Aiyana hadn’t noticed till now flowed down her arm like a living thing, moving to do her bidding. Jagged thorns stuck out from the twisting green threads, dipping into Aiyana’s veins for blood, though they caused her no pain.

The living plants plunged down from her arm, deep into the earth. More briars exploded in front of Chumana, halting the serpent woman in her tracks. The vines bound themselves around Chumana, holding her fast. Thorns plunged into the serpent woman’s skin, sliding between the scales like a frog diving through a layer of lily pads into a pond. Chumana screamed as her blood flowed from the wounds.

“Flower Maiden,” Aiyana said, the wind once again throwing her words through the air, slamming them into Chumana with physical force. Chumana stopped struggling and faced Aiyana, her eyes growing wide.

As she stared into the other woman’s eyes, Aiyana felt her consciousness slide against Chumana’s. A shimmering thread appeared in her mind—the link she shared with the earth, the link Chumana shared with the earth through her heritage as an earth deity. That same thread connected Aiyana to the serpent woman. Suddenly Aiyana slid past a barrier and Chumana’s thoughts and mind were open, there for her to see.

“You have betrayed your people,” Aiyana accused, images from Chumana’s mind flowing over her. “You were a guardian of the land, the maiden of spring. It was your duty to care for the earth, to tend to it and keep it healthy. The magic that was given to you, the power…it was given with the belief that you would use it as it was meant to be used.”

“I did!” Chumana shouted, eyes flashing in defiance even as more of her blood spilled to the ground, flowing faster and thicker as more thorns bit into her flesh.

“You turned your back on your people. You let the land suffer, let Cipactli suffer, just to weaken your lover, to make him need your help.” Aiyana sneered. “You ran off to Midguard while your kingdom died. You took advantage of the chaos there—bonded with their land to stave off suffering through your connection to the land you abandoned.”

“No!” Chumana screamed. She thrust a hand toward Saamal, one curved claw pointing accusingly at the Black God who still stood there like a statue, gaping at Aiyana as if he couldn’t believe she was there. “
He
turned his back on the land, not me! I
had
to go to Midguard, I didn’t have the power to keep this land alive!”

“You halted the sacrifices.”

Chumana looked away, but then immediately turned back to Aiyana. “The sacrifices were barbaric,” she declared. “I did not want to see my people suffer.”

“You stayed in this kingdom and drained whatever magic you could,” Aiyana thundered, feeling Chumana’s guilt through the thin thread. “And when there was nothing left for you, you ran to Midguard and waited. You betrayed your people to keep a man who
didn’t want you
.”

“He wanted me first!” Chumana shrieked. “You ruined everything!”

“You would see the land die to keep Saamal out of my bed.”

“Yes,” Chumana hissed.

The last of the resistance between their minds fell away and Aiyana saw everything. All the rituals Chumana had used to pull power from the land, how she’d used all that magic to force a temporary bond with the
land
of
Midguard
. The alliances she’d made with nature deities in Midguard, promises she’d made to convince them to help her bond. She would have violated those promises as easily as she’d violated her pact to her own land if she’d ever gotten a second chance at Saamal’s bed. The
land
of
Midguard
was already suffering from its people’s lack of government and order, it didn’t need a foreign goddess usurping its natural order too.

Aiyana’s decision finalized itself as the last of Chumana’s crimes paraded before her. “You have taken for over a century, Chumana. Now it’s time for you to repay the land for all it has given you.”

The briars around Chumana’s body slithered over her scales, tightening with every coil. Chumana’s face twisted in pain and she hissed as the thorns buried between her scales and pulled. Blood flowed in sheets from the wounds, pouring into the ground.

“You put no blood, or sweat, or tears into this land,” Aiyana said sadly. “You didn’t tend it, didn’t thank it for its sacrifice. You reaped and never sowed.”

Chumana opened her mouth, but no words came out. Her eyes bulged as the vines continued to constrict around her, her blood flowing faster until crimson rivers flowed from her body. The life-giving fluid rushed to the pits that had opened up around her, flowing into them. Aiyana sighed as the land drank the goddess’ essence, fed from her energy. The rumbling in the earth that had become so constant it had faded to the background stopped and in some far off part of her mind, Aiyana felt Cipactli relax. Words flowed into her, not her own, but those of the beast of the land beneath her, shaped and helped along by Aiyana as they passed her lips.

“You have shunned your divine duties, Chumana. And now it is time to face your judgment. No more will you be the Flower Maiden. Your godhead is forfeit. Return to the cycle of life and be reborn.” She stared down at the goddess bleeding her life into the soil. “And may the earth have mercy on your soul.”

The ground cracked around Chumana, the vines pulling and tugging her down. She opened her mouth to scream and a vine jerked tight around her neck, severing her head from her body. Her arms were next, then her legs, all of her limbs falling from her body in a spray of blood that rained down to the dry grass beneath her. Blood gushed from her dismembered form and her flesh sank into the earth, swallowed up by the monster she had sought to starve to death.

Energy thrummed to life as the earth closed over her remains. A rush of power spilled over the land. Vibrant green grass burst from the barren dirt, pale blades filling the air with the fresh scent of life. The lake beside the castle swelled, bubbling as it rushed to fill its bed once again. The brittle leaves on the trees trembled and plumped with new life, new essence. The wall of brown, brittle briars that had once surrounded the castle swayed and bobbed as life rushed back into them. They slithered over the land, rushing toward Aiyana where she stood with her arms held up to the sky, her head falling back as she grew dizzy with the welcome rush of the land’s returning glory. They flowed over her body, and roses burst to life amidst the thorns.

A hand on her shoulder drew her attention from the heady buzz of energy. She had a flash of Saamal’s human face before he pulled her against his body, his mouth covering hers in a life-affirming kiss.

Saamal’s heart pounded in his ears, every muscle in his body trembling, not from the rush of his returning powers, but from need. Aiyana was alive, she was here, she was in his arms. He could feel her body in his arms, taste her mouth under his, the sweet flavor of the air over a field of flowers. He knew she was here, and yet he couldn’t slow his heart, couldn’t completely push the driving need to reassure himself from his mind.

“You’re alive,” he murmured fervently as he dragged his lips from Aiyana’s mouth. “You’re alive.”

Aiyana wrapped her arms around his neck. “I figured it out. After I died, when I saw the land, the real, physical land… I saw you, saw your leg fall into that pit…”

Saamal covered her mouth with his again, smothering her words. He should be curious, should be desperate to know what had happened and how. But right now, all he could think about was her warm body in his arms, her breath against his skin, and the glorious fact that she was alive.

When he finally pulled away again, the scent of roses caught his attention. Bright spots of scarlet caught his eye and he raised his gaze to find they’d been surrounded by a crimson cocoon of vibrant roses and thick brown briars. The world around them had been shut away, banished from their sight by a wall of living, thriving nature.

“A natural bower.” For the first time he noticed something hard digging into his arms and looked down to see thorn-studded briars wrapped around Aiyana’s arms. The thorns pressed into her skin, piercing it in places, but Aiyana didn’t seem to be in any pain. The roses bloomed between flushed forest green leaves, each velvety petal offering a delicate perfume that filled the bower. He smiled at Aiyana and brushed her hair back behind her ear. “Your doing?” he asked, gesturing with his head at the wall of roses.

Aiyana ran her hands through his hair, fingers playing with the short black strands. “We can always have a formal wedding later…”

Her words sent Saamal’s spirit soaring, his heart pounding in triumph. His wife. Aiyana would be his wife, Aiyana
wanted
to be his wife. He felt as though he could conquer the five kingdoms, extend the reign of the Fifth Sun for eternity, and he honestly couldn’t have said if it was the power flowing through him like strong drink, or the knowledge that he was finally worthy of the woman he’d been planning to marry for the past century and had only fallen in love with yesterday.

Aiyana pressed her body against him, soft curves against the solid heat of his own body, and hunger spiked sharp and hot inside him. He pulled her tighter against him, startled when rose petals began to rain down from the top of the bower. He chuckled in surprise, noticing the rose petals had formed a velvet bed around them. An appropriate wedding bed for his beautiful bride. He lifted Aiyana in his arms, idly watching the briars curling around her body as they moved to make room for him.

“Briar Rose,” he murmured.

“What?”

He smiled and inclined his head toward her body, at the briars curling around her like pets. He laid her down on the bed of roses, raking his gaze over her curves and smothering a groan as his mind tried to race ahead. “You are my Briar Rose.”