Page 107 of Which Witch is Willing?
Aerin put a hand to her head, staring up at the moon. “I thought once the prophecy was fulfilled the answers would become clear. I thought our spell would fix things, not make them worse.”
Claire turned to Lucifer, who hovered outside the shield, her features gathering with the same darkness threatening to overtake their one last glowing ball of light. “What if this is how we fix it?” she pointed to the projection, which currently showed the black forest in flames.
“What?” Tierra gaped, aghast.
“Destruction is essential to rebirth,” Claire explained smoothing at the shimmering garment. “If I’ve learned anything as the fire druid, it’sthat. Think about it, if we want to build a new world, we have to let the old one burn. It’s not an ending. It’s a beginning. A cataclysm between all of this shit-stained patriarchy, war, and oppression and what we’ve done to bend to it.”
Moira nodded in fervent agreement, her eyes catching with the same spark. “We’ve been through it all of this, together. Zombies, zealots, witch hunters, ex boyfriends, zombie ex boyfriends, poltergeists, bitch fights, witch fights, the devil and the prophecy. And through it all, I’ve always sensed, the only thing that could truly destroy us is ourselves. We are sisters and priestesses and lovers and women. We are rare and pure and somethin’ this world has never seen. We were chosen to bring about the apocalypse. So we get to fuckin’ decide what the apocalypse is. We get to build the world our children will protect and balance.”
Tierra put her head on Moira’s shoulder for a brief hug. “You’re right. So wise. We were born to do this, but we fought it because of fear. Beneath that fear, was a knowing. Something more is out there. Something better. Something beyond what we imagined. We are wild creatures of this earth, and we’ve silenced the instinct within us. We have a knowing in here.” She held her fist to her gut. “Inside of us. We are all born to bring something forth into this world. Perhapswewere born to set that free.”
“What about all this?” Aerin pointed to the horror film still playing in the sky. “All of this hatred and conquest, war and pestilence and yes. Even death.” She turned to the horsemen. “What ifyouare the enemy? Not as men, not even as horsemen, but what you stand for? What you’ve been forced to become. To do to others.” That knowing rose within her wild and terrifying. “What if…we are fated not only to love you. But tostopyou.”
For a moment, time stood still.
Julian looked deep into her eyes, and whatever he saw there held him in thrall. His features softened and the trust that glimmered in his liquid gaze filled her with a sky full of grace. “What do you propose we do?”
“We change our skies,” Aerin whispered, thinking of Vian’s note. “We change our skies, so you can touch the world.”
“Come again?” Conquest looked at her as if she’d lost her mind.
Aerin expounded. “What if the Goddess is not a singular being of creation? What if she is not above us in a heaven, or below us in the earth. But…within us? Perhaps she is the warmth, the compassion and the liquid fire inside of us. Perhaps she is unseen because sheisus. We have known, instinctively, that the way things are is unsustainable because she has been lost. And we all know, when we are silent and alone, that there is a better way. A way where every voice is heard, and every life is equal. I don’t want to live in a world where conquest is the only way to victory. Where warlords reign with fear and violence. Where our children suffer from famine, privation, and illness while so many of us have too much. I no longer want to live in a world where people die before their time. Where peopleexist, but do notlive. It was all meant to be more beautiful than this. We cannot wait for death or the promises of the other world. Nor give ourselves over to it. We have to birth it here and now. Together.” She stared up at each one of the mounted horsemen challenging them to understand. “We must change notwhoyou are, butwhatyou are.”
“What would become of us?” Killian asked, his brow crimped with befuddlement.
Aerin shook her head, a weighty grief weighing her shoulders. “I don’t know.”
“Oh for the love,” Moira konked her head with her palm as if she’d just gotten a puzzling joke. “Hope will be your gift. So,hemay mend the rift!” she exclaimed. “It makes sense now.
“You will win the day. So he can light the way,” Claire murmured.
“You will hold the ground. So his soul is no longer bound.” Tierra locked eyes with Killian. “No longer bound to her. To death. To anything but us.”
“That’s the hope.” Aerin said. “I’m sorry, but we have to destroy you Conquest, War, Pestilence, and Death. Together.”
Horses stomped and snorted. The men in their saddles sitting straight and proud their weapons aloft. They shared a long look, holding a silent conclave.
Aerin caught her breath and stood against the man she loved, but she didn’t waver.
It terrified her that she might lose him.
Julian threw one leg over his raven black horse and slid to the ground. He held the scales in one hand and lance in the other.
“Together,” he whispered. Kneeling, he laid both of his weapons at her feet. “Together with the sky above us.”
Conquest’s boots hit the earth and he marched toward Moira clutching his bow with knuckles turned white with rage. His eyes burned into hers with the force of his disbelief and something dangerous and indefinable. Taking an arrow from his quiver, he stood in front of her, staring down at the mother of his child with a silent, masculine intensity.
Then, he hit a knee, and drove his arrow into the earth. “Together, with the sea around us.”
Dru jumped down from his steed and adopted the same posture in front of Claire before plunging his sword into the ground and wrapping his hands around it like a knight of old pledging his fealty. “Together, with the fire within us.”
Killian likewise prostrated himself at Tierra’s feet, Death ceding to life. “Together, with the Earth below us. We are one.”
We are one.
It was the truth that had created them and would unmake them. It was the fire that would consume them. The flood that would overtake them. And the storm that would sweep them away.
The de Moray sisters turned toward Lucifer whose power battered against the shield and they chanted,
