Light My Fire

“The scarring could have been handled better, but I see no infection at all. And the healing time is amazing. This should have taken weeks, if not months, to heal. Did you do this, Celyn?”

“No,” Elina answered while rubbing her suddenly itchy nose. “Celyn saved my life, but Brigida the Foul healed my wounds.”

Morfyd, who was crouched on the floor by her bleeding and now whining brother, her hands gently lifting his head into her lap, looked up. “There’s another Brigida the Foul?” she asked.

“Gods,” Briec said, his nose swollen from where Annwyl had broken it, his wounded leg now bound where she’d stabbed him. “Who’d willingly take that name?”

All dragon eyes turned to Celyn, waiting for an answer. He sighed and Elina realized she’d said too much.

“It wasn’t another Brigida the Foul,” he told his kin. “It was the Brigida the Foul.”

Morfyd abruptly stood, poor Gwenvael’s head slamming hard against the stone floor.

“Owww!”

Morfyd and Briec exchanged quick and panicked glances.

“That’s not possible,” Morfyd said. “Brigida the Foul was ancient when our grandparents were young. Now they’ve gone to the afterlife, but you’re saying Brigida still lives?”

“She still lives. And there’s something else. . . . The twins and Rhian are with her.”

The room was still for a long moment. Until Briec broke the silence first with a bellowed, “What are you saying about my perfect, perfect daughter?”

Celyn was sure he’d have to fight the rest of his cousins until Talaith took the bandages from Elina’s hand as the Rider tried to rewrap them around her own head.

“No, no,” she said. “You can’t use those. They’re dirty from your travels. I will get you fresh bandages.”

She turned to make her escape, but Briec slammed his hand down on the table. “What do you know, woman?”

“Don’t woman me!” the Nolwenn witch snarled back.

“Talaith!”

She rolled her eyes. “Rhian and the twins are fine.”

“I could give a battle-fuck about those twins.”

“Daddy!” Izzy admonished her adoptive father.

“What?”

“The twins are kin as much as Rhian is.”

“Those two vipers can take care of themselves just fine. But my sweet, perfect daughter—”

“Can handle herself quite well,” Talaith cut in. “Leave them be.”

“With Brigida the Foul?”

“I don’t know who that is and stop yelling at me!”

“She’s one of our great-great-great-aunts,” Morfyd replied. “Although at this point, we should probably just call her our ancestor. That’s how old she is.”

“So?”

“Dragons live for centuries, Talaith. Not eons.”

“What about those Immortal dragons?”

“They survive by eating their own. Is that what Brigida is doing?”

“I don’t know what she’s doing. But knowing my daughter, I doubt she’d align herself with someone who did. She’d find that in poor taste.” Talaith blinked. “No pun intended.”

“Everyone in the Cadwaladr Clan feared Brigida. Many of them thought she’d aligned herself with the less-balanced gods. And her impossibly long life suggests there’s truth to that. What I’m saying, Talaith, is that she’s dangerous.”

“Well, you two met her,” Izzy pointed out. “And have no family members telling you about how terrifying she was since you were born. What did you think of her?”

It took a moment before the Steppes sisters realized that Izzy was talking to them. Celyn glanced at Brannie, and they grinned at each other, already anticipating what direction the discussion was about to take.

Kachka asked Elina, “Why do they stare? Are they planning our death?”

“No,” Elina replied after removing more cloth from the pouch tied to the belt around her waist and wrapping a fresh bandage into place. “They ask our opinion.”

“Our opinion? Why? Is it trick? So they can plan our death?”

Brannie quickly looked in another direction and Celyn dropped his head.

“I do not know.” Elina looked at Talaith. “Do you plan our death?”

“No, no!” Talaith exchanged confused glances with Morfyd and Izzy. “We just want your opinion about this Brigida. As outsiders.”

“Oh.” The sisters looked at each other, back at everyone else.

Elina spoke first. “Everything about Brigida the Foul drips with disdain and hatred of all living things.”

“Yes,” Kachka agreed. “Evil seems to come from every pore. She clearly has great plans for the whiney little brown girl and the unholy twins that the horse gods should have destroyed at birth.”

They looked at each other again, nodded, and said together, “We like her.”

Izzy, as confused as everyone else in the room, threw up her hands and said, “Like her? How could you like her?”

Kachka answered for both of them. “She is straightforward. If she were going to kill us all, she would tell us so that she could bask in our despair and cries of suffering. Do you not think, Elina?” she asked her sister.

“I agree, Kachka.”

“That’s great,” Talaith said. “That’s so great.” Then she hissed, “You two aren’t helping me.”