Rowan knew he should be arguing against this, should be bellowing.
Dorian went on, “I should do it.”
“No.” The word broke from Chaol—and Aelin. Her first word since this debate had begun.
But it was Fenrys who asked Chaol, voice deadly soft, “You’d rather my queen die than your king?”
Chaol stiffened. “I’d rather neither of my friends die. I’d rather none of this happen.”
Before Fenrys could snarl his answer, Yrene cut in. “So when the Lock is forged and the Wyrdgate is sealed, the gods will be gone?”
“Good riddance,” Fenrys muttered.
But Yrene stiffened at the casual dismissal, and put a hand over her heart. “I love Silba. Dearly. When she is gone from this world, will my powers cease to exist?” She gestured to the gathered group.
“Doubtful,” Dorian said. “That cost, at least, was never demanded.”
“What of the other gods in this world?” Nesryn asked, frowning. “The thirty-six of the khaganate. Are they not gods as well? Will they be sent away, or just these twelve?”
“Perhaps our gods are of a different sort,” Princess Hasar mused.
“Can they not help us, then?” Yrene asked, sorrow for the goddess who had blessed her still darkening her golden eyes. “Can they not intervene?”
“There are indeed other forces at work in this world,” Dorian said, touching Damaris’s hilt. The god of truth—that’s who had blessed Gavin’s sword. “But I think if those forces had been able to aid us in this manner, they would have done so already.”
Aelin tapped her foot on the ground. “Expecting divine handouts is a waste of our time. And not the topic at hand.” She fixed her burning stare on Dorian. “We are also not debating who shall pay the cost.”
“Why.” Rowan’s low question was out before he could halt it.
Slowly, his mate turned toward him. “Because we’re not.” Sharp, icy words. She cut Dorian a look, and the King of Adarlan opened his mouth. “We’re not,” she snarled.
Dorian opened his mouth again, but Rowan caught his eye. Held his stare and let him read the words there. Later. We shall debate this later.
Whether Aelin noted their silent conversation, whether she beheld Dorian’s subtle nod, she didn’t let on. She only said, “We don’t have time to waste on endless debate.”
Lorcan nodded. “Every moment we have all three keys is a risk of Erawan finding us, and finally gaining what he seeks. Or Maeve,” he added, frowning. “But even with that, I would go north—let Aelin put a dent in Morath’s legions.”
“Be objective,” Aelin growled. She surveyed them all. “Pretend you do not know me. Pretend I am no one, and nothing to you. Pretend I am a weapon. Do you use me now, or later?”
“You are not no one, though,” Elide said quietly. “Not to a good many people.”
“The keys go back in the gate,” Aelin said a bit coldly. “At some point or another. And I go with them. We are deciding whether that is now, or in a few weeks.”
Rowan couldn’t bear it. To hear another word. “No.”
Everyone halted once more.
Aelin bared her teeth. “Not doing anything isn’t an option.”
“We hide them again,” Rowan said. “He lost them for thousands of years. We can do it again.” He pointed to Yrene. “She could destroy him all on her own.”
“That is not an option,” Aelin growled. “Yrene is with child—”
“I can do it,” Yrene said, stepping from Chaol’s side. “If there’s a way, I could do it. See if the other healers could help—”
“There will be Valg by the thousands for you to destroy or save, Lady Westfall,” Aelin said with that same cold. “Erawan could slaughter you before you even get the chance to touch him.”
“Why are you allowed to give up your life for this, and no one else?” Yrene challenged.
“I am not the one carrying a child within me.”
Yrene blinked slowly. “Hafiza might be able to—”
“I will not play a game of what-ifs and mights,” Aelin said, in a tone that Rowan had heard so rarely. That queen’s tone. “We vote. Now. Do we put the keys back in the gate immediately, or continue to Terrasen and then do it if we are able to stop that army?”
“Erawan can be stopped,” Yrene pushed, unfazed by the queen’s words. Unafraid of her wrath. “I know he can. Without the keys, we can stop him.”
Rowan wanted to believe her. Wanted more than anything he’d ever desired in his life to believe Yrene Westfall. Chaol, glancing at Dorian, seemed inclined to do the same.
But Aelin pointed at Princess Hasar. “How do you vote?”
Hasar held Aelin’s stare. Considered for a moment. “I vote to do it now.”
Aelin just pointed to Dorian. “You?”
Dorian tensed, the unfinished debate still raging in his face. But he said, “Do it now.”
Rowan closed his eyes. Barely heard the other rulers and their allies as they gave their replies. He walked to the edge of the trees, prepared to run if he began to vomit.
Then Aelin said, “You’re last, Rowan.”
“I vote no. Not now, not ever.”
Her eyes were cold, distant. The way they’d been in Mistward.
“It’s decided, then,” Chaol said quietly. Sadly.
“At dawn, the Lock will be forged and the keys go back into the gate,” Dorian finished.
Rowan just stared and stared at his mate. His reason for breathing.
Elide asked softly, “What is your vote, Aelin?”
Aelin tore her eyes from Rowan, and he felt the absence of that stare like a frozen wind as she said, “It doesn’t matter.”
CHAPTER 92
Aelin didn’t say that asking them to vote hadn’t just been about letting them decide, as free peoples of the world, how to seal its fate. She didn’t say that it had also been a coward’s thing to do. To let someone else decide for her. To choose the road ahead.
They camped that night at Endovier, the salt mines a mere three miles down the road.
Rowan made them set up their royal tent. Their royal bed.
She didn’t eat with the others. Could barely touch the food Rowan laid on the desk. She was still sitting in front of it, roast rabbit now cold, poring over those useless books on Wyrdmarks when Rowan said from across the table, “I do not accept this.”
“I do.” The words were flat, dead.
As she would be, before the sun had fully risen. Aelin shut the ancient tome before her.
Only a few days separated them from Terrasen’s border. Perhaps she should have agreed to do this now, but on the condition that it was on Terrasen soil. Terrasen soil, rather than by Endovier.
But every passing day was a risk. A terrible risk.
“You have never accepted anything in your life,” Rowan snarled, shooting to his feet and bracing his hands on the table. “And now you are suddenly willing to do so?”
She swallowed against the ache in her throat. Surveyed the books she’d combed through thrice now to no avail. “What am I supposed to do, Rowan?”
“You damn it all to hell!” He slammed his fist on the table, rattling the dishes. “You say to hell with their plans, their prophecies and fates, and you make your own! You do anything but accept this!”
“The people of Erilea have spoken.”
“To hell with that, too,” he growled. “You can start your free world after this war. Let them vote for their own damned kings and queens, if they want to.”
She let out a growl of her own. “I do not want this burden for one second longer. I do not want to choose and learn I made the wrong choice in delaying it.”
“So you would have voted against it, then. You would have gone to Terrasen.”
“Does it matter?” She shot to her feet. “The votes weren’t in my favor anyway. Hearing that I wanted to go to Orynth, to fight one last time, would have only swayed them.”
“You’re the one who’s about to die. I’d say you get to have a voice in it.”