The Goblin's Heir

Chapter Thirteen: What it Takes

The hunting knife was a heavy weight against my hip as I strapped it in place. I could feel the cold iron even through my thicker winter clothing. Where I was going, the weather was mild, but I couldn't seem to get warm these days. 

"Where are you off to?" Knut asked softly, lifting himself up into a sitting position in our bed. It was strange to hear his voice now after more than a day of silence and avoiding him. We still shared the bed, but on opposite sides, not touching, our backs turned to each other. When he looked at me, I turned away. When he reached for me,  I swatted at his hands. He'd hurt me, wounded me mortally and I, however spiteful it might be, refused to let him try to mend it in the hopes that it might lesson the coming blow. If I stayed angry, if I made myself hate him, would it not hurt a little less, would I not spend the rest of my life weeping? Still, I felt a pang of grief for him when he spoke. His voice sounded brittle, too small to have come from someone so large in my life, reminding me of just how close to the end we were. 

I'd let our remaining days slip away. Tonight was his last. Tomorrow he'd be gone.

"Out." I picked up a second, smaller knife, from the bedside table and bent to slip it down the side of my right boot. "Since the feast isn't until tonight, I thought Odd and I could get some hunting in before we needed to be ready."

"Are you going hunting because you really want to or to get away from me?" He asked, bowing his head, looking down at the empty hands on his lap, the snake-shaped ring on his left hand where our youngest son's ashes once were kept. 

"Can't it be both?" I yanked open the doors of my wardrobe. "I'm tired of moping around here. I need to kill something before I spare the children the trouble and off you myself." My hands reached for the cloak of midnight, touching the soft fabric before I caught myself. I swallowed hard against a growing tightness in my chest. I grabbed a dark woolen one instead and whirled it around my shoulders, fastening the rat-skull shaped silver button that held it closed at my throat. 

Suddenly, he was behind me. His hands smoothed across my shoulders, clasping my arms. I shuttered at the feeling, already sensing my anger start to falter. "Let go of me before I stab you." I hissed, touching the handle of the knife on my hip.

"It has been a while since you've done that." He gave a short, hollow chuckle. He pressed his mouth to my temple, daring a brief whisper of a kiss. "Be careful." He said softly. I felt a slight jostle at my belt and whirled around, shoving him back. He pulled his hands from me, holding up my water skin. "What's in this, I wonder." He frowned before uncorking it and sniffing the opening.

"Give that back!" I leaped at him trying to grapple it away. He tipped it against his mouth, taking a sip of it.

"Just as I thought. Faerie wine." He muttered with a scowl, holding the water skin just out of my reach with his long arms. "Haven't you had enough lately? You've been drunk more often than sober this week."

"I wonder why that is." I hissed again. "Give it back!" 

"No." He said seriously. "You're starting to remind me of someone else we both knew who let grief destroy her." 

I flinched as if he'd punched me in the gut, staggering back a step. "You think I'm turning into Titania?" I spat, following it with a baffled laugh. My eyes narrowed into slits as I thoroughly considered using my knife. "I'm nothing like that witch! I'm losing everything, Knut! Every single thing that means a damn to me! My throne and titles, you and our children, now Cat!" I clawed at my own heart. "If a little drink helps get me through this horse shit,  then so be it! It's not as potent as the fruit it's made from but at least it still helps to numb everything so I don't feel it when you decide to twist the knife in my chest a little more." I tried not to remember Lysander, how I turned to faerie fruit to help sell the lie that I loved him and stop myself from cringing each and every time he touched me. Yet I did anyway. My body recalled the feeling of his hands gripping me too tightly and the pinch of teeth. Lysander, even in the grave, was someone who was difficult to destroy.