Hellfire

Aelin

He looked as she has always known him, that antler crown on his silver hair, his laughing eyes smiling at her, always. She could feel several presences standing behind her, but they all faded to mist and shadow as she stared at her uncle from beyond the grave.

"Hello, great niece," he said, teasing. A sob broke from her then. She was really talking to him. Distantly, she felt Aedion slide next to her in her chair, tears rolling from his own eyes.

"Hello, Orlon," he breathed. Her uncle's gaze shifted, and he smiled at her cousin. "My, Aedion, you look just like your mother, except for your mouth." A pause.

"He's here," Aedion breathed. "My father." Orlon's twinkling eyes seemed to dim, and he sighed.

"I'm sorry that we could not tell you. Your mother never wanted you to know, to keep you from guessing, and to keep you from seeking out the answer. Although it seems the answer found you instead."

Aedion nodded slowly.

"I'm sorry," Aelin breathed words and images and pain flashing through her head. "I'm sorry about your death, and my parents' death, and Cal and Marion. I'm so-" She choked, putting her face in her hands, water streaming out of her.

"It was not your fault, Aelin," Orlon told her softly. Her name. He said her name. Aelin cried harder, feeling tears splash down her front and her chair. A warm hand laid on her back, and she knew without looking that Rowan had come up behind her, waiting if she should need him. When she looked up, Orlon was smiling softly at that hand, and rose his eyes to meet Rowan's.

"I am glad you found her."

Rowan inclined his head, deeply.

Orlon shifted his gaze to look at her again.

"I don't have a lot of time, Aelin. There is a certain strain required to be held by the wielder of the Ölüm, and there are a lot of people behind me." Aelin whipped her head to Morgan, who smiled faintly.

"I will not fall until each has met their dead," she promised solemnly.

"Tell me," Orlon breathed. "Tell me everything." Aelin opened her mouth, and began telling him everything, as promised. From the river to the guild to the mine to the castle and beyond. She told him about Maeve, and about Erawan, and what she had been promised to do nine hundred years ago. She told him about her tattoos, about the male whose hand had not rescinded, about all the wicked and delightful creatures she had met and the army she had raised.

Tears were streaming from Orlon's eyes as she finished, and for a while there was silence.

"And you tell me that you're sorry," he sniffed bleakly. Aelin just stared, her own tears far from dry.

"I did not know. About Maeve, or about the Queen Who Was Promised. I did not know about the king, about any of it. All I know is that there is no way I am letting you die. You are going to Settle, and you will have that time with your court, your family."

Orlon seemed to lean forward, staring into her soul.

"Fireheart, I cannot tell you how to win this war, for it is one I never even dreamed of fighting. But there are people behind me who can help you in that regard." Her uncle smiled, eyes sweeping across her face as if he was memorizing it. His eyes then jumped to Aedion, and said simply, "I cannot speak much with you, but know that your mother is here, and will come." Aedion nodded silently. Orlon looked at them both one last time, smiling, and then vanished, gone into smoke. Aelin wanted to claw him back, to explain just how sorry she was, but then more faces appeared. Two of them.

"Fireheart," her mother murmured.