Her fingers tingled and flames licked at her throat. She struggled to her feet, wiped her tear-stained cheeks, and took a few deep breaths. The strength seeped back into her legs and her tired eyes were suddenly alive with purpose.

She threw off the blood-soaked nightgown and it pooled, scarlet and ruined, on the floor. The dress that had been soaked through only yesterday had warmed and dried by the open fire, and she held it in her hands for a few moments, allowing the heavy weight of the wool to ground her, bringing her back to earth.

The dress felt like a companion in itself as she pulled it over her bruised bones. It was familiar; it felt like home. Like her, it was soft and feminine, but also impervious to damage, impossibly strong, robust through the most dreadful of days.

Lily took up her mantle and wrapped it tightly around her shoulders, the material falling in thick, draping folds. It gave her strength, protection, the ability to throw up her hood and disappear into the inky shadows. Yesterday it had been simply a cloak, but today it was her armour.

She still had blood caked beneath her fingernails and streaked through her curls, but glancing in the mirror, she rather enjoyed the fierceness it lent her appearance. She looked like someone she wouldn’t want to cross.

As she flung herself from her room, bag slung over her shoulder, she looked again at the blood that had soaked into the soft skin of her fingers

Lily had a strange feeling she’d be covered in blood again before the day was out. But this time, it wouldn’t be her blood, or the blood of someone she loved. No. That wasn’t going to happen ever again.

She started out into the early morning on foot, leaving behind a note and payment for Lorenna, and headed straight towards the coastline. The fire in her belly burned with relentless abandon, and she didn’t look back.

Not once.

Chapter Thirteen

Lily pushed on, on, on. Towards the lighthouse. Towards Alice.

She drove forwards with relentless fury, terrified that if she stopped to let deep breaths into her stinging lungs, if she stopped forcing her muscles to breaking point, she would feel a worse pain. The pain that was threatening to crush her.

She had lost Alice, she had left her home without any real idea of when she would see her uncle or her beloved apothecary again, and now she had lost the one companion she had on her journey.

Morrigan’s death had affected her to an unexpected depth; on their short journey together, they had relied on each other to continue. They had connected through mutual pain and exhaustion and she’d felt that she had found a friend. Lily didn’t believe in fellow creatures being ‘just animals’; she could never understand how anyone could slaughter or even eat another living soul. Morrigan wasn’t just an animal, she was a companion, a kindred spirit.