Page 9 of The Winter Goddess

The Second Death

“Danu, please.”

I knelt on the green moss floor of the throne room and bowed my head, weeping. “Please bring him back.”

“She’s hysterical.” Lug’s voice was heavy with derision.

Danu put a soft hand on my cheek. I looked up at her. Tears were falling down her cheeks. “I can’t bring him back, child, you know that.”

“I will never harm another mortal—never again—if only you’ll let him stay at my side. Please.” My voice trembled and I barely managed to say the words. “Please, Mother.”

Someone gasped. It had been a long time since I’d made any claim to the kinship between us.

“Mortal beings die,” Danu said. “If they did not…” She trailed off.

“I didn’t think he would die. I would have called you. I would have asked you to heal him.”

“Even if you’d called, I would not have been able to help.” Danu’s voice was solemn but firm. “It is one of the prohibitions of your punishment. That we would not interfere with your life.”

I wrapped my arms around myself, hugging my knees to my chest, and began to shudder. I wept and shook for too long there on the warm stone of Tara, but Failinis did not nose his way to my side, did not lick my cheek. No one moved to comfort me.

“I must ask you again”—Danu finally spoke—“what has your punishment taught you? What have you learned about mortals?”

“I have learned only what I always knew ,” I said bitterly. “Their lives are short and miserable and end in death. I knew this already, Danu. I watched Enya die. Now I have watched Failinis die. What do you wish for me to say? That I am sorry? That I am grateful? I am not. All you have caused me is more pain. All you have taught me is that I was right to leave the mortal world alone.”

A tear tracked down her cheek, but Danu did not look sad; rather, she looked angry. “But you had so much in this life. So much that you did not have before. I saw you take pleasure in the bees, in your friendship with Dagda. You loved that dog more than you have loved anything since—”

“Since Enya!” I cried. “I have not loved like that since Enya, and it still is not worth it. Her friendship does not erase the memory of her dead face or her son’s dead face. And with Failinis—my memories of him do not take away this feeling of loss—of the breath in my body rising and falling when he breathes no longer.” I sobbed, holding myself closer, turning away from her, from them all. “I do not want to remember any longer. It would be better, better if I had not known their love at all.”

Danu shook her head, her gaze filled with pity as she pointed her finger at me once again. I was glad when it hurt, glad when pain filled me as pieces of my skin—cerulean and indigo and slate—peeled away and I could do nothing but scream—not for my own suffering, but for my little dog. For Failinis.