But now . . .
“It does,” I agreed. “Or it would, in the absence of a viable alternate.”
Igraine’s face clouded with confusion, suspicion milky in her eyes. “But there isn’t one. Elder Avramov just told us as much.”
I let myself sink into the mantle’s elation as I rose to my feet, soaring to the Arbiter’s towering height. I was so tall now that I loomed high above the courtyard, cold wind whistling around my temples, so that even the swarming host of spectators beyond the ramparts could see me easily. A goddess sprouting like a sword from Castle Camelot’s campy-ass stone.
How do you like this version of Excalibur, you Blackmoore twats?
I had no real idea what the fuck I was doing, whether it would even work. But no matter what happened, I knew Talia wouldn’t want me to abandon everything she, Linden, and I had fought for since the start.
For Talia’s sake, I had to at least give it one good shot.
“I cede the mantle, and my authority as Arbiter of the seventh Gauntlet of the Grove, to my cousin, Delilah Harlow,” I pronounced, my voice a thunderclap. “And I step in as combatant for House Avramov.”
29
The Word and the Dream, the Heart and the Eye
An absolute silence descended across Castle Camelot.
Then the Blackmoore matriarch’s shrill voice pierced the quiet, Igraine being terminally incapable of calming her tits in any situation not proceeding according to her design.
“You can’t do this!” she hissed up at me, her aquiline features thinned with outrage, like some bird of prey with its feathers ruffled. “This, this isn’t just highly irregular—it’s unacceptable, not to mention unlawful! The Harlows cannot compete in the Gauntlet, in any form!”
“Untrue,” I said calmly, because by now I knew I had the right of it—the mantle magic wasn’t objecting at all to my chosen course of action. Instead it pulsed inside me, steady and warm, like an internal reassurance that it still had my back. “The Harlows have traditionally recused themselves by choice, and then historical precedent, in order to arbitrate. Now I’m ceding the mantle and choosing to compete in Talia’s stead. All very much according to the letter of Grimoire law.”
“But . . . but that’s not how it’s done!” Igraine squawked, having run out of any objections based in fact.
“Maybe under normal circumstances, no—but under normal circumstances, Scion Blackmoore would have been competing against Scion Avramov herself in this tiebreak challenge,” I pointed out. “Are you really so afraid to have him face down a Harlow instead?”
She subsided at that a little, brow furrowing; I had a point. From her perspective, it wasn’t like I was much of a threat, and certainly less of one than Talia would have been.
Shit, from my perspective I wasn’t a serious threat. A Harlow witch was pretty much the weakest possible champion Talia could have asked for as an alternate—but I was what she had, and for her sake, I was sure as hell going to give it my all.
“Fine,” Igraine acquiesced, her mouth drawing purse-string tight. “We accept the substitution. Against our better judgment, let the record show.”
Rolling my eyes, I glanced over to the Thorns, more out of respect than anything else; it wasn’t like I needed their permission, any more than I’d needed Igraine’s.
“Of course we do, as well,” Gabrielle said, and beside her, Aspen inclined his head, a sideways smile tugging at his mouth, as though he couldn’t quite conceal his happiness at this fresh subversion. And from behind them, out of Igraine’s line of vision, my father shot me two sly thumbs-up that cheered me like not even the mantle could have, assured me that I was doing the right thing.
Then I looked down to Elena Avramov, startled to find that she was outright smiling at me; a real smile, shockingly tender, its sweetness out of place on her gorgeous storybook villainess’s face. It made her look even more painfully like Talia.
“You really do care for Natalia, don’t you?” she said, as I came over to kneel by Talia one more time before I left. “How interesting.”
I reached out to stroke those black drifts of hair and her clammy forehead, so unlike her normal warmth. “I really do,” I said, my belly pulsing with ache. “I wish I didn’t have to leave her like this.”
Elena squeezed my upper arm, mouth setting firm. “My daughter’s strong, and you can trust that we’ve got her from here. We all know how to guard against inhabitations—it’s one of the very first things Avramov witches learn when they begin to wield their magic. She’ll know what to do to ride the banishment out, to keep herself safe inside her mind.”