Work Text:
Lilith was a cold woman.
Even as she tells her child, who cries for her only feet away in the wardstone chamber, that it will be alright, there is no escaping that fact.
As she felt the life force leave her body, Basgiath's commanding general could have laughed at how apt the description was now. She could physically feel her body growing colder as the Mairi girl drew the breath from her body to breathe life back into the one thing that could save her children. Save them all.
Her final act was one of manipulation, to get Sloane to imbue the stone. All to save Brennan and Mira. Violet.
Lilith was a cold woman, but she loved with a fire that could rival a dragon's.
She was vaguely aware of her youngest daughter, screaming, clawing, and kicking against the grip the prince had on her, in an effort to get to her mother, but Lilith knew it was too late. No matter how much Violet calls for the smaller of her two dragons, she knows she is already beyond saving.
Still, Lilith faced death not with fear, but with an emotion so close to relief that she couldn't quite find another way to describe it.
She wasn't relieved that she was dying - she was fairly certain she would continue to live, if given the choice - but knowing that all three of her children would survive the war raging above their heads thanks to Lilith's death was a relief indeed.
Lilith didn't initially think of herself as cold or closed off. That only came later, after her time at Basgiath earned her the moniker.
The only person who didn't see her that way, it seemed, was the love of her life. She still remembers the day they during RSC during their second year as if it had happened yesterday.
You're going to scare people off, he'd joked to her that day as they trekked through the forest.
That would be unwise, she responded. She'd been curious what this scribe thought of her. Unlike the others, which had cowered in the face of her ruthless reputation, he had been the only one to stare her square in the face. They'll get roasted by the dragons if they run, she said.
They will, he'd said with a grave nod of his head. But then he'd smiled, and Lilith had felt a small part of herself change in the face of it. But I think that's ok. Not everyone has what it takes to survive this place anyways.
He was, like her, a bit ruthless in his own way.
They had a beautiful life together, despite the seeming mismatch between herself, the uncaring rider, and the soft-spoken scribe she grew to love. That love expanded to her son, and then her daughters.
When Brennan had seemingly died in battle, her husband kept her from falling into a pit of despair. She knew, as she watched the flames burn away every scrap of her son, that she could not allow Mira and Violet to face the same fate. He didn't agree with her methods, not at first, but as he learned the truth of it all, her husband came to see that there was possibly no other option.
Lilith was a cold woman - one who was willing to manipulate and cheat a boy who had lost his father in order to achieve her goals.
So she offered the Riorson boy a deal - a way to save his own life and, in Lilith's mind, a chance to finally end this brutal cycle of violence and death that she was certain would eventually claim the daughters she knew she would give her own life for. She was not blind, nor stupid. She could see the hatred shining in the eyes of Fen Riorson's son when she made her offer. She knew he would make every effort to claim Lilith's life as payment for how she cruelly snatched his father from him.
Lilith was a cold woman, and she didn't care.
She trained Mira personally, pushing her second daughter day in and day out until she could kill a man twice her size with half the effort of anyone else in her year. Mira was born to be a warrior.
Violet, however, was who Lilith saw the most of herself in. Her youngest, smaller and weaker than the rest, was no less dangerous, even if no one else could see it. Quiet. Viciously smart. Remarkably observant. Deviously clever.
If Mira was meant to be a warrior, then Violet was meant to be a rider. Controlling magic, after all, was all about the mind, and Violet had one of the best.
The memories of what she'd done, of all her plans - they begin to fade in her mind alongside the power Sloane Mairi draws from her body. Lilith begins to feel her eyes grow heavy.
Will she see her husband again when this is all over? Lilith asks herself the question, her body growing colder, but she doesn't know the answer. Lilith doesn't believe in gods, but she has to believe there is something beyond this life so that she can cling to the hope of being reunited.
Lilith was a cold woman, but she turned to unmelting ice when her husband left her behind. Unmelting because she knew that she could not waver. She was the only one who could protect Mira and Violet, even if they couldn't see it.
So she plotted and schemed. She didn't care who she harmed if it meant one more day where the safety of her two remaining children was guaranteed.
"Aimsir," she calls out. She can feel their mental connection beginning to fracture, flickering and fading and falling as the magic is drawn out of her.
"I am here." The familiar voice is a comfort. Her constant companion over the decades.
"Watch out for them." For maybe the first time in her life, Lilith's voice sounds like she's about to cry. Maybe, if it wasn't for the hot power leaving her, she would.
Aimsir doesn't respond, but he doesn't have to for Lilith to feel the rush of emotion - love and grief - that she instantly recognizes as his answer.
Lilith takes in her children one last time. Violet is alive. Brennan is alive. And somewhere above them, surely, so is Mira.
When Lilith closes her eyes, she feels warm. Her husband waits for her.
Lilith was a cold woman. But she is a cold woman no longer.