Aoife

As much as I appreciated Willow’s help, and as much as I liked being able to turn my mind off for a bit, the fact is, we needed a solution to the Cyrus problem. However, instead of pondering on my own, this time, I enlisted help. With warm tea in hand, my team of master tacticians (my girlfriends) and I were hard at work trying to find a solution.

The moon had never beat the sun, not once, and I’d been hard at work these last few nights trying to figure out why. The loss wasn’t destined, only the conflict, so why did the moon keep losing? The past moons gave me the dreams I asked for. They showed me war after war after war, humans versus monsters, and the outcome only changed once. Alex’s life was different. He outlived the sun.

Unfortunately, I didn’t plan on falling in love with Cyrus any time soon.

Having looked at the moon’s history and come to a dead end, we decided to take a new approach. Together, the three of us outlined what advantages and assets were possessed by either side. When it came to facing Cyrus, there were three main concerns. 

First, he had the numbers advantage. With his flock of angels and the cult of survivors he’d been manipulating, he had at least double what we had, and that’s assuming his growth stayed fairly consistent. There was every possibility things could be even worse. 

Second was his regeneration. Put simply, until the moment he’s dead for good, the bastard heals stupidly fast. Add that on top of the toughness of his scales, and it’d be a struggle to seriously hurt him. 

Finally, there was his presence. There’s no use denying it, his presence is stronger than mine. He’s older and stronger in almost every way, and that means he has the potential to incapacitate most of our fighters with half a glance. If we didn’t find some way around it, we may end up surrendering without even meaning to.

So what did we have?

Diversity. That’s about it. We couldn’t match their numbers, but they couldn’t match our variety. From plant magic and vampires to sneaky ratfolk and a powerful giant, we had an impressive variety of magic and skills available. We just needed to figure out how to use them.

“We have Matt and Chelsea too.” Erica said, taking a sip of her drink. “They're both pretty damn capable, and they have a grudge against Cyrus. I doubt it’d be hard to convince them to feed him some false info or something.”

“That’s technically true, but I’d like to try and avoid retraumatizing them, y’know?” Willow replied. She was curled up in a large cat bed we’d placed up on a shelf, nursing her own tea as she looked down on Erica and I. “They’ve been through enough, and I don’t know how I’d feel about hand delivering them back to the man who hurt them this way.”

“Fair. It’s just that when I think about what he did to me, I really wanna get back at the bastard, and if I was in their shoes, I’d probably feel the same way. Fuck, who wouldn’t? Honestly, it’d probably be pretty cathartic.”

Huh.

There was something to that, wasn’t there?

The biggest difference between now and all the other times the moon and the sun clashed had to do with technology. With a gun, even a human could deal serious damage, dragon scales or no, and it must’ve been a lot easier keeping secrets when people couldn’t just discreetly record you.

Who wouldn’t want to get back at the monster who’s been manipulating you?

“Erica’s right. I’ve felt what his presence can do to you. There’s no way anyone he’s done that to could stay loyal to him. It’s disgusting. It’s violating. It makes you hate him with every fiber of your being.”

“That doesn’t mean sending in Matt and Chel is a good idea!” Willow seemed pretty adamant about that.

“I think we should let them decide, but honestly, that’s not even what I’m talking about here.” The predator in me, the ruthless carnivore that had been so very bored of late, was now rearing up, stretching itself out as a plan began to take shape. A smile began tugging at the corners of my lips, and I felt my presence begin pushing against its confinement. “What if we took the humans out of the equation altogether? Or better yet, what if we turned them against him?”

“Oh.” Willow had caught on. “I mean, it might be tough, but maybe the Fletchers could get a radio and some speakers working. If we can goad him into confessing and then show that to his cult, most of them will probably give up at least, even if they don’t help us.”

“Oh.” Now Erica got it too. “That could work, and I think I know exactly how to make him talk too.” She cast a sideways glance towards Willow. “You probably won’t like it, Pix.”

“You want to use Chelsea and Matt, don’t you?”

“Evelyn too. She’s a pretty necessary component.”

“How so?”

“Her job is to keep them from dying. I mean, all three of them’ll have to agree to do it, but I think it could work.”

“Like Evie would ever go along with this!” Willow was getting pretty heated, and I was about to interject to try and cool things down, but it turns out that wasn’t necessary. After a moment she seemed to deflate. “I don’t think Evie will let this happen, but if you can convince her, then go ahead, I guess. Unless someone comes up with some other idea, this is our best option, and I hate that so much.”

“I do too, Pix.” Erica stood up from our oversize sofa and reached up to pat Willow’s head with her thumb. “I know what Cyrus can do, I know what it’s like to be in his hands, and we both know how broken those two were when they arrived here. I wouldn’t be suggesting this if I didn’t think it was our best possible option or if I didn’t think it could actually be healing. They’ll be ok. I’m sure of it.”

“You’d better be.”

It was going to be pretty awkward in bed tonight, wasn’t it?