by Blake, Laila
He was just too far away. A long time ago, he’d heard her name called several times, but she never answered. At some point he thought she had, but it was so quiet and so low, he wondered if he had made it up in his fevered longing mind just to catch a sound of her. But for so long now, he hadn’t heard a single thing.
He knew better than to think she was sleeping; it hadn’t been the evening after which she could sleep. He should have heard her walking around, plucking her lyre, maybe crying. But there was nothing and as much as he told himself that he was just too far down in the bowels of the building, the bad feeling that had taken hold of his stomach a while ago just grew into a tense panic in his gut.
Finally, he opened his eyes with a grunt of frustration. They flashed wolfishly silver through the small cell and landed on the distracting vermin feasting on the specks of gruel left in the bowl he’d been given a while ago. From one second to the next, Owain’s face contorted in anger, and anger grew into something more, a muzzle and sharp teeth for the flash of a second in which his chest exploded in a dangerous growl.
The rat scurried out between the iron bars and Owain’s face turned back to normal, tired and frustrated, his hands balled to fists. He know that it was entirely possible he was obsessing about Moira’s safety because it distracted him from his own rather uncomfortable position, but he doubted it. He had spent nights captured before, had spent a whole month in a foreign dungeon once, tortured for information on his captain’s strategies. This was nothing and they were only humans; badly trained ones, at that. He doubted that Lord Rochmond would call for his head, but even if he did, Owain had little doubt he could tear through the guards’ ranks and to freedom.
He could have done it now, really. The metal rods were sturdy but he could see where their setting in the stone was old and cracking here and there. If he did that, however, he would never see Moira again. Never. He would never have the chance to tell her how sorry he was and she would remember him as the wolf who stole her maidenhood and humiliated her, repaid her love with spite and disgust.
His face flashed hot and red with shame at the mere thought of it now. He’d had reasons then, but whatever the reasons had been — he had never behaved as abominably to a woman, as he had that night. And he’d had to behave like it to the one woman, the one incredible girl, who made him feel like no one else, brand new as though his long life, his disappointments and failures had never happened, or happened to another Owain in the distant past. He ached for her now, ached for just a single sound, just a note of her scent, but either were denied him by distance and heavy stone.
Finally, he closed his eyes again and leaned his head against the rough wall. Morning would dawn and he would know his fate, morning would dawn and he would hear her again, somewhere. And not all was lost, he knew. He had heard her answer to Deagan Fairester’s proposal and it had made his chest swell warmly. He had also heard the nobleman’s guards march out of the entrance hall in rank and file and that, too, had made him smile. Both, however, now seemed like hours ago and as much as he tried, he couldn’t dispel the gut feeling that something was horribly wrong. His wolf knew it, too, howling in his chest, wanting to pace the cell like a caged lion in a Carnivalé. Owain spared him that indignity, but he felt the same need to rattle the cages and tell someone to just check on her, just make sure she was all right.
Instead, he breathed in deeply and tried to calm himself. She wouldn’t answer the door no matter who knocked there right now. And yet, underneath it all, he was still sure she would open for him and hear him out. Her eyes had promised it that evening, even if he didn’t deserve it any longer.
He couldn’t sleep but he could try to pass the time, dozing and thinking of her face and the way her hair blew in the night wind. He only had to close his eyes to see her flushed cheeks and her emerald eyes and he was back in her chambers, pulling down her dress, watching her bountiful breasts sway and shiver from the motion as her nipples grew hard and erect. It wasn’t penance and he knew he had no right to these memories; but he had them still, locked tightly in his heart.
Thinking of them, it took him a moment longer than usual to become aware of sounds; feet scraping over stone, low voices speaking urgently. Frowning, Owain raised himself from the straw on the ground, patted it off his clothes and came to stand by the iron bars, looking out into torch-lit corridor of cells. It was obvious that Lord Rochmond didn’t often find reason to lock people in here.
“I really think I should wake the captain and … ” Owain heard the guardsman at the top of the stairs, hurrying after the sound of two sets of feet.
“Don’t worry about it, Clifton already gave us his leave and returned to his bed chambers. You don’t want to wake him a second time, do you?”
Owain did not recognize the voice but it made him shiver. He couldn’t place it - it was male and strong, a soldier’s voice and yet there was something odd and wrong about it.
“But … ”
“Really, guardsman, you have nothing to worry about. Simply return to your post and let us do our business. We will be back out before you know it.” Again, Owain tilted his head in a frown, trying to place the voice and failed. A shudder went down his spine and set his hair on edge; the wolf’s hackles raised dangerously and Owain let him in enough to color his eyes silver. He was ready.
When the two figures entered the corridor alone, he watched them closely. They were an odd pair, a soldier and an old woman. The latter was vaguely familiar, the former wore the Fairester crest and colors but Owain had never seen him before.
“Owain?” the old woman asked when they stood in front of the cell. She sniffed, her eyes looked exhausted and her skin smelled like snow and blood. Before he answered, he breathed them in deeper, interpreting the layers of smells one by one.
“Who is asking?” Owain returned calmly.
“My name is Iris, this is … Carl,” the old woman replied before the soldier took the lead.
“We need to speak with you about an urgent matter regarding young Lady Rochmond.”
Owain tensed and narrowed his eyes. He could feel his heart beating faster but he refused to be taken in so easily. They were both strange, and smelled stranger and he had seen enough for one evening to not trust easily; especially if presented with the very information he longed for most.
“You,” — he nodded at the soldier — “are not who you pretend to be. And you,” — his face swung around to Iris — “work for Fairester. You brewed the poison, didn’t you?”
The Fairester smell was in her clothes and hair, and so were the herbs and the steam and the smell of the liquid the young nobleman had laced into Moira’s wine. Owain noted with satisfaction that both took a step back and exchanged a glance. Owain was the one behind bars but he was not entirely without power.
“I did,” Iris admitted quietly and looked at the floor. “But I swear it wasn’t … poison exactly. It wouldn’t have hurt her. Still, I made a mistake, and Fairester threatened me. And my friend here … adopted this disguise to gain entrance to the castle. We are not here to deceive you. We need your help.”
“The old woman speaks and the soldier is silent … ” Owain noted, eyeing the stranger distrustfully. The old woman was telling the truth, he could smell it easily. It didn’t mean he trusted her or liked her but for the moment his skeptical gaze lingered on the man.
“He knows better than to try and speak through a disguise to a strong Blaidyn,” the soldier answered and it made Owain even more uneasy.
“I know many men who can lie in word and deed. I don’t know any who can lie in appearance as well as you seem to be doing.” His voice was quiet and he had taken a step back from the bars. The soldier was not who he seemed to be, he did not smell like a soldier, nor did move like one or speak like one. “The eyes are easier to fool than the ears or the nose,” he added.
The soldier nod
ded and gave a tiny bow. To Owain, it looked oddly androgynous, and he raised his brows further. The smell also didn’t have a particular gender in many ways.
“You know about Moira, don’t you?” The soldier — who wasn’t a soldier, who wasn’t a man — asked and Owain stared hard at him for a long time.
“I don’t know what I know, or what I saw. I told you, the eyes are easy to be deceived,” he returned carefully but his eyes and the set of his features seemed to tell the soldier all he had to know because a strangely sad smile slid over his features.
“She is my daughter, Moira. This is her sister. I know you … care about her and she cares about you. That is why what happened, happened. It was your love, your tenderness that triggered it, wasn’t it?”
Owain looked down. He wasn’t ashamed of what they had done but he couldn’t quite process what he was hearing, and he certainly felt a dizzying sensation at hearing that he was standing there casually with someone who seemed to suggest they were Fae. Just like that.
“Why are you here?” he got out, trying and trying to smell something that would mark them as non-human but he couldn’t quite make it out.
“We told you,” the soldier continued, once he had taken control, the older woman had sunk into the background, sneezing into a wet handkerchief. Sighing, Owain drew out his own and offered it through the bars.
“Moira is in danger.”
This time, he listened, head snapping up and eyes wide. He’d felt it, hadn’t he?
“I haven’t heard her in a while … ” he agreed quietly, nervously. He could feel the wolf’s agitation all too clearly, his silver eyes moving from figure to figure. “What kind of danger?”
“The Fae kind,” the soldier said simply and this time it sounded distinctly female. Owain blinked as though that would dispel the chasm between what his eyes saw and what his senses were telling him but nothing changed. “There are those amongst us who still very much feel like the war is not over. That Humans and Blaidyn may have thought they won, but in the end, we will take it all back and repay your kind for your treason.”
Owain stood his ground, a tiny snarl escaping his lips. The soldier’s lips curled into an amused and disturbingly seductive smile.
“Hold your temper, Blaidyn,” he teased, eyes lingering on Owain’s broad shoulders. “We are not one of them. I have two mixed blooded daughters and all I want to do is protect them. My daughter is in one of the towers, and he has her. I’m afraid he will hurt her if we don’t stop him. Alone, I am not strong enough. With you, we might be. That’s all I know.”
Owain swallowed and puffed out a hot cloud of air. Did it matter? He was already imprisoned. How much worse could a Fae trap be that it wasn’t worth the chance that they were telling the truth? Of mixed blood, he realized. He had been wrong. Half Fae. But what that meant for Moira, he did not know; only that he didn’t want her to be alone when she found out.
Chapter Twenty-One
Moira’s eyes were closed again. She was tired and she felt safe in this little tower room away from the world, just she and her old mentor. They wouldn’t look for her here, none of them, least of all Fairester. Maybe here, maybe she could sleep for a while.
“Wake up, girl,” a voice said and Moira smiled at the roughness that showed her he cared. Her eyes opened again and formed a vaguely curious expression. “I don’t want you to sleep yet, girl, understand? We are not finished, not for a while.”
“Yes, Brock,” she told him with a childlike nod and tried to pull up her legs. Her feet were still bound, and she pouted a little. “My feet hurt,” she whispered unhappily and this time, Brock’s smile was benign. He leaned down and pulled at the rope that held them, lifted them up and onto his thigh and started to rub his thumb against the arch of her heel.
“How about this, my girl,” he started, eyes never leaving hers. “We finish this and you answer all my questions and then we can get rid of this pesky rope. In the meantime, I keep doing this; how does that sound?”
Smiling, Moira bit into her bottom lip and nodded. She liked the question game and the touch on her feet.
“All right. Now, concentrate. I want you to tell me about the night you weren’t in your room. The last full moon. What happened?”
Moira gnawed at her lip a little longer and a smile spread wide over her features. Suddenly, like a trickle of her magical heritage, a dimple appeared in each cheek, her sallow face transformed in an instant.
“It was the full moon,” she repeated, easily remembering. “You said Owain would be gone and I thought … I thought that meant I could find my way outside, see the moon. I love the moon.” He eyes were drawn to his window as though trying to find it, and then she gasped, her eyes shining like a little girl. “It’s snowing, look, Brock! The first snow! Can we … can we go out, please please please? I looove snow.”
Brock sighed. Certain spells and draughts did have their drawbacks. Maybe it served him right; he was getting soft in his old age, shying away from hurting this one girl. In a way, even he knew that she had spent her life hurting.
“Moira. Focus,” he reminded her, pressing hard into the soft part in the sole of her feet until she moaned and looked back at him with those excited bright eyes. She was beautiful then, looking just like a girl should have looked all the time, but how Moira never had.
“Do you remember the question?” Brock asked patiently and when she nodded her head eagerly up and down, he sighed wearily and gestured her to continue even if she kept glancing at the snow outside his window.
“I went through the kitchen,” she told him, trusting him implicitly. “Into the orchard, it’s the easiest way. There’s a weak spot in the moat I can jump. I like the orchard, it smells like apples there and now it smells like snow.
“I … I pushed myself along the wall to get to the weak spot. It’s easy to find if you know where it is. I can show you if you ever want to get away … anyway. Then the most wonderful thing happened; it was scary at first, I looked up and at the other side of the moat was a huge creature. A wolf, but not really like one. It was Owain, well, Owain’s wolf.” Her expression grew tender and Brock frowned, his hand stilling on her foot.
“I greeted him and he greeted me,” Moira recalled dreamily. “He is really sweet, playful, you know? We ran down the hill and landed in a pile of autumn leaves and he licked my face. And we played in the river … I’d never … never felt so, so happy and so, so free before then. Never. I like his wolf. And then he brought me back and I … I snuck back inside. Nobody noticed and I went back to bed. I really slept that night, for hours and hours.”
Moira chuckled and rubbed her shoulder against her cheek, as she couldn’t scratch it with her still-bound hands. She finally looked at Brock again, but instead of the proud look of approval she had been expecting, he looked angry and Moira immediately shrunk a little.
“I’m sorry, I promise that is the truth, Brock … ” she said quietly and the Fae nodded, mulling it over for a long moment as he watched her face; so innocent, so eager to please. What a beautiful pet she would make if trained right.
“Did you notice anything unusual when you returned to your chambers, anything at all about the castle or yourself?”
That was an odd question, even to Moira’s drugged mind and she thought about it for a while before she shook her head.
“I was tired and … happy? I don’t know, I just snuck and got undressed and fell into bed. I promise, Brock.”
Nodding, Brock leaned back in his chair. He let Moira’s feet sink to the ground again. He saw the poker in the fire but he knew there was no use in it. She would have told him if she had noticed her glow, he was sure enough of his magic now and despite her ramblings about the wolf, she was still the girl he helped to raise. Flawed and human, but not beyond redemption.
“Can you do something for me, child?” he
asked finally, and her eager nod made him feel more benevolent to her again. “Call the glow. I know you can do it.”
“The … the glow, call the glow?” Moira asked confused and obviously afraid to disappoint.
“Yes, the glow.” Brock answered, glaring down at her. “Your Fae glow. Call it for me, girl.”
“I don’t know how.”
Brock grunted and got up. She was so young and so new to the magic. He tried to count that in her favor but he was getting impatient, too.
“Look at me, I will show you, and then you try. Open yourself up to it.” Brock had never fathered a child. Even for Fae, he was not young; but he had never known the joys of fatherhood, of encouraging and working with the inherent magic in all Fae children. Conception wasn’t easy for Fae, one of the few trade-offs for their life span and Brock had never really tried very hard. Here he found himself faced with someone very near a child to him and he didn’t know how exactly to explain or encourage the magic to flow.
Instead, he breathed in deeply and let it flow. He opened the floodgates he always had to hold shut tight in the presence of humans. Of course, after years Lakeside, the magic was no powerful stream, ferociously fighting against the block. His magic was a trickle that happily sprang forth a little when he let it flow. The glow started at his chest and slowly radiated outward to his face and his arms, finally reaching his hands. It glowed dimly through the fabric of his robe but there was light, nonetheless, and Moira stared, wide-eyed and wondrous.
“How … ?” she whispered breathlessly. But Brock wasn’t finished. She could see the lines of his face slowly melting in the golden glow. His hair changed as well, until it was full and dark. Only his eyes stayed clear and blue, glittering and shining like jewels. He was young and old but when Moira tried to look close and find out, her eyes started itch and she had to blink. He was beautiful, so beautiful she wanted to bow or look away as though she could not possibly allowed in the presence of such glowing majesty. His features finer than any humans she had ever seen, a long neck and a slender form under the heavy robe were all she could see and she held her breath before she had to blink again and the distinct need to rub her eyes made her tug at her bonds.
