by Silver James
“There is no going back,” the Harper snarled.
Becca rocked back on her heels. Abhean’s angry tears had darkened the sky. “Abhean, what has happened?” She choked back tears. Fear’s icy fingers wrapped around her throat, and she could barely breathe. Something terrible had happened. She could tell by the look on Abhean’s face. She prayed it wasn’t Ciaran.
Only then did she realize that the Harper was dressed like a Highland Piper, replete with Scottish plaid kilt and the full kit. “Abhean?” she repeated softly.
“I know what is in your heart,” Abhean growled, stalking toward her. “As I cannot leave this place, then neither will you.”
He grabbed her hand and pulled her into a rough embrace. He tried to kiss her.
Turning her head away from his advance, Becca pleaded with the angry fae. “What have I done, Abhean? Why do you treat me like this? I don’t understand.”
“No, you wouldn’t. You are the Child of the Mortals. A chosen one,” he snarled.
Before she could react, the fae’s arms tightened painfully around her. Her feet left the ground, and then the air filled with glittering stars. Becca’s stomach sank to her toes, a feeling similar to riding an express elevator at top speed. The stars blinded her, and her stomach turned over. She squeezed her eyes shut, willing the dizziness away. In a few moments, she once again felt solid ground beneath her feet. Hesitant to see where they were, she opened her eyes one at a time. Her stomach still churned from the wild ride. She and Abhean stood on a rocky crag. Below them, the dark blue sea lapped against a beach of pristine white sand.
“What do you see?” Abhean barked.
Becca stared around her. She’d never gone beyond the standing stones or her bower in the forest. The ocean, a deep cobalt that reminded her painfully of Ciaran’s eyes, swelled restless and prancing like a spirited stallion as it rushed toward the shore below her. The sky was a blue, so brilliant she squinted against its brightness. No cloud shadowed its expanse. She shrugged, not sure what she was supposed to be looking for.
His hand grabbed the back of her neck and forced her to stare out to sea. “Look again, Child,” he ordered. Gone was the spun sugar and chocolate. His voice grated like the storm-tossed gravel beneath their feet.
Becca blinked away tears and saw a wavering outline, like a mirage far out in the ocean. She blinked again and saw another and another. Abhean’s hand squeezed her neck causing more tears.
“Ah, you see them now, the Islands in Time,” he whispered, his voice low and seductive like melted caramel. “Each island is a lifetime—yours or someone else’s. Mac Lir thinks he is the only one with the secret to their manipulation. He believes he is the only one with the farsight.”
Becca shuddered. Abhean’s deadly cold voice froze her very soul.
Abhean continued. “He is not the only Timekeeper. There are others who can tinker with the lives of the mortals.”
“Can you?” Becca whispered, almost daring to hope. “Can you send me back? Or at least show me the way?”
Abhean turned shrewd eyes on her. “First you must grant me a boon,” he said in that spun sugar voice of his as he turned her in his arms.
Becca eyed him through narrowed eyes, not trusting the sudden change in his demeanor. “What do you ask of me?” She swallowed, her throat working to clear the fear lodged there.
Abhean smiled, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Lay with me, Child of the Mortals. Let my spear fill you up as no mortal man’s ever could.”
Becca stepped back, her anger and distaste plain for the faerie to read.
“Am I not fair to look upon?” he beseeched. He parted his robe to reveal his cock. “Am I not ready and willing to give you such pleasure as you have never known, nor will ever again?”
Becca stared at him with the same fascination as a mouse cornered by a snake. He was gorgeous in a dark, cold way, but he held no allure for her. “You wish to take my maidenhead?” she countered quietly.
Abhean’s smile broadened. “’Tis better for me to do so than that mortal you claim to love.”
He snatched her hand and guided it to his cock, forcing her to stroke and cup him. He purred at her touch. “I will give you much more than that mortal you pine for. And I will have what Mac Lir wants.”
“Mac Lir?” Becca remained suspicious.
“Aye, Mac Lir would have you for his own, Child. He would bind you to him and this place, and then he would leave you with no memory of what went before.”
Becca shuddered again, fear clutching at her belly. Abhean was playing some wretched game with Mac Lir, and she wanted no part it. She didn’t doubt Mac Lir wanted her. She often caught him watching her from a distance, and then she realized the faerie stroked himself as he observed her. She felt dirty each time it happened. From what she’d gathered, fae men were not used to rejection by mortal women. Sooner or later, Mac Lir or Abhean would take her, and there would be little she could do to prevent it.
Becca got angry. She was not some prize in a sick game between immortal rivals. She squared her shoulders. “If this is the boon you ask, then I will find my way without you.”
“But you declared you would seduce Mac Lir himself to gain the secret,” he purred, sure he had the trump card. “I have the secret, and I am infinitely more inclined to make love to you. You would enjoy the experience with me, Child. Mac Lir would take you only to make you forget. You would derive no pleasure from his touch.”
“I desire the touch of no man but Ciaran.” Becca turned away from the faerie.
He snagged her hand, jerked her back, and forced her to look at him. Her eyes glistened with silvery tears. The hard-hearted Harper of the Tuatha dé Danaan felt his heart melt at their sight.
“Do you love him that much, cailín?” he whispered in an awed voice.
“He is my heart and my soul, Abhean,” she cried. “I would give up a hundred lifetimes, nay a thousand, to live just one life and grow old with him.”
The faerie harper stared at her for a long moment, digesting what she’d just said. Ah, to love that deeply. His heart felt like it was surrounded by a block of ice. There was one he had once loved nearly that much—one Manannan Mac Lir had refused to help.
He bent his head and captured Becca’s lips gently with his mouth and murmured against hers,
“At Albun Eiler and Alban Elued, the spring and autumnal equinoxes, when light and dark, love and hate, good and evil are equal, the veil between this world and the next thins.”
Becca grew still with hope growing in her heart.
“An unwavering soul, one with unfinished business and a burning desire, might find its way back to An Domhan,” Abhean told her softly. “You must find your own way, cailín, for none here can help.”
Becca wiped the tears from her eyes with a determined hand. She was not surprised to discover Abhean gone when she could see again. “All I have to do is figure out how to get through the veil.”
“Seek within your heart, Child. Seek with your heart to find what is missing,” a mystical voice as sweet as spun sugar sang in her head.
****
Conchobhar once again stood in the war camp of Clann MacDermot to inquire about the Black Wolf of the MacDermots’ health. His heart sank as Niall and Riordan exchanged worried looks. The king admired Ciaran for his prowess on the field of battle, but the MacDermot meant much more than that to Conchobhar. Ciaran was an honorable man, and there weren’t many of those in the world. He glanced at the tent where Ciaran lay injured. Then he surveyed the faces of the men as they sat in small groups around their fires. The smell of death hung like a pall over the camp. Ciaran’s men knew, just as the king knew, but he still had to ask, hoping someone would give him the answer he wanted to hear, not the one he knew to be true.
“The fight has gone out of him,” Niall replied to the king’s question. “I don’t think he will survive this time.”
The king turned to Riordan. “You are closest kin,” he told the younge
r man. “The MacDermot men look to you as they did Ciaran. Will you take his place as An Taoiseac?”
“Nay,” Riordan spat. “Not while he draws breath into his body.”
Conchobhar shrugged. This fierce loyalty was what set the MacDermots apart from all others. “Onóir bheith suáilce,” the king muttered, honor with virtue. “Take him home,” Conchobhar added aloud. “Let him die in his own place, then.”
The journey home was slow and filled with grief. No man believed Ciaran would survive the trip. Not one man in the troop thought the Taoiseac would ever see Ailfenn again. Ciaran’s body, however, proved stouter than his heart. He survived the journey.
Riordan and Niall laid him in the bed he’d once shared with Becca. Siobhan fussed over him even as he slept, unmoving, unfeeling, uncaring, willing his heart to quit beating so he could join his true love in the ever after.
A sennight passed, and Albun Elued, the autumnal equinox, came, yet Ciaran lay still as death. Siobhan attended to his wounds, and Riordan attended to his clann. Niall just paced the hallway outside, willing his Taoiseac to live.
Six months ago, Becca had appeared on the night of Albun Eiler. Niall thought back to his feelings that night, his fear that something terrible would come to pass. His premonition had come true, and he wished he could change things, make them right somehow. Niall loved the fallen warrior with his entire heart and soul. Loved him maybe even more than he loved Siobhan. Certainly loved him enough to die for him.
Siobhan softly closed the door to Ciaran’s room and watched her husband’s broad back pace away from her. There was nothing she could do to change the outcome. She knew of no spell, no prayer, no sacrifice that could be made. Even Odhran had all but blinded himself studying the old manuscripts, looking for some way to bring Becca back into this world.
Niall turned to find his wife watching him. The look on her face broke his heart. “Come, love,” he whispered. She fell into his arms, and he kissed her deeply, blessing again the gods for bringing her into his life.
****
Becca stared into the stones, the tears on her cheeks streamed unheeded. Ciaran’s once glorious hair lay in a ratted nest around his head. Lines etched his face, ones that hadn’t been there before. His lips were drawn, and his skin pale. He wore the mark of death. Becca longed to lay her palm on his beloved cheek and kiss him awake. “You must live, Ciaran,” she whispered, reaching through the stones. “You must live for me and ours. You must love me enough so I can find my way back to you.”
Ciaran opened his eyes. Becca’s beloved face swam in front of him. He reached out to touch her, and his finger captured a silvery tear as it caressed her cheek.
“How is this possible?” His voice, rough from little usage, cracked. To be so close and yet so far from her, his heart cried.
“Love, Ciaran,” her sweet voice whispered again to his heart as butterfly wings fluttered against his cheek. “Love lives forever, and through it, all things are possible. Hear my words, and know your heart resides in mine for all time. Keep my heart in yours. As long as it is there, our love cannot die. Your love for me will light my way back to you. I will come back to you,” she promised.
“Becca.” Her name tore from his soul, a prayer and an oath.
Love me, Ciaran.
“I do,” he promised the darkness.
Dawn wasn’t far off when Siobhan slipped out of Niall’s embrace. She’d heard a noise. She cocked her head to listen, but the entire castle was shrouded in silence. She shivered. The castle was never completely silent. Suddenly fearful, she slid out of bed, wrapping Niall’s mantle around her naked body. She had to check on Ciaran, afraid he’d finally gotten his wish—afraid death had come to claim him. When she got to his room, she found his face wet with tears, and his heart beating stronger than it had in days.
“He lives,” she told Niall joyously as her mate entered the room behind her. Niall wrapped his big arms around her and held her close. “What magic have you wrought, my love?” he asked, awed at his wife’s power.
“No magic of mine,” she declared. She sniffed the air and caught the faint scent of roses and something clean, like sea air or snow on the mountains. She stared down at Ciaran. “Love,” she whispered. “’Tis the magic of love.”
Chapter Eighteen
The greens and browns of September rolled into the frosty nights and boisterous colors of October. Autumn came to Ailfenn, painting the countryside with glorious oranges, riotous reds, and rich yellows. Though still slowed somewhat by his wound, Ciaran was up and about, overseeing his clann once again. His face was lined now, and he looked older than his thirty-one years, but he regained strength daily.
As the days grew shorter, the people of Ailfenn prepared for Samhain. Inventory was taken in the larder and the buttery. Crofters finished harvesting their crops and shepherds brought their herds back from the far grazing lands. The weakest animals in the herds were killed and dressed, the meat preserved for eating during the cold months to come.
Women cleaned their houses, airing their linens and clothing in the soft light of the last warm days of the year. At night, families gathered around their hearths and told the old tales and some new ones. All the girls longed to hear the tale of the taking of An Taoiseac’s true love by the faerie. The boys scoffed at the story, wanting to hear about the glorious battles in which their fathers had fought.
Each night after the evening meal, Ciaran, dark wolf that he was, retired to his den. Sitting on a chair made soft with sheepskins and woolens, he stared into the flames, imagining he saw Becca’s face reflected back at him. As midnight approached and the flames died, he vowed to love her until the day he died. “And I plan to be a bloody old fool before that happens,” he spat into the fire. When the last ember burned to black, he heaved out of the chair. With plodding steps, he climbed the stairs to his chamber. He went the oaken chest at the foot of the bed and took out one of Becca’s gowns. Pressing his face into its folds, he drew hungry breaths deep into his lungs, savoring the faint scent of her still lingering there.
Reverently, he replaced the gown and climbed into bed. Drawing his mantle into his arms, his fingers traced the MacDermot Knot over and over, occasionally caressing the two fiery stones in its center. “You will come back to me,” he whispered repeatedly into the darkness. “Love of my heart, light of my life,” he murmured as he drifted off to sleep.
****
“Light of my life, love of my heart,” Becca whispered. “Oh, Ciaran how I miss you!” Her fingers stroked the altar at the standing stones like a lover’s caress. She laid her head down, and her tears gently fell upon the stone.
Manannan, King of Tir Nan Óg, stared at the beautiful woman, his body hard and aching for her. He knew she came to the stones each day, and he knew why. He’d chastised the Harper for telling her their secret. Now his heart was heavy. He watched this Child of the Mortals survive each of her lifetimes, growing stronger and wiser with each, yet her heart remained empty, and her soul filled with sorrow. He above all the other faerie kings and queens took any covenant with the mortals to heart. It was he who watched over the chosen ones to ensure that they were bound together each lifetime.
He’d thought to spare the Child of the Mortals any more suffering in mind or body by bringing her to Tir Nan Óg rather than returning her to her former life. Manannan realized he’d been wrong. As he watched her melancholy grow each day, he thought his own heart would break. He considered taking her himself, for laying with her would erase her memories of those other lives, but each time he sought to do so, something stopped him. He wanted her as he’d never wanted another mortal woman. He ached to feel her long fingers wrap around his cock, to taste the sweet essence of her. But whenever he looked deep into her eyes, he knew that neither he nor any other in Tir Nan Óg would ever be able to sate the hunger of her soul. There was only one who could. He could not force her. Unlike some others of his kind who took what they desired regardless, to Manannan, even a seduction again
st the woman’s will was still rape. He turned away from Becca, steeling his heart against her pain. He could not return her. He would not. Not without the binding.
****
The week before Samhain, Ciaran himself oversaw the laying of the bonfires on the hilltop above Ailfenn. Odhran chanted over each piece of wood added to the two piles, sending up special supplications to all the gods, old and new. All around Ailfenn, people bustled about, preparing. The last of the harvest had been laid by, meat cured for the cold, dark times of winter, and the people were ready to celebrate. While their joy was tinged with sadness, the folk of Clann MacDermot had much to rejoice this Samhain. Ciaran had returned to them, though his soul ached for the loss of his true love.
Tinkers, minstrels, and harpers arrived daily, their chanting spiels and music filled the air. The tanner and weaver offered their finest goods for the women to haggle over. Breads, sweet treats, and rounds of cheese spilled across overloaded tables. The blacksmith laid out his wares, as did the silver and gold smiths. Life was finally returning to Ailfenn.
Men raced their horses in the meadow below the hill, wagering good-naturedly on the outcomes. Lads and cailíns cast loving eyes at each other, sneaking away from the adults to hold hands and kiss behind the assorted tents. Children danced with delight from one stall to the next table, oohing and aahing over each newly discovered treasure. The clann gathered from the four corners of the territory to celebrate before the dark days of winter arrived to shut them in.
Ciaran walked among them, greeting each by name, stopping to share a moment of conversation, to learn about a marriage or a birth or, sadly, a death. At his throat, the two stones in the MacDermot Knot glimmered softly in the muted sunlight. The men exchanged cheerless glances behind his back, while the women breathed poignant sighs after he passed. Many of them had sought to woo the Taoiseac, and now they knew he would woo none back. The story of Ciaran and his true love had spread far and wide among the people who owed allegiance to Ailfeen.
