“You’re very rough, Omi,” Jago said.
“I’m sorry.” Not wanting to hurt the children, she pulled back.
“Did you feel Mama?” he asked, his eyes shining with hope.
Lisle didn’t want to crush his optimism, but she couldn’t lie. “No, sweetheart. I’m not very good at this yet.” Then added, “You and Maiya are bonded.”
Jago shrugged and gave Maiya a piece of shortbread. She stuck it in her mouth and began to gnaw with her new teeth. “I dunno,” he said. “I guess so. Is that bad?” Whatever he thought, he didn’t truly seem concerned with Lisle’s judgement on the matter. Maiya had all his attention.
“No,” Lisle said and forced herself to smile, even though she felt apprehensive. Two children, both half-druid and half-fae, half-astral and half-earth, had somehow figured out how to bond, possibly before Maiya was even born. “Of course not,” she said, needing to reassure herself as much as him. After all, she doubted the process could be undone.
Still, this was unlikely to be what Munro would have chosen for his daughter, and Lisle herself felt a tinge of regret that such a crucial decision had been made so young. What effect would this have on their development? On their futures? She understood with clarity that her grandson would be the consort of a queen. He’d said as much before, but she’d not paid him much mind, regarding the statement as his way of expressing affection for the girl. But seeing how intricately the two were entwined together, she didn’t doubt they shared the same fate.
“I must go back to the Druid Hall now,” she said. “The nurse will return soon to send you off to bed.”
“Aw,” Jago complained. “I wish you didn’t have to leave.”
She pulled him into a one-armed hug. “I know. But I’m tired too. Old ladies need even more sleep than babies,” she said with a grin.
“You’re not old,” he said. “You’re not even a hundred. Nurse Muime says that means not even grown up yet.”
The truth struck her with a shock. Jago didn’t understand that she wouldn’t live a thousand years like he and Maiya would. Not unless she bonded. Rather than argue or explain, she kissed him goodbye and stood. “Take care of each other,” she said to the children. Although their bond surprised her, it comforted her to know he would never be alone, even if Demi was never found and Lisle only lived a normal human lifespan.
Maiya babbled something at Lisle, her deep blue eyes looking serious. Lisle kissed the princess’ tiny hand. “Thank you for your help.” She didn’t know what to make of what she’d learned, but knowing Maiya sensed that Demi still lived gave her hope. She just didn’t know how to use the information to find her.
A few moments later, the nurse returned as promised. Lisle said goodbye again and waved as the children were taken off to their beds. Another faerie showed Lisle out, accepting the druid’s thanks for their cooperation. Lisle headed for Canton Dreich, eager to discuss what she’d found with Munro. If anyone could find a way to use this information to find Demi, it would be him.
∞
Alyssa knelt on the ground by the roadside with a water pail and a scrub brush. The punishment of manual labour was not as excruciating as the looks from the other Watchers in the compound. The sun had risen, but unlike the other Watchers, she wouldn’t be allowed time for recreation. She would scrub floors and shovel shit for weeks, if not months.
How idiotic she’d been. All her troubles were her own fault. She shouldn’t have pushed. Quinton wasn’t ready. Her eagerness cost her dearly and, in her mind, unfairly. Although she’d brought her punishment on herself, she also blamed his refusal to adopt faerie culture. How ridiculous for a man to get angry over an offer of a sexual encounter. Quinton looked fae with his gold skin and pointed ears, and his essence felt fae as well. He gestured like them, talked like them, even moved like them. So she’d forgotten how deeply ingrained human culture would be.
Leocort’s harsh chastisement annoyed her further. He might be her superior, but his anger was hypocritical, considering the way he looked at Lady Druid Lisle. Of course, the lady was far too dignified to take him as a lover, but that was very different from Alyssa’s friendship with Quinton. Alyssa and Quinton had known each other before anyone called him lord, back when he was like any human on the Isle of Skye.
Alyssa’s hands ached. She’d been instructed not to use her powers in her labours, not that she had any that would help. Her abilities were of the mind. Deciding it wouldn’t be a direct act of disobedience, she used her talents to soothe the hurt. Astral flows couldn’t heal a wound, but they could make a faerie not notice pain. Fooling oneself was something she’d been taught to avoid in her early training, but the situation was otherwise unbearable, so she indulged herself and carried on.
The sun was high in the sky and most everyone had gone to their rooms in the keep. One of the senior Watchers told her to stay and scrub until he returned, but she suspected he’d forgotten her. She could hear little besides the breeze and a rustle of leaves on the cluster of trees opposite her.
With no one to observe, she sat back on her heels and rested. Should she continue, risking that she might actually end up spending the entire day out here, forgotten?
When footfalls sounded in the distance, she went back to her work, not wanting to be thought lazy on top of everything else. Keeping her eyes down, she scrubbed with all her might, working one large stone as though her life depended on her efforts.
The faerie approached, almost too quietly. She frowned, listening hard. Why would someone sneak outside the Watchers’ keep? She felt the weight of a gaze settle on her as someone stared from beyond her field of vision. She didn’t dare look. Was this someone curious about her punishment and why she’d been sent away from the Druid Hall? There certainly had been any number of onlookers through the night and morning. Or had someone, please dear Mother of the Earth, come to tell her she could go sleep?
When a long time passed and she didn’t hear any further sound, Alyssa began to wonder if she’d imagined the whole thing. Finally daring to move, she turned her head slightly and peered out of the corner of her eye. A male Watcher she didn’t know leaned against the high stone wall beyond. At a normal time, she might extend her astral talents a touch. Not enough to invade, but enough to get a sense of the faerie. But not after everything else that had happened since her arrival.
She noticed the lack of rank insignia on his shoulder, indicating he was a trainee, as she had been before Quinton approved her transfer to serve with the Mistwatchers, an honour bestowed because of her faithful service on a mission to Zalia. As such, it was unlikely he’d come to give her new orders. Just a gawker, then. “What do you want?” she grumbled and glanced up to meet his gaze. She was too tired to endure his stares silently.
He moved toward her. “I could ask you the same thing.” He had a strange glint in his eye as he bore down on her with an almost aggressive stance.
“Who are you?” she asked, putting down her scrub brush.
“Someone who doesn’t take kindly to spies.” His pale eyes shone with menace.
“Spies?” She nearly laughed. “I serve the queen, as you do.”
He smirked. “My queen is dead.” A chill passed over Alyssa’s skin as he continued to step cautiously toward her. “And now so is my prince.”
So he was of the former Andenan kingdom and loyal to Koen. Alyssa had heard that some were unhappy about the prince’s death and demanding justice, but she never would have guessed any disloyalty would come from within the Watchers. She had to risk that he might sense what she was doing, so she scanned the area quickly, feeling for the minds of others. The good news was he didn’t notice her doing so. The bad news was there wasn’t a soul nearby. This part of the grounds was completely isolated.
“What has that to do with me?” she asked. “I was in the Halls of Mist when Prince Koen was killed.”
“With them.”
“Them?” She fought the urge to back away from him and instead met his int
ense stare with a glare of her own.
He spat on the ground. “The druids.”
Ah. Some would undoubtedly be angry that the druids had taken Griogair away, saving him from facing his crime. “They’ve sent me away, so here I am.” She tried to match his earlier smirk with one of her own.
He stopped a few feet ahead of her. “You can drop the pretence. That story was weak to begin with. Even if a human did not want your companionship, which I find hard to believe,” he said looking her up and down in a way that made her shudder, “such a lapse is hardly worth this kind of punishment and humiliation.”
Alyssa began to genuinely fear for her safety. Should she shout for help? But then, what had he done wrong besides walk menacingly? She’d faced disagreeable people before. She could handle him. “What the human thought was not for me to decide.” She hoped emphasising the racial difference would make him believe her. “Being sent here was the decision of the head Mistwatcher. He believed I should be as far as possible from the royal home at Canton Dreich.”
The Watcher didn’t appear convinced. “And this druid woman you arrived with, am I to believe she delivered you personally just to see the job done? When no human druid could contain the powers of the fae. They may be able to craft artefacts and read runes, but everyone knows they don’t wield the flows as we do.”
Alyssa shrugged. “What you believe doesn’t concern me,” she said. “I go where I’m told.” She gestured to the rocks. “And I do the work I’m given. I will tell you one thing: they’ve learned to take our flows. If I were you, I wouldn’t be so confident in my beliefs about what the druid lords can and cannot do.”
“Your loyalty to them is touching.”
“I’m loyal to the truth,” she said, trying to appear indifferent.
“Therein lies my problem,” he said.
Alyssa didn’t have a ready answer, so she squinted up at him, uncomfortable in the noon-day sun. How desperately she wished she was tucked away in bed. Even a scratchy bunk in the Watchers’ keep would be welcome now.
“You see, we know you came to secretly investigate Prince Koen’s death. As though a granddaughter of Elder Oron and friend of the queen’s from her days in Skye would be sent for this kind of punishment.” He laughed. “Our commander told us you were trying your tricks during his meeting with the druid. Did you believe no one would notice? No, you are obviously a spy, and no one must find out that Prince Koen arranged his own death. It was his final wish, one a few loyal soldiers helped him complete.”
“What?” Alyssa stared.
The Watcher lunged at her, and the metal knife appeared in his hand so quickly she barely had time to react. She felt the stinging slice near her wrist as she rolled away. Her training took over, and she flung all her ability to influence into his mind. She hoped to knock him off guard long enough to disable him, but he’d been trained as the best of the Watchers had, and he batted away her attempt at mental invasion easily.
She had no other powers, only that of her mind. As the panic set in, a gleam of triumph appeared in his eye. “If you’re right, and I’m a spy, which I’m not, then you can’t hope to get away with attacking me. They will just send others to investigate. My death would only tell them there is something to their suspicions.”
“One day’s delay is enough for us to get rid of the evidence in Prince Koen’s cell. We hadn’t dared before now, but it seems our time to act has come. If you are telling the truth and your arrival is nothing more than to get you away from the druid lord, then everyone will simply believe you ran away, unable to face your punishment. An even better outcome.”
Alyssa’s mind raced. Her opponent moved well and quickly, his combat training more advanced than hers. He had the benefit of earth spells, judging by the conjured knife in his hand. With her astral abilities useless, she had little to go on besides her physical training. Even without magic, she would not be as strong as this faerie, who was both taller and more muscular.
He moved in a frenzy, and she never had a chance. When the knife went into her gut, she froze in horror. She was going to die here in the dirt, unable to tell anyone what she’d learned, a truth that might have meant redemption in the eyes of the druid she’d fallen in love with. The unfairness of her situation ate at her even as the warmth of her blood seeped over her skin.
Her breathing became shallow, and she stared into his eyes as he backed away slowly. She had no telepathic ability to call for help, so she knelt in front of the Watcher, wallowing in the injustice of what had just happened. Her sense of loss and betrayal quickly morphed into anger.
The Watcher looked down on her. “Goodbye, Mistwatcher,” he said softly and turned to glance toward the door as though he’d heard something.
She waited a heartbeat, hoping he had indeed heard someone approach, but soon realised no one would rescue her. She picked up the only weapon at hand, the rock she’d been so vigorously scrubbing. Using her mind talents, she took away her own pain and bolstered her confidence. She influenced herself, surprised to feel her sureness gathering. She steadied her hand and took aim. With all the fury in her, she threw the rock at the side of the Watcher’s head. The weapon thumped home with a sickening crack. He crumpled.
Shoring up her energy to manipulate her own sense of reality and time, she gave herself strength. Although a wave of dizziness took her when she rose to her feet, she managed to stagger to her assailant. She picked up the rock once more, and bashed his head as hard as she could.
With a wave of her dwindling power, she steadied her heartbeat and headed inside, holding her hand tight against the wound at her side. She had to reach Prince Koen’s cell before she collapsed. If she didn’t make it before this man’s accomplices destroyed whatever evidence there was of Griogair’s innocence, her struggle would amount to nothing, and she would be forever viewed as a silly girl unfit for duty with the druid lords. Even worse, she’d be branded a murderer.
She was impressed at how easily she moved and how well she was able to fool her body into believing she was hale and well, despite the evidence of her eyes. Telling herself the light-headedness was of no concern, she crept inside, taking the back corridors only a Watcher could access. If it hadn’t been the middle of the day, she would have been seen and stopped, so her attacker’s timing served her well.
No one guarded Prince Koen’s cell. Why would they? Clearly, no one knew there was any evidence inside, and Koen’s co-conspirators must have decided it was better not to draw attention to the place. They’d been right, of course. In their place, she’d have done the same thing. As long as no one suspected the truth, no one would think to rummage through his belongings. Everything would eventually be returned to his father, Estobar.
Alyssa wondered if Estobar was in on the plot. Perhaps he arranged everything. Could a father kill his own son? The thought made her sick, but she knew the answer. They must have believed Eilidh would execute Koen as a traitor. This way, Koen got his revenge in first by taking away her first mate, the faerie who’d had Koen arrested. The plan was almost poetic.
Inside the luxuriously appointed cell, Alyssa sat at Koen’s desk, refusing to glance down at the blood seeping through her fingers or the red trail left on the floor behind her. Where would the prince have hidden secret correspondence? She rummaged through his belongings, covering the room and all of the Prince’s possessions with bloody fingerprints.
A book of fire magic caught her eye. Fire hadn’t been Koen’s element. So why would he possess such a thing? Inside, she found a letter from Prince Estobar. Her instincts had been right. The plot had been his doing. Now all she had to do was return the evidence to the Halls of Mist.
For a moment, she’d fooled herself into thinking she could make it. But when she rose, blood gushed from her gut. Her power ebbed, then vanished. She fell backward, unable to stop herself crashing to the ground, the bloody letter crumpled in her hand.
Unfriendly voices sounded and dozens of feet pounded in her direction. “N
o,” she whispered. She imagined Munro’s face floating nearby, scowling at her in disappointment.
“The trail goes this way,” someone shouted, and the footfalls approached.
The door flung open, but Alyssa was too weak to move.
“There she is!” She heard the scorn and accusation.
“Faith,” another muttered. “It looks like a butchery in here.”
Blackness crept from the edges of her vision. Alyssa could only move her lips silently. A face hovered over hers, and she recognised the commander who had sat with her and Lady Druid Lisle, the one who punished her for Lisle’s use of her astral powers. He had a look of smug satisfaction on his face.
Alyssa died knowing she had failed.
Chapter 15
Lisle felt every one of her eighty-plus years after spending hours in conference with the other druids. That day had been long enough with the journey to Eirlioc and back, but too many urgent matters had come up to allow her time to sleep.
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