by E E Everly
“Da…” Bronwen shook her head. Her tone had been chiding.
He smiled. “I want to make this as painless as possible.”
I pressed my lips into a thin line. What were they talking about? Was this Brynmor? I had a feeling they were talking about where Cystenian would live after he was married. “I haven’t decided what to do.” Especially since I wasn’t wanted. “My mom has been waiting for Trysten’s arrival for months. I at least must go visit her. Then I’ll decide where to stay. I do want Cystenian to be in Trysten’s life.”
“Of course you do, dear,” Eiluned said as she stroked Trysten’s hair and cheeks.
A few servants brought trays of food and set them on the table. It appeared to be a family-style dinner. The scents were enticing. I’d rather eat than stand here awkwardly with Cystenian’s parents.
Eiluned passed Trysten to the nanny, who settled onto a chaise with her. I guessed she was here to hold the baby. Eiluned settled to the right of Tomos, who sat at the head. I waited until Bronwen chose a chair across from her mother and then slid in next to Bronwen.
I leaned toward her on my right. “Where’s Cystenian?”
“He’ll be here in two seconds.”
I looked up as he raced onto the veranda, breathing heavily, with hair plastered to his forehead. Wow, how’d she know that?
“Mum, Da, sorry I’m late.” He blew hair out of his eyes while catching mine, but his expression remained indecipherable. Cystenian plunked into a chair opposite me and crunched into a roll.
Manners much? He reminded me of every teenage boy I had ever met, and he was my child’s father! Was I older than he was? Now that I looked at all the faces, no one appeared to be over thirty. I had to seriously question Bronwen about the ages of emrys. Did they age the same as humans? My dad didn’t look much older than thirty, and he seemed loaded with wisdom, despite his vile side, so who knows how old he actually was. Maybe Cystenian was still a youth by their world’s standards.
I suddenly felt queasy.
Wait. He’s betrothed. He’s old enough to get married.
I might have exhaled more loudly than I intended, because Cystenian looked up into my face.
“How’s our daughter?” he blurted.
Tension smarted my brow so badly that I grimaced. She was right over in the corner. He could have checked on her as he blew in. My mouth parted, ready to snarl a retort, but I reminded myself that his parents were seated at the end of the table, so I spoke sweetly. “Our daughter, whom you named, is doing fine. Thanks for asking.”
Bronwen cleared her throat and placed her hand on mine. A sensation of peace made my shoulders relax.
Emrys tricks.
Stop doing that!
Bronwen lifted her hand and jerked it back as if she’d heard my thoughts. Or maybe she’d received a bucketload of my feelings.
While eyeing me, Cystenian set his roll down and ladled out whatever beef and sauce mixture was in the tureen. He had a slight smirk on his face. I think he was hiding amusement.
Bronwen spoke under her breath. In a warning. “Cystenian.”
The atmosphere was tense. Probably my fault. I wasn’t ready to forgive Cystenian, and I felt as if I was the center of a joke.
Breathe, Anerah. Channel benevolence.
Bless Eiluned, she broke the silence. “Trysten’s lovely, Cystenian.”
A smile broke over Cystenian’s face. That’s when I saw that he was no more than a boy parading as a man, a young boy who wanted the praise of his parents.
No wonder he wasn’t canceling his betrothal.
“You’re all sweaty,” Bronwen said. “Racing again?”
“Yeah, training.” Cystenian shoved a bite of food into his mouth, chewed quickly, and swallowed. “Iestyn made the double jump. Just in time for the festival.”
Bronwen touched me with her elbow to get my attention. Most likely to stop me from gaping at Cystenian. “The festival is in five weeks. There’s a race with a huge jump.”
“Sounds like a lot of fun.” I slipped a spoonful of peas into my mouth. At least I thought they were peas. They didn’t have that starchy texture. They more or less dissolved in my mouth, leaving behind a slightly earthy but savory flavor.
I tried to picture Cystenian on a horse instead of on the ball field I’d originally pictured. I got nothing. Horses were foreign to me. I’d never even touched one.
Aelwen started pacing with Trysten. She was stirring. I began cutting and chewing my meat with haste. I was so hungry. Any second Trysten would cry and food would become an afterthought.
Cystenian jumped up. “I have her, Anerah. Take your time eating.” He hurried across the veranda. I couldn’t help my surprise. Maybe I could give him some credit. Aelwen passed Trysten to Cystenian, who immediately curled her into his chest as if he were holding a football. They didn’t even know what football was. He took her to the railing and held her up so she could see the world.
My heart melted. I took a swig of water before my eyes teared up.
“We have a lot to prepare over the next five weeks for the festival.” Eiluned pretended to be engrossed in the food on her plate. “With Aria’s arrival, she’ll want to finalize plans for the ceremony.”
“Mum!” Bronwen hissed. “This does not need to be discussed with Anerah present.”
I set my fork carefully beside my plate. Bronwen was right. My daughter was a few hours old, and Eiluned wanted to discuss “plans.” I could take a hint.
“We make no allusions, Anerah,” Tomos said. “This is difficult for all of us. Cystenian is betrothed. He will marry Aria. Rest assured, you will be dear to us. You will be loved. But an indiscretion from an inebriating spell does not give you claim to your daughter’s father.”
I stood, ever so carefully curling my hands at my sides. “I understand.” I closed my eyes and took a breath. “You must excuse me. I think I’ll head to my room.”
Bronwen scrambled to her feet. “This is wrong. Mum, Da, explain to Anerah. She doesn’t understand. She doesn’t know about your ideals. This world’s new to her, and we’re throwing everything at her at once. She doesn’t even know how to be an emrys.”
“Thanks,” I said, grateful to have her on my side. “Whatever powers I have didn’t manifest themselves until recently. I guess I’m nothing special. I’m sorry I’m a disappointment to everyone here.” My last sentence had a nasty edge to it.
Bronwen grabbed my forearm. “I didn’t mean it that way.” She turned to her father. “Da…”
Tomos rose, looking as if he’d prepared a speech. “Anerah. Our society, our world, thrives on purity.” He placed one hand behind his back as he paced closer. I sensed storytelling mode. “Emira was once a place without darkness. Only light, the pure light within the emrys, kept its realms secure. Since emrys have mingled with humans, the tainted bloodlines brought a darkness into our world from Bryn. A few of us have devoted our lives to eradicating that darkness by preserving the pure bloodlines.”
As he paused, a sickness curled in my stomach, threatening the few bites of food I’d managed to eat. “It’s like you’re a narrow-minded dictator,” I said calmly, but with disgust, as I backed away from the table. “What are you doing? How are you eradicating the tainted bloodlines?”
“By marrying purebloods,” Eiluned said, so lightly and so innocently.
I had been right about the pure emrys. “I must disgust you.”
I continued to back away, and without meaning to, I erupted. “How vile it must be to you that your son has touched me! How vile that your grandchild has red hair!” I backed into a chair as the surroundings spun. With blurry eyes, I gestured toward my daughter. “Give her to me!” This world was crazy. This was history repeated. This was pure bloods against muddy bloods. Black versus white. I was right in the middle.
Cystenian and Bronwen crowded around me. Bronwen supported my back and elbow, as if to steer me to a chair or something, and Cystenian took my hand.
“Le
t me have my daughter.” I attempted to blink the blurry images into focus.
“I have her, Anerah,” Cystenian said. “Let’s take you to your room.”
My legs wobbled.
“She’s going down!” Bronwen shouted.
There was a quick exchange of my daughter into Bronwen’s arms and me into Cystenian’s. My head flopped against his shoulder as Trysten’s sudden wail echoed down the hall.
SEVENTEEN
Emira. Bryn. Earth. Three worlds. Connected by portals.
Bronwen and Cystenian explained this once I was tucked into my bed, with my baby pacified in my arms. I’d screamed for them to give Trysten to me and wasn’t mollified until they did.
When I was settled, Bronwen and Cystenian dumped everything on me, since I had been shrieking at the top of my lungs to return to Earth. Bron placed hands on me, and I practically went limp as heat and calmness soaked through me.
Again with the trick. Like a muscle relaxer, except my brain was quite alert.
Portals to keep the darkness out, they’d said. Emira was protected by a god named Deian. Emrys were guardians of his dragons, his most prized creations.
I had to ask Cystenian. “So all three worlds are separate?”
“Yes. Emira has portals to worlds everywhere.”
My eyes rounded. “Everywhere?”
“Worlds without end. Scattered throughout the universe. None in the same solar system. Each with their own sun.”
“How in the world?”
“No, not in the world,” Bronwen said, “universe.”
“No. No.” I shut my eyes. It was too hard to keep them open. “It’s an expression. Earth humans say it when they can’t fathom how something is possible.”
“Ah. I don’t understand, but I’ll take your word for it.”
“So Emira is the dragon world?” I asked.
“Just a few of the vales.” Cystenian pushed a pillow under my arm. Trysten was getting harder to support, but I didn’t want to let her go. “Gorlassar is the first vale where the dragons originated. Every new age, when the valleys become too crowded, a few people—and dragons—migrate to a new valley and build cities. This is Brynmor, the fifth vale. It’s not very populated. Dragons don’t live here yet. My family came here first when Father and Mother bonded. They moved from the capital of Gorlassar, Mared, where everyone flocks.”
“You live on a grand estate.” Indicating his family was important, like mayors of a city or a governor. The property and house, with the servants and people, hinted at so much more.
“Built from the ground up. My parents have lived here for over seventeen hundred years.”
Dang. Emrys did live a long time. I cracked an eye open. “You have servants. You’re wealthy?”
“They aren’t called servants, even though they serve. Uh”—Cystenian scratched his golden curls—“they willingly devote their services to maintaining society. Every person has wealth in some form or another. We all have exactly what we need.”
“But you have people who clean for you, who cook your dinners, who take care of your gardens.”
“Because they recognize the way my family contributes to society, and they help with the tasks my family doesn’t have time for. No one is honored above another. Each person, even the person who carries my breakfast tray, is important.”
“What does your family do that’s so great?”
“They plan and maintain society.” Bronwen was fussing with the curtains, shutting them to hide the low evening sun. “Plot where future cities should go.” Bronwen turned away from the curtain and waved her hand. Several orbs around the room illuminated and gave off a soft glow. Now that was magic. “Note where current ones need expansion. Make sure everyone has their needs met.”
“Your family manages the kingdom? They’re royalty?” I was working hard to equate their world with fairy tales from mine.
Cystenian stiffened. “We aren’t royalty. Not as the rulers on Bryn are.”
Bryn, that was the other mortal world where darkness came from that Tomos had mentioned. It was hard to keep things straight.
“But you are royal.” I was determined to have something make sense.
Bronwen climbed up on the opposite side of the bed and tucked her legs under herself. We were nice and cozy. Cystenian was so close I swear his breath tickled my cheek every now and then.
What was with these emrys and personal space?
“Everyone has a skill they contribute,” Bronwen said. “If Ceinwen is tired of dusting, she does something else. She actually left for university last week.”
I nodded. “Mkay.”
“We don’t force anyone to do anything,” Cystenian said. “If no one is around to brush Iestyn or polish my shoes, I do it myself.”
I snickered. My brain was getting heavy. “Can you cook an egg?”
Bronwen bit her lip and gave Cystenian a look, clearly amused by my challenge to him.
“Yes,” he huffed. “I can even bake a loaf of bread. I can milk a buwch. I’ve churned butter.”
A buwch? I would have to figure out what that was later. “Mended a hole? Sewn on a button?” I asked.
“Yes and yes.”
Okay, so I would give my baby daddy an A in life skills.
“Surprised, Anerah?” he asked. “You are what—sixteen—?”
“Eighteen. I’m eighteen!” Did he really think I was that young!
“You have no idea how long immortality is. I’m seven hundred and nineteen! Don’t you think I’ve had time to master many skills?”
I flinched back, having hit a nerve. I was insulted by how he’d said my age, as if it were a disease. And geez, he was so old. Seven hundred years older.
“Just because we’re a pure bloodline doesn’t mean we put ourselves above others,” Bronwen said.
“I get it. I get it.” I was stuck on the age thing.
“Do you?” Cystenian asked.
“Yes.”
Cystenian stood. “You can’t imagine the responsibilities, the expectations placed on me. On Bronwen and me.”
Even though Cystenian was giving me a sense of his duties to his people and to his family, our disagreement was coming back around to his betrothal. He felt obligated. An obligation I didn’t support. Even if I had grown up in this world, I would have never been in support of arranged marriages or marrying for class. I was a romantic who believed in marrying for love.
I guessed that was what romance movies did to me. “Can’t you go off and do what you want, like your helpers?”
“Ideally, yes. But my parents demand, I mean expect, loyalty.” He rubbed his forehead.
They were brainwashed. Having Cystenian in my daughter’s life would be harder than I thought.
“So you’re marrying Aria,” I said. End of story. Stupid medieval traditions.
“I think you should reconsider,” Bronwen whispered.
“What?” Cystenian and I said at the same time.
“Could he?” I asked.
“It’s not as simple as that,” Cystenian said. “Other factors are in play.”
“What factors?” I asked. “Please tell me. I may not understand, but I’d rather you told me than keep things hidden.”
Cystenian glared at Bronwen. An unspoken conversation passed between them. Eyes twitched, jaws clenched and relaxed. Her nostrils flared.
“That’s enough, Bronwen,” Cystenian said. “Keep your mouth shut.” He whipped out of the room.
“What the heck just happened?” I nudged Trysten toward Bronwen. “Can you put her in her cradle?”
As Bronwen tucked Trysten in, I burrowed into my pillows. Sleep was upon me. Bronwen’s magical muscle relaxer had worked too well.
“Just a difference of opinion. My brother is stubborn. He doesn’t see what’s right in front of him. He’s allowing a past experience to sway him.”
I rolled onto my side and closed my eyes. He has a past. Everyone does. “I get that. I do.” The past was hard
to hide from. I’d have to pry the truth from Cystenian someday. I yawned. “Watch her while I sleep?”
“Of course. Rest now, Anerah. Things will be better when you wake.”
EIGHTEEN
I was alone, early the following morning, quietly minding Trysten in the stillness of my room. I assumed everyone about the estate was sleeping. The sun had barely risen, but the sky was dim.
The silence felt good. I’d slept well. Trysten was a patient baby. When she was awake, she spent most of her time blinking her gorgeous green eyes at the room. When she was hungry, she gnawed on her hands until I picked her up and put her to my breast.
How did I luck out with such a good baby?
Motherhood didn’t seem too daunting at the moment, but I had other things to think about, things that left me with a dilemma. Go home or stay here? I had to make contact with Mom. She would be in a panic. She would have called the police by now. They’d have found my box outside the portal and found evidence of the birth. They’d question her, my father, my roommate. I would end up on the news.
Mom’s heart would be broken.
I had no choice. Even if I ultimately chose to stay, I had to see Mom first.
After Trysten was fed and changed, I searched among the linens in my room until I found a suitable material that I could make into a sling for her. I had no idea how to properly tie one, but I managed to snuggle Trysten between my breasts and secure her while tying her up tightly and safely.
We were going on another hike.
“This will be nothing like the last one, I promise.”
I didn’t know where the portal was, but I knew the general direction. To the south, where the trees were clustered together. From what I remembered during the little tryst that Cystenian and I had, the trees were sparse and the meadow looked as if it was barely within the woodland’s bounds.
