“You spend too much time with the Trapper.”
“Excuse me?”
“The Merlin, we don’t trust him.”
“Well, that’s no surprise. You people act like he’s got the plague or something. I’ve seen less of y’all in the couple of days and way more of him than I’d ever wish to.” Her mouth twisted bitterly as she recalled his lessons. Being abandoned in the woods had been enough to kill all fantasies of the dark and handsome stranger in her head.
She didn’t know she was hungry until Eddie disappeared again and returned with a plate of Cook’s finest. “How did you…” she said, pausing to look up at him. Slaine was constantly bringing Eddie his meals. Seemed the boy had an aversion to company. Or maybe it wasn’t people in general but one person? “What’s this?”
Reclaiming his seat, propped against the hearth, Eddie turned away with an ironic smile.
“This is your supper, isn’t it?” she said. “Eddie, you can’t give this to me.” He didn’t move, not until Amie at last gave in and devoured the cold meal in front of her. It was only after she had finished to the point of licking her fingers that she realized this was the first time she’d eaten all day. Letting the plate idle in her lap she sank back into her chair and rocked. “Oh man, that was so good…I really need to spend more time in Cook’s kitchen.”
Amie knew she was supposed to take her meals in the dining hall with Emrys, a scheme of Underhill’s to force her to learn proper etiquette. But right now she was royally peeved with him and eating in the stables with Eddie Cutterworthy was rebellious enough to satisfy her bitterness.
“So why don’t any of you trust him?” she asked. The way he studied her in return was so dispassionate yet full of measure. Whatever he was looking for in her open expression, Amie hoped she passed the test.
Without blinking he replied, “You should get inside the house. Everyone’s been mad sick with worry since he came back without you.”
Amie was afraid to tear her eyes away from his, too curious to do otherwise than dumbly stare back. “You know if you don’t give me the answers I want I’ll only haunt the stables until you tell me.” Clearly the idea was horrifying to a hermit like him.
Narrowing his eyes in on her, he said, “You don’t frighten me.”
“I could learn real quickly. What are you afraid of?”
“You,” he said. His lips twitched, hiding a grimace or a grin, she was uncertain.
“You have a funny way of showing it, if you really are afraid of me.”
Resting his chin in his hand, he gave her a straight answer. “I’ve been watching you.”
Unlike Emrys, there were no mocking glances or cruel intentions. Sarcasm was something Amie ate and breathed, something from her world she understood. So Eddie’s brutal honesty was a refreshing change for her. “Why does everyone hate Emrys so much?”
“Maybe he isn’t as kind to us as to you.” Amie’s laugh startled the severity out of his eyes and he watched her curiously, like a scientist studying something he did not yet understand. She laughed so hard she snorted, until tears escaped their ducts, because her nerves were shot and she was exhausted.
“Oh man! If that’s what you call kindness then I’d like to see how he treats y’all!” Amie realized as her laughter died how much she had gained and lost in a single afternoon. She wasn’t cold anymore, but she felt very much alone, drank her tea to fill her emptiness with something. “Sorry I lost it there.”
“I find your mood swings fascinating,” he said.
“Glad somebody does, because I’m wearing myself out. I seem to be losing it a lot lately and it’s not even my time…”
“What have you lost?” He leaned forward, set his tea on the antler table between them, settled his elbows on his knees and peered up at her through his golden bangs.
My laptop, my watch, my sanity, my life...
“Nothing…I just—have been trying to figure this place out, you know? When Henry said he wanted me to learn the family business I wasn’t expecting this. I mean it’s not like I’m ungrateful for him going to all that trouble bringing me here. Not like I have much to go back to even if I wanted to. For all I know my wannabe murderer is still hanging around my apartment, waiting for the next round.”
Chancing a glance, she found his eyes schooled to the rug instead. Somehow this gave her more courage she desperately lacked. “I want to learn who I am. I always knew Father was different from other people, tried to deny I was anything like him. But I was hoping Henry would actually be here to teach me. Didn’t think he’d leave me so everyone else could lead me on some wild goose chase. And now the only person who seems willing to give me answers is the one person I trust the least.” Twiddling her thumbs, Amie noticed how long and uneven the nails had grown.
Looks like my superpowers don’t come with automatic manicures, thank heaven. I hate long nails.
“They didn’t tell you who you were, did they?”
For the first time Amie saw a flicker of deeper emotion when their eyes met. “No. My parents died before he could tell me anything. I know it’s so much bigger than faeries and enchanted castles, you know. That’s what scares me the most right now. Emrys—well, he keeps hinting things to me, like there’s a war coming or something. And I keep relying on whatever he says because I’m too scared to go to anyone else. I feel like such a freak.” She didn’t tell him this wasn’t the first time she’d come to this conclusion.
“What is a freak?” His lips played with the word, ending with a grin which hugged his firm jaw easily. Amie saw how once he might have smiled easily and often.
She laughed at his confusion and said, “Like, oh, I don’t know, someone who doesn’t fit in and you make fun of.”
His eyes warmed to a deeper blue. “Aye, you are most certainly a freak.”
“See what I mean?” She lifted a hand in admission but stilled when he finished.
“Not only to us but outside too. You will never be free because of this.” Reaching out his hand to hover over hers, over the ring, he was close enough she felt the heat of his skin bounce off hers. She didn’t know why but she wanted to close the hand’s breadth space.
Stuttering, she broke the tension. “Everyone has two names around this place, it seems. Like you all have split personalities. If you listen to the way Underhill talks you’d think she was schizo for sure.” Where before his blue eyes had seemed hard as ice now they were granite. For some unexplained reason Amie felt she had grossly insulted him and scrounged her newly gained knowledge for some clues on What Not to Say to a Stable Boy.
“There is power in a name. Most of us don’t give our true names freely.”
Amie puzzled over this. It certainly explained why she’d heard Henry referred to as Iudicael by Emrys and why her father went by Rusty instead of Drustan in the States. Then of course others, like Slaine and Eddie, she’d never heard called anything else. Was Jessamiene her true name?
“What’s the difference between the two?” she said.
“The one you give power to is the true name. Whichever has the sweeter meaning.”
“And if they know your true name?”
“Terrible things have happened,” he said with the rumble of thunder behind his voice.
Shivering at the weight and tremor of his words, she wondered what sort of things had happened to her father to make him run so far away. She set her tea cup beside his and held her chest, watched the unnatural steady flames change shape and occasionally wink back at her. So she was shocked when he clenched his fist and stood, pulled her out of her chair with firm gentleness and spoke so low she had to turn her ear to catch it.
“Dearg is my name,” he said to her, slipping his hand to clasp her waist. For one infinitesimal moment the fire in the hearth peaked. So exhilarating a rush of feeling wrapped around her inner core and exploded out, pushing its way through. Instead of closing the last space between them he turned. Without a word, he led her away from his snug keep, through
the caves and secret door, past the stables and to the nightly sleet. Snatching a horse blanket from its hook nearby, he covered her with it.
“Thank you,” she blurted out. She was trembling from the brief contact of his thumbs against her collar as he fused the fabric together with a small drizzle of sparks. She had felt covered by a strange veil of feeling ever since he told her his true name, knowing she was privy to something few others knew.
“Fair be the fillies…Amie,” he said, bidding her farewell.
…
Emrys glared at the amber liquid swirling around within its crystal decanter and leaned heavily on the mantel. Fire had always fascinated him, untouchable, unbearable as it was to his flesh. He was a creature of the shadows, of cold and dank places. Jessamiene’s close ties to the moon were what drew him. If she was the silvery surface of its perfect face, then he was its darker shadow, the flip side of its beauty.
Pity she takes after her namesake so easily, he thought angrily, before tossing the rest of the goblet’s contents in the flames. The Armory had always been a place of comfort on the rare occasion he was sucked back to the castle he most despised. After what he had witnessed moments ago, Emrys had half a mind to outfit himself with the worst of these killing tools and rush to the stables.
She doesn’t belong to you, fool.
His conscience could drone on all it wanted. Still, he couldn’t ignore the monster that had risen up in him to see her in that idiot’s arms. The Cutterworthys were the worst enemies a person could have, lower than humans in his eyes, worse than Sidhe. The fact she had gone straight to him instead of the kitchens like he had half expected her to troubled him. So he had watched from a distance as the game keeper took her into his lair.
Again, he clenched his fists and stared long at the double-bladed axe sitting above the mantelpiece. “Don’t be a slitherkin, Myrrdin,” he morosely said.
Jessamiene had passed the test he gave her this evening. She was who they claimed her to be, not an enchantress pretending to be their little princess all grown up. She had been under their protection when he found her years before and he had to be certain she wasn’t playing them all for fools. It was too dangerous a folly to be wrong, this time, he reminded himself. Once, they had trusted that seductively sweet face and been nearly undone. Not that he wanted to be counted amongst them. But he was the last of his kind, now. All that remained of his people was here in the place he most hated.
“Nimue,” he said to the flames, “how could ye have deceived me so?”
A wave of pure power fell over him like a lover’s kiss. Closing his eyes, he stiffened as she came closer behind him. How she knew to find him here, he already knew. She would cut him down if she ever knew what he had been forced to do to save her life.
Emrys turned to face her the moment her footsteps touched the vast rug. “And where have ye been, woman?” Even though he already knew well the answer, the image of that pretender covering her with a piece of filsh made him see red. “Do ye have any idea what hour it is?”
For a moment, it was Nimue whose emerald eyes burned up before him. “Oh, I’m sorry. Heaven forbid I actually miss a meal with you! What could have possessed me to keep me away? Oh yeah, now I remember…” With a chilled whisper she added, “You left me alone in the middle of the woods.”
Emrys laughed at her. He had followed her from a distance the whole time, determined to catch her casting aside this childish act. “Is that what has your feathers so ruffled? You know perfectly well if I thought ye any less capable I never would have left ye.”
“I could have died out there! I’m not exactly a Girl Scout, you know!” Jessamiene flung her hands at the air, violet streams of energy fleeing her fingertips and falling haphazardly around the room. This only added to Emrys’ amusement of course. She seemed determined to get this through his thick inhuman skull.
“Tsk…tsk…poor little princess got lost in the woods.” She was too adorable for him to not try and wrap her in his arms but Jessamiene shoved him roughly back. Her actions hurt him, though he would never admit it to her. She might not be one of their mutual enemies, the devils he knew were coming for her, but this didn’t mean she hadn’t inherited more than Nimue’s name.
She would have remembered ye by now. Forget this foolish hope, lad.
“Careful, Jessamiene,” he gruffly said. “You do nay want to make an enemy of me, remember? What I did I need not justify to you.”
She gaped at him and this time he saw the pain behind her eyes was real. Instead of making him feel better, he felt a stab of human guilt.
“You really are a heartless prick, aren’t you?”
Emrys ground out, determined not to have her best him, “I believe you are under the impression I am a man and behave as they do. I thought you understood the rules outside do not apply to any of our people here. It is you who have placed impossible expectations on me.”
Jessamiene bit her lip and he was surprised to see a sheen of tears in her eyes. Beneath her anger he felt a well of pain. This time it wasn’t a human-made wound, but rather his fault. Something shifted inside of him that went beyond her uncanny resemblance to his one love that made him reach for her again. Finding nothing but air when she stepped out of reach, Emrys stilled.
“I left you in the woods for your own good. I had to know what ye were made of, lass. Iudicael sent me to train ye how to harness yer inner nixy. But I want to prepare ye for the things he knows not. Trouble is coming. The ones that protected ye from their own kin are nay able to hide ye now. And once they know ye are more than simply human, they will come to crush ye. I tell ye this because I do nay wish to see harm befall you.” He held his palms out to her, open in invitation.
Amie’s fingers fisted the old-fashioned skirt at her waist.
“How can I trust you?” she said, pressing her palm over her chest, and the scar he had mended, when the bond was seared between them.
“Can you doubt I have saved your life, Jessamiene?”
“No,” she choked out, “but that doesn’t make me feel any better.”
He took another step towards her. He was going to break the rules then, rules he had placed over himself which stood apart from Iudicael and his empty threats. Hesitating briefly before stepping into her space, he pulled her into his chest and shook at their contact.
Get a hold of yourself! What are you doing?
Black pools of desire nearly overwhelmed the emerald rims of her eyes, so he saw she wanted him, much as he wanted her. When their lips met, he caressed hers triumphantly. Wasting little time, Emrys dragged her up swiftly and crushed her to him. And just when he felt he had won his prize, as her lips gently tasted his in return, she pulled away.
“No,” she gasped, pressing a hand against his chest to keep him at arm’s length. Nimue, as wild and wicked as she could be, had never turned his kisses away. Rather than feeling offended, he was even more intrigued.
“Where do ye think you’re going? We still need to put food into your belly, foolish lass.”
“I already ate.” She turned to the fire.
Emrys ran a hand down the sleeve of her shirtwaist, trying to calm down from the high her touch gave him. “Where did you dredge up these filthy rags?” He knew very well where she had acquired them. The bitter memory turned up its ugly head, reminding him that much as he wanted to claim her, she was not Nimue. She was not his.
Stepping firmly out of his embrace, she began to slowly back away, eyes wide, lips still red from their brief run-in. “It’s a gift from someone who did better at your job than you.”
Flinching, he had grabbed and forced her to face him, hissing, “If it’s Cutterworthy you’re telling of, judging from the fact this smells like horse filsh, ye should think twice. Slaine is loyal to the keeping of Wenderdowne, the same cannot be said of that boy.”
“If you had done your job I wouldn’t have needed his hospitality.”
“Keep away from him,” he spat, instantly regretting his wo
rds when he saw the rebellion in her upturned brow. Lamely, he attempted to right his mistake, replacing ire with concern. “I warn you only this once, Jessamiene. He’s not to be trusted.”
“Funny, he said the same thing about you!” She pressed an energy-charged palm to his chest, filling him with an aftershock of stabbing pangs, and fled.
Chapter 27
Unexpected Return
She awoke to the rain begging loudly to be let inside. From the crick in her neck Amie concluded she’d fallen asleep out of bed again, and tried to recall the night before. A whirlwind of images filtered through her head, of Emrys leaving her in the forest and being rescued by Dameri, who then led her to the stables. Dearg had looked after her, only after she literally fell at his feet, and Emrys, after kissing her senseless, forbade her to speak to him again. Not that she had any intention of obeying the crazy stalker who left her for dead.
She let her limbs untangle and flopped onto her back to stare at the apex of her canopy. Her eyes were beginning to trace the family crest when a voice broke the silence. “Tell me, Jessamiene, do you still find this the dream or have you awakened?”
Amie bolted upright and gasped. “Uncle Henry!”
His laughter was cut short on impact of her smaller form barreling into his chest. She held onto him, afraid this was the dream and when she woke up, she’d still be at the mercy of Emrys and their never-ending lessons. But it was Uncle Henry, with his surprisingly youthful features, hair black as soot like hers, eyes gray as a rain-swept sky. His laugh lines crinkled into a teasing smile as he patiently waited for her to take her fill. Once she was certain he was real she jumped off the couch and let him have it.
“Don’t you ever take off and leave without telling me again! You hear me, Lord Wenderdowne? I think we’ve both lost enough people we cared about and I’m not adding you to the list.” She regretted her words the moment she saw his forehead crease with times past. Sitting beside him this time, she watched his profile and remembered her father had the same cut of an angular jaw.
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