Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
None of the Fae were happy with his decision to return to Pelham.
Cillian told himself he didn’t care, but some small part felt a little guilty.
Niamh had made it possible for him and Bran to escape Ainmire’s clutches.
Verlin had provided his home as a place to hide, but Cillian didn’t trust the Fae lord.
Kindness wasn’t kind when there was an ulterior motive behind the smiles.
“You would go with him?” Verlin asked, looking at Cillian. “You would leave your people to Medb’s terror? Your kingdom? You would let the Dagda ruin the Winter Court?”
Cillian squinted against the sunlight in the castle’s courtyard, watching Niamh and Seamus call out orders to the Fae who had been chosen to escort them to the wyrding. Cillian refused to show how Verlin’s words worried him. “This isn’t my home.”
“It was.”
The argument from the dining room had followed them outside and would most likely follow them home since Niamh had declared she would be staying with them in Pelham.
Seamus would join them only long enough to help fight Cernunnos before reluctantly returning to the Otherworld.
Cillian was glad because that meant they only had one Fae to deal with in Pelham, but it also meant Verlin wouldn’t be targeted by Medb for Seamus’ absence.
Cillian didn’t want to be the cause of someone else’s agony.
“I don’t know what you want me to say,” Cillian said in a low voice, turning his head so he could meet Verlin’s gaze. “I told you I have no memory of this place.”
“We can give your memories back to you.”
Cillian shook his head, glancing over at where Bran and Aisling stood by the horses so that Aisling could pet one under the watchful eyes of one of Niamh’s crew. “I don’t want them. Not if it means losing Bran.”
Gaining what everyone said he’d lost would make Cillian lose the one person he loved, and he couldn’t do that.
He couldn’t promise Bran he’d be the same man who’d grown up in Pelham if he took back the memories of a Fae who had lived centuries.
The Fae wanted him to be their Winter Prince, but all Cillian wanted to be was someone Bran wouldn’t look at in horror.
“You truly love him,” Verlin said, sounding aggravated. “This witch whose people would see ours destroyed.”
“He’s not like that.”
“They are all like that.”
Cillian clenched his jaw. “I won’t leave him.”
Verlin stared at him, expression impossible to decipher. Then those amber eyes closed, and something like pain crossed his face. “Is he your mate?”
“What?”
Verlin opened his eyes, pinning Cillian with a look he couldn’t turn away from. “Your mate. You didn’t have one before the purge of the Winter Court. You had hoped for one, taken countless lovers, but none were your mate.”
“I don’t—”
“Could you live without him? Could you let him walk away? Or would you do anything in your power to keep him safe? Would your heart wither and die without him in your life? Do you feel a bond between you both even when he is not there?” Verlin turned his head, staring at Seamus, something warm coming to his eyes, features gentling.
“I knew Seamus was my mate the moment I saw him centuries ago. He was one of your personal knights, long before he became captain of them all. He was in the throne room when I was presented to you at the Winter Court.”
Cillian winced. “Please tell me we weren’t—”
Verlin laughed, none of the cruelty that Ainmire had possessed in the sound.
“Betrothed? No. We were not suited, especially not after I found my mate. I was sent to the Winter Court to be a companion, to learn to be your right hand. You trusted me above all others, and I followed you everywhere. I would have followed you into death itself if my mother hadn’t convinced me to live for our people, to care for them in your stead amid Medb’s atrocities.
And I could not do to Seamus what had been done to my mother when she lost her mate. ”
“Your father?” Cillian asked carefully.
“He died in the purge. Medb made an example of him in exchange for my life. My mother…she wasn’t at the Winter Court. She was here. She has been here ever since.”
Grieving with the entirety of her being. Verlin didn’t have to say it, not when it was so easy to see in the fragile lines of Lady Fiadh’s figure.
“My father’s body rots in his armor in the Great Hall of the Winter Court, as do others who tried to stand against the Dagda and his lies,” Verlin said, anger and grief riding his voice.
“I’m sorry.” Cillian meant it. No one should experience the loss of a parent in such a way.
Verlin pressed his lips together for a moment, skin paling at the seam of them. “Are you sorry for leaving us?”
“This isn’t my home.”
“So you keep saying.” Verlin sighed, turning at the sound of the door behind them opening. “Mother, what are you doing? You should be resting.”
Lady Fiadh stepped into the courtyard, a servant hovering behind her. Verlin reached for her, letting her lean her weight on his arm. “I am fine, my dear. I could not miss Cillian’s departure.”
“You wouldn’t have to if he stayed.”
“He has always been stubborn.” Lady Fiadh looked at Cillian, a gravity to her gaze he couldn’t escape. “You take after your mother in that way.”
“The Mórrígan would stay. She would fight.”
“Hush,” Lady Fiadh said before Cillian could argue that he didn’t know a Mórrígan. “You cannot be angry that Cillian leaves to keep his heart intact. Your father begged and bargained for such an escape for you once upon a time.”
Verlin’s jaw twitched. “And he died because of it, half killing you.”
“And that is why I do not want Cillian to ever experience the despair and emptiness I live with. But I have survived to see the Dagda’s downfall stand before me once again, and I do not regret that.
” Lady Fiadh patted Verlin’s arm before letting him go to stand in front of Cillian.
They were nearly of height, making it easy to look her in the eye, to see the faint crow’s feet at the far corners of hers and the shadows that stained the hollows of her cheeks, even in sunlight.
“Every word you have spoken, every action you have done, has been for the benefit of that witch. It is anathema among our kind to care for the enemy, but there is no reasoning with the heart when a mate is involved.”
“I don’t know if Bran is my mate,” Cillian said slowly, reeling a little from her words.
“Sometimes the only lie a Fae can tell is one of the heart because we believe it to be true.” Lady Fiadh raised her hands, and Cillian stiffened as she framed his face, her gaze boring deep.
“The witch is your mate, and as much as I loathe that, I can’t ignore the truth of it.
There is no Fae who will ever accept it, and they will use him to ruin you. ”
“I won’t let anyone hurt him.”
“I thought the same for my mate, and he for me, and now I live without him for all days. I mean this as a warning and nothing else, my prince. You get to decide what kind of love this is, but I will tell you what kind of loss it could be—one you never recover from.”
Cillian had to look away from her, searching out Bran where he stood across the courtyard with Aisling, the other man staring back at him.
He remembered how it had felt last night, when they’d been tangled up in each other.
The way Bran had drawn him close, drawn him in, how kissing Bran had wiped away seven years of uncertainty and regrets and loneliness, settling some inner clawing need he’d done his best to ignore for years.
The idea of letting Bran go was an impossibility he would not fathom.
The thought of turning his back on the Fae forever didn’t sit well with him.
“We have to get Aisling’s voice back,” Cillian said, meeting Lady Fiadh’s eyes again. It wasn’t a promise in any way, but the faint, satisfied smile Lady Fiadh gave him told him she heard what was left unspoken, even if Cillian couldn’t.
“You cannot appear as you are in the mortal world. You will need to use your magic to glamour yourself again.”
“The glamour Etain tore apart wasn’t mine.”
“You still need to use your own magic. Now, close your eyes and listen to my voice.”
Cillian hesitated before doing what she asked, closing his eyes and letting her words wash over him.
It was difficult for him, at first, to turn his awareness inward, to actively search for a power that had so far only exploded out of him without his conscious control.
Remembering Bran’s words in the wyrding was what ultimately enabled him to grab hold of his magic and draw it out of him.
Bending Nature to his will meant wrapping his magic around his body, holding it tight until something wove together and stuck.
Willing himself to not appear as he truly was took effort, but he did it.
Cillian didn’t need to look in a mirror to know he now appeared human because it felt as if his skin didn’t fit over his bones anymore, like clothes that were a size too small, constricting all his limbs.
He opened his eyes, finding Bran and Aisling standing next to him, Jupiter perched on Bran’s shoulder. Bran stared at him worriedly. “Are you okay?”
Cillian stepped away from Lady Fiadh’s hands. “Yeah.”
“You look like you again.”
He raised a hand to touch his ears, tracing the point there that he knew no one else could see. “I don’t feel like it.”
“Niamh says we’re ready to leave. She has our horses saddled.”
“Our legs are going to hurt.”
“I’ll take that discomfort if it means we get home.”
Cillian turned to look at Lady Fiadh. “We appreciate your hospitality.”
“It was my pleasure to help my prince,” Lady Fiadh said easily enough.