Chapter 13 #2
He snickers. “Fair enough. Campan’s Vale had been a part of Tír na Strelle for centuries, but during King Aengus and Queen Caer’s reign, House áine successfully petitioned for a decree to annex the region.
The family has maintained property there for years, though how that gives them the right to the region itself is beyond me.
Regardless, the map was redrawn, and Tír na Lune now claims the Vale.
And the duke has been using some rather harsh methods to impose rule.
Crippling new tithes being the least of them.
The Vale has been overrun by his forces since the king and queen passed. ”
“Do your parents still live there?”
“I never knew my parents.”
He says it in such a matter-of-fact tone, with no trace of bitterness or hurt, that my heart lurches for him. There’s a level of resilience required to navigate the world without parents. One I’m intimately familiar with.
“But the orphanage where I spent a good portion of my childhood is still there.”
“I’m an orphan, too,” I offer quietly.
“Really?” There’s a hopeful, yet confused note in his question, and—
Shit. I’m supposed to be the Favourite.
“That is to say … I was not … I was raised by my grandmother. We were very close. She was a well-respected member of the peerage.”
A well-respected member who stepped away from it when she saw how they treated my mother, but Lachlan doesn’t need those details.
“Were very close?” he asks.
“She died. A year and a half ago.” Grief, that familiar, weighty friend, lands on my chest, making my breaths come a little harder, a little slower.
Lachlan pulls me closer. “I’m sorry, Charlotte.”
I blink rapidly, trying to stall my welling tears. God, how did this get-to-know-you chat become so morose? Time to switch topics.
“What happened during the ceremony? When you slipped into my mind? You mentioned it was some kind of gift.”
Yes.
That warm tingle lifts the hairs at the base of my skull and a shiver runs through my body. He’s still holding me so close, there’s no way he doesn’t notice.
“Are all fae able to … what do you call it? Mind-talk? Psychic dictation?”
His chuckle fractures, echoing both in my mind and behind my back. It’s a strange, though not entirely unpleasant, sensation. “There’s a name for it in our language—diamhrán. It means something like ‘a god’s song’ in the common tongue.”
I swivel my chin over my shoulder, quirking an eyebrow. “Are you a god then, Sir Cathal?”
He dips his lashes, shaking his head, but I swear I hear the faint echo of an answer. Something about how he used to be called one quite frequently. He coughs into his fist, one of those adorable blushes racing across his cheekbones, and slips out of my head like bubbles of water down my spine.
“Our gods, whom humans refer to as the Tuatha dé Danann, all possessed the gift. They used to pass it down to fae who’d gained their favor.
It was once much more prevalent. More varied, as well.
I can use it to speak mind-to-mind, uncover thoughts and secrets.
But there are some fae who can use it to see a person’s fate, read their future.
Very few are capable of the diamhrán now, though.
I am one of the last in the celestial kingdom. ”
“Will it be a problem for the other dukes? Will they be hesitant to welcome you into their Houses if you can read their minds?”
“It’s not that simple. The diamhrán requires an offering from my subject. I’m able to use it on you because of the drop of your blood I swallowed when I bit you.”
I blink, idly rubbing my wrist where I swear I can still feel his fangs, though the marks have faded. “Is it some kind of magic bond, then? Are we permanently linked?”
He laughs, as if the idea is ridiculous. “No. It will fade soon. I’ll need another offering to keep it alive. And if you agree, I’d like to ensure it’s large enough to last through the Season.”
I swallow, paling. “How large?”
“Four or five swallows should do it.”
Truth be told, though his bite hurt the other night, the thought of having him on call is worth any temporary discomfort. I sit up straighter in the saddle. “Alright. Are you going to take some now?”
He tenses behind me, and Tula’s ears flick. “This, ah, isn’t the most conducive atmosphere for … It would be … There’s only two spots where one can access that amount of blood. To attempt either while riding a horse would be very messy.”
“The inner thigh,” I say proudly. “Or my throat.”
“Yes.” I try not to take insult at his surprise. “How do you know that?”
“My brother is a professor of anatomy at Harbridge, a prestigious university back home. I used to do the illustrations for the articles he published in scientific journals.”
“A mathematician, a scientist, and an artist,” he muses, lifting my hand in front of our faces and tracing the length of my fingers with the callused tip of his thumb. I thank his gods that he’s no longer in my mind to read my thoughts. “I will take extra special care of your hands, then.”
His sweet words monopolize my thoughts until we arrive at a break in the tree line several minutes later.
Tula whinnies, shaking her mane and straining a hoof forward as the sun dips below the horizon and shimmering light fills the empty river bed.
It snakes through the forest, sweeping over the land so far and wide that I cannot see its beginning nor its end.
On the night I arrived, Lachlan and Tula emerged unharmed from this same strange light. The memory should calm me. Instead, my survival instincts scream that my human body will not be able to withstand whatever magic makes this possible.
Lachlan tucks his chin over my shoulder, and whispers in the same calm, low tone he used on Tula earlier, “It’s a luxbridge.”
“A what?” I can barely breathe. For a multitude of reasons.
“A way to travel via celestial light on a kelpie.” His lip ring grazes a spot beneath my ear and I nearly fly out of the saddle.
“There are several throughout the kingdom, but they only appear from dusk till dawn. We’ll ride this section into Tír na Lune.
There’s nothing to be afraid of, Charlotte. I have you.”
His deep reassurance is a soothing blanket for my nerves.
So I lean back and let him lead me into the light.