Chapter 18
GIDEON
Disbelief grips me as I guide Isabel through the forest. Does Lachlan know his mate is dead? Did he feel it the moment she died, an abrupt silence where their bond used to be?
Such thoughts weigh heavily on my mind as I scan the trees, searching for a good place to shelter for the night.
Tomorrow, I will make a quick trip to Hollins to warn Isabel’s father about the impending battle.
I haven’t yet decided whether I’ll bring my mate along.
Part of me wants to erect a series of protective wards around her, one behind the other, and leave her there until Hollins is conquered and it’s time to depart for Frostfall.
When Isabel stiffens beside me, I know she has heard my thoughts.
But she wisely offers no protest. I’m in no mood to argue about her safety.
We’re in a time of war, and I’ll do whatever I must to keep her safe.
If soldiers from Hollins or another human town discover she’s my mate, they might try to harm her for the sake of cruelty alone.
I’m so lost in my dark thoughts that I almost don’t see the cabin through the trees.
But then I catch a glimpse of a thatched roof and stacked timber walls, and I guide Isabel closer to the small clearing that does indeed contain a cabin.
The thick overgrowth surrounding it reveals it hasn’t been tended in quite some time.
Wanting to ensure it is truly abandoned before I bring my mate inside, I send a gust of winter wind to push the door open. Once the wind dies down, I stand very still and listen for any sounds coming from within.
I hear nothing.
When I draw in a deep breath, I detect no trace of humans, orcs, or anyone else nearby. Relief spreads through me.
“Come, little moth.” I grasp my mate’s hand and guide her inside.
She gives the tiny cabin a cautious look. Dust motes drift through the air, and she covers a cough.
Hold your breath for a moment, I send down the bond.
Once she complies, I summon my winter magic, calling forth a swirl of wind to throw open the windows and sweep the dust away. Sunlight streams inside, and when the air finally shines clear, with no hint of floating dust, I command the wind to settle.
Isabel lowers her hand from her mouth and slowly releases the breath she had been holding. Her gaze drifts around the cabin’s interior. There is not much here beyond a narrow bed pushed into a corner, a rough-hewn table with two stools, and a stack of wood next to a cold hearth.
“It will do,” I say.
For a moment, neither of us moves. The silence between us is thick, weighed down with the tragic scene we came across in the forest and the difficulties that lie ahead. I set all three bags I’m carrying on the table and search through my rucksack for fire-starting stones.
I add wood and kindling to the hearth, crouch beside it, and strike the stones together until a spark ignites into a proper fire.
As the glow spreads through the cabin, I walk around the perimeter of the place, closing the windows with a touch of magic, a brief swirl of blue from my fingertips, that will prevent anyone from opening them from the outside. I do the same with the door.
Behind me, I feel Isabel’s grief brushing against mine through the bond.
Not pity, but shared sorrow. She didn’t know the fae bodies strewn about the forest with arrows in their backs, but she shares my grief, nonetheless.
Not just grief, but outrage. Until now, she would never have imagined her people could kill women and children so easily.
There were more females than males in the clearing, and those six children…
Those little bodies.
My throat tightens.
Isabel comes to stand beside me, close enough that the warmth of her presence reaches through the coldness that has started to encase my heart.
“I’m so sorry about your people,” she says quietly. “Oh, Gideon. I’m just so very sorry.”
Her words and gentle presence wash over me, comforting and grounding. I place a hand over hers and turn to face her.
“I should have been there,” I say. “I am Lord of Frostfall. They are my people, my responsibility, and I failed them.”
“You could not have known. Your brother… he can’t send messenger birds like you. He had no way of warning you.”
“The situation must be dire in Frostfall if he sent his mate ahead without him. Gods, I cannot believe he sent her with a group and without a highborn fae escort.”
The only weapons I glimpsed among my fallen people were a few knives and swords, though faefolk who are not part of an army typically are not very skilled at fighting, especially when they are outnumbered by humans or orcs.
I cast a glance toward the nearest window, eyeing the position of the sun.
“It will be dusk soon,” I say. “Even if I fly, I do not believe I could reach Hollins to visit your father and then make it back to the cabin before nightfall. Protective wards or not, I do not want to leave you here in the dark. I will go tomorrow at first light.”
Even when I go off to battle, I will leave a few fae soldiers behind to watch over her, just to be safe. The mere thought of any harm coming to her makes me want to roar with rage.
“You will go? By yourself?” Her expression turns troubled. “Please, Gideon. Please take me with you.”
I study her face, taking in the worry darkening her eyes.
“You wish to see your father.”
She nods. “Yes. If battle is truly coming, I need to know he is safe. I know you plan to warn him, but I think he will be more inclined to listen to me.”
“If you truly wish to come, there is something you should know. Though I will warn him, I intend to glamour him as well. I will glamour him to remain at the inn during the battle, and also to keep his tongue from wagging. I will not risk him warning the townsfolk of the impending attack.”
Unease pulses through the bond, a rush of fear. Not fear for herself or for her father, since she trusts I will keep them both safe, but fear for the humans in Hollins. Fear for what the Winter Court army might do to them.
When we attacked Braemar, we didn’t just kill the soldiers. We killed anyone else who happened to be in the streets offering resistance, sparing only the children. Thousands died.
An image flashes through the bond.
It is the view from her bedroom window at her home in Braemar. The nighttime streets lie in terrible stillness, too many houses resting in total darkness, no lanterns burning in the windows because the occupants are dead.
It is an image that affected her deeply in the aftermath of the battle, one she still sometimes dreams about.
I exhale slowly, forcing down a fresh surge of rage. Soldiers from Braemar killed my people as well, though I did not personally know the faefolk from the settlement they decimated.
“There are many innocent people in Hollins,” she whispers.
“And we just saw the bodies of thirty-eight innocent faefolk in the forest, my sister-in-law among them.”
She pales, and for a long moment, she says nothing. I sense the turmoil in her heart, and I despair over the fact that I’m partly to blame.
She lowers her gaze, unable to meet my eyes.
“What happened to your people was unforgivable,” she says. “But is the spilling of more innocent blood truly the answer?”
Doubt cuts through me.
Even though she can sense my thoughts, I pull away from her and quickly turn around, as though I might somehow hide my true feelings from her.
Though we have not yet consummated our union, the bond only keeps growing stronger. I do not believe I can hide anything from her, just as she cannot hide anything from me.
She knows that despite my building rage, my unquenchable need for vengeance, I have occasionally experienced moments of pity for the humans and orcs I wage war against.
I know that I have struck down innocents in the heat of battle simply because they happened to be running through the streets. And sometimes, I wonder whether the gods will punish me for it.
But whenever such a thought enters my mind, I try to tell myself it is my Seelie side surfacing, the side my father tried so very hard to crush.
He loved my mother, but he did not want either of his sons to possess any propensity for mercy.
His words come back to me like a burst of winter wind and icy fury.
Violence is strength. Do not shame me with your Seelie side, son. Do not merely kill your enemies. Make them suffer and kill all those they care about as well. Cruelty is a powerful weapon, one you must always keep in your arsenal.
When Isabel gasps, I know she has seen the memory.
It was his counsel to me as I prepared to join the Winter Court army. Counsel I had tried my best to follow. After a few hundred years of service in the Winter Court army, I became King Theron’s most trusted commander, so perhaps my father was right.
“I will do what I must to avenge my people,” I eventually say. “And I will follow the Winter King’s orders when the battle is upon us.”
“You aren’t your father,” she says.
A growl leaves me, and I spin to face her.
“I know who I am,” I reply with a growl, but the doubt from earlier keeps cutting through me, as sharp and cold as a frost-kissed blade.
You are hurting right now, she sends down the tether we share.
I know you are. It is okay to feel doubt.
It is okay to be tempted by another path for yourself.
Please don’t push me away, Gideon. I see you.
Yes, I know you have killed humans and orcs.
I know you have even taken pleasure in it at times.
But not always. There have been moments when you hesitated.
Moments when you doubted. And I do not believe you are the vicious fae lord I once thought you were.
Not truly. I have felt your compassion, even when you try to hide it from yourself.
Silence stretches between us. Though she means for her words to be comforting, they don’t alleviate the turmoil that’s spreading through me like a cold, black plague.
I think of Lachlan and the agony he must be enduring.
Surely he must know something has happened to Maelissa by now.
When my father died in battle, my mother felt the absence of his soul in this realm immediately, and she fell to the ground and screamed.
I was there that day. I held her as she cried.
“I will take you to Hollins tomorrow,” I eventually say, “but you must remain at my side, and you will only be permitted to speak with your father. No one else. Do you understand?”
A wave of hurt surges through the bond. She blinks fast, then lifts her chin and glares at me. “Fine.”
I suppress the urge to growl again, as well as the urge to grab her and shake her. But I don’t want to scare her or take my frustrations and grief out on her. After taking a few deep breaths, I close the space between us and tuck her gently into my arms.
“Little moth,” I murmur softly.
“Gideon,” she says, her voice strained.
I don’t want to argue with you, my darling mate. Please forgive me for my harsh tone, I tell her. Then I send her a surge of warmth, a flash of affection that comes straight from my heart.
She sighs and wraps her arms around my waist. I kiss the crown of her head, savoring her lilac scent.
Eventually, she hugs me tighter and sends me a wave of affection in return, a warmth that feels like forgiveness and healing.
“I will fix a meal for us,” I say, “and then we should go to bed. We must leave early tomorrow. As you already know, some humans can see through fae glamours, and I don’t want to risk being spotted in the village.
The earlier we arrive in Hollins, when the streets are less crowded, the safer it will be.
” I try not to let her hear my worries about human soldiers wanting to hurt her just for her association with me, but the bond is too strong, and I know she senses this particular fear of mine.
But she trusts me to keep her safe and still wishes to accompany me.
“Do a great many humans possess some fae ancestry? Is it really that common?”
“More common than you might guess,” I reply, remembering the stories about my great-uncle siring several bastards during his explorations of human and orc lands.
“Well, I appreciate you wanting to keep me safe. Yes, let’s leave early, and we won’t stay for long. Just long enough to warn my father.”
We pull apart slowly, and I stare down at her as I finally reach a decision.
After the battle against Hollins, I tell her, I am done.
I will resign my position as a commander in the Winter Court army.
And we will travel to Frostfall together, bury the dead, and lead the rest of my people back into the human lands to create a brand-new settlement.
Somewhere slightly north of here in the mountains, in a place where ussha thrives.
She gasps, and her eyes widen.
“Do you truly mean it?” she asks in a whisper.
“Yes, little moth. The idea has been forming in my mind for a while now, and… the timing feels right. I am only sorry that I didn’t return to Frostfall sooner.
Though, I suppose if I had, I wouldn’t have found you when I was meant to.
So perhaps I shouldn’t be sorry for it. You are my precious mate, Isabel, and I will cherish you forever. ”
“Oh, Gideon. You’re going to make me cry.”
A few tears roll down her face. I wipe them away with my thumbs and press another gentle kiss on her forehead, pleasantly surprised by the rapidly growing intimacy of our bond. She’s close to surrender, so close I can sense it. But she wavers as she considers the events of today.
I don’t want our first time together to be tainted by darkness, she says down the bond.
I understand, and I feel the same way, little moth, I reply.
Relief and affection ripple through the bond, and it travels both ways. Soon, we will consummate our mating union. When the time is right. When the weight of grief and the coming battle no longer hangs over us.
For a moment, we simply stand there, wrapped in one another’s arms, the fire crackling behind us, the winter wind rattling the shutters.
I rest my forehead against hers.
“But I intend to hold you all night,” I murmur.
A soft breath leaves her. “I won’t argue with that.”