34. Leverage
S weat beaded across Kael’s brow as he lunged forward, longsword gripped tightly in his hand. It gleamed when it caught the light. Raif parried the blow easily, letting it glance off his shield.
“Your strikes are slow tonight,” he commented, dodging another swipe. “Soften your grip.”
“My grip is fine,” Kael growled. His hair slipped loose from where he’d tied it at the nape of his neck and stuck to the sweat that dripped from his temple. Finally, he landed a strike on the outside of Raif’s thigh, the blade biting into his thick training leathers. The pair had been sparring for nearly an hour, and to Kael’s great frustration, he’d only manage to land four hits to Raif’s six. He was out of practice, and he was distracted .
“A decent effort for your first time raising a weapon in nearly a month,” Raif appraised, hardly winded by their fight. “Your strength will return. It’s your focus that concerns me.”
Kael, unbuckling his own leathers, cut a harsh glare in Raif’s direction. “I do not recall asking for your assessment of my skills, Captain.”
“And yet I’ve given it all the same,” Raif shot back, then sighed. “Did I make a mistake?”
“Beating me? Some would say so.” Kael reached up to retie his damp hair, pushing strands roughly back off of his skin.
“Bringing the girl, Kael. I shouldn’t have done so without your permission.” Raif sat down heavily on a bench at the edge of the training ring and dug at a rock stuck in the tread of his boot with his dagger. Kael sat on a bench adjacent. He leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees.
“You made the right decision. I would still be shut away if you hadn’t.” It was a difficult thing for Kael to admit out loud, that this human girl had been the one to drag him back from the edge. Raif knew it, too, and kept his eyes on the stone in his boot while Kael spoke.
“She is not what I expected the Red Woman to be,” Raif said.
“Far, far from it,” Kael agreed. “My imagined version certainly would have been easier to kill.”
“She is as brave as I would have expected, though. It took very little convincing to get her to return once I told her of your injury, despite the way you parted.” Raif gave up on the rock and began stripping off his leathers. Kael did the same .
“Indeed, she is that.” To call Aisling merely brave felt like an understatement, but he couldn’t think of a word strong enough to describe her courage. Or, maybe, stupidity, to have returned to help the male who she believed wanted her dead. Whichever it was, he was thankful for it.
“Care to ride with me?” Raif asked, standing now with his leather chest plate tucked under his arm. “I picked up a perimeter post for this morning. If I were to hazard a guess, I’d say you’d be unlikely to sleep if you returned to your chamber now.”
“I could use the distraction,” Kael agreed.
Once she’d been saddled, Kael mounted Furax fluidly and joined Raif at the tree line. His mare, slightly smaller but no less intimidating, stamped and snorted impatiently.
“You are the captain,” Kael said as they began their route. “Why do you continue to take patrols? Especially at this hour. This job is for far greener soldiers.”
Raif slashed at a low branch that hung over the trail and his horse kicked it aside when it fell to the snow-covered ground. “A good leader never asks their men to do what they would not themselves. And I like the quiet of the morning. It’s good for thinking.”
It was quiet, save for the birdsong of those which remained behind to winter there. Kael settled into Furax’s rhythmic movement and drew in a breath of crisp, cold air. It wasn’t often that he was out at this hour—he preferred sunset to sunrise—but there was something peaceful to being awake while the rest of his court retired for the day.
“And what is it that you have to think about?” Kael asked.
“The same as you, more than likely. The war, the future of your court. What the Red Woman means in all of this.” Raif scanned the deep woods, though there was no sign of movement. They hadn’t faced a threat this close to the Undercastle in years, but still the patrols continued like clockwork.
“What do you think?” Kael reached forward to brush a clump of snow from where it had fallen into Furax’s mane, then leaned back in the saddle. He wished for an advisor to tell him what to do, what could be done. Raif was as close as he would get; Aisling’s presence was certainly not a matter he would take to Werryn.
“I do not think she wishes to destroy you, as the prophecy would suggest. But,” Raif added thoughtfully, “it is a prophecy for a reason.”
“Even if she should stay and do nothing at all in its pursuit, it will come to pass regardless. Fate has already set things in motion.” Kael did his best to push feeling out of his voice. He was skilled beyond all else at cool rationalization, but his current situation was putting that skill to the test, and he was failing. There was a crack in that dam he’d erected long ago to hold back his emotions, to keep them out of his way, and it seemed only to spread each time he thought of Aisling.
“What will you do?”
Kael sucked in another deep breath of that sharp air. The cold in his lungs soothed him some. “She suggested seeking out the Silver Saints to act as some sort of mediator in a peace negotiation.” He pronounced their true name then, slowly, as though the words alone held the power to bring them back. The translation, though perhaps less impressive, felt somehow safer.
“The Silver Saints?” Raif barked out a surprised laugh. “Can it even be done?”
“I am not sure,” Kael said truthfully.
“I haven’t heard that name in an age. She’d have us return to the early days then? With the Silver Saints ruling over both courts?” Raif steered his horse down a narrower trail. Furax followed without direction from Kael.
“I am not sure,” he repeated. “I think that she is na?ve and idealistic to believe such a solution could be viable.” He wished he could be, too. Seeing the hope shining in Aisling’s eyes had nearly broken him; he’d never felt such a thing. But he wanted to. And if there was anyone in the entire realm that might inspire it in him, it would be her.
Raif dug in a saddlebag and withdrew a flask. He took a pull, then offered it to Kael. “Maybe. But it is clear that she wants to protect you.”
“She is misguided.” Kael accepted the flask gratefully, the honey wine warming his tongue and throat. He stopped himself short of draining it and handed it back to his friend.
“She cares about you.” Raif finished it off then tucked the flask away.
“Again, misguided.”
The pair rode in silence for a time before Raif spoke again. “If it were possible—if you were the one to raise the Silver Saints—it could give you more leverage on the outcome.”
Kael looked at Raif. “Go on.”
“If you are the one to raise them, they will see you as the cooperative party. It could give you greater pull in negotiations if they believe you wish to see this war end peaceably, rather than the Seelie Court.”
Kael thought about this for several minutes, puzzling over the possibilities. Each path played out in his mind’s eye, each decision branching off into countless others. The only path he was certain of was the one that saw Aisling by his side.
“If you’re right, that could be the simplest way to maintain control of the end result,” Kael acknowledged finally. “I could ensure that it is at least somewhat favorable for our court.”
“It is far from a sure thing, but it may be the best option we have considered thus far,” Raif said, then added: “however na?ve and idealistic it may be.”
The book was exactly where Kael remembered it, pinned between two other thick tomes high on the shelf directly behind the desk in his study, where he kept his most valuable manuscripts. These were not his favorites—those were filled with timeworn pages that he returned to again and again over the years. These were the most ancient, the most rare. He scarcely touched these.
It was bound in oxblood leather, unmarred, the spine barely creased. When it had been brought to him as part of a bounty collected after they’d seized some distant dominion, it was merely a loose collection of pages, tied around the middle with twine. He’d gotten it bound and, knowing wear would only lessen its value, had only opened it a handful of times since. Now, he held it against his chest as he walked through the corridors.
He slept well after his conversation with Raif, but he’d been eager for the day to pass and Aisling to wake. He wanted to speak with her again. More than that, he wanted to see her again. It was only with great effort that he’d left her at the door of her suite after they’d walked together through the night garden. If he’d had his way, and if she hadn’t brought the White Bear along to chaperone, he’d have asked her back to his own chamber.
She was waiting for him in the throne room late that night, as his note had requested, but his gladness to see her faltered slightly when he noticed she was accompanied by the púca and the White Bear. Both looked as though they wanted to snarl when he entered.
“You brought company,” Kael observed curtly.
Aisling threw him an apologetic smile. “They insisted.”
“We’re a package deal,” Rodney said, squaring his shoulders.
“I was not complaining,” Kael assured the three, however untrue. “I trust your rooms are satisfactory? And you’ve been fed?”
“We’ve been well taken care of, thank you.” Aisling smiled again. It warmed him, that smile.
“Nice to see you understand hospitality, after all.” Rodney grunted when Aisling drove her elbow into his ribs. Kael ignored the barb.
“Come,” he said. “I would like to show you something.” He shortened his long strides just enough for Aisling to fall into step beside him as he led the group across to the far side of the throne room.
“How are you feeling?” she asked, loud enough only for Kael’s ears while Rodney trudged sullenly several paces behind.
“Well, thank you.” Kael’s fingers tightened around the edges of the tome he carried, suppressing the urge to reach out and take Aisling’s hand, or to sweep away the strand of hair that had fallen across her cheek. “Very well.”
He pushed open the door to a vestibule off the throne room. It was a small space, hand-carved into the stone rather than built from a natural cavern as the throne room was. There was a long table in the center, and torches burning on the walls illuminated the sturdy hewn chairs around it.
“I take meetings here on occasion,” Kael explained as they filed in. Briar still gave him a wide berth, to his great relief. “With lords, generally, or their guard captains. Those whom I do not wish to give such access to the Undercastle as to see them in my study.”
Aisling’s eyes had already found the purpose for Kael’s tour and she was moving toward the back of the space as though drawn by an invisible force. He and Rodney followed her, stopping before the rear wall and gazing up at the art that hung there.
“This is the original,” she murmured. Four times the size of the page that was still folded up in her jacket pocket, the ink drawing that depicted the three courts was even more ornate than the print. Each fine, tiny detail etched there by hand had significance; the artist wasted no space with filler or meaningless imagery. Reaching above Aisling’s head, Kael unhooked it from the wall and turned to lay it flat on the table.
All three leaned in to peer at it closely. Kael seized the opportunity to step another half-inch nearer to Aisling, just enough that their arms touched when she bent forward. He ignored Briar’s warning growl as he did so.
“I thought you might like to see it this way.” Kael watched Aisling study the artwork, examining every inch of the uppermost segment that depicted the Silver Saints, high above the Seelie and Unseelie Courts. Even the stars that surrounded them, he’d been told, were accurate to their true placement in the sky when the image was drawn.
Once Aisling and Rodney straightened up and stepped away, Kael hung it back on the wall. Still, all three continued to stare up at it.
“I have given your suggestion a great deal of consideration, you know,” Kael said. He kept his eyes on the drawing, though he heard Aisling turn to face him.
“Good of you,” Rodney muttered.
“Quiet,” Aisling hissed at him, then turned back to Kael. “And?”
He looked down at her. There it was again: that hope. It flooded his veins with a comforting heat. “And, despite my earlier apprehension, I believe that it may not be such a bad solution after all.”
“Ah,” Rodney said sarcastically. “So there’s something in it for you, then. What’s your angle, Highness?”
Kael’s temper flared and his eyes snapped to Rodney’s, boring into them fiercely. “Mind your silver tongue, púca, or you’ll find it cut out of your head. Your cleverness will not be tolerated here.”
“That’s enough, both of you. Rodney, take Briar outside for me then make sure he eats.” He opened his mouth to protest, but Aisling beat him to it: “Now. Go on.”
Kael held his aggressive posture until Rodney had left the room with the White Bear in tow and didn’t relax again until he felt Aisling’s hand squeeze his arm gently.
“I’m sorry about him.”
Kael offered her a tight smile. “Only one of them is your pet to control, and to your credit, he is much better behaved than the changeling.”
Aisling’s eyebrows shot up and she laughed loudly—a true, honest laugh. Kael would have done or said just about anything to have heard it again once she quieted.
He pulled out a chair for her and drew up one just beside. When he placed the book on the table between them, Aisling turned her body and their legs touched beneath the table. For a moment, Kael was afraid to move, afraid to breathe. If she’d done so on accident, the last thing he wanted to do was shift and alert her to their contact so she’d pull away. But when he finally did, she remained in place, her thigh pressing lightly against his own.
“This is the book you mentioned?” she asked.
“It is.” He smoothed his hand over the soft leather of the cover then lifted it. The binding was still stiff enough to crack in protest as he opened it to the first page.
Aisling clicked her tongue. “I don’t know why I expected I’d be able to read it.”
“I can read it to you,” he assured her .
For some time, the pair poured over the text. Every few pages he’d skim, Kael would translate aloud a passage he thought might interest Aisling. He’d have read her the entire thing, cover to cover, if she’d asked.
“The Silver Saints possess the ability of Far Sight, unique from other Tuatha Dé Danann, which permits them to briefly glimpse into the tapestry of fate, seeing each warp and weft, each thread and gap,” he recited. “As such, their kind guided the lesser Fae through periods of struggle and unrest and, in time, set them down the path to develop a system of two courts: the Seelie and the Unseelie, the light and the shadow.”
“We could use a bit of Far Sight. Does it say where to find them?” Aisling asked, dubiously eyeing the dwindling number of pages they had left.
“They cannot be found. They must be called, I believe.” Kael skimmed ahead several more sections.
“Called?”
He hummed. “With a ritual of some sort, I would imagine. They no longer reside in this realm.”
“Something like how you call to the Low One?” Aisling shifted, uncomfortable with even the mention of His name.
“Something like that.” When she shivered, he pressed his leg a bit tighter against hers, a gesture he hoped would comfort her against the memory of her experience in The Cut.
“But this book doesn’t say anything about it?” She watched him turn the next page, then two more after that.
“It may be too old; it could have been written when they were still here,” he surmised as he neared the end.
“Oh.” The disappointment was as clear in Aisling’s voice as it was written across her face.
Desperate to keep that spark of hope burning in her, Kael said quickly, “I still have several other volumes I can look in.”
“ We can look in,” she corrected. “We’re on the same team now.”
No longer able to resist the urge, Kael reached out to tuck that stray hair back from her face, then let his hand drop to grasp hers where it rested on the table. “Indeed we are.”
He kept ahold of Aisling’s hand as he walked her back to her suite, after she insisted that she check in on Rodney to make sure he hadn’t gotten himself tossed in the dungeon.
“After all this is over, will you teach me your language?” she asked thoughtfully as they stood in the passageway in front of her door.
He raised her hand to his lips and brushed a gentle kiss over her knuckles. “I will teach you whatever you would like.”