Chapter Fourteen
Connor
Xiathen had again chosen the old well for their next conversation, as if water and stone made better witnesses than people.
Connor and his small entourage of Laird and Max found the Mystic waiting at the edge of the square, hands folded in the sleeves of his robe, head slightly bowed. It looked less like deference and more like listening, as though something beneath the cobbles had his full attention.
The well itself was ancient, older than the cottages, older than the lanes that pretended at order. Its stones had been worn smooth by generations of hands. Someone had tied scraps of ribbon to the iron crank, bright threads fluttering in the wind like half-remembered wishes.
Max took up position at Connor’s right, solid and silent. Laird hovered on Connor’s left, making no attempt to disguise his hovering.
Connor didn’t waste time. “You said you’d explain more about Adrian and this craziness we find ourselves in.”
Xiathen lifted their head. His eyes were calm, dark, and unsettlingly old. “Yes,” he said. “Because you keep asking the same question with a different mouth.”
Connor’s jaw tightened. “Answer it. The Triarc have had their turn.”
Xiathen didn’t argue. Instead, his gaze slid past Connor, toward the lane that led out of the village, toward the place where Glengáill stopped smelling like damp stone and woodsmoke and began, abruptly, to smell like Scotland again.
“Did you know outsiders can find us?” Xiathen asked quietly.
“They can walk our streets. Eat our bread. Touch our walls and swear they are solid.” He huffed a small, humourless breath.
“For them, everything shuts when the midday sun is hottest.” He shrugged.
“I have no idea why but the tradition of all our shops closing at one o’clock exactly has always been one we fulfill. Then they leave.”
Connor crossed his arms. “And they don’t remember.”
Laird blurted, “We do.”
Xiathen’s eyes flicked to him, and something like approval softened his expression. “You do. Because you all belong to the land that holds this place. The threads may look separate, but they knot more often than you think.”
Connor felt his skin prickle—not at the words themselves, but at how easily they were said. “Stop talking like we’re part of your story.”
Xiathen’s mouth curved faintly. “You are. You simply arrived late.”
Connor said nothing. His hands curled, then relaxed.
“This isn’t a glamour,” Xiathen continued. “Not a simple spell that blurs minds. It’s older than that.”
“A law,” Connor said.
“A boundary,” Xiathen corrected. “A perimeter of permission.”
Max narrowed his eyes. “Plainly.”
Xiathen nodded, as if conceding the point. “Very well. Your land, Brannigan land, has always been receptive.”
Connor scoffed. “It’s a glen.”
“It is a glen that remembers,” Xiathen said evenly. “It remembers oaths. Blood spilled in defence. Names spoken with honour. That memory isn’t written down. It’s carried.”
Connor didn’t like how that landed, as if the ground itself had opinions.
Xiathen stepped closer to the well, resting his fingers against the cold stone rim. “When Glengáill crossed the Veils, it didn’t land here by chance. It anchored to the nearest place that could bear its weight without tearing.”
Connor swallowed. “My land.”
“Yes,” Xiathen said. “Because your land has a keeper.”
Connor held their gaze. “Me.”
“A King with unknown power yet to be released. Now a Valour and a Veilwarden. A powerful mix.”
Laird shifted uneasily. “Then why do strangers forget?”
“Because the village isn’t meant to be carried out into the wider world,” Xiathen said. “Not by accident. Not by fear. Not by enthusiasm.”
Max’s voice hardened. “You erase him.”
“No.” Xiathen’s eyes sharpened. “We don’t take what isn’t offered. The forgetting is not punishment. It’s protection.”
Connor snorted. “For whom?”
“For you,” Xiathen said. “And for us.” They looked down the lane again. “Anyone who strays onto your land can see the village. The land allows it. It’s hospitable to the lost.”
Connor thought of hikers, tourists, people who wandered off marked trails believing nothing unexpected waited for them. His stomach tightened. “And when they leave?”
“The memory can’t cross the perimeter,” Xiathen replied. “It slips away. Like trying to carry a dream into sunlight.”
Laird frowned. “But why?”
“Because memory tethers places,” Xiathen said patiently. “If outsiders carried full knowledge of Glengáill back with him, the world would pull.”
“Pull how?” Max asked.
“Curiosity, fear, ownership. And worse, attention from the Council of Veils.”
Connor went still. “They could track it.”
“Yes,” Xiathen said. “A name can be followed. A remembered road can be mapped.”
“So you make them forget,” Connor said, “so no one can lead them here.”
“Not only him,” Xiathen replied. “There are things that follow awareness the way predators follow blood.”
Laird grimaced. “That’s reassuring.”
“It’s honest,” Xiathen said.
Connor exhaled slowly. “Then why can we remember?”
“Because you aren’t outsiders.”
“Feels like it.”
Xiathen didn’t react. “You’re bound to the land by stewardship and protection. The village recognises that. So does the ground beneath it.”
Connor grimaced at the phrasing but didn’t disagree.
“And the Gauthiers?” Max asked.
Xiathen didn’t hesitate. “Because Adrian Gauthier is also a Valour. Because the binding is already weaving your clans closer than either of you planned.”
Connor felt a familiar tightening under his ribs at the sound of Adrian’s name. He hated that his body answered before his thoughts did.
“So strangers remember while they’re here,” Max said.
“Yes.”
“And forget when they leave.”
“Yes.”
“But not in a way they can explain,” Connor said.
“Not in a way that can be weaponised,” Xiathen agreed.
Connor stared at the ribbons tied to the well, fluttering like surrender flags. “And if someone stays?”
Xiathen’s fingers tightened on the stone. “Then they begin to belong.”
Laird’s eyes widened. “So they’d remember.”
“Yes.”
“And if they try to leave after that?”
Xiathen’s calm finally cracked slightly. “The forgetting becomes less kind.”
“A trap,” Connor said flatly.
“A sanctuary with rules,” Xiathen replied. “Like your own strongholds. Protection always has teeth.”
Connor said nothing. He knew it was true.
“So they’re safe while they’re here,” Laird murmured.
“Safer than they were outside,” Xiathen said.
Connor hardened. “And if the Council comes?”
Xiathen met his gaze. “Then forgetting won’t save us. That’s why Valours matter. Because sanctuary only holds while someone stands for it.”
Connor felt anger rise. Not because he didn’t understand, but because he did. “And if we refuse?” Max asked.
Xiathen looked up at the sky, where clouds were gathering again. “Then the village will remain. And the Council will still come.” Xiathen looked back at Connor. “The only question is whether you’ll still be standing when they do.”
Connor turned away before his expression betrayed the decision forming in him. “Come on,” he said roughly. “We’re done here.”
As they left the square, Connor glanced back once. Xiathen stood beside the well, ribbons snapping in the wind. And Connor understood with cold clarity that forgetting wasn’t a mercy. It was a wall. And walls existed only to keep something in or something out.