Chapter 46
The horn sounded across the caldera, and a tower farther up the slope answered almost immediately, its call rising through the steam and red-lit air.
They had not gone twenty paces up the road before riders appeared at the lower gate: six of them, in the dark gold and black of the Ellylldan house guard, their cloaks streaming behind them as they came down at a hard canter.
The rider at the head of the formation hauled his mount to a stop with such force that the animal slid beneath him, hooves scraping for purchase, and was off the horse before it had fully stilled.
He was young.
That was the first thing Elara registered—younger than she had expected of the rider at the head of an Ellylldan guard column.
Dark hair worn loose at his shoulders and deep viridian eyes that found Reynnar and Aoife with a force that made Elara’s throat tighten before she could think better of it.
He covered the last paces in three long strides and pulled Reynnar and Aoife into his arms.
“Faolán.”
“Reynnar. Aoife, I—”
Reynnar clapped him hard between the shoulder blades, and Faolán stepped back with his throat working.
Then his gaze found Aoife, and his face crumpled before he could master it.
He drew her in again, more gently this time, both arms circling her shoulders, and Elara saw the moment one of his hands lifted behind her, hovering, remembering the wings that had once unfurled there.
Faolán shifted his hand to the sleeve of her cloak, smoothing the worn fabric as though that had been his intention from the start, and Aoife let him keep the lie. “Welcome home, Fi,” he murmured against her hair, the words nearly stolen by the wind.
Elara’s gaze moved past them to Caelion, standing near the horses a step behind the others.
He had not spoken since the riders arrived.
He looked hewn from the stone beneath their feet, every part of him held in rigid control, though the muscle ticking at his temple betrayed the cost. His gaze stayed fixed on Faolán’s hands as they fell away from Aoife.
Faolán cleared his throat and sent an order over his shoulder in terse, clipped Tírrísh.
The guards moved at once, falling into practiced motion behind him, though his attention had already returned to Caelion.
They exchanged something that was too controlled to be called hostility, and far too weighted to be dismissed as courtesy.
Faolán inclined his head, a gesture so slight Elara might have missed it if she had not been watching him so closely.
Caelion did not answer it.
Wind stirred between them, carrying the mountain’s heat and the distant cry of the horns before Faolán finally looked away and turned to Reynnar.
“Your lord father and lady mother are in Scáthvale,” he said.
“The old trade matter with the Sylph court. Lord Caelion, your own father is their host. They are expected back by week’s end. ”
“And no herald?”
“None reached us. None reached them, so far as we know. The first word came from Lasairín three weeks ago, carried on foot by those your sister sent. Lady Breagha had the household moving before the messenger had finished speaking.” His gaze touched briefly on Aoife before slipping away. “The rooms have been aired.”
“Thank you, Faolán.”
Only then did Faolán’s attention shift to Elara.
“This is Eilíara,” Reynnar said, coming to stand at her side. There was something in his voice that made her name feel less like an introduction than a claim carefully offered before witnesses. “She is to be welcomed at Brannoc House as our honored guest.”
Faolán stepped toward Elara and bowed. “Then Brannoc House is honored by your arrival, Lady Elara,” he said.
She laughed. “It’s just Elara.”
A smile touched Faolán’s face, small and unexpectedly kind. “As you wish, my lady.”
The soldiers moved at once, two striding ahead, two falling to either flank, the last pair closing ranks behind them. Faolán vaulted back into the saddle in one fluid motion and gathered the reins tight in his fist.
They passed beneath the gates of the lower city soon after.
Elara had to crane her neck to follow the great archway overhead, red-veined stone towering above them, the mineral seams catching stray light in dark crimson glints.
Beyond them, the horses settled into an easy walk over steam-dark cobbles.
Heat drifted from the narrow runnels carved along the streets, winding pale through the air around boots and stirrups alike.
The city carried the scent of cedar smoke and resin, pepper and blistered orange peel.
It slipped into her lungs and settled there, strange enough to unsettle her with how comforting it was.
A cluster of Sídhe lingered beside the road.
Her attention passed over them idly at first, snagged only by familiarity she could not immediately place. Then recognition struck hard enough to hollow the breath from her chest.
A female from the washbasin in the Pit stood near the front of the group, her hands clasped tightly together.
Elara remembered freezing water stained pink from split knuckles, remembered the two of them bent shoulder to shoulder over cracked stone while guards shouted overhead.
Beside her was the male with the burn scar climbing red up his throat, and memory brought back the smell of blistered flesh, the terrible discipline of his silence while the guards laughed.
Heat rushed through her veins and guttered out, leaving a cold ache in its place.
She had known Aoife and Caelion sent many of the freed Sídhe south into Ellylldan lands, where they would be safest—or as close to safe as any of them would ever be. Yet some frightened part of her had continued imagining empty faces and shallow graves all the same.
More Sídhe gathered along the street, slipping from upper galleries and steam-baths, from narrow shopfronts fragrant with roasting meat and spice, from shaded archways where conversations died as the company passed.
The road did not crowd; it drew inward, folding around them with the hush of a held breath.
Faces from the Pit were threaded throughout, the others foreign to her, though their eyes found Elara with unsettling certainty, as if her name had reached this city before she had.
Then, all at once, the Sídhe along the road raised their hands.
Fingers spread. Palms outward. Then drawn inward to the heart.
The gesture Caelion had taught her in a chamber in Turlaith, with that rare softness in his eyes. Deep respect. Recognition. I see your soul and offer mine beside it.
Hundreds of hands rose as one, and the whole street seemed to hush beneath the motion.
Elara’s throat closed so quickly it hurt. “What do I do?” she whispered, though she did not know if Reynnar could hear her over the pounding of her own pulse.
“Chin up, ealaín.”
Two fingers brushed beneath her jaw—only that, the smallest lift, and with it the command she heard plainly enough: be brave.
Elara straightened slowly, her breathing ragged. The shaking left her hands sometime before they reached the keep, swallowed beneath the weight pressing through her chest. Faolán dismounted, handed off his reins, and led them the rest of the way on foot.
Two grooms came for the horses at once. A woman in an apron hurried up the inner stair, calling for linens, while another rushed below to have a bath drawn.
Near the kitchens, a youngling stopped dead at the sight of Aoife, until an older girl caught him by the shoulder and guided him away.
He went reluctantly, head craned back until the passage swallowed him.
By the time they climbed the steps and entered the long hall, the keep had gathered around them in stunned silence. Servants stood in doorways. Guards halted mid-stride. Every face lifted toward Aoife and Caelion as they passed.
“My lady,” someone whispered. “What happened?”
Aoife did not answer, but Elara saw—for the first time since she had known her—the corner of the Sylph’s mouth giving way. Elara reached for her, taking her hand, and Aoife gripped hers so hard the bones in Elara’s knuckles pressed together and sang.
“All will be explained,” Reynnar said, his voice carrying the length of the hall without force. “In its proper time. For now, please. Let us pass.”
The hall opened for him.
Aoife did not release Elara’s hand through the corridor, where every eye seemed to follow them, or up the stair, or beneath the carved archway that led into the family wing.
She held on as one might grip a railing on a pitching deck, and her fingers did not loosen until they rounded the final corner and stepped into the private sitting room.
Even then, it was only because the small, formidable figure waiting in the far doorway had already drawn enough breath to shake the walls.
“Where are my babies?”
Snow-white hair crowned her head in a braid, and a long dark gown of Ellylldan cut was belted in gold at her waist. Her eyes were extraordinary—a gold so deep it had gone nearly red, like embers just before they lost their heat.
Her gaze swept the room, finding Reynnar first, then Aoife. It moved over Aoife’s shoulders and down to her back, where it stopped.
“Fi.”
Aoife swallowed. “Mamó.”
Gran.
The elder Sídhe crossed the room with a speed that made a mockery of her size.
She scarcely reached Aoife’s chest, yet she cupped Aoife’s face in both hands and drew her down with such fierce tenderness that even the nearest attendants seemed to think better of breathing too loudly.
A kiss pressed against Aoife’s brow, and the room changed around her, going quiet in the way rooms did when something ancient and dangerous had fixed its full attention upon a single point.
“Who,” she asked, and her voice had gone very soft, “did this?”
“Mamó—”
“Who. Did. This.”