Chapter Eleven #3
Vadim’s umagi spies in Celieria had been disappearing by the dozens, rendering him blind and weakening the foothold he’d established in
northern Celieria. Whoever was behind those deaths, she didn’t know, but the Fey owed the mysterious agent a debt of gratitude.
With the loss of his umagi, Maur had no way to open the portals to the Well of Souls that would enable him to deliver an army for a surprise attack.
He had something up his sleeve, though. Something so important he would not even let himself think about it when he was with
her.
?Nei, his mind was too full of last night’s triumph. He has created a second Tairen Soul. A boy this time, with vel Serranis
blood.? She closed her eyes in horror. The poor, doomed child. There was no one to save him as she and Shan had saved Ellysetta.
?He must be stopped. If he Mage-claims a Tairen Soul . . . ? His voice trailed off. Twenty-five years ago, that same fear had pushed Shan and Elfeya to willingly risk death in an effort
to bind their daughter’s magic and smuggle her out of Eld so Maur could not enslave her soul. The devastating power of the
tairen under Mage control—it was a horror so dark Elfeya could scarcely think of it without shuddering.
?Elfeya . . . beloved . . . ?
Her body tensed. When her shei’tan said her name like that outside of mating, it never boded well.
?The girl who was here earlier—the umagi who came to feed me—she asked for my help. She wants me to kill Maur.?
Her blood ran cold. ?Nei.?
?Elfeya—?
?Nei! It must be some sort of trap. Some new way to torment us. She is umagi. None of them could even think such a thing without
the one who owns their souls knowing it.?
?Perhaps another Mage is her master then. One who wants Maur dead.?
?Even if that’s true, there’s no way you could kill him without being slain yourself.?
She felt his soul sigh. Then he said, in a voice so soft and weary it made her throat close up, ?After all these centuries of torment, can death truly be so terrible a fate, kem’san??
The tears she kept telling herself she would not shed pooled in her eyes and spilled over. ?Nei, teska, do not think that way. So long as we live, there is hope. A thousand years we have suffered. A thousand more would I bear, just for what few bells he grants us together. Do you love me any less??
?You know I don’t.?
?Then promise me you will not do this.?
?Elfeya . . . ?
?Promise me, Shan.?
For a long moment he did not answer, and then finally, in a defeated whisper, ?What choices we make, we make for us both. If you do not wish it, it will not be done.?
The Fading Lands ~ Fey’Bahren
?Your mate needs feeding,? Sybharukai chided.
Ellysetta had been sitting with the eggs for several long bells. Even now, she leaned against them, her hands stroking gently
over the leathery shells as she crooned little songs of encouragement and praise.
“Aiyah,” he agreed, “and sleep.” Though inside, the nesting lair remained dark and unchanged, outside the Great Sun had passed its
zenith and was already approaching the western horizon. Most of the day was gone, and Marissya and Dax were less than eighty
miles away. They would be here before nightfall.
Rain regarded Ellysetta. There was no hint of the weariness he could feel beating at her. Was she even aware of it? Her concentration
was wholly focused on communicating with the five small, unborn tairen huddled in their eggs. She was weaving love around
the unborn kitlings the way Fey wove the elements, only her weave wasn’t Spirit. It wasn’t illusion. It was genuine emotion,
real love, warming and welcoming. Tenderness. Devotion. Pride. Encouragement. It shone from her like sunlight, bathing the
kitlings in its warmth.
“Shei’tani.” He touched her shoulder. Still singing, she turned towards him, and for a brief moment the song of warmth, love, and tenderness poured over him, soaking into his skin. His breath stalled, and his eyes half closed in pleasure.
He gave a small frown of protest as Ellysetta cut her song short.
“I’m sorry.” She started to rise, and a surprised look crossed over her face as her legs—cramped for so long in their crouched
position—collapsed beneath her.
He caught her, swept an arm under her legs, and lifted her off her feet, carrying her with effortless strength up the main
entrance tunnel.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked as they veered right into one of the larger passageways branching off of the main tunnel.
“You are weary. You need to eat and sleep. There is a sleeping chamber above where you can rest.” Globes of light flared to
life as they walked, illuminating their path. This tunnel was narrower than the main tunnel but still quite wide. The walls
were smooth, the floor well worn.
“But the kitlings—”
“We have time.” The tunnel forked in three, one path leading below, two others leading up. They went up and to the left. “The
sickness attacking the tairen comes most often in the bells between dusk and dawn.”
“I don’t think it’s really a sickness, Rain. When I was singing to them, I tried to find signs of injury or illness, but I
couldn’t. I could be wrong, of course—Marissya is a far more experienced healer—but to me they all seem healthy. Tired and
frightened, but healthy.”
He gave her a grim look. “I feared you might say that.”
“So you don’t really believe it’s a sickness.”
“Nei. My instinct has always told me the Eld must surely be to blame, but I have watched far too many kitlings die in the egg—dozens
of them in my arms when I tried to cut them from the shell to save them—and never once have I sensed Azrahn.”
“Well, if it’s not Azrahn and the Mages, do you think whatever I sensed during the Fire Song could be behind the deaths of the kitlings?”
“I don’t know, shei’tani. I just don’t know.”
The passage snaked around, doubling back upon itself and continuing to rise. Above, dim light shone in from a large opening
at the top of the next U-shaped curve. As they passed it, Ellie glimpsed the bright blue afternoon sky. She lifted a hand
to shield her eyes, surprised that it was still light outside. She’d lost all sense of time deep within the caverns of Fey’Bahren.
She squirmed in his arms. “You should put me down. I’m certain I must be heavy.”
“You are no burden.” He bent his head to take her mouth in a long, sweet kiss. “Besides,” he added when he lifted his head,
“we are already here.”
He carried her through another, slightly smaller tunnel that ended in a tall, Fey-sized wooden door. A flick of his fingers
sent green Earth spinning out to lift the latch, and silvery Air blew open the door to reveal the chamber beyond. He gestured
again, and Fire blossomed in sconces all about the room, adding their light to the sunlight filtering in from yet another
passage leading off the main chamber.
Rain finally set Ellysetta on her feet, and she turned in slow circles to glance around the room. The chamber was obviously
made for Feyreisen: spacious enough for a tairen to maneuver, yet furnished with human comforts, including a bed piled thick
with furs and pillows, and large, beautifully woven rugs to soften the hard stone of the floor. Against one wall stood an
elegant, carved desk and matching gilded chair.
“This is your room,” she guessed.
“It used to be Johr’s—the previous Tairen Soul—but it’s been mine since I returned to sanity. There were other furnished rooms,
but I burned them out in the early days of my madness and never made the effort to restore them.” The corners of his eyes
crinkled at her look of dismay. “I’m much better now.”
“How can you joke about it?”
He cupped her cheek, his thumb stroking. “Because you restored my joy.”
“Rain . . .” She reached for him, wanting to wrap her arms around him and hold him close, but he stepped back.
“Food first. Then rest. Then perhaps I will show you what a grateful shei’tan I am.”
Heat curled in her belly at the sight of the silken promises in his eyes. Until Rain, she’d never realized lavender could
be such a seductive shade, but now she realized she’d never see it again without thinking of breathless passion and love.
“Come,” he murmured. The dark velvet of his voice slipped over her skin, making her breath quicken and her pulse speed up.
“I thought we’d eat outside. The view is spectacular.” He gestured for her to precede him through a broad archway.
Ellysetta walked past what appeared to be a private bathing chamber and through a smaller, unadorned cave with a large opening
that led to the outside world.
She passed through the opening to the broad, wide-lipped ledge that jutted out from the side of the mountain, walking slowly
to the farthest point. There, with the wind whipping around her, clouds close enough to touch, and the ground so far, far
below, it was easy to believe she was once again aloft in the winds, flying over the Fading Lands. Her belly tightened with
exhilaration. She closed her eyes and drew the cool, fresh air into her lungs.
“Just standing here is almost like flying.”
He stepped close behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. “Aiyah. You feel it too. As if you could leap from the ledge and the wind would welcome you and send you soaring.”
“Yes, that’s it.” She opened her eyes and looked down at her feet. The toes of her boots touched the edge of the precipice,
and yet she was unafraid. No hint of vertigo touched her. No sense of even the slightest fear. Only appreciation and thrill
and longing.
“I miss this place,” he murmured close to her ear. “I don’t come back as often as I should. Mostly only when I need the simplicity of being tairen.”
“Simplicity? The tairen don’t seem simple to me.” She thought of the mysteries of the mountain, and Sybharukai with her green
eyes so full of secrets. Ellysetta had been here less than a day, but already she knew there was so much more to the tairen
than she’d ever realized.