Chapter Three
Ellie woke wrapped in warm strength, the music of a steady heartbeat sounding in her ear. His strength. His heartbeat. Rainier vel’En Daris Feyreisen. Rain Tairen Soul. The man who had claimed her as his truemate, the missing half of his soul.
“I’m all right,” she murmured, pulling away to stare up into the watchful lavender gaze of the stranger who named her his beloved.
“I just got a little dizzy for a moment.” Something warm and hungry unfurled within her as their eyes met.
She backed away from him, hoping he had not noticed. “Why did you . . . say what you did?”
“That you are my shei’tani?” he growled.
“Because it is the truth. Because I must.” A muscle flexed in his jaw.
She was suddenly aware of a sense of driving need, of a hunger not warm like hers but hot and demanding; then the feelings faded as Rainier vel’En Daris turned his back to her and took several deep breaths.
“We must go,” he said abruptly. “Your countrymen grow restless and too bold by half. The girl children who were with you are worried.”
Her hands clapped over her cheeks. “Lillis! Lorelle!” How could she have forgotten about them? She spun around, only to find her wrist clasped in his hand.
“Stay close to me, Ellysetta Baristani. I can allow no harm to befall you.” He gestured.
The cone of magic surrounding them disappeared, revealing them both to the swarming crowds jamming the streets.
The throngs were so thick, with more bodies pushing into the area by the second, that Celierians dared to crowd within five feet of the small, lethal army of Fey warriors.
There was a dull roar of sound—thousands of bodies shifting restlessly, voices murmuring—but all fell silent when Ellysetta and Rainier appeared.
“Wait here a moment, shei’tani.” A bubble of multicolored magic enveloped her as Rain Tairen Soul walked several paces away to speak with the shei’dalin and her truemate.
“Ellie!” The high-pitched shrieks heralded the twins’ arrival as they raced towards her. Their faces were splotched with tears, their dresses torn, their lovely curls disheveled. Two Fey warriors, looking much worse for wear than the girls, hurried close on their heels.
“Nei, little Fey’cha.” One of the Fey, a tall young man with silvery blond hair, a swollen eye, and a set of four bleeding scratches down the side of his face, snatched up Lorelle just as she would have flung herself into Ellie’s arms. Lorelle immediately convulsed into a howling, screaming fit, her little fingers curved into claws, which explained the battle wounds on the man’s face.
He subdued her, admonishing in a gentle, genuinely concerned voice, “Nei, nei. Do not touch the Feyreisa when the bright light surrounds her. It would do you much harm.”
Lillis stopped a few feet away, her lower lip trembling, tears pouring from her eyes. She looked so pitiful, so woefully in need of a hug that Ellie instinctively stepped towards her. When the warrior behind Lillis grabbed her up, Ellie froze in her tracks.
A lump rose in her throat. She turned towards the Feyreisen. “Please,” she called out. She pushed at the light surrounding her, but it merely flowed around her hands. “Release me from this thing.”
The look he turned upon her was once again the cold, frightening Tairen Soul’s gaze. With no expression on his face, he scanned the crowd for several long moments, then dissipated her shield without a word.
As soon as it was gone, she lurched forward to snatch Lillis and Lorelle into her arms, hugging them close as they wrapped their little bodies around her and cried into her neck.
“Shh, kitlings. Shh. It’s all right. I’m safe.
” She showered kisses upon their curly heads.
“I’m so sorry you were frightened. Hush, now. Please don’t cry.”
“What’s going on, Ellie?” Lorelle asked once she had calmed down enough to speak. “Why did the tairen-man attack you, then put you in the fire cage?”
“It’s all very confusing,” Ellie told them. “And it must have looked very frightening.” It certainly had scared the wits out of her. “But the Feyreisen didn’t attack me. He knew I was hurt and came to my rescue.”
“Why wouldn’t the Fey let us come to you?
” Lillis asked. “We cried and cried, but they wouldn’t let you out of the cage and they wouldn’t let us in!
” Lillis wasn’t used to her tears being so ineffective.
She glared at the brown-haired, blue-eyed Fey who had kept her from going to Ellie. He only grinned back at her and bowed.
“I know,” Ellie soothed. “I’m sorry. But I’m here now and we’re together again and safe.”
“I want to go home.” Lorelle’s brows drew together in a scowl.
“Me too, kitling,” Ellie murmured. “Me too.”
A few feet away, Rain watched the reunion.
Her love for the children was obvious, as was theirs for her.
He had known love once, but it had died along with all his gentler feelings at the Battle of Eadmond’s Field, where Sariel had breathed her last. That day had changed him forever, stripping him of kindness and compassion, leaving him with sorrow, anger, duty, and the stain of millions of lives darkening his soul.
Had he not been the last Feyreisen, he would have been cast out by the Fey for the blood on his hands and the taint on his soul.
Yet now, in a fit of wicked humor, the gods had thrust Ellysetta Baristani in his path and decreed he must mate, binding the darkness of his ancient soul to the shining innocence of hers.
He didn’t want it. The responsibility for her safety and happiness was yet another burden, the reawakening of violent tairen-passions a potential danger to them all.
But he was the Feyreisen, the last Tairen Soul, repository of all the ancient Fey magics and the only remaining Fey capable of entering the tairen’s lair, Fey’Bahren.
He had lost the freedom of choice with the death of all the other Tairen Souls.
What remained was his duty to protect the Fey.
To live when he would rather die. To mate when he would rather remain alone.
The tairen in him roared again. The Fey in him roared back. The tairen hungered for his mate, was furious at the delay, while Rain, the beloved of Sariel, didn’t want to let another in his heart, as he must in order to fulfill the matebond.
?Rain, be calm,? Marissya warned.
?I am calm,? he snapped back, but he grabbed the unraveling threads of his emotions and pulled them tight.
“Celieria unsettles me.” There were too many memories here, of Sariel and happier days, of death and war.
“My shei’tani is not safe here. She must return with me to the Fading Lands. The courtship will take place there.”
“You cannot just abduct her, no matter how much you worry about her safety. She has parents, a family. Do you think she will accept you if you take her from everything she knows?”
“I will permit her family to enter the Fading Lands. They can remain until the matebond is complete.” That was fair. More than fair. No one but Fey had been allowed to enter the Fading Lands since the Mage Wars. “She will accept me.”
“Don’t be so sure you know a shei’tani’s heart,” Marissya warned him. “She may be young, but she would never be your truemate if she weren’t very strong.”
“Marissya is right, Rain,” Dax agreed. “She doesn’t trust any of us. If you take her from her home, you may never win her. And where will that leave the Fey? We can’t afford to risk losing you any more than you can afford to lose her.”
Rain knew they were right. If Ellysetta Baristani didn’t accept him, he would die.
No gift from the gods ever came without a price, and that was the price Fey warriors paid for the truemate bond.
He had recognized her as his mate. His soul, for good or ill, was already bound to hers.
She, on the other hand, had yet to accept him, and he was ancient enough, powerful enough, that the debilitating effects of an unfulfilled matebond would begin to take their toll on him quickly.
Madness first, then death, either at his own hands or the hands of his people.
“My Lord Feyreisen.”
Ellysetta stood beside him, holding tight to the children with the lovely hair.
He could feel her fear, and her determination not to be cowed by it.
She didn’t trust him, even though she felt the pull of his soul—or perhaps because of that—and she definitely didn’t trust Marissya or Dax.
The tairen within pushed against its cage, sensing its mate, seeking release.
“My Lord Feyreisen,” she repeated. “My sisters and I must return home.”
Logic evaporated. Cold fury took its place. She thought to leave him? “Nei.”
Ellysetta’s jaw went slack.
“What Rain means is that you are welcome to walk with us,” Marissya hurried to explain. ?Rain! Do you want to drive her away?? She held out a hand. “I would be honored if you would join me.”
“No!” Ellysetta all but leapt back to avoid Marissya’s outstretched hand. “I mean, no, thank you. We’ve had enough excitement for one day. I’m sure you understand.” Her eyes turned back to Rain and she said slowly, as if he were thick in the head, “My parents will be worried if we don’t come home.”
“Your sisters may go,” Rain told her. “You stay with me.”
“I can’t send them home alone!” she exclaimed. “They’re just children!”
Her defiance angered him. The tairen’s cage rattled. “The Fey will take them. You stay.”
Her hands fisted. Her body trembled. “I won’t!”
The tairen screamed in rage. She is our mate. She will not leave us! She will submit. We will make her submit! Power flamed in his eyes. “You will.”
She cried out and shrank back in fear. Suddenly there was a glow of power around her, and it wasn’t his. Baring his teeth in a snarl, he whirled around. Who dared? His eyes narrowed on Dax, who wore the telltale shining aura about him.