Chapter 29
TWENTY-NINE
CAIRN
Alleria’s fingers trace along the marks on my skin, following them wherever they go—over my shoulders, down my chest, across my ribs, then back up again. Her touch is light enough that it should be nothing.
It is not nothing.
I find my eyes closing more than once before I force them open again.
For three hundred years, lying still under a human female’s hands meant burying my revulsion and rage, and enduring whatever she decided to use my body for.
It takes focused effort to let Alleria map my skin without bracing. More than that to stay still beneath the tenderness of it. Cruelty I know how to survive. Gentleness asks for something I haven’t had to give in a long time.
Trust.
And I have handed her too much of it tonight.
My Guard would die for me, kill for me, have done both, but this is something else.
Being held through the worst of it by hands that want nothing in return.
I taught myself, over the long years of the collar, to feel nothing, because what I didn’t feel couldn’t be taken from me.
She undid all of it in a single night, and the part of me that should be roaring at the danger of letting her this close has gone quiet.
I let her put her mouth on me. I let her drag unguarded sounds from my throat. I let her see me utterly desperate. Then, when the memories tried to pull me under—the cloying scent of perfumed sheets, the phantom weight of hands demanding I perform—she saw it happening.
She laced her fingers through mine.
She brought me back to her.
“They’re no longer just black.” Her words bring my thoughts back to the present.
“No.”
“Why?”
“The ones you remember are still black. Those are my Nightwild marks. The colored ones belong to Underhill. Because I stand outside the courts, my body holds all their colors instead of just the one for the court I was born to.”
“Sea Court. That’s right, isn’t it? You, Therin, and Brael.” Her fingers find the swirls of blue on my skin and trace along them.
I turn my head toward her. “And where did you learn that, I wonder.”
“Caelum told me.” She lifts her head, a worried frown creasing her brow. “He won’t get into trouble for that, will he?”
“Of course not. It’s no secret.”
“The others don’t have the same marks you do.”
I lift one eyebrow. “Been looking at them naked too, have you?”
Her cheeks turn pink. “No!”
A low laugh breaks free. Minutes ago, she was bold enough to dismantle my control, fierce enough to hold my gaze while I lost every last piece of it. Now a simple bit of teasing has color rising in her cheeks.
I catch the hand she snatches away, lacing my fingers through hers, and draw it to my lips so I can press a kiss to the center of her palm.
“I hold all the courts because I am the Eldráfn of the Nightwild Guard. They show that I am of all of them and none. The others still retain the marks of the Court they were born to, and their Nightwild marks. Most are hidden beneath their clothes, but I’m sure they’ll show you if you want to see them. ”
“No, I don’t think that’s necessary.”
I pull her closer, tracing a thumb over her knuckles. “I’m pleased. Because if you think I was unreasonable earlier, imagine what I would be like if I caught you admiring Therin or the others naked.” I nip her fingertip. “I’m very territorial.”
She lets out a soft breath—half sigh, half huff of exasperation—but she doesn’t try to pull free. Instead, she wriggles down until she can lay her head against my shoulder.
“The blue isn’t for the Sea Court, though.” I move her fingers to one of the silver swirls on my shoulder. “This is the Sea Court’s color.”
“Silver? But surely blue makes more sense.”
“And when did fae follow human rules for sense? Silver because the Sea Court does not only connect to the water, but to the tides, and the moon. Blue is for the Wild Court. Gold for Mountain. And green for Hollow.”
She frowns. “When Therin and the others were telling stories in the Inn one night back in the village where the humans and fae lived together … they used different names for the courts. We … humans, I mean … have always said that the fae have courts based on the seasons—Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter.”
“A piece of fiction that helped us to hide the truth. Our courts are connected to seasons in a way, but again, not the way humans believe. It’s … complicated.”
“There is so much to learn.”
I press my lips to the top of her head. “And you will. In time.”
Silence falls, broken only by the sound of waves lapping at the shore. After a few moments, she stirs, lifting her head to gaze through the opening at the sea beyond.
“I didn’t think I’d love the sounds of the sea as much as I do.”
“Sometimes, when I was in the cages or chained at the end of someone’s bed, I would imagine I could taste the salt.”
Her hands still on my skin. I keep my eyes on the opening of the shelter, and the strip of black water beyond it.
“I would hold the sound of the waves in my head until it was louder than whatever room I was in.”
The words leave me too easily. Too quietly.
What is it about this female that has me sharing things I’ve never said aloud?
She’s quiet for a moment. “Was that why …” She shakes her head.
“Was that why what?”
“It’s a silly question.”
“Ask anyway.”
“Just before you let me go … you found a river to wash in. That’s when I first saw the marks on your skin. I hadn’t noticed them before.”
“There wasn’t a question in there. But I know what you’re asking. The river wasn’t seawater, so it did nothing to replenish my magic. But it was clean and fresh. That was enough.”
Her fingers tighten around mine.
“My Nightwild marks were already there. They were just hidden under the … filth.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I know you are.”
Silence falls again, and this time I close my eyes, listening to the sound of the waves lapping at the shore.
“Nightward’s sea is one of the things I missed most.” The words come out level enough, but saying them aloud cracks something inside me.
It rises all at once—centuries of it. Every loss I taught myself to stop thinking about so it couldn’t be used against me. The sea. The sky over Underhill. The sound of my Guard talking around me.
Her lips touch my shoulder, my throat, and then her palm curves over my cheek and she turns my face toward her, so she can cover my mouth with hers. I taste the tears against her lips, and it almost breaks me.
“I wish I could go back and change what was done to you,” she whispers.
I cover the hand resting against my cheek with my own. I’ve had human women weep over my captivity before, using their tears to excuse what they continued to take from me. Their sorrow always came with hands that still wanted.
But this is different.
Alleria is asking for nothing.
“It is done,” I murmur against her lips. “And we are here.”
Her thumb moves along my cheek, and I allow myself to lean into it for one breath.
Only one.
Then I wrap an arm around her waist and roll, pinning her beneath me. “And I believe I have at least another hundred ways to make you scream.”
Her arms loop around my neck, her lips curving up into a smile. “Maybe I will find ways to make you scream.”
“Maybe you will.” I dip my head and steal a kiss. “Would you like to go back to the keep and attempt it there, or stay here in the cove for the night?”
Her smile falters. The playful light in her eyes fades, and her arms slip from my neck, hands coming to rest against my chest.
“Vessara said it was dangerous to be out of my rooms once night falls. And the Sluagh … If it knows I’m outside, surely it will—”
“The Sluagh will not dare try to taunt you with me here.”
The fact that it dared at all makes me want to hunt it down and kill it.
“It’s been there every night since I arrived.” Her eyes stray to the entrance of the shelter, where the sky is beginning to darken.
“Nightward is mine. Every inch of the land, and everything that lives here—the Sluagh included. They know I’m back.
They know what I’ll do to anything that touches what’s mine.
You can walk every hall of the keep alone, unarmed, in the dark, and nothing in it would dare lift its hand against you.
Outside the walls can be a little more dangerous, I wouldn’t recommend wandering too far alone, but only because there are things in Underhill we should all be wary of, and you haven’t learned what they are yet. ”
I run the backs of my knuckles down her cheek.
“You’ll be freer in Underhill than you’ve ever been in the mortal realm.
There will be no guards at your door. No father deciding what you can do or who you must marry.
And no one believing they have the right to put their hands on you without your choice.
” I deliver that last line between gritted teeth.
Her breath catches.
“Here, the dark will learn to fear you.”
“But what if it—”
“I’ll kill it.”
She stares at me. “Just like that?” The laugh she gives is small and uncertain.
“The Sluagh’s power lies in its ability to get inside your head and unbalance you. Now you’ve accessed the Nightwild magic, I can teach you how to stop it getting inside yours … And if it tries, I’ll remove its head from its body.”
She blinks, then a slow smile curves her lips, and her hands slide up to wind around my neck again. “In that case …” She pulls my head down to hers. “I think I’d like to stay right here.”
I accept her invitation, and cover her mouth with mine, her lips parting for my tongue. Then a paw lands squarely on the small of my back, and the full weight of the vaelcait presses me down as he climbs over me to sprawl across the furs at the back of the shelter.
A second later, a deep, rumbling purr fills the space.
I lift my head and glare at the black mass making itself comfortable. “Impeccable timing as always, Dubh-chrá.”
The purring grows louder, as the vaelcait lowers his head to his paws and closes his eyes.
I sigh.
Beneath me, Alleria’s breath hitches, and then a soft, breathy sound escapes her. She presses a free hand over her mouth to muffle it, but her eyes are bright with laughter as she looks from me to the giant cat taking up half the room.
The sight of her, flushed and relaxed, heats my blood. I shift my weight, rocking my hips against her, and capture both of her wrists, pinning them lightly to the furs above her head.
“You find this amusing?” I lower my mouth to the point of her ear, and she shudders before I even touch her. “Careful, Moirthalen. Laughing could come with a very steep penalty.”
The vaelcait huffs, and flicks the back of my shin with his tail. Alleria fails to subdue her laugh this time, her shoulders shaking with the force of it. I shake my head, and roll off her and onto my back, throwing an arm over my eyes.
“I’ll exact payment later, when we don’t have an audience.”
Alleria’s laughter softens into a sigh. “Are you sure it’s safe having him in here?”
“Safe? No. But not in the way you’re imagining. Give him the slightest bit of room and he’ll invade your entire space.” I keep my arm draped over my eyes. “Ask me how I know.”
“He’s so big.”
I lift my arm just enough to see her. She’s studying the vaelcait. He stares back at her.
“He’s a nuisance.”
He yawns, flashing sharp, white fangs, and his tail hits me again.
“Yes, you are.”
The vaelcait slowly blinks, and tucks his head back down onto his paws, making it clear he doesn’t care what I think, and has no intention of leaving.
His purring evens out, low and steady, and somewhere under it the sea keeps its rhythm against the sand.
Alleria turns onto her side, and fits herself back against me, her head finding my shoulder, and one hand coming to rest over my heart.
I’m aware of the moment sleep takes her. Her body loosens, muscles relaxing, and her breathing turns soft and regular. One hand remains over my heart.
For a while, I do nothing but listen to the world around me.
Dubh-chrá purring. The sea washing over the sand. Alleria’s breathing, slow and even, warm against my throat.
When my eyes close, I force them to open.
For three hundred years, I learned to take my rest in short beats, with one ear open and my body ready to surface at the slightest sound. Sleep was always a risk measured in locks, chains, footsteps, and breath.
The habit pulls at me now, even with nothing I need to stand guard against.
The collar is gone. My magic is my own. I’m no longer in the mortal world, where sleep could mean attack and death at any moment. I’m in Underhill, in Nightward. On land that knows me. With the sea at my side, and Dubh-chrá listening in the dark for both of us.
Alleria is here. Asleep against me. Safe.
For the first time I can remember, the first time since Underhill was sealed away, there is nothing that needs me to stay awake.
I could sleep.
Truly sleep.
And the idea of it sits strangely. A little like grief. And a little like relief.
Alleria shifts against me, and that old instinct surges up, a blade half-forming out of pure reflex. I force the magic away, and my hand finds the curve of her waist instead.
She murmurs something I don’t catch and cuddles closer.
No attack comes. No chains pull tight. No human voice orders me awake.
There is only the sea, only Dubh-chrá’s purr. And only Alleria’s heartbeat against my ribs.
My eyes close. This time I let them.