Chapter 12
Twelve
I stared in the wake of the beast, breathing heavily. Sweat beaded on my forehead, while my heart pounded in my breast.
That was no earthly wolf. Ten times larger, I would warrant, with those uncanny eyes and that shimmering fur.
And the scent of the Dark Fool.
I had beaten it off with a mere tree branch, burning it with no flame.
In a daze, I looked at the branch I still held, whose delicate white flowers belied the damage it had done.
I had wielded the branch of the rountree against my own kind.
My limbs trembled and shook as the strength propelling me to do so left my body, leaving me fragile and wracked with guilt.
The wolf called me its queen.
Those of Faery cannot lie.
A soft moan drew my attention to Thomas as he lay wounded upon the ground. One of his legs stuck up at an awkward and concerning angle. By all the wights of Faery, it looked broken.
I could set it for him if I had the time.
Thomas grinned weakly up at me. “Glad I am to see you, wood nymph.” And he winked.
Did he flirt with me, at a time like this?
Of course he did. He was Thomas.
My heart still galloped within me, and my mind whirled about with questions, but I had no time to dwell upon them. I had to get Thomas safely home.
And then, to get myself across the Veil. To find out if the ungodly wolf did hail me true.
Tend to the shepherd king first.
For he gazed upon me as if I were not the wood nymph he dubbed me, nor the homely farmer’s daughter I seemed, but a very goddess. “I owe you my life.”
At these words, something changed inside me, a thread wrapped around my heart. It neither pulled nor constricted, only made me aware it was there.
“Not yet, you don’t,” I rasped out. His words had too much import, gave me more credit than I yet deserved. I could not let him say them and mean it, lest they build a bond neither of us understood.
Worries crashed about inside me, born out of the pallor of his face and the questions he might ask. I did not know how to explain to him what had just happened.
I did not yet myself understand what it meant.
There were deeper concerns. “The wolf did not touch you?” For malevolent fae can cause paralysis, or loss of wits, neither of which I could cure.
Not as Mairi Grieve’s daughter, in any case.
I could not but recall her on her deathbed, how I tended her for five years, yet never made her well.
“The wolf did not touch me.” Thomas’s cheeks grew red.
“I backed away from him, intent on keeping eye contact, as ye must with such predators, when I fell over the tree. Something snapped, and my leg was nigh onto crucifying me with the pain. I thought I was done for.” He lay back, closing his eyes, breath belabored.
Oh, shepherd, do not faint.
He did even worse, opened his eyes again and asked me, “Bess, what was it? A wolf, it seemed, but I never knew one so large.”
My pulse quickened. If he caught on that the wolf had been a fae beast, would he then realize I was faery as well?
There are some who toss changelings into the fire. Who starve their own children and attempt to beat the faery out of them. I did not believe my shepherd king might be one of those, yet I thought I could not endure if I should see such horror in his eyes.
“Save your breath.” I examined the rountree branch again, noting it forked at the top and might make for a good crutch.
Wrapping my hands again in my skirt, I snapped off the blossoms and smaller branches, casting my eyes about for another limb.
There—a few steps away lay a shorter branch, thick as both my thumbs together. That would do nicely for a splint.
I dropped beside Thomas on the forest floor, measuring the length of his calf with my hands. I pulled up my long skirts and tore off a wide strip of fabric.
“Bess,” Thomas protested. “It is hardly a good time for a romp.” Even pale as milk, he favored me with a lascivious grin.
I rolled my eyes, though an impertinent Thomas was easier to deal with than a worshipful or overly curious one.
“Cease your feeble jesting, mortal, and let me get on with my work.” Too late I noted the words that came out of my mouth, and inwardly cursed.
“I mean to say, I am trying to help you. Be still.”
Father Auberon save me if the wound is infected.
He might have avoided the faery stroke only to die from his injury anyhow.
I pushed up his trouser leg and the blood drained from my face.
The angle was twisted and disturbing. The skin, however, had not broken; no infection then.
But the limb had wrenched out of position.
“I would not hurt you for the world, dear Thomas,” I told him. “But this may sting a bit.” And like that, I twisted his leg into place.
I have never heard such a sound as he made then. I hope I never do again.
“It . . . is . . . nothing,” he squeaked out.
“Liar,” I murmured, not unkindly, as I fastened the splint to his leg. “Ye must be honest with me. If I help ye, can you stand? Can we walk together to your cottage?”
“My lady, it would be an honor to escort—” He pushed himself up, groaning, then fell back. “On the other hand, perhaps it would be better if you should escort me.” He pushed again, and this time allowed me to help him to his feet.
I gave him the crutch for his other side, then slung his arm over my shoulder. The warmth of his body intoxicated me; his breath stirred my hair.
“Good,” I croaked out, determined to get him to safety, even if he collapsed and I dragged him the rest of the way.
But he remained alert, and still stared at me with uncanny reverence in his eyes.
“I owe you my life,” Thomas said again once I saw him off his injured leg and settled in bed. His bed. I was alone with a man in his cottage. The thread around my heart tightened briefly. I shook my head and glanced around me.
The cottage was small, a single room only, and smelled of old wool.
Clearly meant for bachelor accommodations, it had merely a trestle table, a single stool, and an oaken kist, carved with a cloverleaf pattern on the lid.
The clay-lined hearth was barely large enough to earn that name, but pottage sat in a brass cauldron upon it, having cooked all night.
Thomas’s dog, medium-sized with thick, bi-colored fur, awaited beside him, whining at his master’s distress.
Thomas reached down and ruffled the dog’s fur. “There ye go, Cullen, ’tis all right. Lady Wood Nymph is here to look after me now.”
Not wood nymph. Something more and greater, did the Wolf greet me true.
I would look after Thomas, yes. In the morn, I would wet strips of leather and wrap them around his injury.
I would prepare a comfrey salve to prevent infection and would give him wormwood for the pain and valerian for restful sleep.
The lessons I had been taught by Mairi Grieve would serve me well.
No. By the morn I will be gone to claim what is mine, and we two will never meet again.
My heart gave a tiny twitch. On the word of a wolf, a treacherous beast indeed, would I abandon this man, the only one by whom I was truly seen?
He reminded me so of the Dark Fool, and that was one I did not trust one bit.
I pulled the blankets up to Thomas’s chin. “You should not say that you owe me your life.”
“Why not? I am ever grateful for your help.”
Humans sell their gratitude far too cheaply. To express thanks is to acknowledge the other party has done for you, and one day you must do for them as well. They are never willing to do enough.
And if Thomas said he owed me his life, the implication was that one day the debt would be repaid.
Another reason not to linger in the mortal realm.
Thomas ran his teeth across his lower lip, cocking his head. “That was the bravest thing I have ever seen, my wood nymph. How did you know how to face down that Hellish beast?”
“The beast is no more Hellish than I am.” I avoided his eyes and the true answer, which was I do not know. Instead, I asked, “What were you doing out there? Why go out to Carterhaugh on Beltane, of all nights? You are lucky you have only an injured leg to show for it.”
“I meant to join the Douglases. Reavers took their cattle; we had to reclaim our own.”
“Hmm.” I crossed my arms. “And you had to go through Carterhaugh for this?”
“No, I . . .” His gaze grew distant. “Something called me. The howl of a wolf, sounding above the noise of the forest. The song of a pipe but played mournful and low.” He shook his head. “I cannot remember. Too much Beltane spirits, perhaps. I know only the song beckoned, too powerful to resist.”
The wolf wanted him there. I would swear, had I not come along, he meant to kill Thomas.
The only one who cares for me in this mortal world.
“Resist you must, Thomas.” If that wolf had bitten him, I do not know what would have transpired. He might have been locked inside his own flesh, unable to move until death at last took him. He might have lost his sight, his wits, his voice.
He might have ended up like Mairi Grieve.
“’Tis dangerous to be caught out in the forest alone,” I continued. “What if there had been a pack?”
“Ye speak rightly, lass. But what were you doing in the forest at night? It is as much folly for you as for me.”
No, it wasn’t. However much I dreaded the enormous beast, I had fended it off with the rountree branch, and when I told it to leave, it had.
My words returned to me: But you shall not claim this mortal life.
He is mine. I had meant them, and by the blood of Faery inside me, I had to continue meaning them, or lose myself entirely.
We fae cannot give such shallow promises as mortals can.
But I could not protect Thomas when I was no longer here.
I owe you my life. And I owed him an answer. I lowered my head and reached inside me for the Bess he knew. “I had nowhere else to go. Eamon Grieve has sent me from home.” Heaviness filled my senses; my insides felt wounded and raw.
“He has sent you from home,” Thomas said quietly. Pity furrowed his brow.
Good, I said to myself. Let it distract him. Let him comfort you, instead of wondering what he just saw.
There was nothing feigned in the tears that fell from my eyes.
Thomas reached up to wipe them away. “His own child. This is no way for a father to behave.”
I nodded, sniffled, barely kept myself from becoming a weeping mess in his arms.
Thomas’s fingers wandered down my cheeks, curled against the rosebud at the side of my throat. “You can stay here,” he said softly. “With me. If you’ve no kin to go to, I mean.”
My eyes stung. I did not have kin this side of the Veil, unless perhaps you counted Morven and possibly that wandering Fool. I knew not what kin I might have, or might once have had, elsewhere. “I cannot,” I replied. I must be away to Faery this very night.
To find answers. To learn my true nature, whether the wolf addressed me true.
Thomas misread my hesitation. “’Tis not charity,” he insisted. “You could tend my leg. Make me feel better?” He waggled his brows suggestively. Then his face sobered. “I would not sully your reputation, lass. Forget the offer if your fear over your virtue is too great. I will not take offense.”
“It is not that.” A rough laugh caught in my throat. What was “virtue” but another human lie? “Your offer is most generous.”
“It is the least I could do. You faced down that Hell beast for me. You saved my life.”
His soft eyes, the tenderness in his expression, and the emotion filling his voice were more than I could endure. That Hell beast, as he called it, the creature who imperiled him so, was of my folk, my kind.
My . . . subjects? Oh, I could not allow myself to believe it.
And I could not ever allow the shepherd to know.
I closed my eyes and breathed in the lingering Beltane magic.
Opening them again, I placed my hand over his forehead, letting my fingers brush against his curls.
“I want you to forget,” I told him. “Never to remember the call of the forest and the wolf’s seductive song.
Forget the shape of what we faced together tonight.
’Twas only an ordinary wolf. We were lucky, nothing more. ”
Fae magic flowed from my fingertips, awakened in my words. Magic, I thought, far greater than a half-mortal changeling should possess. But a queen? I did not know.
His lips moved in protest, and my finger traced its way down to meet them.
“I found you in the forest,” I told him. “You had fallen and hurt your leg. I tended your injury and helped you find your way home. Remember that only. By the ash and oak and yarrow tree, may it be so.”
He smiled sweetly, like an innocent bairn.
To see him thus, so unknowing and empty, sent a chill across my skin.
I was no better than Amadan, who had so bewitched Glenna with his charm.
But my faery nature could not be revealed.
Not before I understood it myself. And Thomas must be protected from Faery, I felt it in my bones.
The best way to protect him was to leave him in complete ignorance, remembering me fondly, but as a human, nothing more.
I leaned forward and placed a kiss on his forehead.
“Sleep now, and let your flesh heal. Do you think the rest of it naught but a dream.” Slowly I rose from his bedside, keeping my eyes upon him as I made my way towards the door.
’Twas the last I would see of Thomas, and it seemed right he be the last person I saw this side of the Veil.
I opened the cottage door.
Larks sang, and the mourning dove. The sky outside hung a deep blue, striped with lavender, rose, and flame. The sun peaked over the horizon, and a sharp cry rang out of me, unbidden.
It was the dawn. Beltane Eve had ended.
The Veil had closed, and I remained behind.