Chapter Twenty-Four
A field of wildflowers stretched as far as the eye could see before ending in a glittering blue lake and towering green, rocky mountains beyond.
The smell of her magic was potent as the wind blew through the glade.
Except she wasn’t using her magic. It was simply the smell of the wildflowers themselves, as Graves had always told her. She smelled like spring.
Not that it made any sense. She had been in the middle of her clarity spell. And now she had been transported to who knew where.
Had she opened a door? She couldn’t imagine having the ability to move between places she had never been. This had to be something different. Some part of the spell.
Not what Niamh had prepped her for, though. She’d said the spell would have a lot of magic and that the magic would go into her. That she could use it in conjunction with the sacred tree and the celestial movement to get into the bond.
But was this the bond? A place with wildflowers?
“It’s where we grew up,” Lorcan said.
Kierse whipped around, finding him standing in all of his glory before her. His dark hair was gently tousled, and he wore a white button-up half unbuttoned and brown trousers. His hands were in his pockets. His bright blue eyes were not cast on her but the mountain beyond.
“Ireland?”
“Wicklow Mountains,” he said.
Kierse shivered as the familiarity of the place settled into her. Then the more important question, “What are you doing here?”
“You called me, love,” he said with a quirk of his lips as those eyes made their way to her. “I came when you called.”
“That’s…” But the words died on her lips.
She had called him. Or Niamh had with her spell. Kierse actively looked face first into that bond when the magic struck her. She just hadn’t expected all of this.
“It doesn’t look like this anymore, mind. There’s a town here. And the forest has been preserved so that the lake is only partially visible. The trails have been carved out, and there’s signs of human activity. I haven’t seen it like this in hundreds of years.”
“Why are we here?”
“You tell me.”
She pursed her lips. “We did a spell for clarity.”
“Ah,” he said. “That’s smart. This is incredibly clarifying.” He held his hand out. “Walk with me.”
She didn’t want to, but she had no idea how to get out of this place. For the moment, she was stuck here with him. She might as well do what she had planned all along—see if she could get under the bond.
She ignored his hand and trudged ahead of him. His soft chuckle was a tingle up her back as his long strides caught up to her with ease. They were side by side, tromping through the wildflowers, the smell a potent mix all around them.
There was a companionable silence for a few minutes as they approached the lake and took in the visage. One of nostalgia, one of awe.
Lorcan stopped on the bank of the lake and sat in the lush green grass before it. He patted the seat next to him. “Come here. Listen to the water.”
She begrudgingly did as he said. “I don’t hear anything.”
“Close your eyes. It’s there.” She narrowed her eyes at him, and he laughed. “I won’t do anything. Just close yours.”
With a sigh, she did. And then she heard it. With her other senses diminished, it came in like a slow trickle. A river flowing into the lake. Birds fluttering above the water. Fish below it. The wind blowing through the trees and flowers. Not a single modern sound. Just nature.
“No wonder trees are sacred,” she whispered. “If this is what it’s supposed to sound like.”
“Mmm,” he agreed softly.
The silence lingered. She was sure that this wasn’t what she was supposed to be doing. A clarity spell would help her get under the bond. Not let her sit by an Irish lake and feel peace with the monster at her side. That was wrong…right?
“Graves told me that he was going to marry Emilie here.”
Kierse’s eyes flew open. “What?”
“Yep. We were sitting right here.” His face was perfectly neutral, his eyes gone long distant. “I was happy for them. I wanted it to work. I wanted him to be my brother in truth. We’d spent all these years together, and he understood me the way no one else ever had.”
“He regrets what happened, you know?”
Lorcan slowly faced her. “Does he?”
“Yes.”
“There is no amount of redemption that can satisfy what he has done to my family and my people.”
“And this is better?” she asked, gesturing between them. “Stealing what is his and trying to destroy his life?”
“If it destroys his life, we call that justice.”
She huffed and turned away from him. “Fine. Have it your way.” She leaned forward to come to her feet, but Lorcan put a hand on her knee.
“Do you know the tale of the Sons of Tuireann?”
“I don’t think so. What does that have to do with anything?”
“It’s an old Irish tale. The three sons killed Lugh’s father, Cian, because they had a disagreement.”
“Lugh…like the owner of my spear?”
“The one indeed,” he said. “He was a great king of the Tuatha de Danann, and after his father died, he went to a meeting with many of the leaders of the realm and asked, ‘What would you do if someone killed your father?’ The leaders of course said death was not enough. They would torture and tear them limb by limb over many days.”
“Classic.”
“They asked Lugh, ‘Did someone kill your father?’ He answered yes, and the ones who did it came forward and offered to pay a fine for what they’d done.
Lugh set a series of tasks that seemed like a good offer, and the sons agreed before everyone.
Then Lugh admitted that the items he wanted were all impossible tasks taken from all the great kings of the age, ending with three shouts on the top of a hill where shouting was not allowed, where his father had been raised, and the men would kill them before allowing them to leave. ”
Kierse laughed. “This sounds like a hustle.”
“The sons were determined, though. They went out, and they performed each of the impossible tasks, giving Lugh great tools of bounty and healing and war for his upcoming battle. At the end, they went to make their shouts and were all grievously injured. They went to Lugh and said, ‘Use your pigskin to heal us. We did all you asked of us.’”
“And did he?”
Lorcan raised an eyebrow. “What do you think?”
“No,” she said softly. “No, I bet he said no. He wanted them to die doing the impossible tasks.”
“Correct,” Lorcan said. “He told them no. He said, ‘Even if you offered me the world’s weight in gold, I would not accept it unless it also meant you were going to die.’”
“Savage,” she said. “So the moral of the story is fuck off and die?”
“The moral is that there is no amount of redemption that can be done to make up for someone killing your family.”
Kierse nodded in understanding. This was not just another Irish tale. Not just some story for the moment. It was about him, and it was about Graves. And always about Emilie.
“I see. Thus, fuck off and die.”
“We do not have the heritage of forgiveness that is pervasive of the world. Your actions are your actions. You cannot change them after the fact. There is no righting this wrong. You cannot bring my sister back. There is only—fuck off and die.”
And Kierse hated that she understood him.
The Fae Killer killed her parents and her entire race. She couldn’t imagine ever looking that person in the face and forgiving them for what they had done. She could hold a grudge for even minor slights. The idea that time could possibly diminish the loss of this magnitude was unthinkable.
But on the other hand, anger welled up in her like she had never imagined.
“I understand that you’ll never forgive Graves for what he did.
” Lorcan’s eyes lit up as if they were finally getting somewhere.
How wrong he was. “How do you then expect me to forgive you for the transgression you’ve done against me? ”
“I didn’t kill anyone in your life,” Lorcan said, his smile slowly fading.
Kierse came fully to her feet. “No. You didn’t kill anyone, but what you did was just as dishonorable.”
“We’re soulmates,” he said, rising to his feet and his own anger rising with him. “We’re soulmates. You’re my chuisle mo chroí. We’re meant to be together. It’s a way to make everything else right in the world.”
“Maybe all of that is true. Maybe we’re meant to be. But it gives you no right to deny me my power, the last power of the last of the Fae.” She held her hands out. “This is all I have left of them. This is what connects me to my family.”
He winced at that. She wanted to argue more. She wanted to throw a punch and get in his face and yell and scream. She wanted to voice all her injustices against him. But where had that gotten her with Lorcan? Nowhere.
He knew that how he bound their magic was wrong, but he didn’t think being bound was the problem. And if she wanted to get under that bond, she was going to have to convince him that she could understand that.
Lorcan was a mark.
She was a thief.
She needed to use what he had already given her time and time again to make this work. To throw him off balance enough to use the oldest tricks in the book—distraction and sleight of hand.
She would show him what she wanted him to see and then steal back what had been taken from her.
But to do that, she had to admit to things she had been avoiding.
She pictured Graves’s face as he kissed her gently on the mouth and told her to do “whatever it takes.” This was for them. This was to be with him. And if it worked, it would be worth it.
“Maybe it does feel right,” she said softly, turning from him.
She could sense him freeze even if she didn’t see him. If she opened herself to the bond, she could almost feel what he felt as well. Sense the uncertainty in him that she’d agree with him in any way.
“It does, or maybe it does?” he asked slowly.