Chapter Four
Four
Saoirse
The tent expands like a flock in spring, pale yellow flax stretching up to a central post and out across a dozen lesser branches.
In one alcove, trunks spill their wares for the servant girls determined to erect a palace from the dirt: furs upon the bedroll, a silver pitcher beside a crystal bowl.
Above their heads, the triple horse of Kiara’s bloodline chases itself across the tent wall, a ruddy drip blurring the line between tooth and tail.
I frown as I study the flaw.
“You know,” says Aisling, her melodic voice stilted as she bends over a small trunk, “my mother used to tell me I’d get snatched by a púca if I ever made a face like that.”
My lips pull lower. “Is that a promise?”
Aisling snorts, scooping a hand through silver charms and silk ribbons to retrieve a fine-toothed comb. “Are you so afraid of the council that you’d prefer the company of changelings?”
“Yes.” I kneel without prompting, feeling the last rain soak gently into the knees of my skirt. It won’t be long before they scatter rushes to prevent such a mess inside. “At least the changelings are predictable.”
“Changelings are…predictable?”
I raise a brow. “Púca are motivated by mischief or merrymaking, rarely anything else.” I tug the pins from my braid, loosing its coil. “Who does that sound like to you?”
“Point made.” Aisling nods to a serving girl, who holds out a bowl for my hairpins, gaze averted.
I try not to grimace as I drop them inside.
“Is this truly necessary?”
“Are you still living in a cave?”
Heat splashes across my skin. “It’s the only place we can stay without…” I wait for the girl to turn before nodding in her direction. “Interference.”
“Some might call that luxury.” Aisling smirks as she tugs one strand of my braid free, her ring snagging on a knot. “Then again, I suppose not all goddesses require worship.”
“I’m not a—” I bite my tongue as her finger brushes my ear, the touch pouring a goblet of memories and sun-soaked laughter straight down my throat.
A girlhood struck short by poison, her palace and people gone.
Twelfth in line, but it was she who would wear the crown.
Heavy. So unbearably heavy.
Until a young queen came, and…
The vision leaves as quickly as it came, and I blink rapidly to chase away the sight of Aisling’s sad, small face and the softest version of Kiara I’ve ever seen.
Aisling watches me, rosy lips pursed into a bud.
“Sorry.” It’s instinct now, though the tug of true guilt has lessened. I lean forward and shake out the rest of my braid until dark, tangled waves spill over my shoulders. They tense when the serving girl returns, a vial of oil in hand.
With care, Aisling plucks up the bottle and tips the contents into her palm. “Why don’t you and the other girls find something to eat? We can manage on our own.”
The girl glances from Aisling’s face to my hands before she dips her head in a nod, and backs free of the tent.
Aisling sighs, rubbing her palms together until juniper and sage coat the air. “Divinity is undeniable, Saoirse. That’s why so many people wish they were gods.”
“Well, I never did.”
I sit straighter as she laughs, guiding my hair through her fingers to tame the beast it’s become. “Yes, I know. You spent a lot of time during our last council saying that. But as my grandmother always says, regret is for the women with ten children.”
I balk, and she smirks. “Ríona Etain was one of twelve. I was one of six. Do you forget where I’m from?”
I eye the comb with suspicion as Aisling raises it through the air, its edges gleaming amber that fades to cream. “No, I don’t. Is that comb carved of the antlers from Bridled Stag?”
“Yes,” Aisling says, her grin stretching wide as she works it through the ends until my hair lies smooth.
“Before you panic, though, try to remember that abundance doesn’t always mean fertility.
If I were to grind this comb up and slip it into your tea, then, yes, you would more than likely have two or three wains crawling about this place by summer.
But used like this?” She eases the comb through a tender patch near my temple.
“It adds luster to the hair. Makes it grow thicker too.”
“If you say so.” My hand drops to my stomach, massaging the soft rolls there—relieved there is no taut center. Faolan has kept his promise. “I can’t imagine bringing a child into all this.”
“Does that mean the sneachta samhraidh I left you works?” At my quick nod, Aisling’s smile turns sheepish. “Thank the stars. I wasn’t entirely sure I’d brought you the right kind of yarrow.”
“Aisling!”
“What?” Shrugging one shoulder, she eases the oil-slick comb through the last of my hair until it falls, gleaming, down my back. “I wouldn’t know from experience. Kiara and I don’t exactly need to guard against such things, and summer snow looks almost exactly like wild carrot.”
“Point made,” I echo, a reluctant laugh coloring the phrase. It dies as I consider her words more carefully. “How is Kiara, anyway?”
“Plotting, as usual.” Aisling’s own mirth fades as she parts the front of my hair into three streams, guiding them into a complex tributary bound by delicate silver charms. “The only difference is that she’s doing most of it alone now.
” Aisling’s fingers pause their movements, then pinch the final charm closed. “So much has changed.”
As she smooths a tendril behind my ear, her feelings bleed into me: frustration, affection, loneliness. Hurt.
I grit my teeth against the lot.
Once, it took more than this to invoke my full magic—especially after Da forced me to get the caipín baís tattoo.
At the touch of another person, sensations would appear, half-formed and raw, but they were fleeting things.
Impossible to grasp. Once the tattoo was gone, the images became clearer, memories rising to the surface at my call.
I was still sensitive to those around me, but had control for the first time in my life.
Since I awakened the island, though, no invitation has been needed.
It takes only the slightest brush of a fingertip to let someone else’s soul inside.
I ease away from Aisling’s grasp and reach for the shallow tray of pots, vials, and brushes, the smallest of which already bears a dollop of rose-tinted paint.
Before I can stroke it across my cheeks, however, Aisling takes hold of my chin and tilts it higher, her emotions scattering through me like a storm.
“Scar first.”
Aisling dips a larger brush into a pot of creamy white paint, and somehow I manage not to knock it from her hands.
Instead, I force myself to breathe until the tightness eases in my chest. Drop my head back and focus on our reflection in a circle of polished bronze.
The scent of the oil. The tickle of the brush as she covers the raised pink scar Maccus’s blade left behind.
“Why bother hiding it?”
Paint splatters across my collarbone as Aisling and I jerk apart, revealing a third figure in the bronze mirror: slight in size, coy in stature.
Rí Callen leans against the central tent pole, their silvery blond hair mussed by the wood. Windburn streaks their face scarlet—a perfect match for the cloak draping their shoulders, its hem still damp from the sea. “We all know what happened.”
I feel Aisling’s surprise melt to misgiving, though her face shows only deference. “We do, but such obvious reminders only serve to sustain conflict. Do they not, Your Majesty?”
“Right, because a slightly less obvious scar will make everyone forget the events of the summer.” Callen’s nose wrinkles, mouth caught between a smile and a sneer. “You sound exactly like your grandmother.”
A crack appears in Aisling’s composure. “I would hope so. Ríona Etain has kept peace among the Ring for almost sixty years.”
Callen leans forward enough that a silver chain slips free of their shirt, attached to a crystalline talon of ice. “Whose peace?”
“Cal.” I speak the name without thinking—not the name they abandoned, nor the one they chose, but the one that was always mine.
Except it no longer is.
Our eyes lock, and regret imprisons my tongue. Yes, we were friends, once. Before my first bleeding, the amulets had been enough to control my magic, allowing us to play. But after, it was too much of a danger to see them. And I was too scared to say goodbye.
My fingers twitch—a reminder that I could just reach out, touch their sleeve, and know what Callen is thinking. How far their loyalty reaches. How deep their resentment runs.
Callen shifts, and I wrap my hands in my skirts instead.
I don’t need to know if Cal hates me. I only need to know why they are here.
“It’s a pleasure to welcome you to the Isle of Lost Souls,” I say, “though I didn’t expect your ship until tomorrow. I thought we’d agreed to meet at the half moon.”
“We did.” Callen’s gaze skates across the tent, lingering on the painted horse motif. “Kiara had other plans.”
“Kiara?” Aisling’s and my voice overlap, though hers comes twice as sharp.
Callen’s pale brow shoots toward the sky. “We had a message from her seanchaí three nights ago to arrive before the moon waxed.”
“And how glad I am you heeded the call.”
Kiara enters the tent, but it’s not the queen who captures my eye. It’s the man walking in behind her, stealing whatever breath remained in my lungs.
Faolan’s become the Wolf of the Wild once more.
I hadn’t realized how much I missed him—this version of my husband with his head held high.
Trousers dark as charcoal hug the narrow line of his hips, hinting at bones I’ve recently traced with my tongue.
His beard is still unkempt, but the shirt below it is spun of fine linen, dyed a deep, dusky gold.
Color is a luxury we’ve forgone since the ship burned, and every part of me aches to see him cloaked in sunlight once again.
That same ache draws me to my feet just as Faolan’s gaze snaps to mine.
“What in the shade’s realm have you done with my wife?”
I frown just as Aisling lifts the brush again, her movements jerky and imprecise as she covers the scar. “Made her look like a queen.”
“As if Saoirse’s ever needed help with that.
” Faolan strides over, and my mouth runs dry as he stands before me.
Eases one thumb against my collarbone, drawing circles to blend the splatters of paint into my skin.
I shudder as a tangled web of emotions unfurls from the spot—sharper than anyone else’s, felt as keenly as if they were my own. “Which gown? The silver?”
“Yes.”
“Subtle.” Faolan extends a hand and I take it—breathing in sharply as a simmering heat floods my veins. “The moon and sun. What a divine image we’ll make.”
Aisling’s lips flatten into a thin line. “Exactly. You of all people should know the power of an image.”
“Oh, there’s no doubting that.” Faolan sweeps a mocking bow and snatches the dress up in one easy move. “Set the stage, then. Your performers are nearly ready.” He nudges me behind a stretch of cloth hung for privacy as Aisling turns on Kiara, her voice the angry hum of dragonfly wings.
The sound grows muffled as Faolan draws the cloth shut, wrapping us in shadow.
“You’re being rude to her.”
“And?” Faolan’s hands find my laces easily in the dark. “Maybe I’m tired of being tame.”
“Who said you were— Never mind.” I hold the front of my soiled dress closed as the back panels fall apart. “Aisling isn’t the problem. She’s the only one who’s been honest and kind, and—”
“—in league with Kiara—”
“—and I like her.”
I turn enough so he can see my face, and let the dress and shift fall away.
Faolan’s eyes don’t stray from mine, but the color of them deepens, a spark igniting the blue as his hands cup my rib cage, thumbs grazing my breasts. I force myself to keep still as he sighs heavily, then drops our foreheads together.
“You’re not playing fair, Trouble.”
“And who do you think taught me that?”
The glint returns to his eyes as he knots his fingers in my hair, leveling an accusation against my lips. “Pirate.”
I kiss him, shivering as a raw strain of sadness slips from his tongue to mine—so soft I almost wonder if I planted it there myself. His hand tightens, and I frown when frustration frays the sorrow, lines from one of his songs blurring together in my mind.
In a cottage I found her, ’neath unsteady skies
A girl stained silver, the sea in her eyes
And a pearl placed so sweetly b’tween her two…
Behind him, the bargainer’s mark on my hand starts to shift, opalesque rays glimmering to life.
I catch Faolan’s collar to hide it. Pull him closer until our bodies flatten, linen scraping my bare skin.
The sensation is enough to evoke my own desire: two storms converging on the same patch of sea.
It’s the only way I’ve found to cope with the desperate rush of his emotions—a roaring tide that for some reason he’d rather hide with a smile than let me see.
Voices rise on the other side of the curtain, and Faolan breaks our kiss, flushed and dark-eyed.
I can still taste his want. Feel his breath in my lungs—the way my hips rock forward as though to cradle his own.
They ache in protest when he pulls out of reach. “What’s going on?”
My fingers shake as I catch the silver dress before it can hit the ground. “They’re arguing, I think? Aisling’s not happy. Kiara hasn’t told her much.”
Faolan snorts. “She’s far from the only one.”
Those voices get louder, anger showering the air with sparks of hurt. Resentment.
All so very familiar.
“Hold your worries.” Faolan’s lips brush my temple. “I’m going to settle this.”
“Wait—no.” Clasping the dress to my chest, I reach for Faolan’s arm.
The curtain ripples as he steps to the other side.