Chapter Seven
Seven
Saoirse
The first time I walked among the stars, I was seven years old.
Aidan and Conal woke me just past midnight after Mam and Da left for the Damhsa, and together we crept out of the castle walls and into swaths of seamróg speckled with white.
I dug my toes into the earth between five-petaled flowers and tipped my head back until the night stretched on forever.
A smile tugs at my lips as I drive a needle into my skin.
I’ve always been a fanciful girl.
Morning light glints off the scarlet bead on my fingertip as I drop my needle into a basket, careful not to let the blood spill.
Not until a soulstone is cradled in my other palm.
Brilliant, angry colors swirl beneath the triskele etched at its center: three endless waves joined at the middle, cresting toward the east.
With care, I paint each of the spirals a lurid shade of red.
“Daughter of the Knowing Sea, gaze sworn long ago to me.”
The song is barely a murmur, matched by the humming of the stone. A woman’s life unspools behind my eyes as I trace the last curve: sun-split glaciers and a winter that refuses to end. Fingers torn from carding wool.
“Captive soul, your blood shall—”
Pain flickers up my spine as her spirit starts to break loose, nestled in the place between my shoulder blades where Da’s apothecary once left a tattoo. But it’s not the white-hot, numbing sensation it used to be. More like a long-faded memory, there and gone again the next second.
“Captive soul, your blood shall free.”
The stone blackens at the edges as her spirit slips out, wild colors fixing themselves into place.
“The Isle of the Lost.”
I let go of the soulstone, watching it sink to the bottom of the pool, where ripples of silver light burst forth as it collides with the others, their surfaces glinting like the brightest night sky—one Kiara maps with her shrewd gaze.
“That’s fifty soulstones you’ve released already, split between Callen, Tadgh, and Etain’s courts.”
My fingertips ache as I drag them through the water. “I know.”
“Has the bleeding stopped?”
I shrug my sleeves lower, concealing the bandage over my forearm. “It will.” Eventually.
Kiara grunts, nostrils flaring as she looks over my form. “You shouldn’t exhaust yourself so early. Reborn Stalk is arriving soon, not to mention—”
I cast her a look, and Kiara raises her hands. “All right. Point made, Wolf Tamer.”
“Thank you.” The words are sharp, colder than I mean them, but the queen of Ashen Flame has never taken great pains to endear herself to me.
Even now, her eyes track my movements like she’s taking their measure—the hesitation of my steps and gooseflesh pocked across my arm.
The way water has painted my gown like a second skin to my thighs.
Her eyes linger there a moment, tightening at the corners. “You must be freezing.”
I stop, slender chains dotted in seed pearls clinking at my waist. “Forgive me, Your Majesty, but why are you suddenly pretending to care?”
Kiara’s sharp mouth tucks to one side—but there’s a delicacy to the movement. Not defiance. “I’d expect you of all people to understand there is no ‘pretending’ about it.”
She glances over her shoulder to where Faolan regales Ríona Etain with a story, her crackling laughter dancing up the mountain walls. A handful of her court lingers near the path to the beach—Aisling among them—but the rest have already gone, lured by the promise of food and company.
By all accounts, Kiara should have gone with them.
I frown as I study the tense curve of her throat.
“…You’re not lying. You do care.”
Her head jerks back. “Aye. I don’t know why it’s so hard for you and Faolan to believe.” My brows lift before I can help it, and Kiara releases a hard breath. “Fine. I do know—but I don’t regret my actions. Everything I’ve done has been for the sake of my people and the future of Ashen Flame.”
“Everything?” I touch the scar at my throat.
Her eyes are a challenge as they hold on to mine. “Yes.”
My heart quickens, but for the first time since meeting her, I don’t flinch away. “All right, then.”
Some of her heat falters. “It doesn’t mean I wish you harm—”
“I know.” An inexplicable huff of humor splits the word in half. “I don’t think you’re malicious, Kiara, or I wouldn’t have agreed to your plan last night. But just because I understand you doesn’t mean I like you for it.”
Kiara’s dry laugh bursts like a spark from her chest. “Well, I can’t say I like you much either.”
A smile tugs at my cheeks as I adjust the featherlight fabric of my dress until it swirls around my ankles, floating on the water below. “Then it’s settled. Neither of us likes the other. There are worse allies to be had.”
Her crimson cloak sweeps the ground as Kiara stands, a fresh appraisal in her eyes. “Very well.” She hesitates, half-turned toward the path where Aisling waits, a grand tiara of golden antlers perched atop her head. “You’re certain you can handle them alone?”
My stomach tightens as I nod. “I need to. For this arrangement to work, I can’t keep hiding behind Faolan or running away. I have to gain their respect.”
Kiara breathes in once, then dips her head. “Right. Good luck to you, then.”
She sweeps across the clearing to Faolan and Etain, gesturing toward the path in what I can only imagine is a command to enjoy themselves masked as a request. Faolan’s glance is swift and questioning: I answer it with a smile.
He’s too far to see my legs trembling, or the blood seeping through the bandage above my wrist.
I wait until he follows Kiara to the beaches, our eldest queen on his arm.
Wait until the others trail after them.
Only then do I let my face fall.
Pain still flickers at my fingertips, but it burns hot where a knife has pierced my arm—the toll of bloodletting for the sake of magic.
A needle prick will suffice when people are watching, delicate enough to be ceremonial, but I can’t use that method every day.
Not for the sheer quantity of soulstones that arrives on every ship, the dead demanding to be free.
Chewing my lip, I tug aside the fine silk of my garment to peel the blood-soaked bandages back, exchanging the ruined patch of white heather beneath for a fresh clump.
Smoothing everything back into place, I discard the ruddy mess into a covered basket just as a disturbance echoes from the woods, setting a cloud of magpies to flight.
A weight drops in my stomach as their screams fill the air, blue-and-white feathers flashing until all at once, the birds scatter back into the trees and I see him.
Rí Maccus, cutting a path toward me, his broad shoulders wrapped in mist.
For a moment, my body seizes, caught in the memory of that night. His face, cold and ashen with fury, blood splattered across his jaw. When he raises his hand to ward off the piercing sunlight, I can feel those calloused fingertips digging into my throat.
Shut up, you insignificant little wretch.
He held a sword against me that night. Pressed it down until my skin split.
You know nothing—you are nothing.
I blink, and Rí Maccus comes to a stop at the rocky pool’s edge.
There is no sword in his hand, no crazed look in his eye.
He wears a silver tunic, and a crown of matching stones is perched above his brow.
Gray-cloaked members of his clan flit at the edges of my vision, carrying baskets and woven sacks presumably filled with soulstones.
In the distance, I hear Brona directing other members of his court to the beach as wind ripples across the surface of the soul pool, creeping like ice into my skin.
And still Maccus stands there, appearing utterly devoid of malice.
Like it’s not taking every ounce of courage I possess not to shrink back.
Anger flares inside me as I wait for my unease to settle—wait for his calm facade to crack. This is the man who hunted me across the Crescent as if I were his property. The one who would have killed me to sate his pride. He is cunning and merciless. Not kind.
Magic hums in my veins as the last of my fear dissolves and I stare down the Stone King, waiting for him to speak.
Instead, he turns his hands palm up and kneels.
“Bandia Saoirse.”
My stomach plummets past my feet.
“I humble myself before you and beg your forgiveness for the cruelty I displayed when first I stepped upon your shore. I doubted you. Dismissed your birthright. Allowed brutality to possess me in a manner that has plagued me every night since.” He glances up, keen eyes a perfect match for the quartz dotting his crown.
“However, if you would allow me, I would make amends.”
Maccus does not rise from the dirt, our eyes level for once.
Does he feel my confusion? My hatred?
Does he feel anything at all?
Slowly, I walk forward—light bursting from every step as though I really were a goddess and this pool the starry night sky—and something finally crosses his expression.
A strange sort of…awe.
I stop when we are an arm’s length away from each other, studying his face as my fingers curl at my sides.
There are no marks where my nails cut his cheekbone.
No bruises or scars. But I remember the bloody scrape of my skin against that same jawline, a memory stirring from where it’s remained half-buried under the frantic weight of that night.
The king was not quite alive. Not dead either.
Something other.
“What amends would those be?”
Without looking away, Maccus gestures for a servant, who steps forward bearing a plain wooden box. Reaching inside, Maccus’s fingers graze something as dark as iron, and my muscles jerk as I feel the slick cut of his blade on my skin—smell the tang of blood.
But when Maccus lifts the object from the box, it’s not a dagger as I’d imagined.
It’s a crown.
Beaten of silver spun so fine, it could be lace, the base circlet of sailor’s knots forms an irregular line of columns as wee as my smallest finger, carved of the same shadow-black basalt guarding the outer circle of our bay.
Lowering his eyes to the masterwork, Maccus tilts it in his hands to reveal one last layer: a delicate seam of pearly-green beryl cresting the top.
“My ancestors forged the crowns for all of the Daonnaí, using elements from every island they claimed after slaughtering the gods. I hope you will accept this as a token of my goodwill, and a promise to honor your place in the Ring of Stars.”
My chest caves in as my mouth runs dry, starving the laugh that wants to emerge because never in a thousand years would I have thought Maccus would offer me a crown willingly. That the Stone King would submit to me. It’s…unthinkable.
Intoxicating.
“I accept.”
Maccus stands, and instantly that thread of power slips through my fingers as he towers over my head. I stumble back on instinct, and he steps forward to catch me—boot striking the water as his bare hand clasps mine.
Fear lances through my sudden bravery, leaving nothing but panic in its wake.
No one enters these pools.
Not because it’s forbidden, but because anyone born in the Crescent knows to fear the soulstones.
Touching them brings on madness—I saw it in my father’s eyes.
Remember the haunted shriek tearing from his chest after he’d grasped my arm while magic rose within me, blood coating his fingers and my brother’s soulstone.
My eyes drop to Maccus’s hand.
To my blood streaked across his thumb.
“Wait—no!”
The scream lodges in my throat as I scramble to let go—terrified I will drive his mind loose and set off a war with a single touch. Yet even as I try to release him, Maccus stands with unwavering calm, watching me as though I amuse him.
“Calm yourself, Bandia Saoirse. You can’t hurt me.”
And as I stare incredulously, Maccus’s eyes…shift.
Not quite like mine. The colors don’t churn so much as glint—a rod of dark iron briefly lit by a forge. But it’s enough to slacken my jaw, seconds before he lets me go.
This time, there is no lingering burst of memory. No drawing back the veil.
He retreats from the soul pool wordlessly, water and blood still dripping from his hand.
“What…” My tongue is thick, clumsy with shock. “What are you?”
Maccus’s eyes, which had been darting between my own, shutter, the desperation behind their search all but gone. A placid smile takes their place as he bows deep and sets the beryl crown atop a basket of soulstones.
“That is something I hope you hold the answers to, my queen.”
Footsteps echo on the path behind him as the Stone King straightens, then starts to back away.
“Wait! I don’t understand, how did you—” I clutch my skirts and try to climb after him—then stop when I see who approaches from behind. “Aidan.”
My brother marches forward without reverence or relief, his beautiful face stern, his hands empty.
Behind him, half a dozen men and women follow, their arms full of baskets glowing with stones.
I look frantically for our mother—that place between my shoulder blades tense as I search for the apothecary, Sionn, as well—but neither is present.
When I turn to Aidan and the others, Maccus, too, is gone.
“Aidan,” I try again, reaching for the pool’s edge. “I’m so glad you’re here. I—”
“Your Highness.”
Aidan bows, shallow and quick, his eyes on a spot over my head. “The Isle of Reborn Stalk thanks you for hosting this autumn council and asks your blessing on the release of our dead.”
“O-of course.” I blink furiously, nails digging into rock. “But could you—”
“The rest of our offerings will be presented tonight. Until then.”
“Aidan, stop!”
I’m still reaching out, utterly bewildered, when my brother turns his back and departs.