“Oh, will he?” Ciaran laughed.
She shook her head in amazement as she realized, “Aodh remembers me, too. In my time, I did not understand what he was hinting at. After he saw me use my power, he started calling me ‘bright lady.’ He remembered this moment – meeting me here, waking up to my power healing him. He was trying to tell me. This had all happened already.” She looked over at Drostan and breathed in wonder, “It really will be okay, won’t it?”
PRESENT DAY
Drostan had taken over Taran’s post at Ciaran’s side so that he could fulfill his duties and expectations as King. Taran was making a constant, concerted effort to stuff down his fear for Skye while making the rounds to ensure morale was up and everyone was standing at the ready. For what? He had no idea. But they would be ready, just the same.
Latharn had just arrived and been caught up on the events of the day. Having him there helped Taran immensely. Not that he leaned upon the (slightly) older faol for comfort. He simply found it easier to maintain a brave front with his former superior present. Like in the early days, no matter what horror the clan had faced, it had been routine to stay calm and unaffected – to choke off his emotions, to plan and do what needed to be done.
Still, he had nearly broken down when Latharn reached out and squeezed his shoulder, giving him a look that required no words. Taran had nodded and fought like hell to hold it together. He was immensely grateful for the seemingly small gesture – a fatherly reassurance that they would see this through together, no matter the outcome.
Someone found a map of the region in the glove compartment of one of the trucks. It was spread out atop a few of Aiyana’s now-empty crates. Aiyana and the men stood around it, debating tactics. Any lingering apprehension over her place in the clan had dissolved the instant she stood beside their Queen in battle.
They marked off the locations of their clansmen on the map and discussed whether they were in the best placement. Taran was so involved in the conversation, he barely noticed the tapping on his shoulder at first. It was not until he caught himself frowning and pulling away from the persistent touch that he paid it any mind. He turned then, surprised to find Aodh standing closely behind him.
“Aodh…” he greeted when he got a look at the larger man’s face.
Aodh used his hands to sign his response: ‘King Taran, follow, please. Bring Latharn. And nice-little-mortal-soldier-lady-friend.’ (His current way of signing his nickname for Aiyana.)
Taran frowned curiously, wondering what he could want to speak with them about. He excused himself and motioned for Latharn and Aiyana to follow as he stepped away from the group.
They followed without question until Aodh stopped a short distance away. Taran was surprised to find that Aodh had already summoned Ciaran, Drostan, and Miko to this same place. They were all waiting now to speak with him privately.
“What is it, brother?” Taran asked.
Aodh looked around at the rest of them nervously, as if trying to decide how to word his reply. Finally, he signed: ‘Bright lady Skye is alive. Safe.’
“Ya can sense her?” Ciaran asked eagerly.
Taran’s eyes widened.
Latharn and Drostan exchanged shocked looks.
“Where is she?” Miko and Aiyana asked in unison.
Aodh huffed as he struggled again with how to word this. He did not want to go against Skye’s wishes from so very long ago. These memories were supposed to be secret. When they had started to resurface for him unexpectedly a month prior (the night he witnessed her using her magic), he had honored her original wishes and kept the knowledge to himself. As the events of the day had unfolded and he sensed her leave, he realized how it was linked to the past. He understood where and when she had gone. He had been at war with himself all day and into the night over whether to speak up. Watching the way the clan was mourning, he finally decided to give them peace. He knew Skye would not want her family to suffer as they were, to fear her dead and lost forever.
Aodh pointed to the cave, then signed: ‘Skye is there – but not. Far, far away. I cannot tell you much. Secret. Important not to talk about it. But I know she would want you to know she is safe. Protected. Planning. Gathering strength.’
Taran gritted his teeth and closed his eyes, trying in vain to hold back tears. He nearly dropped to his knees at the confirmation that Skye was at least still alive.
Ciaran made no such efforts to mask his tears of overwhelming relief. Sobbing happily as he relayed Aodh's words, he turned and hugged Miko and Aiyana. Miko squeezed him back tightly. Aiyana clapped his back as they laughed together.
Drostan’s eyes went to the heavens as he said a prayer of thanks.
Taran cleared his throat and nodded, struggling for a minute to find his voice. He drew a hand roughly over his face, wiping away his tears. “Thank ya for telling us, Aodh. We shall nah ask for any further details. We will continue preparing to help in any way we can.”
Aodh nodded, then reluctantly signed: ‘…horns, King Taran.’
Taran tilted his head, not understanding. “What do ya mean?”
Aodh shifted anxiously from one foot to the other and signed: ‘The beast. As a boy… in cave… I saw.’
Taran stepped closer, putting a hand on his brother’s arm and frowning compassionately. Aodh had never once spoken of the things he endured before they found him. They had all assumed it too traumatic for the child and never pressed.
“What did ya see, Aodh?” Taran asked softly.
Aodh swallowed hard and tried to shake off the instinctual fear that came along with these memories. He signed slowly: ‘Horns. Carved with spells. Uses them to steal power. Steal life and twist it. Make it bad. Was too small to fight…. but I saw. Horns are weakness. We must break them, King Taran. We must break break break BREAK...’ He signed the word repeatedly with increasingly furious determination. Tears filled his eyes as his breathing grew shallow and rapid.
Taran reached up and grasped Aodh’s hands, stilling them gently. With a deadly glint in his eyes, he assured, “We will, brother. I give ya my word.”
Aodh met Taran’s gaze, took a steadying breath, and nodded.
PAST – APPROXIMATELY 2,000 BC
Skye turned Aodh’s care back over to the capable hands of his new family. His brothers were all eager to help in any way they could – even those who had been stand-offish before. Many had feared becoming attached to the boy, only to suffer the pain of watching him die. Now that they knew he would not only survive, but thrive and grow to become their brother, they were doing all in their power to make him feel welcome, safe, and comfortable.
Faolan watched the mortal boy silently from across the cave. He took in the way the mood of the clan had brightened in response to Skye’s words and healing light. He smiled proudly and watched her move easily amongst the men as if she were their equal. He saw her as far above them all – but then, that may just have been the father in him. His brow arched high in interest when he spotted Taran cautiously approaching. Faolan sat up to get a better view, his curiosity of how this would play out getting the better of him.
Taran stopped a short distance away from Skye, waiting for her to notice him and not daring to come any closer. The future mated pair quickly had the undivided attention of Faolan, and the far more discrete attention of dozens of their clansmen.
Skye turned and was surprised to see Taran standing not far away. She was even more surprised to find him tentatively holding her gaze for the first time since before the Triple Goddess incident.
Taran inclined his head to her respectfully, then tipped his head toward one of the cave tunnels and gave her a nervous, inquiring look. Skye nodded in understanding. He wanted to talk, but not in front of everyone.
She followed him, ignoring the stolen glances of so many of her brothers as she cut through the crowd. When she felt Ciaran send a sense of warm reassurance through their link, she turned and sought him out. She found his familiar, bright blue eyes with eas
e amongst the crowd and gave him a smile of appreciation. Hoping for the best, she headed down the tunnel Taran had disappeared into a moment earlier.
Taran stopped a reasonable distance away from the others and waited for Skye to catch up with him. He kept his eyes low as he tried to steady his nerves.
Skye approached slowly. She was not sure what to expect. She stood in front of him feeling incredibly anxious and unsure. Instead of battling instinctual fear of him like before, she was now worried that any sudden movements on her part would scare him away. It was a strange juxtaposition. She opened her mouth to speak, but quickly realized that she had no idea what to even say to him. She cleared her throat awkwardly before finally motioning to his arm. “You are healing, I see,” she commented. It was a good sign. It meant that he was dealing with the trauma in his mind at least well enough that it was no longer affecting his body.
Taran’s brows drew together before he followed her gaze and looked down at his arm. He studied the nearly-closed wound in a manner that made it clear he had not even noticed. After a moment, he took a deep breath and forced himself to speak. “Skye, I…” he tried, but stopped and exhaled heavily. He pressed his lips together and closed his eyes at how difficult it was to express this. He tried again, shaking his head and wincing as he assured brokenly, “There are simply no words… in any language, in any time… that can possibly convey the extent of my regret for what I have done to you. My behavior was indefensible. And after all that you have survived, I just…”
He trailed off, his mouth working to find the words but coming up short. He wrung his hands and kept his tearful gaze trained on the ground.
“I am unworthy of your forgiveness. Unworthy of even being in your presence, let alone ever filling the role of your mate. I swear to leave you be as much as possible while you are here in our time. You are safe in Ciaran’s care and Faolan’s guardianship… Far safer than you were with me.” His features tensed at the painful truth of those words. “I just wanted to…” He drew a hand over his face and struggled to say, “…to offer what little I can to aid you. When you get back to your own time, you will likely arrive without any of your power to rely on for defense. I heard you tell Latharn earlier that you felt overwhelmed when you battled the wicked druids’ creations. That you have no experience to draw on for fighting flying creatures. That you felt hopelessly unprepared without knowledge, power, weapons, or even the ability to transform. Perhaps… if you share with me your memories of their attacks… I may be able to help you strategize how best to fight them?”
Skye watched in silent amazement as he tentatively held his hands out to her, palms up, as he had seen Drostan do. She could not believe her eyes. Despite the horrific torture he had endured the last time she shared memories with him, he was freely offering her the opportunity to do it all over again if it could help her.
Taran had to struggle to keep his hands steady, given his instinctual fear of her touch. He stuffed the useless emotion down, though. Some things were simply more important. “I have been involved in more battles than I can recall,” he managed hoarsely. “As a mortal and faol, against a wide array of threats – including the very creations you faced. If my experience can benefit you in any way, it is yours.”
When Skye did not reply, he chanced a look at her face. He found her eyes locked on the offer of his hands, her expression one of more emotions than he could hope to decipher.
“I am sorry, Skye,” he whispered with absolute sincerity. “So very sorry that I have failed you so completely since your arrival. I pray that I shall one day be a man deserving of your hand… but honestly, I cannot see how I ever could be. Perhaps in your time I am King in title only? That, I would understand.”
Skye frowned deeply and met Taran’s gaze. She could not allow him to believe such a thing. She stepped forward, bypassing his offered hands and instead laying her hands on his chest as she gazed up into his eyes.
Taran’s heart raced with dread at her swift movement, but he held fast. He looked down at her hands, at first not understanding what she was doing. He inhaled deeply as his eyes rolled closed a second later when she linked to him. She began flooding his mind and heart with memories and feelings.
Taran’s lips parted. Tears soon slipped down his face at the sensation of awe-inspiring love. Skye shared memories of Taran – her Taran – shared looks of adoration, laughter, every time she hid away in his strong arms and let all her fears out. She recalled the way he counseled her, taught her, listened to her, always took great care to ensure he understood her. The way he always made her feel at home by his side. His endless patience with her as she struggled to find her footing in her new life. The way he somehow managed to always instinctually be exactly what she needed in any given moment: A friend. A mentor. A lover. A sounding board. An equal. A superior. A subordinate.
She recalled in perfect clarity making love to him. The sweet passion of their unions. Every physical sensation and powerful emotion. The way they melted into one another. The intermingled scent of their arousal. The combined sounds of their sighs and moans. The words of love they shared as they laid together in the afterglow…
Taran sighed in appreciation at her memories of a connection far deeper than any he had experienced in his life, or even known to be possible. He inhaled sharply in surprise when he felt Skye’s warm, soft hands framing his face, drawing him out of the memories and back into the present. He slowly opened his heavy eyelids and watched in wonder as Skye’s blue and yellow eyes bore into his intensely.
“You will never be anything to me ‘in title only,’ Taran,” Skye whispered ardently. “You will be my heart. My anchor. My King, in every possible way. And when the day comes that you and I meet and fall in love, you will have become a man of such impossible grace and wisdom, I will be the one to feel unworthy.”
Taran looked down at the ground, unable to speak or hold her gaze as he worked through the overwhelming emotions she had just shared.
Skye waited patiently until he had managed to process it all, then asked, “Are you ready to see what happened before I came here?”
“Yes. Please, show me,” he urged.
“Okay… I will try to share nothing beyond what I saw,” she offered. She was reluctant to share the fear and pain she had experienced, or her heartbreak over being separated from him. She already knew, however, that she would be unable to hold back all of it.
Taran frowned deeply, easily catching her concerns. “You need not shield me from your suffering, Queen. We are far beyond such pretenses. I know your pain as intimately as my own,” he declared.
Skye realized how true those words were. She lowered her gaze as she recalled, “I always marveled over how well you could read me. I see now that it is my fault you developed that particular trait.”
Seeing her sadness, Taran ducked his head to meet her gaze. “Then I am glad for it,” he offered with complete sincerity.
Skye looked at him in surprise.
“I have seen the very worst of your life,” Taran reminded. “I have lived through the absolute horror of it in my mind. After all that you have survived, the very least you deserve is someone by your side who can understand you. What I endured was but a small price to pay if it serves to make me a greater ally and mate to you.”
Skye gave a half smile at how familiar he was in that moment. It was like a window into the future. As if suddenly realizing that he had forgotten his fear in favor of reassuring her, Taran stood up straighter, averting his eyes as his previous anxiousness returned.
“That, right there?” Skye said as she pointed at him. “That was a glimmer of who you will become, Taran. That side of you is the spark you will fan to ignite the fire of a great King.”
She took his offered hands and started at the beginning, sparing him nothing. She showed him firsthand everything she had seen and felt right from the moment she had been dragged away and trapped behind the barrier. She stopped when she reached her memory of traveling back in
time. She failed to anticipate the fact that, while Taran was ready to endure her pain and misery, he was entirely unprepared to see how his future-self factored into what happened.
Once finished, she opened her eyes and attempted to release Taran’s hands. His grip only tightened further.
“Dear spirits…” he whispered remorsefully. “You were stolen right from my grasp and I could do nothing more than watch. I did nothing at all that helped you. What kind of a King allows such things to happen to his Queen?” he asked disappointedly of his future self.
Skye opened her mouth to defend her mate, but he cut her off.
“I heard you earlier, Skye…” he ground out. “You told Faolan that I was killed by Brandubh. That you carried my body as you faced an army of fògaraich and the ainmhidh. The war had begun, and I was not by your side to protect you – I only hindered you.” He hung his head in shame, gradually relaxing his hold on her hands as he whispered, “Then, a month after my resurrection, I let you be taken from my side to battle those abominations alone? The wretched creature that tortured you swore to make you suffer as much as possible because of his hatred of ME.”
Skye frowned, realizing that Taran must have understood Teàrlach’s Gaelic words from her memories. Words that she had not been able to translate at the time.
Taran laughed in bitter disbelief as he recalled, “Then you came here, desperately fleeing torture, traversing the very seas of time seeking your Trinity… and the first thing I did when you reached me was cause you even more harm.” He looked up at her with an expression of pure devastation as he asked, “Do I ever protect you? Do I ever do right by you? You put such value in the man I will become, but I… I just cannot see any of this supposed greatness.”
“Taran…” she breathed as she tried to find the words to make him understand. “It does not constitute a failure on your part when my enemies manage to reach me. Yes, we are very cautious, but I do not have it in me to just hide away from the world – from the very war I was born to fight. Even if I allowed you to keep me locked away in some tower like a helpless damsel, there is still no guarantee that I would be safe. The threats in my life are never simple. If it were a matter of an enemy coming at me directly, you would never allow danger within reach of me. You would – and always did – mercilessly put down anyone foolish enough to attempt to harm me in your presence. But it is rarely like that – maybe because I am so well protected by you and the rest of our pack. You prevent any possibility of a direct attack. My enemies can only come at me by devious and deceitful means. The wicked druids came for me in my dreams. They attacked my mind with magic from the other side of the world. You have no way to defend me from such things, and it does not fall on your shoulders to do so. It is not your job as my King and mate to prevent me from ever experiencing difficulties or encountering danger. Do you understand that? We are a team. You ‘do right by me’ every day by standing at my side, no matter what. By helping me overcome each new obstacle as it arises. By ensuring that I see things as they ARE, not as I would LIKE them to be. By providing a voice of reason and never giving up hope. You help me heal my heart and mind between battles. And you and Ciaran… you both help me stay sane.” She smiled weakly as she assured, “There is no one in all the world, aside from you, who can truly understand what a precious gift that is for me.”
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