by Melissa Marr
He wondered what she’d say if she knew his thoughts. He grinned. “So, we can date until the next one is—”
“Fine.” She turned and walked into her cottage. Her voice drifted back. “I expect true romance. Impress me.”
She sounded like she was laughing, and he felt lighter at the sound.
“Tonight, then, when the sunlight is calmer,” he called back.
Her hand waved behind her, a shower of ice and snow swirled in the air, and then she was inside—and he had a date to plan.
Irial
Irial reached out to touch the fabric that divided the two worlds, the veil that now separated the world of mortals for the home of his kind.
He pushed his fingers through the fabric and parted it. The material twisted around his hands, holding him captive for a moment. It had always done so, recognizing him as its own, as if it would pull him back to Faerie. In theory it wasn’t sentient, but one of Irial’s theories was that it was an extension of the High Queen’s will.
Irial parted the veil and let himself fall into the world he was technically to co-rule. Balance was the proper system for all of the fey. Each court had a balance—Dark existed to balance the logic and order of the High Court, and Summer existed to keep the ice and cold rage of Winter in check. There were those outside the courts, solitary fey, and there were those that defied classification. The embodiment of War, Bananach, lingered in the Dark Court, but she wasn’t truly his. Devlin, brother to the High Queen and War, stood at the High Queen’s most trusted. And Niall . . . the faery who now stood as advisor to the Summer King had once been Irial’s beloved, his intended heir, and in his sorrow, Niall had sought haven here in the arms of the High Queen. He was solitary before all of it.
“You dream of your love,” Sorcha said, lowering herself from a swing that seemed tethered to the sky, which for reasons Irial didn’t ask, was currently nearly purple with thick clouds.
The weather here was often expression Sorcha’s moods, so Irial was cautious, as he took another step closer.
“Push me,” she ordered.
There were moments when Irial missed Faerie. This was one of them. He’d missed being around a faery queen who was capricious and lovely and not trying to skewer him with ice-wrought knives. The Summer King had no love or even tolerance for the Dark, and the Winter Queen seemed angry at all times. The High Queen, however, was the sort of mad that Irial enjoyed. Sorcha was both clever and intriguing. He’d spent enough hours and days with her to know that avoiding boredom mattered more than power.
No fey other than Lady War or Death could have more power than Sorcha. What the High Queen sought in their negotiations was something else entirely. She wanted joy and unpredictability. Irial made it a hobby to offer her exactly that.
"Do you have a secret to share with me, Sorch?" he invited, lowering his voice as he teased.
Sorcha cringed at his bastardization of her name, as she always did, even though Irial felt her spike of pleasure at the act. He tasted her emotion, all fey emotions, and it was the weapon he used to know best how to manipulate other regents. The beauty of dealing with the High Queen was that the tightly controlled emotions of the High Court slipped just a touch in his presence. It was, he thought, why she tolerated his visits.
Once he acquiesced to her demand and gave her swing a push—which obviously she could have achieved on her own—he asked, “What shall I convince you to tell me?”
Sorcha smiled. “I have nothing save for secrets. Which one shall I refuse to tell you?”
"Does it have to do with Niall?" Irial stopped the swing and stepped in front of her. He looked into her eyes. Theirs was an odd honesty, a bond they’d shared over centuries. And the Dark King was well aware that she wasn’t this open with most faeries.
“Ask me no questions, Irial, about the things you have forgotten.” Sorcha reached out and cupped his face in her hand. “There was a time you asked me to take this knowledge from you. I will not give it back.”
“I asked to forget?”
Sorcha gave him a small smile. “Yes. You asked. It was your idea, your request to me.”
“When?”
Sorcha stared at him, as if she had no idea how to answer that, and Irial was reminded that time was complicated for the High Queen. She saw the threads of the past, the now, and many varieties of the future.
So he tried another question, “Would the future be better or worse if I knew?”
“Worse.”
Irial was stunned that she answered so quickly. It was typically a hard question, one that took weighing many lives and many potentials. Carefully, he tried, “Will my lack of knowledge create balance?”
“In some time,” the High Queen said.
The Dark King had spent other days, sometimes many in a row, trying to glean truth from Sorcha. “Will she—”
“I cannot answer questions about these halflings,” Sorcha said.
He startled. The High Queen rarely allowed such half-fey beings to live in the mortal world. Cautiously, he said, “The curse was that a mortal girl had the sunlight.”
The High Queen stared at him and in a droll tone pronounced, “Someone chose to bed one of the mortals who would be Summer Queen.”
“Who would dare?” Irial thought about it, the arrogance it must take to risk eternal winter for ruining the terms of the curse. No wonder he had chosen to forget. His rage at such a person must have been intense. He thought about the fey he knew within his own court who might be so bold. Niall? Gabriel? Niall claimed not to be Dark Court, but truth will out in time.
“I recognize the feel of Dark Court.” He watched Sorcha, seeking verification.
She smiled, knowing full well what he was doing, and he felt the laughter she didn’t let slip. After a moment, she confirmed, “No one but the Dark King will notice her ancestry.”
The swing backed away from him, pulling the High Queen backward into the air by way of a pair of long tree branches that had grabbed the sides of the swing.
“Even I cannot lie directly, “ she said. “I will speak plainly: you, Irial, asked me to take this knowledge from you. It was a curse, devised by you, and I placed it on you. You will forget again after this one either is chosen or is not. Your court will forget. The Hunt will forget.”
Such a curse was extreme. What had prompted it? Why had someone been so foolish as to bed the mortal meant to be the Summer Queen?
“Did he love her?”
“Thelma?” Sorcha asked. “Yes, he loved her enough to remake the world. And I . . . cared for him enough to make it so.”
It had to be Niall. Sorcha had always been fond of Irial’s beloved gancanagh. Irial stared at the High Queen, thinking about the questions he could ask. As she hurtled back toward him, Irial let the shadows that were extensions of his court loose. They caught her and slowed her, so that she was perfectly still in front of him.
His shadows held her aloft there and he asked the only thing he could, “Why?”
The High Queen leaned in and covered his mouth with hers, stealing his question and offering a distraction.
The swing vanished, and Irial felt a willow tree behind the High Queen. The branches of the willow draped around them, creating a curtain of greenery that granted them privacy.
When he paused in their kisses, Sorcha was crying. “One day you will have your answers. Between the young king’s choice of her and the future, you will forget again. You must. Do not ask me more, Irial. Do not try to find these answers. Death will come if you do.”
And that was all she would say.
Keenan
Back at the house he was renting, the Summer King was greeted by the scowling expressions of his advisors. Tavish and Niall had been at Keenan’s side his whole life. They’d advised his father—and when Keenan was a child, they were his only guests from the Summer Court.
They were his family, and like any family they had secrets and discord.
If not for the intercession of the eldes
t faeries, those who lived in Faerie, he’d have only known Winter until he reached his eighteenth year. Tavish and Niall had been the ones who started to counter the stories his mother told him. In time, they’d become treasured friends as well as advisors. After nine centuries, they knew him better than he knew himself.
Today, however, Keenan was not as grateful for their insights. He didn’t miss the assessing looks they gave him.
“My king,” Tavish started.
Keenan shook his head. “No.”
“I understand that you have feelings for the Winter Girl.” Tavish shoved the long silver plait over his shoulder in a telltale sign that he was agitated. He was very loyal to the court, and his tolerance of the Winter Court or Dark Court was minimal at best.
“Stop.” Keenan had listened to more than enough lectures on duty. He knew his duty, and he’d see it through in time. When he’d told Donia he thought the girl was here, Keenan had been serious. He was drawn here, to her, and oddly, he’d been drawn to this area before. He met Tavish’s patient gaze and said, “I will take my joy where I ch—”
“Take it with the Summer Girls,” Tavish interrupted. “They require your time. She does not.”
Nearby, Niall sighed and rubbed his head. The second Summer Court advisor was the more emotional of the two faeries—on every topic save duty. There, Niall was quiet where Tavish had been willing to take risks that Keenan wasn’t sure he could accept.
Niall was not at ease with conflict. Still. He’d fight, and he’d sometimes allow himself pleasures that were beyond the typical court debauchery. He disliked quarrels, though.
“Are you sure you need this?” Niall asked, drawing their gazes. He rubbed his hair with both hands anxiously. His shorn wood-brown hair stood out at odd angles, and for a moment, Keenan had a thought that he might let it grow finally. It wasn’t mere vanity to hope that for him, but a wish that his advisor might finally heal. His close-cropped hair was kept that way to make certain no one missed the long scar that ran from his temple to the corner of his mouth.
“Tavish,” Keenan rebuked, glancing back at Niall.
“Joy matters,” Niall said with a shrug. “You know that, Tavish.” Then to Keenan, he added, “You should see her—unless it will make you hate yourself later.”
Those were words Keenan had said more than once to Niall, referring to the Dark King, though. His advisor, for all that he was loyal to Summer, had been a creature of the Dark Court before Keenan’s birth. And it took no genius to see that a part of the gancanagh still missed the other court. That was one of the many things Summer did not discuss.
The Summer Court was a place of frolic, of leisurely naps in the sun, and naked dancing in the rain. They were not so serious, and they had little time for regrets. In that they were more akin to the Dark than to the Winter Court or High Court.
At that thought, Keenan grinned. “Summer does as it wants, and I want Donia.”
Niall laughed at Keenan’s boisterous proclamation. He understood impulsivity better than most any fey thing. He’d gone from Solitary to Dark Court to Summer Court. In every iteration, Niall was driven by emotions and need. He’d joined the Dark for either love or lust, and he’d left out of rage and betrayal. He stayed with Summer out of some mix of those passions.
“Wanting Winter resulted in your father’s death,” Tavish said. “The curse we bear now—and for all of these centuries—is Winter’s doing.”
“And Irial’s,” Niall muttered.
Keenan couldn’t argue, but there were perks to being king. Not as many as he’d like, what with being cursed his entire life, but one undeniable fact was that the king answered to no higher laws. He shrugged. “I do my duties, Tavish. I shall continue to do so. Sometimes, to enable me to do so, I need to remind myself why.”
“For a mortal who is not your queen?”
“No,” Keenan corrected. “She’s a woman—a faery woman thanks to the curse—and one I love. Breaking the curse will free her and all of them”—he gestured into the house where Summer Girls were giggling and running—“and the world. Forgive me if I need a reminder of why I don’t give up.”
Tavish sighed and walked away, leaving Niall and Keenan in the room alone.
After several moments, Niall spoke, “I understand.”
Keenan waited, knowing his friend well enough to know there was more to say. Finally, Niall met his gaze and added, “The past is the past, though. You can’t live in memories.”
“The past is why I am cursed and you are my advisor,” Keenan said. “My father’s past. Your past.”
Niall said nothing for several moments. He was never at ease discussing his time with the Dark Court, as if ignoring it would erase it. Keenan didn’t have that luxury. If he didn’t break the curse—and stop Beira’s ever-growing power—his court and then the mortals that populated the world would perish.
Logic and hope both said he would find the missing Summer Queen, curses were meant to be broken. The Winter Queen might think she was invincible, but Keenan had faith. Somewhere in the world was a mortal who would save them. He simply had to find her.
Tonight, though, he was going to absolve himself of kingly responsibilities and simply pretend he was a faery who had the joy of romancing the love of his life. He knew that he would lose her when he found his queen, but regrets were the stuff of other courts. He might be a bound king, but he was still the Summer King.
He would figure out how to romance Donia, and he would also meet his obligations. Keenan paused as he headed toward his room, snagging a few Summer Girls who spun by him.
“Niall?” Keenan waited until his advisor met his gaze. “Please inform the Dark King that we are here. I saw the Hunt, and I know they are near.”
And Keenan pretended not to see the flash of shadows in Niall’s eyes. He wasn’t sure if his friend knew they were there, but Keenan saw it. The raw truth was that Niall would always have divided loyalties, one even he denied. Eventually, he would need to face whatever he felt for the Dark King. If not, Keenan would be forced to admit to Niall that the element that healed him was not, had never been, sunlight.
Irial
When Irial left Faerie, he was no more informed than when he arrived. He had once known these mortals—or at least known of them. Tonight, he stood staring up at their building. He was unsurprised when he felt the approach of the one being he’d ever loved. Was the mortal one he’d rescued from the gancanagh? Had he hidden them because the eldest one was addicted to his beloved Niall? Or was she the child of his beloved? Why had he asked Sorcha to curse him?
Did Niall know he’d had a child?
Gabriel was the only other faery Irial could imagine protecting, and the Hound had a child already. A half-ling son, and if Irial’s suspicions were right, he had at least one more child who was half-mortal.
Niall’s daughter.
Irial strolled away from the building until he found a park. Once he was situated, he sent messages over his connections to his fey. “Bring me my gancanagh. Gently. Trick and whisper.”
The minutes ticked by as Irial found himself at a table at the edge of the park. He sat inside, alone, at a wooden table in a small bar. The building was stone and wood, brick and mortar. Niall could sit here with him in relative comfort.
“Dark King.” Niall’s voice came from behind him.
Irial felt his abyss guardians, shadows that were both part of him and somehow sentient, surge toward him. He felt the twist of guilt, longing, and lust that Niall quickly crushed. And under it all, Irial tasted love. It was buried, but it was still there. With that, Irial’s tension lowered just enough to hide his own feelings.
“Did you miss me, love?” Irial said as he glanced back at Niall.
Although it didn’t show on Niall’s face, Irial could taste it. Like honied fire. Niall had always been such fun.
“No guards,” Niall asked. His concern had an edge of genuine curiosity now. “I know you summoned me when you heard I was seeking a
formal audience.”
Irial pushed out a chair. “Sit.”
“Not your lackey.”
“Please, Niall?”
Whatever he heard in Irial’s voice was enough for his curiosity to flare even brighter. He took the chair, although he pulled it back as if Irial couldn’t resist touching him.
Irial smiled to himself. Someday, he’d wear down Niall’s fears. He no longer looked at the Dark King with only hate in his eyes. The love—and the lust—were always obvious again.
“Do you ever think about the days where no bed was forbidden?” Irial asked. “Where a woman would slide from my arms to yours? Where—”
“Not if I can help it.” Niall’s expression tightened.
The wave of lust from Niall that washed over Irial was enough to make the Dark King pause. He shook out a cigarette, tapped it on the table. “Do you ever think of children?”
Niall stilled, and for a flicker of a moment, Irial watched him. He wasn’t sure if he could force the question. Did Niall know?
“Have you any?” Irial asked.
Niall took Irial’s unlit cigarette and sniffed it. Carefully, he held to his lips and looked at Irial.
Stunned, Irial lit his cigarette. He didn’t let himself think of other times when Niall had allowed him other intimacy that ended with cigarettes and silences. “Feeling bold?”
Niall took a long drag and exhaled. “Earlier, my king mentioned that although he does what’s needed to fulfill his duties, sometimes, to enable that, he needed to remind himself why.”
Irial watched him curiously.
“I am here to tell you that we are in this town, that my king will commence seeking his queen here.” Niall smoked and stared at him for several moments. “I am reminded that I risked death to leave you.”
“Do you think I wouldn’t risk death to tempt you back?” Irial took Niall’s cigarette and lit his own with it. After a long moment, Irial asked, “Are you trying to see if I’ll seduce you tonight?”