He said the words as if she should know this person and she realized—she knew nothing about the world she stood in. She didn’t know who she was, or where she was, or what she was supposed to be doing. As fast as it had come, her relief at being free of the house and hedge, twisted into horror.
Chapter Seven
She shook her head to loosen the fog and stared at the strange knight. He was tall and lithe, with long dark brown hair and pointed ears, and a face covered in grit and grime. Tuathan, her faulty brain supplied. The surcoat over his armor was plain, with nothing to say what house he came from. Even if he’d had some symbol on his chest she wouldn’t have known what it meant. There was nothing familiar about him. Nothing.
Her stomach clutched with panic.
She knew one other thing for sure—something was very wrong with her Gift. She didn’t know how she knew but when she’d called for power, there should have been more—and that scared her almost as much as the hole where her memory had been.
“I asked you before, where is the Black Queen?” Underneath his helm the knight’s eyes glittered like hard angry crystals. And cold. His expression was oh, so cold.
She had no clue who she was, but even on the dance floor she’d instinctively known to come out with her verbal weapons raised when someone attacked her. She lifted her chin. “I believe you have me at a disadvantage, sir. Who are you and why are you asking me these things?”
“It doesn’t matter who I am.” He stepped in close.
She jerked away. “I think it does.”
“What matters is the Black Queen. Have you seen her? She might be an old woman. Or she might be a woman in her prime, around a thousand or so. You must tell me, have you seen the Crone? Or Aeval?”
The speed and force of his questions was too much. Her head whirled and a wave of black swept over her. She fought it off, but he must have seen it.
The anger faded from his expression, replaced by a look of frustration. “I’m sorry, my lady.” He sighed. “You’ve been under a spell for what looks like a very long time. It must be confusing.”
Is that where she’d been? A trickle of music danced through her mind, and she cocked her head, trying to catch the last strains of sound. “I thought I was at a party.” She looked down at her party frock and sparkling shoes, confused about when she’d even put them on.
He whistled. The horse left its grazing and trotted up to them, nosing the soldier on the arm. “Bet you thought you’d seen the last of me.” The man gave the stallion a good scratch between the ears and was rewarded by a strong head-butt that pushed him back a step. “Sorry to disappoint you, you old sod.”
Their familiarity with each other sent a pang of loneliness through her. Somewhere there must be someone who knew her like this man’s horse knew him.
She pressed her lips together hard, keeping in the sudden rise of loss. She’d find who she was. She had to.
The knight turned back to her, his face was dark and unsmiling and far from friendly. “There’s nothing out here for miles, just the mist and the forest. I camped back a little ways in that direction.” He pointed to the hills across the way and the leafy branches of the forest rising up the walls of the valley. When she didn’t move he frowned. “My lady, I think it best if we leave this place. As you can see the damage we did will soon be repaired and I have no desire to sleep near that thing.” He nodded at the hedge.
Where her magic had burned the stumps were slowly growing back into place. Soon, there would be nothing left to show where they’d emerged. Above the bright greenery a cloud of black dust whirled, confined to the area within the hedge behind an invisible shield.
The soldier swung up on his horse. “My lady.” He offered her an arm, dropping his stirrup and leaving it empty for her foot.
She hesitated. Her entire body was tense, screaming at her to get out of here, or worse would come but she had no idea who this man was, or where she was, or even who she was. All she knew was that she was far away from the only thing she could remember—the party—and even that was fading fast from her memory into the mists and confusion.
He frowned. “My lady, can you ride?”
She didn’t know. The tension stretched to near panic and she moved a step away, wrapping her arms around herself in an effort to keep in the fear.
“My lady, we need to go.” Sheathed in a fine metal gauntlet his outstretched hand looked wide and masculine, and full of strength. He was a knight, trained to fight. Despite his animosity he’d rescued her from the house and, stranger that he was, she didn’t have any allies here but him.
From deep within, out of the void where her memories should be, she heard a woman’s voice, soft with worry. “Straighten that spine and lift that chin, my little thorny rose. Never let them see what you really feel. They feed on fear. And you’ll be a tasty morsel, my little Aeval.”
The memory of love and warmth, and the scent of gingerbread, was gone as fast as it had come, leaving nothing but a trace of what-had-been for her to tuck away and examine later, and a surge of joy at discovering something important. Aeval. Her name was Aeval. It fell into place like a key into a lock. The rush of relief had her shaking.
Hiding her fear of the unknown, she straightened up. She didn’t know much, but she knew one thing—like the thorns covering the hedge and the roses inside the abandoned garden, she would survive. And that meant going with the soldier. She placed her hand in his and her toe in the stirrup. He hauled her up into the saddle behind him and she shifted back, leaving as much space as she could between herself and the rigidity of his armored back.
He was a stranger, but he was the only one here who could help her. For now, she’d stick with him. After that. Who knew? Certainly not her. She didn’t know much besides her name. They moved off up the valley away from the hedge, every instinct inside of Aeval crawling with apprehension.
THEY’D RIDDEN HARD back the way he’d come that morning and gone past where he’d camped the night before. Ardan took them off the trail, using his magic to hide their passage. He wasn’t taking any chances that someone or something would come to check on the disturbances at the cottage, and then it would come after them.
His traveling companion had started the ride barely letting herself touch him. Now, she leaned heavily on him, clinging to his back. He didn’t think she could go any farther without rest, no matter how high the danger.
Finally he chose a wide space deep in the trees. It wasn’t much, but there was room for a fire and it was off the trail. There was even some grass for Triton and a few larger rocks to lean on. It would do.
He signaled Triton to halt. “We’ll camp here.”
She straightened up off him with a jerk. “Here? But there’s nothing here. No hostel or inn. Where are we to sleep?”
Just his luck, another demanding high-born woman to make his life miserable. He twisted in the saddle and offered her his hand. Her eyes narrowed, but she took it and slid down, nearly buckling when her feet touched the ground.
“Easy now.” He held on tight until she’d found her feet. “Better?”
Her eyes flashed. “I’m fine.” She jerked her hand out of his and walked slowly away, her delicate shoulders stiff.
He hid his amusement and dismounted. “As you say, my lady.” She gave him a bare nod. “I still don’t see where we’re going to sleep. Unless you have a house tucked in your pocket?” A hopeful expression crossed her face at the same time as a fierce shiver racked her body.
He gave a short laugh, well aware there was no humor in it. “This is a good spot. It’s big enough for a fire.” He eyed the space. “And the tent.”
It was fall down here in the south, almost summer weather for him, and he hadn’t been using the tent. But given the goose bumps on her bare arms, and the continuing shivers racking her body and making her gauzy skirts sway, the tent would be needed tonight.
He dug into his saddlebags, digging out his leather jacket. “Here.” She took it and moved away
from him, shrugging into it and zipping it up without even a thank you.
He shook his head and started setting the perimeter. He must have a magnet set to draw demanding ungrateful women to him. As soon as he had the information he needed from her he’d be gone and back on his quest.
First, the Winter Queen had chosen him as a boy. And when she’d no longer desired him, she’d used him as the commander of her guard, taking everything he’d had and turning him as bitter as a man thousands of years old. Until finally, he’d snapped.
Then, the Lady Aoife had become his champion. When she’d stepped forward in his defense, giving him the opportunity to earn a place in court instead of sacrificing his life—he’d thought he’d found someone who would be his mentor. A woman who could take the place of Maeve—the woman who’d been his queen, his lover, and his greatest source of pain.
But over the last year it was obvious Aoife was just as cold as Maeve had been, and just as hard. He meant nothing to her except a means to an end.
Now he had this girl to deal with. She had all the markings of a woman who would do the same as all the others—use him until he burned out. But this time he wasn’t stepping forward for the beating. This time, he’d be the one in charge. He’d kept her with him for one reason, and one reason only—the compass still pointed at her. She was his way to the Black Queen. And he was going to find out why.
He set small tendrils of power back along their trail and around the camp to alert him if anyone approached. When he was finished he turned back to his traveling companion. She was huddled against a rock, her hands sunk deep in the pockets of his jacket. As pretty as this one was, she was no different than the others.
But he was different.
He scoured the area and picked up an armful of dried wood, bringing it back and dumping it near the rocks. “ Why don’t you see if you can get a fire going while I get Triton settled and set up the tent.”
She gave him a blank stare.
“Surely you know how to light fire?” She was powerful, he’d seen just how powerful when she’d brought the lightning. Why did a child’s trick, lighting a fire, stop her?
Her chin came up out of the collar of his jacket. “Of course.” But he thought he caught a flicker of something that looked like doubt in her eyes. “You, go set up my tent.” And she dismissed him with a nod.
She turned to where the pile of wood was and pointed.
He snorted under his breath. She might be able to call fire, but she damn sure didn’t know the first thing about how to build one. He was tempted to let her go ahead and try to light the entire stack of wood, but he was tired and wanted his dinner more than he wanted the amusement of watching her struggle.
“My lady?”
“Yes.” She lifted a single brow in inquiry.
“It works better if you don’t use it all in one go. Make a pile of a few of the smaller pieces and get that started first.”
“Of course. I knew that. I was simply evaluating the quality of the logs.”
He choked down his laughter and kept a subtle eye on her while he cleared the space for the tent of rocks and debris. She had no idea of how to build a fire. Using just the tips of her fingers she picked up the smaller kindling he’d collected. Once she had a small stack, she resumed her stance and took a deep breath. A blast of flame leapt from her fingers and the small pile of wood exploded in flames.
“Danu’s breath!” He shoved her out of the way and shot a bolt of cold at the fire’s edges. “Do you want to set the entire forest on fire?”
“I thought...I thought I’d need more.” Her skin paled making her eyes look large and vulnerable. “When I tried to gather my Gift at the hedge such a pitiful amount came. I didn’t expect this to work so well.”
A pitiful amount?
Compared to the way his was, her Gift had been devastating. She’d attacked that hedge with bolts of lightning and she was clearly powerful, much more powerful than him. So why did she think she should be able to do more?
He handed her a larger log. “Now, put this one on and let it catch naturally.”
Her face serious, she took the log, found just the right spot for it and gingerly added it to the fire. She looked up at him, checking for acknowledgement.
“Good. One at a time, and only when you see the last one has caught.”
She perched on a rock cautiously tending the fire, all her focus on choosing just the right log. Ardan went back to erecting the tent. As the tiny one-inch square of canvas expanded into a ten-foot-square tent, he pondered. She was clearly a lady of the courts. Black, Gold, Red. Silver, maybe. Or she could have traveled up from the lands further to the south and beyond the sea. With that amount of power, she definitely held a title. So who was she? And why had the lodestone led him to her when he wanted the Black Queen?
Tent up, he set a kettle to boil, then sat down on a rock, pulled last night’s roasted pheasant out of his bag and tore off a chunk. He was about to hand it to her when he saw her look of distaste.
“You expect me to eat that? With my fingers?” She looked down her nose at the proffered food. “It’s not even hot.”
He looked at the bird in his left hand and the leg in his right and sighed. “I hope keeping you with me is worth it, because you’re turning out to be a pain in the ass.”
“How dare you.”
He hadn’t thought her chin could rise any higher, but she managed it.
Ardan bit back his retort and reined in his temper. He was tired and out of patience, but she was his only clue. “I apologize, my lady. I’ve been living on the land for ten months and I’m afraid I’ve lost the arts of the courts.”
Ten months without worrying if a woman was going to lose her temper and blast him in to tiny pieces and look at what he’d become— a callous soldier, fit only for battles and the company of men.
He put the bird aside and dug out the spit from the bag, reheating the meat over the fire. The smell of roast pheasant rose into the air, making his stomach growl while he found plates and cups. This time when he handed her food it was on a metal plate, with his only fork and a side of dried apples.
She took his offering. “It’s not much, but it’s better.”
“You know, you could say thank you.”
“For what?’
“For the food, the fork. The rescue.” He didn’t know why he expected anything more from her. Years of serving the White Queen and he should be used to women not giving him respect. But it rankled.
“The rescue? Is that what this is?”
“Forget it.” He shook his head. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
She stared at him, her deep purple eyes evaluating.
“Well, if not a thank you, then how about an explanation. Who are you, and how did you get in that house?” He bit into his own dinner. It was better warm, he had to give her that.
She took another bite of pheasant, chewing and swallowing carefully before asking, “You said you were looking for a woman, a queen. But then you asked me about two women. What were they? The Crone and—?”
“Aeval.” The name tasted like ash in his mouth. At her blank expression he rushed to explain, “It’s the same woman. The Black Queen has three names, The Morrigan, The Crone and Aeval and I am sworn to kill her whether she be woman, warrior or matriarch, so tell me, have you seen any one of those? Did they put you under the spell?”
She jerked and looked away repeating, “The Morrigan, The Crone, and Aeval.” But the last trickled into silence and was almost just a breath.
He waited for her to say more, hoped for more. But she stared off into the dark, her expression unreadable.
He sighed. It was worse than pulling teeth. “Let’s start again. You have a name, right? Let’s start with that.”
She swiveled her head around, pinning him with her gaze. He held his breath, waiting. It was as if he were luring a wild thing into a trap.
She nodded slowly. “You may call me... Thorn.”
“Is that your name?” He waited for more—a last name, a title, the land she came from. “No title?” When she didn’t answer he shook his head. “Come on, I know you come from one of the courts. Just look at you, you are a lady if I ever saw one.”
She looked away again, then back. “It’s enough for now. And you are?”
The superior tone in her voice put his hackles up and he found his own back stiffening. He was no one’s servant now, he’d fought for his freedom. “I am Ardan.”
“No title?” Her eyebrow raised and he flushed at the mocking tone of her voice.
“No. No title.” A bitter taste rose in the back of his throat.
By taking a stance against the woman who’d used him all his life, he’d lost his title. And now, this was his last chance at a life. He had to know how she got into that house. And she was going to tell him whether she wanted to or not.
“I’m running out of time, Thorn.” He leaned closer to her over the fire, the heat burning his skin. “I can’t waste it on court niceties. So, now that we have names out of the way, you’re going to tell me everything. How did you get into that house and what do you have to do with the Black Queen?”
Her eyes were wide and apprehensive, the light of the fire flickering in the depths. “I don’t know.”
“Tell me what you remember. Who put you there? Was it the queen? Why would I be led to that house, to you, if it wasn’t her?”
“I’m telling you. I don’t know. I don’t remember.” Her words were fast, her breathing even faster.
Desperation pushed him to his feet. He stood up, dropping his dinner back on his plate and closing the few feet between them. “You must know something. Tell me!”
She leaned back, raising her hands palm out in defense, her face stark with fear. A hot glow rose from her hands and her red curls began to rise with static.
He backed away, never taking his gaze off her and the rising power coming to her defense.
Bespelled: A Fae Fantasy Romance (Fae Magic Book 5) Page 5