I wanted him to hold me, comfort me. Why was he being so cold? This was not my fault. Why was he so far from me and sounding so full of hatred? I wanted to slug him, slap his face. I pressed both of my hands against my chest trying to calm my rapidly-trying-to-rip-from-my-body heart. Gideon. I just wanted Gideon. He was standing so far from me. Not making any move to explain anything. He was just letting this pain rip through me. He’d just been kissing me, now he just stood there, not answering the questions.
“Does Liam know…that I wasn’t supposed to die?” He didn’t need to answer, I could see it on his face, Liam knew. “How long has he known?” Cold resignation took over me. Detach, detach, detach…
“Since the other night at the club. I told him then. Though we suspected that first night in Long Beach.” He finally answered.
I simply nodded. “And the others, do they know?”
He shook his head. “No, but they’ve all been wondering.”
“What? Wondering what?”
“What you are. How it got cocked up.”
“Cocked up? Is that what you call it? I was not supposed to die. None of this was supposed to happen? Oh my gods! That’s why he kept calling me Lissa, kept saying that name. It should have been her not me.” I slumped to the rug in front of the fire, my legs no longer of any use, the air gone from my lungs.
“How? How can something like this happen?” I cried out. “And you knew. You’ve known for weeks. And…after everything we just…after everything you just told me you still didn’t tell me that part.”
“I told you nothing of it because I didn’t know enough until moments ago from Deimari. She had a great deal to fill me in on.”
“You already knew that I wasn’t meant to die. I need more answers…”
“I don’t have any.”
“What am I?”
I don’t know what you are!” He bellowed.
Plans were already forming in my mind. Escape route. Alternate choices. Screw this. Screw them all. Go. Just run. I wasn’t supposed to be dead. I was not Álfaer. I was not Rúnaigh. Then what was I, to be able to do the things I could. What would become of me? If the Comhairle could end me for not doing a cull…would they end me because I wasn’t even supposed to be here? How could I cull if I was not Álfaer? Go away. Get away. “So, that’s it? That’s why you’re being this way? Because twenty minutes ago you could barely pull yourself from me.”
He was still pacing, rage a thunderous cloud around him.
“You were just fine with me when the problem was merely that I wasn’t supposed to be dead, but throw in the new fact that I’m not Álfaer and can’t be Bháis…and that makes me untouchable?” It wasn’t adding up. There was something he was still keeping from me.
If whoever was out there had not shown up…
“It’s her isn’t it?” I breathed out, shocked. “Your dear little Roghnú is out there, isn’t she? This is about her isn’t it? Because you were already unsure as to what I am, you didn’t know if I was Sióg or human and that didn’t keep you from me. This isn’t about that at all is it? It’s her…Liam said—”
“What!?” he yelled. “What did Liam say!?”
“He told me about her, about your feelings for her, or that he suspected…that for years…” I was shaking my head in disbelief; I couldn’t even make my mouth form the words.
The thought of him with her, the way we had just been. The kisses, the touches. My heart was in shreds. “So, is that it? Oh my gods. It’s totally ninth grade all over again. She’s the one you’ve wanted all this time, and now suddenly she’s here and you’re shoving me away.”
“Give me my clothes,” I demanded. I glared at him. How could things have changed so quickly? So fucking quickly. Liam had tried to warn me. I wanted out of here. Away from his anger, his judgment. Everything was happening too quickly. Everything in my head was moving too quickly and I was having the hardest time grasping onto any of it. I needed desperately to break down and cry and I was not going to do that here with him…or with that thing just in the other room.
Oh, how it hurt. I wanted him, wanted it to be an hour ago. Trying to breathe was getting worse, more difficult. My heart. My heart felt like there was nothing left where it had been minutes ago, nothing left but pulp. I just looked at him. I gave him a pleading look, begging him to come to me, not to let this, her, tear us apart.
He moved to his closet, removed my things from within. I moved to him, but when he reached out his arms to hand them to me, instead of taking them, I rushed into his arms, crushing myself into him, laid my head against his shoulder, my hands on his chest, before sliding my arms around his middle. Unwanted tears fell and wet his shirt, ignoring my will.
For just a moment he laid his head against mine and for just that moment I thought it would all be okay, with this nightmare past. But then he backed away from me, pushed me away. His rigidity quickly descending and replacing that flash of tenderness. Obliterating it.
This really couldn’t be happening. I felt ill. His eyes fell closed, not his eyelids, but that carefully constructed barrier dropped over them. His face turned resigned. It just made no sense. His actions didn’t fit the circumstances. His emotions didn’t fit the situation.
“Gideon?” So, this was it.
“We still need to talk.”
He was ice.
“Gideon.” I touched his face, looked in his eyes, gave it everything I had in me, tried waking that place in me to reach out to him with that radiant power.
But he was winter.
“Don’t do this. It doesn’t have to be like this.” I was shaking my head, imploring him with my eyes. I stroked his cheeks with both of my hands, trying to get him to meet my eyes. “I don’t know what exactly she said to change us, but please, think back to just a while ago. How you held me, kissed me, touched me.”
He wouldn’t meet my gaze.
“She hates me Gideon. I saw her in Tiarnas, remember? Saw her with you. She hates me. She wants you. She knows you love me.” There I’d said it. He did love me. His heart beat for me. Me. Not her. I saw something flicker in his eyes, a flicker of that look he’d had when we were kissing.
“She told you I wasn’t supposed to die; she told you I wasn’t Álfaer, didn’t she?”
“She wasn’t the one. It was a member of Na Ceann Comhairle that told me about the mistake. Deimari brought me the other news.” His tone was edging toward vicious.
“Well, someone is wrong, or lying to you. Maybe I should not have died…I don’t care anymore Gideon.” I pulled his face to me, met his eyes. “Are you listening to me? I don’t care if I’m not Isabelle, as long as I can have you.”
“You can’t.” He moved away from me, out of reach. His voice was pure arctic frost.
“Because I’m not Álfaer.”
He looked away in response.
“Someone lied or is misinformed. I am Sióg.” Uldwynah was real, he’d confirmed that. I was tattooed with a symbol from the High Court; I could sprout fricking wings from pure energy. I was able to dream walk and I could get to Tiarnas when I slept. We’d met in the woods, we’d met at the pool, and we’d met on horses. My brain prickled again... “If I’m not…how can I do all the things that I have?”
“We still need to talk, when I get back,” He repeated.
“And you’re leaving with her?”
What had that thing in the other room convinced him of? Why had he believed this lie so easily? How could he turn from me so easily? I shook my head as I grabbed my clothes from his hand. I strode to the door, without looking at him. I was shredded. I wiggled into my jeans, zipped them, pulled his shirt off my body and threw it at him. It landed at his feet. I refused to meet his eyes. I pulled my sweater around me. My boots could wait until I was clear of his home, clear of him. I’d call a cab when I was around the block. It was cold out, but nothing could cause more damage, make me feel colder than I already did inside, clear to my core. And nothing would be sufficient to warm me.
“Iliana.” No Draghail. No Milseachd. No cute endearment now. He spoke with no emotion; no longing, no sympathy, no tenderness. And yet it still could stop my heart, make my step falter. “I’ll be back soon. I’ve been called away, again. Be here when I return. There will be things to finalize.”
“Like what? Ending me?” I shook my head. “You’re going with her. She came here for you!”
“She came here to warn me about you!” He bellowed wrathfully. “Would you like to tell me about Collum!?” He roared.
I stumbled back, fell against the door. My head felt like it had exploded inside…I remembered a dozen things all at once. Bagpipes and fiddles, a blazing bonfire, many goblets of elderberry wine, a faun, a satyr with a girl from the party, the lights, Eyvindur…no it wasn’t Eyvindur I had found. It was Gideon on his horse. No it wasn’t Gideon. It had been Collum. They all swirled around like a kaleidoscope, making me feel sicker.
“Collum?” I held my head, turned to him.
“Don’t try denying it. Deimari was there in the clearing, she saw you in the grass with him. She saw you kissing him, touching him, your legs wrapped around him. And you stand here and tell me you love me!?” His temper rose, his voice turned to thunder in my ears.
He picked me up by my shoulders and pushed me against the wall, moved his face in cruelly close to mine. “Did you like it? Were his kisses as good as mine? Did they make you as hot? Did you fuck him in that meadow?” He growled so deep in his throat I wondered for just a second if he was part animal. “Tell me he forced himself on you.” His voice held the very slightest edge of beseechment.
His eyes were darkly fierce, full of pain and hate.
Tears were streaming down my face. Collum. I’d forgotten about Collum. How had I forgotten that?
This was what it was all really about.
“I don’t know. I honestly don’t remember…didn’t remember anything of him until you said his name. It was such a strange night Gideon. I wasn’t prepared for all of that, for the things I saw, for everything I felt. The air, the energy, it was all overwhelming. I should have been better warned. It was all so different and strange. I didn’t even remember anything beyond the bonfire until you said something”
“Answer the questions!” He seethed into my hair, his rage quiet and lethal. His voice was brutal and his body was vibrating with fury.
“No.” I stroked his face tenderly. “No. Gideon. You. I just want you. You awoke my mhésen, Gideon. It was you. Not Collum. You. Please don’t do this. Make her leave. She’s lying about all of it. I didn’t sleep with him. I didn’t. Let’s just go back to the couch. Go back to where we were before she got here. Please.” I begged him. I implored him. It couldn’t go this way.
“Lies and omissions.” He pulled me from against the wall, pushed me towards the door. “Go. Leave. And you’d better still be around when I return. Do not make me have to look for you” He warned, his tone was death.
I touched the pendant that was resting on my chest. He’d just put it there. It lay over my heart, what was left of my pulverized heart.
He saw me touch it and scowled. “Uldwynah could not have been more wrong.”
“That’s exactly what I was thinking. Screw you Gideon.” I choked out through restrained sobs. “Maybe if there hadn’t been all the games of cat and mouse, maybe if you’d shown me anything, any little bit of what you did here tonight, before I went to that party, that…whatever, that I couldn’t even remember would not have happened. I wouldn’t have been in those woods.” I pointed to his bed, without looking, I couldn’t look at it. “I would have been there with you instead.” Those last words barely made it out, the catch in my throat and heart nearly obliterating them.
I threw open his bedroom door. “Enjoy your get away with that bitch. Keep in mind, I already told you she wants me dead. I told you that yesterday. And how dare you judge me when you’ve been hung up on her for gods know how long.” I stormed out, down the hallway and into his living room, where I abruptly stopped when I saw her standing there.
She was still there. Smug. The look on her face was smug and victorious.
And full of hatred, I could feel it filling the room, could feel her possessiveness of Gideon. Her look was one of death. She wasn’t done with me yet.
“Iliana!” Gideon bellowed as he emerged from his room. “Stop!”
I could hear his bare feet on the hardwood floor. Had there been any measure of affection in that voice I would have stayed right there, but it was devoid of any.
If only I could have been focused, so I could call up that power of mine and throw that bitch out the window, or something equally damaging.
I tore his door open and ran down his steps. I dimly heard it slam shut, could hear his forceful stride following me. But I didn’t look back.
His powerful hands seized me. Spun me to face him. “Iliana, you can’t run from this.” His eyes were a firestorm.
“I’m going home.”
“Wait for me at my place.” He demanded.
“No. I’ll never be there again.” I pulled away.
“I have to leave now. I don’t have time for this.”
“I’m sure you have a watch dog you can send over.” I started to walk away, but turned back to him. “Oh, and since you’re so hopped up on the idea that I’m not Álfaer, find someone else to cull for you.”
I couldn’t breathe right; every breath was a sharp cleaving pain. “Hey, maybe your Roghnú can pull double duty, cull for you and fuck you.” A sob was threatening to rip from me. I could feel it embedded in my mhésen, could feel a soul shattering howl building inside. I kept backing away from him, each step ripping through me painfully.
“I’m your Cerberus.” The words hissed through his teeth.
I met his eyes. “You were.” I nodded sadly, more tears slipping from me, my voice soft, wistful.
Make it stop make it stop make it stop…
It hurt so badly. “Bye Gideon.”
Glossary of Na Síraide Cinn
Naoi Cé Naoi Oidhreacht: The Nine While Nine Legacy
Na Síraide Cinn: The Everlasting Ones ~ all of the Sióg
Na Ceann Comhairle: The One Council ~ rules directly over the Nine
An Bunaidh Naoi: The Original Nine ~ in the OtherRealm the Rúnaigh are known as The Original Nine
Rúnaigh: the guardians of the mysterious, versed in mysteries, possessing rare knowledge, hidden or obscure
*Na Teagmhasach Bháis: The Contingency of Death
Lanmhuchadh: Extinguisher,
Blackout, Death
Coimhdeacht: Escort/Usher
Léimhanam: Mhésen Reader
Breithiúnas: Judgment
Nochta Cúiteamh: Retribution
Roghnú Deireadh: Choose End
Caomhnoir: Guardian of the Contingency
*Airíoch de Beocht: Caretakers of Life
*Airíoch Cruthaitheach: Caretakers of the Arts
*Airíoch Draíochta: Caretakers of the Enchantments
Eilemeinteach: Caretaker of the Elemental magics air, water, fire, earth
Taiscélaid: Seer, Observer of Omens
*Airíoch Nádúr: Caretakers of Nature
*Airíoch Breathnadóir: Keepers of the Records, Watchers of the Earthbound
*Airíoch am Uilíoch: Caretakers of Universal Time
*Scáthanna: Trackers of the ones the Síraide are interested in and those who know the mysteries and/or the ways of the Síraide. Also known as Shadows
*Eirr Rúnaigh: Warriors of the Rúnaigh
Athrú: Shift
Beannachtaí: Greetings
Bréagach Sióg: False Siog
Bronntanas do Beira: Gift to Beira
Céimnithe ar Shiúl: Fade Away
Deireadh an Samhraidh: Summer’s End (Halloween)
Dhealramh: Disfigurer
Do Mhórgacht: Your Highness
Draghail: Troublesome, Trouble
Draíochta ar Linn: Pool of Magics (En
chantments)
Eile Domhan: Other World
Féadfaidh Lá: May Day
Fíor Sióg: True Siog
Ghemúcht: Soul (near equivalent to)
Imíonn: Vanish/Disappear
Lómhara: Lowvara ~ Precious
Mhésen: Spirit (near equivalent to)
Mílseachd: Sweetness
Mo Milis: My Sweet
Naoi Cé Naoi Oidhreacht: Nine While Nine Legacy
Oíche Féile: Festival Night
Píosail: Sexy
Réimse Eile: Other Realm
Sábháilte: Safe
Scaoileadh: Release
Taisteal ar an Alfar: Travel of the Alfar
Tiarnas: Dominion…the Realm of Fae
Tir Na Óige: Land of Youth
Ursprache: Early Speech
Síos a Tabhair leat an gaoithe,
A dúnmharú ar préachán,
Le éadóchas,
Tar léanta milis searbh…
Bring down the wind,
A murder of crows,
With despair,
Come bitter sweet woes…
e.l.f. ~ ethereal light filaments (As Iliana comes to call her power, very tongue-cheek-like)
Pronunciation Guide of Na Síraide Cinn
Naoi Cé Naoi Oidhreacht: NAH-ee Key NAH-ee AYE-rrawhkt
Na Síraide Cinn: NA SHEERR-eh T’kinn
Na Ceann Comhairle: NA Keyun KOWRR-lye
No Time to Cry (Nine While Nine Legacy Book 1) Page 30