Once Upon A Midnight

by Stephanie Rowe

  I personally gave those humans magical powers, and I varied those powers amongst the different families I selected to conduct the rituals we needed to help us keep the Dark Fae within their walls. Those humans are Druids, and each family selected is led by its own Druid high priest.

  Destiny is not a thing even we Fae can control. Had I known then what I know now… but, ah, I didn’t see it coming.

  I had no suspicions, and I am ashamed to say all my abilities, my magic, and my power did not keep me from being blindsided.

  And so my tale begins…

  ~ One ~

  HIS NAME WAS Conall MacTalbot, and he caught her eye as he moved within the circle of the dolmans. She liked the timbre of his voice as he recited the ancient words of the spell that helped keep the Prison Wall intact.

  It was May first—Beltane—and he was a high Druid priest, honor-bound to maintain the rituals. He was honor-bound to keep the Realms from colliding and to pass on the words of the Treaty between Man and Fae to his children.

  Aaibhe, Queen of the Seelie Fae, had been watching him for a few moments. She felt her eyelids get lazy as her lashes stroked her cheeks. He was tall and muscular, and the dark etchings of ancient runes on his bicep were most tantalizingly sensual.

  She had not been moved to be with a male in years—not even Gaiscioch, her dear and trusted ex-lover had been able to steer her into the bedroom. She no longer was interested in relationships, for they did nothing but leave her feeling empty.

  However, this human, this Conall MacTalbot, caught her attention, and she wondered at the fates that had made her take this tour of her Druid priests during Beltaine. She had already traveled most of the scattered dolmans spread throughout the Scottish Highlands.

  With a thought she discarded the Féth Fiada (the Fae cloak of invisibility) and took a step towards him.

  She felt an intake of breath as he turned to stare at her and their eyes met, and she immediately donned human Glamour to tone down her Faeness and let him be at ease. He smiled softly and bowed his head. “My queen—my exquisite queen of the white-gold hair.”

  She gasped with surprise. “How did you know me? How could you know…?”

  “You could be no other. My ancestors have told of your beauty and wisdom.”

  “I only met two of your ancestors…” Her mouth pursed with amusement, and she heard him suck in air.

  He immediately went down on one knee and looked up at her, whispering, “Then it is really you…”

  She laughed. “As you have already said.”

  “Yes, but even so, I doubted myself.”

  She touched his shoulder, and a blue spark ignited in the air between them. Each paused as they stared at one another; it was as though they felt time stand still. Each felt beyond the moment.

  Aaibhe cleared her throat. “Up, Conall… Stand, please.”

  He did what she asked and towered over her, which was saying something as she was quite tall, and she felt a wave of heat rush just beneath the surface of her skin.

  It was only early spring and as such the Highlands air was quite cold, and yet this human seemed oblivious to the bite of the frigid air. He had chosen to do the rituals traditionally, naked except for the leather trews he wore over his muscular long legs.

  Aaibhe was much impressed with his style and manner. She moved a finger up and around, and suddenly they were enveloped in a warm and transparent shield against the cold.

  “Now, we may be comfortable. Conall… tell me about yourself,” she asked of him sweetly. With a flick of a finger, she laid a blanket onto the damp grass, sat, and beckoned for him to join her.

  He did, and as she looked into his blue eyes, she asked herself what she was doing.

  She knew the answer. She absolutely knew what she was doing. She didn’t have cumbersome human scruples, but she did have a sense of what was owed to the office she possessed as queen. She told herself even a queen must have her pleasures…

  Was it just that, a voice inside her head asked her, just a fleeting pleasure? Was it just a bit of romance, pretty words, and physical release? Pleasures where no one would get hurt? Or was it something else that voice demanded of her, was this a link with destiny?

  She knew a need to be in this human’s arms, and a sudden urge to get there made her feel weak with desire. She banished the wayward urge as she reminded herself she was a queen, above matters of the flesh, but when he took her hand to his lips, she was nearly overcome with the rush of heat that sped through her veins.

  “To answer your question, My Queen, you already know my family of MacTalbot has honored the four rituals every year and done our part for the Seelie Fae since the Treaty was enacted.” He looked away for a moment and then smiled sadly at her. “I am a widower, as m’darlin’ wife died in childbirth three years ago. I have grieved for her sorely and have not been able to take another in her place, though my boys need mothering and ’tis my duty to give them one.” This time his face lit up as he spoke. “I have two sons—verily they are the world to me… They are the air I breathe…”

  * * *

  Her smile ravished him; her sweet voice curled around his heart. What was she asking? He didn’t feel quite like himself. His mind had lost the ability to think. His body had taken over, and he felt primal. He wasn’t sure what was wrong with him; he never lost control like this, and yet now, he felt a wayward, almost savage desire, a need to lay her down and ram his cock deep inside her and—“What?” he asked, trying to collect his thoughts.

  Softly she smiled. “I asked where they are now.”

  “With their nanny.” He touched her soft cheek with his knuckle, and she trembled. He felt her tremor rush through his fingers, and the hard-on he had been trying to conceal from the moment he saw her pulsated in his leather trews, demanding release and attention. He hoped conversation would hide his need. “Even as young as they are, I have been tutoring them on what will be expected of them as Druid priests, but they need play time as well.”

  As though she’d forgotten she was the queen of Fae with powers untold, Aaibhe moved closer to him, and Conall found himself doing the same. As though they had a will of their own, his hands went to her waist and held her there as he tried to regain control.

  Her voice melted all better resolves when she said, “I am glad, Conall. They will make wonderful priests… like their father.”

  He growled inarticulately, his voice low and primal with the hunger he felt for her. He pulled her closer by her small waist and allowed his eyes to linger on her nipples protruding now hard and firm in the soft material she wore. He tried to stop himself and even offered, “Forgive me—I don’t know what is wrong with me. I can’t seem to stop…”

  “I don’t want you to stop, Conall of MacTalbot.” So long—it had been so long since anyone had made her feel this way.

  It was as though a burst of energy exploded between them, weaved its magic threads and brought them closer, not only in body but in mind. His soul wrapped itself around her essence, long forgotten in immortality. His heart whispered a matching spell of Druid enchantment neither one wanted to break.

  It was as though they had known one another through all time, as though his spirit and her essence had been united in some distant time, waiting, always waiting for this moment.

  “Your soul speaks to mine,” he said on a hushed note, his hand moving from her waist to her full breast.

  “It has been said we Fae don’t have souls… that our souls have been lost through time,” she whispered as she reveled at his touch.

  “They, my darlin’, those that say so, doonae know of what they speak.”

  She shivered as he cupped her breast and fingered her nipple with an expertise that went through her and right back to him.

  He wanted to lay her back that moment. He wanted to spread her legs and plunge into her honeycomb. He wanted…

  “You believe Fae have souls…?” she asked between hard breaths.

  “Ah, I believe you do�
��and it was meant for mine. We Druids believe that when we bind ourselves to a mate, we meet again in the afterlife.”

  She laughed and realized she had not laughed like that in ages. “Conall, then tell me true, who will you go to in the afterlife… if you mate with me?”

  “You are immortal. It changes all things, and my answer is no longer what it used to be,” he whispered.

  * * *

  For some, love comes out of friendship, for others out of convenience and expedience. Love comes unbidden and when it is least expected and does what it wants, regardless of the perimeters we set for it, Aaibhe thought to herself, but what she, Queen of the Seelie Fae felt in that moment with him was beyond any sensation she had ever known in all her seventy thousand years.

  The emotion she experienced at Conall’s touch was pure and irrational, full-bodied in its intensity, and she invited him with her brilliant eyes to possess her.

  She was the Queen of the Seelie Fae, yes, but all at once she realized what she had forgotten for so long… she was also a female.

  ~ Two ~

  HIS HANDS FILLED with her white-gold hair, and he traced its waist-length waves down to her perfect ass. He bent his head and whispered softly in her ear that she was exquisite, telling her, “You have me under your spell, My Queen.”

  “No,” she answered sharply. “No spells between us.”

  “And still I am helpless to keep myself from making you mine,” he said in a husky voice, feeling a thrill rush through his body. What was he doing? She was the Queen of Fae. What consequences were being waved right before his eyes? She was immortal. He would end up hopelessly devoted, and she would leave—she wouldn’t have a choice.

  She touched him in places that awoke a hunger he thought had died with his young wife. She drew a response from more than his dick, but from his heart. How could that be? He didn’t even know her, and yet… he did. It was as though their souls had met somewhere in time, but that wasn’t possible—was it?

  He felt her desire, and it excited him beyond thought. All reason was banished. Her mesmerizing eyes slew him with her inner beauty. She was an aphrodisiac he could not deny.

  She pulled at her gold-threaded gown. He knew she could have blinked it away, but she wanted him to help her take it off. His hands trembled wildly as he touched the soft material and then threw it aside onto the damp grass beyond their blanket.

  With the tips of his trembling fingers he traced a path from her full breasts, down her middle, tentatively touching the soft gold tuft of hair between her thighs before grabbing hold of it. He cupped her with a vibrating motion and reveled as he watched her throw her head back. He caressed her body with his free hand and bent his head to hers. As he closed his mouth on her lips, he felt an ecstasy that went beyond the physical.

  He teased her tongue with his suggestively, stroking, circling, loving as he flicked and joined with her in a rhythm of what was to come. They were lost to each other—to the world within the concealed aura she had created. Neither questioned their feelings—they only gave with abandon, and the notion was lodged with each that this moment in time was ‘meant’.

  It was as though destiny had brought them together.

  * * *

  She threw herself into that fated moment. She was a queen who should think of consequences, but she couldn’t. She only knew she wanted him in ways she had never wanted the Fae males who had been her lovers in that long-ago dead past.

  Fae ethics and morality are shaded by time. They live forever, and their outlook is so different from a human’s point of view. Love for a Fae loses something in the translation and becomes but a mere physical release at the hands of time.

  Aaibhe had found sex lacking in the past. Now this human looked at her as though she were the only female in the World. He made her feel like a sensual creature that he had to have and that made her thighs clench with need. His craving inspired her, and she found she could not resist him.

  His eyes had undressed, thrilled, and caressed her before he had stripped her clothing away, and she felt herself open up to the possibility that here was a passion she must not give up. He engendered feelings in her that were almost overwhelming, and she wanted everything he could give her. As she pulled on his leather trews and exposed his huge erection, she closed her eyes a moment and then ran her hand over his thighs.

  He took her chin and whispered, “Open your eyes, lass…”

  He called her lass, and it made her feel giddy. No one had ever treated her as anything but a queen, even in bed. She felt feminine and young.

  She opened her eyes and looked into his. What she saw made her hold her breath, but then he was taking her lips with his own, parting them, kissing her into a world where only she and he existed. His teeth grazed her bottom lip gently but with such passion. His tongue brushed hers with velvety smoothness.

  She broke away from his kisses and lowered herself into position. She held his huge, throbbing shaft in her hand and then bent her head to put it to her lips to kiss the length and width of it. She licked at its tip and then back over and around its width. She cupped his balls gently and reveled to the sound of his groans.

  Aaibhe’s body trembled when he called her name and she felt a pool of wetness gather within the cleft of her opening. His movement as he pushed into her mouth was erotic and wild and she felt more empowered than she did as a queen.

  She sucked his hard, dancing cock into her mouth and tasted him. She reveled as she felt it jerk with excitement and pulsate as she lapped at its tip with her tongue. She felt him burn wildly with desire, and it thrilled her.

  He bent and took her in his arms and rolled with her, laying her on her back. She could not remember ever ‘wanting’ so badly. She needed him with every fiber of her being.

  “Conall, your touch is magic to me—I need you. I want you… now…”

  * * *

  “Aye then, lass.” He no longer thought of her as the Seelie Queen. She had become a woman—his woman. Already he felt a possessive need to make her his own completely. It was as though her essence had stretched its long, sweet tentacles of silk around his heart.

  He knew she was everything he could ever want and more. He was determined to make her want him as well. When she did, when she knew that they were meant, he would never let her go without a fight…

  His dick was dripping with need, but he wanted the foreplay to last. It was exquisite pleasure and pain intermixed, and he didn’t want relief—not yet. He wanted the touching, the riotous sensations in his blood, to continue.

  Fuck her, his body demanded of him, and his answer was that he damn well meant to fuck her—and like she had never been fucked before—but he wanted this part of it to last as long as he could hold out.

  She whispered tenderly, “Conall, I have no right to walk into your life and ask you to take me into it…”

  “I give you the right, my sweet life, my Aaibhe—queen of my heart…” His voice was hushed with the fever he felt. He nibbled at her earlobe, wanting to stall his growing need, a need that threatened to make him slam into her right then and there, and he still held off.

  “Pretty words, but they will not last. This—us—will not last. There is so much that will pull and tear us apart. This is just for the moment…” Her words were scarcely a breath on the wind, but she wanted him to understand. She was Queen of the Seelie Fae—how could she mesh that life, those duties with the life she would have with a human?

  “I know only one thing, my love,” he said as he looked long into her brilliant eyes. “You and I… are meant. This moment and more to come are meant. I will not give you up as long as you doona wish me to, and I know you doona wish it.”

  She reached for his face and kissed him, gave him her tongue and lost herself to his kiss as he slipped his hand over her breast and kissed her with a passion she had never known. He came up to tell her in almost reverent tones, “You taste like sweet roses—you taste like sugar and spice, and, lass, you taste like mine
. Aaibhe, it is as though you were made for me alone…”

  “It seems so to me as well, but, Conall—” she started to object.

  He cut her off. “Nay, you know that you and I are for now and always. You know it.”

  * * *

  Gaiscioch was not a royal, but he was a respected member of the Fae Council. He had been honored as a warrior in Queen Bridget’s war against the Dark King and then in the aftermath when they had to contain the Dark King’s abominations.

  He had always been pleased with his appearance, with his long, thick, midnight shade of hair, with the wide streak of gray that started at his forehead and gave him such a mysterious aura, a shadow of nobility amongst his kind. He knew the Fae females found him desirable, but as long as he could remember, only one held his interest.

  He recalled times when things were different, so different—thousands of years ago. He remembered how Queen Bridget had sadly suffered from the blow of a Death Weapon. He remembered how the king had surprised him and had shown and expressed remorse as he witnessed what he had done in the name of revolution.

  The queen had lost her strength at first, but she was still able to create the threads of magic that made the Prison Wall of the Dark Realm. That wall, she knew, would never contain the king; it was his abominations she sought to keep checked. Gais was there, by her side, aiding her. He had always been loyal.

  That alone should have won him his own Royal House. There was no reason why only four Royal Houses must rule. He knew it was said the four Royal Houses were derived from lineage—a magic that one could only be born into—but even so, he thought to have his own. Why not? Then perhaps Aaibhe would have considered him as consort. He believed he had always been her favorite…

  When Queen Bridget died of her mortal wounds, the Dark King exiled himself to his world, with his dark creations and Morrigu following him. The powerful king tried to rectify his mistakes, and this resulted in the creation of the four royal Dark Princes. They were handsome, as fair as any Seelie Fae, but they were sociopaths, without empathy, and sorely disappointed the king. It was said that he left the Dark Realm then and went off to grieve over the failure of his work.