Soul Fire

by R. F. Long

  “I don’t know how,” she whispered hoarsely.

  “Just try,” Daire replied. “I trust you.”

  Rowan laid her hand on Aidan’s chest and took a deep breath, willing her body to fill with soul fire as easily as her lungs filled with air. It came more quickly than ever before. Every inch of her skin tingled and vitality flooded her with life. She could still feel Daire’s warmth against her back, fuelling the fire, part of it somehow, his presence entwined with hers. Carefully Rowan harnessed that power and released it into Aidan. Her mind flowed with it, seeking out the dark worm of Aynia’s last enchantment and driving it away.

  Rowan’s strength flickered out and she wilted against Daire. He held her against him and she was stunned to find that his hands were trembling where they held her.

  “You have always given too much,” he murmured into her hair. “You must learn restraint, Rowan. But just here. Just with regards to magic, my love.”

  Rowan smiled at the endearment, despite the overwhelming sorrow welling up in place of the soul fire. She couldn’t show it, couldn’t let him know. It wasn’t fair. He was Sidhe. He had to go back or fade. And after tonight no one knew where the gateway would be.

  She straightened her body, drew on strength she didn’t know she possessed and opened her eyes. Aidan stirred, awakening in front of her. Úna gave a cry and dismounted, struggling to maintain her composure. Her expression softened with wonder and relief. The queen had not believed a mortal could do such a thing, Rowan was sure of it now. But in spite of that doubt, she had.

  Úna gathered Aidan in her arms. Though he reddened and tried to demur, his mother would not be denied. She held him close and wept.

  Rowan tried to escape gracefully, stepping back as all the Sidhe rushed forwards to see him, to celebrate. This was their time now. She had no part in it.

  But Daire followed her. “Rowan?”

  “I’ve got to go.”

  “I wish you would stay.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t…” She looked around for Matthew, and her brother detached himself from the golden-haired beauty looking after him with a little too much attention.

  A small growl rippled from deep in Daire’s throat and his eyes hardened. “I see you met my sister, Matthew.”

  To his credit, Matthew blushed. “She healed my head.” Though he struggled to focus on Daire and Rowan, his gaze followed the woman as she moved through the ranks of her kin to celebrate her younger brother’s awakening.

  “Yes. She has a talent. Not as great as Rowan’s perhaps, but Fionnuala is special in her own way. Not least because she is my sister.”

  Matthew nodded sagely. “No disrespect meant, Daire.”

  Daire’s eyes gentled in veiled amusement. “None taken.”

  “And I’m sorry. I… I mean, I didn’t—”

  Daire rested his broad hand on Matthew’s shoulder, silencing his apology. “I know Aynia of old and have experienced many of her snares. I am fully aware of her capabilities, as I suffered them as you did. No mortal could have survived her. Few Sidhe ever have. And yet, when faced with harming your sister, you could not, you would not. Family is always family. That is strength.”

  Rowan hung back, her arms hugging her own chest. Her eyes lingered on Daire. She tried to imprint the memory of his face into her mind. His stance, his presence, all the things she was about to lose. She wanted to scream, to cling to him and beg him not to leave her. She longed to tell him she could not live without him, not now when she had finally got him back, not after all they had gone through. Maybe it was the magic of the Sidhe lover, the endless desire for him only, forever, lacking the ability to survive without him. And yet, she knew only her need for Daire, not any Sidhe. Just him.

  Instead, she carefully closed down her emotions, guarding herself against the inevitable.

  “Matt.” Her voice emerged too sharply off key. “We have to go now. See what’s left of the cottage. It’s not too late. We still have time to make it to the opening but we need to shower and change, and…”

  Matthew looked back at the destruction littered around her home. The scenes of devastation inside flashed back into Rowan’s mind in vivid snapshots. She willed her brother to understand, to realise where she was coming from. She couldn’t stay here. Not now. Not to watch him leave her again, to leave her willingly. She needed to get away now.

  For once Matthew realised what she needed, what she wanted from him and nodded in understanding. “Grab whatever you need and come to my place. Don’t forget your outfit for tonight. We’ll head to the gallery from there. It’s only nine. A late entrance makes an impact, right?”

  Only nine. He said it so nonchalantly. It seemed like an eternity since she had headed for the caves, not mere hours. She shuddered and Matthew pulled her closer, hugged her.

  Gratefully, Rowan gripped his shoulders, squeezed him close.

  There was only one more thing stopping her.

  “Rowan,” Daire’s voice sounded almost plaintive, or as near to plaintive as he could manage. “Don’t go.”

  “I have to. I can’t…” She heaved in a breath and then continued, pouring out the words in a headlong rush for fear that if she paused even for a second, she would break down and never say them. “I can’t watch you leave me again. I can’t say goodbye. I’m sorry.”

  She wanted to say more, to tell him how she loved him, but there was no point in making this worse. No need to prolong the agony. Short and bitter, that was the best. Complete. A clean break.

  She dug her fingers in Matthew’s arm and made for the house, intent only on packing a bag and getting away as soon as she could. She couldn’t look back and watch him leave her. Not again.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  She was going. She was leaving him.

  Daire watched Rowan’s retreat with full understanding of what it was. Goodbye. Even though his mind yelled at him to pursue her, to stop her, even though every instinct, natural and supernatural, demanded that he could not let her do it, this was, though she could not say it, goodbye. She left him standing there. He wanted to follow, but he could not because she didn’t want him.

  Not anymore. She was leaving him.

  He stayed still.

  His heart pounded, thudding against his ribs as if it wanted only to tear itself free and go after her itself. His blood surged with his veins, reverberating through his brain like the ocean pounding on a rocky shore. Whatever miracle had given him the strength he needed during the battle, it departed with her, and the fleeting glimpse of heaven he had captured in her arms went with it.

  Rowan left him.

  Daire hung his head and released a breath that he had not realised had been trapped inside him. His sword felt impossibly heavy at his side, and the parts of his upper torso no longer covered by the tattered remains of his Sidhe garments shivered under the chill touch of the Samhain breeze.

  “The Host will now depart.” His father gathered his troops together, as usual in the aftermath of battle, handing out the traditional commands that would see a swift and orderly withdrawal. “We will do what we can to repair her home and belongings. Remove the bodies of the fallen with honour and dispose of the Sluagh dead. See our people back through the gateway, then close it in our wake.”

  Orders. It was so easy to follow orders. He didn’t have to think about it, even though he knew in his heart that he was no longer as he was, not longer the obedient soldier. He had changed. Rowan had changed him, and the touch of the Dark Sidhe had played its part. He struggled with the temptation to fall back, to refuse to go with them.

  But what would that mean to his family? They had thought they lost him once and he had seen the distress it caused his parents. And Rowan had gone, had left him.

  Obedient at last, Daire fell into step behind his family, but Fionnuala halted, staring at him with her piercing eyes. His little sister had grown up to be a mirror of their mother. When she turned her gaze on him he could feel that familiar sensation
of her rummaging through the uppermost levels of his mind. He had known it from his childhood, accepted it as a daily part of Sidhe life, a quick and handy way of passing on information and sharing emotions. It had never felt to him like an invasion of his privacy. Privacy had little place in Sidhe life. Secrecy perhaps, but only from humans or the enemy. Nothing needed to be hidden from another member of the court.

  Certainly not from his sister.

  So why did he resent her intrusion now? Why did he raise a wall in his mind to keep her from his innermost thoughts?

  Fionnuala stepped back, her eyes wide with surprise.

  “I don’t know how to say this, Daire. You…you’ve changed.”

  Changed? She had no idea. What did she know? She was little more than a child still.

  Irritated, he brushed by her. “Not now, Fionnuala.” His patience had finished. Everything was finished. “Let’s just go home.” It sounded like such a lie. The Seelie Court no longer felt like home to him.

  “No. I’m serious.” She darted in front of him again, a lithe little slip of determination, and stopped him with a single hand on his chest. Fionnuala held him still and studied his face. Daire rolled his eyes and tried to ignore her. “Aidan? Look at him.”

  His brother broke off from a group of concerned relatives and joined her, his expression as intrigued as their sister’s.

  Daire put up with their scrutiny for a couple of moments before irritation got the better of him. “Surely we don’t have time for this. The gateway will move.”

  Aidan just frowned. “But the gateway is not going to accept you, brother. You’ve changed.”

  Daire recoiled, sensing the accusation to come. The darkness of the Unseelie Sidhe had filled him in the caves, and still lingered inside him. What Aynia had woken could not be dispelled. He curled his fingers around his golden acorn. It gave no warning, no trill of alarm at the edge of his senses. He frowned. Perhaps if the darkness lay coiled inside him, it wouldn’t work. How could it warn him if he himself was actually the danger? He had all but succumbed to the Unseelie lure. Only Rowan had pulled him back from it.

  But the gateway had allowed him passage after that. He had gone home, passing through the veil to get help. The Realm would have sent out warning if he was Unseelie now.

  Conall had come armed to meet him at the edge of the veil but he said they had sensed iron, rather than their enemies. Anger rose like a red mist before Daire’s eyes, but he pushed it back. He was not Unseelie. He refused to be Unseelie, no matter how much the rage threatened to engulf him.

  In the battle he had felt the same anger, the same all-focused drive when he knew Rowan was in danger. He remembered separating his mind from the other Sidhe, deliberately tearing his consciousness away to allow him to seek her out, to feel her and ensure she was still alive. Was that it, then? The last step needed to make him the enemy after all?

  Daire waited while his sister fetched his mother. In all matters of the Seelie Court her word was law. Finbar was king, Lord of the Bright Host, but Úna was the queen. And that was that. Úna maintained the magical heart of the Seelie Realm. All the Sidhe slowly turned their attention on him, as if he was some oddity in their midst, or worse, a monster. Daire bristled.

  The queen approached, her gossamer gown whispering over the grass, giving the impression that she didn’t walk so much as glide. Daire had been a soldier for so long that he couldn’t really recall Úna being a maternal figure. She was queen first and always had been.

  Now tears sparkled in her crystal eyes, and when she took his hand, she trembled. Daire could feel her presence wrapping around him, a wave of love and regret. Confused by her reaction, he remained silent, waiting.

  “It is as I feared,” she whispered, her voice broken. “You cannot return with us, Daire. You are no longer Sidhe.”

  He bowed his head and then his knees buckled. For one weakness, one brief moment allowing himself to succumb to temptation of the Unseelie within, no matter how great the need might have been, he stood to lose not just Rowan, but his home, his family, everything. His knees met the earth hard and the shock jarred through his entire body.

  “What are you saying?” King Finbar stormed towards them, pushing family and subjects aside in his haste. “He is our son! Our firstborn.”

  “That he is, Finbar. But look at him. Truly now. Look!” She pulled his chin up and through his despair Daire saw her tears brimming like jewels on her eyelashes.

  A bright flare of acid regret lanced through his heart, an emotion far stronger than a Sidhe was given to experience.

  “By the Creator!” the king gasped. “A soul? He has a soul?”

  “Rowan shared her soul with him, to save and sustain him,” said Úna. “And part of it remained behind, inside him.”

  “But he came back to us,” his father protested. “He passed through the veil. This is impossible.”

  “What she gave him was nothing but a seedling then. After that, when he fought for her, laid his life bare to save her, it truly took root. Nothing can stop it now.” She pressed her palm and fingers against the hard line of his jaw. “So angry. So afraid. So many emotions that we will never truly know. All inside you, Daire. You share this soul with her, my son. So you cannot return with us. Shared souls belong together, so that what has taken root may blossom and bring forth fruit.”

  Daire struggled to bend his mind around her words. He staggered as he got to his feet, helped by the wondering hands of his relatives. All of them seemed to feel a need to touch him, to see if he was real, to verify a miracle.

  “I’m a prince of the Sidhe,” he protested. “You’re my family, my friends.” He gazed around them in bewilderment, unable to fathom their words. “You’re just casting me out? Like that?”

  “No,” said Úna in dismay at the suggestion. “We would never do such a thing to one of our own. But Daire—” she sighed, “—Daire my love. You would waste away if you came home. Much as we might need you, miss you, you cannot.”

  “I am a warrior,” he protested. “My place is at the battlefront, standing against the Sluagh, defending my people.”

  “If you are soul-mated to Rowan, your place is here,” said Finbar, wrapping his arm about his wife’s shoulders. “Defending her.”

  A sudden image of Rowan’s probable expression at that statement danced inside him mind and made a smile grow on his lips and in his eyes. But he would always be there to defend her. Just as she would always defend him, even if he told her not to. A different warmth welled up inside his heart, gentle and golden toned at the very thought of Rowan.

  “Where is she anyway?” Aidan laughed. “Have you lost her already? Just remember, I saw her first. If you aren’t interested…”

  He grinned his mischievous grin and Daire shook his head in wonderment. Aidan never changed. Daire hoped it would always be so.

  “You wouldn’t survive an hour with her, little brother, much less a day.”

  “Then hadn’t you better find her before she gives you the slip for good?” asked Fionnuala, ever the pragmatist.

  –—

  The hum of voices, cut with occasional bursts of laughter, filled the gallery, but it all sounded like white noise to Rowan. Right in the middle of the crowd, she stood completely alone. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from her piece. The picture of Daire felt like a cruel joke now, hanging on the wall against the wooden panel. Oak, if she was not much mistaken. That just made it even worse.

  The number of compliments seemed designed to make her cry, but she kept it locked deep inside. They all loved it, raved about it, talked of things like capturing the spirit of nature in a human form, or the depth of feeling in his eyes, or even, the face of human love. She nearly laughed and spat out her wine when the critic from the Arts Review said that.

  It was remarkable how few of her contacts failed to get her message. And they had all come. Even many of those who said from the first they had other plans. She couldn’t tell what they had expected to se
e, but they came anyway. Maybe they had just hoped to witness her final complete and utter failure.

  They were just looking in the wrong direction.

  The exhibition could not have been more successful.

  She crossed the room again in a daze, snatches of conversation following her. “Several significant discoveries…”

  “…capturing the frisson of life through the medium of colour…”

  “…largely untrained, but so intuitive…”

  “…sculpted representation of the primal forms of the earth…”

  Maggie glowed with pride as friends and strangers alike clustered around her woodcarvings, praising them. Half the exhibits carried the little red dot indicating a sale. Libby nearly collapsed when she heard there was a minor bidding war on her oil painting of cacti in bloom. Rowan herself had four offers on Daire’s portrait, but she declined them all, even from prominent collector John Pettifer.

  Her eyes strayed back towards the picture. Her heart lurched again as if she was a fish on a hook and the fisherman tugged the line, reeling her in. If she didn’t know better, she would say he was calling her.

  But Daire was gone. She had walked away rather than see him leave. Like everyone else had left her. It was over and she had a life to lead. That was that.

  Matthew slipped his hand around her arm, startling her from her thoughts, and handed her a fresh glass of white wine. “How are you holding up?”

  “All right.”

  “We can leave any time you want.”

  “Liar.” Rowan sipped the wine. It tasted tart and fizzled against her tongue. She closed her eyes and forced herself to breathe. She had been reminding herself all evening. Breathe in, breathe out, smile, chat to people, introduce the artists, and don’t think about Daire. Not even with his face following you everywhere.

  Of all the pictures in her studio, trust Maggie to have picked that one. And then to have hung it in pride of place on the gallery wall. Fine, it was good, it deserved to be seen. But why did everyone have to rave about it to her?