What ill-fated lovers! It was such a sad story. I’d felt their love on those obsidian floors in the White Mansion, even though both of them had been deeply unhappy: the king because his beloved was not Fae like him, and the concubine because she was trapped, waiting alone, for him to make her “good enough” for him—that was how she’d felt, inferior. She would have loved him as she was, one small mortal life, and been happy. Still, there’d been no question of their love. They were all each other wanted.
“The next we heard of the Sinsar Dubh, it was loose in your world. There are those among the Seelie that have long coveted the knowledge in its pages. Darroc was one of them.”
“How does the queen plan to use it?” I asked.
“She believes that the matriarchal magic of our race will enable her.” He hesitated. “I find that you and I trusting each other appeals to me. It has been long since I had an ally with power, vitality, and an intriguing mind.” He seemed to be assessing me, weighing a decision, then he said, “It is also said that any who knows the First Language—the ancient language of … I believe the only human word that suffices is ‘Change,’ in which the king scribed his dark knowledge—would be able to sit down and read the Sinsar Dubh, once it was contained, page after page, absorbing all his forbidden magic, all the king knew.”
“Did Darroc know this language?”
“No. I know that for a certainty. I was there when he last drank from the cauldron. Had any of our race known the Sinsar Dubh had been rendered inert beneath your abbey before they’d drunk from the cauldron so many times that the ancient language was lost in the mists of their abandoned memories, they would have razed your planet to get to it.”
“Why would they want the knowledge the king had so regretted acquiring that he’d banished it?”
“The only thing my race loves as much as itself is power. We are drawn to it without reason, much as the mind of a human man can be so numbed by a stunningly sexual woman that he will follow her to his own destruction. There is that moment you call ‘before,’ in which a man—or Fae—can consider the consequences. It is brief, even for us. Besides, while the king chose to do foolish things with his power, another of us might not. Power is not good or evil. It is what it is in the hands of the wielder.”
He was so charming when he was open, speaking freely about the shortcomings of his race, even comparing his people to ours. Maybe there was hope that one day Fae and human could learn to—I shook my head, terminating that thought. We were too different, the balance of power between us too exaggerated.
“Repay my trust, MacKayla. I know you went to the abbey. Have you learned how the Book was originally contained?”
“I believe so. We found the prophecy that tells us the basics of what to do to re-inter it.”
He sat up and removed his sunglasses. Iridescent eyes searched my face. “And this is the first you think to mention it?” he said incredulously. “What must we do?”
“There are five Druids that have to perform some kind of binding ceremony. Supposedly they were taught it long ago by your race. They live in Scotland.”
“The Keltar,” he said. “The queen’s ancient Druids. So that is why she has long protected them. She must have foreseen that such events might transpire.”
“You know them?”
“She has … meddled with their bloodline. Their land is protected. No Seelie or Hunter can sift within a certain distance of it.”
“You sound upset about that.”
“It is difficult to see to my queen’s safety when I cannot search all places for the tools I need to do so. I have wondered if they guard the stones.”
I appraised him. “Since we’re trusting each other, you do have one, right?”
“Yes. Have you had any success locating any of the others?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“All three.”
“You have the other three? We are closer than I had dared hope! Where are they? Do the Keltar have them, as I suspected?”
“No.” Technically, I had them at the moment, safely warded away, but I felt more comfortable letting him believe Barrons did. “Barrons does.”
He hissed, a Fae sound of distaste. “Tell me where they are! I will take them from him, and we will be done with Barrons for good!”
“Why do you despise him?”
“He once slaughtered a broad path through my people.”
“Including your princess?”
“He seduced her, to learn more about the Sinsar Dubh. She became temporarily enamored of him and told him many things about us that should never have been revealed. Barrons has been hunting it a long time. Do you know why?”
I shook my head.
“Nor do I. He is not human, he can kill our kind, and he seeks the Book. I will kill him at the earliest opportunity.”
Good luck with that, I thought. “He will never give up the stones.”
“Take them from him.”
I laughed. “Not possible. You don’t steal from Barrons. It doesn’t work.”
“If you find out where they are, I will help you obtain them. We will do this, just the two of us. Of course, the Keltar are also necessary to restrain it, but no others, MacKayla. When you and I have secured it for the queen, she will reward you richly. Anything you wish can be yours.” He paused a moment, then said delicately, “She could even restore to you things you have lost and grieve.”
I stared out at the sea, trying not to be tempted by the carrot at the end of that stick: Alina. Rowena was insisting I work only with the sidhe-seers. Lor was demanding I work only with Barrons and his men. Now V’lane wanted me to ally myself with him and shut everyone else out.
I trusted all of them about as far as I could throw them.
“Since the day I arrived in Dublin, everyone has been trying to force me to choose sides. I won’t. I’m not going to choose any of you over the others. We’ll do this together or not at all, and when we do, I want the sidhe-seers to watch, so if anything ever goes wrong again in the future, we know how to stop it.”
“Too many humans involved,” he said sharply.
I shrugged. “Then bring some of your Seelie if it makes you feel better.”
The balmy day suddenly cooled. He was deeply displeased. But I didn’t care. I felt that we finally had a solid plan, one that would work. We had the stones and the prophecy; we just needed Christian. I refused to worry about what we would do once the Book was secured, if the queen should be permitted to read it. I could tackle only one seemingly insurmountable obstacle at a time, and I had no idea how we were going to locate Christian in the Silvers. Too bad Barrons hadn’t branded him, too.
I had one more question. It had been gnawing at me the entire time we’d been talking. I couldn’t help but feel there was something about myself I needed to know, a truth that would make clear the dreams I’d been having all my life. “V’lane, what did Cruce look like?”
He lifted a shoulder and let it drop, then folded his arms behind his head and tipped his face to the sun. “The other Unseelie Princes.”
“You said they kept getting better as the king made them. Was Cruce different in any way?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Just something one of the sidhe-seers said,” I lied.
“When do you plan to attempt to fulfill the terms of the prophecy?”
“The moment we can get all the Keltar together and I locate it.”
He looked at me. “Soon, then,” he murmured. “It will be very soon.”
I nodded.
“It must be as soon as possible. I fear for the queen.”
“I asked you about Cruce,” I reminded.
“So many questions about an insignificant prince who ceased to exist hundreds of thousands of years ago.”
“And?” Was that petulance in his voice?
“Were he not dead, I might feel … what is it you humans are so often driven by? Ah, I have it, jealousy.”
“Humor me.”
After a long moment, he gave another of those perfectly imitated human sighs. “According to our histories, Cruce was the most beautiful of all, although the world will never know it—a waste of perfection to never have laid eyes upon one such as he. The torque of his royal line was threaded with silver, and his visage was said to radiate pure gold. But I suspect the reason the king felt such kinship to him—before he permitted his love for a mortal to destroy all they could have been—was because Cruce was the only one of the king’s children to bear a paternal resemblance. Like the king himself, Cruce had majestic black wings.”