A northern spirit arrived. One of her own kind, with needled teeth, a vicious smile, waves of flaxen hair, and crimson wings. Kae caught him before he could steal Lorna’s words. She bit his arm, shredded the edges of his wings.
He fought her, dragging his sharp nails over her collarbone, drawing her rich, golden blood. But he was no match for her, and he knew it.
He submitted, wings tucked low, and faded away to the star-streaked north.
Kae remained where she was on the fringes, watching until Lorna, nose bleeding and wincing in pain, had reunited with Alastair on the moonlit hills.
Why did you play without me, Lorna? he was saying, concerned as he wrapped his plaid around her shoulders. I’m supposed to be with you always.
Tears welled in Adaira’s eyes as she watched her parents. She didn’t know how much of the emotions she felt were hers and how much were Kae’s. They seemed tangled together as the memory faded.
Their hands drifted apart.
Adaira wiped her tears, her heart aching. It took her a moment to tamp down the sob that wanted to rack her chest and flatten her on the cave floor. But she held herself up, determined to process what she was feeling.
She hadn’t realized how tender her grief was until she saw her parents, hale and alive, in a memory. How much she longed for their company and mourned their absence. She hadn’t realized how much she missed them, but neither had she realized how angry she was at them for raising her as a Tamerlaine and never telling her she was truly Breccan.
But such anger would only rot her from within, reducing her to smoldering ashes, because the truth was that Lorna and Alastair were both gone, buried beneath eastern loam. Being furious at their deceit did nothing to them but everything to her, and anger would wear her down into dust. Adaira wanted to avoid that fate. She didn’t want to let something that had been good in her life turn sour.
She soon felt Kae watching her, as if she were trying to read the emotions passing over Adaira’s face. Adaira met the spirit’s gaze. Kae looked weary and shone with perspiration, as if sharing her memories had been taxing. But Adaira heard the words Kae wanted to speak in that moment.
All those times Lorna had played for the folk, Kae had been there, whether the bard was aware of her presence or not. Kae watched over her to ensure that Lorna had enough space and safety to sing. She had chased down other spirits, both inflicting and taking wounds.
All those times Jack had played for the folk, Kae had also been present, doing her best to shield him from Bane and other spirits who would harm or taunt him.
I wish I had known, Adaira thought, her eyes resting on Kae’s tattered wings. The deadly points of her nails. The pale blue sheen of her skin, splotched with gold. The wounds and lacerations that were bleeding onto the cave floor.
Adaira had always respected the spirits and had faith in them when it was due. She often thought of them as capricious in nature, fickle as a summer storm on the isle, as neither good nor bad but somewhere in between. Blowing whichever way pleased them most. She had never imagined that something so fierce and clawed and cold and infinite as the northern wind could come to love something soft and gentle and mortal.
Adaira realized it then. Those golden blotches on Kae’s legs, shoulders, and collarbone weren’t natural to her skin, as Adaira had first believed.
They were testaments to conflict and battles. To wounds she had endured.
They were scars.
Adaira climbed down the rock face. Once she was steady on the ground, she turned to watch Kae descend, staring at the spirit’s torn back and remaining wings.
Kae’s wounds were already beginning to knit themselves together, the new beginnings of gold-feathered scars. Adaira had cleaned them with her salve, uncertain how helpful such earthly remedies would be for a spirit of the air, but the ministrations had seemed to comfort Kae.
Adaira had drawn a few leaves from her indigo hair and wiped the debris from her cuts.
“You can’t stay here,” Adaira had said to her, glancing around at the cold, bewitching cave. “But there’s a place nearby. A cottage where you can rest and heal, and where I can come and visit you.”
Kae had seemed hesitant, as if she feared walking beneath the wide expanse of cloudy sky, but she followed without resistance. She couldn’t remain in this cave, not if Adaira wanted to easily find her again. And there was no way to know how long Kae would be banished from her home.
Adaira waited until Kae’s long, bare feet had found the ground. Together, they walked up a hill, down another, until Adaira found the trees that hid the loch and the abandoned cottage.
“I don’t think anyone lives here, but let me check first,” Adaira said. “Wait here for me, in the cover of the trees. I’ll wave to you when it’s safe to join me.”
Kae nodded, but her eyes were wide, her face lined with wariness. Adaira wondered if she knew what this place was, or who had once lived here. As an immortal and a powerful spirit of the northern wind, Adaira imagined Kae knew most of the secrets that Cadence held.
That realization made gooseflesh ripple over her skin as Adaira moved forward alone, taking the narrow bridge of earth to the small island. She had to forge through thistle patches and wiry shrubs, which had overcome a very small kail yard, to get to the cottage. She tore layers of red vines from the door, only to discover a faint radiance in the wood. The door was locked by enchantment.
She paused, studying it. Whatever rested beyond this threshold was either valuable or dangerous. And a drop of Adaira’s blood would most likely grant her access to it.
She unsheathed the sword at her side, just enough to catch a glimpse of the blade and a flash of her own reflection. She touched her finger to its edge until she felt the sting of her skin breaking.
Adaira laid her hand on the door. It unlocked as soon as the wood absorbed her blood, and she carefully eased the door open. She took a tentative step inside, her eyes sweeping her surroundings.
The one chamber of the cottage had packed dirt floors and timber beams overhead. Furniture from a time long past was coated in dust and strung with gossamer. There was a hearth, a kitchen nook with rusted iron pots, a small bed in one corner covered with moth-eaten blankets, and a table scattered with ancient books. A bowl sat at the head of the table, surrounded by scattered parchment, as if the last person who lived here had been interrupted at breakfast.
There was a strange silence to the place, almost like the sound of water, of being held beneath the surface. Or maybe it was the silence of the wind beyond the walls, as if this little island on the loch had frozen in time. The air was heavy and far too still.
Adaira stopped at the table and looked at the sheets of parchment scattered across it. They held a musical composition. For a moment, she could only stare down at the inked notes in disbelief, her heart quickening.
Innes had said the west locked away its music and instruments. Adaira had just found part of it.