Page 148 of Soulgazer

“Not just touched,” Kiara says, and Faolan jerks to his feet, leaving me behind.

“Kiara, don’t—”

“Saoirse is a true descendant of the divine patron of this island. Goddess of fate and keeper of lost souls. That makes her a queen.”

The words are a ring of iron wrapped around my throat. Faolan’s eyes lock on mine, and in a blink, I see it all disappear. The story he promised we’d write. Freedom from the endless webs we were born into. A life on the sea, answering to no one but ourselves.

Gone in the space of a single breath.

I stumble forward onto my feet—not toward Kiara, but to Faolan’s side, until my fingers meet his. “I’m sorry,” I whisper, then bite my cheek. I want to live in the lie. I want it so badly the magic shows me what could be by the mere press of his fingertips to mine.

A version of Faolan appears in my mind, older and sharper, with a little boy on his shoulders whose mischief matches his da’s. I see a wee lass peering out from my arms with eyes I’ll never teach her to hate. A ship with a name, because it is home to us.

I blink, and the scene disappears as Faolan pulls away with stiff fingers, unraveling the final thread of that impossible future. I swallow the bitterness of my hurt.

It was only ever pretend, anyway.

“Saoirse is the only person alive who can lay true claim to this land or its magic. We all saw it. Without her touch, all our dead will remain trapped and even more will corrupt than have already done so.”

“She is a child!” Maccus’s voice breaks into a snarl, the most emotion he’s shown. “Addled in the mind, claiming magic. Kiara, if you think I’ll let you play this hand—”

“Is this a game to you?” A new voice comes from the trees, as smooth as honey and just as warm, before Ríona Etain’s granddaughter, Aisling, steps out.

Heir to the Isle of Bridled Stag, she is small and soft in all the places Kiara is sharp and tall, her eyes two shades darker brown than her skin. I’ve never seen the princess of the pleasure island dressed so casually, her hair braided in a single black rope downher shoulder, though the end is wrapped in a red scarf I recognize as Kiara’s own from the Damhsa all those weeks ago.

Aisling takes her place by Kiara’s side and Maccus goes scarlet.

“You nasty, conniving, bitc—”

“I’ve already sent word of the island’s discovery to the others of the Ring of Stars.” Aisling flicks her braid back and smooths the mustard-yellow skirts she wears, adjusting the gold-braided belt at her waist. “How lucky Kiara was able to inform me before you torched her cousin’s ship. A council will convene here in two weeks’ time with their island’s stones. Or at least the ones they care for most.”

Kiara lifts her chin, leveling Maccus with a look. “If she can truly restore them to the waters and allow the spirits to pass on, I challenge you to find a single ruler of the Crescent who’d dare refuse her a place on the Ring of Stars.”

“I-I don’t want it.” The words fall from my lips like drops of poison, souring her expression. I don’t regret it—the truth pulls from the deepest corners of my person, the ones I’ve only just learned to accept. “I don’t want any of it. I don’t want that sort of power, I just wanted—I thought I’d have—”

Freedom.

My eyes wander helplessly to Faolan, but he’s staring hard at the ground, blood dripping down his chin from a raw gash above his brow. Even trapped by my father, facing off Maccus, he was never this quiet or contained.

An animal saved from slaughter and dropped into a cage. That’s what I’ve made him with my bargain to Kiara.

Her hand falls on my shoulder—I never heard her move—and her face is hard as she speaks again. “Want it or not, it’s yours to bear. Turn away the Ring of Stars and their swaths of dead when you’re the first chance they’ve had at peace in five centuries, and you won’t live past the next morning. Not freely, anyway.”

I laugh, because it’s all I can do. “This isn’t freedom.”

“It’s as good as you’ll get, Wolf Tamer.” Her eyes flit from me to Faolan, and I see now what he’s been running from all this time in the slightest touch of smugness to her smile. “Imagine the story, if that makes it easier. The Girl with Ocean Eyes and the Wolf of the Wild turned king and queen of all the lost souls.”

“You feckin’ knew,” Faolan whispers, the words barely contained. “Aisling could have stopped it. My ship—”

“I’ve done you a favor, cousin. You’re king consort now.” Kiara touches his cheek and he recoils, only faltering when the wound on his leg forces him to give way. Kiara smiles wider, then walks back to rejoin her lover. “Embrace it.”

I stare at her back for a long moment, then look to see what’s left of Faolan’s rigging and sails hanging in burning strips that fall to the deck just as the skies above erupt into angry groans, dropping rain like a blanket over the earth. I turn back to tell him I’m sorry again, to swear I’ll find some way to repair his ship and fix this, but he’s already disappearing into the trees.

Fifty-Six

“Faolan?”

The shadows bend around me, branches caressing my shoulders and leaves stroking my face. He’s close—I can feel him in the anger pulsing just below his surface, the pain raking his heart raw. It takes me a moment to understand that hissoulcalls to me.