Page 27

Syrie stood at the south edge of the crowd, her fingers clenched tightly in the cloth of the robe she wore. Those who accompanied her were spread out along the edges of the gathering, the placement well planned to allow as many of the citizens to escape as possible if things went wrong.

When things went wrong. Not if. Things here were about to go very wrong.

She had no doubts about this. When they confronted the Supreme Leader of the High Council, all hell would break loose in the Great Hall. The prime task assigned to half her compatriots was to get those assembled safely away from the battle zone. Others would head straight for the Goddess. Her prime task was Patrick’s rescue.

The thought of him as a prisoner had consumed her for the whole of the last two days. She’d barely been able to concentrate on anything else. Between the strange pressure inside her threatening her very sanity and the knowledge of his captivity, she’d been all but worthless in the planning for today’s confrontation.

Council members began a solemn processional into the Hall from behind the dais, each one stopping behind the chair assigned to them. The members with the least power sat farthest from the center seat, itself a massive creation, more throne than chair. When all eight had taken their places, the air in the Great Hall shimmered, as if it took on a life of its own, forming a billowing curtain of silver behind the dais.

Smoke and mirrors, nothing more than a child’s manipulation of the Magic. Trickery designed to impress the people gathered to witness the occasion.

A hush of reverence spread over the crowd when the Supreme Leader emerged through the curtain to take her place at the center of the table.

Reverence that should have been reserved for the Earth Mother, not so freely given to these mere men and women chosen to guide the politics of the Faerie people.

“We have called this assembly of our people to inform you all of the most serious of dangers we face. Our world is under attack,” Reynalia pronounced, rising to her feet, the silver curtain behind her shimmering to form a perfectly planned backdrop. “War is coming. Our people, our very way of life are at risk. For months we have seen the tendrils of this assault creeping ever closer. Now, at last, we have the proof we needed to share knowledge of this threat with all of you. We have proof of who is responsible for this assault on the Faerie nation.”

The curtain billowed open to a gasp from the crowd. There, in a glimmering cage of silver Magic, the Goddess hunkered, a band of the same silver Magic fastened around her neck.

“No!” someone cried out, but the Supreme Leader held up a hand, silencing the low murmur of the crowd.

“Yes,” Reynalia said. “I’m afraid it is true. We suspected as much, but now we have our proof. Behold!”

She pointed to the back of the Great Hall just as the massive doors opened, allowing a group of guards to march in. At the center of the procession, a man stumbled along, two chains linked around his neck, held by a guard on either side.

Patrick!

Syrie’s heart pounded at the sight of him, his hair dirty and tangled, his face a mass of bruises.

Once the guards forced him to his knees in front of the dais, all but the two holding his chains stepped away, giving Syrie an open view of his back, swollen and raw. An oft-applied whip, she guessed. They’d made him suffer. For her. For protecting her.

Someone was going to pay for what they had done to him.

Deep in her chest, the pressure that had been building for so long rolled itself into a tight, tiny ball, pulsing with her anger. In less than a heartbeat, the tiny ball burst forth, filling her eyes and her mind with stars. An unimaginable power surged through her body, bringing her to her knees. Her vision clouded so that she covered her eyes with her hands. Vaguely, she was aware of Dallyn reaching her side, helping her to stand, whispering, asking if she needed help.

Someone was going to need help, but it wasn’t her.

When her vision cleared, everything around her seemed to sparkle, as if she viewed the world through a shimmering haze of green.

Green. The color of purest Faerie Magic. Her Magic, amplified many times over.

Slipping her arm from Dallyn’s hold, Syrie pushed through the crowd. She made her way to the front of the room until she was only feet from where Patrick knelt between the guards. Once there, she let the cloak fall from her head and shoulders and dropped all pretense of the disguise she had worn, revealing herself to all those on the dais. She knew the moment she was recognized. Reynalia stopped speaking mid-sentence as their eyes met.

“It is time for your treachery to come to an end, Reynalia Ré Alyn,” Syrie called out. “Release the man.”

“You!” The Supreme Leader sneered. “You should have stayed where we sent you, little one.”

“So that you could have me killed?” Syrie demanded. “As you tried more than once while I was there, I might add. I don’t think so. Release the man.”

Reynalia barked a laugh, rising to her feet. “Who do you think you are to give orders to the High Council? You are nothing. A disgraced handmaiden, returned from exile.”

The other Council members were on their feet now, too, moving as a single entity toward the spot where the guards stood with Patrick, as if by their physical presence they could stop her. As they moved forward, the crowd surged back, leaving an open space between Syrie and the people she confronted.

Good. If they were to leave the Hall altogether, it would be even better. One less thing for her to worry over.

“Release the man,” she said for the third time. “This is your last warning.”

Three, she decided, was the magic number. She’d given them three chances to do as she asked. Three and no more.

“I have a better idea,” Reynalia said as she moved to join the other members of the High Council. “What if we put you in chains with him?”

They’d had their warning.

Syrie turned her sparkling gaze on the chains that held Patrick, allowing a trickle of the fury she felt to ride the green rays of light. The band around his neck popped open and the chains slid to the floor at his feet.

“I’m not overly fond of chains,” she said.

Patrick lifted his head to look at her, a smile forming on his parched lips. Her heart pounded in her chest as the power inside her pulsed in time with her heartbeat.

“What are you doing on your knees?” she asked, holding out her hand. “You belong at my side.”

Patrick rose to his feet. The guards on either side of him looked first at their Supreme Leader before they stepped back to allow him to pass unchallenged.

The crowd had thinned considerably when the chains had fallen, leaving only a few bystanders mixed in with the men and women Dallyn had gathered to her support.

“Look around you, Reynalia. You are outnumbered. Release the Earth Mother,” Syrie ordered, hoping this step would go as well as freeing Patrick had.

“Never!” the Supreme Leader vowed. “She’ll remain as she is, chained for my entertainment, for as long as I draw breath. I am the Earth Mother now.”

“You?” Syrie barked a laugh, derision and fury given life in one sound. “I don’t think so. You’re hardly a Goddess. You don’t even carry the blood of the royal family in your veins.”

“The royal family,” Reynalia sneered. “For all intents and purposes, there is no royal family anymore. I saw to their demise myself. What’s left of that bloodline is little more than a self-absorbed lump of a man, confined to a glen for the rest of his pitiful life, wallowing in his own pathetic self-pity.”

“There are more of the line remaining than you might imagine,” Syrie said. “It was, in fact, one of their own who enabled my rescue from the hell where you’d abandoned me.”

“Nevertheless, they cannot return to Wyddecol. They will never rule again.” Reynalia lifted her chin, looking out over the people still gathered in the hall. “They never deserved to rule Wyddecol in the first place. They were unfit for the service. They never worked for what was right or best for the people.”

It was clear that Reynalia had grown so accustomed to pandering to her audience that she continued to spout her lies even when so few of the people were left in the Great Hall to hear her.

“You expect me to believe that your High Council, this handpicked group you have assembled, is at all concerned with what is right and best for the people of Wyddecol? You think any of them believe war is best for them? War only suits your desire for power.”

“You lie,” Reynalia yelled.

“No, it’s the truth, and we all know it. If your only desire was to do what is best for our people, you would be pleased to see me here. You would be pleased to see that I was saved from what you decreed as my fate by True Love. If what you say is true, you should be thrilled that, in my return to Wyddecol, two souls have been set back on their proper paths. That, after all, is what is right and best, is it not? As that is the greatest desire of all our kind, is that not the task our people should devote themselves to enabling? Especially since it was the warring of our kind that was responsible for the tragedy that ripped those pairings asunder.”

“Foolish child!” Reynalia shook her head, her eyes hardening. “Your priorities, the priorities of a lovesick girl, are not ours. We look to less frivolous pursuits than you suggest. You should have stayed where you were, Elesyria. You have little power here other than a few parlor tricks. You are insignificant to me, to us.” She waved a hand to include the other members of the High Council stationed on either side of her. “Like a midge on a summer’s night, you are but a minor annoyance. You should have remembered as much before you and these other traitors sought to rise against us.”

“And you,” the Earth Mother said from the cage of silver where they’d chained her, her voice hoarse and breaking. “You should have remembered more about your own history, if you ever knew it. You made a grievous error when you chose to punish my own maiden.”

“We’ll see about that,” Reynalia snarled, extending an arm.

Jagged splinters of silver light streaked from her fingertips toward the little band of defenders, as pandemonium broke out in a cacophony of screams and barked orders.

Patrick threw himself in front of Syrie, no doubt determined to protect her. But he needn’t have worried. She lifted her hand and a net of pure light spread out around them, like a spiderweb spun of emerald shards, deflecting the bolts sent their way.

“You should have taken her powers, Reynalia.” The voice of the Goddess rang out over the screams of those who had not yet escaped the battle area. “Simply sealing those powers behind a wall of forgetfulness was a poor choice on your part. Passing through the Time Flow of the All Conscious with her powers intact, like the tempering of fine steel, has made Elesyria stronger than ever. Much stronger than any of you,” the Goddess intoned. “Perhaps even stronger than me.”

Her? Stronger than the Goddess? Syrie didn’t believe such a thing was possible. But even if it were, it didn’t matter. It had nothing to do with why she’d come. She’d come to free the Goddess. She’d come to rescue Patrick. And so far, she’d only accomplished half of her goal.

“Let her go, Reynalia. Don’t make this any worse than it has to be,” Syrie said.

“You’ve already done that, girl,” Reynalia snarled. “Did you not think me smart enough to realize you would come to the rescue of your man? Your Goddess? Did you not realize I would be prepared for your treachery once I knew you were in Wyddecol? I am not without my sources.”

“Your spies, you mean,” the Goddess said. “The ones you planted in my Temple.”

“I planted nothing,” Reynalia said. “I merely cultivated that which already grew wild thanks to your negligence and favoritism.”

So there were spies at the Temple. A feeling of sadness filled Syrie’s heart, quickly replaced with concern for her friend, Nally. The guards that had come after her, the ones who had captured Patrick, had also captured Nally.

“What have you done with Nalindria?” she demanded, dreading what she might hear but needing to know.

“I would not waste my worry on that count, if I were you,” Reynalia said, moving backward to place more space between them. “She has been…” A pause, followed by an evil chuckle. “She has been appropriately rewarded for her treachery.”

Poor Nally. Poor, gentle, dedicated Nally.

“You are a beast, Reynalia,” Syrie said, forcing the words out through her sorrow and anger. “A beast whose time to rule has come to an end.”

“I may be a beast, but you are a fool. Now!” Reynalia screamed, and her guards swarmed in from all sides of the room, streaming out from behind the draperies that lined the Great Hall.

All around Syrie, the clash and clank of metal meeting metal rose to drown out everything else. For a moment she regretted not having accepted the sword Dallyn had offered before they had come, but she knew it would do her little good. Of all the skills she possessed, use of that weapon was not one.

Beside her, Patrick laughed as he hefted a sword he’d taken from one of the guards. He swung it in an arc around his head before bringing it down in a slashing motion to stop the oncoming charge of another attacker. Around them, the battle raged, with fighters on both sides dropping. Slowly, Syrie found herself being edged toward the back of the Great Hall, forced in that direction by Patrick’s movements. It became clear to her that he fought to clear a path for their retreat.

“No,” she yelled over the din of battle. “We cannot leave this place. We must free the Goddess.”

Irritation flashed over his face and he exchanged words with Dallyn, who fought nearby. Together, the two of them began to move back in the direction from which they’d come, back toward the dais where the caged Goddess waited.

As soon as they were close enough, Syrie slipped around the men, darting past two approaching guards to climb onto the dais. She crawled under the long table and stayed on her hands and knees until she reached the cage. Up close, the sight of the Goddess took Syrie’s breath from her. Dirty and weakened, she looked more woman than Goddess. Her hair hung in greasy clumps and her face sagged, as if the silver chain around her neck drew the very life source from her body.

“Hang on. I’ll get you out of there,” Syrie whispered.

“Make it so,” the Goddess answered, her voice ragged, as if she had no energy left to speak.

Syrie absolutely intended to, as quickly as possible. If she could figure a way to open the damned cage.

There appeared to be no lock of any kind, no opening, either. Just bars of pulsing, glowing silver. After several minutes of useless examination, Syrie’s frustration got the better of her. Grabbing the bars with her bare hands, she shook them violently. To her surprise, each of the bars she held ceased to glow, turning a dull gray before they crumbled to ash in her grip.

“Yes!” she exclaimed, moving her hands to the next set of bars.

She tightened her grip until those also crumbled and then moved on to the next, until a gap had formed, large enough for her to reach in to pull the Goddess toward her. When the chains pulled taut, Syrie let go of the sagging woman and fastened her hands around the chains. If it had worked for the cage, perhaps it would work for the chains in the same way.

Though it took longer, the chains ultimately gave way as well, allowing Syrie to pull the Goddess from the cage. Once she had the woman out, Syrie felt as if she were as constrained as she had been before opening the cage. The Goddess, after so long a time hunkered over in the tiny cage, was too weak to stand under her own power. She clung to Syrie as they crouched on the floor near the table.

Syrie had barely risen to her feet to search for help when she heard the ragged warning.

“Behind,” the Goddess warned.

Syrie whirled to find Reynalia, knife in hand, approaching. Two cloaked figures followed closely behind her, as if to guard the Supreme Leader, but neither of these people carried weapons.

“You will not take her,” Reynalia said, slowly moving forward. “We will not allow it. Neither of you will make it out of this hall.”

A shout, more animal noise than words, pierced the air around them, stopping Reynalia and her escorts.

Patrick!

In one leap, he cleared the dais and landed on the table, running full speed. His sword held above his head, he threw himself toward Reynalia and those who accompanied her.

“Orlyn!” Reynalia screamed. “Now!”

In the split second before Patrick landed, the figure to Reynalia’s right drew a wicked-looking sword from beneath his cloak and held it aloft, thrusting it into Patrick’s chest and twisting it as Patrick fell to the ground.

“I remembered, son of Odin,” Orlyn said. “Remembered the purpose of the mark you wear.”

Blood pumped from the wound as the man withdrew his weapon and backed away. From across the distance between them, Patrick’s eyes locked with Syrie’s until they fluttered shut.

The air around Syrie pulsed, as if with an animal heartbeat of its very own. The pulse pounded against her eardrums, all but blocking the harsh sound of Reynalia’s laughter when she stepped over Patrick’s body, as if he were but a bump in her path to reach Syrie.

Syrie’s vision clouded to a pinpoint before expanding, sharpened as if by a green crystalline lens. She felt as if she might explode until, a heartbeat later, the air exploded around her.

It took her a moment to realize that the animal scream ringing in the air came from her, ripped from her lungs as blood pumped from Patrick’s wound. It took another moment to realize that the green lightning streaking across the dais came from her, too.

The filth who had thrust his sword into Patrick’s chest threw himself in front of Reynalia, taking the full force of the blast Syrie sent her direction. Reynalia screamed, grabbing her face and stumbling forward. Before Orlyn’s ashes finished falling, the second of Reynalia’s companions grabbed hold of the Supreme Leader, dragging her to safety behind the curtains leading away from the Great Hall.

But not before betraying her own identity.

As she grabbed Reynalia’s arm to hurry her away, her own cloak fell back, revealing her face.

Nalindria!

The treachery hit like a punch to the gut, staggering Syrie as she lurched toward the spot where Patrick lay. Her own best friend. The one person in Wyddecol she’d thought she could trust above all others.

Reaching Patrick’s side, she dropped to her knees, her fingers searching his throat for a pulse. It was so faint and irregular, she almost missed it. Inserting her fingers into the slice in his shirt, she ripped the material apart, exposing the whole of his chest. Blood oozed up around her fingers when she laid her hand over the gaping hole, formed directly in the center of the mark on his chest. Though he still breathed, it was only shallowly, and no matter how she called to him, no matter the tears she shed, his eyes did not open.

“Help me!” she cried out, not knowing who she expected to come to her aid.

“It is too late, my lady,” Dallyn said, resting a hand on her shoulder.

Too late? Impossible!

When all had been lost for her, Patrick had risked everything to find her. When her life was threatened, he’d been there to protect her. Too late, the man said? Never! She wouldn’t allow it to be too late.

If she had the abilities everyone seemed to think she possessed, now was the time to call upon them.

“Can you lift him?” she asked, rising to her feet.

“Of course I can,” Dallyn said, a ring of offense tinging his answer. “But to what end you ask this, I can not understand.”

“You don’t need to understand,” she said, turning her back and starting for the door that opened onto the plaza. “You only need to bring him where I lead.”

She had to act quickly. Yes, what she planned was against every rule of her people, but it was the only chance she had. It would work. It had to work. And if anyone thought to stop her? She’d incinerate them where they stood just as she had the man whose blow had taken Patrick down.

Doing her best to ignore the misery around her, she quickly threaded her way between the fallen combatants, to push open the great doors and step out into the fresh air.

“Where do you think to take—” Dallyn’s question cut off with a sharp inhalation of breath when they crossed the plaza and started down the staircase, as if it had only just occurred to him what she planned to do. “You cannot take him to the Fountain. It is forbidden.”

She stopped only long enough to fix him with a look. “Indeed it is. But our people have rarely been good at refraining from those things which are forbidden to them. It is for that reason that the Fountain exists in the fragile state it does now. Besides, if it makes you feel any better, we’re not taking him to the Fountain. We’re going to put him in the Fountain. Step lively, Captain. We’ve no time to waste.”

“Wait,” he said, holding her up once more. “You must tell me something first and you must tell me truly. Do you really believe what you said to Reynalia? That it is up to us to set straight the souls that were cleaved asunder in the War of the Long Ago?”

“Absolutely, I believe this,” Syrie said. “If not us, then who should do it? It should be our life’s greatest calling. Which is why you must hurry. I have finally found my other half and I don’t intend that I should lose him now.”

* * *

Patrick awoke, as if from a horrible nightmare, choking and spitting out water. He was drowning!

But how was such a thing possible? He was supposed to be dying. This much he knew for a fact. He’d felt the weapon used against him slide into the center of the mark on his chest, straight into his heart. Of that there could be no doubt, just as there could be no doubt that only a strike in that exact spot could be immediately lethal to him. It was as his father had always said. The Mark of the Warrior, an honor to bear. A target to wear.

And yet, once again, water filled his nose and, as he gasped for air, his mouth and throat.

“Help me pull him out.”

Syrie’s voice!

“Patrick? Can you hear me? Speak to me!”

He fought the exhaustion that prevented him from opening his eyes. Fought the siren call of the seductive black void that beckoned him to remain. Syrie called for him to return to her and he could do nothing but obey. For her, he would gladly give up his seat in the finest banquet hall of Valhalla.

The buzzing of a million voices filled his brain, a tingly, burning sensation that traveled into his face and down his throat. Pulsing and growing, it flowed through the whole of his body until every single part of him seemed to vibrate. When the foreign sensation reached his heart, he felt as though the sun itself were searing his skin, from the inside out.

As quickly as it had begun, the sensations ceased and, at last, he managed to open his eyes.

“There you are! You’ve come back to me.”

Syrie’s beautiful face hovered over him and, without thought, he reached for her, pulling her tightly to him in an embrace that ended in a kiss. He savored the feel of her, the scent of her, the sight of her eyes drifting shut as he held her. Had it been up to him, he would have held onto this moment, dragging it out into forever, completely satisfied to spend his afterlife in just such a manner.

But his Syrie had other ideas.

“It’s done,” she said, rocking back on her heels and offering a hand to help him to his feet. “The Goddess is free and our lives can return to normal.”

That sounded all well and good, except for one thing. He didn’t want normal. He wanted a life with her.

The question was, did she want a life with him?

“We need to talk, Syrie,” he said, determined to find out once and for all how she felt about him. “We need to talk about us.”

She stilled, her eyes darting to the ground in front of her. “Us?” she asked. “What about us?”

At least she hadn’t claimed there was no us to talk about.

“Elesyria!” Darnee, the tall Faerie guard who’d loaned them her cottage in the woods, approached at a run. “The Goddess bids you come to her.”

For a moment, Syrie’s expression wavered, as if she might refuse. But, as he would expect of her, she turned back toward the Great Hall, accompanying Darnee.

He followed along behind the two women, back into the Great Hall where they’d battled the High Council and their army. Bodies lay everywhere, both those who had fought for the release of the Goddess and against. Off to one side he saw the body of Larkin, one of the men who’d come to the cottage with Dallyn.

As the women hurried on ahead of him, Patrick made his way through the others to pause at Larkin’s side. The man’s golden armor had lost its gleam, and a small, dark-haired woman leaned over him, weeping. Next to them stood two small boys, one golden like his father, the other, the elder, dark like his mother. Patrick doubted that either of the children could be more than five or six years old at most.

“You must do as I said, Anola, my love. Take the boys to Thistle Down Manor, just as we’d planned. This changes nothing of your future,” Larkin rasped, a trickle of blood at the corner of his mouth.

“It changes everything,” she said, her words strangled by her tears.

“And you, Ian,” Larkin continued, as if determined to have his say before it was too late. “You, my son, must take my place as a Guardian. I’d have your oath, son. Your oath to devote yourself to the protection of the Fountain and of the Mortals.”

“I so swear,” the older of the two boys said, his dark head bending close to his mother. “I will do as you ask, Father.”

This scene represented everything Patrick hated about battle. How could any amount of glory count for anything in the presence of such loss and sorrow? He turned away, uncomfortable that he should be intruding on this most private of family moments.

On the dais, the Goddess occupied a large chair with Syrie kneeling in front of her.

The sight annoyed him, that Syrie should kneel to anyone, let alone that woman, especially after all Syrie had done for this Goddess of hers. He quickened his steps until he reached Syrie, taking his place just behind her.

“What will you do next, Elesyria? What would you have of me?” the Goddess asked, her dark eyes fixed upon Syrie. “We both know I am too weak as I am now to oppose you.”

“Oppose me?” Syrie echoed, her voice holding the same surprise reflected in her expression. “What makes you think you would ever have call to do that? Haven’t I proved myself to you, my loyalty to you, with what I’ve done here today?”

The Goddess shrugged. “What you have proved is that you are indeed stronger than I am. Even at my best, I will never have the power that you have at your disposal. It would be well within your rights to challenge me.”

“Challenge you?” Syrie squeaked, her head swiveling from the Goddess to Patrick and back again. “You mean challenge you so that I could be the Goddess? But…don’t you have to be born special, or something?”

“This is how it has always been done. The strongest among us, the one best able to control the Magic, is the one who ascends to the position of Earth Mother. And you, my dear, were special enough by birth and even more so now by your trial of passing through the Magic.”

Patrick felt his stomach tighten, like a child expecting to receive a favorite gift, only to learn at the last minute that the gift was being given to someone else. If Syrie chose to become the Earth Mother of all Wyddecol, there would be no room for him in her life.

“Right,” Syrie said, rising to stand, shaking her head as she did. “All I planned to ask for was to be permanently released from service in your Temple. I want my freedom and from what I’ve seen, you’re as much a prisoner there as you were here. Oh, there are no chains on you in the Temple, to be sure. No tiny, cramped cage, but it’s a cage nonetheless. You serve the Faerie people. You live apart in a beautiful palace, but you must always be available at their beck and call. No, that’s not something I ever see me wanting for myself. As far as I’m concerned, you’re the Earth Mother, and welcome to it.”

A flash of surprise lit the older woman’s face, but it was quickly replaced with the emotionless mask she had worn before.

“You realize, of course, that if you return to the Mortals’ world, you will live there in danger. Reynalia escaped, likely to join her brother, who was exiled after the last coup in Wyddecol. She will live out her days on the Mortal Plain, bereft of her Magic. That will be my official decree once all this is taken care of.” The Goddess swept out an arm to indicate the devastation around them. “But, on the Mortal Plain, she will seek you out for her revenge. You and those who are important to you. It will be no different here. Though she is gone, it is likely she has followers who would be a danger to you, as well.”

“Don’t you worry about me,” Syrie said with a bright smile. “Knowing I’m free to go anywhere I want, I think I can find a way to avoid her and all her minions.”

Patrick took the hand she held out to him and led her back through the carnage out onto the plaza. Fearing what she might have to say, he knew he could delay the inevitable no longer. He had to know.

* * *

“What does the world hold for us now?” Patrick asked as they reached a quiet spot overlooking the blessed Fountain of Souls. “We’ve been to the future and we’ve been to Wyddecol. What comes next for us?”

Syrie turned to face her big warrior, moving close enough to look up into his face before she answered. “I’ve spent my whole life searching for two things. I’ve always believed that finding those two things would bring me the happiness I sought. One of things was a purpose worthy of devoting my life to and, through all of this we’ve faced, I’ve discovered that purpose at last. I know now that I’m meant to bring the souls lost to one another back together again, and I mean to spend the rest of my life doing exactly that.”

True Love was, as she had told Dallyn, the most important of all causes. True Love could exist only when those souls that were meant to be together found one another and joined. For too long, that process had been burdened by the wanton loss of life and the destruction of the Fountain during the Great War. The Fountain had quickly been rebuilt, but nothing had been done to reconnect that which had been torn asunder. With her new power, she intended to be the one to do something about it.

“And the other?” he asked, his hands rigid at his side.

“The other what?” she said, biting the inside of her cheek to keep a smile from her lips as his scowl drew his eyebrows together.

Patrick was perhaps the only man she’d ever met who could look as sexy when he frowned as he did when he smiled.

“The other thing you’ve spent yer life searching for,” he said, his exasperation clear in his voice. “You said there were two things. What is the second?”

“Why, you, of course,” she said, giving up all pretext of keeping him in suspense. “And now that I’ve found you, I intend that you’ll never get away from me, my great, scowling warrior.”

No, she’d been wrong. The smile breaking over his face now was much, much sexier than the scowl had been.

“That’s a good thing, then, Elf,” he said, his smile playing at the corners of his mouth as he hooked his thumbs into the belt at his waist. “Since I mean to never let you get away from me again. As far as I’m concerned, it’s only death what has the power to separate us now.”

As much as she loved the man, he did have his aggravating habits.

“How many times must I tell you I’m not an Elf?” she began, but paused as a new thought occurred to her. “My big Valkyrie.”

His brow wrinkled at her use of the name, just as she’d suspected it might.

“Valkyrie? Yer muchly mistaken in yer choice of words, my wee Elf. A Valkyrie is a female warrior. It’s no’ a stretch to say that I canna believe you could ever mistake me for a woman.”

His stance, chin lifted, chest puffed out, would have done any strutting peacock proud.

“True. But no more so than my disbelief that you’d mistake me for an Elf,” she returned.

“Ach, that one’s easy enough to understand,” he said with a grin. “Let me explain. You or an Elf, both have yer roots firmly planted in the world of Magic. So you can see, to an outsider like me, there’s little enough difference between you.”

“Really?” Syrie asked, feeling more confident in her plan by the moment. “Well, then. By that reasoning, you or a Valkyrie, both have your roots firmly planted in the legends of Asgard. There’s little enough difference there, as well. To an outsider like me, that is.”

Brow furrowed, Patrick stroked his chin, seemingly deep in consideration of her argument, though his eyes twinkled with humor. “I see yer point. That being the case, I suppose I’d best come up with a new name to call you by,” he said.

“You might try using my actual name,” she suggested, a hint of annoyance growing at his obstinate insistence on using anything else. “It’s worked fairly well for any number of years.”

“Granted, it’s a lovely enough name. But I doona believe that will work for my purposes. It disna carry the ring to it that I seek.” Again that familiar grin broke over his face. “I do have a new one in mind, though. One I’ve been considering for a while now, even before you pointed out the error of my ways. Might I test it on you? To see what you think of it?”

“A new name?” Syrie asked, her jaw tightening as she determined not to argue with Patrick, no matter how much he provoked her. “Oh, do tell. I can hardly wait to hear what you have come up with this time.”

“Good. I’ve been thinking wife has a sound to it that pleases me. Trips right off the tongue, it does. What say you? Does that one please you more than the other?”

For one of the few times in her life, Syrie found herself close to speechless. “What are you saying?”

“I’m no’ saying anything, my love. I’m asking. And I think my meaning is clear enough,” he said.

“Is this your own barbaric way of proposing marriage to me?” she asked, leaning into him and placing her hand on his cheek.

“I suppose it is,” he answered, at last wrapping his arms around her as she’d wanted all along. “Until death do us part.”

He dipped his head, covering her lips with his, and she had only a moment to wonder if the dousing he’d taken into the Fountain of Souls just might take care of that whole death complication for them. But then, the kiss deepened and she was lost, her mind drifting in that great, soft place where only Patrick could take her.