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CHAPTER XXIII

AISLING

Castle Yillen floated between the thunderclouds of the Other, traveling like a petal in the wind. At Niamh’s whim, the castle moved, casting a shadow atop the Other’s forests, lakes, canyons, and fields, all sparkling with bygone magic. And if one looked hard enough from the flying towers of Castle Yillen to the emerald earth below, one might catch the shifting of giants, of demons, of a world alive and throbbing with power.

Aisling held her breath the moment she peered over Castle Yillen’s edge. The drop below appeared endless, stretching further away from her the longer she looked. Aisling gulped, doing her best to ignore the quivering of her knees.

“Ready, ellwyn ?” the fae king asked.

Ellwyn .

The word elicited a growl from Anduril but a purring from her draiocht . He was mocking her with sweet titles, his arrogance thick.

The Sidhe king stood a few paces behind Aisling, tightening the saddle of an ebony stag. Aisling glanced at him over her shoulder, careful not to meet the glimmering sage of his eyes. For each time they locked gazes, Aisling’s heart raced, her draiocht thrashed, and Anduril pressed against the walls of her mind until her temples ached. Even so, Aisling could hardly help it. The fae king was a dark rogue, dressed in battle leathers and armor forged by the nimble fingers of mountain trolls. Every edge of metal was etched with garlands, runic symbols, and blade scars. Each nick, a memory of the violence the fae king had both endured and inflicted.

Dark jewels and metals winked from his pointed ears. His usual wind-tousled hair was combed neatly back, curling at his nape and ears from Niamh’s storms. Aisling watched the veins in both his hands and forearms cord around his limbs like the roots of an oak. His muscles rippling beneath the sticky layer of soaked leather and fabric as he secured the saddle. But it was the way he whispered to the stag beneath his breath, soothing the beast in Rún that silenced Anduril’s screeching to a whisper, leaving only the beating of Aisling’s heart drumming in her ears.

At last, the fae king caught Aisling staring. He studied her closely even after she nervously averted her eyes.

“ Ellwyn ?” he repeated.

Ellwyn . Aisling rolled the name over her tongue again and again. Anduril spat the word like poison, gagging and heaving for breath.

“I’m ready,” Aisling said. The sorceress approached the stag and took hold of the saddle’s horn. The stag huffed, prancing in place nervously. It appeared to smell her draiocht ; its nostrils flared and the wiry hair at its haunches rose like needles.

“ Easca ,” Lir hissed at the beast. Still, the stag eyed Aisling warily—her magic both potent and unfamiliar. Some creatures slithered, crawled, or flew from their nests, dens, and burrows to breathe the same air as Aisling. Others reacted as if Aisling were a wolf herself, biding her time till she snapped her maw shut and devoured them whole.

“Perhaps we need another mount,” Aisling suggested. Aisling looked around. It was the dead of night and most of the blue rabbits that tended to the stables were off drinking in the tavern hall at the base of Castle Yillen.

“Geld is strong enough for the both of us,” Lir said, and while Aisling knew the fae king understood that wasn’t the issue, she didn’t protest.

Aisling grabbed the horn of the saddle once more. Ignoring Geld’s protests, Lir held Aisling’s waist and lifted the sorceress onto the stag. His hands, large and firm, carried her as though she weighed no more than an owl’s feather, setting her gently down. His touch was tender whilst still bearing the promise of untold might. Aisling swallowed her yelp, swinging her leg over Geld’s back and sliding closer to the horn to make room for Lir. The fae king leaped atop the stag behind her.

Aisling tensed. She felt the warm brush of his thighs, the solid wall of his chest, and the strength of his arms as he reached his hands around her and grabbed Geld’s reins. Aisling swallowed. Had she ever been this close to the fae king before? Suddenly, she couldn’t remember.

Skin like thorns, words like venom, hands like claws , Anduril snarled. Hate, hate, hate .

Aisling wrenched her eyes shut, holding her breath. Were these her words? Her thoughts? Her feelings? Her mind despised the beast, but her body relished him. Needed him closer still. Even as Anduril chimed hotly against both Aisling’s hips and Lir’s thighs. And if the fae king noticed, he said not a word, pressing his palm against her abdomen and pulling her closer.

“Is that necessary?” Aisling asked, her voice betraying the heat she felt building inside.

“The closer your body to mine, the easier to shield you,” Lir said, his lips tickling her ear where he bent to whisper. The storm was loud, competing with his words.

Once, twice, the fae king wrapped the reins around his wrist and flicked, encouraging the mount forward.

“Your excuses grow tired,” Aisling said, straightening her back. She became needlessly stubborn in his presence, impatient, and cold. All of which appeared to encourage the fae king further. “The only creature I need to be shielded from, is you.”

Lir laughed. The sound rattled inside Aisling like the first notes of an organ seated in the righteous mouths of chapels. Deep, inhumane, and coupled with the echo of forgotten gods. A being whose age—whilst invisible to the eye—shone through his elegance, his violence, the wisdom and intelligence behind his every glance, and the burden born heavy in the slope of his shoulders.

“What are you suggesting?” he said, and while Aisling couldn’t see his face, a smile was apparent in the amused lilt of his voice.

“I do not know—or care to know for that matter—the history that lies between us. For whatever reason, your influence in my life is tangled, knotted, and fraying. Both difficult to understand and more frustrating to unravel. And so, you are a weakness to me,” Aisling said. “Even if you despise me.”

This inspired a strange noise from the fae king. He twitched, doing his best to hide his surprise at Aisling’s forwardness.

“You flatter yourself, sorceress,” Lir said. “You’d have to occupy my mind for me to despise you.”

Like a club to the face, Aisling felt the blow of the fae king’s indifference. She shouldn’t and didn’t care, she reminded herself, embarrassed she was hurt at all.

Geld approached the steepled gates of Castle Yillen veiled like a bride with the tempest. Two vast, armored bears stood on either side of the portcullis. They crossed their spears before the gate, still as statues.

“You deny that which my senses determine easily,” Aisling said. “I hear your heart jolt when you see me, I smell your anxiety when I’m near, and I taste your nerves when you accidentally touch me.” All truth. But none of that made Aisling so certain of the fae king’s disdain as her own. Whatever strange bond they shared sank its teeth into the marrow of her heart, and fed off the blood of her obsession.

Parasite, deceiver, distraction ! Anduril screamed, squeezing Aisling till she feared the bruises that would follow shortly after. Seek the Goblet. Seek the Goblet. Seek the Goblet , the Blood Cord chanted like a mad man wailing through cobbled streets.

Lir said nothing. His silence, formidable.

The fae king nodded his head at the two bears, and they uncrossed their spears. Slowly, the portcullis released its teeth from the flagstones of Castle Yillen and heaved open.

Aisling and Lir passed through the gate like ghosts, laced in the supernatural mist of the Other as they stepped onto the jeweled stepping stones that spiraled toward the earth far below.

Aisling’s tongue turned to ash and her stomach knotted tightly. One small misstep from Geld and they’d all three plunge to their death.

Geld’s hooves struggled to adjust to the slick edge of the floating stones, the rain, and the moss that mischievously coated each step of their descent. Geld’s hooves slid off the edge of the fourth stone, sending the stag into a panic.

Aisling screamed, her dinner rising up her throat.

Without hesitation, Lir grabbed Aisling and pulled her tightly against him. His magic flared out, manifesting in vines like ropes that caught Geld’s hooves and straightened the stag. The stag whimpered and whined, prancing in place despite the vines that stuck the beast to the stones. At last, Geld calmed and continued, each step secured by Lir’s vines as they descended.

Nevertheless, Aisling’s heart fluttered as quickly as a cornered hare’s. Her body firmly pressed against the fae king’s.

Racat shrieked inside Aisling as if pierced by an iron reed. The dragún whipped back and forth, struggling for breath as if the fae king’s proximity had made it manic. Anduril, on the other hand, smiled. The belt stifled Racat’s energy, smothering her draiocht till it collapsed against the caverns of her soul—its chest rising and falling with brittle breath. The Blood Cord loosened and cooled, shimmering with satisfaction.

She didn’t love him, didn’t know him, nor remember him and yet, her draiocht shriveled and smoked like a wilted flower, crushed beneath a boot.

You see? You see? Anduril said inside her mind. This is why we hate him.

Aisling clenched her jaw and matched the fae king’s silence. She’d mistaken their connection for obsession. It was only hatred. Enemies by blood once. Enemies by heart now. This much, Aisling knew.