Page 6

Chapter Three

“To look in the face of the dark king is to die, but oh what an exquisite death it shall be,” said the bride as she stood before the throne carved of night and obsidian and the lord who would own her soul forever more.

—Anon., Tales from the Twilight Court

R oan parted the crowd in the vast throne room with a single shout. “Rath, to me!”

Rath Ender, his First Lance and most trusted friend, stepped forth, his silver cloak billowing behind him as he fell into step beside Roan. Eudora kept pace with Roan on his opposite side as they left the throne room together, still concerned about the human he’d brought to the Twilight Court.

Rath’s dark eyes swept over the woman in Roan’s arms as he walked with them.

If Rath hadn’t been so madly in love with Eudora, Roan would have been tempted to banish his friend from his presence so that he could not look upon his prize.

He was oddly possessive of the human woman in a way he never had been before with any female.

“It’s been a while since you’ve had a pet,” Rath mused with a dark chuckle. “Are you bored with battling the Seelie? I thought that was my task, to kill those sunny bastards.”

“As my First Lance, you should be focused on protecting anything I care about, whether it’s my new little mortal or my sister.” He cradled the human woman closer to him.

“I’ve been demoted to a human pet-sitter?” Rath chuckled.

“Rath, this is serious.” Eudora shot Rath a cold glare, which he answered with a hot look of lust. Eudora tossed her head and she raised her chin in challenge to the Fae knight.

Roan ignored the tension between his sister and his oldest friend.

They had danced around each other like this for a thousand years, and it was beginning to bore him.

Like everything in the world of the Fae, nothing ever changed.

Not like the woman he held in his arms, a woman who would in a brief span of time age and die, unless he kept her here in his world with him.

He’d broken the laws of his people by bringing her here, but the woman had saved his life.

She’d tended to him without knowing what he was or what he could give her in return for her kindness and compassion.

She’d even been hurt when he’d entered her car.

Her bleeding because of saving him was one of the ways his people could bond to another creature.

It had deepened his life debt to a blood bond, a thing considered sacred to the Fae.

When she’d held him in her arms and whispered her wish like a fervent prayer, he’d been compelled to grant it. Not only because he owed it to her, but because he’d wanted to keep her. If he brought her to his world, she could be his forever, and he would see that she wanted for nothing.

Roan moved through the black-and-white marble halls until he reached his private chambers.

Rath opened the door for him, and a pair of tiny brownies paused in their cleaning of the room, their scrunched, goblin-like faces frozen in fear.

One of the little Fae creatures quickly swept off her brown cap and bowed deeply to Roan.

“W-we d-didn’t expect...” the female called Babbitt stammered, her sharply pointed ears flattening back a little in alarm.

“Leave us,” Roan barked. The pair vanished with a soft pop. Roan stepped into the room with his sister and Rath, who closed the door behind him.

“Roan, what is the meaning of this? What do you mean to do with her?”

Eudora caught his sleeve. Roan winced and sucked in a breath. Her fingers came away covered in blood, which had soaked through his black tunic sleeve.

“What happened?” She forgot all about the human, focused instead on the crimson blood glistening on her slender fingers beneath the starlight lamps. It had been a long time since his little sister had seen him injured.

“The Seelie happened, dear sister,” he replied as he set the human female down upon his vast bed. The enchantment he’d cast over her continued to work, weaving a beautiful dream that spun in stardust patterns above her head.

As he took a step back from her, he felt strangely untethered, as if he might be carried away by the southern breeze that drifted through the open windows. The weight of her in his arms had felt so right, so natural, but he couldn’t fathom how that was possible.

Now the pain of his arm returned to him, stronger than it should have been. It seemed this human woman somehow made everything he felt more intense. His lips formed a grim line as he knew he owed his sister and his friend an explanation.

“I was attacked, and I landed in the mortal realm during my escape. I was in my owl form and hit this woman’s vehicle. She rescued me, and as such, I owed her a life debt. I chose to fulfill it by granting her wish.”

“She wished to come here?” Surprise colored Eudora’s tone.

“She wished to escape her world.”

Roan leaned over, brushing her hair back from her face, his fingers lingering over her smooth, pale skin.

The journey through the realms hadn’t been easy on his little human, and it may have drained her of energy for a time.

It had indeed been a long while since his people had traveled with mortals, and he’d forgotten how delicate they could be.

“And as I returned, the Seelie attempted to follow me on the Fae roads into our lands.”

“The Seelie were here ?” Rath growled, his eyes sharpening.

“No, I was in the borderlands of the Black Hills when they attacked. The dwarves had warned me of a sighting there, and I wished to investigate.” Eudora took his arm again, despite his protests, and rolled up his sleeve to examine his wound.

Crashing through the vehicle’s glass had not harmed him.

His injuries had been delivered sometime before by Seelie weapons.

As an owl, they had manifested as a sprained wing and some broken feathers, but in his true form they were now bruises and a deep slash from an elfin blade across his forearm.

It was one of the few weapons that could do him real harm.

There were, of course, Fae species that could injure him or kill him.

But when it came to the other Shining Ones, those of their own species, they needed enchanted poisons or blades forged under the waxing light of a harvest moon.

“Eudora, let it be,” he rasped, looking once more at the human who lay in his bed. He wanted to be left alone with her and he wanted time to think things through. He’d never acted so rashly in his life and needed to understand why this woman affected him.

“Don’t be so stubborn. I will not allow my skills to be ignored if they can heal you.” Eudora covered the gash with her hands and closed her eyes. The room filled with the smell of blooming night flowers, and a gentle warmth ran through his aching arm as his sister’s magic did its work.

“Better?” She arched a dark brow at him.

He smiled indulgently at her. “Yes, now I am famished, and I need to bathe.”

“But what about... her?” Eudora whispered as she nodded at the sleeping human.

He met his sister’s gaze, ready for a fight over the words he was about to speak. “She is mine. I shall keep her and she will amuse me.”

“Roan, it is forbidden to keep human pets. Ever since...” Guinevere .

The name was not spoken aloud, but everyone knew of whom she spoke.

“Merlin went to war against us over her, and we were already warring with the Seelie. We lost too many lives because of our father’s obsession with a mortal woman. ”

“This woman is not the consort to the once and future king. She will cause no war.”

“How can you be certain?” Eudora fisted her hands in her silken skirts and shared a worried glance with Rath. “It has been ages since we have kept up with the mortals and their kingdoms. They could have renegotiated their alliances with the wizards and witches of their world. She could be?—”

“Eudora, I have kept up with the world of humans.”

“You have? Why?” His sister tilted her head, her dark-blue eyes seeking answers he was reluctant to give.

“I have my reasons.” He couldn’t tell her that out of all the worlds he could see, the mortal one held his heart in a way that defied explanation. He feared his father’s blood was in him after all, because his father too had been enchanted with humans and it had cost their people dearly.

“Then tell us what you know of the mortal world,” Rath asked quietly.

“Magic is all but gone from their world. The age of wizards and witches is over. They have no shrines to the trees, make no offerings to the sea. They have turned their backs upon the magic of the earth in favor of metal, wheels, and wire.” Roan had watched the humans for years through his scrying crystals.

It fascinated him how they used science in place of magic.

It was how he’d known of their electric vehicles called cars.

It was impressive and terrifying how humans had used science to both improve their lives and destroy them in equal measure.

The devastation of the two recent wars that had stretched across the entire earth still left him with dark worries.

“But why bring her here? Why risk the Seelie finding out? They could try to take her from you or start a war like they did with Father when he brought Arthur’s queen here.”

Roan chose his next words carefully. “This mortal woman saved me. I owe her a life debt, Eudora.”

His sister opened her mouth, but Roan raised a hand before she could speak.

“Her wish was to leave her world.” His voice was as hard as steel.

“She was not desired in her world, nor in her kingdom, not even by her family.” He thought then of the little boy, the child who had beseeched Roan to be a friend to his sister.

That child was alone in his affections toward her, and that knowledge created a storm of emotion inside Roan that he could not explain.