Page 6

S aying goodbye to Briar would be one of the hardest things that Aisling ever had to do.

He’d been by her side through her first heartbreak, through her return to Brook Isle and the final months of caring for her father before his painful death.

He’d braved the Seelie Court, then the Unseelie Court, and had taken Aisling’s grief in stride even when she pushed everyone else in her life away in the aftermath.

Those nights she stumbled home from Ben’s, too drunk to even kick her shoes off at the door, he’d curled up at her side wherever she landed: the couch, the bed, the bathroom floor.

He was patient, and gentle, and kind. Everything Aisling wished she could be for herself.

She couldn’t look at him as she packed a bag with his treats and toys and favorite blanket.

He knew she was leaving him—she knew he did—and it splintered further the pieces of her shattered heart.

But Elowas was no place for her first and favorite White Bear.

No place for any of them, really, and it hurt Aisling even more to think that she might not make it back through that doorway to see Briar again.

Lida was the most dependable and predictable of Aisling’s friends.

It was Saturday, mid-morning, which meant that she would be just arriving home after a meticulously planned trip to the grocery store with a week’s worth of ingredients.

So Aisling didn’t ask ahead, but drove over to her home unannounced in Rodney’s car with its trunk full of Briar’s belongings.

True to form, Lida was in the kitchen, pulling vegetables out of a paper bag and handing them to Jackson to organize in the fridge when Aisling let herself in.

Briar bypassed her outstretched hand and moved straight to sniff at the carrots Jackson was stacking in the crisper drawer.

When Lida saw the bags in Aisling’s hands and the numb, distant look on her face, she turned to him.

“Jack, would you mind running back to the store? I forgot sugar.”

“I didn’t see sugar on the list.” Jackson straightened up, frowning, before he noticed Aisling standing in the hall. “Hey Aisling, I didn’t know you were stopping by. It’s good to see you, though, we’ve—”

“If it was on the list,” Lida interrupted, “I wouldn’t have forgotten it. I didn’t add it to the list.”

Looking curiously between Lida and Aisling, Jackson sighed and shrugged. “Sugar. Anything else?”

Lida shook her head, handing him the car keys and leaning in to kiss him sweetly on the cheek. Aisling turned quickly away from their display of affection.

In the living room, the small television set was tuned to the local cable news station—one of only three channels available on Brook Isle, and the only one clear enough to bother watching at all.

The newscaster’s voice was a steady drone as she interviewed a much older man, both of them standing on a hill somewhere near the Washington coast. The footage was dark, the sun just beginning to crest over the Cascades in the background.

Filmed earlier that morning, maybe, or the morning before.

“Ash?” Lida followed her into the living room, Briar on her heels.

“We’re speaking this morning with astrologist David Markoff about the disappearance earlier this month of Merak, the star at the heart of the constellation Ursa Major.

David, what—” It felt as if the earth had stopped spinning, halting dead on its axis beneath Aisling’s feet.

Her knees nearly gave out, and she had to brace one hand against the back of the couch to keep herself upright.

“Aisling, is everything alright?” Lida asked. Aisling couldn’t hear her, so singularly focused on the broadcast that she could scarcely remember to breathe. Merak. The Silver Saints were a star.

Guided by celestial light. Aisling’s heart thundered as yet another piece of the prophecy’s puzzle slid into place.

“Is this common?” The anchor continued.

“It’s unprecedented; I’ve never seen anything like it in my career.

” The man gestured towards the sky. “Stars die slow deaths, dimming or exploding as supernovas. Even those we once thought had disappeared entirely are now faintly detectable with the advancements we’ve made in telescopes and digital imaging. ”

“They leave traces,” the anchor supplemented. She, too, had tipped her chin up and was gazing at the smattering of stars overhead, fading away as the sky grew lighter. The horizon had shifted from deep blue to a lighter shade of purple.

“Exactly, traces. But thus far, we’ve been unable to detect a single trace of Merak. It’s three times the size of our sun, with a mass two-point-seven times greater. A star that size shouldn’t just disappear. And if—”

The broadcast went to static, then to black when Lida shut the television off.

“Aisling,” she said again, impatiently this time. “What is going on with you?”

Aisling turned to look at her friend, at that face she’d known since she was a child on the playground.

Lida’s eyes were searching, looking for a lifted edge to grab onto and peel back to expose Aisling’s thoughts.

She recalled the last time Lida had looked at her so urgently, so intently.

It was when she’d shared the truth of her mother’s stories on the playground, after Seb had laughed and run off to play with the other children.

Lida had been able to tell then that Aisling believed every word her mother said, and so she did, too.

Or, at least, she believed that it was important to let Aisling believe those stories.

Now, her dark eyes penetrating and earnest, Aisling could only think of how blissfully ignorant Lida was—as all her friends were—to the wide, wide world that lay just beyond their own.

To all of its beauties, and all of its horrors.

For so long, her mother had been able to navigate her life in both of those worlds with grace and compassion: Maeve Morrow had never once wavered in her accounts, but neither had she held any ill will towards those who doubted her.

It dawned on Aisling then that maybe it was her own belief in Maeve’s stories that kept her mother sane.

It was only when she no longer had Aisling to confide in that she lost all ability to cope.

If handed a calendar, Aisling could likely point to the precise time when her mother’s mental state began to slip, and it coincided exactly with the moment Aisling decided she no longer wanted to believe in the Fae.

When she no longer wanted to be wrapped up in Brook Isle’s vicious whispers about Maeve’s lost grip on reality.

But for as long as Maeve had one person who believed her—just one—she was able to handle having a foot on Brook Isle, and another in the Wild.

Aisling took a moment to look around Lida’s home.

The color-coordinated furnishings, the array of framed photos on the wall.

One of the two of them together, years ago, smiling on the deck of the ferry while wind whipped their hair across their faces.

Lida was still that same smiling woman she was in the photo.

Aisling couldn’t say the same for herself.

Lida’s life had continued on, moving steadily forward, her days unchanging while Aisling’s entire world had been upended.

“We miss you, Ash. I miss you,” Lida insisted. “It’s like you’re not even here anymore.”

Aisling wrapped her arms around her waist and squeezed. Her mouth had gone dry; she had to swallow a few times before she could speak. “I’m sorry.”

“I am if you feel like you can’t come to me. You know you can talk to me about anything.” When Aisling looked down, then away, Lida added quietly, “You’ve not been this way since your mother died.”

After several long moments of silence, Aisling said, “She was right.”

Lida took another step closer. Her brows pulled together as she cocked her head to one side. “Who was right about what?”

“My mother—her stories. She was telling the truth all along, Li. I didn’t want to believe in them anymore and it killed her.” Aisling dug into her sides, fingertips pressing bruises into her skin even through the thick sweatshirt she still wore of Rodney’s.

“Ash.” Lida guided Aisling by her shoulders to sit on the couch. She pulled over an ottoman so that she could sit directly in front of Aisling, their knees touching. “You aren’t responsible for what happened to your mother.”

“I left her to deal with everything in her head alone. Maybe this is karma,” Aisling wondered out loud. The thought wasn’t one she wished to share, but she couldn’t stop it from spilling out of her mouth all the same.

Lida leaned in further, trying to meet her eyes. “Talk to me Aisling. Please. You can tell me anything.”

“It’s real, all of it. The Wild, the Fae. I…” Aisling trailed off, unsure which parts of her own stories she wanted to tell. Which parts she could even manage to put into words now. Even just that barest confession was enough to make her stomach roil and her body tremble with nerves.

But Lida didn’t push, didn’t interrupt. Just took one of Aisling’s shaking hands and held it steady between her own.

“I’ve been. I’ve seen it. I drank with them, danced with them.

Fought with them.” Aisling sucked in a breath and stopped herself just short of admitting: I fell in love with one of them .

“They were cruel to my mother—I learned that. And some of them were cruel to me, too. But others were kind. They helped me.”

She shut her eyes tight as their faces flashed through her mind: The Shadowwood Mother. Methild. Ivran. The sidhe in the archives. Elasha. Kael. Always, her thoughts strayed back to Kael.

“And that’s where you’ve been going?” Lida asked carefully.

Aisling kept her eyes closed, too afraid to see the look of disbelief she was sure her friend wore now. She nodded and whispered, “Yes.”

A pause—one that felt too long. Then Lida murmured, “What happened to you there?”

“Too much. It isn’t as beautiful as my mother always told me.

She was tricked. I nearly was, too. But there was someone there who I…

who I cared about, and who cared about me.

” Aisling drew in another breath. Her mind raced ahead, thoughts coming far faster than she could verbalize.

“I couldn’t save him then, but I have a chance to now. ”

“Who was he?” Lida shifted closer, their knees pressed together tightly now.

“The king. He was cruel at first, like the others. But there was so much more to him. So much that he kept hidden from everyone else. He saved me, in the end. I thought I was saving him, but he was always going to save me. It was written that way and I couldn’t change it.

But I have to go back—I have to bring him back.

” She had to try . Aisling didn’t care anymore whether it was predetermined or not.

She was the Red Woman, and she was his. And it was time she embraced both of those things.

She was aware of how cryptic and rambling her answers were, how unhinged she must have sounded. She wouldn’t believe it herself if their roles were reversed and Lida was sitting where she was now, confessing to everything she’d kept bound so tightly in chains and locked away inside her heart.

But instead of laughing or mocking or telling her to get a grip, Lida simply asked, “What was his name?”

Aisling clenched her jaw. She couldn’t say it, not without breaking down. She didn’t want to break down yet.

“You loved him.” A statement this time, not a question; though not accusatory or disbelieving.

The pain that cracked through her chest was biting. Blinding. With gritted teeth, Aisling nodded once.

Lida studied her for a moment more, then sighed. “I’m not going to pretend to understand any of this, Ash, or what you’re going through now. But I’m here for whatever you need. I’ll take good care of Briar, you know that.”

Aisling nodded again. “I know.”

“And I’d take care of you, too. If you’d let me.” Lida squeezed her hand once, then again.

“I know,” Aisling repeated. She squeezed back. When Lida stood and made to leave, she asked, “You believed me back then, didn’t you? When we were kids?”

Lida stopped and turned back. “I wanted to. What kid doesn’t want to live in a world where faeries and magic are real?”

“And now?” Aisling tugged nervously on the hem of her sweatshirt.

Shrugging, Lida offered a half-smile. “Same answer.”

She’d tell Lida everything one day—every last detail—when she finally grew too weary to carry it all in her head by herself. But for now, Aisling just nodded and said, “Thank you.”

Once she was alone with Briar, Aisling’s throat tightened. She couldn’t avoid this part any longer.

She pushed the ottoman out of the way and slid off the couch to sit on the carpet.

Briar ambled over and sat between her knees.

He shifted forward to rest his forehead against hers—a habit of his since the day she’d brought him home.

Sometimes, she imagined it was his way of trying to communicate.

As if he could press his thoughts into her head.

Aisling wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her fingers deep in his soft white fur. His body was warm against hers and she thought, for just a fleeting moment, that their hearts were beating exactly in sync.

“I’m sorry,” she choked. The rest of her words were lost: I don’t want to leave you. I have to leave you. I promise I’ll come back. Unable to speak them out loud, she tried to press them into his head right back. He leaned into her as if to respond, I know.

And finally, finally, Aisling cried the tears that she’d been unable to bring forth since walking away from Kael’s burning body.