Page 21 of The Forever Queen

So I pray,

That you’ll come with the rain.

-Niamh-

Another invitation.

This time, one for everyone who’d read Niamh’s quill strokes.

The table exhaled, eyes darting back and forth across the parchment as though it hid more than a mere invitation. As though whatever trickery––real or not––would be exposed by glaring at the letter long enough.

“What does one wear toL? Brearon such short notice?” Peitho said, the first to break concentration.

“Whatever you choose. We’ll need to gather in Ina’s wing when the last star joins the night sky,” Filverel said.

“That’s not long from now.” Peitho stood from her seat, inspecting the cornelian embroidered gown she already wore—a garment far too humble for a celebration, especially by Peitho’s standards.

“That’s too soon,” Galad said. “We haven’t prepared. Haven’t planned?—”

“We ask for Niamh’s compliance,” Gilrel said. “It isn’t so complicated; so long as Niamh allows us the opportunity to earn the gods’ favor and, in turn, her Goblet of Lore, then our task—for the moment—is complete. At that point, we need only wait for whatever hoops she wishes us to jump through.”

“You drawl as though it’s simple,” Fionn said, setting his shackled wrists onto the edge of the table. “Niamh, now, is most likely curious as to our motives considering Lir’s and Aisling’s choices going forward will affect all the Sidhe whether they reside in the Other or in the mortal plane. That’s why she’s invited us. We cannot overestimate her affection for us. Especially as word ofImbolc’s tragedy has no doubt already reached the Isle of Rain and other Sidhe might fear Lir’s and Aisling’s power.”

“It matters not. She’ll stand to help against the mortals,” Galad said.

Aisling looked down at her hands in her lap and then at Anduril, glowing softly as if listening intently. Lir’s eyes flicked to the belt, turning to slits as he considered it. And in response, Anduril seemingly growled at the fae king and his oppressive attention.

“Regardless,” the son of Winter continued. “Aisling and Lir shouldn’t be near one another at all unless absolutely necessary.”

Now Lir did move, grinning from ear to ear wolfishly. But it was absent of its playful nuance, filled to the bone with a cruelty that sent the sylphs above cowering.

“How convenient,” the dark lord said. “But I won’t be separated from Aisling.”

“Just until we obtain the gods’ favor and the Goblet,” Galad said, gesturing toward Niamh’s invitation.

“You agree with him?” Lir asked Galad, a glint of betrayal sweeping across his features before fading behind his facade once more.

Galad pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes. “Yourdraiocht, together, is unpredictable, uncontrollable. Every touch between the two of you encourages whatever power your union bears. Until we better understand it, isn’t it wise to abstain from provoking it? Or at the very least, allowing it to mature when the fate of our worlds depends upon it?”

Lir cursed beneath his breath, seeming to dare a look at Aisling.

Anduril grew hot, warming Aisling’s flesh beneath her gown with an intensity she couldn’t understand.

Whatever Aisling and Lir’s union was, the mere mention of it sent Racat writhing inside her. Herdraiocht, alive and humming to the potential of Lir’s whenever she was beside him. And touching him…every day the sensations, the magnitude of their connection grew, and a part of Aisling wondered if she could withstand it. Similar thoughts, Aisling imagined, ran through Lir’s mind as well.

And yet, there was something more. Something she desperately tried to untangle in her mind whenever the Sidhe king appeared in her thoughts. Anduril hummed more loudly, growing heavier at her hips.

“Very well,” Lir said to everyone’s surprise. Lir stood from the table and started toward the door. The room, the forest, the sylphs all staring after him and the night beyond, twinkling from the corridor’s balcony. A single star short from joining the moon’s procession; the time to leave was nigh.

CHAPTER VI

LIR

Heartbroken, Annwyn’s wolves howled. Just as the alders soaked themselves in the blood of its berries in mourning, so, too, did the wolves cry, rememberingImbolcand all that was lost. Lir tasted Annwyn’s grief like one drank from a chalice, gulping until every drop slid across his tongue and the burden of Annwyn’s sorrows was made less. So was his responsibility as high king of the Sidhe and wielder of the twin blades. Lir, the forest, and thedraiochtwere one; his despair, mirrored in the inky veins from the five-pointed leaves sailing into Castle Annwyn on the current of evening’s breath.

Lir stood bent over a table. Both palms were pressed into its edge while his eyes wandered across its surface again and again, memorizing the pieces scattered across a map of the mortal plane. The emeralds, carved into ash leaves, represented the Sidhe, their kingdoms, and their legions. The rubies stood for the mortals, spreading across the map like embers in a summer forest.

Only that morning, Lir had received three owls. One from Niltaor in the south, Sheka in the far east, and Reili farther west. Each spoke of mortal sightings just beyond their kingdoms, creeping closer with their scarlet torches crackling in the dead of night, their steel clanking, their boots marching. Stepping nearer and nearer to enemy territory, yet just out of reach. The seas were swarming with fiery ships that left tendrils of smoke in their wake, bobbing before the storm moons. They were everywhere, marring the world black with their influence.

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