Page 33 of The Forgotten Prince

“There were ambassadors?” Gwendolyn asked.

“Indeed,” said Lir, and then he sighed. “It was they who stole our memories. Were it not for our precious tomes, we’d know little of those days. Lamentably, it was far too long before we began compiling our histories, and we lost so much during the interim.”

Gwendolyn’s face contorted with confusion. “But, Lir, you are still the same people,” she suggested. “It is not as though your stories have been passed down through the ages—you yourself lived them!”

“True,” said Lir. “True. But, alas, time is the bane of our human minds. I might not look my age, but this body has been well used, even so, and the mind cannot keep all we expose it to, more’s the pity.”

Gwendolyn wondered if they might allow her to peruse those volumes, but evidently Málik spoke true: The value of Lir’s experience was immeasurable. “Why do you suppose they stole your memories?” Gwendolyn pressed.

Lir shrugged. “I don’t know. Mayhap because they believe our ignorance will keep them safe?” He shrugged again. “That is my brother’s opinion… alas, they took our memories and now bind all Fae who visit—like her,” he said.

“Bind?”

“Compel,” he said. “Constrained. Think of it like a gag put into one’s mouth, only without the foul-smelling rag. Fae magic,” he said.

“Bespelled?”

“Yes, and willingly, so I am told—as a matter of return for any passage into the mortal realms. I know not how it works, but it is a trick of the mind, I believe.”

Gwendolyn frowned, wondering if Málik had bound her too. She remembered his explanation of her inability to recount everything she had discovered in the fogous, but he had very conveniently refrained from saying who had kept her from it. “By whom, I wonder?”

“His father, his king, I would suppose.” And then he said, “It is unlawful for any Faekind to speak of the Fae realms, or any account thereof. So I am told, much of their knowledge was used to their detriment by the sons of Míl.”

Gwendolyn knew they were exiled through some trickery by the Sons of Míl; this made sense to her. Her gaze slid to Esme, where he’d pointed. “Did you know her before I came to your village?”

“Indeed!” he said. “She was one of our original ambassadors, and so I am told she’s the only one her father trusts to come and go as she pleases—in part, to keep an eye on that one.” This time, he indicated Málik. And he put his hand to his mouth as though to whisper behind it. “I am told he was exiled, but he has never corroborated this, and Esme will not speak of it. I do not know if it is true. And nevertheless, there is a persistent rumor—do not take it as truth, mind you—that he was banished for the love of a woman, compelled to seek her endlessly, only to lose her again and again every time he finds her.”

You have been my weakness for a hundred thousand years…

Gwendolyn blinked with sudden foreboding.

She had considered his profession only an embellishment—an expression of his affection. Poetic words to win her heart. But if what Lir was saying was true, if the woman he was speaking of was Gwendolyn, could it be she was the love he had lost… and would lose yet again?

Málik had also claimed Gwendolyn was part Fomorian. But Gwendolyn hadn’t any understanding of what that meant, only that, according to Málik, her mother’s people were descended of this rás of demigods—so was the Fae king.

Unbidden, Gwendolyn remembered a conversation a few days past, wondering at Esme’s vehemence when she’d spoken of Gwendolyn in terms of being a changeling. The very notion that Gwendolyn or Demelza might find it abhorrent had offended her.

During the time she had been speaking to Lir, Esme had abandoned Bryn and now sat discussing some private matter with Málik, only this time they were no longer arguing. Gwendolyn frowned. “Málik said you knew their language well. Do you know what Tuatha means?” she asked, merely curious.

“Kindred,” he said.

“So…Tuatha de Danann means… kindred of Danann?”

Lir gave her a shrug, then a nod, and Gwendolyn continued, wondering aloud. “Where is Danann?”

“Or who,” he said, with a half-smile. “No mortal can say, and no Fae will. But I do know this realm they now occupy is not the land of their birth. Their motherland was a land of great riches, where death and disease did not exist. I believe they called it Hyperborea.”

“Hyperborea?” Gwendolyn’s head snapped up, having heard that name before—from, of all people, Loc. But what should he know of that? And why had he brought it up in conversation? But then something occurred to her. “If they do not speak of this place, how do you know its name?”

“Pookies,” he explained.

“So, you’ve never discussed this with them.” She hitched her chin in Málik’s direction.

“Of course not!”

“I ask because Locrinus once told me he traveled there.”

His gaze shot to hers. “I do not believe this!” he declared. “More likely, he heard the name during his sojourn to Ériu.”

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