Page 79 of The Savage Queen

“We’ll stay the night,” Lir said, to Aisling’s relief. She needed new garments, lest she traverse the feywilds and climb Lofgren’s rise in no more than a soaked gown.

Peitho grimaced. “You can’t possibly?—”

“Make yourself useful, princeling,” Lir interrupted, ignoring Peitho and gesturing to Bludhaven with a nod of his head.

Dagfin scoffed. “You intend to enter a mortal township with four fae, the not-so-mortal queen of Annwyn, and a weasel?”

Gilrel frowned. “Careful,Faerak, before we gift you as an offering.”

But before Dagfin could reply, the air adjusted, and the pressure popped their ears. The distinct scent of pine needles and rain perfuming the air. As though the spirit of a storm had come and gone, rinsing them each in magic.

To Aisling, nothing had noticeably changed. But by the expression on Dagfin’s face, Aisling knew they’d been glamoured by Lir’sdraiocht. Disguised as something other than fae.

“Problem solved,” Lir said, starting for Bludhaven.

“Name yourselves,” two men shouted from atop the wall’s battlements, crossbows armed with iron-tipped arrows.

Dagfin approached first, the rest behind.

“Dagfin of clann Feradach and crown prince of Roktling.”

The archers hesitated, lowering their crossbows as recognition dawned.

“TheFaerak?” one of them asked, hope inflecting their northern mortal accents.

“Aye. My group and I come in search of refuge for the night,” Dagfin continued and before he could say more, the drawbridge was lowering, groaning till the interior of the township was visible. A civilization overgrown by the forest despite their great wall: moss-covered wattle and daub cottages, pigs roasting overspits, the plucking of a distant fiddle, unfamiliar incense, and the churn of hundreds flooding the cobbled corridors and spilling at the seams. Mortal builds, stacked upon one another, all nestled between crisp cypresses and their roots.

A poor mortal imitation of a fae world.

“Please, please enter, Your Majesty,” one of the archers said breathlessly. “Veran will be most honored to make your acquaintance.”

Cautiously at first, their group crossed the drawbridge and stepped inside Bludhaven. The guards’ attention lingered on those accompanying the Roktan prince.

Before them, at the center of the main thoroughfare, was a rune nailed into the flagstones. And etched on its surface read a prayer:

I sing this song to Dark One

Whose shadows keep me warm.

Protect me in your woods.

Forge a path amidst your keep

And, while I wander,

Spell your beasts to sleep.

Lir considered the rune for but a heartbeat, swiftly distracted by the bustling village.

These druids worshiped Lir, prayed to him, and the fae king despised them nevertheless. At best, considered them with apathy, these druids spared for their reverence and nothing more, Aisling assumed.

Aisling shook her head. Throughout her life, she was taught humans both feared and despised the mythic barbarian lord. Never could she have imagined some mortalsworshipedhim. Beseeched him for protection while traversing his forests.

The villagers whispered, heads bobbing to get a better glance at the strangers passing through. Women were leaning through their upper story windows, the smithy pausing his smelting, the beggars cursing beneath their breath, the sentinels twitching as they eyed not Lir and his knights, carefully glamoured, but Dagfin.

“It’s he!” a muddy child shouted, quickly silenced by his friends. “Prince of Demons Death.”

They revered Dagfin. A folk hero, brought to life through the smog ofSamhain’s breath, bleeding across Fjallnorr at dusk. Forcing Aisling to wonder if Lir and his knights had noticed the shift in the air Dagfin inspired as well.

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