Page 104 of The Savage Queen

Aisling dipped her arm in the waters. It burned still, scarlet and blistering. The rest of her wounds from Danu’s ambush paling in comparison.

“Starn and I used to spar in rivers like this,” Dagfin said, appearing from the surrounding forest to lean against a boulder nestled beside the river. “Before the mortal sovereigns chose to build their walls. The song of running water veiled our ruckus and washed our cuts before supper.”

“That was another life,” Aisling said, surprised Dagfin spoke with her. Since their last conversation around the fire, theFaerakhad been reluctant to glance in her direction or exchange more than a handful of words. His coldness was a punch to the gut, but Aisling didn’t push him. She knew he needed time to process the forking of their lives. A truth that’d been breaking Aisling’s heart since it first took root.

“Aye, back before we knew what true battle was. What it meant to harm another much less kill them.”

Aisling swallowed. The smell, the sound, the emptiness Aisling had felt when she’d slaughtered all who’d stood with Danu slipping into her mind.

“I don’t regret what I did,” she said, meeting theFaerak’s eyes. “It was necessary. A means of survival.”

The image of every beast kneeling in flame flashed across her mind’s eye.

Dagfin weighed his thoughts, brow pinched and arms crossed.

“I’ve killed countless Unseelie in my lifetime, Aisling. I’m hardly one to judge.”

“Yet you do judge.” And Aisling didn’t blame him for it.

Dagfin’s brows drew together, furrowing his expression.

“It’s more so that I don’t understand,” he said. “I kill to protect the innocent. You kill for power.” He hesitated. “And forhim.”

Aisling looked away. Mortal minds weren’t weaved with the capacity to understand survival in the same manner the wild understood. As for his mention of Lir…Aisling couldn’t think of it now, afraid to touch theFaerak’s implication.

A passing gale sifted through her hair. One of the few sounds amidst the quiet. Dagfin’s anger finally breaking through.

“Whatever binds the two of you, Aisling, undo it. Before it costs you your soul.”

CHAPTER XXXIV

AISLING

Time didn’t burden the feywilds.

After endless days and sparkling nights, Aisling wasn’t certain how long they’d traveled. Only that they did so in silence. Still stunned from their encounter with Danu. The fae king a shadow of his former self, haunted by his mutilation. Haunted by the absence of what he’d carried for centuries, careful of its vulnerability. Wings now torn and left to freeze in Fionn’s ice.

He ignored her. Aisling wasn’t certain why. Only that Lir disappeared for hours between the trees, refusing to be accompanied or respond, to be near, to speak with anyone save the forest itself. So, Aisling allowed him his time to grieve. To understand both the sadness and the anger.

Aisling tossed in her sleep, avoiding another encounter with the Lady to little avail. A plane the Lady accessed easily, warping Aisling’s dreams into nightmares and prophecies.

The rest of the Sidhe slept in a circle beside her. All of them, beneath the shelter of a cave. Dagfin an arm’s length away, still clutching a dagger even as he slept. Lir and Gilrel were on night watch, threading through the forest for any enemies that dared lay siege so soon after their last onslaught.

Racat hadn’t found Danu after she’d escaped. The dragon, a question in all their minds, grief and shock the only barrier preventing any to speak of the form Aisling’sdraiochthad taken and interrogate her for it. Although she knew, by the look in Filverel’s eyes, the questions were coming. Questions that haunted Aisling and answers herdraiochthid each time she confronted the beast with her queries. Mastery of magic, in its essence, was the dominion of beasts, Aisling was realizing. A balance between control and power; to either leash yourdraiocht, let it ravage freely, or find some alternative in between.

Nevertheless, Danu hid. Her roots shriveling, knotting, and slithering into the cave where she’d fled. Gathering her legions in another part of the continent, Aisling assumed. Lying in wait to finish what she’d begun.

But despite Aisling’s fires, Danu hadn’t entirely lost.

The empress had managed to best Lir, the most powerful Sidhe lord, because she’d taken advantage of his weakness: Aisling herself. Had Lir not sheltered Aisling from the poisoned roots and shards that staked his back, he never would’ve fallen prey to her schemes. It was Aisling and the protection he’d allotted her that’d ultimately been his downfall. A sacrifice that went against his very nature.

One half of Aisling grew sick with guilt. The other half convinced herself Lir’s actions were self-serving. Protecting the host that amplified his power and nothing more.

And yet, despite their escape, Danu had taken, and would continue to take, from Aisling’s mind. Plaguing her dreams, alongside the Lady, with the caustic screams of Aisling’s victims. The brutality of her slaughter dissolving the anger Aisling wielded so readily into unfamiliar sadness. Rage, anger, fury made Aisling feel strong. On the brim of spilling over with power. Sadness, on the other hand, made her feel weak and helpless. A memory of her human self. Her dreams flooded bymidnight tears till she sprung awake screaming and sobbing in a cold sweat.

“Ash,” Lir’s voice sounded in the night. Aisling whipped her head to the forest’s lip, finding Lir’s eyes reflecting the light of the moon amidst the dark. Lir emerged from the surrounding pines. He studied her closely and before Aisling could wipe away her tears, he was kneeling beside her. His proximity stirring the forest and enveloping them in wisps of cypress needles and sweet saps from the midnight gale he inspired.

Aisling made to push him away. To hide her tears. But Lir pulled her close, his long legs on either side of her, his arms holding her waist against his torso.

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