Page 86 of The Savage Queen

“Follow me,” he said. He climbed up the tree, reaching down to help Aisling. She took his hand, a step behind as they navigated into the heart of the apple tree. Brambles of berries bubbling from the branches and making dense their path.

At last, they emerged where the tree’s limbs spread like the hand of a giant. Its palm facing the black sky, fingers splayed. But the leaves and the apples protected them both like a secret, obscuring them from the voyeuristic stars above. A cradle of apples, of branches braided and woven, and the light that spilled between the tree’s limbs.

Lir reclined atop the heaps of fruit; his fingers stained in berry juice from their climb. Aisling inspected her own hands, red too with their influence.

“You must be starving,” Lir said, his voice the sound of a twilight gale. “Had I known mortal foods no longer slaked you, I’d have provided something for you sooner.”

Aisling laughed beneath her breath. “You’d grow trees simply to abate my hunger?” She gestured to the garden around them.

“I’d do anything you asked of me.”

Lir plucked an apple from the piles in which they lay.

He took a bite, offering Aisling a taste next.

Aisling, when amongst the fae, found herself insatiable. She could devour cauldrons-full, if only for one more bite. Perhaps the remaining morsel of her mortal life, gasping for air.

Aisling indulged in the apple. Sickly sweet and scarlet, it shimmered, replenishing every bite the moment after she’d swallowed. The apple whole and seemingly untouched, time and time again.

Startled, Aisling gasped, dropping the apple. It rolled through the nest of branches, through the garlands, smashing onto an antler from the stag statue below.

Lir laughed, the sound of it setting flocks of silver-eyed ravens aflight in Aisling’s stomach.

“Sidhe apples are endless, capable of feeding entire kingdoms. Lest they be mortal kingdoms. A human could sit below this tree for a lifetime, gorging themselves on a rubycrisp yet never satisfied. And after decades, the tree would collect their bones, a single apple still clutched in skeletal hands, untouched. The legend of Connla is only one example of this.”

Aisling reached for another, watching again and again as the magic perfected the supple edge of the apple.

Lir drew a knife from his belt, peeling another plucked apple idly.

“How is suchdraiochtharnessed? Or is it simply born?” Aisling asked, her interaction with the druid in her shop still alive and burning in her memory alongside the torn spell paper in her pocket.

Lir thought for a moment, running his fingers through his hair.

“Enchanted objects or places are designs of the gods. Usually, areas where the Forge first spilled into the universe and its power grows most potent and ancient. But enchanting an object or a place that otherwise bore no special magic, is also possible. Though these spells are more complex.”

“Have you always known how to conjure such spells?” Aisling asked. By now, Aisling was familiar with how Lir bred magic ona whim. Sorcery, second nature to the Sidhe king who was half-spell himself.

“No,” he said. “To breathe through thedraiochtis one thing. A matter of emotion and forming a connection with yourdraiocht. To construct, build, create, or even manipulate through thedraiocht, is far more complex and almost always learned. The first to do so was Niamh. A Sidhe queen to the west where rain perpetually falls. It’s said, her sword, gifted by the gods, could cast spells upon wielding it:Sarwen, the mortal reaper.”

Aisling’s brows pinched.

“Why did they call it the ‘mortal reaper’?”

Lir smiled despite himself. “Niamh wielded Sarwen to destroy entire fleets of mortals.”

Silence brewed between them. Aisling’s heart surging at the tale of Niamh and her enchanted blade. But not with loathing as she would’ve anticipated. With satisfaction. As though this Sidhe queen had corrected a wrong Aisling wished she could correct herself.

“Can you teach me?” Aisling asked and Lir considered her. “To cast spells,” she clarified. Aisling held her breath, half anticipating him to decline. To warn her of its dangers, of its complexities, of its consequences.

Instead, Lir tossed her an apple.

“Close your eyes,” he said and so Aisling did, plunging into the dark. “How familiar are you with yourdraiocht?” he asked.

“It’s most often shrouded in shadow,” Aisling said. “Huddled in the abyss inside. Its eyes just bright enough to peer back.”

“Over time, it will live freely inside you, no longer cooped deep below. But it’s feral, wild, and seeking to either be dominated or dominant. It will learn from you which role it prefers.”

Aisling’sdraiochtstirred, waking from its slumber and blinking. Ancient bones clicking as it yawned and straightened.

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