Page 207 of Mountain of Mirrors and Starlight
Mine!
A face danced in the mist, a memory, a feeling—a soft murmur of starlight.
Something else was hers. Something she wanted far, far more.
She clenched the magic within her, and let the rest of it fall away.
“Caer,” she said, when she could form words again. The sound spread like ink on a page, no longer her own voice. “Take me to him.”
The fog rolled away.
She found herself in the forest of Autumn, beside the glittering barrier. It looked like it had always done when she passed over it, but it felt different—like it had a heartbeat.
She remembered Beau’s story about the fae prince who loved a mortal, and wondered, maybe, if it had some truth to it.
Aislinn held out her hand. “Take me to him.”
The scene swirled, launching her forward and spitting her out on a hard, stone floor.
Slowly, Aislinn climbed to her feet, her ears ringing, her skin spongy and numb. She was in a room that looked familiar to her—a sparse room in a castle. The walls were newly plastered and daubed with red and ochre leaves, in a style that seemed all at once familiar and utterly alien to her.
Afelcarreg? What was she doing here?
“Caer.”
A scream sounded in the distance. Aislinn blasted out of the room. A maid ran past her, giving her a curious look but deciding she wasn’t worth the questions at the moment. The world seemed strange and misty, like she wasn’t there at all, although the maid’s reaction suggested otherwise.
She drew on a glamour just in case, making herself as invisible as the wind, and flitted through the castle until she reached a chamber packed with people.
On the bed sat a thin, pale, dark-haired woman.
Queen Gwyn. Caer’s mother.
A dozen people crowded around her, murmuring over a tiny, limp, dark-haired newborn on the bed, still slick from childbirth.
It wasn’t moving.
Caerwasn’t moving.
One of the women picked him up.
“No!” Gwyn howled.
“Your Majesty,” said the midwife, “the child will not live.”
“Give me my baby!”
“Your Majesty—”
“Leave us!” the queen screamed. “Get out of this room.”
One by one, every courtier, every advisor, every servant left, until all that remained was Queen Gwyn, holding the barely breathing body of her baby son.
And Aislinn. Aislinn stayed too.
He was still alive, she knew that much. There was a faint spark of life in him. She could feel it like it was a flame about to be snuffed out.
Gwyn held his tiny body to her chest, smoothing his dark hair, still brushed with blood. “You cannot die, my precious boy, you will not. Your body is tiny, but it holds the heart of a dragon.”
