Page 84 of The Crown of Moonlight
“Can you stop being such a bloody martyr?”Daire’s voice is low.“If you didn’t want me knowing your secrets, you shouldn’t have taken my sister to bed.”
I glance back at Flora, and our eyes crash together.Her expression is unreadable, and I’m not certain what I even expect or hope she feels.
“Riadan’s a runesmith, remember?And there are no secrets between us,” Daire continues, unaware.“She read your arm, Chyr.I know all about the petty, personal oaths your uncle made you take: never challenge him, never be disloyal, never disobey him, never believe or speak ill of him, never question him—especially about your father—never believe ill of him or your father.That’s not the worst, though, is it?I know Chulainn bound you never to speak before the Assembly, seek the throne of Tirnaeve, or enter the mortal realms without his explicit permission.And he bound you to accept his interpretation of the Compact as the final judgment.”
A horse shifts—an iron shoe scraping against the stone.
Daire’s challenge is there in the way he watches me, but if he thinks I was unaware that Riadan had read my runes, he’s much mistaken.Not only that, but I wasglad.
Iamglad.
It’s been nearly fourteen months since I took the risk of showing her, and I had begun to believe—to despair—that she hadn’t told him before we stepped through the doorway.Now, finally, the words I can’t speak have been said aloud.
Flora stares at me, her skin turned pale.She presses back into the cold stone of the cavern wall, her breath catching.“How could you swear to that?”
“It was that or be punished for Fionn’s crimes,” Daire says.
I rock back on my heels—that’s something not even Daire’s sister could know.How did she find out?
Ronan clears his throat and steps into the firelight.He’s soaked to the skin and carries the limp bodies of four rabbits strung on a leather cord slung across his shoulders.Twigs of rowan are tucked into the crook of one arm.
“Since we’re having this discussion now,” he says, “let’s set aside Chyr’s oaths to his uncle for a moment.”He drops the rabbits and the rowan beside the fire and crosses to where Flora is still backed against the wall, while leaving her plenty of room so she doesn’t feel like she’s being crowded.“The rest of us aren’t compromised by the king’s politics, and we are still the Anvar’thaine.Our oaths bind us to uphold the Compact.If any of us—including Chyr—breaks those oaths, the rest have no choice but to banish them to the Gloaming.Do I need to explain that to you?”
The wind outside is rising, blowing in through the entrance.The fire cracks and sparks.It takes all my control not to seize that wind and make it howl, not to whip the fire into an inferno to match my rage.
I was going to give Flora a little time before I broke this to her.But this is another of Ronan’s talents: he sets a trap and waits for the wild things to come to him.Now he’s the first to grasp what the others haven’t fully processed.
Lorcan likes to fancy himself the clever one in this group, but it’s Ronan who often sees what others don’t.
Still, Flora doesn’t know enough to fully understand the situation yet, and she doesn’t trust him.If he’s hoping for an advantage, he won’t get it.
She slides along the wall towards Bramble.“I assume the point you’re making,” she says, “is that you all have to make very sure I get to Muilean.”
“True, and all of us have to offer ourselves to you as companions,” Ronan says.“You can’t choose Chyr.You do see that, don’t you?Not with the oaths that have him tied in knots.”
Wind drives rain into the cavern mouth.Fat droplets bounce off the stone.
Flora’s eyes find mine again.All the colour has drained from her face, and I can see the panic as Ronan’s words sink in.Every one of the tears that start to spill down her cheeks feels crushing.
My chest squeezes, flattened under a mountain of regret.
If I’m honest, though, I can’t blame my oaths, my uncle, or the war.I should have found a way to stop this.I’m the one who’s responsible, and now Flora is drowning in the fate to which I’ve bound her.
Chapter 32
Refuse and Die
Flora
I
want to melt into the cavern wall and disappear.That’s an idea I haven’t considered yet: whether my magic would let me transform myself to interact with the landscape.The concept is distracting enough that I let my overwhelmed mind dart after it like a dog after a hare.
Still, the tears keep falling.I wipe them with my fists.Beside me, the horses chew their feed, their bodies radiating heat while Shade and Shadow guard my front from Daire and the other Riders.
All too soon, I’m back to thinking about Ronan’s warning.My nails dig into my palms.I don’t want Chyr—or anyone—as a consort, but that doesn’t change the way my stomach seizes at knowing I can’t choose him.The idea of having to accept any of the others makes me lock my knees to keep them from giving out.
I watch Chyr through the haze of wet-wood smoke, the angry set of his jaw, the unhurried efficiency with which he unpacks plaids and rations, the way the Riders angle their bodies towards him, keeping him in sight.When he speaks to them, they lower their eyes a degree, even when they argue.
