And she didn’t plan on telling him?
The room and its occupants were tense with awkward silence. Finally, Niamh broke it. “That’s why you didn’t burst into ash, Echo. You’ve fed from Elijah, haven’t you?”
Not particularly pleased at discussing their intimacies in front of strangers, Elijah let out an uncharacteristic growl.
“No offense meant,” Niamh assured him. “I’m going somewhere with this.”
“Yes, I fed on him.” Echo lifted her chin as if daring the others to judge what she was.
“Well, a vampire with a fae mate gets a nice little gift from the mating. A fae mate’s blood protects you from daylight. It turns that vampire into a Daywalker. It was one of the reasons Queen Aine of the Fae decided to chuck all the supernaturals out of Faerie. She considered there would be many a vampire desperate enough to attack the fae over the lure of becoming a Daywalker. To try to experiment with their blood and see if there was a way around the mate loophole part of the deal.”
Elijah’s heart raced in his chest at the news.
All Echo had ever wanted was to walk in the sun again. To live as she once had. His blood could do that for her?
She looked at him and as if she couldn’t hold her guard up anymore, tears blurred her beautiful eyes. “Elijah?”
He crossed the room, a blur of movement, to be at her side. His arms moved around her as she swayed into him, trembling. It was so unlike her. Echo was usually so tough. But this … this changed everything for her.
“How often?” he demanded of Niamh. “To maintain being a Daywalker. How often does she need to feed from me?”
Echo gasped at his question, staring up at him in wonder and awe.
It made him feel about fifty feet tall.
“Just that once. Even if you were … even if something were to happen to you, Elijah, Echo will remain a Daywalker for the rest of her immortality.”
When he met his mate’s (his mate!) gaze again, he saw the many things she wanted to say but couldn’t in front of their new companions. He nodded, telling her silently he understood. They’d talk later.
Turning back to Niamh and the others, he demanded, “So what now? How do we end this threat?”
“We need backup,” the Irish fae told them grimly. “I’ve seen a final battle. And we can’t do it alone. We’re going to need Conall and Thea MacLennan.”
“So, we’re still traveling to the Highlands?” Elijah asked.
“We are. All of us. We stick together from now on.”
There was silence as they all sized up one another.
Finally, Elijah dared, “Do we win?”
Niamh gave him a sad smile. “I see many paths. At the end of one, we win.”
“But at the end of others, we lose?”
Fionn glowered at him. “I don’t know how to lose.”
It was a promise.
And a little reassuring, but not entirely.
“We’ve got this.” Rose nodded at him. “We can take them all down. I know. Because Niamh’s right.Wehave something worth fighting for.”
23
The roads were winding,sometimes dark from the canopy of silver birch and fir trees. The firs were lush and green while the birch trees sparser but no less beautiful. At once, the road changed, the trees disappearing from the rugged hills, opening to views of a loch glistening down in a valley of the morning sun.
The morning sun.
