Although the Fair Folk found ways to slink into our realm, it was expressly forbidden to consort with them. To keep a darrig was treason—the gnome-like creatures could predict events not yet passed and affect the outcome of simple occurrences. A tree falling, perhaps. The direction of a flood. Or even the outcome of a sword fight in a tournament.
“You believe Connla has the darrig?” I guessed, keeping my eye on the prince in question, who was celebrating hisluckywins by lazily swilling ale in the stands.
“Old Rechtmar is past his prime,” Cathair told me. “Connla is his heir, his war advisor, and the captain of his fianna. If anyone has it, it will be Connla. Capture the thing for us, won’t you?”
“You mean execute it.” I glanced past Cathair to the queen. “Don’t you?”
“Not this time.” His expression held the kind of deadly intent I’d learned not to question. “We have a use for the creature.”
I hid my uncertainty. Mother despised and distrusted the Fair Folk—they who had once ruled this land as gods. They were wicked, fickle, violent creatures who did not belong in the human realm. During a diplomatic delegation twenty years ago, the Folk had assassinated the high king, Mother’s husband. The unjustified execution had incited the Gate War. The fight had been savageand bloody, until the Folk had effectively ended it by stealing away twelve human girls—the last, the queen’s own daughter.
Motherneverutilized the treacherous Folk for her own devices. Except me, the changeling child who had been left in her daughter’s place twelve years ago. But after so much time in the queen’s household, I was far more human than Folk. And everything I did for Mother, I did willingly.
Including this.
I refocused my attention on Connla, who was still staring brazenly at me from below. “How am I supposed to find the darrig?”
“You’ve demonstrated your tactical skills to me, little witch. And you’ve been developing an adequate head for subterfuge.” Cathair’s voice was sardonic. “But you have not yet proved yourself adept at seduction.”
I wasn’t thrilled by that idea. But what Cathair—and by extension, Mother—asked of me, I obeyed.
So here I was—a little drunk, sweating my arse off in a gown that left nothing to the imagination, as an overfed prince beckoned me closer with greedy fingers. Again, I fought a shudder of disgust.
I reminded myself this face did not belong to me. Nor the body, most likely. Who cared if I used them as tools, asweapons? They were nothing but what I made of them.
I swayed toward Connla, pasting on a slow smile and swinging my hips more than was strictly necessary. He patted his knee and I lowered myself onto his lap, gritting my teeth as his hand slithered around my waist.
“Yes, more wine is exactly what we need,” I murmured, leaning into him. “But won’t you allowmeto serveyouthis time, my prince?”
I reached for the carafe of wine. But Connla caught my hand with one of his own, gripping my wrist. His eyes raked me from head to toe, bright with a canny light.
“I didn’t expect your message tonight,my lady.” His breath was hot and sour on my cheek. “Nor did I expect you to show up in my tent, half-dressed and eager for wine.”
“What can I say?” I clenched my jaw harder behind my smile. “I couldn’t take my eyes off you. Besides, it’s hard to find a decent drink up at Rath na Mara.”
“Perhaps. Or perhaps you had some other reason.” His eyes glittered. “You see, after your unexpected note, I confess I told a few local lads about it. I maybe even bragged a bit. And what they had to say about you was…interesting.”
His hand tightened around my wrist, sending pain flaring up my arm.
“The thing is,Fia Ní Mainnín, everyone says you’re not actually a cousin of the queen. They say you’re a little witch. A cailleach, if you can believe it.” His voice took on an unpleasant note. “Now, I’ve lain with a witch or two before, so I couldn’t care less about that. But they also say your power comes from the Folk. They say you’re achangeling.”
Shite.
“Changeling?” I forced a laugh, which came out reedy. “The wine must have addled your wits, my lord. I’m the queen’sfosterling.”
“I know what I heard.” His expression was implacable. “You’re unnatural. Look at you—your hair is dark as deep water. Your mismatched eyes are strange enough to give a man nightmares. You’re small enough to snap like a twig in the forest. I’d wager money on it—you’re a filthy changeling, like they said. Where did the high queen find you? How does she keep you? And what must I do to take you from her?”
I froze at the menace—thehunger—in Connla’s voice. His grip on me tightened painfully. My options were narrowing by the moment. My veins itched with brambles, and I fantasized—brilliantly, achingly—of wrapping my fingers around his throat and choking him with thorns. Filling his mouth with sharp leaves, blanking his eyes with wet berries until I returned him to the land as a creeping, stinging blackberry bush.
It would be so easy.
But mother would eat my liver for breakfast if I Greenmarked one of her under-kings’ heirs without her say-so. With more willpower than I knew I possessed, I calmed myself.
Still, his words crept into my mind on serrated little feet.
You’re small enough to snap like a twig in the forest.
The words rankled me, although they were half-true—Iwassmall. I’d always been small. When Mother first sent me to her weapons masters to learn to ride and shoot and wrestle and fence, I was nine, and small even for my age. I couldn’t draw the longbows favored by Mother’s fianna; I couldn’t reach the backs of their fine tall stallions; I couldn’t even begin to lift the broad, straight claimhte carried by proud fénnidi into battle. So I fashioned my own bows out of young saplings I found in the wood, and I taught myself to ride bareback on fleet marsh ponies too small for grown adults and to fight fast and dirty with a dagger in both hands. Even now, at twenty, I was small—shorter than most and lean from strict exercise and rigorous sparring.
