My feet flung me through the forest, my mind churning with fear and fury and slow-swelling resolve. But as my gown evanesced like a midnight strewn with dying stars, my scattered thoughts coalesced.
By the time I reached the Willow Gate, I was myself once more. My dark hair was braided tightly to my head. My collarbones and chest were protected by leather and steel. My hips hung heavy with my skeans.
But I was not the same as when I came here tonight. I had finally seen my enemies for who they were. The Folk Gentry were as terrible as I’d been told—most alike to humans in appearance, but most different in cunning and treachery. And if the others of his kind had cursed him for his wickedness, then the tánaiste who held Eala captive must be the worst of them all.
But he had not yet been punished.
That would be my job. And I was beginning to see how it would have to be done.
I knew little of this tánaiste—this heir of shadows.Irian.I knew only that he was a pariah, an outcast—alone but for a flock of swan maidens who despised him. And no one was meant to be alone for that long. Not even wicked Gentry heirs.
Chandi had told me to stay away from him. But that wasn’t going to happen. For me to succeed at the task Mother—and now Eala—had set me, I was going to have to get close to him.
Then I would become the weapon I’d been forged to be. I would take his Treasure. And I would destroy him.
Part Two
The Shadow Heir
My heart is as black as the blackness of the sloe,
or as the black coal that is on the smith’s forge;
or as the sole of a shoe left in white halls;
it was you put that darkness over my life.
—“Donal Og,” translated by Lady Gregory
Chapter Fifteen
Beith—Birch
Winter
Are you daft, man?” I snapped. “Don’t put it there!”
“Whatever happened toprinceling?” griped Rogan. But he did as I said, dragging the massive sack of fertilizer toward the risers at the back of the greenhouse.
For a while after the Feis of the Nameless Day, Rogan had been nowhere to be seen. I’d tried not to care—I’d been busy. Corra had kept their end of the bargain—it was time I kept mine.
But in the past week, I’d spotted Rogan lurking at a safe distance, like a stray puppy hoping for scraps. He always had practice weapons with him—a claíomh or a bow or a staff—but the edge of his attention grated against mine.
I’d participated in enough pretense to know a sham when I saw one.
Finally, I’d put down my trowel, wiped my earth-streaked hands on my apron, and beckoned to him. He’d wandered over, looking surly—Rogan never could bear being alone for long. His hair was beginning to look unkempt, the stubble on his cheeks starting towander into beard territory. He was also looking a little haggard, like he hadn’t been getting enough sleep. Or had been eating too many meals that were mostly mead.
“Do you want to work?” I’d asked.
He’d nodded, a single jerk of his head.
“There will be no tossing of heavy objects willy-nilly,” I’d needled. “You will not touch the plants. You will not break things. You will do as I say, nothing more and nothing less.”
“And if I strike you three times, changeling, will you return to Tír na nÓg?” Rogan had grinned, an unexpected flash of mirth that instantly disarmed me.
But then I’d remembered how his face had transformed at the sight ofherlast month. He’d gazed at Eala like she was magic. Like she was music. Like she waseverything. He’d never looked at me that way.
He was handsome, strong, and good. She was lovely, bright, and gentle. They were meant for each other. And I was trying to stop begrudging them their happy ending.
