“What are these?” I heard myself ask.
Moira looked up from her teacup. She frowned, levered herself from her chair, approached on measured footsteps. When she saw which tapestries I indicated, her frown deepened.
“I’ll thank you not to go nosing where you have not been asked.” Her tone was stern and unyielding as a cliff, but her eyes were soft. Albeit distant.
“But—” Again, my eyes flew to Irian, who was gazing now at his mother, the same softness lurking in his own eyes. “Who is he?”
“I told you—I rarely recognize the figures who appear in my visions.” She turned abruptly to Irian. Shemustrecognize him—if not as her son, then at least as the same man who graced her tapestries. But her deep gray eyes settled on him with nothing save mounting irritation. “Your friend lacks manners. Perhaps it is time you go.”
Guilt settled like scurf atop the river of my mounting grief—why had I soured this precious, fleeting time with Irian’s mother by demanding answers to intrusive questions she could never answer? The true tragedy of Ethadon’s twenty-year-old geas was obvious to me now. Though he had stolen Moira’s memories of her only child, he had not stolen away her inborn gift of clairvoyance. She still glimpsed Irian, his past and perhaps even his future—the thread of her love stronger than Ethadon’s curse. Yet she could not recognize her son even when he stood two feet in front of her.
My eyes burned with tears. Of all the Folk curses I had witnessed, this was among the cruelest. For Moira and Irian both.
Irian uncovered a long, narrow tapestry lurking near the bottom of the stack. I realized with a jolt that it depicted a colossal oak tree, with vast autumnal branches stretching to tangle with its lofting roots. A full moon kept the dark at bay. At the base of the Heartwood, two figures stood—both clad in black, their faces hidden as they gazed at the holy tree. Their hands were joined by a ribbon of black and a ribbon of green.
“This one.” Irian ran his fingers gently along the threads and asked, “May I have it?”
The question jolted Moira. Her palm flew to her chest, resting over her heart before drifting thoughtlessly down to rest on her stomach. “No. They are mine. He—he is mine.”
Mastering herself, she gestured briskly toward the door. She did not notice how Irian’s face shattered in the moment she turned away, vulnerable as he faced the reality of his mother’s condition.
“Really, now.” Moira’s tone grew caustic. “It’s getting late.”
It was time to go.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Fia
We stepped out into a fine early evening. Breezes winnowed over the moor, sending patches of vivid heather and vibrant gorse nodding. I inhaled, tilting my face toward the setting sun and letting it chase away some of the sorrow Moira’s curse had conjured in me.
“I’m sorry.” I turned to Irian, whose eyes were shadowed beneath the hair sweeping over his face. “I daresay she didn’t like me much after all.”
He laughed a little. “She is an ancient cantankerous recluse. She liked you as much as she likes anyone.”
“From your lineage, that’s practically a confession of love.” Irian’s smile grew, and I reveled in it, his joy more precious to me than sunlight. “But I am sorry. I think I ruined the afternoon with my prying.”
“You ruined nothing.” Irian’s smile faded. “What my mother and I had was ruined by my father long ago. It is I who should apologize, for clinging to the fragments of something I once cherished but is now broken beyond repair. The edges never grow less sharp. And now I have cut you, as I have myself.”
“No.” I longed to embrace him, to let closeness comfort us both. “These are the hurts that matter. For if we did not feel them, we would know we had stopped truly living.”
Irian’s gaze burned hot on my face, and his hand drifted as if he wished to touch me. He reluctantly forced it back to his side, dragged his eyes to the horizon. “The sun lowers. If we wish to make it back to the Summerlands by nightfall, we should return to the aughiskies.”
“Let them frolic,” I suggested, letting a note of wickedness creep into my voice. “Unless I am much mistaken, we may be blessed with one or two new little murder horses come next spring.”
“Scandalous.” Irian raised his eyebrows. “And us? Are we to bed down in Moira’s whimsy ram barn?”
“The night will be warm.” A sudden burst of nerves made my voice meek. I surreptitiously patted my pocket, ensuring what I’d brought from the Summerlands was still stowed securely. “There is something I wish to see before we return.”
Curiosity flared to light in Irian’s eyes. His voice thrummed low as he asked, “What, pray tell, is that?”
“Once, in a time of hidden heirs and harmless adventures, a little boy found his way into a garden where he was not meant to go.” Irian’s eyes flashed, and I inhaled, battling my own hollow hope. In the Deep-Dream the Bright One had told me,Deirdre lives. I doubted she had spent the last twenty years languishing in the garden where she’d once been imprisoned. But I wanted to see the place where my mother was shaped by earth and sky, where she and young Irian had woven their friendship through whispered tales and shared wonder. I might never lay eyes on her, never hear her voice. But perhaps, in standing where she once stood, I might brush the edges of her memory. “Will you take me there? Will you show me Deirdre’s garden?”
An emotion stronger than regret and sharper than hesitation arrowed over Irian’s face. Then he straightened, threw his cloak over one shoulder, and beckoned me forward.
“It would be my honor, mo chroí. And my delight.”
The moors ridged away from Moira’s cottage like a restless sea, punctuated by great smooth stones curved like the backs of whales. We followed a white-capped river scything sleekly through the rock until we reached the edge of a moss-draped woodland painted gold by the dying sun.
