Rachel blanched, her mouth falling open.
“My father,” I said. “Cernunnos, King of the Fae. My mother is inside. Cliona, Queen of the Banshees, in case you were curious.”
The shifter went white, her eyes wide in her pale face. She tugged on Caelan’s arm and murmured something in his ear.
“I’ll follow you in a moment,” he said.
Rachel didn’t hesitate. She turned on her heel and hurried away. When she was outside of earshot, Caelan stepped closer to the wards.
Dad frowned. “Step closer, Lord.”
Caelan’s upper lip curled.
My father merely watched him with an expression I couldn’t identify. “I can make you. I’m asking to be polite and for the space you hold in my daughter’s heart.”
To his credit, Caelan stepped closer. Dad reached through the wards with one hand and touched the Lord’s forehead. A mix of gold and green light speared through Caelan’s skin.
His eyes closed, pain rolling over Caelan’s features as Dad did…something to him. Every second it took, Dad’s expression grew even more grim.
“I’m going to have to open the wards,” he said. “He will not harm you.”
I nodded, not having a clue what was going on, but trusting him regardless. He must have found something.
Dad dropped the wards for a split second, just long enough to yank Caelan through. Rachel, apparently watching from the trees like a female peeping Tom, screeched and came barreling back through the woods, as if she knew what Dad had done and threw herself toward the hole.
She bounced off the wards so hard, she flew back several yards. Dad disappeared in a flash of light, Caelan in his arms, but not before saying in an urgent voice, “Get to the house.”
I didn’t wait to see what Rachel would do. The wards would hold no matter what she did. I took off running toward the house, Garrett waiting for me on the porch.
His face was grim, a shining ring of gold around his iris.
“Something’s wrong with Caelan,” I breathed, though he already knew.
With an iron grip on my elbow and a final look behind us, Garrett ushered us inside.
Chapter
Thirty-Four
Caelan lay motionless on my couch, a gold and green light swirling around him—Dad’s magic. His eyes were closed, his claws back inside his hands.
Tess sat on the couch, huddled inside a blanket, eyes wide as she took everything in.
“What’s going on?” I said as I came up beside my father.
“You were right.” Dad’s hands moved as his magic flowed inside the Shifter Lord’s body. “There isn’t anything wrong with him physically, but he isn’t seeing or hearing the same things you are.”
I didn’t understand. Mom touched my elbow. “Caelan sees you as you are, but the words you say to him are not what he’s hearing. He’s being affected by a powerful illusion.” She shook her head. “That’s not quite right. A glamour, perhaps. Not a spell, not one we could easily sense. Someone extremely powerful has been messing around inside his head.”
“Lugh,” I breathed.
Dad gripped something at the side of Caelan’s head and pulled, exposing a thin, wriggling line of grey and green magic. Simone, who had been silent this entire time, gasped.
“What is that?” she breathed.
“Magic,” Dad said grimly. “From the looks of it, it’s been inside him for a while.”
I sank onto the edge of the coffee table, the ramifications of what my father had just said rattling around inside my skull like jagged rocks.
