“Better than any man in my life.” I smile, something incandescent flickering through my chest when I realize it’s more than a pleasantry. It’s the absolute truth.
Garred wanders down the hall, and Lachlan turns to me.
“What is this place?” I ask.
“Officially? Smythe Children’s House. But most of us call it the Eyrie. Sounds more badass.”
“You grew up here.” It’s not a question; I remember him informing me he’d grown up in an orphanage during our ride to Tír na Lune.
“Since I was an eleven-year-old eaglet,” Lachlan jokes.
I turn to study the space, starved to know what kind of environment could have formed such a kind, formidable man. To our left is a large living area with a wide brick fireplace; to our right, a dining room with a long wooden table and two benches. There are chips in the tabletop, several deep gouges as well, and the chairs surrounding the fireplace are worn and lumpy. Overstuffed. Probably supremely comfortable.
Both spaces are messy—tin horses and knights march across the dining room floor, and the living area is littered with open books, plaid wool blankets, and an overturned bucket of colored pencils.
It’s ahome.
Perhaps the most home-like place I’ve been since I arrived in the Otherworld. It reminds me of Granny Maggie’s colorful,haphazardly decorated cottage. Especially with all the art on the walls. Most is the charmingly crude work of little children, but there’s a large painting atop the mantel. Lachlan doesn’t stop me when I walk toward it to get a better look.
The piece centers on a younger version of Garred, who has an arm around the shoulders of an older man to whom he bears a striking resemblance. They’re very nearly upstaged by the brood of thirty, maybe more, pointy-eared children of various ages, ranging from ruddy-cheeked toddlers to young men and women who’ve just shed their adolescence.
I search the canvas for?—
There. At the very edge of the front row. A lanky fae boy with long limbs, untidy auburn hair and unmistakable lake-blue eyes. He’s looking out of frame, wearing an expression of such sadness and anger that I wish I could go back in time and give him a hug.
“I did not have the happiest childhood. Despite Mr. Smythe’s kindnesses. Nor was I the easiest ward to corral.” He circles his thumb over the center of his callused palm. “I’m trying to make up for it now. By teaching self-defense classes to Garred’s wards and any villagers who feel safe enough to attend.”
“The carvings you work on every morning at breakfast. Those are for the children?”
“Well, I don’t arm the toddlers. But the older children deserve a chance to defend themselves. Garred has more here now than he ever has, due to the occupation. He never turns anyone away. I wish I could do more, but I’m … beholden to Desmond.”
The lump in my throat hardens, getting more difficult to swallow past the longer I stare at the sad boy in the painting. “I’m sure Garred is very grateful for whatever help you can offer.”
Lachlan sniffs, turning away from me. “Right. Well, make yourself comfortable. I’ll be teaching for a few hours, and thenwe can head back. There are some books in the cabinet over there, but, fair warning—I don’t think Garred has any of those raunchy ones you like.”
“Actually, if you don’t mind, I’d like to attend your class.” He looks shocked, but pleased. “I want to learn how to defend myself, too. I can’t be much worse than the children.”
“You sure about that?”
I thump his arm.
“Didn’t feel a thing.” He smirks, and my insides glow.
“Come, Your Majesty. Let’s teach you how to throw a punch.”
Chapter
Twenty-Four
It is a challenge not to use my newfound punching skills during my outings with Duke Áine over the next several weeks.
There is a planned tour of Tír na Lune’s artisanal shardlight district; we barely exit the castle gates before a group of young women pull him away to judge an impromptu beauty contest. “The duty of a duke!” he calls out with a not-nearly-apologetic-enough grin as he leaves me on the sidewalk.
The following week, he invites me to an exclusive dinner in his quarters. It is so exclusive that I am the only one there. I eat his frangipane tart. And damn him, it’s delicious.
When I return to the suite that night, I find Lachlan and Aowen discussing the various attacks on my person here in Tír na Lune.
That morning, Sir Quinn shared the news with Lachlan that the man who attacked me in the crypt had been identified. He belonged to an anti-monarchist group that’s taken root withinthe territory. A group that also included one of the duke’s courtiers—an older fae woman who was at the castle that night and likely fed my location to the assailant.
