It’s not like it’s easy for me to just shut it off. Every other Fae born and raised this side of the veil knows how to slip between forms like changing clothes. They learned it as children, probably. Practiced in mirrors. Got tips from their parents over breakfast.
But humans are just...humans. No magic. Just intuition they mostly ignore even on a bad day.
How am I supposed to let go of the Ash that existed before this moment?
All the thousands of tiny moments that make up the woman I was. The missions. The training. The way I learned to hold a knife before I learned to hold a pen. The calluses on my palms that took years to build. The sound of Graves’ voice telling me Iwas special, chosen, valuable. Lies wrapped in praise wrapped in chains.
Woman.
What a funny little word when you realize you aren’t one.
You’re Fae. A Fae woman?
Fuck, focus, Ash.
But it’s not easy.
I look at my hands. The ones I’ve known my entire life. At the little scar on my left hand, between my thumb and forefinger. I got it caught in a fishhook when we were fourteen. Ripped the skin clean off.
I think it was Pepper who had a rogue casting.
And I love that fucking scar. It’s mine. It’s proof that I existed, that I lived, that I was a kid once who did stupid things with her cousins and bled for it. What if it’s just gone when the glamour falls? What if I drop this mask and there’s a body underneath that doesn’t belong to me? One I don’t know. Don’t recognize. Don’t understand.
Will the scar still exist?
That’s what I’m supposed to just let go of. I know the memories are important. Morrigan made that clear. But the scars. Those are the reminders that I lived and I fucking survived and no one can take that away from me.
No one.
“Ash.” Kieran’s voice cuts through the spiral. He’s kneeling just outside the salt circle, close as he can get without touching the barrier. His ice-blue eyes hold something I don’t have a name for. “Do you want to talk it through?”
No. Not really.
But that’s not how relationships work, is it? As a human I could just push that aside. Bury it. Add it to the pile of things I don’t examine too closely.
But the more I sit here, the more I understand that Kieran, Orion, and Finnian can feel my emotions. They can tap into them the same way I can tap into theirs. The bond doesn’t allow for hiding. Not really.
“It’s silly,” I say, clearing my throat. I’m grateful the goddesses and Dagda are in the kitchen. I hope like hell they’re cooking food and not planning any more magical ambushes.
“Nothing about you is silly.” Kieran says exactly the right thing. “Stubborn, certainly. Perhaps a masochist. But in the best ways.”
I almost laugh. Almost.
“It’s the scars.” I look at my forearm. Point to the raised line on my shoulder. “Shrapnel. I took a hit but it saved the lives of my guys.”
“They mean something to you.” I can see how much it kills him that he can’t come into the circle. That he can’t touch me, hold me, fix this with his hands the way he fixed so many other things.
Orion stretches his legs out long, getting cozy on the floor like we’re having a picnic instead of a crisis. “When did you get them?” He rests his hands behind his head, elbows out, leaning against a chair that looks deeply unsteady.
“Fourteen.” I run a finger over the coin machine scar. “Twenty-five.” The shrapnel on my shoulder. “Also fourteen.” My knee, fell off a roof running from a security guard. Don’t ask. “Eighteen.” The thin line on my forearm where a car window exploded inward.
“Ah.” Orion nods like I’ve just confirmed something he already knew. “They aren’t leaving.”
I blink at him.
“Before immortality,” he continues, far too casual for my liking. Though that’s just who he is. “Permanent. Scars you gotas a mortal stay. You’ll use glamour to cover ‘em up if you want, but they’re part of you now. Part of your story.”
Oh.
