Page 71

“Yeah? From who?”

“Prince Sorrow, Ard Tiarna of the Fear Gorta at Cailleach’s Keep. It seems he has retired from the palace and has sought solace once again in his court’s manor. He wishes me join him there to congratulate me on my newly acquired title.” His fingers played with the small hairs at the back of my neck. “I have sent a message back to him that I am settling a few matters at Whispered Nightmares, but will attend his court shortly.”

A chaste kiss was pressed to the base of my neck. “And how long will you have before you must ride off to the Dúluachair keep?”

“As long as I desire, within reason. He knows nothing of my predilections nor my disposition. For all he knows, I could be a terrible, uncouth ass who declines invitations from his neighbors and never outright says he will not attend.” A simple roll of his shoulders was given as a shrug. “Or I could be a puppet Ard Tiarna. He does not know. For this first meeting, he will give as much grace as I so desire, within reason.”

“How long have you been the Fómhar Ard Tiarna?” It was a question that had burned at the back of my mind off and on since he pulled me from the hole.

“Since long before the War of Thorns. Long enough to have been old when your Raven was conceived.”

“And how long were you Brittle Spear?”

“These are questions you should not be asking yet, Banfhlaith, and certainly not in the presence of your sleeping friend.”

I looked down into my lap at the dozing human and smiled. When had she fallen asleep? “Another time then.”

“Indeed. Another time. All will be revealed in time. We have a short while longer before we begin moving again. We are making good time, but we could easily fall behind if we dally too long at luncheons.” Lips brushed against the base of my neck again.

“My Ard Tiarna?” I asked hesitantly, leaning back into the sanctuary of his arms.

“Yes, Banfhlaith?”

“Did I really fuck a living forest?”

I felt the grin pressed into the base of my neck as he placed a kiss there. “And if you had? Would you regret your decision? Would you turn away from our games?”

I thought about it for a moment. Would I? I was starting to really understand the Fae side of me. I had never been so perverse or open to the whims of the flesh when I was masquerading as a human. Something about the air in Magh Meall or even the magic woven into everything around me had unlocked my innermost passions. I had never been truly afraid of them, and I’d always had rich fantasies that ran the gamut of sexual delights. But I had always known my partners, no matter how open-minded they were, would balk at them. So, I had never shared them.

But I had the freedom to do so here, where the Fae enjoyed their games. I could easily fall into that, but there was the complication of The Raven. The more I thought about the question, the pall of the death of what we never had began to eat away at me. I had never in my human life, ever, cheated on a partner. I was always out the door before I could let my eye wander. And yet here I was, sitting in the lap of a Fae who would give me everything with no strings, while longing for the tangle of strings.

I betrayed Emrys—whether he would see it as such or not—I had.

My heart twisted around the thorns surrounding it.

“I don’t know.”

He mistook my reluctance to answer as something wholly different. “Then I have no fear in telling you that you did not, in fact fuck a living forest. The forest was very much alive and quite dangerous, even during the day, when most hunting creatures are hidden from the light. And I have no fear in telling you that the forest very much did wish to taste of your flesh and passions. Had I let it, it would have torn you to pieces. You’d have enjoyed every second of your last moments, but it would have been your death nonetheless.”

“So, you appeased it by having me fuck a wooden dildo you made from one of its branches. You gave it what it wanted, but in a controlled way.” I furrowed my brows following the twisted logic of a Fae for once.

“A stroke of genius if I do say so myself. Those woods do not often ask for bodies, but are quite insistent when they do. They feel it is their due to be appeased when they demand. It’s why, as much as I wished to give in to your other fantasy, I could not allow you to get off the horse.” Another grinning kiss was pressed to my flesh, this time just behind my ear. “Maybe between here and our night camp, though.”

Chapter 27

Cricket

We should not have stopped. If we had ridden all the way through, perhaps my mind would not have had a chance to catch up to my lust-soaked body. When it did, it flayed me alive for the foolishness I had allowed to happen. My mood turned dark, and instead of burdening my friends, who were all more than happy to chat with the Fae over plates of food around the evening campfire, I wandered to the small stream that we had stopped next to.

Fish the size of my fist with tiny faces and whiskers trailing behind their bodies and even tinier gnarl-knuckled hands sifted through the rocky stream bed searching for something. I had almost forgotten, between the rolling hills of red and gold grasses and the soaring canopies of the stunning forest, that we were in the land of Nightmares, at least until I saw the fish turn its face up to me and scowl.

“Back atcha, brother,” I muttered and plucked a dead cattail from the riverbank, careful not to disturb the living plants.

“Do you make an occasion of speaking with Fintan often, Banfhlaith?” The soft bass of Brittle Spear’s voice shook me from my reverie and glare-off with the fish.

I didn’t bother to turn to him. I would prefer it if I offended him and he sauntered off, taking himself—and the Fae he endangered by helping me—back to the safety of their manor.

“Not really. Seemed like better company.”