CHAPTER5
This was making less and less sense.
Aodhan had expected the call to lead him straight into the seelie lands—toward the great Sunlit City, perhaps, or the fortress of the Summer Knights. Instead, he found himself unerringly drawn southward, over the tangled, wild forests of the unseelie.
Which was ridiculous, because his so-called perfect match couldn’t possibly be an unseelie high sidhe. For a start, he’d never met one who wasn’t an utter bastard (with the notable exception of Cuan, who literally was a bastard, and a much nicer person because of it). Fate was a bitch, but he flatly refused to believe she could be that cruel.
And besides, no self-respecting unseelie would be seen dead on one of his kind, unless they’d been impaled. Despite his self-declared neutrality, his white coat and golden wings marked him indelibly as a seelie creature. It was unthinkable for an unseelie knight to be bound to a steed from the opposing faction. The two sides didn’t cross, at least not without bloodshed.
Still, he was definitely being pulled deeper into unseelie territory. By adjusting course and engaging in a bit of quick mental trigonometry, he was pretty sure the summons was emanating from Lady Maeve’s sidhean—one of the great fae hills that housed the scattered unseelie courts. Like his own oak tree, such places concealed far more than their exteriors suggested.
Aodhan was more familiar with Maeve’s particular sidhean than he would have liked to be, thanks to all the kerfuffle with Cuan and his unexpected human soulmate a few months ago. In Aodhan’s experience, Maeve and her lackeys were vicious even by unseelie standards.
If it is one of Maeve’s people calling me, then maybe they’ll be so horrified when I actually turn up that they’ll drop dead from cardiac arrest. Or at least banish me immediately.
This cheerful thought sustained Aodhan over most of the distance. If it was a choice between drowning in troll-shit or clambering onto the back of a steed whose mane color-clashed with their heraldry, a high sidhe would pick horrible death every time.
Unfortunately, as he came within sight of the vast, curving hill that housed Maeve’s court, it occurred to him that it was strange for one of her people to be in mortal peril within their own home. Unless, of course, they’d managed to anger Maeve herself, which admittedly was not an uncommon occurrence.
He circled the hill, taking care to stay high enough to avoid detection by any of the guards. The call was definitely coming from inside. The urgency had abated a fraction—which just meant that it was an overwhelming sense of pressing need rather than crushing doom—but he still had to fight the instinct to swoop down and kick in the gates.
Gritting his teeth, he forced himself to think rationally. Weighing up the evidence, he was fairly certain his summoner wasn’t one of Maeve’s high sidhe. For multiple reasons, it just didn’t make sense.
No, it was far more likely that they were some trespassing seelie warrior, captured by Maeve’s war-band. Raids were technically against the truce agreed between the Winter King and the Summer Council, but they still happened on a regular basis. The seelie and the unseelie high sidhe despised each other far too much to ever co-exist peacefully, even at a distance.
If his would-be rider was locked away in a dungeon, awaiting execution, it would certainly explain the strength of the call. Goddesses above and below, how in the seven hells was he going to rescue them? After last time, he could hardly knock on Maeve’s front door and ask nicely if he could have one of her prisoners, please. Nobody held a grudge like an unseelie high sidhe, and he didn’t think she’d have forgotten his involvement in freeing Tamsin and Cuan from her court.
Fighting his way through an entire underground fortress filled with psychopathic elves was, needless to say, out of the question. Stealth wasn’t really an option either. At the moment, he was cloaked in a cursory illusion that served to conceal him against the sky, but it wouldn’t stand up to any form of scrutiny. His natural form was not exactly inconspicuous, and he wasn’t confident in his ability to sneak around on two legs either. Especially not past grims, hellhounds, and goddesses-knew-what other unseelie beasts Maeve might have guarding the place.
The sidhean would be warded against all forms of magic. Given time and a few dozen relevant books from his library, he might have been able to break the hill’s arcane defenses and open up a back door—but he didn’t have the leisure of a few months to research the problem.
Which left… what?
Aodhan was still hovering over the hill, searching vainly for inspiration, when a horn sounded. He barely had time to tighten his concealment spell before the turf on one side of the sidhean shimmered. Grass and dirt faded away like morning mist, revealing a squared-off stone arch. A cascade of light poured out, thousands of silver fireflies swirling into the air.
And with the light came the unseelie high sidhe.
The host streamed from the sidhean, brighter and more dazzling than the sparkling motes dancing around them. Dozens of knights in full armor, mounted on bristle-backed giant boars or snarling dire wolves; ivy-crowned mages on sinuous, slinking griffins. Silk-clad courtiers perched gracefully on the backs of jewel-draped horses, or jet-black stags with sharp, spreading antlers. Hunting beasts ran or flew at their masters’ sides—hellhounds and churchyard grims, carrion crows and fairy cats. Banners snapped from proudly upraised lances, and the air shivered with the calls of hunting horns.
A full high sidhe court riding out in all its splendor was an unmatched spectacle, overwhelming every sense. Aodhan didn’t so much as glance at a single one of them. He only had eyes for one person.
She rode at the head of the host, at the right hand of Lady Maeve herself. A place of honor, usually reserved only for the most trusted high sidhe… but this woman was no high sidhe.
She wasn’t even fae.
Even from this distance, Aodhan could smell the humanity of her; a warm, wholesome fragrance like fresh-baked bread. Amidst the bright, poisonous colors of the unseelie court, her brown hair gleamed like polished oak, elegant and natural. She wore no armor, but she didn’t need it. The way she held herself—spine straight, shoulders back—revealed an inner strength harder than diamond. In all the braying pageantry and glittering self-importance surrounding her, she was a single still, silent point.
By all the goddesses, was Aodhan’s first dazed thought, followed immediately by: Herne’s hooves, why the hell would a woman like that need me?
Admittedly, she was mounted on a hell-goat, which was possibly explanation enough for the urgency of the Call. Neither warrior nor mount looked happy about the situation. The black, flame-eyed creature kept skipping sideways, snorting and tossing its horned head as though plagued by biting flies.
This, Aodhan realized, was undoubtedly due to what its rider was carrying. One of her hands clutched the pommel of the hell-goat’s saddle, but in the other she gripped the hilt of an odd, flattened weapon. Aodhan had no idea what the thing might be—at this distance, it looked like a small, round shield inexplicably welded onto a handle—but it radiated such a chill, deadly aura that it made his withers twitch.
Iron—not one of the debased forms, but cold iron. The woman must be a mighty warrior indeed, to bear such a weapon.
A changeling?Aodhan wondered. Humans who had been taken from their own realm as children and raised as fae were highly prized. In both the unseelie and seelie courts, such changelings were second in status only to the high sidhe princes and princesses. If this woman was visiting this sidhean as part of some epic quest, it would explain why Maeve had turned out the entire court in her honor.
But a changeling warrior would hardly ride a goat.