Chapter Four

Xishlon Fire

Iris Morgaine

Zhilaan Forest

Xishlon night

Iris holds up her III-marked palm to the Zhilaan Forest’s Eastern tree line, waiting to be allowed entrance, her Noi Fire Falcon kindred perched on her shoulder. Iris’s heartbeat patters against her chest in a nervous rhythm over her bold quest, her fire power a hot, blazing mess. The Zhilaan’s gigantic Nightwood Pines loom over her, high as the purple-tinted clouds above, the whole Eastern Realm suffused with the Xishlon moon’s purple light.

She can sense the fiery Forest’s welcoming energy whooshing through her, her Lasair spirits lifting in response to the sensation even as her trepidation intensifies. Blazingly determined, she steps through the tree line into the Forest’s Dryad’khin territory then pauses, overcome by the hair-prickling sensation of being watched.

The Forest’s wash of purple moonlight embraces her, its loving aura suffusing her Lasair might and tinting her fire aura purple. Her tightly guarded hold on her emotions is suddenly wrenched open, every pent-up, impassioned feeling rushing forth, as her kindred falcon lets out a joyful cry and flies up and alights on a branch overhead.

“What if he feels nothing for me?”

she asks the fire-loving Forest as she brings her palms to the rough trunk before her, the tree’s fierce love instantly encircling her. “What if I give in to the moon’s pull to honesty, and he says he could never love a Fire Fae?”

Insecurity rises, potent enough to cut through the Xishlon moon’s thrall, a feeling of overwhelming loneliness overtaking Iris, her gut clenching from the sheer strength of it.

You utter fool, she roughly chastises herself. What are you thinking? Yes, there seemed to be a strong attraction between the two of you, but he clearly fought it. He could never want you for his Xishlon’vir.

A jaded laugh bursts from Iris’s throat, bitterness rising over her deluded idea that Dryad Sylvan would want to entertain the non-Dryad Xishlon’vir tradition, his own peoples and their traditions almost completely wiped out several times over.

She knows that the Dryad Fae have established a growing community here, naming Sylvan as the leader of their Tree Council. She’s heard they’ve built elaborately crafted canopy homes here, set inside huge burls that cling to the top of the Nightwood Pines’ enormous trunks, the Dryads’ elevated dwellings connected by vine bridges, everything lit by phosphorescent fungi, the Dryads’ knowledge of building and farming in Balance with Nature transforming the entire Realm.

Several months ago, when Sylvan left with most of the Dryad Fae for their new Zhilaan Forest territory, Iris thought she sensed reluctance on his end to be parted from her, his strong fireline keeping tight hold of hers as they clung to each other’s hands, the surrounding Dryad refugees eyeing them with everything from knowing curiosity to open concern.

Iris could read their unspoken thoughts simmering on the air—a powerful Dryad like Sylvan was clearly meant to find a mate from those of his own kind.

And then, Sylvan wrangled his magic away from hers with what felt like great effort before bidding her a strained goodbye, and Iris wondered, as raw longing for him gripped hold, if she’d ever feel that closeness between them again.

Certain that the answer was a firm no.

But then, his letters started arriving.

A trickle of them at first, carried southeast by a Fire Hawk, the trickle strengthening to a letter almost every day, the walnut-ink missives matter-of-factly detailing Sylvan’s work to reestablish a Dryad homeland and bring their Balance-minded ways to the entire Eastern Realm.

Ensconced in her small Fire Fae community to the north of Voloi, Iris pored over every letter, her pulse never failing to quicken as she read each one multiple times. Her aura flared white-hot when he sent his shortest letter yet, inviting her to travel to Zhilaan so he could show her what they were building there.

Yet, his prose was so succinct, Iris agonized over whether she was reading too much into his correspondence, suffusing it with her own longing for him.

Wrestling with her feelings, Iris decided to give in to her yearning to see Sylvan again, forgetting that the trip would coincide with Xishlon, the damned moon turning her into a lovesick mess, unable to approach him with any semblance of hidden feelings.

Get a hold of yourself! she gruffly urges as she withdraws her palms from the tree before her and bunches them into fists. Admit it—coming here was a mistake. Even if he has feelings for you, he’ll never give in to them. Let him go before he breaks your heart.

Her emotions bottoming out, Iris roughly swipes away the tears pooling in her eyes and turns to leave, to get as far away as she can from the man who will never, ever want a Fire Fae.

Rancid misery simmering through her power, she moves to turn back toward the tree line, but freezes in her tracks.

A majestic, deep-purple stag is watching her.

The breathtakingly handsome creature is standing, stock-still, between two Nightwood Pines, its silvery rack seeming to possess hundreds upon hundreds of points, its eyes flashing like violet gems.

Iris’s heartbeat quickens, her magic roaring into sudden, hotter life as the certainty sweeps through her—

This is Sylvan’s hidden kindred.

Staring straight at her, as if at a treasure found.

Emotion grips Iris’s throat, hot and raw.

Could he be searching for me this Xishlon like I’m searching for him?

After they parted, Iris tried to fall back in with her fellow Lasair Fae, settling with them in Eastern Noilaan, where the Lasair had taken up residence near the Eastern Realm’s sole active volcano, the fire power there a marvel to behold.

She tried to forget Sylvan. Truly she did. Tried to fit in with a solely Lasair community once more. But the xenophobic views still held by some of the non-Dryad’khin Lasair felt like clothing Iris no longer fit into, and she found herself arguing against such thinking as passionately as she used to argue for it, her thoughts and dreams increasingly drawn back to Sylvan.

Night after night, she revisited the time when she’d emerged from the Dyoi Forest’s innermost being and experienced that first awareness of her fire powers and Sylvan’s flashing around each other . . . and how he’d grabbed hold of her when she almost fell to her knees, his embrace igniting something powerful between them. They’d sought each other out from that point on, their late-night conversations under the stars a sometimes painful illumination as they told each other about their lives and confronted the difficult history of both their people, the Lasair and the Dryads having always existed on the mistrusted periphery of the Sidhe Fae’kin. Both groups almost wiped clear off the face of Erthia during the Fae wars.

But it’s not just Sylvan’s fierce personality she misses.

Increasingly, he’s part of the hottest fire of her dreams. For so many years, she’d thought she was meant to pair with Yvan. But this attraction . . . it’s like all the lightning bolts in the world colliding in a firestorm of sparks. There were moments she was sure that Sylvan felt it, too, as she caught a few of his sidelong glances before he’d quickly look away, his face tense with conflict. He seemed, in those moments, to be struggling as mightily against their draw as she was, the two of them hells-bent on holding to their own Fae ways. Both of them voicing, as if in an attempt to ward off this thing growing between them, how they planned to seek out their own kind after the Realm War.

If the Natural World survived.

And now, here they are in a world that has, against all the odds, survived—tenuously—the opportunity to seek out their own Fae kind suddenly before them like a path unscrolled at their feet.

But the Xishlon moon seems to have other plans, Iris thinks as she peers up through the Zhilaan canopy. As does her aching heart. An ember of hope ignites as Iris moves toward the stag, only to have that ember snuffed out as the stag turns and strides away.

The pain of rejection clutches Iris’s heart with surprising force, just as the buck pauses once more, turns and gives her an unmistakably beckoning look, her falcon kindred landing on the buck’s majestic rack.

Startled, Iris’s fire magic blazes into a swirling, sparking anticipation. Emboldened, she finds her footing and follows the silent, stately kindred and her falcon through the Forest, caught up in a sense of the whole Forest eagerly watching.

And breathlessly waiting.

Eventually, the buck stills, and both kindreds set their gazes on her. Iris stills as well, her heart thudding as the kindred gives her one long, last look then darts away, disappearing into some dense brush set around a raised hillock, her falcon taking flight toward the canopy above.

Confusion flooding her, Iris lets out a hard sigh, tracking her kindred’s flight path. Her fire aura leaps when she finds Sylvan there, sitting on a branch just above her, washed in the Xishlon moon’s purple light, her falcon perched on his shoulder.

Iris’s heart lurches toward Sylvan, her fire magic warming every vein as her falcon takes flight once more and Sylvan drops down before her, branch horns rising from his pine hair, his piercing eyes intent.

Those beautiful pine eyes of his.

“Your kindred,”

Iris marvels, entranced by him. “It’s . . . beautiful.”

Her vulnerability rises, fear swamping her emotions as she looks away, overcome by intimidation. She pulls in a deep breath, draws on her fire to fuel her courage . . . and meets his eyes.

“I . . . I thought . . .”

Iris starts, tripping over the words as the Xishlon moon coaxes her every feeling for Sylvan to the surface, “I thought that maybe . . . there’s a chance that a Lasair might be welcome as a permanent addition to your fire-loving Forest.”

Her pulse beats hot against the sides of her neck as he studies her, his rooted steadiness such a contrast to her often out-of-control flame, her intense passion, which she has so much trouble keeping hold of.

“It’s not my Forest, Dryad’khin,”

he offers, his deep voice thrumming right down Iris’s spine. “It’s our Forest.”

A slight, amused smile tilts his green lips. “And the Forest isn’t the only fire-loving thing here.”

Heat shoots straight down Iris’s spine.

“I want you as my Xishlon’vir,”

she blurts out with a quick glance toward the purple moon above, this moon that’s throwing her heart as well as every tendril of her fire wide open.

An emotional look overtakes Sylvan’s expression before his lips slant upward once more and he takes a step toward her, his hands moving lightly to her waist, her magic flaring around that touch. “You’ve a mind for melding traditions tonight it seems,”

he says, serious now, “as do I.”

Iris nods, remorse coursing through her for briefly losing her way. Only to be shown a better path forward by the Forest. And by her blossoming love for Sylvan. A path that embraces diversity and love, the Forest itself expanding the circle of Dryad’khin.

“I feel like you truly see me,”

Iris says, the words flowing off her tongue, every heartfelt thing eased into existence by the moonlight. “Even though . . . even though you’re Dryad and I’m Lasair.”

Sylvan reaches up and threads his fingers through her hair, an almost pained look on his severe face that sends Iris’s heart into a faster rhythm. “We were wrong to fight this,”

he murmurs as she reaches up to place her hand over his heart. Sylvan’s breath hitches as he gives her a deeply besotted look and draws her closer, his scent such a deep, rich pine. “This entire Forest,”

he murmurs as he caresses her back, “is fueled by fire. Which means you would be a most welcome permanent addition to it.”

Tears mist Iris’s eyes, the subtext in his words clear, his touch and his love singeing away every barrier between them.

“I want you, Sylvan,”

Iris admits.

Sylvan gives her an impassioned look, the surge of Iris’s fire echoing his intensity because she knows the two of them have found something in each other strong as wildfire. Strong as the surrounding Zhilaan Forest.

Strong as the Xishlon moon above.

“I want you too,”

Sylvan says, his warm lips brushing her temple. “Let’s meld all the traditions this eve, my beautiful Lasair-Dryad’khin.”

And then he draws back slightly, reaches out to run his fingertips along the stamens of a moon-blooming Xishlon Lily twined around the nearest trunk, its petals glowing violet along with the pollen now gracing Sylvan’s fingertips.

He brings his fingertips to her skin, and Iris shivers as he traces a line of the pollen down the side of her neck, over her inner shoulder, then down her bare lower arms.

“What are you doing?”

she breathlessly asks.

“Showing you the Forest,”

he says before bringing his lips to hers.

Iris ignites against his impassioned kiss, heated tendrils of pleasure coursing over her skin where he traced the pollen, entrancingly flame-hot.

“What was that?”

she breathlessly stammers.

Sylvan smiles. “Fire pollen,”

he answers, voice low and husky with want. “It holds the Forest’s fire-embrace in it.”

Iris gapes at him, stunned. “What else can this Forest do?”

Sylvan’s smile turns sultry. “Oh, so much more.”

Iris can’t suppress her own besotted smile as she grips Sylvan’s leafy tunic and pulls him into another fiery and thoroughly claiming kiss, the two of them surrendering themselves without reservation to the moonlight. As Sylvan draws her down to the mossy Forest floor and reveals the full, Xishlon-fueled wonders of the Zhilaan Forest’s embracing love.