39. Keira

Chapter 39

Keira

I blink up at a silvery sky, pierced with the light of dawn. Hopelessness floods me as I lay limp on a bed of moss beneath the stone circle.

Warmth spreads throughout my body, burning within my chest and leaking to the tips of my extremities. I am being healed. A priestess with almond eyes and black hair hovers over me, pulling back as I sit up.

“You were almost completely depleted,” she says softly. “Using too much magic is an immense strain on the body. It can cause your heart to give out.”

She doesn’t know that my heart has already been shattered to pieces.

I pull myself to my feet and my grandmother stalks over to me, her old body still having all the graces of a cat. Her bony fingers clutch my chin and twist my face both ways, as though inspecting cattle.

“You look far better than the sorry state we found you in. I take it you did not enjoy your time in the palace? That you have not been adjusting to life in this realm?” She asks.

“It didn’t go well. Finan doesn’t like that I have a brain and a spine.” I clench my fists until my fingernails bite into the soft flesh .

“Foolish man. I never liked that spoiled brat. He did this to you?” My grandmother brushes her fingers across my throat and I nod. Her lips twist in a flash of rage. “I will make him pay, don’t you worry about that, and I will enjoy every moment of it. Do you feel up to walking to the temple?”

“Yes, thanks to…” I turn to the priestess with the almond eyes.

“Clivia,” my grandmother says and the woman nods an acknowledgment to me.

“While we walk, tell me about this fae man you were trying to get back to.” Her tone is carefully neutral. That alone, in this woman who has strong opinions about everything, is enough to make me weary. Along with the fact that her first question wasn’t about how I got here.

My stomach rolls in nervous anticipation.

Shame should flood me at being caught trying to abandon my realm for the fae world, but my need for him is too strong to feel anything else.

I think for a long while, as we take a paved path that cuts through the slate hills and leads away from the portal interchange, deeper into the forest.

“Aldrin wasn’t anything like you warned me, grandmother,” I say. “I tried to be so careful, to anticipate his betrayal at every turn, but it never came. He treated me with respect, like an equal. When I told him I was leaving his realm, he personally escorted me to the portal. He let me go, even though it broke him. Never once did he try to hold me against my will, or manipulate or control me.”

My grandmother’s fingers dig deeper and deeper into the flesh of my elbow as she guides me along the path, her features twisting downwards in a snarl.

I bite my lower lip. “He has the kindest heart of anyone I have met. I fell for him, and in the end, it was I who betrayed him when he was at his most vulnerable.” A sickness fills me at the admission. Once born of bitterness and self-loathing.

“You came to love him. To trust him and his intentions.” She states. The tendons in her neck stand out and a muscle feathers in her jaw .

“Yes,” I say simply.

A flash of violence ripples through her. I need her to believe me. To help me.

I turn wide eyes on her. “He seeks to bring peace and open trade between our people, and I believe he can achieve it.”

My grandmother is silent for a long time, her teeth audibly grinding. “I am sorry Keira, I truly am. Please understand that everything I do is in your best interests. That I have to make hard decisions that will protect our family and our kingdom.”

“What do you mean?” A chill runs down my spine.

“No high fae is kind or acts selfless, only for their own interests. They are ruthless, brutal and manipulative. The needs or desires of a human is nothing to them. We are objects to be used. It pains me that yet another man has taken advantage of your gentle heart.”

“No.” I freeze in the middle of the path, right where it opens up to the Priestess’ Sanctuary. “No. The old prejudices were wrong. I met so many high fae and they were not like that.”

“Not like that?” My grandmother grips my arm tightly. “Don’t forget that I made a pilgrimage too, Keira. I hoped you would be spared the rude awakening I had on mine, but it cannot be helped.” I shake my head but she cuts me off. “And don’t tell me that Aldrin is different, because he is not.”

“Aldrin would never—” My voice rises.

“He did child!” She grits her teeth. “He became a crazed, possessive high fae and traveled to this realm to hunt you down. To claim what he believed is his and drag you back to the Otherworld, no matter what you want. He would force you to be his consort.”

The whole world seems to stop as the blood drains from my head. “I don’t believe it.”

“Well, you better believe it, because he is here, as our prisoner,” she barks, anger rippling through her taut muscles as she points a finger at the temple before us.

The pounding of blood in my ears is all I can hear.

Aldrin came for me. He heard me. Every night I cried for him while gripping my moonstone bracelet and called for him to find his way to me. He heard me.

I don’t believe he has transformed into a monster since I last saw him. That he would do anything against my will, the very least that he would drag me away if I didn’t want it.

He physically can’t, not with the blood oath he made to me.

My grandmother watches me closely, examining my reaction. I hold her eye. “Take me to him. I want to speak to Aldrin.”

She lets out a long breath and her shoulders sag. “I will, child. I wish you wouldn't have to endure what I did and see the truth of him, but a bargain is a bargain.”

My grandmother leads me into the priestesses’ sanctuary before I can question her.

It is a natural green bowl carved between tall hills and encircled by dense forest. Dozens of small cottages dot the perimeter of the space, with trails of smoke billowing from their chimneys and flower gardens clinging to the granite masonry. The edges of vegetable patches and orchards peek out from behind the housing.

The temple stands tall in the heart of the Priestess’ Sanctuary, dwarfing all other buildings. It is a hybrid structure, grown from multiple trees with immensely thick trunks and branches that interweave to form walls, with stone blocks filling in the gaps.

Leadlight windows decorate the high reaches of the temple, depicting images of summer, autumn, winter and spring, night and day. Great stone arches and doorways peek out from between barky trunks. A circle of moonstone portals wraps around the temple, connecting priestesses’ sanctuaries from across the kingdom.

It is so similar to a Watchtower Tree in design that pure longing for the Otherworld crashes through me.

There is a crowd around the temple. A ring of priestesses and druids, singing and chanting and funneling their magic into the small aquamarine plinths set into the building at regular intervals. A ward ripples around the temple and I realize this is how they are holding Aldrin.

My stomach turns sick at the thought. Panic grips me at the potential of him being harmed or mistreated. Could he be badly injured? How else could they contain him?

As we near the temple, my grandmother’s grip around my arm tightens. “Keira, don’t allow him to manipulate you with pretty little lies. Open your eyes and see him for what he truly is, just like you did with Prince Finan. Make your peace with it.”

I nod, far too exhausted to argue with her. “I want to speak with him alone.”

My grandmother releases my arm. “I know. He cannot physically harm you.”

I whip my head toward her. “Why? What have you done to him?”

“Oh, nothing yet, but I have my plans. Go inside and see for yourself.” She turns on her heel and stalks off.

Two priestesses guard the double doors of the temple, opening them as I approach.

The large space within the temple is illuminated with bright slices of color, as rays of sun enter through the leadlight windows high above. They cast colorful patterns across the floors, the rows of long benches and the walls. There are sleeping figures laid out across those pews, hidden under their cloaks.

I freeze just inside the doorway.

At the opposite end of the aisle, Aldrin sits on the steps of the dais leading to the altar. He is hunched forward with his elbows braced on his knees, scowling at the ground. His dark hair is pulled up in a knot, and loose strands hang across his beautiful face.

Deep shadows play beneath his eyes, causing the sharp angles of his high cheekbones and his razor-sharp jaw to be thrown into focus.

Those pointed ears I had become so accustomed to almost seem foreign to me after being in my realm for weeks. I swallow the lump in my throat. No part of Aldrin should be foreign to me.

The doors boom shut behind me, and Aldrin finally glances up. When he sees me, his entire body turns rigid and freezes.

“Keira.” He stands, reaching out an arm but not daring to move. “Is it really you?”

It is as though a spell is broken, and I race toward him, barreling into his arms. Aldrin wraps them around me and holds me hard against his chest, kissing my hair and touching my face.

Silent tears run down my cheeks, and I am laughing and sobbing at the same time. I cannot help it. He only crushes me in harder to him, and I finally feel safe wrapped in his strong arms.

“I’m so sorry. Aldrin, I am so sorry I got you into this mess,” I choke out. “I should never have left you. You came for me.”

“Yes. I came.” He brushes my hair from my face. “I heard you calling for me.”

I pull away from him just enough to gaze into his eyes, which soften as they hungrily soak in every detail of my face like a man dying of starvation. “How? How did you hear me?”

He pulls a leather thong from beneath this tunic, and its moonstone pendant glows in the morning light. “I took this from the portal. It is somehow connected to your bracelet. I think.”

I don’t know how that could possibly work, but right now, I don’t care how Aldrin found his way to me, only that he did.