I petted his shoulder the way you’d comfort a friend. “It’s all right, Aisling; I’ve looked into your face and I’m not befuddled, I swear.”
“Look at me,” Doyle said.
“No.”
“Aisling, look at me.”
He lowered the one hand just enough to gaze over it at Doyle. “You have not harmed me, Aisling.”
He closed his eyes and whispered, “You don’t understand.”
Doyle put a hand on either side of Aisling’s face and gave him all the concentration out of those black eyes. “Drop your hands, Aisling, drop them.”
Those spiral eyes were too wide, almost wild like a horse that is about to bolt, but he slowly let the other hand fall away. Doyle held his face between those two, big, dark hands and gazed directly into his face. “You do not have to hide from us, my friend.”
I touched his arm and said, “You don’t have to hide anymore, Aisling, not from us.”
Aisling started to tremble, and then to shake as if he were freezing cold instead of kneeling in the warm sunshine. One single silver tear trailed down from the corner of his eye, and then another, until the tears seemed to be racing down his face. Doyle rose high on his knees and kissed him on the forehead.
Galen came to kneel on the other side of Doyle, and when he moved his hands from Aisling’s face, Galen kissed his forehead, too. “You’re safe,” he said.
I hugged Aisling. “You are safe with us.”
His shoulders started to shake, and then he started to cry almost hysterically. His arm came around me and around Galen on the other side, so that he held all three of us with Doyle in the middle, and we held each other and we held him, and let him cry.
The Red Caps and sidhe who had been about to have a fight all trooped back into the house quietly, faces averted for the most part. Only Jonty risked a look; he nodded at me, and I nodded back. We were left alone in the warm sunlight, with the smell of eucalyptus filling the dream of eternal summer with a crisp, healing scent. We laid everyone’s discarded shirts underneath the shade of the big tree, so we wouldn’t be lying on the scratchy, dry grass, and put Aisling in the center of us, so that we could all touch his bare upper body. We petted and stroked him, not as lovers do, but just to fill the terrible skin hunger that he’d had to deny for so long. Babies who don’t get enough touch will fail to thrive and die, even if they are well fed and otherwise well cared for; touch is so much more important than most people want to admit.
We touched his back and shoulders at first, and then he rolled over and we ran our hands over his chest and stomach. The three of us gazed into the spiral of his eyes, traced his face with our fingertips. I got within inches of him until I could see that the black spiral lines were formed of tiny birds all flying out of his eyes. I remembered that moment in the dead gardens when his body seemed to have exploded into tiny songbirds. I traced the line of his cheek and said, “Have the spirals always been tiny birds?”
“Not in a very long time,” he said, softly.
Galen peeked over the top of his head, so that he was staring at him upside down from inches away. “I don’t remember them ever being tiny birds.”
Aisling laughed, and it filled his face with a joy that I had never seen there; even behind his veil he had been a solemn man.
“It has been longer than your lifetime, Galen, since Aisling had birds in his eyes,” Doyle said.
The happy glow faded around the edges, and then without looking at any of us, he said, “Would you unbind my hair and … touch it, please?”
I glanced at Doyle and Galen. They both nodded, and Galen smiled. We had Aisling sit up so that we could take out the pins that held all those small braids tight to his head. Even with three of us doing it, it took a while to undo all the braids. We ran our fingers through the gold and blond of his hair. It didn’t shine with its own light the way Fenella’s hair did, but it gleamed, catching every bit of light that filtered through the leaves above us.
His hair fell in ankle-length waves, thick and warm, not as soft as Galen’s, or Frost’s, or even Rhys’s, closer to Doyle’s texture. Aisling lay down on his stomach and let us pet and play with all that shining hair until we made a cloak of it fanning out around him.
He gave a deep, contented sigh and rose up on his elbows. “Some of the nobles of the Seelie Court contacted me. They offered me the throne.”
“When?” Doyle asked.
“A few days ago.”
“Why did you wait to tell us?” Galen asked.
“Because I thought you would cast me out, and I have nowhere left to go.”
I smoothed his hair back, piling it into my lap like a pet, until I could see the side of his face. “I would not cast you out for the machinations of other nobles. You have no more control over the different factions within the courts than I do.”
He glanced at me. “You aren’t angry?”
“No,” I said.
“You have two factions within the Seelie Court that want you on the throne.”
“Sir Hugh’s contingent and the king himself, but I know that there are Seelie nobles as there are Unseelie nobles who see me as unfit for either throne.”
“They fear that your mortal blood will steal away their immortality as it did on the dueling grounds.”
“I know that, and honestly for all I know they may be right.”
Aisling looked at me, obviously surprised. “You’re worried about it, too, then.”
“Yes.”
“Will you take the throne then?”
“The Goddess and faerie itself crowned Doyle and me as rulers of the Unseelie Court, but the Seelie sithen did not recognize me when I entered it.”
“You were part of the wild hunt, Merry; you can’t be queen of any court and lead the hunt,” Doyle said.
“You mean ever?” I asked.
He smiled and shook his head. “No. When you ride with the hunt, especially if you are the huntsman, it is your only title. You lay the crown aside to lead it, and pick it back up only if you give up being the huntsman.”
“You were the huntsman once, I remember you said so.”
“I was, but not of the same wild hunt that you and Sholto led.”
“I never saw more than one wild hunt and that was the sluagh,” Galen said.
“As there were once many more faerie mounds, so with the wild hunts,” Doyle said.
“I remember when Darkness led his own wild hunt and was the huntsman for our queen,” Aisling said.
Doyle stroked a hand through the other man’s hair. “You are older than I am, my friend; you would remember.”
“What did you tell the nobles who offered to make you king?” I asked.
“I told them I would not betray you, or Doyle.”
“What did they say to that?” I asked.
“They told me to think upon it before answering.”
“If you want the throne, Aisling, take it,” I said.
He looked startled. Doyle said, “Merry!”
I stroked the hair so gold and warm in my lap. “No, Doyle, you’ve seen how some of the Seelie nobles treat me. They’ve come here in hopes that I can help them get with child, and many of them still treat me like some mongrel. People follow you for only three reasons; love, fear, or loyalty. No one at the Seelie Court loves me, or fears me, and I’m not certain there’s much loyalty to anything there except whatever, or whoever, will further their own pursuit of power.”
“Lord Hugh wants a baby with his lady,” Doyle said.
“But he also wants to be close to the throne, and if he put me on it, he would be,” I said.
“There has never been a welcome for Merry and me at the Seelie Court,” Galen said.
“Are you both serious that Merry should just give up the golden throne?” Doyle asked. He was looking from one to the other of us.
We both nodded. “Besides, Doyle, the Seelie sithen recognized Aisling when the Seelie first came to this country. Taranis exiled him; because of that his own sithen wanted to crown a new king. The sithen has already chosen Aisling as king; let it stand.”
“What if the sithen has changed its mind after over two hundred years?” Aisling asked.
“Then you will be welcome back here in the Western Lands,” I said.
“Aren’t we forgetting something?” Galen said.
“What?” I asked.
“The king would have to be dead for Aisling to take this throne.”
“That works for me,” I said.
“Me, too,” he said.
“Me, three,” Doyle said.
“If I agree, it seems like a plot,” Aisling said.
“I’ve wanted him dead since he took Merry,” Galen said.
“Oh, yes,” Doyle said.
“For hurting Merry I would happily slay him, too,” Aisling said.
“If the sithen still wants you as its king, then be the king of the Seelie, Aisling. The sithens will let a hereditary monarchy rule, but the start of every lineage is chosen by each kingdom. I believe that when we stopped letting the land choose its own ruler, that was the beginning of our decline as a people.”
“When the Irish stopped letting the great stone choose their kings, that was the beginning of their undoing, as well,” Doyle said.
I stroked his arm, because I knew that his people had been among the Irish and he still felt for how much they’d suffered at the hands of the English, though I’d only learned his feelings on it in the last year. Doyle had been such a mystery, not just to me but to most of the court. He had been the captain of the guard, and the Queen’s Darkness, her left hand, her assassin, but it was as if all that had kept him from having feelings, or being entirely real. In his own way, Doyle had been as lonely as Aisling.
“You would truly let me take the golden throne, when you could unite the two thrones of the sidhe for the first time in centuries?”
“It’s a pretty thought that I could unite us, but I think there is too much fear and hatred between the Darkling throng and the golden one. Oh, Aisling, six of the noble houses declared themselves against me. I’m not certain I can safely rule even the Unseelie throne, but I know that the Seelie throne is too dangerous for me and the babies, and the men I love. I would not risk all that I hold dear for any throne, so be king if you can; the sithen has chosen you and that should stand.”
He studied my face and finally said, “You really are the most extraordinary person, Merry.”
“I am a practical person in this, or a selfish one. I do not wish to lose any more of the people I love, not just for power.”
“That’s right, you and Doyle both gave up the Unseelie crowns given to you by faerie itself to save Frost’s life.”
We smiled at each other, and we reached out at the same time to take each other’s hands, which made us smile more. “What is more important than love?” Galen said.
We looked at him, and I held my other hand out to him. He took it with a smile. “Nothing,” I said.
“I’ll disagree,” Aisling said.
We all looked down at him where he still lay propped up on his elbows. “What’s more important than love?” I asked.
“Safety,” he said.
We were all silent for a moment, and then we all nodded. “The power to keep that which you love safe,” Doyle said.
“It always comes back to power,” Aisling said. “It has to, because without power you can’t protect what’s yours.”
“I can’t argue with you,” Galen said, “but damn, that was a mood killer.”
We laughed, even Aisling. “You are charming, Green Knight.”
“It’s part of my magic.”
Aisling looked up at him. “Truly?”
Galen nodded. “Apparently.”
“To be charming in a friendly way, not a romantic way?” Aisling asked.
“Yes.” He smiled, and shrugged. “I think it’s what helped me not get killed in a duel years ago. People just liked me, even when I was a political disaster and didn’t have enough powerful friends to protect me.”
I drew Galen down to me so we could kiss, and said, “I’m so glad you’re magically likable; I would have missed you.”
He grinned. “I love you, our Merry.”
“And I love you, too, my Galen.”
“I’m jealous,” Aisling said.
We all looked at him. He added hastily, “I don’t mean of Merry in particular, but of your being in love, and being able to lie with a woman. I haven’t dared break my long fast for fear of bespelling some poor woman.”
“I guess it is ironic that to be safe to have sex with anyone, you’d need the woman to already be in love with someone else.”
“Something like that,” he said, and gave a half laugh, but it was more bitter than happy.
Doyle patted his back. “I’m sorry, my friend.”
I remembered why I’d wanted to talk to Aisling. I told him about Bryluen’s effect on Rita the nanny. He sat up, spilling his hair all around him, face serious as he listened. “It is highly unusual for one so young to exhibit such powers.”
“So you didn’t have to worry about hiding your face when you were a baby?”
“No, not until I reached my teens, and then the year that I grew six inches, my shoulders filled out, and I suddenly looked more my age, and that was the beginning of this. I thought I was just very good with women, and then I started attracting women I didn’t want to attract, and we began to figure out what was wrong.”
“Your power is the closest to what Bryluen is doing; can you see if you sense anything?” I asked.
“I will happily look at the baby, but I’m not sure what I can tell you; as I said, my powers didn’t manifest until I was in my teens. It’s very unusual that both your daughters would be displaying powers almost from birth.”
“They are going to be very powerful,” Doyle said.
“I believe you are right,” Aisling said. He began to gather his hair back from us, and to braid it almost absentmindedly. “I will need a covering for my face before I go to the nursery.”
We finally used the remains of Doyle’s shirt to make a mask that went around his lower face and tied securely enough to make Aisling happy with it. He left his hair in two long, thick braids. It reminded me of the way Saraid had worn her hair, though his was longer and seemed thicker. I hadn’t petted her hair, so I wasn’t sure on the thickness. We walked toward the house with Doyle and Galen holding my hands. Galen held out his hand to Aisling. I couldn’t be certain, but I thought he was smiling under the white mask when he took the offered hand. We walked four abreast out of the practice circle, and as soon as we left the magical spell that kept the reporters from seeing inside it, we heard a yell of, “Hey, Princess!”