“Okay,” she said. “I’ve never had beer before.” Within a few moments, she’d used an illusion to round her ears and add freckles to her nose. “I’m ready.”
Just as Griogair struggled to cope with the loss of his connection to the Ways of Earth, Eilidh floundered without her connection to Munro. She could feel the thread that joined them, even though she could no longer sense his emotions or tell where he was. She hadn’t figured out how to block the connection through meditations. Instead, it happened when she spoke to Griogair. His words had sent her into a panic, and the reaction was instinctual.
Now that she saw how selfishly angry and jealous Munro had become, not even caring what she was going through—her fears for her father, for the future of her people—she wasn’t certain she wanted to open the connection. She sighed. How had everything gone wrong? Why had he become enraged when she needed comfort and shelter?
Griogair was preparing to meet with the azuri conclave, so she wandered the house, not realising at first she hoped to see Munro, sitting stubbornly somewhere, refusing to leave her side. But he had gone. Nightfall approached, and she hadn’t slept all day.
“Where is your druid?” Oron said as he entered the room.
“I don’t know, Elder.” Eilidh explained what had happened, how Griogair’s words shocked her into shutting off Munro. Oron pressed her, so she told him of Munro’s inexplicable emotional outburst and that she’d sent him away.
“You must reopen the connection, Eilidh. You need him. We need
them
.”
“I’m not certain I can cope with his emotions right now. He is wild with fury. I panicked.” She added reluctantly, “He is right to be furious. I don’t know why I said what I did.” It shamed her to realise she had become as out of control as Munro. Her emotions heated purely because he had the temerity to get angry with her.
“Child, sit down.” Oron’s tone was stern, but his expression gentle. “You have neglected your practice lately. At the rate you’re going, it will take you a century to master even the most basic astral incantations.” Eilidh sat on the floor, and Oron joined her. “You are gifted, Eilidh. You have an enormous capacity. I can feel it within you. Yet, you spend much of your time in a human frame of mind. Too much of your youth was wasted, with elders and teachers trying to force you to become something you couldn’t. A century of wrong teaching will take a long time to untangle, but even longer if you hide from it.”
“Yes, Elder,” she said.
“First, open your connection to your druid.”
“I don’t know how.”
Oron reached over and touched Eilidh’s hand. His powerful presence approached her thoughts. “Show me how you cut him off.”
She shifted her focus to the thick vine that represented Munro’s power, and showed Oron the glass wall separating them.
“Bring it down.” Oron’s thoughts pushed on her mind, prodding her forward. “You’ve created it, so unmake it.”
“I’m afraid.”
“Of what consequence is that?”
Eilidh opened her eyes and met Oron’s for just a moment before delving back in. She didn’t want to break the glass. The sharp edges might hurt them both. One thing she’d learned quickly was that when it came to the power of her mind, even symbolic barriers had real perils and should not be quickly dismissed. She could melt the glass, but the heat might burn the vine. “I don’t see how,” she said with frustration.
“How did you erect it?”
“It just appeared,” she said.
Oron squeezed her hand, and she looked up. “Isn’t it obvious?” he asked, his wrinkled face breaking into a smile. “You’re thinking too hard. Life in the human world has taught you to think. Your training as a Watcher taught you to react. When you walk the Path of Stars, you do neither of those things. You must let yourself
feel.
Being fae does not mean not feeling. Being fae means not being ruled by feelings. You need this druid, because he will force you to learn this principle, and quickly.”
Eilidh had spent the first part of her life with her father and others who tried to teach her the Ways of Earth, in which she was extremely weak. Then she spent twenty-five years in exile, trying to do as little magic as possible, doing only what she had to in order to survive. Now she was expected to forget all that. To start over. But being accepted back into the kingdom made her complacent. She hadn’t put as much into her studies as she could have. In the Otherworld, she now had more access to earth magic than most faeries. Only on Skye did she have to work at her magic. “I’ve been lazy,” she said. “I didn’t realise it until today. I’ve spent as much time as possible in the Otherworld and not enough time here learning. Forgive me, Elder. I’ve not been a faithful student.”
“The barrier. Bring it down.” Oron sent a gentle wave of restful energy into her thoughts, bolstering her confidence.
Turning her attention again to the glass, she now looked past it, at the ropey tendril of her bond with Munro. As she drew closer to it, she reached out. The bond pulsed with power, like a strong, throbbing heartbeat. Suddenly he was with her again, and the glass disappeared.
“Well done. Now don’t let anything come between you again. If you keep the barrier up, it will grow more and more difficult to deconstruct,” Oron warned. “We must talk about Griogair.” He stopped. “What is it?”
A sickening sludgy feeling overcame Eilidh. “Something’s wrong with Quinton.” She feared she might heave up what little was in her stomach. “I must go to him,” she said.
Oron used his power to snap her attention to him. “This is a moment for you to learn. Acknowledge the feeling. Don’t be ruled by it.”
“It isn’t mine, Elder. It’s his.”
“All the more reason.”
“He’s sick,” she said, pleading. “Or hurt. Or something. I cannot do nothing.”
“He’s fine,” Oron said. “Alyssa is with him. If he was in trouble, she would have called.”
“Called? Alyssa can mind-speak?”
Alyssa was with him?
A pang of jealousy shot through her heart. She’d been foolish to try to pair them, shamed that she had tested him and was caught doing so, and relieved when it didn’t work. But now she’d pushed him away. Perhaps he would find it better, easier, to be with someone else.
“No,” Oron said. “But she has what they call a mobile telephone.”
“What’s wrong with him?” Eilidh said. What she’d wanted to ask was:
Where are they? What are they doing?
But she reined those thoughts in.
“He’s fine,” Oron said, firmer this time. “Let’s take this opportunity to visualise the difference between his feelings and yours. This has been your difficulty. You take his pleasure, his pain, as your own. The bond is a tool, but it must not own you, or you will lose yourself. Both of you will. Although I suspect your druid is in less danger of that than you are.”
“Because he is human?”
“Because he isn’t confused about what he is. You’ve spent too much of your life wanting to please someone else or trying to hide. Now comes the hard work of growing up. Learn this lesson. If you control your thoughts, your emotions, and see your own potential, you will be the strongest astral fae in five thousand years.”
Eilidh stared, searching Oron’s eyes for some hint he was making a joke.
“Why do you think the queen fears you so, Eilidh? She brought you before her the first time because she heard of your potential, and people in her kingdom were talking about you as a hero.”
“And the second?”
“She was curious about Munro and wanted to see him face to face, to convince herself he was truly just a human. But Griogair’s deception about you being his lover, well, that went too far. A ruse that has likely worked for him in the past, but he misjudged her jealousy.”
“Jealousy? Has he not had many such affairs?”
“He obviously would like others to think so. But it wasn’t physical intimacy that would have worried her. She’s felt for a very long time that Griogair has been plotting against her. She told me in our meeting. What she fears most is that you will ally with him.”
“Me? But I’m her subject. I’m loyal to the crown.”
“Why?”
Eilidh spluttered, “I am fae.”
“Am I not?” Oron asked.
“That’s different.”
“I should remind you,” he said with a laugh, “that you are an exile as well. Twice. And the queen has more reason to fear you—and to hate you. There is no going back, Eilidh. There will be no peace.” Oron sighed. “I had not wanted it to happen this way.”
“Can you not carry on as you have for the past thousand years?”
“Not anymore,” Oron said. “Let us see to our guest. Griogair has much to tell us, I would wager.”
Pain hammered in Munro’s head. He woke, not certain where he was. His perfect night vision showed him he was in a hotel room, and the sound of water running in the bathroom told him he wasn’t alone. The glare of the digital alarm clock pierced his eyes like a knife. It was two in the morning. Sixteen hours since Eilidh told him to go away.
He had only fragmented memory of the previous day and night. Phillip had called, saying he and three of the others were in Portree. They wanted to meet with the azuri fae.
Munro agreed to catch up with him that afternoon at the hotel where they were staying. He knew he had to take them to Oron. He’d given his word, even if Eilidh didn’t want to see him. And maybe, while he was there, he would give her a chance to change her mind. But first he’d wanted a beer. So he and Alyssa found a pub that served lunch, and he had a beer, then another, then another. That was the last thing he remembered.
Alyssa.
Holy crap. What had he done? That was when he realised he wasn’t wearing a shirt. He still had on his jeans, thank god, but
what had he done?
First things first, he told himself. He had to call Phillip. He didn’t want to acknowledge that he planned to call the other druid mostly because he wasn’t ready to think about Alyssa just yet.
The small hotel room had a double bed with a flower-print duvet, a small wooden table with two matching chairs, and artwork bolted to the wall. His phone rested on the table.
Munro moved to one of the chairs and picked up his phone, then scanned his received calls list to find Phillip’s number. “Hey,” he said when the other man answered.
“Look who survived,” Phillip said groggily, sounding like the phone had woken him up. “Didn’t Frankie ever tell you that alcohol and magic don’t mix?”
The thought of his dead cousin jolted Munro. “Yeah,” he said quietly, remembering the day he learned his cousin was a druid too. “I guess I wasn’t paying attention.”
“After last night, I doubt you’ll forget again soon.”
“About that,” Munro said. “I can’t remember entirely. Actually, I don’t even remember seeing you yesterday. I mean, I hope I didn’t do anything stupid.” He winced at the brief silence that followed.
Finally Phillip said, “We’ve all been there. I don’t think a single one of us gave up the drink without a fight. But one bad night, and you learn you aren’t in charge anymore. I’m just glad I met you alone. I think the guys might have freaked out to see you raging like that.”
“I’m sorry, Phillip. Eilidh and I had a fight. I guess I lost the plot a little.”
“No worries, my friend. I’ve been
there
too. If you’re up for it, we can meet in the morning. All of us.”
“If you guys are sure about going ahead with this, it’s better not to wait. There’s some political shit going down with the fae, and nobody knows what’s going to happen. So, better today than tomorrow or next week. Plus, the fae are nocturnal,” he said. “If we wait ‘til morning, we’ll catch them off guard. They don’t sleep that much, but they don’t do official meetings and stuff during the day at all. The night is for work. The day is for sleep, rest, and friends.” Only as he explained it did he really see how much he’d come to be part of their community, even if it was on a part-time basis while he juggled his time with Eilidh and his job.
“Okay,” Phillip said. “I’ll wake the guys. We can meet in the lobby in fifteen, if you’re still at the hotel.”
“Yeah,” Munro said, casting his eyes toward the loo. The shower had just stopped running. She’d come out any minute, and he’d have to go through the humiliating ordeal of asking her what he did or didn’t do. “I’m still here.” They said goodbye and Munro looked around for his shirt. He couldn’t find it anywhere. He started to panic a little. He couldn’t go back to Eilidh half-dressed, and no shops would be open. Maybe he could get Alyssa to cast an illusion of a shirt long enough for him to get to his bag at Oron’s house.
When Alyssa walked in, she was carrying his blue and red striped rugby shirt. “You’re awake,” she said with a smile. “I got the stains out, but it hasn’t had time to dry yet. I wrung it out as best I could.”
“You didn’t have to do that,” he said, embarrassed that the granddaughter of the conclave leader was doing his laundry. “Thank you.”