Enchanted Moon (Moon Magick Book II) (3 page)

Maera
could be next.

Soft
color danced over Maera’s filmy blue dress. For a moment, Ailyn stared, fixated
by the layers, a flurry of wishes rising inside her.

For
a strange moment, time suspended and all serious matters hung with it, light,
airy. Not gone, but weightless. Then Maera stood and walked deeper into the
water. She did not lift her skirts but let them pool on the surface, then sink,
further seducing Ailyn’s gaze.

The
veil’s deep colors whispered over the garment and the water. So tempting. She
stood as well, preparing to physically stop her princess.

“Do
ye ever wonder what would it be like?” Maera said. Her voice sounded far away
and her attention veered to the color-dancing air at the center of the small,
still pond. “A different life. A different birthright?”

Different
birthright? The air shifted. Ailyn’s neck hairs lifted.

“Curiosity
is natural, methinks.” Fear tickled under her breastbone. Ailyn adjusted her
bow so the threads stopped touching her skin. “We dinna have to go back, Maera.
Not yet. But let us away from the portal.” New need to leave took hold of her.
Someone—something—was coming. “Think of the worry we’re causing.”

But
Maera shook her head. “Nay. If I’m to return to where I belong….” She stepped
deeper in. “Will you...” The tips of her wings sank below the surface.

“Will
I what?” she asked past the tremor in her throat, stepping in deeper also.

Maera
pressed a hand to her gut, shaking her head. Ailyn could guess what she wished
for. If only Maera didna have to marry. If only her mother had recovered and
continued her firm rule. Maera’s wings bowed, wetting further. She wouldna be
able to fly.

 
“The guard is on the way. Colm will
arrive at any moment. Let us leave, ’ere they discover us like this.”

Ailyn
took in a gulp of air, tasting the water’s mossy scent, the leaves and the
heather on her tongue. She went deeper into the cold water, halting when Maera
put both hands out. Maera moved in deeper, the water lapping her thighs, her
skirts a wide circle of watery light. “Maera, you cannot.”

“Can
you hear it, Ailyn?”

Her
heart hitched. Hear what? The mad beating of her pulse? The hiss of the leaves?
Desperation gripped her. “Get out of the water, Maera! The cold alone will be
biting off yer toes.”

“The
music, Ailyn. I can feel it in my veins.” Maera closed her eyes for a breath.
When she opened her eyes, they shone bright. “There’s little else I can do,
Ailyn. I wish I could tell you, that I could make you understand. Find Colm.
He’ll understand what to do.”

The
icy water did more than bite. It snarled and cut. Ailyn thrust forward,
reaching for Maera’s arm, intent on yanking her back to shore. Maera dodged,
diving toward the shimmer. Within two strokes, she reached her hand out so that
her fingertips disappeared into the glow. “If it’s true...”

“Stop!”
Fear careened through Ailyn. She dove forward, her footing slipping, and her
balance off. “Maera, stop this madness!”

“There
is much you canno’ know, Ailyn…”

Ailyn
fought to correct her clumsy stroke in the water. The string of her bow clutched
her neck. She had to get to Maera. “Think of your people, Maera!” The icy water
attacked her skin and muscle.

“I
am.”

Heat
radiated off the shimmer in stark contrast to the icy depths beneath. Tossing
off her bow and quiver of arrows, Ailyn stretched her right arm, kicking and
twisting in the water. Her fingers touched Maera’s sleeve. Just one more push
and—

Her
childhood playmate—of a time, her heart sister—glanced back, parted
her lips, and then vanished.

“Maera,
no!
” Ailyn screamed, piercing the
sudden quiet. She dove for the sparkling surface, sweeping her arms wide. She
reached and felt for her friend. “Maera!” she half-sobbed.

Maera
had merely gone under.

Certainly
not through.

Let her be beneath
.

Please,
only beneath!

On
a deep gulp of air, Ailyn dove under. The water yawned around her, swallowing
her up. Her toes found the bottom, and then slipped off. The glow of the veil
lit the pool, showing a tangle of emerald reeds along the murky bottom. No sign
of Maera. Ailyn pushed, twisted, and searched for some glimpse of skirts. Her
lungs began to burn. She needed to surface. But a slip of milky blue snared her
hopes. She pushed toward it.

Her
chest felt afire. She needed air. She kicked hard, panic pulling her down.
Closer. So close. She reached out, almost touching the thin softness, readying
to yank it upward with her. But the material slipped through her fingers and
survival took over. Cursing Maera for her recklessness, Ailyn swam upward.

She
broke the water’s surface gasping and coughing. The icy water seemed impossibly
colder, or was it the frosty air on her face? “Maera?” The glow of the veil was
gone. Nothing but shadows and darkness met her eyes, a flickering of a faint,
distant light beyond the trees.

“My
liege?” she called again, her voice raspy. She got no answer.

Taking
a new chestful of air, she dove back under. But the light was gone. Naught but
inky darkness met her. She swam anyhow, reaching, feeling for a limb or fabric
until again her protesting lungs forced her to surface. “Maera!” she shouted.

Only
the echo of her voice answered. She strained to hear more, and a low hum teased
her ears. Ailyn pressed her shaking lips together and swam toward the shore. In
the distance between the trees, a light flickered. Taking one more searching
glance around her and finding no signs of life, she saw little else to do but
head toward the light.

Chapter Three

A
clear head would keep Ailyn alive. Were her brother here, Colm would bark
orders and demand her to focus. “Mind yer training,” he would command. She
repeated those words now, over and again, vowing she would find Maera in the
darkness and drag her back home.

What
if the princess had crossed over?

No.

The
notion of Maera vanishing into the forbidden sphere of men, of pure barbaric
evil, physically sickened her. There must be another answer. She must yet be
here in the Fae realm. Somewhere. Perchance she’d surfaced and made escape
while Ailyn had been under the water.

Ailyn
elbowed her way onto a bank. Her hands touched hard, frosty ground. Too hard.
Too cold. She dismissed the white lacey pattern on the ground and squinted in
the shadows. Where were her bow and quivers? Taken?

What
could be so dire to warrant Maera abandoning her people? Even Maera’s questions
spoke the truth. No faerie could survive passage, and only a mad one would want
to. The act not only violated Fae laws, but pure Fae blood alone could
penetrate the separation.

Hundreds
of years of lore passed down to each generation warning against the magick of
the veil couldna be based on lies. The veil itself did not scare Ailyn, though.
Neither did the actuality of passing through it. What sent her mind reeling was
Maera taking her own life—as well as her people’s—under such little
consideration.

Either
her princess was a betrayer, or graver matters were at hand in her country than
she ever could have guessed.

Maera
wouldn’t cross over. Would she?

Despite
the fear punching her stomach, Ailyn forced herself to stay on her feet, bare
and numb or not. She had to get back to the keep, to tell Colm, to find help.
Colm would know what to do.

She
struggled to her feet, thankful for the protection of her leather leggings and
cursing herself for taking off her boots. Where were her boots? Gone as well.
Fatigue in her limbs combined with the cold numbed her movements. A sodden
dress would have weighed her down. Thank Morrigan for small boons like a
guard’s garb on a madness-filled night. She would laugh at the ludicrous string
of events, but a low internal voice warned to keep her wits about her.

Not
a hint of the veil’s shimmer remained. Whether through the now-closed portal or
through the wood, Maera was clearly gone. Every passing moment brought a new
wave of dread. As much as she hoped for the latter, Ailyn knew, deep in her
belly, she’d lost her either way.

With
a ragged sigh, she wrung out the edges of her tunic, scanning the glade. The
faint light in the distance might be fire. A wood tribe celebrating the light
of the moon? Her teeth chattered and her fingers were stiff as she unsheathed
her dagger, amazed she’d not lost the blade in her panic.

Mayhap
it was the guard? Surely enough time had passed to allow Colm to realize that
Ailyn had not returned. He would gather the guard and remember she’d suggested
the glade. Or he’d believe she’d been taken, too. By whom? Who had he thought
took Maera? Oh, no! Why had she not recognized that he might believe Maera had
not left of her own free will? Thoughts careened through her head. The
ramifications of her missed chance welled like the waters, threatening her very
breath.

Regardless,
the fire called to Ailyn’s freezing, trembling body.

She
strode toward the glow with purpose, ignoring the fact that her chin trembled.
Tears were not allowed. She replayed the moments again. Maera’s strange words.
Colm’s even stranger words. Ailyn finding her here. Maera reaching out. The
bottom of the pool dropping off as Ailyn went under. What if Maera had drowned?

Nay,
she’d not consider it.

She
listened for hoofbeats, for an echo of voices of the guard, keenly aware of
what a pitiful example she’d made of their ranks. Naught but her own ragged
breaths and…a low beating? A moon rite, then. The fire didn’t belong to the
guard. Would she be welcomed? New anxiety bloomed. She continued forward,
resting a hand on the rough, spotted bark of the nearest tree.

Standing
around, about to freeze, would help no one. She must find Colm. What she’d tell
him, she knew not. Not yet. She headed toward the low, beating sound. Drums and
a faint hum. Ailyn forced one leaden leg in front of the other, ever aware that
not all Fae supported the queen. She might find aid and warmth. As easily, she
might find fists.

The
princess that Ailyn knew did not act rashly. Even as a child, Maera hastened
from whimsy and fear.

“My
liege, are you there?” she asked the night air, though she knew no answer would
come.

What
had happened this night to rend everything so wrong? The princess lost her
mother. Colm suspected more, though. As his sister, Ailyn should have demanded
answers. This was his fault. If he’d but listened to her, he’d at least know to
look in the glade.

Nay,
it was her fault. She’d not chased into the pool soon enough. Moreover, year by
year, she’d let a childhood friendship fade as her friend’s duties grew. Year
by year, Ailyn learned deference for her place in respect to Maera’s. That
deference made her hesitate this night. Or perhaps, that old friendship had
caused the inner pause she now so sorely lamented.

Emotion
thickened in her throat. The fire’s light became a beacon. Even a fight she’d
welcome over this keening remorse. Ailyn wound through the trees, blade ready.

What
would she tell Colm? The truth. She’d lost Maera. In fact, Maera might have
passed into the human realm. How would they ever locate her? The veil did not
simply appear. Only under the power of the moon and goddess did rarely blossom.
What would Colm do? Say? Blame her. Kill her. Never speak to her again. She
never should have joined the guard. What had the queen been thinking?

Oh,
aye, Ailyn knew what Tullah had thought. That Ailyn’s mage skills were so
pitiful, the queen had to place her somewhere, underfoot as she’d become four
years past.

This
night proved that she was adequate at best.

The
hum—a chant—beckoned her closer, but in her belly a warning
weighed. Something wasna right. She knew little of the woodlanders’ moon rites,
so she could not specify what felt…off. She listened for further signs of
magick, something to confirm if danger lurked near. Nothing within the woods
gave her answers, though. Naught but drumming and chanting met her senses.

These
woods should have been denser, it seemed. She looked for the familiar, though
certainly years of growth meant the area would not match her memory. The knoll
to the north should be here. But rather than craggy outcroppings, the land
leveled out. This did not look, nor did it feel, like home. Dread rooted deeper
into her belly.

She’d
not crossed too...had she?

Nay.
Wasna possible. The shock of the water, of Maera’s actions, must have
disoriented her.

The
idea edged in further, though. What if Ailyn had crossed the veil? Not Maera at
all, but her? What if she now stumbled through the land of man, ripe for
barbarian hunting? She had no nobility in her blood to speak of, though. Not
even plain wings. To have passed the veil defied law and logic.

Skin
skirts and bones for jewelry. Hunted down and killed for magick she only
sported traces of. Useful for naught but court tricks.

She
gripped her dagger tighter, pressing her cold lips together. No protection
enchantments warmed the jeweled handle here. And no weaponry to cast a new one
over it. No Maera. No Colm. No comfort. No disappointment. Horrors instead.

“Maera,”
she hissed in the dark.

Nothing.
She shivered on the inside rather than the out.

She
should run. To where? The portal had closed. The fire was her best hope for
aid, and its light willed her to come closer. To warm her bones. To survive.
Was there any other way to survive? Her muscles ached under the cold breeze.
Her body needed that warmth and her legs moved forth of their own accord. She
paused at a small copse of trees for her concealment. The sight before her
drove her two steps back.

Aye,
crossed she had.

No
doubt could remain after seeing the ten—nay, more like
twenty—painted, bare-chested bodies dancing around the wide bonfire.
Broad shoulders, heavy bellies, swollen painted breasts. Stacked wood in the
shape of a man, branches for arms and antlers upon its head, stood in the
center. Flames climbed up its limbs. Light danced in its hollow mouth and eyes.
Shrill chanting rang in the air. Barbarians!

Even
from half a furlong away, the heat of the bonfire tickled her face. Her body
cried out to be closer. Even her mind hatched hopes, conjuring reasonable ways
to get to the warmth. Perhaps this was a tribe, a moon rite. Perhaps she was
safe. Nay. She wasn’t. She couldn’t.

She
had to go back. She must cross back somehow. Colm could not lose her. All they
had left was each other.

The
bare chests and bellies writhed in beat with the music, and if not for the
warning in her gut, Ailyn might be seduced into dancing herself. The low beat
whispered into her body and her heart skipped to match it. What had she trod
onto?

She
had to go back. Colm would know what to do. Mayhap she would find Maera at the
water’s edge, calling her name, frantic and eager to return, too.

“Have
ye the sacrifice?” a deep bellow called out.

The
gatherers hollered in answer. Ailyn retreated another step, yet her eyes
riveted to the scene. Two men carried over a trough laden with something dark
and lumpy, their masks ominous in the dancing shadows. One, broad-nosed, wide
horns on either side. The other, an oversized horse head. The light caught the
contents of the trough.

Severed
animal parts. Blood.

Ailyn
choked back a gag and clutched at her stomach.
Run
! Every part of her cried for escape. Yet her legs fixed to the
ground as surely as if vines had reached up and tangled around her calves.
Run
. She couldn’t. Her gaze clung to the
silhouette upon the trough. The bumps and curves. So small, broken-looking. Every
whispered childhood tale came crashing forth.
They will steal you just to boil your bones. They’ll feed on your flesh
and cackle with glee over having killed a faerie.

They’ve no magick left.
They want ours.

The
chanting rose.

What
would Maera do, were she here after all? She would be soaked through, wearing
her layered gown, possibly hurt. She’d head straight to the fire. Maera would
seek help. Maera clearly could not assuage the danger that fire might
represent. If she could, she’d never have gambled with the veil. Ailyn had to
find her.

Ailyn
scanned the gathering and the trees for signs of her princess. The men lifted
the trough high. The flames rose to the sky where the full moon hung low. Ailyn
stumbled backward, coming up against a tree. A gnarly branch snuck around her
waist. Another around her face, choking off her full-lung scream. The branch
squeezed, cutting off her air supply. The tree dragged her back.

“Shh,”
a voice said against her neck. “They’ll hear you.”

Nay!
Not a tree. Worse. A man.

Her
scream died. Flashes of an all too similar scene sprang forth. The memory
receded. Here and now took hold instead. The man’s hand mashed her lips to her
teeth, blocked her nostrils. She fought to breathe, shaking her head. Her arms
were braced, too, immovable. She couldn’t even stab her dagger backwards enough
to damage him.

“Sshhhh,”
he demanded again near her ear. “I’ll not hurt ye. Be still.”

His
voice vibrated through her. Her chest quickly recalled the panic from the
water. She needed air. Ailyn shook her head, opened her mouth, and tried to
bite him. He loosened his grip. She inhaled deeply.

“Better?”

So
grateful for the air, she nodded, relaxing the tiniest bit. Enough to placate
him. He was holding her, but had not tried to kill her. Nor rape her. Yet.

“I’ll
release you if you’ll promise to be silent.”

Release
her? What was his game?
I like it when
you resist
. The memory snuck back through.
Run, Ailyn!
She shook off the echoing words and weighed her
options. At the first opportunity she would duck, twist, and flip him onto his
back. Within seconds, her blade would slit his throat. Then run she would. As
far as her legs would take her.

To
him, she nodded. The moment his arm relaxed, she executed the spin and twist
Colm had drilled into her for months. The man landed on his back with a grunt.
Ailyn pounced, landing on his broad chest and aiming for his throat. He blocked
her blade and rolled atop her instead, pinning her arms above her head. His
breaths came in hard, steaming puffs on her face. The moonlight and distant
fire illuminated his face. Two glittering amber eyes searched hers.

Ailyn’s
voice caught. Her involuntary scream came out a squeak.