Gossamyr (39 page)

Fear was key. So little she knew, and yet, had thought to know!
What now would become of her? She could never regain her Enchantment
when returning to Faery.

Anger swirled around the fear. If she had known before leaving
that she was mortal, would she still have left Faery? To fight for a
land that was not even her own? So many lies told, all to keep her
from knowing love. The mortal passion. A crime to the fée, but
to a mortal? Was it not a birthright?

As well, pity and a very slippery bit of hope fought with
Gossamyr's darker emotions. Self-pity was not a familiar mien; yet it
stabbed at her gut, weakening her stance. Why her? Why had the Faery
lord chosen to toy with her life?

"I should not have left."

"You wanted to prove yourself," he quickly answered.

"Could you not have sent me to a dangerous task in Faery? A
quest to defeat a root lamia?"

"Gossamyr, you pleaded for this chance. You were the only
choice to send after the Red Lady."

"You mean, your disgruntled lover."

He lifted a gray brow. "You have spoken to her?"

"Spoken? You say it as if I would converse with the bitch
before I destroy her. Curse you, Shinn! I have not. But I know all.
That you two were to be wed. That she was the reason for my being
brought to Faery. That you banished her. It is all because of a
lovers' spat that I now find myself neither here nor there. She—
she is a Rougethorn!"

"Yes."

"I thought her a Netherdred."

"Why?"

"I don't know, I assumed. Where else could something so evil
reside?" In a fée lord's heart? The flickering thought
gave cause to wonder. "I thought it because the Rougethorns
practiced magic— but the only reason you hated Avenall was
because he was from the same tribe as your lover?"

"That is not fair."

"But it is true!"

He splayed his hands between them. Blue-black raven feathers
listed in the breeze. So close she stood, and yet, not too close for
Faery. It was hard for her to step into Shinn's air. "Why did
you two not marry?"

"She dabbled."

"An excuse! You had to have known such before the two tribes
were even brought together with the banns!"

He nodded and sighed, unwilling to speak. Difficult for him? She
would not relent until the truth was hers. It was owed to her. This
may yet be her greatest challenge.

"You must have once loved the Red Lady, to have agreed to
wed."

"Lust, Gossamyr, no more than that. The Red Lady...I was
drawn to her. Compelled by the succubus's song. She is a dangerous
lure to any fée male. But I will not claim lack of defense; I
wanted her. It was a time when the Rougethorns had only begun to
dabble. Discussion to unite the tribes was so new. The Faery elders
believed uniting the tribes would bring the Glamoursiege morals to
Rougethorn, prevent them from following the darker arts of dabbling.
They are no lesser than we...only very few have established alliances
with mortal wizards and witches.

"My sudden distaste for my betrothed had nothing to do with
her dabbling—she did not participate in magic at the time. It
was, as you have learned, the sudden onset of my mortal passion that
turned my lust from her. I had visited the Otherside and fell in love
with Veridienne. 'Twas the first time I knew my feelings for a woman
were true—in the deepest way, the way mortals love—so
unlike the lust I had felt for Circelie."

"Circelie?"

"The Red Lady."

Gossamyr swallowed to hear her father name—so personally—
the enemy she had stalked. An enemy, she realized, who had dabbled in
Gossamyr's very fate.

"Circelie was persistent," Shinn explained, "and
sought my continued affections. And so, when Veridienne was with
child Circelie kissed her; a cursing kiss, you understand. When our
child was born 'twas a changeling."

"That was the child—"

"That I placed in your mortal mother's cradle," Shinn
said.

That he had not named her as the child broke the truth wide open.
Gossamyr began to sink below the surface, groping blindly for hold,
but sensing no matter how hard she struggled, or how long, she would
never simply float. Never again would the mortal air feel light.

"In exchange, we took the female babe lying in the cradle
back to Faery. You, Gossamyr."

She could not conjure the scene. A mortal babe lying alone in a
cradle. Was there not family about? Not a mother's watchful eyes to
protect her babe from mischievous faeries? How had Shinn decided
Gossamyr would be the one?

"You...knew I was healthy?"

"No, we expected you would live but a few days, so sickly you
were at the time. You surprised us both. Never doubt my love for
you."

Turning away from Shinn she looked up to seek the sun, but as it
set so its color was muted and pink. Not bright enough to bring tears
to her eyes. The tears were there, but she sought camouflage. Faery
love was false, a device modeled after the real thing, but never
equal.
Not the same.

"You know it is not the fée nature to love as the
mortals do." Shinn's voice trickled over her scalp. So strange
the fée lilt sounded to her now, and here on the Otherside.
Alien. Not right. She craved the rumbling tones of Jean Cesar Ulrich
Villon III. "We are...fickle."

"Oh, I know that now."

"But you...you knew love, Gossamyr. You have always had the
capacity for it. I saw it in your eyes when you spoke of him. He—
Avenall—woke the love buried in your mortal heart. Which is why
I discouraged your courtship. To love as a mortal, and have your
heart broken, would have proved painful."

She spun on his erratic explanation. "Should that not have
been my decision?"

"I only wanted to protect you. Desideriel Raine is a good
man."

"I know that!" She turned and lowered her head. Picking
at the fur flowing over her left wrist, she could but summon anger. A
bold and furious rush that made her jitter and fist the air. He had
thought it all through so carefully. Thinking to protect her from a
broken heart? Shinn thought only of the political alliance her
marriage would promise Glamoursiege. Desideriel was Wisogoth; the
ancient faery tribe aligned to Glamoursiege only promised a brilliant
future.

To ever keep the Rougethorn taint from Shinn's life had meant
keeping it from hers.

"He excels in battle," Shinn continued. "Desideriel
takes command—-has even bested me more than once—and
shows no hesitation to do so. He is the only choice to lord over
Glamoursiege when I am gone. We have discussed this."

"I do not doubt Desideriel's qualifications—"
...to lord over Glamoursiege...
"You just placed
Desideriel to the throne instead of me? I understand now." She
approached him, anger keeping her stiff, sharpening her words. "You
cannot have a mortal sit the throne and so you must marry her to a
full-blood fée. Have you planned this since the day you
brought me to Faery, Shinn?"

"Not so long as that. Gossamyr—"

She put up a hand, hoping to silence his insincerity in her
booming heart. But those violet eyes gazing upon her with such
sadness, and that sweet hyacinth aura, betroubled her and challenged
her need to remain angry with him.

"I begin to understand the strange workings of your twisted
faery love," she said. "That is why you wish me to marry a
man who can never love me—because I shall never love him.
Hence, the mortal passion would remain buried."

Shinn nodded. "It is for Glamoursiege."

"Indeed. Isn't it always for Glamoursiege? Unless Lord de
Wintershinn finds a mortal woman he can love over the chance to unite
two tribes."

"That is..."

"Not fair? Oh, yes, the fée always require balance.
For every good there requires ill. For every trick a trade. For every
broken heart...what? It is too late. I know love, Shinn. The deep,
gorgeous, and yes, even painful love that faeries fear. You could
never stifle my truth, yet in attempting to do so, you caused the
very tragedy you sought to prevent."

"It was done to protect you, Gossamyr. Should you learn the
truth Time will catch up and... The glamour—"

"You worked a glamour on me? Is that why I wore a blazon,
because of faery glamour? Why? Why not simply return me to my mortal
parents after you saw I was not to die? Should they not have had the
right to raise their own child?"

"The d'Ange family was carefully chosen. They were not to
survive long after your birth."

"Carefully— They did not— D'Ange?"
Unsettled, Gossamyr groped for purchase on nothing more than the air,
but stood without falter. Ulrich, where be he to? She needed him to
stand by her, to support.
It could become romantic, should you
allow it.
"That is the name of the family you stole me
from?"

"Not so much stole, as—"

"Be honest! It is a Faery rite to steal mortal infants to
replace sick changelings. Give and take! Good and ill!"

The feathered cloak fluttered out; beneath, Shinn's wings coiled
open and beat the air once. Trying to maintain calm. Gossamyr knew
that telling sign.
Please, Father,just open up and give to me my
truth!

He gripped the air before him, clenching—keeping back his
truths—but spoke yet with calm. "If Circelie did not tell
you, how then came this knowledge to you? Who revealed your truth?"

"Avenall."

The Faery lord gaped. Not an expression Gossamyr had ever before
seen.

"Yes, my banished lover-to-be has joined forces with your
banished lover. Marvelous, eh? But he does not remember me. Yet you
left your lover with her memory intact, for that is the reason you
now battle the revenants. To think you could have prevented this war
with but your own discretion!"

Yes, wince, she thought. Show me emotion. Confess to your
indiscretions! To your lies!

"Avenall Eloi Papilion," Shinn muttered, marking each
name slowly. "I made it so."

"Of course..."Gossamyr whispered. "Papilion. That
is his name complete. I had...forgotten. The succubus has him in her
erie.
Circelie?" She must remember. And: Avenall Eloi
Papilion. "Avenall does not remember me. And he's changed so
much. And how...how were you able to banish him from Glamoursiege
when he was a Rougethorn?"

"I have command over all who have settled in Glamoursiege.
Avenall has been there since he was very small."

As she had suspected. "Yet, you deemed him unfit for me with
so little time as a Rougethorn?"

"Forgive me, child of mine."

"How can you name me that after all has been revealed?"

"I love you."

"Oh?" His admission meant so little right now. It felt
little more than a tap from a damselfly's wings to her nose.
Irritating, if truth be confessed. "Well, I hate you, Shinn. I
hate you for your lies. I hate you for sending me away. I hate you
for your smugness and your supremacy. And I hate you for the truth!"

The commander lifted his chin, catching the setting sun in a
glitter across his throat. "Your hate, it is just."

Gossamyr stepped around to catch his straying gaze. "So I
will wither and die as a mortal? Is that not the way of all mortals?
Such a truth is not so fearsome."

"Remember, I have always told you to believe."

"Yes, yes."

"You believed you belonged in Faery and that is all required.
The blazon of glamour was yours with Belief. But now...to know the
truth..."

"I have not aged since arriving in the Otherside. Time has
not touched me."

Gossamyr turned away and twisted her head down against her chest.
Tears flowed freely. Shinn would be horrified. Ulrich would dance a
merry jig at her plunge into emotion. But it felt right to cry.
Because she hurt. Deeply. So deep it seeped from her chest and
swelled into her heart and gut. Oh, but the ache had been put there
by the only person she had ever trusted! How many more times would he
wound her with his mistruths and abrupt reactions?

"I should leave," Shinn said softly.

Gossamyr stretched out her arms. "No! We are not finished.
There is much to be said. Twice now you have hurt me with your
indifference. Look at me! You witness my pain. A pain you put here."
She pounded her chest with a fist. The inability to squelch emotion
made her lips shiver as she spoke. "It seeps from my heart,
Shinn."

He tilted his head inquiringly. So dispassionate. "Does not
your hate for me close the wound?"

Cruel, emotionless fée.

Then he did something remarkable. Shinn reached out and touched
her face. He traced the curve of her eye, wetting his fingertip with
her salty pain. Drawing it before him, the sun caught in the glint of
her teardrops.

"Worth so much," she said, challenge sharpening her
tone. "Mortal tears."

"Worth nothing when I am the cause." He swiped his
finger down his cheek, wiping off her tears on his flesh. Briefly,
the salted trail sparkled like his blazon before fading and twinkling
away.

Shaking her head, Gossamyr wept. "I hate you. And..."
She fell to her knees and clutched Shinn's legs. All that she had
known was her father's heart. And for every ill there had been a
right so perfect she had never once doubted his love. "I love
you."

Love and hate. Impossible to separate the two emotions, for they
were alike in intensity. Both birthed from her heart. Both gushed
tears down her cheeks. Both were...so mortal.

Fingers touched her scalp, gently easing into the motion of
comfort. Gossamyr continued to sob, pouring out her loss, her
reality, into her false father's arms.

Shinn knelt and tucked her head against his shoulder. And for a
long time the two embraced, Gossamyr's sobbing filled the air,
salting it and painting it heavily upon her heart. The rose-colored
sky darkened and crickets began to chirp. And with that plunge into
evening, and the release of her pain, Gossamyr settled to a sniffling
acceptance.