Anne Kelleher - Silver's Bane

He still moved like a sidhe, she thought as she perched on the chair’s hard edge, but she noticed that a furrow had appeared between his brows.

“Nessa,” he said gently. “I’m not sure what’s happening right now in Faerie, but nothing I can imagine is good. Finuviel—the one who stabbed me, who came to your forge with Cadwyr—Finuviel is Vinaver’s son, my own sister’s son. It wouldn’t surprise me if the two of them have been planning this for a very long time, and saw Alemandine’s pregnancy as an opportunity to strike while the Queen was at her weakest. I don’t think he only intended the dagger for me. I think it’s clear he made a bargain with this Cadwyr that Sir Uwen speaks of with such dislike—the dagger, in exchange for the host that Finuviel was supposed to lead to the border. After I found that amulet, before I met Finuviel, I came to a place beside the river where it appeared a great army had ridden across. It didn’t occur to me then they might have ridden into the water and come out in the same way you did, here in Shadow. So the questions have become, where’s Finuviel, where’s the host, and where’s the Caul, for Finuviel must’ve taken it in order to bring the silver dagger into Faerie. For all I know, Alemandine may be dead, and Finuviel already King. And as you say, it’s better that I leave. I’ll go at dawn. It’s at dusk the goblins hunt.” For a split second, he smiled, but then his face darkened, and he looked old, careworn and tired. He paused, drew a deep breath, then continued. “I’ll do what I can to find your parents, Nessa, but you must understand that I don’t know what’s waiting for me. Those goblins that came last night, Nessa, I’ve never seen anything like them. Oh yes, I saw them. I went to the top of the tower. There were so many. I’m not sure there’s magic enough in Faerie to stand against them.”

But silver still works, she thought, fingering Dougal’s amulet as an idea occurred to her. There wasn’t much time, and she was tired, but if she used a sword that only needed repair—she’d have to see what she could find. She leaped to her feet and headed for the door. “Do you know where to find the forge?” She’d have to satisfy her curiosity about the corn grannies and their rituals another night.

He looked startled. “The forge? Where the blacksmiths work?”

“Stop there before you leave? Please?” She only waited long enough to ensure that he nodded, and then she skipped down the steps, curiously more lighthearted than she had felt in days.

The afternoon was fading into twilight, when Merle paused on the threshold of the tower room overlooking the western sea. A storm was brewing, and the sound of the surf as it pounded against the rocks that formed the foundation of the house her father had so graciously provided was louder up here for some reason than in her own solar on the floor below. Then a wet breeze licked her cheek and she turned to see her husband’s outline, black against the garish lines of red and violet light flooding through the gray-streaked clouds. “Hoell? My love?” She spoke tentatively, for ever since their perilous escape from the horrible things that had driven them from Brynhyvar, she could not quite believe that not only had they both escaped the fiends, but that Hoell, her one true love and anointed King of Brynhyvar, had come back to himself. He was no longer the meek and gentle creature he’d become as a result of their child’s death. Their first child’s death, she thought, placing her hand on her swelling abdomen. It could happen to anyone, she thought. Lots of people lost children. She felt a feeble flutter against the thick silk of her new chemista and she smiled. Swim, little fish, swim.

But it worried her more than she wanted to admit to find him sitting alone in the dark, leaning so far out the open casement that his hair was damp with spray. But his expression reassured her, as did his words of sweetly accented Humbrian, “Ah, here you are, Merle. Come sit a moment. The sunset’s splendid, don’t you think?”

“My love, aren’t you cold?” But she edged closer, curling her cold fingers around his surprisingly hot hand.

“Come, I’ll warm you.” He folded her against his chest, snuggling her against him so that she felt the beating of his heart against her shoulder. The sea looked angry as it lashed against the rocks and the sky was streaked with red. It reminded her of the blood dripping down the gray stone walls of Ardagh. She still heard the screaming of the dying and the screeching of the sidhe in her dreams. It was one of the reasons her father had given them this house. Only the insistent rhythm of the waves washing over the rocks soothed her. She closed her eyes and turned her face away, willing herself to relax into the circle of his embrace.

“I don’t know what you like to look at up here,” she said. “There’s nothing to see but the water and the sky.”

“Maybe you’re right.” She could feel his breath through the linen of her veil, hot against her scalp. It reminded her of all the nights they’d lain in her bed during his madness, when he’d clutched her to his chest like a little boy. “But when I sit here, and the light is right, I think I see Brynhyvar, sitting out there like a purple jewel, right across—” he extended their arms, folding his hand over hers, pointing with his index finger “—there.”

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