Lord of the Fading Lands (The Tairen Soul Book 1)

Water pure, the path to cleanse

Blood to bindings call

Tairen’s Eye to forge the bridge

Azrahn these souls enthrall.

—Magecraft Seeking Spell

The coast was clear at last.

Night had fallen. Ellie’s parents and the twins had turned in for the night, and the Fey who’d been swarming around the Baristani house seemed to have finally left. Ellie could no longer even sense the tingling awareness of their presence.

She secured a brown shawl over her distinctive hair and slipped out her bedroom window, careful not to let the leather boots hanging about her neck bang against the glass or windowsill. While the Fey warriors outside the house might be gone, the five who’d followed her into the house and declared themselves her ‘quintet’ were still very much in attendance. They’d stayed despite Mama’s outrage, despite even Papa’s coming home and ordering them to leave his house.

Faced with the direct order from Papa, the Fey called Bel- hard had merely bowed and politely refused, just as he had with Mania. He’d offered to make himself and the other four Fey invisible, so as to minimize the family’s discomfort with their presence, but the idea of invisible magical beings roaming through her house had nearly sent Mama into palpitations.

‘Thank you, but no,’ Papa had answered. ‘We would rather see you so that we may know where you are.’ And then, to Ellie’s surprise, he’d demanded that the Fey swear an oath of honor not to use magic to hide their presence in his home, and not to read nor influence the minds of any of his family members.

The demand had obviously surprised Belliard vel Jelani, but he’d sworn the oath, first in lyrical Feyan, then in the formal eloquence of ancient Celierian court-tongue. Ellie knew enough about Fey honor to know that no Fey would go back on his sworn word.

Papa had also tried to get Belliard to swear not to call magic for any reason inside the house, but the Fey refused to do that. ‘Nei, honored one, we may need to use magic to protect the Feyreisa and her family. I will make no vow that puts her at risk.’ And that had been the end of it.

Ellie’s bare feet made no noise on the wooden shingles as she crept across the back-porch roof and climbed down the ivy trellis to the small, bricked courtyard at the back of the house. She kept to the shadows, avoiding the brightening moonlight in the hope that no one would notice her furtive departure.

Just before supper, one of the neighbor children had smuggled a note to Ellie through Lillis and Lorelle. From Selianne, Ellie’s best friend, the note had been scrawled in a shaking hand and read: Meet me. You know where. Twenty-two bells. URGENT!!!!

Selianne’s fear all but leapt off the parchment as Ellie held the note. Her terror was understandable. A few years back, as Selianne had prepared for the birth of her first child, her mother, Tuelis, had confessed that she wasn’t Sorrelian as everyone assumed, but that she’d actually been born and raised in Eld and sold in marriage to her sea-captain husband at age fourteen. Selianne had kept her mother’s secret. She’d only told Ellie in a moment of fear, when she’d been plagued by nightmares of Eld Mages stalking her son Bannon to steal his soul.

Now, with Rain Tairen Soul in the city and suddenly becoming a fixture in Ellie’s life, Selianne was probably terrified that he would find out the truth about Selianne and her mother and come to kill them. Despite the risk of discovery, there was no way Ellie could ignore Selianne’s summons.

On the ground, she ducked into the deeper shadows of a small alcove near the courtyard gate and bent to don her boots. When she rose, she let out a strangled cry.

Belliard vel Jelani stood before her, his Fey skin shining faintly, his dark eyes watchful. ‘You wish to go somewhere, Ellysetta Baristani?”

‘I …’ Her cheeks burned with embarrassment. Behind Belliard stood the other four Fey of her quintet, each wearing a similar blank but watchful expression. ‘I wanted to go for a walk to get some fresh air.”

Belliard glanced at the ivy trellis behind her and followed the path she’d taken out her bedroom window, then returned his flat gaze to hers. ‘You are the Feyreisa,’ he said. ‘You need only to ask, and we will accompany you to your chosen destination.”

She paused a moment to regain her composure, then lifted her chin. ‘I’m going to meet a friend, and your presence will only alarm her.”

‘We will accompany you, all the same. You are Rain Tairen Soul’s truemate, and all the city knows it. There are those who might think to harm the Fey through you.”

For a moment, Ellie considered heading straight back to her room, but she couldn’t just leave Selianne waiting at the museum. Remembering the way her father had bargained with the Fey warriors earlier, Ellie gathered her courage and said, ‘If you insist on coming, Ser vel Jelani, you must swear an oath of honor that you’ll give my friend and me privacy. No eavesdropping or mind reading.”

Belliard’s expression never wavered. ‘Aiyah, Ellysetta Baristani. I do so vow’ When her gaze flickered to the four Fey behind him, he added, ‘I speak for all of your cha’kor, your quintet. We are here not to spy, but to protect.”

She took a deep breath. ‘Well, let’s go, then. I don’t want my friend to worry.”

Surrounded by her escort of five leather-and-steel-clad immortals, Ellie hurried down the alleyway, then turned east on the lane that ran through the West End’s quiet merchant district. Fire-lit lamps cast a golden glow over the cobblestones and storefronts.

‘Do you climb out of your bedroom window often, kem’falla?’ Belliard asked as they walked.

Ellie felt her cheeks heat up. ‘No.’ Her parents were sound enough sleepers that she usually went out the kitchen door. ‘But this is not the first time you have done so.”

‘Not the first time, no.”

‘I had not thought Celieria’s daughters were so … adventurous”

‘Most aren’t.’ If her parents had known she slipped out of the house at night, they would have put an immediate stop to it. But the nightmares that plagued her all her life made sleep difficult, and alone in the silence of the small bells, Ellysetta had often found peace by walking in the night air. At first she’d kept to the private courtyard behind the house, but as she grew older the courtyard began to feel too confining and she started to roam farther. Most nights, she ended up at the same place she was going now—Celieria’s National Museum of Art.

‘You are either very brave or very foolish, Ellysetta Baristani. Night streets are no place for young women alone.”

Ellie shrugged. In all the years she’d walked alone at night, she’d never had a problem. Indeed, no one had ever even seemed to notice her presence before. ‘Celieria is well patrolled, the streets are well lit, and this is an honest part of the city.”

‘Evil has an affinity for the night. Even in well-lit, well- patrolled, honest quarters.”

‘I’ll keep that in mind.’ She glanced at the other four Fey, then back to Belliard. ‘Since you seem determined to guard me, perhaps you should tell me your names”

The five Fey bowed and introduced themselves one by one. The smiling, brown-haired Fey was Kieran vel Solande, son of the shei’dalin Marissya and her truemate Dax. The blond warrior whose face Lorelle had scratched was Kiel vel Tomar. The other two, both black-haired and brown-eyed, were brothers, Rowan and Adrial vel Arquinas.

‘There are another five Fey in your secondary quintet who will guard you for the few bells in the night when we must sleep,’ Belliard added.

‘Mama will just love that,’ Ellie muttered.

‘Your mother does not like magic or magical races?”

‘She’s from the north. The magic from the Mage Wars left behind many evil things. Dangerous, mutated creatures; dark places no one dares enter.’ Even children with frightening afflictions. ‘Magic and Celierians don’t mix well.”

‘And yet, here in Celieria City, the people accept magic and its benefits without question.’ Belliard pointed to the Fire-lit lamps.

‘Well, the Mages never sacked Celieria City, did they? The worst of the Wars never reached south of Vrest. People here would feel different if mutated predators like lyrant roamed their woods, or if their children were born with ghastly deformities and deadly powers.”

‘Do you share your mother’s fear of magic?”

Ellie hesitated before answering. ‘Magic … makes me uncomfortable.’ For the past year or so, if anyone wielded strong magic around her, she would get terrible headaches and her sleep would be tormented by particularly horrible nightmares. She didn’t even want to think what her dreams held in store for her tonight.

They reached Celieria’s main thoroughfare and turned north. Though most of the hardworking families of the West End were asleep, that was not true of all of Celieria’s population. Carriages rolled down the cobbled street, carrying nobles in colorful silks and satins to their night’s entertainment. Men and women, some well dressed, some more commonly so, strolled down the wide bricked sidewalks on either side of the road. Boisterous laughter and music poured through the doors of numerous pubs. Normally, Ellie didn’t come out until much later at night, when fewer people roamed the city. She was very aware of her Fey escort’s distinctive garb. ‘You’re going to draw attention.”

Belliard vel Jelani shared a glance with his fellow Fey, then gestured. Lavender light glowed around them, and when it faded, all five warriors were dressed in simple Celierian clothing and their Fey skin had lost its luminescence. They were still too handsome to be pure mortal, but their disguises would allow them to walk without drawing too much attention to themselves.

Ellie rubbed at the goose bumps that rose on her skin in response to Belliard’s magic. ‘Nice trick.”

They turned the corner and slipped into the streams of people walking the sidewalks. A number of women gave the Fey long, hungry looks, but no one stopped them or acted as though their presence were anything out of the ordinary. Ellie led the way up the remaining half mile to the arched bridge that spanned the Velpin River.

Celieria’s National Museum of Art lay on the other side of the river. The domed building was the crowning feature of a sprawling, manicured park that bordered the Velpin’s magic- purified waters. Circled by Fire-lamps, the building gleamed like a jewel in the night.

Ellie hurried up the wide brick walkway to the museum’s entrance and pushed open the leaded-glass doors. Though the museum staff departed promptly at seventeen bells each day, the museum doors were never locked. Something far more powerful than bolted doors protected the building’s many priceless treasures. Any thief could wander in and look to his heart’s content, but let him touch a single precious piece of art and he’d be paralyzed until the curator arrived in the morning.

‘Don’t touch any of the exhibits,’ Ellie warned. Her voice echoed in the marbled vestibule. She led them through the domed rotunda, where marble columns ringed a twenty-foot statue of King Dorian I holding his sword upraised in one hand, his Fey wife beside him with healing hands splayed over the upturned face of a child. At the base of the statue, deeply carved letters painted with pure gold proclaimed the majestic promise of Celieria’s creed: Might and mercy shall vanquish all foes.

She headed down the second arching corridor on the left. Sculpted tairen heads with glowing ruby eyes flanked the entrance to the Fey wing.

Ellie’s friend Selianne Pyerson was sitting on a cushioned bench beside the alcove that housed an eight-foot bronze of a tairen rampant perched on a boulder of white marble veined with gold. Selianne’s normally tidy blond hair was disheveled, as if she’d been running her hands through it, and her pretty face was drawn tight in lines of worry and agitation. She jumped to her feet when she caught sight of Ellie, then froze when she realized her friend was not alone.

‘Who are they?’ Selianne gestured to the five men standing behind Ellie.

‘They are … um … my guards.’ Faint lavender light shimmered, and the Fey assumed their true appearance.

Selianne stumbled back a step. ‘It’s true, then. The Tairen Soul really did claim you as his mate.”

‘Apparently so.’ Ellie introduced the five warriors to her friend. ‘Selianne and I have been friends since my family first came to Celieria City.’ They’d been childhood outcasts together, Selianne for being the foreign-born daughter of a Sorrelian sea captain and his wife, and Ellie for her odd appearance and strange ways.

Selianne dragged Ellie back a few steps and hissed into her ear, ‘I can’t believe you brought Fey with you. What if they … you know … read my mind or something?”

‘They won’t,’ Ellie assured her. ‘I made them give an honor oath not to eavesdrop or mind read before I let them come with me.’ She glanced at Belliard behind her. ‘Would you mind giving us that privacy now?”

He bowed. ‘I will build a privacy shield around you both. You may walk and speak freely to one another without worry that others will hear.’ He raised his hands, and threads of faintly glowing white and lavender magic spun out from his fingertips. Ellie felt a soft, cool wind swirl around her. It smelled of springtime, full of sweet rain and crisp morning air. As it closed about her, she felt a strangely light and tranquil silence enter her mind, as if a pressure she’d never realized existed had been lifted.

Selianne stared at Ellie. ‘You can feel their magic, can’t you?”

Ellie raised her brows. ‘Can’t you?”

‘No. I know he’s weaving magic, because he said so and his hands are glowing a little more, but even knowing it’s there, I can’t sense it.’ She lifted shaking hands to her mouth and turned away. ‘Dear gods. I can’t believe you brought them with you, Fey oath or not.”

‘I’m sorry, Sel. It was either that or not come at all, and your note sounded so frightened. I did the best I could.”

‘I know. I’m sorry that I sounded ungrateful. I do appreciate your coming, and at least you didn’t bring … him .. . with you.’ She jerked her chin towards one of the paintings of Rain Tairen Soul. ‘It’s bad enough that he’s here in the city—but to have him claim you. What happens when he finds out about my mother?”

Ellie clasped Selianne’s hands. ‘He’s not going to find out,’ she vowed, staring earnestly into her friend’s terrified blue eyes. ‘I won’t let him. I’ll lock the memory away so deep inside me, he won’t be able to find it, and we’ll just stay away from each other until he’s gone. Do you hear me? Everything’s going to be all right’ She filled her voice with conviction, and kept her hands clasped tight around Selianne’s cold fingers until her friend’s terror began to abate.

After several moments, the reassurance seemed to sink in. Selianne nodded and drew a deep breath. ‘All right. Good plan. We’ll avoid each other until he’s gone.’ Releasing El- lie’s hands, she let out a shaky laugh. ‘How soon will that be? And is there anything you can do to hurry it up?”

Ellie laughed too. ‘You sound like Mama.”

‘I knew there was a reason I loved her so much’ Selianne flashed a brief grin, then shook her head again. ‘I just can’t believe it, Ellysetta. There must be Fey blood in you from some-where.’ Her blond brows rose. ‘Maybe you’re the child of a dahl’reisen.”

‘Maybe I’m the child of Celierians and I’m just sensitive to magic because I come from the north,’ Ellie answered repressively. She took Selianne’s arm and began to walk with her away from the Fey. ‘What excuse did you give Gerwyn to leave the house so late at night?”

‘He thinks I’m with the Ladies of Light, planning the Sun Festival.”

‘What will he do when he finds out you’re not?”

‘He won’t. I actually was with the Ladies tonight. I just stopped here on my way home.’ Selianne waved a dismissive hand. ‘Enough about that. Tell me everything.”

Ellie tried to recap the day’s tumultuous events quickly, but Selianne insisted on details. Soon the whole emotion-filled tale came pouring out: Den’s attack the previous night, the fire cage and Rain Tairen Soul’s claiming of her, the shattering news of Ellie’s betrothal this evening.

‘Oh, that sneaking, conniving, rotten little maggot,’ Selianne breathed when Ellie told her about Den’s assault and showed her the mark on her neck. ‘But I thought the mark had to be someplace …’ She broke off, blushing.

‘I know, so did I, but apparently it’s the mark, not the location, that’s important.”

‘Surely your parents wouldn’t really make you marry him?”

‘They’ve already signed the betrothal papers, and they won’t break the contract for fear of how it would hurt the family and Papa’s business. And now that Rain Tairen Soul did what he did, I think Mama is even more determined to see me wed to Den. She’s afraid of the Fey and their magic. She hasn’t said as much, but I think she’d rather marry me off to old Master Weazman than see me wed to a Fey.’ The ancient, toothless old Gilding Master was known as much for his lechery as for his exquisite work with precious metals.

‘Well, put that way, I admit I understand her concern. The Fey are a frightening, secretive lot. And we all know what they’re capable of.’ Ellie stiffened. ‘The same can be said of several other races I could name, Selianne.”

Selianne gave her a reproachful look. ‘There’s no need to get personal, Ellysetta.”

‘Sorry.’ Ellie blew out a breath. ‘I’m a bit on edge.’ She rubbed her arms and the back of her neck to massage away the faint tension gathering there.

‘Be honest, Ell. Do you really think Den or your parents stand a chance of defying the Tairen Soul? What’s to stop him from just breathing a little tairen flame on Den? Problem solved. Betrothal broken”

The same thought had occurred to Ellysetta earlier, when Papa had told her that he would not break the betrothal. She’d instantly dismissed it, though the possibility still nagged at her. ‘He wouldn’t do that. That’s not honorable.”

‘And flaming millions of people was?”

It always came back to that whenever Selianne and Ellie discussed Rain Tairen Soul or the Fey. It was the one constant bone of contention in an otherwise flawless friendship.

‘That was war, and the Mages had just killed his mate. He went mad for a while from a documented Fey phenomenon called the Wilding Rage. Gaelen vel Serranis experienced the same thing when his sister was murdered. We’ve had this discussion a hundred times.”

‘It was murder, Ellie. In both cases. No matter how you try to pretty it up.”

‘It was vengeance. The Eld murdered Gaelen’s sister—that was true murder. She’d done nothing to provoke them. The Eld murdered Sariel—an unarmed woman healing the wounded on a battlefield—hoping to destroy Rain Tairen Soul. Well, in both cases, the Eld got more than they bargained for, didn’t they?’ She rubbed at the tension in her neck and arms again.

‘You’ve never liked hearing anyone speak ill of the Fey, especially not Rain Tairen Soul.’ Selianne eyed her intently. ‘Aren’t you even the least bit afraid of him?”

‘Of course I am. Who wouldn’t be? He’s the man who scorched the world. But, Selianne, when he held me in his arms this morning and said those things to me … I could have died right then and been happy. I’ve never felt so … at peace, so loved.”

‘It was probably Fey magic—a glamour of some kind.”

‘I know that. But, Sel, if you’d felt it … part of me thinks I would do just about anything to feel that way again. Even if it was a lie”

‘I don’t like the sound of that, Ellie. You’ve never wanted a pleasant lie over a hard truth. Never.’ Selianne gripped El- lie’s hands, squeezing tight. ‘Don’t let them control your mind.”

Ellie smiled and shook her head. ‘I can assure you no one’s controlling my mind. Part of me may want Fey-perfect love, even if it’s an illusion, but most of me is still firmly grounded in common sense. In fact, I keep waiting for Rain Tairen Soul to come back and tell me he made a mistake in claiming me, and would I please just forget the whole thing.’ She laughed.

Selianne didn’t laugh with her. ‘I’m worried for you, Ellie. Maybe your mother’s right. Maybe you’re better off marrying Den—or even old Master Weazman.’ She cast a glance over her shoulder at the five Fey standing near the wing’s entrance. ‘Handsome as they are, I’d never want anything to do with them.”

Ellie didn’t answer. The sensation she’d mistaken for tension was now a tingling in her skin, an odd awareness that grew stronger by the second. She lifted her head. ‘He’s coming.”

‘He? He who?”

‘Rain Tairen Soul.”

‘He’s coming?’ Selianne squeaked. ‘Here? Now?”

‘Yes.’ She felt him, felt the hunger and longing rise up within her in response to his nearness. The sensations were frightening and compelling all at once. ‘He’s here.”

Fresh panic flooded Selianne’s eyes. ‘Ellie, the Tairen Soul hasn’t sworn any vow against mind reading, has he?’ Ellie shook her head. ‘Bright Lord save me; that’s what I thought. If he picks my brain and discovers the truth, he might decide to flame me instead of just Den.’ She snatched up her shawl from the bench and hugged Ellie in a quick, fierce embrace. ‘I’ve got to go. Take care, dear friend.’ She hurried away, heading for the rear exit of the Fey wing to avoid the approaching Fey King.

Ellie saw her cast one last, frantic look over her shoulder and freeze in her tracks, but even without that, Ellie would have known that Rain Tairen Soul had walked into the room. The shields Belliard had built dissolved. Ellie could hear the clap of Rain’s boots against the marble floor as he walked towards her, but it was the way her skin felt flushed and the blood raced through her veins that told her he was near.

She turned to face him. Everything about him called to every one of her senses, leaving her as giddy as an adolescent girl mooning over a handsome boy. His luminescent Fey skin shone against the blackness of his leathers. His eyes glowed with power, and Ellie saw his gaze flick from her to Selianne.

Worried that he would do just as Selianne feared—probe her mind and discover her heritage—Ellie stepped directly into his line of vision, drawing his attention away from her friend. ‘You’re here. How did you know where to find us?’ She heard the sound of racing footsteps as Selianne took advantage of the Tairen Soul’s distraction and ran away.

The Feyreisen’s fierce gaze pinned Ellie in place. ‘Bel told me. But even if he had not, I would always be able to find you, shei’tani.’ Anger rolled over her in waves. ‘You should not have attempted to leave the house without guard. You will not do so again.”

Though his anger frightened her, the barked command made her spine go poker straight. ‘I’m not your prisoner. You have no right to order me to do anything. I’ve gone for walks in the night many times in the past and never come to harm.”

‘You weren’t the Feyreisa before now. While the Mages may have overlooked Ellysetta Baristani, the woodcarver’s daughter, believe me they will not overlook Ellysetta Baristani, the Tairen Soul’s mate.”

Ellie swallowed. He sounded so certain, so ominous. ‘Maybe what you say would be true if there were Mages in Celieria, but there are none. There haven’t been since the Mage Wars. They were banned a thousand years ago”

His lips pulled back in a small snarl. ‘And do you really think they’ve stayed away all this time? They are cunning adversaries, patient and powerful.’ He advanced on her, and she backed up nervously. ‘You can be certain they know about you by now, and they’re already plotting to capture or kill you.”

Ellie’s heart pounded in her chest, beating with sudden fear. She told herself that since he’d claimed her as his true- mate, he couldn’t possibly harm her, but that didn’t seem to matter much. The way he looked right now, it wasn’t hard to imagine him killing her.

‘Aiyah, you should be afraid. Perhaps fear will stop you from acting foolishly.”

She turned to run, but only managed half a dozen steps before he caught her wrist.

‘Nei, Ellysetta. You will not run from me. You will …’ His voice broke off, his attention captured by something just beyond her shoulder. Sorrow washed over her, deep and heartrending. The emotions were his, but she felt them as clearly as if they were her own.

She turned to follow his gaze, and her breath stalled. She had unwittingly run straight for the one room in the museum where she spent most of her time—the exhibit dedicated to the scorching of the world.

More than twenty oil paintings circled the room, vivid canvases painted by Celieria’s greatest masters, all depicting the tragic story of Rain and Sariel and the fiery aftermath of her death. Dominating the room was Fabrizio Chelan’s masterpiece, Death of the Beloved.

The look on Rain’s face as he regarded the great master’s most famous work would have made her heart ache even without the stunned, breathless pain radiating from him. Tears filled her eyes. For the first time, she didn’t find the famous painting tragically romantic or tragically beautiful. For the first time, she found it only tragic.

He released her hand, and the terrible rawness of his grief faded. ‘Her death was nothing like that,’ he murmured. His gaze remained fixed on the central figures captured forever through Chelan’s unsurpassed mastery of composition, color, and perspective.

‘How do you mean?”

‘I never got to hold her like that for the last time. They drew me away from her as part of their ambush, then attacked her to destroy me. She was badly burned. The Elden Mages cut off her head so she could not be healed. I was in the air when I felt her die, and the Rage took me then. I don’t remember much after that, but they tell me I incinerated the entire battlefield in mere chimes. There was nothing left of her to hold when I finally came back to sanity.’ He reached up a hand as if to touch the painted image of his dead mate, then pulled back when sparks flashed from the protective weave. He stood there, staring at the image of Sariel in a dramatic, beautiful death swoon, her cheeks still rosy, unscorched, and glimmering with Fey luminescence, clutched in the arms of the mate who should have been at her side protecting her but had not. ‘She died alone, at the hands of an Elden Mage.”

The pain of Rain’s loss squeezed Ellie’s heart. Her throat went tight and tears burned at the backs of her eyes. ‘I’m so sorry. I know you loved her.”

‘It was a long time ago.’ He frowned at Sariel’s image. ‘That isn’t even a very good likeness of her.”

Ellie gave a choked sound that was half laugh, half sob. This painting was one of the most famous masterpieces in all of Celierian history, and yet Rain Tairen Soul declared the image to be not only wholly false but a poor likeness as well.

‘In a way, it is good to see this painting and remember,’ he continued. ‘That you loved her?”

‘Nei. That I failed her. My first duty was to protect my mate, and I did not. It will not happen again.’ His expression hardened and he turned to face her. ‘Which is why you will never again attempt to leave your home unescorted.”

‘But—”

‘Nei! You are my truemate. Harm to you is harm to me. The Eld know this, and that puts you in great danger, Ellysetta. The world is no longer a safe place for you.”

His eyes were starting to glow again, and she could feel his anger beating at her. She should just meekly agree and go home. That was the smart thing to do. He was a powerful Fey who’d already lost control of his wild magic once before. Only a fool would actually argue with him.

And yet … something would not let her just meekly murmur her obedience and allow the Fey to lead her home like a prize dog on a leash. ‘I realize your concern is genuine, my lord Feyreisen, but even if Eld Mages really are hiding in the city, plotting evil, they have no reason to harm me. I am betrothed to another man.”

‘Bel told me of the butcher’s offspring. His desires neither hold sway over our bond nor protect you from the Eld. Your soul called out, Ellysetta Baristani, and mine answered. That one moment made you a prize the Eld would kill to claim. Nothing can change that. And that means you must never again attempt to wander the streets alone.”

‘But—”

‘No buts.’ His hands seized hers in a tight grip. ‘If you will not consider your own safety, consider the safety of others. Sariel was my mate. I should not have survived her death. But I did, and you know the results.’ He gestured to the fiery, violent paintings surrounding them. ‘Whether you want it or not, you are my truemate. Even though our bond is not yet complete, if the Eld managed to kill you, I should not survive it.’ Sudden intensity burned in his eyes, and his voice dropped to a low whisper. ‘But what if I did?’ Ellie’s mouth went dry. Her skin burned where Rain’s hands gripped hers as images and emotions flooded into her. The blinding grief of Sariel’s death. The hot, wild rush of rage, driving him to rain fire and death upon the world. The haunting screams and terror of those who died in the face of his madness.

She yanked free of his grip, and the onslaught ceased.

She pressed one shaking hand to her mouth and the other to her belly. ‘What was that?”

‘A tiny fraction of what I live with, Ellysetta, every day since I scorched the world.”

‘I’m going to be sick’ She spun on her heel and raced for the nearest waste bin, barely making it before the contents of her stomach heaved out of her.

When she was done, he was there beside her, a glass of cold water in his hand. She could have cried with humiliation. Instead, she took the glass, rinsed her mouth, and spat. Not meeting his eyes, she handed the glass back to him. It melted into nothing. All signs of her brief, violent sickness vanished as well.

She stared at the empty space and couldn’t even summon surprise. Of course the Fey could make vomit vanish. All that power had to have its practical uses. She forced a laugh. ‘Where were you when Lillis and Lorelle had the stomach ague last year?”

He didn’t laugh or even smile at her weak joke. ‘Sieks’ta. I should not have shared that with you. I have shamed myself. Not even fear for your safety excuses me.’ He gestured, and Bel stepped closer. ‘Your quintet will take you home. As I’ve just demonstrated, my control is not yet what it should be.’ He bowed, his face a frozen mask.

If he’d meant to impress upon her the gravity of her situation, he’d succeeded. His tactics might have been brutal, but they were effective. She couldn’t even summon any anger. How could she blame him for wanting to avoid reliving the horror he’d just shared with her?

She started to reach out to him, but caution made her drawback before touching him. One taste of his torment was enough. ‘I won’t leave the house without escort again,’ she promised.

As Bel led her away, she paused at the entrance of the Fey wing and glanced back. Rain stood looking up at Chelan’s painting of Sariel’s death, his face pale and drawn.

The young boy darted silently through the shadows of the West End’s quiet merchant district. A block ahead, the pretty blond girl he’d followed from the museum turned down a narrow cobbled lane that led to a modest residential district. The boy smiled. He could practically feel the gold sovereign warm between his fingers.

Follow her, Master Manza had ordered when he’d realized the blonde was Ellysetta Baristani’s friend. Find out where she lives. She may prove useful.

Rain remained in the museum for almost a full bell after Ellysetta’s departure, sitting on the bench in the middle of the room, staring up at the countless images and remembering.

He’d loved Sariel. With all the unfettered, consuming passion of youth, he’d loved her. He’d been a young Tairen Soul, full of the power of his gift and the promise of endless skies, and she’d been a beautiful Fey healer, not as powerful as Marissya, and no match to his own strength, but so gentle and compassionate there were none who did not love her.

She’d been first in his heart since boyhood. He’d never wanted another.

And now he did.

It felt like betrayal. As if his own body, his own soul, had betrayed his heart.

Spirit swirled around his fingertips. Swaths of mystic magic poured out in a sparkling cloud that slowly began to spin. He watched it, guided it, as the magic condensed and took shape. Long, straight strands of silky black hair blew back from a luminous oval face of stunning beauty. Full, red lips smiled at him with exquisite tenderness, while eyes like blue forget- me-nots watched him with endless patience and love.

‘Sariel,’ Rain whispered sadly. He’d woven the memories many times. He was a master of Spirit. To any other onlooker, Sariel would have seemed whole and alive and real, but Rain held the weave, and he knew—he always knew—she was an illusion. He’d managed to pretend otherwise, but no longer. The slender arms that rose to embrace him seemed hollow and faded, and when he reached out to her, his hand passed through the weave.

He would have wept if he still had tears within him. ‘I don’t want to lose you, e’tani.”

Sariel smiled and shook her head. She bent to kiss him, but when he tilted back his head to meet her lips, the Spirit weave dissolved. Sariel faded into mist. Rain groaned and buried his face in his hands. Not even with a kiss to a phantom love could he betray his shei’tani.

‘Your magic knows you belong to another, even if your heart still rebels.”

Rain lifted his head. Marissya stood at the entrance to the chamber. Dax was at her side, while her quintet stood guard a bit further away. Marissya was watching Rain with a strange mix of compassion and irritation. The truemate in her disliked that he’d even attempted to betray his bond with a kiss to his lost love, while the empath in her understood why he did.

‘We all loved Sariel, Rain,’ Marissya continued, ‘but you must let her go. Your shei’tani will never accept you so long as you cling to the memory of another.”

‘I know that without your scolding.’ Her reprimand stung, even more because it was deserved. He rose to his feet.

‘I am glad to hear it. I wasn’t certain you were thinking clearly. Kieran told me you shared your torment with your shei’tani.”

Kieran had a flapping tongue. ‘She tried to leave her home unescorted. Truemated to the Tairen Soul, and she tried to wander Celierian streets alone—at night! She even refused to believe her life might be in danger. Did Kieran tell you that, too?”

One cool brown brow rose. ‘He merely suggested you might need my help weaving control over your emotions. It appears he was right.”

Rain’s lips compressed. To argue would only prove her point.

Marissya sighed, and her expression softened. ‘The gods weave as the gods will, Rain. And even though it may not be apparent at first, they do weave purpose into all things. Even terrible things. Sariel’s death was a devastating loss, but all this time I believed it was the price the gods demanded for the end of the Wars. That was the only pattern I saw in the weave … until today, when a Celierian girl called a tairen from the sky.”

‘What are you suggesting?”

‘The tairen and the Fey are dying. You are the last bridge between our two species. You told me the Eye of Truth sent you here, to Celieria, to find our salvation. We both know it can be no coincidence that Ellysetta is your truemate. Somehow, she is the key to saving us all. Though we’ve yet to see her power, it must be vast. She could never have called your soul if she were not your equal in every way. We also both know she could never have called you if you were still bound to another—even if that bond was only e’tanitsa, as it was between you and Sariel.’ Her hands closed over his, and cool, calming threads of empathy and healing stroked across his battered emotions. ‘You’ve seen the pattern, too, Rain. No matter how badly you want to deny it. Sariel had to die so Ellysetta could be born to save us.”

Rain pulled free of her grasp and turned away.

‘You must not blame Ellysetta,’ Marissya continued. ‘She is an innocent. She is the soul the gods shaped to save the tairen and the Fey’ She circled round him, relentless. ‘And you, Rain, are the soul the gods shaped to protect her and bring her safely back to us so she can fulfill her purpose. You cannot shirk your duty, not to the tairen, not to the Fey, and definitely not to your truemate. Set aside your longings for what used to be. Embrace Ellysetta in your heart as well as your soul so you can win her trust and her bond and help her discover her strength. Because, Rain, one other thing seems certain to me.’ The shei’dalin’s eyes grew dark with portent. ‘Whatever task the gods have set before Ellysetta Baristani, it is fearfully dangerous. Else she’d not need a tairen to protect her soul.’

Far away to the northeast in the heart of the Elden wilderness, the subterranean palace of Boura Fell, seat of the High Mage Vadim Maur, lay buried deep in the earth, masterfully shielded from Fey senses and Fey magic by rock, soil, and wards worked from the darkest Elden wizardry. The massive complex stretched for miles beneath the surface, one of many similar fortresses hidden throughout Eld. For nearly a thousand years, the network of underground palaces had survived, thrived even, undetected and steadily growing in strength and number, like a cancer quietly spreading its deadly tentacles beneath the skin of a seemingly healthy man.

High Mage Vadim Maur, leader of the High Council of Mages and uncrowned ruler of Eld, sat at his massive desk and pondered the news from his apprentice in Celieria. Around him, sconces flickered with Fire, lighting the dark, windowless cavern of his study with a pale yellow glow, illuminating the numerous bookcases that held priceless ancient texts and centuries’ worth of notes on his experiments.

Rain Tairen Soul had a truemate. A truemate with red hair and green eyes, so suspiciously like the child stolen years ago.

Vadim sat back in his chair and steepled his hands beneath his chin. Suspicion was not certainty, and not enough to make him tip his hand. Not yet, at least. There were two hundred Fey in Celieria City … too many to confront lightly even without the substantial added might of the Tairen Soul. Vadim had not won and held his grip on the High Council of Mages through the blundering application of brute force. He was a man who believed in choosing his battles … and in preparing his battlefield.

He’d already dispatched a handful of spies to northern Celieria in case his search party had missed something so many years ago. Meanwhile, his apprentice Kolis Manza would continue his work in Celieria and learn what he could about the girl without rousing suspicions.

Vadim rose from his desk. His rich, gold-embroidered, purple velvet robes whispered around him as he crossed the room to approach a carefully warded black metal door. He dissolved the wards, placed his hand in the hollow etched deep into the door’s center panel, and uttered, ‘Gaz vegoth.”

The ancient Feraz witchwords sent magic swirling. Metal groaned as the unseen bolts securing the door slid free from their anchors in the stone. The door opened inward to reveal the small round antechamber that served as Vadim Maur’s private spell room.

Fire flared to life in three golden sconces as the High Mage stepped through the door, and in the flickering light, figures seemed to move and sway across the intricate patterns of the mosaic tiles that covered every fingerspan of wall, ceiling, and floor in the room. A carved black stone altar occupied the center of the room; a bowl and goblet of hammered gold rested atop it. Opposite the door, pure, cool water poured from the carved mouth of a snarling dragon’s head into a rune-etched catch-basin below.

Vadim moved around the room, murmuring a cleansing spell. When he was finished and satisfied that the room held no residue of previous spells, he grasped the small golden ewer that rested on the wide lip of the catch-basin, and filled it. ‘Water pure, the path to cleanse,’ he murmured as he poured the water into the altar bowl.

From a deep left-hand pocket of his Mage robe, he withdrew a tiny vial filled with still-warm blood he had recently taken from a particular guest of his lowermost dungeon and uncorked it. ‘Blood to bindings call.’ He dribbled a thin stream of the dark red liquid into the bowl. As it broke the water’s surface, the blood diluted rapidly, tiny red streamers shooting through the clear water until the bowl was filled with cloudy pinkness. With a razor-sharp black dagger, he slit the palm of his hand and added his own blood to the mix. His Mage senses grew sharp and he felt the dark, binding threads of magic that tied him to the blooded captive.

He tugged on the thin gold chain about his neck and withdrew the sparkling, dark, rainbow-hued Tairen’s Eye crystal that had been resting against his chest. The stone was not warm from contact with his skin as any other pendant would be but instead remained defiantly cool to his touch, rejecting him as its owner had done for centuries.

‘Tairen’s Eye to forge the bridge.’ He lowered the crystal into the water until it was completely submerged. The pink, bloodied water grew clear again as the Tairen’s Eye crystal at the bottom of the bowl began to glow and pulse like a heartbeat. Vadim dipped the small golden goblet into the altar bowl and drank. The pulsing beat of the crystal grew loud in his ears as his heart matched the rhythm.

‘Azrahn these souls enthrall.’ The High Mage of Eld closed his eyes. He stretched his open palms over the golden bowl. Azrahn gathered at his fingertips and spiraled upwards, a spider-silk-thin filament of darkness that pulsed with red lights keeping time with the beating crystal. Threads of Spirit joined it, wrapping the Azrahn in a protective shield, hiding it from Fey senses. The weave traveled up the tiny pipe that rose from the antechamber’s ceiling, through hundreds of layers of rock, into the fresh night air of Eld, then raced south towards Celieria with dizzying speed. His senses raced with it, shooting over forests, rivers, and towns until he reached the glowing brightness of Celieria’s capital city.

And there, as his body stood vacant and chilling half a continent away in Eld, High Mage Vadim Maur began softly to croon, ‘Are you she, girl? Are you the one? Show yourself.’

* * *

Well into the night, Ellie drifted in a fretful sleep, tossing and turning as she dreamed of flames and magic and horrible battles where blood flowed in rivers. The scenes changed. Shadows dimmed her vision, and a cold, frightening fog covered the world. Within the fog, something stalked her, calling to her, beckoning with familiar malevolence.

Fear gripped her, the certainty that whatever she did, she must never reveal herself to that crooning evil. Hide deep and well. Do not let him find you.

A strong breeze from her open bedroom window blew across her face. In a half-waking state, she imagined a shadow falling across her. She tensed with sudden fear, then sighed her relief as a tender hand brushed hair from her eyes. Her eyelids fluttering with the effort to open, but a kiss feathered across her brow and a soft-spoken caress of words soothed her. Deep, restful sleep finally overtook her and she sank into it willingly.

Crouched on the floor beside her bed, surrounded by a weave of Spirit to make himself invisible, Rain Tairen Soul watched over his truemate as she slept.