“He owes you his wakening,” Aerin disagreed, but shrugged in general acknowledgment. “Still, his element is heat, not air. I should be able to track him through the earth.”
Lara blinked at the taller woman, suddenly appreciating the breadth of possibilities granted by an affinity for stone. “You must be a fantastic hunter.”
Aerin fixed her gaze on the distant mountains, enough strain in her neck to suggest she deliberately avoided Dafydd’s eyes. “I have always captured what I sought, yes. But Hafgan is connected with this land. He can, perhaps, persuade it to show no signs of his passing.”
“Then we forget about him for a while.” Lara’s voice hardened. “The truth is, we know where he’s likely to end up. Right now Emyr probably thinks you’re dead and has no warning that Hafgan’s on the way. Finding Ioan and scrying Emyr is our best chance to avoid a catastrophic battle. We’ll worry about Hafgan later. Aerin, the—”
The sound of surf, soft enough before to have been unnoticeable, intensified abruptly, the earth rattling with it. Lara reached for the staff, making certain it hadn’t come unstrapped from her back, then turned to the beach, still afraid the weapon had somehow triggered a tsunami. They couldn’t run: there was no ground high enough within reach, even if they were as fast as the Seelie horses.
It was those horses that pounded down the shore, their striking hooves making the rumble under Lara’s feet. They slipped between moonlit shadows from one step to the next, only half existent in the world as Lara saw it, and were at the dunes in impossibly little time. One came to a full halt, the other dancing around it. Each touch of its hoof to earth sent another jolt deep into the ground, shaking Lara where she stood. She had never seen them run when she wasn’t astride, but that they struck the earth hard when they returned from their shift through space rang true with her. The Seelie army must have nearly shaken trees from their root beds as it rode. Impressed, she nodded toward them, then shot an abashed smile at Aerin. “The horses, I was going to ask.”
Aerin made a fluid gesture as though she’d conjured them, then slipped gracefully down the hill to catch and calm the prancing beasts. Their tack was gone, left somewhere else along the beach, but the Seelie woman leapt onto her horse so easily it was clear she didn’t feel the lack. Lara, alarmed, watched Dafydd do the same, and followed him down the hill muttering, “Remember that I’d never ridden a horse before coming here?”
He gave her a hand and pulled her onto the horse’s back with enough finesse that for a moment even she thought it was her own agility making the move. Wisdom caught up, though, and she blurted, “Aerin?”
“Feel the earth,” Aerin said smoothly. “Feel it rise through the horse’s legs, feel it embody you, feel the connection between you and the beast and the land. You cannot fall, when you are one with the horse.” It was the enchantment she’d used before to stick Lara in place. This time, though, Lara felt a hint of what she meant, a tenuous bond between herself and the horse and the ground below. The
It was easier each time she did it, even considering the delicacy that had been necessary to create the path to the tomb in the Drowned Lands. Ioan was a vital figure in her thoughts, details of what she knew about him tumbling into place. Passionate in protecting his people, even in protecting those who weren’t quite his anymore, like Dafydd. Willing to go to immoral lengths to find help. Lara’s own kidnapping was proof enough of that. A skilled warrior with no evident fear. A man dedicated enough to the life he’d been given to undergo physiological changes that would make him truly one of his chosen people.
There was far more, certainly, that she didn’t know, but that was enough. Each element she remembered added a piece to the symphony: the warrior, drums; the protective nature, a lonely note from a trumpet. They came together, weaving a ball of music and light that hung in Lara’s mind as it gathered strength, then ricocheted across the countryside in a blaze. “Roadways,” she said aloud. “Please follow the roadways.”
Song gurgled as it twisted around, returning to Lara and seeking another path. She said, “Back down the beach, back to where we left the horses,” into Dafydd’s shoulder, and heard a trill of impatience enter the symphony as the riders wheeled and drove their animals back the way they’d come. “Does your lightning have a personality?”
“Short-tempered but easily assuaged,” Dafydd replied without a hint of seeming to think the question strange. “Impatient, impulsive, callous. There’s no softness in it. Why do you ask?”
“Because the truthseeking music is starting to make commentary. And the staff has all along,” Lara added more softly. “It wants to be used. It wants to destroy.”
“Your will is stronger than its.” Determination, if not strict accuracy, filled Dafydd’s voice. “Lara …”
She pushed her nose against his shoulder and said, ruefully, “This still isn’t the time.”
“Perhaps not, but I’ve greeted Aerin more enthusiastically than you, and that was hardly my intention. I feel … rushed. As though I daren’t stop moving, for fear events will overwhelm us. And I barely know what’s happened this past season or more!”
Something popped in Lara’s chest, making breathing easier. “I feel the same way. And you’re forgiven. I got a kiss, and she didn’t.” It was petty, but his acknowledgment in how he’d received Aerin made all the difference.
“You kissed me,” Dafydd said firmly. “A favor I intend to make up for later. Now, Lara … can you tell me what I’ve missed?”
She said, “Turn left where the road forks,” instead, as the pathway behind her eyelids veered that way. For a moment she dared open her eyes, glimpsing the roadway. Texture and color set it apart from the fields alongside it, even in the moon’s scant light. A thrust of bright music lay over the road itself, not illuminating it in any real-world way. The combination made her dizzy. She closed her eyes again, grateful that she rode with Dafydd and had no need to guide the horse herself.
“I don’t know most of what’s happened here,” she said then. She sketched out the details of Dafydd’s rescue by Ioan and Merrick’s reappearance, the latter of which made the Seelie prince’s posture tense so much their horse whickered in agitation. “I followed him back to the Barrow-lands, through his worldwalking spell, but I got thrown out of time again. He’s here somewhere, Dafydd, I’m sure of it. Hiding in the waters, maybe, although I thought he might come after us while we were in the city and he didn’t. Thank God,” she added with feeling, then exhaled and brought her attention back to the matter at hand. “The farmers who attacked us saw two Seelie warriors, and Ioan’s no longer fair.”
“Can you seek him the way we seek Ioan now?” Dafydd relaxed a little, though there was still strain in his body.
Lara shook her head. “Maybe once we stop moving. I’d need to concentrate more than I can when we’re jolting.”
“Jolting?” Dafydd sounded offended and Lara laughed.
“I’m not used to horses, Dafydd. Right, turn right up ahead. We’re almost there.” The streaking light in her mind was resolving, becoming a steady bright point. “Can you see a town?”
“Village lights. There’ve been one or two others along the way. You’re certain this is the right one?” The question was more impressed than suspicious; Dafydd had never doubted her, not since he’d recognized her gift.
Lara pressed a smile into his shoulder, then peeked over it to catch a glimpse of torches glowing in the near distance. “If it’s not, my power has gone horribly awry. That looks like real fire.”
“It is,” Aerin called. Lara startled, having not realized the Seelie woman could hear them over the horses’ hooves. Aerin dropped her horse into a walk to make conversation easier as she nodded toward the village. “Our light spheres are easy to maintain, but they’re a constant slow draw on magics. They must use fire for most light in this valley, or one of us would have discovered them long since.”
“You hunt down magic use? You can do that?” Whether they
Aerin shrugged. “Not as a matter of course, but it can be done. It’s why we hide our citadels behind glamours, to make them less vulnerable. So if there had been a long constant draw of power here, in a valley near the Drowned Hundred … yes. Someone would have investigated, and Emyr would have—”
“Taken action,” Lara volunteered as a shiver spread over her skin. Emyr was not a nice man. Neither had Hafgan been nice, and it was easy enough to see how two leaders of such arrogance could drag their people down paths of unthinking cruelty. Ioan at least seemed less dedicated to the concept of his own superiority, and Dafydd was entirely diffident by comparison to his father. Maybe it was their relative youth, but it seemed to Lara the Barrow-lands would be better governed by the sons than the fathers.
