Ullstean mirrored Aengus’ posture and stuck his nose in the air. “Monarchs come and go, but the Dagda is eternal. You shall not pass until you solve my riddle.”
I clenched my hands into fists. We had traveled across the country, been detected by the Fear Dorcha, and been chased and attacked by dogs. I knew exactly how these riddles ended—with bloodshed even if the person answered correctly.
I stepped forward and placed my hands on my hips. “When I eventually meet your father, who should I say threatened the Queen of the Faeries and her mate, the King of the Otherworld?”
The other males retreated behind the apple trees, leaving Ullstean standing alone in the middle of the path. His rosy cheeks turned pale, and his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. “This way, Your Majesty.”
“My mate is in the royal coach,” I said. “Allow me to bring him.”
He raised his hand. “The Dagda only allowed Her Majesty entrance into the palace. No others.”
Aengus stepped forward. “I will take Her Majesty to meet our father.”
“As you wish.” Ullstean inclined his head and stepped back behind a tree trunk.
I turned to Rosalind, who promised to keep Drayce safe. Cliach’s shoulders rose to his ears and he rubbed the golden body of his harp, looking as though he regretted having left his loch.
Aengus took my arm and guided me through a wide pathway between two rows of apple trees whose fruit glinted gold in the magical light. I turned my head to a white sky devoid of clouds or sun or the darkness of the curse.
“No matter what you see or hear, do not look to your left or right,” he said in a low voice. “Do not turn around, do not pause, do not let your steps falter.”
“What’s happening?” I whispered.
“The Dagda has warded the orchard. Anyone who walks to the palace with suspicion in their heart will be consumed by the beasts that roam his lands.”
“And you’re only telling me now?” I fixed my gaze on the tall grass, not daring to glance into his face for fear of triggering this additional ward.
“It’s been centuries since I last visited my father,” he replied, sounding sheepish. “And I thought we would access the palace through the back.”
Heavy, bestial breaths filled my ears and warmed the left side of my face. I stared straight ahead at the path, which stretched out for what appeared to be miles. Aengus told us the palace was only a few miles away from the bridge, but we had been traveling for three hours. If Enbarr had run fourteen circles around the Dagda’s land in that time, then it couldn’t be as large as it appeared.
I shoved those thoughts aside as the heavy breathing turned to grunts that made the fine hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. A warm breeze blew the mingled scents of rotting apples and putrid feces into our faces, making my nostrils twitch. Something warm and wet and worrisome snuffled at the back of my head.
Talons of trepidation tore down my spine. “You said there were beasts,” I whispered to Aengus. “What kind?”
“I once saw a giant boar,” he said. “Another time, it was a three-headed wolf.”
“And you survived them?”
“No.”
After several heartbeats of waiting for him to elaborate, I parted my lips to ask when I felt something part my hair and sniff into my ear. Unpleasant tingles poured down my ear canal and sent a jolt of panic through my heart. I wrapped my hand around Aengus’ broad arm and squeezed.
He stiffened. “Your Majesty.”
“Am I hurting you?”
“Rosalind would scold me if she saw us in such close quarters.”
“You like her?” I asked.
He paused. “It is rare to meet a female who doesn’t so easily fall for my charm.”
I clenched my teeth, bristling at the implication that I was one of the many who found him irresistible. Just because I had ignored Drayce’s warning to kill Aengus, that didn’t mean I thought about him as anything other than a means to defeat Queen Melusina.
Loosening my grip on his arm, I snarled, “I love my mate.”
“Of course, you do,” he said in a voice too smooth and practiced to sound convincing.
The clouds around us lowered and turned into wisps of smoke that caressed my scalp. Panting breaths surrounded us, seeming to have come from the mist, but they were nothing compared to Aengus’ unbearable arrogance. The edges of my vision turned black, blocking out all but the path ahead. Irritation thrummed through my veins and made my nerve endings tingle.
“What King Drayce and I share goes deeper than physical attraction,” I said through clenched teeth. “We’re soul mates, bonded together by love and trust and a shared destiny.”
“It’s hard to believe that when you’re clinging to me like a maiden in the throes of passion, Your Majesty.”
I shoved his arm away. “That’s because I’m trying to keep my mind off the beasts.”
“Did it work?” he asked.
“Did what—” Realization trickled through my skull like an autumn shower. “That was a distraction?”
“Even the headless Dullahan can see your devotion to King Drayce. He is very lucky to have such a dedicated mate.” Aengus stopped walking, and the air around us rippled, revealing in the distance a tall, white wall. It stretched about three-hundred-feet wide around a giant, grassy mound.
“The Palace of Bóinne,” he said.
“What?” There was something wrong with the bricks. They were too round, too unevenly spaced, and each with holes that reminded me of something sinister. I quickened my steps and stopped as soon as I realized what I was seeing.
Lining the wall were rows upon rows of human skulls.
Chapter 12
Horror froze my body to the spot. My mouth gaped open, and I couldn’t stop gasping at the endless, grinning skulls staring out at me through eyeless sockets. They were different sizes, different shapes, some four times the size of a human’s, others as small as a bird’s, some with long, pointed jaws and others so elongated they
