Gift of the Realm (15 page)

“I
come on King Owein the Fine’s behalf,” he struggled to say, and hoped the words
made sense. They sounded like gibberish to his own ears. “I seek an audience
with King Cael the Strong.”

Through
the blur of transformation, Colin saw the dagger arching toward his throat.
Sluggish though he was, he managed to spin away with only a moment to spare.
The blade passed within inches of his jugular.

“Hold,
Brogan!” A deep voice boomed above the din of panicked fairies. “’Tis a
Halfling you think to shave with your blade. One with the ability to walk as a
beast.”

The
owner of the blade aborted his second swing, lowering his raised arm to slip
the foot long, lethal looking knife into a jeweled sheath at his waist.
Piercing, emerald green eyes roamed Colin’s transformed body in a thorough
survey.

“So
it would seem,” the fairie called Brogan replied. “’Tis doubtful my blade would
even scratch this one. He survived the nettles handily enough.”

At
six two, it wasn’t often Colin had to look up to meet a man’s eyes. He had to
look up a good four inches now. The knife-wielding Brogan was a mountain of a
man. The epaulettes riding the shoulders of his stark-white tunic proclaimed an
official rank of some sort, and though his shoulder-length auburn hair wouldn’t
meet regulation in any human military organization, his bearing would. If Colin
had to guess, the brawny Brogan was a fairie version of general. He appeared
well suited to the role.

His
vision finally clear, Colin ignored the mocking humor in Brogan’s eyes,
searching the large hall for the owner of the voice capable of stopping such a
fairie with but a word. His gaze came unerringly to the fairie who could be no
other than King Cael.

As
tall as Brogan, the fairie king was resplendent in the garb of fairie royalty.
His dress was similar to Owein’s. Black, fitted slacks covered his long legs,
and the tunic molded to his powerful chest shimmered in the soft glow of a
dozen chandeliers. Instead of the blue Owein preferred, Cael’s tunic was of a
deep, rich plum. A stark white cape rode one shoulder to flow down his back.
Pale blue eyes appeared almost colorless in his tanned face. His white blond
hair was as long as Brogan’s.

Sprawled
on a magnificent throne of precious silver, Cael beckoned to Colin to come
before him. Colin crossed the room, purpose in his step. The many fairies of
King Cael’s court gave him a wide berth, stepping clear of the Halfling who had
caused such a stir by arriving in their midst in the form of a wolf. Like the
stunning riches of silver, gold, and precious gems decorating every surface of
the raft’s great hall, including the walls, Colin barely noticed their wary
stares. Aware of Brogan dogging his steps, he searched the crowd for a head of
honey-blonde hair, but there was no sign of Keely.

“So,”
Cael said when Colin stood before him and bowed his head in a respectful
greeting. “You’ve come on King Owein’s behalf. I find it odd he sends a
Halfling to seek my audience, instead of coming on his own. Why is that, I
wonder?”

“He
knows of my personal interest in the matter at hand, but no doubt he would have
come himself, and long before now, if he had not been blocked from entering
your raft.”

“What
lie is this?” Cael challenged, clearly offended. “I have placed no
bacainn
upon the raft, against Owein or any other.”

“I
don’t lie, King Cael, nor do I accuse you. The
bacainn
is Princess
Fiona’s doing, in place nearly three hundred human years now.”

Colin
noted the stiffening of Brogan’s body beside him, even as Cael demanded of the
fairie general, “Is this true, Brogan? As Guardian of the Realm it is your duty
to inform me of such matters.”

“As
I would have if I had been informed of such,” Brogan bristled. “Princess Fiona
said naught of it to me. If your daughter placed a
bacainn,
as the
shape-shifting Halfling claims, she did so through stealthy means. No word of
its existence has reached my ears or that of the Guard.”

Cael
studied his captain of the guard, his eyes calculating. “She’s said naught of
anything to you for some time now. How long has it been?”

Brogan
said nothing and the scowl he sent Cael’s way surprised Colin, especially when
Cael merely sighed in response and turned his steady gaze on Colin.

“What
personal matter has brought you here, Halfling? The comings and goings of the
people of the realm rarely affect the human world in these times.”

“As
I said, I come on King Owein’s behalf, as well as my own. The
bacainn
I
speak of keeps Owein from his human mate.”

Cael’s
eyes widened in surprise. “So, the rumors are true,” he said on a booming
laugh. “Owein has bound himself to a human. I shall lift a glass to his
misfortune. But tell me, Halfling. What has any of this to do with me? If
Owein’s human choice spurns his attentions, it is no more than he deserves for
binding himself to one not of his own kind. It is no concern of mine.”

“His
mate does not spurn his attentions, she is denied them. Princess Fiona has held
Saraid Quinn captive here in your raft these many human years. King Owein seeks
your aid in seeing to her release.”

“
Quinn
?”
Cael repeated the name with deceptive calm, considering the towering rage
evident in his pale eyes.

“Aye,
King Cael. It is my understanding you were once acquainted with Saraid’s
father, Fitzgerald Quinn.”

Furious
color flushed Cael’s face. “Brogan,” he said. “Find Princess Fiona and bring
her to me. It appears your theory was wrong. Left to her own devices, my
daughter has expanded her obsession with gaining her vengeance on that
bounder.”

Without
a word, Brogan left the room. Cael watched him go, then pinned Colin with a
considering frown.

“You
said this matter was of personal interest to you, Halfling. Why?”

“My
name is Colin Quinn.” He held steady under the king’s narrowing gaze. “I am a
descendant of Owein and Saraid, and through Saraid, Fitzgerald. As I am, my
mate is a Halfling, descended from Owein and Saraid as well. Without access to
your raft, and you, Owein has enlisted our help in breaking the curse binding
his mate.”

“A
Halfling union, you say? With your combined blood, you and your mate could have
easily lifted the
bacainn
and called Saraid home without ever having
left the human world. Why take the chance of entering my raft as the beast?”
Cael leaned forward menacingly, his fingers gripping the arms of his silver
throne. “If you think to claim vengeance for this ancestor you claim my
daughter has so foolishly wronged, be warned, Halfling. Though your fairie
blood prevents me from killing you, there are actions I can take that will make
the nettles of the ring feel like a mother’s kiss.”

“I
seek no vengeance,” Colin assured him.

“Then
what do you here?”

“I
seek my mate.”

“
Your
mate? You’re story unravels even now. I thought it was Owein’s woman my
daughter is supposed to have held.”

“Everything
I have told you is true, King Cael. Owein’s Saraid abides somewhere in your
raft, and I’ve come to see her freed. But I also come in search of my own mate.
She is a strong Halfling, and Saraid’s plight weighs heavily on her heart. For
a human decade, Saraid’s pleas for release have drawn my mate to the entrance
of your raft in dreams. In my own stubbornness, I refused to join my destiny
with hers, and she felt she had no other option to see the dreams ended than to
come on her own. I saw her enter your raft with my own eyes this very night,
and fear she now shares Saraid’s fate. I have come to collect her.”

“Another
one who refuses to accept his destiny, only to watch his woman stumble about on
her own and find herself in trouble.”

Before
Colin could ask him what he’d meant by that cryptic remark, a murmur of
interest rippled through the great hall.

“Why
have I been summoned like a common servant?” a feminine voice demanded.

Chapter
Seventeen

“No
one could ever mistake you for a common servant, Princess Fiona,” Cael drawled
languidly.

Colin
turned to find Brogan leading a stunning fairie in a flowing white gown toward
Cael’s throne. He stared, struggling to equate the delicately beautiful
creature at Brogan’s side with the manipulative fairy who had brought so much
harm to so many lives.

Her
regal gait carried her toward the throne, appearing to float ethereally in the
midst of her subjects, until her scanning gaze fell upon Colin. Her eyes
widened and she faltered suddenly, stumbling to a halt. With his hand clamped
around her upper arm, Brogan continued on, dragging her in his wake as she
attempted to dig in her heels.

Cael
followed their progress with interest, clucking his tongue when they stood
before him at last. Fiona jerked her arm from Brogan’s gripping fingers to send
Cael’s Guardian of the Realm a fulminating scowl.

“You
look pale, daughter,” Cael noted casually.

She
lifted her chin and met the king’s gaze. “I don’t appreciate being hauled about
by your watchman, father.”

“Ah.
You dislike Brogan’s hands upon your delicate skin? But that was not always the
case, was it?”

Fiona
gasped, her gaze flying to Brogan at her side. Brogan remained stoically
silent.

“I
don’t know what he told you,” Fiona began.

Cael
silenced her with a flick of his hand. “I didn’t call you here to discuss your
choice of bedmates. Not recent ones, anyway.” His gaze moved to Colin. “You
haven’t greeted our guest. From your reaction a moment ago, I can only assume
you know him.”

“Princess
Fiona,” Colin greeted her with a stiff bow of his head.

“I
know of him,” she admitted loftily, without recognizing his greeting. “He’s a
Halfling, and a
Quinn
.” The hissed name sounded like a curse on her
lips.

The
hush in Cael’s great hall was complete as the fairies of his court followed the
unprecedented conversation between their king, his daughter, and a
shapeshifting Halfling, with undisguised interest.

“He’s
both of those,” Cael agreed, “and entertaining as well. While we’ve awaited
your arrival, he’s been amusing us all with a tale of lost mates and revenge.”

Fiona
flicked Colin a dismissive glance. “He’s a human and not to be trusted.”

“I
have spoken the truth, princess,” Colin interjected.

Fiona
turned on him. “Men know nothing of the truth. Deceit and greed is all you
know.”

“If
I know of deceit and greed, princess, I learned it at your hand. I grew to a
man watching my mother suffer a broken heart thanks to your manipulation of the
only man she ever loved. And I’ve seen the despair your actions have caused
others.”

“Michael
Sterling chose his family’s money over your mother’s love
and
you,” she
insisted. “He made his choice.”

“Aye,”
Colin agreed, startled at hearing his own sentiment concerning his father’s
actions slipping so cruelly from her lips. He’d battled the bitterness of his
father’s abandonment his entire life, but Keely was right. Michael Sterling was
as much a victim of Fiona’s twisted revenge as the rest of them. “It’s what
I’ve always believed as well, but then, the choice wasn’t really his, was it?
Your enchantment saw to that. And what of Owein and Saraid? And their babes?
Did they have a choice?”

Fiona’s
mouth flattened into a thin line, her body stiffening like a poker. She remained
silent.

“Where
is Keely, princess?” Colin demanded.

Cael
had been following the conversation silently, his calm demeanor proven false as
he turned to Brogan. “It is time you took your mate in hand, Brogan.” He
ignored Fiona’s gasp of dismay. “I took your council when you insisted my
daughter needed time on her own to put the hurt caused by Fitzgerald Quinn
behind her. We were both wrong. It seems while we waited for her to grow up and
recognize her true fate, she has spread her poisonous resentment beyond the
bounds of two worlds.”

“My
resentment,” Fiona cried, “comes from having a
father
who took the side
of a scheming human over his own daughter’s pleas.”

“Untrue,
daughter.”

“True!
You paid him the fortune he demanded and stayed my hand when I would have
struck him down. You protected him!”

“I
did what I needed to do to protect
you
from your lust for the human’s
blood! You’re no green pixie, Fiona, far beyond the age of exemption for
breaking fairie law. You know full well had you managed to take his life for
anything less than the survival of the People, it would have meant the loss of
your soul.”

“I
don’t care,” she snapped.

“I
do!” Cael roared. “Think you I could sit back and watch the life force slowly
fade from your lovely face? I couldn’t. I wouldn’t.”

Fiona
made no rejoinder, her blue eyes swimming with frustrated tears.

“What
have you done, Fiona?” Brogan asked quietly from her side.

Fiona
remained stubbornly silent. Brogan looked to Cael for his answer.

“Somewhere
in the raft, she holds captive the mate of the Halfling here,” Cael indicated
Colin with a stilted jerk of his head, “along with the mate of Owein the Fine.
A King of the Realm, no less! What she has done is to shame me, along with the
rest of her people.”

“Where
have you stashed the human women, Fiona?” Brogan asked on a long sigh.

“They
are beyond your reach.” She spun toward Colin with a sneer. “And yours. They
are safe from the men who would take their hearts and crush their souls.”

Colin
had heard enough. He took a step toward Fiona, meaning to force a location from
her lips, but Brogan’s hand to his chest brought him up short. There was no
humor in the eyes staring out at him from the fairie general’s proud face.