When she woke up again, she was in a room she thought she’d never see again. It was her bedroom back in London. Everything seemed drab and dull as she sat up and looked around in confused horror. “You’re finally awake,” said a familiar voice.
“Fenella!” Rowan exclaimed, feeling somewhat relieved even through her distress. “What is going on? Why am I back here?”
Her once-familiar looked at her with a sad expression. She was still a girl, but now her appearance was purely human, blond and blue-eyed with no cat ears in sight. “Aidan convinced Lord Kennet to cancel your contract. Your father’s too. You’re free.”
Rowan sat in stunned silence for several heartbeats. Free? She knew she should have been thrilled. Everything was back to normal. She would not have to bear a half-fae child and leave it in the Otherworld. But her heart felt like it was breaking. She had wanted to stay. She loved him. She would have stayed forever if he’d let her.
“Why? He said that he loved me…” she said, tears streaming down her face. Fenella sat down beside her, putting an arm around her shoulder.
“I don’t know,” she said. “But I’m going to look into some things. I’ll do whatever I can, but…” She paused and looked up. “I have to go. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” She disappeared just as Blair came in with a pitcher of water.
He was thrilled to see her awake. All of the servants were. And her father was recovering too. Everyone hugged and praised her; the house was filled with high spirits. But all she could feel was hollow and empty.
didn’t think she’d ever cried so much in her life. She didn’t want to; her logical mind told her it was ridiculous. It served no purpose, and since this was obviously what Aidan wanted, she ought to feel glad that he hadn’t waited longer to abandon her. Or alternatively, she should appreciate the limited time she’d had with him, since it was a relationship doomed to failure.
But every time she imagined his smile, the tears started falling whether she willed it or no. She could hardly sleep. The bed was the same one she had slept in since childhood, but without his arms around her, it no longer felt comfortable or familiar.
Blair was worried, but he seemed to know there was nothing he could say. She had refused to tell anyone what had happened in the Otherworld. Not because she was ashamed. It just hurt too much, and they wouldn’t have understood.
She knew they would all be scandalized; they would think she’d been taken advantage of. Well, perhaps Lord Kennet had pressured her unfairly in her desperate moments, and certainly she felt Niall would not have been kind to her. But she couldn’t hate them, because they had led her to Aidan. Everything with him had always been her choice. Except right at the end.
After a week had passed, her father finally came to see her. He looked a little older than she remembered, and his face was gaunt, but otherwise, Geoffrey Ravencroft appeared to be healthy with all his mental faculties intact. He had his hat in his hand, but he was dressed to go out. She didn’t know what to say to him. “Blair tells me you haven’t left your room.”
“No,” she said, looking down at her hands in her lap. “I haven’t really felt like seeing anyone.” He took a step toward her, and she felt his hand rest on her head. She couldn’t remember the last time her father had touched her in an affectionate way. “Father?” She looked up, but he was staring at the ceiling as if inspiration might be found there.
“I know what you did. What you tried to do for me.” There was no censure in his voice, which surprised her. If there was anyone who would disapprove of cavorting with a Prince of the Fair Folk, it would have been him. “I can’t say anything to make it easier. You shouldn’t have had to make such a choice. I am sorry.” He moved his hand from her head and walked back to the doorway.
She had no words for him, but she could feel the tears start to fall again. “Prince Aidan came to take tea with me every few days,” he said. “He’s a good man. Whatever happened, I’m sure he felt it was the right thing to do, but I don’t think he would’ve wanted you to give up because of it.” He put on his hat. “I have to go meet with the Privy Council. I’ll be home for dinner.” Then, he was gone, leaving Rowan blinking her eyes and wondering if she’d suffered a strange hallucination.
She suspected her father had meant to imply that Aidan wouldn’t have wanted her to give up on life, but she took it a completely different way. She couldn't give up, not on him, no matter what he wanted. Her mind on fire, she went to her desk and started looking through her journals and papers frantically. Somewhere here, it had to be…
“Looking for this?” said Fenella’s familiar voice, holding out a leather-bound journal that had fallen to the floor.
“You’re back!” Rowan exclaimed, throwing her arms around her friend. “Does this mean you’ve discovered some information?”
Fenella nodded. “Better than information. I bribed one of the invisible servants who happened to be in the throne room when Prince Aidan arrived. Now, you’ll be able to see exactly what happened through the eyes of someone who was there.”
“The Palace has invisible servants?!” The idea that a bunch of people she couldn’t see may have been watching her at all times gave her the shivers. But there wasn’t time for this. “Never mind. Just show me.”
Fenella nodded and pulled a small, silk-wrapped object out of her pocket. It was an orb of glass or crystal. “When you touch it, the memory will expand around you, just like if you were there, but you won’t be able to interact with anything. So, no screaming or throwing punches,” she added with a half-smile. “Also, it might be a little disorienting, so you’d better sit down.”
Rowan seated herself on the edge of the bed, and Fenella tipped the orb into her hands. As soon as she felt the smooth, cool object against her fingers, the light around her changed, becoming bright and golden. She could hear the sound of angry footsteps echoing off the marble tile and a murmur of voices. She blinked, and she was looking at the person she most wanted to see.
Prince Aidan stood on the top step of the dais, his posture tense. Rowan saw him from the side, from a lower height than she was used to, and the invisible observer whose memory she borrowed was reticent to look directly in the prince’s face, but she could hear his voice perfectly well.
“So, you will do nothing?” he said, low and furious.
“What would you have me do?” boomed Lord Kennet. “You have no proof that your brother had any knowledge of this attack. Besides, this is standard Court behaviour. If you cannot protect one woman, how can you expect to rule?”
“Oh, that’s rich, coming from you. I won’t have Rowan’s safety be made into a game for your amusement,” Aidan replied, his voice dripping venom. “The only reason this happened is because you don’t have the balls to make a choice yourself.” Rowan could hardly believe Aidan had the nerve to say that to his father, no matter how angry he was, but Lord Kennet didn’t even react.
“I believe my method is more fair and impartial,” he said, crossing his arms.
“Fair? There is nothing about this that is fair. Not to me, not to her. Not even to Niall,” Aidan said, throwing his arms out in frustration. “You set him up for failure.”
“Perhaps I was simply tired of watching you sitting on your hands. If you want something, you need to take action.” It seemed to Rowan that Lord Kennet grew colder with every word while Aidan only became angrier. But then, it was like a switch had been flipped, and his face set into something icy, emotionless and implacable.
“I am taking action now,” he said. “Release them from the bargain. Rowan and her father. I’ll win my throne another way.”
“You’re taking quite a risk. Niall isn’t just going to back down.”
“I would rather fight him one on one than take a chance with Rowan’s life. Maybe when things are settled…”
When Lord Kennet laughed, it was cruel. “Subduing your brother and his supporters could take hundreds of years. By the time you think it’s safe, your little mortal girl will be long gone.”
“Then I will wait!” Aidan shouted, his composure cracking for the space of a single heartbeat. He took a deep breath and leaned into his father. Power leaked from him in shadowy rivulets until it surrounded him like a cloak and filled the room with ebony skies and starlight. For the first time, Rowan wondered if he might be much more powerful than his father. If he had just been biding his time.
“I will wait ten thousand years for her soul to be reborn if that’s what it takes. I love her. I won’t use her and throw her away. I am not you,” he said, his voice deep and cold like the heart of a glacier. “You will release them from the bargain.”
Lord Kennet did not appear to be afraid, but he was awed, and Rowan thought, proud. “It is done.” Aidan straightened and took a step back, drawing his power within himself. He looked weary and desolate, just as he had the last time she saw him. “What will you tell her?” his father asked, though with more kindness than she would’ve guessed he possessed.
“Nothing,” Aidan said. “If this is truly the end, I would rather she hate me and move on with her life than wait for a day that might never come.” He turned and exited the throne room without another word.
Lord Kennet sighed after him. “I am sorry, son. Everything I have done for you has turned out wrong.”
The vision faded, and Rowan was back in her room. She could feel the tears streaming down her face, and Fenella handed her a handkerchief. “Now, you know how he feels. So, what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to go back, obviously,” Rowan said fiercely. “I love him, and I’m not going to let him push me away just to protect me. He’s being ridiculous.” Fenella looked relieved. “Is that why you showed me that memory?” Rowan asked, laughing with sudden realization. “You needn’t have bothered. I was going to come back anyway.”
“You don’t know how happy I am to hear that. I was afraid I was going to have to work hard to convince you. Prince Aidan needs your help. He would never say so, but he’s in a bad situation,” Fenella said, and Rowan noticed for the first time that she looked exhausted.
“Oh, sit down here, Fenella, and I’ll pour you some tea. I must say that I’m slightly hurt. You really didn’t think I would help?”
The fae woman sighed as she accepted the tea cup. “You forget that I wasn’t there with you in the Court of Waves. For all I knew, you’d had some sort of argument, and of course, Aidan wouldn’t say anything.
I didn’t have any idea what happened until I saw the memory myself. And even then, the last time I saw you, you were a wreck. I can’t say I would have blamed you for being angry.”
“I am angry,” Rowan admitted. “Angry that he wouldn’t at least tell me the truth and let me decide a course on my own. But that doesn’t mean I’ve stopped loving him. So, tell me what’s going on.”
“Just like you saw in the vision, Prince Aidan swore he would defeat his brother without using you, so he challenged Niall to a duel. One on one, two weeks to prepare, magic, but no weapons.
Normally, I would have said he should have done it long ago. Niall is physically strong, but it he has nothing on Aidan’s magic. I mean, you’ve seen what he can do,” she said, waving her hand in the direction of the crystal orb that contained the memory.
“But it’s almost like Niall planned for this all along. That arrow Aidan was shot with was poisoned. It’s nothing fatal, but it is draining his magical power faster than he can replenish it. The really frustrating thing is that he won’t do anything about it. Not talk to his father, not try to postpone the duel. It’s almost like he’s given up.”
Rowan felt a surge of anger and worry. Anger at Niall and worry for the man she loved. “Do you believe if I go back, it will motivate him to keep fighting?”
“That’s my hope. And maybe you can talk to Lord Kennet on his behalf. If he had another week, and he actually rested, I think the poison would be out of his system.”
Rowan nodded, but she turned to her once-handmaiden with a critical eye. There was something that had been bothering her for a while. “Forgive me for saying this, Fenella, because you’ve been nothing but a friend to me, and I have no reason to distrust you, but you seem to know an awful lot about what’s going on for a simple chambermaid.”
Fenella laughed sheepishly. “I’m surprised you didn’t question me beforehand. In the beginning, you assumed I worked for Lord Kennet, and I just let you believe it.
The truth is that I work for Prince Aidan. I always have. I was what you might call a spy or a scout before I stumbled into being your familiar. But, just like I told you before, I wasn’t supposed to interfere, only to watch and report back.”
“But why would Aidan be interested in me? I don’t even understand how he would have known about my existence.” She had never been entirely clear on why Lord Kennet would have been interested in her, but she had accepted it had something to do with the bargain between him and her father. The idea that Aidan had been the one watching over her made even less sense.
“That is a question I think you should ask him in person. But first, we need to figure out how we’re going to get you back,” Fenella said, crossing her arms with a troubled expression.
“I assumed we’d go the same way you got here,” Rowan replied, blinking in surprise. The handmaiden shook her head.
“The way I travel is a special ability exclusive to my particular species,” Fenella said. “I can’t bring anyone with me. It’s hard to explain.”
Rowan pursed her lips. “I suppose there’s no way we can ask anyone from the Court. That means I’ll either have to open the Triskel Gate myself, which I’ve never done before or…”
There was one person she knew would be able to open a portal to the Otherworld, but she wasn’t sure how willing he would be to help. However, there was no time to second-guess. “There is someone we need to go see.”