A pained look crossed Cillian’s face. “I don’t want to be responsible for anyone’s death.”
“We choose to serve,” Niamh said, as if that was the end-all and be-all of the argument.
Cillian shook his head. “We needto find Aisling.”
“How long until we get to shore?” Bran asked, looking past Niamh at the cliffs. He didn’t see any feasible way up them.
“We will reach the cove soon enough.” Niamh eyed them critically. “But you both must change. The clothes you are in are too noticeable for the village we will be passing through. And I will bring another healing draught for my prince to take.”
“Isn’t there any way we can bypass the village?” He just needed to be on shore to activate the locating spell in his bracelet. From there, they could travel to wherever Aisling was.
“To do so would draw more attention. We have wares to trade, and some of my crew will handle that while we see what your magic can do.”
Her tone said she didn’t believe it would amount to much, and it stung. Bran held his tongue, though, not keen on arguing around so many Fae.
Bran tapped Jupiter on the beak, then held out his arm again. She hopped onto his forearm, and he launched her into the air, watching her fly up to perch on top of the highest mast. Then they were ushered back to the room Cillian had been recuperating in below deck. Niamh wasn’t long in returning, her arms laden down with clothes, a cavalier-style hat, and a small box. “Your boots you can keep. Please change into these. The hat is for you, my prince. And you, witch, must wear this.”
“No,” Bran said, the word wrenching itself from his mouth as he stared at the collar and leash in the box she held up after placing the clothes on the bed. “I won’t.”
“All mortals wear such items in the Otherworld, whether witch or not. You are not one of us, and you must be owned,” she said flatly.
“No one owns Bran, and he isn’t wearing that,” Cillian growled.
Niamh set the box with the collar and leash on the bed and stared them both down. “Witches have no rights in our world. They are the enemy and always have been since our world was cleaved from theirs. If he walks around with freedom, that will draw attention more than anything else we do. Attention that will get him killed. You say he is your friend. If you wish to keep him safe, you must leash him. He is far too willful to pass as a servant.”
“You mean broken,” Bran spat out. “Your kind doesn’t keep willful witches. You break them into pets.”
Niamh shrugged, as if it didn’t bother her one bit that their society allowed such horror.
“What would happen if he didn’t wear it?” Cillian asked.
“It is not done for pets,” she said.
“I’m not—” Bran said.
“You are such a thing here,” Niamh hissed, taking a single step forward, though she didn’t reach for any of the throwing knives on her person. “Here, you are a witch, and if you are that, then you are one of two things—dead or owned. If you do not wear my prince’s collar, then you are fair game for any Fae to claim.”
Bran stepped back, one hand going to his bare throat as he stared at her. The idea of being a prisoner to someone like Ainmire again sent a jagged bolt of fear through him.
“Can you give us a minute?” Cillian asked quietly.
She sighed before passing over the last thing in her hand to Cillian. “Drink this. It will ease your lingering aches.”
Niamh left, closing the door behind her. Bran sucked in a breath and stepped away from the bed, glaring at the collar and leash. “I’m not wearing it.”
“Bran,” Cillian said. “I don’t want you to become a target.”
Bran spun around, gesturing sharply at the collar and leash. “So you want me to wearthat? Want me to willingly put it on and suffer through not being able to use my magic again?”
“Niamh didn’t say it would do that.”
“She didn’t say what it would do at all. That’s how Fae speak, Cillian. You have to listen to what is and isn’t said when they talk. It’s all word games to trap you in a corner.”
“Is that what Ainmire did to you?”
Bran looked away from him, glaring at the wall. “You wouldn’t have been fed if I hadn’t agreed to what he wanted.”
Neither of them had been able to attempt an escape for fear of the other one coming to harm. Leashed by words, if not by a physical one, at the time. It still pulled the same way. And now, Cillian was contemplating what Ainmire had done, and the idea of it had Bran sick to his stomach.
