“Heilyn is fifteen moons and Milo is eighteen. Have you ever seen anything like that before? Have any bairns been stolen from here?”
Roger added, “They say you have seers here. Can you not look somewhere and find them?”
Edan rubbed his wrists repeatedly. “You must help us. I’ll do anything. I have a wee bit of coin but not much. But I’ll work for you for the rest of my days or help you build a new castle, I’ll plant your oats, anything if you will just help me find her.”
Ailith’s heart nearly split in two listening to the poor man. The strain in his voice, the rigid set of his shoulders. A man holding himself together by sheer will. If she could just see his face. She should not wish for that. And yet the need pressed at her, insistent and unwelcome.
“What is your trade?” Maitland asked. “Where is your wife? What has she seen?”
“My wife is dead. She died giving birth to Heilyn. And my trade is an armorer. I can build the finest swords in all the land.Daggers of all sizes. My brother Roger creates the finest sheaths. We make them lighter and lighter, yet we guarantee the blades will not pierce the leather. My sister sews the finest threads.”
Maitland turned his attention to Dyna, letting her lead the conversation. “I see the shape of things as they are, but I need your daughter’s face in my mind to find her, and I don’t have it. I don’t see anything, but I don’t know your daughter. I usually must have a connection to the person to be able to see them in my visions. I’m sorry, but I don’t know where she is.”
Edan bolted out of his seat, knocking the stool over. “What are you talking about? Are you the seer? You think you’ll dream about her and she’ll be there? I can’t believe in such things. They are not true.”
Dyna sat back, then spoke quietly. “Whether or not you believe in my skills as a seer doesn’t matter to me. I’m concerned about your daughter and your nephew, so even if you walked out our door at this moment, I won’t stop looking for the two bairns.”
Edan paced over to the door, grabbing the handle, but then paused, spinning back around a moment later as if he rethought his intentions. He closed his eyes and tipped his head back, then took a deep breath and moved back to stand in front of Dyna and Maitland.
“Please. I’m begging you. I have to find my daughter. You don’t understand. Heilyn is my whole world. I lost my wife, but I still had Heilyn. I cannot lose her.” And the tears rolled down his cheeks. “I don’t… what the hell do I…” He plopped back onto the stool and his head fell into his hands, the tears still covering his face. “And please don’t tell me anything about faeries because I don’t believe in them. People talk to me about some faery stealing my bairn, but that is a most preposterous thought. I would have seen someone in my cottage.”
Magni stood by the door and beckoned Dyna to his side while Edan wasn’t looking. Ailith wondered what he was about, but she was close enough to overhear.
Dyna approached Magni, who whispered, “I’ve seen Lia. Twice.”
Dyna grabbed both of his forearms. “Are you certain? Absolutely sure of this?”
“I am. Morgan saw her near the apple tree and on the way here, Cormac and Edan both saw her.”
“Explain thoroughly, please.” She still gripped his arms tightly. “He’s denying any belief in faeries.”
“When he was asking me for help, she appeared.”
“Where? On the ship?”
“Nay, in the sea,” he whispered. “She was riding a dolphin, if you can believe it. I saw her with my own eyes.”
Edan must have caught the change in Magni’s and Dyna’s faces because he rose to join them, catching the end of their conversation. “I can hear you. I saw her too. The lass. She was around five or six summers old, and she sat upon a dolphin, golden-haired in a green gown. She waved to us. I think she was a figment of my mind. We all want to find my daughter so badly that we created the wee lass in the sea.”
Magni scoffed, “That is not what I saw. I saw a faery I know verra well, and her name is Lia.”
Unwilling to get into this ridiculous conversation, he turned away only to be caught by surprise. Edan froze as his gaze found Ailith’s. She rose before she knew she’d moved, drawn by something she could not name. She nodded to him, an odd force coursing through her as his attention focused on her. “Who are you?”
The question struck deeper than it should have, as though he asked more than her name. Ailith turned and hurried toward the kitchens, her thoughts in disarray. She needed distance, amoment to steady herself. But then her thoughts changed. If she were to do what she wished to do, uncover what was happening to the bairns in her dream, she couldn’t hide from anyone, so she turned back to face him.
Only she was struck nearly speechless. This was definitely the man she’d seen in her nightmare. “I am Ailith Grant, daughter of Alasdair and Emmalin Grant, and I’m pleased to make your acquaintance.”
His gaze traveled from her plait to her blushing cheeks but stopped on her finger. “You’ve pricked yourself.” His hand settled under hers, bringing it forward for him to study. “Needlework?”
“Aye. I was working on a garment for my brother’s bairn coming this summer.” It was just a man’s hand, but his touch warmed her, and his concern struck her unusual, probably because most people didn’t concern themselves with her. Ailith had sat in the background for the last seven years, ever since she’d been held captive, and she wasn’t willing to risk being taken again.
But this was different. “Your daughter was taken?”
He took a linen square from his overcoat and held it against her bleeding finger, pressing as gently as any healer would. “Aye, in a thunderstorm that never rained.”
“What’s her name?” He smelled of woodsmoke and salt, an odd mix he’d picked up from his journey across the sea. “Heilyn. She’s fifteen moons old, and she’s the light of my life.”
He lifted his gaze for a moment and she studied the color, a shade of brown like her favorite pony, but he had the most unusual golden flecks here and there, mixed in with a different color.
