The moment I stepped outside my chest flickered with warmth, as though my Flame were breathing a sigh of relief. I laid a comforting hand on my chest, grateful for its presence. It had taken so long to coax it from the shadows, and it was not the reactive, lively wildfire it had once had been. Perhaps it never would be again. But it was here, and it was mine and –
– And it was burning my fingers.
“Ouch,” I hissed, snatching my hand back. “What’syourproblem?”
It strained against my chest with such force that the breath was knocked out of me from the inside. I gasped at the sudden burst of sensation; it was like having a live fish trapped in my ribcage. The thrashing came again, and I stumbled forward with it, then realising this was what it wanted, I kept walking. My pulse was thundering, but I didn’t dare let a sliver of hope slide past my guarded heart, even when I glanced down the path and saw a tall figure riding down the road on a handsome black stallion. He was slight and pale as the moon, with long white hair that sat stark against the dark gold cloak on his back; the banner of the crown. The rider slowed as he approached the tavern, and I could have sworn his gaze, shaded beneath his cap, flicked my way before he guided his horse around the gate to the back where the stables sat empty.
Although I didn’t know him at a glance, my Flame was blazing harder than it had in months and it could not have been less subtle with the wild thrashing that dragged me after him. I hurried around the side of the tavern, and emerged just in time to see the stable door open.
The man stepped out and my breath froze, my Flame stilled.
Until his skin began to shimmer and shift.
Taller and broader, the man removed his cap to reveal a mess of dark hair. It was Caelan’s green eyes that stared back at me.
“Hello, Rosie,” he said.
For a moment, all I could do was breathe.
Breathe, and ease the tension and pain in my chest. Breathe, and calm my feverish Flame before it got ahead of itself and did something awful like set my whole body alight in golden, glowing warmth.
“Hello, Caelan,” I said finally.
Something shifted in his gaze at the sound of his name on my lips, but he didn’t move any closer. Neither did; I had to keep my distance, just as I had all those months ago, when to get too close was to risk the leash over the willful creature in my chest. So we stood there on opposite ends of the barren backgarden, separated by a clothesline and openly staring at one another. He looked the same; hair a little longer around his ears, beard so thick now it almost obscured half of his scar. But still Caelan, still beautiful and a little wild in that way that spoke to the unpredictable fire in me. We stood there for far too long, and might have remained locked in that gaze until nightfall – but Caelan’s eyes slid to something just beyond me and his lips twitched beneath his beard.
I turned to the kitchen window just in time to see Sorcha’s dark hair whip out of the way, leaving Magnus wide-eyed and mouthingShitbefore he ducked beneath the sill.
“We have an audience,” said Caelan.
His voice was just how I remembered it, dark and rolling like a spill of fine velvet. Mine, by contrast, creaked out in a weak, uncertain hush when I turned and said; “They’re probably wondering where you’ve been.”
The look on his face was pained. Far too soft and understanding.
“I had to go.”
“Did you have to stay gone?”
He took a step forward, and I moved instinctually back. The pull between us had always felt magnetic, but right now those magnets were flipped. Caelan’s throat bobbed, but he didn’t comment on my gesture nor the obvious simmer of anger beneath it.
“Yes,” he said instead. “For a while.”
“Why?”
The word was a challenge, and he rose to it with grace.
“Because Brigid needed me, and I made a promise.”
It would have been selfish to tell him that I’d needed him, too. That my cold chest had hurt every day, that the fiery hole his absence ripped through my very being had ruined me. I was ashamed of how badly I wanted his apology in that moment. He hadn’t made me any promises, not like the oath he’d sworn his baby sister. And if the Dagda had promised him tomein some way, I knew I would never want that to rob Caelan of his choices. But I couldn’t tell him it was alright, because it didn’tfeelalright.Not yet.
“Why didn’t you just tell me? You knew what I was, you accepted me. Why would you think—”
The words choked off with a pathetic croak, but Caelan understood well enough. The look on his face was sheer agony.
“Because it wasn’t enough to tell you what I was,” he said, voice as pained as his furrowed brow. “I would have had to tell you everything. I would havewantedto. And if I did that, if you’d asked me not to risk my life, or to spare the King’s — if you had asked me not to go through with any of this… I don’t think I would have. I was scared that I’d have it in me to betray my own sister, the person I’ve spent my whole life trying to protect. And that’s not something I wanted to discover about myself.”
He was right.
I might have asked that of him. I really might; I’d gotten to a point in my life where I could be just that selfish when it came to the people I loved — and it wasn’t something I wanted to know about myself, either.
