Page 63 of Why Broken Wings Fray

Even though he had shut me out once more, he reached a hand towards me and let one of his infamous grins possess his face. “Come inside, Olivia. Killian wishes to show us this cake that you two found. And it is not green, so I will command you to eat it if I must.”

Frowning, I rose to my feet and took up a stride at his side, ignoring as he let the untouched peace-offering that was his hand fall back to his side.

29

____________________

First, there was a shout.

Just a bellowing of noise. Not a true word. Not a fully formed thought. Just the beginning of a vowel that was cut short by a horrific noise akin to air being punched from lungs.

Then there was the ringing. The singing of blades as they were drawn, the metallic tang to the air as blood and glory shimmered along swords and set into the hilts.

I had heard the havoc that befell a castle when it was stormed, once. Moments after Raegan had started his ascension to the Choilltean throne. Moments before an arrow put Niamh into a deep, permanent sleep. And this was like that, except it was louder and far more promising as the walls of the Cluaineach castle rumbled with every thunderous movement the intruders took.

Raegan and I had only just returned to the dining hall, walking at a safe yet friendly distance, our hands brushing against one another one-too-many times to claim it a coincidence. And I had only just settled into the comfort of him, a comfort unlike Killian in that it was born of mutual understanding of one another instead of simple friendship. My mouth had just opened to thank him for coming and pulling me from the balcony, and that was when it started.

Raegan was quick, swift, and agile with his motions as we crossed the dining hall threshold and my whole body was placed between his two hands. He shoved me behind him, his hand a constant against me that held me in place at his back, his other moving for the sword that rarely left his hip.

His ceadan were just as swift, each of them leaping up from the table, swords crying as they relinquished their sheathes and shone their magnificence against the fireflies that buzzed in all directions.

All there was to do was wait. We flinched as we heard roars, we grimaced as we heard last cries. But it was the beating, the feet against clay floors and the echoing of their intentional movements, that was what sent fear through me. The rhythmic bass of it pounded against my body and set itself into my bones as I clung to Raegan’s back, quick and willing to have him protect me.

“Take this,” he murmured as he blindly reached a dagger around his back and wiggled it for me to take. Yet again I stared at a weapon, unsure of my true capability to wield one, but nodded and took it from him nonetheless.

And then they arrived.

But they were not pixies.

I had allowed myself to get far too comfortable in the world of the fair folk. Too trusting and too naive to the slyness that everyone continuously warned me of. Because at the head of the small group that had charged through the Cluaineach castle were two males. Two males who should have been strangers, but weren’t. Or at least not in the conventional sense.

Before us, hands deep in their pockets, ease and a general ambience of indifference across their faces, were the two fairies that had waltzed by us in Marazion.

I shot Killian a nervous glance over my shoulder, only to see him gaining on me where he soon resided in my shadow. Between the King in front of me and the seasoned warrior behind me, I should’ve felt safe. But there was something about seeing them again, knowing that our brief sight of them had been anything but coincidence, that threw me into great unease and made me slide closer to Raegan. I would’ve crawled into his skin and lived there, if it had been a choice. His hand remained bent around his back, placed on my elbow, a steady reminder of his presence.

The first of the fairies, the one who had let out a powerful laugh in the streets, strode ahead of the rest. His hair, now that I saw him much closer, should have given away his non-human status, because though it was brown, it was a shade of brown that I had yet to see naturally occur. It was brown in the way tree-trunks were brown, brown in the way fresh mud after a rainfall was brown.

He let out a charismatic grin that yet again made me want to trip my way towards him, only for Raegan to grip me tighter. The damning thing was that he – his presence, his hand on my arm – silenced that strange lure towards the fairies. Being with him overrode any desire for me to run to them.

“King Raegan,” the fairy said, his voice thick as he swept out his arms and sketched a false bow for Raegan. As he rose, his hauntingly-blue eyes snapped to me, causing him to stretch his fake grin into something truly wicked. It was the first time that I had looked at someone in Saoghal, other than Raegan, and quickly feared them. I thought only Raegan had been capable of dominating a room in such a way.

I pushed closer to him and fisted my hands in his shirt.

“Taran,” Raegan said, his back straight and his chin forever high. If the presence of the fairies, and the company that had stumbled in behind them, worried Raegan, he showed absolutely no sign of it.

“And what do we have here?” Taran purred as he tilted his weight to the side, his head falling heavy to his left, as he tried to peer around Raegan and to me. The noise Raegan made at the back of his throat was something natural and instinctual as he pushed at me, placing me farther behind him and using his tremendous width to block all eyes from me.

“She is none of your concern,” Raegan snapped, his words accentuated with a rolling growl. “Stare at her a moment longer, Taran, and I shall melt your eyes from their sockets.”

But Raegan did what I thought he was incapable of doing – he broke a mask in front of someone that wasn’t me. Because now, Taran split a wide grin and flicked his attention over his shoulder to his companion who snickered back.

They knew what they had when they looked back at me.

Killian knew, too. That’s why he took a position at my side, even if it meant being back-to-chest with Raegan. Neither one of them cared, sandwiching me between them and accepting the close proximity if it meant my safety.

“Let me guess,” Raegan took to a purr, back to his equally as sly and vicious form as the fairies in front of him. “That little weasel at your side – Caden?”

“The one and only,” Caden said, identical in nearly every way to Taran other than a small scar that split his left brow. He sauntered to Taran’s side and offered Raegan yet another false bow.