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“After discussing your health with Sister Ainnir, we’ve decided a busy mind and body may bring about your full recovery. Therefore, as you no longer require medical attention, I am putting you in Sister Liotha’s charge.” Ard-siúr motioned toward the tallest of the women. Flat nosed. Wind-burned cheeks. Hands broad and tough as leather. And a no-nonsense manner reminding him of Griffid. That skeptical, show-me air . . .
He staggered against the snatch of an image. His knees weak as water as he clutched at the slippery pieces of memory sliding through his mind.
Griffid?
The grizzled soldier returned to him, gap-toothed and grinning. His face as clear as the cluster of women in front of him. His temples thundered, a snarling pressure knotting his spine as he fought to concentrate. To battle his way through the shimmering stained-glass wash of color bursting across his vision.
“Are you unwell?” A touch upon his forehead. A hand upon his sleeve. And Griffid vanished. Lost in the endless well where Daigh’s past swam but rarely surfaced.
He steadied himself, shaking off the proffered aid. Refusing to let these women see his weakness. His anguish. They saw too much as it was. Picked him apart like a flock of vultures. Yet despite all their probing, soul-searing stares, they could offer him no hint about his lost past. Of that, they were as uncertain as he. Time, they assured. Time and freedom would restore him.
But as he followed Sister Liotha to his new duties, a vague, unsettling notion clawed at his consciousness. He could count on neither time nor freedom. Both waned with every passing day. And why that was, like all else, he could not remember.
Sabrina crumpled the letter, flinging it away with a satisfying toss. She’d have to pick it up later—before Jane found and read it—but for now, it felt good to take out her frustrations on a scrap of paper that couldn’t fight back.
Aidan requested her immediate presence in Dublin. Again. This was the fifth such letter she’d received in the space of two months. He couched his command in conciliating language, but the essence remained the same. While he understood her desire to withdraw from Society following the tumultuous aftermath of their father’s death, he could no longer allow her to hide herself away from the world.
He talked of unity. Purpose. The Douglases against the world. Like they were a family. But you needed more than shared blood to be a family. And their father’s murder had shattered those familial ties. Aidan couldn’t just glue them back together with sticking plaster and false optimism. Pretend the last years hadn’t happened.
The Sisters of High Danu were her only family now.
Even Sister Brigh, though Sabrina hated to admit it.
That was the conclusion she’d come to after hours of soul-searching. She was sticking with it.
She wouldn’t go to Dublin. Period. She didn’t care how many letters Aidan penned.
Her eldest brother had never understood her devotion to the cloistered bandraoi life. He’d always been far more comfortable among the bustle and confusion of the city. Could slide into the skin of a Duinedon without difficulty. And had rarely, if ever, showed any interest in his Other inheritance besides the most basic of household magics.
Not Sabrina. She’d always sensed her Other blood was written upon her face, clear as day. Always felt like a fish on dry land when called upon to pretend otherwise. She recalled with discomfort the stilted conversations of afternoon social calls and the wallflower shyness of parties. The fluttering, simpering young women with nothing on their minds besides making advantageous marriages. As the proper wife of a proper peer, when would she ever get the chance to use her powers? She’d be relegated to a life half lived. The best parts of her left behind, unwanted and forgotten.
Her endeavors to become a bandraoi might not be progressing as she’d envisioned. But it was a life she understood. Her previous existence seemed, with every passing year, a dream belonging to some other Lady Sabrina Douglas. Certainly not to her.
The tower bells rang the hour. Time to report to Sister Ainnir and her duties.
Lately, the daily routine of the infirmary and hospital had become, well . . . routine. Assisting those suffering from accidents and illness. Short forays to the neighboring farmsteads and villages when a healer or midwife was needed.
The stranger’s disturbing arrival had shaken her from the rut for a few days, but with Daigh’s removal to new quarters, she’d lost even that frisson of anticipation when her stomach went jittery and her breathing quickened.
It was just as well.
She’d become far too aware of him waiting at the end of the long, low-ceilinged passage. The impatient way he prowled his quarters. His aura of command, shaken by circumstance yet there in the arrogant set of his jaw. The ruthless intensity chained in the depths of his forever gaze.
Daigh MacLir. The name Ard-siúr had chosen for him. Like pulling an identity from a hat. But it suited him. Hard. Sharp.
She rolled the name on her tongue. “Daigh. Daigh MacLir.”
Shaking off the quiver that skittered up her spine, she rose to retrieve the balled letter. No, Sabrina. No. Daigh was off-limits. Out of bounds. A treacherous obstacle placed upon her path. She offered a prayer to the gods for strength.
Sister Brigh called him dangerous. Sabrina wouldn’t go that far. But power did ripple off him like smoke. She’d felt it immediately. She might not know who he was. But she knew what he was.
Other.
Like her.
Tossing Aidan’s summons on the fire, she watched the edges blacken and curl to ash.
A merging of Fey and human. A product of both worlds.
