A Glimmering Girl (5 page)

“And easily found at home, I imagine.” Lilith had seen the poetry section in Faeview’s library.

“You can credit
your
father for that. Apparently he adored Yeats. He collected several volumes, including two first editions. I found what I wanted, the one about how
one man loved the pilgrim soul in you…”
Cade lifted Lilith’s hand and kissed her fingers. “...
And loved the sorrows of your changing face…”

“
When You Are Old,”
she said.

“Well, exactly.” Cade rolled his eyes. “The title killed it. I might have been an ignorant boy of fourteen, but even then I knew it wasn’t a good strategic move to point out a woman’s age. And Sheila was an older woman. Of course she had nothing on you.”

“Not a hundred years older than you?”

“Close. She was nineteen—twenty, more like. I was devastated. In all my life, nothing had been so romantic as Kevin O’Connor, with his dark hair, clear skin, and black leather jacket, quoting Yeats to Kathleen Turner.”

“I wish—”

“No!” Cade lunged forward and slapped his hand over Lilith’s mouth. They stared at each other, astonished.

Great gods!
Her heart was going a hundred miles an hour. She could imagine what she must look like—she
felt
her eyes ready to bulge out of her face.

“Sun and moon, I almost…”

“Yeah.” Cade held her so close she could hardly breathe. His lips crashed into hers in a desperate kiss, terrified and relieved all at once.

She had utterly forgotten the portal.

A fae portal ran between Igdrasil and Mudcastle. It cut a fairy’s travel time down to minutes from one place to the other, as opposed to an hour’s flight—an hour only if there were no shiny objects to stop and inspect along the way.

Portals as a rule were harmless, but the Igdrasil-Mudcastle portal was treacherous. Its creator—Lilith’s mother—on a whim most fae had added a twist: a three-wishes charm.

Cade’s mother had accidentally wished herself a hundred years into her past while standing right near this spot. Lilith’s mother had purposely used the portal to escape from Idris in 1876 a hundred years into the future.

Just now, Lilith had almost said aloud,
I wish I’d known you then.
She didn’t want to think how their lives might have been changed.

“What did you do?” she said, forcing her mind away from the averted disaster.

“Do?”

“About the poem?”

“Oh. Yes. It turned out a happy failure. I found something far better.
The Song of Wandering Aengus
.”

“Aengus. Aengus doesn’t sound very romantic.”

“Oh, but it is. Aengus was a god of love, you see. Of youth and beauty as well, but those two held no attraction to me. I had more youth than I wanted, and it was accepted fact that I’d never have beauty.”

“Ye of little faith.” Lilith kissed the palm of Cade’s hand. He was beautiful in her eyes, more so every time she saw him. “But I won’t argue with your Dumnosian stubbornness.”

“It was the love god part I related to.” Cade flexed a bicep. “I suppose every lad of fourteen considers himself a love god. I was so full of nervous
wanting
then.”

“Not like now,” Lilith said drily.

He gave her a teasing kiss, a mere brush of the lips and dart of the tongue that sent shivers of anticipation over her.

“In the poem, Aengus sees the woman of his dreams—only to lose her immediately. He vows to find out where she’s gone if it takes the rest of his life.”

“I’ll grant that’s romantic.”

“It was obvious, though apparently not to Aengus, that the woman was a fairy and not about to be caught if she didn’t want to be. I felt right sorry for the chap, love god that he was.”

“Love god that he was.” Lilith moved closer to her husband, and he welcomed her into his arms. She leaned against his chest and listened to his heart beating. “Did Sheila approve your recital?”

“She was quite lovely about it,” Cade said. “I’m sure I was far redder than usual by the end, but she made no comment on my appearance.
That was sweet of you, Cade, dear,
she said and kissed me on the forehead.”

“Aww.”

“Not
aww,
no!
A love god isn’t sweet. A love god isn’t a dear. A love god is devastating, rakish, hot—anything… not sweet. My demonstration of devotion was an utter failure. But not wasted. The plight of poor Aengus captured my imagination. You might say it awakened me to a certain idealism. Aengus chased his fairy all the night long, but as the dawn broke she disappeared into the brightening air. He vowed to find her again, though he grew old wandering the hollows and hills:

I will find out where she has gone,

And kiss her lips and take her hands;

And walk among long dappled grass,

And pluck till time and times are done

The silver apples of the moon,

The golden apples of the sun.”

Lilith lay uneasily against Cade’s chest, grateful for the reassuring sound of his steady heartbeat. She’d never heard the poem before, yet the story was familiar, as if she’d lived it herself.

They were both silent for a moment as the lovely words hung in the air, then Cade spoke. Innocuous words, said quietly, but with a catch in his voice, as he might announce he’d been diagnosed with a chronic illness or that he was sterile.

“I’ve been having dreams.”

No…
For a flicker of time, the world went dead silent. Lilith couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t hear. Couldn’t think. She
made herself
take a breath.

“…dreaming that I am Aengus,” Cade was saying. “I’m searching for the woman I love. She’s lost in the mystic—not hiding, but lost. I keep calling to her.
Come back! Come back to me!
The woman I’m searching for is you, my own dear Lilith. And I’m an old man, and I haven’t seen you in so very long and… my heart has broken. I’m so full of grief for missing you I’ve come to the place of despair. I know I’ll never see you again. I can’t… go on.”

He stopped talking. Once Lilith’s breathing was again regular, she looked up at him. His eyes glistened, and a tear had rolled down one cheek.

“Oh, honey.” She moved up and kissed him.

“What a git, eh?” he said.

“Never,” Lilith whispered. “You’re my hero, and I love your romantic side. I love everything about you.”

She wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her face against his neck. The mist had almost burned off, and the sound of waves crashing below the cliffs was more distinct. There was no island on the horizon, but still she was anxious. She’d never heard the poem about Aengus and the fairy, but…

But in the last week, her lucid dreams had started up again—the kind of dreams that had brought her to Dumnos, dreams from the mystic. In these dreams, every night she’d heard Cade, desperate and broken, calling to her from the mist.

Come back! Come back to me!

« Chapter 4 »
Wings

The renovations suggested by the goblin Max had worked; Lilith and Cade could at last live in their own house without it making them sick.

All the cold iron at Faeview had been replaced by wood where possible and Dumnos steel where steel was required. For good measure, the hard-angled, rectangular windows and doors were gone, exchanged for new ones with rounded edges.

Their headaches had disappeared.

Lilith opened a bag of ice for Cade, at work behind the wet bar, just as Marion, Ian, Sharon, and Jimmy let out a collective wail of woe over another score made by the
Spellbinders
.

“I thought we were promised appletinis!” Marion said. “I’m beginning to doubt such a thing exists.”

Cade’s aunt loathed the mystic, and who could blame her? She’d lost or was in fear of losing her only two blood relatives to either wyrd or fae. Beverly, her sister, had been abducted by a wyrding woman and possessed for thirty years. Cade, the nephew she’d raised since he was five, was a faeling. It was good to see her joking and smiling, doing her best to accept what she hated for the good of what she loved.

“Almost there, Moo.” Cade flashed his aunt a smile. “These things must be done delicately. Say a prayer for the
Crucible
while you wait.”

“You all act like it’s unexpected,” Lilith said. “I’m told the
’binders
always beat the
Crucible
.”

“Boo! Hiss!”

“Blasphemy!”

“Traitor!”

Cade’s eyes scrunched with his playful smile. “I’ll take a penalty kiss on that one.” He put down the shaker and pulled Lilith into his arms. His lips were warm and soft and firm all at once, and his kiss tasted of Guinness.

A surge of eagerness for him swept though Lilith’s body—along with ungracious irritation that they had company. She’d once considered Cade Bausiney awkward, trending toward unattractive. Now the very fact of his existence in the world was necessary to her happiness.

“Hey, over there,” Moo said happily. “Snogging later. Appletinis now.”

“Yes,” Lilith murmured. “Later there will be much snogging.”

“Your servant, my love.”

He was self-deprecating, as ever—a trait ingrained in his marrow—but since he’d awakened to his fae nature, Cade’s self-confidence had flourished. His capacity for loving life had taken on new vitality. If there was any awkwardness, it was of an endearing sort.

She no longer questioned whether he was strangely handsome or strangely ugly. He was more gorgeous to her every day, and not merely because she loved him. His eyes were greener, his hair a darker russet, on the brown side of ginger rather than the orange. His rough skin had smoothed, his smile brightened. The twinkle in his eye was more crazy-making.

She tore herself away from him and joined the others near the television.

Like a regenerated time lord, Cade had redecorated. James’s inner sanctum now reflected the new Lord Dumnos’s tastes. The chintz sofa, La-Z-Boy recliner and TV tray were gone, replaced by dark leather love seats and oversized chairs arranged around a low square cherrywood coffee table. A monster-sized flat screen dominated one wall.

Changes were happening to Lilith too. For the first time in her life, people thought she was pretty. She’d overheard a guest at the Tragic Fall call her stunning, and the woman wasn’t having a laugh. Her own eyes were going fairy green. Her hair had lost its dullness, lightened to pale blond. She was generally stronger, lighter, and more vibrant.

“Scooooooooooooore!” Ian and Jimmy jumped up, clinked their mugs together, and finished off their stouts.

“Dad, let it go. It’s over,” Sharon said. 

The study was still a man cave, but today the ladies had invaded to watch the grudge match. The guys punched the air as if victory was at hand, and their wives groaned and rolled their eyes.

In overtime, the
Dumnos Crucible
had given up three points to the
Sarumos Spellbinders,
and only two minutes of play remained in the soccer match.
Football,
Lilith reminded herself. She knew enough about the game to know Sharon was right. It was a lost cause. Sarumos would win again.

Sarumos.

“Where is Sarumos, exactly?” Lilith said. “Is it a city or a county… a shire?”

It sounded like Sarumen, a name that had once evoked bitterness. Jenna Sarumen had stolen Lilith’s fiancé back in California. If Lilith ever saw Jenna again, she intended to buy her a bottle of champagne. Cristal.

“In medieval times,” Ian said, “Sarumos was the name the people of the west used for London. The Normans insisted on using London, however, and as their influence spread, the use of Sarumos died out. There was always a hamlet near Christminster called Sarumos, and when the owners of the
’binders
moved the team there in the 1980s, the name was revived.”