Song of the Fairy Queen (46 page)

All the breath went out of her, her heart wrenching at the thought.

“As we all have. He was making mistakes he never would have made if he wasn’t stretched so far.”

A single crystal tear trembled on an eyelash, falling to the table with a light, musical sound.

“This way there’s no pain for him. No might haves, no could haves. No second thoughts, no regrets. He’s free to love again, as your people do – without the memory of the ‘Fairy Queen’ to haunt him. The one who left him, who he loved and lost, or to haunt the one who someday comes to love him.”

“There will be someone else for you to love, too, Kyri. Someday,” Oryan said.

Kyri would have laughed, save for the pain of it, so it came out as more as a gasp.

The smile she gave him was even more painful to watch.

“No, Oryan. I’m afraid not,” she said wryly, as another crystal tear slid down her cheek. “In that we Fairy are more like the birds we resemble, swans, for instance. Or wolves. We mate for life…and when we lose that mate, there is no other.”

Morgan would be the only one for her, although she didn’t say that out loud.

For a moment Oryan stared at her, stunned. He couldn’t imagine it, it was incomprehensible.

“How soon are you leaving, Kyri?” he asked instead, his own breath short at both the enormity of what she’d done and the cost – clear to him in the pain in those sea-foam eyes.

The reality of her departure came with a sense of something very like grief.

She’d been with him, with them, been a valued advisor, since the very beginning.

Looking at him apologetically, she said, “I’ve already given the orders, my people are moving out even as we speak.”

Very gently, she added, “Oryan, it really is for the best.”

She took a breath. It was done. More tears threatened and she didn’t want to shed them.

“I’m sorry to go, Oryan,” she said, “sorry, too, to leave you, my friend.”

And she was. She was saying goodbye to all of these she’d loved. Not just her beloved Morgan – pain tore at her – but also Oryan, her dear friend, whom she’d grown to love like a brother. Fragile Philip, struggling to find himself again, and valiant young Jordan, trying so hard to fill his father’s shoes…until the father he’d once known returned to him.

Even John of Orland, who she’d only just begun to know.

That truth finally struck Oryan as well and his heart wrenched.

“So soon?”

She was leaving. Kyri was leaving. It seemed impossible that he wouldn’t see her fly into camp, her incredible wings shining. He couldn’t imagine a world without her in it.

That grief ran deep.

“Will we never see you again, Kyri?”

She said, with a small winsome smile, “If the fates are kind, my friend, yes. Keep fighting, Oryan, so the Fair can return. You’ve been a good friend to me and my people. I couldn’t have wished for better.”

“And so have you,” he said.

Oryan had intended to offer her an arm-clasp but suddenly found himself pulling her into a long, hard hug, mindful of her wings.

Kyri clung to him. She buried her face briefly in his chest. The tears that threatened now fell. Not only was she freeing her beloved Morgan but she was losing Oryan as well.

“I’m going to miss you, my friend,” she said, her fingers pressed to her mouth.

Tears sparkled and shimmered, dropped to the carpets with a soft patter as she struggled for control.

Suddenly Oryan couldn’t imagine not seeing her, not having her stand there beside the map table with some light comment to ease or brighten things or that calm, clear insight she had.

It didn’t seem real. None of this seemed real.

“I’ll miss you, too, Kyri,” he said, intensely, releasing her reluctantly.

“Gawain is still safe,” she said, so he would know. “Still bound to me. If he needs me, I’ll go to him. Nothing will change that. No matter how far away I am. If anything should happen to me, the knowledge of his location will pass to Galan. I promise you that, Oryan, my friend. Your son will be safe, I swear it.”

Oryan lowered his head. She’d thought of everything.

She turned to John of Orland and nodded in salute.

How much
, John wondered,
does a woman, even a Fairy, have to love a man to let him go to save him even from himself
? Especially this one, the Queen of the Fairy. It was so tragic he thought someone should write a song about it. His heart ached.

He nodded back and then bowed…in homage, honoring the sacrifice she’d made.

Kyri laughed a little at that. “John.”

She turned. “Philip. Stay well.”

His soft brown eyes met hers, no longer as wounded as they’d once been. Their arm-clasp was hard, his fingers tight, his still-thin face showing his struggle.

“I owe you my life.”

She shook her head fiercely. “You owe me nothing, Philip, my friend, nothing. No man should ever have to suffer at another’s hands.”

“Jordan,” she said, turning to the younger man.

Jordan straightened, his eyes meeting hers. He nodded, but in disbelief. Was she really going? It seemed unreal.

Watching her with Morgan had been like a fairy tale. This, though?

She smiled as their hands met.

Kyri’s eyes met Oryan’s and he hers, her expression clear, resolute.

She’d loved him, too, as a brother and loved him still and always.

“You are ever and always my friend, Oryan,” she said. “If you have need of me, Call and I will come.”

Oryan nodded.

“Geoffrey,” she said gently and touched the back of his hand.

He’d loved Gwen…and her.

Geoffrey’s finger closed around hers for a moment.

“I’ll miss you,” she said, her voice little more than a whisper. “Thank you, Geoffrey.”

Then she was gone.

Geoffrey stared after her in shock. It was unimaginable that he wouldn’t hold back the tent flaps for her again, for sweet Lady Kyri.

Outside Galan and Dorien waited, reaching out to brush their fingers against Kyri’s in some semblance of comfort.

Kyri smiled back at them, sighed, and let her wings unfold.

She had the comfort of her people, all of them and they would give it to her as she needed it.

It was who she was. Kyriay, Queen of the Fairy.

The waters of the scrying bowl cleared. Pictured within it was the image of a small cottage, neat and clean, the boards starting to weather from the gold of new-cut pine to gray. Flowers grew around it like a skirt. It was a pretty little place filled with sunlight, tucked amidst the tall trees of the forest.

Kyri peered in it to see Morgan, his shirt off, the broad muscles of his chest flexing, chopping wood with a steady methodical rhythm. Sweat glimmered on his skin, dampened and darkened his fair hair. Her heart caught to see how beautiful he was.

She smiled and laughed at the sight.

He looked rested, healthy.

Although the rebellion wasn’t over by any long means she knew it was going well, well enough that Morgan could take this time at home with his wife. They were having more success, claiming more land as rebel territory, as safe lands for the people of Oryan’s Kingdom. Safe enough for him to have built this cottage, safe enough for him to make something here in this pocket in the forest.

Small safe havens.

More people flocked to Oryan’s banner every day.

There were small sections of the Kingdom now that were more Oryan’s than Haerold’s, where even Haerold’s men feared to tread.

Sections such as this.

She remembered when Morgan said he wished he and she could be simple folk living in a cottage…

Except she couldn’t.

She was Queen of the Fairy.

She couldn’t give him that but she could give him this instead.

Kyri smiled as tears glimmered, nearly blindingly, when Morgan looked to the cottage, to the woman who stepped out of it and he smiled.

Her heart caught at the sight.

She knew he’d found someone, a pretty, fair-haired girl who looked at him with love in her eyes, who smiled at him.

It had taken nearly two years, but he, they, were doing it, they were winning and he was alive and happy.

“Take care of him for me,” Kyri whispered to her, the girl in the cup. “Love him. I can ask no more and no less.”

With a wave of her hand, she sent the image away.

A single tear fell into the bowl, into the water, ringing lightly when it reached the bottom.

She looked out across the glen.

All around her were the sounds of her people, making meals, making love, happy, alive.

A flutter of children flashed across the glen, giggling and laughing, squabbling as children did.

Her people were safe and the tide was turning in the Kingdoms.

She couldn’t ask more.

Kyri lifted her face, looked up at the sounds of laughter in the trees above her and closed her eyes. Turned her face up to the sunlight, to the warmth.

“My Kyri,” Galan said, softly.

Turning, she smiled gently at him. “I’m well enough, Galan.”

With a sigh, she thought of Morgan and his sweet girl, nodding as she smiled.

“I’m well enough.”

Letting out a breath, she looked across the glen.

Her people were happy, healthy…

She would protect them and keep them that way, whatever the cost.

She pressed her hand over her heart.

Alarm, despair, fury, helplessness, a tumble of strong emotions not her own coursed through her. Kyri came awake with a cry of horror.

Morgan
.

She woke to a sense of sudden alarm, to pain. She cried out as it pierced her.

Morgan….

He was all she could think of.

She was too far away...

Frantic, desperate, she was already running, barely clearing the edge of her aerie before she was in the air, winging toward him. So far…

She searched…desperately…

And couldn’t find him.

He lived… She knew that. She would have felt his dying, would have begun the slow descent to death herself… Instead there was only a void where Morgan should have been. He wasn’t dead…

Why couldn’t she find him?