Queen of Air and Darkness
Page 124

The few steps across the sand and scrub grass were the longest and shortest Cristina had ever taken. Kieran stretched out both arms: Cristina went into them and lifted up her face and kissed him.
Heat and sweetness and the curve of his lips under hers nearly lifted her off her feet. He was smiling against her mouth. Saying her name. His hand on her side, thumb gently caressing the inward dip of her waist.
She leaned into him and reached out with her free hand. Mark’s warm fingers closed around her wrist. As if she were a princess, he kissed the back of her fingers, brushing his lips across her knuckles.
Her heart was beating triple time as she turned in Kieran’s arms, her back to him. He drew her hair away from the nape of her neck and pressed a kiss there, making her shiver as she reached out to Mark. His eyes glittered blue and gold, alive with desire for her, for Kieran, for the three of them together.
He let her draw him in and they tangled together as one. Mark kissed her lips as she leaned back against Kieran’s chest, Kieran’s hand in Mark’s hair, trailing down Mark’s cheek to trace the line of his collarbone. She had never felt such love; she had never been held so very close.
A great clamor burst out in the sky above them—a clamor they all knew, though Kieran and Mark knew it best.
They drew apart quickly as the air rushed around them: The sky swirled with movement. Manes and tails whipped in the wind, eyes glowed a thousand colors, warriors roared and shouted, and at the center of it all was a great black brindle horse with a man and woman seated on its back, pausing to look down at the earth below as the sound of a hunting horn faded on the air.
Gwyn and Diana had returned, and they were not alone.
* * *
Julian had always thought his studio—which had been his mother’s—was the most beautiful room in the Institute. You could see everything through the two glass walls: ocean and desert; the other walls were creamy and bright with his mother’s abstract paintings.
He could see it now, but he couldn’t feel it. Whatever feeling it was that looking at beauty had always raised in his artist’s soul was gone.
Without feeling, he thought, I am dissolving, like royal water dissolves gold. He knew it, but he couldn’t feel that, either.
To know you were despairing but not to be able to feel that despair was a strange experience. He looked at the paints he’d arranged around the plain white cloth stretched over the central island. Blue and gold, red and black. He knew what he ought to shape with them, but when he picked up the brush, he only hesitated.
Everything instinctual about drawing had left him, everything that told him what would make one curve of the paintbrush better than another, everything that matched shades of color to shades of meaning. Blue was just blue. Green was green, whether light or dark. Blood red and stoplight red were the same.
Emma is avoiding me, he thought. The thought didn’t bring pain, because nothing did. It was just a fact. He remembered the desire he had felt in her room the night before and set his paintbrush down. It was strange to think of desire as divorced from feeling: He had never desired anyone he hadn’t already loved. Never desired anyone but Emma.
But the night before, with her in his arms, he had felt almost as if he could break through the dullness that surrounded him, that choked him with its nothingness; as if the blaze of wanting her could burn it down and he would be free.
It was better that she did avoid him. Even in this state, his need for her was too strange, and too strong.
Something flashed past the glass of the studio window. He went to look out and saw that Gwyn and Diana were on the lawn and that several of the others surrounded them: Cristina, Mark, Kieran. Gwyn was handing a glass jar to Alec, who took it and went running back toward the Institute, flying across the grass like one of his own arrows. Dru was dancing up and down with Tavvy, spinning in circles. Emma hugged Cristina and then Mark. Gwyn had an arm around Diana, who was leaning her head on his shoulder.
Relief washed through Julian, brief and cool as a splash of water. He knew he should feel more, that he should feel joy. He saw Ty and Kit standing a little apart from the others; Ty had his head tipped back, as he often did, and was pointing at the stars.
Julian looked up as the sky darkened with a hundred airborne riders.
* * *
Mark could not help but be conscious of Kieran’s tension as the Wild Hunt began to land all around them, alighting on the grass like dandelion seeds blown by the wind.
He could not blame him. Mark himself felt dizzy with shock and the aftereffects of desire—already those moments with Cristina and Kieran by the boulder seemed like a fever dream. Had it happened? It must have—Cristina was smoothing down her hair with quick, nervous movements, her lips still red from kissing. Mark checked his own clothes quickly. He no longer had faith that he had not ripped off his own shirt and cast it into the desert with the announcement that he would never need shirts again. Anything seemed possible.
Kieran, though, had drawn himself up, his face a mask Mark knew well—it was the look he had always worn when the rest of the Hunt mocked him and called him princeling. Later he had won their respect and been able to protect both himself and Mark, but he had had no friends in the Hunt besides Mark—and perhaps Gwyn, in his own odd way.
Mark, though, had never won their respect. Or so he had always thought. As he gazed around the group of silent Hunters on their steeds, some faces familiar and some new, he saw that they regarded him differently. There was no contempt in their eyes as they noted the fresh Marks on his arms, the gear he wore, and the weapons belt at his waist, bristling with seraph blades.
The riotous celebration that had followed the arrival of Gwyn and Diana had quieted down upon the arrival of the Hunt. Helen had taken Dru and Tavvy and marched them back to the house, over their protests. Diana slid from Orion’s back and went to stand beside Kit and Ty as Emma headed back to the Institute with Aline to see if they could help Alec.
Gwyn dismounted, removing his helmet as he did so. To Mark’s astonishment, he inclined his head to Kieran. He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen Gwyn bow his head to anyone before.
“Gwyn,” said Kieran. “Why have you brought all the Hunt here? I thought they were delivering the water.”
“They wished to acknowledge you before they left upon their mission,” said Gwyn.
One of the Hunt, a tall man with an impassive, scarred face, bowed from his saddle. “We have done your will,” he said. “Liege lord.”
Kieran blanched.
“Liege lord?” echoed Cristina, clearly stunned.
Diana touched Gwyn lightly on the shoulder and strode back toward the Institute. Mark’s head was spinning: “Liege” was what the Hunt often called a monarch, a King or Queen of Faerie. Not a mere prince, and not one sworn to the Hunt.
Kieran inclined his head, at last. “My thanks,” he said. “I will not forget this.”
That seemed to satisfy the Hunt; they turned their horses and took to the air, bursting up into the sky like fireworks. Ty and Kit ran to the edge of the clearing to watch them as they hurtled across the sky, riders and steeds blurring into the same silhouettes. Their hooves churned the air, and a deep boom of thunder sounded across the beaches and coves.
Kieran turned to stare at Gwyn. “What was that?” he demanded. “What are you doing, Gwyn?”
“Your mad brother Oban sits upon the throne of Unseelie,” said Gwyn. “He drinks, he whores, he makes no laws. He demands loyalty. He musters an army to bring to his parley with the Cohort, though his advisers warn against it.”
“Where is my brother?” said Kieran. “Where is Adaon?”
Gwyn looked uneasy. “Adaon is weak,” he said. “And he is not the one who slew the King. He has not earned the throne.”
“You would put a Hunter on the throne,” said Kieran. “A friend to your causes.”
“Perhaps,” said Gwyn. “But regardless of what I want, Adaon is a prisoner in Seelie. Kieran, there will be a battle. There is no avoiding it. You must take the mantle of leadership from Oban as all look on.”
“Take the mantle of leadership?” said Mark. “Is that a euphemism?”
“Yes,” said Gwyn.
“You can’t honestly be telling him to kill his brother in the middle of a battle,” said Cristina, looking furious.