Chapter 42 - A Lick of Frost

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A Short Tale of Cold, the Returning Hero, No Air, Black Death, Pleading for Mercy, Stand Off, Agony, Whispers in the Warm Dark, and Heartbreak

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Cold was a killer.

She knew this in a way a lot of people never comprehended, understood the vicious cold of a deep winter night. Oh, and it was winter all right, almost ten degrees below freezing now that the sun had sunk beneath the horizon and the weak winter light no longer turned the snow to diamonds. The heavy drifts of shadowed white looked deceptively soft in the deepening dark. Tiny snowflakes like splinters of ice beat against her exposed face. Frost-crusted snowbanks cut at her bare legs. The snow was packed together so that it dragged at her bad leg and sent pain shoving deep into her knee. The cold seeped into the arm she'd landed on when Eamonn had thrown her, so that the dull ache continued to pulse and throb.

But she kept trudging because she knew that eventually Eamonn would be able to work through the pain, get up, and follow her out into the night. That was why she went deeper into the forest instead of toward the city. There was no one in the city who could help her except Nuada, and he was on his way to the cottage. She couldn't risk missing him by going into the city. Dylan briefly thought of running to the faerie mounds where Roiben ruled, then remembered those were in Jersey. So was the Shadowhunter Institute. There was no way she could get through the City fast enough to make it to Jersey. The dark-haired Elf could track her down easily in the concrete jungle. Find her, kill her - as easy as a snap of his fingers because only humans with the Sight could see him and she didn't know anyone nearby with the Sight who wouldn't be hurt by the silver-eyed Elf. So she ran into the woods, praying and shivering and terrified. When she found a concrete path running through the park, she crunched along the snow-dusted, salted pavement and trembled inside her coat.

Dylan stumbled through the snow, fighting to hunch into her jacket and keep walking as the wind knifed through the leather coat and the thin black dress. Snow melted slowly because of her body warmth and soaked the hem of her dress. Oddly, her socks stayed dry. Stayed warm. Well, warmish. Where the rest of her was already raw and numb with the cold, she could still feel her toes. Chunks of rock salt dug into the bottoms of her feet. They were tingling with the frigid chill but she hadn't lost feeling in the soles quite yet.

But she was a doctor. Four years of medical school and more than five years living in New York City told Dylan that if she didn't find a place to hide out and get warm, she was going to freeze to death. First she would shiver as her extremities went numb. Then the numbness would spread through her and the shivering would get worse. Walking would become extremely difficult. And then the shivering would stop. Once her body was too tired to shiver anymore, she would have at most fifteen minutes before the cold dragged her into deathly sleep and her heart stopped. And that was if she was dressed okay, which she wasn't. No gloves, no scarf, no shoes. Her dress was one of those thin cocktail numbers that had been bought at a thrift store for an NYPD awards function Peabody had invited her to a year ago and wasn't meant to be worn outdoors without a thick coat, and then only for the few minutes it took to catch a cab or get into the car.

Dylan shoved the thought of why she'd worn the dress out of her head. Shoved away thoughts of being rescued, of dark-shadowed eyes bronze with fiercely protective fury, of the lethal whisper of Elven silver singing through the air. Couldn't rely on rescue right now. Instead she stopped for a minute and tried to push down the dizziness and aching pressure that throbbed through her skull. Steam misted in harshly panting gasps from her mouth.

Heavenly Father, Dylan prayed silently, I don't think I can do this. I can't breathe. I can't... help me. Please.

Gritting her teeth, trying to ignore the familiar burning beginning in her throat and spreading through her chest, Dylan shoved away from the ice-cold oak tree she'd been leaning against and kept walking. She didn't know where she was going, only that it was far away from the silver-eyed Elf intent on her imminent demise. There were fae in these woods who knew her and liked her. They would help her.

Maybe. If they were nearby. If she could get to them.

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Nuada stopped at the edge of Central Park, sudden unease curling in his belly. The hair at the nape of his neck prickled. There it was: Dylan's cottage. Windows lit with the warmth and glow from within the stone walls. Home, his heart whispered, but he tried to ignore it now that he was suddenly confronted by the reality of the place. The Elven warrior swallowed down the swift surge of trepidation. Wink had said that she wanted him to come back. In the depths of the troll's good eye, Nuada had seen that it wasn't just that Dylan wanted the prince to return - she needed him to. The feral-eyed warrior didn't understand that, but he'd accepted it without even trying to challenge the thought once he'd recognized it for what it was. And Nuada trusted his vassal and friend.

That didn't erase the nerves. He had said vicious things to the human lady that had sworn herself to him. His honor, and the emotions in his chest that he was still trying to ignore, demanded Nuada apologize to her. She'd already accepted the letter. Already accepted the gift. Loved both, Wink had said. But he'd had time, stars curse it. Time to think about each gift, about each word etched into that paper. He would have no time now. These words would have to come swiftly. Would have to be the right words. If they weren't... what other damage might he do?

He'd never been good at apologizing. Even with his sister, the other half of his heart and soul, sincere apologies had been difficult to voice and were rarely completely accepted. He had always fumbled something, some part of it. His father had always been very careful to correct his youthful efforts gently, but that was not an option this time. Nuada knew he'd misstepped with Dylan often. She always forgave, even if he didn't apologize at all. But he had knifed her in the heart this time. Would she still forgive?

Do not be a coward, the warrior prince growled at himself when he realized that he was still doubting, still worrying like an inexperienced youth instead of a seasoned warrior. Take your courage in hand, go to her, and get it done.

Nuada moved toward the cottage. Slowed, frowning, when he saw the door was ajar. The nerves in his belly now sizzled down his spine. Flickering firelight spilled across the snow from the cracked door, red as mortal blood. A different unease whispered over his skin. Casting out with sharp Elven senses, Nuada lightly pushed open the cottage door. Feral eyes and Elven mind-magic caught several things at once: the electric tingle of non-lethal pain, the copper stink of human blood, the vicious stench of cruelty and hatred, and... a handful of scattered scarlet drops on the wooden floor.

There was no one in the cottage. No little brownie, no prowling kitten. No mortal lady. Only the psychic impression soaking into the floor, into the walls of the entryway, in the blood on the floor, the urgent screaming runrunrunrunrun. Nuada's pack dropped to the floor from nerveless fingers.

Even though he knew there was no one there, the Elven warrior prowled the cottage searching for any indication of what had happened. No sign of forced entry. No blood beyond the entryway. Nothing broken or missing other than Dylan's leather coat.

And Dylan. Dylan was missing. The world tried to tilt, tried to spin away from him as the prince thought of all the different reasons why his lady could have been missing. All the different things that could have happened to her. When something icy slid through his belly, Nuada clenched his teeth and shook it off. Not now. He would let the... the unease shiver through him like winter wind later. But not now. Not yet.

"Your Highness!"

Feral eyes sliced to the brownie that squeezed through the still partially-open door and scrambled toward him. Becan panted for breath as Nuada strode quickly toward him. "What happened? Where is she?"

"Eamonn, Sire. He came, he got into the cottage, I don't know where he went but-"

Nuada held up a hand for silence and Becan's little mouth snapped shut. The Elf knelt in front of the brownie and held out his hand. "Show me." Black eyes flicked nervously between the prince's implacable, emotionless face and his outstretched palm. The glacial amber eyes were smoldering to crimson-washed bronze. Then the wee fae laid his tiny hand across Nuada's, and showed the prince what he'd seen.

Impressions and images flooded Nuada's mind. Becan hadn't been in the front room when he heard his mistress yell. Dylan crying out his name from the front door - not Eamonn's name, but Nuada's. Begging him to stop. Demanding he get off of her. Nuada's belly churned violently when he realized what the dark Elf had done. Pain saturated the sharp cry Dylan made. Becan scrambled to get to his mistress. Found her trapped beneath the silver-eyed Elf, struggling as desperate sounds escaped her mouth. The world swirling by as the brownie raced back to the bedroom, rifled through Dylan's purse, pulled out a silver-painted canister that burned the little faerie's hands and arms like poisonous salt or iron when he hoisted it up. The brownie dragged it back to the entryway.

Nuada paused the memory then, frowning.

She wasn't struggling anymore. She was speaking quietly to Eamonn, whose weight between her legs kept her pinned to the floor. Her face was bruised, her lip bleeding. But Eamonn wasn't hammering at her the way Nuada had thought he would (Nuada vaguely registered the shudder of relief that shivered through him). The dark Elf hadn't yet gotten to the point where he could hurt her that way. Something Dylan was saying had given him pause.

The Elven warrior let the rest of the memory play out. Becan moved closer to his too-still mistress. Moved within earshot. Nuada heard what his mortal lady murmured to the twisted Elf who kept her hands ruthlessly pinned above her head.

"You want to make Nuada suffer, right? Well, he loves me. Which is disgusting, by the way."

Nuada winced, even though he knew it was untrue. Even though he knew she did not, would not feel that way. Even if the feral-eyed warrior confessed that smoldering truth, she would never... But Dylan was still talking. Still entrancing Eamonn with her vicious words.

"Think how much he'd suffer if he found me with you. Enjoying it, I mean."

More words. More enticements. The bronze-eyed warrior tried to shove aside the sickness and the sudden, sharp ache in his chest as Dylan continued murmuring those evil tempting things to the dark Elf that kept her pinned beneath him.

Nuada knew what Dylan was doing. He had not known she could do that. Had not known his lady could be so deceptive. Hadn't thought Eamonn would fall for such an obvious ploy. Didn't the other Elf see the fear and loathing in her eyes? Couldn't he hear the ice frosting her voice? For all his flaws, Eamonn had been a great warrior. How could he fall for such a trick? But she was a mind-healer. Dylan knew the way the mind, even a twisted mind of a murderous fae, worked. Knew it, and had used it to get what she wanted. Mingling with Nuada's rage, with the dread and the fury and the hatred, there was chilling approval because he knew that she knew exactly what she was doing.

That's my girl, he thought savagely. That's my clever girl.

Then snarling rage washed the thought away as the dark Elf kissed her, took possession of her scarred mouth and tried to dominate her. Nuada could see the way she held herself still, waiting, waiting. Not resisting, but not giving Eamonn anything. Could see how Dylan fought against her natural instinct to attack the Elf who held her captive with a warrior's steely, unforgiving strength. Was that a tear streaking from the corner of one blue eye? Black fury smoldered in Nuada's chest. He would kill the silver-eyed Elf of Zwezda for that tear.

Eamonn released Dylan's blue-bruised wrists at her insistence and busied himself with brutal kisses at her bleeding mouth, raw-bruising bites at her vulnerable throat. Shimmering black slid over her legs as Eamonn pushed her skirt out of his way. Feral bronze eyes caught a glimpse of familiar penguin socks. Her toes were scrunching rapidly in agitation but in all other ways she held so very still.

Ice coated the prince's heart as he watched, waited. If Eamonn had actually... if that vicious bastard had actually managed to...

Brownie magic floated the silver canister right into Dylan's hand. She wrenched her head back and gasped out the dark Elf's name. He snarled at her. With a glint of hate in those fey-like eyes, Dylan snapped out, "Get the hell off me," and sprayed the contents of the canister  right in Eamonn's face. ("Defensive spray," Becan explained softly. "One of humanity's better inventions for a woman in danger.") The Elf bellowed like an enraged bull and fell away from her. Nuada's impossible lady staggered to her feet and then leaned hard against the front door, breathing heavily. An odd glint in her blue eyes and the awkward way she held her arm had sharp concern lancing the prince's chest. The last part of the memory was Dylan yanking on her leather jacket and escaping at a limping stumble into the winter night.

He wrenched his mind from the memory and fought against the hatred and the rage burning in his blood. The Elven warrior didn't remember drawing his lance. Didn't remember rising to his feet. Only at the door did he stop, because Becan grabbed his pant leg. Shards of topaz ice bit deep into the brownie as Nuada stared down at him. "What?"

"Milady is ill, Sire. Her fever only broke a couple hours ago. She was doing better, which was why she agreed to let you return, but the cold... I'm worried. The chill in the air could kill her just as surely as Eamonn will if he finds her. It's been almost fifteen minutes. You must bring her back. Please."

Dread pierced the icy crust of rage encasing his heart. Ill? Wink hadn't said... It didn't matter. Fifteen minutes in the cold. No shoes, no gloves, only her dress and her jacket. And sick? With a barely gone fever. "I will find her," the Elven warrior vowed softly. "I promise you that."

Please, he prayed as he stepped out into the dark, though the prince had no idea who he offered his prayer to. Please, protect her. Keep her safe until I can find her. Please.

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The seductive whiteness of the world around her called, promising rest. Promising peace. All she wanted was to rest for a minute. Just sit down and not move for a few minutes. But if she stopped, she wouldn't get back up again. Her feet were slogging through the snow of their own volition. Dylan wasn't even sure where she was going anymore. Wasn't she near the derelict playground of faerie metal? Couldn't remember. Was fairly sure she should have been worried about that, but she wasn't. Too tired to be worried. Too tired to do anything but put one foot in front of the other and pray for safety, fever-blurred eyes sliding over the salt gleaming dully on the lightly frosted pavement at her feet. Her feet were killing her.

"Hello, sweetness."

Dylan's head jerked up and she stumbled back, nearly falling. Only Eamonn's coldly gentle hands on her elbows kept her semi-upright. Silver-washed blue eyes widened as the dark-haired Elf smiled down at her with all the viciousness of a serpent's strike. His moonbeam skin was raw and red around his eyes where she'd gotten him with her defensive spray. "No," she gasped, pushing at him with numb hands. "No!"

"You don't want to say no to me again," Eamonn murmured, tightening his grip until his fingers bit deep into her arms. "And you don't want to use that on me again, either." He carefully extricated the canister of pepper spray from her nerveless fingers. Dropped it into the snow. "I think we need to talk, human."

"Let go of me," Dylan cried, twisting around, struggling to break his impossible grip. "Let go!" Her teeth sank into his wrist and he snarled an obscenity. She yelped when his quick, almost casual blow to her face knocked her sprawling to the biting cold snow. Then he was on her, pinning her to the snow. Tiny shards of ice bit deep into the back of her neck and legs. "Get off!" And in her mind she ordered herself, Scream! Shout, keep talking! Make noise! Someone will hear me. Someone has to hear me.

Dylan got a good fistful of silky black hair and yanked on it hard. Strands of hair parted company with Eamonn's scalp and he hit her again, opening a cut across her bruised cheek. She spat blood in his face. I won't let this happen to me again, I won't, never again, never! Dylan's fist slammed into Eamonn's throat, sending a shockwave of pain zooming up her already injured arm. She cried out and he gagged and choked.

As the Elf sagged sideways, she scrambled out from beneath him and rolled onto her hands and knees. Scrambled to crawl off the paved path and away into the woods. Eamonn grabbed her by the ankle of her bad leg and yanked. Dylan slammed hard into the ground. The air exploded out of her. Then the Elf tried to make a grab for her hair. Snagged her ribbon and yanked so dark curls tumbled free. Tossed the black silk ribbon aside and wrapped her hair twice around his fists and hauled on it.

She cried out as she landed backwards against the Elven warrior, who let her fall to the ground again. Three sharp blows to her face sent Dylan reeling into outer space. Copper flooded her mouth. She floated on an ocean of dizziness and pain, the gnawing cold now a soft blanket attempting to lull her into killing sleep. Distantly she heard the sound of fabric tearing. Stinging pain raked across her hip bones. She tried to shake off the dazed lethargy that kept her barely conscious. Tried to flail and push him away as hot breath nearly scalded her face.

No, please, not again, no, no! I won't let this happen, get up, move! Get up! Get up! Get off me!

Then she heard a screeching yowl and Eamon cried out in pain. Suddenly the crushing weight of him was gone. With a heave, Dylan rolled onto her hands and knees, scraping them on rock salt and half-iced snow, and saw what had distracted the Elf.

He twisted and struggled to dislodge something that clung to his back. Dark stains marred the back of his shirt and glistening blood streaked down his face and smeared his hands. Eamonn snarled and swore as he reached for the black thing clinging to him and clawing him viciously. Then the weak light of the waning moon glinted off eyes like tawny marbles. A terrifying realization penetrated the fog around Dylan. Her eyes went wide.

Bat! No, Bat, no! As Dylan tried and failed to get to her feet, the Elf finally got a grip on the little black kitten, wrenched him from his back, and hurled Bat against an ice-coated tree trunk. The tiny body hit the tree with a sick wet thud and fell to the snow. Bat did not get up. Didn't even move.

"No!" She tried again to get up. Slipped on the salted ice and fell to the snow again. Landed hard on something cold and glittering.

Her pepper spray.

"That's it," Eamonn growled, stalking toward her. Even in the near perfect darkness of the winter night, she could see the promise of vengeance in his face. "I have had enough from you and your little beast and your wretched brownie and your damn prince. You are going to die and you are going to die tonight."

Dylan grabbed onto the trunk of a tree, scraping her numb hands on the frosted bark. Smears of blood glistened darkly against the ice. Leaning heavily on the trunk to keep from sliding to the ground again, the burning cold beating mercilessly at her, she somehow managed to climb to her feet. The pepper spray in her hand was hidden by the tree she leaned against. Eamonn stalked closer. Dylan's heart hammered her chest, slowly strangling her. But in the back of her mind she suddenly could have sworn she heard Nuada murmuring, Hold steady. Wait for him to come within reach. Don't risk yourself. Just wait. Don't be afraid.

She knew it wasn't him - wasn't him glamored and speaking through the link of their joined hands. He wasn't nearby. Eamonn would have heard him, sensed him. But it made her feel better. Eased some of the shivering terror. The chilled can of defensive spray helped too. So Dylan waited, blue eyes wide as she watched the Elf who wanted her dead come close and closer. When he was barely a foot away, he stopped. "I suppose you want to say some prayers to your god before I kill you."

And as the Huntsman prepared to cut out the innocent heart of the fair Snow White, she dropped to her knees and cried, "Oh, I must say my prayers before I die so I can go to Heaven."

The words to the old Grimms' fairy tale suddenly flashed through Dylan's mind. She shook them away and swallowed. She didn't need to pray to prepare for death if Eamonn actually killed her. Her eyes narrowed. No, she didn't need to say any prayers for that. She just wasn't going to let Eamonn kill her. Not after everything the dark Elf had done - or tried to do - to Nuada. Not after Bat. She glanced briefly at the too-still little body in the snow, so starkly black against the pristine white. Her eyes stung. Then she focused on Eamonn again as he murmured icily, "Sadly, I am not obliging." His hand shot out and he yanked her away from the tree with a vengeful snarl as she brought up the hand holding the pepper spray and gave him another shot in the eyes.

A wolf's snarl, a monster's slavering roar. He released her and stumbled back. Lunged forward again as she turned to run. Grabbed the wrist that held the defense spray and twisted sharply. Instinct and the tingling warmth of the Spirit had Dylan sliding into the wrenching twist so that instead of breaking her wrist as he'd intended, hot pain shot up her arm as the fragile bones dislocated with a loud pop. Still she screamed, a single cry of of shock and hurt that shattered the night and echoed off the winter-bare trees. She dropped the canister.

And then she was in the snow again, the back of her head cracking the ice on the paved pathway. Eamonn climbed onto her chest, his brutal weight slowly driving the breath from her body, as his hands wrapped around her slender throat and began to squeeze.

"Soith beag," Eamonn snarled in her face as she fought for air, fought against the near-breaking weight of him, the impossible strength of him. "Tá tú marbh. Lig dó teacht ar do corp sa sneachta." She smacked against him with feebly striking hands. Thrashed her head from side to side, trying to loosen his choking grip on her throat. Couldn't breathe, couldn't breathe, no, no... "An bhfuil tú ag dulgo caoin? Ceadaigh dom an fheiceáil do deora." He didn't try to crush her throat this time. He wanted her to feel this, feel the life fading from her body. Feel her heart racing, only to slow to stillness in her chest. Eamonn wanted it to last. And just in case the Silver Lance was running to save his precious mortal lady, Eamonn threw the image of the human gasping for air as far around as he could, knowing that if the prince was nearby, he would see the dark Elf choking the life from his little whore. "Stad ag streachailt. Tá mé ag dulchun tú a mharú, gnómilis. Níl aon duine ag dul a shábháil tú. Tá tú marbh."

No air, couldn't breathe, no, no. Chest burning, heart slamming hard, Dylan gasped but no icy air reached her desperate lungs, no relief, not a single breath of cold winter air and his grip was tightening, tightening. She dug her nails into his arms. Drew hot blood. Still he didn't let go, just kept squeezing.

Nuada, she thought, called, pleaded. Her mouth worked soundlessly as she struggled to take a breath. Everything was darkness and airless shimmer. Nuada, help...

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That single scream saturated with pain ripped into the Elven warrior as he raced through the woods, following nearly invisible imprints on the snow from Eamonn's boots. Nuada stopped for only an instant at the sound, frozen. His blood turned to ice. Dread coiled and knotted sickeningly in the pit of his stomach. He knew that scream. Dylan. Mo duinne, hold on.

The Elf prince ran faster.

Frigid air burned in his lungs. Fear was a poison in his veins. It had been a long time - centuries - since he'd had to race somewhere, knowing that if he didn't make it, knowing that if he was just a second too slow, someone he loved would suffer. Gods, what would Eamonn do to her if he didn't get there in time? The same thing that had almost happened on the floor of the cottage; the same thing he'd seen nearly happen in Becan's memory. Rage mingled with the dark poison already in his blood.

A psychic image slammed into Nuada so hard he staggered and fell to his knees. His skull felt like it was splintering under the onslaught. Dragging a deep breath in through his nose and out between his tightly clenched teeth, the Elf prince slowly eased back from the image enough that he could actually see it. When he did, sick horror drove an icy knife into his gut and the breath exploded from his lungs.

Eamonn's hands, white as moonlight on killingly cold snow, wrapped around Dylan's throat, squeezing. Squeezing. Tears glimmered in those wide impossibly blue eyes as she pushed at the dark Elf. Struggled to suck in a breath beyond the choking hands. The fey light was already fading slowly from her eyes. Her scarred lips were turning blue. Those lips framed the word please over and over again. Begging. Begging Eamonn. Those merciless hands merely tightened further. His fingers bit deep into her throat, throttling, bruising. And in vicious Gaelic, Eamonn snarled, "Little bitch. You're dead. Let him find your corpse in the snow. Are you going to cry? Let me see your tears." A soft choked whimper escaped from the vulnerable throat caught between those throttling hands. She shoved at him. Flailed at him with weak and bleeding fists. "Stop struggling. I'm going to kill you, sweetness. No one is going to save you. You're dead."

Danu's mercy, Eamonn, stop, I beg you! The desperate, pleading cry escaped the Elf prince before he could prevent it. Those hands loosened briefly around Dylan's throat and she managed to suck in a ragged breath. Nuada felt the brief flicker of surprise and irritation from Eamonn's mind. Even as terror shuddered through him, the feral-eyed prince cried, Stop! Spare her, please. Please!

Beg me some more, Silverlance, the Elf ordered softly, silkily. Those hands loosened a little more. The light began to return to those moonlit blue eyes. Beg me for her pathetic life. Beg me. I want to hear you beg. When there was only silence, Eamonn tightened his grip and Dylan choked. Beg me or I'll strangle your whore in front of your very eyes. You won't find me before I'm finished with her.

Nuada lunged to his feet, his knuckles white as bones as he gripped his lance. Even as he followed the link between his mind and Eamonn's, the prince kept his voice desperate, kept the mental words in keeping with the pitiful image the Elf of Zwezda had of him. Gods, I beg you, Eamonn. Have mercy. Don't take her from me, please. Black boots practically flew across white snow as Nuada hunted down the soon-to-be dead man who dared to lay hands on the Silver Lance's lady.

What does she mean to you? Eamonn demanded, loosening his grip again. Dylan sucked air and struggled to roll away from the Elf crouched on her chest. Eamonn yanked on her hair and she cried out in pain. What does the little trollop mean to you, Nuada?

Since Eamonn already knew (though he didn't know that what he knew was a secret), and since the dark-haired Elf was going to die this night, Nuada didn't bother to lie. As long as he kept up the pathetic stream of lovesick professions, there was time to get to her. Gods, please let there be time. She is my heart. I love her. Please, I love her...

You're pathetic, Silverlance. She's a human. How can any self-respecting fae warrior take a human as his mistress, much less fall in love with her? You're disgusting.

Seconds away now. Only seconds. Nuada darted between the trees just as the image of Dylan vanished from his mind and the link between his mind and Eamonn's snapped. The fae prince halted at the spot where Eamonn had been in that image. No one. Nothing. Only thin, dark spatters that gleamed in the weak light of the moon - blood.

No, Nuada realized, taking a step forward, careful not to disturb the mussed snow and the blood stains. No, there was something else. He knelt and picked up something jet black in the silvery moonlight. A silk ribbon. On impulse he brought it to his nose. The perfume of spring lilies and roses washed over him, mingling with the now-familiar scent of Dylan's skin. The unsuccessfully-ignored ache in his chest sharpened at that sweet scent. Please let her still be alive. This was his fault. He should never have left her. Please let her still be alive. Molten copper eyes landed on a ragged scrap of cloth near the trees, black as the satin hair ribbon and black as the blood under the moonlight. When he realized what it was, fury and fear nearly strangled him. Please let her be all right.

"Ag lorg seo?" A familiar and hated voice. Nuada's head jerked up at the question looking for this? Sanguine-washed bronze eyes zeroed in on Eamonn, who leaned against a far tree trunk. He held up one hand almost lazily and weak moonlight glinted golden off of a thin chain. Dylan's medallion. Eamonn tossed the golden necklace at Nuada's feet. The prince picked it up without ever taking his eyes from his enemy. He slipped the necklace into his belt pouch and straightened.

"Or," the Elf added with a sardonic quirk of his lips, "would you be looking for this?" He reached down behind the tree, wrenched up a slender but limp body, and threw Dylan down at the dark Elf's feet. She landed on her back with a breathless cry. Eamonn's naked sword lightly touched where Nuada knew the silver scar of the fear-darrig's blessing lay at her throat. "Thought you'd try to track me through the link. Clever of you. But not clever enough. And oh, dear. Looks like the poor thing's struggling to stay conscious. She's been out in the cold a very long time. How long do you think she has before she freezes to death?"

Golden eyes locked with eyes of glassy blue and Dylan blinked sleepily at him. Her chest barely rose and fell with her breathing. Minute tremors shook her slender form. But she said softly, "I'm okay."

Eamonn kicked her savagely in the side and she cried out, hunched in on herself. Nuada took a step forward, lance upraised, but Eamonn snapped, "Be still! Or I'll slit her throat. She's caused me a lot of problems tonight."

Feral eyes took in the raw, blistered flesh of the dark Elf's face. The bleeding scratches and claw marks dark against the white skin. A dark bruise marred the pale expanse of Eamonn's throat. She'd hurt him. That's my girl.

"Now tell her what you told me, Silverlance. Tell her what lies in your heart. Let her hear the sweet words before I kill her right before your eyes. Maybe I will take pity on you and spare her, if they move me enough."

Tell the truth. Tell the truth and play along with Eamonn's sick game to buy a little more time. Nuada studied Dylan's face: the fresh bruises, the cut on her cheek, the bloodlessness to her skin, the glazed look in her eyes. Too long in the cold. And sick, Becan had said. Her fever barely broken. She didn't have long before she succumbed and fell asleep. Once asleep she had maybe five or ten minutes to get warm again.

The Elf prince knew what Eamonn wanted from him. Knew it was all just a sick game to draw out the suffering. He had to play along for now. Until he could think of a plan that didn't involve that sword blade drawing across that vulnerable throat and spilling her life's blood onto the snow. So his eyes, still edged with bronze fury and hate, melted to warm honey near the centers as he looked into Dylan's eyes and said softly, "I love you."

Truth. Lie. Both and neither. Confession to help save her life, a confession of truth that was a lie because it couldn't be the truth. And yet it was, but she could never know that truth. Could never know and would never believe if she ever did find out. So he murmured the burning secret that smoldered in his chest and painted it in the falseness of charade. Saw the disgust on Eamonn's face. Saw the flicker of sorrow in Dylan's glazed, oh so beautiful eyes. She bought the sweetly poisoned lie that it wasn't true. She thought he was playing along with the courtship charade, with Eamonn's perception of them. It hurt her because she knew - or thought she knew - that the very idea of being in love with her sickened him, hurt him, and she would do anything to keep him from feeling that way if it was in her power.

He'd said it once. The words had been like cold stones on his tongue, heavy and bruising. Now they simmered in his mouth, scorching as a promise, and he found that he had to say them again. If she died tonight, or if he did... he could not die, could not lose her to death, without saying those words at least one more time. Gaelic turned the confession into a vow shimmering with Irish mists and the magic of the Old World. "Mo duinne, tá grá agam duit."

Something flickered behind her eyes and she whispered, "I love you, too." Nuada barely managed to suppress his shudder at the sweet, venomous lie. She would never know how those words cut him. Raked at him like taloned hands. But he just kept his eyes locked on hers. Her lips quirked a little at the corners. A hint of steel slipped into her eyes before they slid closed. Her fingers twitched at her side and she winced, but pressed her hand against the snow. "I'll be okay, Nuada. Don't worry about me."

"Mo duinne-"

Eamonn's snort of disgust sent rage spiraling through the Elf prince. "Well, the both of you are absolutely revolting. That's so sweet I'm getting cavities. Anymore and I'm afraid I might be ill."

"Hey," Dylan mumbled through teeth that chattered with the cold shivering through her. Her raw, bleeding fingers dug into the powdery white as she forced her eyes open and blinked up at the dark Elf. "Hey, traitor. Come down here. I got something to tell you. It's important." When silver eyes glared down at her from within raw red flesh, she added, "Wow. Coward. Too scared of a little human woman to come down. Once bitten, twice shy, is that it? Coward." Pain throbbed hotly through her dislocated wrist as she packed the snow into a loose ball in her hand. Eamonn hadn't even noticed. The salt from the pavement burned in the scrapes on her palms. Her entire body, lying on the frosted cement, was a mass of aches. The world refused to focus properly. "Come here. You already took my pepper spray; don't be a coward. Maybe I'll tell you a secret."

Everything in Nuada went still as stark hatred flashed across the other Elf's features. Then Eamonn knelt and stared down at her. The sword was still too close to her throat for the Elf prince to risk making a move. "All right," Eamonn snapped. "What?"

She smashed the loosely packed snow she'd been scooping up right in Eamonn's face. Into the glaring silver eyes and the raw flesh around them. To Nuada's surprise, the treasonous fae screamed and threw himself backwards, away from Dylan. She rolled over, tried to stand. Slipped on the snow-dusted concrete. The next moment, Nuada's arms were around her, pulling her to her feet, hauling her away from where Eamonn thrashed and screamed. About twenty feet away the Elf prince gripped her by the shoulders and studied the mortal that had somehow managed to distract the other Elf long enough for Nuada to get her away.

"What did you do?"

He wanted to crush her against his chest and never let her go. Never. He wanted to feel her heartbeat pounding in her breast, feel that proof that she was alive. Wanted to brush his lips over the bruises darkening her face and throat to ease the pain there. Stroke her cheek and soothe the burn of the cut, maybe brush back those tangled curls from her face. Bend his head to that scarred mouth and prove to her that the words Eamonn had forced out of him weren't lies. Just hold her, gods, he just wanted to hold her for a minute and reassure himself she was at least mostly all right.

Instead Nuada satisfied himself with practically devouring Dylan with his eyes, checking surreptitiously for injury beyond the bruises and the cut on her cheekbone. She shivered violently and her lips were tinged blue with the cold under the swelling and the bruise. Sickness-induced aches, pain, and hypothermia-induced exhaustion made her eyes glassy.

"Rock salt," she mumbled, sagging against him. If he hadn't caught her, she would've fallen. Nuada's heartbeat hammered hard under her ear. Worry? A lust for revenge against the other Elf? Or anger that she'd gotten into trouble once again? He was so warm. So very warm. Almost hot under her hands and cheek. She wrapped her arms around him and closed her eyes wearily. "We're near the playgrounds. They salt the sidewalks and paved pathways to keep the concrete from icing over." There was a razor edge of satisfaction beneath her slurring voice and stammering words. "I've always known that the only thing worse than iron to the fae is salt, especially when the salt gets in the blood. And his face was already wrecked because of me getting him with my pepper spray and because of... oh, no. Bat." Dylan tried to push back from Nuada, tried to move around him to go towards the trees. "Bat!"

Bronze eyes flicked to the edge of the concrete pathway even as he pulled her back to him. He was not letting her go except to finish off Eamonn. Since the dark Elf was yet writhing and screaming, Nuada had a moment. "What is it?" Then his eyes saw what she'd already known was there: a small, limp body covered in sleek black fur, so dark and so very still against the snow. With a terrified cry, Dylan broke away from him and stumbled toward the fallen kitten to scoop him up, hugging him to her chest.

"Bat," she whispered, voice trembling. "Bat." Numb, trembling fingers brushed gently against the kitten's head, but his eyes didn't open. Dylan shivered and hugged the little creature a bit tighter. "Oh, Bat. Wake up, honey." Frightened eyes turned to the Elf prince. "Eamonn threw him. He attacked Eamonn and that monster threw him into a tree. He's breathing but... but I can't wake him up. Bat," she said. "Bat, sweetie."

Nuada swallowed once, hard, before flicking his molten eyes to Eamonn, who still moaned on the snow. Tiny wisps of smoke seeped between his fingers. Salt. Salt could unmake a fae, could melt their bones and sear their veins until there was nothing left but a burnt-out husk if it got into the blood. Especially if it mingled with other poisons, like aerosol or plastic. The Elf of Zwezda was probably going to die from such a thing. Still... Nuada was taking no chances. Not again.

He approached the whimpering dark Elf and, without a word, drove his lance into the writhing traitor's belly. A choked cry gurgled in Eamonn's throat as the Elven silver ripped into the faery warrior's gut. Nuada slowly, slowly began to lean hard on the haft of the spear, shoving the blade deeper. Surprisingly, the dark Elf began to laugh. It was weak and choked by the silver blood bubbling now between his lips, but it was still recognizeably a laugh.

"Are you going to kill me, Silverlance?" Eamonn demanded in the Old Tongue. "Kill a fae for a human?"

Nuada jerked the spear so that the blood-smeared blade sliced into Eamonn's belly again, spilling caustic acid. The other Elf choked on a scream of pain. When his noise subsided, the prince said coldly, "To protect my lady from an Elf without honor, an Elf who should have been born a filthy human."

"Your lady. Pah. Your filthy whore, you mean. Well, then," the Elf of Zwezda mumbled around dark-stained lips, "I curse you, Silverlance. If I die this night, my curse will strike at your very heart. You speak of honor. You speak of your precious lady. I will steal both from you as you have stolen my life from me."

Eamonn spat a mouthful of blood onto the snow and fixed his cat-slit eyes on Nuada. Something burning cold lanced through the prince's chest. Pressure began to throb at his temples. He shook his head once, trying to clear it. Eamonn's voice echoed inside his skull as the dark Elf hissed, "I was never the one to fear, Prince Nuada. Your enemies are numerous but they are no real danger to her. The danger is you. I curse you now to lose everything you hold dear. Your father, your sister, that troll you call your vassal. And your precious mortal toy. You will lose them all by your own hand. Your father will fall at your sword. Your vassal will fall in your service. Your sister will die because you are blinded by duty and loyalty."

"Silence," Nuada whispered as the throbbing pressure built and built inside his skull. Images flickered behind his eyes, almost too fast to see. Nuala with a twin-dagger in her chest. His father with Nuada's own notched sword buried in his heart. Wink a corpse in the dust, Lorelei weeping into the massive chest that no longer rose and fell with the troll's breath. "Enough."

"Not yet," Eamonn gasped, struggling around the agony burning in his gut and spreading like liquid fire through his body. "Not enough yet. Because the worst will be the filthy human you hold in your heart. I curse you, Silverlance, with love and with lust. I curse you to want her so desperately you cannot stand it." Power, Elven magic fueled by the pain and mystic energy of dying, shivered over Nuada as the prince shook and thought, No, no, I will not, you have no power over the Silver Lance, no, I'll leave her before anything could happen to her. Slivers of ice and tendrils of power pulled at him, wrenched at him until the world was spinning fast and hard around him. And the dark Elf hissed, "You might run from her in a vain attempt to save her but you will always go back to her. And in the end, the need will drive you mad and you will take her. Take her, and use her and use her until there is nothing else but your need and her pain. She'll cry and beg you to stop. Beg you as she begged me. But you won't stop until her cries are silenced and her heart is still. She'll die, Silverlance, trapped beneath you, cursing your name, betrayed and broken, and her blood will forever stain your han-"

"Enough!" Shoving through the choking power tightening around him like razor-edged iron wires, Nuada wrenched the Elven lance upward and then plunged it back into the traitor's belly. With a jerk of Nuada's wrist, the spear sliced swiftly downward, spilling the foulness of the intestines into the wound. On a battlefield, anyone with such a wound was quickly given a mercy stroke across the throat to end their suffering and give them a quick, clean death. Eamonn would die as well, but slowly and surely in the night. Painfully. In absolute and feverish agony as the wound festered. And once he was dead - or even before, if he grew weak enough - the carrion-eating fae of the Park would be on him like crows feasting on a gibbet.

The prince drew in a ragged breath as Eamonn's foul words faded and all the dark Elf could do was lie there in his own agony. Never. He would never hurt Dylan like that, curse or no, never. He knew that. More importantly, she knew it. Royal magic was enough to fight such a paltry death curse, anyway. With a muttered oath, the Elf started to turn away from the soon-to-be carrion on the ground.

A plaintive meow snagged his attention. Nuada froze when he saw Dylan curled up on the snow. A dark shivering shape he knew to be Bat was struggling to nudge her face with his small head, mewing. Dylan's skin was death-white and frost coated her dark lashes. The snow in her hair didn't melt. Bat licked her lashes and tried to melt the ice sealing her eyes closed. The mortal didn't react to the rasp of his tongue.

No. Oh, no. Nuada sprinted to her side, the lance automatically shortening to a half-spear. He sheathed it across his back and dropped to his knees, scooping Dylan into his arms. She was breathing, but barely.

She wasn't shivering.

Bat let out a trembling meow and climbed laboriously on top of his two-legger's cold form, kneading her chest with tiny paws and leaning in to keep licking at the ice on her lashes. The kitten's back and one side was scraped, the fur glistening with blood. He didn't seem to notice. Seemed only to care about his human. He purred loudly and nipped her chin with sharp white teeth. Dylan didn't react. Bat yowled and bit her hard enough to draw a few tiny drops of steaming blood. Not even a flicker. Nuada's heart stuttered.

"Dylan," the Elf prince snapped, giving her a little shake. Bat licked furiously at her eyelashes. "Dylan, wake up!" A flicker of frosted lashes. A furrowing of her brows. She made a small sound. "Dylan, mo duinne, wake up. Open your eyes. Please, my love," he added with an edge of desperation to his words. "Open your eyes." Another flicker of eyelashes. Nuada pushed Bat out of the way and breathed on the last bits of ice holding her eyes closed. The frost melted under the heat of his breath. "Beloved, I beg you, come back to me."

Blue eyes, dark in the dim light of the waning moon, fluttered open. Blinked blearily up at him. "Nuada?" She blinked again to bring him into focus. "Are you... are you real?"

"I'm real, Dylan."

Her hand trembled with the effort it took to reach up and touch his face with icy fingertips. "It's you. You came back." Her lips quirked into a wan half-smile. "You came back." She drew a shuddering breath. "I'm so tired." Her hand fell and she closed her eyes again.

"No, sweetheart," the Elf prince said, climbing to his feet. "Keep your eyes open." She glanced up at him beseechingly, but he shook his head as he started to make for the cottage. "Not yet. I know you're tired. I know. Stay awake."

"Don't wanna..." She turned her face against his chest and closed her eyes again. Nuada swore viciously under his breath and ran faster. Bat, clinging to his human with his claws, hissed at Dylan and scratched her on the chest, where the sensitive spill of white scar tissue over her heart was hidden by her thin dress. Her eyes flew open. "Ow!"

The cottage was a beacon of warmth and amber light amidst the dark winter night. Nuada had never been so glad to see a human dwelling in his life. Becan must have been watching for them because as the prince slowed, the door swung open. The Elven warrior blinked once, his only sign of surprise at seeing the female brownie known as Brighid standing at Becan's side. Becan used his magic to lift the shivering kitten off Dylan's chest as Brighid raced ahead to Dylan's bedroom. Nuada strode after her, knowing what needed to be done. Simply warming Dylan wouldn't work, or he would have done so with a little magic on the way out of the woods. It had to be done gradually or she would go into shock. Sick as the brownie had said she was, the shock could kill her just as effectively as that lethal cold.

The fae warrior recalled what he'd learned during his time as a common soldier in his father's army as a young man. To fight killing cold, body heat was best. He remembered what his captain had ordered for him once when he'd fallen through the ice into a mountain river - get to a warm tent, strip, and let one of the army followers keep him warm. It was the safest way to fight hypothermia, but Dylan was not going to be happy about that.

I don't care, Nuada thought as he went into Dylan's bedroom. Ten glowing, flickering blossoms of goblin crystal were arrayed on a shelf on the wall, casting soft comforting light. Two others, the fûjin flowers, were on the nightstand beside her bed. As long as she survives. Despite the heat of the cottage - which wasn't very high, but was still warmer than the icy night outside - Dylan still hadn't stirred from the cradle of his arms.

"Lay her on the bed, Your Highness," Brighid said softly, and Nuada obeyed. He slipped off Dylan's leather coat, careful of the arm she still held at an awkward angle to her body. The wrist on that arm was swollen and blue with bruising.

Dislocated, the prince thought, and wished he'd had the leisure to kill Eamonn slowly. Maybe over the course of five or six days. With sound-proof walls, salted acid and red-hot iron.

Shaking away his fantasies, Nuada focused on his lady, who was still barely conscious. When his hands went to the zipper at the back of her damp dress, though, she pushed his hands away with a sharp sound.

"I can do it," Dylan mumbled, pushing at her hair. Was that a thread of panic in her tired voice? She gestured vaguely. "Go stand over there. Don't look."

"You cannot even stand on your own two feet just now, much less get undressed," Nuada snapped, and unzipped the snow-dampened dress. She pushed his hands away again and shot a pleading if exhausted look at Brighid. Feral eyes glared at the brownie. Brighid went pale. The prince growled, "Help her." Then he lunged to his feet and strode to the shelf that showcased the glass, crystal and diamond flowers, keeping his back to the two women.

Brighid had planned on coming to the human's cottage to see Becan tonight. When she'd arrived, the other brownie had quickly laid out everything that had happened and asked for her help in caring for his mistress. Of course she'd agreed. Now she helped Lady Dylan strip to the skin and slip on fresh underthings. Becan had looked up what to do for when his lady arrived from one of her medical books and Brighid followed the instructions now. Dry clothes, but nothing more than undergarments because someone would have to climb into bed with Her Ladyship to warm her and for that bare skin was best. The brownie maid tossed the wet clothes into the hamper with house-sprite magic and helped the mortal slip under the thick blankets on her bed. Lastly, she cast a very slow-acting warming spell on the blankets.

"Your Highness," the brownie murmured, catching the prince's attention. "If there's nothing else?"

Nuada dismissed Brighid to go back out into the front room with Becan and the cat. As the brownie pulled the bedroom door closed, Nuada blew out a breath, drew off his tunic and shirt, swiftly discarded his boots, and climbed into bed with Dylan. He fitted himself around her, letting his bare chest press against her back. At the touch of her skin he sucked in a breath through swiftly clenched teeth. She was so cold. He wrapped an arm around her and laid his chin on one icy shoulder, careful of the black strap so dark against her death white skin. Then the Elf prince tried to decide if breathing was elective. He didn't dare breathe, not with the perfume of lilies and roses mingling with the faintest copper tang of mortal blood. One of those scents sent a surge of irritatingly soft warmth through his chest; the other infuriated him.

"Cold," Dylan mumbled. She scrunched back against his warmth. Nuada's chest was almost blisteringly hot. His arm across hers and his hand lightly cradling one wrist were almost hot enough to burn. It was so nice to feel that blessed heat after all the cold. But the warmth only penetrated a little ways through the ice in her body. She knew she should've been shivering. Knew the fact that she wasn't was really bad. Dylan just couldn't remember why. She was having a hard time really thinking about anything, actually. "Really cold. Tired."

"Don't sleep," Nuada said tonelessly. He had to stay here with her until her core temperature went back to normal. That, he thought with a dark edge of what in a lesser man might have been called panic, could take hours. Hours of Dylan cuddled against him beneath the blanket. No. He wouldn't think about that. And he wouldn't think about the fear that still sizzled beneath his skin, either, the fear because he'd nearly lost her tonight. Aloud, the feral-eyed prince merely added, "It's not safe for you to sleep yet."

"Tired," she slurred.

His arm across her body tightened. He'd nearly lost her. His own foolishness had prompted him to leave her unguarded and he had nearly lost her. Been forced to watch Eamonn's hands tightening around her vulnerable throat. Watch her struggle for each breath until there was no breath to be had. Nuada squeezed his eyes shut and tried to focus on the fact that the dark Elf was dying - if he wasn't dead already. Tried to focus on the cold, smooth flesh pressed against his. Dark, soft hair under his cheek and caressing the side of his neck. The rise and fall of Dylan's chest as she breathed. Just let himself hold her to him under the sincere pretense of warming her. He hadn't lost her. She was here with him now. She was all right - or would be. They were both all right.

Images flickered behind his eyes, images that drove the breath from him. Those hands around Dylan's throat. Eamonn pinning her to the floor of the cottage, his mouth working at her throat like a hungry wolf's jaws. That single tear trickling from the corner of her eye. Just the sight of her curled up and too still in the snow. By the stars, beloved. Only centuries of iron self-control kept him from shaking.

"Tired," Dylan mumbled.

"I know," Nuada said in a suddenly soft voice. His breath was like steam against her shoulder. Dylan could distantly feel his fingers stroking along her arm, bringing the chilled blood closer to the surface. "I know you are. But you have to stay awake." With a bit of sarcastic admiration, the prince added, "I'm honestly surprised you're even lucid at this point."

Dylan snorted. "Barely lucid." Oh, boy, he was so warm. If she could've plastered her entire body to him, she would have, but moving was too much effort just then.

"Lucid enough to listen to something important?"

"Sure." She tried to shrug. The scorching heat of his arm slid over her skin with the movement. "I'm lucid. Sure."

"I have two things to say to you," the prince said softly. He felt her tense. Oh, yes, Dylan was lucid right enough. And was the ice in her blood thawing just a little? Nuada couldn't tell if her skin was warming up or if it was just his own wishful thinking. So he just said, "Firstly... have I ever told you how very clever you are? Or how brave?"

Dylan blinked sleepily and tried to scootch further against all that lovely delicious heat. Anything, so long as she wasn't so icy cold anymore. Why did Nuada sound almost like he was smiling? "Don't think so."

"Then I will say it now." He tilted his head so that he could murmur in her ear, "You are very clever. Becan showed me through his memories how you got away from Eamonn." He felt Dylan stiffen further. Tasted a brief psychic wash of shame from her. Nuada frowned. Did she think he was angry about the way she'd tricked the Elf of Zwezda? There had been... a little hurt. Stupid. Foolish needle-prick of jealousy and hate because his enemy had forced those enticements from her lips. But it was mostly rage and hatred at Eamonn, not for her. Did Dylan truly think so little of him?

Disgusting human whore. Fates curse it, of course she did. Why shouldn't she? So he only continued to lightly stroke her arm while he murmured, "That was brave of you, Dylan. I know Eamonn frightens you. It must have been difficult for you, but it was very brave."

Nuada paused then while the mortal relaxed against him again. Marshalled his thoughts. Was it cheating to give this apology when she was barely clinging to consciousness? Possibly. Still, if she didn't remember it when she woke, then he would simply give it again.

"The second thing is... Dylan. I'm sorry. For abandoning you. For leaving you unprotected. For hurting you as I did. For saying the things I said. They were untrue and I behaved cruelly and churlishly. Forgive me my trespasses against you, my lady. Forgive me my betrayal."

Then Dylan shifted in his arms, turning over to face him. Her eyes were still glazed and sleepy, her smile tired, but she touched cold fingertips to his cheek and sighed. He felt that touch all the way to his marrow. Despite the chill in her fingertips, a wisp of gentle warmth curled around his heart. "You're always forgiven, Nuada." Dark lashes drifted downward and a shaft of alarm shot through him. She couldn't sleep yet. He opened his mouth to call her name. Those incredible eyes flicked open again. "Do you forgive me? Are you still angry?"

How could he be? How could he be angry when the consequences of that anger were so obvious in the bruises on her face, the cut on her cheek? Nuada knew that once she was warm enough not to need him right beside her, he would probably have to see to her injuries. And he knew there were more. Dislocated wrist, possibly a strained shoulder. Eamonn had also thrown her to the floor, and to the iced pavement. It was a miracle she didn't have a concussion. She'd scraped her hands and arms on the sharp ice. Knees too. And the dark smudges at her throat shamed him, even though he hadn't been the one to put them there. So Nuada lightly touched her cool, uncut cheek and said softly, "No. I'm not angry. I forgive you, madoigna."

Dylan's smile widened briefly before she rolled over and cuddled back against his chest once more. Her skin was still like ice, but tiny tremors were beginning to shiver through her body. Then she said suddenly, "My wrist hurts." She huffed out an irritated breath. "Shoot. It's dislocated. That's going to really hurt when I get all the feeling back in my extremities."

Nuada took the wrist in question and studied it for a moment. The cold had mostly kept the swelling down, but it was still bruised, still tender. If they didn't put it back into place soon, it would be that much harder once the warmth came back to her body and her wrist really started to swell. But it would hurt no matter when he relocated it. Shifting a little so he could use both hands, the amber-eyed prince asked, "Would you like me to tell you a story?"

"I... guess so. Sure."

Keeping his voice butter-smooth and gentle, the Elf prince murmured, "Nuair a bhí..." Once there was... And he wove together the story of Setanta, the boy who would one day become the warrior known as Cù Chulainn, the Hound of Ulster.

It had been a favorite of his as a child before he'd learned the truth of humans, of their hungering ways and their unstoppable greed. He'd loved that story because Cù Chulainn had been very close to his age - only nine or ten years old at the beginning of the tale, the mortal equivalent to Nuada's barely ten centuries. And he'd loved it because of the warrior woman, Scathach, who reminded him even now of his mother.

"An buachaill a bhí anois ina fhear, agus ghaiscíoch. Mar sin, thairg dó Scathach an rogha a claimhte. Thairg an cairdeas a pluide, ionas go mbeidh-"

"Wait a second," Dylan mumbled, turning to peer into Nuada's face. "The what? 'The friendship of her thighs?' What the heck does that even- gah!"

With a sharp jerk and a wet popping sound, Nuada yanked the hinge joint back into place, wincing at the shocked cry of pain from between Dylan's clenched teeth. Dylan let out a shuddering breath and scrunched against the Elf prince, her face pressed against his shoulder as she struggled to stay above the hideous waves of pain surging through her arm.

"Oh, that hurt," she whispered. "That hurt a lot."

"Forgive me," Nuada murmured, reaching up to stroke her hair. She was shivering hard now. Good. Her temperature was slowly but surely rising back to where it needed to be. Her skin was no longer so cold it burned. "It had to be done."

"I know," she said. "I'm fine. It's fine." Dylan flexed her fingers until the movement no longer sent stabs of pain through her wrist. Paused. The longer she spent underneath these blankets the more lucid and aware of her surroundings she became. Now she realized she was pressed against Nuada's scorching heat (and didn't that feel absolutely wonderful after being so freaking cold?) but she also noticed that he wasn't wearing a shirt and she wasn't wearing... pretty much anything. Except a bra and panties.

Oh, my gosh. Oh, my. Of course Dylan had known this intellectually for the last however many minutes, but there was a difference between knowing and knowing.

"Um... I'm gonna roll over now." Which she proceeded to do. Since shudders of cold still racked her body, she gritted her teeth and let Nuada fit himself against her back. Allowed him to put one blazingly hot arm around her. He gently cradled her recently-relocated wrist.

Oh, my, Dylan thought again, trying to keep from thinking about anything except how warm he was. He was so warm and Dylan could feel his steady heartbeat against her back like a drum. Then she remembered, "Hey, wait, you distracted me. What does that mean? An cairdeas a pluide? The friendship of her thighs?"

Nuada closed his eyes. Couldn't she simply accept the story and enjoy it? Why did she have to ask him inconvenient questions? "It means," he said in a deliberately bland voice, "that Scathach allowed Cù Chulainn to be her lover."

"Like, her sweetheart? Or just her... bedroom companion?" Talking about sex around Nuada made her uncomfortable on a good day. Talking about sex after they'd had a huge fight and he'd only recently come back to her made her both uncomfortable and fluttery. But talking about sex and lovers while lying trapped in bed with the most handsome Elf prince she'd ever met while wearing almost nothing was nothing short of hideous torture of the most embarrassing sort that would've made her flush if she hadn't been freezing practically to death and how did she keep ending up in these uncomfortable situations with Nuada, anyway?

Nuada's reply was muffled against her hair. "Bedroom companion."

"That's disgusting," Dylan replied flatly, distracted from her own plight. "He's like, what - fifteen? And she's what, forty? That is so gross. She's a freaking cougar."

The prince huffed a laugh. "A what?"

"A cougar; an older woman who looks to younger men for sexual partners." Nervous, the babbling started. "If you're a guy who preys on younger men, you're a chickenhawk. If you're a girl who preys on older men, that's sometimes referred to as a lolita. Although lolita can also be a preference for young men or women in general, too. And if you're a guy who looks to younger women, then you're a cradle-robbing creep."

"I learn so many strange things about humans from you," Nuada said.

Dylan's laugh was soft as a whisper. Some of the ice cold dread that had been swirling in the pit of Nuada's stomach began to thaw. She could laugh. She could smile and she could laugh, which meant she was all right. If Eamonn had... if the Elf with cat-slit eyes had hurt her the way he wanted, there was no way Dylan would have been able to do those things. No way she could bear Nuada's touch. So the feral-eyed warrior breathed a silent prayer of gratitude and relief.

"Hey, that reminds me," Dylan said softly, rubbing at one tired eye with a loose fist. Tingling pain was beginning to hiss across her scraped palms and forearms, across her scraped knees. "Speaking of cradle-robbing creeps and stuff. How old are you?"

Nuada blinked at the sudden unexpected turn in the conversation. Thought for a moment. "Four-thousand-ninety-"

"No, no, I mean if you were human. Don't growl at me," she added tiredly when she caught the sound of the Elf grinding his teeth. "What's the human equivalent to your age?"

"Forty," he replied sourly. "A century for an Elf is like a year for a human. I would be nearly forty-one."

Wide-eyed, she turned to look at him. Dylan felt ridiculous, but in her surprise she blurted out, "You're more than a decade older than me!" It was one thing to know Nuada was a few millennia old. She knew people who'd been around during the time of the dinosaurs (albeit not very many). But for some reason the Elf prince struck her as being... well... younger than that. Her own age. Maybe not in years - definitely not in years - but in maturity. No wonder she seemed like such a child to him.

"Mo duinne, I'm over four thousand-"

"Yeah, I know, but you're forty! You're old! I can't believe it; I'm almost-engaged to an old guy! You're like... forty! You know what? I'm just going to go back to thinking of you as four-thousand and some change. Otherwise I'll end up feeling like I'm disrespecting my elders."

Nuada's mouth stretched into a tired, exasperated smile. The fact that he could smile at all without having to force himself to do it, the fact that smiling at her still felt like the most natural thing in the world, surprised him. What surprised him even more was the endearment that popped out of his mouth without any prompting. "Darling, you know that doesn't make any sense."

"I know," she grumped. To hide the sudden uncertainty she knew shimmered in her eyes, Dylan turned her face back to cuddle the pillow. Nuada was still warm against her back, but not so warm he was scalding anymore. Her shivers were slowly beginning to taper off. Once they stopped, once the amber-eyed prince decided her skin was warm enough to suit him, he'd get out of bed and leave her. Probably to go wash her human germs off.

And yet... Darling. Why had he said that?

"Humor me," Dylan added, deliberately shading her voice with amusement.

"How old are you, then?" The prince demanded in mock-outrage. "You are hardly a child, though you often act as one."

"I'll be thirty on December twentieth," she informed him with quiet dignity. So he'd been right that day at Erik's forge - her birthday was fairly soon. She'd been twenty-nine for the eleven, nearly twelve months he'd known her. How young she was. How could he... feel the depth of emotion he did, for someone so very young? "Ugh," she added, breaking into his thoughts. "I hate being cold!"

"You seem to be completely yourself again, though."

"Hmmm? Oh, yeah," she added, drawing up her knees to her chest. When she tried to drape her arm across them, a stinging pain made her jerk back. She'd forgotten she'd scraped up her knees on the ice and the pavement. They weren't bleeding, though. The cold had kept the blood at bay long enough for some healing to begin. Still hurt, though. "I'm okay now. Just cold. Thank you for... for keeping me warm. And for saving me. I'm sorry I'm such a nuisance."

Nuada's shrug was loose and easy and Dylan felt it ripple from his shoulders through the muscles of his chest pressed so tightly against her back. Biting back a squeak took all of her concentration for a minute. Then he said, "You are not a nuisance. Well," the prince amended. "Sometimes you are. But that is the way of women- oof!" Her elbow in his solar plexus pulled the exclamation out of him. "Ow. I will leave you to shiver here - do not think I won't." Dylan tried to scoot back to plaster herself more firmly against the delicious warmth of him, but there was no room. "And," Nuada added when she'd settled, "I did not save you. You saved yourself. I am... very proud of you."

There was a long silence, and then, "Really?"

He laid the hand that had been stroking her arm on her shoulder and squeezed gently. Kept his chin on her shoulder because he wanted to shift and press the heat of his mouth to the smudged scars on her shoulder from long-ago gunshot wounds. He wanted to trace the silvery scars on her back with the pads of his fingers. Send soft, soothing magic into the bruises marring Dylan's back and circling her neck. Tenderness was not new to him by any means. He knew how to be gentle with a woman in various settings. But it was different here. With her. She was his lady but... but that relationship was so complex and tangled and if he touched her the way he wanted Nuada dreaded too many of the consequences. So the immortal warrior said only, "Yes."

Then he finished telling her the story of Cù Chulainn. Told her next of Aengus, called by humans the Gaelic god of love, and the woman he loved more than life who was turned into a swan. Dylan had no objections to that story.

Time moves slowly in darkness, in dimness and shadow. The icy chill in Dylan's body slowly faded - the only way for Nuada to really gauge the passage of time. Eventually the shivers ceased altogether. She was still too cold, however. And, the prince realized when she shifted and rolled over to cuddle against him, she was also asleep. It was safe for her to sleep now. He still had to stay under the blankets with her, but she could sleep. That was not the problem.

The problem was, as midnight slipped by and the cold dark of the earliest morning settled over the world, she was cuddling against him. Before he could even think to stop it, her arm slid around his waist. Her cool hand pressed against his bare back. The heat of her breath against his chest had the prince breathing very shallowly through clenched teeth. Carefully, Nuada shifted until he lay on his back instead of his side. Dylan's grip on him shifted as he did. Now she was draped against his side, her open palm against his now hammering heart. Silken curls brushed his chest, his belly, like a caress every time she moved. This was what he'd been afraid of. Now that the danger was past, his mind no longer dwelt on the fear and the rage. On the fiercely driving need to protect. Instead his thoughts centered on the soft skin of her belly pressing against Nuada's side. Her fingers, which twined unconsciously in a lock of his hair. Every time those slender fingers moved, her fingertips stroked his skin. He even felt the delicate brush of her toes against his ankle. Whenever Nuada tried to shift at all, Dylan nuzzled her face into his chest. Her soft, cool lips would ghost over the thin scar beneath his right pectoral muscle and his heart would knife sideways in his chest.

He shivered and closed his eyes. Struggled to keep his breathing even. Struggled, if he wanted to be honest with himself (which he didn't) to breathe at all. He wanted so badly to... to... he could not let himself think about that. Could not let his thoughts explore what he wanted. But she had nearly died, he'd nearly lost her and now he wanted so much to hold her. Just to prove to himself that she was alive, that she was all right, that she wasn't hurt. Hold her. Prove to her that he had been telling the truth when he'd said-

No, Nuada snarled silently. No. Think of something else.

Love, then. How could he be in love with a human? How could he be in love with anyone he hadn't always loved? Nuada did not possess the freedom to love Dylan. And if he loved her, if he allowed himself to love her, then what did that say about his loyalty to others? To his people? To his cause? To his kingdom? His life was not his own. It was wrong to discard those he cared about, those he had a sworn duty to, just to indulge himself with a mortal woman who would one day die and leave him alone again.

But did he not deserve some happiness as well? And Fates help him, he was happy with her. Even now, when her every innocent touch in sleep left him seared to the bone, there was nowhere he would rather have been than at her side. Had his father seen into Dylan the night Nuada had been flogged, the night she'd risked her life to stand by him, to save him? Had Balor known that here was a woman who could snare his son's heart? If so, was his father trying to give him a gift? Or shove him head-long into a fatal trap from which there was no escape? Was his father trying to help him, or destroy him? It hurt that Nuada didn't know the answer.

For one of the rare times in his adult life, Nuada had no idea what to do. And this time, he had no one to ask. Who could he go to? His sister? The knowledge that she was not to be trusted in this important decision was like an iron dirk in his belly. Every time he remembered that fact, the knife twisted, twisted. Nuada could not go to his father, the setter of this sweetly-baited trap. Wink? The prince shied away from that option. What would he say to his oldest friend? That his heart had betrayed him and he could not stop thinking of the impossible mortal woman who even now held him chained to her side by bonds as unbreakable as the feel of her heartbeat, the kiss of her breath on his skin, and the way she so softly murmured his name in her sleep? Dreaming of him, as he dreamed of her.

Nuada, please. Please, Nuada. I want you to kiss me. A shudder let his groan escape. That dream had not left him yet. He wished it would vanish like morning mist in the sun. He didn't want to think of those soft lips turned up to him, so tantalizing, eager for his kiss. As if Dylan would ever really let him kiss her. Not after everything she'd been through in her life. Yes, she found him attractive. Most women did. But there was a difference between admiring a man she viewed as a friend and allowing that friend to take liberties with her person. And he would be a fool and a churl to ask her. Maybe if the courtship charade demanded it, maybe then. But of his own volition because he could no longer withstand the temptation of that beautiful mouth? Never.

And if the pretense at courtship did demand they kiss? Nuada knew that unless they found a way to break it swiftly, his father would most likely demand they begin to "get caught" every so often locked in romantic embrace of some sort. Could the prince live with that? Could he accept that? Accept that she allowed his touch, his kiss, because the king commanded it of them?

Nuada remembered the strange disquiet in Dylan's eyes when they'd discussed possibly having to marry (and it would be an absolute miracle if that little possibility didn't kill him). Could he allow her to suffer that way, forced to accept the touch of a man she did not love? What would happen to them if Balor forced them into such a situation? Would she still look at Nuada with that wealth of affection and fondness in her eyes? Would her loyalty remain untarnished, her spirit unbroken?

Nuada had grown up knowing he would most likely marry a woman he didn't love. A woman who would be his wife and bear his children and be his queen when he finally took the Golden Throne. Dylan had had no such thoughts, no such preparation. What would happen to her beneath the crushing yoke of the king's commands? And if he let himself love her, let himself surrender to her when she would not, could not love him in return... what would happen to him?

"Wassa matter?" Dylan mumbled sleepily against his chest, and Nuada jerked in surprise. She was awake - barely. Obviously struggling to remain above the sticky waves of sleep pulling at her. Struggling and failing. "Y'okay?"

"I am well enough," he said softly, running a hand lightly over her hair. She sighed and snuggled closer. For a brief, heartbreaking moment, he let himself pretend it was all right to lie beside her this way with her head pillowed on his chest and a slumberous smile on her scarred face. That it wasn't a betrayal of everything he stood for. He said, "Go back to sleep."

She already had before he'd finished the statement. In sleep, Dylan now cuddled against him so that her icy cheek lay on his shoulder, her head tucked under his chin. One hand slowly and absently stroked his other shoulder in slumber while her warm breath shushed against his neck. Her toes flicked against his calf as she sighed contentedly. Nuada blew one of her stray curls away from where it tickled his mouth. She pressed closer. He swallowed hard and tried to ignore her. No luck.

Damning himself, Nuada slipped an arm around her beneath the blanket and laid his cheek against the top of her head. His fingers tangled gently in the curls that hung down her bare back. He wouldn't sleep. Once Dylan was warm enough he was getting out of this bed. Probably getting in the shower and drowning his futile wishes and desires in ice cold water. But until then he would pretend. Pretend she wanted him, loved him. Pretend he could be happy with her. Be with her at all. So he shifted a little and tried to ignore the still-cool softness of her body pressed against him. Tried to ignore the nagging reminder that this couldn't last, that this way meant grief.

Nuada breathed in the sweet scent of her and laid his lips ever so lightly on the top of Dylan's head. She did not stir.

.

Eamonn floated in darkness and agony as the cold gnawed at him, as stomach acid seared him, and his flesh slowly died from the Silver Lance's belly cut. If he died, at least the lily-white prince would suffer for it. If he died, then Nuada would fall to the curse and rape his little human sweetheart to death. King Balor would have to have him executed... if Nuada didn't take his own life first. Eamonn would have laughed if he'd had the breath for it. Lust would be the end of the prince. Good.

Rough hands slipped under his armpits and began to drag him across the pavement and onto the snow. He didn't bother struggling. He was too far gone to care what any of the carrion-eating forest fae did with his body. Anything was better than this pain.

He frowned - or tried - when a familiar voice grumbled, "You idiot. Why did you go after her? We were supposed to wait and use the dream spells to break the prince's sanity. Why did you go after her?"

Eamonn wanted to tell that voice to shut up. He'd seen an opportunity and seized it.

She'd been vulnerable. Little whore. She'd tricked him. Promised him her favors, just like she'd given the Silver Lance. Curiosity had prompted him to accept. What had the Elf prince seen in her? Mortal flesh, mortal blood, mortal features, mortal charms. Why had Nuada betrayed everything to rut with her? The Elf of Zwezda had wanted to know.

So he'd tried her. She'd whimpered when his teeth sank into her throat and in that moment he'd understood. Mortal pain. Mortal fear. A woman's fear. He'd smelled it, tasted it on her skin. Intoxicating. No wonder Nuada had bedded her. The pain and delicious fear in her as she'd made herself vulnerable to him had been like a drug. An instant jolt of adrenaline and pleasure because she was weak, helpless, and so very human. The heir to the Golden Throne was not as chivalrous as he pretended to be, oh no. Inside he was just as twisted, just as tainted as Eamonn, as Bres.

Then she'd ruined it. Turned on him. Lied to him. Cheated. Used her witch's poisons on him - salt and that other caustic stuff. But his revenge would be sweet, even if he wasn't alive to see it come to fruition. He could imagine the glassy pain and shock in her eyes as the Elf prince broke her to pieces beneath him. Could imagine the choked cries, the tears, the heartbreak as Nuada used her viciously. The light fading from those strangely fae eyes as she bled out under the man she trusted, the man she loved. And Nuada. Eamonn could just picture the grief and despair on that scarred face. Hear the howl of anguish as the little whore died. Would he weep? Maybe. If he loved her as much as the dark Elf thought, then maybe. He hoped so.

That voice was still talking. "Good thing we have a healer nearby. Idiot. Otherwise you'd have been dead long before morning." The dragging stopped. "Yeah, Iolo, I found him. He's hurt bad. Idiot. Silverlance and his little human slut got to him. Can you do aught for him?"

"Maybe," the Welsh fae lord muttered, crouching over the prone and bloody figure. "Maybe."