Chapter 50 - Confession

that is

A Short Tale of Gifts Beneath a Tree, a Visitor's Warning, Drowning, Information Just Out of Reach, Music, Comfort, the Truth At Last, and Longing

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"Milady," the brownie murmured once they were back in the front room. Sloe black eyes absently admired the tree and its baubles while the Wee Fae remained very aware of the passage of time. "Milady, it is nearly midnight."

"Yes," she replied, rubbing almost nervously at the half-circle scar on the underside of her arm. "I know." She laid the Christmas Mouseling on the fireplace mantel and studied the room. There were fifteen or so minutes left before midnight. "I'll be back in a bit."

Dylan went to her room, to her closet, and pulled down from the shelf a box. Inside were several brightly wrapped packages that she'd picked up from the Floating Night Market and other places over the last few months. Some of them were for Becan, others for John. A few, more sedately wrapped in royal blue with Celtic designs in silver and gold, were for Nuada (if he would accept them, which she wasn't one-hundred percent sure of).

And there were a few, which she or Becan had wrapped during the day while the children were doing other things, for each of the ewah. Wink had brought the children's livery, though she hadn't known that at the time. Her brownie had answered the door and accepted the packages while she and the children were out getting the tree. Becan had also wrapped them while the others were out. There were also several smaller packages from the Troll Market that apparently had been arranged for by Nuada during their last visit, though they were already wrapped and therefore Dylan had no idea what was actually in them. These were in simple brown paper and their shape gave absolutely no indication of their contents.

Instead of carrying the presents, she simply dragged the box out of her bedroom and down the hall towards the living room. And it was as she was setting up the presents beneath the Christmas tree that a hollow knock sounded at the front door.

She rose slowly to her feet. Becan was not going to get the door this time. This time, she would answer because no faerie wished to confront Carapace Clavicle Moundshroud if they could avoid it. And because right after the sepulchral sound of an iron knocker against her door where no knocker should have been, there came a rapid and much more natural-sounding knock to the beat of shave-and-a-haircut. Dylan's mouth curved up in a smile almost against her will.

When she opened the door, a skeletally thin man with skin the pale gray color of old bones in a suit of abyssal black inclined his head. Eldritch eyes gleaming with the greenish phantasmic light of St. Elmo's fire raked her from head to toe and back up again. Wrinkled lips peeled back and sharpened teeth glinted in a smile. "Well, now. Well, well, well, now. There you are, my dear."

"It's been too long, Mr. Moundshroud," she said, and embraced him. His arms were like frigidly cold bands of steel, but she had long ago gained a sort of immunity to the graveyard chill that clung to the Keeper of the Samhain Tree, in the same way she'd learned to ignore the mildewy scent of graveyard earth and his incredibly beaky nose and pointy ears (and the tufty wisps of gray and white hair that sprouted out of both). The old Other Kin even brushed a grandfatherly kiss against her forehead. It burned with the iciness of bitter frostbite. "Come in," Dylan said warmly. "Come in."

The person who followed the old fae inside the cottage was tall, gangly, and sported freckles all over his vampire-pale face. Wild shocks of carrot-colored hair stood out brightly against his pale skin and black t-shirt. He kept his hands stuffed in his black jeans, but Dylan could see the half-circle scar on the underside of his arm. A scar identical to her own, and to the ones borne by his four dearest friends. This boy was Moundshroud's protege, Joseph - called Pip, or Pipkin, for his last name - and he had cheated Death twice in his life. He too had the Sight, by virtue of being born at midnight on Samhain. And now he offered Dylan a two-fingered salute and a half-mocking grin.

"Hey," he quipped, grinning. He still had a childlike gap between his two front teeth. "What's up, Doc? Saved anyone else's life lately by doing something stupid?"

She snorted. "Oh, yes. I go around trading years off my life all the time. Have a seat, you punk."

"Take the floor, Pipkin," Moundshroud ordered. "Chairs belong to old people." With a grumble, the freckled boy plopped tailor-style on the floor. Moundshroud took the chair. Dylan sank onto the footstool. After a long moment where Dylan let the withered being study her, the Keeper said, "Do you know why I've come, child?"

Dylan rolled back her sleeve to bare the lopsided, half-circle scar on the underside of her forearm, a scar the color of old bones - the same faded, moldering gray as Moundshroud's wrinkled skin. "Is it time? Because... because if it is, I have to ask you to give me an extension."

"If it was time, you'd know I can't do that. I don't control when your divine Master calls you back to Him. And if it wasn't time, nothing I could do would end your life. That's not why I'm here." The Keeper of the Samhain Tree sighed and glanced at the dying fire in the hearth. "You are being courted by Prince Nuada Silverlance, heir to the Golden Throne of Bethmoora, yes?" Dylan nodded. Moundshroud sighed again, like a sere wind through a cemetery in October. "Blast. I'd hoped that was just a stupid rumor. You are in way over your head this time, my dear."

She frowned and cocked her head. "What do you mean?"

"Even I can't protect you all the time, or even most of it. The ones like me, the old ones - we don't interfere much with the fae kingdoms. Bad PR, you know? If we put our oar in too often, the royals would all band together and kill us. They could, you know. If they all worked together, they could kill us one by one. So whatever old One-Arm is planning, I can't help you. You understand what I'm saying?"

Dylan couldn't stop tracing the scar with her fingertips. A scar made by Moundshroud's sharpened thumbnail. A concave scar that marked where the Keeper had pierced her arm all the way to the bone, and penetrated bone to find the marrow. If he could do that, if he could save a dying child, if all the fae kings had to band together in order to kill him, why couldn't he help her? Because of politics. Probably because of the rules of magic as well. "You came to warn me about Nuada's father?"

Moundshroud nodded. "Balor will do anything to maintain the truce between the humans and the fae. Anything that even smacks of an act that might break it puts him on edge. You have to be careful, Dylan. If he has some sort of plan to discredit Prince Nuada to his anti-human supporters and you get in his way, he'll shatter you."

"I'm stronger than I look," she muttered, thinking of the Blackwood boys and the human wolves and Eamonn. "I survived our deal, didn't I?"

"Not strong enough that you can't be blackmailed," Moundshroud replied, running a bony hand over his mostly bald head. Only a few short wisps of stone gray hair sprouted like fungus from his skull and the depths of his large, pointy ears. "You love the prince, which means the king can get to you. If you stand in his way, he'll do whatever it takes to get you out of it. You have to believe that."

Blood sheeting down Nuada's back, soaking his hair and his trews and spattering the floor beneath his feet. A sudden surge of nausea and horror made her stomach clench and her eyes sting. Oh, yes. Oh, yes, she believed that of Nuada's father. He would torture her prince if either of them slipped up in any way. But... "Would he kill Nuada? If he had to?"

"Without hesitation," the old fae replied. Dylan squeezed her eyes shut. Her heart plummeted into her toes. "And he would kill you even quicker than that if he thought you were a threat to the truce. And it doesn't take much to convince him of that. If you don't do everything in your power to make the Silver Lance lovey-dovey with the humans, if Balor thinks you're making the prince's prejudice worse or interfering with his plans to make Nuada look bad in front of the courts, he'll kill you. Both of you. Do you understand?"

She nodded. "What do you think he's going to do?"

"It would look very bad for the prince if he married a human," Moundshroud replied. Dylan couldn't stop her flinch. "It would look even worse if he took one for a lover." At her confused expression, the Keeper sighed. "Child, sometimes I wonder how you can be so naive. If the Silver Lance marries you, it could be said the king forced him into it. The impact is lessened. If the prince beds you without the bonds of marriage... well, no one would think the king would order the prince to take a human to his bed. They would think the Silver Lance did such a thing of his own accord. I tell you this because I know if Balor ordered you to sleep with Nuada, you would say no at first."

"Not at first," she protested. "Period. I'd say no period. I'm not having sex with anyone before marriage willingly. I made a covenant-"

"If you refuse the king anything, he will torture and perhaps kill the prince," Moundshroud said. Dylan's protests died in her throat, swallowed by her horror. "Or he will torture and perhaps kill you. But after your rescue of the prince back in October - yes, I heard about that - Balor knows that his son is your weakness. More than likely, he will use Nuada as a bargaining chip, a hostage against you. I want you to be prepared, child."

For a long moment she was so stunned she couldn't speak. The king would do that? Nuada would not have believed such a thing, or he'd have warned her. But that didn't mean Balor wasn't capable of it. Children saw their parents differently than other people, even when they were adults.

"It's always blood or sex with the fae, isn't it?" She asked more than a little bitterly. Blood or sex. Death or life. I hate that. She sighed. "Is this why you wanted to see me?"

"Yes. Are you frightened?"

"For him," Dylan replied. "Not for me. I couldn't bear to lose him. I love him. If I die, then it's because it's time. The same thing applies if the king decides to... if Nuada... but it won't be the same. Not for me. I'll lose almost everything. A third of my life will be gone. And John... John's job is so dangerous. I could lose him at any moment. Then the only One I'll have left is Heavenly Father."

"The Star Kindler, the Lamplighter of the Moon, the Elves call Him," Moundshroud murmured. "Wood folk call Him the Rain Bringer, the Wind in the Boughs, the Shepherd of the Forest. Even I call Him that sometimes. We don't talk much, the Rain Bringer and I, but I know Him. And I know He'll look after you, child. As long as you don't do anything stupid," the Keeper added after a beat.

"I know," she whispered. "I know. But I just... I don't want Nuada to get hurt."

"Then be careful." Moundshroud rose creakily to his feet and stretched with a groan that reminded Dylan of shambling corpses hungry for human flesh. "Come along, Pipkin. Lazy boy. Never should've taken him as my apprentice," the old fae muttered with a good-natured roll of the eyes, moving towards the front door. Pip merely rolled his own eyes behind the old fae's back and graced Dylan's hand with an insolent little kiss.

At the front door, which opened of its own accord, the Keeper of the Samhain Tree turned back to Dylan and laid his bony hands on her shoulders. His nails lightly pricked her skin through her shirt. The scar on the underside of her arm throbbed in response. "I feel I should remind you... of two things. One is that in a life-or-death choice between sex and blood, the followers of the High King are commanded to choose the former, not the latter."

Dylan swallowed hard. With the fae, it almost always came down to sex or blood. Branwen's Tears, the poison of the gancanaugh, was a prime example. It drove a person to a painful, sometimes maddening or even lethal state of arousal, and no one could maintain control under its influence. But killing something - shedding copious amounts of hot copper blood in a lethal flood of crimson - could ease the brutal need just as easily as sex. But the edicts of the High King of the World commanded that if a Latter-Day Saint had to make the choice between sex and death, to change the choice. To make it a choice between life and death. That was not considered a sin - to be used that way in preservation of sentient life. Her bishop had even reminded her of that fact after her attack in the subway.

Why is Moundshroud telling me this? She wondered, and a sudden burning heat took up residence in her chest. Oh. Okay. That's why. Because You want me to be reminded. I thank Thee, Heavenly Father. Is that because of whatever the king might be planning? The heat flared. Dylan's hands curled into fists at her side. I see. So he's planning something that has the potential to be lethally dangerous to one or both of us? Warmth spread from her chest down her back and into the coldness in the pit of her stomach. I see. I thank Thee.

"What's the second thing you feel you should tell me?"

"The second thing is this - trust in the Spirit. He will never steer you wrong. And trust in those who love you."

Those beetle-black eyes gleaming with eerie green in their depths pierced her to the core. Dylan nodded. Moundshroud gave one sharp nod of satisfaction before pulling her into an embrace once more. Most would probably find the moldering odor of grave earth and cold marble discomfitting, but ever since the night she'd met Moundshroud and Pip, somehow it always comforted.

"Be careful, my dear. I don't want to see our deal fulfilled for a long time yet, do you understand?"

"Yes, sir."

He released her and without another word, turned on his heel and strode into the darkness with Pipkin followed after him. Pip walked backwards, waving at her as he too disappeared into the night. Dylan was about to shut the door when she caught sight of something glittering on the outside doorknob. She lifted up an orb of faceted orange, green, and amber crystal and stared at it for a few seconds before she realized what is was.

A jack-o-lantern Christmas ornament.

Despite the chilling conversation she'd just finished, Dylan found herself smiling.

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Blood bubbled between Westenra's lips as the vermin struggled to draw a full breath into lungs filling with blood. He choked and hacked, trying desperately to clear his lungs. It didn't work. He only succeeded in spitting up more scarlet onto his shuddering chest. Crimson soaked his open shirt. Every breath was glottal and wet and ended in a hacking cough that brought more blood frothing between his lips.

"Please," he choked out. "Please."

Nuada did not spare him so much as a glance. Instead, rage-scarlet eyes flashed to the clock on the wall. The pathetic wretch had perhaps thirty minutes left. Even if the Elf prince had wanted to do something - which he most certainly did not - he couldn't have.

"If... if you help me... I'll tell you their names," the human rasped. Nuada jerked in surprise.

"Who?" His voice was deadly ice.

"The ones... who raped her. Please..." Westenra gasped for breath, his fingers scrabbling weakly against the blood-streaked desk. After several moments of coughing he managed to draw enough air to groan, "I'll tell you who they are. I will. I swear." The pale man cocked his head to the side and regarded Westenra with narrowed, coldly glittering eyes like frozen arterial blood. The stark hatred in the white face sent ice-cold fear sliding through the old man's guts. Tears began to roll down his weathered cheeks again. "I don't wanna die, please..."

Nuada steeled himself to do something so revolting he feared he very well might be sick. Pulling off his black leather glove, he reached out and grabbed Westenra's hand in a bruising grip. Gritted his teeth. For Dylan, the Elven warrior reminded himself. Already he was choking on the chaotic terror and nauseating psyche of the man whose thoughts he meant to investigate. I must do this for Dylan. With a deep breath that stank of fear and the first stale hints of death, Nuada rammed into the human's mind.

Instantly he had to fight against the vicious nausea that threatened to choke him. Such depravity. Such callous sadism. The Elf prince found himself drawn inexorably towards the memories of Dylan.

Little girl with riotous brown curls insisting defiantly, "I do believe in fairies. I do. I do. They're real. I do believe in fairies!" Stamping her foot, tears streaming from her eyes. Blows, slaps, pinches, shoves. From other children and from adults exasperated with her defiance. Locked in the dark. Pain. Torture. Humans did these things to their children? Didn't they know that children were the gods' greatest blessing? How could Dylan's parents have let this happen to her? How could any of these children's parents let such things happen?

Weary maiden with just the first blushes of womanhood. Animals slavering after her, hungering for fear and blood. Still whispering in the darkness, "I do believe in fairies. I do, I do. I do believe in fairies." Fist in her mouth to muffle her screams at night when she woke and remembered her twin brother was gone. Westenra had watched her on the security cameras when she was in Isolation to study her, to find out how to break her spirit once and for all. Found it in two teenage boys willing to rip an innocent girl to pieces.

It hadn't just been coincidence, Nuada realized with sudden shocking hatred. Wasn't just fun and games. Oh, it had been fun, they'd wanted Dylan just as they'd wanted the other three children trapped in that basement, but he'd told them to focus on her. Told them to use whatever it took and if she died they would figure out a way to hide it. But they'd gotten a taste for her because she'd fought those little bastards like a hellcat and they wanted to break her spirit just as much as Westenra did. Monsters.

Who are they? The feral-eyed Elven warrior roared in the human's skull. In the real world, blood began trickling from the psychiatrist's nose. Delicate blood vessels in his fragile human brain ruptured under the force of Nuada's rage. What are their names?

Help me, Westenra cried silently as the blood in his lungs began to asphyxiate him for the very last time. The images, the memories, slammed into Nuada in a slicing whirlwind as the human began to struggle for air. Children, so many children, beaten and abused and brutalized and left in the dark and tortured and tears, so many tears, and sobs, despair, screams and pleading to go home they wanted their parents when could they go home? But what had infuriated Westenra was that Dylan didn't ask because she'd known she was not welcome in her own home, never pleaded to go home, never asked for her parents because she didn't want them, she just wanted her brother and there was nothing John could do. Help me, Westenra begged as his chest convulsed and he struggled for air. Please!

Tell me their names! There was too much in his way to just rip the names out of his mind. He could scarcely stomach the thoughts swirling around him, crashing against him like blows as Nuada fought to force Westenra to give him the information. Tell me! But the human's mind was already fading. The chaos of his thoughts and memories was already slowing. The spark of life flickered. Westenra gagged. No! Nuada roared, slamming through the mind's dwindling presence. Tell me! Tell me their names!

Two images floated to the surface of Westenra's mind. Nuada nearly choked at what he saw. Tell me now! Tell me! What are their names? I have to know! Tell me who they are!

But in the end, the Elf prince had to wrench out of the human's mind before death took a firm hold on him as well. Panting for breath, Nuada swore viciously at the carcass on the desk. Swore, and tried to shake away the sick sense that part of the human's psyche was still deeply entrenched in the Elven warrior's mind. He drew a breath and tasted death on the back of his tongue. Tasted shame coating his mouth, that he hadn't thought to probe the human's mind sooner.

The last images hadn't been what he wanted. Not even close. Knowing he was dying, the human filth had deliberately shown him something that would strike at Nuada's very heart.

One was a memory of Dylan slumped against the narrow bed in her room in the institution. A homemade blade of some sort slick with her blood lay in her limp grasp. More blood gushed from the ragged wound at the bend of her too-pale arm. Her head was tilted back on the mattress. Crimson smeared her death-white skin. Scarlet soaked the white t-shirt with a blond fairy in a green dress and her raggedy blue jeans. Her chest barely rose and fell with each breath. In the memory, when she'd tried to sit up straight, instead her strength had given out and she slumped over and landed in a sprawl in the widening pool of her own blood. Those lovely fey-like eyes were glassy.

And the other... he couldn't think about the other image just now.

Instead, Nuada spat on Westenra's corpse. Then he put the spider back in the box. Lastly, he picked up Dylan's file. He had a choice - take it with him, or leave it. If he took it with him, it would implicate Dylan in any investigation regarding the human's death. So Nuada put the manila folder back in the filing cabinet behind the mortal's desk. Then he turned and, putting his glove back on, walked out of the office.

He ran into a bit of trouble with the security guard on the way out. Unfortunately the fat human managed to shock him with one of those gun-like weapons that could fell even a troll if the fang-like prongs found the right spot. His promise to Dylan meant he could not kill or even truly hurt the mortal. Instead, he thwacked the guard where the jawbone met the skull with the butt of his lance, just as Nuada had done once upon a time to Dylan's brother. The guard dropped like a stone.

Crown Prince Nuada Silverlance strode out into the night.

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She checked on the children again out of nerves. She was so tired - it was five-thirty in the morning - but she couldn't sleep. Not until Nuada came home. So tired, though. Could barely think straight. But she had to check on the kids.

Peeking inside the den, Dylan saw 'Sa'ti and Bat purring together on the sofa. The black cat rumbled appreciatively as the little girl's arm tightened fractionally around his furry bulk in her sleep. 'Sa'ti was purring as well. A'du'la'di had managed to somehow fall off the futon without waking up. Now he shivered on the floor. Dylan's eyes stung when she saw that the boy clutched the Wonderful Wizard of Ha's with the same fervor that his little sister held her stuffed mountain lion. Tsu's'di was sprawled across more than his share of the fold-out bed, but there was enough space for Dylan to pick up the chilled little boy and deposit him back on the bed again. She tucked the blankets around him and smoothed back his hair. He didn't release his hold on the book. But when Dylan leaned down to kiss his forehead one more time, he stirred a little and mumbled, "Mama."

A lump came into her throat and she had to hurry from the room as tears pricked. Mama. No, no, no. He hadn't been talking to her. He'd probably been dreaming about his parents, the poor thing. He had not been talking to her. He hadn't even been awake. She was being silly. She was being absolutely ridiculous.

But... but... Mama.

There was only outlet for this kind of emotional overload (which, Dylan reminded herself a bit tartly, was only happening because she was so blinking tired). Dylan went to the back room of the cottage where she kept her piano. Shutting the door behind her - she didn't want to wake the children - she sank down onto the piano bench with a sigh and pushed back the wooden covering on the keys. Tentative fingertips brushed ivory keys. Was she going to practice? Or just play?

Just play, she thought, as she pressed high C and a clear note like chiming crystal shimmered on the air. Playing the piano wasn't hard (unless you were absolutely tone-deaf both musically and vocally, which she was not). The hard part was playing music someone else had written. If you didn't care about recording a composition or recreating it, playing the piano was easy. All you had to do was press the keys and let your emotion or whimsy guide where the song went. Which was what Dylan did now.

She mostly stuck to minor chords and high notes. The music they made had a melancholy, almost lonely feel to it that she generally preferred over regular notes. After a few minutes letting the notes have their way with her, though, she found her fingers going through the music for "Help My Unbelief." Out of all the songs she loved (and there were many), she could only play a handful of lullabies and perhaps two dozen hymns. Out of those, she had only memorized four or five, and only the melody lines, not the entire song. Playing more than one note at a time - unless she was merely goofing off and didn't need to keep to a particular rhythm - was completely beyond her. Now, though, as her fingers coaxed the melody, the words went through her mind. Playing the song much slower than it was written, she sang along.

"I feel I'm walking in the rain,
dripping with the weight of heavy days.
Empty spaces fill the places You once used to be.
It feels dead inside where Heaven used to be.

"There are times I feel You in the mountains.
There are times I see You in the fiery sky.
But tonight,
I just need to know You're by my side;
that somewhere out there in the starry sky.
I need to know that I'm within Your reach.
Help Thou my unbelief."

Becan listened to his mistress sing. Her voice was pretty enough when she could keep in tune (which was, he had to admit, rarely; only if she were singing along to a tune could she manage it). Yet the way she sang, true emotion in every word, made the brownie sigh a little. He did not follow the Star Kindler exactly. Oh, he didn't doubt the existence of the gods, or the Highest of all gods. But it seemed as if his mistress's life was very hard considering she claimed her divine Master was looking out for her. Becan wasn't quite sure what to think about all of that. It wasn't really his place to question Lady Dylan, but he had questions. Plenty of them. But they could wait until a more quiet moment in his lady's life.

Brownie magic alerted Becan to the presence beyond the front door before the quiet knock reached sharp fae ears. He scrambled for the door and opened it to the prince. Sloe black eyes looked up into eyes of molten gold that seemed to burn with savage intensity. The prince was unusually pale, his skin bone-white against the blackness of his clothing. Becan stumbled back a little. "I... Your Highness..."

"Where is she?" Nuada demanded in a voice that seemed oddly brittle. "Where..."

"I feel like I'm drifting in a starless night.
I'm barely holding on to the light.
I close my eyes. I try to find Thee.

"Anchor me. Make me strong somehow.
When I start to leave the path, hold onto me.
I wanna be done drifting. Anchor me."

The music was very faint, but Nuada could hear it. He walked past Becan towards Dylan's room. The music sounded as if it was coming from Dylan's bedroom. But she wasn't in her room. Not even in the shower. The Elf prince sighed and sank down onto the enormous bed. He wanted to talk to her. Not even talk. Just see her. Couldn't. She was in that room she'd asked him not to go into. So Nuada drew off his overtunic, which was speckled in places with dried blood, and tossed it into the dirty clothes hamper near the door to Dylan's closet. He put his weapons aside. Then he simply sat for a long moment, staring at nothing.

He felt hollowed out and cold. So cold. Not the cold of the body. He did not care about the fact that Westenra was dead, except that it meant Dylan was safe from him now. The blood that had stained his hands - until he'd washed it away in the pristine white snow outside Dylan's garden gate - did not bother him. It was not remorse or regret that plagued him. It was... uncertainty. Doubt. Would she do as she'd said and welcome him now that he had gone out into the night and killed a man?

And it was a sense of... of being soiled by his contact with Westenra, with his filthy mind and, by proxy, the obscene appetites he'd catered to and felt himself. He'd had to walk through the man's mind and memories, though the prince had kept the contact as brief as possible to combat the rising urge to be violently sick. And then Nuada had been forced to sully himself again with that depraved mind when he'd thought the names of Dylan's other attackers were to be discovered.

Now he desperately wanted to bathe; wanted to scrub himself clean with scalding hot water and the harshest soap he could find if he could. But he knew it would not help and he didn't want that as much as he wanted to see Dylan.

Should I go to her? Nuada wondered suddenly. I... cannot explain this need to see her. I only know that I wish it. Should I go to her?

"Like a ship that's worn with sails so torn drifting out to sea,
The wind is blowing in and you're tossed again
Is it time to leave behind the ship and walk to Him?"

Well. If that was not a provedential answer, he didn't know what was. The Elf prince rose to his feet and left the bedroom. On the way to this mysterious room (why had he never gone in? Simply because Dylan had asked him not to?) he stopped to look in on the children. 'Sa'ti was in her customary sandwich position, squished between Bat and Neytiri. A'du cluthed a small picture book to his chest. Tsu's'di snored, one arm thrown across his face. Nuada carefully closed the den door and moved on to the room at the end of the short hall.

The door was cracked. Nuada pushed it open. Seated at a piano of gleaming mahogany, Dylan slowly made her way through a sheet of music. Every few moments she would glance between the music and the piano keys. Clearly she didn't know all the words to the song, or perhaps all the notes. As he watched, she sighed and stopped playing. The sheet of music went to a pile on the bench beside her. Another sheet found its way in front of her. After a few false starts, her fingers found the rhythm and she began to play again. After a minute, she began to sing.

"He knows it's hard to hold to His light sometimes.
The world is so far from the right,
so just close yours eye.
He'll help you shine.

"Light Keeper, be strong.
Light Keeper, hold on through night.
When all the world is telling you
it's not worth the fight,
hold onto your light.
Hold it tight, Light Keeper."

Nuada leaned against the doorframe. Was she singing this because she liked it, or because she knew he was there? Because she knew it held a message that shored up his failing strength? Be strong. Hold on. He seated himself on the floor, back resting against the doorframe, and closed his eyes again, and listened as Dylan sang words that seemed to encompass him and many of the sentiments and feelings that often plagued him. As the music continued his brutal exhaustion slowly began to ease. The coldness began to thaw a little.

"You might feel left behind when others leave the light.
But oh, how the Father loves you.
He'll never leave your side.
He'll help you shine.

"Light Keeper, be strong.
Light Keeper, hold on through night.
When all the world is telling you
it's not worth the fight,
hold onto your light.
Hold it tight, Light Keeper."

The silence in the wake of the song jerked him from whatever tired, far away place he'd allowed himself to drift off to. Exhausted firegold eyes opened to meet a gaze of worried, starlit blue. Nuada slowly got his feet. Dylan stood as well, but didn't make another move. She merely watched him. Was she angry that he'd come into the room? Disgusted with what he'd done that night to her tormentor? Was she afraid of him now that she had tangible proof he was capable of bloodshed?

"Nuada," Dylan murmured. Her voice was impossibly gentle. "Are you all right?"

No idle question, this. Not the standard "are you okay?" that humans often employed when they did not truly wish to know the answer. Something about him had her concerned. Had her questioning him. Perhaps he looked the way he felt - exhausted. Hollow. Uncertain in a way he hadn't felt since he was a boy.

He opened his mouth to answer her and found himself whispering, "Dylan. I... may I... hold you for a moment?"

He could tell she was surprised, but she didn't hesitate to go to him, to slide her arms around his waist and rest her forehead against his shoulder. She didn't stop him from wrapping his arms around her. Pulling her tightly against him. It should not have surprised him when she reached up and guided his head to her shoulder. He buried his face in the crook of her neck, surrounded by the dark wealth of her hair.

Nuada realized he should have known the comfort she would offer would hold nothing back. The Elven warrior tightened his grip a fraction and the words spilled out of him like blood from a wound. The sick, sick rage churning in his belly and the sour taste on his tongue and the insidious feeling that he'd somehow been infected with Westenra's evil and no matter what he did, it would never go away.

Nuada didn't know why he was telling her all of it. Did not know why he told her any of it. Only that the scent of her blocked out the stench of blood and death, and there had never been anything so soothing as the way she stroked his hair and murmured soothingly, "Mo airgeadach, my silver one."

This was pathetic. He'd killed men before. Killed humans. He'd gone to war against them countless times. Why did this affect him so? Had he become a coward in the years since his father had struck the truce with the children of men? A weakling to be felled by the sight of a little blood? But it hadn't been the blood or the killing that had hit him like a blow to the belly. It had been walking out of that office, out of the building, and realizing even as he set foot in Central Park that he still felt... filthy. Poisoned by that sickening mortal and his cruelty. He shuddered at the thought of never feeling clean again.

"It will fade," Dylan assured him in a voice as soft as a sigh. "Don't worry. It will fade. I know how it feels, that sullied feeling like the monster is inside you, poisoning you. I know. It will fade, Nuada. I promise." She turned her head just a little to whisper in his ear, "I'm here for you. I'm here. This will pass."

Her lips brushed against his ear as she spoke and a sudden spike of hot lust stabbed him. Westenra's memories, Westenra's thoughts and sick fantasies, swamped him. Oh, the human had never touched one of the children abandoned into his care, at least not in that way because he didn't lust after children. Monster he was, but not that sort of monster. No, instead he wanted the girls - those maidens on the edge of adulthood, physically women but emotionally still young and vulnerable in so many ways. He'd wanted girls in their late teens. He'd wanted Dylan, and others. But by then she wouldn't allow anyone to touch her, much less use her that way. The few times Westenra had tried, she'd shredded him with her ragged nails and her teeth, battered him with flailing limbs while she screamed like a banshee. She'd learned the importance of screaming by then. But that hadn't stopped the filthy human from yearning for the girls out of his reach.

Hunger burned in Nuada's belly, mingling with revulsion at the images still imbedded in his psyche from touching Westenra's mind. Gods, he wanted her suddenly. Fiercely. It was a vicious, almost ravenous need. He had to have her. Now. Right now. Consequences be damned. She couldn't fight him. Elven strength versus human, a warrior's strength against her mortal woman's frailty? It would take seconds for him to have her pinned against the wall and before she could scream he could-

No! Nuada wrenched away and stumbled back from her. No, gods, no, please. Not his thoughts. Not his thoughts, stars curse it. Not. His. He drew a ragged breath and shoved at the savage lust, the memories, and everything else but the shield of his honor. Only when he could draw a full breath did he open his eyes and look at her.

No condemnation. No anger or fear. A flicker of hurt, perhaps, but that was all. "I know," she said gently. "I know. I've helped other friends with psychic overload before, so I do know. But he's not you, Nuada. Part of him might be in your head, but he is not you. Stand apart from him. You would never hurt me. Don't let him make you believe otherwise. You would never hurt me."

"I want to," he whispered, disgusted with himself. This. This was why he so rarely touched mortal minds. Their festering evil contaminated everything it touched. Nuada shuddered and confessed, "Part of me is driven by what was in... in him. Part of me wants to hurt you. Wants to see your fear, your pain. I want to..."

"But you won't," Dylan replied firmly. "You would never do anything I didn't want you to. You're not that kind of man. Come here." He closed his eyes and shook his head. "Nuada, get your butt over here before I drag it over here," she added, and the tartness in her voice made him smile almost against his will.

He went to her slowly, hesitantly. She did not hesitate to wrap her arms around him again and hold him. "It's okay. It will be okay. You had to walk through his mind, didn't you?" The Elven warrior flinched in her arms. She made soothing sounds and stroked his hair some more. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have asked you to do this. I'm sorry. It will be all right, though. I promise."

"I feel... I feel so..." Unclean. He couldn't even get the word out. It was almost too much, touching her this way when the nauseating evil still hissed inside his skull and tried to urge him on to do vicious things. It had been so long since he'd touched a human mind so intimately, other than hers. He hadn't been prepared. "Dylan, I..."

Help me. He would never ask it of her, never. His pride would never allow it. But part of him also knew that he didn't need to ask. She was inside him, part of him, and she knew him just as well as he knew himself. She knew what he needed before he even had to ask for it.

"It will be all right," Dylan murmured. Her breath was a warm caress against his skin, soothing and soft. "I'm here. We're together; we're okay." Her fingers running lightly through his hair lulled him. "Trust me, Nuada. Trust me. It will be all right." Gentle touches. Petting caresses against his face that melted away some of the savagery, some of the sickening rage and the hatred burning in him. "I'm here now. I'm here."

Do not leave me. The words seemed to shimmer between them, through them. Though neither Elf nor mortal quite recognized the presence of the sentiment, both responded to it - Dylan by tightening her hold on him, attempting to act as a buffer between the prince and the darkness; Nuada by allowing himself, for one of those rare moments, to draw strength from the woman in his arms.

After several long moments of simply standing with her in the candlelit dimness, Nuada was calm enough to realize she was trembling. Not shivering with cold, though the room was cool, but actually trembling. Not in fear. Something else.

"Dylan?" He lifted his head from her shoulder to look down at her. Blue eyes lit with moonglow made his heart stutter. The candlelight mellowed out the slashing scars that usually ran in pale pink, silver and white lines across her face. It danced along the hollows at her throat and beneath her jaw. It burnished her dark hair and gilded those fragile cheekbones with dancing amber light. And in that moment she had never looked more beautiful to him.

"Nuada, I have to tell you something," she whispered. He stiffened. "It's nothing bad," she added quickly. "At least... I don't think it's bad." She reached up and framed his face between her hands. A tremor went through him at her touch. "Nuada. You're so... you're perfect, you know that?" Dylan smiled when the ghost of the Elf prince's satisfied smirk flitted across those dark lips. Oh, he knew, all right. "I just... maybe I made a mistake with this but I have to tell you... and maybe this isn't the best time... but I've been so worried about you. All night I've just been thinking about what I'd do if you got hurt-"

"Oh, yes," Nuada interrupted, giving her an unfathomable look. "About that." He held up one arm and rolled back his sleeve. Dylan's mouth fell open as she saw the tiny pair of pricking wounds surrounded by faintly irritated skin. "Because you asked me not to harm the security guards, I found myself at a slight disadvantage when one of them woke on my way out."

"That's a... they Tased you?" She grabbed his arm and lightly brushed her fingers over the wound. Gone was the somewhat flustered woman. Now she was a healer. Dylan sighed. "I can't believe this. You managed to get hit with a Taser prong." Surprisingly, though, she offered him a sympathetic smile. She briefly kissed the injured spot. Her lips were warm and soft. "Poor Nuada. I know from experience that had to hurt."

He scowled, and it was so like his normal expression that relief swept through the mortal woman in an almost staggering wave. "I am used to pain."

Dylan sighed again, though an exasperated smile touched her lips. "Anyway... it seems we're at an impasse now."

One knife-thin brow rose. "Oh?"

"Yeah, see... I can't break my word to any of the fae. That's a capital offense. And I did tell you that if you got hurt, I was going to punish you. Severely." As if in contradiction to the concept of punishment, she slid her arms around his neck and stepped closer to him. His hands automatically settled at her hips. "What do we do about that, then?"

"Dylan..." The Elf prince studied her face. There was trepidation there, nervousness... but was that a little excitement as well? Just a little? No, he was being foolish. She'd meant the threat in jest. He could not honorably force her to bestow a kiss on him simply because he'd been a little too slow in avoiding an attack. And with that revolting human's fantasies still swimming through him like poisonous lamprey... "Mo duinne, you do not have to do this. I release you from that promise."

"What if... what if I don't want to be released from it?"

He went utterly still. For a moment the echoes of Westenra's consciousness went silent in the face of his shock. Words, Dylan's words from the past month, flitted through his mind like silk butterflies. Do with me what you will. You're hot. Take what you need.

And he suddenly remembered what he'd been trying to recall about the night of the argument, the night he'd left. Do you want to talk about what happened before? She hadn't been upset about what had almost happened at the playground. And when he'd said no, no he didn't want to talk about it, she'd asked, Do you want me... do you want me to stop this? Stop touching him, stop stroking and petting and letting her fingertips ghost over his scars. Do you want me? Not what she'd meant to ask but in that first moment before she'd finished her question he'd been so sure that had been what she was asking and he'd wanted to say yes. Even knowing it was pointless, futile, impossible... he'd wanted to say yes, to ask her to be his. But there had been nothing in the question to indicate she didn't want to touch him, didn't want him to touch her, didn't want to... to...

Could she want him? Was it possible? After all that she had suffered, after all the nightmares and atrocities, could it truly be that she desired him? Desire and the fiercely loyal love she professed, that he wanted to believe but struggled to find faith in. Could it be?

She was trembling anew in his arms. He cupped her cheek and nearly came undone when she turned her face into his palm and sighed. Softly, so softly he scarcely could hear her over the thundering of his heart, she whispered, "I have to tell you something. Something important."

"Tell me."

Skirting so close to the argument from that night, so close now. Hadn't it begun like this? Dylan saying she had to talk to him, tell him something. He thinking it could be nothing as bad as she seemed to think and urging her to tell it to him. But she'd promised never to blindside him that way again. He had promised never to abandon her again. What could she possibly have to tell him?

"Please don't be angry, but... I..." Dylan swallowed hard. She hadn't actually made the decision to tell him. She only knew that she had to. She couldn't keep it a secret any longer. Couldn't keep letting it beat at her with everything else going on between and around them. It was also dangerous to go into the political situation at Findias with this remaining a secret between them. "I, um..." If only Dylan could get it out without sounding like a teenage girl asking out her first boy.

"I won't be angry," the prince murmured. He did not currently possess the energy to be angry, for one thing. "Tell me, mo duinne."

She shoved at her hair in a familiar, nervous gesture. "Okay." She blew out a shaky breath. "Okay. Um, the thing is, I think I... I'm fairly certain that I..." When Dylan looked up at him, her expression was soft in a way that was by now as familiar to him as the wealth of affection in her gaze. Soft and sad and almost pleading with him... for what? "Nuada, I think... I think I'm in love with you."

Nuada jolted and stared down at her. His heart knifed sideways in his chest. No. No, that was impossible. It could not be. And yet... "You think you're in love with me?" The words were out before he could stop them.

Dylan blew out a pent-up breath. "No. I... I know I'm in love with you. I've... I'm sorry, I know this probably is not what you needed to hear right now, but I love you. I've never felt this way about anyone. You're the most amazing man I've ever met. You make me feel so safe and I can trust you and you're so gentle and kind and I'm sorry, Nuada, I'm so sorry, I know it's dangerous and you're probably completely disgusted but I love you so much and I had to tell you."

She loved him. She loved him. She loved him as he loved her. Dylan, he thought, oh, mo duinne, a ghrá mo chroí, I love you, as well. Joy smote Nuada's heart, and he knew then he would never recover from the wound. Some of the darkness inside him faded away under the bittersweet pain of that confession. For a long moment all the prince could do was gaze into that beloved face so full of uncertainty. He couldn't tell her the truth, stars curse it. Could not tell her of the power she had over him or the way his heart yearned for her. She was right, after all - it was dangerous. Dangerous enough that she loved him, but it would have been even more dangerous if she knew of the smoldering emotion in his chest that always burned for her. And it would have been torture enough for them both without his complicating things with his own confession. Not when there was no hope for anything real between them.

"I am not disgusted," Nuada said only. "I am... my heart is too full for words. You love me. For how long?"

"I don't know," she said. My heart is too full for words. Something warm and soft fizzed in her stomach. "I figured it out that night we were talking about getting married if your father ordered it. But ever since I left your sanctuary, I'd never stopped thinking about you and missing you. Then you came back and I was so happy to see you. I just... I don't know when it happened. I'm sorry, Nuada."

"Do not be sorry, Dylan. But I... you know that I cannot..."

The regret and apology in his voice would've been obvious if she'd been deaf. Dylan smiled sadly. "I know, Nuada. I know. I don't expect anything from you. I just want you to be happy and safe. That's all." She sighed a little. "I've never expected the fairy tale, you know - meeting the prince, falling in love, getting married and becoming a princess. I never even expected to meet anyone like you, not ever. It's all right. Being considered your friend is more than I could've ever hoped for, so... you don't have to feel the same way. I know better."

Nuada wanted to laugh at that, though it would have been bitter and wistful. She knew better, did she? Silly girl. He skimmed his knuckles down the thick scar on her cheek, over the delicate line of her jaw. Her eyes drifted closed and she drew a shaky breath. Now it all made sense - the way she reacted to him, the devotion, the loyalty in her heart. It seemed Fortune was intent on playing him for a fool. How had this happened? It was almost laughable. It had been ridiculous enough when he'd thought his love one-sided. To know that they loved each other, even if Dylan did not know it... it would have almost been funny, it if hadn't hurt so cursed much. Better to think his love unrequited. So much harder to think that if he gave up everything else, he could be with her and she would have him.

That thought was too much for his control. They could never be together, not truly. Never love as others loved, be as others were allowed to be. All that was available to them was this flimsy charade and the forlorn hope that the king would force them to wed. That would have to be enough, yet never could truly be so. All this circled through Nuada's mind as he made a reckless, perhaps imbecilic decision that he was certain held the power to break him.

He slid his hand around to cradle the back of her head, his fingers tangling in her soft dark hair. Those impossibly lovely eyes roved over his face as he struggled to keep his breathing even. Nuada felt his eyes shift to the gold-kissed ivory of desire. Dylan's breath caught in her throat. She swallowed hard and her tongue darted out to nervously glide over her bottom lip. His desire sharpened. She loved him. This was all right, had to be all right, because she loved him and he loved her and needed her in this moment, needed the cleansing balm of what she felt for him to soothe away the last of the shadows.

"Dylan," he whispered. She was so close. So warm against him, so soft. Everything he wanted. Needed. He didn't want to think of bloodshed and torture and death anymore. Did not want to see the obscene images he'd been forced to pick through in Westenra's brain. All the Elven warrior wanted was to lay his mouth against hers and lose himself in kissing her for just a moment. "Mo duinne. I need... please, Dylan, I need..."

She touched his cheek, tracing the royal scar. Sweet, sweet touch. In a voice of whispered surrender, she said, "Tóg an méid is gá duit."

Take what you need.

Before he could even think of all the reasons why he should not - which he had tossed aside days ago, anyway - Nuada bent his head and captured Dylan's mouth with his. She gasped. Sighed against his mouth. The sweetness of chocolate and strawberries, a ghost of taste on her lips, had him groaning softly. Her hands curled in his shirt, tugging him a bit closer. She stood up on tiptoe to more firmly press her mouth to his. He could taste his own racing pulse under his tongue. He tried to be gentle, tried to be careful of her memories and what remained of her innocence, but the events of the night were still riding him hard and he needed this, needed to drown out the shadows with the sweetness of her, the love he could feel through this kiss.

Nuada groaned against Dylan's mouth as she made a soft, kitten sound that shivered over him like a touch. He tangled both hands in the silken strands of her hair because he had to hold onto something and why not the wealth of dark curls he loved to touch? The heat of Dylan's body through the thin shirt scorched him. He growled into the kiss and she shivered. Had to keep it chaste, though, had to keep it close-mouthed and undemanding or he would frighten her but by the Fates he wanted her. This. Wanted, needed, craved.

Dylan gasped when Nuada's teeth nipped at her bottom lip. Golden heat simmered in her blood as his mouth moved over hers, strong but so very generous, gently and patiently coaxing her response. His fingers slipped from her hair to touch her shoulders. The touch was light and caressing, even through her shirt. Nuada's hands slid down her shoulders, down the smooth plain of her back to her hips. She could feel his hands trembling even through her thin top. Could feel his heart pounding so hard against her body. That wild, feral scent that always clung to him wove around her like an ephemeral spell. Whatever uneasiness had been haunting her all night faded away in the wash of sensation - the warmth of his body, the reassuring strength of him against her, the absolute gentleness of his mouth on hers despite the obvious desire in him.

He was kissing her. He was kissing her. Oh my. Oh my goodness. Oh my gosh. She'd thought about what it would be like to kiss Nuada. Dreamed about it. Been so sure she would never get to experience it for real. Only now he held her to him and kissed her like he meant it, as if he cared for her. Kissed her almost as if he loved her. As if she were precious, cherished, treasured. Everything about the kiss felt familiar and so very right. Everything about him felt right. She was going to break her heart this way, shatter it to jagged pieces, but she didn't care as long as she could be with him for a while, just a little while. This is so impossible, this will never work, but if it's a dream don't let it be over, please, please.

"Dylan, I'm sorry," Nuada whispered against her lips. She shivered at the yearning in his voice. Shivered at the pleading note she heard beneath the words. "I'm sorry, I know better than this, we should not be doing this, I did not mean to-"

"Kiss me, Nuada... please," she said, tightening her grip on his shirt. She didn't want that warm embrace to end. Wanted him to keep holding her as if he truly cared about her. It was just a game of pretend but for once she didn't let that detail matter at all. "I want this. If you don't want it then okay, we'll pretend it never happened. But if not, then for now just forget about what we should or shouldn't do. If this is what you want, then please don't stop. I want this. You."

"You don't know what you're asking." She was asking, Nuada thought, for his absolute and complete surrender in a way he had never given it before. She was asking for him to give her his heart for a little space, though he knew full well it would shatter when he had to take it back. And she would suffer the same fate.

"Yes, I do. I'm a grown woman, Nuada. I know this can't go anywhere and for you it's just physical but-"

"But you are dear to me," the Elf prince finished softly. "And I do not wish to hurt you."

Dear to me. Stunned, she tried to find something to say. Anything. But there was nothing except the sudden strange pain inside her, so sweet and sharp as a knife. There was nothing except that pain and the sorrow she'd carried since realizing how much she loved him. But... dear to him. But not dear enough to love the way she loved him. Too mortal, too human, too so many things that he found so objectionable. I do not wish to hurt you. Oh, too late. Far too late. And yet... dear to me. She could be satisfied with that. If that was all she could hope for, she could still accept it.

But all Dylan said was, "You won't hurt me." The corner of her mouth quirked in a crooked sort of smile. "I'm resilient, remember?" Still he hesitated. Dylan could feel the warmth and the tenderness of when he'd kissed her fading away from them. She didn't want to let that go. She'd never felt that before, not with anyone. Not ever. Only with him. And maybe she would never feel it with anyone else but she didn't want to lose it now. So Dylan whispered, "Nuada... don't you want this? Even just a little bit?"

His eyes burned into her. Did she know what she was asking? Did she have any idea? Did he want this, what a question. He didn't simply want her. He ached for her in a way he had never known before. It wasn't simply physical, either. Not even mostly physical. Dylan filled an emptiness inside him he hadn't even known existed until the first moment when she'd whispered, I consider you my best friend. She met his need for something he still did not quite understand. She offered Nuada so much that he had always wanted but could never hope to attain - a home, a family, a love that was unyielding as the iron in her blood and as bright as the starlight in her eyes. He wanted this more than he'd ever wanted anything.

But he could not have it. Not ever.

Before the Elven warrior could say anything to that effect, however, Dylan stood up on tiptoe again and pressed her lips against his. This kiss, unlike the one he'd initiated, was tentative. Slow. Very careful. If he moved even an inch, Nuada was positive she'd step back and never kiss him like this ever again. Which meant he should move. Should stop her now before he surrendered to the silken seduction of her lips caressing his. Except he couldn't even move. That feather-light whisper of movement against his mouth kept him rooted to the spot. It tasted of sadness and wishes. Of abandoned hope and pleading. It was innocent, only a girl's kiss, but it stripped away everything until he was barely holding onto his control.

His eyes drifted closed and he gave himself up to the feel of Dylan kissing him. Her hands had been tightly fisted in his shirt, as if she thought he would try to escape, but now they smoothed across his chest and slid up to his shoulders. His own hands against her body were light as a sigh but held all the weight of the choice he was making as he gently pulled her closer. Then she whispered against his mouth, "What do you want, Nuada?"

Their eyes locked for a moment. Then, in answer, he shifted so that she was caught between the stone wall and his body. He shoved the door to the music room closed before capturing her mouth again with all the heat he'd been trying to suppress for so long. By sheer force of will he kept the kiss chaste, close-mouthed, but it was a struggle. Dylan's arms went around his neck and his hands slowly ghosted up along her ribbed cotton shirt and the length of her slender back for just a moment before settling again at her hips. Nuada wanted to get the feel of her, wanted to memorize the way Dylan felt in his arms, held between his hands. Wanted always to remember this moment and how it felt to touch her, even so innocently, because he was almost certain he would never have this chance again.

Dylan tasted of summer strawberries and honey. The taste of her brought back whispers of memory, but nothing brutal or vicious. Sweet memory, memories of a dream where he'd kissed her and held her in the waters of a warm spring and felt every soft curve of her body pressed against him. A shared dream? He did not know. Right now, he didn't care.

"Nuada," Dylan sighed into the kiss. He wanted to hear his name on her lips like that again. Hunger took root in his belly and he let the very tips of his fingers slip beneath the hem of her dark shirt. His fingertips grazed the incredibly soft, sensitive skin just above the top of her jeans, over her hips. Touched the silky scars at her stomach. His touch was just light enough to tantalize. Her breath caught in her throat. Having her so close, tasting her, touching her, was intoxicating. He lightly caressed her skin again and she gasped, "Nuada."

"I want you," he whispered, his voice nearly a groan. His mouth trailed kisses over her jaw and down to her vulnerable throat. His lips brushed over the fluttering pulse. She made a sound that was almost a whimper. "By the Fates, Dylan, I want you." Need you, love you, can never have...

But he knew suddenly that if he asked it of her, she would give herself to him. Completely. If he asked her or commanded her to let him have her, she would do it. Not out of lust or longing, but because her loyalty, her love, and her oaths to him ensured it. It was such a temptation to whisper a suggestion - not even ask, just simply murmur oh so softly in her ear that perhaps this was best finished in her room, where he could purge the shadows in his mind by losing himself in the haven of her embrace, her body - but no, no. That would've been a hideous betrayal of her trust. Shamed scraped at him, that he'd even thought of it. Besides, such intimacy could never be between them. Kisses, perhaps, but nothing more.

"Tell me to stop," Nuada murmured, and found her mouth again. Delicious shivers raced up and down Dylan's spine at the huskiness of his voice. Her fingers tangled in his hair. There was no question about whether she wanted this or not. No question that she wanted him. "Tell me," he insisted against her lips. "Tell me to stop or leave or something, tell me you do not want this." It was the only way to possibly save them both from more heartache, more grief. As if this moment wouldn't haunt his dreams for a very long time.

"Nuada," she whispered. "Nuada, I trust you." He wouldn't let this go beyond what was appropriate, what was safe. He had enough control - more control than she did, with her lack of experience and the way his slightest touch could make her head swim - to keep things chaste. So far every kiss had been completely close-mouthed. She trusted him. She knew he wouldn't let things get out of hand. "It's okay, I trust you."

"Do not say that," he pleaded. He kissed just under her jaw and she sighed. His lips found her racing pulse and she shivered. His hair slid against her skin like silk. He nuzzled her throat because he couldn't help himself. He just wanted... just wanted her to be his. Truly his. Why could he not have that? "You should not trust me. Not with this."

"I do, though," she said. Her voice was more than a little breathless. "You wouldn't hurt me. Not in any way. I know you. It's okay."

"Dylan." Her name was a desperate plea against her throat. Then his teeth scraped ever so lightly against the delicate skin over her pulse and she cried out. There was no pleasure in that sound. Her hands slid around to shove hard at the solid wall of his chest.

"No," she said. "Don't do that." Her heart raced like a frightened rabbit's. "Don't, please don't."

Nuada jerked back. "Forgive me," he said quickly, brushing back her hair. Where there had been slumberous desire in her before, now there was only panic. Old fear that raked at his belly. "I did not mean to take it so far. Forgive me, Dylan."

"It's okay," she mumbled, though she briefly covered her face with both hands in her familiar calming gesture. Her hands shook and her breathing came in ragged, frightened gasps. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to freak out. I'm sorry. We shouldn't... we shouldn't have let it go so far. I just... I'm sorry, I... I'm sorry." Dylan drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I just have this thing about neck biting. Sorry. I know guys like it but I just... I can't. I'm sorry. And I'm sorry for... for crawling all over you like that. I don't know what I was thinking. Jeez. I'm so stupid. I shouldn't have let this happen. Law of Chastity, Dylan, jeez. Stupid, stupid. Nuada, I'm so sorry."

"Dylan," the Elf prince murmured reprovingly. "Dylan. You need not apologize. I can't say that I did not enjoy this," he added, his voice warm. Her smile was wry, but it was there. The rolling of her eyes made him feel even better. He hadn't frightened her too badly, then. "As for your fear, I should have been more careful. I knew about... about this." Nuada very gently touched his fingertips to the bite-scar at the base of the back of her neck. Even though he was gentle, she flinched almost imperceptibly. "I am sorry, for that. And I am sorry for... taking advantage of your feelings, even though I knew your faith probably prohibited such things."

She bit her lip, unsure if she actually wanted to ask this question, but finally said, "Why did you? 'Take advantage,' as you put it. Which, by the way, is silly. I'm just as much at fault as you are."

Nuada smiled and tucked that one rebellious curl behind her ear. "Why? Because you are a very beautiful woman, one I care for very much. As I said, you are very dear to me. And so beautiful. Because I was tired and... unsettled, I let my desire get away from me. I can only ask your forgiveness, my lady."

"It's fine." Very dear to me. He had to stop saying that, or he was going to give her heart palpitations. There was such sadness in the words. In his voice. Such sorrow. Why? Because he hated that he cared for a human at all? Or some other reason? "I'm okay," she added. "We just have to... just have to keep things a little less... um..."

"Heated," he said in that velvet voice that always made her shiver.

"Um... yeah. Thanks for keeping your tongue in your mouth, by the way," she added, then could've kicked herself. As if that didn't make her sound like a complete and total moron with absolutely no kissing experience. How was it that this prince could reduce her to a flustered teenage girl with such ease?

"You're welcome," he said, and drew her back against him because she was blushing so sweetly that he couldn't resist. "Though I admit, a more intimate kiss was a temptation." She blushed hotter. Some of the tension between them eased a little.

"So what does this mean for us, exactly?"

He smiled a little, though there was something pained in it. "It means we'll be more at ease whenever the charade requires that we kiss," he said, and she laughed a little. Then he brushed his fingers against the softness of her cheek. "And it means we care for each other. Perhaps to different degrees," Nuada added when Dylan blinked at him in shock, "but we do care for each other, mo duinne. And that is no bad thing. We simply must be careful how we express such things, and must keep in mind the... realities of our lives."

Such as the reality that this can never really go anywhere. The pain hit her hard again. She shoved it down where she wouldn't have to worry about it. Maybe it was absolutely stupid to let herself pretend this could ever become anything... but if that were so, then for once in her life she would deliberately allow herself to be stupid. She just had to ask, "Then... you're not angry? At all?"

"No, a chumann. I could never be angry because of your love for me. Tá tú mo chara daor." You are my dearest friend. The words were like cold stones in his mouth, that bruised his tongue and left it bleeding. They struck Dylan with the force of a blow and somehow both soothed the ache in her chest, and made it so much worse. Nuada looked as if he might ask her something, or speak some other soft word. But in the end, he only added, "I think we should both go to bed. Once we have slept we can... see if anything else needs to be addressed."

Translation, she thought. "I'm okay with everything that just happened, but I'm not sure if you are, and I'm not sure I will be in the morning. We'll figure it out then." Dylan forced herself to smile up at him. "All right. Good night, Nuada."

"Good night, Dylan." He moved to leave, but at the door he paused and looked at her again. Could he truly walk away from her and leave things as they were? She looked so uncertain. Almost lost. In a sudden move he pulled her against him and kissed her. Slowly. Thoroughly. Now he was in control of the passion and the desire. Now he could give her sweetness and romance. Nuada put just enough heat into that kiss to make her legs weak and her stomach flutter before he pulled back. "Dream of me," he added in a whisper like velvet. "And dream sweetly, mo mhuire - my lady."

Dylan nodded, smiling almost dreamily. "I will. Good night, mo airgeadach." Only when he was out the door and going back down the hall did she close the door to the music room and sink down onto the piano bench. "Wow," she mumbled. Her knees were weak and she had the sudden urge to giggle like a little girl, though she wasn't sure if those giggles were happy or hysterical. Though judging from the stinging of her eyes, she'd have been willing to wager a five-pound bag of lollipops that it was hysterical. The smile slid from her face and she touched her tingling lips with shaking fingers. "Oh, wow. I'm so screwed."

Nothing she did could erase the heaviness in her chest or the melancholic, self-deprecating half-smile curving one corner of her suddenly trembling mouth. She wasn't going to cry over something so silly. She wasn't.

Eventually she laid down and fell hard into vivid and shadowed dreams.

And in Dylan's bedroom, stretched out on the enormous bed with his face pressed into the pillow that smelled of her lily-and-roses shampoo, Crown Prince Nuada tried to sleep as well. Exhaustion dragged at him. The late hour - dawn was scarcely a breath away - called to him. But he knew that if he slept he would dream of her and when he did, it would be a continuation of what had begun in the music room. Now that he knew how she felt the yearning filled him more than ever. She loved him and he loved her. Only his rank and her faith kept them from truly being together now. Nuada's hands fisted in the sheets as he realized the full depth of what kept them apart and how simple it would be to push it all aside.

All I must do, the Elf prince thought bitterly, is abandon my people and my honor. All I must do is lie to her, and follow a God I cannot trust. All I must do is forget everything I stand for and everything that has happened, and for a few short years she can be my lady and my love in truth as well as pretense. But even then, even if I wed her, there is so much forbidden us. Children. A family of our own. Safety. I cannot wed a woman while I remain in exile and it is not safe for her in Faerie.

He thought of the kiss she'd laid against his lips. Sweet kiss full of longing, full of sorrow, full of love. Thought of that confession. I think I'm in love with you... I love you so much... It wasn't fair, but when was life ever fair? It did not matter. Those lips against his, the taste of them... he would never forget. But what would change between them now? Because of course things would change. There was no way they could not.

In the morning, Nuada told himself. Think about it in the morning. Well... it is morning, he thought as the first hint of dawn began to glow through the window. When we've both had some sleep, then. The world's burdens can surely wait until then.

And in the meantime, he would let the burning of those remembered kisses sear away the last of tonight's brutal darkness, and sleep.