Flight (Children of the Sidhe) (3 page)

Maybe she saw the panic in his eyes, because Tessa knelt next to him despite his sullen tone and placed a comforting hand on his arm.
“Do you want to sleep? I could make you sleep. It might help you recover some perspective.”

“That’s quite an offer. What are you, a doctor? You’re going to give me a pill?”

“A pill? Is that like a spell? I know some of the best spells – you won’t feel a thing, I swear it.” She smiled, and while he was sure she meant to be friendly, he was alarmed.

“Where am I? And what are you?”

Tessa took a moment to reply. First she just watched him as if she was trying to guess something. “Did Nemglan tell you nothing?”

“He told me I had to jo
in him, and then changed into a hawk and bit me. I guess I changed?” He looked at her for confirmation.

She nodded abruptly.

“We flew, and then he said we came through the portal. We came here. Where is Nemglan?”

“He left to help track the assassin. I gather you’re on his list, and your father got to you just in time.”

“He just left me here? Where’s here, anyway? You haven’t answered. Where did that
portal
lead?”

“You’re in Tir Nan Og – the Land of the Y
oung. The land of your people, the Sidhe.”

“What are you talking about?”

“In your world, people may call it Otherworld.”

“And the
Sidhe?”

Tessa gave him a snide look. “I believe in your time we’ve been made into faeries of lore. Tiny scraps of magical things with wings. Ah, look…apparently we do come with wings.”

Nathan stood and paced away from her. What the hell was she so moody about? He was the one who had just been told he was in another world, and part…Sidhe?

“He told you nothing?” Tessa asked.

Nathan could tell she was mad to be the one spelling it out for him, but he was grateful. “I’d rather not talk to that man, anyway. Can you help me get home?”

“You can’t go home. You’re not going anywhere until Nemglan comes back for you.”

“I don’t wait for anyone’s permission to do anything.” Nathan stopped pacing, turning to face her, his hands clenched at his sides like he could defend himself from the onslaught of emotional pain at the sudden reappearance of a father he’d never known. His mother had it rough, and this guy had just left her to that life while he flitted around the
Land of the Young
?

Tessa
stood in front of him, watching him with something akin to curiosity. Her stick-straight hairstyle and those high cheekbones that gave her an exotic appearance also made her look severe. Maybe if she smiled every so often...but that wasn’t his problem. He realized he’d been staring at her, and her eyes had narrowed like a cat’s, making her look even more severe than before.

Nathan decided it must be a mistake. He was nothing like her. Half
Sidhe? What the hell was that? A race out of old world mythology...faeries, essentially. They appeared as the
good folk
in tales about changeling babies and pretty young men and maidens whisked off for a hundred year dance. Fucking ridiculous. For the first time, the possibility that he was losing his mind entered his consciousness.

All of a sudden, Tessa
burst apart right in front of him, her shape reforming into three doves that circled and wove around the large room. At once, they flew toward him, and in a flash she was herself again, standing in front of him.

He jumped back.
“What the hell are you?” he shouted. “You could have warned me.”

“
Sorry. I just feel better – calmer – after I do that. You’ll understand soon enough.”

He looked down, knowing she was right. He swallowed against a sudden lump of fear lodged in his throat.

She softened, moving toward him. She reached out a hand and patted his arm. “Don’t worry. We’ll teach you.”

He changed the subject, his skin tingling where her hand had been. The contact felt good, and he craved more, but he’d never show this creature such a longing. “So what are you? What’s with the three birds? How is that even possible? You’re one…then three…then one again? That’s stranger than having a hawk shape.”

“It’s a family trait, one passed seemingly at random through the female line. In my dove form, my song can lull the sick or wounded to sleep, and my tears can cure them of many ailments,” Tessa listed her abilities while watching him closely. Some humans had been known to lose their minds when brought to Tir Nan Og. She hoped this favor wouldn’t result in a crazy human occupying her ancestral home.

“That’s…the strangest thing I’ve ever heard. I think I must be dreaming.”

“You look mighty pleased at the idea I’m stranger than you. But you’re half human, so here you’re the oddity. A rather adorable oddity, I will say.” She gave him a smile that bordered on wicked, and he knew she was trying to make him uncomfortable, not actually coming on to him.

“You’re not bad looking yourself,
faerie
. But I’m not interested.”

Tessa gave him a cold look
, her jaw clenched.

Nathan said, “How about this:
I’ll just go back home now and Nemglan can come have a chat there if he wants.”

Tessa stepped toward him, and again placed her hand on his arm. He resisted the urge to move closer to her. “Nathan, let your father have
a chance to seek the assassin. Give him tonight, and tomorrow morning if he has not reappeared I’ll take you through the portal myself.”

He doubted she meant to do any such thing, but he knew nothing of portals. What choice did he have but to trust her? His
father
apparently did.

“You say that with such distaste.”

“I haven’t been beyond the veil in many years. Your world was never to my liking. Too much clamor, too many vain and stupid mortals. I enjoy my scholarly life here. My home is quiet, even by Tir Nan Og standards.”

“Mine, too,” he told her, for some reas
on. She was still standing so close, looking at him with eyes like jewels. “Quiet by vain and stupid mortal standards, anyway.”

“So you’ll stay?” S
he gave him an encouraging smile, like she spoke to a child throwing a tantrum.

“Tonight. That’s my only guarantee.”

Five

Nathan paced some more after eating a snack out of his bag. Tessa offered him food, but while he looked at it with longing, he turned her down. She’d smiled at that. So he knew something of the old tales. She didn’t know how half humans responded, but the food of Tir Nan Og was addictive to humans. It was one trick Sidhe had used in the past to trap humans here.

Nathan’s pacing
finally annoyed Tessa enough that she showed him to a room. He radiated tension as he followed her up the stairs. He needed to settle down or he was going to shift again.

“I’m sure Nemglan will return by morning – time flows more slowly here in Tir Nan Og, so he’ll have a day or two beyond the veil in the course of your stay. Do you need anything else?”

“I’ll need more water, but not until the morning.”

“And food. You’ll need to eat, Nathan.” She wasn’t sure why she c
onfronted him with it tonight. It could have waited until the morning.

“I don’t want to eat Otherworld food.”

“But you’ll chance the water?”

“Do you think it’s safe?”

“I could try a spell to ensure it.” Tessa entered a guest room and looked around. She hadn’t used this room recently, but all appeared ready for her unanticipated visitor. The walls were cream colored, and the dark wood floor had a woven rug in red and black. The enormous bed took up nearly half the space, and a fireplace stood in the center of the opposite wall.

“Again with spells?” H
e frowned as he followed her into the room.

A single window showed the deep gray of a Middleworld night. This world moved between dawn and dusk, but never had a true night. The dusk deepened until you’d think you stood on the border of night, and then the dawn would stretch out before you, leading to the new day. Underworld was exactly the opposite. They never had a true day. What would seem to be pre-dawn light would give way to dusk, and a night that stretched on and on.

“Let me light a few glow lamps for you.
” She touched one, and her spell hopped from it to the other two, in a chain that brightened the chamber in seconds.

Nathan scowled at the
spells, but she could tell from looking at the clear bottle he’d been drinking from that he didn’t realize how much he depended on human
technology
, which may as well have been spells for all he knew how they worked.

“Now how do I turn them off?”

“Give me your hand.” He did, his fingers warm against her skin. She touched his open palm, and he tried to pull back but she wouldn’t let him. “Oh, yes. I thought so. You have Sidhe magic,” she breathed. His magic felt bright and pure, far lighter than hers. She felt a twinge of some rare emotion; was it shame? She’d been soaked in darkness recently, and it had left a stain she hadn’t seen to yet.

“You can feel that?” he asked in a low voice. His eyes pierced into her, like he could see through her.

Tessa held her palm above his, and turned the question back on him. “Do you feel this? That’s my magic. When you’re ready for lights out, touch the lamp and feel for it. Tell it to turn off. It’s simple.”

She left him then,
frustrated and not knowing what to do with the extra energy such feelings left her with. Normally if she felt this way she’d have a man over for the night, and that would cure her nervous energy. Lovemaking was the surest remedy. But hosting tied her hands on that score. She could go fly for a while. It seemed strange not to invite Nathan, if that was her goal. And she couldn’t take him out in his first bunch of hours here to the wilds of Tir Nan Og. He could hardly stand her appearance. What if they ran into giants, or snakekin? He had no idea what to expect.

Tessa went back to her desk, but her work didn’t draw her in like it usually did. She decided to give the spell she’d mentioned a try.

First, she drew water from the well in the courtyard. She placed it in a crystal bowl she kept for ritual purposes. Today she didn’t plan to scry, so she kept her eyes averted slightly from the surface of the water in her ritual bowl. She didn’t want to know what a vision would show her at the moment.

She focused on the water, on purifying it for human use. Eyes closed,
her hands grew warm as the magic built, and she felt the satisfying
rightness
as all of the components clicked into place and the spell worked.

Her ward chimed at the precise moment she released the charge she’d gathered into the water. Tessa hissed in annoyance. This batch was ruined. She’d have to try again later, she thought as she went to the door. But no one knocked for a moment, and Tessa got a bad feeling.

Sure enough, it was Abarta standing outside when Tessa cracked the door to peer out. Tessa grabbed a deep gray cloak and went outside, hoping Nathan hadn’t noticed the chimes. If he came to investigate, it could all be over for him.

“Back so soon?” she asked Abarta spitefully. “Didn’t we play this little game already?”

“Do you have news for me?” A smile played around the trickster’s full lips. Abarta definitely brought sex to mind. Right now that just made Tessa angrier. She shouldn’t be attracted to her blackmailer, despite his Sidhe draw. She was Sidhe, too, and around males of her kind all the time.

She shook all thought of sex out of her brain and focused on the conversation at hand. “No. I don’t have news for you. I met with my brother, and found out they know little more now than they did two days ago. The families of those on your list are apparently taking responsibility for their half-human children. They’re trying to find them before you do.”

“And none of them have been successful yet?”

“Not to my knowledge. I told Mikhail to pass a message to Ian, that I’m willing to help if he needs me. That’s about the best I can do to insert myself into the damn investigation in the matter of a day.”
Tessa answered quickly and firmly, ignoring the accusation she thought she must be imagining in his tone. Tessa didn’t have to fake her anger. Why she was faking anything at all was beyond her.

When she’d thought of Nathan coming outside and facing Abarta and his doom, her stomach had dropped. He was a person, not just a half-human. She couldn’t be the cause of his demise.

As long as Abarta didn’t guess her allegiance, they could both win in this situation. She only hoped that’s how it would turn out.

“Tessa, you will call me if you
have anything to share.” Abarta’s firm tone was belied by the sardonic smile that never seemed to leave his lips. “If not…”

Tessa straightened her spine and stared him down
. “I get it. Now go away and let time work its magic.”

“
Time doesn’t have long. You’ll get the information I need, one way or another.”