Reunion (11 page)

Trása wasn't sure what woke her. She lingered for a moment in that limbo between sleep and consciousness, trying to remember simple things like where she was, what time it might be and who was holding her in his embrace while she slept.

The first answer came easily. She was in
Tír Na nÓg
in this strange alternate reality that had become her home these last ten years. The magic
tingling against her skin gave that away. In light of that revelation, the second question was meaningless. Time was different here in
Tír Na nÓg
. Who knew what time it was out in the real world?

The third answer brought a smile to her face. The warm body holding her was Rónán.

He'd come to
Tír Na nÓg
last night, after returning from a reality he refused to name. As usual, he wouldn't tell her about the realm he'd been visiting and Trása had learned not to press him for details. Rónán carried a burden she couldn't comprehend and even though she'd begged him, time and again, to share the
Comhroinn
so she could understand, he always refused.

She turned to study his sleeping face in the soft twilight of her bower cave. His dark hair was longer than it had been when they first met, his chin shadowed by a three-day growth, his face relaxed and at peace - something she rarely saw when he was awake. Just beneath his ear was that tiny, wretched cut that never seemed to heal and there were lines on his brow now, even while he slept, that could not be attributed to age. Although Rónán was almost pure Faerie and would never age like a normal man, the lines came from the burden he carried, the terrible knowledge he owned, not the passage of years.

And, she suspected, his inability to do anything meaningful about his lost twin.

He would wake soon, she guessed. He'd smile, get up and shave, and joke around with the lesser
Youkai
. But the smile would never reach his eyes and the jokes weren't all that funny, although the lesser
Youkai
weren't sophisticated enough to appreciate that.

Trása smiled to herself, knowing there was one burden she would soon be able to take from him.

Something tickled Trása's cheek and she realized what had woken her. She batted away the irritation, a little annoyed Echo had woken her so early and was undoubtedly going to disturb Rónán if she tried to ignore her.

"The boys are back. The boys are back. The boys are back." The pixie's high-pitched buzz
hummed around Trása's ear as the little
Youkai
hovered above her head, wings flapping like a hummingbird. If she didn't move or at least acknowledge she was awake, Trása knew from long experience that Echo would start nipping at her ear.

"All right, I heard you. They're back," she whispered, turning her head to look at the pixie as a surge of excitement welled up inside her. If Pete and Logan were back, her laborious and secretive plan to finally bring Darragh home might be about to bear fruit.

"Hurry up. Hurry up," the pixie buzzed impatiently. Echo was naked except for a strip of brightly colored ribbon around her neck and some shiny silver string tied around her wrists that looked suspiciously like bits of Christmas tinsel. As there was no Christmas in this reality, and certainly nothing like Christmas decorations, she guessed Pete or Logan had brought it back for her on one of their runs. It also accounted for the pixie knowing they were back from their latest rift running expedition.

Taking great care not to disturb Rónán, she carefully wiggled from his embrace and stepped out of the bower cave and onto the wide branch outside her home.
Tír Na nÓg
was laid out before her, no longer sad and empty. It was filled with
Youkai
now, although few were the original inhabitants of this realm. Most of them, like her little pixie, Echo, were refugees from other realities where the
Matrarchaí
were making their presence felt.

"Better put come clothes on. Better put some clothes on," the pixie sang, buzzing around her ear to be certain she'd heard. The pixie's annoying habit of repeating everything at least twice had earned her the name Echo. Trása forgot who first called her that. She thought it might have Isleen. Whoever it was, the name had stuck and now everyone called her Echo.

"Boys will blush. Boys will blush."

Trása smiled at that. Pete and Logan, even though they had spent the last decade among the
sídhe
folk of this realm and countless others, still suffered traces of the inhibitions their upbringing had ingrained in them. Echo was right. If she didn't put some clothes on before she greeted Pete and Logan on their return, they wouldn't know where to look.

Trása returned to the bower cave and grabbed her clothes, including her boots, and took them outside onto the ledge so as not to disturb Rónán while she dressed. Not only did she not want to alert him to her plans until everything was in place, he'd looked exhausted when he came to her last night. She figured he needed all the sleep he could get, and here in
Tír Na nÓg
was the only place he ever slept soundly.

"Nika's home, too. Nika's home, too," Echo chanted as Trása got dressed.

The news gave Trása pause. She hadn't even realized the Merlin had gone with Pete and Logan on a mission that was supposed to be secret. Not that the news bothered her unduly. If anything, she probably should have thought of it herself. Trása didn't doubt Nika would be looking out for her interests. The Merlin was ridiculously loyal to the
Tuatha Dé Danann
half-
beansídhe
she considered responsible for her rescue. "Was she rift running with Pete and Logan or does she just happen to have arrived home at the same time?"

"Running with them, running with them," Echo told her, darting about Trása's head, probably because she liked the way it made the tinsel around her tiny wrists glitter. "Brought you a present. Brought you a -"

Echo gasped and suddenly blinked out of existence.

Trása sighed. The present, she guessed, was meant to be a secret. "You didn't tell me which
rifuto
they came through," she called, but knew it was useless. Echo was probably miles away by now, fretting that "the boys" - her collective name for Pete and Logan - might be mad at her for ruining their surprise.

Trása made her way down the organic wooden stairs that encircled the massive trunk of her tree home, trying to work out the most logical place for Pete and Logan to have entered this realm. She had impressed upon them the importance of keeping their mission a secret from Rónán so they were unlikely to have emerged at the stone circle near
Nara
in
Chucho
, in this reality's version of Japan, where Rónán normally resided. They would not be expecting to find him here.

She didn't think the others knew about her and Rónán. They certainly didn't live together or do anything else normal couples might do. Since he'd unlocked Delphine's memories seven years ago and discovered how long they had to wait until they could return to the realm where they'd left Darragh, they'd lived in different hemispheres, and even when they were together, Rónán was not one for public displays of affection. Trása wondered about that sometimes, figuring it was nothing to do with the burden of responsibility he carried, and everything to do with being raised by a woman who thrived on making a spectacle of herself.

"
An Bhantiarna
, a word, if I may?"

Trása stopped, as one of the refugee
Tuatha Dé Danann
Pete and Logan had rescued from another reality about four years ago stepped in front of her, blocking her way. She silently braced herself and forced a smile, wondering how much noise he would make if she pushed him off the stairs. He wouldn't die. They weren't so far up the branches it would kill him if he fell. Besides, he was pure
sídhe
. And even if it hurt when he hit the forest floor, he could heal himself.

It's nice to dream sometimes.

"I'm sorry, Stiofán, I'm in kind of a hurry. Can we talk later?"

"You are here and I am ready to speak. Why should it not be now?"

Because you're an insufferable pain in the backside and Nika should have let the
Matrarchaí
slaughter you, so I wouldn't have to put up with your self-important pomposity
. That's what Trása really wanted to say to this tall, handsome Faerie. She knew his type well. In his own reality he'd been a
sídhe
of high standing and had the ear of his queen. Here he was safe from the
Matrarchaí
, but a nobody. The work they were doing, the battle to save as many
sídhe
as they could from the
Matrarchaí
in this reality and countless others, was a job only the mongrel
sídhe
like her could fight. Stiofán couldn't step out of a magical realm without dying and it was in the magic-depleted realms where the
Matrarchaí
had their strongholds. When it came down to it, though, Trása knew this swaggering, displaced
Tuatha Dé Danann
lord wasn't upset that he couldn't join the fight; he was just having trouble coping with the notion that he owed his life to a bunch of mongrel
sídhe
.

She sighed. "You have one minute."

Stiofán sniffed. "I do not know what a minute is, but I will assume it is all the time I need to state my case regarding my accommodation."

"What's wrong with your accommodation?"

"It's intolerable."

"Why is it intolerable?" she asked, the temptation to shove him off the stairs something she found herself having to consciously control.

"I sleep only a short distance off the ground."

"And that makes your accommodation intolerable, how exactly?"

"A
sídhe
of my stature should be much further up. The higher branches are filled with
Leipreachán,
pixies and sprites. It is beyond comprehension how you can allow the normal order of things to be so perverted, you would honor lesser
sídhe
over those of the
Tuatha Dé Danann
."

Trása couldn't stop herself from smiling, although she did manage to control the urge to laugh out loud. "Really?
That's
your problem, Stiofán? You think we're perverted because you don't have the penthouse suite?"

The
sídhe
glared at her, not understanding her words, although he understood her tone. Sarcasm was the same in any language.

The
sídhe
drew himself up and looked down his long, aquiline nose at her. "This unacceptable state of affairs would not be tolerated in a realm where there was a proper
Tuatha Dé Danann
queen, rather than a mongrel pretender."

Trása took a deep breath.
Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.
Logan had taught her that a few years ago. He claimed it was the only way to cope with living in the public eye and not go mad listening to everyone else's opinion on how you were living your life. He'd gone so far as to make her memorize the tiny refrain and promise to repeat it over and over - or at least until the urge to throttle the name-caller receded - whenever she found herself in a situation such as this.

It had taken a while for her to accept his way of thinking, but she was grateful for it because she was in too much of a hurry to let anything this pompous windbag said, get to her.

"Feel free to find another realm where the social order is more to your liking," she suggested. "Now get out of my way, Stiofán, or I'll arrange to have some of my honored lesser
sídhe
evict your sorry ass out of
Tír Na nÓg
and you can go live in the mundane world. You never know, those filthy humans out there struggling to get by might be a little more sympathetic to your need for a room with a view."

Stiofán had probably never been spoken to so harshly, and if he decided to retaliate with magic Trása wasn't powerful enough to stop him. In her own realm, she had been cursed by Marcroy Tarth and was doomed - in that reality at least - to spend her days as a barn owl. It was the reason she could never return and was relying on the others to do what needed to be done for her. Stiofán was more than capable of doing the same to her here, or worse.

But he wasn't as sure of himself as Marcroy. And perhaps he sensed Rónán was back. He might be brave enough to insult Trása to her face. He wasn't going to challenge one of the Undivided.

He hesitated, and then stood aside to let her pass.

Trása did not spare the Tuatha Dé Danann lord another thought as she headed down the tree-trunk stairs, hoping "the boys" had come through the rift near the entrance to
Tír Na nÓg
. If they hadn't, she was going to have to get undressed, pack up her clothes and boots, change into a bird large enough to carry them, and fly to wherever they had emerged with a surprise for her.

Although he had no magical powers in this reality, Darragh had developed almost preternatural senses over the past ten years. Without them, he would have died long ago. They were tingling now as he ate his meal in the dining hall of Portlaoise Prison, his arm circling his plate to protect it from any of the other inmates with mischief in mind.