Fey Born Read online

  The spriggan scratched his coarse beard in contemplation, gesturing at her clothes in dislike. “Why she dress like that in man clothes? Not show enough of snow white flesh.”

  “Agreed.”

  Lana folded her arms across her chest in discomfort.

  “Yours, guardian?”

  “She is mine.”

  A ray of hope warmed her blood despite this peculiar conversation. Perhaps Keegan did feel something for her after all, she thought.

  “Odd it is,” the spriggan muttered in all seriousness.

  “What is odd, Master Spriggan?”

  “She be pure mortal.”

  Keegan’s long lashes lowered, showing a glint of ice-cold silver. “She is pure mortal,” he echoed.

  “You be pure guardian.”

  “I am.”

  “Odd it is, a great powerful guardian marking a pretty mortal.” The spriggan frowned and then grinned in sudden enlightenment. “Mayhap guardian likes pretty.”

  “Mayhap,” her guardian agreed.

  Lana knew Keegan would not explain about the claiming.

  “Share her?”

  Lana gasped in outrage at the spriggan’s boldness. Never would she let that creature touch her!

  “I doona share what is mine, Cadman. Now tell me what you have overheard while watching us from your shadows?”

  Keegan knew this rock faery?

  The spriggan balked, taking a step back as if to run, but her guardian mate moved faster. Grabbing the spriggan behind the neck, he lifted the squirming rock faery so they were face to face.

  “Nothing,” the spriggan spat, trying to free himself.

  “Doona lie to me, Cadman.”

  “Not friendly you.”

  “Nay, Cadman, I am not feeling particularly friendly at this moment.”

  The spriggan frowned at his large captor. “Talk like them, too.”

  A growl of impatient menace vibrated in the air from her guardian. Lana rubbed her arms, fighting back a shiver.

  “Tell me, Cadman. I doona like hurting other fey borns.”

  “Heard nothing.”

  “I doona believe you. Try again.” He gave the spriggan a firm shake.

  “Valor taken. Stolen you say.”

  Lana saw Keegan scowl darkly before setting the spriggan back on his bare feet.

  With as much disdain as possible, Master Spriggan straightened his rock-encrusted coat. “Bad manners you,” he snapped in that gravelly voice.

  “Bad manners you, spying on a guardian,” Keegan said tightly, mimicking the spriggan’s inflection.

  “Know what she be. Guardian like pretty. I like pretty. I know.”

  “Know what?” her guardian inquired with a touch of edginess.

  The spriggan hopped forward. Before he could jab her in the stomach with his finger, Keegan shielded her with his body.

  “Never touch, Cadman.” He sliced the air in front of the spriggan’s face with his hand. “Understand?”

  Lana grabbed Keegan’s powerful right arm and held on. The cold edge of dread spread inside her.

  The spriggan stepped back slowly. “Pretty gold fleece. See her bathe in moonlight, see her in stream.”

  Her guardian muttered an oath under his breath, his body stiff with tension in front of her.

  “See mark of sword on her flesh,” the spriggan continued, walking backward. “She heads toward there.” He stopped in a shaft of fading sunlight and pointed north with a dirty finger.

  Lana swallowed down her fear. She did not trust this rock faery creature. There was something devious in his manner.

  “Where?” Keegan growled, his patience all but gone.

  “Knowth,” Cadman said in satisfaction, showing pointy white teeth. “One of few sword hosts. One of very few.” He twirled around, hands waving in the air. “Special she be,” he chanted loudly to the sky. “Special she be. Feels Valor in her blood. Old, old legends be true.”

  “What is that creature talking about?” Lana whispered in her guardians ear. “What legends, Keegan? What is Knowth?”

  He turned away in response.

  “Keegan?”

  He would not answer her.

  The spriggan stopped twirling with a shout. “I answer for guardian,” he said. “You die, pretty. In the Otherworld below, the dark sword takes you. Die all over.”

  ———

  Not if I can help it, Keegan thought in defiance. Sitting with his back pressed against the trunk of the hawthorn tree, he glanced over at Lana while she slept on her side to his right.

  Bracing his hand on his knee, he wondered how Cadman knew the dark sword was at Knowth, one of the great passage tombs of their ancestors. The spriggan let his deceit slip with that one, and then confirmed it when he mentioned their Otherworld, a fey born place below. How could the sword be in two places? He did not know which was the truth. He only knew he had found one of his enemies.

  Sighing, he looked up at the sky. Night had fallen long ago and he ran a hand through his hair in mounting frustration. If Valor was in the Otherworld, finding the sword would be difficult. He was a creature of the earth, his senses tuned to this place, not the other. Never would he have sensed the dark sword there, at least not until the decaying body of her dead host became one with the iridescent cave pools.

  His jaw tightened. He trusted Lana would guide him to the sword long before the foretold drowning.

  Lana. He stared into the dying embers of the fire circle he built, and swallowed hard in disgust. Caring for her was rooting inside him, a living tempest. It amazed him he could feel so consumed with the idea of mating with her. He must find a way to protect both Valor and Lana, he thought furiously.

  His thoughts immediately fastened on the false-hearted spriggan. He allowed Cadman to return to his underground home for the night, confident the creature was secure in his own deception. He had known Cadman for nearly five years now and always recoiled at the odor of the spriggan’s flesh. Keegan rubbed his chin in ominous silence. If he had to put a name to his unease, he would say the spriggan’s blood smelled wrong. It was almost as if man blood flowed with spriggan blood, but that could not be, he reasoned. Never had spriggans been able to conceive a babe outside of their fey born race. Shifting in discomfort, he pulled a small rock from under his hip and tossed it away. Most spriggans were truthful, despite their wayward ways. This one was not. Cadman played by a different set of rules and was therefore unworthy of trust. Soon, he would seek answers. For now, he would wait and see what other knowledge Master Spriggan might unknowingly betray.

  He glanced right. The light from the half moon, joined with the bright stars above, bathed Lana where she lay. He could tell from her breathing she was feigning sleep. It was a warm spring night; moisture in the air and the scent of his mating claim on her was strong in his lungs, taunting him. Her back was to him, tresses cascading like golden waves down her back, the slender curves of her a constant lure. He looked away and resettled his arms on his bent knees.

  For the first time in his long life, he felt desire and indecisiveness. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and listened to the night, only to hear the soft sounds of her taking precedence above all others. He felt her in his innermost places. Hot and hungry she made him, like a mortal male with red blood streaming in his veins. He wanted to touch her, to bury his face in her hair, to taste her flesh. Here in the • night with spriggan pillars on one end and trees on the other, he wanted to mate like a mortal and feel the hot sheath of her close around him.

  “Am I going to die, Keegan?” she inquired softly, sensing his contemplation of her.

  “I will not let you die.”

  She rolled over and faced him, her hair sweeping behind her. It made him ache.

  “I would not have an untruth between us, my guardian mate.”

  “I will not let you die.”

  She sat up and shifted closer to him.

  His stomach clenched.

  “I believe you,” she whisp
ered, creating both ease and obligation inside him.

  They sat looking at the yellow embers, their bodies awash in the gleam of the dwindling fire circle.

  “Keegan, would you tell me of the legend Cadman spoke of?”

  He did not want to do it, did not want to share the tale, did not want her this near to him where he could smell the very essence of her being.

  “Please, I would like to know.” She touched his forearm, her warm fingers golden compared to the cool paleness of his fey skin.

  “The sword legend is old, Lana. Older than I know.”

  “I understand.”

  Her small hand remained on his arm.

  “Valor is the name of a great sword spirit of the faeries. She chooses a female of strength to be her host. The current host has been with Valor since I can remember.”

  “One of strength?”

  “Aye,” he replied. “That is why I find it hard to believe you were chosen.”

  She nodded, pulling away and changing the subject. “Does the host not age?”

  He shook his head. “She receives the gift of immortality from the sword spirit.”

  “If she is immortal, how can she drown?”

  “The same as you or I,” he replied softly.

  “You can drown?” she said suddenly, her lovely brows arched in confusion and dismay.

  “Aye, Lana. I can drown. Being fey born does not make me immortal.”

  “I thought fey borns were immortal.”

  He shook his head. “For some unknown reason, this false belief of faery immortality took hold among men and the fey have allowed it to continue. I am fey born. I live a longer life than mortals, but I do eventually die. I am not invincible,” he said softly.

  “But the host is immortal.”

  “In most ways. In life, there are always exceptions to any rule. Since this immortality is a gift from the sword spirit to the host, there are boundaries, subject to the claiming of the water or fire spirit. If the sword remains within water or fire for a time, the host will die.”

  “So the host is not completely immortal.”

  “Nay, she is not.”

  “What will happen to Valor should her host… drown?”

  Silence welled up inside him. “Valor will need another host to survive.”

  She waited for him to explain and he looked away.

  “In every generation, there are a wee few who are born bearing the mark of the sword. Most often…” He paused to form his words. “Most often they have some fey blood in their veins.”

  “The claíomh hosts!”

  “Aye,” he answered. “The claíomh hosts”

  “Do I have any fey blood?”

  He shook his head. “You doona, which I find strange, but then enchantment requires no explanation.”

  She seemed to think about that a moment. “Are the hosts always female, Keegan?”

  His considered the gentle curve of her belly, where the birthmark lay hidden beneath the clothes. “Aye, the spirit of the sword is a sacred female.”

  “I thought the sword spirit would be male.”

  He shook his head. “Valor is the dark side of the true female.”

  “Dark side?”

  “Taker of life, the opposite.”

  “I doona understand. I thought males are the opposite of females.”

  “The female and male have two sides. The light side of the female is the cradle and giver of life. Her dark side is the taker of life.”

  “And the male?”

  “The light side of the male is the seed of life.”

  “Seed?”

  He looked at her in utter bemusement. “His seed gives life to the womb.”

  She nodded, slightly flustered, then asked, “And his dark side?”

  “The Destroyer. You doona want to know more than that.”

  “Do you have this dark side?”

  “I am male. Both the light and dark side of the sacred male exist equally in me.”

  “As the light and dark sides of the sacred female exist equally in me?”

  “Nay, Lana,” he shook his head. “Because you bear the birthmark, you are more dark than light.”

  She pulled away from him and he could see the puzzlement and distress in her features.

  “By the white moon, I am not evil, Keegan.”

  “I never said you were. Why do you equate darkness with evil? Is the night evil? Is the rich black soil evil?”

  “Nay,” she confirmed softly.

  He could barely hear her response. “Life and death are equal. Light and dark are equal. That is the way of things.”

  She touched a trembling hand to her forehead. “Will I kill, Keegan?”

  “Aye, if you become Valor’s host, a protector of the lands, the fey, and your tribe you will.” He thought she could live with that. “Valor does not take life indiscriminately, Lana, only if threatened.”

  “Have you?” she asked in a hushed tone.

  “Have I what?”

  “Have you taken a life, Keegan?”

  He did not answer, for there was no need.

  Silence hung in the air.

  Lana found herself staring into eyes of dark passion and cruelty. The mortal grayness was shifting to fey amethyst. If the current female host of Valor should die, she could become the next host, and all that she had ever known in her life would change. She would become dark, a taker of life, and lose her body to the shadowy enchantment of immortality!

  She scrambled to her feet, intent on fleeing, anywhere, somewhere, where all of this was just a nightmare.

  A hand shot out, shackled her wrist, and yanked her back down.

  She landed on a muscular chest, her forehead colliding with a firm chin.

  “Let me go,” she cried, her legs entangled with his longer ones.

  He eased her back onto the ground and covered her body with his.

  “You asked me to tell you,” her fey guardian said tightly above her.

  “Let me go. I would never kill.”

  “You kill to live, Lana.”

  She froze and stared up at him.

  “Do you think the plants in the fields are not alive? Do you think the trees cut down to build your homes are not alive? Do you think the meat that fills your belly comes not from living and breathing animals?”

  “Stop it,” she gasped, shoving at his chest, not wanting to hear the truth.

  He leaned on his elbows and took hold of her face, his large hands unyielding yet gentle. “One of our defenders is missing. We must find her so she can protect all that we hold precious.”

  She closed her eyes, hot tears squeezing out. She heard the wisdom of his words, yet her heart feared, feared she would not be good enough, and terrified she was.

  “I canna…” The dread came from deep within her and she opened her eyes to look up at him. The silver was changing, swirling, and becoming… total amethyst.

  “The darkness is what gives us our strength. That strength overflows within you. Embrace it.”

  He moved above her. His tongue slid tenderly over her lips. “Why do you do this to me?” he said in agony, his large hands buried in the silken hair at her temples, holding her still. “Even before my mating mark you tempted me. Why? I doona like weakness,” he growled, his embrace was almost frightening in its possession, as if he could not control the currents raging inside him.

  She held her breath, unable to respond. His eyes were shadows, both tender and dangerous.

  “Kiss me, Lana. I want.” And then his hot mouth settled over hers in a fevered kiss.

  She clung to the strength of him. His mouth was firm and sensual with need, almost insatiable with hunger. He tasted of berries and of rain, but most of all he tasted of the forbidden.

  He held her tightly, his body pressing her down into the soft ground, enveloping her.

  Simple mortal.

  Purebred fey.

  Not allowed.

  Never allowed.

  She did not c
are.

  Neither did he.

  “Want you,” her guardian whispered huskily against her swollen lips. His tongue swept across her face, pausing at his claiming mark on her jaw and then trailed wetness down her throat. “Want.”

  He suckled at the sensitive flesh under her ear, sending exquisite shivers down her spine. Lana arched her neck back, eyes closing, giving him better access to her throat. Her breasts ached against his hard chest.

  He settled his lower body against hers and she felt the hard length of him rock against her softness.

  A sigh of feminine surrender escaped her lips.

  And then…

  He buried his face in her shoulder, his body trembling.

  An agonized moan vibrated against her throat.

  She opened her eyes. “Keegan,” she whispered in concern, turning to kiss his cheek. “What is wrong?”

  “Not allowed,” he said harshly.

  “Please.”

  He launched himself away from her, into the air, into darkness, and Lana thought she saw the silvery glint of wings before the chill of the night enveloped her. Even her guardian mate did not want to lie with her. She could not know she already belonged to the sword.

  Lana turned and buried her face in her arms, her sobs muffled and soft against the ground.

  ———

  Behind one of the spriggan pillars, Cadman squatted low in fury and resentment. He had seen all. So, the dominant guardian wanted to rut with the sword host, he mused darkly with inner vehemence. But then, so did he. He fancied her greatly. Thinking of the golden fleece between her long white legs, he played with himself until the little death came and the torture of it drenched him in a thick sweat. When he finished, he hiked up his pants, feeling better.

  His master made him promises of great treasure if he stole Valor from the faery vaults of Tara. No one suspected him, a mere spriggan. He grinned at the irony of it; he, a mere spriggan. It has been almost as easy as stealing a farmer’s babe. Now the powerful Valor lay imprisoned in water, guarded by the mirror fey, for all in the Otherworld wore but reflections of the above. And now he, Master Cadman Spriggan, was faced with the dilemma of another sword host.

  He scratched his bearded chin, his tiny black eyes turning cold. By mentioning Knowth, he set the misdirection. An ambush already lay in wait. He needed to be rid of the repulsive guardian for what he had in mind, but it was more easily thought then done.