Page 82 of A Touch of Shadows

Wren was so sick of hearing about Queen Aeryn the traitor.

‘She wouldn’t. Whatever happened, she had reason. I know her.’

His voice turned serious. ‘She’s lied to you all your life, Wren. Did you ever think about that?’

Of course she did. But she didn’t want to say that now. It felt ungrateful somehow. If Elodie had lied, well, it was to protect her. From all of this. Wren understood it all too well now. She’d do anything herself to get out of this. She just wished she could tell Elodie that. Forgive her. Let her know that in one way, even if only the one, she had done the right thing.

Finally finding out who she was, where she came from, who her parents truly were… that had always been her dream. She had never thought it would turn out to be such a nightmare.

At least she had Finn. She leaned against him, and he slipped his arm around her shoulders.

‘What will happen? At the trial, I mean?’

Wren wasn’t even sure why she asked. She didn’t want to know what would happen if they found Elodie guilty. She could guess and that was enough.

‘She’ll be presented to the Aurum. It will decide.’

‘A fire? They’re going to let a fire decide? How does that even work?’

He laughed and his hand brushed against her arm, sending shivers through her. ‘Come on, you know it’s not just a fire, Wren. It’s… it’s alive with magic. It’s linked to Elodie, and through her to all of us. It is light incarnate. You felt it running through both of us. You used it to save me.’

Had she? Sometimes she wasn’t so sure. She had used something. Yes, she had felt the light, the burning, blinding, brightness of it, but she had also felt the chill and soothing touch of its antithesis, the dark.

‘Can you… can you show it to me?’

It wasn’t that Finn squirmed, he’d never do that. But he shifted a little uncomfortably. ‘We’re not meant to just wander in there. It’s a holy place. But… if we’re quick and quiet… all right then. Come with me.’

CHAPTER 48

WREN

They didn’t exactly hurry on their way. A moment with Finn was not to be squandered because, now they were in Pelias, those were already becoming rare and precious. Every so often Wren stopped and kissed him, as soon as they were both sure they were alone.

The temptation to just find an empty room and pull him into her arms was even stronger than she had imagined.

Later, she thought, later. After the presentation to the council and the feast, and whatever other horrors the royal court had planned for her. She’d take him back to her ridiculously large quarters, dismiss anyone still there, and they could make love. She had to have something to look forward to. So long as they found a way to lock the door, because she was not comfortable with the way people just kept bustling in and out of her private chambers. But she would find a way. The lure of Finnian Ward was too strong. Just walking alongside him, entwined with him, made her feel all kinds of things she was certain princesses were not meant to know about.

But she wasn’t really their princess and she never would be. It all had to be a terrible mistake. Everything she was told her that.

Finn opened a discreet door and led her along a rather plain corridor. It was almost a shock given the lavish surroundings elsewhere, and, she had to admit, a massive relief to step inside.

‘Servants’ corridor,’ he told her with a grin when he saw her confusion. ‘The keep is riddled with them. It’s like another world.’

Interesting. She filed that piece of information away in case she needed it later. She’d find out where the rest of these passages were.

They climbed an equally plain staircase hewn from the white stone of the hill on which Pelias stood, and then, finally, Finn opened another door.

The chamber beyond was enormous. She stepped through, gazing up in wonder. Everything was the same white marble. On the floor it had been polished to a mirror sheen, veins like golden threads running through it. It was like standing in a cave made of ice, and had clearly been carved out by many hands over many years. Above them the dome arched high overhead, and carvings decorated the walls, depictions of kings and queens, of great battles, of lovers, of families, of tragic deaths and newborn children. But in all the scenes the symbol of the Aurum repeated. A flame curling into a circle, eternal and powerful, a vortex of pure light. There were no windows, she realised, no natural light at all.

All illumination came from a flame, constant and ever moving, in the centre of the huge room. And around that flame rose a group of seven standing stones, each larger than a human being, rough and unpolished, in stark contrast to everything else here, the most natural thing in this unnatural place.

‘Like the Seven Sisters,’ she murmured, bemused.

‘I’d never thought of that, but yes,’ Finn admitted. He looked uncomfortable with the thought.

Carefully, Wren approached the flame. It was confined to a well-like structure in the centre of the stone circle, and it moved constantly, dancing before her. It was almost the same height as she was. That didn’t seem to vary. Almost human-like. She felt like it was watching her as much as she was watching it.

Without thinking, she passed inside the circle of attendant stones and reached the low wall surrounding it. In the depths of the flame she could hear something, she was sure of it. Distant and faint, but so alluring. A song, perhaps, a lullaby, something she knew, although she couldn’t name it. But that song, that tune… it had been with her all her life.