“No magic or torture you can devise will make me forget my loyalties.” She shot a spiteful look at Hafwyn, who was busy healing Adair.
“Aisling, are you well enough to come here for a moment?”
“It is a scratch, nothing more.” If he’d been human he would have needed at least ten stitches, maybe more. I would not have called it a scratch, but it wasn’t my body. He came to me, his sword naked in his hand.
“Put up the sword, Aisling.”
He did, hesitating only a moment. “What would you have of me, Princess, if not my sword?”
“If you show your face to a sidhe woman will she tell you anything you ask her?”
“You mean to make her besotted, so we may question her?”
“Yes.”
Melangell’s eyes had gone a little wide.
“I have never used my powers in that way.”
“Would it work?”
He thought about it. “Yes.”
“Then let us see if she will tell us for lust what she will not tell for loyalty.”
I motioned for the guard on Kanna, the other of Cel’s guard, to turn her to face the far wall. Dogmaela had already gone to the other end of the hallway. She may have had divided loyalties, but not enough to join her kneeling comrades. Or enough to protect them. Interesting that Melangell and Kanna had spoken only to Hafwyn, as if Dogmaela was not even there.
Aisling’s hands rose to his golden veil. “You should look away, as well, Princess.”
I nodded and moved back. Though I could admit to myself that there was an almost unbearable urge to look at his face. To look on someone so beautiful that one glimpse would make you fall instantly in lust with them. A beauty so great that one glimpse and you would betray all you held most dear. I did wonder.
Frost knew me too well, took my arm to move me just a little more to Aisling’s back. He gave me a look, and I shrugged. What could I say?
Aisling removed his veil, and all I could see was that his hair was yellow and gold, like streaks of honey, and, like the gold in his skin, shining together. It was braided in complicated knots so that it looked much shorter than the hair actually was. If no one could look upon his face, who did his hair?
“She has closed her eyes,” he said.
“Hawthorne, cut her eyelids off. They’ll grow back.”
She did what I’d hoped she’d do; at the first touch of the knife tip, she opened her eyes. Her eyes blinked, and Hawthorne moved the knife back. Her gaze moved up Aisling’s body, as if drawn against her will. I knew when she reached his face because I saw it in her eyes. Saw the shock of it over her face. It was a frightened look, as if she looked not upon great beauty, but great ugliness.
Hawthorne turned his face away. Lord Kieran did, too. Only Crystall looked upon Aisling’s naked face without flinching. He smiled, as if he saw something wonderful. His clear, white skin filled with radiance, as if the sight had kindled his magic. Only when his hair was shot through with color like prisms in the light did he turn away, as if he could not bear the sight any longer.
Melangell screamed, and it was a sound of irretrievable loss. The echo of it died on the stones, and her eyes filled with… love. It wasn’t lust, no matter what Adair had said. Her eyes filled with the mindless devotion of teenagers in their first crush, or newlyweds on a perfect honeymoon. She looked at Aisling as if he were her entire world.
Melangell had never liked Aisling, never had much use for him. Now she looked at him the way a flower gazes at the sun, and it made me sick to see it. I didn’t like Melangell, but this was… wrong. If there was no cure for it, then I had done something far worse to her than any torture I could have devised. To be hopelessly, completely in love with someone who hated you. There isn’t even a level in Dante’s hell for that.
Frost seemed to understand because he said, “Aisling, ask her the question.”
“Why did you attack Galen?”
“To kill him.” Maybe she wasn’t as totally besotted as she appeared.
“Why did you want to kill him?”
“Because Prince Cel wants him out of Meredith’s bed.”
“Why does he want that?”
Melangell shook her head hard, as if trying to clear her thoughts.
Aisling knelt in front of her, putting his face and upper body close to her. “Why does Cel want Galen out of Princess Meredith’s bed?”
She’d closed her eyes again. “No,” she said, “no.”
“You cannot close me out of your mind, Melangell. You have seen me. You cannot unsee me now.” His voice was a whisper, but it seemed to trail down my skin. It made me shiver and it wasn’t directed at me.
Frost whispered against my ear, “Her power was once similar to his; it may mean she can escape him.”
“She could kill with her touch.”
“But how do you get a man to touch you, Meredith? By making them want you.”
It made sense, though frankly Melangell was beautiful enough without the extra lure.
He leaned in and I thought he would kiss her, but she pushed backwards as far as Hawthorne would let her go. “Don’t touch me,” she said.
“You said my power had faded, Melangell. Why fear my touch if I am but a ghost of what I was? Why does Cel want Galen out of Meredith’s bed?” He grabbed her face between his hands, and she screamed, though not in pain. “I am willing to test my magic against yours, Melangell.” He kissed her, long and lingering.
Frost had tensed beside me. Which meant that once even a kiss from Melangell had been a dangerous thing. That I had not known. Dangerous indeed.
Aisling drew back, and her face was raw with need. “My sweet, tell me, why does Prince Cel want Galen out of Meredith’s bed?”
She swallowed hard enough that I heard it across the room, but she answered, “The prophecy said the green man would bring life back to the court.”
“What prophecy?” Aisling asked.
“Cel paid a prophet to tell him if Meredith would be a true threat. She would bring life back to the court with the help of the green man and the chalice. Galen was the only green man that she took with her. When we saw what she did at the press conference, we knew that he was her green knight.”
“Has it occurred to any of you that green man is a metaphor for vegetative deities, or even another name for the consort?” I asked.
Melangell ignored me, but when Aisling asked the same question, she answered, “Prince Cel said the prophecy meant Galen.”
“And do you believe everything Cel tells you?” I asked. When Aisling repeated the question, she answered, “Yes.”
“Fool,” Hafwyn said from behind us.
“What else did the prophecy say?” Aisling asked.
“That if someone of flesh and blood sat on the throne, Cel would die.”
“What did he think ‘flesh and blood’ meant?”
“Mortal.”
“You all must have been frantic when the princess returned with flesh and blood as her hands of power.”
“Yes,” Melangell said.
“Is there anything else Cel has done that we should know about?” Aisling asked, and I made a mental note that he was a thorough man.
She bent forward as if in pain. Hawthorne had moved back, as if he wasn’t comfortable touching her. His power was not similar to either of theirs, so maybe he was in danger of being bespelled by Melangell. Whatever the reason, when her hands moved, the cloth that tied them unwound, and since Hawthorne was turned away, he did not see it. Aisling went for his sword, but he was kneeling and at a bad angle. Her hands came up, and she clawed her eyes out while we watched. Only when blood and wet liquid ran down her face did she stop.
“You cannot force more secrets from me now,” she said, and her voice was full of her usual rage.
Aisling let his half-drawn sword go back into its sheath. “Melangell, you cannot unsee me. I told you that.”
I couldn’t tell if she was crying or if it was just pieces of her eyes. “The sight of your shining face will be the last thing I will ever see. I hate you for this, but I cannot regret it.”
“Oh, Melangell,” he said, and he touched her face.