The Stargazer

Stargazer (chapter eleven)

Rowan eyed the decorative table that lay in pieces on his lawn and then looked up at the flowered cap of his tower. Tossing furniture out now, was she? Fits of temper matched that red hair and royal title, he supposed. A trickle of humor edged down his spine. He shouldn’t be amused by her, he told himself sternly. He shouldn’t be standing here wondering what she was up to. There were so many other things he could be doing. But here he stood, curious about the girl and what she was doing.


Had she tried dancing? He hoped not. He’d seen firsthand what happened when Fae danced, pitting themselves against the Time King. No one could challenge time and win. Humans had known that since the dawn of creation, but the Fae still had a lot to learn.


Cupping his hands around his mouth, he bellowed.


“Aislinn!”


No answer. The flowers that hung in clumps, concealing the bower, never moved. She might still be sleeping. He tried again.


“Aislinn!”


Nothing. Something pinched in his chest. Not worry, he assured himself. Concern for a fellow prisoner. Nothing more personal than that.


He had no way of accessing the upper storey himself and Wheezer was nowhere to be seen this morning. Inaction didn’t sit well which left him with only one choice: to assume the girl was stupid enough to ignore his advice and had danced. At least he could search the seasons for her.


He hoped he wouldn’t find her.


He started in Spring. The princesses he’d met before had preferred the cool, pale season above the others. Something about balance and rebirth. Mist tangled among the silver trees, the faint breeze stirring a soft melody from the leaves. Light glowed in the hazy air, sheening from paper thin bark and dew moistened leaves. A beautiful, gentle morning.


No princess.


Summer embraced him in warmth, still pleasant yet though the glitter of sunlight through emeralds warned the day would grow warmer still. Water rustled over stone, the waterfall sheeting into the pool, unbroken.


No sign that the princess had ever been here.


He entered Autumn with rising hope. Halfway through the seasons and no sign of the girl. Maybe she’d listened to reason after all. The sultry caress of heat slowed his steps, inviting him to nap. Light shimmered on gilded leaves with an almost hypnotic cadence.


He shook himself out of his daze and moved on. There was no time for a nap now. One more season waited before he went back to the tower and started throwing rocks.


Winter wrapped around him, chill in spite of the pristine diamond shine of sunlight on white velvet snow. Ice motes in the air caught the light and fractured it into a thousand dancing rainbows. Silence lay over the landscape.


“Aislinn?”


His voice sounded muffled and indistinct. He frowned. Snow dampened sound, that was fact, but this was different. Something more was at work here. He tried again.


“Aislinn!”


Her name murmured into the air and Rowan cursed. She was here, damn it. It was the only reason for him to be obstructed which made little sense to him. The girl was here for him to fall in love with, wasn’t she? Putting her at risk this way was counterproductive.


Unless the point was for him to fight to protect her. He snorted, planting his hands on his hips and gazing around. He was more than willing to fight the Time King on any field offered. He wasn’t doing this for the girl but to tweak the King’s nose.


He began his search, moving more quickly now in a progression of meandering paths that crossed the season in a grid. Drifts of snow impeded his path and he was forced to change course more than once. His steps made no sound as they broke through the ice crusted snow and the branches of the trees draped overhead, thick and muffling.


A glimpse of crimson on white caught his eye and he turned toward it. Bushes pushed up in his way, forming a barrier of snow and ice. Rowan ignored the impediment and pushed through, wading up to his hips and snapping off branches as they snatched at his clothes. Brute force was sometimes the only answer to a King who would love to trail him around in mazes for hours.


In the center of a wide glade, the princess lay in the snow, one arm over her head, her body curled into a pained ball. The fiery length of her hair had come loose from the clip she wore and tangled over the snow cover, ice beginning to anchor her in place. Frost coated her skin and gown, hazed along her eyelashes and blended her brows with her pale, translucent skin. Rowan knelt beside her, his heart beating hard. With careful hands, he rolled her onto her back. Her limbs flopped gracelessly wide and her head lolled to the side. At her throat, he sought and found a pulse, thin and weak but there.


Snarling curses under his breath, he gathered her up and rose. Damn girl had nearly killed herself after he’d warned her not to dance. He was going to take a strip off her hide when she woke up. But his heart didn’t stop pounding in his chest, the blood in his veins as cold as the winter air around them. While this princess was taller than those he’d known before and sturdier, she felt small in his arms, too fragile and breakable. He had to get her back to the tower and warmed up.


The trip was easy enough. He walked ten yards in a single direction and abruptly stepped from Winter into the moderate nothing season around the tower. Still no sign of Wheezer.


He bumped the door open and carried the princess inside, kicking the door closed behind him. The fire muttered on the hearth, bare flickers of flame that were, at least, keeping the room warm. He laid Aislinn on the bed and jerked the covers from under her. She lay as if frozen, frost liming her skin and hair like a veil. He had to warm her up and he had to do it fast.


Throwing more wood on the fire, he coaxed the flames into a roar before dragging the bed closer to the hearth. He left the covers wadded at the foot of the bed. Right now they would only serve to insulate her from the heat that was beginning to filter into the room.


What else could he do? Glancing at her, he looked down at himself, closed his eyes and swore. Most of the heat from the fire was being absorbed into the room itself. It would take a while before the air warmed enough to do her any good and he needed to get her warm now. She didn’t have the time to wait.


Grumbling under his breath, knowing he was being manipulated into this, he toed off his boots, shrugged out of his shirt and crawled onto the bed. Wrapping his arms around her, he pulled her back against him, trying not to flinch from the unnatural chill of her skin.


There was a time when he would have put her in a medical tube and let the machine warm her at a moderate pace that wouldn’t put such a strain on her heart. Even without access to a med tube, he could have used the thermal blanket that was in every soldier’s ditty bag.


Time.


He snugged the girl closer, tamping down on the rage that always simmered just under the surface. If he hadn’t been a fool and bargained for more than Fate had allotted him, Aislinn wouldn’t be here right now. She would be safe from the Time King’s machinations.  It wasn’t personal. He didn’t know the girl well enough for that. The fact remained she was trapped and was hurt because of his stupidity.


He held her, wrapping himself around her as best he could, trying to share his body heat. Slowly, too slowly, the frost began to fade from her skin and the fire edged back into her hair. But she didn’t move. If it weren’t for the faint rise and fall of her breathing and the steady beat of her heart, he might have thought her dead.


Time passed and the air warmed.  Rowan stirred from her side long enough to brew a warm drink to help replenish his own body heat before crawling back onto the bed and holding her. Nearly an hour passed before the first faint tremors shivered over her body and he began to hope she might come through it unharmed. He rubbed her arms and legs, trying to restore circulation. The trembling became violent shaking that felt as if her body was trying to tear itself apart and her breathing became labored gasps.  He continued to rub her arms, holding her so that she wouldn’t hurt herself by falling out of bed or hitting the heavy wooden frame. The shakes eased after a while into hard shivers and Rowan reached for the blankets, covering them both.


Her breathing eased and he knew she slept. Sliding away from her, he got something to eat and put some soup on to warm. She would need the heat as much as the fluid when she woke. Retreating to the table, he watched her sleep.


She wasn’t like the princesses he’d known, he mused. She had more fire in her, more life. She wasn’t afraid of him. Granted, that might be a matter of a lack of common sense than courage, but he appreciated it. He’d hated feeling too large, too rough for good company. She didn’t rail against her imprisonment but fought to get free on her own terms. He could appreciate the sentiment even if he did think her rash for ignoring his warnings.


Aislinn shifted, curling in on herself. Her hair draped over the edge of the bed, brushing the floor and baring her back. Her wings lay tight against her back, the colors like brilliant inked art against her pale skin. They were beautiful but confusing. If memory served, the Sidhe didn’t have wings. They didn’t need them to fly. She’d said her father was Tuathe de’. They didn’t have wings either. It didn’t make her a liar, just a puzzle.


He hated puzzles. Linear and absolute were more to his taste.


She uncurled with a cry, her body arching off the bed and Rowan was on his feet, moving before thought congealed. He caught her when she would have fallen, brutal tremors shaking through her slender form.


“Easy,” he crooned. “Easy now.”


“Rowan!” She caught at him, her grip tight on his arms as her lashes swept up. Eyes too pure blue to be real met his, desperate and pleading. “I need you to kiss me.”


“What?” He reared back and would have dropped her but she held on, odd golden sparks beginning to ignite in the cerulean depths of her eyes.


“Kiss me. Ground the power.”


Another seizure nearly ripped her from him. She was too hot, he realized abruptly. Her skin flushed with heat and steam rose from her hair.


“Please.”


The whisper was faint as her grip on him lost strength. Her lashes drifted down and her gaze went hazy again, the blue lost in the growing golden fire. He was losing her.


He didn’t stop to think about it, didn’t ponder the risk he was taking. Bending down, he caught her mouth with his. He hadn’t had any practice at kissing, no experience to fall back on. He just mashed his lips to hers and hoped it would be enough.


A spark jolted through him, a live wire that set every nerve in his body humming. Power surged into the breach, fire that quickened his breath and made his heart pound. His blood heated and he growled into her mouth. The small loss of control acted like accelerant on a bonfire. The power flooded him and his body reacted. His brain sizzled to a halt, thought disconnecting in the face of raw, physical sensation.


Pleasure. So much pleasure. So much it terrified him.


The fire ebbed and he jerked free, dropping her back on the bed and retreating. She didn’t follow. Her lashes drifted down over eyes once more blue and her slim body softened into the covers.


“Thank you.”


Her whisper followed him out of the tower and into what freedom the forest offered.