The House Of Gaian

comments about maids being lured by moonlight and the sea.
    “I think so,” Murtagh replied. “A persistent lover can be a powerful force in the world, and he was everything his rival was not.”
    “And how long did he stay?”
    “They were together until a few years ago, when one of Death’s Servants took his spirit to the Shadowed Veil.”
    “Was your father as constant?” She was sorry she’d asked, because he stopped walking and just stared at the sea.
    “It’s hard to say,” Murtagh finally said. “Even for a selkie, there are dangers in the sea. He went out one day and never came back. Now my mother was another story. She was from a southern Clan. He must have cared for her, because he stayed with her—and stayed away from the sea—until my sister was born two years after I was. The southern Fae don’t allow half-breeds in their precious pieces of Tir Alainn. She didn’t know my father wasn’t pure Fae until my sister was born—a babe who didn’t look Fae. She demanded that my father take the two of us down to the human world and abandon us. Instead he abandoned her and brought us back here. He disappeared a few months later. My grandparents raised me and my sister.”
    “Why did you tell me this?” Jenny asked softly.
    Murtagh turned away from the sea and looked at her. “So you would know I understand about family. I’
    m keeping watch for your brother’s ship.”
    “I know. Cordell said you would. But...”
    “What favor do you want from the Lord of the Selkies?”
    “I’d like to stay here for a few days.” Jenny raised her hands, then let them fall to her sides. “Foolish, I know, but—”
    “But once he passes this island, he’ll have clear sailing back to Sealand ... and safe harbor. The sooner you know that, the easier you’ll feel.”
    “Yes.”
    “Then stay. Gran will be pleased to have company.”
    “Gran?”
    Murtagh grinned. “You’re welcome to stay with me, but I think you’d be more comfortable guesting with my grandmother.”
    “Yes,” Jenny murmured, feeling flustered. She didn’t want to stay with him. She really didn’t. But she hadn’t expected him to anticipate that and provide the solution.
    His expression serious now, Murtagh brushed his fingertips down one side of her face. “You’re easy on the eyes, Lady Jennyfer, and if times were different, I would have given considerable thought to courting you by moonlight and the songs of the sea. But I think, right now, you need a friend more than a lover.
    So I’m offering a friend’s hand rather than a lover’s kiss. Is that all right with you?”
    She clasped the hand he held out to her. “Yes.”
    He studied her. “Is there something else?”

    “I wish—” She pressed her lips together.
    “You wish ...?”
    She shook her head. “It’s nothing. It’s foolish.”
    Keeping her hand in his, he started walking back to the harbor. “Wishes may not be granted, but they’re never foolish. What is it you wish?”
    “I have kin who live near the Mother’s Hills. Some of the family was heading there overland so that not all of us would be together in case... in case we couldn’t get past the eastern barons. My cousin Breanna
    ... I wish I could send her a letter, letting her know where I am.”
    “She holds a special place in your heart,” Murtagh said after a small silence.
    “Yes.” Jenny smiled, remembering a summer when the two of them had changed a storm by celebrating it.
    “Then write your letter.”
    Her smile faded. “I couldn’t risk it. If the letter was confiscated by a baron or magistrate controlled by the Inquisitors, they would know about her, know where to find her—and my other kin as well.”
    Murtagh snorted. “This is an Old Place, and you’re among the Fae. I’ll send your letter by messenger.
    He’ll travel through Tir Alainn. Your letter will get to your cousin safely, that I can promise you.” He smiled at her as he led her toward the cottage closest to the sea. “You see? It wasn’t such a foolish wish after all.”

 

     
     

Chapter 16

 

     
     

     
    waxing moon
     
    “But I thought we were going north!” Gwynith almost wailed as she hastily closed her canteen.
    “We were. Now we’re not.” Selena attached her own canteen to Mistrunner’s saddle and mounted.
    While Gwynith and the two escorts who had remained with them scrambled to mount their horses, she studied the Mother’s Hills rising up in the distance. A hard day’s ride