A Lady and Her Magic (Faerie 1)

One of them harrumphed. “I’m certain you are. Thousands of years, and a human has never entered our land. I think they should be tossed in the gaol and left there to rot!”

Sophia’s grandfather rolled his eyes and banged his gavel. “They’re here on my invitation, gentlemen,” he said. He coughed into his hand.

The Trusted Few looked shocked. “They can be sent back immediately and their memories taken from them.”

Ramsdale shot to his feet. “No one will take a single memory!” he bit out. “Not a single one. My wife went through years of torment because of your need for secrecy. I will not allow it. Not for a single moment longer.”

One of the Trusted Few had the nerve to chuckle. Ramsdale rounded upon him. “Do not test me, old man,” he warned. Ashley clasped Ramsdale on the shoulder and urged him to calm.

Ashley faced Sophia’s grandfather. “You had a reason behind your summons, did you not, sir?” he asked.

“Summons,” the Trusted Few sputtered.

Sophia’s grandfather coughed into his handkerchief and waited a moment to catch his breath. Then he continued. “I am dying, I’m afraid.”

Ramsdale made a noise in his throat but didn’t say anything.

“But I had some wrongs I needed to right before I did. I got you here, gentlemen. Or at least I put it all in motion.”

He sat up straighter in the chair.

“Pray continue,” Ashley encouraged.

“My wife is a mission faerie, as was my daughter. When my daughter fell in love with Ramsdale, I gave no thought at all to the way things were done. I cut her from my life and let her move into yours, simply because those are the rules of the fae. It’s the way we live. But it shall be the way we live no longer.”

The Trusted Few complained amongst themselves.

“I allowed my own prejudices against the humans to take my daughter from me. I let her choose. And she chose love. Looking back on it, I wouldn’t have respected her had she chosen anything less.” He chuckled lightly to himself. “When my granddaughter was presented with the same path, she chose to give up love for family.”

He speared Ashley with a glance. “You love my granddaughter, almost as much as he loves my daughter. You fell in love with one of the fae, more’s the pity. But that is not your fault.” He stopped for a moment to catch his breath.

“It is my belief that with strict re

gulations, the fae and human worlds can mix. It’s against the law of nature to take children from their parents. By doing so, I got to raise my grandchildren, but that’s a travesty in itself.”

Ramsdale looked enraptured.

“I raised three of them, but he didn’t get the honor,” Sophia’s grandfather continued. “And he has three that I haven’t even met and never will.” Emotion choked his voice. “I will die without knowing my grandchildren or their fates.” He slammed his fist down on the tabletop, hitting it so hard that Ashley couldn’t help but wince for him. “But the travesty is that he could have died without knowing his three children. Sophia, Marcus, and Claire could have been lost to him forever. And that, my good sirs, is a crime.”

Ramsdale leaned toward him. “Who is Claire?”

Sophia’s grandfather took a box from his pocket. “She is your third fae child.”

Ramsdale’s mouth fell open. “I have three children?”

His father-in-law slid the box toward him. Then he opened his fist and blew some dust into the air. The Trusted Few looked at it incredulously, as though he’d be shackled in Bedlam within moments. But then he said, “May you share your pain with them all, so they can understand. Open the box.”

Ashley had been there when Sophia opened her box of memories and remembered feeling like he was hit by a team of runaway horses when he’d felt her pain. He steeled himself as Ramsdale opened the box, but it wasn’t enough. The memories swirled around the room like living beasts. They prowled and jumped and danced and fought with all the occupants of the room, and Ashley wanted to do nothing more than leave the chamber and run from the feeling. But he forced himself to experience the heartbreak that came with losing a child. A parent’s desperation in knowing there’s nothing he can do to prevent it. The aching sorrow of remembrance.

The Trusted Few felt it, too. One swiped at his eyes, as another clutched at his throat, choked by the feelings closing in upon them all. Finally, when Ashley worried he could take no more, the feelings dissipated. They settled like dirt after a broom throws it into the air, heavy and dirty.

“We should all be ashamed,” one of the Trusted Few murmured.

The others were a little more reticent. But they slowly agreed. “How can we make it work? Our kind performs a service within the human world. If the fae strive to be part of that world, there can be recriminations.”

“Ambassadors,” Ashley muttered to Ramsdale.

The man appeared to have hope for the first time since they’d sat down. The ruddiness had left his cheeks, and he appeared to understand what was required of him. “Ambassadors.”