Rituals (Cainsville 5)

I flashed to a memory of Pamela's, of being brought here to see the woman I now realized was my great-great-aunt, a figure who'd haunted my visions and nightmares. Unable to deal with her own fae powers, she'd wound up incarcerated here, clawing out her own eyes and cutting out her own tongue.

Pamela had somehow understood what had happened to her great-aunt. That was my mother's gift--her curse. She could recognize fae, even when she hadn't understood what they were. All she'd known was that they were not human and that her aunt had done these horrible things to herself, and it had something to do with these creatures.

Can I blame my mother for hating the fae? For growing up harboring a hatred so deep it poisoned everything?

I can blame her for what she did to Gabriel. That was a choice. But can I blame her for seeing him--the living representative of their legendary king--and being unable to overcome her loathing?

My mother is, in her way, not unlike Seanna Walsh. We can hold them accountable for the choices they ultimately made, while still understanding that something inside them made those choices far easier than they should have been.

I walked to the gravestone I'd cleared the last time. My great-great-aunt's. Vines had already wriggled across it, and I was pushing them away when Ioan walked over, back to his usual self now, with Brenin at his side.

"It's a relative," I said. "My great-great-aunt..."

I trailed off as I read the name. Charles L. Manners.

"Interesting name for an aunt," Ioan said.

"The last time I was here, I cleared it and saw her name, and then fell through into a vision."

"Then I would suggest her name was part of your vision. This appears to be what we would have called a pauper's grave, for those without family. I can hardly imagine your people would have abandoned her here."

"You're right."

I kept looking at the stone, and in my mind I did see her name. Then I saw her again, my last vision of her, following me through the halls of the asylum, urging me to kill myself, telling me it was the only way out.

That image still haunts me. I'd like to think it was a projection of whatever dark magic worked in this place, but part of me fears it really was her, that she really did think that was the only solution.

"Liv?" Ioan said softly.

I straightened. "Okay, so this is the part where you send the beast-spies in to see what the sluagh have in mind. How does it work?"

"Well, first, I need your hand."

I started to reach out. Then I stopped. Since the moment his horse first took flight, I'd forgotten what I'd really come with him for: to see what Ioan was up to.

When I hesitated, he arched his brows. Then he nodded and said, "You think I have a trick up my sleeve. I do. But you're going to have to give me your hand to see it."

A smile played on his lips. Naturally charming. Naturally charismatic. That's what Cwn Annwn were. Yet I saw his smile and it was like being back on the horse, all my doubts melting. I gave Ioan my hand, and he laid it on Brenin's head.

"Close your eyes," he said.

I did.

"Now I'm going to take your other hand. Feel it?"

I nodded as his fingers encircled mine.

"All right, then." Brenin, go!

Ioan's last two words resounded in my head, and I flew off my feet. I hit the ground, knees and feet and hands smacking against it, and all I could see was the black blur of Brenin's fur as he dragged me through the cemetery.

I tried to let go, screamed for Brenin to stop, but the hound ignored me. My hand seemed grafted to him, as if he were a kelpie, dragging me to my doom.

I'd been tricked.

Of course I'd been tricked. Fae lied. The Cwn

Annwn were just better at hiding it.