Crown of Iron

Chapter Seven

"I will always come back to you," he says, voice low and solemn as he takes her hand in his own, pressing his lips to her knuckles. "Always."

"Are you swearing me an oath?" A strange, unfamiliar horror fills her heart, as if his words mean more than she knows.

"Yes," he says, voice barely above a whisper. "I am yours, always. I swear it."

A small sphere of golden light appears in the space between them, slowly unfurling into a long golden thread. One end of the thread encircles his wrist, the other encircling her own before dissipating.

She glances up at him from beneath her lashes. "You are stuck with me now, you know," Anya says, her voice barely audible over the lilting, unfamiliar music.

"How is that a problem?" he asks, hooking a finger beneath her chin as he presses his lips to hers once more.

Anya wakes in a cold sweat, flinching as her gaze falls upon Tiarnán standing in the door to her room, his amber eyes flashing in the dark light. He has his quiver slung around his waist and his bow in hand. "Thought you were coming hunting—we need to get going if we're going to catch anything."

Any other day, she would have dreaded being up this early after retiring so late, but even as she sits up and shakes by the fog of sleep, she can't get the dream out of her mind. She can still hear that unfamiliar music in her ears, can still see Elias every time she closes her eyes.

She falls back into her bed with a groan, covering her face with her arm.

~*~

Tall blades of lush grass brush her ankles as she treads along a barely visible dirt path, following Tiarnán as he navigates through the forest with ease. Dappled sunlight breaks its way through the canopy of leaves above, casting a warm golden glow across the endless expanse of green. Birds dive and soar beneath the trees, singing their familiar songs.

Tiarnán is almost invisible amidst the towering trees with his moss coloured cloak and ash brown tunic. If she glances at him out of the corner of her eye, he almost seems to disappear. A belt is loosely tied around his waist, a sheathed dagger and his quiver hanging from the leather strap. Tight leather boots adorn his feet, and he treads silently through the undergrowth with a gait so light he leaves no footprints in his wake.

She is not nearly as graceful.

As a child, she used to play in the forest with Eámann and Brigid, but those days are many winters behind her, and her days at Lord Rian's estate have done little to help her here. There she is proud and tall and dignified. She can play at being noble until it's almost convincing, the illusion only shattering when they look close enough and see that her gown has been patched a dozen times, and the soles of her shoes are starting to wear thin.

Here, she is helpless, subject to the whims of a wild woods that bow to no one. She is dressed in shades of crimson and wine, standing bright against a backdrop of clovers and ferns. The heels of her boots, meant to help her stand tall in the face of nobility, catch on tree roots that stretch across the narrow path.

Anya lifts her skirts, tucking the corner of her hem beneath her belt as she steps across a stream that bisects their path, wondering if getting Eámann to stop complaining about dinner was really worth coming volunteering to go hunting. She doesn't know how she is meant to help—the dagger strapped to her waist is heavy and unfamiliar, and any fire she might conjure would ruin the pelt of any animal they could find.

Tiarnán stops, bending down amongst the grass, his fingertips tracing an outline in the dirt. Then, wordlessly he stands, and continues on. He is focused, calm, and collected, certain in every action he makes. Sometimes, she still thinks of him as a child, and though he is still young, he has been forced to grow up far before his time. He doesn't carry with him the youth present in others his age. His memory of childhood lies long forgotten, and she wonders if he even remembers a time when their mother was still alive.