The soft hand brushed her forehead again, deceptively gentle. "Can you move?" Achren murmured.

Eilonwy considered not answering. But what good would it do? She could not stay in the bottom of a boat. Whether or not she could move, and how much, was not so easily answered; she shrugged, tearing her eyes away from that white face, and stared stonily at the begrimed boards beneath her.

Achren regarded her silently for a long moment, then motioned to the gag at her mouth. "There is no need for this barbarism," she declared, to Magg. "Remove it."

He hesitated. "Milady, she did attempt to spellcast as we struggled."

"Did she?" An arch, pleased purr. "Nonetheless, obey me. She will need her voice. And so shall we all."

My voice, Eilonwy thought, or yours? But she lay still as stone, and deigned not to look at Magg as he loomed over her. Something flashed at the corner of her vision, and a cold, blunt edge of metal slid against her throat. It pressed, trembling, a little too hard for its purpose. She hated the twitch in her own skin, the instinctive, almost imperceptible recoil in muscle and tendon that betrayed her fear to her assailant. His obscene delight at being its cause pressed against her consciousness, and she pulled away from him in revulsion. Filthy wretch. You'll find out what she is when she's done with you.

The blade moved, and the tension at her jaw popped free, just as she acknowledged her own vindictive pleasure at the thought of Magg's eyes being picked out by ravens, and squirmed between alternating mental discomforts. Dallben would say such inclinations were dangerous. Achren, despite giving him his orders, would say it was only what he deserved. She trusted Dallben's judgements over Achren's, of course...and yet...

"Free her hands," Achren commanded, pulling the gag away.

Magg moved. A tug at Eilonwy's wrists sent shock up her arms, spasming her shoulder, prompting a hoarse cry of pain. Achren bent over her again sharply. "Take care! She is hurt."

"She fought me," Magg repeated hastily, sawing at her bonds. "I did what I had to. If she is injured, it is due to her resistance, and no fault of mine."

The ropes parted, and Eilonwy's arms fell free and forward; she curled herself up in agony, groaning as her long-strained muscles contracted. "Clumsy fool," Achren growled, her hands busy, searching for injury. "Where is the pain?" she whispered. "Do not fight me, child; you know that I can help you."

It was true enough; Achren could heal when she chose, a power she sometimes dangled over the bodies of tortured prisoners, who begged and promised until they realized she bestowed her mercies only that she might break them again a new way. Eilonwy, nauseous with pain and the ugly witness of memory, shut teeth and eyes against both. "I don't want your help," she gasped out, in a harsh rasp.

Achren's hands stilled for a tense moment before they moved again, chafing her arms, working upward; Eilonwy could not bite back a yelp of pain when they reached her shoulder. Pause. Satisfaction. That relieving warmth flooded her- a drug, administered against her will, that yet served its purpose. She choked on her own rage at being subjected to it, at the traitorous relaxation of her own body under its influence—but the surge of anger drew its own power with it, a return of wholeness, of strength, of the ability to resist.

In a sudden burst of movement, she gathered her stiff limbs beneath her and launched herself up and sideways, pitching herself over the side of the rowboat before either of her captors could react. Water enveloped her in a cold embrace; she scrambled, kicked, found footing and stood up, sloshing backward into waist-high sea.

Magic, blazing with her anger, rushed into her veins and limbs and mouth, took form and shape in words and gestures; Eilonwy flung it with all her strength toward the boat. Magg was nothing but a dark figure, diving backward behind a brilliant sunburst. But Achren had risen. She stood straight in the bow of the boat, arms low, hands held in a warding gesture. The wooden craft ignited beneath her and around her, explosive flames roaring toward the sky. The blast of power tossed her dark robes, tumbled her hair back in a wild tempest of streaming silver. But she stood immobile, illuminated like a goddess, untouched by the heat, her face glowing with exultation.

Eilonwy reeled, stumbling backwards with a sob. Blast it all! Magic didn't work, had never worked, when Achren was concerned. How? How, after all these years, after all she had learned, could she still do nothing against her? Dallben could have taught her, could have helped her, but he had not; no, he had sent her away, instead—dropped her, defenseless, right back into the hands of a woman he had never been able to confirm was no longer a threat.

She screamed out curses in rage, flung spell after spell, felt the crumbling of the burning boat in her core. Blazing chunks fell into the waves and floated, until the surrounding water was fractured with glowing orange, sending up smoke in wavering clouds. Achren stepped calmly from the hull as it broke apart, and waded through the wreckage in a wide arc, watching her all the while like a silent, stalking cat. She moved until she stood upon dry land, and then she stood still, waiting, full of that expectant, triumphant light.

Eilonwy dropped to her knees in the water, choking on the last of her screams, on the dregs of useless magic. The current drifted, pulled at her clothes and hair, drifting sand across her submerged feet and legs. She dug her hands into the seafloor. A vibrating buzz met her fingertips, singing through her arms, a counterpoint to the bodiless voices that still whispered and hummed around her, audible again now that her fury had burned itself out. They still spoke no words she knew, but they pulled her to and fro like the ebb and flow of each wave that swept past: cajoling, demanding, soothing, tempting by turns. Around her, in the water, turquoise light was coalescing into constellations, winking and shimmering at the edges of her gown, at the crest of every ripple that broke against her.

"You see."

Achren's voice. Eilonwy looked up, exhausted, at the woman standing a stone's throw away, the filmy edges of the water breaking at her feet.

"See," Achren repeated, waving toward the glittering water, "the sea knows you. Tan Llyr has met every one of your mothers at these shores, from the very beginning, and so it greets you, a gift of Llyr." She raised her hand, beckoning. "Eilonwy, daughter of Angharad. Come. The land of your mothers has long awaited you. Come and look upon it."

Eilonwy gulped, and shivered—an answer to the faint tremor she sensed, as though the land itself had moved at Achren's words, shifted forward for a better look at her. She stared toward the proud figure, at what took shape beyond it. In what little light remained, a dark beach lay braced by jagged rocks, sloping up to a craggy silhouette against the clouds. Cliffs? Yes, but...not cliffs only. The blunt tops of towers, bereft of collapsed roofs, rose from a central mass. Fractured stone arches framed the sky like torn black webbing. Dark lines traced crumbled walls downward, merging with the bedrock foundation of tumbling stone. Behind Achren, ancient stairs led from the sand upwards, a winding invitation into mystery.

The voices urged her, all but pushed her forward. The sand came loose and sifted through her fingers, was sucked away in the current, leaving her hands empty. It's gone, she thought. It's gone...gone, no matter what it was once. Why bring me here? Only to show me all I have lost?

Tiny sparks of green danced beneath her face, congregating, as though curious, around every place her tears fell, marking their impact with tiny, expanding rings of light. For a heartbeat she could see the shape of each droplet, surrounded and shimmering, before it was unmade and released into the cold sea. So easy, she thought wearily. If only...

"Come," Achren called again, and the voices moaned in her ears. What did they want, then, these empty ghosts of Llyr? Whose side were they on?

She could not stay here, lost and cold in the water with only these tiny lights for company. She must go somewhere, and there was nowhere to go but forward, where Achren stood as gatekeeper between her and whatever lay claim to her beyond. No divine moon glimmered benevolently above, no friend or protector stood at her side; she was only herself, alone in this web woven by a master hand. Would she be enough?

Her hands wrapped into her drifting skirts, tangling within the fabric, and she realized that her makeshift pocket, despite its mishap, was still partially attached. Something small and hard brushed her fingers; she groped between the folds and found the shard of ormer.

I was alone, for all the years before I escaped her the first time. The smooth surface of the shell pressed against her thumb—a fragment, but smooth and unmarred. I was enough, then. I shall have to be, again.

She stood slowly, and pushed through the surf, turquoise fire streaming from her figure and shattering upon the water in blue embers, until she stepped upon the beach. Achren reached out, as though she would embrace her; Eilonwy swerved away from her in outrage and halted, staring, registering an astonishing thing: they were the same height.

In her memory, Achren had always towered over her—a detail accurate enough in her earliest recollections; but it held true even later, in the times just prior to her escape, when the difference between them could not have been nearly so vast as it seemed in her mind's eye. Now here they stood, face to face, in a silent, tense assessment, and she felt a strange thrill at the sight of those icy eyes on level with her own.

Achren was beautiful still...breathtakingly so; Eilonwy had always denied it, with the willful blindness of childhood resentment, but she conceded it now. Though there were signs of age in the lines around her eyes, the fine bones of the queen's cold face were as chiseled, her brow as smooth, and the sensuous curve of her lips as full, as ever they had been when men had groveled at her feet within the Great Hall of Spiral Castle. But there was something new in her gaze...something drained and weary, and no less dangerous for it, like the weariness of an injured wolf that will fight to the death before baring its belly.

The silence stretched out. Eilonwy waited, heart pounding, meeting that cold gaze as though her life depended on not blinking.

"Look at you," Achren breathed out, finally. "Grown powerful on your own, beyond my expectations." There was an odd pride in her voice, as though she credited herself with such advancement. "By the gods, you are a beauty: your mother made over. If she stood again before me I could hardly tell you apart."

Before anyone else who called her a beauty under such conditions, Eilonwy would have laughed, and mocked them for their insincerity. But Achren did not pay compliments for their own sake, and the word, on her lips, was not flattery. "How, then," she muttered sullenly. "Did she stand before you wretched and drenched, after being abducted, knocked senseless, and dragged into a boat?"

"Not at all. But you favor her all the same." Achren's mouth twitched up wryly. "In particular, with that expression that says you'd be pleased to see me hanging upon my own gibbet."

Eilonwy's scowl deepened and she broke her gaze, staring angrily out at the dark water. "I'm glad to know she passed some good sense on to me, then."

She heard a quick, measured inhale. "I see some things, at least, have not changed," Achren said levelly. "I do not reproach your anger; you have been cruelly treated today, and I regret that there was no way to bring you here willingly. Nevertheless, your perversity will only waste time." She stepped closer, her voice lowering, a compelling, coaxing thrum. "There is no need to spend your strength fighting me. I have not summoned you here as prisoner, but as a queen to her rightful domain. I have only ever sought for you to claim your destiny. In the end, you will know the reward to be worth all your trials."

She motioned toward the stone steps. "Are you not curious, at least, to see your homeland?"

"It doesn't appear to be much of a land," Eilonwy observed, standing her ground, "if all that's left is a half-ruined castle."

"All that is left, for the moment," Achren countered. "Would I have brought you here, to enthrone you over only bare stone and empty sea? You cannot fathom the grandeur of what this place once was. And what it can be once more, with your power to restore it. All this, I can show you."

"Why?" Somehow the words were twisting in her thoughts, melding with the chorus of voices that sang at the edges of her mind, confusing and bewildering; behind them she seemed to see green fields and hills, lush with wildflower banks and clover, sparkling rills and waterfalls; blue banners emblazoned with a triple moon, snapping high upon the bobbing masts of ships, upon the tops of shining towers. She shook her head, dispelling the visions. "It's always been you who wants a throne. I don't want to be anything more than who I am."

"You," Achren said, stepping close to her again, eye to eye, "have no idea who you are."

The voices rang in her head, insistent; she could barely think around them. "That's not true."

That blade-smile flashed in the dusk. "Eilonwy of Llyr." How could her own name sound so much like a taunt? "Daughter of Angharad. Daughter of Regat. Daughter of Mererid. Daughter of Morgana..."

"Stop."

"Daughter of Ceinwen. Daughter of Glesni. Daughter of Eleri..."

"Stop it!" She crushed her hands over her ears, but now the voices had taken up the recitation, chanting one name after another, names flowing like the blood in her veins passed down from this relentless line of queens, carved into her ears as though she were the monument upon which their memory depended.

Daughter of Rhiann, Daughter of Eurolwyn, Daughter of Creirwy, Daughter of Branwen, Daughter of Llyr, of Llyr, of Llyr....

"I know all that!" It was a desperate cry, shouted above a din only she could hear. "It doesn't matter. They've gone, Llyr is gone. None of it means anything, anymore."

The voices moaned, and Achren's eyes gleamed in a triumphant flash of cold grey. "That is by no means true. Your ancestors lived here, loved here, fought and bled for this land, built it up by their skill and their power. The magic spun by your mothers still sleeps in every stone, waiting for one of their own to awaken it."

The ormer shard, clutched against her thumb, burned like ice, like fire, vibrating to the rhythm of her pulse, to the increased cadence of her breath.

"King Llyr lies at its heart," Achren went on, "buried beneath the sea. Your mother risked her life and rescued the island's people when she could not stop its destruction. Would you make her sacrifice for naught, when you could raise it again? Bring your people back from exile?"

Bring them back? Her feet seemed heavy, suddenly, melded to the earth beneath with something stronger than her weight, even as her body seemed lighter and lighter, suffused with a spreading buoyancy, euphoric and frightening in its intensity. She shook her head again, desperate to clear it, no longer certain of anything. Of what did Achren speak? Llyr had been destroyed, its people perished in the sea. Gwydion had told her so; everyone knew it. No one knew how...no one, not even Dallben, not even...

"How do you know any of this?"

"I was here."

Eilonwy stared. The voices moaned a mournful undertone. "You."

"Indeed. The Queen herself, your grandmother, invited me here, to help shore up the island against an outside threat."

It was a slap in the face. "She did not," Eilonwy gasped. "They would never have called you. You lie; you have lied to me all my life."

"You need not rely on my words. Know the truth for yourself." Achren circled her, moved in from behind, whispered over her shoulder. "This is your place, and it calls you. The voices of Llyr have been speaking all this time, since the moment you came near; I know, for I hear them in part; the land speaks to me as the sea speaks to you. Listen."

"I can't understand them."

"Your heart knows the meaning. Only listen. Stop fighting, and open yourself to what they tell you."

Eilonwy trembled, her resistance crumbling. Achren, she could defy, but this was something else entirely. In the buzz under her feet, in her ears, on the air, there was an essence that wrapped around her, recognized her. It was pouring in, streaming, filling the dark spaces in her that had never known their own shape and lighting them up like a morning sky. The voices sang, their chorus mingled with the endless rhythm of the sea. Her heart pounded, matching them, in an anxious but ecstatic cadence.

She took a step, and the chorus rose, expectant. Another, and another, and the voices cried out in welcome. She reached out, touched the face of the stone, its surface etched with centuries of salt, inlaid with millennia of crystal. That same flow, that undefinable power, breathed here too, a dark, smooth inhale to match and balance the fire in her gasping inhale.

"You see," Achren said again, from somewhere behind her, but she barely heard it. She did see, many things, in a swift series of impressions. Light on water, a ship gliding along its liquid path, silver sails sweeping after a flock of birds. A young couple: a dark-haired man, beautiful as a moonlit night, a golden-haired woman, radiant as summer. They stood waist-deep in water, embracing amid swirling turquoise sea-fire. Warriors marched and weapons clashed: men and women fought side-by-side. A ring of towering stones rose over shadows and mist, their feet lost in secrets. White-clad, flower-crowned girls sang around an altar, fragrant with smoking incense. Women enthroned among flower garlands and bowers of blooming willow trees clasped newborn infants to their breasts, reverent attendants pressing curled hands to their hearts. Horses galloped down a beach, shouting girls perched lightly on their backs, their faces fearless, their hair flying behind like banners. A tall girl, her head a streaming silken crown of red-gold, ascended a dais before an assembled crowd. Someone behind her slipped a fine chain over her head, settling a silver crescent at her breast; a gem set within it shone like a star. Three women, standing on a high tower: two dark-robed and careworn, the other an image of herself, all clasping hands around a central figure, whose hands carved enchanted symbols into the air, trailing sparks. Achren. It was Achren.

Eilonwy cried out and stumbled, threw out both hands to catch herself. The ormer shard tumbled from her grasp. Black rock met her palms with a burst of cold liquid magic; it flooded her in a breathtaking instant. It was moonlight; it was starlight; it was sweetness and saltwater, as wild as the wind moaning in marsh-grass, as deep and rich as the thunder of the surf upon the cliffs. It was both ancient and new, and perfectly familiar, as fitted as a garment made exactly to her measurements, a sense that had always been there, whose existence she had never known.

Had she?

Memory stretched, reaching back, and back, found the barrier where it could go no further, the wall beyond which she had never been able to see, never tried too hard to climb, sensing the horror that lurked behind it. But this magic recognized it as foreign, found the cracks in its foundation and slid into them like water. The silver thread running through her knew its own shape on the other side, sent forth tendrils of itself to join together with what she had been before. Like roots it spread through the weak places in the wall, crumbling them; like a flood it swept them away, and left her gasping with the rush of returned self.

It was too much at once, memories that could crush her beneath their weight. She turned from them, and they chased her like ghosts, as shrill as the cries of her mother the day she had been stolen, ringing again in her ears. Blinded by visions, she ran, and came to herself, panting, exhausted, at the top of the stone stairs. She stood upon a high point, looking across a channel to the bones of the ruined castle, surrounded by a battered sea wall. Light glimmered from a single narrow window, high in one central structure. The surf roared at its feet.

The voices sang a warning, and she looked behind her; Achren had followed her up the stair.

"Stop!" It came out in a white breath that hung between them in the air. Eilonwy backed away, trembling. "Don't come any closer to me."

The woman halted, wary and expectant. "You feel it," she said, holding up a placating hand. "Power that awaits your will to command it. Magic that only you can harness. It is the legacy of your people."

"But why do you care?" Raindrops dotted the stone around them, as though the tears she held back, determined to fall anyway, had manifested themselves outside of her. "It can never be yours."

Achren lowered her hand. "It is true," she said. "I can share in it, in part, where our elements entwine. But the magic of Llyr is not mine to wield."

"Yet in pursuit of it you stole me from my family," Eilonwy cried, voice breaking in spite of her resolve. "I know it! I know it now! You took me away, and then you blocked my memories of them. You raised me as a captive, until I broke free, and now you have stolen me again. Just to bring me here and tell me I can raise an island from the dead?" The voices groaned as though pleading for release, and she shook them off angrily. "An island whose fate cannot possibly interest you—you, who have ever only wanted the throne of Prydain back! Why? What can my future ever have to do with you?"

Achren's face twitched. She moved away from the stairs, and gazed across the channel at the skeletal castle. But for her long hair, caught by the wind and scattered like gauzy strands of spider silk, she stood so still that she might have been another ruined pillar, half eaten away by time.

"I have long known that I would never again wear the crown," she said. Her voice rang hollow, the falling rain catching and pulling it down into the stones at their feet. "This, I have seen, in every divination, every scry, every fall of bones. Long ago, it galled me. Now I weary of the game. It is enough, for me, to ensure that Prydain shall never again be Arawn's, and to have thwarted him wherever I could."

It was strange and surreal, this explanation, as though they were equals, from one who had always silenced her, ignored her, chastised her for asking questions. Eilonwy struggled to find her footing on such unfamiliar ground. "If you'd really wanted to thwart him," she said hotly, "you could've assisted those already fighting him. Instead you spent all your time spying on the Sons of Don, and nearly tortured Gwydion to death."

Achren seemed to flinch ever so slightly at the name. She took a slow breath, and her lip curled in contempt. "They may call themselves by their mother's name, but the Sons of Don are men. They think as men think, and fight as men fight. They waste themselves, hurling the blood of their youth against the black gates of Annuvin, spending all their strength against one who is no longer a mere man." A faint note of grim satisfaction stole into her voice. "I would be fool indeed, to cast in my lot with theirs."

She turned her sharp gaze on Eilonwy, eyes glinting like flint. "The golden ships that brought the spawn of Don to these shores are as foreign to Prydain as your own people, when first they arrived. If I bear no love for them, remember that they did not wrest the throne from Arawn to return it to me, the ruler of this land by birth and by blood, but to claim it for their own. Such is the way of men, and has always been.

"But this all signifies nothing," she went on. "They distrust me, and rightfully, and would have refused any aid I offered. They will let their battles with Arawn lay waste to the entire country before they admit they have failed to stop him. But your aid, they will not refuse."

Eilonwy stared blankly. "My aid."

"Of course. You have proven yourself loyal—several times over, from what I hear." Achren shrugged scornfully. "Raise the island, or do not. Seek out your people and rule them, or leave them be, wherever they are. It is all one to me-though I thought you would want to so honor your ancestry." Her voice grew hard. "But you are an enchantress, whether you would be a queen or no. Only grasp what power is available to you here, and yours may be the hand that tips the balance, ridding this land of Arawn for good."

The words seemed to crackle in her ears. "When," Eilonwy said slowly, "have you ever desired anything to be done for good?"

Achren smiled, a bitter shape through the rain. "You reveal your own ignorance," she said, "to willfully misunderstand me so. It is childish folly to put such names to things. A feast is good, to those invited. To those left out, chewing their own emptiness, it is a waste and a wicked extravagance." She looked away, the smile dissolving. "But if there is such a thing as goodness, Arawn stands in opposition to it. Our reasons for resisting him are worlds apart. I claim no lofty motive, nor do I deny my self-interest. What does it matter, in the end, so long as he is defeated? My power diminishes, but I would live—and die—free from his shadow. Prydain shall be at peace. Perhaps the Sons of Don, dull from having no one to blame for every ill, for having one less excuse for endless war, may even turn their attention to the land's nurturing, at last."

Silence fell, broken only by the rush of falling rain. A streak of light, branched like a river and its tributaries, flashed from sky to sea. Eilonwy felt the jolt of it, deep where her heart beat, a breadth of power virtually unlimited. Could it be true? Could this magic be used to defeat...

"If the power of Llyr is so great," she said, "then why did the Daughters of Llyr not join in the fight against Arawn long ago?"

"They might have done so," Achren answered, after a moment's hesitation, "had their aid been asked. But your foremothers were shrewd; they knew, as I know, that allying themselves with the Sons of Don might result in unforseen ...complications. It was why Regat turned to me, and not Math, when Arawn set his sights on her domain."

"And you brought no complications of your own," Eilonwy retorted.

Achren laughed, a sharp sound that cut through the rain like the swipe of a dagger. "By Gwynn! there speaks Angharad's daughter. I did not say so. But it is water beneath our feet, now."

"It would seem your aid availed them nothing, then."

"There was a confluence of unfortunate circumstances. It is a long and complicated tale, one better told beneath a dry roof, beside a fire. You are weary, and have not eaten or drunk today, I believe. You need make no weighty decisions tonight. Come, at least take shelter and refreshment. Enough of Caer Colur stands, still, to welcome you home."

She gestured to the glowing warmth from the single window. Eilonwy stared toward it, curiosity burning bright, the voices in her mind a steady hum of anticipation. She could stand here, hungry and cold, in the rain, wrestling with the weight of returned memories, trying to shield herself from whatever manipulation Achren was weaving. Or she could play along, and at least be fed and warmed for her risk. Was it wrong, to want to see her mother's home, her people's stronghold? Was it dangerous, to follow this stream of magic trying to pull her to its heart?

"Magg," Achren said aloud, startling her; Eilonwy glanced sideways as a figure materialized from the stairway, realizing that she had forgotten about Magg entirely. Despite his treatment of her all day, despite the threat he had represented, he was, somehow, as forgettable as any tool dropped carelessly by a craftsman once its task was done. In the blazing fire of Achren's presence he had dwindled to a mere shadow, skulking, unnoticed, like a dog trailing a camp, hoping for cast off bones.

"My queen." He bowed low, his spidery limbs akimbo. "What is your command?"

"I have none." Achren turned from him, a mocking smile upon her lips. "We stand upon Llyr, the domain of the Princess Eilonwy, and she will give the commands. What say you?" she continued, to Eilonwy. "Shall this man serve your dinner, and ready your chambers?"

Magg took a step back, mouth open in dismay. Oh, it was clever, diabolically clever to grant her such a backhanded boon! But Achren, whatever else she was, had always been clever.

"Yes," Eilonwy said, watching with satisfaction as Magg's face contorted in pale rage. "Though from several things he said on the way, I gather he is expecting some lavish reward that you have promised him. So when he has finished with my chambers, he can ready yours, and stay there."

She turned from both of them in disgust, ignoring both Magg's strangled sound of outraged protest and Achren's low, cynical chuckle, and surveyed the path before her. A narrow walkway extended along the edge of the channel, flanked by a low stone wall. It was wet and treacherous-looking, disappearing into darkness within a few steps.

"What a convenient thing it would be," she said pointedly. "if I had my bauble, so I could see where to go."

She felt Achren freeze behind her. "What do you mean? Where is it?"

"Somewhere on the riverbank, back on Mona," Eilonwy said, waving a dismissive hand toward Magg. "It fell from my pocket while your spy was dragging me to the boat. And of course, I couldn't say anything. I'm afraid he was a bit too busy clubbing my head to take any notice that it was gone."

There was a cry behind her, a sniveling, animal noise of fear. The air crackled with fire and metal, the old, old familiar smell and taste of Achren's anger.

"You!"

"Mercy, my queen! I did not know, I did not realize—"

His voice cut off in a shriek. Eilonwy turned, though she herself quailed, her body shrinking instinctively away from the anger she had learned to fear, long, long before, whether she were its target or not.

Magg was crouched against the stone wall, his hands flung up over his head in self-protection, as though someone intimidatingly large were looming over him. Achren herself was nothing of the kind, but she gave the impression of it, somehow, as she stood before him, her face flushed crimson with rage.

Her lips moved, and with them the space around them. The earth shifted and cracked, and the wall Magg leaned upon, the stone beneath him, crumbled without warning, leaving him crouched upon a single pinnacle, held to the path with only a sliver of solid stone. The sea churned far below. He screamed in terror, a sound Eilonwy would never have believed could emerge from a grown man's throat, were she not witness to it.

"Escape from that, you witless idiot," Achren hissed, "if you would prove yourself fit for the simplest task."

Without another word or backward glance she whirled, leaving him clinging to his tiny pedestal, gibbering, his face to the ground. Eilonwy stepped back as Achren advanced, staring at his huddled shape.

"You don't care, do you?" she said, as the woman swept past her. "He has served his purpose, and now you don't care whether he lives or not."

Achren paused and turned to her. "Do you?"

She thought of his leering face above her, his sweaty, shaking hands on her legs, his hot breath in her ear, and spoke honestly. "No."

Achren stood close, as potent a pillar of fire before her. Her icy gaze met Eilonwy's with something akin to sympathy—the closest to such she had ever seen in them. "When once you have embraced your power," Achren whispered, in a tone that made her shiver, "you need never fear any man, ever again. None will touch you unless you invite it; none will dare even look at you without your consent. And no matter whom you choose to favor with your attention, you will belong only to yourself." She bent even closer, her proud face as hard as stone. "Of such power, common women only dream. It is the gift of a goddess to her daughters, and it lies in your grasp. Your people knew its value, while you have only begun to realize it. Think well, Princess. You stand upon the brink of a choice—one never given to most."

Eilonwy stood, mouth dry, heart pounding in her throat, as Achren turned and continued down the path, leaving her to follow, not even glancing back to see that she did.

The voices crowded around her, urging her forward. Was there any reason to resist them—beyond her distrust and fear of Achren? Achren, who had, perhaps, just spoken truth to her for the first time in her life. Not that it made her distrust her any less. But was it impossible ... so unthinkable ...that their paths could run side-by-side? Just for this moment...

Eilonwy glanced back at Magg, a dark shape huddled on his fragile pedestal. She felt no pity. Instead, a hot, potent surge of anger made her turn from him, and propelled her down the path. "Achren."

The woman turned, a dark shadow within a stone arch. Beyond her, the towers of Caer Colur rose up black against the pale luminosity of the clouds. Eilonwy walked ahead, past her, and set her foot upon the foundations of the castle of Llyr. The voices in her mind sang in triumph.

"Tell me," she said, "what you mean by embracing my power."


This was one of those rewrite-it-multiple-times-until-you-get-it-right chapters. There is so much riding on this part in the story and I have almost nothing, canonically, to work with...both blessing and curse, in a way. I'm indebted here to the input and writing of fellow author ZosiaDetroit, for all of the work she's done expanding Achren's character into something more complex, dimensional, and even, in some odd way, sympathetic, than she ever was to me in my original readings. I hope my readers are enjoying things! Do check out Zosia's new story, Tan Llyr, on Archive of Our Own, where she weaves a beautiful fable explaining the origin of this phenomenon!