Never again did he allow them to enter his house, never again did he allow Mama to speak of the exorcists, not even when seizures flung Ellysetta howling to the floor. Thereafter only Papa could get near her when the seizures came, and he would hold her and rock her as every muscle in her body clenched in agonizing pain. He would sing to her, softly, his tears spilling on her skin, his love wrapping around her. And she would cling to him, finding refuge in his unwavering love, anchoring herself to him until the torturous seizures passed.

"He is a good man, your father," Rain murmured.

"Yes. The best I've ever known." But she knew … she'd always known … that as much as Papa loved her, he also feared the thing that lived inside her.

And she knew he was right to fear it.

"Rain, if he hadn't stopped the exorcists, I don't know what would have happened, but it would have been bad. Very bad.”

"What do you mean?”

"I wanted to kill them, the men who drove those needles into me. I was only a child, but I'd already seen death through my nightmares. I saw it again then, in my mind, but this was different. It wasn't a nightmare. It was what I wanted to happen, what I wanted to do to them. I saw those men torn apart, screaming as their limbs were ripped from their bodies. I saw myself laughing, dancing in a shower of their blood, drinking it like a child drinks rain as it falls from the sky." She pressed her hands to her cheeks. "Oh, Rain, what kind of monster am I?”

She waited for his horror or revulsion, but it never came. Instead his arms enfolded her and pulled her close against his chest. "Ellysetta … Shei'tani … You are not evil to have wished those exorcists dead for torturing you as they did. And do not believe you could have killed them, even though you dreamed of it. Fey women cannot kill, not even to defend their own lives. Their natural empathy prevents it."

"But Rain—”

"Shh. Hear me out. Even though your physical appearance seems mortal, there is little doubt in my mind that your blood is Fey. Who your parents are and why they did not return to the Fading Lands before your birth, I cannot say, but your soul shines too brightly and your magic is too strong for me to believe you are anything else.

"When those men hurt you, adding more pain on top of that you were already suffering, your Fey heritage must have stirred in anger against the crimes done against you. The tairen lives in us all, and it is not a tame creature." He smoothed her hair back from her face and stared earnestly into her eyes. "Do you think Marissya has never wished death upon another? Nei, Fey women are not so timid as that. They are gentle, aiyah, and compassionate, but even they feel the tairen rouse when pushed hard enough.”

Hope flickered in Ellysetta's heart. "Do you really think that's what it was?”

"I have no doubt" The unwavering certainty in his eyes made her consider, for the first time in her life, that perhaps the dark, dangerous thing inside her wasn't evil after all.

"But … even if that's true, it doesn't explain why all my life I've suffered those horrible seizures and nightmares.”

"That is a separate matter." Cold anger flickered in his eyes, making them glow. "If I am right, this Shadow Man of yours is a Mage, and he's been hunting you all your life. Definitely in your dreams. Night is the time when Azrahn grows strongest, and dreams are one realm where Azrahn lives in us all. I suspect your nightmares, your seizures, and probably those wandering souls, those ghosts you feel walking across your grave, are all connected, and all in some way spawned by the Mages." He stroked her hair.

"But why would they do that to me?”

"You are a Tairen Soul's mate. Your magic, though you keep it locked away, is powerful beyond measure. Even as a child, they must have known something about you—or known enough to hunt for you. Soon we will be wed, and I will take you back to the Fading Lands. We will search for answers there. When I discover who has been tormenting you, I will make certain they can never do so again.”

This time, the cold, implacable promise of death and retribution did not frighten her. It made her feel safe instead. She'd told him the worst nightmare of her soul, and he had not reviled her. She turned to him, burrowing into his arms, pressing her face to the warmth of his throat. "Hold me, Rain. Keep me safe.”

"I will give my life before allowing harm to come to you, shei'tani." He rested his cheek against the soft spirals of her hair and closed his eyes, breathing in the delicate scent that was already imprinted on his soul. The tairen in him stirred to life, but this time with fierce protectiveness rather than hunger, solicitous of its mate and her fragile state.

With more instinct than thought, Rain began to croon a soft, wordless, purring song, a song of thought and magic and emotion all woven together in silken, resonant waves.

In his arms, Ellysetta went still. He felt her breath catch in her lungs, then release in shallow, delicate gasps filled with wonder. Within her soul, a tiny, unseen door cracked open. Communion, like a shimmering beam, fell upon him and in that shining sliver of warmth the first, fragile bond between them was formed. A tender, tremulous thing. A warm light where moments ago there had been only cold, dark solitude.

His ancient soul trembled, its fierce arrogance humbled. Tears—his first in a thousand years—glimmered in his eyes. He blinked. The tears spilled down his cheeks, and he marveled at the feel of them, warm and wet, cooling rapidly. One tear tracked to the corner of his mouth, and the long- forgotten flavor of salty wetness touched the tip of his tongue.