Dageus smiled wryly. “You should have seen me, Chloe-lass, lying there, believing that I was dying and never going to see you again, then realizing not only was she going to free me, but she planned to heal me and return me to you.” He paused, pondering what else had transpired, but he couldn’t think of a way to explain it because it hadn’t made full sense to him.

He suspected it never would. There’d been a thick tension between the queen and the other Tuatha Dé, whom she’d called Adam. As he’d lain there, the queen had instructed Adam to heal him, but Adam had protested that Dageus was too near death. Adam had argued that it would cost him too much to save the mortal’s life.

The queen replied that such was the price she was claiming due for the formal plea Adam had lodged—whatever that had meant.

The male Tuatha Dé had not been pleased. Verily, for such an otherworldly being, he’d seemed mortally horrified by her decree.

“What? What aren’t you telling me?” Chloe said impatiently, cupping his face with her hands.

“Och, ’tis naught, lass. I was just thinking there were undercurrents betwixt the two Tuatha Dé that I didn’t fathom. At any rate, Adam healed me and the queen lifted the souls of the Draghar from my body and destroyed them.”

Chloe sighed happily. “Is that when she closed the stones?”

“Aye. She said she’d reconsidered and decided the power to move through time was not one man should yet possess.”

“So why did it take you so long to get back here?”

“Chloe-love, for me, but a few hours have passed since that moment in the catacombs. Only when you told me that it’s been nearly a month, did I understand what the queen meant when she said that time didn’t pass the same way in our realms.”

“So that part of the legend is true too!” Chloe exclaimed. “The ancient tales claim that a single year in the Tuatha Dé’s realm is roughly a century in the mortal world.”

“Aye. Theirs is a different dimension.” He paused, staring down at her with a troubled gaze. He took in the sight of her swollen eyes, her reddened nose. “Och, lass, you’ve been grieving me for a long time,” he said sadly. “I wouldn’t have had such a thing happen. What did you do?”

“I waited with Gwen and Drustan and—oh! We have to call them!” She tried to squirm from his lap for the phone, but he tightened his arms around her, refusing to let her go.

“Anon, love. I’m so sorry you suffered. If I’d known—”

“If you’d known, what? If this is what had to happen so I could have you back, I don’t have a single regret. It’s okay. You’re here now, and that’s all that matters. I couldn’t ask for anything more.”

“I could,” Dageus said quietly.

Chloe blinked, looking confused and a bit wounded.

Dageus kissed her tenderly. “I’ve been wanting to ask you this for so long, but I feared I may not have a future to promise you. I do now. Will you marry me, Chloe-lass? Here, at this moment, in the Druid way?”

And so commenced one of the most thrilling hours of Silvan MacKeltar’s life. He sat across from the queen of the Tuatha Dé Danaan and renegotiated terms. It was fascinating; it was frustrating because she would tell him nothing of herself; it was exhilarating. She was clever, and immensely powerful, tenfold what he’d sensed in the Draghar.

There was no need to ask that the power of the stones be removed from their duties, for he’d felt them close shortly after Dageus had left. The ancient circle of stones had felt abruptly dead. Void of energy, left with a mere brush of presence that made them seem slightly more there than the surrounding landscape. When he inquired about it, she merely said that she’d reconsidered the Keltar’s duties.

They squabbled a bit—he squabbled with the queen!—over a few minor points. Mostly because it was rather like a game of chess and finessing for the advantage was as much a part of her nature as it was his.

Gold was required, the amount unimportant, the queen told him, as it was simply a token, to be melted and added to the original Compact. Naught else was at hand, so he pledged the ring Nellie had given him on their wedding day.

Though she’d steadfastly refused to answer any of his questions about their race, she advised him that henceforth she would personally attend one Keltar in every generation so they would never lose sight of their place in things again.

And so The Compact was pledged anew and the responsibility of the stones was bid a grateful farewell, to be suffered again only on the day—and Silvan hoped it would not come for a very, very long time—that man discovered such dangerous secrets on his own.