The queen was courting disaster. And she was using her daughter as bait.
“Please, lady,” the boy begged as he stood before her in the rising wind of another storm. “Reconsider this action.”
The queen stood tall on the Plain of Gates, where battle had only recently raged. She turned and looked high up Knocknarea Mountain to where her predecessor’s cairn was silhouetted against the racing clouds.
“Tell me again, child,” she said, her voice liquid in the turbulent air. “What is your position in this clan?”
The boy rolled his eyes. He wasn’t one to play the games that amused the queen. “I am your seer, lady. He who detects the patterns of past, present and future in the weave of time.”
“Ah,” she said with a small nod, still not facing him. “Then you are not queen.”
He battled a sigh. “No. I advise only. And I advise you to hold your action. She is your daughter. The last who can take the throne when you go.”
“Maybe,” she said. “Maybe not. She grievously disappointed me, seer.”
“It is ever the way of children and parents, my queen.”
That got her to finally turn around, her ghostly blond hair lifting like a heavy banner in the wind. She offered the boy a wry smile. “You would know this with your centuries of experience?”
“I would know it from observing,” he said, his dimple showing. “It’s my job.”
She considered him for a minute, then shook her head. “And mine is to discard your advice if I so deem.”
He reached out a small hand, but did not touch her. Faint sunlight glinted off the burnished copper of his hair. “Don’t discard this. You know what the Dubhlainn Sidhe are capable of. You cannot be so angry you would offer her up to them.”
The queen’s smile was not as delighted now. “Oh, I can, seer. I can. And I think I will.”
Without another word, the queen simply strolled away and left the boy with his misgivings. He saw what she refused to: the nightmares to be visited on her youngest daughter, the isolation, the pain. Orla had been foolish, there was no question. But even her crime didn’t warrant the punishment about to be meted out. No crime warranted that.
There was nothing the boy could do to stop it, though. Bowing his head with the weight of things no small boy should carry, he went in search of the queen’s daughter.