A Solstice Journey (4 page)

“They did?” Celyn asked.

I nodded, vaguely remembering even though I had been so young. “It wasn’t something that they couldn’t
not
tell me. I figured it out, kind of, because I didn’t look like them, and everyone we met had to point it out to us, like my parents hadn’t figured it out before.”

Celyn laughed and I joined him after a second. He had a nice laugh, one that made me want to laugh too. I had sounded… not annoyed, but perplexed by the stupidity and nosiness of people in general.

“They look like you,” I said.

He laughed some more. It wasn’t at me. He just found that statement funny. But one didn’t look at me and think I was Icelandic.

“Blond,” I elaborated. “Blue-eyed, and tall. My sisters said that I was really their brother because I had blue eyes like them. And I’m tall too, but other than that, yup, I’m adopted.”

While I really didn’t look like my parents and sisters, I also didn’t look like any one ethnic group. Even after all the traveling, and later, the searching I had done online, I couldn’t easily point to a racial group and say, “Hey, I’m one of them.” I was a mixture of all of them. It had bothered me when I was younger, but when I got more comfortable with myself, when puberty was over, I accepted it. I just was different, and that was all there was to it.

“They are striking,” he said quietly. “Your eyes.”

I didn’t know what to say about that, but I smiled, since he was trying to be nice. And it was nice that he seemed to be interested in me, in the same way I could be interested in him.

“But unfortunately, we need to talk to Idris before anything else.”

“Business before pleasure,” I said lightly.

His eyes lit up when I said that, so he knew I wasn’t averse to what he was hinting. Celyn made a sweeping bow and gestured toward the door.

“Off to business, then,” he said grandly. Then his voice dropped to a husky, sexy purr. “And then, more about this pleasure that you want to talk about.”

I swallowed hard and hoped my dick twitching wasn’t too noticeable—that voice had gone right to it. All of a sudden I didn’t want to leave the room.

Judging by the slight smile Celyn wore, he was pleased with my reaction. But he made a shooing gesture to get me out the door. I didn’t think I was going to be able to move, but I did, walking across the threshold and hoping I didn’t look like too much of an idiot because I wanted to be going in the other direction: back to bed to get naked and sweaty.

C
ELYN
LED
me into a huge hall. The walk had been mostly silent, the quiet broken by Celyn pointing out various pieces of art along the way. I had given up trying to track where we were going, since the castle seemed to be all twisty corridors of stone and a large number of heavy wooden doors. Nothing actually stood out, and I didn’t think I could find my way back to Celyn’s room if my life depended on it. By the time we arrived, it felt like I had been walking for ages in those winding halls, and I had seen no stairs, so as far as I could tell, this entire place was only one floor, with a very impressive front wall.

A large number of people stood around in groups talking in the hall. All of them were dressed in the same tunic and pants Celyn and I wore, in various colors, embroidered in different patterns. Everyone we passed stopped and stared at us. Celyn nodded at several of them, and I started to wonder who exactly he was. I hadn’t thought about it before, because of everything else that had been happening. But corporate politics had taught me how to read a room, and I was doing it now. Celyn was someone important, more important than the horse and the armor told me. Now it was evident because he was being treated like he was a director conducting a tour of the office. People acknowledged him, and while they weren’t bowing, he was being treated with respect. They all seemed surprised to see me, so I guess elves weren’t too popular here.

“Don’t worry,” Celyn told me with a smile as he slipped his arm around my waist. We were the same height, so it wasn’t awkward, but it felt odd because I wasn’t used to such public displays of affection from someone who wasn’t family. “You have nothing to fear because you are with me.”

“Are you going to tell me that I’m under your ‘protection’?” I asked dryly, looking at him.

Then I noticed the huge cat in one corner of the room, licking its paws and acting like a housecat… except it was the size of compact car. I shivered when I realized what it was: the Yule Cat, straight out of the Icelandic legends. That was the cat that was supposed to eat you if you weren’t wearing your new clothing on Christmas Eve. It yawned, showing its long and sharp teeth, and my stomach did a slow roll. I wanted to blurt out that I had new clothing, and it couldn’t eat me.

Celyn saw where I was staring in horror and then laughed, the asshole. “She’s harmless.”

The cat looked over at us, and I didn’t believe she was harmless, even as she purred loudly, sounding like a car with a bad muffler. She was glad to see Celyn, at least.

“She eats children,” I hissed.

Celyn laughed again. “She steals children to bring them to a better place,” he corrected. “But she hasn’t been able to do so in ages. I fear that it’s because she is fading in the world of
menskr
.”

I shook my head. “My parents still send me something new to wear every Christmas to make sure that I’m not eaten by her, even at my age.”

Celyn looked at me more closely then. “Your parents keep the old ways. With the coming of the White Christ, the poor
k
ǫ
ttr
has faded.” He paused and looked at her again. “And shrunk too. But Math is friendly, and I grew up with her. She made a very nice pony to ride when I was younger.”

If she was shrunk now, I wondered what she had looked like before. Celyn walked us over to her and, before I could freak out too much, scratched her under the chin. She closed her eyes in pleasure and purred even louder at his attention.

I had to admit she didn’t look that dangerous in this situation, but I still told Math, “I have new clothes for Christmas.”

She opened her eyes, and for a second I would have sworn the look in them said, “I don’t steal
Álfr.
”

I ignored that look and let Math sniff my hand a bit before I petted her too, scratching behind her ears so I wasn’t near her teeth. I could feel the eyes of the other people in the room boring holes in my back.

“Math usually isn’t very friendly, is she,” I said to Celyn, considering the reactions I sensed behind us.

He laughed. “Math is just picky about who she lets pet her. Many a noble or their children have found that out, much to their dismay.”

I almost pulled my hand back, but I figured that Math had had a chance to bite it before this, and she wasn’t going to do it now.

“Nobles?” I asked him quietly, hoping he would know what I was talking about.

“We have a king, so of course there are nobles,” Celyn explained. He didn’t sound too amused or patronizing. “Is it not the same way in the world of
menskr
?”

“Not where I am from,” I said. “And actually, most of the world is the same way.”

“And how are you ruled, then?” he asked me in amazement.

“We elect our own officials,” I said. “It’s called democracy. It works for the most part, but that could be said for a monarchy too, so let’s not get into a debate about politics.”

He laughed again, and I could hear the people behind us talking, the buzz of their voices as they wondered what we were talking about, who I was, where I came from, why Celyn was enjoying my company.

“And I take it that you’re a noble?” I asked Celyn, even if I could guess the answer. He was
someone,
and I just had to figure it out.

“You might say that,” he teased, showing me a sexy smile. “But it isn’t different among the
Álfr
, either.”

“Which would mean something, if I actually was one,” I pointed out, trying not to sound too annoyed. He opened his mouth, probably to protest, and I talked over him, not trying to be rude, just trying to explain. “I may be one, but I’m
not
one. I was raised as a
menskr
, and you can tell me that I’m not one of them, but that’s who I
think
I am, and that is more important than the genetics of the whole thing.”

“Genetics?” Celyn asked.

“Blood and family,” I answered. “It’s a complicated thing with a lot of science that I don’t understand, but basically genetics is the science of who is related to who.”

It was actually an issue in Iceland because of the small population. There was even an app for your smartphone linked into the national genealogical database so you could check to see if your casual hookup was a relative, since Icelandic last names were patronymic and not family names.

“Family is important,” Celyn said solemnly.

“Which is why I want to get back to mine,” I said. I turned and looked at him, ignoring the attack cat with us. “You can get me back, right? That wasn’t a one-way ride, was it?”

Celyn was looking at me as if there had to be any place else
but
here to have this conversation. There probably was, but it had just dawned on me that I might not be able to go home. I hadn’t thought about it before, because I had been in shock about almost dying.

“If we were not able to patrol our lands and slip between the worlds, do you think that we would?” he asked.

“When you found me, you told me that I was here, in
Sút
,” I reminded him. “So I was already here, and I don’t know what happened or how it happened.”

“This is not the place to discuss this,” Celyn said.

“But this is the time we have to talk about it,” I insisted. Then I stopped, a thought striking me. “You weren’t going to try and trick me into staying here by having me eat something and then telling me that because I ate your food I have to stay here?”

“
No!
” Celyn exclaimed.

Dead silence filled the room for a moment before people started talking again. Math looked at me like I was an asshole, and I felt like one, but I wanted to know what the deal was. Celyn was cute, and I would like to make time between the sheets with him, but not at the cost of never seeing my family again.

Celyn escorted me to a small alcove half-hidden behind Math. She got up and stretched, even as she was looking at both of us like she thought we were idiots, before moving to block the sight and sound of us from the rest of the room.

“Where do you get such strange ideas?” Celyn asked me with a pained smile. “What do the
menskr
say about us?”

I flushed and looked at my feet. “Um… Greek mythology. Nothing to do with elves or dwarves.”

He shook his head and didn’t say anything. But who would blame me for thinking about the myth of Hades and Persephone right now? Okay, Celyn didn’t exactly grab me and carry me off, and I do admit that getting lost in the snow and being rescued by him was very different, but I wasn’t thinking quite logically at this moment in time.

Celyn opened his mouth to say something and then shut it again. I decided I couldn’t make a bigger ass out of myself if I continued to run with the scenario. “So it’s okay to eat the food?” I asked.

“Why do you think that it’s not?” he demanded hotly.

“There’s this Greek myth about a goddess who has to live in the underworld with a god after he kidnapped her and she ate some fruit.”

Celyn just stared at me in disbelief, and I smiled weakly. “I know. Crazy Greeks. And I know that you didn’t kidnap me, and I don’t think that you’re a bad guy, but I want to be able to go home. I have a family that I love and a job that I enjoy.”

“What do you do?” Celyn asked. I knew he was trying to distract me. It was sort of working. I was calming down, thinking again, not panicking.

“I’m an accountant.”

“A what?”

“I do work on certain accounts for a multinational company,” I explained. Celyn still looked blank, but when it came to my job, it was something I was used to. Very few people actually knew what an accountant did besides the obvious. “I track money.”

He blinked and laughed. “You have the look of a warrior.”

“I thought that I was an
Álfr
?” I asked.

Celyn shook his head, more comfortable with this question than the others. “They are fierce warriors.”

“You people aren’t at war with them or something,” I asked with a tinge of dread. That could have been part of the reason I was getting odd looks from everyone. Would it get me tossed in the dungeon?

“We are not,” he assured me. “There was actually supposed to be an alliance with them, sealed upon my marriage with their king’s heir.”

“That means that you’re Idris’s son,” I stated, things mostly clicking into place. “And what about Llinos?”

“She actually is Idris’s favorite,” he explained hastily, holding out a hand as if to stop the idea. “Idris has no children, none of his wives could.”

“More like him,” I muttered. If a couple was infertile, the issue was the man couldn’t have children and not the woman that was usually blamed for the issue.

Celyn ignored me and continued to talk. “She is his heir presumptive. We are both his sisters’ children, but Llinos is of his older sister, while I am of his younger.” He was silent for a moment and then sighed. “She will have children. It is well known that I have no interest in women. Our people want a stable line so they don’t have to worry about this in a generation. And since I will have no children, then there will be no one to challenge Llinos’s when they inherit.”

“Well, kids aren’t for everyone,” I told him, seeing the guilty look on his face. “Though my sisters will have some. I know that none of them are interested in women that way.” I paused and looked him straight in the eye. “And neither am I.”

He looked pleased but then got back to the reason Math was hiding us back here. “I cannot promise that you can go home.”

I opened my mouth to protest, and he surprised me. Celyn kissed me, hot and needy, wrapping his arms around me to hold me tight as his tongue slipped into my mouth. I kissed him back after a moment of shock, holding his bottom tight and rubbing against him like a cat. He moaned in pleasure, backing me deeper into the alcove until my back hit a wall.