I glance around the table, gaze moving slowly from face to face, as I soak up the laughter and savor the unique flavor of testy banter that flows richly between those who would lay down their lives for one another.

  This moment is perfect.

  And it’s all we ever have. This moment, right now.

  We’re fools if we fail to cram all the living and loving we can possibly do into each and every one.

  FIRST EPILOGUE

  SOME TIME LATER…

  AZAR

  Azar, prince of Autumn, stood in the winter kingdom, staring at the miles and miles of snowy land, unable to fathom why he felt compelled to come here today.

  But he didn’t fully fathom many things of late. Everything was new to him.

  The Tuatha De Danann had suffered great calamity and loss, the queen had told them. She’d been able to ensure their survival only by restoring them to their earliest forms, with no memory of events that had passed before.

  Each of them was now newborn. Beginning life fresh, with no baggage, but for whatever they incurred by their actions from this day forward.

  He had no memory of life before the queen restored them, yet there were certain things that stirred in him a powerful emotion. All of the Fae were experiencing it; something the queen called déjà vu—already having seen or been before.

  She’d told them regardless of their memory loss, it was not possible to eviscerate the core of one’s being and, so long as they possessed emotion, the imprint of love remained. There would be those so deeply ingrained in their hearts, they would one day be drawn together again.

  Azar began to walk, wondering what beckoned him in this icy land, so different from his home. He inhabited the noisy, celebratory kingdom of eternal harvest, that sprawled vast and wide beneath buttery dawns and crimson and saffron sunsets, gardens overflowing with mandarin pumpkins, spicy, scarlet apples, and buttery gourds. In the Autumn kingdom all was vivid, with a constant hum of voices and celebration.

  Here was a hushed land of few colors, void of gardens, carpeted with snow, stretching beneath a sky so blue it dazzled the eye and towering trees glazed with ice that sparkled as if diamond crusted beneath the brilliant sun.

  He found the air here—unlike the temperate harvest clime of Autumn, perpetually smoked by the fires of Samhain—crisp, bold, and invigorating. Here there was no crackle of leaves beneath his boots, only the soft crush of snow.

  From time to time, he would stop as he walked to gaze wonderingly at intricate patterns etched in ice on the boughs of trees, marveling at the skill of the artist who’d painted them with such care. And, from time to time, he would pause, perplexed that here was an unexpected grassy knoll, bursting with brightly colored flowers amid the snow.

  He walked for time uncounted, reveling in being alive.

  You are tabula rasa, the queen had told them. Each of you is now a book with blank pages. You choose what you write upon them. Choose well. I will only interfere if it seems we are, as a species, about to make the same mistakes again.

  He liked being a blank book that yet held the resonance of those things he once loved. He suspected his fresh start was a gift whose true, exquisite value he might never know. He trusted he would find his way to matters of his heart again.

  As he topped a snowy crest in a forest, he drew to an abrupt halt, transfixed, staring into the glade beyond, blood quickening in the way it did whenever he encountered a person or thing that had been important to him, in that time forgotten.

  Two princesses stood, their heads close, talking excitedly about plans to continue reshaping the land.

  One was golden and bright, the other pale radiance. It was the pale princess, who stood upon a thick carpet of snow blossoms, that took his breath away.

  He strode forward to greet them, and they turned, as one, smiling.

  He sketched a formal bow. “I’m Azar, prince of Autumn. I bid you good day and bring greetings from my court.”

  “I’m Severina,” the golden princess replied. “Although we are not currently in my kingdom, I bid you welcome to Summer.” She glanced from the pale princess to Azar and back again, then back and forth again, eyes widening with delight.

  The winter princess was staring at Azar with the same blend of wonder, fascination, and joy he’d inexplicably felt upon seeing her, with a kiss of rose blossoming in her cheeks.

  Eyes dancing, Summer gave Winter a quick hug and kiss and said breathlessly, “I’ll come back later. Perhaps much later. Till tomorrow, then?”

  “Tomorrow,” the winter princess agreed, with a warm smile. “We’ll paint the labyrinth. I don’t care much for that place. Perhaps we could replace it with something new?”

  Summer said excitedly, “Flowers and fountains, with a small garden house.”

  “That sounds divine.”

  After Summer vanished, Winter turned back to Azar and curtsied low. “Greetings, Prince Azar. I bid you welcome to my heart and home.” She frowned, looking flustered. “I meant ‘hearth’ and home,” she corrected, blushing. “I’m Ixcythe. And I’m delighted to meet you.”

  “Ixcythe,” Azar echoed her name, savoring the way it felt on his tongue, but there was something…something else he would call her, something that felt just right. “I think I shall call you ‘Ix.’ ”

  SECOND EPILOGUE

  SOME TIME LATER…

  CHRISTIAN

  I stand in the corridor, gazing down at Lyryka, wanting to say a million things, saying none of them.

  It took a long time for me to come around to this moment but eventually I placed aside my selfish desires and arrived.

  When first Lyryka mentioned her dream, I consoled myself with the thought that the Silvers in the White Room behind Barrons Books & Baubles were shattered, and there was no way to fulfill it.

  But in time, I’d come to understand how important it was to her and I’d begun making inquiries, first of Barrons, who’d refused to tell me one bloody thing about his hundred or so Silvers other than he was sorry I’d ever seen them.

  It was Kat who told me where to find what I sought. Here at the abbey, beneath their feet, the entire time.

  Today, she escorted us here, and one of the Shedon broke the powerful wards sealing the door.

  Now Lyryka and I stand outside the golden hall, and I’m wondering why the bloody hell I ever did such a bloody stupid thing as take it upon myself to find the way to give Lyryka what she wanted, knowing it would only take her away from me.

  I smile faintly. I know why I did. I have only to look at her, see the excitement, wonder, and joy in her fascinating eyes to know I’d do it again and again.

  Trapped for three quarters of a million years, Lyryka hungers to see the world, live her own stories, bold and free. And she doesn’t want company. I can’t fault her for that. We all must make our way alone before we’re much good at making our way together.

  Still. Bloody hell. She’s under my skin. My desire for her never wanes. Doesn’t matter how many times I’ve had her in my bed, I’ll miss her body next to mine. I’ll walk into our bedroom in the morning to find an empty bed, hungering to hear her cranky early-morning grumbles and, later, our endless conversations about anything and everything. My castle will feel so bloody empty without her.

  I’ll miss flying the skies beside her, soaring the Highlands, listening as she exclaims with delight over the smallest of things.

  I’ll miss her funny way of seeing life as if it’s all one great big epic story. I’ll miss her diction, her eclectic choice of words.

  I’ll never be able to look at a Guinness bottle again. I’ll end up shaking it, hoping she’s inside.

  “Oh,” she exclaims, staring up at me, gleaning my depth of emotion, “you so like me, Christian.”

  “I do.”

  “No, I mean you really, really like me.”

  “What can I say? Duality is my poison.” This goodbye is killing me. I hate it. I will not fuck it up for her. I love you, I don’t say. She’s not ready for that. But, oh, Lyryka, how I love you.

  She beams. “And I’ve got duality in spades.”

  “You do. Stay. Just a bit longer. A few more days.” Bugger it, I wasn’t going to say that. I may be safer not opening my mouth again.

  She sobers. “It’s never going to get easier, Christian. In fact, the longer I stay, the harder trying to say goodbye will become.”

  Precisely what I’d be counting on. But I won’t say it again, and I won’t press.

  “I’ve been waiting for this moment all my life, Christian. Dreaming of it. The choices, the freedom. Just look at all those mirrors. I can choose any one of them. I’m finally, truly free. Thanks to you, Christian. You broke my bottle and shattered my ice and set me free.”

  I exhale gustily and say urgently for the hundredth time, “The Silvers are dangerous. Remember what I told you about the Hall. Choose quickly, Lyryka. Don’t dally. Remember, the image each shows is not where they lead.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, I know all of this. You’ve told me at least a hundred times.”

  “Half a dozen, at most.”

  “You’re worried about me.”

  “And you’re delighted about that.”

  “I am.”

  “You’re naïve.”

  “I am,” she agrees. “And vulnerable and open and kind, and the universe is hard on people like me.”

  “You’re not people.”

  “I was using that—”

  “—I know, in the broadest conceptual sense.”

  We smile at each other then I growl, “Goddamn it, Lyryka, I’m going to miss you.”

  “I know,” she exclaims, radiant. “It’s amazing. I’ll be out there in the world, and someone’s going to be somewhere else, missing me. But they won’t summon me or demand my presence or try to hold on to me because they care about me and they want me to be free.”

  “Utterly, deliriously free. I want you drunk on choices, sloshed on life. I wish you the finest, most heroic adventures beside the grandest of companions. But one day, if you decide to come back…”

  “One day,” she clarifies, “when I do come back…”

  “You might come to me.”

  “I will come to you.”

  “And I’ll be waiting.”

  “And you will give me all the sex I demand because you’ll be so happy to see me,” she assures me with complete confidence.

  I smile at her and arch a brow. “We’ll see.”

  She arches a brow back. “Oh, we most certainly will.”

  When she leans in to kiss me, I close my eyes and savor every nuance of it, sear it into my memory, in exquisite detail, to keep me company for however long this woman makes me wait.

  Lyryka is worth waiting for.

  THIRD EPILOGUE

  AND YET MORE TIME LATER…

  MAC

  I stand on the sidewalk in front of Barrons Books & Baubles and tip back my head, scrutinizing the elegant, Old World façade of the bookstore, nodding with satisfaction.

  I love this place. But something was missing.

  I just finished adding a café, which I christened Korrie’s Korner, after one of my best friends from high school who loves reading as much as I do. Long ago, we used to dream of opening our own bookstore and café together. I can’t wait to tell her about it and hope she’ll come to see it. We recently reconnected, and she sounds ready for a change.

  I think she’ll love Dublin and what I’ve done with the café I named for her. Korrie’s Korner is a place where people can come to have a smashing good cup of coffee and read a book, curled in a window seat or one of dozens of overstuffed armchairs. Perhaps gather before the fire, discussing history, current events, anything and everything, tackling the issues facing our world, finding solutions. With luck, I’ll draw the brightest hearts and minds in Dublin and eavesdrop shamelessly. I’m not as busy with the Tuatha De Danaan as I thought I would be. The Fae are doing extremely well governing their kingdoms. And now I have a place in the mortal realm that will connect me to the diversity of humans with whom I share the planet.

  The only reason it took me so long to get around to creating Korrie’s Korner was I love the way the bookstore looks and couldn’t figure out where to put the café that wouldn’t detract or seem odd. While I am High Queen of the Fae, not everyone knows that, and I don’t want to advertise by having people enter a noticeable pocket of reality tucked into a corner. Besides, the spatial disorientation of Barrons Books & Baubles is already extreme enough.

  Ergo, I built up.

  “Seriously, Ms. Lane?” Barrons says dryly, behind me.

  Ms. Lane. Uh-hmm. He doesn’t like it. “Who holds the deed?” I cast a teasing smile over my shoulder.

  He arches a brow. “Who holds the woman that holds the deed?”

  “As if you’d ever stop holding me just because I put a café on the roof of the bookstore,” I say, laughing. “It’s perfect there. Admit it.”

  “Your bookstore. My rugs. Humans will traipse en masse through the establishment, across my rugs, to get to your bloody café. Why not place a few tables out front? How will you explain the countless lemurs marauding about the shop to your patrons?”

  I snort with laughter. “The lemurs don’t maraud, and you know it. They escaped twice. And they haven’t tried to leave again since I added the forest and expanded their floor. Rae loves playing with them when she visits. Besides, between you, me, lemurs, and our friends that drop by, good grief, do you really think lemurs are what will strike our patrons as odd?”

  “There is that.”

  “I needed more room, and the rooftop really is the best place,” I say as we head for the door. “I tucked in an expansion element. Come, I’ll show you. I want to know if you think it’s too obvious. I plan to offer Barrons Books and Baubles tees, mugs, calendars, and the like, and I saw these really cute heart-shaped pink Post-its that—oh! Speaking of pink, I’m going to add a bakery to the café with fresh baked cakes every day. I also plan to get some of those hand-tooled leather journals made by local crafters, and some framed, local photography. I have so many ideas.” I continue prattling about them as we wind through the bookstore, then draw up short realizing not only is Barrons not paying any attention to me, he’s texting someone, completely tuning me out. Consternated, I say loudly, “It’s not as if I plan to let the patrons tour the sex dungeon, and really, Barrons, given that I got the café and you got a sex dungeon, I think my renovations are a win-win.”

  His head whips up, phone gets shoved into his pocket, and his dark eyes glitter.

  “I thought that might get your attention.”

  “And where did you say this sex dungeon is?”

  “If you’d been paying attention, you’d know. But no, you tuned me out at heart-shaped pink Post-its.”

  His hands are on my waist, and he pulls me close and I shiver. I always want this man. Never get enough. And yes, I did put a sex dungeon in. Before I built the café.

  “It’s in the basement,” I murmur.

  “We don’t have a basement.”

  “We do now. Would you care to see it?”

  “Can’t get there fast enough.”

  * * *

  Later, tangled in crimson sheets before a crackling fire, I finally broach a topic that’s been bothering me for months.

  Barrons says when you ask a question, you must be prepared for every possible answer. I’ve been afraid of the possible answers to this one.

  I roll over onto my side, prop my head on a fist, and stare down at him, my dark, powerful beast of a man, stretched naked on his back, arms folded behind his head, eyes closed, and trace my fingers over the curve of his biceps, down his arm, along his jaw. His torso is still tattooed with black and crimson runes from the dark magic he and Ryodan worked that night in the Unseelie king’s castle to entice the power near. He hasn’t died since. I run my hand over the shapes, across the ripples of his abdomen, then, before I go lower still, remove my hand. Difficult though it is when Barrons is sprawled naked next to me, I need to focus on thoughts. “Barrons, remember the premonition I told you about?”

  “The one where the Fae slipped you the Elixir of Life,” he murmurs.

  “Yes, that one.”

  “Why are you still thinking about it?”

  “Seriously? I did terrible things.”

  “It seems to me,” he says opening his eyes slowly, “the only thing you did wrong in that version of events was not a reflection of you, in any way other than showcasing your hope, optimism, and desire to achieve peace for both species.”

  “I wiped out humans and trapped the Nine in limbo.”

  “In that version, you’d been slipped an Elixir without your knowledge that stripped emotion and soul. The king wasn’t entirely correct. With chemicals, and external potions, one’s core self can be eviscerated. Yours was taken against your will—in that version of events within a premonition,” he clarifies tightly.

  “Are you defending me in a premonition where I turned into a she-bitch from hell?”

  “I’ll defend you everywhere.”

  “Okay, forget that one. My point is I had four unusual fugue states while I was in the chamber beyond time.”

  “The other three?”