Persimmon walked over to me, and I crouched down to look at him better. "How is this possible? Persimmon is an actual ghost."

"Hmmm... interesting. You could see Persimmon in the mortal world?" Ciaran crouched down to the ghost cat and held out his hand. Persimmon sniffed at his fingers, but seemed unimpressed. He padded away and hopped up on the table to sleep.

"Yes, all the time. Persimmon lived in Mike's magic shop."

"He was a forest cat that died in cat form, I suspect. He was a Fae, not a human." 

"Okay, but how did I see him then, and how did I bring him here?" I rose from my crouched position and stared at Persimmon laying on the table.

"That's just one more delightful mystery of you. You may have been able to see all spirits on the earth, not just the mortal ones, and I suspect your nascent links with Adrian and Luis made that possible."

 "With Adrian and Luis? Why?"

"Hmm..." Ciaran tugged on his bottom lip as he struggled with how to explain. "Having a piece of a soul within you allows you to draw on their spirit. It's not a complete connection like these roots, but it allows you some extra power."

Hmm... so I had been using my friends like batteries. Great. "Was I hurting my friends?"

Ciaran laughed, "Oh no, but your possession of that piece of them did make them long to stay. Because they gave freely, it allowed you to make use of their gift to you."

I thought about that, then looked up at Noc. "Um, I managed to do that again with Noc here." I still held the spark of his lifeforce. It shimmered like a snowflake within me.

Ciaran's thoughtful look turned into a surprised glee. "Hmm... well... this gives you one more tool for your arsenal. But..."

He was staring down at me with an intensity that made me nervous. Finally, I swatted him on the arm to get him to stop. "But what?"

"Hmm... I forgot what I was about to say. Anyway, are you ready to try the exercise?" Ciaran asked with an impatience only matched by small children on Christmas. 

I wanted to hoot at that. Exercise - if holding a bolt of lightning while straddling a volcano was what he considered an exercise. "Not really, but I want to have some chance since I don't have numbers." 

I had a feeling that I'd be going into this without Luis.

"Very good. Gentlemen, for your safety, please leave the room."

"But... My Lady didn't practice with me. Perhaps it would be safer to try with me first?" Rielte said.

"I think I can try with you later, Rielte." I gave him an apologetic smile.

He slumped a little in disappointment, but nodded. "Very well, My Lady."

 I felt a little bad for Rielte as he left with Brin and Noc. But then it was just Ciaran and me, and Ciaran's expression made all my pity flee. He took my hands with a brilliant smile, and I felt a rush of every emotion as my first effort to pull released a wave of life force into me. I clutched his hands and gripped them tightly as I tried to spool it in me. It was like trying to capture a hurricane in a mason jar.

"I need to Sto —" I remembered how I almost hurt Brin, taking so much.

"Relax. I can take it. You can take it.  The muscles in Ciaran's neck were straining, but a wild grin lighted on his face. "I cannot believe how powerful you are! It's amazing! It must be because you are a new tree!"

I removed one of my hands from him, and I clutched the collar of his tunic. His free arm snaked around me and crushed me to him. Still, the maelstrom spun between us. He pushed, I pulled, and tried to keep it. I saw the hubs and spokes and heard the song of the trees, of every tree in existence as they connected, spoke, and hub, and spoke.

I wanted to get lost in this storm, and I closed my eyes. I could feel my spirit unraveling, and Ciaran shouted, "Push it back to me!"

The windows shook, and we glowed like suns. Sheet music on the grand piano went flying as a sudden wind blew things around. The table fell on its side and Persimmon howled in surprise then vanished. All the chairs but one flipped over and hurtled several feet, crashing into walls and clattering against the floor.

Why? Why should I push it back? It was such a fabulous solution to it all. Give in and get swept away. I waited, and I felt Ciaran tremble against me. He was trembling and gasping. His emotions were growing from delight and connection to worry. "Princess, stop now before we go too far! I don't wish to lose you!"

His panic snapped my brain back into attention. I was hurting both of us. So I pushed. I pushed his force back into him, and some of mine as well. He caught it, spooled it, and held it within him. A deluge of elation and need arched my back. I had never felt anything like it and it felt like the whole universe was on pause. Ciaran bent me backward and stared down at me with his lips parted and his eyes ablaze with passion.

The only sound I could hear for a moment was the beating of our hearts. With my life force still caught like a minnow in a net and our bodies meshed together, the intimacy of the moment was nothing like the way I'd felt doing this exercise with Brin. Ciaran's eyes dazzled with sparkles and swirled with unnamable hues. I felt his desire, but I wasn't ready to give in even though my body was saying otherwise.

"Ciaran..." It was the only half-hearted protest I could make. If he pushed, I'd be done for.

He released all of his air in a loud shout, and my life force came back into my body with a slam made me exclaim as well. I felt complete with it all, and then some. I felt like the lifeforce returned was mixed up with his, and it throbbed like something alive within me.

"Madeline... what on earth do you keep doing to me..." His voice sounded unsteady, with none of the teasings he usually did. He let go of my other hand and hugged me with both arms. They trembled against my back as my heart tried to find a slower rhythm. I felt a gentle squeeze, and then he released me to go sit down with a heavy thump on the sole chair that hadn't been knocked over. I was pulled into his lap.

He gazed at me with a wonder that I never thought I'd see on this arrogant and cocksure man. Then he clutched at his head as though it ached. He spat out a stone and laughed, and laughed some more.

The stone looked like an opal, but it flashed with multicolor fire all on its own the way Ciaran's did when he was overcome.

"I didn't kiss you! How!" I blushed from head to toe.

"If I were a young maiden, I should sob in a corner while exclaiming that I could no longer be a bride." He wiped his eyes. "Oh, sweetheart... If we had kissed, now that would have sewn things up."

I stood a chair up and landed on it with a thump as I stared at the opal. He placed it in my hand. "I don't get it. Why didn't that happen with Brin, Rielte, or Noc?"

"They are not linked, nor are they consorts."

My eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Did you know this would happen?"

I swear to the Almighty! If he knew...

Ciaran shook his head. "As part of our punishment for our grand hubris in the thirteenth century, the Creator ensured we could not have true children any longer. He wanted to make sure our line could not grow beyond the few that we are. None of the Edentrees could have a child. None, that is, until you were born from what I can only think was some mixture of science and magic. Your father is quite the scientist... why I remember one time..."

"Ciaran, get back to the point," I said, even though I really wanted to know what my father did.

"Ahem, yes. A story for another time. You've done a million impossibilities. First, you exist - a marvel that should have sent Duir to her knees in gratitude. Second, you possess our powers. Your magic chose your everlasting counterparts. It chose me!. My life has been rather solitary since all the trees save your father and I have their counterparts, as ours... are gone. 

He held my hands as he looked at me so earnestly. I wanted to know more about his counterpart... but it didn't seem like the right time.

"I thought since your mother and your father were not supposed to be possible, that you'd be as sterile as a liger," he said.

Uh, what? I nodded for him to go on, but my heart beat faster.

"The reason there are trees that belong to the rose family, or the ash, or any number of families, is because at one time we would produce children until we were made unable to. All the trees on all the realms are empty avatars producing themselves but no children. Not really. I thought I was also as sterile as a liger."

"Did you make me pregnant, Ciaran?" I stood up, ready to beat him to a pulp.

His surprised laughter echoed in the music room. "No, but when I spooled some of your energy into myself, I could have. It would have created a hybrid seed between us, forming a seedling. I would need to add my energy to the seed, then plant it back into your body. You would have transferred the seed to your womb, then two months later, we'd be parents. I'm sorry. It's an instinct that I thought had died thousands of years ago. The same instinct lives in you - you first sent me some of your life force when you returned mine."

The enormity of what could have happened crushed me. I had more questions in light of what happened with Noc. "Um, Ciaran. I have Noc's, Adrian's, and Luis's energy in me..."

His brows climbed up his forehead then he tapped a finger against his lips. "I hadn't considered there'd be any danger since they are not trees. I doubt that anything will happen with any of the energy that you hold from your friends."

I exhaled in relief. "You don't?"

"I have every confidence that nothing will happen."  He looked at me through half-lowered lids as he stood. 

"Thank you for not going too far with me." I leaned my head against our clasped hands and struggled to not think about the strange leftover glowing within me. I went to search for it again, but it had disappeared. I could not find Adrian's or Luis's energy either. Only Noc's twinkled in my mind like a lone star.

If they were gone, it must have meant I had released them finally. That's what it was. 

Ciaran lifted my chin and pressed his lips to mine erasing my niggle of worry. "The missing kiss from my Princess," he whispered. "Since you've stolen my maiden virtue, it's only fair that I get a kiss."

I gaped at him, outraged. He chuckled as he released me.

"I did not steal your virtue, creep!"

He leaned forward. "Oh, but you did, Princess. I've never had the opportunity to share my lifeforce in a communion of two with my partner, and it was..." He closed his eyes. "Exquisite."

I flapped my jaw uselessly as he left me speechless. Finally, I said, "Well, if that's the case, then you took mine too!"

"Yes." His voice was low and warm. "I will take responsibility for that."

As I blushed from all this unaccustomed seduction, I didn't know what to say to that. I didn't want to admit at that moment that during our 'exercise,' I had no other thought but Ciaran. I was afraid of giving him that much power over me.

"Ha... Madeline, my Princess fair. You've changed us for good. I cannot be the wise and distant mentor I'd intended to be. I want to spirit you away to my land and feed you whatever you wish until you're too fat ever to leave."

I sputtered with glee, "Ciaran, that would be entrapment, although I'm down for all the food."

"Yes," he said as he kissed one hand and then the next. "That's why I won't do it, sad as it makes me. Instead, I shall make my aim to be your royal consort a new goal of mine."

I pulled my hands away and stood. Now I had two men aiming for the same goal, and both were committed. "This has been a lot... I need to get to bed."

He stood up as well and kissed my forehead. "I agree... sweet dreams, Princess. You'll be in mine."

Persimmon had reappeared at some point and meowed, and I glanced at the ghost cat. I agreed with him. I was in big trouble.

As I left, I realized I hadn't thought of Luis once.