Chapter 5

• The last time he saw her, the magic hadn’t worked, and he’d followed her. Opening his eyes, he looked around. Here is where she had been. At first, he was absolutely astonished to discover she was with child and no one in the entire FaTerra realm had known.
• It had been so hard to locate her at first because it had been the night of the dark moon, but her cries had led him right to her. She was in labor and close to delivering her spawn. He remembered dropping to his knees beside her and begging her to let him take her home so the midwives could care for her. His kind, even with all the magic they held, never had easy birthing, and he was terrified something would go wrong.
• She’d refused. In her delirium, she was determined that her other half would come that night. That he would not miss his child’s birth. The man she waited for was an angel. At first, he thought she was confused, but the things she described to him only proved what she said was true. His princess was carrying a halfling. Angels could only produce offspring with those that held magic in their veins.
• When it became clear to her that she wasn’t going to survive this birth, she’d made him promise to watch over her child. Of course, he’d agreed but had also thought at that moment that he could get her back to FaTerra before her last breath and get help. She knew the child was a daughter and had already named her Avalie, a family name of her great-great-grandmother. Firo had gone along with that as well, even knowing the child wouldn’t be welcome in their realm.
• Dawn was starting to break when the child took her first breath of air outside her mother’s body, and Firo had been stunned beyond rational thought when he’d taken the child in his arms to hand to her mother. A pulse moved through him, right to his very soul, as he looked down into the eyes of the tiny being. She made emotions come to life inside him that he didn’t know he possessed. Her cry cut through his heart and made him want to pledge his unending service to her. She was a royal halfling, and her life and soul were intended for only him.
• If it hadn’t been for that, he would have come to his senses faster and gotten Avaline back to FaTerra. As she held her child in the earliest light of dawn, something had come over him, and he hadn’t taken her home. Deep inside him, he knew that if that had happened, the child could very well be forfeited because of her standing, and that was something he couldn’t allow.
• When the rainbow, bright and vibrant, steaked the sky, he took the infant in his arms, wrapped her in his cloak, and sat there beside her mother’s body, trying to figure out how to keep her alive and in this realm. He’d cried with the child that morning because he knew he was going to have to let her go in order for her to live.
• As Avaline’s body broke into minute particles to be reabsorbed into the earth, Firo had his Avalie cradled against his chest and secured with his cloak. He used his bare hands and strong magic to create a small cottage that was going to be the child’s home. Out here, away from humans, was going to be her only chance to survive long enough to adulthood. That also bought him many years to figure out what he was going to do when she was.
• With no tether to a charge from his realm, he had time to do this right without being magically bid to return to FaTerra. For days, he constructed the home, cleared the area, and kept the child close to him. With magic, he fed her with the dew of plants and swaddled her with the soft rushes along the river.
• Once the home was finished, he set off to find someone to care for her. He’d spent a day in the city, cloaked and watching mothers come and go with their offspring. It was then that he knew he couldn’t use magic to find this child an adopted mother. The woman would have to be willing, and he had no idea how he was going to go about that.
• Firo had all but given up when he spotted a homeless woman caring for a few others scattered in alleyways. He followed her for a day and discovered that it was what she did. She had nothing of her own, no real belongings, no home, but she gave of herself all the energy she had to care for others. She was the one he selected.
• He had dupped her as far as his appearance went, and for that, he still didn’t feel any regret. If he’d approached her as he was, she wouldn’t have agreed to go with him. He persuaded her to walk for a day and come back to the forest area, where he promised her a home if she agreed to care for the child.
• He looked at Ava as she slept. It had been that way for years. He made certain they had clothes, food, and anything else needed by leaving it on the doorstep. He’d watched Ava grow and thrive under the care of that woman who embraced that she’d been given a second chance at life. He had allowed himself to hope that it was going to be okay until the day he was able to meet Ava, but then something happened, and all of that changed forever.
• Getting up, he quietly went over to her and stood above her, looking down and whispering. “I don’t know what’s next, little one, but I do know everything is going to change again.” He held his hand over her and checked that she was warm and resting peacefully. It wasn’t much, but it was one thing he could give her. One restful night before her world was altered again.
• Stepping back, he looked at her lovely face one more time and then flicked his hand up his body and vanished back home.