The Fae Book 2: Burr and Daisy

The Birth of the Future King

33 years ago...

The storm outside seemed to be getting more and more wild by the minute. Against the black night sky, the jagged flashes of lightning  were so close and so frequent they almost seemed like they were trying to get inside the room.

"He can call down the storm," Aria Byrne murmured as she stood by the window and watched the lightning rip across the sky in an on-again, off-again display.

Aria turned to her daughter and recently-acquired son-in-law, watching Melody pant helplessly against the pain as she squeezed and twisted her husband's hand. As the contraction faded, so did the lightning. With a sigh of relief, Melody sank back against the pillows on the hospital bed, but her reprieve was short-lived.

"Liam," she whimpered, "Another one's starting." And as the contraction strengthened, the lightning outside flashed more and more violently.

The nurse came into the room, her eyes to the window. "Quite the storm your baby decided to be born in."

Aria smiled to herself. If she only knew...

The nurse checked Melody, and then went to the door and calmly asked another nurse to get the doctor immediately before she came back to Melody and started  maneuvering the bed so it was ready for the birth.

"Well, you've shot all the way to ten as fast as I've ever seen," she remarked as she double checked that everything the doctor needed was ready.

The doctor came into the room moments later and checked Melody. "This is happening fast," he muttered. Ten minutes later, just as the nine-pound baby boy was eased into this world, bolt after bolt of lightning flashed directly outside the baby's hospital room window, followed instantly by deafening crashes of thunder, making all of the lights in the hospital flicker for a brief moment. A minute later, as the squalling baby was placed onto his mother's chest, he stopped crying and the violent storm ceased. Immediately and completely.

Aria walked over to her grandson, and his eyes widened so she could see they were the silver of a lightning bolt. No blue eyes for this baby.

"Eyes that hold the lightning. This is Oberon," Aria pronounced the name over the boy as she placed her hand on his back and felt an electrical sensation travel up her arm. "Welcome to the world, Prince Oberon."

"What the -- Oberon? Seriously?" Liam sputtered. "What the hell kind of name is that for my son?"

Melody looked at her husband, who was about to continue protesting the baby's name. "He is Oberon," she told him firmly. "This is our little boy, and if my mother says he's Oberon, he is Oberon. And just to say, the last time you didn't listen to me and didn't believe me, it didn't work out too well for you, did it? Tell me you're smarter than a goldfish and can learn, Liam."

Liam shut his mouth.

"The last Oberon was born seventy years ago," Aria said quietly to her daughter and son-in-law. "This Oberon was born so the old Oberon could fade from power in eighteen years."

"What's the deal with the name? With Oberon?" Liam asked.

Aria shook her head. "Not much of a Shakespeare fan, are you?"

Liam shook his head. 

"And in all fairy-related stories spanning hundreds and hundreds of years, Oberon was mentioned there, too. It's not a coincidence."

"So what does the name mean?"

"Oberon is the name of the King of the Fae -- the fairies," Aria clarified.

Liam looked down at his little son, staring up at him with the unusual, silvery eyes, and he thought about the wild lightning storm that occurred throughout his son's birth.

"My son is the...King?"

"He will be when he turns eighteen," Aria said. "Right now, he is the Prince of the Fae."

It was unsettling enough when Melody had told him about the fae and that her mother was fae-blessed and had gifts. He hadn't reacted well to that at all, and it had taken quite a while to win back Melody. He still carried a ton of guilt for his reaction to Melody's news. Now? Now his own son was born to be King of the Fae? It was just a lot to wrap his mind around.

"Is he like you?" Liam asked quietly, trying to absorb all of this. 

"He is more, much more, than I am," Aria said quietly. "He is the Prince of the Fae, the heir to the crown. When he assumes the mantle at eighteen, when he becomes the King of the Fae, he'll come into most of his strength."

"What does that mean, Mom?"

Aria looked at her daughter. "It means we need to spend the next eighteen years preparing him for becoming King. Right now, you, as his mother, will be able to calm the storms, but eventually, his True Queen -- she will calm the storms he calls down with just a word."

"So he's fae blessed?" Liam asked, still trying to fathom the magical world he'd never known had existed until a few months ago. 

"He is, but he's more. I'm not even sure I have the words to describe it, Liam. He will have gifts, but as he grows, he will have powers, each year adding to them, and when the old King fades, the new King will be able to call on untold power -- the source of all magic, the draíocht. That power will be at his fingertips. We must make sure he's ready for that power. It's a tremendous responsibility."

Throughout the next day, a number of nurses and doctors came by to see the "most beautiful" baby anyone had ever seen. They exclaimed over his eyes, over the sheer beauty of his features, over his perfect skin, over his amazingly thick black hair.

"It'll always be this way," Aria warned her daughter and son-in-law when Liam remarked on the attention the baby was receiving. "The fae-blessed and their offspring are extremely attractive to other people, but this boy will draw people to him effortlessly and they won't even know why. It's the magic he holds within himself and it'll be that way all of his life."

"So you're saying he's going to have no problem getting the girls?" Liam asked, flashing a grin.

Melody rolled her eyes at him, irritated that her husband found this amusing. She was scared to death. Then again, she had grown up witnessing her mother's gifts and her power. If her son's powers were even greater, beyond comprehension...that was slightly terrifying. And for the foreseeable future, she would be the one to calm his storms...that sent a chill down her spine.

"I'm saying," Aria leveled her son-in-law with a look, "that everyone, especially females, will be drawn to him...and that's going to turn out to be less of a blessing and more of a curse. Having your pick of the girls means more of an opportunity to make a mistake."

Aria looked off into the distance for a moment, and Melody knew her mother was seeing into the mist -- the future. These future visions were one of her gifts from the fae.

"A very big mistake."