I raised eyebrows at him. "I hadn't really thought about it. I know for a fact that most fairy tales are just that, stories."
"But the elements of them" - he drew a pale yellow hand out of his blanket far enough to shake a finger at me - "the essentials, they got from us, from true stories." He frowned. "Not all of us are Irish, Scottish, or anything that is part of what they call the British Isles. We hold survivors from nearly every part of Europe."
"I'm aware of that," I said.
"Then act like you know. Surely Prince Essus told you that some fairy tales were passed-on true stories."
"My father told me most were simply made up."
"Most," Sage conceded, "but not all." He waved his finger at me again. "If the chalice has brought back the complete power to that ring" - he pointed at the box - "then if you have your perfect match on this plane, you'll know it, and if you don't, you'll know that, too."
I looked at the little box, and suddenly it seemed more important than it had even a moment ago.
"That's not how the queen used it," Rhys said, "not for herself."
"No," Nicca said, softly, from behind us. "Once her own true love was killed in battle, she used the power of the ring to fill her bed. She was able with its help to make another sidhe elf-struck."
I turned and looked at him. He wore slacks that were so dark brown, they were nearly black, and boots that matched underneath. His hair spilled over his na**d upper body, because his wings were even larger than Sage's, and though we'd tried to get a silk-and-spandex tee over them, in the end we'd been defeated. They were too huge, and too oddly shaped, all swirls and tail.
"I thought she would go mad when Owain died." Doyle's eyes were still tight shut, his hands gripping the chair arms, but his voice sounded normal enough.
"What no one had realized was that the ring had an added power," he continued in his calm voice. "Apparently, it acted as a kind of protective magic around the couples of its choosing. It guaranteed a happy ending, by making sure no tragedy befell them."
Rhys nodded. "The ring had begun to fade in power - we knew that because the great matchmaking ball had failed some decades before. A sidhe would come to the door of the ballroom, and no one would step forward. But we didn't understand that the ring had kept us safe, not just happy and fertile."
"Until the battle of Rhodan," Frost said, "where we lost two hundred sidhe warriors. Most of them had been wed to their love matches."
"It was the first time in our history that a single couple that the ring had brought together had not had a happy ending," Doyle said.
"It wasn't just one couple," Rhys said, "it was dozens." He shook his head. "I'd never heard such keening."
"Some of those left behind chose to fade," Doyle said.
"Suicide, you mean," Rhys said.
Doyle opened his eyes enough to glance at Rhys, then closed them again. "If you prefer."
"I don't prefer, it's just the truth," Rhys said.
Doyle shrugged. "Fine."
Galen had drifted up behind everyone. "Did the ring ever pick more than one person for anyone?" He was dressed all in pale spring green.
"You mean once someone was widowed, did the ring ever find them someone else?" Doyle asked.
"That, or literally pick more than one person for someone. I mean, you may get a child from every match the ring made, but to be truly happy, not just magically in love, did the ring ever have trouble choosing just one person for someone?"
Doyle opened his eyes again and actually turned to look full at Galen. "Do you not believe in soul mates, one perfect love for each person?" It would have seemed an almost silly question from anyone else.
Galen glanced at me, then forced himself to look away to meet Doyle's dark gaze. "I don't believe in love at first sight. I believe true love takes time to build, like friendship. I believe in instant lust."
He moved directly behind my seat. I could feel him like some warming fire, I wanted him to put his hands on the back of the seat, to be closer to that warmth. As if he'd heard me, he put his hands where I wanted them, and it was all I could do not to touch my head against his fingers. But somehow with the ring box sitting there, I wasn't sure I wanted to be touching him when I put it on. I was pretty certain that touching no one was the best idea, until we knew if the ring had been affected by the chalice.
"Could we get the queen's permission not to wear it until we're at the faerie mound?" I asked.
"No," Doyle said, "she was most insistent."
I sighed. We did not want Andais angry with us. We so didn't want that. "Fine, give me the box, and everybody stand back."
"It's not a bomb," Rhys said, "just a ring."
I frowned at him. "After what I've just heard, I'd almost prefer a bomb." Almost, I added in my head.
I didn't want my choices limited here and now. I was afraid of whom the ring would pick, and why. I didn't trust magic in matters of the heart. Hell's bells, I didn't trust matters of the heart at all. Love was an unreliable sort of thing, sometimes.
Rhys handed me the box, and after I repeated my need for privacy, all of them got up and walked away from me. Kitto remained at the back of the plane with a blanket over his entire body, hiding. Hiding from his fear of metal, and modern technology. He was afraid of so many things that it seemed less remarkable for him to be afraid of airplanes, than for Doyle, who feared almost nothing.