"The second book in this series builds suspense with betrayal and love that matches no other."
Reviewed by Mandy Burns
Posted August 16, 2010
Romance Paranormal
Emmaline Gallagher is one of the few Fae free to roam the
human world. Three hundred years ago, Emmaline, as the
personal assassin for the Summer Queen, made a mistake and
killed the wrong villain, thus destroying the man she
loved. Emmaline was forced to leave her life behind just
before the spell was cast imprisoning all Fae beings.
Emmaline is now working undercover in the human world for
the Fae enemy Phaendir, using her glamour skills to mask
her real self to uncover the Phaendir's plans to keep the
Fae trapped. Emmaline and her colleagues have located
another artifact to help free the Fae, but it needs a
magical key and there is only one man for the job. Aeric O'Mallary, known as The Blacksmith, is unable to
leave the world from which he is imprisoned. Aeric is the
only Fae, other than his ailing father, with the ability to
create weapons with magic. Three hundred years ago, Aeric
was engaged to his childhood sweetheart, until the Summer
Queen's assassin cut his love short by killing his fiancée.
Aeric is biding his time for Emmaline Gallagher to enter
the gates of his world so he can vent the anger and
vengeance he's been holding for centuries. Aeric finally
gets his opportunity, but something about Emmaline does
strange things to his heart and mind, forcing him to listen
to her reason of why, as a free Fae, she has returned to
the one place where many want to see her dead. CRUEL ENCHANTMENT is the second book in this series and it
builds suspense with betrayal and love that matches no
other. A fabulous read!
SUMMARY
Even the most powerful hands need a delicate touch… Emmaline Gallagher is a master of wielding personal glamour.
As a free fae who lives among humans, she must hide her true
self at all times as she works undercover within the
powerful Phaendir—for if certain factions within the
Phaendir gain control, the fae will be wiped from existence.
Now, an object of fae power lies within a locked ancient
box. And there is only one fae who can forge the key. Known as “the Blacksmith” Aeric O’Malley can create or
destroy almost anything with his forging skills. Emmaline
has come to him in need, but he and Emmaline have a past—and
he has spent centuries wanting to take revenge on her for
her transgressions. But now that he has her within his
grasp, something about her keeps him from exacting his
vengeance—or is it merely her glamour blinding him? Trapped by fate, Emmaline must hope that she can reach
Aeric’s furious heart before it’s too late….
ExcerptEmmaline Siobhan Keara Gallagher.Clang. Clang. Clang. The shock of hammer to hot iron
reverberated up his arm and through his shoulders. As Aeric
shaped the hunk of iron into a charmed blade, Emmaline’s
name beat a staccato rhythm in his mind. He glanced up at
the portrait of Aileen, the one he kept in his forge as a
reminder, and his hammer came down harder. It wasn’t every
night the fire of vengeance burned so hot and so hard in
him. Over three hundred and sixty years had passed since the
Summer Queen’s assassin had murdered his love, Aileen. Emmaline Siobhan Keara Gallagher. He’d had plenty of time to move past his loss. Yet his rage
turned bright tonight, as if it had happened three days ago
instead of three hundred years. It was almost as if the
object of his vengeance were close by, or thinking about
him. Perhaps, as he’d imagined for so many years, he shared
a psychic connection with her. One born of cruel and violent intention. He was certain that if the power of his thoughts truly did
penetrate her mind, she had nightmares about him. If she
ever thought his name, it was with a shudder and a chill. If Aeric knew what she really looked like, he would envision
her face with every downward impact of his hammer. Instead
he only brought her essence to mind while forging weapons
others would wield to kill, maim, and bring misery. If he
could name them all, he would name them Emmaline. It was the least he could do, but he wanted to do so much
more. Maybe one day he would get the chance, though odds
were against him. He was stuck in Piefferburg while she
roamed free outside its barriers. Aileen was far from him,
too, lost to the shadowy Netherworld. He tossed the hammer aside. Sweat trickling down his bare
chest and into his belly button, he turned with the redhot
length of charmed iron held in a pair of tongs and dunked it
into a tub of cold water, making the iron spit and steam. As
he worked the metal, his magick pulled out of him in a long,
thin thread, imbuing the weapon with the ability to extract
a fae’s power and cause illness. Aeric O’Malley was the Blacksmith, the only fae in the world
who could create weapons of charmed iron. His father had
once also possessed the same magick, but he’d been badly
affected by Watt syndrome at the time of the Great Sweep.
These days he wasn’t fit for the forge, leaving the family
tradition to Aeric. Making these weapons every night was his ritual, one he had
kept secret from all who knew him. His forge was hidden in
the back of his apartment, deep at the base of the Black
Tower. The former Shadow King, Aodh Críostóir Ruadhán
O’Dubhuir, had been the only one who’d known about his
illicit work; he’d been the one to set him up in it. Now the Unseelie had a Shadow Queen instead of a king. She
was a good queen, but one who was still finding her footing
in the Black Tower. Queen Aislinn might not look kindly on
the fact the Blacksmith was still producing weapons that
could be used on his own people. Queen Aislinn wasn’t as . .
. practical as her foul biological father had been. He pulled off his thick gloves and wiped the back of his arm
across his sweat-soaked forehead with a groan of fatigue.
The iron called to him at all hours of the day and night.
Even after he had done his sacred duty riding in the Wild
Hunt every night, the forge summoned him before dawn. He
spent most nights fulfilling orders for illegal weaponry or
sometimes just making it because he had to, because his fae
blood called him to do it. As long as his magick held out,
he created. The walls of his iron world glinted silver and deadly with
the products of his labor and in the middle of it all hung
Aileen’s portrait, the one he’d painted with his own hands
so he would never forget what she looked like. So he never forgot. Despite the heat and grime of the room, her portrait was
still pristine, even as old as it was. Angel pale and golden
beautiful, she hung on the wall and gazed down at him with
eyes of green, green as the grass of the country she’d died in. His fingers curled, remembering the softness of her skin and
how her silky hair had slipped over his palms and mouth. His
gaze caught and lingered on the shape of her mouth. Not that
he needed to commit the way she looked to memory. He
remembered Aileen Arabella Edmé McIlvernock. His fiancée had
looked like an angel, walked like one, thought like one . .
.and made love like one. Maybe she hadn’t been an angel in all ways—no, definitely
not—but his memory never snagged on those jagged places.
There was no point in remembering the dark, only the light.
And there was no forgetting her. He never would. Nor would he ever forget her murderer. Emmaline had managed to escape the Great Sweep and probably
Watt syndrome, too. He couldn’t know for sure; he just
suspected. His gut simply told him she was out there in the
world somewhere and he lived for the day he would find her.
She’d taken his soul apart the day she’d killed Aileen and
he’d never been able to put it completely back together again. It was only fair he should be able to take Emmaline’s soul
apart in return. Slowly. Piece by bloody piece. The chances she’d walk through the gates of Piefferburg and
into the web of pain that awaited her was infinitesimal, but
tonight, as Aeric gazed at the portrait of Aileen, he hoped
for a miracle. Danu help Emmaline if she ever did cross that threshold into
Piefferburg. He’d be waiting. ~*~ The fae checked in, but they never checked out. It was a fae
roach motel. Did she really want to cross that threshold and
possibly end up a squashed bug? No, of course not. Problem
was, she had no choice. Emmaline Siobhan Keara Gallagher stared at the outer gates
of Piefferburg. Was she really ready to take this risk?
After all she’d done, all the years and energy she’d
committed to the cause, she still shuddered at the thought
of going in there for fear she may never come out. She stared at the hazy warding that guarded the fae from the
human world, set a few inches out from a thick, tall brick
wall. The wall didn’t go all the way around Piefferburg,
since the detention compound—resettlement area was the more
PC term—was enormous and the borders included not only
marshlands, where a wall could not be built, but the ocean,
too. It was the Phaendir’s warding that kept the fae
imprisoned, not that thick wall. That was there only for the
eye of the humans. An almost organic thing, the warding
existed in a subconscious, hive portion of the Phaendir’s
collective mind—fueled by their breath, thoughts, and magick
and, most of all, by their very strong belief system. That warding was unbreakable. Or so it was thought. “Emily?” She jumped, startled. Emmaline turned at the name the
Phaendir knew her by, something close enough to her real
name to make it comfortable. Well, as comfortable as she
could be while undercover in a nest of her mortal enemies. That didn’t exactly make every day a picnic. Schooling her expression and double-checking her glamour—she
was paranoid about keeping it in place—she turned with a
forced smile. “Brother Gideon, you frightened me.” His thin lips pursed and he smoothed his thinning brown hair
over his head, favoring her with a glance that anyone who
didn’t know him would call nervous. Emmaline, of all people,
knew better. Gideon was confident, dangerous. The face he
presented to the world was one calculated to make people
underestimate him. Brother Gideon was average in every way possible—medium
brown hair, average height and build, unremarkable brown
eyes, weak chin, receding hairline. A person walking by him
on the street would glance at him and immediately dismiss
him as nonthreatening. In reality, Brother Gideon was the
most menacing of all the Phaendir, a black mamba in a cave
filled with rattlers. While you were busy overlooking and
underestimating him, he’d be busy killing you. That’s what
made him extra dangerous. It was no secret that Gideon was nursing a crush on her.
She’d been carefully fostering that crush for quite some
time now, using it as an effective tool. It wasn’t a
pleasant or easy thing, having a man as vicious as Brother
Gideon admiring her. It was, however, a useful thing. Useful
to the HFF—Humans for the Freedom of the Fae—an organization
to which she’d dedicated her life. “I’m sorry, Emily,” he replied in his very average light
tenor of a voice. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I just saw
you standing out here and wanted to see you off.” A little over a year ago Brother Gideon had attempted a
coup. He’d tried to obtain the Book of Bindings before
Brother Maddoc, the Archdirector of the Phaendir, could do
it. Emmaline was certain it had been a move to take over
Maddoc’s place. Brother Gideon strove very hard to implement
his much bloodier agenda for dealing with the fae and he
needed that top spot to put it into action. Luckily Gideon had been caught and punished by being demoted
four places in the Phaendir power structure. But Maddoc
should have killed him. During the last year, two of the
Phaendir who occupied spots above Gideon had met their ends
in freak, horrific accidents. The murders had been
brilliantly executed and no one could prove Gideon had
anything to do with the deaths. Emmaline had no doubt he was
behind them. Maddoc needed to watch his back. The prospect of having Gideon leading the Phaendir made her
mission more critical. It even made her fingers itch for her
old crossbow and it took a hell of a lot for that to happen.
If anyone needed a quarrel through the throat, it was
Brother Gideon. Maddoc needed killing, too, but he was
several shades less threatening. She forced a smile. “And I’m so glad you did.” “Are you sure you’re ready for this?” “I may be human, but in my heart, I’m Phaendir. I live to
serve.” Gideon smiled and she fought the urge to vomit on her hiking
boots. She looked away from him, up at the hazy warding. Gideon
thought she was human and a human wouldn’t be able to see
the warding, so she motioned to the wall. “It’s immense and
so . . . strong.” She made sure she glanced at Gideon with a
shy smile as she said the last. “It’s a beautiful thing,
this place the Phaendir have created to keep us safe.” She
used the reverent tone of the Worshipful Observer that
Gideon believed she was. Gideon came to stand near her and clasped his thin, pale
hands in front of him. “Labrai wills it so.” He paused. “As
He wills your entry into Piefferburg and your eventual
success. You’re a woman with a strong, stable character.
You’re destined to do well.” She wanted to laugh. A strong, stable character. Right. Her
characters were so layered even she had trouble parsing
them. She was a fae HFF member currently undercover as a
human Worshipful Observer who was soon going undercover as a
member of the Faemous TV show crew in order to mine
information for the Phaendir while actually working a
mission for the HFF. Yeah. Not confusing at all. It was an event that would ironically blow all her covers,
bringing her back to what she really was. A free fae. As if she wasn’t already bewildered enough. Danu and all the gods, why was she going into Piefferburg of
her own free will? She swallowed hard. The Blacksmith was in
there. She had nightmares about coming face to face with him
often enough to warrant a prescription for Xanax. And hell, she was seeking him out. He was the only one who
could help the HFF at this point. How crazy was that? He
wanted to kill her . . . maybe. Probably. Maybe. It had been so long—over three hundred and sixty years—since
the night she’d killed Aileen Arabella Edmé McIlvernock. She
didn’t even know if Aeric had survived Watt syndrome, though
she hoped he had. If he hadn’t survived, and if there was no
other fae who could forge a charmed iron key, they were all
doomed. She knew Aeric’s father also had the talent, but
he’d been one of the first fae to come down with Watt
syndrome. At the time she’d left Ireland, he’d been very ill
and not expected to live. She wasn’t sure about his father, but she felt it in her
blood that Aeric O’Malley had survived. She could feel him
in there, within the boundaries of Piefferburg. Almost as if
he was waiting for her. She shivered. That couldn’t be
possible, of course; it was only her vivid imagination. And he wasn’t the only one who might be thirsting for her
blood. Once upon a time, when she’d been the Summer Queen’s
greatest weapon in the Seelie war against the Unseelie,
she’d burned some bridges. Many, many bridges. There were
those in the Black Tower who would love to cross the charred
ruins of those very bridges . . . to strangle her. Danu, she hoped her glamour was strong enough to fool the
Blacksmith. If the illusion slipped, if he found out who she
really was, her life was as good as gone. If any of the
Unseelie found out who she was . . . Or if the Summer Queen found out . . . Or Lars, the Summer Queen’s barely leashed pit bull . . . Emmaline shuddered. Once she was in Piefferburg, she would
have to go to the Rose Tower and check in as part of the
Faemous film crew. From there she’d have to find a way to
get over to the Black Tower to find Aeric. She shivered. The Rose. She wished didn’t have to step foot
in it. At least she could avoid the Summer Queen, who likely
thought the Faemous crew beneath her notice. There was no
way she was voluntarily going anywhere near the woman who’d
screwed up her life so much and, via Lars, planted
nightmares in her subconscious that put the ones she had
about the Blacksmith to shame. Gods, why was she doing this again? Oh, right, because she
was the only one who could. Damn it. “Emily? Are you nervous?” She blinked and glanced at Gideon, pulling herself back from
the muck of her thoughts. For a moment, she groped for
something plausible to respond with. “Well, a little. I’ve
heard the stories about the goblins.” Humans were terrified
of goblins, though as a fae she didn’t swallow the boogeyman
tales. There were other races that were much more terrifying
and, honestly, their religion was quite nice. “I saw the
bodies of the Phaendir you sent in after the book—” He waved his hand, not wanting to take that conversational
road. He’d sent Phaendir into Piefferburg last year to
retrieve the Book of Bindings and the men had returned
gnawed upon. “You’ll be fine. You’re going to the Seelie
Court, to the Rose Tower. They’re much more hospitable to
humans than the Unseelie. No goblins there, only the tamer
breed of hobgoblin and a few brownies. They’re servants,
mostly.” She smiled. “I know I’ll be fine. You would never let me
come to harm, would you, Brother Gideon?” He smiled at her and she suppressed another shudder. There
was lust in his eyes—a thing no woman wanted directed at her
by him. “Never.” “Anyway, like I said, I’m ready to sacrifice my life for the
cause of the Phaendir.” Gideon took her hands in his. His skin was papery feeling,
dry. On his wrists, she could feel the start of the scars
that marked his arms, chest, and back. Brother Gideon
flagellated himself every day in the name of Labrai, though
Emmaline had long suspected he enjoyed the floggings with
his wicked cat-o’-nine tails. “But I am not willing to
sacrifice your life, Emily. Not for anything.” He blinked
watery brown eyes. “Oh, Gideon,” she said in a practiced, slightly breathy
voice. “Your piousness is already so attractive and to know
you actually care about me as a person is so . . . moving.”
She didn’t melt against him or bat her eyelashes, but she
did stare adoringly into his eyes. “Shh, I understand. I only hope that one day—” “Brother Gideon? Emily?” It was Archdirector Maddoc’s voice
coming from behind them. Gideon gritted his teeth for a moment. His face—just for a
heartbeat—made the transformation from medium to monster.
Veins stood out in his forehead and neck. His skin went pale
and his eyes bulged. He dropped her hands and moved away
from her, his natural, unassuming visage back in place in a
matter of seconds. Just the glimpse of Gideon’s true self
was enough to leave Emmaline shaky, a reaction that luckily
worked for this particular situation. The tension in the air between Gideon and Maddoc ratcheted
upward. Power struggles within the structure of the group
seemed to permeate all their interactions. Then, of course,
there was the carefully orchestrated charade she’d been
performing for Gideon to make things worse—making Gideon
believe she was sleeping with his archenemy. As undercover
HFF, it was her job to throw wrenches into the best of the
Phaendir’s machines and she was good at her job. “Are you ready?” asked Brother Maddoc with a warm smile.
Brother Maddoc was annoyingly likable, considering he was
Phaendir. With him, you got what you saw on the surface.
Trouble was, he hated the fae. Not as much as Gideon hated
the fae, but enough to want to keep them imprisoned forever.
Her smile flickered. “No.” Maddoc laughed and pulled her against him for a hug. “Don’t
worry, you’re all set up. They’re expecting you at the Rose
Tower as the newest addition to the Faemous crew. Just go in
like you’re a real anchor and start snooping around for
information about the bosca fadbh. I don’t think I need to
impress upon you how important a job this is, Emily.” Except it wasn’t her real job. She knew all about the bosca fadbh, and what she needed
concerning the valuable puzzle box would be found nowhere
near the Seelie Court. The fae already had one piece of box.
The second piece, the one the HFF was trying to get, was
halfway around the world, off the coast of Atlit, Israel. It
just sucked that the only man capable of helping the HFF get
that piece was stuck in Piefferburg. She laid her head on Maddoc’s shoulder, an action that made
Gideon shuffle his feet and cough as he tried to conceal his
irritation and jealousy. “I won’t let you down, Brother Maddoc.” “I know.” He smiled and kissed her temple. “Now go. They’re
ready to let you in.” She turned toward the heavy wrought-iron gates that
separated Piefferburg and most of the world’s fae from the
fragile human world. The huge doors opened with a groan and
all the heavy protocol that went with the admission of
individuals began. On this side of the gate things were
monitored by the Phaendir. On the other side of the gate,
all deliveries or people passing through were carefully
inspected by the fae and all arrivals reported to both
towers. Of course neither side trusted the other. The fae
exerted what little control they had by checking to make
sure no Phaendir entered—some had tried; all had been
brutally killed. The Phaendir, of course, would not allow
any fae to leave. Humans could come and go at their own
peril. Not many did. Only the very brave and the very stupid
dared cross into the land of the fae. Or the very desperate. That would be her. Glancing back at Gideon and Maddoc and shooting them a look
of uncertainty she didn’t have to feign, she stepped past
the gates. Surely the Blacksmith wouldn’t recognize her under her
powerful glamour. Surely she would be safe from his wrath.
If she could fool all of the Phaendir, she could fool one
fae. Even if somehow he did recognize her, hundreds of years
had passed since that unfortunate day and her errand was of
monumental importance to his people. Surely this would turn out all right.
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