The Shadows

by Chance, Megan

  “Nothing affects me as you do,” I muttered.

  He gave me a half smile. “I heard that, you know.”

  “You shouldn’t take it as a compliment.”

  “I don’t,” he said. “Do you mean to answer me?”

  “There’s nothing,” I said. “The nightmares and you, and . . . oh, there was an ogham stick Patrick gave me to hold that burned my hand. But I think it was only that it had been in the sun.”

  He went very still. “An ogham stick?”

  “A piece of stone with . . . well, they’re words of a sort, carved into it. The Druids used them to cast spells and . . . I don’t know, read fortunes, I suppose. It’s quite ancient.”

  “Where did Devlin get such a thing?”

  “Patrick collects Celtic relics. So did his father.”

  “What kinds of relics?”

  “Statuettes and torcs, stone reliefs, drawings, that kind of thing. He has four cases in his study, and that’s not even all of it. You should see it. . . .” I trailed off as I realized that there was no chance Derry would ever be invited into Patrick’s study. “He says he means to return them to Ireland one day, where they belong.”

  “Does he?”

  There was something funny in his voice. “Is something wrong?”

  He stared at me as if he couldn’t look away. Then he smiled, and it was like a sign saying We’re done with all this now. Back to the usual. “Are you feeling better, lass?”

  Again, I felt disappointment. “I am.”

  “My healing touch.” He waggled his fingers at me. Just then Lucy returned, bearing a little plate full of petits fours. She was licking icing from her fingers. “I hope you don’t mind,” she said as she gave me the plate. “I couldn’t resist trying one.”

  The white icing gleamed in the gaslight, piped roses a moist and glistening pink, sugared violets twinkling. My mouth watered.

  “It’ll just make you sweeter,” Derry said, rising, pulling her laughing and squirming into his arms. Very deliberately, he licked a bit of icing from her lower lip.

  “You’re so bad.” Lucy giggled in the moment before he kissed her, deeply and thoroughly. Her arms curved languorously around his neck; she buried her hands in the waves of his thick dark hair.

  And I was jealous. Terribly, horribly jealous. Miserably, I looked into the plate of petits fours. The smell of them was sickly sweet, the sugared violets melting purple, the piped roses wilting. The thought of biting into one turned my stomach. I put aside the plate and sat there, waiting until Derry and Lucy unknotted themselves. And then once they had, the way Lucy looked . . . as if she’d just risen from bed; no matter that she was fully dressed—everyone in the place must know exactly what she’d been doing. Derry was no better. His dark hair was sticking up where she’d tangled her fingers in it.

  “I saw a man over there with a machine that makes paper flowers,” Lucy said, straightening the bow beneath her chin, gesturing for us to follow as she turned. “He’s giving a demonstration now. Let’s go see.” She hurried off.

  Derry held out his hand to help me from the bench. I ignored it. “She ran her fingers all through your hair.”

  He leaned close to whisper, “How would you know that unless you were watching?”

  “I know because it’s a mess,” I snapped back.

  He grinned. “You seem to care a bit too much about my hair, lass, if you don’t mind my saying so. But I suppose if you’re very nice to me, I might let you comb it.”

  Whatever truth had passed between us when Lucy was gone had completely disappeared. He glanced past me to the bench, to the plate with the petits fours. His grin faded. “You didn’t eat.”

  “The two of you made me so sick I lost my appetite,” I said, and then I marched away, following Lucy into the crowd.

  TWELVE

  Diarmid

  Aidan Knox was very drunk when they left the fair, and somehow drunker still when they dropped Lucy at her house. Diarmid realized then that Grace was keeping her brother upright. “D’you want help to get him home?”

  She flashed him a look of pure fury, and he knew she must be overcome with shame. “Thank you, no. Good night.”

  “Yer a strange ’un, aren’t you, Derry-erry-erry?” Aidan slurred before he began laughing helplessly, falling over his sister’s shoulder.

  Diarmid caught Aidan’s arm, helping him upright again, but when he began to walk with them, Grace said, “Good night, Derry,” and he stood back and watched them go.

  For a block. Then he followed, discreetly, just to make certain they made it home without someone robbing them or worse. There were desperate men about in these times and wilding boys who roamed the streets looking for prey, which a girl and her drunken brother surely were. It wasn’t until she manhandled her brother up the steps and into their house that Diarmid relaxed and went back to the stables.

  The night was too warm; it set his mind turning. He thought about her obvious distress tonight and how fiercely he’d wanted to ease it, to touch her, to tangle his fingers in her hair. He wanted to believe it was no different from the way he felt about girls in general, but it was, and he knew it.

  He thought of how she’d seen his homesickness during the show, and her question about why he’d left that he’d wanted to answer. But he couldn’t say: I was called. It was a spell. A prophecy. And so he’d said nothing, and seen her disappointment when he’d put her off.

  And twice now she’d seen him glowing. Twice it had caused pain that left her weak and helpless. An ogham stick—by the gods, Patrick Devlin has an ogham stick—had burned her hand.

  Once he was back at the stables, he went to the little tack room he shared with Jerry, the other stableboy. Jerry was hardly a boy, closer to thirty than twenty, but jobs were hard to come by now, and he said he’d rather be paid to be a stableboy than not be paid at all; and Diarmid saw enough tramps in the streets, sleeping on stoops and in dank corners, to agree. Diarmid took off his shirt and lay on his cot, listening to Jerry snore, feeling the sweat prickle on his skin and promising himself that everything about Grace Knox could be explained away. She’d said it herself: he’d stepped in the light just the right way, and she’d been faint again from not eating. The ogham stick had been in the sun.

  But . . . her nightmares. Nightmares about storms of fire and ravens. Still, everyone had nightmares. And it was only because he’d been on battlefields where the Morrigan’s Badb had sent her ravens descending in a cloud of screaming terror that he’d felt such an anxious dread when Grace had said it.

  Yes, easy to explain. But for one thing:

  He’d realized who Grace reminded him of: Neasa, who’d been Finn’s adviser and Seer and sometime lover. A Druid priestess with the gift of oracle and spell casting. She, too, had dark and dancing eyes and thick, curling hair and skin pale as milk. Diarmid had seen that hair of hers swirling as if it were alive as she called up storms that chased and blistered in their fury. Storms of wind and thunder and crackling lightning.

  Neasa, whose daughter had been the veleda. Who’d been given the care of the dord fiann. Who’d lived at the foot of the Fianna stronghold, Almhuin. The Hill of Allen.

  “My family is from Allen,” she’d said.

  The veleda.

  Diarmid pushed the thought away the moment he had it, the same way he’d been pushing it away all night—really, since she’d told him where her people were from, though he couldn’t deny it was why he’d asked Lucy to bring her along to the fair. He was trying not to spend much time with Lucy now—it only made him feel terrible. He hadn’t wanted to spend another evening watching the lovespell shine in her eyes, but there had been no other way to get close to Grace Knox. It had been his whole reason for the fair: to ask Grace questions, to discover . . . what? Something, anything. He hoped to find that she was no one. Just a girl whose family had fallen on hard times, who hadn’t eaten and had swooned from hunger.

  And that wish troubled him too. Because the only reason
he was working in the Devlin stables was to discover who had called them and why. To find the veleda. Without her, they were dead. Samhain would be here soon enough; it was already June. They needed the veleda.

  He should be overjoyed at the idea that he might have found her.

  “When she makes the choice, the sacrifice must be at your hand,” Manannan had said. “This is the geis put upon you, lad. ’Tis you who must kill her. If you refuse this, the Fianna will fail and be no more.”

  He’d thought that the veleda would know the prophecy, that she would know her role and the sacrifice that must be made. He had no wish to kill a lass, but the Druid priestesses he’d known had been as strong as any man, and as determined. There was no weakness in them, no hesitation. They would have been trained to die. But here was Grace Knox, with her worn gowns and dancing eyes and the blithe way she told him that her soon-to-be fiancé collected Celtic relics, as if she didn’t understand the significance of that at all.

  Because she didn’t.

  She was an innocent.

  She could not be the veleda.

  But he felt in his heart that she was.

  He woke the next morning to heat that made him sweat before he even moved, and a dread that lodged in his chest. He buried himself in work, in mucking stalls, trying not to think. In the light of day, nothing seemed quite so dire; it was easy to feel that he wasn’t certain, to decide merely to watch Grace Knox for a while until he was sure. Then he would tell Finn. Finn was charming and charismatic, but he was also ruthless, and—Diarmid had to admit this troubled him even more—he doubted Finn would miss her resemblance to Neasa. What Finn would do about the fact that Grace looked like his old lover Diarmid didn’t know, and didn’t want to guess.

  So he would watch. And while he was watching, he would get into the Devlin house and look at these relics. Ancient Celtic torcs and statuettes, she’d said, and he wondered if there had been a horn among them. If Devlin had been the one who called them.

  And if he had, what did he know about the veleda?

  It seemed too big a coincidence, Diarmid’s suspicions about Grace Knox along with the very sudden attention Devlin was now paying her. But perhaps it was a coincidence. What had Lucy said? That her brother had loved Grace for years. Perhaps so. Diarmid could see why.

  Still, it made him uneasy.

  Finn had ordered him to search the Devlin house anyway, and as it was, he’d delayed long enough. Grace had said the collection was in Devlin’s study—not all of it, she’d said, but perhaps he would find what he was looking for. Finn’s hunting horn had been a working one, without a great deal of ornamentation. So many years later, it would only look old and not especially valuable. Perhaps it would be in one of those cases. And Diarmid wanted to get his hands on that ogham stick. He wondered what Cannel would see in it, if anything.

  When twilight passed and night fell, and the steward said the horses wouldn’t be needed tonight, Diarmid told Jerry he was going to take a walk.

  The other stableboy chuckled. “You’d best watch yourself with that Devlin girl. Ya know you’re playin’ with fire.”

  Diarmid said nothing to that. It was true. A few more days and then he would walk away, and after a week or so of not seeing him, the lovespell would fade, just as it always did. Lucy would think of him with fondness if he was lucky, or bitterness if he wasn’t, but even that would disappear eventually. Because her love for him had been compelled. It wasn’t real.

  It never was.

  Diarmid shook off his sadness at the thought and put Lucy from his mind as he strode the two blocks through the lamplit streets to the well-kept houses of those rich enough to live in this part of town without being so rich they had mansions and summer homes. Once he was at the Devlins’ back gate, he leaped over the cast-iron arrows and into the narrow strip of yard, past a marble bench and a small fountain and rows of rosebushes, their fragrance sweet and heavy in the evening air. He peered stealthily into the windows until he found the study. There was no outside door, but there was a window.

  The only light came from a lamp burning on the desk, a dim glow. The study was empty, but for how long?

  He grasped the sill, pulling himself up—a two-thousand-year sleep hadn’t taken away the strength he’d honed in battle and in spear practice. Once he had a good hold, he put his hand to the sash. It slid open easily, soundlessly—thank the maids. He leveled himself up and through, dropping as silently as he could to the floor, which was thickly carpeted—another blessing.

  There he paused, listening. He heard voices from another room, more than a few. Music from a pianoforte, inexpertly played. So the Devlins had guests, which he hoped meant Patrick Devlin would be busy entertaining.

  Diarmid made a quick scan of the room. Display cases lined the wall to his right. Framed shadow boxes held the things Grace had mentioned. A bull-head torc like those he’d seen a hundred times—not one meant for kings, but worn by a warrior, perhaps even one of the Fianna, though he didn’t recognize it. Statuettes, a stone relief, some drawing on bark he could barely make out in the dim light, another of the Morrigan. He shuddered at that and looked away, into the cases, and then it was as if his other life washed over him in one dizzying wave—the world he’d known: fortresses and rolling green hills and the wind blowing through his hair as he hurtled with his fellows toward an advancing army, a battle cry in his throat, the sword called Liomhadoir, the Burnisher, in his hand, and the Red Spear at the ready. The things in this case had belonged to warriors and kings—that bowl there, the one cast with wrens, had been Neasa’s. He’d seen her drink from it a hundred times, some foul potion that helped her find her visions. There was a crystal Druid egg the size of an apple; a few amulets—two on a necklace, green stone threaded through with red; another blue and set in a ring. A bronze shield with arms he didn’t know. There, a silver goblet that reminded him of those he’d seen on the table of the High King. The sheer number of things was astounding, but there was no horn. Then he saw the ogham stick.

  The ogham runes were chipped, hard to read, and it was too dim, but there was no time to study it now. Better to take it and be gone. He tried to lift the case lid—it wouldn’t budge. Locked. He glanced around, saw the paper knife gleaming in the lamplight on Devlin’s desk, and grabbed it, working it in the lock. Too broad. He turned back to the desk, saw the letter opener, and tried that instead. A few twists and the lock was sprung.

  Diarmid pried open the lid and took the ogham stick, which was as cool as any stone should be. He tucked it beneath his arm and closed the lid again, a little too hard. He froze, listening for any pause in the conversation, anything to tell him that someone had heard. The music continued. He breathed a sigh of relief and then left the cases and went to the bookshelves, looking at each and every ornament that decorated them, hoping for the horn. Statuettes, mostly, another Druid egg. No horn.

  He glanced toward the window. He should go, except that she’d said there were other things too. This wasn’t the entire collection, and who knew when he would have another opportunity? He should be sure. Where else would Devlin keep valuable things?

  Perhaps his bedroom.

  Diarmid hesitated. It was too risky. But Finn would ask him if he’d searched the house, and when he confessed that he hadn’t, he’d be sent back. And this felt too right. All these relics, Patrick Devlin’s obsession with Ireland, the poems about rebellion and oppression. Patrick’s mission, Grace had said, and Diarmid’s instincts screamed that the horn was here somewhere.

  He leaned out the window, tossing the ogham stick onto the ground below—best not to get caught with it if he was going to get caught, and the chances of that were rising every moment. Without it, he could lie that he’d been meaning to visit Lucy—which would be bad enough but wouldn’t be as bad as being arrested and hung as a thief. He went to the door of the study, opening it just a crack, peering out. No one in the hall. The music was louder now. Diarmid eased from the room, looking warily toward the ser
vants’ stairs near the kitchen.

  He dashed for the stairs, hiding himself in the shadows of gaslight turned low. When he reached them, he took the first five to the turn of the landing and drew back, waiting. He heard no one, but the stairs creaked beneath his step. No one would think twice about sounds on the servants’ stairs, he hoped. The next floor was empty, a hallway lined with closed doors. He went down the line, knocking quietly at each one in case someone had taken to bed with a headache or dyspepsia or something, opening each when there was no answer. Mrs. Devlin’s room was marked by the scent of roses. Then Lucy’s—a lace-testered bed, an abandoned gown, scattered shoes. He smiled; the room was so much like her. It felt like an invasion of privacy, too, and he liked that less. He shut the door again.

  He thought the next room might be Devlin’s. It was a man’s room, in deep blues and dark woods, but it felt empty—nothing there to show that anyone inhabited it. Diarmid went to the next. This was the one he wanted, he knew immediately, and he slipped inside. It was like the study below: leather chairs by the fireplace, a bed with heavy curtains in brown velvet. A dressing table littered with cuff links and a tangle of silk ties, a brush with strands of dark-blond hair.

  Diarmid looked for anything that might house the rest of the collection. He went through everything: the dresser drawers, the huge armoire. Only clothes and more clothes—by the gods, Devlin must have a different shirt for every day! Under the bed, the desk near the window. Nothing.

  Diarmid had canvassed the entire room. Wherever Devlin kept the rest of the collection, it wasn’t here. Diarmid had been so certain. But now he was tempting fate.

  He left the room and crept again down the hall, down the stairs. He was at the first landing when the applause started. He pushed himself back as far as he could into the shadows. If the party was over now, there would be no place to escape except back up, and he didn’t relish the thought of somehow having to manage a drop from a two-story window. Or he could wait in Lucy’s room and pretend he’d come to see her and enlist her help in getting out. Except that what she’d want once they were alone in her bedroom, what she would think he’d come for . . . that would be harder to manage than the window drop.