By Blood Betrayed (The Lost Shrines Book 3)

by Amberlyn Holland

  His Attribute was relentless, and the lingering essence moved inexorably back toward the light until, with a burst of silver, the soul slid back through the veil. Death pushed again to blow the last grasping shadows away and settle Arun back where he belonged.

  The sudden jolt of return restarted the heart and the lungs. But the wound and blood loss still devastated and disrupted the body.

  That, however, was not Death's problem. He'd completed the purpose of his calling.

  The shift back was abrupt, the sense of Death faded so quickly it rocked Phelan back on his heels. Before he even caught his balance, however, he shouted desperately at Selena.

  "Now. Heal him now."

  -10-

  "NOW. Heal him now."

  The sudden surge of life in Arun's body stunned Selena, but Finn's shouted command jolted her out of the momentary shock.

  She jumped into action, pushing away the dozen questions formed in the wake of Finn's transformation. The desperate need to heal her brother before she lost him again overshadowed everything else.

  To do that, though, she needed to tap into the earth's magic. Healing this kind of damage took much more than the small store of power she carried with her. The ley-pool of swirling power beneath spring was the most powerful and convenient source, but Mora had corrupted it with her sorcery and Arun's blood. And that taint was spreading to the thicker leylines leading into it. Selena couldn't risk using any of the close leylines, in case they were infected, too.

  Selena's soul was already darkened by the minor sorcery she'd done at Hafgan's knee. The more tainted power one used, the more corrupted the soul became. The more one craved the power for its own sake.

  Even knowing all that, Selena would risk her own soul, without hesitation, to save her brother. But the tainted power of the spring would also leave its depraved mark on Arun, as well. She would never willingly allow her brother to carry the taint staining her.

  So Selena reached farther away, pulling power from leylines untouched by the corrupting influence of the Mora's magic. She stretched to the edge of her ability, where the lines were weaker and the flow sluggish but managed to pull some of their light toward her. She welcomed it, pulling it in until it combined with the shards of magic she carried within.

  Dragging as much power into herself as she could, Selena encouraged the light inside her to grow until the magic filled her. Until the energy of it could no longer be contained and she throbbed with the need to release the power or be consumed by it.

  Then she focused every bit of the magic she held into Arun. With careful precision, she stopped the bleeding, knitted the worst of the torn flesh back together, and replenished as much of his lost vitality and strength before exhaustion overcame her.

  She slumped over Arun until her head rested lightly on his chest. The band of fear around her heart finally eased when she felt the steady, if slow, rise and fall of air in his lungs. Heard the rattle of his heartbeat under her ear.

  Her brother was alive.

  Hot tears splashed onto her cheeks, releasing the conflicting typhoon of grief and fear and joy and uncertainty that she'd forced down to focus on healing him

  Arun would survive for now, but he'd need to rest for a while. The magic only took them so far. The body had to do the rest on its own. And there was always the possibility of infection setting in.

  Finn stayed by her side, not even trying to conceal anything from the bond humming between them. Worry. Concern. Amazement. Guilt. Uncertain anticipation.

  He was waiting for her reaction to his revelation. Yet another thing she'd buried in her desperate need to save her brother.

  He'd been exactly the same. Except, he'd been completely different. Selena had seen the change. Felt it.

  And what he'd done was impossible. But the proof that it was real lay right in front of her.

  Selena sat up, gaze burning into his.

  "Who are you?"

  Finn's entire body stilled, his expression blanked, and panic hummed along the bond. He blinked at her and she saw the wheels turning, the lies forming, the excuses taking shape. She could feel it before it cut off abruptly in the more familiar sensation of the connection being smothered.

  Then it all drained away. His shoulders drooped, and the impassive mask disappeared.

  "My name is Phelan."

  The breath punched out of her as the softly spoken name drew together a dozen disparate moments in her mind with shocking clarity.

  The huge stray dog, unlike any she'd ever seen before. His skills as a warrior, far outstripping any humble bard's ability. The dispassionate voice and the unnaturally, unbelievable gift that restored her brother.

  The name was one of three everyone had heard around the campfire, in a tavern late, or at any village fair.

  Phelan. Ranulf. Maddyn.

  "Alwyn's Hounds. You're one of the Harbingers of Death."

  Finn—Phelan.

  Phelan winced and shook his head. "Don't believe all the stories you hear. Most of them aren't true."

  She looked meaningfully down at her brother's bloodstained chest, now breathing steadily in her arms.

  He shrugged. "Some are truer than others, I suppose."

  A thousand questions leapt to her mind, but there wasn't time, now, to demand the answers she deserved.

  Her priority was Arun. They needed to get him inside, get him somewhere warm and clean and safe to heal. Somewhere she could make sure he was protected while she went after Mora and made sure the sorceress never hurt anyone again.

  She struggled to rise, trying to move without disturbing Arun.

  "Let me carry him in," Phelan said.

  She hesitated and hurt flashed in his eyes. Refusing his help was ridiculous. Whatever his true name, whatever difference it might make between them, he'd saved Arun. He wasn't a danger to her brother.

  She nodded and stepped out of the way to make it easier for him to pick up Arun's still unconscious form.

  When he started down the path toward the outpost, Selena hesitated again, torn. She didn't want to let Arun out of her sight. But the poisoned contamination of the leylines crossing through the spring tugged at her, a wrong demanding to be put right.

  Healing her brother had taken the last of her reserves, though. She had nothing left to heal the wellspring.

  As much as she hated to see it, as much as she'd been afraid to use it for healing, the taint really was minimal. Mora hadn't had a chance to do more than start on whatever she'd intended. And Arun had dragged himself away before too much of his blood spilled into the pool. Selena hated to leave the spring like this even long enough to rest, but she risked making it worse in the state she was in. Attempting to heal the spring while she was already exhausted past her limits probably wouldn't end well.

  With one last regretful glance over her shoulder, Selena followed Phelan back to the outpost.

  Dawn had fully bloomed in the sky, and the kitchen was already half-filled with early risers.

  And every single one of them stopped to stare when Phelan carried Arun inside. Knowing how quickly the situation could get out of control, Selena pushed in front of them and started giving orders in a no-nonsense voice that had people moving. As they swept through the dining hall, she pretended not to hear any of the questions that rumbled through the room. Explaining what happened would mean understanding it herself, and she hadn't quite wrapped her head around the morning's events yet.

  Once Arun was laid out comfortably on the sleeping mat in his room, Selena sat next to him with water and fresh linens to clean and bind his wounds. Phelan stood guard in the doorway and watched her work.

  Into the strained silence, he said quietly, "You can't tell anyone. That he was dead. That I..." Phelan hesitated, face pinched as he searched for words. "That I brought him back."

  There was a depth of secrets and half-truths left unspoken in that simple statement. For now, though, Selena knew neither of them w
as in any place to discuss any of it.

  Instead, she asked the one question weighing on her mind.

  "Will he know he was dead? Will he remember it?"

  Selena had no idea what she wanted the answer to be. Either seemed like an equally horrible thing to live with.

  "I don't know. This is only the second time I've tried it. The last time... didn't work."

  Selena had heard the stories. The extra stanzas added to the ballad after the death of his foster parents. How they were murdered, and he and his brothers were helpless even with the might of their Attribute.

  Everything that had happened. Everything they'd endured, had wrenched the connection between them wide-open and neither had the energy to fight it closed again.

  Selena felt his pain and regret and the desperate determination to make up for a failure that wasn't his fault.

  Tears sprang to her eyes and the urge to comfort him gripped her. But this wasn't Finn, whom she'd come to care for in spite of herself.

  This was Phelan.

  And Selena didn't know him at all.

  *****

  Saving Arun had ripped open the memory of the last time he'd unleashed his Attribute. He'd managed to hold it at bay with the immediate need to take care of Arun. Now, though, nothing was left to distract Phelan from reliving the despair he'd shared with his brothers when they tried to undo their foster parents' death. When they'd failed. Even the full force of the Attribute flowing between all of them had been unable to subvert fate. Even Death couldn't undo what was meant to be.

  The failure of it remained a weight in his soul he was determined to do penance for.

  For a moment, pity softened Selena's eyes. Phelan knew she felt too much in the raw emotion spilling out of him. Hard as he tried, though, the bond kept slipping open. Putting on display everything he'd spent years hiding behind a carefully built mask.

  Then she looked away, and he felt her curiosity rise back to the surface. The questions she'd suppressed in the urgency of getting her brother somewhere safe couldn't be ignored by either of them anymore.

  "So," she said thoughtfully, and Phelan steeled himself for the questions he'd been dreading. "The Ballad of Alwyn's Hounds?"

  Phelan blinked at her, surprised by the sudden change of topic and uncertain of exactly what she was asking him.

  "You said some of the stories about you and your brothers are truer than others. What's true?"

  Phelan usually avoided this conversation altogether. By pretending to be someone else. Or by keeping everyone distracted with swashbuckling tales of past adventure and conquest. Or by indulging in reckless ventures that left everyone breathlessly enthralled by his daring.

  But none of those things would work on Selena, even if he wanted to evade the truth.

  Taking a deep breath, Phelan leaned against the wall for a little extra support and considered his words carefully.

  "Most of the history is right. I was too young to remember Tresk's army slaughtering our clan or Lady Alwyn saving us, but I know it happened."

  Maddyn rarely talked about it, but the haunting memory was always there in his eyes. As was the pain of being ostracized by their people because of it. That's why Phelan always took any missions near the Tribes land. He couldn't care less about their former kinsmen's opinion or acceptance.

  "Did she really use the Cauldron?"

  "Yes. And you saw for yourself that being healed in it really did give us the Attribute of Death. But most of the gifts the ballad ascribes to us are pure imagination. We can't kill someone with a touch or a look. There is no guarantee someone will die whenever we show up. We can't foretell death. Well, Ranulf can. Sometimes."

  Selena raised an eyebrow in question and Phelan sank his teeth hard into his bottom lip. He had no right to share that with her. Yet, after Arun, he felt like she had a right to know since he was going to ask her to keep it a secret.

  "We each only got a part of the Attribute of Death. Ran can see the potential for death coming soon, though it doesn't always happen. Madd feels death as it happens near him. I can see the shadows of deaths that have occurred in a place."

  "And you can bring people back from the dead."

  "Not exactly. Not always. There are deaths that are fated to happen. And those that could happen, if the circumstances fall just right. But destiny isn't set in stone. I can change the second kind of death but not the first. And trying to subvert destiny," he swallowed, remembering the nightmares of the dark well that still occasionally plagued him. "It's painful and difficult to come back from. It's not a choice to make lightly."

  "And yet, you brought back Arun?"

  Phelan knew she was really asking why, but he had no answer. In the moment, there had been no thought, no consideration. He didn't know if it was her grief spilling into him that spurred him, or if some sixth sense had demanded it of him. He only knew that Arun wasn't meant to die today. And that allowing it to happen could change everything that came after.

  Unable to explain, he lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug.

  She waited, watching him closely and he expected her to press for a real answer. Instead, she surprised him by shifting the conversation again.

  "And the shapeshifting? Were you the stray?"

  Another surge of guilt threatened, but he ruthlessly shut it down. Phelan dipped his head and exhaled. "Yeah. That was me. The Hound form is something we inherited from our father. He was a shaman and shapeshifter. The Cauldron didn't take the ability away."

  Selena looked down at her hands, and Phelan felt a sweep of loss across the bond. He'd taken away the stray from her, as well. By the time this day ended, she was going to hate him. There was nothing he could do to take back the lies he'd told or the hurt he'd caused her with his secrets.

  "Why are you really here?" Selena demanded.

  "I'm here because of the spring," he answered honestly.

  Her head snapped up, fury and surprise fighting in the glare leveled at him.

  Phelan held up his hands, trying to forestall her anger. "I meant, I'm here to protect it from Hafgan. Not that I've done such a great job so far."

  "Protect it from Hafgan? Why?"

  She asked too casually. If he hadn't already guessed she had a history with magic and sorcery, her poor attempt at subterfuge would have sealed his suspicions.

  "I think you know why," he said, but when she sputtered, he didn't push or demand answers. She'd been through a lot and the sun had barely risen. There'd be time later to coax that story of her own gifts and training from her. "The spring is a place of power, and Hafgan needs to replace the power he's losing now."

  "Replace the power he's losing?"

  This time, her surprise seemed genuine. Hafgan did his best to project the image that his magic and abilities were unlimited.

  "He's been drawing from one of the most ancient and powerful shrines on the continent. But he's used it so long, for such darkness, that he's rapidly depleting the magic and power it contains. It's why the land is dying. He's sucked everything out of it and replaced it with nothing but corruption and evil and it's spreading out."

  "That—" For a moment, she looked genuinely surprised then her expression shifted into thoughtful consideration. "That makes sense. So you think he's coming here for the spring?"

  Something about the way she emphasized spring made him wonder what else she might have thought Hafgan would be after but he held his tongue. Trying to dig into her secrets at the moment wouldn't get him anywhere.

  "Yes. But not just this one. He can't get that much power from any one shrine, but if he ties three specific ones together, the increase in magic would be exponential. Fortunately, none are easy for him to gain. We're in the borderlands here. Bringing his army in to claim this outpost would force a confrontation with the Thousand Tribes. That's why he sent a spy, I believe. He wanted to keep an eye on it while they coordinated the efforts to go after the other shrines.

  "Wh
ether she recognized me as a Hound or just as trouble, my arrival triggered her to contact him last week, I think."

  When he'd been chasing her through the woods, he'd recognized the dark, unique scent he'd noted the first time she'd used sorcery in the clearing. And it occurred to him that Mora had never come close to him in the time he'd been at the outpost. Even in the evenings, when she'd followed Arun on his round of greetings, she'd peel off to gossip and chat with someone on the other side of the room before Arun got to Phelan.

  But she'd been so subtle and shy, he hadn't noticed.

  In the hallways nearby, Phelan heard the others getting more and more restless with questions and concerns. All but one heartbeat kept a polite distance, though. Selena looked overwhelmed, her face pale and drawn with exhaustion but he knew she wouldn't get any rest until she placated the inhabitants of the outpost.

  "Why don't you go deal with the mob you know will be waiting for you. Then get some rest. I'll stay with Arun while you do what you need to do."

  Selena looked torn, both relieved by the idea of rest and reluctant to leave her brother's side.

  "I'll protect him with my life. You have my word."

  Selena stared down at her brother a little longer. Then she carefully arranged the blanket over him and stood up.

  At the door, she paused but didn't look back at him.

  "I have no idea what I'm going to tell them. I don't know how much I should tell them. When I decide, can I tell them the truth about you? Your name, I mean, not... not what happened with Arun."

  His experience told Phelan it was a mistake. That it was always better to be underestimated and overlooked. But his instincts told him now was time for the truth. That it was time to stop playing at being an anonymous nomad and start claiming his name.

  "Yes."

  The single, simple answer felt like it changed everything. And yet nothing was different at all.

  Selena dipped her head in acknowledgment then left. Without once ever looking back.