The City of Thieves

by Kyle Alexander Romines

  The ground trembled under Cathán’s rage, and Berengar and Morwen exchanged glances. Maybe Cathán was as powerful as he suggested.

  “No one is innocent. You showed me that. I would have given you peace, but your kind understands only death. Humans are a pestilence—a blight upon the earth.”

  Azura shook her head. “Humans aren’t perfect, but they are capable of more than you credit them, druid.”

  “Their very existence is an offense against nature. They raze the forests and strip the land of its resources to expand their cities and settlements. They make war against all who are different from themselves. They threaten the practice of magic, which I took an oath to protect. I would see every man, woman, and child put to death.”

  Morwen’s expression hardened. “You’re a monster.”

  Cathán pointed a long, claw-like finger at Berengar. “He is the monster. He and his kin. How many ‘innocents’ did he cut down in the purges? Surely you don’t imagine all were rioters.”

  Morwen regarded the druid with defiance. “He’s made his share of mistakes, but he’s nobler than you’ll ever be.”

  Sinister whispers reverberated through the clouds above. Berengar looked around, mindful of Cathán’s followers. He had beaten Cathán before, but even with Morwen and Azura at his side, he was outnumbered by a large margin. The troll and the ogres shifted restlessly, spoiling for a fight, while the goblins remained nearly motionless, their shadows moving in the dim light.

  Unnoticed by the others, Azura fingered one of her throwing knives. Berengar stepped toward Cathán to keep the druid’s attention on him while Azura carefully inched toward a better position.

  Cathán turned back to Teelah. “What of your other task in Dún Aulin?”

  “I found the scout who escaped. The warden led me straight to him. The scout told me everything. Soon King Lucien will be within our grasp.”

  “It was you from the start,” Berengar said. Cathán had been watching them the whole time, probably from the moment they entered Leinster. “You hired the Black Hand to retrieve the thunder rune—and the goblins after I took it from them. So much death, all for a stone.”

  “This is about far more than the stone.” Cathán spread his arms wide. “Do you know what this place really is? The ancients called Tulach Mhór the ‘great mound.’ It is no giant ruin. It’s a prison.”

  As he spoke, something stirred deep within the earth, and Morwen’s face whitened in response to an unseen threat.

  “I sense it too,” Azura said.

  Cathán lowered his arms. “This is where Padraig banished Caorthannach, the mother of demons, when he defeated the last of the Fomorians. And here she has slumbered ever since, waiting to be released to pour out her wrath upon the land and cleanse Fál of the unworthy. I need only an elemental stone and a sacrifice of royal blood to release her from her prison. Once she has collected enough souls, I will resurrect Balor, and the Fomorians will eradicate humanity from the land and usher in a new age of darkness.”

  “What?” Teelah’s brow furrowed, betraying her surprise. “That’s not what we agreed. We joined you so we might have our revenge on King Lucien, not eradicate the entire human race. The Fomorians enslaved our ancestors and brought only misery to the world. I’ll play no part in their return.”

  Berengar stole closer still. With any luck, he could reach Cathán before the troll or ogres could intercept him. He cast a look at Azura, who kept the throwing knife held behind her back, and gave Morwen an almost imperceptible nod.

  “The time has come to pick a side,” Cathán declared. “Your kin don’t seem nearly as hesitant to join my cause.” All across the ruins, goblins hissed in assent. “Perhaps you do not enjoy the loyalty you thought. Now bring me the stone.”

  Teelah remained where she stood.

  Berengar sprinted forward. “Now!”

  Morwen cast a ward that deflected black arrows as Berengar cleaved a goblin in two and charged at Cathán with his axe held high.

  “Stailc gaoithe aeir.” Cathán formed a fist, and a blast of wind struck Berengar head-on. The force knocked him to the ground. “Fool. Have you forgotten that nature herself is my servant?” He looked up at the goblin horde and pointed at Berengar and the others. “Kill them and bring me the stone.”

  The troll and two ogres lumbered forward, swinging their clubs while the goblins scurried to join the fray. Berengar dodged an arrow, ducked under a blow from an ogre, and beheaded a goblin before falling back to join Morwen and Azura. Enemies closed in around them as Cathán looked on.

  Azura cut through one goblin after another without tiring. Even with the damage wrought by his axe, Berengar could hardly match her pace. The goblins, which moved faster than most humans, couldn’t land as much as a single blow on her. Morwen alternated between battering goblins with her staff and casting spells, though it was obvious her new staff was more difficult to wield unfinished.

  Goblins scrambled from the troll’s path as it headed straight for Berengar. He kept his axe at the ready and braced himself for impact. “Stay together. Don’t let them pick us apart.”

  Azura used her voice to target the troll, and a current of power blasted across the hilltop. The impact threw goblins aside and struck the troll head-on. Although the creature’s momentum carried it forward, the force of Azura’s words altered its course enough to cause it to miss them entirely and fall down the hill.

  Azura’s moment of triumph was short-lived, and she found herself cornered by an ogre. When she attempted to knife it, a stray arrow knocked the blade from her hand. She took to the air to fly over it, but the ogre seized one of her legs and swung her back and forth in the air.

  Berengar brushed past the goblins in his path and charged the ogre. The creature was too slow to bring its arm up to defend itself. The axe drew blood, and Azura slipped from the creature’s grasp. The ogre rounded on Berengar, who rushed to meet it. The collision sent them both to the ground, and Berengar’s axe fell away. He rolled out from under the ogre’s fist, which shattered stone beneath it. Faolán pounced on the monster’s back long enough for Berengar to free his sword and cut the ogre down the middle.

  Before he could rejoin the others, the second ogre struck him with its club. The impact lifted him off the ground. He lost his grip on his sword and landed hard against a stone pillar. The ogre lumbered toward him, its club held high. Berengar attempted to go for his fallen sword, but a goblin leapt on him from above and sank its teeth into his neck, drawing blood. While he wrestled with the goblin, the ogre drew nearer.

  “Morwen, do something…”

  Lightning fell from the sky and struck the hilltop, and the ogre and most goblins were knocked off their feet. A scream came from Morwen. Smoke rose from the burned hand holding the thunder rune. She dropped the stone, which rolled away and landed at Cathán’s feet, and sank to her knees.

  The runestone vibrated and glowed when Cathán picked it up. Sparks ran across his robes, and his eyes shone with white light. He trained the thunder rune on Berengar and his companions. “Farewell, Warden Berengar.” A blast of pure energy shot from the stone to incinerate them.

  A growl came from Morwen, who, despite her injury, forced herself to her feet with an expression of pure determination. “No.” Fierce winds swept the hilltop as she grabbed a golden amulet that hung around her neck. “This amulet is enchanted with light magic, and you cannot overcome its power.”

  When Azura saw the amulet, her eyes widened in recognition. “Ramsay.”

  Morwen gave a great cry, and the amulet shone with light. A golden sphere formed around them, shielding them from the lightning. “Leagan amach!” The sphere detonated outward, and a wave of energy knocked all the goblins in the area aside. Morwen crumpled to the ground, weakened by the energy required to wield the amulet’s power.

  Berengar scooped up his axe and rushed Cathán with a roar. “Now!”

  The druid countered the strike with his scythe and aimed a weaker bolt of ener
gy at him. To Cathan’s surprise, Berengar’s axe absorbed the blast and deflected excess electricity.

  “Surprised?” Berengar shrugged off the lightning and continued his advance, even as Cathán held the rune on him. “You should have paid closer attention to my axe.”

  His axe bore a silver rune of its own. Morwen had enchanted the axe with a spell of resiliency that drew on the rune’s power to repel magical attacks. It had worked against Ravenna’s shadow magic, and it appeared just as capable against the electrical force wielded by Cathán. Although the weight of the energy flowing from the thunder rune threatened to drive him back, Berengar forced himself to keep going until he was within striking distance of Cathán. The lightning rebounded on his foe.

  The fluttering of wings sounded above the thunder, and Azura landed next to him. “Let’s take him together.”

  Cathán looked from one to the other, his eyes full of uncertainty for the first time.

  An arrow whizzed by the druid’s head as a horn reverberated in the distance.

  “Humans!” a goblin cried before an arrow struck him dead.

  Men in armor stormed the hilltop in numbers equal to Cathán’s followers. They wielded swords, bows, and other weapons with lethal efficiency.

  Monster hunters, Berengar realized. Given the odds against him, he might’ve been relieved by the monster hunters’ sudden appearance—if not for the insignia they wore. “The Acolytes.” How did they find us?

  He looked back at Cathán, but the druid had vanished, taking the thunder rune along with him. Before Berengar could pursue his foe, goblins ran at him through the archway, though most ignored him in favor of the monster hunters.

  The monster hunters’ captain reached the top of the stair. “Find the cursed blade, and the one who carries it—along with the warden and his companion.”

  The skirmish quickly turned into an all-out battle between Cathán’s forces and the Acolytes, with Berengar and his allies caught in the middle. Azura spread her wings to fly away, but the monster hunters threw a net over her. Berengar waylaid a goblin in his path and looked from Azura to Morwen, who fought with her back against a stone wall. He couldn’t help them both at once.

  Two attackers ran at him with their swords raised, and Berengar took them on together. One managed to score a slash across his armor before Berengar bashed in his head. The other rattled his teeth with the hilt of a blade before falling victim to a goblin’s arrow. When the troll smashed through another archway, the monster hunters were forced to divert their attention to the rampaging brute. Berengar continued toward Morwen, now almost completely surrounded.

  Just before he reached her, the ogre he thought he killed earlier came running at him. The collision sent them both over the hillside. Berengar fell several feet and landed hard beside a pile of rubble. He pushed himself up, staggered to his feet, and looked for his axe. It hurt simply to stand. The sounds of battle carried from above, and his gaze fell on the stair leading back to the summit.

  He saw the ogre’s fist a half second too late. The blow struck his chest, and the next caught him on the chin. When the ogre bashed him against a stone wall, Berengar tasted blood, and his vision swam. He fought to remain conscious and searched for a weak spot. Blood flowed from the open wound where Berengar’s sword had sliced through the ogre’s abdomen. Mustering all his strength, he planted his feet against the wall and drove himself forward, taking the ogre by surprise. He thrust his hand into the ogre’s exposed abdomen and ripped out its viscera in a heap. The ogre dropped to its knees, and Berengar bashed its head in with a rock until it stopped moving.

  He limped toward the staircase. His leg threatened to give way under him, but he forced himself to keep going.

  “There he is!”

  A group of monster hunters encircled him. Unarmed and barely conscious, Berengar lashed out in anger. Someone hit him on the back of the head, and suddenly he was on the ground looking up at a sea of unfamiliar faces.

  “Put him with the others. The boss wants this one alive.”

  A boot hurtled toward his face, and his world faded to black.

  The world shifted under him. Berengar stirred. His body ached all over. A blindfold covered his eyes, and ropes bound his hands and feet. He was still too weary from battle to even attempt to free himself.

  I should be dead. The Acolytes wanted him dead, so why was he still alive?

  No answers came. His thoughts were a clouded mess. Whatever the reason the monster hunters had spared him, it couldn’t have been for anything good.

  The earth moved beneath him again. His body lay sprawled across a wooden surface. A wheel rolled over a rock below, tossing him about. He was in the back of a wagon. The sound of horses and men’s voices carried from outside. They were in transit.

  Where are they taking us? He coughed and felt searing pain. The ogre had cracked—or broken—some of his ribs. He was lucky it hadn’t punctured a lung. He was in a sorry state either way.

  “Morwen?” The word came out jumbled. It occurred to him he might’ve been unconscious longer than he thought. “Azura?”

  There was no answer. The last he had seen, Morwen and Faolán were cornered, and Azura was trapped in a net. He hoped Morwen at least had managed to escape in the midst of the fighting, but he feared the worst. The wagon rolled over another rock, causing him to hit his head against the wagon’s side, and again the world faded away.

  He drifted in and out of consciousness for the duration of the journey. Time lost all meaning, and he was only vaguely aware of his surroundings. Past and present converged in fragmented dreams where he saw the faces of those he had killed waiting for him to join them in death.

  When he came to again, the wagon was rolling over a paved road. His head still hurt, but his thoughts were clearer. A bell tolled in the distance, and he heard the sounds of crowds outside the wagon. They were back inside the city. Eventually, the wagon came to a stop when the company reached their final destination, and the door to the back of the wagon was thrown open.

  “He’s awake,” a voice said.

  “Knock him out,” said another. “He’ll be easier to manage.”

  “Look at the shape he’s in. He hasn’t eaten in days. Besides, there are hundreds of guards within these walls.”

  “Do you know who he is? I’ll not take the chance. Do it.”

  Another blow to the head left him in a haze. Strong arms hauled him from the wagon and dragged him indoors.

  The next thing he knew, someone was saying his name.

  He hung in midair, suspended by chains. His blindfold had been removed. The guards had taken his cloak, armor, and boots, leaving him clad only in a pair of pants. Berengar blinked and let his eyes adjust to the pale light that crept inside a wide stone chamber. Held at bay by torches, shadows lurked hungrily about the periphery of the room. Iron bars covered the windows.

  “Berengar?”

  Morwen was similarly restrained, as were Azura and Teelah. Berengar extended his hand toward her, but his shackles held him fixed in place, and she loomed just out of his reach. The sight of her in chains woke something dark and angry in him.

  “Are you alright?”

  Her right hand appeared badly burned from her attempted use of the thunder rune. “Better than you, in any event. It’s not as bad as it looks.”

  “Where are we?”

  “Listen.” Azura craned her neck toward the chamber’s locked door. “We’re in a tower cell in the palace. There are guards posted outside.”

  Berengar listened carefully. “I don’t hear anything.”

  “That’s because you’re listening with human ears.”

  “Show-off,” Teelah said ruefully.

  “Can’t you get us out of here?” Berengar asked Azura.

  She shook her head. “These chains are iron.”

  “So?”

  “Iron repels fairies,” Morwen explained. “The monster hunters of old used iron weapons to kill the fair folk.”

&nbs
p; “Figures. How did the Acolytes find us?” And what are they doing working with the palace guards? They’re supposed to be outlawed by the church.

  “It wasn’t us they were following.” Like his armor and weapons, Morwen’s staff and satchel were missing. “It was the cursed blade they were after. They took it.”

  “So the blade’s back where it belongs. What of it?” Berengar willed away the pain and forced himself to think. “Something doesn’t add up. I can see why the palace guard would want her locked up, but what are we doing here?” He was a Warden of Fál. If the High Queen learned he had been strung up like a common criminal on Lucien’s orders, Leinster’s boy-king would bear the full brunt of her ire.

  “You should have let me go when I asked,” Azura said. “Now the whole kingdom is in danger.”

  Berengar felt his anger rising. “If you hadn’t stolen the cursed blade, none of this would have happened. Enough games. I want answers. Who hired you to steal the blade?”

  “I don’t know. They offered me a wand in return for the theft of the blade.”

  “A wand?”

  “A fairy wand. It’s what I hoped to find at the Institute.”

  “I’ve seen you use that voice of yours. What do you need a wand for?”

  Her lips pulled into a frown, revealing her pointy-edged teeth. “All fairies have magic, but wands help us hone our power into spells in the same way most human mages rely on staffs.”

  “Some human magicians use wands as well,” Morwen offered.

  “Fairy wands are not like those used by humans. They are very rare and hard to come by. Mine was taken from me when I was banished from the fairy realm.” Azura lowered her head. “I agreed to meet the client at the Giant’s Foot to make the exchange, but I never intended to surrender the blade. I know the dangers it poses. That’s why I stole it in the first place—to keep it from falling into the wrong hands.”

  Morwen’s brow furrowed. “You mean King Lucien? Why did you say he wasn’t the king?”