Fireshaper's Doom

by Tom Deitz

  Morwyn’s face went suddenly hard. She glared back at Lugh. “I swore an oath, Ard Rhi, and kept it. My soul holds no peace because of it, yet I know that in that, at least, I acted rightly. My duty was to avenge my son, and that I have done. The rest is for Dana to say; I care not.”

  “Not even if there is war?”

  “I will return to the Land of the Powersmiths,” Morwyn replied wearily. “War will sweep by me, and I will scarcely mark its passage.”

  “But others will not. You will come to know this, Fireshaper: that when war ravages Faerie, perhaps even breaks through to consume the Lands of Men, that every one who dies, man or Faery, will die cursing your name. That may be your doom, Fireshaper. I only hope it does not come to pass.”

  “But what about Fionchadd?” David interrupted desperately. “We’ve got to try to resurrect him, and soon—we’re running out of time!”

  “We are indeed,” the Morrigu acknowledged unexpectedly, “but I think we may yet succeed—if we can enlist the aid of that mortal woman I see skulking about by the pool yonder.”

  Lugh followed her pointing finger, and nodded. “Bring that woman here,” he commanded.

  “Lord, help me,” Katie whispered to JoAnne Sullivan, as she saw two warriors break ranks behind Lugh and start toward her. “What can they want with me?”

  The younger woman could only shake her head and frown.

  Katie cleared her throat expectantly. Whatever Oisin had chosen her for was about to happen. She was there, finally, the place where the cross had been. She’d been late—evidently something important had gone on that she’d missed. She had arrived in time to see the ships come sailing out of the clouds, though, and that was a wonder straight out of Ezekiel. But now they had noticed her, and were coming to get her. Did They want her to do something for Them? But what could Katie McNally do that these fine folk could not? She couldn’t imagine.

  A hand brushed her arm, gentle but firm. She looked up, saw a man there—or a boy. Which was he? She couldn’t tell; they all looked like tall young men to her—except for their eyes. And the women . . .

  “Come, Katie McNally,” a gentle voice urged her, a woman’s voice this time, at her left. A woman in what looked like solid gold armor. “You must come with us; the High King of the Sidhe has need of you.”

  Katie nodded, set her mouth, and stood up as straight as she could. “I’ll walk of my own will,” she said. “You do na’ have to force me.”

  “Nor would we,” the woman replied.

  And Katie left JoAnne Sullivan standing speechless beside the pool and went forward to meet Lugh Samildinach.

  Lugh looked her up and down. “Do you think she will do, Morrigu?”

  The Mistress of Battles stared at Katie, and Katie felt as though something were pecking away at her fluttering heart; the woman’s voice, when she heard it again, was like the cawing of a crow. “She will, Lord, if her doubts do not betray her.”

  “You are certain?”

  “I know, Lord, that with battle comes death, but with the knowledge of death comes also the knowledge of life. And this one has lived a very long life, as mortals go. She has done many of the things we have done, and she has done one thing none of us will ever do.”

  “And what is that?” Froech asked.

  “She has aged, boy,” Lugh interrupted. “She knows the feel of mortality in her bones, as we never can. Death comes even to the Sidhe, sometimes, but we never see it approaching. To grow old and know it is waiting there at the end must take great strength indeed.”

  “So you need me for my old bones?” Katie snapped, feistier than she felt.

  Lugh looked at her without emotion. “I need you for the Power age has horded within you.”

  “What power? I’ve got no power.”

  Lugh’s face was impassive. “I need you to lead a ritual, to be a kind of priestess, as it were.”

  Katie’s heart flip-flopped. A priestess! What did they mean by that? She wouldn’t be involved in no pagan rites, no sir. That would be asking too much. She’d been a good Catholic woman since her birth.

  “I’ll not.”

  “But you must.” Lugh smiled. “A life hangs in the balance, and you alone can help to save it—you and some of these other good folk.”

  “Why me?”

  “Because this is your World. And because there is no time but now for the doing, and no one for the doing but you. Morwyn’s son dwells in a body not his own. He cannot leave it, and yet that body will fail, it will die. He must have strength enough to claim another by then. Yet we cannot wait, for he battles the lizard’s thoughts incessantly. He is awake now, but he must sleep again. He will not reawaken.”

  Suddenly the red-haired woman was on her knees before her. “Will you do this for me, Katie McNally?”

  “Yer askin’ me for my soul, Lady. I cannot help you.”

  “Let me talk to her,” David interrupted. “Maybe I can explain—I’ve seen a little more of both sides.”

  Katie sighed and let the boy lead her back to the pool. If he thought he was going to convince her . . .

  David grimaced uncertainly when he saw his mother still waiting there, took a deep breath, and slid his hands down his hips as though he sought pockets he did not have. Finally he folded his arms in frustration. “You’ve got to help them, Katie.”

  “And why would that be, young sir? I’ve helped them too much already.”

  David frowned. “But they need your help, Katie, it’s as simple as that,” he began slowly. “You asked why, and all I can say is because . . . because they’re just good people, most of ’em. Because they’re alive, even if it’s not the same as you and me, and they’ve got a right to be happy just like us.”

  He paused, chewed thoughtfully on the side of his hand before continuing. “I know what’s bothering you; it’s the religion thing, and I’ll tell you straight it bothers me too, sometimes; ’cause what I know, what I’ve seen, just don’t jive with what you read in the Book. Hell, I was almost an atheist before I found out about all this. But it is real, Katie; it’s all part of one creation.”

  He paused again, glanced around, locked gazes briefly with his mother, before looking back at Katie. “I know I must sound like I really think I know it all to be telling you this, but there’s one thing I do know absolutely, and that’s if you really do what you know is right, then you’ll be okay in the hereafter. If you make people happy, that’s a right thing. If you aid the sick, that’s a right thing. I wish I had time to explain more, to try to make you see—that when they talk about you being a priestess, they’re not trying to make you give up God, they’re trying to make you serve God, just in a different way. I mean, it’s all one world in the end—but you and me and just a few others know how much more to it there really is.” He took another breath. “This stuff didn’t cost me my religion, Katie. It helped me find my religion.”

  “Well, I ain’t havin’ any part of it,” JoAnne said suddenly. “I’m gonna get Little Billy and get outta here. You better come on, too, if you know what’s good for you.” She began stalking away from the pool.

  David’s eyes flickered indecisively from Katie’s uncertain face to JoAnne’s rigid back. Finally he sprinted after his mother and caught her by the arm.

  She looked around at him, her face a mask of uncertain indignation. “I can’t go through with this, David.” she whispered. “Do you really have any idea what’s goin’ on?”

  “It’s kind of complicated, Ma,” David said, as he drew her back toward Katie, “if they’re talking about what I think they are. I’ll just have to tell you what I told Katie. These are good people here, getting ready to try to do a good thing.”

  “I don’t want to hear about it. Tryin’ to raise the dead an’ all that! It’s plain ol’ satanism!”

  “No it’s not, Ma. Not at all.” David released her arm and pointed toward the precipice. “I mean, just look out there! Look at those ships. You ever see ships floating in the sky? You
ever see a man walk through the air like Lugh did about five minutes ago? You ever see me appear out of nowhere with a king’s ransom in gaudy jewelry in my hand? Yet you believe in a man who’s supposed to have walked on water and fed a multitude with loaves and fishes. This kind of stuff ought to make you believe more, not less, because it makes all that miracle stuff more likely. And anyway, what they’re planning doesn’t involve invoking powers or anything, it just involves one person’s strength of will—he just happens to be wearing a lizard’s body right now, that’s all.”

  JoAnne’s nose twitched. “Don’t that make him a demon, though?”

  David thought desperately. “No—of course not. Listen, I think the best I can tell you is that these folks are like angels, only not quite. Some folks say they didn’t take sides when Satan rebelled, and were doomed to roam the space between Heaven and Earth. Don’t ask me, I don’t know. But we ain’t got time to argue now. Talk to Katie if you don’t believe me.”

  JoAnne’s troubled stare shifted to Katie. The old woman smiled wanly and motioned her away. “You go on, child, I got to think by myself for just a minute.”

  JoAnne nodded slowly, as David led her back toward the waiting company. “I’m gonna be doin’ some serious thinkin’, too, let me tell you,” she told him as they walked. “But that old lady’s got some faith too, so I reckon if it’s good enough for her, it’s good enough for me. If she’ll go through with whatever’s goin’ on, I will.”

  Katie looked at David’s departing back. She’d heard every word: what he’d told her, and what he’d told his mother besides. But was he serious? Could he be telling the truth? It was too much, too complex. And he was so young. But he’d smiled; there’d been tears in his eyes, and his face had fairly glowed when he talked, like she’d only seen a very few people do in church. He believed what he said. She squared her shoulders and started forward.

  “I’ll do it,” Katie said a moment later, as she stood before Lugh’s splendid form. “And may the Lord forgive me. Now tell me what you need me to do.”

  “It will take six of you,” Lugh said. “Six mortals, for we deal with the Powers of your World now, which even the Sidhe have almost forgotten.”

  “What do you mean?” Liz asked carefully.

  “I mean that there are circumstances under which the laws that govern even life and death may be transcended—very particular circumstances, I might add. Circumstances that blur the distinctions between the Worlds, as they blur—or combine—all such distinctions: man and woman, youth and maturity and age!”

  The Faery lord spared a sideways glance at JoAnne, who was glaring about distrustfully, apparently having second thoughts already. She was casting particularly disapproving looks at her older son, her younger one having already curled his hand happily in her own.

  “Well, I don’t see nothin’!” she announced flatly. “Just get it over and done with.”

  Regan laid a hand on her shoulder, which she tried unsuccessfully to shrug off. “You know it not, JoAnne Sullivan,” the Faery lady said, “but together with Katie and Liz you embody one of the greatest confluences of Power in all your World. Indeed, men once worshiped one like you: the threefold goddess: the crone, and the matron, and the virgin maid. Goddess they never were, in fact, yet the three together are still a focus of Power. It is that Power we would draw on now.”

  “With,” the Morrigu interrupted, “their consort, the threefold god: the sage, and the warrior, and the youth. They usually sacrificed the latter two,” she added with a sly glance at David.

  “By which you mean Uncle Dale, for sure, and . . . who else?” David faltered.

  “There are several choices,” Nuada observed, “but there is one particular requirement.”

  David looked at him dubiously. “Which is?”

  “The maid and the youth must be virgins.”

  “Well, that lets me out, Sullivan,” Gary chortled. He punched Alec’s shoulder. “How ’bout you, McLean?”

  Alec did not reply, though he blushed rather profusely.

  “We could use Little Billy,” David suggested. “He’s sure to qualify.”

  Nuada shook his head. “No, he is too young.”

  “And is Liz a, er—” Gary found himself blushing.

  “Damn right,” Liz volunteered with conviction.

  “So it’s either Alex or Sullivan—if they’re . . .”

  David stared at the ground, kicked a stone. “I’m eligible,” he mumbled.

  “So am I,” Alec ventured.

  “But Liz and I make a better set.”

  “Well, there is that.”

  “And now for the warrior.”

  Alec and Gary looked at each other. “Flip you for it?” Gary said.

  Alec shrugged. “You were the most heroic on the Tracks. I mean, you attacked the deer and the manticore—”

  “Like a friggin’ idiot.”

  “—and helped draw off the Watchers. I couldn’t have done that.”

  Gary nodded. “Okay, okay, you’ve sold me. So what do I do?”

  “Yeah,” Liz broke in, “all this beating around the bush about threefold gods and goddesses and stuff is giving me the fidgets. Can we or can we not resurrect Fionchadd, and if so, how?” She whirled to face Lugh. “Well?”

  “One word will say it,” Lugh replied. “And that word is blood.”

  “Blood?” Gary asked, startled.

  “Blood is the life,” the Morrigu said, “the vehicle of Power . Without it, without the Power it contains, why, what is a man’s body but earth and water? Even in Faerie it is the same. Now the first two things we have a-plenty in the water of yonder falls, the stones beneath our feet. But there are two other things that must be present also: Air and Fire: spirit and Power. Spirit Fionchadd has, and a life force of his own within the lizard. But more life force he needs, if he would shape himself anew: and that comes best from blood. Various rules determine whose, but in this World the threefold god and the threefold goddess would seem to do very nicely.”

  “I thought sex came into it some way,” David muttered. “Or did I read The Golden Bough wrong?”

  Liz raced his mother in shooting him a glare.

  Morwyn looked amused. “You had your chance at that and lost it. Had I but known, this would be far simpler now. But however you work it, it still takes a certain amount of time and a certain amount of pain, and there are means both quicker and easier—if Fionchadd has the Power.”

  “So what do we do?” Uncle Dale asked, tugging nervously on his whiskers.

  Lugh looked at the Morrigu. “This is really woman’s magic,” he said. “I think I had best defer to you.”

  “And about time, too,” the Morrigu snapped. “I will need a cauldron, to start with. A pity Bran’s was lost to us; it would serve very well just now.”

  “I have one on my ship here,” Lugh replied, “though it is not enchanted.” At his nod, two soldiers fell from ranks and quickly boarded his vessel, to return a moment later with, indeed, a cauldron large enough for a man to sit in.

  “Looks like my old wash pot,” JoAnne confided to Katie.

  “Fill it with water!”

  Two more soldiers brought water from the falls in golden ewers.

  “Now add stones—bones would be even better.” The Morrigu looked around. “I believe there is a deer’s skeleton in the woods just to the right of those trees.”

  Two more soldiers broke rank.

  A moment later the cauldron was full of a strange concoction of water and rocks, the bones of a dead deer, leaves from a certain tree . . . and a few things the Morrigu had not told them of.

  Katie groaned and stood up. She couldn’t delay any longer. Her time had come. It was her soul now: damnation or salvation, one, all in a couple of minutes. But she’d been praying while those other folks went on about high-sounding things. And she’d prayed again after the woman with the crow had told her what she had to do. She didn’t like it, but she had no choice; too many folks were
depending on her, too many good folks, good folks among even Those Ones, she guessed. Regan, at least, had never been anything but kind to her. So she had prayed and asked God’s guidance, and then his forgiveness. She thought she had them. It was for a good cause, she’d decided. She didn’t know if They really had souls or not. But they sure talked a lot about them. Maybe that was what made them so intense, so hot-tempered, so strange and perilous—they didn’t truly know God’s love. They were immortal, therefore they didn’t need God, except that you needed God most when you were alive, not dead. Regan had told her about Dana, once, but Dana wasn’t God. Regan was sure of that. What she was, Katie had no idea.

  “Katie, it is time,” Lugh said.

  They stood in a circle, with the cauldron in the center. Uncle Dale was to Katie’s left, and then JoAnne and David and Liz and Gary, back to Katie’s right. Katie held her breath. She hoped she wouldn’t forget. She hoped, one more time, that God would forgive her.

  “Stretch out your arms,” she commanded finally, in a stronger voice than she had known she had.

  And six arms stretched above the water: Her own frail arm was there, soft-wrinkled as ancient silk. And the hard-knotted arm of Dale Sullivan, that had seen almost as many years, but showed them far, far less. And the firm, straight arm of JoAnne Sullivan, strong from ironing and hoeing. And the brawny arm of Gary the Warrior, forested dark with hair. And—touching eagerly when they thought no one was looking—the smooth young arms of Liz Hughes and David Sullivan, hers pale and lightly freckled, his muscular and tanned and almost hairless: the maiden and the youth.

  The Morrigu stood behind them, her back toward the sun. From her belt she took a hook-bladed knife that had as its hilt the bone of a mortal man who had once been her lover—before she had had him slain. She handed it to Katie. “Do it as I told you,” she said.