Heir of Danger

by Alix Rickloff

  He lifted his face to it, letting the touch of it sink into his flesh, know him and return to its sender. What harm in offering himself up to the tracing? Any not of this company would surely come as a friend.

  Unfortunately, Máelodor must have felt the brush as well.

  The group stopped as he lifted a hand, his fingers flicking, his curse a mumbled slither of words on an oily breeze.

  Immediately, the link was severed, the comforting presence withdrawn, leaving Brendan more alone than he’d ever been.

  He forced himself to limp along through gritted teeth. His painful progress slowing as he hoped for a renewal of the encouraging presence.

  It never came again.

  The forest folded round him in a tangle of green so that every step was a stumbling lurch, mist threading the wood, a ringing in his ears growing louder and more insistent. He couldn’t think. Couldn’t focus. The bells were all he heard. He began to hallucinate. A face within the trees. The flash of a leg. He blinked: Was he losing his mind or was that Killer’s black-and-white fuzzy body keeping pace off to their right? Impossible, but at least it offered him comfort to think the little dog kept him company even if it was a mirage conjured by delirium.

  They emerged into a clearing, the mist here clinging thick and gray and wet over the ground. A slab of toppled granite lay upon its side, smaller stones scattered amid the bracken. And something else: a power ancient when the earth was young. A well of magic so deep and immense, it seemed to push to the center of the world. It wrapped itself around him, burrowing beneath his skin until he saw the flux and flow of mage energy in the air, on each trembling leaf, each scratching limb, every glistening drop of water.

  He stood dazed, letting this river of Fey power surge around him.

  It was as he’d hoped.

  Arthur’s tomb had been built upon a thin place, a spot where the deeper Fey magics surfaced and the two worlds touched. A source of enormous power if one were skillful—and desperate—enough to tap the melded energies.

  He was both.

  Máelodor stepped forward, the Sh’vad Tual raised high before him.

  For Brendan, it was now or never.

  Rogan’s honey tongue had been almost as helpful as his tracking abilities. As Elisabeth waited in the shelter of the cottage’s doorway, he persuaded the two guards left behind not only to saddle two horses but, in a display of Irish impudence, to sing every verse of “John Barleycorn” backwards. They willingly complied and Rogan and Elisabeth had trotted out of the yard with the awkward, off-key caterwauling “wan and pale both looked he till” wafting behind them.

  An hour and a half later, at Rogan’s insistence, they left the horses behind and entered a deep, overgrown copse. Clouds flattened gray black across the sky as they pushed into a strange biting wind, as if January’s chill had touched down within this isolated corner of the county.

  “I’m not certain how you managed to palaver me into doing this, Miss Elisabeth. Perhaps you’ve a bit of the leveryas in you,” Rogan joked as he pushed aside a heavy branch for her.

  She ducked beneath it, yanking her skirts away from the snagging twigs. “You wanted to go after him as much as I did. It just took the right spark for you to see the light.”

  He dropped back into his slow, loping stride. “And what do you plan on doing if we do find them in time? I’m thinking these barking irons of ours won’t be more than a fly bite to that great hulk of an attendant.”

  “I haven’t the vaguest notion, but something’s bound to occur to me. It’s gotten me this far, hasn’t it?”

  This far, being the middle of nowhere following a vague hazy trail of mage energy. For a moment, doubt assailed her. Could she trust Rogan? Could he be leading her away from Brendan? She pushed aside the thought. She’d not go down that road. The vision had shown her she would find Brendan. And find him she would.

  The path forked. A narrow winding branch to the left heading down to a stream cut. A wider avenue uphill into deeper wood.

  Rogan paused, head up. Eyes trained on a point invisible to Elisabeth as he scanned first one direction, then the other, in a slow, measuring manner. He really did resemble a bloodhound, with his eyes sunk into the folds of his long, angular face, and gangly limbs ending in oversize hands and feet.

  She dropped onto a broken log as she waited, torn between relief at the rest for her weary feet and irritation at any delay. After a few moments, she began chafing her hands. Tapping her foot. Trying not to seem impatient when every inch of her jangled with nerves.

  Rogan’s power couldn’t fail them now.

  Impatience finally won over her aching feet. “Which way?”

  Rogan remained unmoving in the middle of the trail, hands clamped to his side, eyes fixed and staring.

  “Rogan?”

  No answer. Instead, his eyes rolled up in his head as he began to convulse.

  “Rogan!” She ran to him, grabbing him as he fell to the ground, his body curled into a ball, seizures raking him, his jaw clamped shut, low animal moans coming from deep in his throat. Was it poison? Had his heart given out?

  She grabbed him to her just as the shuddering stopped. As he went limp, his final rattling breath collapsed his chest. Black oozy liquid dripped from the corner of his mouth.

  Tears stung her eyes as she looked up into the canopy of sycamore and maples, oaks and ash. Whispered a prayer for the harper’s passing.

  “This is dark magic. Máelodor’s handiwork.”

  A man’s voice behind her shot her heart into her throat. She spun around to see him standing half within the trees. Where had he come from? She fumbled the pistol up to aim it at the stranger. “Who are you? Show yourself.”

  He stepped into the open, and she nearly dropped the gun in shock. He was completely naked. Not a stitch of clothing. Not even a strategically placed fig leaf.

  He seemed completely comfortable with the situation, and in fact chuckled as if he were used to such a reaction. For some reason his lack of embarrassment overcame the awkwardness of the situation, and she was able to maintain—albeit with difficulty—her composure, though it was hard not to gape. “I said, who are you? Answer, or so help me, I’ll blast a hole right through you.”

  He inclined his head, though it had the solemnity of an old-fashioned courtier’s bow. Difficult to pull off nude, but he managed it. “Do you not recognize me?”

  She studied him more closely—from the waist up. Medium height and lean—not a spare inch of fat marred the compact muscles. His hair was black as night, though here and there a few silver strands shown through. Premature silver, since he didn’t look more than in his mid-twenties. His eyes were brown, his gaze amused and wary at the same time.

  A grin pulled at the corners of his mouth, eyes twinkling. She’d seen that tongue-in-cheek amusement before, but where—

  “Mop with legs? Fur ball? Blasted mutt? Anything sound familiar?” he asked.

  Unfortunately it did. Frighteningly, jaw-droppingly familiar. A dog that had changed into a man. Or was it a man that had changed into a dog? No time to ponder details. She’d add it to the tottering pile of strangeness her life had become and mull it over another day.

  “You’re Other,” she whispered.

  “I am not.” He drew himself up with a huff of insulted dignity. Impressively done for a naked man. “I am of the Imnada.”

  He pronounced it with such solemnity, Elisabeth half expected a clap of thunder to follow.

  “Who are they? I’ve never heard of them before.”

  “No.” He knelt beside Rogan’s body, began tugging at his boots.

  Like a puppet with cut strings, the harper’s body rolled limply, limbs flopping. For some reason, that finally brought everything crashing down around her. Rogan was dead. Brendan was missing. She was keeping company with a naked, shape-shifting dog-man. Her head began to spin, and she found it difficult to catch her breath. “You can’t—I mean, Rogan—”

  Killer glanced up. “Do
es not need them anymore, though if you are uncomfortable with my taking them, I will remain as I am.” He sat back, awaiting her decision. Astonishment must be doing things to her. All she could think of was how incredibly polite he was being. That and how very, very undressed he was.

  Heat crawled into her cheeks. A bit late, but perhaps it was a delayed reaction. “I suppose if you must, you must. I mean, you . . . you can’t be comfortable like that, can you?”

  She tried looking everywhere but at him, which was hard to do. There wasn’t much else to look at other than trees. A muscular, handsome, gentleman in the buff was a hard thing to ignore.

  “Cold doesn’t bother me as it does most humans, but you would be more comfortable with me clothed, I think. You look a bit . . . dazed.” Again the teasing smile, dimples carved into his cheeks.

  “Can you blame me? I’m talking to my . . . my . . . pet.”

  “Neither you nor Douglas would have trusted a companion in human form.”

  As he hastily appropriated Rogan’s clothes, Elisabeth averted her gaze and tried not to remember how many times the dog had been in her chamber as she’d dressed. How many revealing conversations she’d had with him curled in her lap. Yikes! She’d scratched his stomach, for heaven’s sake. “So what’s your name? I can’t keep calling you Killer.”

  “That’s as good a name as any.”

  “Why show yourself to me this way?”

  There was a silence as if he was pondering his response. “It’s a risk, but one I felt necessary. Until now, we’ve chosen to remain unknown to the race of Other, but events no longer allow for such choice. We’re not so unwise as to think a war between races would not pull us in as well, however much we’ve barricaded ourselves away.”

  She heard the rustle of fabric, a colorful oath that had her smiling despite herself. He might be a shape-changer, but his cursing was all human. “How did you find us? Last I saw, you were gnawing on a man’s leg.”

  There was a bark of quick laughter. “So I was. I tracked you along the coast as far north as Balbriggen before I lost your trail. Then, just as I found you again, the mage storm blew me off course. It took me longer than I’d hoped to make land.”

  “So you’re saying you—”

  “I am a shape-changer.” His tone said, end of discussion. “You can turn around now. I’m clothed.”

  He had taken only Rogan’s breeches and boots and had wrapped Rogan’s body in his coat, laying him out beneath the sky, closing his eyes, hands crossed upon his chest. As she watched, he appropriated Rogan’s knife and pistol.

  “Can’t you bury him?” she asked.

  “Had we the time, I would burn him as is proper, but this will have to do.”

  The light dimmed as a strange gray twilight filtered through the leaves, the wind died, the birds fell silent as if the world waited for what was to happen next.

  Killer lifted his head, eyes closed. Elisabeth almost expected him to sniff at the air like the dog he had been—or was—or . . . something. She’d worry over this new revelation later.

  “We must go,” he said. “Quickly.”

  “Go where? Rogan’s dead.” She swallowed around the lump in her throat. “He was the one who could follow Brendan’s trail. I’m lost.”

  “But I am not. And together we can save Brendan before Máelodor uses him in the summoning.”

  “Uses him—”

  “Later. For now, we must go.” He held out a hand, again with that strange formal gallantry. She took it, feeling the cool roughness of his palm, the strength in his wrestler’s body.

  And followed him into the wood.

  Brendan reached out, sensing the ley lines running outward beneath the earth from the toppled slab like spokes upon a wheel. Feeling his way along the potent river of mage energy as a sailor might take readings to chart his depth. Here and there dipping deeper as he wove his magic into the pattern. Carefully. Skillfully. Too much and one ran the danger of losing one’s very humanity in the fierce hurricane storm of Fey power. The trick was to manipulate the streams of mage energy in ways that channeled its might, yet did not diminish it.

  He hoped to the gods that, after so many years lying dormant, his skills remained, or this would be an extremely short-lived attack.

  The spell he finally called upon was one he’d found in a Greek grimoire, the parchment translucent with age, the writing faded to near-illegibility. Father had bought it from a bookseller in Venice during one of his extended tours of the Continent, but it had been Brendan who’d spent a year transposing and translating. Six months mastering the unfamiliar technique. He could still smell the musty aromas of age and ink and old paper that made up the Belfoyle library. Feel the fragile softness of the pages beneath his fingers. See the light spread and shrink over the shine of polished oak floors in the long days devoted to unraveling the secrets contained within.

  This must be what they meant when they spoke of one’s life flashing before one’s eyes.

  As he stretched with his mind and his magic, he uttered the words of the spell beneath his breath. “Esemynest agesh kavesha. Hweth d’esk mest.”

  Immediately the magic rose within him like a spring tide. Easing the pain of his injuries, healing the numerous wounds he’d incurred last night under Máelodor’s maddened gaze.

  Brendan closed his eyes as his body renewed itself, the rising pressure spilling over, dazzling his eyes, crackling along his arteries, sparking new and wild pathways in his brain.

  As he felt the power crest, he released it with a sure flick of his fingers, casting it out like the thrust of a sword. Honed to a steel brilliance, the spell cut the air on a whistle of wind and buried itself in Máelodor like a dagger to the back.

  The mage screamed, high and thin, his mouth gaping black, his face paling to a sickly gray. He whirled around, losing his balance as he fumbled with crutch and peg leg and the uneven ground. The Sh’vad Tual dropped from his hand to roll free, its fire extinguished.

  Brendan’s guard grabbed for his pistol, but Brendan was faster. He tore the weapon from the man’s hand, pulling him close as he fired into him. The man jerked and grunted before falling to the turf with a dull, wet thud.

  Máelodor’s response came swift and certain. A savage explosion of ripping power, severing veins and crushing bones. The hiss of his slithered words a mutilating combination of Other force and Unseelie atrocity.

  Brendan panted through his teeth against the pain unleashed by the dark magic, forcing his mind to focus on the ley lines, on the healing energy centered in the tomb. But even as he struggled to hold on to the Fey power, it ran between his fingers like water. His spell unraveling beneath the blacker, stronger, fiercer demon spell.

  Shielding himself against the worst of the curse, he groped his way toward the Sh’vad Tual. Reaching for it, he dodged Máelodor’s fanged and venomous bite. And never saw the deadly bull-like fist of Oss until it blindsided him, striking him in the head. Rattling his teeth. Breaking his focus. The mage energy draining out of him in one sucking whirlpool rush.

  He lay upon the turf, staring up into a sky riven with cloud and fire and a sweep of circling birds. There was a fraction of a second when he saw the slit-eyed malevolence of Máelodor and the blur of his descending staff.

  He rolled aside, but not before the tip of the staff scored a bloody gash along his upper arm. Immediately, his fingers numbed and his arm went dead as the poison entered his bloodstream. And time and chances wound down.

  twenty-six

  Máelodor lifted the Sh’vad Tual high above his head in both hands. “Mebyoa Uther hath Ygraine. Studhyesk esh Merlinus. Flogsk esh na est Erelth. Pila-vyghterneask.”

  The stone ignited in a wash of color. The words of the dark spell beating against Brendan’s brain. Each syllable pounding in his chest like the tolling of an enormous bell.

  Fire and light poured out over Máelodor’s hands and down his body. Sparkling over his skin and clothes in drifts and eddies before burying thems
elves into the ground at his feet.

  Brendan cried out, the visions cascading through his mind. Arthur, his face black with sweat and blood and dirt, his sword broken as he fell. Aidan’s lifeless body one of thousands beneath a crow-filled crimson sky.

  “Klywea mest hath igosk agesha daresha!”

  Mage energy blazed up through the trees in a tower of blue-white fire. The ground rumbled and lurched as the sky darkened to a false midnight. As a storm’s tempest raged, wind whipped the leaves, bringing down cracked and splintered limbs. Blinding and choking him with a gritty, throat-scouring dust.

  Brendan covered his head as he curved into the shelter of a fallen log. Opened his eyes on a world gone suddenly still.

  Where the giant slab of mossy granite had leaned was now a doorway, the shine of silver light spilling from an exposed cavern, the chime of faery bells high and bright and floating clear upon the air.

  Slowly lowering the stone, Máelodor motioned with a jerk of his head.

  Oss stepped forward, even his blank features tinged with the shade of fear. Ducking inside, he disappeared for a moment before reappearing with a strange shake of his head and a spread of his palms.

  “What?” Máelodor’s response cracked across the silence like a whip as he pointed to Brendan. “Bring him to me.”

  Oss’s gaze fell on Brendan like the first spade of grave earth.

  The man dragged him stumbling to Máelodor. “What mischief is this, Douglas?”

  Brendan’s lip curled with animosity. “You’ll have to be more specific. Mischief is my middle name.”

  “The tomb is empty. You had the stone. What have you done with the High King’s bones?” Máelodor demanded, spittle forming at the corners of his mouth, his eyes alight with madness. I’ll have your answer or Oss will slice off a finger one at a time.”

  The servant pulled a knife from his belt, grabbing Brendan’s wrist, though he felt no pain due to the advance of the poison in his bloodstream. In fact, he barely noticed anything as he pondered this new and wild hope.