"Shut up!" I roar.
Arden tries a spell on Polo Shirt, but he just smiles and pulls out a medallion much like mine. "That's not going to work."
This isn't going well. I need to get this situation under control— stop thinking, and just let my instincts take over.
Quick as blinking, I grab the guard's gun from its holster and kick it across the floor toward Arden. It slides under the desk and she dives to get it at the same time Polo Shirt does.
At the same moment, the burly guard slams his forehead toward mine. I move just in time, but I've lost my advantage with the knife. If we grapple and he gets it, there's the end of me. So as he lunges out of my grip and winds up for a punch, I throw the knife as hard as I can at Polo Shirt.
It catches him in the butt cheek and he howls. Arden leaps up— she got the gun. Laurel is busy smacking Skinny Tech Guy's head against the floor to knock him out, and she's screaming while she does it. Working out some anger issues leftover from the breakup, I guess.
Then I'm slammed onto the floor with a bone-jarring thud, and I see a whole constellation of stars swimming over my eyeballs. The guard's hands are around my neck; but I've trained for this, with Aislinn. It was easy with her being so light; this guy's got a lot more weight on him than she does. Still, the principle is the same; I buck and roll, and manage to flip us on our sides. He loses his grip, and I'm up, stamping my foot down on his neck hard as I can. He chokes with pain, his face red.
While he's recovering, hands to his throat, I grab this marble statue thing off a console table. I swing it at his head, but he catches my arm. He's strong.
There's a shout from the far end of the lobby. Three more guys incoming.
"Stop!" screams Arden. "I'll shoot!"
They walk toward her, bloody hands outstretched, and she starts to gag. The gun slips from her fingers, firing with a bang that startles everyone— including the guy fighting me. I take that split second advantage and smash the marble chunk into his head.
His eyes roll back and he slips to the floor. I don't have time to find out if he's dead or not. Arden's ward isn't working against these three jokers, maybe because they're all combining their power.
I race toward them. One turns, focusing his spell on me— and when nothing happens, he looks perplexed— right before I body-slam him into the wall.
Having lost their third guy, the two remaining druids can't hold Arden with the spell. She sucks in a breath, picks up the gun, and points it at them. "Shut up!" she shrieks, her face a fierce red.
They shut up and stand there, like they don't know what to do when their magic doesn't work.
But when there's no magic, there's me. My fists are the last thing they see before they hit the floor.
25
CHAMPION
Aislinn
I don't feel anything once Maeve is gone. No regret, no pain. There has never been any love between us— she made that choice for both of us. And she made it easy for me to take her life, by trying to take mine first.
I don't understand her at all. Maybe if I knew her whole story— but I never will now.
Kieran.
There's a door by the big window, connecting the observation room with the sacrificial chamber. It's not even locked. I stride in, and the druids look up from their grisly work of taking him apart. I'm still glowing violently golden, and they run from me, out through a door in the far wall, blood dripping from their fingers. They don't even try to fight.
I call on my strength and catch two of the black-robed ones, smashing their heads together so hard I can hear the crunch of skull-bones. The third escapes me, throwing one of his fellow druids in my path as I reach for him.
I speak the incantation again, and the few druids left in the room are paralyzed mid-step, their Life-Streams unfurling to meet me. In a few seconds, the light drains from their eyes and they fall like empty cups.
The others, I don't chase immediately. Their running footsteps fade in the corridor outside.
And then I look down.
Kieran is in pieces. They did their work quickly and well. It's not even him anymore— it's a mess of blood and bone and organs and tissue. Some of the blood in a glass container. The heart in another. Other pieces of him— I retch.
No one could put him back together.
I crouch against the wall, away from the blood. The scream that erupts from me scrapes my throat raw with its force. I scream again, and again, till I can barely breathe.
Pain. Panic.
Blood everywhere. Pieces of him.
Everything that he was— gone. The laughter and the silver eyes. The singer and the scientist. The one who gave me a driving lesson and the one who gave me nightmares. The one who never killed with his own hand, but caused death anyway. Protector of leprechauns. Curse-maker. Who kissed me the first night we met and gave me some of his own power, just to see what I would do with it. He bound me with spells, and he freed me with magic. I took my first life at his word, and now I've killed for him again.
How can someone be all that he is one minute— living, breathing, full of choice and existence— and the next second, gone? Shut off, like a light switch flipped.
How is he gone?
Something inside me is gone too. It died when they struck his head, and again when they cut off his breath, and again when they slit his throat. I am gone. Empty. There's nothing, nothing, except a big black world, darkness impenetrable, forever. If I stepped outside in the daytime, surely the sun would be gone, too, like Kieran.
I think, briefly, of spells and resurrection. But I know that isn't possible. Even if it were, his soul would need a body to come back to, and this one is spoiled beyond hope.
The smell is what finally drives me out of the room. That, and the urge to find the rest of the druids and kill them. The glow is fading from my hands as my body slowly works on absorbing the Life-Stream. I feel light-headed, but my exhaustion and grief must be curbing the manic high I should have from doing this amount of magic.
What can I do to make his death mean something?
I already killed most of them.
I need to kill the rest.
I need to find the girl, the other Korrigan. She can't stay here alone.
I walk back through the observation room. It's starting to smell, too— when people die, their insides let loose. In spite of myself I look at their faces— mouths mute and empty, eyes open in the holes of their masks, bodies draped over seats like discarded dolls. Moments ago they had lives, families, favorite shows, jobs, purpose— and now they are nothing. Just like Kieran.
Somehow, even without my pixie sense, I find my way back to the cell where they kept me. Maybe I'm getting used to the layout of this place, after all. Along the way I find a druid sniveling in a closet, and I bring him along. My sister Korrigan will need his years.
"Where is she? The other Korrigan?" I shake him, hard. I'm using the last of my strength, but he doesn't need to know that.
"Down the hall. Cell 5. Please don't kill me."
"Please?" I laugh. "I've said that word a lot today. Nobody listened. Now move."
He stumbles in front of me, unaware that I'm fading, failing. The cells we pass are all open, except for 5 and 6.
We stop before number 5. "Open it," I order.
He knows the code. Maybe he was one of those who paid "conjugal visits" to her at night. He deserves everything he'll get.
When the door opens, the girl inside scrambles backward, away from him, her eyes filled with panic. I was right— he's been here before. Then she sees me, and her fear changes to interest.
She's thin— they clearly haven't fed her much. She wears a skimpy white dress, and I can see bruises on her thighs and arms, like fingerprints. Her dark eyes are tapered a bit, and her black hair hangs straight but stringy around her head.
"You've done a Life-Stealing before?" I say to her.
She opens her mouth, showing me a stub where her tongue was.
The bas
tards cut it out so she couldn't Life-Steal from them.
Quickly, before the druid can run, I pick up a potted plant near the door and smash it over his head. He crumples.
"I'll say the incantation, you take the days," I tell her.
Again I speak those old, harsh words. I won't ever be able to say them again without remembering what I've done, and why. Maybe, with all the years I have now, I won't ever need to.
The girl catches the golden Life-Stream between the first and third fingers of her left hand, as Maeve taught me. She draws it into herself, leaving a tiny bit behind, maybe a few days. I raise my eyebrows, but I think I understand why. She wants him to live those few days in terror, knowing he has very little time left, incapable of doing anything about it.
I think about the other cell, Number 6. What if someone's in there, too? A prisoner? I don't have the code, but this doomed guy does. Now I have a choice— to wait until he wakes up and get the code from him, or chase after the other druids, who are probably long gone.
I've done enough taking of life for one day. Time to save someone instead.
"Let's tie him," I say. "I have a question for him when he wakes up."
It takes a few minutes for the druid to come to. By that time I'm so weak I can hardly prop myself against the wall. But he's tied securely, and he can't do magic with his hands bound. We should be safe from him. Besides, he's such a weaselly little fellow, I doubt he'd have the courage to try.
"You need to tell me the code for Cell 6," I say.
He shakes his head. "I don't know it. What did you do? What did she do to me?"
"You have very little time left to live," I say. "If you want us to let you go so you can make the most of it, you'd better get us into that cell."
"There's a security room down the hall. Code 47852 to get in. Then the password to the computer is Beltane18. Look for the Cell Codes file in the Prisoner Security folder, and you'll see the unlock code for Cell 6."
As soon as he finishes speaking, the girl smashes his head against the wall, knocking him out again. She kicks him, too, several times, mostly in the crotch and stomach. He's going to be in a lot of pain when he wakes up.
I'm sweating, trembling. The room keeps dipping and moving up and down. There's no way I can make it to the security room and find that code.
Then hands grip me under my arms. The girl drags me out into the hallway, sets me against the wall, and lays a finger on her lips. She wants me to be quiet, in case there are druids around.
"It's okay," I say. "I killed them. A few got away, but I don't think they'll be back for a while."
She stares at me, shock and joy in her face. Swiftly she presses her lips to my forehead and then darts down the hall, in the direction of the security room.
I'm jolted awake by her hand on my shoulder. She's back, gesturing toward Cell 6.
"Okay, okay. Give me a minute." When I stand, I feel like the world is swimming and swirling.
She offers her shoulder to me, which is kind, considering she's barely skin and bones herself and probably not that strong. We stagger over to the door of Cell 6, and she punches in the code and pulls it open.
In the cell, a man is lying on the bed. He's wearing only a pair of ragged shorts, so his bruised, scraped shoulders and bloodstained back are in full view. His left hand rests on his hip— there's a blood-soaked bandage— where his finger— should be—
He turns over to look at us.
The Far Darrig.
I'm falling.
I can't breathe.
I'm on the floor in the cell doorway, and he's beside me, both arms around me. "Aislinn. Aislinn, it's all right. I'm all right."
"They killed you."
"A trick."
"You were dead. I saw your— they took you apart." I suck in air, again, again, but I can't seem to breathe it back out. Patches of black swim in front of my eyes.
"Aislinn. I'm sorry. It was all a trick, I'm so sorry. We couldn't tell you— it had to be real."
"It's the magic, I'm hallucinating now," I whisper.
"Look at me, cuisle mo chroidhe."
It means "pulse of my heart." A term beyond endearment.
But I just saw the blood from his veins poured out, so he can't be sitting here, calling me that.
He puts his right hand under my chin and tips my face up. There's a wound, seamed with blood, across his forehead. Curls of dark hair hanging over it, still matted with blood at the tips. Faint freckles sprinkled over a straight nose. His cheeks bearing the chafe marks of the leather muzzle. Lips, cut up in a couple of places.
And his eyes. Bruised, but silver-gray under those dark lashes. Crinkling at the corners as he smiles at me.
It's really him.
"How?"
"I made a deal with Stanley. Told him I would give him the spell on one condition— deceiving Maeve. I told him I didn't want her witnessing my death. He was more than willing to 'screw the old bitch over,' as he put it."
"But you gave him the spell."
"Well, yes. I had to, to keep him from hurting you."
"But the sacrifice— that was you. It looked just like you."
"A man of similar height and build. A prisoner here, like us. They painted his face, dressed him in a robe, and bandaged the left hand so no one would know the difference."
"So someone died in your place?"
"Stanley was always going to kill both of us. The other prisoner and I just— switched death dates. Stanley was actually happy to do it; he said it made sense to save the more powerful sacrifice for Samhain. October 31, that's when I was to be sacrificed. I was hoping that with the extra time, I could figure out a way for us to get out of here. Look, love, the rest of the explanation needs to wait. I don't know how you managed to get away and find me, but we've got to leave. They'll be coming."
"No," I say. "They won't."
He looks confused.
"I didn't know the plan," I say slowly. "I killed them, Kieran. I killed them all."
Shocked, he stares at me. "You— how?"
"Drained them. All of them, at once. Just a few got away."
"I— how is that possible?"
"Do you understand what I'm saying?" My voice is raw, shaky. It still hurts to talk, after the screams that ripped out of me in the sacrifice room. "I killed like, thirty people just now, because I thought they murdered you. Do you know what you just put me through? How I felt when they smashed your head in, and choked you, and cut your throat?"
Of course he knows how it feels. He watched his wife be ripped to shreds by Maeve's servants.
The girl at the door moans a little. She's probably desperate to get out of here, even more so than we are.
"Aislinn, we need to do this later," Kieran says. "Come on. We need to leave."
I can barely walk, and he's in no great shape himself; and the Korrigan behind us is hardly more than a ghost; but somehow we make it down the hallway. The girl leads us to a big elevator in the center of the compound, and we ride up.
When the doors open, we're half-expecting someone to leap out and attack us. At the very least, I'm sure there will be questions and possibly guns from any guards who might be patrolling on the main floor. And I have no idea how we will withstand any of it.
But when we step out, Zane is just finishing off one of the druids with a magnificent punch. A few more bodies are lying on the floor around him. Arden is tapping away at a computer behind the lobby desk, and Laurel stands guard by the front doors, a long knife in her hand.
Relief takes my legs out from under me, and I sit down, right there on the gleaming lobby floor. Zane looks up from moving the druid's unconscious body. "Aislinn?"
Laurel turns, and Arden steps out from behind the desk. I can only imagine how we look to them— battered, bruised, and bloody, with a tongueless waif as a tag-along. We probably look like a bunch of damned freaks that just crawled out of hell.
To me, they look like angels.
26
&nb
sp; BAD BLOOD
Zane
I can tell right away that Aislinn's in bad shape. She's half-dressed in a ripped shirt and some makeshift bandages, and most of the bandages are peeling away. The wounds under them are seeping blood.
But it's her face that scares me— dead white, almost gray, and pinched, like she's in terrible pain. She just sits there, on the floor. Like the fire has burned out of her and left her with nothing.
The Far Darrig looks about the same. He's got a big mess of wounds, and as much as I hate the guy, I don't envy him the aches and pains he's gotta be feeling.
Then there's the girl behind them. All sharp angles and bones, with straight, stringy black hair. She's got an Asian cast to her face— might be pretty if she didn't look so terrified. She crouches by the open elevator, too scared to go back in but not ready to come too far away from it, either.
Damn, what happened to them?
I don't know what exactly went down or why. But I do know that Aislinn needs to get some stitches, and then probably food and sleep. She's my number one here.
I stride right past the Far Darrig as if he isn't there and pick Aislinn up. She feels lighter, more fragile than she's ever felt. Her head falls to my shoulder.
As I turn with her, I take a closer look at the Far Darrig's wounds. Bruises, knife wounds, flesh rubbed raw on his face and wrists. It's not hard to guess he's been tortured. And he's apparently missing a finger. I think a light tap from me would topple him.
"Man, you need a hospital," I say. "C'mon."
"Wait," says Laurel. "Kieran O'Connell?"
"One and the same," says the Far Darrig with the ghost of a smile.
Laurel looks at me, understanding in her face. "He's the trickster guy? The one she came for?"
"Yes."
Arden is moving past me, toward the frightened scarecrow girl. Her face is a mask of shock and horror, with maybe some delight mixed in there. "Wynnie?"
Druid (Secrets of the Fae Book 2) Page 21
