Luther reacts immediately, blasting the monster in the chest, then hacking the tail off the injured knight. But a fourth demon uses the opportunity to stab Luther beneath the shoulder blade.
“Father!” Arthur shouts in anguish.
With a vicious growl, Luther twists around to hack at his attacker, then moves onto the next two demons, cutting them across the chest and legs, a tempest of blood and death.
Off to the side, Arthur tries a faint, wanting to rush to his help, but Mordred’s always there, blocking his way, corralling him away. He’s toying with Arthur, enjoying the sight of his growing despair.
And then I feel it, a slight, distant pull that makes the blood in my veins thrum in recognition. Dread sets in as I look up at the sky, squinting against the sleet. We’ve run out of time. Carman’s called her dragon over, and it’s heading this way.
“Get off me!” I shout at Urim, trying to wriggle free.
But the Dark Sidhe sends a shock of power through me in warning. “Your boy will be fine if he stays put,” Urim says, misunderstanding my sudden alarm.
Off to the side, Thummim’s decided to take part in the fun, sliding inside Arthur’s reach while Mordred hops backward, and punches Arthur in the chin. Arthur reels back, slips on the ground, and nearly loses Excalibur as he tries to right himself. Then the Dark Sidhe’s elbow connects with the back of his temple, and Arthur’s eyes roll back in his head.
I reach for my power, letting it rip out of me. Ribbons of flames whip out of my splayed hand, crackling and hissing as they come into contact with the snow. But with a savage growl, Urim twists my arm further up, and I lose all control in the pain that follows, the fire I summoned exploding in a shower of harmless sparks.
“Hush, he’s fine now, princess,” Urim says, as Thummim gently lays Arthur on the frozen ground. “Now watch as justice finally takes place.”
The Dark Sidhe forces my head around, and through the tears and sleet, I see Mordred’s tattooed back advance upon a cornered Luther, power radiating from him in waves.
“Do you know who I am?” my brother asks, stopping a couple feet away from the tall knight’s sword in challenge.
“Don’t give a rat’s ass who you are, demon,” Luther spits, eyes cold and calculating.
“It’s a shame, for I know a lot about you, Luther Pendragon,” Mordred says, a raw edge to his voice. “I know you betrayed my father to satisfy your base urges to bed his wife and take his place on this silly little Council of yours. You should have killed me too, when you had the chance.”
Luther’s lips curl up as he puts two and two together. “Not for lack of trying,” he says. “But your parents had already tossed you out like the garbage you are, so I couldn’t find you.”
He kicks his last knight from behind, sending her crashing into Mordred. The woman lets out a surprised yelp, raising her sword at the last moment. But with a quick turn of his hips, Mordred dodges the weapon, and hits the knight on the forehead with the palm of his hand, before sidestepping her as she drops to her knees, unseeing eyes crying blood.
“At least you’re not denying it,” Mordred says, inching forward again.
Luther mirrors his movement, taking another step back, and bumps against the courtyard’s fountain.
“My question now to you is this,” Mordred continues, “Will you have the balls to fight me, or are you going to run for it, old man?”
Sword held defensively in front of him, Luther steps onto the wide basin, and thrusts his gloved fist down. Purple light blooms outward across the basin, the fountain’s ice cracking into hundreds of frozen splinters. Then Luther snaps his hand around, and the shards of ice rush straight at Mordred.
My brother laughs excitedly, flicking the icepicks aside to let them fall harmlessly to the ground.
“You’re going to have to do better than that, old man, or it’s going to be over too quickly,” he says.
Without waiting for an answer, Mordred rushes forward, black flames erupting from his extended fingers. I cringe inwardly at the sight. His power’s too similar to Carman’s and Dub’s, tainted. Like mine is.
Luther’s sword sings, cutting through the air. But my brother’s too quick, a flash of darkness that cannot be stopped. He ducks, slipping past the blade, then strikes. Luther winces as black fire licks his thigh, melding the iron of his cuisses[100] to his flesh. He tries to take another step, falters, then slips off the fountain in a crash of metal on stone.
Mordred lets out another chuckle. “Like I said, over too quickly.”
Bile rises to my throat. He’s like a leopard, toying with its food, taking cruel joy in the bestowing of pain and fear, all the while knowing he can take his victim’s life at any moment. Yet despite all the evidence, I still can’t accept that this is my brother’s true face.
“Mordred, stop it!” I shout.
I gasp in pain as Urim yanks hard on my arm to keep me subdued, but I’ve managed to make Mordred pause. He looks over his shoulder at me, confusion and anger warring on his tattooed face.
“After everything he’s done to our family, to you, you still want him to live?” he asks.
“Killing him is not the way to go,” I say feebly.
A sneer pulls at Mordred’s lips. “You’re only saying that because you’ve got a crush on his spawn. But that doesn’t excuse the sins of the father.”
Behind him, Luther tries again to crawl away, eyes wide with fear. And I finally see it, the dark, writhing mass extending from Mordred’s feet to the fountain, consuming all in its passage.
“Blood calls to blood, sis,” Mordred says, turning away from me.
He closes his fingers into a tight fist, and the tar sweeps up to take Luther out. There’s a startled shout to my left, then Arthur’s suddenly in front of his father, Excalibur held before him as the inky wave crashes over them.
Terror twists my insides viciously, and with a howl of rage, I let my power loose. This time, Urim jumps off me with a string of curses, holding his midsection like he’s just been stabbed. I haul myself to my feet, and bolt for the fountain.
I find Excalibur lying in a pool of blood, and I grab it without breaking stride, the sword pulsing in my good hand at my touch, as if in acknowledgment. In the span of a breath, I close the distance between me and Mordred, and swing Excalibur down, aiming for his head.
Searing pain lances down my arm, blurring my vision with tears. I clench my teeth, forcing myself to finish the strike, but at the last second, the blade swerves to the side, leaving Mordred unharmed.
“Did you just try to kill me?” Mordred asks, eyes wide in disbelief.
Excalibur falls from my numb fingers, and I stumble back, seething.
“You would choose him over your own flesh and blood?” Mordred continues.
“You killed him!” I shout, my voice breaking with a sob.
“He’s fine,” Mordred snaps.
He steps away, and behind him I can see Arthur helping Luther up, tar surrounding them like a dark moat, faint traces of a sylph’s shield still flickering in the cold air.
I look back at Mordred, the full weight of what I just tried to do dawning on me. I’m not sorry, not truly. Not after what he did. Yet the hurt that flashes on his face makes me doubt myself. I open my mouth to apologize, then clamp it shut again. There’s nothing I can say that’ll make any of this better.
That’s when the screams erupt. We both look up at the cloudy sky as it lights up a bright, fiery red somewhere to the north. And then I hear it, the steady pumping of giant wings beating at the air.
I forget to breathe.
“I had a feeling things might get to this,” Mordred says stiffly. “You should’ve stayed put, like I said.”
Behind him, Arthur raises both arms up, as if to wave the dragon over. Then his voice rings out sharply. “Tháinig anam sa dragan!”
I have to avert my gaze as light flares out from his raised hands, then a powerful double roar rends in the air.
“
That’s only going to piss her off more,” Mordred states, sounding oddly calm. “You might want to leave now.”
But I can’t tear my eyes away from the two red dragons speeding through the sky to intercept Carman’s beast. They are half the size of the dragon I helped create, but they don’t hesitate. The chest of one lights up, ruby red in the waning day, long neck curved gracefully back. And as the black dragon bellows out its torrent of fire, the smaller one spews out its own jet of scorching flames to counter it.
The two streams of fire meet in a powerful explosion that sends burning embers showering down upon the Headquarters, and the second red dragon launches its attack.
“No way,” I breathe. “I thought all dragons were extinct!”
“All wild dragons,” Mordred says. “Where did you think the Pendragons got their name from?”
One of the smaller dragons shrieks as it dives in an attempt to rip the larger beast’s wing with its talons, missing by inches.
Mordred grabs my bad arm, and I suck in a breath as pain stabs at my dislocated shoulder. “You really should leave,” he says tightly, as the heat from another charge blazes above head.
I finally look away from the aerial battle. The world is carnage, disintegrating before my very eyes. Men and women trying to hold the assailants back while not tripping over their fallen comrades. Sneering and hissing demons crawling everywhere, eager to bring down everything that comes in their way, even their own.
“I said to get a move on, and—”
A tinkling laugh floats down to us over the wind. Mordred snatches his hand away. Carman’s hanging in the air, feet away from her own dragon, like the angel of death itself. And, caught in some invisible bindings beside her, are Lugh and Blanchefleur.
“Take cover and get ready to fire!” someone shouts.
I blink slowly as Inspector Bossart rushes around the crumbling dorms, frantically waving his arms about.
“Fall back, all of you!” the man shouts at a group of men huddling behind the crumbled wall of the dorms’ southern wing.
Men dressed in camo and carrying rifles.
The very ones who shot at me before.
Mordred laughs quietly, following my line of sight. “Oh, this is going to be interesting.”
The militiamen start firing in rapid bursts, aiming at the flying beasts without distinction between them. Not that it matters; bullets, it appears, can’t pierce dragonhide. Still, the guns keep rattling, casings pinging off stone and masonry, smoke rising from the barrels.
Then Carman swipes a bored hand around, and all at once the bullets reverse their course, a metal hail that’s going to take everyone with it. Time seems to slow, yet I can’t make myself move to stop this nightmare.
My chest hollows out, despair filling it instead. Why am I so powerless? Why can’t I undo the wrong I’ve done?
Warmth suddenly radiates through my body, nerves singing with power, and time seems to stop. I gasp as my feet lift off the ground, the force carrying me high above Caamaloth, until I’m face-to-face with Carman herself.
Her dark stare fixes me like I’m the plague-bringer. A vein throbs at her temple, hair stuck to her face by the storm. Yet, strangely, I feel no fear. She seems so little now, while I feel so big, so full of energy.
I exhale, the smallest of breathes, and the warm power bursts free, spilling out of my outstretched fingers in a kaleidoscope of colors to sweep through the whole compound like a tidal wave.
I watch as the light dissolves Lugh’s and Blanchefleur’s bindings, draining them of Carman’s poison, without the witch being able to do a thing. Below us, cries of awe and wonder arise as knights and Fey alike find themselves healed, pain and injuries erased in a heartbeat.
Then, as quickly as it appeared, the magic dissolves, and I find myself drifting back down, unharmed.
“Traitor,” Mordred says, glaring at me.
I look at my hands in confusion. “That wasn’t me,” I say, though my fingers are still tingling with the last of the energy.
Jealousy flashes in my brother’s eyes, quickly replaced by disgust. But before he can retort, loud cheers erupt across the courtyard. We both look up to find that both Carman and her dragon have gone, not a single trace of them left in the clearing skies.
The tide has turned, and the demon ranks are already splintering away, choosing to flee like their leader before we can retaliate.
“Luther, don’t!” Arthur shouts.
I barely have the chance to see Arthur’s father lunge at Mordred with a long dagger before I fling my hands out. With a thunderous crack, the earth splits open between Mordred and Luther, forcing the latter to skid to a stop, before he can fall into the abyss.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Luther shouts at me. “You let the witch escape, and now you dare defend that filth who’s been murdering our people?”
“I’m not letting him go,” I say, although I’m not quite sure what I should be doing instead. All I know is that I don’t want Mordred dead.
But isn’t that what’s going to happen to him if he doesn’t get out of here now?
A bitter smile stretches Mordred’s lips. “Oh, but you have no choice in the matter, sister dear,” he says. “You owe me three favors now, and I’m calling one back.”
A strange torpor spreads through my limbs, as if I’ve suddenly been caught inside a dream. I watch helplessly as Mordred launches himself over the breach to punch Luther, clocking him in the jaw so hard the man drops to the ground without a sound.
“Don’t even bother,” Mordred tells Arthur as he tries to come to his father’s defense.
Then, with casual unconcern, Mordred bites down on his thumb, and starts tracing symbols with his own blood along the edge of the fountain. I watch, as if from very far away, as the whole water basin starts to shimmer, and a portal appears in its place.
“Retreat!” Mordred shouts to the last of his men.
Urim and Thummim are the first to leap into the fountain, quickly followed by the few Dark Sidhe who haven’t abandoned Mordred’s side yet.
“Remember that we’re two sides of the same coin, sis,” Mordred says, ignoring the knights slowly circling him. “Take as long as you need for your wee brain to process that. And when you finally see reason, come join me like you were always meant to.”
Mordred looks like he’s about to add something, but shakes his head instead. Then, with a final wave at me, he disappears through his portal.
Chapter 27
“Unhand her,” Arthur growls.
I try not to wince as the two guards tighten their hold on my wrists instead.
“The sentence for treason is death,” Luther says. “And don’t you dare throw a temper tantrum, Arthur. This isn’t Lake High. She let that Dark Sidhe go, even though she had him in the palm of her hand.”
“It’s not like she chose to,” Arthur says, sounding calm despite his clenched jaw. “And if it weren’t for Morgan, we’d all be dead. You saw it. Everyone saw it.”
The knights holding me look over my head at each other. I can feel their nerves in the slight tremors of their hands.
Luther’s mouth curls into a heinous sneer. “I think a night in jail might straighten you out, son. Despite the mounting evidence of her evil purpose, you’re still acting like a neophyte around her!”
The virulence of his tone startles me. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine Luther would look at Arthur, his own flesh and blood, like he’s the scum of the earth, like he’s…me.
Anger boils inside me. I’m ready to gouge Luther’s eyes out if he keeps this nasty business up.
“I would hold your tongue if I were you.”
Luther flinches as Sir Cade strides over to us, no trace of injury on him either beneath the grime and soot. My uncle looks pointedly at the knights flanking me, and they wither away under his glare, releasing me.
“That Fey bitch is a traitor,” Luther spits, “she deserves to burn!”
Arthu
r blanches, hands balling into tight fists. I wish I could go to him, tell him not to worry, that such insults have no bearing on me. But now is not the time, not in front of all these people. They may think I’ve saved them today, but I know it’s not enough to get rid of all the prejudice and suspicions that have weighed on my shoulders since the day I was born. And I don’t want to have these people cast the same looks at Arthur.
“I believe you are getting things mixed up,” Sir Cade says. His chin lifts a fraction higher. “The one who should be arrested isn’t Morgan. Emmerich.”
My uncle’s right-hand man steps up, handcuffs in hand. “As you very well know, anything you say can and shall be held against you,” the knight tells Luther in a monotone voice, as if arresting a high-ranking officer of the Order is a daily occurrence.
Luther’s face turns purple. “Surely you’re not going to put me through this circus of yours again, are you? You’ve tried me before, and I was proven innocent.”
“A ‘not guilty’ verdict doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re innocent,” Sir Cade says. “As we both very well know. But there are new charges that have been brought against you.”
“Sir Luther, you are hereby officially charged with failing in your fiduciary duty to your ward by misusing her funds,” Emmerich says, handing the handcuffs over to one of the guards, “as well as embezzling the Order’s assets for personal use, bribing other officials, intimidating subordinates, destroying of evidence…shall I continue?
“And unfortunately for you,” Sir Cade states, “your actions did leave traces this time around.”
I snort back a laugh of derision. The Board could look over the murder of Jennifer’s dad, but mess with their funds, and now Luther gets to walk the plank. How typical.
Luther watches in stupor as his men turn on him, snapping the handcuffs around his wrists. The once proud knight and contender to the Board Presidency looks at last to his son for support.
Morgana Trilogy Complete Series Page 106
