Brighid's Fallen (Keepers of the Flame Book 5)

by Cate Morgan

“Stupid child,” Lilith repeated, words dripping with inherent venom. “Did you really think you could win against me?”

  “Not me,” Cara gasped, her lips turning up in a small, inconceivable smile. “Her.”

  Lilith dropped Cara as she whipped around, hissing when she saw her prize had been spirited away.

  Cara, hand to her throat, stood to face the frothing demon in priest’s form before her. “It is done.”

  Lilith turned and charged, screaming like a wounded dragon. Cara didn’t move, didn’t so much as flinch. Alex burst free from the demon trap just as Lilith reached her.

  In an act so desperate it was inevitable, Alex gave the demon its head. Together they surged forward and knocked Lilith clean off her feet.

  The three of them--Alex, Lilith, and Cara--tumbled from reality just as the vault’s ceiling caved in.

  Cara hit the ground with bone-jarring impact, expelling the air from her lungs in a rush. Rolled to a bruising, disjointed stop. Then she pushed past the pain and to her feet, wondering how she’d narrowly avoided being cut to ribbons again. It seemed in Lilith’s arrogance she’d enjoyed playing with her too much, extending her pleasure instead of just ending Cara’s life.

  She looked around and found herself in a dreamscape built of nightmare. The city, on fire from above and below. Smoke billowing like a black, low-hanging fog across a sky stained improbable colors. Sound was muffled, but she could still hear the screams, punctuated by gleeful chittering.

  Then there was that ear-splitting dragon’s roar again, echoed by snarls and growls that could only be from Alex.

  Alex.

  She turned and nearly stumbled as the landscape wheeled in the dreamlike currents. She fought for solid purchase in this, Lilith’s unstable plane.

  There was no Desmond, now. There was only the All-Mother, and barely an Alex to fight her. Black talons extended from both hands, whirling and slashing in a blur. Lilith’s fangs exuded long streams of poison as she howled, while Alex’s dripped blood. There was a fierce, terrifying beauty about him, as though in releasing his inner self he was complete. As if he had Ascended.

  Cara swallowed, searching for an opening. She had no sword. No weapon of any kind. Could Brighid even reach her here? This was Lilith’s realm, not that of the Tuatha.

  A telltale flicker in the corner of her eye, a hint of a sigh.

  What’s your next move, Keeper?

  The words echoed in Cara’s mind. She turned.

  And gaped, as Brendan strode toward her with a bittersweet smile. Brighid’s smile, as she promised Cara she would not have to face this trial alone.

  There was no time, not even for words. She came to a split-second decision, barely the length of a single heartbeat. Her feet moved before she even realized she’d made it.

  Lilith held a struggling Alex in place and prepared to disembowel him.

  Cara reached out a hand. “Mairya!”

  Two things happened at once. Michael’s sword hit her palm, and Brendan merged his angelic spirit with her champion’s heart. The blue flame inside her exploded to searing white.

  And then she moved through between.

  She exited the other side with a devastating thunderclap overhead, a spike of bright, blue-tinged lightning ripping across the orange and black sky.

  She came out, and in a single turn of one of Lilith’s eyelashes, before the archangel’s sword could react to her all too human touch, she impaled the All-Mother of demons from behind.

  And then she died.

  Both of them.

  A cool touch, like the soft, incessant drip of water against her warm cheek. It seemed she had been asleep forever, in that peaceful moment between waking and knowing. Remembering.

  And then pain. Searing, tearing, screaming. Every nerve on fire, reaching into her core. Grabbing hold and burning some more, just for good measure. Death, over and over again, in waves but without relief. Even Brendan couldn’t shield her from it.

  It went on, and on. Until there was no trough to precede the next wave. Just crest upon worsening crest. She had no body to curl in on itself in defense, only soul--wide open and feeling. Compared to this, Ascending the first time had been a warm bath. Then, there had been only light and overwhelming sensation.

  It felt like her tiny Flame had gone nuclear, ripping everything away in its path, including her. A star gone supernova extending to the edges of existence.

  She could not pray, or call for help. She could only mentally scream Brighid’s name.

  She couldn’t even pass out.

  A whisper, as though in a dream.

  You must fight, child.

  She tried to latch onto the words, but they slipped away.

  Fighting did no good anyway. Neither did surrender.

  Oh, come now, another voice, vaguely familiar, chided her. You can do better than that.

  She would give anything to so much as whimper right now. Brendan?

  Well done. Now--BREATHE.

  Air entered her lungs in an uncontrolled flood. With lungs came feeling in her gut, her heart, her limbs and head. Blood rushed through veins that had not been there a moment ago, tingled in fingers and toes.

  Then her heart beat with a great, echoing slam in her chest and ears, and it felt as though the entire world had come to life.

  Relief.

  Then nothing.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Lilith’s expression of abject surprise was, without question, worth every moment of living with a demon inside him for the rest of his natural--and possibly unnatural—life.

  It was shame Alex had no time to enjoy it.

  One moment the All-Mother was simply there, gaping at the blade protruding damned near twenty inches from her slim torso. The next, poof.

  Gone.

  It was too much to hope she was dead. That would have been too easy.

  A metallic clatter turned his attention to Cara, who was stark white, her cobalt eyes nothing but pupil. Michael’s sword lay at her feet.

  He was with her so quickly he may have passed through space and time itself to catch her as she collapsed. Mairya tried to pull him away, but he snapped at her like an animal. It seemed his demon was as protective of her as he was.

  What had Cara said? That his demon had been accepted in an act of true sacrifice? Had that been enough to change its nature?

  He lowered them both to the ground, as the dreamscape began to shred at the edges. It unraveled to reveal the reality beneath, but he had no attention to spare for such hellish wonders. After all, now that he was here, he knew he had been here before. When the demon had been put in him, his nightmares had been of this place, with Lilith’s shrill laughter filling his mind.

  He glared up at Mairya and her unwelcome expression of sympathy. “Why didn’t you step in? You could have stopped Lilith before it came to this.”

  She crouched to tenderly brush strands of hair from Cara’s still face. “Because it was her choice to fight. Would you have me dishonor her sacrifice?”

  “To save her life? Yes.”

  Mairya turned her enigmatic gaze on him. “Free will is perhaps humanity’s greatest curse, as well as its greatest blessing. And I am barred from interfering.”

  Alex stared down at the Keeper, not wanting to believe it was too late. “Why didn’t she ask for help?” he wondered, half to himself.

  “Because she would never think to.” Mairya smiled at his surprise. “She has always felt herself alone, you see. And, largely, she has been.”

  “Except for Brendan.” He bit back a curse. “What happens now?”

  Mairya straightened, shook her head.“In this place? There are no rules. She may Ascend, or she may die. In the end, it is up to her.”

  “Can she Ascend?” Alex asked. “She took up an archangel’s sword. How is she even still alive?”

  “As I said, in this place there are no rules.” Mairya looked up at the flaming sky, her expression one of seeing, and calculation. She placed her hand on Alex�
��s shoulder. “We must hurry.”

  A head-spinning, nausea-inducing moment later they were back in the vault, the room destroyed beyond redemption. Everything had fallen inward, teetering overhead on the verge of full collapse. Alex found himself in a dark little cove near the door with certain and near-immediate death rumbling a warning overhead.

  “Get her to the Flame,” Mairya said beside him.

  Alex scooped Cara into his arms and started running. Something sparked in him, connected to the demon. Filling him with...light?

  It grew stronger the further he delved into the tunnels. Soon his need pushed him through between, in intermittent flashes that cracked like lightning around him. He kept telling himself, forcefully, that Cara would not be afraid. And if he was going to save her life, then neither could he.

  He skidded to a halt when he reached the sepulcher. The fire flared at their entrance, as though in response to their arrival. He turned to Mairya. “What--”

  “Set her down, lad. And step away.”

  He bent to set Cara in the warm glow of blue light. The Flame snapped and grew, and he hastily retreated as far as he dared. Mairya gently laid Cara’s sword next to her, and joined him.

  Nothing happened, for a good long moment. Alex feared they might be too late. “What happens now?”

  “What else? We hold vigil.”

  Alex’s nails bit into his palms like teeth. She had to live.

  She had to.

  Soon it became apparent the light was steadily growing, filling the cavern with eerie blue luminescence. His eyes adjusted, even as his gaze never wavered from Cara’s still form.

  “Come on, Keeper,” he murmured. Soon his knuckles began to ache with sheer force of will.

  Cara kept her eyes closed. Not wanting to face reality. Not willing to remember. Not daring to relive.

  It was quiet here, and dark. The only sound was that of her own breathing, the only tangible feeling the faint beat of her own heart.

  So she would keep her eyes firmly closed, and hope no one noticed her fear. Her pain.

  Images began to seep between the cracks of her hastily built walls. There had been explosions, and screams as their battlefield had broken away from the edge of the world. The bone-shattering impact of hitting the water, of darkness and her lungs filling.

  She had never cared for swimming as a child. But for her unit, her team, she would swim. She floundered blindly and desperately to find them and pull them to safety, if she could. Even as inevitability weighed her down.

  She surfaced just once in the roiling surf, just enough to pull in a lungful of precious air. The water pounding against the rocks was indiscernible from the assault overhead.

  Beneath the surface once more, she struggled out of her gear. She had to slice one of the straps clean through with her field knife, but then she was able to kick her way back into the smoke-choked air.

  She grappled herself onto a rock long enough look around her frantically, searching for any sign of her people. She’d thought for certain she’d escaped this nightmare once before.

  But she was alone.

  A soft tsk invaded her panic, like the softest sigh through trees. And the ocean calmed, and the sky cleared.

  “Don’t you know by now, child? As long as you are mine, you are never alone.”

  Cara opened her eyes.

  Brighid smiled down at her, her eyes shimmering between hues like snake skin. “There, now. Isn’t that better?”

  Between. So that’s where she was.

  She swallowed. “How bad is it?”

  “I will not lie,” Brighid told her, clutching the sword in her hands. “We have never seen the like before. You wielded an angel’s sword in Lilith’s realm. Took on an angel’s spirit, just for a moment’s protection. By rights you should not have survived. And yet…here you are. Wedged in the cusp between planes.” Her smile widened. “Even the Dagda is interested to see what will happen next.”

  Cara rolled painfully to her knees. That was the thing about the Celts--even their gods had a sense of humor, even at the most inappropriate of times. “That’s encouraging.”

  “It is, actually.” Brighid gently helped her to to her feet. “They are in awe of you. A true champion, capable of such deeds--it is beyond expectation, even for such as us. It brings hope.” Now her smile was feral. “And allies.”

  Much needed allies. Because once Lilith had finished licking her wounds, she would come for them with everything she had. After she came for humanity.

  Cara looked down at her own hands in wonder. “How did I survive?”

  “No one knows, but I suspect you had powerful protections around you--beyond mine.” Her eyes crinkled at the corners with laughter. “Perhaps Brendan the Scribe put in a word with Michael.”

  Brendan. Love and mourning washed through her. So he really had been there, in the end. Especially in the end.

  “Come, child. It is time.” Brighid beckoned gracefully. “Let us see what fate has in store.”

  Ascendence. The first time had been a shock to her system, confusing and painful and blinding. Without surcease. But she had been changed, for the better.Of all her regrets, taking Brighid’s offer had not been one of them.

  She took Brighid’s cool, smooth hand. And then…

  Light.

  As Alex and Mairya watched, all the Flame’s light centered on Cara, seeming to be absorbed. The fire in the basin faded slowly like a sunset, until only darkness remained.

  Hair-thin lines of electric blue light sparked along the ground, making him blink.

  “Ley lines,” Mairya whispered.

  Alex put the knowledge away for later examination. He was too focused on Cara to do more.

  Now a faint blue glow surrounded her, pulsing softly like a heartbeat. To his amazement, her limp form slowly raised to head height, as though lifted by an invisible figure. Her back arched, arms and legs hanging to the sides. Intermittent flares sparked around her, growing in strength.

  A rustle of fabric, or perhaps wings, as Mairya shielded him from the explosion of pure light than that seared the cavern. Even then he was blinded.

  He started to get his vision back in time to see Cara floating back to the ground, He started forward, by Mairya stopped him. “Not yet.”

  But he was riveted, pushing against her arm. Cara was breathing.

  Her eyes opened, and she blinked slowly. She reached for her sword, carefully curling her small hand around the grip. Metal scraped against stone as she dragged it toward her.

  She rolled to her stomach and pushed herself upright. She looked dazed, and in pain. He moved again, but she held out a hand to stop him. Disappointingly, she ignored him in favor of Mairya. Her eyes were bright, electric blue.

  “Shield him,” she said, her voice a strange, echoing chorus. Whispers filled the cavern on a soft breeze that gave his hair a teasing ruffle.

  Cara shifted her hold on her sword to both hands, pivoting. A moment later the blade struck the ground and light once more filled the cave.

  It spilled from Cara’s bent form in waves, pouring out into the winding tunnels. It washed over Alex, carrying his perception along in its wake even as Mairya curtained him once more. It took his breath away, the beauty of it roaring and filling what had to be at least two hundred kilometers of corridors beneath Paris’ streets like a floodtide.

  Cara was returning light to the City of Lights. Her light.

  And like stars appearing in a dusk sky, Paris once again came to life.

  Alex blinked, bringing him back to the sepulcher room. Cara swayed as the last of the light left her, having given over everything she had. There was no stopping him now--he pushed past Mairya and caught her as she wilted like a sigh.

  “She will sleep now,” the angel told him as he stood with Cara tucked against him. “For a good long while, by the looks of it.”

  “So that was her Ascending,” Alex said, looking down at her in wonder.

  Mairya touched the back of
her pale fingers to Cara’s cheek. “Something more even than that, I think.”

  Alex gave her a piercing look. “What do you mean?”

  She shook her head, looking bemused. “There was more than her light in what she released. Something, if I didn’t know better, I would have said was a bit angelic.”

  “From Michael’s sword?” he guessed, hitting on the most likely explanation.

  “Perhaps, in his studies, Brendan found a way of protecting her. I suppose we may never know.” She came back to the present. “Come. I will take you home and then return my brother’s sword to him.”

  And then, just like that, Alex was standing in the middle of his apartment. A sleeping champion in his arms.

  Cara woke slowly, groggily, with everything aching in bittersweet excess. All things considered, it was a nice change of pace. She simply lay still, eyes closed, reveling in the fact her lumpy futon seemed more comfortable than was usual. Memories were pleasantly vague, and the quiet was a godsend.

  Relative quiet.

  A muted shuffling emanated from somewhere close, intermittent but not irritating. It was a comfortable sort of sound, adding to her sense of peace rather than detracting from it. It spoke of lazy Sunday mornings in another time, another place.

  The shuffling got a bit louder, followed by a shadow falling across her face, sensed though not seen. She shifted a bit and opened her eyes.

  “Hey,” Alex greeted her softly. He pressed the back of his hand against her forehead. “How are you feeling? You’ve been running a fever.”

  Recollections began to trickle in, tickling her mind like an unwelcome spider against her skin. “Alex?”

  He perched on the bed, giving her an odd, probing look. “Yeah.”

  She stretched experimentally, curling her toes and fingers. She felt a little tingly, as though she’d had too much coffee in one sitting. Her head was heavy, and spun a bit when she tried to lift it. “I Ascended.”

  “You i.” He handed her a glass of water. “I brought you back to my place, after.”

  She sipped from the glass, and it was glorious. Her head cleared immediately. “How long was I out?”