Blood Magick

by Roberts, Nora

  “That was excellent,” Iona breathed. “Disgusting but excellent. I didn’t know he could juggle the elements like that—boom, boom, boom.”

  “He was showing off,” Branna replied. “For Cabhan.”

  Fin stood where he was, in the open, as if daring a response.

  He lifted his arm high, called to his hawk. Like a golden flash Merlin dived down, then, following the direction of Fin’s hand, bulleted into the trees.

  Fin whirled his arms out, in, and vanished in a swirl of fog.

  “Oh God, my God, Cabhan.”

  “It wasn’t Cabhan’s fog,” Branna said with forced calm. “It was Fin’s. He’s gone after him.”

  “What should we do? We should call the others, get to Fin.”

  “We can’t get to Fin as we can’t know where he is. He has to let us, and he isn’t. He wants to do this on his own.”

  He flew, shadowed by the fog, his eyes the eyes of the hawk. And through the hawk watched the wolf streak through the woods. It left no track and cast no shadow.

  As it approached the river it gathered itself, leaped up, rose up, sprang over the cold, dark surface like a stone from a sling. As it did, the mark on Fin’s arm burned brutally.

  So Cabhan paid a price, he thought, for crossing water.

  He followed the wolf, masked by his own fog until he felt something change in the air, something tremble. He called to Merlin, slowed his own forward motion, seconds before the wolf vanished.

  • • •

  FIN MIGHT HAVE WANTED TO HANDLE THINGS ON HIS OWN, but Iona called the others anyway. Placidly, silently, Branna brewed a pot of tea.

  “You’re so calm.” Iona paced, waiting for something to happen. “How can you be so calm?”

  “I’m so angry it feels my blood’s on fire. If I didn’t bank it with calm, I might burn the place to the ground.”

  Stepping over, Iona wrapped her arms around Branna from behind. “You know he’s all right. You know he can take care of himself.”

  “I know it very well, and it changes nothing.” She patted Iona’s hand, moved to get a dish for biscuits while her angry heart beat fists against her ribs. “I never asked why you’re home so early.”

  “We decided we could start the whole shift rotation today. I have a lesson at the big stables at four, but Boyle could spare me until.” Iona rushed to the door. “Here they are now. And, oh! Here’s Fin. He’s fine.”

  When Branna said nothing, Iona opened the door. “Get inside,” she snapped to Fin. “You don’t even have a jacket.”

  “I was warm enough.”

  “You’ll be warmer yet if I kick your arse,” Boyle warned him. “What’s all this about taking off after Cabhan on your own, in some fecking funnel of fog.”

  “Just a little something I’ve been working on, and an opportunity to test it out.” Fin shook back his hair, rolled his shoulders. “Brawling with me won’t change anything, but I’m open to it if it helps you.”

  “I’ll be the one holding you down while he does the arse kicking.” Connor yanked off his coat. “You’ve no right going off after him on your own.”

  “Every right in this world and any.”

  “We’re a circle,” Iona began.

  “We are.” Because it was Iona, Fin tempered his tone. “And each of us individual points of it.”

  “Those points are connected. What happens to you, affects us all.” Meara glanced over at Branna, who continued to fuss with tea and biscuits. “All of us.”

  “He never knew I was there, couldn’t see I was following, watching where he went. I was cloaked. It’s what I’ve been working on, and the point of trying it.”

  “Without letting any of us know what you were about?” Connor tossed out.

  “Well, I didn’t know for certain it would work till I tried, did I?”

  He walked to Branna. “I used some of what I have of him in me to conjure the fog. It’s taken weeks—well, months, come to that—for me to perfect it as I only had bits of time here and there to give to it. Today, I saw a chance to try it. Which isn’t so different, if you’re honest, from taking a ride out into the woods just to see what may be.”

  “I wasn’t alone.”

  “Nor was I,” he countered just as coolly. “I had Merlin, and used his eyes to follow. He’s taunted us, and you gave him back a bit, for you know, as we all should, if we look to be doing nothing at all, he’ll know we’re doing a great deal more. Why else did I make such a show of dispatching the rats?”

  Irritation vibrating around him, he turned, lifted his hands. “Is there so little trust here?”

  “It’s not lack of trust,” Iona told him. “You scared us. I thought at first Cabhan had ambushed you, but Branna said you’d made the fog yourself. But we couldn’t see you, we didn’t know where you were. It scared us.”

  “For that, deirfiúr bheag, I’m sorry. I’m sorry for causing you a minute of fear on my account, any of you, but you most especially who stood for me almost before you knew me.”

  Iona released a sigh. “Is that your way of getting out of trouble?”

  “It’s only the truth.” He moved to her, kissed her forehead. “I admit I followed the moment, saw a chance, took it. And taking it, we know more than we did, if that’s any balance to the scales.”

  “He’s right,” Branna said before anyone else could speak. “It may take time for me to cool my anger, as it may for the rest of you, but if we’re practical—and we can’t be otherwise—Fin’s right. He used what he has and is. I wondered why you showed off so blatantly for Cabhan. It was a bit embarrassing.”

  At Fin’s cocked brow, she gestured to Connor. “Take this tea tray by the fire, would you? The jars on the work counter are sealed, but I don’t want food near them.”

  “He used the elements, one after the other, fast—zap, zap,” Iona explained. “Wind, fire, earth, water. It was pretty awesome.”

  “Considerable overkill,” Branna said tartly, “but I see the purpose now.”

  “Since it’s done, it’s done.” Boyle shrugged, took a mug of tea. “I’d like to hear what we know that we didn’t, and as no one’s in a bloody battle, I’ve only a few minutes for it, as I’ve work still to do.”

  “He ran as the shadow wolf, leaving no tracks in the snow. Fast, very fast, but running, not flying. I think he conserves the energy.” Fin took a biscuit, then paced as he spoke. “He only flew to get over the river, and as he spanned it, my mark burned. It costs him to cross the water, and now I know when I feel that, as I have before, he’s crossed back to our side of it. He took the woods again, turned toward the lake. It tired him, as he ran a long way, then I felt the change, felt it coming so slowed, pulled Merlin back toward me. The wolf vanished. He’d shifted into another time. His own time, I’d say. And his lair.”

  “Can you find the way back? Sure and you can find the way back,” Connor continued, “or you wouldn’t look so fecking smug about it.”

  “I can find the way to where the wolf shifted, and I think we’ll find Cabhan’s lair isn’t far from there.”

  “How soon can we go?” Meara demanded. “Tonight?”

  “I happen to be free,” Connor said.

  “Not tonight.” Branna shook her head. “There are things to prepare for if we find it. Things we could use. What we find, if anything, would be in our time. But . . .”

  “You’re after going back, once we find it, on going back to his time.” Boyle frowned into his tea. “And take him on there?”

  “No, not that. We don’t have all we need, and the time has to be our choosing. But if we could leave something in his cave—block it from him, use it to see him there. Hear him. We could get the name. And we might learn his plans before he acts on them.”

  “Not all of us,” Fin countered. “It’s too risky for all of us to go back. If we were trapped there, it’s done for us. Only one goes.”

  “And you think that should be you.”

  He nodded at Branna. “Of cours
e. I can go back, leaving no trace in the cloak of the fog, take your crystal, as that’s what’s best for seeing, and be out again.”

  “And if he’s in there?” Iona gave Fin a light punch on the shoulder. “You could be done.”

  “That would be why a couple of us—at least a couple,” Connor calculated, “find a way to draw him out, keep him busy.” He grinned at Meara. “Would you be up for that?”

  “I’d be raring for it.”

  “So . . .” Grabbing a biscuit, and another for his pocket, Boyle considered. “The four of us go where Fin followed today, and hunt from there. Connor and Meara catch Cabhan’s attention so he’s after them, and the lair’s clear of him. If we find it, Fin takes this crystal, shifts in time back to the fecking thirteenth century, plants the thing in the cave, comes back, and we’re all off to the pub for a round.”

  “That’s the broad strokes of it.” Branna patted his arm. “We’ll fix the small, and important details of it. So we don’t go until we do. None of us go near the place.” She looked directly at Fin. “Is that agreed?”

  “It is,” he said, “and I’ve some ideas on a few of the details.”

  “As have I.” Satisfied, and only a little angry still, Branna took a biscuit for herself.

  16

  IT WOULD TAKE NEARLY A WEEK BEFORE BRANNA WAS fully satisfied, and those days took precious hours away from perfecting the poison. Still, she considered it all time well spent.

  The timing would be tight, and the circle would be separated at several stages—so every step of every stage had to be carefully plotted.

  They chose early evening, so routines could hold and they’d still have an hour or more of light before dusk.

  In her workshop, Branna carefully placed the crystal she’d chosen and charmed in a pouch.

  “You must place it high, facing the altar, where it will reflect what’s below,” she told Fin. “And you must move there and back quickly.”

  “So you’ve already said.”

  “It bears repeating. You’ll be tempted to linger—as I would be in your place—to see what else you might find, what else you might learn. The longer you’re there, in his place and in his time, the more chance there is of you leaving some trace, or of him sensing you.”

  She placed the pouch in a leather bag, then held up a vial. “Should it go wrong, should he come back before you’re done, this should disable him for a few moments, long enough for you to get back to me, Iona, Boyle in our time. It’s only if there’s no choice.”

  She pouched the vial, added it to the bag. Stared down at it as she wished what he needed to do didn’t need to be done. “Don’t risk all for the moment.”

  “As all includes you, you can be sure I won’t.”

  “Touch nothing of his. Don’t—”

  “Branna.” He cupped her face until their eyes met. “We’ve been over it all.”

  “Of course. You’re right. And it’s time.” She handed him the bag, went to get her jacket. “Iona and Boyle will be here any minute.”

  “When this is done we’ll have a window to look in on him as he too often looks in on us. And we’ll be able to give all the time needed to the poison that will end it.”

  “I’m uneasy, that’s the truth.” She didn’t know if it helped to say it, but did know it was foolish, and maybe dangerous, to pretend. “The closer we come to the end of it, and I believe we will end it, there’s a pull and tug in me. It’s more than confidence and doubt. I don’t understand my own feelings, and it makes me uneasy.”

  “Be easy about this. If for now, only this.”

  She could only try, as there was no room for doubts, and no time to delay as Iona and Boyle pulled up outside.

  She picked up a short sword, fixed the sheath to her belt. “Best be prepared,” was all she said as Iona and Boyle came in.

  “Connor and Meara are on their way.”

  “Then we’d best be on ours.” Branna reached for Fin’s hand, then Boyle’s. When Iona took Boyle’s other hand, they flew.

  Through the cool and the damp, through the wind and over the trees, across the river, then the lake with the castle of Ashford shining behind them.

  They landed softly, in a stand of trees, in a place she didn’t recognize.

  “Here?”

  “It’s where I lost him. It’s been hundreds of years since Midor and his cave,” Fin pointed out. “Some houses not far, some roads, but as with Sorcha’s cabin, I think the place where Cabhan was made will remain, in some form.”

  “There’s a quiet here.” Eyes watchful, Boyle studied the lay of the land. “A kind of hard hush.”

  Feeling the same, Fin nodded. “We’re a superstitious breed, we Irish, and wise enough to build around a faerie hill without disturbing it, to leave a stone dance where it stands. And to keep back from a place where the dark still thrums.”

  He glanced over at Boyle. “We agreed to stay together, but it’s fact we’d cover more ground if we split up.”

  “Together,” Branna said firmly, as she’d expected him to suggest it. “And if the dark still thrums?” She drew out a wand with a tip of glass-clear crystal. “The light will find it.”

  “I don’t recall that being in the plan.”

  “Best to be prepared,” she repeated. She lifted her wand to the sky until the tip pulsed light. And watched Merlin circle above them.

  “Between my wand and your hawk, we should find the lair. It pulls north.”

  “Then we go north.” Boyle took Iona’s hand in his again, and the four of them headed north.

  • • •

  ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE RIVER CONNOR AND MEARA walked in the woods. He’d linked with Roibeard, who swooped through the trees, and with Merlin, who watched the rest of the circle travel another wood.

  “It’s a pleasure to finally have some time to go hawking with you. It’s been too long since we just took an hour for it.”

  “I need to practice more,” Meara responded, easy and casual, though her throat was dry. “So I’m full ready when we add the package.”

  “We could’ve come on horseback.”

  “This will do.” She lifted a gloved arm for Roibeard, and though the hawking was a ploy, enjoyed having him.

  “Would you want a hawk of your own?” Connor asked her.

  She glanced at him in genuine surprise. “I’ve never thought of it.”

  “You should have your own. A female if you find one who speaks to you. Your hawk and mine could mate.”

  The idea brought a smile as it seemed a lovely thought, and a normal one. “I’ve never tended to a hawk on my own.”

  “I’d help you, but you’d do well with it. You’ve helped often enough with Merlin when Fin’s gone rambling. We could build a place for them when we build our house. If you’re still in the mind to build one.”

  “I’ve hardly thought of that either, as I’m barely making strides on the wedding.” She let Roibeard fly again. “And there’s Cabhan to worry about.”

  “We won’t think of him today,” Connor said, though both of them thought of little else. “Today we follow Roibeard’s dance. Give us a song, Meara, something bright to lift Roibeard’s wings.”

  “Something bright, is it?” She took his hand, swung his arm playfully as they walked. But she wanted that connection, the physical of it, as they both knew the music could bring Cabhan.

  They’d planned on it.

  She decided on “The Wild Rover,” as it was bright enough, and had a number of verses to give Cabhan time to be drawn in, if it was to happen.

  She laughed when Connor joined her on the chorus, and any other day would have prized the walk with him, with the hawk, with the song in the pretty woods where the snowmelt left the ground so soft and pools of white still clung to the shady shadows.

  When he squeezed her hand, she knew the ploy had worked. And it was time for their part of the scheme.

  Her voice didn’t falter as she saw the first wisps of fog slithering over
the ground, nor when Roibeard landed on a branch nearby—a golden-winged warrior poised to defend.

  “I could still your voice with a thought.”

  Cabhan rose from the fog, and smiled his silky smile when Meara stopped singing to draw her sword. “And so I have. You risk your lady, witch, strolling through the woods without your sister to fight for you.”

  “I’ve enough to protect my lady, should she need it. But I think you know she does well protecting herself. Still . . .” Connor ran a finger down Meara’s blade, set it alight. “A little something more for my lady.”

  “What manner of man has his woman stand in front of him?”

  “Beside him,” Connor corrected, and drew a sword of his own, enflamed it.

  “And leaves her unshielded,” Cabhan said and hurled black lightning at Meara.

  Connor sent it crashing to the ground with a hard twist of wind. “Never unshielded.”

  • • •

  ACROSS THE WATER, THE PULSE OF BRANNA’S WAND QUICKENED. “Close now.”

  “There.” Fin pointed to a wild tangle of thickets edged with thick black thorns, snaking vines dotted with berries like hard drops of blood. “In there is Midor’s cave. I can feel the pull, just as I felt the burn when Cabhan crossed the river. The way’s clear.”

  “It doesn’t look clear,” Iona said. “It looks lethal.” Testing, she tapped the flat of her sword on one of the thorns, listened to the metallic clink of steel to steel. “Sounds lethal.”

  “I won’t be going through them, but through time. Though when this is done we’ll come back here, all of us, and burn those thorny vines, salt and sanctify the ground.”

  “Not yet.” Branna took his arm. “Connor hasn’t told me Cabhan’s taken the bait.”

  “He has. He’s nearly there, and the sooner I’m in and out, the less time Connor and Meara have to stand against him. It’s now, Branna, and quick.”

  Though it filled her with dread, they cast the circle, and she released Fin’s hand, accepted it would be done.

  “In this place,” she chanted with the others, “of death and dark, we send the one who bears the mark through space, through time. Powers of light send him through, let our wills entwine. Send him through, and send him back by the light of the three.”