They slowed and stayed out of sight when Chara's unicorn stopped, shifted, fell to her knees in the golden clovers, and hung her head.
“This was what Destiny referred to when my unicorn first met her,” Chara said into his mind. “She warned me to stay away from my stone in the Stonehenge.” She looked at him. “She also told me to find the gem, I’d know the one and write my warrior. Remind him what needs to be done.”
“Och, nay.” He shook his head in disbelief as her incarnate took the gem out of her pocket and appeared to write in the bed of clovers. “She’s...you’re...”
“Yes.” Chara squeezed his hand. “I’m using the magic of the gem to write the tattooed words. To remind you what needs to be done.” She looked from her incarnate back to him. “Through you and your tattoos, I’m telling Ethyn. Then...”
“Bloody hell, nay.” He shook his head. “Ye didnae.”
But she had, and they both knew it because she’d bid him farewell when the words appeared on his flesh. That didn’t make witnessing it any easier, though.
After a few more rushed slashes, almost as if she were running out of time, her incarnate shifted back into her unicorn. They followed as she raced to the cliff where their stone once sat.
“I'm going to be turning eighteen soon,” Chara murmured, figuring out why the unicorn was in such a hurry. “When I do, I'll become fully human and won’t be of any use to the Brotherhood anymore.” She looked at him, amazed. “That's why we had to wait until I turned eighteen in a dream before you slept with me. I was still too connected to my former unicorn before then. If we'd come together prior, the Brotherhood would've locked onto my location sooner.”
“I'm glad we waited then,” Marek replied, his internal voice thick with emotion as they continued following her unicorn to the Stonehenge.
As they followed her to what would undoubtedly be her end.
The battling between Marek's Fianna and his brother had just ended, and Ethyn held Ciara’s head in his lap. More specifically, the head of her newly cursed wolf. Yet even as Marek’s former self fled, realizing what Chara’s unicorn had done, hoping to save her, it was too late.
One Stonehenge faded away to be replaced with a darker, more sinister one. The same place but in a different dimension. On a different plane of existence. One made of dark magic and foul intentions. One that everyone on every adventure had witnessed at one time or another, whether they knew it or not.
“Nay,” his former Fianna roared, skidding to a halt in the circle moments after he appeared to be running from it. He met the eyes of Chara’s unicorn when she stopped in front of their stone and said the very words Marek had when dreaming. Felt the same horrible desperation. “Run and dinnae look back!” He feared he might not be able to fight the evil within him. That he might hurt her. “For if I catch ye, all will be lost. Ye will be lost!”
Yet she didn’t run, nor would she.
Not when she had come willingly.
Though he clearly fought the darkness inside him, desperate to save her, it was already too late.
He had run straight into a ritual he could either join or fight.
“I willnae join them.” Marek shook his head, furious, sensing what he’d felt back then. “No evil is strong enough to keep me from loving you. Protecting you. ‘Tis impossible.”
He pulled Chara close as his Fianna echoed his sentiments, and, at last, what the Brotherhood ultimately did unraveled before them. Though only twenty or so hooded figures melted out of the woodland and began chanting, another far louder booming voice echoed all around them.
“It’s the God of Death.” Chara watched their incarnates, and her eyes welled. “Like we suspected, he’s been at the heart of this all along, wanting land of his own. Power of his own on a mortal plane.”
“The MacLomains,” Marek murmured. “And through them and the magical power that will be at their disposal, Scotland.”
“Where’s Destiny, though?” Chara began only to trail off when her friend drifted out of the woodland. She raised her arms, clearly in charge of what was happening. “Oh, God.”
The chanting grew louder, all-consuming, deafening, and terrifying. Unfazed by what would cripple most with fear, Marek’s Fianna turned his wrath and what was swiftly becoming an unholy soul on the darkness closing in. A visible noose of death tightening with every commanding step Destiny took.
“What is she doing?” Chara had never been so heartbroken. “Why is she...I thought...”
The chanting increased, and the darkness pulsed as if gathering energy. As if pulling together all its ingredients, which in an ethereal, horrifying way, it was. For as the sun set, they saw strobe-like flickers of what the God of Death had garnered over the years.
Ethereal entities made up of Cray’s dragon in a former life wrapping his wings around his son as their souls were consumed. Madison’s former dragon roaring in defiant pain as she lost her mate and younger son. Using their dragon magic, the Brotherhood would hide what happened here from all those who came to this Stonehenge afterward, god or not.
“This is awful.” Chara wiped away a tear. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything so horrific.”
Yet it turned out that wasn’t quite true.
Not when the darkness started toward Chara’s unicorn, who stood unmoving, her eyes never leaving Marek’s Fianna.
“She’s ready,” Chara whispered into his mind, choked up. “She’s terrified of being separated from you, but she seems ready. As though...” She blinked, following her emotions, or rather those of the unicorn. “As though she has no doubt she’ll find you again because she wrote it, felt it, was promised it...more than that, she believed it.”
Almost the moment she said it, everything unraveled with heartbreaking speed, and the attack was swift. Darkness gathered like a building tidal wave behind Destiny, whose gaze narrowed in on the unicorn. If that weren’t enough, she suddenly wielded a dagger unlike any other. One that appeared older than time. Black and lethal, it seemed forged in the fires of hell.
The same dagger they'd seen in a dream when Marek first kissed her.
A strange otherworldly relish filled the goddess’s eyes, as though perhaps her father saw through her gaze before she whipped the dagger at the unicorn.
Though Marek’s Fianna stood directly between her and Chara’s incarnate, it mattered naught. Destiny was too powerful, and the dagger more powerful still. It sliced the corner of Marek’s temple in passing and slammed into the unicorn’s chest just as the setting sun hit the horizon.
Chara put a hand over her mouth at the heart-wrenching sight that unfolded.
The dagger not only took down the unicorn, who fell on the stone that had been theirs but affected Marek’s Fianna as well. He stumbled, his legs clearly weakened by even the slightest touch of the dagger. Soon enough, black visibly crawled through his veins, sucking away his immortality and life, but he didn’t care.
“He only cares about ye,” Marek managed, just as emotional. He wrapped his arms around Chara more tightly. “His life means nothing.”
“She feels the same.” Tears slipped down her cheeks. “She only cares about you.”
Even though darkness swirled around the dying unicorn, soaking up what it needed from her, Chara sensed something deep within it all. Something no amount of dark magic could touch. A tiny little glow growing in her mind’s eye. A light within the hearts of the couple that no darkness could see.
That no darkness could follow.
A light, as it turned out, that would make all the difference in the end.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
THOUGH THEIR SURROUNDINGS faded and they were once again in Scotland, Chara felt frozen in time. Stunned by what she had just seen. “Our gem...”
“Aye, lass.” Marek wrapped her more tightly in his arms, understanding that she needed an anchor. Something to ground her from the almost surreal experience they’d just had.
“It was there in the end,” he managed. “�
��Twas the last thing I saw when staring into your eyes.”
“And the last thing I saw when looking into yours.” She trembled in shock. “How is that possible?”
“Because your unicorn used magic to keep the gem with her,” Destiny said softly from nearby. “Magic, I made sure remained undetected so that the gem could do what it needed to do.”
“Did ye then?” Marek growled. When his dragon eyes flared, and he stepped in Destiny’s direction, Leviathan cut him off.
“You will not take another step, Scot.” The Viking’s dragon eyes flared just as hotly. “Not until your emotions are under control, and you can see clearly.”
“See clearly,” Marek said, incredulous. “I saw one thing and one thing only.” He gestured at Destiny, enraged and betrayed. “She lied to us. Lured us.”
“No.” Leviathan stood his ground. “If she had, she would not be here.”
Marek frowned. “So, you trust her now?”
“Yes,” Leviathan said, surprising Chara with his change of heart. With how certain he sounded. “I do trust her.”
Marek didn’t let up, and Chara didn’t entirely blame him. “Why?”
“Because I witnessed it from her point of view.” Leviathan’s hard gaze never left Marek. His posture remained tense, his dragon eyes sizzling. “I saw what she did. What she intended when she knew there was no hope for you two in that life.”
Leviathan truly did stand between Marek and Destiny, didn’t he? Truly believed her?
“What did you do?” Chara looked at Destiny, still feeling such overwhelming grief it was hard to speak. “Can you talk about it now, or do we have to keep playing charades?”
“I’d like to know as well,” Adlin said, manifesting nearby, his eyes alight with curiosity.
“As would I,” Grant agreed, interestingly enough, more stable in his ethereal form than usual.
Destiny lowered to a log slowly as if at this point standing were too difficult. As though, for the first time since Chara had known her, she was truly tired. Exhausted from all the secrets. From the weight she’d been carrying for over a millennium.
“I can tell you now,” Destiny said softly, as though rallying her strength. Her eyes welled, and her gaze went to Chara’s ring. “Now that your history has unfolded in its entirety and you two have ignited your gem, my father can’t hear me anymore. It sealed off the last of his ability to follow what I say.”
She was right. The gem glowed brightly.
Chara wasn’t entirely sure why she did it considering the horror show she’d just witnessed, but she sat next to Destiny. Perhaps because the goddess had been such an important part of her life or simply because she could feel the sheer sadness coming off of her.
The regret and need for forgiveness.
“Tell us then, Destiny.” Feeling the compassion of her former unicorn simmering beneath the surface, she took the goddess’s hand. “Tell us what happened. What you did to bring us to this moment.”
“I started by hating,” Destiny whispered. Though she gazed at Leviathan, she didn’t really see him, only what he represented. “I hated the Viking mother who didn’t want me. Who found me vile and gave me up to an even viler father. A father who, despite being a god, felt equally shunned by his own kind. A god who, being the epitome of Celtic death, which, might I mention, is nothing like the Norse goddess Hel, sought retribution.”
“Retribution, aye?” Adlin murmured, drifting closer, sensing something. “That particular sentiment seems to be going around a lot on this adventure.”
“Aye,” Grant agreed, just as perplexed. “Pray tell, how does this fit in with those of MacLomain blood?”
“More simply than you would think,” Destiny said. “For my mother was of the Sigdir tribe.”
“Och,” Grant and Adlin said at the same time, equally caught off guard.
“You mean to say your mother is one of the MacLomain’s Viking ancestors?” Adlin’s eyes widened. “That you’re, in essence, related to my clan?”
“Yes.” Destiny pressed her lips together, gathering herself before she continued. “So you see, what the Brotherhood did was at the behest of my father for me...” She broke off, emotional, before she continued. “Long story short, though I’d like to say it was just my father, my hatred of the Sigdirs at the beginning was every bit as strong. I wanted to hurt them. See them suffer.”
“And what better way to do that than to destroy every last one of their descendants,” Grant murmured, troubled. His brow knit. “For a Celtic god couldnae get near the Sigdirs with their Norse gods protecting them. But he had easy enough access to us MacLomains through Adlin’s creation.”
“Yes,” Destiny confirmed sadly, nothing sinister in the least about her now. In fact, if Chara wasn’t mistaken, her pull, her inner light, seemed to be fading.
“While we knew we’d target that Stonehenge,” Destiny went on, “we didn’t have enough to accomplish our ultimate goal. Not until I sensed Chara’s little unicorn when Marek’s incarnate first met her.” She looked at Chara, heartbroken. “So yes, it was very much me, full of hatred and loathing for someone who had nothing to do with you, who found you.”
“Who also set this whole thing in motion,” Grant surmised softly.
“That’s right.” Destiny pressed her lips together again before she continued. “There’s no way to describe the inherent hatred I came by naturally being death’s daughter, nor the hatred I felt when seeking what I needed to reap my revenge. To have my justice.” Her gaze returned to Chara, more tender than she’d ever seen it. “Yet something happened once I finally pinpointed your unicorn’s location. When I saw what you and Marek’s Fianna had together.”
“Something that made you finally make contact with each of them,” Adlin prompted when Destiny paused.
“Correct,” she whispered, looking back and forth between Marek and Chara. “I had to see if you were what you seemed. If...” She appeared to struggle to find the right words. “If perhaps it was all somehow my imagination playing tricks on me.” She shook her head. “For surely something so kind and good and loving as you two couldn’t be at the heart of anything to do with my mother.”
Destiny paused again before she looked at Chara and nodded. “But you were.” She glanced at Marek. “You both were.” She again stared at something unseen, as if looking into the distant past. “I tried to fight how I felt every waking moment, but once it started,” she pressed the heel of her palm to her chest, “once warmth began filling me and drove away the cold, it was impossible to stop it.”
Marek frowned. “You make love sound like a sickness.”
“Because that’s how it felt.” Destiny shook her head. “Don’t you understand? I wasn’t just death’s daughter but favored. Once upon a time, my soul, my heart,” the heel of her palm turned into a fist, “this thing beating in my chest was darker than you can imagine.”
“Yet love still infected it,” Leviathan murmured.
“It did.” Destiny shook her head again and looked at Chara. “To this day, I still don’t entirely know why, either, other than that you had to be at the root of it. You were the last of your kind.” She blinked back tears and squeezed Chara’s hand. “But you were so much more than that, too. In both lives.”
“So, what happened next?” Chara wiped away a tear, not doubting for a moment Destiny meant every word. “How did everything go down after that?”
“Easier than I ever dared hope, actually,” Destiny murmured. “Until I realized it wouldn’t be so easy after all.” She looked from Marek to Chara. “While I knew the golden clovers created when you met were powerful in their own right, I never foresaw the gem.” She shook her head. “I knew right away what it was capable of. That, in essence, it was a manifestation of everything you two shared. Not just untouchable love but a rare and powerful magic.”
“Magic that would have gained you even greater favor with your father, yes?” Leviathan said. “Magic that could have made both of you even
more powerful?”
If Chara didn't know better, she'd say the Viking looked at Destiny with respect now.
“Yes,” Destiny confirmed. “But that didn’t matter.” Her gaze flickered between Chara and Marek again. “What mattered was trying to find a way to save you both. To see Chara through to her humanity so you could have a normal life together.”
“Yet nothing ever goes as planned, aye?” Adlin kicked in.
“No.” Destiny sighed. “When father realized how close Chara was to becoming fully human and losing what he needed, he put feelers out, for lack of a better explanation. Those feelers, naturally, locked right onto Ciara and her virginal Woodland Druidess blood.” She looked at Marek. “I knew things were spiraling out of control quickly, so, as you now know, I concocted a plan with your Fianna. You were going to join our ranks, which we made clear in the forest that day when you sought me out. Then we were going to turn on the Brotherhood before things escalated too far.”
“Yet escalate they did,” Grant murmured.
“And quickly,” Destiny agreed. “I knew the moment Chara discovered Ciara and Ethyn’s Fianna were at risk, everything might change in the blink of an eye.” She squeezed Chara’s hand. “There was no way she would let their love suffer for hers. No reality in which she would see their love any less worthy than her own.”
“And I didn’t,” Chara said softly. “Couldn’t.”
“No,” Destiny replied. “Instead, you took matters into your own hands before I knew what you were doing.”
“I wrote my warrior,” she said softly, again feeling the urgency she’d felt when writing those messages. “To remind him what needed to be done.” She blinked, suddenly seeing what she hadn’t before. “Not just how to give Ethyn and Ciara a chance to find each other again, but all of it.” She looked at Marek, awed. “All the riddles that helped us along the way in this life. That got us to this moment. Riddles that evil wouldn’t understand.”
A Scot's Retribution (The MacLomain Series: End of an Era Book 5) Page 18
