Bastion of Magic (The Sidhe (Urban Fantasy Series) Book 4)

by S A Archer

  He’d barely crossed half of the open space of the ledge before the very air shook with a roar. The burning hiss of dragon flame seared the space between himself and the cave.

  Lugh dodged back, bringing up an arm to shield his face. Although no natural flame, nor any flame produced by fey magic, could harm him, he’d never yet tested his resilience against the blaze of dragon breath. Dragon magic rivaled all others in power and complexity. A deadly thing, when facing their fury.

  The illusion of invisibility shredded away from Jonathan as if he tore through a mist. In full dragon form, Jonathan was massive. Each wing stretched out like a sail. His great jaws snapped at Lugh, each sharp tooth as long as a sword.

  One claw made a swipe at him and Lugh dove to roll beneath it.

  “Rotten, sneaky fey!” Jonathan roared, shaking the ground with his rage.

  “Jonathan!” Lugh shouted over the thunderous voice. Flinging himself into the air, he tumbled over the sweep of the dragon’s tail. “Listen to me!”

  Another stream of flame scorched the air.

  Lugh spun away from it, even as his jacket caught fire. As he circled, he stripped out of it and cast it aside.

  “You think I don’t know why you are here, knave?” His tail smacked against the mountain, sending up a spray of rock shards.

  With each stomp of the dragon’s feet, Lugh struggled to keep his footing. Flicking out his hand, Lugh cast a mass of magma into an arc that shielded him from the debris.

  With far more speed than something so large should be capable of, Jonathan snatched Lugh in one great claw. The fist gripped him from beneath the arms down past his hips, and threatened to crush his slender fey bones. Ensnared so tightly, Lugh couldn’t teleport out of the dragon’s grasp. At best, if he managed to teleport at all, he’d just take the dragon with him.

  Lugh could have manifested the flame of the sun itself. It might even hurt the hide of the fire dragon, if he could summon enough force into a narrow stream, but he didn’t attack.

  The dragon slammed down his fist, jarring Lugh, but not crushing him, as he could have. “I know other portals have been blockaded by fey magic!” Jonathan’s great snout snarled into Lugh’s face with breath like a furnace.

  “Not by my hand!” He shouted back.

  The dragon’s red eyes narrowed as he snorted. “If not by yours, then whose?” His grip tightened just a fraction in threat. “Explain yourself.”

  Lugh would wager that the dragon Champion knew much more about the nature of the Seelie, than Lugh would ever know about the dragons, but Jonathan was young and new to his mantle. Lugh couldn’t be certain if diplomacy could hack through the dragon’s anger. What he did know was that Jonathan respected fact more than any of Lugh’s interpretations of the truth. “Manannan. I believe he alone has done those deeds, although he has a handful of wizards acting as his minions.”

  When the dragon didn’t respond, Lugh shifted against the grip, finding no new slack in it. “He means to close as many other portals as he can. All of them, if possible. With the power of the earth realm behind him, Manannan believes he can win the fey realm for himself.” Lugh grit his teeth, his own suppressed anger coming to the fore. “Though king of the Seelie, Manannan has no concept of the other races and the other realms. Closing the other portals is not like closing off the spigots of foreign magic so that the earth realm can be made pure fey. The long standing peace of the earth realm is in jeopardy, and the consequences of war on so many fronts would devastate the fey.”

  “Then why are you here? To warn me?” The dragon loomed over Lugh, blocking out the sky.

  “To preserve the peace.” He let that resonate. “To preserve our friendship.”

  The dragon’s incredulous huff sent smoke from his nostrils in streams past either side of Lugh’s head.

  Finally, he admitted, “To ask you the favor of closing your portal voluntarily for a few days.” Even on his back, crushed to the ground beneath the claw of a dragon, Lugh leveled his determination at Jonathan. “I will see Manannan in the new realm, whatever it takes.”

  The dragon morphed, casting off black smoke as he did so. In the next moment, Jonathan in his humanoid appearance replaced the great beast, but he was no less formidable. Although Lugh was tall, even for the Sidhe, the dragon was even taller. Where Lugh was deceivingly lightweight for his appearance, as most fey were, Jonathan was all muscle. His dragon tail yet remained, like a whip, snapping back and forth behind him like a great feline. His wingspan reduced, but the leathery wings remained outstretched from his back. Other than this, and his reptilian eyes, Jonathan now took on the form of a man. Instead of being wrapped inside the dragon’s claw, now Jonathan’s big hand rested spread against Lugh’s chest. “You would lie to your king? Tell him this portal is closed for good?”

  “I will do what I must, as I have always done, for the good of the fey.” Lugh leaned up on his elbows.

  Jonathan didn’t stop him. “He’s crazy, this king of yours. Crazy or stupid.”

  Lugh sat up, but didn’t bother to brush off yet. “He’s feral, but that doesn’t matter. He means to rule the realm, whether I aid him or not. He would smash and bar all the other portals, where I can negotiate for temporary closure. If I don’t bring him to the realm, then he might unleash his Changelings and his wizards upon the fey, slaying those who dare to challenge him, where I might bypass those defenses bloodlessly. I will see Manannan in the new realm, lest the Seelie shall never become a part of it and the fey are destroyed.”

  Jonathan chuckled, deep and rumbling. “You want to take him to Donovan? The All-Father and Creator of your new realm? Manannan killed Danu to take her place in the heart of the Mounds. Do you think he will try anything less now?”

  “I am counting on it.” Lugh glared his meaning and the clarity in Jonathan’s expression revealed that he understood the truth now.

  Lugh’s true purpose.

  Returning the Seelie to the fey realm was but one consequence of his real goal. The goal he would not speak, not to anyone.

  Not until it was done.

  “A reckoning between Manannan and Donovan. Are you so certain of who will win?”

  “Of that outcome, I have no doubts.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  London and Peyton hadn’t said a word to each other on the boat ride over to the Isle of Man, but he kept giving her that glare. If the guys on the Tac Team noticed it, they ignored it. Inside the cabin, Malcolm lay on the floor, bound and unconscious. London suspected there were tranquilizer darts in the rifles that the Tac Team aimed at him. But not even the rough seas and the fast speeds woke the Sidhe from whatever drug-induced slumber gripped him.

  Watching the island coming into view, London risked touching the charm hanging from her necklace. It hung beneath her shirt, pressing to her skin. Lugh, she thought. Lugh! Her mind screamed to her patron. If only she could know for sure if he heard her. He’d said it would work and it had in the past. But still, she wished she could get an answer through the magic. Malcolm’s been captured. She glanced at the private docks just outside of Douglas beneath the mansion on the cliff that the Seelie king had taken for his new court. We’re bringing him before Manannan.

  And having seen what Manannan did to his ‘friends,’ there was no imagining what he would do to an enemy. Malcolm had suffered enough for one lifetime. Once before, she’d had the opportunity to help him, but failed. If she failed him again, she wouldn’t forgive herself.

  The Tac commander wrapped Malcolm in a sheet, and then carried the dead weight over his shoulder. He led the way off the boat, with his two-man team following him from the dock into the cave beneath the mansion.

  London hopped down onto the dock with Peyton right behind her. Not wanting to let Malcolm out of her sight, London started after the team.
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br />   Only Peyton’s grip on her arm jerked her back around to face him. Her palms pressed to the hard muscles beneath his shirt, keeping a little breathing distance between them. “Don’t you pull any stunts in there,” he warned.

  “I don’t know what you are talking about.” She started to step back, but he gripped both of her arms, keeping her still.

  “No one hates the wizards, and what they do, more than me, but you can’t stop them.” He snapped at her. “You can only do your job and hope to God they find you useful enough to live.

  She searched his eyes. For the first time, the only thing she saw in them was honesty. But she still wasn’t going to admit anything. “If you hate the wizards so much, why don’t you turn to the Sidhe for help?”

  “After all I’ve done? The Sidhe would be right to kill me. The minute I turn against the wizards they will send the Changelings after me and they know no mercy. I work for the wizards, and I prove my worth to them, or I’m dead.” He shook his head. His fingers gripped her arms hard enough to bruise. “It’s no life, but it is better than death.”

  London glared at him. “Let go of me.”

  “You are a monkey wrench. One that might just jam up the gears for the wizards. But, you try anything heroic in there,” he lifted his eyes to the mansion above them, “and it is not just your neck in the noose. I brought you in. I’ll take you out before I let you get me killed.”

  “Let go of me before someone sees you and begins to wonder what’s going on,” she said through clenched, smiling teeth.

  It took a moment longer, but finally he let his hands fall away.

  Her palms stayed pressed to his stomach as she stared up into his eyes. “Sometimes, it is not about you. Living a life you hate is worse than dying for something you believe in. It’s a hard concept, I know, but man-up and deal with it.”

  London turned and walked away from him. That hadn’t been as eloquent a speech as Willem had given to her, but that was the best she had time for. The Tac Team already had Malcolm inside and she meant to catch up with them. She didn’t know what she would do, or what she could do, but she would be ready in case the opportunity presented itself.

  Lugh had instructed her to protect his interests. Harm to any Sidhe wasn’t in his interest. The very idea of anything bad happening to Malcolm fundamentally tore at the core of her that lived on Sidhe magic. She wouldn’t allow it. Not if she could find a way to stop it.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  The slap rocked Malcolm’s head back, jolting him out of unconsciousness. His eyes rolled, the disorientation surging over him.

  The hands that gripped the front of his shirt lifted him from the ground enough to shake him.

  Blinking rapidly, the blur cleared from his vision, but the man in his face wasn’t anyone he knew, but from the wicked too-wide grin, he knew the man had to be a Changeling. When Malcolm reached to push him away his hands moved together, bound to each other. “Get off me.” His demand came out hoarse, abusing his dry throat.

  Instead the Changeling dragged Malcolm forward across the slick marble floor. Besides gripping the Changeling’s wrist with his hands, Malcolm hadn’t been able to organize his movements. He couldn’t convince his muscles to work together. Whatever they’d done to him hit him like Dawn’s knock-out Touch, only with more hangover. His muscles felt too mushy to move his bones.

  By the time the Changeling dropped him in the middle of the huge room, the best he’d managed was to focus his eyes. A bunch of people lingered around the fringes of the room, watching them. All except the man dressed in some kind of historical costume who loomed over him. He even looked like an actor, with his perfectly trimmed sandy hair and ocean blue eyes. Only the pointed ears proved he was fey, not human. From the looks of him, he had to be Sidhe, only he didn’t glow with magic any more than Malcolm did. A Seelie bloodhound? That was his best guess through the clearing fog of his brain.

  The Changeling roughly jerked Malcolm around, forcing him to his knees before the man.

  With a handsome smile, the Seelie glanced down at Malcolm. “Did Taliesin have a son? I had thought not.” His fingers gently cupped Malcolm’s jaw and tilted it. “No, I see it now. You have Tamara’s eyes. Taliesin was your grandfather.”

  Malcolm jerked his face from the man’s grasp, almost knocking himself to the side with the unbalanced effort, only the Changeling jerked him upright again. “Get away from me,” he managed, without the force he’d meant to put into the demand.

  The Seelie only smiled wider, as if they were having a pleasant and amusing conversation. “Do you know the stories?” He lifted a curious eyebrow. “Taliesin, the greatest bloodhound of the Unseelie Court?”

  All Malcolm knew about his granddad was that he’d gone feral. That’s why Malcolm’s dad feared Malcolm, thinking he’d go crazy someday, too. He didn’t bother answering the Seelie’s question. Twisting his wrists, Malcolm tested the bonds. Tight as they were, the bandannas still had some give.

  “No?” The Seelie angled towards a table beside him with bottles and glasses. He poured some liquid into a tumbler from a bottle wrapped in a black towel. The magic within swam in the liquid like black worms. “Not even the time he slew a dragon with his very will? It’s true.”

  Malcolm winced as the twisting of his wrists cut the fabric across his scars. “I’ve seen a dragon.” The magic of the dragons had been foreign. So unlike fey magic. Malcolm hadn’t known that he might be able to manipulate it like he could threads of fey magic. There wasn’t a lot he understood about himself or his abilities, except that other fey feared him.

  “So you know how impressive that feat must be.” The Seelie swirled the tumbler, making the worms of enchantment spin in the whirlpool he created. “Do you know how Taliesin died?”

  Malcolm didn’t say anything, because he didn’t know. He shifted, making an attempt to get to his feet, but the Changeling kept him down on his knees.

  The Seelie crouched down before him, so they were eye to eye. “Donovan murdered him.” He gave a serious, it’s-true nod. “Just like he killed every other Unseelie bloodhound for thousands of years.”

  When the man cupped his cheek, Malcolm jerked away from him. “Shut up!” He couldn’t call the Seelie a liar, since he didn’t know. Donovan had been an Elite. An assassin. Probably he killed a whole bunch of people. It didn’t matter. None of that mattered. “Donovan saved me.”

  “And for that, he should be commended.” The Seelie tilted his head, looking at Malcolm like he might figure him out. “What’s your name?”

  “Malcolm,” he admitted.

  “It is my true honor to meet you, Malcolm, grandson of the great Taliesin. I am Manannan.” The Seelie chuckled at the reaction on Malcolm’s face. “I see the rumors precede me. I promise you, they are not all true.” He tilted the glass back and forth, sloshing the liquid a little. “You know what it is like being a bloodhound. How the others whisper about you. Lie about you. How they say you are dangerous. How they want to leash you or lock you up.”

  Malcolm fixed his eyes on Manannan. His ears ached for the next words. This Seelie knew. Understood.

  Manannan pointed a finger at him with a grin and a meaningful nod. “There it is. The truth.” His smile widened. “You know it, like I do.”

  In an us-against-them way, he glanced at the people standing around them. “They don’t understand. None of them do. None of them can. They can’t see magic. They can’t lick it from the air. They can’t inhale it. They can’t Touch it. They can’t feel it sing to them.”

  Malcolm trembled, remembering the song of the artifacts that once called to him. “How do you know all this?”

  “I know it, because I have lived it.” This time, when Manannan curled his hand around Malcolm’s cheek, Malcolm didn’t pull away. “Don’t believe the lies about m
e and I won’t believe them about you, either. No one can understand me like you do.” He caressed his thumb over Malcolm’s cheek. “No one can understand you like I do.”

  The smoothness of Manannan’s Touch breathed into Malcolm with pure magic. He inhaled, sucking it deep inside him. Never had he ever tasted something so crystal clear and pure.

  “The things I could teach you,” Manannan whispered, “would change your life forever. You could be a god among the Sidhe.”

  “I don’t want to be a god.” The words breathed out of Malcolm.

  Manannan laughed, then he raised the glass between them. “Here. Drink this and restore yourself. Then we shall discuss apprenticeship. The only way to learn all the skills of a bloodhound is from one of your brethren and I am the only other one who has thus far escaped assassination.”

  Recoiling from the glass, Malcolm said, “I won’t drink worms.”

  Although the smile hadn’t changed, something altered in Manannan’s eyes. “The enchantment does sort of look like that, doesn’t it. But there are no worms in the glass, Malcolm. Only magic. Taste and see.”

  “No.”

  Manannan stilled a moment, and then handed the glass to the Changeling who knocked it back with one gulp. “See? It won’t hurt you.”

  Malcolm glanced back at the Changeling, unfocusing his eyes to see beyond the surface. The black coils of magic slithered within him, just like it once had with Lugh. Malcolm had been able to push back some of the darkness within the Seelie warrior, but not all of it. Not that writhing core of living horror like what infested the Changeling.