by S A Archer
Gathering his magic between his palms, Kieran reached through his connection to draw forth the greatest force of magic he could hold. Building the sound into a tight and contained ball of energy, Kieran smashed every ounce of power he could hold into it until his entire body buzzed with nearly as much pain as the ley lines caused. Then he fired it at Manannan with a force blast of vibration that should have knocked down a brick wall.
It ricocheted off the winds whirling about Manannan, scattering the magic before it could even reach him. Kieran hadn’t even gotten his attention with his strongest attack. As Manannan flung open his arms again, a new pressure wave of energy impacted Kieran and sent him tumbling to the ground.
It was then, coming back up to his knee against the gale of power, that Kieran saw him.
Donovan.
To see him now, in the flesh, stole the voice from Kieran’s throat more than the whipping winds. With his eyes wide, Kieran stared at him.
Donovan wore the same tailored black slacks and button down shirt he’d often worn in the Glamour Club. Each of his unhurried steps carried him closer to Manannan. The wind didn’t disturb his clothing or his hair, even though Kieran couldn’t even approach through it.
Donovan’s dark eyes never left Manannan, as he approached him with that serious now-you’ve-got-my-attention-and-you-are-going-to-regret-it look that used to keep the earthborns on their toes. No wind or magic stopped Donovan, until he faced Manannan with less than an arm’s reach between them. “Come to steal another realm I see, Feral.”
Even though the wind defeated his sound magic, Kieran could hear Donovan’s soft words. It was as if the sound coming out wasn’t torn by the air currents like every attempt Kieran made to penetrate it.
Manannan’s sneer dismissed the insult. “Taking what is rightfully mine and no assassin is going to stop me.”
Donovan stared him down like only he could do. Not even the trolls in the Glamour Club could hold their own to Donovan’s wrath. Kieran knew this angry stillness contained a fury that was about to explode, but Manannan didn’t seem to see the signs. Donovan’s deep voice didn’t even raise as he said, “You’re not going to kill me as easily as you killed Danu.”
Kieran watched Manannan lift his chin defiantly. “You’re nothing!” The Seelie laughed, his hand slipping behind him, where the hilt of a hidden dagger showed from beneath his waist-length jacket. “You’re not even a perceiver! How can you imagine you could stand in the center of the realm, in the heart of all fey magic?”
His power struggling to project the sound against the wind, Kieran shouted, “Donovan! Watch out!” But the wind shredded his words before they could reach him.
“I am the god of magic!” Manannan raged, and then stabbed the glinting silver dagger right into Donovan’s chest, burying it to the hilt.
Donovan arched forward. He clutched at Manannan’s upper arms, as if to steady himself after the blow. Golden tendrils of power curled off Donovan like wisps of smoke, unaffected by the wind, and floated over to seep into Manannan. Donovan snarled between his clenched teeth. “Fey for the rest of time will know you as a traitor.”
The magic through his connection to the realm surged up inside Kieran, forcing him to inhale. The vision washed over his eyes, and through a golden mist, Kieran saw. And he knew.
Manannan stood at the center of an enchantment that bound the king and queen of the Unseelie court along with Manannan’s own wife, the Seelie queen. The feral madness that consumed Manannan with greed echoed through the memory as, by his power and command, all three of the royal Sidhe began to unravel. Their magic peeled off them like mist, just as it was beginning to do to Donovan. The magic swirled by Manannan’s command and entered into him, raising a vortex of power strong enough to attack even the very heart of the Mounds.
In the memory, Kieran witnessed Manannan turn and strike his knife into the All-Mother’s heart. Exactly like he’d just done to Donovan. As her magic began to peel off her in golden wisps of smoke, and merge into Manannan, the princess Kaitlin burst into the room and slammed herself into Manannan, knocking him aside. With the breaking of the enchantment, the sky cracked and the Mounds shuddered. The Collapse cascaded through the realm, and nothing had been able to stop it.
Kieran blinked and his eyes cleared. He saw what happened and he despised Manannan for it. Like every other fey connected to the realm would have seen it and despised him. In a fury, he rushed for Manannan again, but the solid force of the enchantment blocked him.
All he could do was scream as Donovan disintegrated. Just like the other Sidhe had come apart into a mist of magic. The golden light within the mist curled and streamed into Manannan until there wasn’t any left.
“NO!” Kieran cried.
Chapter Sixty-Two
Malcolm dodged, flattening himself against the bulletproof glass as the next lance of lightning ripped the air.
Peyton dove and rolled to avoid the strike, coming up with a tall riot shield from one of the fallen security guys. He planted it on the ground in front of London, shielding them both behind the narrow glass barrier. “You hurt bad?
“Just stunned,” London rolled to her stomach and aimed her gun around the shield to fire shots at the wizards, driving them into cover around the corner into the stairwell. “Malcolm, get the fey!”
He hesitated, his instincts wanting him to fight. Which was better? Taking out the wizard threat or helping the fey to escape it?
“Go!” She demanded.
That got him moving. He didn’t bother trying to climb over London and Peyton, who sprawled in front of the doorway to the main room. Instead, he just teleported to the other side of the wall.
Inside, he was slammed with the stink of raw blood and guts. Fighting down the urge to gag, Malcolm rushed to the closest cage. There wasn’t anything like a lock on it. Instead there were two heavy metal plates facing each other, one welded to the cage and the other to the door. The door didn’t even budge as Malcolm yanked on it.
The dwarf inside hooked his fingers through the crisscrossing links of his cage. “There’s magic and magnetics locking it.” He pointed back towards the glass wall to the counter against it.
That’s when Malcolm noticed it. There were a ton of wires, bundled and stretched out along the floor. A line peeled off to reach up to each cage. The glow from the cables wasn’t the color reflecting the light, but from an inner glow of magic. Malcolm ripped off the helmet, to see more clearly. They’d laced the enchantment inside of a real thing, keeping the torn fragments contained so they wouldn’t float away, instead of spider webbing threads of magic through the air like the fey would have done.
Following the enchanted cord, Malcolm scrambled back to the counter where a red crystal jabbed out of the top. A heavy power cord fed off the back and plugged into an outlet in the floor. Malcolm yanked the cord. All of the cages clinked heavily, as the magnetics disengaged. Some of the fey rattled their cage doors, but they still didn’t open.
Wrapping his hand in the straps of the helmet, Malcolm shielded his fist. Then he leapt up with all the power he could muster and punched downward. The helmet smashed the crystal into shrapnel.
The cage doors rattled and banged open. The fey poured out of them, embracing each other and rushing about. Malcolm screamed at them, “Get out of here!”
Not that he’d needed to. They’d already started grouping up, the stronger ones gathering the young and weak to them before teleporting away.
As he ran back towards London one of her shots hit a wizard in an amulet and it exploded. He flinched when the blood and meat sprayed against the glass wall, turning a section of it into a streaked red. The blast drove the other two back, giving Malcolm the chance to open the door barricading between him and the humans. He crouched next to them. “Get in here!”
�
�No!” London grimaced as she forced herself up to her knee. “Get the fey out! We need to bring this place down!”
Malcolm glanced back. Most of the fey were already gone. A handful of dwarves were all that remained and they clamored in closer. The one with a scraggly yellow beard and a depression in his face were his eye was missing pounded his fist into the glass wall. In a heavy dwarvish brogue, he growled, “There isn’t a building standing that a company of dwarves can’t bring crashing down!”
A flick of magic rolled towards them, rippling the magic fragments in the air. Malcolm saw it coming. Standing up, he reached out his arms, grabbing the magic suspended around them and drawing the bits together into a shield of power. As the magic slammed into it, he shouted between his clenched teeth, repairing the shattering enchantment before it could fly apart.
“Peyton, go with the dwarves.” London grabbed the riot shield from him. “We’ll cover you and keep them distracted.”
“The elevator shaft,” one of the dwarves said, and his mates nodded to the unspoken plan.
“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Peyton whispered close to London.
“Just go!” She aimed around the riot shield and snapped off rapid shots that sent the wizards back into cover.
The dwarves didn’t wait for Peyton, charging to the elevator shaft and digging their fingers into the gap and forcing the doors open. The cables hanging in the space acted like ropes as they started down them.
Peyton fired a couple more shots as he rushed to join them. He skid to a stop at the open elevator doorway and glanced back at London. “I was right about you. You are one hell of a monkey wrench.” And then he hooked his gloved hand around one of the cables and slid out of sight. In a moment the elevator dinged and the doors slipped closed.
As the wizards peeked around the corner again, London reached around. Her hand flattened to Malcolm’s stomach. “Get back.”
“I can fight them.” He knew it. He might not know exactly how he’d fight them, but instincts and magic always led him.
London just shoved him back through the doorway. A stream of flames, green and licking at the air like a living thing, splattered along the glass wall, sweeping towards them.
She shoved him back and yanked the door closed. “Seal!”
Malcolm spun around towards the long room. Rows and rows of empty cages reached to the floor to ceiling windows on the far side.
With the concussion of an explosion the entire building shifted. The sprinklers overhead hissed and then spurted a storm of water onto everything, making the electronics sizzle.
“That was fast!” London shouted, and he turned towards her. Her hand cupped her ear. “The dwarves are bringing the building down! We have to get out!”
Her eyes suddenly went wide as she stared past him. Malcolm spun around.
It was like slow motion.
The water falling in fat droplets from above made everything blurry, but Malcolm could see well enough through them. From between the cages a man stepped out, raising a thick rifle that looked like it fired something high powered.
The Commander.
Malcolm recognized that cruel twist that passed for his smile.
The second the rifle was leveled at Malcolm, he fired.
The pain of it sliced right through him, as the bullet punched through the front of Malcolm’s body armor and exploded out the back.
Chapter Sixty-Three
Kieran stared disbelieving at Manannan, who shouted into the storming magic with triumph.
And as his outcry silenced, so did the storm.
The stream of colored light flooding in from the earth realm ceased, as if by the flicking of a switch.
The ground stilled beneath Kieran. The sky forgot its rage and streamed with golden light from the endless blue expanse. Every blade of bent grass gently rippled in the light breeze.
All was calm.
With only Manannan standing alone on the rise, his arms still open to embrace the magic that was now within him, and his face upturned to the realm.
The portal flickered as Tiernan, Bryce and Willem rushed through it. They all skid to a stop to see Manannan, alone on the hill, surrounded by peace.
The sudden gasp from Manannan broke the silence. He gripped his chest with both clawing hands. “Oh, no… No! Not like this!”
A golden tendril of magic, like a scarf, fluttered out from him.
Kieran blinked, not certain he saw it at first. And then it thickened and grew.
And then another. And then a third.
Each uncoiled from Manannan and swirled into three pillars of light beside him.
Manannan screamed in horror as the magic took shape into the figures of his wife, and the Unseelie king and queen. The ghostly images bore witness as the golden shapes of the ancients, all the images that had been carved into statues in the temple not but a few minutes’ walk away, appeared in a semi circle in front of Manannan.
“No!” Manannan screamed at them. “I am the god of magic!”
Threads of power, which Kieran would never have been able to see if the ancients hadn’t allowed it, ripped from within Manannan. They coiled and bound together until the body they abandoned Faded into nothingness. Then the threads exploded apart, shredding into particles and raining harmlessly to the ground like glitter.
The ancients destroyed Manannan so utterly that even his magic had been torn down to the most basic element.
The ghostly figures of the Sidhe royalty that Manannan had murdered faded as their magic flowed down into the ground, and Kieran knew, just as he’d seen the vision of their deaths, that they were returned, at long last, to the cycle of magic.
One figure stepped forth from the gathering of the ancients. As he did so, the other ancients faded back into the magic of the realm. The golden sheen of light defining the man’s shape washed away as if he stepped through a gently cascading waterfall, to reveal Donovan in the flesh once more.
The stiffness of shock made moving difficult, but Kieran fought through it as he rushed towards Donovan.
“Kieran.” Donovan glanced his way, looking him up and down and seeing his lack of shirt and the drying blood on his skin. “Rough day?”
Kieran laughed as much as he cried, flinging his arms around Donovan’s neck. He hugged him hard and fast, before releasing him. Laughing as he wiped at his eyes, he said, “Yeah, just a bit.”
Donovan gripped his shoulder and squeezed, just as he’d often done for the earthborns in the Glamour Club. “Come,” he said, simply.
Following him, Kieran walked back down into the valley where the portal shimmered. Bryce stared at Donovan, a brilliant grin fixed to his face. Tiernan’s cocky smirk tried to hide his own smile, as he crossed his arms. The Scribe hopped and clapped, “Good show!”
Donovan gave them the barest nod of acknowledgment, as he headed not towards them, but to where Lugh and Rhiannon lay on the ground. The traitors of the fey and allies of Manannan. They both had come up onto their elbows. The tears in their clothing revealed uninjured flesh, rather than the wounds they’d taken.
Reaching down, Donovan collected Rhiannon’s hands in his own. He helped her to her feet, and then caught her by the waist to steady her. Her hand brushed her forehead and her eyelashes fluttered like she might faint, but Donovan kept her steady. With a gentle smile, he leaned in to press a kiss to her lips. The solid black of her hair melted into a honey brown. When their lips parted and her eyes open, the near black irises glittered as they transformed into a brilliant sapphire blue. “Welcome to the realm,” he murmured to her.
A silent tear slipped from the corner of one eye and she swiped it away with a tapered finger. She whispered back, “Thank you.”
Releasing her, Donovan turned towards Lugh who st
ill sat on the ground, looking up at him. His tired arms hung over his bent knees.
Donovan offered a hand and Lugh took it.
Kieran staggered back a step. Didn’t Donovan know all that Lugh had done?
As if hearing the unasked question, another vision flooded up from Kieran’s connection to Donovan. This memory transported him back to the day of the Creation of the new fey realm. Only now, Kieran truly understood what he’d seen that day. As Lugh connected to the new realm, and to Donovan himself as the Creator, he’d fallen to his knees. In that instant, everything Lugh had ever said, done, and knew flooded from him into Donovan, sparing no secret. And they both knew, with clarity, that Manannan remained a threat to the fey and to the new realm.
No mere Sidhe could defeat the powerful bloodhound. Only the Creator, wielding the power of the realm and the ancients, could finish him for good.
And no one but Lugh could trick Manannan into coming here before he was truly prepared.
“Go,” Donovan had said. And Lugh had obeyed. Not because of any compulsion, but by his own loyalty and conviction to see this justice done.
Kieran blinked away the memory, seeing Lugh and Donovan facing each other once more. Each trusting the other as completely as they had the day the new realm manifested.
“Good work, Champion,” Donovan complimented him and gave him a comradely slap on the shoulder.
Lugh didn’t smile. His gaze remained lowered and when he finally made eye contact with Donovan the weariness there was palpable.
“I know,” Donovan said, “but I have one more task for you before you are done.”
