“Kieran!”
The noise of the battlefield filled my ears and the fog clouded my vision. Where was Kieran? Where did he go? He dragged me through the fog and into the woods, pulling me along for a long time before the mist began to clear.
We stopped at last in a clearing, so far away that I couldn’t hear the sounds of battle anymore. I punched and smacked at Alec with my useless fists.
“We have to go back and help them,” I cried. “We can’t just leave them there.”
“If you go back, all the good you’ll do is get yourself killed,” Alec argued.
“But they can’t possibly win against so many.”
“Maybe not.”
Kieran...What if...
I backed away from him, “If he dies, I’ll never forgive you.”
“I’ll take that chance,” he said. “You would’ve have been killed back there...We both would have.”
I sank down to the forest floor, already feeling the heartache returning. It was different this time. It wasn’t ever going to go away.
“That was your plan all along,” I whispered. “To just let Kieran die.”
“You know better than that,” Alec said. He sat down beside me and wiped some of the blood off of my face with his sleeve. “Now all that we can do is wait for them to find us.”
“And what if they don’t?”
“They will.”
It was near dark when Megan and Alana staggered cut and dirty out of the trees and into the clearing. They were both out of breath and panting as they looked around.
“The others aren’t here yet?” Megan asked, looking back into the woods.
“Here?” I asked. “I thought all of you were together!”
Alana wiped some of the blood off her cheek, “I thought he left with you.”
“No matter,” Megan said with a sharp look. “I am sure they will be here soon.”
I covered my face with my hands. This couldn’t be real. Any minute I just knew that Kieran was going to walk up alive and well, and all of this would just be a bad memory.
Please...Please...
No one spoke. No one moved. We all huddled together and waited in the twilight for whatever it was that was going to happen next.
I stared into the fire, crying without a sound. Brushing the tears from my cheeks, I could still smell him on my hands.
Oh Kieran...Please...Please...
There was movement in the forest, a commotion of twigs snapping and leaves rustling. I strained my eyes to see through the darkness until I could just make out two figures coming into the clearing, one of them seemed to be carrying something.
“Kieran?” I called out nervously.
It was Niall’s voice that came out of the darkness, “Megan, Alana, come and give us some help.”
Somehow I beat them both to the two figures. I was standing in front of Niall, staring at the red haired girl at his side. I didn’t want to look down, but I forced myself to do it.
Don’t be him...Don’t be him...
There, in his father’s arms, lay Kieran. Even in the dark, I could see the blood covering his face and chest.
“Wh-What happened?" I asked, afraid to reach out and touch him, not sure where it would hurt him.
Megan and Alana pulled Kieran from Niall’s arms as if he weighed nothing and eased him down onto the ground. Niall took my arm and pulled me back, “They shot him. They shot him again and again, too quickly for him to recover, and when he fell, they must’ve cut his throat... I got there just as they were trying to behead him.”
“And where were you?” I accused.
“I was taking care of four others so that Megan and Alana could get away,” he murmured as if in a daze. “I heard the whoosh of the axe and turned –“
“Please!” I held up my hand, horrified that someone could do that to my Kieran.
Past Niall’s shoulder, I could just make out Kieran lying on the black ground. His shirt open and his pale chest exposed. Even in the darkness, I could see the blood still flowing. I tried not to see the odd angle of his head or the bloody wound at his throat so deep that I could see the pale pink-yellow of his windpipe and specks of white bone.
No one could survive that. There was too much blood, too much damage, not even magic—
“Will he die?” I choked out.
No one answered me.
Chapter 19
I sat by the small fire, watching the red haired woman work over Kieran’s mangled body. She said nothing to any of us other than Megan who she ordered back to the festival scavenge whatever supplies she could find.
Kieran remained still as she tended his still bleeding wounds. I kept watching his chest, trying to see it rise and fall with his breaths. It didn’t seem possible that he should be able to breathe when his throat was open and exposed. I held my own breath, as if that would help, and waited for any sign of life.
Sitting beside me, Alec said nothing. I could feel him watching me, maybe wondering if I was blaming him, but I was in no mood to comfort him. I should’ve been there. I should’ve done...Something.
Niall came and sat down on my other side. He was still pale and shaken, watching the woman tending his son every bit as closely as I was, “I cannot begin to thank you, and of course Alec, for what you did. Had you not given us some warning, it all could have been much worse.”
“Worse?” I asked in disbelief. “Kieran is dying.”
Niall never took his eyes off Kieran or the stranger nursing him, “She won’t let that happen.”
“Who is she?”
“That is Brigid,” he said with a sigh. “That festival would’ve ended in a feast in her honor and then the bonfires...”
“Is she one of you?” I asked, even though I already knew she had to be. After all, normal humans didn’t throw balls of fire from their hands.
Niall nodded, “Yes. She is one of the Tuatha De Danann, probably the oldest of any of us, but unlike the rest of us, she is also a saint.”
“A saint?” I asked, “What from the Catholic Church?”
“Aye,” Niall said with a nod. “When the Christians came to Ireland, there were so many people still loyal to our kind, Brigid especially; they had to make her a saint in order to convince the people to convert.”
I kept my eyes trained on her. As long as she kept working, Kieran was still alive. “What happened to her face?”
“No one really knows,” he said. “Some say that she was burned by the fire of knowledge and now understands all things.”
“Do you believe that?”
Niall kept his eyes on Kieran laying there so still, “If it will save my son, I’ll believe anything.”
“I just feel so responsible for the attack,” I confessed. “They were in America, Corydon actually, watching me before they came here.”
“This had nothing to do with you,” Niall comforted. “The Mileans have attacked us from the beginning.”
Alana sat down near Alec and tossed a stick on the fire. “It’s always been this way. We hide. They find us. Some of us live and some of us die.”
With a wave of her hand, sparks and smoke made a picture of an old cottage with a straw roof.
“I was just a wee child when they came for my family.” Alana said softly. She waved her hand again; the smoke swirled to show a little girl playing with a primitive doll of some sort, and then the image shifted to a group of men holding a woman in a long skirt by her arms as another man was stabbed again and again before severing his head from his body.
“They made my mother watch as they killed my father. I hid in the reeds, thinking maybe they would let her go and leave us in peace to mourn his death,” Alana said as she brushed her cheeks. “But the Mileans weren’t finished.”
She pushed her hand through the smoke again to make an image of the woman now tied to the horses and being pulled apart.
“When they were gone,” she said. “I ran away. I ran until I came to a traveller camp. The travellers have alw
ays aided our kind, so they hid me until they could get me to Niall.”
She tossed another stick on the fire, “It wasn’t you. They just keep coming for us, they never stop.”
Alec looked at her with tears in his eyes, “I am so sorry. I am sorry for everything that my people did to you. I would never wish that on anyone.”
“Your apology won’t bring my family back, now will it?” Alana hissed. “It won’t save Kieran and it won’t make her love you.”
She got up and went over to where Brigid still worked on Kieran.
Without a word, Alec got up and stomped off into the darkness. I went to go after him, but Niall reached up and put a hand on my arm.
“Let him alone,” he said gently. “I think he needs some time to himself. It’s more than just Alana that’s under his skin.”
“What do you mean?”
Niall turned his tired eyes back to Kieran, “The boy betrayed his blood line, even he doesn’t realize how serious that is, and all for something he cannot have.”
“Niall—“
“Just let him be,” he said softly. “Let him lick his wounds in peace.”
I didn’t argue, I turned my attention back to Kieran.
“Will he be okay?” I asked.
“He’ll recover,” he said a flat tone, but I could feel him watching me. “You truly love my son?”
“Yes,” I said without hesitation.
Niall nodded, “Then I must ask you to make your decision. Each of you has one foot in the other’s world, and no happiness can come from that.”
I looked at Niall, then poor Kieran, and finally out into the darkness where I could just make out Alec’s silhouette. Why did my heart ache so?
“It’s a difficult choice,” Niall offered. “Once it’s made there’s no turning back. Despite what I said last summer, I would be honored to have you for a daughter. I want Kieran to be happy and he has gone far too long without a mate.”
There was no time to answer. Alana was calling to me that Kieran was awake. I didn’t remember moving, one minute I was beside Niall and the next I was kneeling next to Kieran.
I took his hand in mine, trying not to cringe from the coldness of his skin. I kissed each of his fingers.
Thank you...Thank you...
I heard Alec coming back to the fire. I wished he wasn’t so close, listening, and watching me. I just wanted a moment, just a moment, when it was just Kieran and I. No one else, just us...
“Kieran,” I whispered. “Can you hear me?”
He lay there, barely moving, with blood soaked cloths across his throat. Slowly he opened his eyes and looked at me. His beautiful green eyes were drained and feverish, but he was alive. I smoothed back his damp hair and kissed his forehead.
“So then you weren’t a dream,” he said in a weak and raspy voice.
“No, I’m here,” I said as I brought his fingers to my lips again. I wanted to hold him, but I knew that would only make his pain worse. “I love you...I love you...I thought I lost you.”
Kieran pulled my hand up to his chest, holding it against his barely beating heart. "So you’ll have me then?"
I kissed him softly, "Forever."
Kieran kissed me and then, sending a shiver through my body. He managed a feeble smile, “Even that won’t be long enough.”
Chapter 20
For two days we camped in the clearing, exposed to the elements and waiting. We slept on the cold ground in shifts, taking turns tending to Kieran.
I stayed near his side, giving him sips of water and feeding him small bits of food that Megan brought back for the abandoned festival. I watched over him as he slept, wishing he was in a warm bed instead of on the cold ground.
How much longer can he survive like this?
He became feverish at night, tossing and turning on the ground. At times, his wounds would tear and open, bleeding again so that I had to call for help.
Don’t let him die... Not like this...Don’t let him die...
Suddenly I had a new mantra. I repeated it over and over. There was some part of me that felt if I just kept repeating it, nothing bad could happen.
I changed the cloths that covered the gaping wound at his throat. Every hour, when I removed the make shift bandages, the cut seemed a little less deep and a little less raw.
Still, it was frightening to look at and see just how close...how just one more cut...
I shook my head and tried not to imagine the pain and horror he suffered before Niall got there. Even now, it looked as if he turned his head just the slightest either way, it would just roll of his shoulders.
Don’t let him die... Not like this...Don’t let him die...
Somehow we survived those two days, Kieran with his life and me with my sanity. Once he was strong enough to stand on his own, we moved into the rooms at the nearest hotel and Brigid bid us farewell, saying that we were safe for now, that it would be a long while before the Mileans attempted another attack.
I stood in the hallway outside Kieran’s door, waiting for Brigid. Megan and Alana mentioned that she was leaving last night and I wanted to be sure not to miss her.
Brigid came out of the room next door with her hood pulled up over her head and hair again. I stopped her before she could slip away.
“I just wanted to thank you for all you’ve done to help us, and most of all for saving Kieran.” I spoke quickly, trying not to look at her scars while trying not to be obvious that I wasn’t looking at them. “I just couldn’t let you leave without saying thanks.”
Brigid reached out and took my hand. I felt a strange electric charge as her fingers touched mine. She held it for just a moment and then released it, turning her emerald eyes on me.
“You know the mortal is in love with you,” she said prophetically.
Of all the things I imagined her saying, that was not one of them. I wasn’t sure what I expected her to say exactly, but that certainly wasn’t it.
“I know,” I mumbled and dropped my eyes.
“But you still choose the son of Niall?”
“Yes,” I whispered, feeling her watching me.
“The mortal will not get over it,” she said flatly.
Guilt flooded me as I pictured Alec in the carriage at Light Up Corydon with snow falling all around us. I didn’t want to hurt him. I never wanted to hurt him.
Brigid nodded as if she could see my memories, “But that doesn’t change your mind.”
“No,” I said without hesitation.
Brigid sighed as she turned to walk away, “I wish you well then.”
“You saw all of that just by shaking my hand?” I called after her. “What else did you see? What about Kieran?”
She didn’t answer and I didn’t chase after her. I watched her leave, wondering if she really had the power to see the future. If she did, what was that she wasn’t telling me?
* * * *
A week later, the vacation visas Alec and I had were set to expire. I wasn’t ready to leave yet, but I had no choice.
“You have to go back,” Kieran said in a scratchy voice. He was propped up on pillows in the hotel bed sipping the warm teas that Brigid left for him “You have no choice.”
I sat down on the edge of the bed and took the cup when his hands began to tremble, “What about you?”
“I’ll be along shortly.”
I tucked the blankets around him, wishing I could crawl in with him. “I don’t want to leave you. Look what happened last time.”
He smiled weakly and pointed to his raw and scared neck, “Can you imagine me going through customs like this? Harmony, I need help to even stand. I need time to heal.”
“I know,” I said with a defeated sigh.
He took my hand in his, “What if I make you a promise?”
“Like what?”
“What if I promise that I will spend every minute, every second, of our time apart trying to get back to you?”
I brushed his hair from his forehead and away from
his eyes, “You won’t keep me waiting?”
“No,” he whispered and leaned forward to brush a gentle kiss over my lips. “I can’t wait to start my forever with you.”
Kieran, supported by Niall, went with us to the airport. He was still pale and weak with a scarf around his neck to hide the angry red scar. I held his other arm, not sure if I was really of any assistance to him, but I needed to touch him.
It was awkward standing there, trying to say our goodbyes, with Alec and Niall watching. I pleaded silently with them until Niall sensed my desperation. He eased Kieran’s other arm up to my shoulder and backed away.
“We’ll just wait for you over here,” he said as he motioned for Alec to follow.
I waited until they were a few steps away from us and then looked up into Kieran’s handsome face.
“I still don’t want to leave you,” I confessed.
Kieran held me against his chest, but he was so weak that I could barely feel the pressure of his arms. I could already feel his legs starting to tremble with exhaustion.
“I’ll be along just as soon as I’m strong enough to travel,” he whispered and my hair.
“That’s exactly why I shouldn’t leave,” I argued. “You’re still so weak. I’m going to be so worried about you.”
Kieran lowered his lips to mine, teasing my mouth with a feathery light kiss that hinted of so much more to come.
“Forever won’t start soon enough,” he promised and kissed me again.
I wrap my arms around him, never wanting to let go. I heard my flight announced, but I held him even tighter.
Not yet... I’m not ready yet...
Alec move towards us and cleared his throat as if embarrassed, “We have to go now, our plane is boarding.”
I stepped away from Kieran, my heart already breaking again.
“You’ll come soon?” I asked.
Kieran smiled weakly, looking as though he would faint at any moment. “Nothing will keep me from it.”
He and Alec shook hands begrudgingly and then it was time to go.
“Take care of her,” Kieran said as Niall came to his aid and Alec led me away.
Far Away (Gypsy Fairy Tale Book Two) Page 8
