The Order of Brigid's Cross - The Wild Hunt (Book 1): The Wild Hunt

by Terri Reid

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Before they got to the door, Gillian and Ian already had it opened and were waiting for them. Coming forward, Gillian hurried over to Jamal and smiled. “I bet you’d like to see your grandmother first thing,” she said.

  He nodded, his voice trembling. “Yes, ma’am, I would.”

  She looked up, met Em’s eyes, nodded, and then placed her arm around Jamal’s shoulders. “Well, why don’t you let me show you the way,” she said and then turned to Em. “And I’ll meet up with the rest of you later.”

  Sean stood by the open door and watched Gillian lead Jamal down the hall and up the stairs. When he could no longer hear their footsteps, he staggered back into the parking lot and, grabbing hold of a garbage can, vomited again. Ian hurried to his side. “That bad, was it?” he asked softly.

  “I pray I never see anything like it again,” he said, his voice low. “The carnage. The savagery. The blood. And when I think that Jamal saw something just as bad…”

  He bent over the garbage can, emptying out the last vestige of any food in his stomach and then took a shuddering breath. “We’ve got to stop this,” he said.

  “Aye and we will,” Ian said. “Are you ready to talk about it?”

  Sean nodded. “Yeah, I’m good now.”

  They all moved inside to reconvene in Father Jack’s living area where the tea pot had already been put on the burner. Once Sean had introduced them all to Pete, he recounted his experience at the park.

  “Dammit, Sean, you can’t put yourself in that kind of situation again,” Ian insisted. “You can’t go in there unprotected.”

  “I’m not unprotected anymore,” he said. “Em gave me a sword.”

  “And now you need to learn how to use it,” Em said simply. “And you must carry it with you at all times.”

  “Sorry, a sword isn’t standard issue,” Sean replied. “And I don’t know how the chief would feel about me carrying a sword around the streets of Chicago.”

  “Well, your chief wouldn’t have to know,” Em said. “I can make it invisible to all but you and those of us who can see through glamour.”

  “Aye, faery glamour,” Ian said slowly. “I’ve been doing some research today. It seems to me that glamour could be a formidable weapon.”

  “What do you mean?” Sean asked.

  “These creatures, the Wild Hunt, could be seen, not only today, but yesterday with Jamal,” he replied. “You could all see all of them. They weren’t using glamour.”

  “So?” Sean asked. “I mean, they were ugly sons-of-bitches, and I would have preferred not to see them.”

  “Sure a lot harder to fight things you can’t see,” Ian replied. “And, more to the point, if they ever decide to use their glamour, how do we see through it?”

  Sean nodded. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

  “He’s got a good point,” Em said. “We’ve never been at war before. We haven’t thought things through from a defensive angle.”

  Father Jack nodded. “That’s true,” he said. “I’ve never worked with a group so large before, nor in a situation so treacherous.”

  “I know I’m the new kid on the block,” Pete said. “But can you give me an overview of what’s going on here?”

  Sean nodded. “Sorry, I forgot to let you know that Pete signed on to the group.”

  “Signed on? Without knowing the particulars?” Em asked.

  “Well, Sean told me it would be worth my time,” Pete said. “So, I’m in.”

  Surprised, Em stared at Pete. “You trust him that completely?” Em asked.

  Pete glanced at Sean and then back at Em. “With my life,” he said.

  The tea kettle whistled and Father Jack stood up, walked over to the small kitchenette and poured the water into a large tea pot. Placing the pot on a tray with cups, saucers, cream and sugar, he carried it across the room and set it on the coffee table in the center of the room. Em walked over to the pantry next to the kitchenette and retrieved a couple of packages of cookies and, without pretention, placed them on the table next to the tea.

  “Em, you’re supposed to put them on a serving plate,” Father Jack said with a wry grin. “To make it look pretty.”

  Em pulled a gingersnap from the box and bit down. “Why? It just dirties a plate,” she replied.

  Pete looked over at Sean and grinned. “You two are made for each other,” he teased.

  Father Jack sent Pete a quick smile, poured himself a cup of tea and sat back in his chair. “So, Pete, let me tell you a story to try and help you understand what Sean has gotten you into,” he said.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Before Father Jack began his story, Ian stood. “I’m going to find Gillian,” he said. “Please excuse me.”

  He closed the apartment door softly behind him and walked slowly down the hallway, his mind racing with the events of the day. He’d seen the photos of yesterday’s crime scene, had seen what condition those bodies had been in, and to think that Sean had nearly been another victim. How could he ever explain to Mary, Sean’s sister and Ian’s dear friend, what had happened? How could he tell the rest of Sean’s family?

  He knew that Sean was safe. He knew that his concerns were now unfounded. But he also knew that he needed to express those thoughts and fears, and he also knew there was only one person who would understand.

  He spied Gillian backing out of a room ahead of him and waited until she had closed the door before he spoke. “Is everything fine in there?” he asked.

  She jumped and turned. “Ian, you gave me a start,” she replied, holding her hand to her chest, and then she saw his face. “Tell me.”

  For a moment his throat tightened with emotion and he just shook his head. “He nearly died,” he said, his voice low. “He nearly became a victim, like the ones we saw in the crime scene photos. He nearly had his head…”

  He couldn’t go on. Couldn’t say the words.

  Gillian hurried to him and put her arms around his waist, pulling him close. He wrapped his arms around her and laid his cheek on her head, absorbing the comfort she was offering. She nestled closer and sighed. “Aye, Jamal told me he’d gone into the cloud to fight the creatures,” she whispered. “Your Sean is a great, wondrous fool and a very brave man.”

  “He saved some of them,” Ian said. “He yelled at them to run and they did. That’s when the creatures turned on him.”

  She shuddered in his arms. “Why weren’t they running on their own? Why did it take Sean to warn them?”

  He stepped back, his hands sliding to her waist and shrugged, as he tried to make sense of it himself. “I don’t know, perhaps it was because they were frightened by the sight of them,” he said. “They saw their friends being hacked to bits, saw the creatures attacking, and froze.” He paused and met her eyes. “It seems to me they could see them. But I had an awful thought as I was listening to Sean’s account. What if it had been even worse? What if Sean hadn’t been able to see the creatures?”

  “Glamour,” she replied with a nod. “It’s been one of the weapons of choice of the fae for centuries.”

  “Aye, and it also means that we never know if we are being followed or spied upon,” he said.

  “Or walking into a trap,” Gillian added.

  “And if this truly is a war we’re getting into,” he said slowly, “we need some kind of faery radar.”

  “I like that idea,” she said. “It would be helpful, especially if we are to give shelter to those the faery seek. Since the church is decommissioned, it does not offer the same protection it once would have.”

  Ian was silent for a moment, ruminating over their conversation. A few moments later he looked at her and Gillian could see by the intensity of his eyes, he was already into research mode.

  “The laboratory you have downstairs; is it only for research on the Book of Kells?” he asked.

  Gillian shook her head and smiled. “No, as a matter of fact, it’s set up with a wide array of material
we might need for the Order.”

  “And the Internet access, is it secure?”

  She nodded. “Aye, it’s safe.”

  He cradled her head in his hands, gave her a quick kiss on the lips and stepped back. “Well, then, let’s go discover a way to view the fae,” he said, grabbing her hand and leading her down the hallway.

  “Well, let’s just,” she repeated as she jogged down the hall to keep up with him.

  They stepped inside the pristine facility and Ian immediately headed to the computer. “Come along,” he urged Gillian. “I need you to do a search.”

  “A search?” she asked, incredulous. “Do you really think all we need to do is search ‘how to see faeries’ and it will appear?”

  He nodded. “It’s worth a shot, isn’t it? Sometimes in research you start with the most obvious before you tackle the obscure.”

  Rolling her eyes, she moved past him and sat down behind the monitor. After logging in, she accessed a search engine and typed in the question. More than two dozen responses appeared, although half of them seemed to have something to do with a video game.

  “Go to the oldest ones first,” Ian said, “The ones that deal with legends.”

  She clicked on a site that dealt with faerie lore from an encyclopedia about fairy folklore that was originally published in the late 1800s. “This is the oldest information I can find,” she said.

  “Excellent, now search for faerie sight,” he instructed, leaning over her shoulder.

  Using the search engine within the site, she searched and found several entries. “This one talks about those born with sight,” she sighed. “Not what we need.”

  “Ah, but look at the next one,” Ian said, reading the description. “A wash of marigold.”

  “Marigold?” Gillian asked.

  “It’s also known as calendula,” Ian said. “It’s been around since early Egypt.”

  “I’ve heard of calendula,” Gillian said. “As a matter of fact, I’ve used it as an ointment.”

  Ian nodded. “It has healing properties and supposedly it increases physic properties,” he said. “So it makes sense that it could be used to see the fae. I was actually going to do a study on herbal lore in the future and calendula was one that has always intrigued me.”

  Gillian swung her chair around, stood up and wrapped her arms around Ian’s neck. “I don’t know which I find sexier,” she whispered, kissing him lightly on the lips, “your body or your mind.”

  He wrapped his arms around her waist and kissed her back deeply, leaving them both breathless. “And here I thought it was my delightful personality.”

  She smiled up at him and then exhaled slowly. “Sorry, I distracted us. What do we do next?” she asked.

  “Well, unless you’ve got a storehouse of dried herbs somewhere in here,” Ian replied, “we need to wait until tomorrow and visit an herbalist to get what we need.”

  He bent over and kissed her neck. “And, in the meantime,” he said softly, his breath tickling her ear, “I suggest we continue to be distracted.”

  She sighed and melted against him. “I could allow myself to be distracted for a wee break,” she said, ending her sentence on a soft moan as his kisses traveled up her neck to the lobe of her ear.

  He was just starting to kiss his way back down her neck when he paused and looked past her to the wall where the replicas of the pages of the Book of Kells hung. “Gillian?” he asked, all passion gone from his voice.

  Aye, it’s his body, she thought, frustrated. I’m a wee bit tired of his mind just now.

  “Yes, Ian?” she replied, trying to be patient.

  “That picture, it’s one from the book, right?” he asked, moving away from her and walking over to the wall.

  She wrapped her arms around her chest, instantly feeling the cold, and nodded. “Yes, it’s one of the reasons I came to Chicago,” she replied. “I did it because…”

  But he was no longer listening to her. Instead, he studied the facsimile for another moment. The illuminated drawing seemed to be abstract, with one third of the picture having a blue background that formed a long, elliptical shape that was then surrounded on the bottom and one side by a tan background. On top of the background were drawings and inked words scattered willy-nilly across the face of the page.

  Ian turned away from the drawing and hurried back to the computer. He bent over the keyboard and quickly typed into the search engine, and then he pressed the button to send his find to the printer sitting across the room. Once the page had been ejected, he walked over to Gillian, placed his arm around her shoulders and guided her back to the reproduction hanging on the wall.

  “You’ve got to see this,” he said, excited about his finding.

  “Aye, I see it,” she said.

  Then, without saying a word, he lifted up the page with a full-color map of the city of Chicago, with Lake Michigan’s blue waters matching the blue from the reproduction. Looking from the printed page back to the wall, Gillian nodded and smiled. “Aye, it’s Chicago,” she replied calmly. “And that’s why I’m here.”

  “Wait. You knew the Book of Kells had a drawing of the city of Chicago?” he asked. “Somehow a monk from 6 A.D. in Ireland painted a picture of the city of Chicago?”

  She nodded, biting back a smile. “Aye, it really was quite obvious once you took a good look at it,” she replied, and then she patted him on the shoulder. “But don’t worry me darling, I still think you’re brilliant.”

  Not amused, he stepped away from her and walked back to the enlarged photo. “Okay, since I’m obviously the student here,” he replied with a wry smile, “what are all of these markings?”

  She joined him and shook her head. “I’m still working on it,” she said.

  She pointed to circles on the map, some of them small pin dots and some slightly larger. “Could they be portals to Tír na nÓg? And, if they are, what’s the difference between their sizes?” she mused.

  Ian quietly studied it and, without saying a word, went back to the computer. Soon the printer was discharging another sheet of paper. He picked it up and brought it back to Gillian and, once again, lifted it up to compare it to their photo from the Book of Kells. The printout showed Chicago, but this time there were a series of long lines of different thicknesses drawn across the city, intersecting each other at the different markings on the map.

  “What’s this?” Gillian asked.

  “A ley line map of the city,” Ian replied. “Do you know ley lines?”

  She nodded. “Like rivers of magic or energy,” she replied. “They seem to run from one ancient structure to another throughout the world. I didn’t realize Chicago had so many.”

  “Aye, Chicago seems to be a major intersection of ley lines,” he said, pointing to one of the thicker ones. “And this one ought to be of great interest to you. It not only runs from Chicago to Stonehenge, but it also runs through Glendalough County in Wicklow, Ireland.”

  Gillian turned to him. “The monastery?” she asked.

  He nodded. “The oldest monastery in Ireland,” he replied. “From about 6 a.d., which is about when your Book of Kells appeared on the scene. It’s interesting, isn’t it, that a line directly from that place would end up in Chicago?”

  Moving Ian’s map closer to the illustrated photo, she followed the line until in intersected with the largest circle on the drawing. “Interesting, yes,” she replied. “But hardly a coincidence, I’m thinking.”

  Chapter Thirty

  “So, what do you think?” Sean asked Pete as he drove him back to get his car at the bar.

  “I think this whole thing is crazy,” Pete replied. “And if I hadn’t seen those creatures with my own eyes, I would be writing up commitment papers for your own good.”

  Chuckling, Sean nodded. “Well, keep those papers handy,” he suggested. “This whole thing might drive me crazy yet.”

  Pete studied his friend for a moment and then spoke. “So, what’s next?”

 
Sean shook his head. “Just like every other crime I’ve investigated,” he replied. “I gather facts and collect evidence. I figure out means, motive and opportunity.”

  “What about your friend, Adrian?” Pete asked.

  “Yeah, seems like he’s caught up in it,” Sean replied. “But he was a good cop, so that one is a little confusing.”

  “Not really,” Pete said. “Think about what he said this evening. No one that matters got killed, just a bunch of gang-bangers. He could be convinced that he’s doing a public service by allowing the Wild Hunt to kill them.”

  “But cops aren’t supposed to think that way,” Sean said. “We’re not the judicial part of the system. We enforce the laws; we bring people to justice and then let the courts decide.”

  Pete shrugged. “Well, I’ve been in enough courtrooms to see that justice doesn’t always happen,” he said. “If they’ve got a good lawyer, if the police mess up on procedure, if they can intimidate the witness, they walk free. I can see a frustrated cop start to take things into his own hands.”

  Nodding slowly, Sean looked over at Pete. “Especially if you have some high-powered, faery friends who can magically take care of things for you,” he agreed.

  “And we can’t rule out that he might be doing this against his will,” Pete added. “It seems like the fae are known for manipulating situations for their benefit.”

  “Yeah,” Sean said readily. “That makes a lot more sense than Adrian going bad.”

  “Wait a minute, Sean. I know you like the guy,” Pete said. “But don’t give him the benefit of the doubt too quickly. He seemed pretty happy to report on those deaths.”

  Sean pulled up next to the garage behind the bar and turned to Pete. “Are you sure you want to drive home tonight?” he asked. “We don’t know who might be waiting for you.”

  “I can handle it,” Pete replied. “I’ve had plenty of people after me in my line of business. It’s just another case.”