by Dani Harper
At that precise moment, the grand matriarch glided over the threshold of the imposing entrance. Older than even Gwenhidw, Eirianwen’s appearance alone was yet sufficient to turn every head. She never seems to age, thought Trahern, and wondered anew what kind of powerful glamour she used to stave off the paintbrush of numberless centuries. Her exotic beauty required no enhancement—but enhance it she had, to devastating effect. She was dressed to emphasize her station this day, her autumn-colored robes woven with oak leaves of amber and claret, and her snowy hair piled high on one side with gilded branches and jeweled acorns, left to fall like silken water over the other. Each delicate finger sported a long golden talon. Gold dust tipped her long eyelashes and emphasized her high cheekbones. Even her wine-colored lips were brushed with gold.
As she stepped forward, a camarilla of her most powerful kindred instantly appeared and fanned out behind her, each formally attired in her colors. The Court held its collective breath, and the matriarch’s melodic voice poured into a vessel of utter silence. She didn’t bother with preamble. “Braith, you are guilty of treason against the House of Oak.”
“I am guilty of nothing,” he retorted. If he was afraid, he did not show it.
Trahern didn’t show it, either, but he was suddenly very much afraid. Treason? It was the most heinous of all crimes. What game was this, that Eirianwen would accuse his brother of such a thing?
“Your rebellion is an act of betrayal,” she continued.
“I betray no one. I merely seek a life of my own. The law states that I have the right—”
She cut him off with a wave of her delicate hand, its gold talons glinting in the light. “We are not here to debate your foolish ideas or your imaginative interpretation of fae law.”
“I will be heard!”
“You will not. We have already concurred that your life is forfeit, and we are merely here to carry out that sentence.”
Forfeit. The word stole the breath from Trahern as surely as if he’d fallen into an icy lake. She cannot mean that. She must be trying to frighten him into submission. His brother, however, would never submit. Sudden fear for Braith sharpened his focus beyond what he could normally call upon—
Tân mawr! He shouted it in his mind. Tân du!
Instantly, a tall curtain of oily black flames spread into a wall around his brother, barricading him from harm. As it sucked light from the room, the fire cast a dull purplish glow like a kraken’s dying ink. Eirianwen arched a brow as her camarilla consulted among themselves as to how they might attempt to countermand the spell, and Trahern instinctively wished he had not chosen black flame. It was the most difficult to master and beyond the abilities of most sorcerers. So much for concealing the level of his skills . . .
“I see you have improved upon your talents,” she said.
He walked boldly across the open floor, his fine boots making the only sound in the entire room, until he stood by the fiery barrier surrounding his brother. “I fear my talents lie more with building the wealth of the House of Oak through simple commerce. This is merely an illusion I picked up on my last trading expedition to the outer realms.” He thrust a hand into the flaming wall. Anyone else would have lost a limb, but he had to make it appear harmless. Yn diffodd! The flames extinguished, leaving only a circle of amethyst-colored birds upon the floor. They took to flight immediately. A heartbeat later, they drifted down to the steps of the dais as scented purple flowers. A type he knew Eirianwen favored.
The crowd clapped delightedly, then seemed to remember whose presence they were in and fell back to apprehensive silence.
Braith’s voice was far from silent inside Trahern’s head. Have you taken leave of your wits? Her wrath will engulf you as well!
Be silent, he shot back. You’ve dug a big enough pit for yourself already. As twins, they had shared mind speech since birth. They would not share much more if he didn’t think of some way to ease the situation fast. And arguing will only make things worse, he added quickly. In such a public venue, the matriarch’s dignity and station must be acknowledged and preserved—and that meant his only useful weapons were appeal and appeasement. Trahern knelt, his carefully composed gaze never wavering from Eirianwen’s perfect face.
Stony silence greeted him, then stretched interminably, but he waited. To speak first could ruin everything—and there was no guarantee that Braith would remain quiet for long. Thick tension permeated the very air as if a tempest gathered strength. Just as his taut nerves seemed ready to snap like a bowstring, a slight flex of the matriarch’s index finger permitted Trahern the opening he sought.
“Fair and Shining One, you have led the House of Oak to unimaginable heights,” he began. “You have expanded its holdings and its territories, and many Houses rightly fear your boldness even as they are undone by your cleverness.” Spoken to anyone else, such flattery would have been summarily dismissed. In Eirianwen’s case, it was simply the truth—though only part of it. She was most famous for utter ruthlessness.
“First you display a foolish entertainment; now you intend to introduce further tedium by begging for your brother’s life?” The faintest of smiles played around those golden lips, but Trahern knew it was not inspired by mirth. “You’d do better to bore me with a full report on your latest acquisitions.”
“I intend neither,” he said aloud, his expression as bland and detached as he could make it. “Many of your triumphs have been won by your formidable talent for planning.” That was an understatement. The woman had recently gained a large stretch of Alder territory with a strategy that had taken fifteen mortal centuries to play out. “By example, you have taught me that all things have their usefulness in the right time and the right place. This has served me well in bargaining on your behalf. I merely suggest that my brother may be of use to the House of Oak in a time yet to come.”
Her eyes glittered. Yet she laughed prettily as she turned to the assembly. “He would be of some use now if he would accept the pairing we have so carefully negotiated, would he not?” The Court tittered their assent nervously, fearful to join in but too afraid not to.
“True words. I simply submit that Braith’s talents may yet be required. Should they not be ready at hand to serve you, as an arrow is kept in a quiver, as a dagger in a hidden sheath?” His words would be a complete mystery to the assembled courtiers but not to Eirianwen. She’d made good use of his brother’s capacity as a farseer, consulting with him on numerous occasions before assembling her tactics against other Houses. Surely she would not discard such a valuable tool! Trahern waited in agony as she made a show of considering his words. She didn’t confer with her camarilla, or anyone else, of course. Her followers would do whatever she said, agree to anything she commanded. The entire Court was still, hushed and waiting for her decision, but he knew full well that their shallow hopes were for further entertainment, not for his brother’s life. Nothing would delight them more than to see Braith’s blood stain the elaborate mosaic he stood upon.
Eirianwen’s golden lips parted, and it seemed that every being in the vast room leaned forward as one. “We would not want it said that the House of Oak wasted a potential asset.” She smiled then, her teeth gleaming white and feral. “Nevertheless, the family has already made its decision. Braith, I pronounce upon you the Sancsiwn Teulu.”
Trahern rose to his feet in spite of himself. A family sanction was not only extremely rare, but its ancient penalty was immutable, even by the Throne itself. But Eirianwen had not finished speaking to his twin.
“It is most fortuitous for you that your brother has made such a convincing argument for your continued existence. If the sentence is not to be satisfied by your death, then perhaps it can be fulfilled by your transformation.” Still smiling, she waited a beat and was not disappointed.
“What kind of transformation?” asked Braith warily. Though his face had paled somewhat, he still stood firm and unmoving, his hands fisted at his sides.
“Why, into something much more
serviceable to us, of course! Something loyal. Faithful. And most of all, obedient. Consider your new form a kind of mold, something we hope will permanently shape, and therefore alter, your rebellious nature.” She motioned to those behind her. Immediately, several of the highest-ranking members of the House of Oak crossed the floor, every one of them a full-fledged sorcerer. Trahern had known them all his life, followed them, learned from them, eaten and drunk with them, but their eyes were expressionless as they formed a circle around him and his brother. Instantly he braced his feet and drew energy through the very floor, gathering it to his palms unseen. His powers were potent enough, disciplined enough, to take down at least two of the camarilla at once, then strike again with the rebound of the energy. But the remaining would have the advantage before he could deliver a third blow. If he coordinated with Braith, however, his brother’s limited magic might help shield him—
Stop! Braith’s voice was loud inside his head.
I will not let them do this to you!
My brother, you cannot save me. Even if we destroy the entire circle and every member of her retinue, we cannot prevail against Eirianwen herself. And I will suffer far more if they take you, too. Get out of here now! Braith even put a mental punch behind his words, as if he could compel his brother by sheer force of will.
Trahern refused to move. By the stars, there had to be something he could do, something he could say—and that’s when he saw the space in the circle. Eight of the most powerful fae in the whole of the Nine Realms stood waiting. But everyone knew it took nine to enact a Sancsiwn Teulu.
Nine. He shook his head slowly, horrified beyond words.
Eirianwen’s triumphant laughter was as delicate as a cascade of crystal bells. Her exquisite face was animated, her eyes vibrant. “If you truly wish him to live, my dear, then you will take your place,” she said.
He should have remembered that his mother was at her most beautiful just as she sprang a trap.
TWO
Viewed from the very bottom, the cave was long and narrow, as sinuous as a dragon, until it faded into distant darkness. Countless stone chambers lined one wall, carved into the rock itself. Glittering things hung on the opposite wall. At Trahern’s approach, they coalesced into countless woven silver collars and thick chest plates that resembled heavy chain-mail. His sorcerer’s sight revealed the green aura of binding magic around them.
No magic was needed to sense the aura of misery and despair here.
He was close to despairing himself.
Nine suns and twelve moons had passed since Eirianwen ordered what was left of his brother to be taken away to the kennels. Nine suns and twelve moons that Trahern had counted breath by painful breath, before the smug matriarch finally tired of her prolonged games at Court and left, taking her camarilla with her. Nine suns and twelve moons before he was finally free to search for his twin.
To the kennels. He’d assumed she meant where the Wild Hunt housed its horses and hounds far beneath the castle at the base of the mountain itself. But the lleolwr spell he’d cast to locate Braith had led him in another direction entirely, to this deep and dismal place where shadows moved like living things in the weak gray light.
Trahern conjured a bright, glowing sphere in his palm and used it to peer into each den as he passed. All were empty. Just as he wondered if anything dwelled here at all, a huge, shaggy black shape burst from a kennel immediately ahead of him. The immense dog looked neither left nor right, its glowing red eyes trained on the jagged break in the ceiling high above. In a single leap, it was airborne, its menacing shape dissolving into a mass of fine particles that swept upward like a giant flock of dark birds, intelligently moving as one. Between the space of one breath and the next, it had shot through the rocky orifice into the world beyond and was gone.
A grim. Trahern recognized the creature for what it was, though he’d never seen one transform before. A grim had many names—gwyllgi, ci du, barghest—but only one purpose: to travel to the mortal world above the fae realms and foretell the demise of humans. He shone his light into the black dog’s lair.
No bedding here, only a bare stone floor worn smooth over millennia. No silver bowl of water as Lurien’s hounds enjoyed; in fact, there was no sign of food or drink at all. It was said that grims felt neither cold nor heat, did not hunger or thirst. They were a fae contrivance rather than a natural animal. Yet the absence of comforts seemed wrong somehow.
The only similarity between these kennels and those of the Hunt’s well-tended hounds was the ornately carved archways, devoid of doors or bars. Trahern was about to turn away when his light revealed something more: a finely chiseled inscription in the stone of the threshold. He looked more intently, perceiving now that the engraving bore the same greenish aura of binding magic as the silver collars he had passed. In fact, all the kennels were marked with the very same words—CENNAD O FARWOLAETH.
Messenger of Death.
My brother should not be in this place. He is but a common hound. But what better trick to throw Trahern off the trail? Perhaps Eirianwen hoped I would not search here.
He looked up just in time to see a flicker of movement in one of the last kennels. Could it be Braith? Trahern took a single step forward—until the sight of writhing flesh and impossibly contorted limbs blazed afresh across the inside of his eyelids. His ears rang again with the horrific crunch and pop of bones changing shape and the agonized screams that suddenly transmuted to ululating howls.
Long moments passed before the horrifying memory released him. When he came to himself, more emotions than Trahern had ever experienced in his lifetime battered him from within. Most were strange and nameless, but all were painful, and guilt loomed large among them. Whatever these feelings, however, he couldn’t permit them to hold him back. Whether Braith forgives me or not, he needs my help now.
Taking a deep breath, he walked to the stone lair and stooped to enter. There, his worst apprehensions were confirmed, and he simply sank to his knees. The bright sphere in his hand tumbled to the floor, revealing the prone form of the largest dog Trahern had ever seen. This was not the same dark-furred canine he had witnessed in the circle. No mere hunting hound, this. Thick folds of skin draped a monstrous muzzle, while pendulous lips and flews curtained bone-crushing jaws. Heavy-boned legs ended in leonine paws.
My brother is a grim . . .
Out of nowhere, a woman in an Oaken cloak lunged at Trahern like a maddened warth and succeeded in knocking him backward. “How could you?” she screamed, pummeling him with hard, sharp blows that found their intended targets, clawing him with silver-tipped fingers. The great dog was on its feet at once, its bark a deafening roar in the small space, adding to Trahern’s confusion. Instinctively, he tried to seize her wrists, only to have her head-butt him, then sink her teeth into the base of his thumb. The pain focused his wits, and he shouted a word that sent her flying backward into the beast. The impact knocked the wind from her, and she gradually slid down to sit at the dog’s feet, where she glowered at Trahern . . . and he recognized her.
“Saffir.” The great dog sat stolidly at her back and nuzzled her as if to check that she was all right. The cloak had fallen aside, and her pearl-colored hair spilled over her shoulders like tumbling water. Dark-blue blood welled from her mouth and nose, accusing Trahern, but it was the rich sapphire of her hooded tunic that struck his senses like a slap to the face.
She was in the Court! She’d witnessed what he’d been forced to do to his own brother.
“How could you do such a monstrous thing to him?” she demanded, as if he’d spoken aloud. “He loves you!”
“How could you?” he shot back. “Were you not at the root of this? Was it not your imaginary love, your so-called Pâr Enaid, that condemned him? If you sought to improve your status by pairing with my brother, you have surely miscalculated.”
She stilled then, even as the dog began growling in Trahern’s direction. Blood still trickled freely from her bruised mouth and nose,
but it didn’t detract from her sudden quiet dignity. “Is that what you think? That what Braith and I share is not real? That I wear the appearance of feelings as an enticing garment to serve selfish ends? You are no better than your coldhearted dam.”
“I am nothing like her! Nothing!”
“Then you have been her foolish puppet. Has she sent you now to see how her plan progresses?”
“A puppet truly.” Bitterness mixed with bile. “But not entirely foolish. If I had not done her vicious bidding, my brother would now be dead, and I would be unable to help him.”
Her eyebrows rose. “If you wished to help, why did you not come at once? Braith said you would not abandon him, but I have not shared his certainty.”
“Our mother’s spies are not easily discouraged, and Eirianwen herself only left the palace this very day.” Saffir’s interrogation poked at his anger with a sword point. “And how do I know that you were not hired by her to entrap Braith from the very beginning? You wear her colors!”
“As you are doing now, or do you not dress yourself? As a healer, it is my privilege to come and go wherever I wish, and I have long been tending one of the Hunt’s horses whose belly was torn by a basilisk. I took this cloak from one of your mother’s guards. The stupid dihiryn blocked my way, thinking he could gain some pleasure for the great favor of letting me pass.” She partially drew an opal dagger from a sheath on her shapely calf. “His body lies in the abyss behind the south tower. The guards have been too timid to come down here since he vanished.”
“You’ve been here all this time?”
“When they took Braith away, I followed at once.” Her voice quieted. “I did not think they would bring him to this place.”
