by Jeffrey Cook
Justin staggered, but the Sword of Light flashed again, and he kept his feet. Regaining his momentum, he took two more long strides and swung, just as a new blast of the green flame was building around the wight's arm. Justin's strike was faster than the spellcasting, burying the sword in the wight's shoulder with all the momentum he could put into the swing. The sword flashed bright again, and the greenish flare died out. The spellcasting in Gaelic was drowned out by a horrendous scream that shook the cavern.
The sword flared again, and the fire seemed to direct itself into the wound. As Megan watched, the wight's green eyes were replaced by a flash of white light, and then went dead. The wight remained still as Justin pulled the sword free, and the other armored figures—both the crawling pair and the two trying to corner Maxwell—fell, lifeless.
Chapter 13: Recovery
Megan's voice cracked a little as she as she slumped, then sat down against the wall, her latest attempt at singing having failed for the moment. But now it was just the pain and hoarseness, not like before, with the sheer silence seizing her throat.
Lani passed her a canteen of water, because of course she had canteens of water, for reasons of Lani. Everyone else gathered around, slumping or lying down in similar states of injury and fatigue, though everyone was at least able to walk under their own power.
“Remember to drone a little on the Ms and Ns,” Ashling said. “That always helps in these old-style songs. And don't try to get loud. You'll just strain yourself, and it won't help.”
Megan drank, and then nodded. After a few more sips and a few more breaths, she started in again on the healing song. Some of the exhaustion faded, along with the magic taking the worst of the pain from the burns. Megan kept singing, between water breaks.
When she'd fully caught her own breath, and let the minor healing effects take her own edge off, Lani slid closer to Megan, speaking quietly, "So, what happened? You were doing great, and then..."
"I don't know," Megan answered, pausing the song, and taking another drink. "I was doing fine, really starting to feel it working, and then the song was just gone."
"Gone? Like, how?"
Rather than trying to explain, and seeing no harm to the effect, Megan started singing. The first few notes went over fine, and then her voice just disappeared, just as it had during the fight. Then she moved on, the song coming back, before disappearing again.
"That's really weird."
“...Yeah,” Megan said, her eyes slowly widening as her mind came together more. “Oh.”
“What is it?” Lani asked.
“It's the F#. I can't sing F#. Not in any octave. The doctor meant that really literally.”
“The doctor? At the market?” Lani groaned. “Megan, you didn't.”
“I did. But how does that even work?"
"It doesn't matter how it works. The important part is that it does. You traded it away and might never get it back. Which, among other things, means those songs are never going to work."
"Among other things?"
"I'm just saying, Megan, you need to be more careful. The things faeries consider to be commodities, you—well, you just need to be careful."
"Okay, I get that this is bad. We're fighting magical undead things. But is there some other commodity that's really getting to you?"
“Well, yes, okay? There is. Mack.”
“I'm not going to trade your brother for anything, Lani.”
“I know, I just ...He's a collector's item, you know? Humans and other folk having kids is one thing. The same two staying together long enough to have a second ten years later is a unique rarity. A bright, energetic little rarity that thinks everything is awesome, and daisy-chain necklaces are against the first-grade dress code, because I've asked, and I just ...”
Megan reached over and hugged Lani. She wasn't used to seeing the more focused girl talk this quickly and disjointedly. Lani seemed more worked up now than by the fact that they'd almost gotten killed. "I know the stories aren't just stories,” Megan said carefully. She'd certainly learned a lot since making '80s-movie baby-stealing jokes, and now she was pretty sure she'd avoid doing it again. “And I guess, yes, I wasn't very careful with that note. But I'm not going to let anyone hurt your brother, okay?"
Lani looked miserable, but hugged Megan back.
Megan kept an arm around Lani, and Ashling and the Count settled in to try to offer some comfort as well. Jude, limping and favoring one back leg, joined not long after. Megan continued the healing song, slowly feeling her own burns getting less intense, though they didn't fade entirely, while the others started showing more signs of life and wanting to move again. From her practice sessions, she was fairly certain healing was never going to be a strong point, but at least she could usually rest and focus while doing it.
After resting, Justin settled in next to the others, lifting away a portion of his burned t-shirt, to show a slight wound. Far more troubling than the faint burn mark, though, were several short, black lines extending out from it. Occasionally, one seemed to move just slightly. "I didn't think it was more than a minor injury, but..."
Ashling gestured to the Sword. "Press that against it."
There was a hissing noise as Justin did what she asked. When he drew the sword away, his skin was undamaged by the contact with the flaming sword, and the black marks had disappeared, leaving only a clean cut in the skin. "What happened?"
Ashling spat. "Fomoire magic. For some of them, just throwing around fire, or lightning, or poisonous slugs wasn't enough. They had to make sure that the survivors had parting gifts."
"Poisonous slugs?" Megan couldn't help but ask.
"Egypt trademarked a lot of the snake magic, so they improvised," Ashling answered, matter-of-factly.
"Of course they did. And I guess, for Justin, the sword is faster. What about the rest of us?"
Ashling frowned. "Well, some of you could borrow the scabbard and sword for a little bit. It might work okay, since you're only half-fae. And then there's antidote magic."
"Does that come in a bardic variety?"
"Well sure, but..."
Megan frowned. "Don't tell me that it's only for Romanian bards, or you need to buckle it on your horse the right way, or something weird. This is serious."
Ashling sighed, turning away to ruffle the Count's feathers, and Megan instantly regretted the comment. Ashling had just started reverting back to more typical responses, after all of her anger at the Butterfly Collector. "I'm sorry."
Ashling looked back and nodded. "I know. That's not it. The problem is, that song has some F Sharps, too. I only know the one. Fomoire magic is nasty stuff. Only so many ways around it."
"Oh." It was all Megan could come up with.
The climb back up was no more fun than the way down, but they ultimately decided that it beat trying to make their way through more magical traps. At least this time, they were able to light their way, and had Justin lead the way with the sword, cutting through branches and roots as necessary.
"So?" Cassia asked, once she verified that everyone, particularly both cats, were safe, beyond Jude's limp.
"He's dead. Or re-dead, or something," Megan volunteered, lifting the shroud they'd taken off the body. She explained the wards and the battle with the suits of armor. "So can we not fight any more undead sorcerers, maybe?"
"We probably shouldn't be fighting any more undead anythings," Lani said. "We've gotten lucky twice. We should go tell your dad and let the experts handle this."
Cassia frowned. "You have an expert. You have the Claiomh Solais... and Sir Shyness there isn't too bad with it. We should do this."
Ashling chipped in, "And this is all we have to find the Butterfly Collector. He's behind this. We have to hurry."
"Why? Sure, he likely has a lot to do with causing the wights to stir, but is that even his intent? We can't exactly question them. What do we have to gain?" Justin said, getting a nod from Lani.
"Caw. Caw"
"The
Count says that we might find more information that could hint at what he's up to."
"And anyway, the longer we give them, the stronger the wights are going to get. We need to catch them while they're waking up and still getting reoriented," Cassia said.
"They looked pretty awake to me. That last guy had a lot of magic flying around," Megan said.
"And it would have been a lot worse if he'd had time to, say, enchant those guys with any kind of real commands, instead of puppeteering them, or to set a couple more traps and wards. These were the biggest badasses Balor could find among mortals, back in the day. I say we kill as many as we can now. Then we go brag about it to Ric... that'll get his attention and get him on the case of hunting down the rest of 'em a lot faster than going and saying we couldn't hack it."
"The problem is, maybe we can't,” Lani said. “Like I said, we're getting lucky. A crew of redcaps or sidhe knights won't need luck. Yes, these guys are dangerous, but they don't have their armies this time. And they were mortals. Yes, Justin is good. Yes, we're pretty resourceful. But half of us aren't really combatants. This is serious. We need to get bigger guns in on it."
"Bigger guns will take time," Cassia said. "Especially Unseelie big guns. I suppose you could always go to Orlaith. At least she'll take anything Fomoire seriously."
"I don't care if she takes it seriously,” Ashling replied. “She'll screw it up, or try to take advantage of it.”
Justin looked to Megan. "Whichever way you want to go,” he said. “I'll fight for you and do my best to protect you. But I'd counsel going to your father. This isn't safe."
Megan sighed, and looked at Justin, then Lani. "I know this isn't safe. I know we probably should go back to my dad. But it does kind of feel like we need to hurry here. I say we keep going. But we'll try to be careful. We need to try to find this guy, though. After that, if we can figure out who he is, or where he is, we focus on that, and leave the wights to Dad, Inwar, whoever, okay?"
With the concessions made, Lani elected not to argue further. "All right, so where's the next one on the map?"
Chapter 14: Rigged
The next of the barrows turned out to be some distance, but at least it got them out of the worst of the marshy, slippery ground. Maxwell was walking again, exploring at times as they traveled, but Jude continued to favor one leg and to let Megan carry him, at least until they reached the actual barrow.
This time, there was no hidden entrance, just a heavy stone door, long since sealed up. It took Cassia and Justin working together to get it open, and even then, took quite a while to move it. Ashling and the Count took the lead, but Ashling paused only a few feet in, having the Count perch in an alcove that had once held a torch. "I'll do my best, but this place is really warded. Trying to find a safe path through here is kind of like trying to find a haystack in a needle factory."
Megan blinked. "You mean a needle in a haystack?"
Ashling shook her head. "I meant what I said. If you're in a needle factory, there are no haystacks. And if there is one, it's probably a trick. Someone took some time putting some seriously long-lived wards in here. I suspect there's plenty of other traps too."
Cassia, as the most durable, took the lead, with the Count and Ashling each perched on a shoulder, doing their best at guidance. Ashling guided them around a tripwire and around the trigger for a deadfall but missed the poison needle trap. Cassia's armor deflected most of it, but three needles stuck into her skin. Lani immediately set to removing them, and trying to discern what was on the needles, but Cassia, after a moment, shook her off. "It'll be fine. Stings a bit."
"But the poison..." Lani started.
"Satyr," Cassia said, starting to move again. "This is no worse than a really heavy pub crawl on Cap Hill."
Lani and Megan glanced at each other, then moved to follow Cassia. It wasn't all that long before Ashling called them to a halt again, having the Count take her to a specific spot on the floor.
"Okay, everyone, watch carefully. Cassia, you're taller, so you can get the good cereal on the high shelf. And also stand in back so they can see.” The pixie dismounted. “There's a hollow floor there, and there, and there. Just step on the spots I step on." Ashling made a huge leap from one floor stone to another, then another one. Megan tracked which she landed on, and took careful steps across.
“Great,” Ashling said eventually. “Now not one step closer until Lani deals with this thing right here.”
Lani looked. “Yeah, the markings look like it might be another deadfall, but covering the whole hallway.”
“It's going to be hard for us to find enough space to sleep,” Megan said.
Lani rolled her eyes. “I can at least try to see about dismantling millennia-out-of-date technology before worrying about having to use magic.”
She knelt and peered at the wall for a few moments before Cassia just smashed away a thin portion of the stone. "That should make your life easier."
“Huh,” said Lani. “It wasn't a deadfall at all. It's some kind of elaborate spike trap. Just when you think you know what to look for...”
"Whoever designed this place was seriously paranoid." Megan said.
"And clever," Justin added. "Most of these don't stand alone. For most people, avoiding one of them would lead you right into the next."
Lani finished her work disabling the trap. "I'd really, really appreciate studying this place, if it weren't trying to kill me."
"We're almost there," Ashling said, starting to move again.
"Better than GPS," Lani said. "And works underground."
"Through that door," Ashling said a few turns and twists later, pointing to another heavy looking stone door. She paused in looking it over, shining brighter. "They're not even trying to hide the wards on this one." Indeed, the door was heavily marked with twisting symbols.
"Easy enough to deal with that," Cassia snarled, smashing the door to mar the symbols, not giving Lani or Justin time to shout a warning. As she hit it, the floor fell away from under them.
Most of the group hit the stone floor beneath heavily. The cats seemed to have a better time landing on their feet, while the Count managed to lift off and grab Ashling before she hit the ground. Cassia was back on her feet in an instant, the teenagers took more time about it. No one was able to get out before the former floor, now their ceiling, closed again some fifteen feet above their heads.
"I'm sorry!" Ashling called, brushing herself off and starting to scan the room, which had no signs of any doors, or much of anything but bare stone, and some darker stains on the floor, amidst a few flat bits of metal and fragments of bone. "I don't know how I missed that one."
"It's okay, Ashling," Lani said, "The wards were probably about hiding that, not protecting the room. Another trick. We just need to figure out how to..." She paused as a grinding noise echoed around them. "Uhm, how to stop the walls from closing in on us. That's probably more immediate than getting out."
The walls didn't move especially fast, but were definitely moving. Cassia's efforts to push back made no difference, likewise, even with the Sword of Light, and the satyr's strength, the walls resisted efforts to do more than scratch them. Cassia seemed to feel only slightly better about this when Lani suggested that the wards probably had something to do with that, too.
Seconds passed, with the walls continuing to grind. Megan, and even Ashling made efforts to help with the pushing, while Lani studied the edges, looking for flaws or gaps. She finally found a couple points where the stone had worn down, but wasn't able to do much with it, and the gaps turned out to be much too small for even Ashling to fit through.
Just as it was getting hard to breathe in the cramped space, Justin jammed the Sword of Light between the walls, and the indestructible sword turned out to be good to its reputation, holding them apart just enough for people to stand, and move slowly, though Cassia, and, to a lesser degree, Justin, had to squeeze a little, and only the cats, the Count, Ashling, and Lani had any hope of getting pas
t anyone.
"What now?" Megan finally asked.
"One of three things," Lani responded, trying to use the time to continue searching the walls for anything that might help, "Either the mechanisms pushing the walls break down, we run out of air, or..." she gestured to where the tip of the sword had begun being driven into the wall, despite its resistance, though barely perceptibly so far, "Or the sword eventually gets pushed in like a nail, and we get flattened anyway."
"I don't like those odds. Ashling, you open stuff all the time. Can you do that here?"
"One, wards, big ones. Two, that's windows and stuff. If I had a dozen pixies here, sure, but..." she went very quiet.
Megan spent a few moments looking around, finally settling on Lani, "Can you figure out how to shut it down?"
"In theory, with enough things to make the right tools from, and time. But not while you're all awake."
"But you could do it if you had some stuff to work with, and we were sleeping?" Ashling asked.
"Sure, probably. Menehune thing. But I think everyone is a touch high stress. And if anyone wakes up, I'm done."
Ashling pointed to Cassia. "Give her your breastplate. Spare metal bits. Anyone have candles?"
Cassia started in on removing the armor, while Lani dug into her bag, and offered up two candles, looking confused. "Those are good to have in emergencies. This better be important, though. I was serious about running out of air."
"Very important," Ashling responded, setting up the candles with some help, and having Lani light them. "We can't have you falling asleep. Everyone but Lani, get as comfy as you can." When Lani continued to look confused, but spent time laying her tools out anyway, the pixie continued, "I'm going to help Megan with a lullaby."
"Cool!" Megan replied, despite the situation, "Anti-magic, wind and cold stuff, inspiration, healing, and now putting people to sleep? Is there anything bardic magic doesn't do?"
Ashling gestured up, "Absolutely terrible for stopping stone wall traps."
