If I hadn’t just seen it with my eyes, I’d have doubted that he’d even been in the water.
He stood by the pedestal. “Ah, there you are.” He lifted the talisman into the air. It was an amulet on a thick gold chain—oval and gold with a topaz center.
He was holding it. Which meant his role was over, which meant I could get Brady back.
Tick tock, motherfucker. Piss off.
Lugh frowned and gripped the talisman harder.
Nothing happened.
“What is it?” Hyde asked.
I pushed past Hyde to glare at Lugh. “Why are you still here?”
He looked up slowly from the talisman, my annoyance reflected on his handsome face. “It’s empty.”
“What do you mean, it’s empty?” Hyde asked.
Lugh’s jaw tightened. “I mean there’s no longer any power inside. The talisman is powerless.”
Nineteen
I stared at Lugh. “What do you mean it has no power. It drew you here, didn’t it?”
“Yes, the metal has residual power, but the true essence of the talisman is absent.”
What did this mean?
But Lugh was examining the pedestal. “Wait. There’s something lodged here.” He tugged and retrieved a slender roll of parchment. “How quaint, a note.” He tucked the talisman into a pouch at his waist and carefully unrolled the parchment. It looked ready to crumble.
“Be careful,” Hyde warned.
Lugh shot him a flat look that was so like Brady, it made my heart clench painfully in my chest. He returned his attention to the scroll and scanned it.
Impatience snapped like a whip inside me. “Well?”
“The power isn’t here.”
“You already said that,” Hyde said dryly.
“It’s in the mortal realm.”
Hyde and I exchanged glances, and my heart sank.
“There is no way into the mortal realm right now,” Hyde said. “They’re dealing with their own threat.”
Yes, that was true, but my mind was on the other fact, the fact that Lugh was still here, inside Brady’s body. The fact that the fucking mission wasn’t complete. The fact that it meant I wasn’t getting my mate back right this fucking minute.
I strode toward the water. I needed to get back to the other side. I needed to get my hands on Abram so I could choke some answers out of him.
* * *
Abram backed up as I approached with murder in my eyes. “Get him out of my mate’s body. Now.”
Abram held his hands up to ward me off. “I can’t. The quest must be completed.”
I was on him, hands locked around his throat. “But it can’t. It can’t be fucking completed, so get him out.”
Harmon pulled me off Abram. “Killing him won’t help. You know that.”
Gah. I backed up and spun to face Lugh. “Get out. Just get out of his body.”
Lugh’s eyes flashed with anger. “Do you think I want to be here? Do you think I relish being in this unfamiliar form, in a world that is not mine?”
“Yes, that’s exactly what I think. I think you’re enjoying this. You get to live again, you wanker.”
His lip curled. “Live? Living is overrated. I was in bliss, and then I was here, surrounded by devastation and pain. This is not my time. Your problems are not my problems.” He dismissed me and focused on Abram. “I’ve done what you’ve asked of me, now set me free.”
“I can’t …” Abram’s voice trembled. “The talisman must be located, and you’ve located only half.”
Lugh let out a warning growl before advancing toward Abram, his lethal intention clear in his eyes, but he’d need to get in line.
Hyde intercepted him. “We don’t have time for this. We need to get back to the mist. The league will join the militia as first defense, and you’ll come back to the Academy with us.”
Lugh snorted. “I belong on this side of the mist.”
Bitterness stung the back of my throat. “Yes, you do, but that body you’re in doesn’t. Brady belongs on my side. He belongs with me. And like fuck am I leaving him behind.”
Would Brady’s body be able to withstand sector three of the mist? Maybe if Athos carried him through…We’d figure it out. We’d do what we had to, and once we got home, I’d use the weavers to find a way to get my mate back.
“Let’s get the fuck out of here.” I headed toward the tunnel. “We have a war to win.”
* * *
Lugh was sullen and silent the whole way back to the mist. We rode solidly, stopping only for short breaks. The sky had darkened an hour ago, but we rode on. There was no time to waste.
Fuck the league and their waste-of-time mission.
Fuck them for taking my mate.
But if they hadn’t, I wouldn’t have known the truth about the fomorians or about Laramir.
Urgh!
The land had become barren a while back, signaling our entrance into the cusp. Hyde and two league men rode ahead to scope out the terrain. My gut was tight with anxiety for him. What if there were fir bolg about? What if they attacked Hyde?
“Maybe he really doesn’t want to be here,” Harmon suggested from beside me.
“Huh?”
“Lugh,” Harmon said. “I believe him when he said he didn’t want to be here.”
“Yeah, well, he’s going to get his wish.”
“The weavers?”
“They’re bound to have a solution.”
“Like they did for me?” There was no bitterness in Harmon’s tone, just weary resignation.
“We’ll find a solution, babe. Once the fucking war is over …”
If we survived.
If we won.
Odds were not in our favor.
We all knew it. It was in the slump of shoulders and the darkness in every eye. Yeah, we knew we were screwed, but no one verbalized it. Verbalizing it would mean accepting it was a possibility, and accepting it was a possibility went halfway to making it true.
No.
We would fight, and we would win.
The realist could take a sabbatical for a while.
“Up ahead!” one of the league men shouted.
Lights appeared in the darkness, hundreds of tiny, glowing, yellow lights.
The pounding of hooves signaled Hyde circling back toward us. “The militia is up ahead,” he said. “They have an army.”
“How many men?” Harmon asked.
“Four hundred or so, but more are coming.”
Laramir’s army was a thousand strong. Four hundred was nothing. But if more were coming …
Hyde locked gazes with me. “It’s a possibility, Justice. Their men combined with ours … We may be able to fight the fir bolg.”
But we wouldn’t be combined. We’d be split into two armies. We’d be weaker. Unless …
An idea bloomed in my mind. “The fir bolg aren’t affected by the mist.”
“That’s right,” Hyde said.
“But the fomorians are.”
He frowned. “Yes.”
“The mist is keeping our allies from fighting alongside us …”
Hyde’s mouth popped open as realization dawned.
“Motherfucker,” Harmon said.
I grinned. “There’s only one solution. We shut off the mist.”
* * *
The militia camp stretched as far as the eye could see. Fire sconces were rammed into the earth periodically to illuminate the night. Tents had been set up, and campfires burned. The smell of cooking meat tickled my nostrils as we wove our way past fomorian men dressed in leather armor and boots. The glint of swords and axes was a comforting sight.
Balan rushed to greet us. “You made it.” He looked over my shoulder to Lugh and Abram, and then his shoulders sagged. “No luck?”
I shook my head. “We’re headed back to base now.”
Balan walked beside me and Hyde as we made our way toward the border. I quickly gave him a rundown of our plan to shut off the mist.
“They have no choice,” Hyde said. “It’s our only hope of survival.”
Balan looked over his shoulder, and I followed his gaze to see Harmon, Lugh, and Abram a few paces behind us. Lugh had donned Brady’s feytech armor, ready for the trip, and Athos padded a few paces behind him, ready to carry him across sector three.
“I’ve never taken much stock in the league’s fanatical obsession with the talismans,” Balan said. “But I must admit, I do wish the eye you found had been active. Legend has it that the eye was able to wipe out armies. With it, we would have been guaranteed a victory.”
“Unfortunately, the person who hid it did too good a job. Now that we need it, we can’t get to it.”
“The advisors of old believed in fate and destiny,” Balan said. “The fomorian who hid the eye must have believed it would resurface in the right hands when the time was right.”
“Yeah? Well, he was wrong, and now we’re at a major disadvantage.”
“But if the mist is gone, we can join forces. We can fight. Fomorian, knights, and weavers together.”
“We have hounds, also.”
“Even better.”
The camp was far behind us now, the sconce light like fiery stars hovering too close to the earth. Lugh, Harmon, Abram, and Athos joined us at the border.
I nodded at them. “Are you ready?”
Lugh grimaced. “Do I have a choice?”
“No,” Abram said.
“What happened to ‘my liege?’” Harmon said with gravelly amusement. “You were kissing his ass earlier.”
“We needed him to complete the quest,” Abram sniffed.
And he’d been willing to die for it, standing in the path of Lugh’s blade if it meant the talisman would be found. Wow, that was dedication.
“Let’s hope we don’t meet again,” Lugh said to Abram. “Because next time, the woman may not be there to intercept my blade.”
Abram paled and backed up several steps. “Good luck.” He turned on his heel and strode quickly back to camp.
Sector two? Athos asked me.
I nodded.
Athos nudged Lugh and growled.
Lugh’s jaw clenched. I guess kings didn’t like being ordered about.
I met his dark gaze, a gaze that I’d fallen into on more than one occasion, one that had looked at me with love, but now glared at me with defiance.
“Do you want to be free?” I canted my head. “If you do, then you’ll do as I say because right now, I’m your only hope.”
He sighed and climbed onto the hound. “Does this beast know where—”
But Athos was already off.
“Let’s go, guys.” I took a few steps toward the border.
“Justice,” Harmon said.
I turned to look at him, and realization hit me. Athos had been his ride through sector three. He couldn’t make it through the mist without him.
“Shit. I’ll send Athos back for you. Just wait here.”
“No,” Harmon said. “I’m staying here. I can lead the army to our base once the mist retreats.” He glanced at Balan. “If that’s all right with you.”
Balan smiled. “That would be most helpful.”
“No.” I took a step toward Harmon. “I need you with me.”
His smile was sad. “No, you don’t need me, Justice. You want me, and fuck does that feel good. But right now, I’m needed here. Get the posts down, and I’ll be there.”
There was no argument against it. He could be helpful here, and it wouldn’t be for long.
I straightened my spine and nodded. “I’ll see you soon, babe.”
“You can count on it.”
Together Hyde and I stepped into the mist.
Twenty
Athos took point through the mist with Lugh still on his back. The king could have walked once we were out of sector three, but Athos didn’t seem to mind carrying him. Maybe the hound was imagining he was carrying Brady, which he technically was. Lugh just happened to be a hitchhiker in control of my mate’s body. Looking at him hurt my heart and made me want to punch something all at the same time.
We were halfway across sector two, halfway to base, when Hyde pulled me to a stop. He turned me to face him and kissed me hard on the mouth. The shock of his lips on mine froze me to the spot for a fraction of a second, and then my body ignited for him. For a moment, I forgot where we were. For a moment, the urgency that had coursed through me a second ago melted away. My hands ran over the back of his head, pulling him to me to deepen the hungry kiss.
“Is this really necessary?” Lugh drawled.
Hyde broke the kiss, his expression tormented.
And it hit me. This was our last kiss. This was goodbye. What had happened beyond the mist could never be repeated. My stomach clenched, and a soft sob caught in my throat.
We’d crossed the line, and as much as I’d convinced myself we could go back to the way things had been, deep down, I knew it was a lie. We’d consummated our love, we’d connected. There was no coming back from that. How could we? But there was no going forward either. Our actions had placed us in a painful limbo that, if left unresolved, would fester and eat away at us.
“Excuse me?” Lugh snapped.
Athos growled at the king to shut up.
“I love you,” Hyde said softly.
Fuck, I would not cry. “I love you, too.”
We stepped away from each other and continued farther into the mist.
Lugh didn’t say another word, but I could feel him watching me. He probably thought we were ridiculous, not that it mattered what the fuck he thought. He’d be gone soon enough. I’d make sure of it.
A screech to our left had Hyde and me falling into battle stances.
Lugh looked back, his mouth tense. “What was that?”
You best get ready to fight, Athos snarled at Lugh.
Lugh couldn’t understand the hound, but my stance and my unsheathed weapon were enough to clue him in. He leaped off the hound’s back and unsheathed his massive sword.
The screeching was almost on us, magnified somehow. No, not magnified. There was more than one creature. There were several. I knew that sound from sector three. The fucking spider creatures. What were they doing in sector two? The explosions and the trial sonar pulse must have disorientated them.
And yep, they were headed right toward us in a cloud of dust.
Hyde rolled his neck on his shoulders. “Get ready.”
Adrenaline flooded me, and then the spider fuckers were on us.
* * *
My armor was soaked in blood, but my limbs burned pleasantly from the exertion. Lugh strode ahead beside Athos. We’d fought well side by side, as if we were a team, as if we’d done this before.
Except Lugh wasn’t part of our team. He was an interloper. I needed Brady back.
Cadets intercepted us at the border where sectors one and two met, and again halfway through sector one.
Lloyd had got the patrols going well.
As we approached the fortress rise, the mist thinned. I broke into a sprint, happy to be home, eager to do what needed to be done. The training grounds were lit by sconces and campfires.
More cadets appeared, garbed in armor and carrying weapons, ready to fight. They were standing in rows while Lloyd, Aidan, and Devon inspected them and barked orders.
I recognized weavers among them dressed in feytech skin. Their training in battle magic must be over. Kash ducked out of a tent, stopped, and turned his head to look up at me. His eyes widened, his mouth split in a grin, and then he was striding toward me.
Lloyd followed his trajectory and caught sight of me. “Justice!” He raised a hand in greeting, his icy blue eyes heating in welcome.
Warmth flooded me an instant before Kash pulled me into his arms.
Hyde made a soft sound of protest but didn’t say anything. Instead, he took a deliberate step back as if d
istancing himself from the display of affection. I caught his eye and watched as the shutters came down.
My heart squeezed painfully.
“You made it back,” Kash said, his lips moving against the shell of my ear. “I fucking missed you.”
He released me just as Athos crested the rise behind us, with Lugh at his side.
Lloyd’s eyes widened at the sight of his second-in-command. Aidan and Devon exchanged shocked glances, and then all three were running toward Lugh.
The king’s eyes flared in panic, and he took a step back, but the guys were on him in a group hug that brought angry tears to my eyes because this moment belonged to Brady. He should be here, not Lugh.
The guys didn’t know … I hadn’t had a chance to pass this bit of information to them through Kash. They had no idea about the talisman either.
I opened my mouth to explain, to warn them, but I needn’t have bothered. The guys stiffened and released Lugh abruptly, almost in unison.
Devon growled low in his chest.
Aidan sniffed the air, his lip curling.
Lloyd looked at me. “What is this? Who the fuck is this?”
I ran a hand over my face. I had a lot to explain.
* * *
“We tie him up,” Devon said once I’d explained everything.
Lugh bristled. “Touch me and lose a hand.”
Devon took a deliberate step toward the king, but I intercepted the moonkissed.
“Lugh wants to be free as much as we want him gone.” I met Devon’s gaze steadily. “No one touches him, understand me?”
“You’re protecting him?” Aidan looked shocked.
“I’m protecting Brady. This is still Brady’s body, and he’s still inside.” I jerked my head to a flat rock a few meters away. “Go sit.”
Lugh glared down his nose at me, down Brady’s nose, and it was a look so Brady that it made my soul ache.
Shadow Master: The Nightwatch Academy book 4 Page 12
