Legend of the Lakes

by Clara O'Connor

  The stars were aligned tonight, on Mabon. Magical blood on the floor of the arena would unlock the ley line from this circle. I was at full strength and I could save him. But if I did, how far would we get? Could I doom both the living and the dead for this one life?

  Devyn had made a choice once and now so must I.

  “Executioner,” the praetor commanded, and the dark-hooded man stepped forward with his axe, indicating that Gideon should kneel at his feet and place his head on the waiting block.

  No. Gideon wouldn’t kneel. He wouldn’t kneel.

  This wasn’t supposed to happen. I needed time to think. I had thought that once they were all safely out of the city I could go deep enough to heal the ley. The ley would be healed, I would be gone, and with me Calchas’s leverage over the Britons. I thought I had finally figured out a way to best him, but I had been wrong.

  Gideon stepped back from the block and I breathed a little easier as he started to speak.

  “We have but one life, and it is not to serve ourselves, to bend others to our will, but to serve others, to be a force for good. One person does matter, one person can make a difference.”

  He looked up at the balcony – at Fidelma, at me. One person could make a difference. It had to be now, today. I would never be this strong again, but I needed to be at the Strand to heal the ley line. Think. I let my power explore the circle in front of me. Would this circle allow me to go all the way to the faultline from here?

  No, it was locked. And old blood on the sands was the key. It had to be now. It was Mabon, the autumn equinox, which meant that if I didn’t do something, the corruption would flow west and north.

  “My lady marries today. Long be her life! Together they will rule this island, and all will be equal, all will be free.” Gideon was speaking as he bowed his head. “It is my honour, my privilege, to spend my blood so that they may walk into the future together.”

  He knew. Somehow he knew that his blood would unlock the circle. But how? I looked again to Marcus, who stood frozen, his jaw clenched, his eyes glazed at the warrior’s speech. I didn’t understand. This wasn’t supposed to happen. I couldn’t save him. If I went now, I would damn everyone else.

  Gideon stepped forward to the block.

  He was alone. He had spent his life being rejected. I had rejected him. Was this how he faced his end?

  No.

  “I choose you,” I whispered into the wind that swirled and swept around the arena.

  “I choose you,” I whispered again, and stepped forward.

  But Marcus’s arm came around my waist, pulling me back into him.

  From where Gideon stood, alone on the sand, we would look united, together.

  Gideon’s eyes blazed in our direction. At me. At Marcus.

  Together.

  No, this was all wrong.

  “People must take a stand, for what is just, for what is right. I give my life in that cause. For the sake of those I love.”

  And with these words, he knelt.

  But what is right? How could I save one man and damn the city, and all the souls trapped in the node?

  I felt disconnected from him, from Marcus, from the world.

  Marcus pulled me tight against him as Gideon looked up at us again before bowing his head.

  I was letting it happen. Knowingly.

  Only this morning I had promised him I would choose him. A promise I now betrayed. I had the power to save him… or all those souls and the dying land…

  Marcus whispered in my ear. “This is not how it ends.”

  The axe fell.

  Red.

  So much red upon the sand, spreading out.

  I felt nothing. I was nothing.

  My gaze floated across the balcony, unable to look at the fallen Griffin. The uncaring senators, the shocked and furious Britons, Bronwyn in Rion’s arms, the frozen Steward of York staring not at his broken son but at Marcus and me. Fidelma’s scream. Bronwyn’s sobs. This was the only sound in the ensuing silence, the crowd oddly subdued at the death of the nobly spoken warrior.

  Calchas frowned at the silence. Ever in tune with the needs of the crowd, he moved swiftly to distract them with his next piece of entertainment.

  He grabbed my hand and Marcus’s and raised them high until the attention of the crowd moved from the broken body, the blood seeping into the sands on the arena floor below them.

  “And so a necessary evil is removed from the world so that the city’s future rulers can be brought together.” He smiled beatifically at us. “Out of the ashes of our fallen governor rise the future King and Queen of all of Britannia.”

  The crowd roared enthusiastically as its favourite son and his bride were presented to them as a bright and glittering future. There were no kings in the Empire, but the crowd was delighted with the shiny new vision and seemed not to mind.

  “We emerge from the greatness of the Empire that bore us and rise anew, a jewel freshly polished,” Calchas announced. “We have been but an outpost of a once mighty Empire. The Empire is lost, while we are renewed. The illness has been cured, our technology has triumphed, and our rulers have the strongest magic in the land. It is a glorious day indeed. And now for the main event.”

  Calchas stood back and pulled Marcus and me in front of him, joining our hands. Marcus’s green eyes held mine. He had sworn to help me. Well, it was too late now. Rion held Bronwyn. Fidelma, on her knees, still wept alone. She had fought to keep him alive, the child she had walked away from; now, at the end, she had tried. The steward still watched Marcus and me, thin-lipped and hollow-eyed.

  They waited with the rest of the city for the next event to unfold: my long-delayed wedding to Marcus Courtenay. A marriage that would make me the Queen of York, I realised. Not just York, all of Britannia. The next act after this would be for all the kings and princes here to swear fealty to the puppet rulers that Marcus and I would be.

  A breakaway state from the Empire. Calchas had waited for just the right time. The Roman legions would not come; famine and revolt across the Empire ensured that Calchas’s independent fiefdom was something they would not have the resources to retake and hold.

  Marcus repeated the vows that the praetor dictated. He led them again so that I might also repeat them. The words of the vows were meaningless in their assembly. I tried to focus on him, but my gaze kept returning to the sands where a strange mist had closed in over the fallen body that lay there.

  That was new. I once more sent my senses across the circle of the arena. It felt different. Unlocked. The blood. Gideon’s blood had opened it. I could sense the ley line here now. It was bound; the arena bound it. And something more… the odd notes were stronger here, the foreignness visible.

  If I struck now—

  Marcus pressed my hand, pulling me back to the moment.

  “We now pronounce you husband and wife.” Calchas beamed. “Long may you reign.”

  The sound of bells pealing out across the city made their way into the arena, as the roof finally opened.

  A dull roar sounded through me.

  The lights in the tower above us flickered and then went out.

  He was dead.

  “Thank you,” I said, and smiled at Calchas. The handfast cuff released and I was free. What minor impediment the metal band had inflicted was gone. And now the ley line was wide open.

  The crowd exploded.

  No, not the crowd, the world.

  I was only one person and I had never assumed I could be enough. Calchas and people like him, they forced their will upon the world around them, bending everyone and everything to it. But to what end? So that they, who already had so much, could have more. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t just.

  No more walls. No more elites.

  The symbols of power would crumble. I would churn them into dust.

  I could feel the very walls of the city shake and tremble under my will. I pushed the ley line upwards, closer to the surface, letting it dance and weave through t
he foundations of the walls that had protected the corruption of the city for far, far too long.

  Then there was a dull roar and the walls came down.

  The world swirled around me; the promise of the lakes was mine. I was the sword in the darkness.

  In my mind, I descended deep into the circle, the darkness of it blinding me, but I followed the foreign element until I reached it and cleaved it in two. The force of the blow rebounded on me, and I was blown out of the ley line. Stunned, I sagged in the arms that held me fast.

  And then sentinels crashed onto the balcony.

  “My lord,” a guard said, addressing the praetor and Alvar at his side. “We couldn’t gain entry. It’s an illusion.”

  “Who raised the lockdown?” Alvar demanded, ignoring the report as he looked up at the now open roof.

  “Sir, the power is down across the city,” the guard reported.

  I felt dazed. Fidelma stood staring out at the sand and the stain upon it, but I couldn’t bear it; the swirling sand answered me and covered the body, the grains whirling and dancing in a frenzied mania around the amphitheatre.

  The crowd was screaming, running for the exits as cracks appeared in the walls of the very structure that had housed the false justice meted out here for generations. On the balcony, senators and their families were similarly scrambling for the single exit, pushing each other as praetorian guards and sentinels poured in and the Britons, unarmed, positioned themselves in front of me, Marcus stepping forward and taking his position beside them.

  The winds whipped around us, holding the guards off while they protected themselves as best they could against the buffeting winds. I felt the crackle of lightning answering my call high above the city’s soaring towers, crackling across the city, waiting for my direction.

  I was free. I bowed to no one. I could take it all, take the city, take the power.

  No, I had to stop it.

  If I could seal the fracture, then no one would have to die again. The ley line would be healed and it would stop leaching whatever power it could capture from above ground.

  Tonight we would finish it.

  Chapter Thirty

  “It has to be now,” I said. “I need to get to Mary le Strand.”

  I could feel it, the cleaving of the ties here had opened the fracture; I could do it now. But I needed to release my hold on the storm here.

  “My lords,” said a sentinel carrying swords to the outnumbered Britons… No, not a sentinel! Linus, and behind him Alec, Rion’s captain. He made it out of the ball. The Britons were armed now, but they were still no match for the sentinels’ tech-powered weapons.

  The arriving sentinels weren’t as polished-looking as the ones that guarded Calchas. Alvar’s expression seconded my realisation that the new arrivals were definitely not from the imperial legions. The praetorian guard discarded their guns in favour of the ceremonial weapons they wore and were trained to use.

  “The Code is in chaos; all tech is down across the city.” Linus grinned. He had done it. He and his friends had helped, as he had promised.

  “It has to be now,” I repeated. “I need to get to Mary le Strand.”

  If Gideon’s sacrifice was going to count, it had to be now; there would never be another chance like this. Tonight was Mabon, the tide was high, and the circle was unlocked. I scanned the fracas around me. Marcus growled impatiently and, taking up one of the swords on the ground, entered the fray as the recovering praetorian guard took an attacking position while Calchas was hustled off the balcony.

  “Calchas is making for the control room,” Linus cried.

  “You must stop him. We need the tech to be down for as long as possible,” I instructed him. If we were to make it across the city, we needed the chaos of the blackout. Linus nodded, and within moments was back in the fray, yelling to the fighting Britons and dissidents that they needed to stop the praetor.

  The storm overhead raged down on the city, the praetorian guards penning us in but the close quarters and the bodies of the fallen, pushing, fleeing council members hampered the fight. The Britons were trained better in hand-to-hand combat, and I watched as Alec cut another down and moved on to the next. Rion’s golden head also cut a swathe through the black and scarlet uniforms. There was screaming and grunting as hits and slices were traded.

  I spotted Alvar, who was momentarily still in the midst of the fighting. His eyes gleamed as they met mine and he pushed his way towards me. Marcus shoved and sliced at bodies, trying to cut off the threat. Callum had taught me well, and I raised a hand to send a bolt towards Alvar, but there were so many people and I couldn’t be sure I would only hit him.

  My hesitation cost me, and a knife left his hand. I caught his triumphant grin and then I was falling.

  But I fell to the side. Someone had pushed me out of the path of the blade. There was a snarl and Marcus was after Alvar as he fled.

  The body on mine moaned. Fine cloth entangled us as I pushed myself upright to meet Ginevra’s startled eyes.

  “Ow,” she said, taking in the knife handle protruding from her shoulder.

  “Ginevra.”

  “I don’t know why I did that,” she said, looking at me as if I might have the answer.

  “Hello, Gin,” I greeted my old friend.

  “You left,” she said. She had missed me. And I her, I realised.

  Then Linus was there, helping me back to my feet. The fighting had lessened, Alvar’s knife the praetorians’ final move before retreating.

  “Where is Féile? Marina?”

  “We have them, they’re safe,” a second sentinel said, stepping forward – Rion’s captain, Alec.

  If this was going to work, I wouldn’t be enough. I needed the others.

  “I need you to bring them to the Strand,” I told him and, when he didn’t move I added, “Now. We heal the ley line tonight.”

  Richard Mortimer had lifted my former best friend to her feet and dealt with the knife before handing her to a senator I didn’t recognise who stepped forward, watching me warily as he took Ginevra from the steward.

  “Calchas is gone,” Rion said as he arrived, a few armed – disguised – sentinels with him, more having given pursuit with Marcus.

  “As soon as the tech is up, he’ll be back in control of the city. We need to move,” I told him. “We need to get to Mary le Strand. If the ley line is healed before Calchas resolves the blackout, we have a chance.”

  “Wait until we have the city. You can deal with it then.”

  “No, it has to be now. The blood has triggered an opening that wasn’t there before.” Gideon’s blood. I shook my head. I couldn’t think about that now. There would be time to mourn after it was all over.

  I could heal it. We had Féile and Marina. The future and the present, and me as the past. The three of us had to be together to heal the fissure. My mother’s words circled in my mind, her counsel to have belief in the present, to trust in the past, have love in the future, and be held by courage. Belief. Trust. Love. Courage.

  I took a deep breath.

  I wasn’t as strong as I had been, and the break was so deep.

  But we could do this. I looked out to where Gideon had fallen. I had to do this.

  Rion indicated to Alec to bring Fidelma who still sat on the ground, broken, staring out at the arena floor.

  We raced across the city, our passage hampered by the panicked crowds that were leaving the arena, fleeing the swirling sands and mayhem within only to find themselves in citywide darkness as lightning flashed overhead. The streets, buildings, and lit towers of Londinium were dark; there was no safety to flee to. Their confusion and fear spread to the citizens that were emerging from their darkened homes, fearful of the outage and confused by the events they’d seen broadcasted from the arena.

  Bronwyn took my hand as we were buffeted by the crowd, and I dragged her across the streets I had grown up in. Alec carried Fidelma as she no longer seemed to have the strength to carry herself. Rio
n pushed himself in front of us to give us some headway through the panicked citizens.

  Finally, we turned onto the Strand, weaving between people as we ran. How long did we have until Calchas resolved the chaos, and the tech was back in place once more? My feet hurt in the fancy slippers that were designed for getting married in not for running. I focused on the physical pain as I pushed down the grief that slithered through my focus. I forced it back as we swung through the gate, no sign of the sentinels that had stood guard before.

  We paused at the entrance to the cavernous space down under the church; it was an abyss of black now that the lights were out. There was a flicker, and then a sphere of light appeared over our heads, lighting our faces in an eerie otherworldly light. Marcus stepped out of an alcove. Bronwyn gave him a severe look as another and then a third light bobbed over our heads. It was the light trick that Marcus had learned from Devyn so many years ago.

  Down the endlessly spiralling stairs we went until we finally came to the flat corridor that led to the room at the end of the hall.

  I braced as I looked at the dark oak door, impervious as time itself. Marcus and Linus grabbed the great rings and pulled it open. Great sconces blazed around the room.

  “Mama!” My darling girl broke free of Marina’s arms and ran to me.

  “My baby, oh my baby.” I pulled her small body tight to mine, the weight of her the most comforting thing I had ever experienced.

  Marina stood quietly, her face pale as she smiled cheekily.

  “What kept you?”

  “Oh, y’know, this and that,” I chipped back at her lightly.

  I pushed Féile’s dark curls back off her forehead. “Sweetheart, do you know what we’re going to do?”

  She nodded solemnly. “Marina says we’re going to make the song better.”

  “We are. We three make the triskelion.”

  Her neat little nose screwed up “What’s the tr-trick-salon?”