The Hallowed Knight

by Jenn Stark

  “It’s okay,” I told her. I’d been afraid of exactly this problem. There was just too much we didn’t know, and to Armaeus’s point, too much we should know, needed to know.

  I refocused on the screen. “Kreios? Let’s do it.”

  As Nikki flashed me the thumbs-up, the Devil moved into position beside her. His expression was unnaturally intense, his normally soft, mobile lips now pressed into a hard line. I didn’t understand the exact nature of his relationship with Nikki, but there was no one I trusted more to love her and keep her safe.

  “Go,” I said.

  Kreios reached out his long fingers and gently brushed Nikki’s cheek. With a soft smile, she looked up at him—and jerked back.

  While I couldn’t see what she saw, there was no mistaking the physical reaction that followed. Nikki’s body convulsed, her eyes widened, and the monitors all around her started emitting chittering screams. She stared up at Kreios, her eyes imploring, her mouth falling open. For one long moment, no sound came out. And then when it did, it was in such a tangled rush of mixed languages, it was my turn to jerk back.

  Nikki wasn’t only sharing Seamus’s truth. She was sharing the truth of all he represented.

  A truth that rooted me in fear to the floor.

  As quickly as it started, Nikki’s oral dissertation ended and she slumped back, the monitors still gyrating wildly. Kreios moved his hand to her forehead, and I could see his lips move, though I couldn’t hear what he said. The effect, however, was immediate and deeply gratifying. Nikki slumped into a boneless sleep and the monitors blinked out—then came online again, once more showing perfectly placid readouts.

  “She should rest now,” Kreios murmured, though he didn’t take his gaze from Nikki’s face.

  The screen went dead.

  “What was that?” Brody demanded, turning on me. “What did she say?”

  “She said—Seamus said—that the coming of the Green Knight presages the end of the world,” I reported, my words dull. “It’s a title that’s been known among the druids for thousands of years and rarely adopted because of its fell warnings. But the real concern here isn’t that Conal is the Green Knight, but that he’s the Hallowed Knight.”

  Brody rolled his eyes. “And what’s that?” he asked, exasperated.

  “A druid blessed by the ancient gods, sent here to do their bidding. If that’s who Conal is, then even if we defeat him, we’re too late. The damage has been done, the seed has been planted, the candle lit. Nothing will ever be the same.”

  “Oh. Is that all.” Brody scowled at the empty screen. “Which leaves us where?”

  “It leaves us with a problem.” I passed a weary hand over my brow. “There’s more, too. The spectral opposition warriors have started their own movement in earnest, opposing the Neo-Celts in my name. Seamus is their underground leader, though no one knows that, not even most of the warrior sects. He’s not simply allied against his son, he’s afraid of him, particularly if Conal’s this Hallowed Knight. He’s using some of his druidic woo to manage the spectral opposition warriors, and…and he thinks I’m pretty much the Easter bunny. A god-human synthesis, at one with earth and sky.”

  Brody rocked back on his heels. “Well, that could be handy.”

  I grimaced. “I sincerely hope not.”

  “Given all that, what I’ve found makes more sense,” Mrs. French said. She offered me a thick file. “History of druid complaints through the years up until the late 1800s, both by and against them. Something for you to be reading when you get to Ireland. “

  “Ireland?” Brody demanded. “When are you going there?”

  There was a knock on the door, and I glanced at the clock on the wall. Ten a.m. sharp—which would make it 6 p.m. in Ireland. Perfect timing. I took the file from Mrs. French and gave Brody a weary smile.

  “Now,” I said. “Keep the home fires burning for me.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Are you seriously kidding me with that pack?” I demanded fifteen minutes later, staring at Simon with genuine dismay as he stood in the middle of the lobby of Justice Hall next to a backpack almost as tall as he was, its contents spread out on the floor. “I didn’t expect you to pack for a European tour.”

  “What?” Simon protested. Behind him, Brody sat on the couch, enjoying the show with a cup of Mrs. French’s tea. “We need this stuff. I’ve got collection tubes and a digitizing scanner and two separate laptops in case one gets deep-sixed, one of which has access to the Arcana Council’s network no matter where we go.”

  My mind, of course, went immediately to the In Between. I didn’t think we’d have much in the way of hot spots there. “No matter where?”

  “That’s what I’m going to test out.” Simon nodded enthusiastically, already refilling his pack. I handed him Mrs. French’s folder for good measure. “If we can get computer access In Between, we can begin to understand what it really is. What its chemical composition is, whether or not people can survive—even people we thought were dead—and whether or not this is simply a new and improved way to breach the veil. It’s important stuff. Your dad dropped off the mother of all maps on me, and I haven’t had time to digitize that bastard, so that’s in here too.”

  I narrowed my eyes. Willem of Galt, or the Hermit, hadn’t made an appearance at Armaeus’s Council meeting, but that was to be expected. His job was to protect the veil between Earth and the outside plane where the gods still roamed.

  “You actually saw him? How's he doing?” And more to the point, how long was my own father going to continue to ignore me?

  “He didn’t drop it, drop it. Like, not in person. It was just waiting for me when I got back home from the Council meeting. Sitting right there in the lobby of the Bellagio, addressed to me. Once I opened it up, I was seriously jacked.”

  I frowned, and Brody and I exchanged a look. Even Mrs. French sniffed with concern.

  “You’re sure it’s from the Hermit? It couldn’t have been someone else trying to mislead you?” I pressed.

  “Totally not that,” Simon said, his words absolute. “I may look young, but I’m not an idiot, you guys. This map is the real deal.”

  “Okay, well, good.” I sighed. “Next question: How well do you know Trinity College?”

  “Are you kidding? I love that place. I was there just last summer to do some research for Armaeus, and it’s incredible. I can’t believe you’ve never been there.”

  “I’ve been there, it’s just been a while.” I’d logged some major Google Earth time in Brody’s car to jog my memory, but this particular trip was definitely going to test the boundaries of my need to know where it was I was going. “You’re going to have to have a real specific picture in your head for this to work. You good with that?”

  “Of course,” Simon said, reshouldering his pack. “I’m picturing it right now, clear as day.”

  “Excellent. And that pack is flame retardant?”

  He frowned with surprise as both Mrs. French and Brody backed up several steps. “What do you—hey!”

  I collared Simon and burst us both into the requisite flame. Truth be told, Simon did have the ability to transport himself incorporeally as well. But while my travel requirements involved me catching on fire, his involved leaving all his clothes behind. And in his case, his clothes didn’t regenerate when he did. Whoever was handing out powers in the basement of the Arcana Council, they had a sense of humor.

  Nevertheless, reaching the library in the heart of Trinity College proved easier than expected. We stumbled onto a sidewalk and caught ourselves before sprawling into the mud, which was more difficult than you might expect given Simon’s enormous pack. Once we patted our clothes free of sparks, though, the trek to the Trinity College library took us less than five minutes. I swept the outside of the building with a quick, cursory glance, and, well, it looked like just about every other European library I’d ever seen: an old weathered stone facade, three and a half f
loors, arched roof. Despite the cool springtime temperatures and the late hour, the area around the library was packed with tourists too. I couldn’t imagine how crowded it would be in the summer.

  “Are we supposed to meet anyone here?” I asked. “Or are we on our own?”

  “According to Armaeus, one of the library caretakers will usher us through to the reading room, but he didn’t give me any indication who that would be. He just said we’d be recognized.”

  “Well, it can’t be because we’re American. Half the people here look American.”

  “Yeah, well. Can you blame them?”

  I snorted a soft laugh, surveying the area. From their broad, flat accents to their bright smiles and terrible sweaters, college-age American students choked the green in front of the Trinity College library, almost too many to be believed. Then again, I had to imagine that Ireland was one of the coveted “gets” in a study-abroad program. Just enough of a foreign experience to say you’d been to Europe, a thick enough brogue that even English was difficult to discern, and all the Guinness you could drink. A student could do far worse.

  We elbowed our way into the library, which involved some slight sleight of hand on my part, given Simon’s pack, but nobody paid us any mind. Despite the signs announcing that no oversized packs were allowed in the hall, we weren’t the only rule breakers. It was surprisingly loud too, the sound surely an affront to the miles of books that were stacked floor to ceiling. I stared around the room, trying to get a sense of the age of the place, the history, but I found it strangely lacking. It was as if I was staring at the veneers on an old, revered Renaissance masterpiece. I was more interested in what lay beneath, but I couldn’t quite get to it.

  “I feel like we’re still on the tourist track,” Simon muttered, echoing my thoughts. The library was absolutely beautiful, but it felt…oddly incomplete.

  “Justice Wilde.” The quiet, polite male voice startled me with its thick Irish accent, like a cork bobbing along in an American sea. I turned and saw a slender man who appeared only slightly older than Simon, if Simon hadn’t actually been born in the 1960s. As it was, the Fool grinned at this clear sign that our fortunes had improved.

  “You’re our guide?”

  “I’m William Gray, yes.” The man blushed as he nodded to Simon with awkward deference. “It doesn’t feel right calling you Fool Simon, I must admit.”

  “Just Simon is good. The Fool stuff usually takes care of itself.” Simon hefted his enormous backpack up on his shoulders. “We good?”

  “I’m surprised they didn’t make you check that at the front door,” William said, eyeing the pack with patent amazement.

  “I—” Simon frowned, looking over his shoulder, but I nodded William on.

  “You’re taking us to the Long Room, I assume?” I asked as he led us toward a well-worn staircase. “Armaeus said we needed something from the Book of Kells.”

  “Oh, I’ve already got that,” Simon interjected. At my startled look, he grinned. “Dude. The Internet. Armaeus wanted me to catalogue the animals and various animallike whozits the ancient scribes used in their illustrations. I didn’t need to be here for that. It’s all catalogued on my laptop.”

  “We’ll be going to the Long Room anyway,” William said, agreeably enough. “The library, you see, for all its nooks and hidey-holes, was built on a very simple plan. To get anywhere, you need first to go to the Long Room. As you’ll see, in reality, there’s quite a bit more to it than it seems.”

  We entered the main room and, as the floors below had been, found it chock-full of people. At the front of the room was a beautiful Celtic harp that caught my attention, but I didn’t know why. When I flicked my third eye open, it glowed with a unique energy, but not a strong one.

  “That’s not Ireland’s most impressive harp, but you’re on the right track,” William said beside me. I glanced at him, startled that he’d caught me looking, and he nodded to the harp. “That one is what we call Brian Boru’s harp, and it’s pretty enough, to be sure. An early wire-strung cláirseach dated to the fourteenth or fifteenth century, and, as they say, one of the three oldest surviving Gaelic harps. But it’s not the oldest, not by a longshot. That’d be Scáil An Bháis.”

  “Scowl unwashed?” Simon repeated the word phonetically, frowning at him.

  “Shadow of Death,” I translated. I felt a chill slide up my spine when I said the harp’s title, and I didn’t miss the operative word. Death had been a druid priestess, and druidic harps were well documented in ancient literature. I’d never known Death to play any instrument, but… “Um, how old is the harp you’re talking about?”

  “Nobody knows for sure, and that’s the truth. They said it was the harp of a woman, and it could be true. It’s not a massive instrument, but it’d still take some strength to wield it.”

  “You make it sound like it’s a weapon,” Simon said, eyeing Brian Boru’s harp.

  “In the right hands, isn’t everything? And the legends about Scáil An Bháis are long and twisted indeed. According to our most ancient stories, whoever plays it stirs the soul of the world itself, a soul that, should it heed the call of the harp, could be made flesh, to wreak terrible vengeance or glorious reward, but no one knows which. We only know that to play the harp too long is to break the world in two.”

  “Oh,” I said, my voice sounding very small. “And, um, where is this super special harp, again?”

  William smiled. “Lost in the In Between, it’s said. But come, we’ve got much to see.” William moved us along the passageway, past the busts of philosophers and men of note who’d been affiliated with Trinity College over the years. All the faces blended together after a while, serene expressions masking once-active minds, minds lost now to all eternity.

  Or were they? I thought about the In Between and how little we knew about it. While in Brody’s beater sedan waiting for my head to stop spinning, I’d spent some quality time roaming the Wikis and Reddits of the world, but everything I found seemed to double back on itself, seeming almost deliberately confusing. Was that by chance? Or were the druids and other agencies trying to cover their own shadowy tracks? I’d stowed Mrs. French’s druid file in Simon’s pack when he wasn’t looking, but it would make for interesting reading.

  “So, William,” I began. “What do you know about—”

  “Gabh mo leithscéal—Pardon, Justice Wilde. In a moment, you’ll see all you need.” William had reached the end of the Long Room where a spiral staircase stretched up to the second tier. He glanced back over his shoulder. “Up you go.”

  Simon immediately started up the stairs, but I didn’t miss the jump of electrical currents that swirled along the iron railings as he did so. “What’s up there?” I asked.

  “A doorway. But there are those who would see what they shouldn’t if they looked at the wrong time, so if you would, we need to be quick about it.”

  Without further hesitation, I clattered up the metal staircase, oddly reassured to hear William coming up behind me. I wasn’t certain I believed him about his concerns of us being watched, but he seemed credibly worried. When we all reached the second level, though, William didn’t head down the narrow passage. He turned to the blank wall.

  “There’s a good lad,” he murmured as he pressed a panel that appeared exactly like the other panels in the wall—only this one shifted. A thin passage opened, so narrow that Simon had to shoulder off his pack to sidle inside, and I followed quickly after him. William came last, and just that quickly, the panel slid sharply back into place.

  I blinked, looking around the dim space as William hit another switch. Illumination sprang to life in electric sconces lining the room, which contained a table, benches, and two short stacks of books. Bookshelves lined the room except for right beside the door, where there was a small stone shelf set into the wall, used at one point for holy water, I assumed, though now it was dry as dust. That didn’t stop William from miming a blessing with it as
he entered, before he turned to the stacks upon the table.

  “They came,” William said, his voice once more reverent.

  “Who came?” I was immediately put in mind of my own Mrs. French, all the way back in Las Vegas. It surprised me how much I missed her in this cold, archaic library where everything was so stark and still, halfway around the world. “What are these books?”

  “Well now, these are the books you came all this way to see. The Book of Kells is perhaps the most famous of our tomes, but it’s not the most precious, I should say. Not when you start to speak about what truly lies in the mists of Ireland, hidden away from all to see.”

  I eyed him. “You’re talking about the In Between. You believe it exists as well.”

  “Believe! Well, of course I do. I’ve been in it—though not traveling far, to be sure. The ways are treacherous for the unwary, and I’m new to the study.” He glanced at Simon. “I was told you might be a serviceable guide, for all you’ve not been there yourself.”

  “Well, maybe not so much a guide,” Simon demurred. “That’s usually Sara—Justice Wilde’s thing. But I plan to map everything I see, and if that survives…”

  “Ohhh.” William nodded, excitement lighting his eyes. “That would be something.”

  “But you’ve been in it,” I said again. William was definitely Connected, but I didn’t consider him supremely so. “How many others have? Do you know?”

  He cut his glance to me. “You have to understand, Ireland isn’t a large isle, for all that it looms large in the minds and hearts of her people. If you were to compare it to an American state, it’s no bigger than your Indiana.”

  I frowned. “I’ve never been to Indiana.”

  “And I would venture to say many people from Indiana haven’t had the chance to visit Ireland either.” William chuckled. “But we’re about three hundred miles long and one hundred and eighty miles wide. It’s not a lot of space for such a proud people. We’ve long been keen to stretch our boundaries without leaving our place, you could say.”