Beauty

by Sophie Oak

  “You aren’t dead,” Lach said harshly. His voice was strained, as though he really had been screaming and not just in the dream. “You aren’t dead. Maybe you were, but you aren’t now.”

  Tears streamed down Bron’s face. “I killed him. I killed Shim.”

  Gods, he didn’t want her to take it that way. “No. I gave my life to you, a chumann. I didn’t want to live without you.”

  She sat up, her breasts exposed in the moonlight. “Gillian didn’t bring me back. Shim did.”

  “Yes, and somehow I brought Shim back,” Lach insisted. “He isn’t dead. I know when I’m reanimating someone. I can feel it.”

  Shim felt his eyes narrow. “And how many corpses have you reanimated over a long period of time, brother?”

  Lach’s face was pale, except for the scars which appeared as red as the day he’d gotten them. “More than you know. More than I want anyone to know. Shim, you’re alive. I didn’t remember much, but I remember now. I called on my power and it flared, like your fire. It flared in a big way and it brought you back to life. Damn it, Shim, use that brain of yours. You eat and sleep and you can feel your body. A corpse can’t do that.”

  “You don’t know. You don’t know that.” The thought horrified Shim. He was dead. He’d been dead. Was he still dead?

  “I killed you.”

  Bron. He had to hold on to Bron. His head was swimming. His body felt like a foreign thing, but he moved to hold her. “You didn’t kill me. You didn’t.”

  “I felt it. I was you in that dream, Shim. I felt my hand reach out and pull at your soul. I reached out and took your life to save mine. How could I do that? You’re dead because I killed you.”

  “He isn’t dead,” Lach insisted. He got off the bed and shoved his legs into a pair of trousers. “Will either of you bloody listen to me?”

  “You should have left me, Lach,” Shim spat back, his anger bubbling to the surface. How could he go on knowing what he was? How could he make love to his wife when he was a dead thing animated only by his brother’s power? He’d given his life for her, but Lach had brought him back and turned him into a monstrous thing.

  Lach’s fists clenched. “You would rather be dead than dependent on me? Is that how much I mean to you?”

  Shim felt Bron stiffen in his arms. “He didn’t mean that, Lachlan. He values you.”

  “What are you talking about?” Shim asked.

  Bron turned her face up to him. “You said I didn’t listen, but I think you’re the one who missed something here. Didn’t you see what he did for you? Didn’t you feel why he did it?”

  Shim shook his head as though he could sharpen his memory by getting rid of the cobwebs polluting his brain. They were all there now. His and Lach’s and Bron’s memories were shuffling through his head like a wild mixed-up stew that had been stirred and now bubbled. Lach had run into the burning building. Lach had been horribly burned—by his body—and yet he’d picked Shim up again.

  And Shim was dead. Dead. Dead.

  “He won’t listen.” Lach turned away. “And it’s not about this bullshit. He felt what it’s like to really be me for the first time and he doesn’t want anything to do with it. Well, guess what, brother, get used to it. We’re bonded, fully, and now you have a piece of my darkness inside you.”

  Shim didn’t know what exactly was fueling him. He knew deep down he needed to take a moment, but that word kept riding him. Dead. Dead. Dead. He wouldn’t have children. They would all be Lachlan’s. Bron would turn away because she couldn’t want a dead body in her bed. Lach had set himself up to win everything. “And you have what you always wanted, brother. You have a tiny piece of light to illuminate that wasteland you call a soul.”

  There was a sharp crack and a flare of pain. It took him a moment to realize where it had come from. Bron. Bron had hauled off and smacked him right across the face. Smacked him hard enough that his flesh ached.

  “Don’t you dare talk about him like that, you idiot. How could you? After everything he did for you, you could say that to him?” Her eyes were bright with tears as she looked up at him.

  Shim felt a little sick. What was he doing?

  Lach, his brother, his other half, his protector, turned away.

  Shim held his hand to his cheek, a horrible wave of guilt crashing over him. “Lach.”

  “Don’t. There’s nothing to say. I always knew it would be this way. Don’t you think I knew you were the better part of us? It’s why I couldn’t let you go. But you aren’t dead. I gave you some of my life or my soul, I don’t know how it worked. I just know I pulled every ounce of power I could and I focused it on you. Maybe you weren’t dead. Your power was still flaring. I just know that I focused everything I was on saving you. And I’ve done worse things, brother. Things you don’t know about. Things you and Duffy won’t ever forgive me for. But I did it because I love you both. I don’t know how to live without you. But I’ll figure it out. I’ll see Bronwyn home, and then I’m going to leave. There’s no place for me here.”

  Lach stalked off. Shim felt a roiling shame. Now all the memories were surfacing. How sick he’d been. How long he’d lain in an odd fugue state, somewhere between living and dead and how his brother had never left his side.

  How could he have said that to him?

  Bron got out of bed, her every movement a brisk and angry testament to her emotional state. “I don’t know that I will ever forgive you for that.”

  “Bron, I’m sorry.” The words sounded stupid. Idiotic. Futile.

  “You know how he feels and you still say such things to him? He was trying to save you because he thought he was worthless without you. He thought he was a dumb animal without your half of his soul.” She pulled Shim’s shirt over her head. “I have to find him.”

  Shim got to his feet. So much had gone wrong. It should have been a beautiful thing, their true bond. It should have been followed with more lovemaking and the taking of her sweet blood. But it felt as if everything was ashes and he was the reason.

  And he’d forgotten what he’d learned of Bron.

  He’d seen her. He’d seen what a sweet child she’d been. Loved and coddled and slightly marginalized because her brothers were so much more important. He’d felt her overwhelming will to live and not simply because it was an animal instinct, but because she hadn’t been finished. She hadn’t done what she’d needed to do.

  She needed to make a difference. She needed to matter in some tangible way, in some way past her soft body and sweet looks.

  Bronwyn Finn McIver needed to fight.

  Shim sat down on the bed, his head in his hands and his heart aching in his chest. He’d messed everything up because he’d refused to really listen to the two people who mattered most in his world.

  Lachlan needed to protect his heart, and he wrongly thought it resided in Shim’s soul. Bronwyn needed to matter and Shim had locked her away so she could never be what she needed to be.

  He’d fucked up.

  And there was only one way to make it right. He had to talk to his brother, and he had to convince him that Bron’s fight was their fight.

  If she wanted a battle, then they would be right by her side. He wouldn’t lock her away. The things he loved most about her were her fierce heart and the love she was capable of. If he locked her away, some beautiful piece of her would die and he couldn’t be the one who did that to her.

  There was a loud crack. Shim froze in place because he’d heard it before. The sound of an eddy wind charging in.

  Shim took off running because it looked like the battle had found them.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Lach felt the moment the eddy wind covered the air above him. He had a split second before there were soldiers on the ground.

  And his sword was back at camp. He’d walked off without his sword.

  Immediately Lach reached out to try to find the dead and call them to aid, but his power was so much weaker now.

  Why couldn’t he c
all it?

  “Lach?” Bron’s voice called through the trees just as the soldiers surrounded him.

  How many? Too many. And he wasn’t sure where Bron was. He struck out, his fists his only weapon. There were dead around, but only animals and small ones at that. He was in a forest, far from the cemeteries and crypts that would have brought him an army.

  He felt a burning sensation at his side.

  He threw his elbow behind him and caught a soldier in the face. Where was Bron?

  And then a shout came up and the sound of metal on metal. There was a clanging and a roar.

  Duffy wielded his axe, cutting soldiers off at the legs. They fell to their knees, large hacking wounds making it impossible for them to walk. A soldier brought his sword down on Duffy’s head, but Duffy simply kept fighting.

  “Get Bronwyn!” Duffy shouted. “Get her and my Gilly out of here. This is my job, brother. This is my fight.”

  Lach looked down at his little brother, so much pain in his heart, but Duffy was right.

  Lach fought his way out of the throng as the first sonic boom hit. Roan had found his way to them and he and his vampires were fighting. So were the men from Aoibhneas. Nate and Zane were fighting, knives in their hands.

  Bron. He had to find Bron.

  And then he saw her. She stood at the clearing, facing the river. She was dressed in nothing but Shim’s battered shirt, her sweetly curved legs bare and her naked feet in the grass. She looked so young and fragile.

  And the hag held her by the neck.

  The hag, with her midnight-black hair and even darker eyes, smiled and held up her hand and in a wink of an eye was gone, her body pulled up by the eddy wind she’d ridden. His sweet Bron vanished.

  Shim came running, but the battle was done. He looked up into the air, lifting his hands. Lach could sense what he was going to do and ran to tackle him. He hit Shim full force and held his hands down.

  “You can’t use your power. You don’t know what that will do.”

  “My power can’t hurt Bron,” Shim insisted. “Fire can’t hurt her. She was in the middle of that fire for minutes when we found her the first time. It knows who its master is.”

  “And air? How about that, Shim? If you burn away the eddy cloud and she falls a hundred or two hundred feet, how will you save her this time?” Lach felt sick.

  And then he felt her. A calm presence. Bronwyn.

  Bring the war to me. Bring them all to me. She won’t kill me. You have time and I have power. I love you. I love you both. Trust in me. Believe in me.

  Lach sat back, her words hitting him like a hammer. He knew what she intended to do.

  “We have to go after her,” Shim said, standing up. “They’ll take her to the palace.”

  It would be the sensible thing to do. He could rally whatever troops were left and he could search for her. He could save her and carry her away and give the fight back to her brothers. He could still have what he wanted.

  But it wasn’t what Bron wanted. What Bron wanted was a chance to end the war. She didn’t want the crown and she no longer wanted revenge. He’d felt that deep in her soul. She wanted to end the war to bring back the kingdom of her youth and to give her people their freedom.

  His wife was a hero and he’d been a coward.

  He shook his head. “No. We go to Aoibhneas. We gather her brothers and whatever troops we have and we march.”

  Shim stared at him for a moment. “But that leaves her in danger.”

  “It leaves her in a place where she can turn the tide.” He didn’t want it. Every cell of his body revolted at the thought, but Bronwyn mattered more.

  “And if she dies?” Shim asked.

  His heart would be a gaping hole. His life would be over. “Then we’ll find her through that door Duffy talked about. We found her once. We’ll find her again. But if we don’t let her try this, she won’t be the same woman we love.”

  Shim took a long breath and held his hand out, gripping Lach’s. “Then we are in agreement. And Lach, I am so sorry. I didn’t mean it. Alive or dead, I am your brother and I love you. I am grateful to be walking and loving our wife.”

  Lach stood. The forest around them was quiet now, the soldiers disappearing with their hag. They had found their prize and once it was in hand, none of the rest of them mattered.

  “Where is Her Highness?” Roan asked.

  “Gone.” The word sounded hollow.

  Dante’s clothes were torn, covered in blood though he bore no mark of his own. It was easy to see how he’d healed so quickly. Kaja bore two holes in her neck. She’d obviously forced her husband to feed and heal after the battle. She looked up with tears in her eyes.

  “Gone? How?” Kaja asked.

  Shim came to his side. “The hag took her, but Bron wanted to go.”

  Dellacourt snarled their direction. “She wanted to be taken? She wanted a hag to cart her back to the very man who had her killed in the first place?”

  Charlie, the boy from Aoibhneas, walked with an arm around each of his fathers. “I can hear her.”

  Shim stepped forward. “What do you mean?”

  Nate looked down at his son. “He’s stronger now, but maybe his time there is still affecting him.”

  Lach wasn’t about to put up with that. He’d been marginalized for far too long. “No. Listen to him. Let him speak. If he says he hears Bronwyn, then I want to know what she’s saying.”

  Charlie looked him in the eye. “She’s not really saying anything, but she’s feeling. She’s feeling strong and she wants the rest of us to feel strong, too. She’s ready.” Charlie stood up, pushed his fathers away a bit. “I’m ready. We’re all going to be ready.”

  Lach nodded, his mission clear. To bring the battle to Bronwyn. Like it or not, he was her soldier now.

  “Lach, you have to come quick.” Gillian was suddenly at his side. Tears streaked down her face. Harry stood behind her, a deep frown creasing his brow.

  Gillian grasped his hand. He allowed himself to be pulled as he looked back at Roan.

  “Prepare to move. We’re heading into Aoibhneas. Someone find that damn phooka. He’ll know a way. He’s herded us to this point. The least he can do is get us where we need to be.” He followed after Gillian and then his heart nearly broke.

  Duffy.

  “He saved me. He fought so hard, but they kept attacking him. Lach, do something. I should be able to heal that wound. I’ve laid hands on him. I’ve sent him everything I have. Why won’t he heal?”

  Tears welled in Lach’s eyes. “Because the dead don’t heal.”

  Shim gasped behind him. “Oh, gods. He died days ago. That’s how you knew I was alive. Because you’ve kept Duffy with us.”

  Duffy’s eyes came open.

  “I’m so sorry, brother.” Lach looked down at the wee gnome who had been his heart friend for as long as he’d known what a heart was. Duffy had been their companion, their playmate.

  “I knew it. I always knew it, brother.” Duffy sat up, looking down at the wound on his chest. It wasn’t bleeding. “I was mad at first, but now I know why I got to stay. I did it, Lach. I fought and I won. I got me battle and I saved me girl. Even though she never was me girl. It don’t matter. I get that now. It don’t matter that she couldn’t love me back. It just matters that I loved her and I got to be a better man because I loved her.”

  Gillian. All those long years, Duffy had still loved Gillian, his childhood crush on her forming the core of his being. Lach had known Duffy had a thing for Gillian. Even from a young age he’d refused to call her sister. He’d loved her from afar and now he’d sacrificed for her.

  Bronwyn loved them back. She didn’t deserve any less. Love was something Lach had worried all of his life. He’d called what he felt for Bronwyn love, but he’d always worried it was more about possession and obsession, that his dark heart couldn’t hold a softer emotion.

  He’d been wrong. He loved his brothers. Loved his father and mother. Loved his
sister.

  Gods, he loved Bronwyn Finn and there was nothing dark about it. She was his light, not Shim. However their soul had split, it was in him to love. His heart wasn’t a cold, dead thing. It was huge and it could only get larger. He loved Bronwyn and that meant loving every piece of her, including the piece that demanded she fight.

  He’d adored the girl who ran through his dreams. He’d lusted after the lover, but he worshipped the woman she’d become. Not simply a princess, but a queen. A woman was always a queen. She was the queen of her home and her family. Bron’s was just bigger than most and like every woman with a family, she would sacrifice. She would make the world right for them, giving her body and soul to those she nurtured and loved.

  He would be strong. His woman had just taught him what his father never had—how to truly be a king.

  He looked at his sister and whispered. “He’s loved you for always. Give him something.”

  She nodded and sank to her knees, tears falling like raindrops. She leaned over and kissed him. “You are my hero, Duffy.”

  A brilliant smile lit Duffy’s face. “That’s all I ever wanted to be.” He gripped her hand, his small compared to hers. He looked up at Lach. “You have to let me go now, brother.”

  Lach knew the moment had been coming from the instant he’d reached out and pulled Duffy from death. He’d felt Duffy die in that black cloud that had been meant for him and he’d reacted. He’d called on his power and brought him back. “I didn’t want to let you go. Not alone, Duffy. I don’t know what’s out there. I didn’t want you to die.”

  Duffy smiled up at him. “Dying ain’t nothing to be afraid of, brother. Be afraid of not living. I got me battle. I got what I always wanted. I got to be a hero. Now, it’s time for me to find another adventure. There’s a door, Lach. It was right there and it was calling to me. And I weren’t alone. I saw me mothers. Both of them. The one what raised me and the one what gave me birth. Lach, death is a doorway. I want to know where it leads. I want the adventure that waits for me and whatever happens, I’ll see you again. I’ll conquer whatever is out there and make a place for us.”