by C. L. Roman
John was a fine man. And he raised Ryan as if he were his own. It's true, and something for which I've always been grateful. But he didn't father my eldest son.
"Then who did?" Maeve glanced at Jackson as the question left her lips.
That is my own business and none of yours. The point is, he was Fomorian.
“That still puts Jackson short of the half-Fomorian status the law requires,” Maeve said.
Maybe, maybe not. But, regardless of what the law says, the link to Fomora is there whether you have one drop or a whole body filled with Fomorian blood. You have as much right to her magick as any pureborn in Aelfholm.
The writing continued, but Jackson closed the book, hiding it.
"Jacks, you need to —"
"I need time to think," Jackson said, and walked away across the meadow. By the time he returned, it was growing dark. Maeve looked up from the cook-fire as he approached.
"What have you decided?" she asked.
He accepted the plate of food she offered and sat down. "About what? I didn't notice Balor offering me any choices."
"There is always a choice. Even now, you can choose to fight or hide."
He stiffened. "I am not a coward."
"Self-preservation is not cowardice. And in this situation, staying hidden might be the wisest course. Stay here, at least until you learn to control both sides of your magick. Balor can't get to you here. He can only wait until you come out."
"And what about you? Will you stay here with me?"
She looked away. "I'll stay as long as I can."
"Don't do me any favors, Maeve. You don't owe me anything." He stood with his back to the fire, looking up at the brilliant canopy of stars above them.
"I owe you my life." She walked up behind him, laying her hand on his shoulder.
"We both know that isn't true. You weren't in danger from Balor that day. And even if you were, there was nothing I could have done about it."
"You didn't know that. Why did you attack him, Jackson? You were a child. You had to have known you were no match for him, yet you launched yourself at him like a fury straight from hell. If determination were all it took, Balor wouldn't be a problem right now."
He faced her, brushing the dark fall of her hair back from her face. "Even then I knew you were worth protecting." He gave a short laugh. "Not that you needed my help. As I recall, Balor is the one who came away scarred, and it wasn't me who marked him."
"Even then?" She stepped closer, into his embrace. "And what do you know now?"
He kissed her, his lips brushing hers, tentative at first, then with growing heat. Finally, he drew back. "Now, I know I was right. Whether you need protecting or not, I'll always need to keep you safe."
She wound her arms around his neck, rising up on her toes to press her lips to his. His arms tightened around her, returning her embrace, his hands sliding down to her hips to draw her tighter against him.
"We all need protection, Jacks. Just not from the same things."
He leaned back, looking into her eyes. "And what do you need protection from?"
She smiled up at him. "You, mostly."
Their lips met again as she threaded her fingers through his hair. He trailed kisses along her jaw and down her neck, pushing her tunic off her shoulders as she strained closer to him.
Jackson lifted her into his arms and strode into the hut, passion rising through him in a hot tide. Deep inside, something bright and electric woke, sending waves of sensation from his core to his fingertips. Maeve groaned as he laid her on the bed. Unbuttoning his shirt, she pushed the cloth aside, baring his chest to her questing lips.
He cupped her cheek, brushing his thumb along her lips as she looked up at him. Her eyes widened, and her body went still.
"Jackson, does this always happen when you make love?"
Startled, he stared at her. "Does what always happen?"
She waved her hand, indicating his torso. "The glowing."
"The glowing?" Jackson looked down at himself. His skin shone with a pale blue light. He cleared his throat and sat up, holding his hands up to look at them. "Umm. Nope. This is definitely a first."
Curious, he focused on the light, willing it to gather in his palm. It complied, flowing from the rest of his body into a four-inch ball in his hand. With it concentrated like this, he could see green strands in the luminescence, separate from, yet intertwined with the blue.
"Gaimora," Maeve whispered.
He looked at her in confusion. "What?"
"I read about it in some of the ancient texts I studied for my thesis." She sat up, drawing her knees under her. "Most of the research I did indicated that Gaian and Fomorian magicks are incompatible. They fight against each other, the stronger practitioner inevitably destroying the weaker. In the case of crossbreeds like yourself, they usually make for a less powerful mage. Neala was an exception." She looked up at him. "I never knew how she did it until I found a couple of manuscripts that referenced something called Gaimora, where a mage was able to balance the two. Weave them together, so to speak. The ability is incredibly rare."
He concentrated, and the ball shrank to the size of a marble. He played with it, manipulating it between his fingers, over the back of his hand and back to his palm. It sat there, pulsing slightly.
"It feels... happy," he said with a note of awe in his voice.
"This is what your grandmother was talking about," Maeve said. "Finding the balance."
"If that's true, why couldn't I do it before? I sure as hell didn't do anything different. I didn't even try to call it this time."
She shrugged. "You stopped fighting it." She kissed him. "You stopped fighting yourself."
He kissed her back and released the magick. The blue-green energy flooded over them, embracing them in light.
Chapter Seventeen
Balor sat alone in the darkened room, a scrying bowl on the table before him. His muttered incantation stirred the water and a picture formed. The hotel room, Balor standing over Jackson, so close to victory. He watched as the green shards of magick poured from the shield edge, crushing the human against the wall. Maeve hung suspended on the opposite side of the room, helpless.
Balor grinned.
His smile faded as he watched the saltbox sail through the air, snowing over him in the picture, breaking the miniature Balor's concentration. Maeve's prison dissolved, the purple streaks of her magick shoving it aside with ease. She dropped to the floor, but instead of facing her captor, she ran to the human and threw her arms around him. The human nodded and...
Balor stiffened, leaning forward over the bowl. His gaze sharpened.
"Stad," he muttered. "Dularias."
The image halted and then rewound.
"Argaith gomal."
It moved forward, like a series of pictures rather than a movie. Each frame showed the next, incremental movement.
"There," Balor rasped. A pulse of clear light, infinitesimal, but at this speed, unmistakable. He nudged the point of light with his little finger. "Motfeil."
The image zoomed in, fixating on the point where Balor's nail touched the water. When Jackson's wrist took up the entire bowl, Balor leaned back, satisfied.
"Now it makes sense," he said, a plan already forming in his mind.
***
When Jackson left the hut the next morning, the grimoire lay open on the table, its pages already covered in spidery text.
You're out of time, boy. He's taken them.
A dull thud in his chest warned him he would not like the answers, but he had to ask. "Taken who? What are you talking about Gran?"
"Your family." Maeve stumbled out of the hut, her hair wild about her shoulders, cell phone in her hand. "Or, at least your mother and sister. Arcadia just messaged me. Her contacts in the upper realm are talking about a kidnapping that's all over the news. He made it about as public as he could without taking out an ad in the Times."
"Balor?" Jackson asked. "Why involve my family? Th
ey aren't a part of this."
The spellbook jumped, drawing his gaze down. They are a part of you, and so they are a part of this. Balor always was a ruthless bastard.
"Dinael would never sanction this," Maeve said, but her eyes held doubts.
Dinael will, no doubt, chastise his dog later. But in the meantime, he wants the power returned, and you back home. I doubt he cares much how it's accomplished.
"But why the sudden attack?" Jackson asked. "Balor had to know we'd surface sooner or later. If all he wants is for Maeve to come home and to take back the magick you gave me, he could have waited. Why kidnap my family?"
He can't just take what I gave you. For the magick to return, you must die. The longer you stay here in the protected place Solcruth made for you, the more strength and experience you will gain, putting his victory in doubt. And then too, Balor never was the most patient of persons.
"No," Maeve agreed. "But he isn't stupid either. The Lower Realm has strict laws regarding inter-realm relations. Kidnapping humans breaks several of them, not to mention murder. He wouldn't risk breaking Fomorian law if patience would get him what he wants." She looked at Jackson. "Neala’s right. He knows about Solcruth, and he doesn't want to give you time to master her."
Jackson nodded. "You said he was ambitious."
He is that. His father ruled Aelfholm before Bran's father, Aidan, deposed and imprisoned him. Balor was not more than a child at the time, but it was said he swore to retake the throne, even then.
"But he's Dinael's agent. If he wanted the throne back, why work for the crown instead of trying to take it?" Jackson asked.
"Dinael commands the Fomorian Guard," Maeve said. "They are an elite fighting force, and fiercely loyal to our family. Even Balor isn't arrogant enough to believe he can take them on and win."
Not to mention Balor's healthy sense of self-preservation. He may hold the Eye, but Dinael holds the Eilimenti. In single combat, a contest between them would be catastrophic. At least one of them would die, and there's no certainty which one.
"So, it's a stalemate," Jackson said. "But if Balor had another stone of power..."
Maeve's hands tightened into fists. "Even the guard couldn't contain him. Balor could use the combined power of the Eye and Solcruth to destroy Dinael, take the Eiliminti, and reclaim the throne."
Jackson's mouth settled into a grim line. "I don't think I want him using my family to claim anything."
"You can't let him lure you out, Jacks. He is an archmage. You don't have a chance of defeating him with magick."
"I can't let him hurt my family, Maeve. You know that. If facing him will keep them safe, then that's what I'll do." He ducked into the hut and came back out with Solcruth clenched in his fist.
"This is exactly what he wants. You're playing into his hands."
Balancing the sapphire in his palm, he held out his other hand next to it and closed his eyes. In the space between one blink and the next, a pistol materialized in his palm. His fingers curled around the forty-five-caliber weapon.
Maeve's mouth dropped open. "A gun? Of all the magick and weaponry Solcruth could have provided, you asked for a gun? Balor is going to love this."
He arched a sardonic brow. "Far be it from me to disappoint the man," he said. Slipping the stone back around his wrist, he opened his arms to her, and she embraced him.
"This is crazy, Jacks. You know it is," she said.
"Ssh. We don't have time to figure something else out. If he can't get to me, is there any doubt that he'll kill them?"
Reluctantly, she shook her head and then kissed him. "We'll face him together then. Together maybe..."
He smiled sadly. "I appreciate the offer, but no." Before she could stop him, he covered the top of her head with his hand. "Sleep, beloved," he whispered, and azure mist filtered over her.
Caught by surprise, her eyes were closed before she could protest, and she collapsed into his waiting arms. "Oh man, are you going to be pissed when you wake up," he said. Jackson carried her into the hut they'd shared and laid her gently on the bed. He touched her cheek. "Don't be too mad," he whispered.
Moving away from her, he closed his eyes. "Create a place where Balor can find me, but we'll have a level playing field," he said.
Chapter Eighteen
For the first time in her life, Brenna Delaney wished for a little magic. Perhaps if she'd been less adamant about living an “ordinary” life, Ryan would still be alive, and they wouldn't be in this mess.
She looked down and stroked Shawna's hair. Their kidnapper had hit her daughter with some kind of spell when she tried to fight him, and Shawna hadn't woken since. Brenna shook her head. The glimmer of light she thought she'd seen flickering between Shawna's fingers when she attacked him had to have been a figment of Brenna's imagination. Real or fantasy, it hadn't helped.
Now her daughter lay with her blond hair spilling over Brenna's lap, her face pale and lax, a thin line of blood trailing from her ear. Brenna checked Shawna's pulse again, relieved to find that it was still strong.
Torchlight flared from the walls, unsteady and dim, creating more smoke than illumination. Cold seeped up from the stone beneath her, making her bones ache, but there was no furniture to sit on, and no windows to look out of. How they'd gotten in here in the first place was beyond her, since she hadn't been able to find an entry or exit of any kind. The walls were rough, and bled moisture that she wasn't entirely sure was water.
A green flare blinded her momentarily. When she opened her eyes again, he was standing there, frowning at her.
"I was certain he would have come for you by now, but as it is, I am beginning to think I might have made a mistake. You are Brenna Delaney, correct?”
Brenna blinked at him. "Who are you, and what are you talking about?" she asked.
He crouched down in front of her, tilting his head. "Forgive me. I forget at times that you are only human and likely have no idea what is happening, let alone the capacity to figure it out. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Balor, an emissary of Dinael, King of Aelfholm."
Brenna bit back a laugh. "Wow. A bit pompous, aren’t we?" His face darkened, and she hid a grin. "You don't look much like a diplomat." She eyed him with caution. The four long scars on his cheek were grim indicators that this was no mere messenger. "And you don't act like one either. You do know that kidnapping is illegal, right?"
Balor's mouth flattened into a thin line, and he straightened. "I am an official of the royal court. And more powerful than you know. You would do well to keep that in mind."
"I don't know where this Aelfholm is, but I'm willing to bet they don't like kidnappers there either. Not to mention men who prey on the helpless."
"I can assure you, your little witch there is far from helpless. The spell she tried to cast would have caused me considerable discomfort if I had allowed her to finish it."
"My daughter is not a witch," Brenna said, her voice rising. "And any pain she might have caused a... person... such as yourself is entirely deserved, I'm sure."
He crouched down again, balancing on the balls of his feet. "Keep your illusions, mistress. I don't really care what you believe. What I would like to know is where your son is." His eyes narrowed. "Jackson Delaney is your son?"
"Well, of —" She stopped speaking abruptly, wariness rising in her gut. "I don't know any Jackson Delaney," she said.
He slapped her, and she tasted blood. "Don't lie to me. You aren't good at it, and I hate wasting time. Try again."
Brenna's eyes glinted. "You know, I've always hated bullies." She put the tip of her tongue out, exploring the cut in her lip. "What do you want with this man anyway?"
"Let's just say he's stolen something, and I am charged with getting it back."
"Jackson would never steal," Brenna said.
Balor's eyes lit. "He is your son then."
"I never said any such thing."
"You didn't have to. There's a certain lilt in a mother's voice when she says the
name of her child. It is there in yours when you speak of him. Now, where would he go to hide from me?"
Brenna shrugged, careful not to dislodge Shawna's head from her lap. "Jackson's never hidden from trouble in his life. I doubt he'd start for a nasty piece of filth such as yourself."
Balor drew his hand back, but Brenna didn't flinch. "Go ahead, hit me again. Much good it will do you." Her stare could have frozen the sun, and Balor lowered his hand.
"You have courage. I'll give you that." He grabbed a handful of Shawna's hair and ripped her from Brenna's grasp. "But tell me, which of your children do you love more?" he asked and flicked a spray of green light into the younger woman's face.
The spell spread over her as Shawna awoke with a shriek, grasping at his wrist to ease the tension on her scalp.
Brenna lurched to her feet. "Let her go," she screamed. "I don't know where Jackson is! We haven't heard from him in days."
The sickly green glow oozed over Shawna's head, and she clawed at his hand frantically. Sparks flickered spasmodically from her fingertips, and he laughed. "You'll find that only I can work magick here, child," he said. "Part of the beauty of creating your own holding cells. You can design them to hold specific individuals regardless of their talents, and without impacting your own." He shook her once. "So, unlike yours, my spells work perfectly. And this one will smother you in under a minute if your mother does not answer my questions."
Brenna launched herself at him with a banshee screech, hands extended like talons.
Balor snapped his fingers, and a flash of green slammed Brenna into the cave wall. She slumped to the ground, dazed.
Giving up on her casting, Shawna jabbed three stiff fingers into his throat. Gasping, Balor dropped her. "You bitch," he rasped, staggering backward.
"You bet your ass." Shawna hit the floor running, Balor's suffocation spell dissipating behind her like fog in the morning sun. She skidded to her knees next to Brenna. "Mom? Are you all right?"
"She is fine. You, on the other hand, are a dead witch walking." Balor palmed a sphere of cold, glowing jade. It floated an inch from his skin, shot through with jagged black streaks.