Hollow Earth (Hallowed Realms Book 2)

by Amy Miles

  The cold edge of my brother’s eyes turned on me. For a split second, I saw them narrow. That one gaze made me feel dirty. As if he had lumped me in with my father.

  “Please,” Taryn said from beside me. “I’ll be the last one to stop ya from tearin’ that old goat limb from limb when the times comes, but I need to hear the truth, too, if it is as ya say it is.”

  The calm, clear voice of the girl at my side broke through the waves of anger pouring off my brother. Like a sword parting flesh, it was an immediate reaction that left me almost breathless. I did not know if any of what Alroy claimed was true, but I held no lingering doubt that Taryn was important to him.

  My mother shook Baylor off and moved towards the edge of the platform. When she spoke, she did so to address each person still alive in the courtyard. “The words of my eldest son, Alroy, are true. This girl”—she looked down at Taryn—“is my daughter.”

  “Like hell I am,” Taryn snapped. “I’ve got a ma and you bloody well aren’t her!”

  The queen looked down at her with a sad smile. “I have no reason to lie to you now, Taryn. The words I speak are true. Alroy and Aed are kin to you.”

  “Well, that stings like a bloody arrow in the arse,” I heard Taryn say under her breath, but I was trapped in my own world. Countless scenarios ran through my mind, but none could stick longer than a few seconds.

  “That is why Mother worked so hard to keep you two apart,” Alroy said. It took me several long seconds before I realised that for him to have that sort of knowledge, he would have had to have lorcan on our side of the Wall far sooner than I suspected. He smiled a grotesque but oddly familiar lopsided grin. “I was raised for war, Aed. I know how to play chess with my pawns.”

  I felt weak in the knees. I wasn’t sure if I was holding Taryn up or if she was doing the same for me. I kissed my sister. Thank the gods I didn’t like it.

  I struggled to clear my throat. “I don’t understand.”

  Morrigan finally looked down at me. She couldn’t seem to focus on my face very long before she shifted to look at Taryn. “I only ever wanted to protect you two. Knowing the truth…” She glanced back at the fuming king. “Taryn’s life was in danger from the first moment she was conceived. I’ve tried to spare you, both of you, forever having to know the truth. But, now you do.”

  I made sure Taryn was stable on her feet before I approached the stage. “How? Why? When? How?”

  The rapid-fire questions poured out of me faster than I could silence them. I knew Taryn would be as desperate for answers, so I allowed the madness seeping into my tone to be enough for both of us.

  “It’s no secret that I have no love for your father.” She pressed back her shoulders. For the first time in ages, I saw the woman who had existed before Alroy died. The strong, fierce woman I had loved. “There was another man before Baylor. A human, who was decent, kind and loved me despite our differences.”

  “A human?” both Taryn and I said at the same time. I couldn’t fathom that. My mother, the one who had shown such anger towards Alroy for loving a human, had done the very same thing.

  “Enough of this, Morrigan—” Baylor’s command cut off, and I looked up to see that a lorcan had shoved him. He stumbled forward several feet but came to a stop before colliding with my mother.

  “Alroy was born out of that love.” She raised her chin and announced in a clear tone for all to hear. “Half banshee. Half human. A blend of both races but forced to endure a life thinking he was the son to a deceitful man. As Alroy grew, I saw the terrible damage Baylor was creating in my son and I did as any mother would. I told him the truth so he could be free.”

  Glancing back over my shoulder, I saw that none of this was shocking Alroy.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked my brother.

  If it were possible, his face seemed to soften. “You were Baylor’s son.”

  Those words buried deep in my chest, condemning me for a life I didn’t choose. I looked at my mother and saw sadness pinch her features and I knew. Baylor was my father, not his. That explained why Alroy and I had always been so different, in personality and form. He was light while I was dark. But Taryn…

  “And Taryn was conceived by this human, too?”

  My mother nodded.

  “So she’s my half-sister.” I twined my fingers through Taryn’s to give her what little strength I had left. “That’s why she is blond. Why she has always clashed with Father like Alroy did. Why you hated her so much.”

  “No!” Morrigan nearly fell off the stage when she took that final step. “I have never hated her. I only wanted to protect her. To keep her from being seen and possibly recognized by Baylor. How could I show her love when it was my duty as Baylor’s wife to hate everything she stood for? How could I show her anything but contempt these past months with your father watching my every move? How could I encourage the two of you to be together when I knew the truth?”

  “You almost let her be beheaded!” I raged at my mother.

  “No.” She shook her head. “I saw the look on your face and knew she meant something to you. I only let the events unfold.”

  “She could have died.”

  Morrigan had begun to tremble. “I had faith in you, my son. You are strong-willed like your father. I knew you would find a way to save her.”

  “Hang on a second. I dunna understand,” Taryn said, taking a step towards my mother. “How can I be yours when I ’ave my own family?”

  My mother closed her eyes to the tears that fell. Watching her pain splash across the bodice of her dress, I began to realize it was far more than my brother’s death that had left her mortally wounded and distant.

  “She gave you up,” I said. “There must have been no other way.”

  Taryn looked back at me. Her beautiful eyes looked like a tempest on the sea, stormy and volatile.

  “It’s true,” Morrigan said with a bowed head. “I could not bear the life I’d been forced into. And though I loved Aed, he was too much like his father. Even as a boy. I feared what he might become. I feared the life I would have to endure with Baylor, so I ran back to the only man who had ever loved me. In his arms, I believed in goodness again. That the world could be set right again. But the king is a jealous man, bred for conquest and with an unquenchable thirst for power. When I discovered that I was pregnant again with Taryn, I could not let him have you. And so I entrusted my secret with the only two people closest to me. My healer, who saw to the births of all three of my children, and my loyal guard, who longed for a child of his own.”

  “Da?” Taryn whispered.

  Morrigan nodded. “Baylor flew into a rage when my healer secreted me away for the birth. He suspected my infidelity and in a rage threatened to kill anyone involved.” Her voice broke and tears fell unheeded. “My healer vanished days after the birth. I never saw her again. Not until I caught a glimpse of your wee friend earlier.”

  I looked at Taryn, sure that I would see the confusion in her face, but instead, I saw tears.

  “Tris’s ma was your healer. That’s why she disappeared,” she said, hanging her head.

  Morrigan nodded. “Believe me when I say I never wished any harm to come to her. Kenna was a dear friend. One of the few who understood my misery.”

  I watched my father pacing behind my mother like a lion eager to be free from its pen. But each time he looked up to meet the gaze of a lorcan, he withheld his outbursts. For once, the old man was silent.

  “Mother knew that if she gave you to your human father, Baylor would find you,” I said. “So she gave you to her guard, your father, to care for. But the king would have suspected his involvement in helping to secret my mother away for the birth. As punishment, your father must have been sent to serve at the Wall.”

  Taryn’s hands trembled as she covered her mouth. “It’s all my fault. His wounds. His decreased station. All because of me.”

  I reached for Taryn, but she moved to the side. The tension in her body sca
red me. I worried she would lash out at my mother or Alroy. Neither would be a good option. So, I did the only thing I could. I tried to stall.

  “Is Taryn’s biological father alive still?”

  Taryn gasped. The thought must not have occurred to her.

  It was Alroy who responded. “Yes. I sought him out years ago. He is a kind man, as Mother says. He knew about you, little sister. It pained him to know he had to let you go so you could live. But he loved you enough to never speak to you when he saw you passing on the street. It was enough to see you.”

  “He could see me?” I could see Taryn mulling over what that could mean. But I already knew. That explained why Devlin could see her. She was half human. That meant they shared a connection on a physical level. She turned to glare at Baylor. “You son of a—”

  Shite.

  I leapt and grabbed hold of Taryn as she lunged. I wasn’t sure what she thought she would do when she got to my father. She probably hadn’t thought that through.

  “You are angry,” Morrigan called and I felt Taryn quake in my arms. She turned to face her. “I understand and I wish there could have been another way.”

  “Are ya seriously goin’ to stand there and tell me there was nothin’ more ya could have done? Ya slept next to that monster every night. Ya could have put a knife to his throat a thousand times and put us all out of his misery.”

  “And how exactly would I kill the very man who held death in his hand by the stroke of his pen?” Morrigan said. “It’s not such an easy task, I assure you.”

  I was too busy staring in shock at Taryn to see Baylor’s attack before it was too late. My mother’s gargled cry sent Alroy into action.

  “Stay back,” Baylor demanded. The blade held to Morrigan’s throat did not flinch. It pressed tight against her flesh, just shy of puncturing her skin.

  Alroy’s enraged growl rumbled in my chest. In a single leap, he landed on the stage. The supports groaned, threatening to collapse under his weight. He seized poor Hadley by the hair, yanking her up from the ground where she cowered. Her pitiful screeching cries had me rushing to the stage.

  “Alroy, stop!” I held out my hand to him. “She is innocent.”

  “You care more for her life than that of our mother?” Hard ridges of stone appeared on his face, making his grimace look utterly terrifying.

  “No. Of course not. The king would not dare harm her.” I glared at my father. If there was one thing I knew about Baylor it was that self-preservation was his greatest tool. “He still needs Mother’s money to run the kingdom.”

  Baylor snarled. “You know nothing, boy.”

  I should have seen it coming, but my mind couldn’t quite catch up. The instant Baylor sliced my mother’s throat, Hadley’s sudden scream and the scent of blood filled the air. I wasn’t sure where to look first—at the still-beating heart in the hand Alroy had shoved through Hadley’s chest, or at the crimson sheet of rain pouring from my mother’s throat.

  “No!”

  I ran for my mother and caught her before she tumbled off the front of the stage. Her dead weight fell on me as I crashed to the ground. Blood slicked my clothes as I turned her over. I knew until the day I died I would never get the sound of her gasping for breath out of my mind. Blood bubbled around my fingers as I tried to staunch the blood flow. Her face grew pale. Her eyes wide with terror and a pain I couldn’t begin to imagine.

  Taryn collapsed beside me, her arms hugging me, but it wasn’t tight enough to hold me together. I threw back my head and wailed as Baylor turned tail and ran. The bastard only cared about saving his own skin. From somewhere in the back of my mind, I heard Alroy yell out a command to retrieve the king, but I didn’t care.

  “I’m so sorry,” I whispered as I brushed the hair back from my mother’s face. “For everything.”

  I didn’t know what I was apologizing for. It could have been one thing or a million. At that moment, I needed her to know I forgave her for going cold when Alroy died and when she was forced to endure giving up her only daughter all alone. I understood now the depths of pain with which she had lived. And I’d never been given the chance to help her.

  “I love you,” I whispered, but when I looked down at her glassy eyes, she was already gone. Hunching my shoulders, I cradled her into my chest and wept.

  Epilogue

  Devlin

  From the torchlight outside, we saw every horrific detail of Hadley’s and the queen’s death from the safety of the manor house. What we hadn’t been able to make out was anything they were saying. Muffled shouts were as best as we got, but one thing was clear, that massive lorcan was now calling the shots. It wasn’t safe here. I didn’t think Taryn would be able to fight her way out of here. She did have her weapons and Aed, though he seemed too distraught to be much good in combat.

  “Devlin,” came a small whisper.

  I whipped around from my crouched position near the window and saw Tris and Seamus. We’d gotten separated in the confusion.

  Relief flooded over me seeing them alive after the chaos we’d been through. The shade of Seamus’s face gave me reason to worry, however.

  “Is he hurt?” I whispered.

  She shook her head. “No. He just picked the ultimate worst time to go through withdrawal. I haven’t been able to boil any water to mix in with the crushed Chinois Root.”

  By the look of things, she wouldn’t be able to find that any time soon.

  “I know where the kitchen is,” Alana said beside me. It was the first thing she’d said since we took shelter in the house.

  “No. It’s too dangerous. We have to get out of here...or wait it out,” I said, not knowing which path would provide the worst fate.

  Unfortunately, the decision was made for us.

  Just then about a dozen lorcan burst into the house.

  Alana and Tris shrieked while Seamus and I did our best to hold the same position. He was useless, riddled as he was with fever, but he wasn’t about to let them take his love without some sort of a fight.

  They didn’t attack, however. They only shrieked and pointed outside. They weren’t going to kill us...yet, but they did want us herded outside.

  Seeing no real choice in the matter, we obeyed their order. Beside me, Alana was stiff as a board as she watched the lorcan around us as they forced us back to where Taryn and Aed were.

  One of the lorcan beside me made a series of grunts, causing Alana to scream again. She buried her face into my chest as I pulled her in close, trying to shield her from the noise. When we were front and centre, the largest of the lorcan turned towards us.

  “Ah, we have company?” he said.

  “Alroy, leave them alone,” Taryn said. That thing had a name and it spoke English. “They aren’t part of Netherworld,” she continued. “They’re human!”

  “Are they now?” The beast she called Alroy laughed. “Yes. I can smell the mortality on them.”

  Outside, it was clear to see why Taryn had wanted us to seek shelter inside. All around us was a sea of dead or dying villagers or lorcan ash. If Alroy was on a killing spree of this level, I didn’t see what chance talking him down would do.

  The lorcan seemed to consider her plea, which I couldn’t wrap my head around. How was she able to speak with them? Every other time, these things couldn’t be rationalized with. This lorcan seemed more civilized somehow, which was ironic given the body count.

  “Leave the humans, for now. Bring me the king. Alive. I’m not done with him,” Alroy said with a voice that was eerily calm.

  I turned my head to see the king in the distance mounting a horse from one of his fallen guards. The poor creature was coated in blood and terrified. The king took no pity on the horse and dug his heels into its side, causing it to break into a full run away from the wreckage. Alroy didn’t seem the least bit concerned with his attempted escape.

  As one unit, a group of five lorcan turned their focus on the king.

  My eyes widened as I looked at Taryn. He
r expression seemed to be saying what I was thinking. The lorcan had a leader, and we were no match for them in a group. We’d barely managed to take one of them down. There was no way we’d defeat this many.

  “What do ya want from us, Alroy?” Taryn hissed once the small band of lorcan had left. We were still outnumbered with no hope of escape, so I wasn’t sure where she got the courage to snap at the thing.

  “You know what I want,” Alroy said, turning his black hulking figure towards her. “You.”

  The hell he was gonna touch her. Before thinking it through, I shoved Alana off to Tris. I hopped onto the stage and wedge myself between the lorcan and Taryn.

  “You won’t be laying a bloody finger on her,” I shouted as I cleared the platform. I’d only gotten a few feet when Alroy’s blade was digging into my throat. I hadn’t even seen his arm move. He was too fast for my eyes. All around me, lorcan swooped in, their loud cries deafening me.

  “No!” Taryn yelled, pushing her way towards me. “I’ll go with you. Just don’t hurt him. Don’t hurt anyone else!”

  Alroy looked at Taryn and then at me as though understanding our situation. This seemed to please him. “So, you care for a human?” Alroy said, but he didn’t drop the blade. In fact, if anything, he pushed harder. “Perhaps we are more alike than I thought.”

  My nostrils flared and my hands balled into useless fists. I’d seen what Alroy and his crew could do, and yet I had put myself in danger in a feeble attempt to protect Taryn. Because of my foolishness, I had put her into a worse situation. She now felt she had to protect me and was agreeing to whatever his demands were.

  “Come.” The lorcan waved to Taryn. “It is time to go. I will spare what is left of your town if you come willingly.”

  “Where are you taking her?” I asked, feeling the edge of his blade bite against my neck as I spoke.

  Alroy’s reptilian-looking face seemed to sneer at me.

  “He has a fighter’s spirit, this one. He reminds me of you, Aed.”

  Aed was glaring at us from where he sat, his dead mother still bleeding out in his arms. His demeanor shifted from one of shock to one of ultimate revenge.