by S A Archer
And after millennia of wasting his life, he would not allow himself to be swept away without every resistance.
But how to find and bind himself to the ley lines? Mckenna had given him no clue, if he knew any clues to give.
Around him, certain sensations appeared muted, while others seemed heightened. Where his hands and knees propped his tired self over the ground, he felt very little by way of touch, like a numbness. Scents reached him as sharp as ever, and the cooking smells of the camp behind the wagon found him, just as the grass of the field, the lingering mud of the not fully dry ground after a rain, and the sparse huddles of trees. His vision was not so clear. Like a blue tint muted the colors of life. He still saw nothing of himself, although he knew the placement of his non-physical body as perfectly as he would have his physical one. Sounds, though, seemed to carry with even more clarity.
And through the constant mumble of voices, he caught the sound of a familiar one.
One that spoke his name.
…Lugh…
He’d missed the sentence that framed the word, but he knew the voice immediately.
Jhaer.
Or Donovan, as he’d taken to calling himself.
Lugh managed to raise his form to his feet and balance himself there against the gravity of fatigue.
And then he walked forward, too exhausted to attempt any fancy, spirit-like sort of gliding motion, toward the trees and brush line that bordered the northern side of the pasture. Lugh followed the voice. Followed it to its source. To the group of Unseelie hiding like thieves in the bushes, watching the wood elf camp.
They saw him not, even as Lugh glared at them. Donovan was closest to the pasture, the Sidhe that had been his second at the parley standing by his right hand. They had come to stop him. To foil his plans for no other purpose than to be vindictive. Such was the nature of the Unseelie, to create impediment. Lugh snarled at Donovan. Feeling his fangs, even in this memory of his physical shape.
Donovan turned toward Lugh, and for a moment, he thought the Unseelie assassin could see him. But rather, he was looking through him.
Lugh turned to see what caught his interest.
The scrawny earthborn who stole the flute from the museum, the one London had called Malcolm, came toward them. But it wasn’t Donovan his face raised toward.
He stared right into Lugh’s eyes.
It was startling to say the least, after no other had acknowledged him.
The lad hauled back his hand as if to punch.
And then he did.
Driving his fist right into Lugh’s chest.
The pain of it seared his soul, bringing a scream that shattered his focus. Utter blackness, as cold as the center of a stone, crackled and spread through Lugh’s entire being. Slicing at him and fracturing his mind.
The lad grinned evilly and then yanked back his hand with peals of laughter. “Now that!” He pointed right at Lugh. “Was brilliant!”
Lugh crumbled, gripping at his chest as frozen agony blossomed within him more horribly than when he’d consumed the dark magic.
He felt himself falling into blackness.
And then jerked away from them, as if some rope yanked him backward so fast the world blurred.
Chapter Eleven
Donovan heard the intake of Malcolm’s breath. When he turned to look at the bloodhound, the lad was frozen. Holding himself with the utter stillness that the fey could do when extremely intense. He stared at seemingly nothing, though Donovan knew there must be something of magic there. The boy unerringly sensed every nuance of it. And whatever this was, caught his attention with a powerful focus. Keeping his voice low so the wood elves nearby could not hear, he asked, “What is it?”
Malcolm moved, but just barely, manipulating something Donovan couldn’t see. It was a small movement, like he didn’t want anyone to see him do it, but from the shape his hands took, it appeared as if Malcolm balled up something.
Then he rushed a step forward and punched his arm out hard into nothingness. He gave a grunt of effort as he shoved his hand forward and then jumped back. Grinning, he bounced on the balls of his feet, laughing wildly. “Now that!” Malcolm pointed at nothing with youthful glee. “Was brilliant!
A serious set fixed Donovan’s expression. “What did you do?”
Malcolm shook his head, still overcome with his random glee. “You should have seen it. It was savage!” The earthborns used the slang ‘savage’ to mean ‘wonderful’, but from Malcolm it sounded truly wicked. The bloodhound ran on magic instinct, and more than once it’d been dangerous.
“No one can hear him,” Kieran reassured them, even though he glanced around as if to be certain that his mastery over sound fully muffled this outburst.
Tiernan leaned around Donovan, mistrust hard on the fellow’s features as he hissed at Malcolm, “Have you lost your sense?”
A scream, sounding as much animal as man, tore through the air. The birds of the meadow took flight at the horror of it.
Donovan snapped his head toward Malcolm, demanding, “What did you do?”
The lad’s grin faltered. Blinking, he settled in an instant beneath the weight of Donovan’s fury. “Just… The Seelie was here, like a ghost or something. All gross and broken inside.” He made a scooping gesture against his chest. “I jammed a bunch of Trip’s magic into his chest. It went wild inside him, like a ball of snakes.”
“You did what?” The boy had kept the magic he’d ripped out of himself? Used it like a weapon? Carelessly infecting the Shining One with Trip’s darkness?
Another monstrous scream roared from the camp.
It was a scream Donovan knew.
“All-mother’s tears…” He spun back toward the camp. Toward the main wagon, where elves fled, screaming in terror, as if the sluagh themselves were inside.
Only what was within was far worse than the sluagh.
“What the bloody hell is that?” Tiernan drew out a handful of throwing knives and dropped them. Before they could hit the ground they hesitated, just above the grass, then floated up around him like sprites, his power over metal making them conform to his will.
“The Eclipse.” Donovan pushed forward. He’d witnessed the Eclipse the last time it happened and the ensuing carnage. “Malcolm, can you pull back the magic you stuck into him?”
Malcolm’s eyes unfocused and then he shook his head. “No.”
Donovan snapped out orders, “Earthborns, backup and defense. Stay away from Lugh. If he gets the chance, he’ll kill you.” He flicked a hand to Tiernan, commanding him to go wide right toward the camp. He, himself, jogged directly toward the building from where the howl came.
And from which the screams of pained and panicked wood elves now spilled.
The beast was loosed. Now blood would spill.
Chapter Twelve
Lugh plummeted backward, landing back within his body with a jolt that made the universe spin. Clawing his chest, he fought to tear out the magic writhing within him like serpents. His own screaming bounced around him, mingling with the shouts of the elves that scrambled to grab him. He flailed, backhanding someone away. Kicking against the power within, he impacted yet another body, knocking it back across the room with the crash of furniture.
Choking and twisting, his body jerked out of his control. Rapid spasms beat him about the bed. Even growling and fighting himself, he couldn’t slow the racking of his form.
“He’s seizing!” Niamh screamed, “Protect his head!”
“Lugh!” London’s voice ripped the chaos.
“Stay back! You can’t help him!” Another shouted.
Within him, the beast he’d become with the dark enchantment burst forth like a panther as sleek as midnight. It dove into the mass of serpents, atta
cking and rending the foreign magic that slithered and twisted like coils of a snake. The serpents snapped out with dozens of heads that clamped poisoned fangs into the panther, subsuming it within its mass of slithering, sleek coils.
Chapter Thirteen
London rushed toward Lugh. His body jerked violently as the seizure tore at him with merciless power. Even as she reached for him, screaming his name, Kev caught her about the waist and lifted her off her feet to yank her back. She struggled against his embrace, but knew there was nothing medically or magically that she could do for Lugh.
Not that anyone else seemed to have any better ideas than she. One of Cai’s young apprentices took a hit to the jaw, and the lad went down in an unconscious huddle, not to get back up. Mckenna caught a foot in the chest that drove him back, crashing into the table of spell items and potions, sending the mess crashing to the floor with him. The wood elf king did find his feet, but stayed back this time.
Cai managed to hook an arm around Lugh’s upper body, keeping him from pitching into the floor or smashing his skull against the headboard. Niamh caught Lugh’s face between her fingers, holding on to him even as he flailed.
She screamed over the panic, “What’s happening!?!”
“Unseelie!” The accusation ripped from his throat with singular, deadly fury. With a roaring scream like a barbarian’s war cry, Lugh’s arm swept out. He twisted as he swung, flinging everyone away from him.
Almost as suddenly he was on his feet on the bed. The seizure was gone. So were the whites of his eyes. What little blond was left to his hair was choked out with an inky blackness. Spreading black stain bled in his skin around his eyes, spreading out like infection. His torn shirt half hung on him still, ripped open to show the wounds from him clawing at himself. Blood streaked down his chest and left tacky trails down his slacks.
Mckenna shouted, “Bloody hell! Get away from him! Get out! Get out!”
Not fast enough. Cai took a fist to the throat that wrenched with the snap of bone.
Lugh snatched Niamh by her braid, yanking her up to him. His fangs ripped at her throat, cutting off her scream. Mckenna tried to snatch her away, but Lugh clutched the elven king’s face in his hand, and flung him backward into the wall again, rocking the wagon with the impact.
Lugh spun toward London and Kev. Even as she preyed that his token would stop him this time, she reached for her gun. Maybe a wounding shot could bring him down before the beast killed them all.
Kev snatched London and, with a sudden rush, they were gone. Teleported away.
The force of the pull and the sudden change in the pitch of the ground sent London tumbling. Kev caught her and the two of them dropped down for cover behind her car in the shade of the tree.
Below them the chaos spread into the pasture. London recognized the Unseelie right away, their line spread out, covering the open space before the camp. She hissed, “This is so not good.”
And then Lugh emerged from the wagon. Tall and dark, baring fangs at them as he hissed. “Archers!”
And a line of elven archers appeared over the rise behind the camp. Their bows raised skyward.
Lugh swept his arm toward the Unseelie before him. “Fire!”
A flight of arrows soared over the camp in a high arch, aimed to pitch in a steep drop right into the center of the pasture. Right at Donovan and his small band of Unseelie.
“No!” She fought to get to her feet, panic overtaking her. The need to reach Lugh burning like a madness.
“Quiet!” Kev shouted into her ear, dragging her back with too strong arms. “You’ll die in the crossfire.”
“But Lugh!” She struggled.
“No!” Kev jerked her hard. “Listen to me!”
Against her wishes, she stopped fighting him.
“We wait and we watch for our chance to move.”
And even though she knew that made sense, she didn’t want to agree.
“Lugh’s a fighter and he’s possessed by something you can’t handle.” Kev drew her down behind the car. “He’ll get through this, even if he leaves no survivors. And then we follow him.”
The sound from her was a grumbling whimper of frustration. She wouldn’t leave her patron. Not to Donovan and his Unseelie.
She’d watch for her chance.
Chapter Fourteen
Malcolm didn’t need Donovan to tell him that he’d made a hash of the situation. All up until the screaming, Malcolm thought he’d been wickedly clever, getting the drop on the Seelie while he used some kind of magic to sneak up on them. All he knew was that the Seelie hadn’t been a ghost, no matter what he’d looked like, because Malcolm had seen fey die and he’d never seen their spirit rise up from them.
Besides, the Seelie looked more like the ghost of a zombie than the ghost of a man. All frayed and shot through with inky black magic like some kind of sticky rot.
And that rot had attacked the black mass of Trip’s magic and exploded like a purple supernova from the heart of Lugh’s magic. Seemed like something like that should have killed him. Or messed him up real good and make him easy for the others to bring down.
Not turn him into some furious psycho.
Which is what he looked like when he burst out onto the porch of the trailer and shouted for the archers to fire.
In all his life, Malcolm had never seen the like. A bunch of arrows whooshed up high into the air… and then tilted downward, aimed right at them.
Beside Malcolm, Kieran arched back to watch the incoming volley. “Bloody crap!”
Mind racing, Malcolm tried to think which of the earthborns could defeat that. Bryce would more likely make the arrows flaming, rather than incinerate them. And he couldn’t be sure Kieran could vibrate them off course enough to make a difference.
Donovan called out, “Tiernan!”
The metal Sidhe lifted his hands towards the volley of arrows and then swept his arm away from them and toward the empty woods. A hundred threads of magnetic power flicked out fast as the beat of a pixie’s wing, and snared every last one of the metal arrowheads in flight, and then whipped the lot of them off into the woods.
That’s when things went wild.
The popping of teleportation sent ripples through the makeshift village and there was no doubt where they were headed. “Incoming!” Malcolm shouted to the earthborns. Magic bunched in the air as dozens of teleportation points shimmered to their left and right. “Flanking attacks!” He pointed as Trip and Kieran prepared their combo attack for the right side, mixing precisely aimed piercing sound and blinding shadows that encased the elves that appeared, scattering the attack.
Bryce swept a stream of fire back and forth in the air, just as the elves on the left appeared, driving them back.
Malcolm drew his long knife from his thigh, his only weapon without magic of his own to wield. Over his shoulder, he snapped at Dawn. “Get behind Glamour!”
A pink hue washed over her, creating a barrier that made her invisible to others. Malcolm watched her rush away from where she’d been, in case someone might have seen her vanish and searched for her there. As the healer, she lacked the will to fight, though Donovan insisted that she learn to defend herself. Her value, though, was in her magic and Malcolm would do what he could to keep himself between her and the onrush of elves.
With an animal roar, a massive bear glowing with a pink aura lumbered through Bryce’s flames, unharmed by the onslaught. Bryce dropped back, jerking his dual blades from his back.
“Illusion!” Malcolm warned, but the panic had Bryce. He’d dropped the wall of fire. Instead, flames spilled down his arms and back up his blades. The earthborn spun and attacked, making a beautiful aerial twist before slicing his knives harmlessly through the Glamour image.
The distraction had worked. Without t
he fire to hold back the wood elves, they raced onto the open field.
Bryce and Malcolm backed to each other in defense as dozens of elves flooded towards them, blades drawn. Twisting and slashing, the two Sidhe lads countered every blow, but managed little more.
A heavy breeze washed over them, carrying blinding dirt that whipped over the lads. Beyond the elf that sliced at him, Malcolm saw the woman whose hands were upraised to call the wind. And the Glamour-clad figure of Dawn swinging a branch like a cricket bat and whacking the wind warrior in the back of the knees, sending her down.
Leaping and flipping, Malcolm attacked and parried the sword masters rushing him. Bryce held his own, wounding two of his opponents with the flames that leapt from his blade to burn their arms.
If only Malcolm had that kind of advantage.
Grinding his teeth, Malcolm stabbed with the same attacks that Donovan had drilled into him. But the wood elves blocked each blow just as fast.
From behind, he heard Donovan shout, “Malcolm!”