by Darby Kaye
“Shite.” Bann ground his teeth together. He shared a look of exasperation with Shay. “I’ll return shortly.” Slipping out, he started for the stairs. A door opened behind him.
Further down the hall, Rory stuck his head out of the room he was once again sharing with James. In the darkness, he was not much more than a silhouette. “Everything okay?”
“Errant child, nothing more.”
“Glad he’s yours.” With a yawn, Rory disappeared.
On silent feet, partly to not disturb the rest of the household and partly to sneak up on Cor and frighten the piss out of the boy in retaliation, Bann reached the main level and paused. He cocked his head, listening.
Something moved in the kitchen. The rattle and whoosh of the back door. Even as he hurried toward the sound, a draft of cold air raised goose bumps on his arms. Or maybe it was his son whispering a name.
“Max? Is that you, boy?”
Bann slid his blade free as he stepped into the kitchen. Barefooted, Cor lingered in the open doorway, shivering in a T-shirt and sweatpants, shoes untied. Snow swirled in, ghosting along the tiled floor. At the man’s footsteps, he spoke over his shoulder.
“I saw him.”
“Max?”
“Yeah. I got up to pee and I looked out my window. I could see something moving in the trees on the other side of the wall.” Cor swallowed. “It looked like Max, but…”
“But what?”
“But he moved funny. All…” The boy jerked his limbs about.
Dread trotted up Bann’s spine on cloven hoofs. He pulled Cor away from the door. “Go to Shay while I—”
“What is it with you?” Shay spoke behind them.
They both whirled around. A tiny part of Bann was impressed she was able to sneak up on him, while another part of him was disappointed to see she had pulled on a pair of jeans and a hoodie. She carried her knife in one hand.
“If you think you’re going out there by yourself while the kid and I sit around sucking our thumbs—”
“I don’t suck my thumb!” Cor protested.
“—then you’re crazy. Or stupid. Or both.”
“Perhaps. But for now, I need to know you two are safe.” Bann tightened his fingers around the hilt of his own weapon. “Stay in the house.”
“No way. I’m—”
He raised a hand, forestalling Shay’s protest. “I need you to stay with our son.”
Shay’s mouth formed an O. To his surprise, she nodded wordlessly.
Before she could change her mind, he stepped into the darkness and looked around, eyes watering from the frosty air as he checked the shadows. Bending low, he sprinted across the yard, keeping the wall between himself and what was waiting for him in the trees. Patches of snow lingered like white stepping stones placed randomly throughout the yard. Overhead, the stars shone with glee at having the sky to themselves.
“‘I am a bull of seven battles’,” he chanted as he ran. A warming tingle started from the soles of his feet, whipped around his legs, and flooded his chest. Even his manhood swelled slightly.
Reaching the wall a few feet away from the gate, he paused to listen. His hearing, made more acute by the power of the Song, picked up a faint chuff of breath. A twig snapped.
Bann crept toward the gate. Another branch broke, the crack ricocheting through the night. Reaching the gate, he peered over it, careful not to touch it, the buzz from the wards setting his teeth on edge.
Max, but not Max, stood a few yards away.
Eyeballs hellhound-red, the dog swayed from side to side, his coat matted with clumps of dirt. Bann could smell the sour stink of death still clinging to the creature. Lifting his snout, the not-Max sniffed the air. Bann caught the gleam of madness in eyes that once were filled with affection and protectiveness and the pure joy of being a dog.
Rage at the gods, at Fate, and as always, the undercurrent rage at himself for being the long-son of Boru surged through Bann.
The beast opened his muzzle, revealing canines as deadly as the blade in the Knight’s hand. “Bannerman Boru.” The voice rasped like the rusty hinges on a coffin.
“Lord Cernunnos, I assume.”
“After a fashion. Imagine my surprise to awake and find myself trapped within this dog carcass.” Lifting a paw, he twisted it around to gaze at the pads on the bottom of the feet. He staggered a step before dropping it again. “So different from the stag’s. But I believe I will come to appreciate its unique attributes once I’ve determined how to shapeshift this new body.” Cernunnos pulled his lips back in a mockery of Max’s wolf grin. “Although I have had one successful hunt already.”
The dead Tully, no doubt. “May it take you a hundred thousand years to adjust, then.”
The dog-god chuffed and turned to leave. “We will battle again, Bannerman Boru.”
“Wait! What about my son? Why did you want Cor?”
The monster glanced back over his shoulder. One eye glowed like an ember in a dying fire. “Oh, I still desire the child. And I will take him from you. Not on Samhain as I had hoped, but certainly when you least suspect. And when I do, you will taste ashes in your mouth.” He stepped into the shadow of a massive spruce. The blackness swallowed him, as if the creature had simply passed into another room.
For a long minute, Bann stared at the spot, ignoring the cold biting his skin. Then, spitting to one side, he spun on his heel and started for the house.
Across the yard, he saw the Doyle clan spilling out of the doorway, their hair various shades of bronze in the light of the kitchen, and all armed and eager for a fight, Rory and James jostling for position to be the first into the fray. He spotted Shay waiting on the back step with Cor beside her.
And she calls me stubborn. His gaze flicked down to his son holding his switchblade. Despite everything he has gone through these past few weeks, hell, this past year, there he stands like a true Tuatha Dé Danaan, ready for battle. He lengthened his stride when Shay’s gaze met his. Friend and lover and warrior and healer. Aye, she is all that. And, perhaps soon, something more.
“Faugh a ballagh,” Bann whispered, and hurried toward his family.
TURN THE PAGE FOR AN EXCERPT FROM
THE SEQUEL TO THE STAG LORD
Unholy Blue
Coming December 2015
from Spence City
A metallic clang, followed by a yelp of pain, had Bann out of the bed and on his feet. Eschewing his clothes, he grabbed his iron knife from where he had placed it, unsheathed, on the floor next to him. Panting from the shock of being yanked out of sleep, he flung the door open and raced down the dim hallway to his son’s room and threw himself inside.
Cor’s bed was empty.
Panic walloped him in the gut, making his exposed testicles draw up good and tight. His eyes flew to the window. The curtains were still drawn; the first light of dawn illuminated the cloth panels.
A gasp of pain jerked his head down and around.
Cor was sitting inside the crate, rubbing the top of his head while he tried to keep Sam from jumping on his lap. Bann noticed a blanket and pillow were shoved to one side.
“What the hell are ye doing in that thing?” He walked over as his son scooted out, hampered by Sam, who was doing his best to chew on Cor’s hair. Bann reached down and scooped up the pup, wincing when claws scratched his bare torso.
“Sam was lonely. And Shay said he couldn’t sleep in my bed.”
“So, you decided to sleep inside the dog’s kennel?” My child is an idiot.
Cor nodded, still rubbing the top of his head. “I had to pee and I forgot where I was. I hit my head on the top of the crate.”
“What’s going on?” Shay appeared, belting her robe around her.
Even in the dim light, Bann could see Cor glancing at his father’s naked body—more specifically, at his father’s groin—then at Shay. He could almost hear the confusion roiling around inside of the boy’s head. He’s seen me nude almost every day. And on more than a few occas
ions, in front of his mother. But this is different.
“Cor. Go on to the bathroom.” He stepped aside as Cor scurried from the room, then placed the pup back in the kennel and secured the door. He looked at Shay, who shrugged.
“It’s only awkward if we act like it is,” she said.
After dressing, Bann ushered Cor and Sam out the back door to allow the pup to relieve himself, father and son bundled up against the early morning chill. The cold turned them into dragons with white smoke coming from their mouths. Hands shoved in his jacket pockets, Bann studied the full moon hanging over the western mountains; it seemed reluctant to give up its kingship of the sky. Nearby, Cor played with Sam. Boy and puppy scampered from one end of the fenced yard to the other, engaged in some sort of tag with rules that changed depending on who was winning.
Bann noticed that the woodpile, stacked to one side of the back door, had spilled out of its cradle. Shaking his head, he walked over to it. She should not have this so close to the house. Picking up the logs, he started to restack them.
“Dad! Help!”
Bann whirled around. Cor was crouched on the ground by the fence, holding one of Sam’s back legs as the dog tried to crawl through the puppy-sized gap between the bottom of the fence and the ground. Before the Knight could reach them, the pup squirted free of Cor’s grasp and disappeared.
“Shite!” Still a few feet away, Bann broke into a sprint. Without thinking, he started chanting lines from the Song, the ancient words that gave the Tuatha Dé Danaan speed and strength and endurance. “‘I am a bull of seven battles, I am a hawk on the cliff.’” A surge of power rushed through him. He cleared the fence with a foot to spare, as if a giant hand had pitched him over the top of it.
Landing on the other side with a grunt, he shouted at Cor to stay put, then sprinted after the small yellow blur that had whisked behind the nearest boulder in a puppy game of hide-and-seek. Behind him, he could hear Cor yelling for Shay. He wondered what the chances were that the woman and boy would actually remain within the safety of the wards instead of following him. In Cor’s case, slim. In Shay’s case, none, he thought, pulling his weapon free.
“Sam?” He slowed to a jog, not wanting to scare the puppy into hiding from him. “Here, boyo.” He made a kissing sound as he made his way into the jumble of boulders. The memory of chasing after Max a few weeks earlier into that same maze of rock during a snowstorm just as unbeknownst to him, the Fir Bolgs were massing for an attack on Shay’s home—with Shay and Cor inside—mocked him. Looking down, he spotted tiny pawprints in the sandy soil. As he trailed after Sam, he wondered how something so small could move so fast. He rounded the next boulder and stepped into a clearing, eyes locked on the ground. A soft whimper made him look up.
Two men and a woman stood at the far end of the clearing. The remains of a campfire sat a few yards off to one side. A pile of wood was stacked next to it.
The strangers were armed with bronze hunting knives and wearing the torc. One of the men, his brown hair shorn in a pseudo-military crew cut, held Sam in his arms, a hand clamped around the pup’s muzzle. Something about him seemed familiar to Bann.
“Remember me?” Crew Cut asked. Before Bann could answer, he continued. “I was at the party where you beat the shit out of my friend.”
Recalling the evening, Bann shifted his feet under him, fingers tightening on the haft. “Good times, eh?” His gaze flickered over to the others. “I take it Quinn Tully was a friend of yours as well?”
“He was.” The woman answered. “As well as a clan member.” Her dark blonde hair was pulled back in a braid so tight, Bann wondered how she was able to blink.
“And we Tullys protect our own.” The other man spoke. A scar puckered one side of his upper lip, giving him a permanent lopsided grin.
“This your dog?” Crew Cut asked. At Bann’s nod, he hoisted the pup up to eye level. Sam hung limply, tail tucked between his legs, trying not to call attention to himself. “Cute. Looks just like a toy I had as a kid.” His eyes, a cold blue, slid past Sam to Bann. “I used it as a football with a bunch of my friends until we kicked the stuffing out of it.”
Bile flooded Bann’s throat. “Ye son of a bitch,” he said softly. He started toward the man, then jerked to a stop when the other two raised their knives in warning.
With a grin, Crew Cut took a step back and lifted Sam to shoulder height, setting his feet and cocking his arm back in a quarterback stance.
The female Tully made a movement toward him. “Dude. No.”
“Yeah, really.” Scarface added. “Not cool.”
Crew Cut ignored them. He pointed behind Bann with his free hand. “Go deep!” he shouted gleefully. Then he threw the puppy.
Spinning on a heel, Bann dropped his knife and ran. Both arms extended, he kept his eyes fixed on the small body clawing the air. Legs pumping, he leaned forward, past the angle of being able to stay upright, knowing he only had to break Sam’s fall. He stretched further, willing another inch to his arms. With a gasp, he caught Sam with one hand. Pulling the pup in close, he scissor-kicked himself around in midair as he cradled the young one against his chest. He hit the ground with a grunt and skidded a few feet.
Even as he lurched to his feet, a rage swept through him that was so pure he almost went deaf from the high-pitched squeal in his ears, like a public address system gone awry.
The warp spasm. The ancient battle rage of the Celts.
Blinking through the haze tinting the world around him in a crimson wash, he nodded as the warp spasm began whispering to him, urging him to rip the man’s skull from his neck. Mayhaps use it as a fokking football, the voice added. Bann agreed. Three against one. An even match.
The sudden chk-chk of a shotgun being racked. He noted movement out of the corner of his eyes, then a quiet “Bann.”
Shay appeared next to him with a shotgun aimed at the Tullys. Cor was at her side. “Take Sam and go back to the house, kiddo. It’ll be okay.” After the shaken boy had gathered the pup in his arms and disappeared, she shifted the gun to one arm and handed Bann’s dropped knife to him. Then she pointed the shotgun’s muzzle at the woman and Scarface. “I keep this,” she hefted the gun, “for coyotes. And you guys certainly qualify. Now, over by that rock. Move!” As they shuffled over to the boulder, Bann noticed they seemed relieved. “Okay, the asshole’s all yours,” Shay said. “Try not to kill him—it’d just make things worse. But you can bloody him all you want.”
Curling his fingers around the handle of his knife, he gave a curt nod, then started toward Crew Cut. “Just the two of us, eh?”
Crew Cut curled his lip. “If you’ve got the balls.”
As Bann stalked the younger Knight, the battle rage murmured more suggestions. Slice off each finger, one by one, from his hands. Look, there’s a flat rock you can use as a cutting board. Think of them as little sausages. Sausages. Hmm, that gives me a better idea. Cut a slit in his belly and pull out his intestines with the point of your knife. You can wrap them around the blade like spaghetti, then force them down his throat.
He smiled. Why, ye’re a clever one, ye are, he thought.
Without breaking stride, he plucked one of the heavy branches from the dead campfire. Club in his left hand and blade in his right, he charged. “Faugh a ballagh!”
Crew Cut attacked, as well. His knife whistled through the air; the rising sun danced an orange reel along its blade.
Bann feinted to one side, then smashed the club down on Crew Cut’s forearm, shattering the bones with a wet snap. The younger Knight’s knife tumbled to the ground from nerveless fingers. Cradling his arm, Crew Cut stumbled backwards, Bann matching him step for step.
Crowding closer, Bann pressed the tip of his knife on the underside of Crew Cut’s chin, the point digging into the soft skin. Blood welled up. “Afraid, are ye?” He could feel on his cheek the moist heat coming from the man’s gaping mouth; it stank of pain and fear and knowledge of pending death. Holding his broken arm, the youn
ger Knight made a strangled sound. “Would that be a yes?” Crew Cut nodded with an upward jerk of his head, desperate to keep his throat away from the point of the knife.
Bann smiled. “Good. Then, ye know how that wee one felt when you pitched him into the air, ye shitty piece of Bog-born arse. Now, there was no reason for ye and yer friends to be near our home. Unless ye were up to no good. Am I right?”
“We were just hiking by when—” Crew Cut’s voice died away as Bann dug the tip of the blade deeper into skin as soft as Sam’s belly. Feeling the prick of the blade, Crew Cut stood on tiptoe, more blood trickling out. Bann let him struggle like a fish on the end of a spear for a long minute before relenting, then he lowered his knife. Crew Cut staggered back a step, ashen-faced with pain. Sweat beaded his upper lip.
“Ye tell Weston Tully,” Bann tapped the man’s broken arm with the end of the club, eliciting a strangled cry, “and the rest of yer clan to leave off. Next time, I’ll not be as generous. Next time, ‘twill be his blood that is spilled.”
Author’s Note
For those readers who are familiar with my middle grade series (The Adventures of Finn MacCullen), as well as my young adult series (Griffin Rising), it would be fair to say this book is quite the departure from what you’re accustomed to getting from me.
*Cough—understatement—cough*
Except that it isn’t.
I am continuing to draw upon the ancient myths of the Celts, or, at least, my version of those myths, a version that would have the Tuatha Dé Danaan alive and well and kicking both god and goblin butt in High Springs, Colorado. However, Bannerman Boru’s famous sire, the High King Brian Boru, was actually a real person and ruled Ireland from 1002 to 1014 AD until his death—his supposed death—at the Battle of Clontarf near modern-day Dublin. I say supposed death because, in one variation of the Boru story, he is linked to the Goddess Danu, which links him to the Tuatha Dé Danaan.
As you now know, Celts are hard to kill.
And shapeshifters are not my invention. Many cultures around the world believe in the ability of humans to magically take the forms of various animals for various purposes—some good, some not so good. My version of the Stag Lord is somewhat darker than the demigod is usually portrayed, for my Cernunnos is more like the spiteful shapeshifter of the Navajo cosmology.