"That's not the fault of anybody here in Edo," Trása reminded them. "So it's hardly fair that you're indulging your boredom by making things explode."
That got a reaction from Ren. For the first time since arriving here in the Imperial Palace, Pete wished he'd refused the endless hospitality the Empresses afforded those considered responsible for saving this realm from the Matrarchaí. It wasn't as if they even deserved the title of saviors. He and his brother had been hogtied and unconscious for most of it.
Ren turned to face Trása. He no longer seemed even a little bit inebriated, Pete thought, a little envious of how quickly he had sobered up. "I was under the impression we'd established some time ago that you don't get to dictate what I do with my time."
Logan looked as if he wanted to offer his opinion, but Pete grabbed him by the arm and pulled him out of the way. Drunk as he was, he knew this confrontation had little to do with him and his brother, and probably not a lot to do with their magical concussion grenades. It had everything to do with the falling out between Ren and Trása over his refusal to access Delphine's memories. As he and his brother were in no small way responsible for Ren's position on that, he thought it wise they not do anything to remind Trása of the fact.
"I'm not dictating anything to anybody," Trása said, showing no hint of backing down. "I'm merely passing on a request from our hostess. You're here for Teagan and Isleen's birthday celebrations ... all of you," she reminded them, glaring at Pete and Logan. "The only thing you're achieving at the moment is reminding those Imperial Court members of the Konketsu who fondly look back on the days when they were allowed to hunt the Faerie for sport, why that was so much fun."
She has a point, Pete thought. He wasn't sure if telling Ren that, was such good idea.
Perhaps there was a way to gracefully extricate themselves from this potentially awkward scene. At the very least, a way to have them back down without losing face. Christ, how long have I been here that I care about losing face?
He took a step forward, steadying himself by hanging onto Logan. "If Wakiko has requested we refrain from blowing up her moat," he announced, deliberately enunciating his words, which he suspected just made him sound drunker, "then it behooves us to heed our hostess's wishes and refrain from any further ... you know ... exploding stuff."
"Jesus, Pete," Logan chuckled, "how pissed do you have to be to drop the word 'behooves' into normal conversation?"
Trása must have been thinking along similar lines. She glanced at him with the faintest of smiles. "Behooves?"
He shrugged. "I'm feeling poetic."
"Well, I'm feeling cold," Trása said, wisely taking the opportunity Pete offered her to back down without seeming to lose the argument; perhaps a sign of how much she'd matured these past three years. She turned her back on Ren and smiled at him and Logan, the first sign of her thawing toward them since they'd returned from the dead realm that had once been their home. "Let's go back to the palace. I don't know about you, but I'm soaked to the skin and Wakiko promised me my own fiefdom if I could get you lot to stop blowing up things."
"Far be it from us to rob you of a fiefdom!" Logan cried, throwing his arms wide, which made them both stagger. "You coming, Ren? Trása's getting a fiefdom."
Ren didn't answer. He was staring at Trása with a dark look, his earlier good mood a distant memory.
"Logan, why don't you go with Trása? We'll tidy up here and be along presently."
Trása gave Pete a thankful smile, took Logan by the arm and began to guide him back toward the gate, no mean feat the way Logan was weaving about.
Ren watched them leave and then turned to Pete. "You don't need to watch over me, Pete."
He shook his head, which was a stupid thing to do, because it just made everything spin. "Yeah ... actually, maybe I do."
"Trása and I have a difference of opinion, that's all. It doesn't require adult supervision."
"A difference of opinion?" Pete rubbed his temples, wishing the Faerie ability to heal one's own wounds extended to sobering up in a hurry. "Is that what you're calling it? Jesus, I could cut the air between you two with a knife."
"You wanna fix it? Fine. Why don't I unlock Delphine's memories like Trása wants me to and see what happens?" Ren thrust his hands into the pockets of his trousers and began to walk back across the drawbridge to the gate.
Pete hurried after him, grabbing him by the arm to turn and face him. "That's not what I meant."
"It's why Trása is mad at me."
"And you're mad at her because you think she doesn't understand why you won't do it. I get that. But you need to take a deep breath, sunshine. It's everybody's business when you're pissed off about something, Ren."
"That's ridiculous."
"Is it?" Pete asked, as another bolt of lightning lit the sky in the distance. The storm was moving away, the thunder muted by the distance, but he hardly noticed. He had something to say and the alcohol had driven away his natural caution. "You've got a head full of other people's memories, no small percentage of which belong to that psychotic bitch, Delphine, and you're on such a huge guilt trip about leaving your brother behind, you should be paying excess baggage. You just about blew that moat clean into the middle of next week with a wave of your arm just now. No ori mahou, no spells, you just willed it to happen. And that was for a bit of light entertainment. We don't need you going postal on us again, Ren. Not with that sort of power at your command."
It occurred to Pete just after he finished his rather impressive, if somewhat verbose, analysis that if Ren really was pissed off with the world, it might not be a good idea to be the one who pointed it out to him so bluntly.
"She thinks I've abandoned them," Ren said, surprising Pete with his openness. Maybe he just needed someone to call him out.
"Darragh?"
Ren nodded. "And Hayley. And Sorcha. Even old Jack O'Righin."
"It's not your fault, Ren. We've been searching for some way back to that damn reality for three years. I had a life there once remember? So did Logan. If we could have found a way back, we'd have done it long before now. Do you want me to explain that to Trása?"
"She'll just tell you that I need to unlock Delphine's memories. We tried that once ... didn't go so well, did it?" Ren sighed, as if he was weary with the discussion. "Look, I know what she's mad about, and it's more than Delphine's memories. I could go home to the realm I come from. There's enough gampi paper here to fold the rift. And because it's my origin reality, I can always find it."
"Then why don't you?"
"That's what I can't explain to Trása." He did not elaborate or offer the reason, Pete noted, for why he was refusing to do it.
"Why doesn't she just open a rift and go back herself, if it's that important to her."
"Trása's cursed, remember? If she steps into our home reality, she'll turn back into a barn owl."
"You two coming?" Logan called from the gate.
"We're coming," Pete called back, and then turned to Ren. "Sort it out, Ren," he advised. "Do something about it or let it go, but don't keep chewing your on own liver about it."
Ren nodded, but whether he was planning to accept Pete's advice it was hard to say and they didn't get a chance to discuss it further because at that moment a loud crack rent the air; a sound that Pete hadn't heard for three years.
"Jesus Christ, that was a gunshot!"
Ren looked at him in confusion. Over by the gate, Logan and Trása had stopped, looking bewildered. They were probably the only other people in this reality who recognized the sound.
Another shot rang out, but there was no way of telling where it was coming from.
"There are no guns in this reality," Pete said.
"Then it's coming from a rift," Ren said. He blinked out of existence before Pete could respond.
A shout went up from the wall above as Pete broke into a run. Someone was yelling for reinforcements. Several more shots rang out. He caught up with Logan and Trása and quickly outdista
nced them, running for the rifuto stones.
The Imperial Palace was under attack.
By someone with automatic weapons.
Chapter 4
The shooting was a rearguard action, Ren realized, almost as soon as he waned into the forecourt of the hommaru where the rifuto stones were located. There was nobody coming through with guns blazing. Whoever it was had probably come through a rift somewhere else in this reality, sneaked into the palace by mundane means, and were now using the palace rifuto stones to escape.
There were several bodies lying on the ground in front of the lightning-filled stone circle. Imperial Guards, by the look of them, come to investigate who had opened the rift, with no idea their bamboo armor wouldn't stop a bullet.
Ren had arrived in the forecourt behind the tall pillars that flanked the entrance to the outer hall of the Imperial donjon. He flattened himself against the nearest pillar as another shot rang out, this one so close a chip of granite grazed his cheek when the bullet struck the column and ricocheted.
Whoever was escaping was determined not to be followed. Ren closed his eyes for a moment, wondering if he had enough control in waning from one location to another to get closer to the rift without being shot. He wasn't confident. When he'd left Pete on the drawbridge, he'd intended to wane into the forecourt right next to the rifuto stones. Whether it was his own lack of finesse, or the alcohol, he'd appeared nowhere near the stones. Instead, he was around four hundred yards away on the steps of the donjon.
If he was going to get to the rift, he was going to have to do it the hard way - by running across the forecourt through a hail of bullets.
Or maybe not. He'd just blown the moat to kingdom-come with a wave of his arm. What would happen if he tried the same with an open rift? Would it destroy the rifuto stones? Close the rift? Tear a hole in the space-time continuum and bring on the end of all life in the universe? Ren was banking on the latter being a remote possibility.
The invaders were escaping to another reality, a magic-less one at that, he figured, as a staccato burst of gunfire mowed down a dozen more Imperial Guards advancing on the intruders: there were no automatic weapons in a world full of magic. But, at the same time, whoever had invaded this realm had access to magic or they'd not be able to open a rift.
The Matrarchaí.
Ren forced the thought away. Although he'd assured Logan and Pete they were inaccessible, in truth he kept Delphine's memories at bay only by sheer force of will.
If he merely tried to forget the omnipresent burden he carried the opposite effect occurred and he found that the walls he'd built in his mind to contain her memories bulged inward under the pressure, trying to escape and overwhelm him.
Why now? Why can't you just stay away from this realm and leave us alone?
He risked another glance around the column, but all he could make out clearly was the lightning-streaked rift, the edges of which were almost too bright to look upon, with a dark hollow of nothingness in the center. From this distance, he couldn't tell where the rift originated, but if it was the Matrarchaí, it probably opened into a high-rise building somewhere ...
Ren cut the thought off. Knowledge like that came with a brutal price.
He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, drawing power to him. He touched his thumbs to his index fingers, closing the circle. There was a reason he didn't need to work the folding spells of this realm any longer. He'd come to the Imperial Palace to learn how use ori mahou and stumbled instead over the lost secrets of the kuji-in.
Rin for strength of mind and body, he reminded himself, aware he couldn't control anything if he wasn't calm. His explosion at the moat had proved that. He'd been aiming for something much less spectacular.
Hei to focus psychic power in order to mask one's presence. If he was going to do this, it would be useful not to get shot.
Toh to balance the solid and liquid states of the body. Ren still hadn't worked out what that even meant, let alone how to harness the power of it.
Sha to heal oneself or another - an ability he'd inherited from his sídhe ancestors, fortunately, because it was one less thing he needed to master.
Kai for complete control over the body's functions, to slow the heart rate, endure extreme heat and cold. Ren hadn't come close to figuring this one out, or even finding a reason why he might need to.
Jin to focus the mind's telepathic powers. Retsu to harness one's telekinetic powers. Both useful skills he owned anyway, but kuji-in had enabled him to gain some mastery over them.
Zai, as best Ren could tell, was meant to bring harmony by merging with the universe. Whatever that meant.
And, of course, Zen which was supposed to bring enlightenment and understanding, and was the one skill he suspected he may never master.
It took only a few seconds to calm his breathing and run through the list in his mind. He felt magic coursing through him, gathered it to him, ready to unleash it on whoever had dared invade his realm.
Ren stepped out from behind the pillar.
Time seemed to slow down. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Pete, Logan and Trása just reaching the forecourt, diving for cover behind the large ornamental pots housing the carefully manicured cherry trees whose blooms were just beginning to fade, when the spray of bullets was directed their way.
In front of him lay a score of unmoving bodies and they continued to fall as the Imperial Guard officers shouted at their troops to advance, either not understanding or not caring what the hail of bullets might do to their men.
Ren raised his arm and opened his fingers.
By the light of the rift he could make out several figures, although he was too far away to identify them. Two of the figures - he couldn't even tell if they were male or female - were positioned either side of the open rift, down on one knee firing the automatic weapons that were doing so much damage to a defending force armed with nothing more than swords and grim determination. The lightning from the rift and the incessant rain served to plunge the rest of the forecourt into darkness.
Only a split second before Ren let loose his power, through the shouts and the gunfire and the rain hitting the metal kabuto of the Imperial Guardsmen, he heard a child scream.
There was no chance to pull back. As he unleashed all the force he could marshal and hurled it toward the rift and the gunmen defending it, from the darkness emerged two other figures, each one carrying a struggling child in their arms.
Ren had no time to react. He'd sent his devastating magical warhead on its way before he realized these interlopers had a very specific purpose.
He should have known the Matrarchaí would not let Delphine's death go unpunished.
He should have known they would come for Teagan and Isleen.
And he would have known, if he'd allowed Delphine's memories to do something other than fester at the back of his mind, while he blocked out everything she knew for fear of what truly knowing her might do to him.
It must have been only seconds, although it felt like a lifetime, as Ren waited for his magic to hit the rift, powerless to do anything to stop it, or to stop the men carrying the screaming twin Empresses toward some unknown alternate reality that the imminent explosion would destroy any chance of finding.
He opened his mouth to scream a warning, but it was lost in the melee as the ground shook and the rift disappeared in a spectacular cascade of bright light that seared his retinas and left him temporarily blinded. Anybody still standing in the forecourt was knocked off their feet. The sound of the explosion rumbled over him, so deep, so loud, that he felt, rather than heard the rift collapse.
The sound moved on, rumbling over the rest of the palace and left them in a momentary lull of shock and stunned silence.
Ren picked himself up, unable to remember when exactly he had fallen.
He looked across the courtyard as the white lights faded from his eyes. The rift was gone, and from here it looked as if much of the stone circle had disintegrated with it. He stum
bled forward as the remaining guards began to climb to their feet. At the sound of someone groaning, he glanced over at the forecourt gate to find Logan, Pete and Trása climbing to their feet, apparently unharmed.
And then, in the stunned silence, he heard a whimper.
Ren staggered into a run, suddenly filled with hope. Perhaps the explosion had thrown Teagan and Isleen back into this realm. Perhaps it had closed before they could be taken through. Perhaps it had only seemed like they were already into the rift when it collapsed. It was raining, after all, and dark, and hard to tell ...
He could hear the others running close behind him, although whether it was because they believed he might have seen or heard something, or they'd heard the whimper for themselves, Ren didn't know.
"Teagan!" he called. "Isleen!"
He reached the remains of the stone circle and cast about in the darkness, uncaring of the rain. There were several bodies scattered about, dressed in ordinary linen yukata that would have made it seem as if they belonged here - right up until they pulled out the machine guns and opened fire.
The rain kept pelting down, making it hard to see, and even harder to hear.
Then Trása called out, "Over here!"
She was squatting over the body of a large man with a shaved head and distinctly Asian features - probably the reason he'd been chosen for this foray into enemy territory. She grunted with the effort of pushing him out of the way. By the time Ren and the others got to her, she was dragging one of the empresses clear and helping her to her feet.
Miraculously, she seemed unharmed. The man's bulk must have protected her from the explosion.
Dishevelled and terrified, the little girl clung to Trása and looked about in a panic. "Teagan!" she demanded. "Where is my sister, Teagan? She was right in front of me. Where is she?"
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