Rhoann seemed fascinated by the groaning Fae on the floor—well, the Water Fae was a healer, albeit a specialist in magickal injury rather than physical. Conall supposed the professional interest was hard to quell; all the same, he needed a bit more of Rhoann’s attention than he had at the moment, and cleared his throat.
Rhoann arched a brow. “My apologies, draoi ríoga. I was nearly caught, just now, in a trap like this one, around the wellspring at the bottom of the Pool.”
There’s more than one. Conall’s breath caught hard in his chest—right about where his heart was trying to kick its way out. If there’s one at the wellspring in the nexus chamber… mac’fracun fola’the, the magick of the daragin and the Gille Dubh and maybe even divine magick next to the great nexus…
No. There might well be a wall around the chamber’s wellspring. But if its magick was as incompatible with the ley energy of the nexus as the living magick of the wellspring itself was, none of them would be standing here right now wondering about it, and neither would anyone within a couple of city blocks.
Conall hoped, anyway. Because if things were otherwise, there wasn’t a whole hell of a lot he could do about it at the moment, unless he could figure out how to be in two or more places at once.
Rhoann cleared his throat, sounding uncannily like Conall.
Conall fought the urge to facepalm. He was all too aware that he looked like a human or Fae teenager—he, like all Fae, had stopped aging when he came into his birthright of magick, and the more powerful a Fae’s innate magick was, the younger that Fae came into it—which meant he had to work harder than most mages to maintain an appropriate level of gravitas. “Sorry, I was distracted. Details, please. And sometime before I have to deal with our guest would be good.”
“Our guest—”
“Later. Please.”
Rhoann arched a brow. “As you wish. I was caught shortly after Mac and Lucien and I finished lovemaking. I used the post-coital magickal surge to shapeshift—I was in my seal form. Mac and Lucien surfaced, and I dove; I was swimming near the bottom of the Pool, when a column of light—magickal light exactly like the light behind us—appeared around the wellspring. And I was stuck, half within the column and half outside it.”
“Magairl snáthith ar’srang.” Conall had to admit, ‘balls threaded on a wire’ was an apt multi-purpose curse. So many things he needed to know, and even asking questions wasted time he couldn’t be completely sure they had.
Have to start somewhere, though. “How did you get out?” What had worked for Rhoann might, just might, work for Terry. Which would solve one problem and let him focus on the others.
Rhoann shook his head, as if he were following Conall’s thoughts. “I was only able to escape with help from Mac and Lucien. I changed forms so they could take my hands and pull. But they could find no purchase, no way to brace themselves—except against the wall, and neither of them wanted to try that—and it took much longer to free me than any of us would have liked.” Rhoann looked as if the memory of what had happened to him was making him uncomfortable. “And… there are no words to explain this, but… I could not see the part of my body that was trapped, but when I changed back to my Fae form, I am as sure as I may be that the part of me on the other side of the magick did not change.”
Conall blinked rapidly. “You were half Fae, half… seal?”
“It was unpleasant.”
“I’ll bet.”
“Though that condition did not last.” As if the thought had just occurred to him, Rhoann channeled a towel and wrapped it around his waist. No doubt the thought had just occurred to him—Rhoann was a nudist at heart. “It took my scair-anaim several minutes to pull me out, and I believe the part of me within the trap changed to match the rest of me before Mac and Lucien were able to pull me all the way out. And everything of me we could see was Fae as I emerged.”
Trap, yes. A trap laid by the daragin and the Gille Dubh. But why? To catch what? The tree folk had no quarrel with humans—yet Terry, the human, was unable to free himself, while Rhoann, the Fae, had managed to do so, with help. And then there was Rhoann’s peculiar delay in changing forms. And trying to fit all the pieces together would probably be easier if he weren’t still bristling over the threat to Josh from—
“I heard wind.”
Speak of the devil.
Maelduin wasn’t moving—he looked almost as if he would hug the concrete, if only his hands were free, as insurance against it somehow rising up and smacking him in the head again. “I remember hearing wind. Leaves whispering. And there was moonlight, I think.”
Conall was grateful for the arm Josh slid around his shoulders. “Fasten your seatbelts,” he murmured. “It’s going to be a bumpy night.”
“Don’t you mean ‘ride’?” Josh placed a light kiss on the top of Conall’s head.
“If the Gille Dubh and the daragin are directly involved in this mess now, we’re in enough trouble. I’m not going to misquote Bette Davis on top of it all.”
Chapter Eighteen
Save me? From what? Terry blinked up at the being in front of him, trying to keep most of his thoughts to himself. Especially the probably unpopular ones about sharing a soul with Maelduin. From this trap?
The dark male shook his head, sending tangled hair tumbling over his shoulders. We are caught together, for now. But we are safe here.
The language the being used was fascinating. Terry felt as if he were standing under a tree, and was somehow able to make sense of the way the leaves whispered against each other in the wind, and the way the moonlight shone through them. Under other circumstances, he’d probably be happy to just sit, watch, listen.
Not now, though. We’re safe in a trap? Terry was reasonably sure he sounded like an idiot. But realistically speaking—if ‘realistic’ was even a word that applied to anything in his life any more—he had more than enough good reasons to be confused.
This is not a trap, not exactly. The dark male looked almost as perplexed as Terry felt, which Terry found comforting, in an odd way. More like a shield. But when one cannot come out from behind a shield, I suppose it is something like a trap.
This isn’t helping. Terry was getting tired of looking up at the being, so he stood, careful not to touch the wall enclosing them. There’s nothing out there I need to be shielded from.
And even more important, there was something out there—someone—Terry had to get back to, someone he wasn’t sure it was even safe to think about around his strange companion. He’d obviously been wrong about the magick. Maybe he’d been wrong about other things.
Or maybe—more likely—he hadn’t. Either way, he had to get out. He had to learn the truth.
There is a… thing… against which all the wellsprings must be warded. Strange, it looked as if the being’s eyes were brighter, glowing green. We have guarded them the only way we can.
We? I only see one of you.
The being smiled faintly. The other Gille Dubh. And the daragin, the trees with which we share our essence.
At least now Terry knew the being wasn’t named Gille Dubh. And as for the bit about the trees, and sharing an essence… he’d decided Maelduin was crazy for a lot less, but that had been before everything went insane. Everything, including him, or so it seemed. He wasn’t sure what his total capacity was for handling the bizarre, but apparently he hadn’t reached it yet, so it was probably best to go with the flow, for now.
The flow, though, wasn’t taking him where he needed to be. Every answer you give me just leads to more questions. And I’m not interested in a Q-and-A—I just want to know how to get out of here. How to get through this wall.
Dark eyebrows disappeared into tangled bangs. There is no wall, human. And there is no getting through it.
Terry bit back several of the choicer words his Nonna had always saved for special occasions. No wall? He pointed at the translucent, numbing barrier. Even Maelduin didn’t tell me to ignore what I could see with my own eyes.
/> Coinneach smiled, but his expression sent a chill through Terry. Oh, shit.
If the Gille Dubh heard that thought, he didn’t let on. Probably because he didn’t need to. What you call a ‘wall’ is simply a discontinuity between what was, and what is. You see it, you see the magick that keeps the past from the present, only because you share a slaidar’s soul.
If it keeps me in, and everything else out, it’s a wall. Terry shrugged. You can call it what you want to. I just want to know how to get out of here.
It is not ‘here’ that you seek to escape, human. It is ‘now.’
* * *
The human’s blank stare pleased Coinneach. In his experience, it was always easier to get information from a confused human than from one who thought he understood what was happening to him. Other Gille Dubh had valued humans chiefly as lovers and companions, in the time before Slada’mhor, the Great Theft; Coinneach had enjoyed human males from time to time, to be sure, but his own gift, his own responsibility, had always been the protection of the twinned races, Gille Dubh and darag. A responsibility he had failed at once, and would not fail at again,
What’s that supposed to mean? Terry’s gaze flickered to the barrier, and back again. Escaping now?
Humans were not equipped to understand a darag’s view of time. Still, Coinneach supposed he owed Terry at least an attempt at an explanation. Humans were not slaidarin, after all. The network of wellsprings has been timeslipped.
Another one of those answers that just generates more questions. The human’s chin came up, his eyes narrowed.
Terry’s show of spirit was an inconvenience… yet Coinneach had to admire it. Perhaps my darag could explain everything to you at once, but I cannot. Yet I will try.
Please.
The human did not appear to be pleading. Coinneach found himself rather liking him. My kind and I experience time much as you do. But time is a very different thing for our daragin. To them, time is a collection of moments, to be stored, and savored, in whatever order pleases them. ‘Now’ is whatever moment they choose to inhabit.
Terry glanced around. I don’t see any darag here.
The human’s doubt was palpable. And remarkable, considering everything he had seen, and his close association with a slaidar. Perhaps there was good reason for him to doubt the Fae—and if there was, Coinneach intended to uncover that reason and bring it to light. Patience. First root, then branch, then leaf.
Being patient isn’t high on my list of things to do right now.
Coinneach smiled. And my darag calls me hasty. He shook his head, shedding moonlight laughter. The daragin have always been able to share their choice of ‘now’ with their indwelling Gille Dubh. It is a pleasant way to pass the daylight hours, when we are otherwise trapped in our trees. But now… with the help and the power of our Mother Sun, we have bound the magick of the daragin to the whole network of the wellsprings—the channels through which magick flows from the Realm of the slaidar—those wellsprings which feed daragin and Gille Dubh and those which do not.
Terry reached out a hand toward the barrier, but pulled it back before it could make contact. Bound it how? With these walls?
In a way. Coinneach held back a sigh. A darag’s lack of time-binding made speech, bound into the whisper of leaves and the gleam of moonlight and dependent on concepts such as ‘past’ and ‘present,’ awkward at times, but the ancient trees excelled at conveying complex concepts in a single whispered thought. All the wellsprings, and all within them, exist in a different ‘now’ from the rest of your world.
Terry went pale. How different?
Coinneach shrugged—a human mannerism, but a useful one, worth borrowing. I am unsure—I am no darag, but measuring time is still foreign to my kind. But at a guess, perhaps five minutes, or a little longer. We have been moved into the past of your world.
How do we get out? White showed all around the brown irises of Terry’s eyes, eyes like a slaidar’s save for the jewel-like faceting of a magic-thief’s eyes.
Terry was handling his situation remarkably well, all things considered. The humans of Coinneach’s past experience had not been nearly as resilient. We do not, until the daragin release the magick once and for all, or until it falls of its own accord. And we dare not allow that to happen.
The chaos of the human’s poorly-guarded thoughts sounded like fitful gusts of wind, the kind heralding a change in the weather. Coinneach could not make out individual thoughts, only fragments tossed on that unpredictable wind. Terry thought of traps, of fear, of wonder, of loneliness. The strangeness of the being he found himself trapped with. A driving urgency, and his slaidar. And doubt.
Doubt, yes. Coinneach could use doubt. You have not told me how you came to be here. Surely the tale had to do with the magick-thief… and surely there was something in that story he could use.
What do you care? You and I are just… I don’t know, castaways. Together. Terry paced the bounds of their shared prison, breathtaking grace edged with fear.
Coinneach liked the word ‘castaways.’ Terry’s mind showed him a sunlit isle, strange trees with feathers at their crowns, deep warm sand. I told you I want to help you. You have fallen in with bad company, I fear, in the form of the slaidar who brought you here.
Terry stopped, as if rooted, his expression still and closed. If you think Maelduin is a bigger problem than being out of sync with the rest of the world and having no way back, I’d really love to know why.
Coinneach carefully kept the smile in his heart from reaching his eyes or his lips. The human did not leap to the slaidar’s defense, but rather asked for an explanation.
The truce among the Gille Dubh, the daragin, and the Fae was not to Coinneach’s liking. His memories of Cuinn an Dearmad’s duplicity, and his own death, were too fresh for him to want or trust any kind of alliance with those who had stolen his life.
But his darag had promised, had bound Gille Dubh and daragin. So an end to the alliance would require evidence that the Fae had already broken the terms of the truce.
Terry could give him that evidence, and with it Coinneach could free the folk of wood and earth and root from bondage to the faithless ones, forever.
And once the comely human’s eyes were opened to the slaidar’s enchantment and deceit, something might be done about the danger his darag suspected the human and the Fae posed to the barrier against the Marfach.
Once, long ago, yet only yesterday, the slaidar-kin broke faith with us. They told us a convenient truth, and then took from us what they needed and left us to die. Have they done the same to you?
Chapter Nineteen
The view from the far side of the cylinder of magickal light didn’t tell Conall anything he hadn’t already figured out. It did, however, let him be alone with his thoughts for a few seconds. Not that his thoughts were great company at the moment. What had happened to Terry was bad enough, thank you very much. The more-than-implicit threat to Josh had brought him closer to his own personal edge than he liked to be. And now the possibility that the Gille Dubh had gotten themselves directly involved with their trap, and the human caught in it? Well, that had just added several old tires to the dumpster fire that was his night.
Fuck me ’til my knees buckle.
Footsteps grated in the construction grit covering the floor, and Conall looked up. It was Josh, of course. “Sorry, dar’cion, just trying to work things out in my head.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for, d’orant.” Josh came around behind Conall, slipped his arms around his waist, and rested his chin on Conall’s head. One of Conall’s favorite ways to be held—it reminded him of being incorporeal inside Josh, which was his favorite place in two worlds to be, for all that the experience was too intense to bear for anywhere near as long as either of them might wish. “Relax, let me take care of you for a minute.”
“My favorite words.”
“I know.”
Soft laughter, followed by a light nibble on Conall’s ear, made
it clear what sort of ‘taking care of’ Josh intended; the surge of living magick in Conall’s body was almost as sweet as the arousal taking his mind off their immediate problems. He groaned—as quietly as he could—as the soft sounds made by the tip of Josh’s tongue probing his ear mimicked an even more intimate penetration.
Josh’s arms tightened around Conall. “Sorry there’s no time for rope,” he whispered. His warm breath felt almost as good as his tongue.
“That makes two of us.” Conall stifled a sigh. Nothing calmed him like being bound as only his scair-anam was able to bind him. He had spent centuries, in the Realm, avoiding the touch of any other Fae, in constant fear of the magickal onslaught even his accidental arousal might unleash; the first time he had submitted to Josh’s binding, though, the fear had vanished. Utterly. When Josh bound him, he was safe, and so was everyone and everything around him. His unFae trust in his scair-anam was so profound, even the living magick within him submitted to it; Josh could undo any binding Conall could channel.
“Tell me when to stop.” Josh tongued Conall’s earlobe into his mouth and sucked gently.
“How about never?” But even as Conall spoke, he shook his head. No rest for the wicked. He gestured, channeling just enough magick to create a sound-screen around the two of them. “We’re on the clock. In addition to figuring out how to get Terry back, and finding out what the Gille Dubh and the daragin are playing at, we’re going to have to do something about our interloper.” He rested his hands on Josh’s strong forearms, squeezing just hard enough to be sure Scathacrú was still asleep under Josh’s shirt-sleeve. “If he’s half the blade-dancer Tiernan is, I’d rather try to outrun a pack of Fade-hounds naked and slathered with barbecue sauce than tangle with him. And even if I were prepared to forget the way he was looking at you before I stepped in—which, I assure you, I am not, and never will be—he’s sworn to kill Tiernan.”
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