Stone Cold

by Rory Ni Coileain

I wouldn’t let someone else tell me I’m poison. Who I am and am not allowed to be with—to try with, at least. No one else gets to tell me that. Coinneach and the darag don’t get to tell me that. My own past, my own history doesn’t get to tell me I can’t try.

  All he had to do was close his eyes, to bring back how it had felt last night, going to sleep wrapped in the arms and the body of a Fae who had just blown his mind and tended gently to his body. He wasn’t in love, not yet, anyway. But for the first time since Bryce, he wanted to try to be.

  There was just one small problem with his maybe-happily-ever-after.

  Opening his eyes, he turned back to Coinneach. I could tell you that I reject Maelduin. But I don’t think it would do what you need it to. Because I’d only be saying it to try to keep him safe—to keep everyone safe. My heart knows it isn’t true, and I think that’s what matters. Because whatever it is that links us doesn’t have anything to do with my words. It’s in my soul. Isn’t it?

  He hated the way the Gille Dubh seemed to slump in on himself. It is.

  A wind whispered around Coinneach, and Terry got the impression it was the darag’s side of a conversation he wasn’t part of. Whether or not it was directed at him, though, it seemed to help; Coinneach’s shoulders straightened, and he nodded.

  My darag thinks there is another way. If we separate you physically, the danger your bond poses to the timeslip will lessen. And doing so will gain us time to devise a better solution. one that does not wall the wellsprings off from the rest of the world.

  Separation was pretty much the last thing Terry wanted. But if the nightmare got through, got into the wellsprings, came after all of them, he would never get the chance he should have taken last night. This morning. Any time before the damned wall went up.

  What do I have to do?

  * * *

  Maelduin was having trouble catching his breath. “Is that… why you killed my father?” The words seemed to be coming from somewhere else, not from him. “Because he was…”

  He couldn’t finish. But neither did Tiernan seem capable of speech.

  No one had told him.

  Neither of his parents had ever had the opportunity to do so—fair enough. But surely the distant kin who raised him must have known. And no one had ever said a word, had ever so much as hinted. Wanting to spare him, perhaps, or hiding shame.

  Neither made any particular sense. None of his distant kin had ever cared enough about him to be other than indifferent to his feelings. And as for shame… while the act by which he had been brought into being was taboo, forbidding a Fae to do something was like forbidding the stars to fall on a summer night. And it was definitely not unheard of in Fae history and legend for fiur and thair to conceive a child together. Doing so, though, had never been an excuse for the ultimate prohibited act of kin-murder.

  “There is more to this story. More that has been kept from me. Else you are the cold-blooded kinslayer I have always believed you to be, and if you were that I would be fighting for my life.”

  This time, Maelduin’s own words rendered him speechless. … if you were that… Something deep within him had already decided he had given his life, his vow, his honor to a lie.

  And why was Tiernan regarding him with what could only be pity?

  “I am a cold-blooded kinslayer, that was your mother’s verdict and the reason I was exiled.” Tiernan’s near-monotone spoke of pain in a way no theatrics could. “But even one as heartless as she supposed me to be would not tell you the whole truth.” His gaze slanted to the others present, Conall and Josh and Rhoann; blue topaz eyes narrowed.

  He warns them not to speak. “You have told those who are not our kin. Tell me.”

  Tiernan stiffened. “As you wish. I killed your father, my brother, in the act of rape. For love of your mother, my sister, I did justice, not murder.”

  Justice. And for that I am sworn to kill you, or die trying.

  It took Maelduin a moment to recognize the howling in his mind as the memory of wind. Then a scream rose through the gale.

  “Jesus fucking Christ, make it stop!”

  Terry.

  Terry needed him. Now.

  But he was bound by his oath, as surely as if the mage’s ward were still wrapped around him. His death, or his satisfaction of a now-empty oath, was watching him, waiting with the studied patience of a scian-damhsa.

  Not only was his oath hollow, he could not fulfill it, not without the grace and skill in Terry’s keeping. Gafa id’r cú-cémne a’s tine—caught between Fade-hound and fire, and as likely to be devoured by either.

  Slowly, gracelessly, Maelduin knelt. Bowing his head, he swept his hair aside from his neck, leaving it bare to a blade.

  “I yield to you. Accept, and I shall be forsworn, my life forfeit. I ask only that you allow me to try to save my scair-anam, before you kill me.”

  * * *

  The wind howled like a gutted crack-head and cut like broken glass. Which was okay with Janek—he didn’t give a fuck about the noise, and he hadn’t actually felt anything since his parasite had taken over their shared body. So being able to feel the cold was a step up. And being able to feel meant he was the first one awake.

  Yeah, things are fucking great.

  He’d fallen on his back, and on a tilted slab of ice, so he could see most of his own body. A few rags of his clothes were still with him, and his shitkickers—not enough to do anything useful about the cold, but at least his dick probably wouldn’t freeze off in the next few minutes. Not that it had done anything useful lately either, and it wasn’t like he hadn’t lost a few other parts here and there, but even a zombie had limits.

  And he still had his knife. His Fae-killing knife, tucked in the top of his right boot.

  For the first time, or at least the first time he could remember, Janek acknowledged a thought that had been lurking in the back of his mind ever since he and his passenger had lurched and clawed their way up out of the water and slush and ice.

  I might not live long enough to use that knife.

  Janek’s fists clenched until he felt the tight skin splitting over his knuckles. Two years of torture he’d lived through, slowly rotting, healed only to rot again, thanks to the abomination living in his head. Two years, and forever, waiting for his chance at the fucking Fae. He hadn’t even known the word ’abomination’ before he’d picked up his parasite—the monster loved the word.

  And as soon as it woke up, the abomination was going to escape. Even if it killed him. Killed all of them.

  No. No, it wasn’t.

  If anything killed the Marfach, it was going to be Janek.

  * * *

  The whisper of wind rose from the floor again, and moonlight glimmered in Terry’s mind, as if seen through the leaves of a wind-tossed tree. Terry fought the urge to fidget—now that he’d made up his mind to do something, he needed to, well, do something.

  The darag’s plan is not free of danger. We can send you anywhere in the web of the wellsprings, but you should go where the barrier is strongest.

  Makes sense—

  The barrier is strongest where the Marfach is.

  Oh, shit.

  Coinneach nodded. Mother Sun’s magick is strongest there, and She loans it to us. Enough power resides there that we felt nothing when the Marfach tried the barrier; there should be more than enough to keep you safe until we work out another way to guard the wellsprings.

  Should be.

  Coinneach’s gaze went to the floor. Nothing is certain.

  Except the flaw that’s already there. Already here. Terry took a deep breath, the way he did before going on stage, to center himself. And he wondered when a world so strange, so completely off-center, had become normal. I’ll go.

  For the first time, Coinneach smiled. He was almost as beautiful as Maelduin, for all that the two were nearly total opposites in so many ways. Then we have a chance. But you should go now, before the barrier weakens any further.

  Terry nodded,
narrowing his eyes at the eerie shifting opacity surrounding them. I wish I could talk to him before I go. Tell him what’s happening.

  Coinneach arched a brow. If you speak aloud, he should be able to hear you, though he will remember your words as something he heard in the past.

  Has he been able to hear us all along? Can he understand us? Jesus, what had they said? Trust, betrayal, monsters… You said it was Maelduin’s blood that let me understand you, at first.

  Coinneach considered. Your bond might let him hear you, but I doubt he can understand you when you speak this way. The speech of darag and Gille Dubh includes light, and light cannot pass the barrier. Without it, our speech is no more than wind.

  Terry’s knees felt a little weak. But he’ll hear me if I speak now.

  Yes.

  SPEAK QUICKLY. The gust from the floor startled Terry—and Coinneach, too, apparently. Terry guessed the tree wasn’t in a hurry too often.

  Terry nodded, swallowing hard.

  “Maelduin…” Fuck, what if he’s not out there anymore? What if he gave up? “If you can hear me… I was wrong. We’re connected, even if I don’t quite understand how. There’s a hell of a lot I don’t understand, and I don’t know how much of it you understand, and I don’t have long to talk. But this wall between us is incredibly important—Coinneach calls it a timeslip, and it’s keeping the most horrible thing I’ve ever seen out of the wellsprings. It’s your enemy, Coinneach says. And the connection between us, you and me, makes the barrier weaker. I’m not going to let that monster get to you.” Sweat beaded on Terry’s forehead and upper lip, as his second-hand memory of the carnage in the park forced its way to the surface. “So I’m letting Coinneach and his darag send me away until they can figure out a better way to keep the wellsprings secure.” His voice wavered, threatened to crack. “I’ll come back. I will. Don’t try to come after me, it’s not safe.”

  THIS MOMENT, HUMAN. THIS.

  The wind rose.

  “I’ll come back— ”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  The silence that followed Maelduin’s declaration was near-total, broken only by the wind heard only in his memory, and the remembered echo of Terry’s scream.

  Accept, damn you. Maelduin blinked stinging sweat out of his eyes.

  A rattling sound—keys in a lock—shattered the silence. A door crashed open, followed by uneven footsteps.

  Maelduin cursed under his breath, and raised his head just enough to see the intruder. A human, dark-haired and dark-eyed, handsome in a rough-hewn unshaven way. And he was looking at Tiernan as if he questioned Tiernan’s sanity, or his own. “You didn’t even bring your goddamned sword?”

  “I don’t need one.”

  Maelduin winced at the insult, but said nothing. He could lend the other scian-damhsa his oath-blade when it was time, if it came to that. A tidy solution, since it was going to kill him in any event. The human’s dark eyes, though, might be enough to deal him a death blow by themselves, if his current glare was a fair indication. This must be Kevin. His uncle’s scair-anam, a human male who loved an unlovable Fae.

  A Fae who had killed for justice, and for love, and not for any curse.

  Maelduin’s life had had a single, constant center, from the moment he had been old enough to take up a blade. Then he had come to the human world, and instead of finding that center, he had acquired a second one. Now the first was a lie, and the second was out of sight, out of reach, and—if that terrified scream was any indication—perilously close to out of time.

  Kevin shook his head. “You think you can take another blade-dancer with your sciana-Clo’che?”

  Blades of living Stone?

  One corner of Tiernan’s mouth edged up. “I don’t need to. I’m not going to fight him.”

  At last. “You accept my surrender, then?” Strange, how eager he was for his doom to be pronounced.

  “No.”

  Maelduin’s head jerked up as if pulled by a chain. “No?”

  “What the fuck do you mean, ‘no’?” This from Kevin, like the crack of a whip.

  Maelduin was beginning to have doubts of his own, with respect to his uncle’s mental soundness. And judging by the stares Tiernan was getting from the others in the room, Maelduin was in the majority.

  Tiernan appeared not to notice. “If I accept his surrender, I have to kill him. And I’d rather not be a kinslayer twice over, at least not until I’m sure there’s no other alternative.”

  A deep, calming breath didn’t help matters nearly as much as Maelduin had hoped it might. If my life is going to fall to pieces, is it really too much to ask that it fall apart in the way I was planning for? “Under the terms of my oath, the ‘other alternative’ requires me to kill you. And I am unable to do that—I will most likely kill myself instead, as I bear an oath-blade sworn to your blood—unless I find Terry and Share with him. And even if I could fight you in my present condition, Terry needs me now. So there is actually no other alternative.”

  “I found one.” Light glinted off a gold ring in Tiernan’s arched brow. “Namely, I refuse to accept your surrender.”

  “Am I the only sane person in this room?” Kevin’s face was red, his voice under tight and obvious control. “This Fae is sworn to kill you.”

  “I can take care of myself. You heard him yourself, he said he can’t kill me until he Shares with Terry. Which means there’s something he wants more than he wants my head right now.”

  Kevin opened his mouth, then closed it again, turning to regard Maelduin. The cold anger riding his gaze would have given a charging war-steed second thoughts. “Why do you have to Share with Terry?”

  While Maelduin was trying to decide whether silence or speech was his best option, Josh spoke up. “He said he was crippled. Clumsy.”

  That got everyone’s attention, especially Tiernan’s. Maelduin flushed under his uncle’s keen regard, but refused to look away. “I was warned the Pattern would take something from me. It stole my skill with a blade, as well as my grace in the use of it. The skill it took me a lifetime to acquire and hone.”

  Kevin’s lips narrowed to a thin line. “And you want it back.”

  “The only thing I want back is the one who holds half my soul.” The words were out before Maelduin thought, but he would not call them back even if he could. His soul knew what he needed. Rescuing Terry mattered more to him than his revenge, and he valued Terry over the skills he had spent his life perfecting.

  He had been wrong. His life did not have two centers; it had one. One who needed his help, yet might not want him.

  Life was easier when I believed I was cursed.

  Conall frowned. “Then why surrender?”

  “Because a blade-dancer who would trust another scian-damhsa, one who is bloodsworn, is a fool.” Maelduin spoke softly, distracted, trying to plumb the silence that had followed Terry’s cry, to make sense of the whispers of wind in his memory. “And my uncle is no fool.”

  Tiernan chuckled. “You’re kneeling in the middle of a room full of men, and males, who know better.” He put out a hand, showing he was unarmed, and also clearly intending to help Maelduin to his feet. “And I officially don’t accept your surrender.”

  Maelduin recognized the substance of the hand extended to him. It was living Stone, the elemental form of Earth, the Demesne they shared. He took it, and marveled at the warmth of it.

  Getting up was difficult to the point of humiliation. No one spoke—though the dragonet hissed in what might have been laughter. Maelduin ignored it, choosing to look instead at the male he was sworn to kill. “Why did you feel you needed no blade to meet me?” he blurted into the awkward silence.

  Tiernan said nothing, but extended his crystal hand again. Even warier of the gesture a second time, Maelduin stared as Tiernan produced a grace-blade from the Clo’che of his own hand, balanced it perfectly across two fingers as the harsh light winked off its wickedly sharp edge, then flipped it into the air and reabsorbed it back into
his hand.

  Scian-Clo’che.

  “I carry all the blades I need,” Tiernan replied at last.

  He could have killed me, as I stood here and gaped like an amad’n. Like the fool I am and have always been. “You do mean to let me live, else you would have killed me already.”

  “I would never come between a male and his scair-anam.” Tiernan looked as if he might be about to say more, but then subsided, frowning slightly at a meaningful look from his own scair-anam.

  When Kevin turned back to Maelduin, his expression was slightly less severe. Very slightly. “Maybe my scair-anam doesn’t need a mere human’s protection, but he damned well has it.” Perhaps Maelduin only imagined the human was less ill disposed toward him than he had been. “You want him to turn his back on you, let you go, because it’s more urgent for you to somehow break through that wall and rescue Terry than it is for you to kill him, the way you’ve been planning to do your whole life.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why the urgency? Make me understand what’s going on here.”

  He is truly afraid for his SoulShare. My uncle. The sudden warmth he felt toward the human startled Maelduin. “I heard Terry call for help, just now. He’s in pain, or danger, or both.”

  Tiernan, Kevin, and Rhoann eyed Maelduin, with varying degrees of disbelief. Conall and Josh, though, were looking at one another, and nodding.

  “The SoulShare bond,” Conall murmured. “You could sense me, and I could sense you, when I was trapped in the mirror. And when you were trapped in the Realm.”

  Josh’s hand slipped into Conall’s. “Even before we’d finished Sharing.”

  Maelduin allowed himself a small sigh of relief. They understand. Maybe more than I do. And if they did… “If you have had this experience before… might you know why I hear only in memory?”

  Now he had everyone’s attention. “Cac marh lobadh.” Conall’s whisper was probably inaudible to anyone but a Fae. “Are you sure about that?”

  “Yes.” And if the mage is nervous, I probably should be too. “Each time I hear Terry’s voice, it is as if he spoke some time ago, but I failed to hear him then, and only remember his words now.”