The Web (Fianna Trilogy Book 2)

by Megan Chance

  “If the Fianna have her, it’s already too late,” Lot said.

  Patrick sank into a chair. “I thought your warriors were infallible. You said they would never let one of the Fianna within a hundred yards of her.”

  “Perhaps it wasn’t one of the Fianna who snuck in, but Miss Knox who snuck out,” Rory suggested.

  Simon MacRonan, their Seer, a man with generations of Druid blood in his veins, said, “Are you certain she didn’t go for a walk, perhaps, or shopping? Young girls are so easily bored—”

  “She couldn’t have walked past the guards, could she?” Patrick glared again at Lot. “Or at least, she shouldn’t have been able to, and she would never have gone willingly with the Fianna.”

  “Have you forgotten the ball seirce?” Lot asked.

  “No,” Patrick said, and then hopelessly, “No.”

  “Clearly, it is more imperative than ever that we find the Fianna,” said Bres. “The raid last night was a failure. We’d hoped to trap them in their rooms, but they got away. They won’t be back, unfortunately. The tenement was burned to the ground.”

  “Burned?” Patrick echoed in horror. “Who gave the order to burn it? There were innocent people there.”

  “It was beyond unfortunate,” Jonathan Olwen said angrily. He was Patrick’s closest friend in the Brotherhood. They’d been in Ireland together, and had returned together, too, after the failed rebellion. “It was unconscionable. I’ve been saying so all evening.”

  Bres looked apologetic now. “I’m afraid our men got a bit overzealous. Thankfully, no one was harmed.”

  “I fail to see how we’re going to win any converts if we’re burning them out of their homes,” Patrick said. “Or how we’ll lure any informants. Your men were careless.”

  “They won’t be again,” said Bres grimly.

  “Just how trustworthy are your men? They see nothing when Grace disappears, and they’ve burned a building filled with innocents. What have we gained? Have we any idea where the Fianna are now?” Patrick demanded.

  “None.” Miogach turned from the window where he’d been listening. He sighed. “We’ve been winning some gangs to our side, but there are many more who see Finn’s Warriors as heroes. ’Tis no different than in Ireland. How they win such blind devotion is a mystery. I’ve never understood it.”

  “They have a rough charm that appeals to the downtrodden. ’Twas always so,” Lot purred.

  Bres scowled. “You’d think they wouldn’t be so difficult to find—seven lads with a reputation for ruthlessness—but those who know their whereabouts are fiercely loyal. We’ll either have to capture hoodlums who will talk or wait until the next riot.”

  Miogach turned to Daire Donn. “Perhaps there’s better news in the hunt for the archdruid?”

  Daire Donn shook his head. He alone of the Fomori men hadn’t cut his thick hair. “A small vanity,” he’d explained sheepishly. He’d tied it into a queue, but at his motion, strands escaped to fall over his shoulder. “I’m afraid not. The archdruid is as elusive as the Fianna. The sidhe we’ve questioned seem confused. They’re drawn here by magic, but they don’t know where it comes from. However, they’ve only just begun to mass in the city. They’ll find him, and when they do, we’ll find him as well.”

  “Grace’s grandmother seemed certain that an archdruid was the answer,” Patrick told them. “She knows more of the old stories than anyone I’ve ever met—or knew them, anyway, when she was lucid. She told Grace to search out the sidhe.”

  Miogach said dourly, “Aye, the sidhe will help her. Right over a cliff. If they leave her alive that long.”

  “She had no plan to search on her own, did she?” Lot asked.

  Her fear surprised Patrick. “I don’t think so. She seemed content to leave the search to us.”

  “Thank Domnu for that. Mere mortals have no chance with them at all. They’re drawn to Druidic power. A veleda would be irresistible to them. If they were to discover her . . . I doubt she would survive them.”

  “But if they’re so dangerous, why would Grace’s grandmother tell her to search them out?”

  “Whatever her reasons, they’re mistaken.”

  “Have there been any signs that she might wake from her coma?” Bres asked.

  “No,” Patrick said. “I’ve hired a nurse to help care for her, but there’s little hope.”

  “You’ve taken care to investigate this nurse thoroughly? The Fianna will infiltrate us any way they can.”

  “Yes. She’s no spy.”

  Bres rubbed his chin in thought. “Perhaps ’twould be wise to take the veleda’s grandmother into our care before the Fianna decide she has something they want.”

  “I could bring her into my home, I suppose,” Patrick suggested.

  “I will put Balor in charge of securing a new nurse. I’m certain you were vigilant, but one cannot be too careful.”

  “And as long as you have the grandmother, perhaps ’twould be a good idea for Mrs. Knox to be your guest as well,” Lot said.

  “Why?” Patrick asked.

  “A girl never truly leaves her mother. If Grace escapes, she’ll go to her first.”

  “You must do it, Devlin,” Simon urged. “We can protect them better if they’re all in one place.”

  Patrick remembered Diarmid Ua Duibhne in his study, saying, “You’ve started a war, Patrick. Perhaps you didn’t mean to, but you did. And in wars, people die. Especially innocents.”

  He looked around the table, at the men he’d worked with over the years to secure Ireland’s freedom, and the Fomori who had so eagerly blended their cause with his, and his fear began to ease. He’d done the right thing in asking for their help. They would find Grace and bring her back. They would find the archdruid and save Grace’s life.

  This was a war they could win.

  Patrick woke with the clang of swords ringing in his ears, the smell of hemp smoke in his nose, and a sense of disaster in his heart. He struggled from the visions the smoke had helped him to find and blinked at the shadows in the darkness. Someone had let the fire die. He reached for his sword; it wasn’t beside his pallet, and he wasn’t lying on furs but on thin blankets on top of something elevated. Something was wrong. He opened his mouth to call for Aidan—he needed him. The veleda was in great danger. Aidan would have the answers. Aidan would know—

  The images from his dream melted away. Patrick realized he was safe in his own house, and this was a bed, not a pallet, and the only swords he had were ancient and locked away in a safe. How did he even know what burning hemp smelled like?

  But his fear and unease didn’t abate. Nor did the words ringing in his mind:

  You need Aidan. Find him.

  Earlier that day

  Grace

  Derry grabbed my hand as people began to disembark the ferry. Very deliberately, he wove his fingers through mine.

  “I said I would go with you,” I told him, trying to ignore the heat of his touch. “You can let go of me.”

  A half smile. “Just until we get off the boat.”

  “You don’t trust me.”

  “I’m sure the feeling’s mutual.”

  The station was crowded, but Derry kept a tight hold on me as we pushed our way through the masses. Once we were outside, he didn’t release my hand; he dragged me after him into the chaos of the Brooklyn Bridge construction, stone and mortar and timbers so big I wondered what trees they could have come from. The streets beyond were full of people, wagons, and horses; slinking half-feral dogs; weary peddlers hawking what hadn’t sold at market; women bartering and men stumbling into saloons. We passed warehouses and the navy shipyard, with its giant hulls looming like buildings.

  I tried to memorize our path—I would need to know it when I made my escape—but Derry never traveled in any one direction for long, and I realized he was inten
tionally creating a maze. Well, how hard could it be to find my way to the ferry? All I had to do was ask someone.

  “We’re almost there,” he told me as the neighborhood changed. Warehouses and dockyards gave way to rickety buildings, tenements. It was a little better than the area where he lived—the yards weren’t quite so festering and the privies were still standing upright. There were men drinking and women bickering with their husbands and yelling at playing children. Derry cut a wide swath around three huge rooting pigs, muttering about them beneath his breath. I was so lost that we could have been in New Jersey, for all I knew.

  He came to a stop at a four-story brick building stacked next to three others just like it. A group of ragged children played baseball in a tiny square of dirt that passed for a yard. Privies bordered a cesspool. A man sat motionlessly in the doorway.

  “There’s something you need to do,” Derry told me.

  “What is it now?”

  “I don’t know any of the Dun Rats well enough to trust them. Finn’s made an alliance with them, but ’tis Keenan they’ve talked to, not me. They’ll do what Finn asks, but ’twould be better if they thought I had a personal reason for wanting to protect you.”

  “A personal reason?”

  “I need you to pretend to . . . be my lass.” His hand tightened on mine. “’Tis for your own safety.”

  I won’t be here long. “Fine.”

  He was obviously relieved. He pulled me with him to the door. The man there shifted, staring up at us blearily.

  “Who’re you?” he asked.

  “None of your business, old man,” Derry said, stepping past him.

  The man caught Derry’s ankle. The bleariness disappeared from the man’s eyes and his whole face hardened. “I said, who’re you?”

  Derry glanced at me before he said, “Derry O’Shea, of Finn’s Warriors. I’m looking for Hugh Bannon.”

  “Derry O’Shea?” The man quickly released him. “Hugh’s on the third floor.”

  “Much obliged.” Derry dragged me into the dark tunnel of the stairs, just as black and pitiless as the ones in his own tenement—now burned to the ground by Patrick—with the same mix of smells: cooking and sweat and sewage and mud, though at least here it didn’t smell like rotting dead things.

  I whispered, “So they’ve heard of you even in Brooklyn.”

  “I’ve a reputation,” he whispered back.

  I didn’t have to wonder what it was. The way that man had released his hold, the mix of respect and alarm in his eyes . . . it only reminded me again how dangerous Derry was, how careful I had to be.

  When we reached the flat, he rapped on the doorjamb, calling, “Hugh Bannon?”

  “Who wants to know?”

  “Derry O’Shea.”

  “Come in!”

  We stepped inside. The flat was small, a main room and one on either side. A window in the main room looked out onto a brick wall, and everything inside was gray: gray floors and walls; tattered gray blankets against every wall and in every corner; and gray boys ranging in age from six years old to mid-twenties. Three girls were equally gray, their dresses and skin smudged with dirt and soot. One of them was at the potbellied stove, where she stirred something in a great enamel pot, her dirty blond hair straggling into her face. She turned when we entered, and the smell of cabbage wafted toward us. My stomach rumbled. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast, which seemed a hundred years ago.

  “I’m Hugh.” One of the boys detached himself from the others. That he was their leader was clear by the way they watched him, alert to his every move. He looked to be Derry’s age, eighteen or so, with a face so bony you could imagine what his skull must look like. His hair was brown and shaggy. He wore a brown scarf about his throat—they all did. A dun-colored scarf. The Dun Rats.

  “Finn sent me,” Derry said. “We’re looking for sanctuary for a few days. Not long. Just until things blow over.”

  “Troubles with the law, eh?” The boy grinned and winked at his followers. “Got riots over there today?”

  “Not yet. But one’s coming in a few days.”

  I was startled, though I shouldn’t have been. I knew of the dissatisfaction in the city and the growing gang violence, but to hear Derry admit his involvement so casually—well, I’d already known he was dangerous, hadn’t I?

  Escape. Just as soon as you can.

  “We welcome the fight, right, boys?” Hugh asked the others.

  “Right!” they chorused.

  “There’ll be fighting enough in the days to come,” Derry assured him. “And we’ll be able to use you. In fact, we’ll have need of you. We’ll do some training while I’m here.”

  The boys cheered. Hugh looked at me. “So who’s this one?”

  Derry pulled me close, and when I tensed, his hold tightened in warning. “The cause of the trouble, I’m afraid. A new gang in town took a liking to her and won’t take no for an answer.”

  Hugh laughed. “I think we can help you out. Ain’t no room here, but Bridget’s got a panny downstairs where she can put you up.”

  “We’re grateful for whatever anyone can spare,” Derry said.

  “Miles,” Hugh said, “take our guests downstairs, will ya? And tell Bridge that I said to keep them.”

  Another boy melted from the wall. He was about my age, and he had coloring like mine: dark hair, pale skin, and brown eyes so dark they looked black. His trousers had a hole in the knee, and the sleeves of his coat showed the bones of his wrists, which jutted out sharply.

  “This way,” he said, gesturing for us to follow him to the stairs. He took us down one flight, pushing open a door as he said, “Got some guests for you, Bridget. Hugh says to keep ’em.”

  The flat was much like the one upstairs, though there were fewer people inside—only two skinny boys and two waiflike little girls. In the middle of the room was a table, and a tall, gaunt woman sitting at it, darning what looked like much-repaired socks. Her dark hair straggled loose from the bun on top of her head. In spite of her thinness, her face was so round it made me think of a lollipop on a stick.

  “I’m Derry, ma’am. And this is Grace. We were sent by Finn.”

  Her expression had been stern and wary, but now she burst into a smile. “Finn, eh? Well, well.”

  Derry smiled back at her, and she flushed with pleasure. It only irritated me more. Was there no one he couldn’t charm?

  He said, “There was a little trouble. Best for the two of us to get out of the city for a bit.”

  “Riots?”

  “Not today. But a raid last night. Burned our panny to the ground.”

  “I’m sorry to hear it.” She said to Miles, “Tell Hugh I’ll hold onto them. They’re pretty enough to keep. And polite too.”

  Derry said, “Thank you, ma’am. We won’t forget it.”

  Her smile turned calculating. “No, and neither will I. When you go back you’ll tell Finn how accommodating I was?”

  “He’ll hear nothing but praise from me.”

  She pointed with her darning needle to another room at the back. “You’ll be sharing with my boarders. Most of ’em ain’t here yet. I got nearly every inch rented out but for the alcove. The two of you can have that. I usually charge three cents for it, but it’s empty just now so you can have it for free.”

  Derry reached into his pocket. “I don’t want to put you out—”

  “No member of Finn’s Warriors pays for anything in this place. Miles, show ’em there, will ya?”

  My dismay grew when Miles led us into the second room. It was windowless and dark and small, with piles of rags and makeshift pallets lying everywhere, along with guttered, unlit candles melting into the floor. Miles took us to a shallow alcove built into the wall—I wasn’t certain for what purpose. “Here you are.”

  I threw a panicked look at Derry,
who ignored me and said to Miles, “Thank you, lad.”

  “’Tis a pleasure, Derry. I heard o’ you, you know. We all have. You need anythin’, you just tell one of the kids to fetch me.”

  “I’ll do that.”

  Miles nodded eagerly and left. When he was gone, I jerked my hand from Derry’s. “This isn’t what I imagined.”

  “’Tis the best I can do,” he said.

  My plan to escape tonight evaporated. I was surrounded by people, all of whom would be watching us. And it had taken us too long to get here; it was no longer day, but evening. This part of town was perilous—for a girl alone, so close to nightfall, it could be deadly. I remembered too well my encounter with the gang boys near Derry’s tenement, how they’d cornered me in an alley, and how frightened I’d been until Derry arrived to save me, how close I’d come to disaster. I also had no real idea where I was. I had to spend the night here. With him. In this tiny alcove, which was perhaps five feet wide by three deep—barely enough room for one person.

  “I can’t do this,” I said.

  Derry’s laugh was short. “You’d be surprised what you can do, I think. And you’ve no other choice. I can’t have you escaping. In case that’s what you were planning.”

  “I don’t want to be here,” I said softly.

  “Believe me, I know. I’ll see if I can’t get us something to eat.” He left me staring at that alcove, at the pile of filthy blankets. I was trapped, at least for the night. I leaned against the wall, crossed my arms, and cursed Aidan.

  Tonight, escape was impossible. But there was tomorrow. Once I was out of here, I would hunt Aidan down and tell him just what I thought of his betrayal.

  I heard Derry in the other room talking to Bridget, his deep voice, her answering laughter. What light there was faded until I stood in complete darkness. I heard the clang of a pot, more laughter, a child whining, and Derry’s quiet response. Then he came back into the room. He had a lit candle. I didn’t see he was holding something else until he nudged it at me.

  “Here,” he said. “Cabbage soup. I didn’t want to ask where she got the cabbage, but it tastes all right.”