Born of Oak and Silver (The Caradoc Chronicles) (15 page)

She helped him
to stand. Magically, she suddenly held a square of shimmering fabric. Most tenderly, she wiped the blood away from his face. Her long and delicate fingers then proceeded to smooth his hair. “Come, Cian, there are needs that we must attend to.” She swept her gaze down to his tented pants, and looked up into his eyes under the hooded fringe of her long lashes. Her hand slid down from where it had rested over his heart, trailing down across his abdomen and teasingly close to his aroused sex.

He throatily moaned and worked to press himself against her
. She smiled most cruelly. Leading him by a single hand, Maurelle began to move him forward. A dumb and thoughtless smile was pasted to his face.

As she approached the Silver
, Maurelle sifted so that she was now behind Cian. She pressed her body into his from behind, and wrapped her arms around him before again urging him forward. She was using him as a shield between her and Bram as she moved ever closer to the Silver.

A tingling started up through the ground
at my feet. It pulled on me. Bram was drawing from my Druidic powers to complete the fracturing of the Silver. I paid it little notice. My heart was in my throat as I watched the man who was my best friend reduced to cattle.

“Cian!” My voice croaked.
I cleared it and yelled even louder at him. “Cian! No! Fight her! I know you can hear me, Cian! Fight!” My anger and even greater desire to protect my friend finally allowed me to disregard Bram’s instructions and find the strength to move my feet. I did not care if the circle was broken—this was Cian. I’d told him that I would protect him, and thus far I had failed. I would not stand idly by as he was taken advantage of by something as vile as the Sidhe.

I
started toward them at a run. The air was charged with the energy that Bram had collected in order to crack the Silver. The hair on my arms stood on end as I requested even more be given, calling Fire and seeing how a swirling ball of intensely hot flames willingly formed in my waiting hand instantly.

T
he Silver began to stretch and open to allow Maurelle entry. The binding, cracking elemental substance stretched further in order to recover the Silver’s newly growing form.

I was now
within an accurate range, and raised my arm to launch the ball of flames I held at Maurelle’s back. I paused mid-motion as Bram stepped between me and Maurelle. The flames still burned in my hand. I shouted my vexation. “Bram, what are you doing!? She’s going to take Cian! Move!”

I fought to move around him, but was met
by his countering of my every step. Two old hands shot out quickly and held me firmly in place. I struggled against him, and watched with wide-eyed dismay as my hand holding the fire was pulled down and locked at my side. The fire began to sputter and threatened to go out.

Anger turned into frantic desperation as I realized that Bram
had succumbed to her influence as well. With all of the others under Maurelle’s spell, I was Cian’s last hope for release. However, Bram held me fixedly in place, his old limbs like that of an iron, aged oak. Fighting him was useless.

I looked down at my mentor’s face. His too was lined
tracks of blood before they stained and receded into the extreme white of his beard. I attempted to compel him as I looked into his eyes, pleading with him in my frantic fury. “Bram, let me go. Please. We must help Cian.” I struggled futilely against him again, willing that the strength of my words would override the all-consuming influence of the Fae.

I saw
as his ancient eyes began to blaze in defiance. He was fighting it. I moved to test his hold, and his hands tightened painfully as they held me locked into place. “Bram, please, help me,” I begged him one last time.

Maurelle laughed mirthfully
. “Ah, Bramwyll, I assumed you would be less susceptible to falling under my glamour. Do you never learn? Although, I will admit that I do find the knowledge of falling so easily to be quite . . . arousing.” A wave of provocative sandlewood washed over us. “I will make sure to remain undampened around you from this moment forward.” She again filled the men’s loins as she giggled merrily. “Come, Cian, I have needs which I think you will attend to nicely.” She spoke against his ear, feigning privacy when she had spoken loud enough for everyone present to hear. She bit his earlobe softly, and Cian groaned audibly.

Maurelle
resumed pulling him backward.

“Bram! Let me go, you fool!” I fought wildly, void of any effect on Bram’s seemingly supernatural strength.

“Farewell, Daine, I shall look forward to seeing you once again, and soon. Bramwyll, I thank you wholeheartedly for allowing me the use of one of your blood. I promise you, he will die . . . slowly.” Maurelle laughed again, her cruelty being disguised as joy.

I felt as though I was crumbling ins
ide as I watched helplessly while Maurelle’s heel crossed over the Silver.

“Cian, I am
so sorry.” My regret and sorrow laced my words. I lowered my head in defeat.

It snapped up abruptly as Bram suddenly spun around
, with the iron dagger that had remained in his hand poised for throwing. I watched in disbelief as he threw the knife at them, sure and quick.

The dagger
flew swiftly, flying through the air with a slight whistle as it cut its way through the night and toward its target.

It landed true,
squarely between Cian’s eyes.

He crumpled,
though still being held up by Maurelle’s preternatural arms. She chuffed disapprovingly, and threw his body to the ground with a sickening thud.

“No!” I shouted as I pushed futilely against Bram
, who was still preventing my flight toward my friend. He was immovable.

“
I do not give you or your kind any that I consider my own—nor will I ever allow it to be so,” Bram told her calmly, in a voice that echoed off the standing stones around us like thunder.

My bones rattled inside of my body as his words
ricocheted off them.

Maurelle seemed completely unaffected
. “Ha! You have missed your target then, Bramwyll. Never will I stop pursuing the bloodline of the great Macardles. Heed my warning: gather them close, Bramwyll, and make sure that it is there they always remain. Your vigilance cannot extend everywhere.” With her final words, the Silver shattered irreparably. Maurelle had been well enough inside to have been spared.

The slivers of Silver began to smoke and burn as they touched the earth.
Several fell onto Cian’s body and burst into flame as soon as they made contact with his flesh.

Bram finally
fell forward, brushing the flames off and away from his fallen grandson. He took Cian’s lifeless body into his arms and sobbed with heart-wrenching agony.

His tears
were free of blood.

My father’s ruined hat lay upon the ground in the growing pool of Cian’s blood.
I fell to my knees and felt as though the world began to crumble beneath me.

The funeral was a silen
tly marked vigil—there were no words able to express our grief. We stood much like standing stones ourselves, guarding and watching over the shrouded figure in the midst of the burning pyre.

I mourned alongside Darragh’
s family. My arm was around Brigid as she sobbed quietly against my chest, and Ayda was weeping on my shoulder as she tightly clasped my hand.

It was
Bram, the family’s patriarch, who touched his torch to the prepared mound on which his grandson’s body lay.

We mourned
as sparks and ash rose, caught by the cliffside wind, leaving a flickering trail behind them as they were led down to the sea below.

“We should p
repare ourselves for the worst—fortify the wards, and move everyone into Drumcliff,” a Druid of about fifty, who was not a resident of Drumcliff, was voicing to the assembly of Druid masters.

Two and a half weeks a
fter Cian’s funeral, we had gathered at the request of the High Council in order to discuss the events of Ben Bulben. The presiding members of each watch group were present.

Our discussion focused upon the potential repercussions of
the rifting Bulben Silver, which had permitted an unprecedented and diverse number of Sidhe into our world. Furthermore, it was hoped that the gathering of many, with a wide variety of skill, talent, and insight, might enable us to discern how it was that Maurelle had managed to escape her highly warded prison.             

“At this time, we do not know if that is necessary. We have h
ad no word from the other Watches that would support anything further having occurred. To date, the strangest report we have received was from a small village here in Ireland. They purported to have a Nuckelavee riding about. We sent two of Drumcliff’s best to determine if the claims were valid, but neither Darragh nor Gairnan were able to find any evidence of the creature’s existence,” Ewan, Bram’s second-oldest son related.

Darr
agh and Gair were not present to add their own testimony to Ewan’s, as they had returned to Killiney to grieve in the familiarity of their own home.

“Yes, but the very fact that there was a rumor
at all should serve as a warning to us that something is not right. There has not been a single report, or even rumor, of Nuckelavee being in our midst for centuries,” the fifty-year old Druid countered. “Furthermore, we have no means by which to attribute the escape of one of the higher Fae from wards created by Bramwyll. Containment wards failing should be reason enough for all of us to exercise extra precaution. It would be foolish to ignore what is so blatantly happening before us. We have strength in numbers. The Watches should be banded together before it is too late for us to do so.”

Bram sat silent
ly at the head of the chamber, his fingers steepled before his mouth as he heard and pondered all of the points presented by our congregation. He had said very little throughout the meeting’s run, and by turn, the conversation had done little more than repeat all of the same concerns over and over again. It had been this way for most of the day before Bram finally cleared his throat and decided to speak.

“Gentlemen,
the same distress fills us all. Those who are uneasy about the safety of your families are more than welcome to gather them in Drumcliff.” This admission brought many nods of approval from the men in the crowd. “However,” Bram interjected, “those of you without familial dependants, or those of you who are comfortable doing so, I would strongly encourage you to remain at your posts until we are better able to ascertain the severity of the situation.” This made some shift uncomfortably. Bram had posed a direct conflict between their senses of duty and self-preservation.

“In the mean
time,” Bram continued, “I will be leaving directly for France in hopes of discovering how it was that Maurelle removed herself from my wards. If none of you object, Daine Dalton will be accompanying me.” He looked over the group of amassed Druids for signs of disapproval. His gaze lingered briefly upon my face until I gave my assent before it moved on to the others.

When no one opposed
his proposal, he stood up abruptly. His heavy wooden chair squeaked in protest at his quick removal from its seat. “Very well, in my absence I appoint Braesal to fill my seat in the High Council.” He nodded to his son, who nodded back in acknowledgement. Bram then strode promptly from the room.

I extracted
myself from our group as quickly as I could manage, moving through the castle randomly, searching all of Bram’s usual resorts. I found him in the final library that I came to, the one that contained the oldest references that the Druids possessed. Bram stood in the center, bent over the room’s only table. He was reading a yellowed scroll of leather, his lips moving soundlessly as his eyes moved over the ancient words. I entered the room and came to a stop opposite of his studiously bowed frame.

“Get your things
, lad, we will be leaving within the hour,” Bram muttered as he continued his search.

I was frustrated. T
here were so many things that I wanted to ask him, but being unable to articulate anything, I simply turned away and went hastily to my room to gather my things.

My
apartment had taken on an air of reverence. Neither Gair nor I had slept in our room since the night before Cian and I had left for Ben Bulben. I stood in our common room, looking over the living space to Cian’s chamber’s doorway. Part of me fully expected Cian to emerge from his room, text in hand, and give me another discourse on the finer pleasures of Miss Rosie Calhoun.

I breathed
deeply; it still smelled of him here.

I
crossed the sitting area to my own room and found it stagnant and lifeless. I sighed heavily as I entered—too many sad memories now accompanied this place.

In
my wardrobe I found my leather riding packs. I did not know by what means we would be traveling, but decided that it would be best to travel as lightly as possible. I stuffed a few items of clothing into the bags, my daggers, and the book that I was in the process of reading weeks ago. As a second thought, I also brought out all of the money that I had stored away in a small pouch and stuffed it into the bottom of my bag. If it came to it, I would buy whatever else I absolutely needed.