Born of Oak and Silver (The Caradoc Chronicles) (32 page)

Her body convulsed in a series of spasms, and I watched as the light and life
forever disappeared from her beautiful eyes.

“You should
have given me the Sword, Daine,” Ayda said idly from somewhere not far.

I
rocked the now lifeless body of my daughter, blood soaking into my clothing as I spat in response, “You would have killed her anyway.” A swelling rage took control of my mind and body. I turned my head, seeing her start as she encountered eyes that burned with living fire.

Ayda quickly regained the air of indifference, admitting simply
, “Yes, you are right about that. She had quite the likeness to Brigid, don’t you agree? I almost couldn’t bear to look at her without feeling like I needed to immediately kill her too—and I did. So, I suppose it all worked out for me in the end.”

I coul
dn’t believe what I was hearing. I felt nothing but revulsion as I looked at her. She deserved to die, and I would personally see to it that she did.

I lay
Charlotte gently upon the forest floor. My clothing was saturated by her blood. I raised the Sword in my hand menacingly toward Ayda, my daughter’s blood blotting its blade. I was beyond being able to speak words. I stood in a bloody field, surrounded by the lifeless bodies of my massacred children. I was capable of only one thought: revenge.

I stepped forward;
Ayda’s pulse quickened at her neck. I watched her like a focused predator as she began to back away fearfully.

“I warn you husband, Maurelle will be most unhappy if you damage me
,” Ayda warned desperately.

“Doubtful,” I growled lowly. I stalked closer, my eyes focused intently on hers. She
did not mistake my intention.

She began to side
step away and I matched her, caught in a dance where only one of us would walk away. She and I both knew that it would be me. I would not use Druidry to kill her—that would be over too quickly. I wanted to feel her die as I avenged my fallen children with my bare hands.

“I will fight y
ou, Daine, and it will not be pretty. I am more powerful than you can ever imagine.” She called fire, causing it to shoot up in a pillar around me. I was untouched. I used her fire against her, wielding it as though it were my own, manipulating it into a warm and protective cocoon before I stepped through it entirely unscathed.

Her face paled, her eyes wide
ned. “That’s not possible!” Her foot stomped on the ground in a tantrum. She huffed as she thought of her next attack.

“Do not even try it. I will remain unharmed no matter the Druidry you use. The world bends its self and its devices
only to me,” I said to her pitilessly, my voice a thing of ultimate authority.

Her
claws seemed to lengthen even farther, her face twisting into an ugly, amused glare. “It does not matter; you will be easy enough to dispose of without the use of something as menial as Druidry.”

Bram’s face appeared behind her, his arms snaking around to hold he
r arms pinned down at her sides. He was using all the strength he had left to hold her, forcing his body into one final purpose. “Throw the Sword, Daine—end this!” His eyes, though fierce, pleaded with my own.

“No! I would kill her myself!
” I roared at him. I prowled closer to them.

“Do not stoop to their level;
be true, Daine,” Bram countered, grunting in pain as Ayda fought rabidly against his hold. His voice was soft and even, but somehow it managed to break through the rage that sheltered me.

“But you’ll die,
” I said, my voice faltering.

Ayda must have
mistaken my tone for indecision; she began to laugh hideously. Her voice was breathy from Bram restricting her movements and lungs. “Poor Daine, always having to choose between the lesser of evils,” she mocked. “He’ll choose life, old man. You’ll live to fight another day, mark my word.” Her eyes rocked back to mine, taunting as she smiled with a mouth full of obscene teeth.

I could not stand
to look at her a moment longer. She was a sick, twisted illness that had been masquerading as a devoted wife and mother. Bile rose into my mouth, and I sneered as I tasted it.

“Throw the S
word, Daine! I cannot hold her much longer. It is too late for me; I will not recover from these wounds. Let me die honorably; allow me this final act of vindication.” His green eyes, the same shade that Ayda’s had once been, were resolute. He wanted this. He wanted redemption as much as he wanted to redress what had been done to his family.

“Finish it! Now!” His face was strained with the effort
of containing something that would soon overpower and kill him.

I drew my arm back
and threw the Sword with all my might.

I
t flipped end over end as it flew through the air.

Ayda let out a scream, and Bram, despite holding a raging and wild beast in his arms, managed to express a silent, and final, appeara
nce of absolute gratitude.

The S
word struck true, piercing them both through their chests. They toppled to the ground, their blood seeping out to tangle and intertwine, becoming indiscernibly one.

I stood as a statue, b
reathing ragged breaths that threatened to rip apart my chest. I fell to my knees as the pain of my inconceivable loss washed over me, drowning everything in darkness.

I heaved, sick w
ith what had been done, my tear-filled eyes darting to the fallen bodies of my children, and to Bram who had died protecting me, just as he always had. I sobbed, guttural sobs that seemed to originate from the farthest reaches of my soul.

The Druid receded, lost in our shared grief. It wasn’t long before I realized that I had just died too.

I
burned Ayda’s remains, not wanting to befoul the earth with something as malign as she. When it was done there was nothing left, and for that I was afforded some peace.

At night
fall, I loaded the carefully wrapped and prepared bodies of my children and mentor, tenderly placing each in the back of our wagon. I rode alone, a solitarily mourned funeral procession of one.

I did not feel. I was dead inside. However, no matter how much I willed it, I could not stanch the flow of tears that refused to cease falling from my eyes. Slowly
, the horses pulled the wagon forward. I did not want to bruise my most precious cargo.

Too soon,
I arrived at the spring where I had found the Sword.

I wanted to lay them to rest in a place that held only good memories of us together.
A meadow adorned with golden flowers was the least that I could give them. It seemed as if it had been years since I was last here.

The horses stopped.

I don’t know how, but I climbed down from the wagon’s buckboard and stood unblinkingly before the five delicately wrapped bundles. I bent and picked up the first.

I cr
adled each of my children to me, holding all that was left of them as tightly as I could, as if by so doing they would feel and know that I was there. That I was with them even in death.

I stumbled and shuffled forward as I pressed my weeping face against them.
There were moments when I could do nothing but collapse to the ground and sob.

I carried Bram reverently
, laying him down beside them. He would guard and protect them in death just as fiercely as he had in life.

I opened the earth of the wall just below the spring, deep and dark, aligning stones to make their tomb. The water fell tranquilly over the opening. I ceased its flow. Then, with agony, I stooped to carefully lift my chil
dren, stifling my heartbroken lamenting against their burial shrouds. Lovingly I placed each into their final place of protection and rest.

I lay Bram
down last. I placed my hand gently upon his chest and whispered a pious plea. “Please keep them safe.”

Taking one last glance to assure myself that they were all well, I allowed the earth to close, to blanket and shield them forever.

The spring had issued forth from a large stone that jutted out from the rest of the rock wall. I went back the wagon and returned with a hammer and chisel. I worked tirelessly, thankfully losing myself to the task before me. Ever so gradually, the stone was transformed into the head of a lion.

It was frozen mid-roar, its mouth wide with teeth bared.
I could think of no better emblem to protect my family as they rested peacefully behind. When I had finished, it was once again day. After standing back to survey my work, I released my hold on the spring. It cascaded from the lion’s mouth, falling loudly into the clear pool below.

The words my mother had written on the parchment had finally all come to pass.

I memorized the place, the smells, the feel, the sounds, and wished with everything that I had that I could join my family forever here.

A young family appeared, the picture of pure happiness. Their daughter, who was perhaps
five, charged the cool water of the pond, giggling with joy as its coolness met her warm skin. She was followed by a fat and jolly little brother of perhaps two years, who squealed with his own delight. Their parents greeted me, unaware of the way my insides rent as I heard the children’s laughter.

I closed my eyes, knowing that my own children would
never again be joining in the fun. I moved painfully toward my wagon, feeling pieces of myself being irretrievably left behind.

The memories the house held
were too painful. My mind continually deceived me. I’d swear that I heard children laughing, and then expected my own to run through the front door and into my office at every moment. I suppose that is what grief is, the time that it takes for our minds to accept that someone is really gone. Until that point, we’re lost in the belief that they are not truly gone at all, simply away and will shortly reappear.

The idea of waiting and hoping to see their ghosts haunted me.

After carving the lion’s head, I made my way to the house. I was numb, in shock and unthinking. I think I went there purely out of habit. I stared at the house, silent and dark, and after putting my horses away, went inside.

I smirked bitterly as I felt the wards tingle on my skin as I crossed the doorway
.
Can’t keep the wolf out when he’s masquerading as one of your own,
I chastised myself.

I passed by the liquor cabinet, grabbing Bram’s newly opened
bottle of Irish whiskey, and took it with me into my study. I drew the curtains closed, casting the room into darkness. I sat in my chair, sinking unfeelingly into its familiar curve, and brought the bottle to my lips. I drank heavily, not caring for how it burned. I found the discomfort an incentive to drink all the more.

Contrary to Máedóc’s warning, I nursed my grief, wallowed in it, and reveled as it grew.

I drank myself into a stupor every night for weeks. I couldn’t stand my waking hours; they were too painful to bear. The house that had always been loud and lively was now constantly enveloped in silence and stillness.

If the days were bad, the nights were worse. In the darkness I allowed my mind to hope that maybe my misery would qualify me lucky enough to be haunted by
the ghost of one of my children. They never came, and the disappointment was nearly maddening.

Rather than endure more than I was capable of surviving, I found it much eas
ier to simply drink until I could no longer remember.

Two weeks into my drunken mourning, I had once again drifted off into the unconsciousness that I so craved. The wind picked up, rattling the shutters against the house. The rattling
escalated into a forceful banging. Loud enough to wake me from the drug-induced sleep. I lifted my head slowly from where it had lain heavily upon my desk, feeling my neck knot and tighten from having rested at such an awkward angle.

The first thing I saw was the S
word, unmoved since I had let it lay beside my head upon the desk. I looked around groggily; my head swam, and I felt as though I might be sick. The sound of the shutter slamming against the house vibrated dully around in my skull. I was going to have one devil of a headache in the morning. I stood gingerly, holding my hand to my head in an attempt to steady myself as I stumbled into the furniture that I had forgotten lay in my way. The floor seemed to move precariously beneath me.

With much mo
re concentration and effort required than I had expected, I made it to the window and drew aside the heavy curtains. I squinted as I looked out into the brightly lit night; there was a full moon out tonight.
Strange
, I thought to myself as I noted that not a single leaf of the tree, nor a single twig of the many shrubs that were rooted just outside my window, fluttered in the breeze. If it were possible, the wind blew only against my study window, raising a near deafening racket as the shutters continued to pound against the house.