Shadowmagic - Sons of Macha (41 page)

Maeve looked to her daughter and said: ‘It is too late for talk, you cannot stop us.'

‘We can stop you, Mother, with this.' Fand took an arrow out of her belt and handed it to Maeve who received it on the face-up palms of both her hands.

‘Don't be foolish, daughter, have you not seen what we can do?' Maeve then faded into her ghost form. The arrow remained on her hands. Her face was the picture of confusion. She grabbed the arrow with one translucent hand and then felt the sharp tip with the other. When it pricked her spirit-skin, fear crossed her face and she dropped the arrow.

‘Go back from where you came, Mother.'

‘But I thought, Fand, it was you who called me forth.'

‘I did not call you.'

‘Then who?' Maeve asked, truly confused. ‘We were lost in a void and then we … were … We found ourselves on a shadow island. A Shadowwitch of great power must have called us. I thought it was you.'

‘When did this happen?' Mom asked. She walked up to Maeve and the old queen stepped back.

Maeve placed her hand out as if she was sensing the air in front of my mother. ‘You have power. I can feel it. What do you conceal?'

Mom reached to her neck and pulled out from under her tunic her Shadowrune. When it was made during the unorthodox Choosing in the Chamber of Runes it was so clear it looked to me almost like a hologram of a rune. Now it looked old and cracked as if it was made out of ancient dried blood. Maeve instinctively reached for it but Mom pulled it back.

‘Where did you get that?' Maeve asked.

‘Last summer I performed The Choosing with oak sap and the Chamber rewarded me with this.'

Maeve was really shocked. ‘Even I would not dare to do such a thing. You
created
that day. From your Choosing an island … a shadow island
became
. We who last saw the sun on this field during our battle with Finn found ourselves alive once more – with form but not substance.'

‘How did you get here?' Mom asked.

‘We simply walked under the waves to the mainland. We need neither food nor air.'

‘This rune was clear for almost a year,' Mom said, ‘and then this summer, on the night you stole the blood of a child, it darkened.'

Maeve thought, then nodded. ‘We have a bond, Shadowwitch. What is your name?'

‘Deirdre.'

‘Daughter of Liam of the Hall of Knowledge?'

‘I am his daughter,' Mom said, ‘but Liam and the Hall are no more. All was destroyed – by your allies.

‘And the Tree of Knowledge?'

‘What care you of a tree?' Fand spat.

‘The Great Hazel is a very special tree.'

‘They are all special, Mother. The day you forgot that is the day you forgot how to be Hawathiee. Do you even remember why you fight? Has power corrupted you so that you use it only to gain more? Is power enough reason to lose me? Is your power enough reason to condemn the Fili to suffer, to grow old and die?'

Cialtie and his Banshee sorceress rode closer. He shouted, ‘Enough talk, Maeve.'

‘Your comrade Cialtie,' I said, ‘tried to destroy all of The Land and everything in it. Has he told you that?'

The old queen looked sharply to me in a way that made me regret speaking then she looked to her daughter for affirmation. Fand nodded yes.

‘I do not wish to kill you, daughter.'

‘I have lived too long with your name,' Fand said. ‘If I fail to stop you today I will kill myself for the shame of being your progeny.'

I imagine that even if I were to stab Maeve with my pointy stick it wouldn't hurt her as much as did her daughter's words.

Macha on horseback stepped forward with Lugh at her side. ‘Enough, Maeve! Let this begin.'

‘Macha kidnapped a Fili child so as to bleed her for you,' Nora said, ‘and when she was through she wanted to kill her. Is this the kind of future you want for The Land?'

‘And you know Lugh,' Dad piped in. ‘Do you really think he will let you rule? Do you think any of them will?'

Maeve looked to all of us. If I was a betting man I would have bet that we were getting through to her. She looked down thoughtfully at her hands and then as fast as any viper she lashed out. Her hand in ghost form shot into Mom's chest. Mom screamed and arched her whole body back in pain and terror.

We were all frozen with shock but that didn't last long. When we all stepped forward to intervene, Maeve hissed, ‘One step closer and you shall see her heart.'

That's the kind of threat that can stop you in your tracks. Maeve reached her other hand into Mom's chest and when she pulled it out, her fist contained Mom's Shadowrune. You could see it through her translucent fingers. She pulled sharply and it broke free of the leather necklace it hung from.

‘Your opinion, daughter, is something I have never valued. Your intellect and thoughts have not ever been worthy of my notice.' Maeve, still with her hand in my mother's chest, held the rune up to the sunlight. ‘And now I see – too late – how wrong I have been. You have become a better Fili Queen than I could ever be. Goodbye, my daughter … try to forgive me.' She placed the rune between her back teeth and then bit down hard. The Shadowrune erupted with amber light that made us all cover our eyes. When we could see again, we saw Maeve and her Fili army fading into their ghost form and then they kept on fading. Before anyone could speak – they were gone.

We all stared at the place where they had been with a ‘What the heck happened here' expression on our faces – everyone except Cialtie. I could come up with a lot of nasty names for my uncle but ‘slow' isn't one of them. He was looking around like a dog deciding whether or not to steal a hot dog from a picnic table. He was reassessing his rapidly changing power base. So I did the same.

OK, we had gotten rid of Maeve and her ghost army – this was a very good thing – but Cialtie still had a kick-ass Banshee army. Just us against them was a battle that could go either way, especially if Cialtie and his gang decided to take us out before we could get back behind castle walls.

‘Maeve,' I shouted.

Dahy jumped and said, ‘Where?'

Despite the tenseness of the moment, that made me laugh. ‘No, not that Maeve – Connemara Maeve.'

‘Yes, Conor,' came the waitress's voice from behind me.

‘I think you should slowly walk the rest of The Grove back to the castle.'

‘OK,' she said, in a voice I could tell was trying to be braver than she felt.

‘Have your people stay where they are, Oisin,' Cialtie said, ‘or my archers will fell them where they stand.'

‘We are here under the protection of a parley, brother. Even you would not break that faith.'

‘With all of the things you have accused me of,' Cialtie said, ‘breaking a parley seems insignificant. Anyway, your parley was with Maeve, not me.'

‘Uh oh,' I thought, but apparently I said it out loud. I got unanimous dirty looks from everyone on my side and a sickeningly sweet smile from my uncle.

‘I have archers trained on this position,' Dahy said.

‘Arrows do not worry a Lord of Wind,' Lugh said and then to demonstrate he flicked his hand and a wind tussled all of our hair.

I stifled a fart joke. This was definitely the wrong time for that.

‘I see we have a new Turlow,' Dad said, bowing one of those little bows a king gives to another king. ‘Now that you have lost your ghost army and the Brownies, are you sure you want to continue this conflict without allies? I will hold no ill will if you withdraw now.'

You got to hand it to Dad for a gutsy move but the new Turlow didn't look like he had enough backbone to dump Cialtie with the guy sitting right next to him.

‘We Banshee have nothing to fear from the Faerie.'

‘The day I lose my fear is the day I think I would be most afraid,' Dad said.

‘Hey, Turlow,' I said. ‘You know it's not just Faeries around here. We got Imps and Pooka, and Fili. There's even a mermaid back in there. And oh, I bet these guys will surprise you.' I pointed to the treeline and from every visible oak an Elf dropped down on a rope. The Elves, I learned, could climb oaks without the trees making them relive every horrible minute of their lives. I waved and they shot back up like their ropes were some kind of slow acting bungee. ‘Those guys are, like, invisible when they are in the trees. I'd worry about getting out of here through that forest.'

‘You have persuaded the Elves to enter this conflict?' The Turlow said, amazed.

‘Yup,' I said, ‘and I definitely would stay out of the Yewlands for a while if I were you. Boy, are those trees mad.'

‘This matters not,' Cialtie said. ‘We are not leaving. We are taking Castle Duir and you have made it easy for us to do it. My army is on the field, brother, your archers are useless and there are less than three score of you. Lay down your arms and I will be merciful.'

This wasn't good. As I looked to Cialtie and The Turlow and Lugh and Macha all glaring down on us from horseback like we were ants under a magnifying glass, the elation of Maeve's heart-ripping ghost army vanishing was starting to wane. We really were in a bad spot here. The Irish Druids weren't even armed. It was really just, me, Mom, Dad, Dahy, Essa and Araf. Brendan was up on the battlements with archers who were useless because of Lugh. We were so truly stuffed that even I couldn't come up with a smile, but amazingly and uncharacteristically – Dad did.

A tiny smile that was just noticeable enough to unnerve his opponent and hearten me appeared on the corners of his mouth. ‘Are you sure, brother, you want to start this now?'

Cialtie's mouth turned at the corners as well. For as opposite as these two men were, the mirrored smile reminded me that they were still siblings. ‘This day, my little brother, is long overdue.'

Dad nodded one of those slow thoughtful nods and took a deep breath. The scene reminded me of a showdown at the end of an old black and white western movie. ‘Then I would like to introduce you to someone.'

Cialtie's smile vanished as he looked around for some kind of trick.

‘This is Nora Fallon,' Dad said, pointing to his left.

Cialtie's smile returned. I half expected him to say, ‘So what?'

Dad then addressed Macha. ‘Mother, this is the grandmother of the little girl you kidnapped. Lugh, you may remember her son Brendan. Before we begin, she has something to say to all of you.'

Dad looked to Nora and nodded. She held her hands out in front of her, took a deep breath and shouted the immortal magic word, ‘YEEEEHAAAA!'

W
hile I was begging the yews for arrows and then flitting to the Real World, Dad, Dahy and the rest of the war council were coming up with a plan – a plan they forgot to tell me about. I thought the idea was fight Maeve and die, but Dad formulated a strategy in case Fand succeeded in convincing her mother to give up the ghost. I guess that's why they pay him the big bucks.

Nora never did tell me what gift she received from the yews but she obviously told Dad. When the yews asked me what gift I desired, I didn't know what to say but Nora knew exactly what she wanted. She wanted the same power as the woman who had stolen her grandchild. She wanted power that could trump Macha's power. The yews gave Nora power over horses. They gave her power that superseded Macha's horsemanship. When Nora held out her arms and yeehaa-ed, Cialtie, Lugh, The Turlow and especially Macha were thrown from their rearing horses. All of them as you would imagine were shocked but Macha – the queen of all things equestrian – was absolutely dumbfounded. I'm pretty sure it had been a thousand years since a horse had disobeyed her.

Dahy had always taught us, ‘When you're in a brawl, punch the biggest guy first.' Now that Maeve was gone, the new biggest guy was Lugh. With him still on the chessboard we had no archery cover and without arrows, we were sunk.

Lugh went off the back of his horse just like the others but unlike his companions he didn't hit the ground. As instinctively as you and I would reach out to grab a banister when we stumbled on a flight of stairs, Lugh conjured up a wind that caught him and sat him down on the ground feet first.

Dahy stepped up and threw a dagger directly at his head. The mountain oracle flicked his hand and Dahy's knife was blown off to the right. But this was a Dahy blade and it swung back on its target. I held my breath as it came at him from behind but just as the blade was about to stab the self-proclaimed god in the back of the neck, Lugh threw up his hand again. It was like he had eyes in the back of his head. The knife, though, wouldn't give up. Dahy must have incanted some serious knife homing voodoo into the thing 'cause it kept coming back like a stupid growling puppy that didn't know when to give up. Finally Lugh grew annoyed at swatting away at the knife like it was a persistent mosquito. With an increasingly aggravated look on his face, he finally held his hand in front of the approaching blade. The knife's homing magic was neutralised by the wind coming from his hand and the blade hovered just before the oracle's face.