Brothers: Legacy of the Twice-Dead God (49 page)

“If you recall,” MacNamara said to Harris,
“he shot every one of his opponents between the eyes in the first
two seconds of his first match with that weapon.”

“You’re just going to stand there and let
them intimidate me?” Harris asked in English. Kieran towered over
him, even three feet back. Those big, thick arms made his chest
seem enormous. Of course, MacNamara towered over all of us, but he
wasn’t nearly as imposing as Kieran when he wanted to be. The elf
was just scary in general.

“Intimidate you?” asked the elf. “You set the
trap, Mr. Harris, and used me as the bait. If I weren’t so
interested in what they were going to do next, I would turn your
mind into a turnip for that alone.”

“You seem to be overstepping boundaries at
every turn, Clifford ol’ pal,” I said from behind Kieran. “And not
very smartly. Why don’t you just go ahead and tell us what’s going
on behind those beady little eyes of yours.”

“Watch your tongue, boy,” he snapped angrily.
“I deserve respect.”

Up to that moment, I had considered the
Crossbow and the Quiver to be one tool together. Now, I realized I
was wrong in that assumption—the Quiver was older and originally
paired to a longbow. The Quiver controlled the return of the Bolts,
which is what I needed right then, so I called it up from my cavern
to my back. It felt good, slung across my shoulders with the
Crossbow crooked into my right.

“Perhaps,” I said, raising the Crossbow and
firing one Bolt. “But not from me.” I called to the Bolt through
the Quiver to halt its flight before it hit. I’d seen this in
movies before, where the bullet hung in mid-flight as the special
effects twisted the perspective around to face the hero so he could
do some outrageous act to avoid or deflect the bullet. The polished
wood of the Bolt rotated silently in the air, piercing Harris’
shield scant millimeters away from his skin. He focused on the
fletchings as they turned slowly in front of him.

“I’d say you’ve lost control of this
situation,” said Kieran softly. “And once again, to a
seventeen-year-old, untrained boy. No offense intended, little
brother.”

“None taken,” I said calmly as I stepped
forward to retrieve the Bolt. Grasping it lightly with two fingers,
it dissolved immediately, returning to the Quiver, which in turn
sank back into my cavern to rest against the Stone foundation.
Harris visibly relaxed, exhaling loudly.

“You show a much better mastery of those than
any of the Black Hand has in centuries, my boy,” said MacNamara.
“How long have you had the weapons?”

I thought back over the past few weeks,
counting. “I’ve lost track of what day this is,” I said.

“Thursday,” muttered Harris.

“Ten days, then. I got them on a Monday,” I
said.

“But you were unconscious for three days
recovering from healing me for what he did to me,” offered Kieran,
pointing to Harris, “so that would make seven.”

“And how long have you been apprenticed?”
MacNamara asked, coyly.

“Technically, the same day,” I answered,
“though we couldn’t actually get to anything until this Tuesday.
No, wait, you did show me how to see in the garage, so Monday would
be right.”

“At least this humiliation was in private,”
said MacNamara to Harris, the twin irises of his eyes aglow.

“I will ask only once more,” said Kieran,
“why are you after my brother?”

“It’s a matter of National Security,” said
Harris, sighing heavily into the last words. He seemed to shrink
even more into his fireplug stature. “Your father was poking around
into the disappearances of some very disreputable people, people of
interest to the United States government. I started watching him as
he traveled around, searching. Our world is much smaller than the
humans’ world, but we can still get lost in it and show up later
with different names. We’ve been doing it for centuries. But Robert
McClure was finding bodies and that became disturbing. So we
started looking at the who’s and where’s and why’s and we could
come to only one decision.

“So, the first task was to find more
information,” he went on. “I approached your father in Vienna a
year ago and asked him directly why he was searching for these
people. I had fifteen cases in front of us with primary evidence to
support my claims of his work. And before you make any claims about
how I may have conducted myself, do realize that Robert is
certainly just as volatile as I am.”

Kieran shrugged at the comment. “Whereas I
might have agreed with that statement, Seth would not and he has
more recent associations with our father than I. However, let’s
just let that river run for now.”

“The one item we didn’t have, to make sense
of the fifteen cases, was the similarity,” Harris said. “The only
true correlation we could make was that Robert McClure had sought
these twelve men and three women and found their remains. They were
all magically powerful but not politically. Robert shouldn’t have
even known these people.”

“Out of curiosity, Mr. Harris,” I asked,
“just how old do you think my father is?”

“Our best guess has him at about one hundred
sixty,” he said.

“Curious,” I said. “MacNamara? How many times
has my father won at your games?”

“In various forms, six,” the elf said, poking
at the nearest prone man with his foot, still grinning.

“More than we knew about, then,” I said,
kicking my estimation of my father’s abilities up once more. “So
Mr. Harris, with that little bit of information, would it seem
likely that your estimate of my father’s age is off?”

“I don’t see how this is germane to this
discussion,” said Harris.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” I said. “You
didn’t say to what conclusion you and your fellows came.”

Harris stood there and stared at me.

“This is where you fill in the blank and say
what your conclusion was,” I said, hefting the Crossbow
slightly.

“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see
this is a prelude to war,” Harris said angrily. That caught
MacNamara’s attention and he stopped prodding the unconscious body,
turning his attention to us again.

“A war?” asked Kieran. “Against whom? By
whom, Mr. Harris?”

“That was Robert’s secret, wasn’t it?” said
Harris. “He had all the answers and he wasn’t telling anybody
anything. We assumed that either Seth could lead us to more
information or we could lure Robert and Olivia out of hiding using
him as bait. Either way, we needed him as much as we needed
Robert.”

“So in the name of National Security,” Kieran
said, getting a mite testy. “And the time honored tradition of the
end justifying the means, you set dogs on a teenager. And at every
turn, instead of admitting your obvious mistakes, you have
blustered and bullied him, attacked us nearly fatally, and finally
only told some fraction of the truth—and only a fraction—because
three people far more powerful than you are finger twitches away
from killing you.” Kieran was nearly yelling at the end. MacNamara
twiddled his fingers over Kieran’s shoulders at Harris as he said
that last part, emphasizing “finger-twitches” quite nicely. He
didn’t like Harris either, apparently.

“You see a prelude to war?” Kieran continued,
more quietly. “You’ve caused one, you idiot. You are using your
government to attack me and my family. Gratuitously. Call your
handlers, Cliff. Explain to them that the McClures are bigger than
they are, that they need to leave us alone. Now! If they don’t,
they will have a war and they will definitely know the who’s and
the why’s.”

Kieran turned and stormed past me to the
door. I could see the anger roiling through his aura, emanating
from the center outward. I kept quiet and followed—Momma didn’t
raise no fool! Not that I thought he’d actually do anything to me,
but, like he said earlier, let’s just let that river run. He was
too happy a man to let the anger ride him for too long.

Behind us, MacNamara said, “Ehran sucked all
of the drama out of my question, so I’ll have to wait. Still, his
questions were much better than mine anyway. You have a short time
before your bout with Ferrin, so you may wish to prepare now.”

“That’s not fair to me…” Harris started to
complain.

“Not fair?” MacNamara interrupted him. “You
just broke the peace six times in front of me! Me! Fair would be
McClure challenging that and me tossing you into oblivion. Fair
would be McClure answering that challenge and tossing you into
oblivion himself. Fair would be Seth filling you full of holes with
that magnificent weapon he’s carrying.” He paused in his tirade.
“Besides, they rattled Ferrin, too, so I’d say the two of you are
on an even keel in that regard. Of course, ultimately, they did
rescind their promise to kill him on sight, whereas I didn’t hear
them do the same for you here, so maybe it isn’t quite even. Good
luck.”

The outer door opened as MacNamara joined us.
I sent the Crossbow and Day Sword home before leaving the room.
Initially, I had thought the Crossbow and Quiver would be the least
useful of all, but I was definitely wrong on that score. The mass
extermination during our first battle and the pure finesse of the
encounter with Harris proved how effective the duo could be. I
don’t think that there is a “least” among these five. MacNamara was
right: magnificent weapons.

We followed MacNamara back through the
tunnels to the entrance to the field. As we exited, we found
ourselves on the opposite side of the stadium, turning right in the
aisle. Two gates down and we were at our balcony.

“I must admit, dear Ehran,” said MacNamara,
turning around just past our gate, “how positively fascinating it
is to watch two completely different castes of man, each powerful
in their own right, be totally and absolutely cowed by someone who
appears to be no more than a mannequin.”

Kieran laughed heartily at that. It didn’t
drive away all the anger and he drove the laugh a little more than
he felt it. That was all obvious from the emotional flow in his
aura, the heat flow in his body, and the way they blended together.
Not that I was going to narc on him or anything.

“Now that you’ve rattled both their cages, it
should be quite an interesting campaign,” the elf said.

“Maybe,” said Kieran. “Ferrin locked up his
last fight pretty quick, though.”

“Surely Harris will be better prepared,”
argued MacNamara.

“Oh,” Kieran said with mock surprise, “were
we not seeing him at his best just now? When his life was at risk
seven ways from Sunday? Truly? Had I not been expecting his
stupidity, there would have been six dead men in that room. The
looped feedback from the power they were weaving would have fried
their brains when I cut the linkages. As it is they will be
unconscious for several days and suffer sporadic and severe
headaches for the rest of their lives.”

He paused, inhaling deeply and closing his
eyes tightly. That was his anger talking. This was really bothering
him.

When he spoke again, it was in an older Elven
dialect, one with several levels of political situations or castes.
He spoke as a diplomat of an outside people pleading with an Elven
king. It was a high praise.

“Lord MacNamara, I do apologize most
profusely for allowing my anger at another person color any
discussion with you,” Kieran said. “I did not intend at any time to
show any animosity toward you or yours.”

MacNamara answered in English with big smile,
“Now you’re just showing off.”

I thought he was working the elf, personally.
Seemed to be doing the trick, too. Those sparks of orange and red
in his aura shrank and wafted to nothingness. I’ve seen my dad do
this to people, be all diplomatic and stuff. Now Kieran was doing
it. You’d think there was a genetic predisposition for it. Seemed
to skip my generation, though.

“I have accepted an invitation to view the
final bout with the United States coalition,” said MacNamara.
“Considering your current animosity toward their champion, perhaps
it is best that I not extend that invitation to you as well.”

“Just so,” answered Kieran placidly, bowing
his head slightly.

“A regent will come for your team an hour
before noon then. Good luck, McClure. This should be most
interesting,” MacNamara said, then turned quickly and walked down
the aisle, disappearing quickly into a throng of people that didn’t
seem to be there before. Kieran reached over the gate, unlatched
it, and walked in with me following in his wake.

“Peter!” Kieran called as we walked into the
apartment. The anger in his aura was still rolling through him.

“Coming,” Peter called from our room. He came
out wearing just his pants and drying his hair with a towel. “Yes,
sir?” he asked.

“When we get home,” Kieran said, “I want to
hire attorneys, several of them, as high powered as I can get.
Business managers to handle our money issues. Computer specialists
to get us tied in to the world at large. Then I want us hooked in
to the magical world. I want protections on our attorneys and other
employees. We will need to send someone to Father’s Savannah home
and Colbert’s Atlanta compound and investigate them both. And we’ll
need to do it from Ireland. Can you get that started?”

Peter shrugged through the towel now around
his neck. “If you’ve got the money, yeah,” he said.

“Money will not be an issue,” answered
Kieran. He was calming down now, finally. Peter was watching him
with curiosity.

“Harris really got to him,” I said, chuckling
a little, plopping down on the couch while Kieran paced with
nervous energy.

“Idiots in authority usually do,” Kieran
muttered, then dropped to the couch opposite me, sighing heavily.
“He’s right, though. It does look like a prelude to war.”

“Against whom?” asked Ethan from the doorway
to his and Kieran’s room. He was dripping wet and buck-naked. Peter
threw his towel across the room to him. He started drying off with
it.