Reunion (19 page)

Damn you, Hayley.

Ren tried to recall the burning need he'd had to be the one who saved Hayley when he was younger. He wasn't nearly so foolish, passionate, or absurdly heroic these days. That reckless desire had caused a catastrophic chain if events that had led him here to this place, and this moment, with the blood of a dozen or more people on his hands.

Perhaps she was okay. Abbán had sent her back to her own realm. She'd been gone a long time and it was unlikely anybody would believe her when she tried to explain where she'd been, but Kerry and Patrick would be thrilled to have their daughter home. Even Neil would probably be glad to see his sister again.

There's nothing I can do about it, anyway,
he reminded himself.
She's home now. Back in my world ...

Strange how I haven't stepped foot in that reality in ten years and I still think of it as mine.

Ren reached into his pocket and retrieved the other jewel he carried today - the ruby Trása's cousin Abbán had used to open the rift from their reality to this one. That was not what made it special, though. Ren had the ability to come and go as he pleased to this realm. This jewel had opened a rift to the reality where Darragh was stranded and could do it again.

For the first time in a decade, Ren had the means to bring his brother home, quite literally, in the palm of his hand.

But if he did that, as soon as he found him Darragh would expect to share the
Comhroinn
with his brother. That meant giving away the presence of Brydie and the amethyst and the certainty that Darragh would insist on asking a
djinni
to release her, and then they'd know if she was pregnant, and Ren's nightmare would come true ...

"I'd like to help," he said after a time, studying the multifaceted gem. "I'd like to get Darragh. But I can't. Not now. Not with this crisis with Isleen. Trása can't understand why I'm not moving heaven and earth to find my brother and bring him home. God knows, Logan and Pete want to go back and get some answers from the
Matrarchaí
, even though I've shared a lot of Delphine's memories that I've been able to make sense of." Ren hadn't shared all of her memories, partly because he couldn't access them either. Knowing what Delphine knew was only useful if something triggered the memory. He'd had the same problem with Darragh's memories when he tried to figure out how Darragh had managed to teleport himself out of danger when he first arrived in this realm and the Tanabe tried to kill him. He'd searched Darragh's memories to no avail, until Trása told him the skill was called waning and he had to have something to search for. That, more than anything, drove his need to share the
Comhroinn
with other Empress twins as they died - not for information, so much as context for the memories already filling his head.

"The more I learn, the more it seems our reality is the key. It's where the
Matrarchaí
are headquartered. And now Trása's gone and messed everything up trying to be helpful. Marcroy is going to miss Abbán soon and wonder where his ruby is, so I guess I'm not going to be able to put off dealing with him for much longer, either."

He sighed heavily at that thought. There were consequences attached to confronting Marcroy Tarth.

"There're things I know that Marcroy doesn't ... or rather, things Delphine knew."

He took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a moment.

"How to you think Darragh's going to take the news that -" Ren doubled over, his thought cut short by a searing pain slicing across his abdomen.

He fell to his knees on the wet stony ground. The pain shot through him in white bolts of agony. It felt as if he were being stabbed and his hand came away bloody when he tried to feel his abdomen for the source of the pain.

Darragh
. It was the only explanation.

Darragh was trying to contact him and he was doing it with the equivalent of
airgead sídhe
in the other realm. Titanium. Darragh had done this years ago, when they were first separated and naive enough to believe they would be reunited any day now.

Ren had communicated with Darragh the same way, reminding him of the accident Ren had had as a child by carving the word "bike" into his forearm. He knew Darragh would see it and then dredge it from Ren's memories - shared during the
Comhroinn
- and make the connection between the titanium bike spoke that had injured Ren, and the matching wound he'd manifested in another reality years before, the only time the psychic link between them had worked the other way.

For a time, after that, they'd kept in touch, but then Darragh had asked Ren to stop. He'd sent him one last message:
no more.
Since then, they'd stayed in touch with nothing more than the tiny nick behind the ear that Ren reopened every few days, just to let his brother know he hadn't been forgotten.

Things must have changed dramatically for Darragh for him to reach out like this. When Ren peeled away the bloodied fabric of his
gi
pants and read what Darragh had hacked into his own flesh, he knew his previous rationalizations were moot.

It didn't matter any longer whether this was the right time. It didn't matter about Hayley. It didn't matter about Isleen and Teagan. It didn't matter that the nightmares might return. It didn't matter that they might one day come true.

None of it mattered.

It was time to bring his brother home.

The
Tuatha Dé Danann
, although long-lived, were not particularly forward thinking. It was hard sometimes, Marcroy reflected, to remember how they owed the Druids a debt of honor and wondered - as he often did - if the treaty they had sworn almost two thousand years ago had been worth the long-term cost.

As this evening's ceremony drew to a close in the sacred grove outside Temair, Marcroy wished more of his ilk possessed the ability to see into the future. The gift of Sight sadly seemed to belong almost exclusively to human practitioners of magic and a few of the Brethren he would likely never meet.
Tuatha Dé Danann
seers were almost unheard of.

Had there been one around at the time the treaty was worked out between human and
sídhe
, Marcroy was convinced it would never have been agreed upon.
But, then again, perhaps it still would have.
The
Tuatha Dé Danann
possessed the ability to cross into other realities where similar treaties had been forged and there had been no warning, in those realities, of the trouble to come. In fact, Marcroy had got the very idea for the treaty after hearing how successfully it had worked in other realms. Pity he didn't get to see any of those other realms a millennia or so after the fact. He may not have been so quick to embrace the notion of sharing
sídhe
magic with humans to fight off a common foe.

"The reason humans think the
Tuatha Dé Danann
are so arrogant," a small voice whispered in his ear, "is because you always look so bored when presiding over their ceremonies."

Jamaspa
. Marcroy hadn't seen or heard from the
djinni
in years. His sudden appearance - if that's what the faint wisp of blue smoke hovering beside his ear could be called - could only mean trouble.

Marcroy couldn't answer him, either. Queen Álmhath was staring at him, waiting for his response to her spring offering. He was here to accept this gift on behalf of Orlagh, the queen of the
Tuatha Dé Danann
. Fortunately, the ceremony was almost done. Soon he could leave this mundane world and return to the peace and serenity of
Tír Na nÓg
.

"I thank thee on behalf of Orlagh and all the
Tuatha Dé Danann
," he said, annoyed he was required to appear grateful. Back before the Treaty of
Tír Na nÓg
, although the gifts were the same, there had never been a need to say thank you. Supplicants didn't expect thanks from their betters. Thanks were something reserved for equals and Marcroy considered humans to be woefully short of being his equal.

The queen bowed and turned to face her people, gathered among the trees, throwing her arms wide to welcome them to the celebrations. As they let out a cheer, Marcroy took the wicker basket laden with food none of his kind would ever eat and turned away, at the same time catching sight of Álmhath's son, Torcán and his wife, Anwen. Torcán seemed to be itching for the party to begin. Anwen, however, was watching Marcroy with eyes that were both cold and suspicious.

"She is not what she seems, that one," the
djinni
whispered in his ear. "You should be careful of the queen's daughter-in-law."

"Is that why you came?" Marcroy asked as he turned his back on the humans. "To warn me about some chit of a girl."

"Not at all," Jamaspa said, his voice tickling Marcroy's ear and sending ominous shivers down his spine. "I came to fetch you."

"For what?"

"For the Brethren," Jamaspa said. "They want to see you."

Marcroy Tarth was a prince among the
Tuatha Dé Danann
. He had the ear of Orlagh, queen of the
Tuatha Dé Danann
. He was her envoy to the mundane world. Lesser
sídhe
quivered with terror at his approach. Humans spoke his name in whispers for fear of invoking his wrath.

And yet, when confronted with the Brethren, he felt as puny as a small child.

Even though they had sent the irritating and smug Jamaspa to fetch him, Marcroy couldn't imagine refusing the invitation, even if it meant his doom.

When he met with the Brethren, however, he was not taken to some fabulous palace hidden among the clouds, or a shining temple atop a high mountain. Jamaspa brought him to a jungle so humid and teeming with every imaginable creature, both magical and mundane, that for the first time in his long existence, Marcroy felt a little lost.

The Hag was waiting for him, seated on a decaying log, her wrinkled skin so weathered and brown that he wondered if she counted her age in years or millennia, assuming she bothered to keep count at all. A thick, silent mist began to close in around them as he approached. Lit from some indefinable source, the fog tendrils gave the Hag an air of mystery and power that was not undeserved.

"My lady," Marcroy said with the deepest respect, bowing as he approached her in the clearing across a thick layer of warm rotting detritus that smelled earthy and rank.

The ragged old woman looked up at him with ancient, watery eyes, almost as if she was surprised to see him, even though he was answering her summons. "You came."

"I live to do thine bidding, my lady," he said formally. "How may I aid thee?"

The Hag closed her eyes and said nothing for such a long time that Marcroy feared she had fallen asleep.

He waited in silence for her to move, to say something. He did not dare so much as twitch in case it displeased her. The mist grew steadily thicker until it blocked out every sound from the jungle, enveloping them in a white cone of silence and fear.

Finally, the Hag opened her pale eyes and fixed her gaze on her visitor.

"I am cursed with the Sight," she said. Her voice was rasping and dry, as if autumn leaves rustled through her throat. "As if that is not bad enough, my Sight is filled with images of you and your cursed mongrel progeny."

Marcroy was shocked by the accusation. He had no half-blood get. He was very careful about that sort of thing, although if there was some mistaken belief among the Brethren that such abominations existed ... well, it explained the summons, at least.

He smiled with all the charm he could muster. "I can assure you, my lady, if that is what disturbs thee, I will make certain your visions never see the light of day. You need not fear. I will make no mongrel child to sully the proud line of Tarth."

His charm made no impression on her. She glared at him. "Too late for hollow promises, lad."

Marcroy couldn't ever remember anybody daring to call him "lad". He squared his shoulders and raised his chin proudly. Nobody, not even the Hag, spoke that way about the
Tuatha Dé Danann
. "Forgive me, my lady, but I am a prince of the
Tuatha Dé Danann
. How could you not trust my word?"

"Because the damage is already done, fool. And it's your progeny's progeny that keeps me - and my brethren - awake at nights."

"You are mistaken, my lady," Marcroy said, before he could stop himself.

The Hag snorted at him. "You are the mistaken one, Tarth. Your lust ... your
mistake
... spawned RónánDarragh."

The accusation took Marcroy by surprise. He shook his head, refusing to believe it. "That cannot be."

"Their mother was a Druidess," the Hag reminded him, "impregnated during a
Lá an Dreoilín
festival. Too much wine and not enough sense. It is the cause of most ills that beset most realms."

Marcroy shook his head. It couldn't possibly be true. And even if it
were
true, what difference did it make? Rónán and Darragh were long dead.

There had been many
Lá an Dreoilín
festivals in Marcroy's long life, but no pregnancies, he was certain of that. If he occasionally weakened and allowed himself to dabble in a little bit of harmless fun, Marcroy made a point of taking any human lovers he fancied to
Tír Na nÓg
where he could magically ensure no half-breed child would be spawned by his indulgences. He made a point of never ...