Maximus concentrated all his energy on moving forward, while he focused on the mad Druid whose attention was still fixed on Carys.
She wouldn’t subjugate herself so, but he had no intention of letting this farce continue. He’d crush Aeron, not only for what he was but for what he was doing to Carys.
“Aeron.” Morwyn touched his arm, then flinched back as if the contact repelled. “Even if you escape the wrath of our people, you’ll never be able to hide from the retribution of the gods.”
“Hide?” For a fleeting moment he glanced at Morwyn before returning his silver gaze back to Carys. “This is my destiny. Why should I hide from gods whose power fades beside the one true force of Annwyn?”
“But the Universal Life Force is part of us all.” Carys no longer clung to Aeron’s leg. She appeared to be stealthily retreating. “It’s not more powerful than our gods. It’s a part of them.”
“Which shows how ignorant you are.” Aeron pointed the gladius at Carys’ face and she froze in her retreat. “While trapped in that childhood vision, before Gwydion plucked me from the flames, I caught a glimpse of the source.” For a brief moment, genuine reverence threaded his words. “I’ve learned the secrets of Annwyn, and to control its power is to control the gods.” He gave a mocking laugh. “How do you really think I invoked this spiral? From our weak, splintered deities?”
The bloodied tip of the gladius grazed Carys’ forehead, and Maximus’ heart slammed against his ribs as scalding fear flooded his being. The Druid was insane. There was nothing to stop him from thrusting the gladius through Carys’ brain. Mars, hear my prayer.
And still the Druid ranted. “I allowed them to believe they were instrumental, but their combined contribution is negligible. It derives directly from Annwyn itself. I have the power to obliterate all the minor gods, and tonight I will.”
“You can’t.” Morwyn sounded horrified.
“I can do whatever I wish.” Aeron gave another of his icy smiles. “Gwydion showed me all that could be mine if I became his.” He bent toward Carys, the gladius scarring her cheek with a trail of Druantia’s blood, and the torch left the bowl. Instantly, Maximus sucked in a great, cleansing breath, and strength seeped through his trembling muscles. “But I’m no longer his,” Aeron hissed into Carys’ face. “And after tonight, when I no longer need him, he will no longer exist.”
Another few paces and he’d be in striking range. Mars, keep the Druid focused on Carys so he wouldn’t realize Maximus had regained the use of his limbs.
“And now you may strip for my pleasure.”
“Aeron, I’m begging you. Please let the Roman live.”
Why was she begging that piece of shit for his life? He could save his own skin. And by Mars, he’d save hers too.
“You’re in no position to make bargains. See how his flesh blisters.”
But the torch hovered above the bowl, and the scorching heat was bearable. He eased forward another step.
“I’ll do anything. Anything you command.” Desperation shivered through every word, and a shudder crawled along his spine. Carys didn’t beg. Carys obeyed no man’s command.
But she was doing both in the deluded hope this Druid would allow him to walk free.
As her shaking fingers pulled at the ties of her bodice, his stomach churned with revulsion, and with a primordial roar he swung his torch at the bowl, sending it crashing onto the stone plinth, severing the magic and scattering the sacrificial artifacts.
Before Aeron had a chance to draw breath, Maximus thrust the torch into his face, grinding it into flesh and bone, and as the Druid fell back, gladius flailing, the blade sliced open Maximus’ arm.
Carys scrambled back as Aeron and Maximus crashed to the ground, blood thundering, pulses hammering, at the horrific screams that rent the summer eve. Sweet Cerridwen, not from Maximus. She couldn’t bear to think of him so terribly injured as to emit such bone-shattering howls.
The torches fell to the ground, and the scent of roasted flesh polluted the air. As if she was captured in a bloodthirsty vision, she saw Maximus plunge his dagger through Aeron’s right hand, pinning him into the earth, before he snatched up his gladius and raised it to the gold-streaked sky.
Druids rushed from the forest, weapons to hand, but froze at the horrific scene. Panting with fear, Carys crawled to Maximus, where he knelt over Aeron, and covered his back with her body, protecting him in the only way she could.
But already her kin had recovered their senses; already they were screaming their war cries, advancing toward her, and all she could do was cling to his neck, and weep useless tears for the raw burns scarring his blackened skin.
“Wait.” Morwyn was standing by their side, arms outstretched. “Aeron murdered our queen. He intended to kill our princess, but the Roman saved her.”
Maximus’ body shuddered beneath her, as if he gave a silent laugh. “You lose, Druid. Your whole life has been for nothing.”
Bile gurgled as Carys saw the ruined mess of Aeron’s once coldly beautiful face. Only his eyes remained the same, silver, eerie. Inhuman.
And glowing with malice.
“You lose too, Roman.” His voice rasped, snakelike. “She’ll never be yours. She has no future.”
“Her future is with me.”
Aeron’s lips, what remained of them, stretched into a mirthless smile, a black abyss filled with blood and decay. “You have no future. It’s too late. The spiral turns upon itself, spewing death to all who oppose, death to all outside, death to Rome—”
As Maximus plunged his gladius down, Carys squeezed her eyes shut, but still felt his muscles bunch, felt the blade sear through flesh and bone as he impaled his gladius through Aeron’s throat.
“It’s over.” He turned, took her in his blood-soaked arms, and she buried herself into his strength, his warmth, his charred, battered body. He pulled his gladius free and she looked toward the Druids, all prepared for the ceremony, all armed, all twisted with confusion and doubt and grief.
The sun dipped on the far horizon. Its last dying ray glowed with sudden purpose, and arrowed between the capstone roof and the top of the sacred altar, flooded the mouth of the holy mound and penetrated the entire length of the passage into the central chamber itself.
She couldn’t see it, but she knew, because as the sun set on this day, the longest day, it was the only moment such phenomena occurred.
But it didn’t matter. Aeron was no longer in the mortal realm. He hadn’t completed the Renewal, hadn’t claimed his sacrifice.
Druantia.
A dry sob escaped. He had taken their queen, but the spiral was not renewed. It would die; their world would crumble; Rome would triumph.
A mighty roar, as if from the Earth herself, thundered from the mound, followed by a fierce wind that gusted from the mouth, ripping plants and grass and tossing stones and debris.
“What’s happening?” Maximus gripped her shoulders. “The Druid’s dead. Who’s controlling this?”
She didn’t know who or what was controlling it. She didn’t even know what was happening. But as the earth shifted beneath her knees, as the wind whipped into an unnatural frenzy, and as the forest surrounding the holy hill began to shiver with the rage of deceived gods, understanding flooded through her.
“This is what he planned all along.” She had to shout to make herself heard above the horrific roar. “The spiral’s collapsing.” Her eyes widened as she remembered the rest of Aeron’s words. “It’s going to kill everyone outside, Maximus. We have to warn them.”
He pulled her to her feet, seemingly unhindered by the extent of his injuries. Bushes and saplings, uprooted, catapulted through the air, birds took to the skies in screeching alarm and Druids struggled to remain upright as the earth undulated beneath their feet.
Clinging to his hand, she led him through the forest, and although night had now fallen, fires blazed at irregular intervals, lighting their way. The air pulsed, like a giant lung, as if the spiral readied itself to Renew under its own terms, its own unknown conditions.
As they emerged into the clearing, a mighty thunderclap rocked the forest, an explosion so intense it might have existed only in her own mind, her own ears, except within a heartbeat the aftershock radiated outward, hurling them forward unimaginable distance.
Gasping from the impact onto the hard ground, she turned to Maximus, who still had her hand in a bone-crushing grip. Waves of malignant power rushed over them, through them, yet ultimately left them undisturbed.
“We’re not going to make it.” She could barely speak, her chest ached so.
“We have to try.” Without letting go of her hand, he helped her up. “It’s all we can do, Carys.”
Within a couple of steps, she stumbled over a small furry body. A sudden blaze in the distance shed an eerie glow and she sucked in a shocked breath.
“Maximus.”
All around, creatures of the forest and birds of the air lay on the ground, slain as they fled the devastating fury.
His jaw tightened and their eyes locked. But neither spoke, as if uttering the words, vocalizing the horror, would turn possibility into reality.
Even if that possibility was already the reality.
Still the belligerent waves pulsed outward, yet around them, as if they weren’t there. As if she wasn’t there. And she tightened her hold on his hand and drew close to his side, calling on Cerridwen to protect Maximus as she protected her.
Cerridwen.
“We must go to the Cauldron.” It was suddenly imperative, as if the answer awaited her there.
He didn’t answer, as though he knew an answer wasn’t necessary, that already it was too late to save anyone at the settlement or even beyond. Who could know how far or how viciously this distorted spiral might expand?
They crested the ridge that hid the Cauldron from the forest, and her heart slammed against her ribs, choking the breath in her lungs.
A column of white-blue flame raged directly next to the Cauldron. A flame that pulsed and throbbed with energy, which leaped up into the starlit sky, yet was rigidly contained within a perfect circle.
“What magic is this?” Maximus’ voice was hoarse, as he dragged her forward. “What’s your goddess doing, Carys?”
Violent wind whipped past them, and the pulsing spiral screamed at primal level as if infuriated at being diverted from its purpose. But still the great flame sucked in the wind, sucked in the spiral, sucked in the great, destructive power before it could encroach farther into Cymru.
He pulled her to the edge of the flame. It gave off little heat, and she stared, uncomprehending, at its root.
A small pile of pebbles was the only indication that shards of magic bluestone hid an illicit circle of distortion. The circle where she had intended to hide Maximus to keep him safe.
The circle that, by capturing within its compressed boundaries the devastating force that swept across the land, now protected her entire people, and the Roman Legion, from annihilation.