Max knew he was in the Fomorian’s caverns before he opened his eyes. There were the sounds, of course, the acoustics of vast spaces and dripping water, and the hypnotic drumming of surf. One could almost hear the lichen growing, sense tree roots twining through soil, and feel the air brushing one’s cheek as a pixie or faerie went skimming past. And there were the smells: sea and stone, wet moss, burning beeswax, and an animal smell like a flock of sheep that’s been led out of the rain. These details told Max quite a bit, but all he really needed was the giant himself.
The Fomorian had his own peculiar gravity, an aura that seemed to warp the air about him. He was like a mountain on a prairie—he didn’t have to move or make a sound, but his presence diverted the waters, parted the sky, and quietly shaped the lives of those within its shadow. The Fomorian did not merely dominate a landscape; he defined it.
A voice spoke, deep as a canyon. The words it spoke were Old Irish, their syllables a pleasing tumble of sound.
“He wakes. We must decide, for she is close and longs to take him. Can you look at me, Hound?”
Max opened his eyes to find that he was on a slab of stone in the midst of a huge cavern the color of old sea glass. Its walls danced with light reflected from hundreds of candles and the faeries that flitted here and there from little alcoves and perches. Above loomed the giant.
The Fomorian had changed since Max had seen him. He looked tired and worn. Streaks of gray shot through his plaited hair and beard while dried blood flecked his ramlike muzzle. Many wounds laced his broad face and throat. Where there had once been five eyes, there were now four. The fifth was just a scorched and empty crater.
“You’re hurt,” Max croaked, his voice barely audible.
“Aye,” the Fomorian said. “I’m hurt. You’re hurt. The world’s grown perilous. You’re near to crossing over, kinsman. Do you want to live?”
The giant posed the question with no drama or urgency. He might have been asking if Max preferred sugar in his tea.
“Yes.”
“Think before you answer,” the Fomorian urged. “I see a hard road should you stay. Death might be kinder. You can slip away now, surrounded by friends. There is no shame in dying from this wound. The blade that made it has slain a god before.”
Max strained to sit up, but was far too weak. “I want to live,” he breathed. “Help me. I know you can.”
The Fomorian sat quietly, as though weighing options and their consequences. “Blood magic is strongest,” he said. “But it has its price. You saw this when the lymrill gave its life to reforge your blade. Other sacrifices must be made.”
“Then we will make them,” said a voice.
Max turned his head to see Scathach rise from a stone bench nearby. She stood before the Fomorian, frightened but defiant. The giant gazed at her gravely.
“Will you, now?” he asked. “You are mortal, lady. Are you willing to share the little life you have? You will never get it back.”
“I won’t hoard my years just to bury those I love.”
“Scathach,” said Max quietly. “I don’t want your life.”
“It’s mine to give. Rowan will never win this war without you.”
“Rowan needs you too,” Max reminded her.
“And it shall have me,” she said proudly. “I’m not going anywhere.”
The giant’s largest eye, a yellow orb with a goat’s square pupil, flicked back to Max. “Even if sacrifices are made, that wound will never heal. Together, we may close it, but it will always yearn to bleed. We are cheating Death of her prize.”
Scathach pressed her hand upon the stone slab near Max’s side. Her palm came up red. “We’re wasting time.”
Max’s arm was numb, but he managed to reach out and curl his fingers around hers. His flesh was so pale he hardly recognized his body as his own.
“I can’t take your life,” he said quietly.
Scathach pressed his hand to her lips. “You’re not,” she insisted. “Just a few years of old age and you’re welcome to them.” She gazed at Max a moment, her eyes brimming with tears, before turning to the giant. “What do you need from me?”
The Fomorian beckoned to a squat, long-fingered faerie with a birdlike face. It brought a stone bowl, a silver knife, and some soft leather pouches. Setting the bowl upon the slab, the Giant abruptly seized Scathach by the wrist. She barely flinched as the knife opened her forearm and a river of red ran streaming into the bowl. As the giant squeezed, faeries began to gather close, drawn to mortal blood—a maiden’s blood—and the magic it could make.
The Fomorian chanted, the words coming with a slow, deliberate rhythm. Max listened, his mind slipping back into a fog.
A draught of years
Of love and life
To stem a tide of woe
Iron, water, storm, and strife
Blood spilled by a hallowed knife
We cheat the Hunt, the Hound it seeks
His wounds we knit, his flesh we keep …
As he chanted, the Fomorian’s speech became less distinct, his words condensing into a low hum that made the stone vibrate. More faeries arrived from the tunnels and pools. Their glow filled the cavern, but all Max could focus on was the Fomorian, who was slipping into a trance. He stared through Max, huge and wild, a weathered monument to some forgotten god. When the Fomorian drew the knife across his palm, he gave a primal howl that shook the caverns.
Max was vaguely aware that faeries were now coming forward, yielding their slender hands to the knife’s sharp bite. Their blood mingled with Scathach’s, red and silver, mortal and Fey.
At last, Max fell asleep. His consciousness settled like a grain of sand within an oyster, destined to produce something strange and perhaps even wonderful. His ensuing dreams were extraordinarily vivid.
The first involved David. Max saw his friend walking beneath a gray twilight, making for a forest whose trees bobbed and rocked like ship masts. Beyond them, Max could see Blys, Prusias’s capital rising in gleaming tiers within its armored mountains. The city was smoking, its halls ablaze with light as mechanical creatures squatted and shuffled on the battlements. The city’s walls were overflowing, its citizens and soldiers streaming over bridges to settle in sprawling camps upon the snowy fields.
Snow. It was everywhere. Max saw it in Blys. He’d seen it whipping through David’s floating forest. He saw it as far south as Zenuvia, driving gales of ice that bombarded Lilith’s palaces. Far below, a goblin cog cracked on in a desperate race to reach a harbor. Tiny figures scrambled about on deck, taking down sails as a gargantuan wave—a true widow maker—broadsided the vessel. The ship was driven under the water in a cresting mountain of foam.
The winter’s reach extended to Rowan. Max saw the school clearly, Túr an Ghrian rising like a shining white obelisk beneath a bloodred sky. It towered above the cliffs and Old College, its summit lost in a swirl of dark clouds and snow. In his dream, Max heard Old Tom’s chimes ringing across the campus. There were still students at Rowan, young apprentices that would be matched to charges, configure bedrooms, and begin their studies of Mystics. Against a backdrop of war and snow, Max found this comforting.
He had never seen Old College so empty. Only a few apprentices hurried along beneath the streetlamps, clutching books or scrolls. To Max’s eyes they were babies, round little puddings too young to join the war effort. I must have looked the same.
If the students looked young, Rowan’s remaining teachers looked ancient. A few were gathered atop Maggie’s steps, clutching their robes and cases as they gazed up at the raw and windy sky. They might have been a group of Oxford dons debating whether to fetch umbrellas before their evening stroll. How did the Director ever lure this group out of their retirement? With carrot and stick as she always did. Gabrielle Richter was a master.
Max decided he’d have a peek in her office. He walked down Rowan’s paths, passing wilted flowers, the marble fountain whose waters gave off an eerie mist, obscuring its cherubs and hippocampi. Despite the cold, the Manse looked cheerful enough. There it waited, solid and familiar, its ivy crisp with frost as smoke trickled from its chimneys.
Inside, a pair of First Years copied each other’s homework in a sitting room off the foyer. They didn’t notice Max, didn’t look up as he turned down the narrow hallway that led to the Director’s office.
As Max strode along, he took notice of the portraits lining the wall. He’d always found them mildly absurd. One would think important people sat around enduring mild indigestion. He stopped to appraise Ms. Richter’s.
It was just as unfortunate. A tastefully dull oil painting in a gilded frame whose subject sat at a desk with a sober, introspective expression. The portrait revealed nothing of the Director he knew. Max had never seen Ms. Richter sit that way much less wear such an insipid expression. No, she was frank and firm—occasionally intimidating—but she knew just when to soften a moment with a bit of levity. Max missed her. In some ways, Gabrielle Richter was the closest thing he had to a mother since his own had passed out of his life.
He slipped within her office, taking in its paneled walls, the maps, the elegant French doors that looked out upon the gardens. All the furniture was draped with canvas as though everything were being moved or put into storage. Desk, chairs, settee—everything was covered up but for a steaming coffeepot upon the desk. That isn’t right, thought Max. Where would anxious students be reprimanded for breaking curfew? Where would captured vyes sit while Mum threatened to eat them? A mistake had been made. Max would have to speak with someone.
He went out the French doors, crossing the patio and the orchard. Mourners stood by one of the sacred trees, gazing at a large apple made of gold. Max sympathized but did not stop. War was hard; more golden apples would decorate this orchard before it was finished. He couldn’t mourn everyone.
Max made his way to the Sanctuary, proceeding through its hedge gate to walk beneath an arched canopy of interlacing tree branches. Peering ahead, he was delighted to see that the Sanctuary was, as yet, untouched by winter. Its meadows were green and gold, its sky a pale blue with just a hint of cloud drifting over the mountains.
Emerging from the tunnel, Max saw the Warming Lodge, a low, timbered building overlooking a tranquil lagoon. Nolan would know what was happening with Richter’s office. Max made a beeline for its porch, his fingers brushing the tall grasses. Arriving at the porch, Max found Nolan’s fiddle lying on a rocking chair, but no sign of the man himself. The lodge’s door was locked. Max knocked.
Something most unsettling opened the door. A second glance revealed it to be Gregory Wyatt Nolan. He was dead, of course—had died during Prusias’s siege—but even death couldn’t keep the man from looking after Rowan’s charges. There was nothing hostile about his aspect, but the corpse couldn’t speak. It had no tongue and what little flesh remained on its bones was riddled with maggots. Max guessed that the shorn ribs had been his death wound, but the skull was also fractured.
Max stared at Nolan’s teeth, for the man’s skull seemed to have extras—two entire rows of jagged, predatory incisors set into grooves above and below the normal allotment.
“Have you seen Ms. Richter?” he asked. “Someone’s packing up her office.”
Nolan’s corpse stood aside and pointed within. Max squeezed past him, entering the Warming Lodge where sunlight filtered lazily through the rafter windows. Entering the main room, he walked down the long aisle, passing stalls and terrariums populated by a menagerie of magical creatures. Max didn’t see Ms. Richter, but he did spot a familiar dark mound resting by the haystacks at the aisle’s end. He couldn’t blame YaYa. She’d earned the right to nap as often as she wished.
“Don’t wake her!” hissed a voice.
Max turned to see Scott McDaniels in one of the neighboring stalls. He was dressed in his burial suit. Unlike Nolan, he had not decayed. The man looked just the way Max remembered him and so tantalizingly real that Max almost went to him. But he restrained himself. Scott McDaniels was dead, just as Nolan was dead. He was no more real than the sunken goblin ship or those apprentices cheating on their homework. Max ignored him.
“Don’t!” Mr. McDaniels cried. “It’s not what you think!”
Max waved off his concerns. “It’s only YaYa,” he muttered, but his smile faded as he came closer. The ki-rin resembled a gargantuan black lioness with a broken horn atop her head. There was no gloss to this animal’s coat, and its fur was not black, but dark gray. The creature stirred as Max approached. A heavy head swiveled toward him.
It was the wolfhound.
Max had been dreaming of it since he was twelve. The monster was larger than a cart horse, with paws the size of dinner plates. As it rose, a bloodcurdling growl sounded in its throat. Max turned to leave.
But the clones had entered the Warming Lodge. They walked casually toward him down the aisle. The big one bore his spear and radiated an air of smug triumph. The gaunt, feral one radiated only death. Max stared at the weapon in the wild one’s hand. It looked to be no more than a chipped wedge of flint or ebony, but what pain it had caused! Max had never experienced anything like it. The blade didn’t merely cut flesh; it frayed something far deeper—one’s tether to eternity.
The clones broke into a trot. Max reached for the gae bolga, but it wasn’t there. Warm air tickled his neck. The wolfhound’s growl became a rough, throaty challenge.
“What are you about? Answer quick or I’ll gobble you up!”
Max turned just as the animal attacked. He caught it by the jaws, its teeth puncturing his flesh as he forced them away from his face. Staggering beneath its weight, Max was driven back toward the clones. The wolfhound’s breath was a furnace blast as it snapped and clawed, straining ever for his throat.
The clones were close. Max could hear their footfalls, the clink of armor. Dropping his shoulder, Max turned and hurled the wolfhound into the clones.
It howled as their weapons pierced its sides. Max backed away, watching spellbound as the clones fell upon the animal, stabbing deep into its writhing body. The Warming Lodge’s residents fell into a bleating, crying panic. Kicking the wolfhound over, the bigger clone raised his spear for the kill.
But the feral one held up his hand. His companion stopped, lowering his weapon reluctantly. Leering through a tangle of hair and broken teeth, the assassin approached Max and offered him the stone knife.
Max closed his fingers about its worn handle. He liked this blade. It was brittle and probably useless against armor, but it was hungry. And, unlike the gae bolga, this weapon wasn’t fickle. It craved Max’s blood, the wolfhound’s, even that of the clones. It had craved blood ever since Set scattered Osiris all over Egypt.
Hefting the knife, Max looked down to where the monster sprawled on the floor.
The wolfhound was gone.
It was Scathach who lay there, Scathach crumpled in a gasping heap while her life trickled away through her torn gray cloak.
Max screamed.
“Hush!” Scathach whispered, wrapping her arms about him and rocking him against her. “You’re just dreaming.”
Gasping, Max let his weight fall against her. For a long minute he just lay against her, his hands traveling over her back and shoulders, searching for the wounds he’d seen her suffer.
“Was it Failinis?” she asked gently. Max had told her about his recurring nightmares and it was her opinion that the wolfhound was Failinis, the very beast that sat before Lugh’s throne.
“It was the wolfhound,” Max panted. He didn’t want monsters to have names.
Sitting up, he held Scathach’s face in his hands. She smiled at him, looking beautiful if careworn.
“You look better,” she said. “The Fomorian’s magic has worked. I’ve been so worried.”
Max glanced down. He wasn’t wearing his own clothes, but a white linen robe. And he was no longer on the stone slab, but a down bed whose frame was made of twisted driftwood. He looked about the room, a small cavern of pale stone whose floor was strewn with rushes. Water was dripping outside. Through the walls, Max heard the faint crash of surf.
“How long have I been asleep?” he asked.
Scathach pushed the damp hair out of his eyes. “Three weeks,” she said. “Maybe longer. I lost track. It’s easy to lose track here.”
“Where’s the Fomorian?”
“Resting. He gave a great deal of himself to save you. It was many days before your wound would knit.”
Max opened his robe to see his side wrapped with a green silk bandage stitched with runes. Scathach stopped him from peeking beneath it.
“Meet your new best friend,” she said. “You must never take it off. The Fomorian says it will prevent the wound from opening.”
Nodding, Max eased off the bed and tried to stand. His legs trembled like a newborn foal’s. Clutching Scathach’s shoulder, he steadied himself.
“Your strength will return,” she assured him. “You haven’t been up for over a month. It’s natural to be shaky.”
“A month? You said three weeks!”
“Three weeks since the giant began to heal you,” she explained. “It’s been over a month since you were wounded. Once we arrived here, the faeries sang me to sleep and held us captive. We’re lucky David found us. We might have slept forever.”
Max frowned, trying to make sense of what Scathach was saying. “Wait,” he said. “David rescued us? How is that possible? He’s with Ms. Richter and the fleet. They must be two thousand miles from here!”
Taking his hand, Scathach led him back to the bed. “I think you should sit for a moment,” she said. “David has visited several times to check on you. He comes to us from Nether. I’ve had news from him. Important news.”
Max knew that expression. He had seen it many times before—on Scott McDaniels, policemen, mourners. To see it now on Scathach set every nerve on edge.
“Just tell me.”
“The fleet was intercepted. Prusias launched an attack using Workshop creatures. Bram destroyed them, but we suffered casualties. The Director was one.”
“Ms. Richter’s hurt?”
“She’s dead.”
Max could only nod and close his eyes. A moment later, he rose, steadied himself, and walked slowly about the room. “How?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
Another nod.
“Who’s Director?”
“David.”
Max stopped pacing. If there was anything that could be salvaged from such a tragedy, this might be it. Some person, some brilliant and courageous person had the good sense to name David Menlo Director. David would doubt himself—he always doubted himself when thrust into the spotlight—but Max had more faith in David’s abilities than anyone else’s.
“Thank God.”
“There is some other good news,” said Scathach, trying to cheer him. “Cooper and Hazel are alive. David said Cooper’s going to be okay and is intent on his mission. Apparently, he’s even roped Toby into it.”
“Toby? Those two can’t work together. Cooper will murder him.”
“That’s what I thought, too, but then I imagine a smee might be very useful when infiltrating the Workshop and Prusias’s city.”
“David told you what Cooper’s mission was?”
“He did,” she replied. “He’s Director now. David knows everything about every DarkMatter operation. He even assigns the new ones.”
“I report to him,” said Max, somewhat amazed. “I report to my roommate. He’ll never let me live it down.”
“We both report to your roommate,” she pointed out. “And you should know he’s given us a new assignment. We’re to set out as soon as you’re able.”
“We already have a mission,” said Max. “We have to enlist the Fomorian.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
“Why? He’d be an incredibly powerful ally.”
“Oh, I have no doubt of that,” said Scathach. “You should see the beaches. They’re littered with ships and demons. Prusias picked the wrong island to invade.”
“Exactly,” said Max. “That’s why we need him.”
“The Fomorian will fight to defend his island, but he won’t leave it.”
“Have you asked him?”
“I have.”
“And what did he say?”
Scathach shrugged. “That his place is here. Many faerie folk have taken refuge with him. They live under his protection.”
Max frowned. “Faeries. They take us prisoner and now they’re the reason the Fomorian won’t help us? Whose side are they on?”
“Their own,” Scathach replied. “To be fair, some have been trying to make amends. Some are proud and aloof but I can’t fault their generosity. They sacrificed a great deal of their blood and magic to aid you.”
“Sacrificed,” said Max, musing on the word. “And what about you? What did you have to sacrifice?”
Scathach looked away and gazed at the bandage wrapped about her forearm. “I don’t really know. A bit of strength, maybe. A bit of magic. Perhaps some years. I am changed, but I couldn’t say how.”
Her eyes met his. “Wouldn’t you do the same for me?”
“I’d do anything for you. You know that.”
Taking his hands, she pulled him toward her. “I do know that,” she whispered. “Which is why my decision was no decision at all.”
The ensuing kiss was rudely interrupted by an excited lymrill. Streaking into the room, Nox bounded onto a bedpost and then onto her steward’s shoulders. Max staggered beneath her weight and toppled back onto the bed.
“Jeez, you’ve gotten heavy!” he exclaimed, tipping her onto his pillow. “What are they feeding you?”
“Gold,” said Scathach disapprovingly. “The faeries have plenty and like to bribe her with it. Nox has always been a diva, but now she’s a spoiled diva. Yesterday, she hissed when I tried to give her iron.”
“Nox,” said Max sternly. “Iron is good for you. Gold will make you soft.”
The lymrill did not seem to mind this prospect. With a cheeky mewl, she rubbed her back against the pillow and spread her claws to admire their golden tinge. Max poked her tummy, his fingers navigating the prickly quills to feel for extra padding. There was none. Nox was as solid as a tank—an even denser tank than she had been.
“She must weigh over a hundred pounds,” he marveled. “Nick never weighed this much and she’s not even half his size.”
“Not for long,” said Scathach, sitting and stroking the lymrill’s ruff. “They’ve also been feeding her from their table. The faeries say she’ll be the size of a lion.”
“Why are they being so nice to her?”
“Because she’s your charge,” Scathach said. “Evidently, nothing’s too good for a friend of the Faeregine.”
Faeregine. Max put aside his anxiety over a lion-sized lymrill to try and place the word. He’d definitely heard it before.
“That’s what the hags called Mina,” he recalled. “The faeries call her that, too?”
Scathach disentangled Nox’s claws from her bracelet. “Yes, they do. They practically worship Mina. They talk about her like she’s a god.”
“Mina’s human,” said Max decisively. He was unsure how he knew, but he was almost certain. “She’s not faerie.”
“The faeries agree,” said Scathach. “They say whenever the Faeregine is reborn, it becomes whatever is threatened most. They say she’s returned this time as a human child.”
“What does the Fomorian say?”
“He doesn’t say much about her. He’s more interested in David.”
“He and David have a funny history. Did he tell you about it?”
“Not exactly,” said Scathach. “But the last time David visited, the Fomorian stared at him and said something like ‘Sorcerers are all the same. They steal your secrets and keep their own.’ He was really angry.”
Max frowned. “What did he mean by that? What secret was David keeping?”
“I don’t know. David tried to speak privately with him, but the Fomorian refused. What secret did David steal?”
“The Fomorian’s name,” Max replied. “Or really, the fact that he doesn’t have one. When we first came here, the giant said he’d help us if David could guess his name. But if David guessed wrong, the giant would take his head.”
“How did David figure it out?”
Max couldn’t help but grin at his memory of the occasion. “By looking at him! It was the craziest thing, Scathach. David just stared at the giant for hours like he was some sort of riddle. At dawn, he sat up and recited the Fomorian’s entire family tree. He’s the son of Elathan. Apparently Elathan was so ashamed of his child’s appearance he refused to give him a name.”
“Why doesn’t the giant just give himself a name?”
“He needs a truename,” Max clarified. “The Fomorian can’t fully live or die without one. He just continues to exist, age after age. David promised to give him one.”
“That’s so sad.”
“It is. I’m sorry to hear the Fomorian’s angry with David. I really thought those two understood each other. I wonder what David’s secret is.” Max hesitated. “I saw him when I was dreaming. He had two hands.”
Scathach raised an eyebrow. “You saw that in a dream?”
“And I saw Blys,” Max continued. “There were things on the walls and thousands of people streaming out of the city. And winter—winter’s everywhere, Scathach. Even in Zenuvia and at Rowan.”
Max stopped. The rest of his dream came flooding back. His visit to Ms. Richter’s office; had the covered furniture been telling him Ms. Richter was dead? And the coffeepot! Had that been some sign or symbol that David was the new Director? The mourners in the orchard … had that been real? Max’s mind raced ahead to his visit to the Warming Lodge: Nolan’s corpse, the man’s inexplicable teeth, and that awful scene with the clones attacking the wolfhound. But that hadn’t been the wolfhound. It had been Scathach.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I … I don’t know,” said Max, sitting back down. “My dream. The wolfhound.”
“You always dream of Failinis,” she said soothingly. “Did he ask you his question?”
“And did you answer?”
“No. I’ve never answered.”
“Well,” she said, “I suspect when you do, he’ll stop bothering you. Dreams are strange things. You must have overheard me asking David about his hand.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Max uneasily.
Scathach laughed. “How else would you know he got it back?”
Max grew dizzy. Leaning forward, he stared at the stone floor. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
“Do you want some water?”
“No, I …”
Doubling over, Max vomited on the floor, his stomach heaving up great gouts of dark red blood and silver faerie essence. It splashed on the cavern floor, running off to pool at its lowest point. Max was shivering as sweat beaded and ran off his body. His wound ached; he yearned to tear off the sash and examine it. Retching, he vomited again. Scathach fetched a towel from a table.
“The giant said this might happen,” she said, cleaning him up. “It’s the faerie blood. Humans can’t tolerate it.”
“I’m not human,” Max muttered, wincing from the pain in his side. “I … I think it’s done something to me. Awakened something.”
“Do you want water?” she asked.
He shook his head. The nausea was fading, but he felt very weak. “I need air,” he said. “Fresh air.”
“We’re free to wander the caverns.”
“No,” Max gasped, his head spinning. “Outside. I have to get outside. I can’t be down here anymore. I need to go outside.”
“The Fomorian said to stay here. He said it could be dangerous outside.”
“Since when have you been afraid of danger? I’m not looking to slay a dragon. I just need fresh air. I feel like I’m drowning down here.”
While Scathach fetched Max’s clothes, he mopped up his mess. He didn’t recall drinking the giant’s draught or anything beyond the initial few verses of his chant. Had the draught changed him? His dream was certainly unlike any he’d had before—was it prescience? No. He wasn’t seeing the future; he was seeing recent events or the present as it happened around the world. That was something else entirely. He wished David were there.
When Scathach returned with Max’s things, she was armed for battle.
“I just want a sniff of air,” said Max.
“And the Fomorian said it might be dangerous,” she reminded him. “We can go, but we’ll go prepared. Take this, will you? I don’t want to touch it.”
The gae bolga lay sheathed atop Max’s clothes. He took it, along with a short rod of roughened steel Rowan’s dvergar had made for him. When Max touched the rod to the sword’s pommel, it promptly swallowed the hilt up to its guard. Once firmly attached, the rod lengthened so that the gae bolga was transformed from a short sword into a long spear. Max thumped it on the floor.
“There,” he said. “A weapon and a walking stick. My legs are still a little iffy.”
Scathach looked modestly away as he dressed. His travel clothes had been cleaned, his black tunic mended. His boots had been resoled and his shirt of nanomail gleamed like molten silver. He slipped it on, aware that Scathach would insist. Pulling on the rest of his clothes, he left the ivory brooch for last.
He held the brooch in his hands a moment, thinking about his dream. Scathach said Lugh had made it for Max, that it had a very special purpose.
“This is for when I die,” he said, studying its Celtic sun.
“A grim way to think of it,” said Scathach. “It’s meant to bring you home when your time here is finished.”
“What would have happened if the Fomorian hadn’t healed me?”
Scathach shrugged. “I only know the brooch’s purpose. Lugh didn’t explain how it works or what’s supposed to happen. Only that it was for you and would bring you home to the Sidh when your mortal days had ended.”
“The Sidh isn’t my home.”
Scathach wrapped a heavy shawl about her shoulders. “Do you remember where you were born?” she asked thoughtfully.
“Of course not. I don’t even remember my first house. We moved when I was three.”
“And you’re only eighteen,” she observed. “You think of Rowan as your home now, but will you in two thousand years? Will you even remember it?”
Max said nothing.
“You’re becoming an immortal,” she reminded him. “An eighteen-year-old god. In many ways, that means you’re still an infant. You don’t yet know what home is.”
“Well, how old are you?”
“I’ll never tell,” she replied coyly. “Now that I’m mortal, I get to reset the clock. I can’t look more than twenty, can I?”
“You’re still an older woman,” said Max. “Some might call you a cradle robber.”
Scathach was aghast. “That’s a terrible thing to say!”
“You just said I was an infant.”
For a moment, Scathach simply stared. Then she chuckled. An evil, utterly unnerving giggle as she helped Max on with his cloak.
“What are you laughing about?” he asked tentatively.
“Nothing. I just thought of how I’m going to get my revenge. Don’t worry. It won’t happen soon. You’ll have plenty of time to forget it’s coming.”
“I was kidding, you know.”
She batted her eyelashes. “Oh, I know.”
“You’re not a cradle robber. There’s no need to get revenge or anything.”
“Why should you worry?” she asked innocently. “You’re an immortal. And it’s not like you’re a deep sleeper. Oh wait—you are!”
Again with that awful laugh!
“I’ll set Nox on guard,” Max warned.
“Good luck with that. She’ll be off gorging with the faeries.”
Nox bounded after the pair as they left the room. The small cavern opened onto a larger one, a great hollowed space of gray-green stone with several pools of bubbling hot springs. Three naiads were sharing one, soaking their sleek bodies and appraising Max with more than mild interest.
“Don’t you look fine, up and about,” said one.
“Thank you,” said Max.
“Why not come for a swim?” suggested another, hopping out to sit on its edge and dangle her legs in the water.
“We’re going for a walk,” huffed Scathach. “Put some clothes on.”
The naiad gave Scathach a dreamy, condescending smile. “I wasn’t talking to you.” Her gaze drifted back to Max. “Don’t waste your time with mortals, my prince. Their lives are short and their beauty fades. She’ll only break your heart.”
Max decided not to say anything until they’d left the cavern and traversed several more. Scathach was walking quickly, her knuckles white upon her spear.
Other than the naiads, they saw no faeries and no trace of the Fomorian. The final cavern they entered was the largest yet, a natural amphitheater of polished stone containing a still pool of dark water. Below the pool’s surface Max could see huge, ghostly images flitting beneath—broken ships and shattered skulls and ravens in vast, unsettling numbers.
“This is the giant’s scrying pool,” said Scathach. She gestured ahead to a torch-lit opening on the far side of the water. “Those stairs lead to the surface.”
They skirted the pool, keeping to its narrow ledge. Now and again, Max would glance at the images, but they were too close, too abstract to decipher. Passing under the archway, they climbed a series of rough steps that wound up toward daylight.
“I’m surprised there’s anything human-sized in here,” said Max.
“The Fomorian’s not always a giant,” said Scathach. “After he healed you, he grew much smaller. He was scarcely taller than Bob when he went off to rest. In the Sidh, they always said Fomorians were powerful sorcerers. He can probably be whatever size he likes.”
“I guess that’s true,” said Max. “On my first visit, he carried Cooper, David, and me in his hands like we were beetles. He must have been bigger than a dreadnought.”
“Let’s hope he isn’t that big if he catches us. He warned us to stay inside.”
“He warned you,” said Max, peering out the narrow opening at some gray, windswept dunes. “I didn’t hear a thing. Besides, I’m a sick, delirious patient who needs fresh air. We won’t be gone long.”
Nox bounded ahead while the two walked along a ridgeline that overlooked the sea. The sky was reddish and heavy with clouds, but here and there the sun poked through like lances of golden light. It looked to be late afternoon.
Despite a bit of sun, the temperature was far colder than he remembered it being at Shrope Hovel. It wasn’t merely chilly, but a stinging, teeth-chattering cold that fairly begged one to stay indoors. When they did set sail, they’d need warmer gear. Ormenheid could do many things, but she couldn’t change the weather.
Still, the cold air and a brisk walk were having their intended effect. They woke him up, driving off the drowse so that Max was finally thinking clearly after his injury and weeks of sleep. He revisited his dream and earlier conversations. What had the Fomorian said when Max awoke?
“We must decide, for she is close and longs to take him.”
What had he been talking about? Who was ‘she’?
He glanced up. Scathach had stopped and was pointing with her spear at the beach below. Coming beside her, Max gazed down at a broad stretch of icy sand.
“The Fomorian’s handiwork,” she muttered.
While scavengers had done their work, the carnage was still evident. Max stared at the wall of piled corpses, the shattered ships, and the bodies swinging from the pillar like criminals at a crossroads. An army had shattered on this beach, broken like a wave upon a rock.
“We need him,” Max concluded. “He has to come to Blys.”
“He won’t,” said Scathach, staring out at the horizon. “I’ve already asked. I even begged and that’s not something I do very often.”
“He’s my kinsman. Maybe I’ll have better luck.”
Scathach lifted her chin and squinted as the sun’s red rim dipped beneath the clouds. “I forgot. Of course he’ll listen to you. You’re both immortals.”
Max gave her a sideways glance. “Is this about that naiad?”
Scathach turned and gave her shadow a downcast glance. “She’s not wrong, you know. It’s foolish to fall in love with mortals. You should be with your own kind.”
“You are my own kind. You’ve lived in the Sidh. You know it better than I do.”
“I’m cast out,” she said softly. “There’s no ivory brooch for me. When my time is up, I go into the ground.”
“Don’t say that.”
She shrugged. “It’s the truth. I don’t regret my decision—I’d do it again. But there will be times it makes me sad. You have to give me that.”
“Fine. But no more talking to naiads.”
A grudging smile appeared. “I’ve never liked them,” she confessed. “Not even in the Sidh.” With a sigh, she turned and continued along the ridge.
They walked in silence, Scathach brooding while Max puzzled over his dream and what the faeries’ or Fomorian’s blood might have done to him. Were these strange dreams a temporary phenomenon or was he doomed to see hints of what was happening in the wider world? Max didn’t think he’d like that. Peter Varga experienced visions and they seemed to take a haunting toll.
The cold deepened as the sun set. Max’s toes were numb and his lashes speckled with snow, but he was in no hurry to return to the giant’s caverns. Marvelous as they were, they seemed cut off from the world. Out there, beyond the darkening horizon, Rowan’s fleet would be making landfall near Blys. A month, maybe two, and the siege would begin.
Something caught Max’s eye.
A raven was ahead, calling shrilly as it soared high upon the wind. Others answered its cry, flapping out from the leaning pines by the hundreds. They scattered, some screeching past while others wheeled and dove behind a gray, sparse hill. As they disappeared, it sounded like even more ravens cried out in greeting or challenge.
“Something’s going on over there,” said Max. “Let’s have a look.”
Scathach glanced doubtfully at the red twilight settling over the isle. “It’s getting dark. We should get back.”
But Max had to see what the fuss was about. Ravens were attracted to carrion. If there were this many, then a feast must have been present. More of Prusias’s soldiers? Perhaps. If so, they had made it much farther inland than their comrades. And why would they come here? There was nothing but hills and a few streams.
“Max,” said Scathach. “I think we should head back. Something isn’t right.”
“Head back, then,” he said. “I want to see.”
He trudged ahead, leaning on the gae bolga as more ravens settled on the trees and hilltop. Nox was walking alongside him now, a mouse dangling from her jaws. She stopped as something padded over the summit.
It was a wolf—a leering, emaciated wolf whose ribs could be counted through its mangy coat. Baring its teeth in a territorial snarl, it turned around and disappeared down the hillside.
“Max!” called Scathach.
He ignored her. There was something on the other side of this hill and he had to see it. The ravens grew louder. Several hopped about the hilltop; others flew back up into the sky to wheel like vultures over a carcass. The gae bolga was growing warm, even hot to the touch. Its blade was trembling, pulling Max forward like a divining rod.
The hairs on Max’s neck rose one by one. His arms felt like cold lead. So did his legs. His blood was ice, every heartbeat a piercing agony. Only a tiny corner of his mind could process that Scathach was now beside him. She was trying to reach for his hand, but she kept missing. Her fingers merely grazed his wrist.
The Old Magic was kindling within him. It roared up in challenge to whatever was beyond that hill. But it had no outlet. His wound had left him far too weak to respond, to channel that flood of energy. It raged within him, a caged inferno.
More wolves peered over the hill, crippled and sick, panting and growling. One held a rotting arm between its jaws like a dog might carry a bone. When enough had gathered, they stole down the hill like shadowy nightmares. Surrounding Max and Scathach, they escorted them toward the hilltop like a snarling honor guard.
Max railed silently at his foolishness. The Fomorian had warned them and he had chosen not to listen. But was that even true? Had he chosen to ignore the warning or had something chosen for him? He tried to shut his eyes.
Don’t look at her, he told himself. If you don’t look, she won’t have any power over you! Don’t look!
He might have wished for a spaceship. His eyes refused to close. They remained stubbornly open, fixed upon the scene unfolding before him. Their gaze traveled over starving wolves and mangled corpses and a sea of squawking ravens to settle on a spare, shrouded figure washing clothes in a stream.
It was the Morrígan.