Beyond the Pale: A Thin Veil Novella (The Thin Veil Book 3) (9 page)

Kier cried out in pain and clutched her stomach. “It’s happening,” she moaned.

“Then we don’t have much time,” Brogan said. He picked her up and ran through the trees, until he came to a small pond that glittered in the sunlight. He placed his hand on a large boulder near the edge of the water. The sun reflected off the wet rock, giving it a warm glow, as though it were already a sidh. “This is perfect; only I will be able to find this place again,” he said. Then he kissed her hard on the lips. “I
will
come back for you. Tell our daughter that I love her.”

She saw the boulder glow even brighter, and then it became translucent. Through the shimmering stone she could see a woman, with red curls falling around her shoulders, looking at them anxiously. “Go,” Brogan said, setting her on her feet. “Go, and be safe.”

She kissed him again, and then took a painful step through the sidh, to where her husband’s lover waited to receive her.

As she passed through the sidh, she stumbled and fell forward. The other woman caught her and helped her lie down, all while her eyes were fixed on the sidh. The room they were in was dark and cold. Kier screamed in pain again, and Maeve tore her eyes from the sidh and started bustling around her, bringing blankets and pillows. Without speaking, the druid removed the blood-soaked cloths from Kier’s shoulder and leg and wrapped the wounds in new cloths that had been soaked in some kind of herb solution. Then Maeve left her, disappearing up a narrow wooden staircase. Kier clutched at the starstone around her neck. Would it even work from this world? She sang the song to activate it, her voice ragged and weak. “Brogan,” she moaned, but there was no answer.

Maeve returned, carrying a mug of steaming liquid that smelled of licorice and pine. She offered it to Kier, but her hands were shaking too hard to hold it. Maeve spooned some of the tea into Kier’s mouth, and she forced herself to swallow, hoping the druid was not trying to poison her—and suspecting it would not make any difference by now. She held her starstone in a tight fist and sang the song again, wanting to see Brogan’s face one last time. But the stone stayed cold and silent, even as she sang the song over and over again in an increasingly feeble voice. Perhaps it just did not work between worlds. Perhaps he was too thick in battle to respond. Perhaps…but no, she would not think of that. He would survive. He had to—their daughter was counting on him. Soon, he would be all she had left. She brought the stone to her lips. “I could have loved you,” she whispered, kissing it.

Then another contraction sliced through her body, and the stone dropped from her hand. “Baby…coming,” she managed to gasp. She felt the urge to push and pressed down hard, the wounds in her shoulder and thigh blazing. She couldn’t hold back the scream that burst from deep inside her, a sound of pain and sorrow and loss. And then, for a moment, she felt relief. She fell back down onto the pillows Maeve had placed behind her and closed her eyes. She could feel herself fading away. But the baby…she still had to save the baby.

Maeve placed a warm bundle of cloth in Kier’s arms. Emanating from the bundle was a soft musical sound—the child’s Lýra, the signature of the Tuatha Dé Danann. Kier kissed the top of the fuzzy head and managed a smile through her tears. Her daughter was alive and perfect. At least one of them would still be here waiting for Brogan.

“Maeve…” she whispered, speaking to the other woman for the first time. “Thank you. Listen to me, very carefully. I know you are a druid. I know you were…” She paused to take a ragged breath. “I bear you no ill will. I am too far gone—there is no hope of saving me, not outside Tír na nÓg. Please, I beg of you to keep this child safe, for the love you bear my husband. Do this for him.”

“How?” Maeve asked, and Kier noticed for the first time how young she was. “Brogan said someone wanted to kill her—what if that person comes looking for her?”

The realization of what needed to be done washed over Kier like a warm wave. “You’re a druid,” she said, understanding at last. Perhaps
this
had been her destiny all along. “The dyad that should not be…”

“What?” Maeve asked, leaning in to better hear her.

“You must help me make her human,” Kier said.

“I don’t understand,” Maeve said, her eyes fixed on the tiny pink child in Kier’s arms. “Why would you want that?”

“If she is human…he won’t be able to find her,” Kier said. She didn’t have the energy to tell Maeve about the prophecy. And what she had said was true—without the Lýra, Lorcan would not be able to identify Brogan’s child, even if he did manage to come to Ériu somehow. She would be perfectly hidden. And Brogan could find a way to undo the spell when he returned for her.

“I don’t know how,” Maeve said, her eyes filling with tears.

“I do,” Kier replied. She told Maeve what she had read in the druids’ books in Tír na nÓg about giving a Danann the gift of humanity, told her how to make the potion that would allow them to combine their power. Kier had her press a glass vial to the wound in her leg, which was still seeping blood. Maeve added it to the potion, and then drank it at Kier’s command. Now, Kier knew, it would be done, and she would die knowing her daughter was safe. Together, they chanted the incantation, and Kier watched in horror as her own wounds began to manifest on Maeve’s body. She will heal, she told herself.
She will heal, and she will become mother to my daughter.
She grasped Maeve’s wrist and pulled her close, letting their blood mingle, the tiny baby pressed between them. She felt the baby’s body grow warm, but the infant did not seem to mind. The baby squirmed and made tiny squeaking noises, trying to nuzzle further into her mother’s chest. The sweet chimes of her Lýra stopped, and Kier released a shallow breath.

* * *

Lorcan felt it the moment she died.

He had been raging at Brion, demanding that Kier be found at once, when suddenly it felt as though all the air had been sucked out of the room. Where before he had been filled with anger, there was now only emptiness. He sat down hard on the chair behind him.

“Are you all right, my lord?” Brion asked. Lorcan had stopped speaking mid-sentence.

“Leave,” was all he could reply. Brion did not hesitate to do his bidding.

“Kier…come back…” Lorcan gasped as soon as he was alone. He couldn’t say how he knew—was this some new ability he had inadvertently acquired? But the truth settled around him like a millstone—undeniable and inescapable. She was gone, the one spark of light in his whole miserable existence, the one person who had ever cared for him. Unbidden, hot tears forced their way to the surface, and he brushed them away. “Kier, come back,” he whispered. “This was all for you. You cannot love me if you are…”

A knock at the door startled him, and he stared at it for a moment, shocked that the whole world had not stopped existing with her. “Not now,” he managed to say.

“My lord, I have important news,” the messenger said through the closed door.

Lorcan stood, struggling to master his expression. “Enter.” The man who came in was visibly afraid. So the news was not good.

“Be quick,” he said.

“I know…I know you wanted the king brought to you alive. But I have just received word that he was killed—far from here. Some of the warriors tried to ambush him and Ruadhan, but the king and his steward slew them all. Ruadhan seems to have escaped, but…we found the king’s body. I’m afraid it is too late for…for what you intended.”

“And Kier? She was with him when this happened?”

“No, my lord. But one of the other warriors said he saw her appear out of nowhere while they were battling the king’s forces on the western ridge earlier today. She was wounded badly. The king escaped with her through a sidh, but he returned alone.”

Where did you hide her, Brogan?
“Did the warrior see where he took her?”

“No, my lord.”

“It doesn’t matter. She’s dead.”

The messenger looked surprised. “You…you know this?”

“Yes.”

“And the child as well?”

The child.
He had been so fixated on Kier that he had forgotten about this child, whom he knew now for certain could open the sidhe. Kier had been far enough along; the child might have survived. Well, he would find her, even if he had to tear Tír na nÓg apart. The king was dead, but as long as his child still lived, Lorcan could still conquer Ériu.

He dismissed the messenger and sat back down, closing his eyes. He pictured her face, the curve of her jaw, the way her hair always fell in front of her eyes when she laughed. He lifted his fingertips to his mouth and kissed them, imagining that they were her lips. And then he opened his eyes, and felt more alone than he ever had in his long life. He tried to reach inside for his anger, his hatred of Brogan, his loathing of humanity, wanting to feel something other than this desolation. But all that was left was the gaping abyss of an empty soul.

* * *

Maeve gently lifted the squirming infant from her mother’s cooling chest. The baby blinked at her, and Maeve looked into her tiny face for the first time. She had her father’s eyes. “Oh, Brogan,” Maeve whispered. “She’s beautiful.” Something stirred in her heart, something she hadn’t felt since Brogan had so cruelly abandoned her several months ago. It was love, and with it came the seed of something entirely unexpected: hope.

THE END

An exclusive sneak peek at the third book in the Thin Veil series.
Among the Unseen
will be available May 20, 2014 (but you can preorder it today!).
www.amazon.com/B00G2HATKG/

CHAPTER 1

Again
, she told herself. Taking a deep breath, Cedar held her palms flat in front of her. Small white flames flickered in the air above them. She closed her eyes and willed the energy flowing through her arms to gradually build, causing the flames to shoot up higher. Slowly, she brought them down again.
Control it
.
Keep it steady
. She opened her eyes a crack and checked to see how she was doing. The flames held steady, dancing and flickering on her palms but staying right where she wanted them.
If only I’d had this power sooner
, she thought, then reprimanded herself, closing her eyes again and trying to concentrate on the flames.
Don’t think about it. Don’t think about them
.

But it was too late. The images started to pour into her mind, and no matter how tightly she squeezed her eyes shut, she could not block them out. Her adoptive mother, lying in the dirt, covered in blood. Eden’s sweet, innocent face twisted in terror as Liam—gentle, kind, treacherous Liam—tortured her mind. Jane’s blackened figure, burnt beyond recognition. Finn’s convulsions of agony as Liam slashed at him again and again with a crystal dagger.

She opened her eyes and flinched. The field she was standing in was engulfed in raging white flames. The brightly colored poppies Finn had grown for her were snapping and crackling and crumbling into ash. She swore loudly, then raised her arms and concentrated on bringing the flames under control, drawing them in until only a puff of smoke lingered over the charred field. Her control over her newfound abilities had come to her so easily, so naturally when she’d used them to defeat the druids while standing on the Lia Fáil. And she could still wield her powers effortlessly…unless she let her memories get the better of her. “Just relax,” Finn had told her. “Imagine that you’re painting, and the flames are the colors.” She appreciated the metaphor, but relaxing was harder than it looked.
Nuala is dead
, she told herself.
Liam is dead.
But they hadn’t been working alone, and Cedar would not rest until she knew her family was safe.

She was queen now, as strange as that still sounded to her. And she could relax as soon as every last druid who had been working with Nuala was found and imprisoned. She had captured all the ones who’d attacked her and her family and friends on the Hill of Tara, sending them via sidh to Maeve’s workshop. From there they’d been transported through another sidh to guarded cells in Tír na nÓg. Still, she had no idea how many others had been working with Nuala and Liam. She massaged her jaw, trying to unclench it.

Cedar took a grim look at the charred field all around her and decided she’d practiced enough with fire for the day. Drawing in another deep breath, she gently closed her eyes. When she opened them, the air in front of her was shimmering like a sprinkling of fairy dust. She exhaled slowly. Through the sparkling air she could see a gentle green glade at the foot of a misty waterfall, one of her favorite retreats.

Being queen came with a lot of benefits, but privacy wasn’t one of them. So even though Cedar technically wasn’t supposed to leave her own home without an entourage of guards and servants, she took advantage of the fact that she could go anywhere she wanted, anytime she wanted, without stepping foot outside her front door. Finn didn’t like it, which was becoming a source of tension between them. She had thought he would become less protective now that their lives weren’t in immediate danger, but he still got nervous whenever she used the sidhe to do a little exploring, even when she created one from Felix’s house to Jane’s apartment, which, to her delight, was becoming a regular occurrence.

Stepping into the scenic glade, Cedar sank down onto the tender grass, feeling the tension leave her body. She’d spent as much time as she could spare exploring her new kingdom, which was coming back to life after years of poisoning. She’d only discovered the glade last week, but it was already her favorite place to go when she felt overwhelmed by how much her life had changed over the past few months.

She stretched languorously as she watched the sunlight shimmer through the mist of the waterfall, feeling as if she were inside one of her own sidhe. The gentle roar of the falls helped soothe her stressed nerves. Perhaps she would bring Eden here later.