Beneath the Forsaken City (33 page)

“Of course not,” Aine said, smiling. “Join us. We were just going to come looking for you.”

“We were?”

“You were.” She nudged Conor again, and he sighed.

“That gift of hers is a little disconcerting, isn’t it?” Eoghan said as he lowered himself down beside them.

“I try to ignore it, but sometimes you menfolk think so loud it’s like you’re shouting.”

Eoghan grinned. Conor tensed, but he continued to spoon porridge into his mouth. No matter what Aine claimed, it was obvious she and Eoghan had formed a rapport. And why not?
Eoghan had been sent to help her, while Conor was paying the price for his disobedience.

Aine didn’t seem to notice, though. Either she wasn’t paying attention to his thoughts or she couldn’t read them all the time. He wished he knew for sure.

“Conor is going to try to rebuild the wards,” she told Eoghan. “We’ll need to summon the Conclave. Will you help?”

Eoghan looked intrigued. “Of course. I’ll wait for you in the hall.”

Conor said nothing as the brother left, and Aine turned back to her breakfast. When they were both finished, she took his bowl and stacked it in her own. Her hand lingered on his wrist.

“Eoghan and I are just friends,” she said. “I am yours, heart, body, and soul. You have nothing to fear from him or any other man.”

“I don’t doubt you,” he said. And he didn’t.

But that short discussion had changed something between them that even two months apart had not, and he had no idea how to fix it.

“What if it doesn’t work?
” Conor paused outside the great hall, where Riordan, Eoghan, and the rest of the Conclave waited, expecting to witness the rebuilding of Ard Dhaimhin’s wards. He’d said he was sure he could rebuild them without Meallachán’s harp after what he had done in Cwmmaen’s hall, but it was all just supposition. What if he started to play and the only thing that happened was a little music? Why hadn’t he tried this in private first?

“It will work.” Aine stretched up to kiss him lightly and squeezed his arms in encouragement.

He nodded, buoyed by her belief in him. Whatever had happened earlier that day, the love shining in her eyes was real, as was her conviction that Comdiu had brought him here for this purpose. He actually believed it might be possible.

In a few moments, they would find out.

The harp sat beside a chair in the center of the room, innocuous, unremarkable. If he understood his gift, the actual harp should be immaterial. When he was finished, would it hum with power like Meallachán’s? Or would it go back to being just a
simple instrument of polished maple, never hinting at the role it played in the protection of their city?

Conor strode into the room, making his expression confident, but he needn’t have bothered. The anticipation and anxiety in the room was palpable. The moment demanded he make some sort of announcement, a grand gesture, but he didn’t trust his voice. Instead, he sat in the chair and lifted the harp into his lap.

Aine took up a position across from him and offered him an encouraging smile. He took a breath, put his fingers to the strings, and began to play.

Unintentionally, the notes took on the form of an old song, the one he had composed for Aine years ago at Lisdara, before he left her for the first time. And then the music began to change. He lost sight of the individual notes, the melody. In his mind’s eye, he saw the music as a golden light, emanating from the harp and spreading out over the fortress.

He stretched himself further and it curved into a shining dome, encompassing the city, the forests, all the land the Fíréin had laid claim to, all the land they depended on for their sustenance. When it had expanded as far as he could see in his mind’s eye, he let it fall in a shimmering curtain to the ground. It was not the web of interconnecting wards that had originally protected the city and given warning to the sentries but a shield
 
—a shield of song and magic and will, a barrier to those who meant to harm the new city that had emerged from the druid’s attack.

Satisfaction swelled in him as the last notes faded. He had done it. Conor opened his eyes and scanned the room.

“Is it done?” Riordan asked.

Conor looked to Aine. Her expression cracked his confidence and sent his heart plummeting. “Tell me.”

“It worked for a moment. The shield went up. But it dissipated the minute you stopped playing.”

Silence fell around the room, their hope dying with her words.

“So we do need the harp,” Eoghan said. “To make it permanent.”

Riordan looked to Conor. “And the harp is destroyed. What do we do now?”

“I don’t know.” Failure washed over him, heavier than before. “If Gillian still lived, he might know a way. I thought it would work.”

Where had he gone wrong? Had he not concentrated hard enough? Why had he not been able to will the outcome? He had been so sure
 
—confident, cocky even
 
—that he’d be able to rebuild the wards with nothing more than his gifts. Wasn’t that the purpose of his experience at Cwmmaen? To show him how he was meant to save Seare? To convince him he was needed back home?

Since when does Comdiu need you to save anyone or anything?

The chastisement cut through the jumble of his thoughts, illuminating the sheer arrogance of his assumptions. He’d assumed that his rescue from captivity had been for his benefit, the storm punishment for his disobedience, but maybe all of it had been to free Talfryn and his family from the grip of the sidhe. But if that were true, why show Conor the extent of his gifts?

Unless it wasn’t the extent of his gifts he was supposed to learn but rather the nature of them, their limitations.

His face burned as he realized the depth of his egotism. He’d actually believed Comdiu had given him the power to will the outcome of events, that He would hand over that sort of power to someone who hadn’t even been faithful with what he’d been gifted
 
—someone who had failed his vows to his wife, had been deceived by evil . . .

Conor jerked his head up. The nature of his gifts. Hadn’t he just said to Aine that his gift was related to the control of magic?
It made sense. Everything he’d done had been beneath the influence of Briallu’s glamour, including his archery session with Ial. He’d never actually been manipulating reality; he’d been manipulating the sidhe’s magic.

I’m sorry, Comdiu. I’ve been foolish. Prideful. Disobedient. Even when I thought I was doing Your work, I only had an eye to my own glory. Please don’t let Seare suffer because I was unfaithful. Show me. Tell me what to do.

He silently poured out his contrition, only vaguely aware of the conversation flowing around him, until that familiar tug cut through his thoughts. He gripped the chair as dizziness swept through him.

“Conor? What’s wrong?” Aine was by his side in an instant, a hand on his arm, a concerned look on her face.

“I don’t know. Just an . . . odd feeling.”

“What kind of feeling?”

“Ever since I was in Gwydden, I’ve felt a pull to Carraigmór. At first I thought it was just Comdiu nudging me back to Seare, but it got stronger the closer I got to Ard Dhaimhin. I assumed that when I rebuilt the wards, it would go away.” He winced and rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s rather uncomfortable.”

He noticed that the hall had fallen silent again and all the Conclave members were looking at him. “What?”

Riordan and Eoghan exchanged a glance.

“What is it?” Conor asked.

Eoghan shook his head. “Couldn’t be.”

“Give him a chance,” Riordan said. “It would explain a great deal about what’s happened here.”

Conor glanced at Aine. “Do you know what this is about?”

“I do now. But I shouldn’t tell you. I don’t want to interfere with how this is unfolding.”

Frustration welled up within him again at being the only one
in the room who didn’t know what was going on. “Lead the way, then, since you all have this figured out.”

Aine took his hand, undoubtedly meaning to calm him, but he barely managed not to shake it off. He’d been back a day, and already he felt as if everyone around him knew his business better than he did. He turned down the corridor that led to the Ceannaire’s study, making a quick turn into an intersecting corridor before they reached the stairs.

He moved forward, drawn by feel more than sight. It was here, the place, the object, whatever it was that called him so strongly. Riordan and Eoghan slowed, looking around them, talking in low tones, but he couldn’t make out the words. He trailed a finger over the stone as he walked and then stopped abruptly.

“Here. Don’t you see the door?” It was set seamlessly into the stone wall, almost unnoticeable even though it was wood instead of stone. He traced his finger along the joint of where the two materials met, unable to keep his eye on both at the same time. How was that possible?

“An enchantment,” Aine murmured. “Old magic.”

He shot her a curious glance, and when he looked back to the door, he blinked. The stone wall shimmered in front of him. “Remarkable. How do we get in?”

“There’s a password,” Eoghan said. “I’ve heard it, but I can’t remember it. It should have passed to me as Liam’s successor, but . . .”

A password. That tickle in the back of his mind grew. He opened his mouth and unfamiliar syllables floated out.

The door opened with a soft whoosh. Conor exchanged startled looks with the others, then pushed it open.

Beyond the doorway was a cramped passage, lit by an otherworldly glow. He hesitated before plunging into the narrow space.

He was dimly aware of the others following. This place had
a hush, as if it were cut off from the rest of Ard Dhaimhin. Perhaps it was. A sense of magic, not the light touch of the wards but something deeper and more rooted, passed over him. He stumbled.

“I feel it too,” Aine whispered behind him.

At least it wasn’t just his imagination. He continued downward until the corridor ended in the stone wall and then doubled back on itself at an angle. Ancient defenses, like the passageways into Ciraen cities, ambush spots. Something about this room was important enough to defend with both cunning and magic.

Feeling as if he were breaching some sort of inner sanctum, Conor stepped through the entrance.

A surge of power nearly brought him to his knees. Aine rushed forward and grabbed his arm. “Are you all right?”

“Aye.”

He turned in a circle, taking in the cubbyholes, all the parchments and scrolls that filled them. “What are all these?”

“Prophecies,” Eoghan said. “Writings that have been collected from all over the world since Daimhin’s time. Even Liam knew only a fraction of what is contained here.”

“Was this room what called you?” Riordan asked.

“No.” Conor walked slowly around the chamber, letting his senses guide him, even though he saw nothing to distinguish any spot from another. Then he paused. A drawer, barely perceptible among the shelves. He grasped the ring and pulled.

A familiar case lay inside it.

“The sword.” The sword that had called to him so strongly during the oath binding ceremonies, the blade upon which the clan chiefs of Seare had sworn their allegiance to King Daimhin. He removed the case and carried it to the table in the middle of the room.

There could have been discussion in the background, but
Conor heard nothing. The thrum of power, so much like the magic in Meallachán’s harp, vibrated through him, aligning itself with the beat of his heart. He flipped the latch, bracing himself for a blast of power.

But it did not come. Instead, the magic faded to a mere whisper, the ripple of water over rocks in a stream. The etchings on the blade glowed in the dim light.

He closed his hand around the grip and lifted it before him, not on his palms as he would handle a ceremonial blade but as a weapon. A surge of electricity traveled up his arm and nearly took his breath away.

Then the whispers began. Echoes at first, then stronger, the sounds of men’s voices vowing their allegiance to the brotherhood, to the High King. An idea began to take shape in his mind. He looked to Aine and saw the same wonder reflected in her eyes.

A smile stretched her lips. “Aye.”

He replaced the sword in the case, and the voices faded, the hum of power dwindling to nothing. He closed the box and flipped the latch shut.

“This is what the druid wanted. And now I know why.”

“You’re getting ahead of yourself, Conor.
”

He stopped pacing the Hall of Prophecies and dropped his hands from where they’d been locked behind his head. “You saw it as clearly as I did. This is why I was called back. This is why the succession of Fíréin leadership passed to me and not to Eoghan.”

The sword could solve so much. They needed men. Warriors, soldiers, whatever he wanted to call them. Men who would be willing to fight to retake their country, now scattered across Seare. Thanks to the sword, he knew who they were, knew he could call them back. But how?

“Aye, we need men,” Aine said softly. It took him a moment to realize he hadn’t voiced his thoughts aloud. “But we can’t call them back until we reinstate the wards. Right now they’re safe because they’re scattered. The druid doesn’t know who they are. But what’s to keep him from just destroying the city, with all our men inside?”

“His plan must be bigger than that.” But Conor couldn’t discount her words. Without the wards, they were at the druid’s
mercy. He scrubbed his hands over his face and sighed. “So we’re back to where we were before.”

“Maybe there’s something in these records that could tell us about the wards or the harp,” Aine mused, wandering along the shelves.

“There are thousands of pieces of writing here. The right one would practically have to jump into your hands.”

They met each other’s eye as a thought occurred to them simultaneously. Aine put voice to it. “The timing of it . . . you felt the sword call to you right after you failed to rebuild the wards.”

He winced at her word choice, but she was right. So what were they missing?

He went to the case on the table and opened it. Once more the thrum of magic vibrated through him, so different from the magic of the wards and yet similar to Meallachán’s harp.

“That’s it,” Conor murmured. He lifted the sword from the case, this time holding it flat across his palms. Its etchings glistened in the soft light.

No, not etchings
 
—runes.

Excitement gripped him. He peered closer at the blade. Most of the symbols he didn’t recognize. He’d interpreted them originally as Odlum, but they were different somehow. Then his eyes focused on a familiar symbol: a three-spoked wheel, like the charm Aine wore around her neck
 
—and the symbol carved into the tuning pin of Meallachán’s harp.

Conor’s pulse suddenly throbbed through his entire body. He could barely choke words from his tight throat. “We need Eoghan.”

Ten minutes later, Conor, Eoghan, and Aine gathered in the Ceannaire’s office above with the sword, the harp, and the pouch of tuning pins. Conor flipped open the sword’s case as Eoghan laid out the eight pins he had salvaged from the ruins
of Cill Rhí. Aine placed her charm on the table between them, its carved symbols facing up.

“They’re runes,” Eoghan said in surprise.

“Aye.” Not all of the runes on the pins were present on the sword or vice versa, but several
 
—the wheel, something that looked like an arrow, and a strange crosshatch
 
—were. Conor reached for the nearest pin and held it in his hand, expecting to feel some indication of magic, but he felt nothing.

“I don’t understand,” Conor murmured. “I was sure this was the source of the sword’s power.”

“Maybe it is,” Aine said. “The runes are a language, right? You can’t just put random words together and expect them to mean something.”

“So they only work together,” Eoghan said. “Which means you need to put them in the harp. We already know these mean something or they wouldn’t have been on Meallachán’s instrument.”

“But we have less than a third of the pins. How do we know we have the ones we need?”

They frowned as they looked over the items, all objects of power, all mysterious.

“The three have this one in common.” Aine pointed to the rune that looked like a wheel charm.

Eoghan lifted it and considered. “The name of Comdiu, the three parts of our God.”

Conor glanced at Eoghan, startled, and nodded. It made sense. He unscrewed the first tuning pin and replaced it with the rune pin, then tuned the string until it sounded true.

He plucked it one last time, and a deep vibration hummed inside him. His eyes widened. “What’s next?”

Aine scanned the runes. “This one is common among all three as well.”

Eoghan picked it up. “Protection. Actually, it’s the rune for
sword
, but it means the same thing.”

Conor stared at Eoghan. His friend had always insisted that he had no knowledge of languages or magic, yet now he spoke with absolute certainty. Conor didn’t argue, though. He just put the pin on the end of the harp opposite the wheel.

Language or not, this was more like constructing a building than a sentence: bracket a span of notes with Comdiu’s protection, fill it in with magic. It made sense in a symbolic sort of way.

“What about the rest?”

Eoghan touched each in turn. “I don’t know. Your guess is as good as mine.”

Conor spread each of the other six pins at even intervals along the harp. Once he had tuned each of the notes, he ran his fingers along the strings. Magic hummed on his skin.

He glanced at Eoghan and Aine. “Shall we give it another try?”

“Shouldn’t we get the others first?” Aine asked.

Eoghan shook his head slightly. Conor agreed with him. As confident as he felt, this still might not work. It was like trying to speak a language of which you had only the most rudimentary knowledge. The message had the potential to get garbled in the delivery. And with only eight of the twenty-eight pins . . .

“All right, let’s give it a try, then.” He forced a confidence he didn’t feel into his tone.

The first note sent a shiver through his body as he began to play. This time he didn’t control the music. It almost wasn’t even a song. It was a breath, a prayer, a plea to Comdiu
 
—an acknowledgement that while his skills were too meager to accomplish something this vast, he served a God who was greater and more powerful than that which they battled against.

Perhaps that was the reason for the magic embedded in the
runes: a reminder that there was something bigger and more mysterious at work than what they could accomplish by their own abilities.

And then the music changed again to that golden light, spilling out like liquid metal and seeping into the city’s foundation like rain. It was not a shield as he had first conceived but rather the touch of hallowed ground. A benediction. A blessing. It sped along the earth like a flood, burning away invisible shreds of mist it met along the way. And somewhere in his heart, Conor understood.

Ard Dhaimhin was not meant to be protected and shielded from the kingdom; it was to be its heart, its shield, its sword. What they built here would endure not because of any attempt to make it safe but because they were courageous enough to stand against the evil that threatened it.

When the last note died, Conor didn’t need Aine to tell him it was successful. The wards tickled his skin like the crackle of an impending lightning strike. It was as if the music had become part of the city, the foundation upon which it stood.

“You did it,” Aine whispered. “It’s different . . . strong. It’s not what it once was, but it’s what we need now.”

“Comdiu did it.” It was no coincidence that of the twenty-eight pins Eoghan could have found, these eight accomplished something so vast. And once more, Comdiu chose to humble him by showing him the limitations of his own knowledge, the graciousness of their Lord’s protection.

“It’s done, then,” Eoghan said quietly. “Let’s tell the others.”

Word of what Conor had done spread through Ard Dhaimhin almost as quickly as the magic itself, helped in part by the fact that more than a few people could feel it.

“So we’re protected,” Riordan said when Conor, Eoghan, and Aine met with the Conclave in the hall. “Against what?”

Aine answered. “I’m fairly certain that anyone possessing sorcery cannot set foot within Ard Dhaimhin’s borders. It’s become part of the foundation of the city.”

“And the sidhe?” Daigh said. “Can they pass?”

“They will be able to pass as they did with the other wards,” Conor said, “but their power will be limited to affecting individuals. I don’t think one could weave a full-scale illusion, not with the magic as the foundation of the city.” His experiences at Cwmmaen had taught him that much.

“So you couldn’t do the same thing to drive the sidhe from Seare,” Gradaigh said, disappointment in his tone.

“Not on such a large scale,” Conor said. “At least not yet. We have some other ideas that could be explored.”

Aine jumped in. “Conor and I would like to spend some time with the texts in Master Liam’s study and the Hall of Prophecies and see if there’s anything of use there.”

“Seems wise.” Riordan paused. “There’s something else we must discuss, though.”

Conor’s stomach sank. He could guess what was coming. “I don’t think
 
—”

“No, hear me out. Eoghan was Liam’s choice for Ceannaire, but he had other duties, and now I think we know why. I fell into leadership in their absence. But it seems Carraigmór’s own magic has chosen you. I think we make a grave mistake if we don’t listen.”

“I never wanted to lead the brotherhood,” Conor said.

“Neither did Liam. But he was chosen, as I believe you are.” Riordan glanced around at the members of the Conclave. “Perhaps for more. Only time will tell.”

The implication of Riordan’s words made him ill. “You can’t possibly mean . . .”

“There’s a prophecy.” The hard set of Eoghan’s jaw and the intense look in his eyes were at odds with his quiet tone. “It speaks of the one who will stand against the Kinslayer with ‘the sword and the song.’ Master Liam showed me.”

Conor looked at Aine. She gave him a little nod, though he couldn’t tell if it was meant to be encouragement or verification of the truth of Eoghan’s words.

“Prophecy or no prophecy, the brotherhood is over,” Conor said finally. “There is no Ceannaire because there is no Fíréin anymore.”

Riordan looked around the table and voiced the question on all their minds: “What are we, then?”

“You did well.” Aine’s soft voice snapped Conor out of his thoughts as he stared out the window in Liam’s study. She slid her arms around his waist from behind and leaned her head against his back. Just that small show of support warmed him and eased a little of the tension in his body.

“Can you tell me what they’re thinking?” he asked.

“You know I shouldn’t have
 
—”

“But you did. I need to know.” He turned and pulled her closer, but for once he wasn’t tempted off topic. “Please.”

“They all believe you are meant to take leadership of the city in Liam’s stead.”

“And . . .”

She sighed. “A few of them
 
—Riordan, Daigh, Eoghan
 
—believe you are the one prophesied in the writings.”

“The High King.”

“Aye.”

He heaved another sigh. He couldn’t explain it, but what he felt was more than just fear. It was like the nudge on his spirit in the Sofarende camp, the one that prompted him to stay even though common sense
 
—and Talfryn
 
—told him to flee. He felt tied to Ard Dhaimhin, true, and the sword called to him. But kingship? That felt completely wrong.