Bricrui (The Forgotten: Book 2) (22 page)

CHAPTER 12

Back at the palace, Layna set to work
feverishly to act upon the information that Alina had provided
about Lord Telvani and Lord Farthen’s activities. The fact that
there were items somehow connected to the spell that was affecting
the Council members could potentially be the break that they
needed. If they could find these items, there was a chance that the
Council would go back to normal.

Alina had reported that their handlers had
destroyed the items of the test subjects once they had discovered
the fate of those performing the spells. She said that, to the best
of her knowledge, this had freed those under compulsion. And while
it hadn’t stopped the progression of the Bricrui transformation
completely in those who had done the spell, it did slow it
down.

It stood to reason that if Telvani had known
that he could halt the process by destroying these items that he
would have, especially after having been ousted. His estates had
all been thoroughly searched, though the hidden compartment in his
desk here in the palace suggested he was extremely cunning with his
hiding spots. They had also belatedly found several secret
passageways running throughout his house, so if he had hidden the
items there, why would he not have already destroyed them?

Charles had found him wandering close to the
palace’s extended grounds, and though he did have one small
apartment within the city, it was largely unused and unlikely to be
chosen as a safe-house for something so important. Therefore, she
and Gryffon had come to the conclusion that the items were
somewhere in the palace. He had been spending much of his time here
and would want to keep them close.

They had ordered a sweep of the entire
palace, concentrating on those areas which Telvani spent the
majority of his time. She and Gryffon combined their considerable
magic force to search, but had so far come up empty. Layna was
doubling eager to find the items, both to have her Council members
restored, and to buy Alina more time.

They took a moment to sit and think, bringing
Phoenix into the throne room to let her climb on the massive
chairs. She kept trying to pick at one of the jewels encrusting the
throne, specifically a giant ruby on the bottom. Gryffon was
half-heartedly batting her hand away, though it was unlikely she’d
be able to dislodge it anyway. This throne had been made centuries
ago. It would be pretty impressive if their little girl could break
it after so long.

There was a sudden *pop* and Layna’s eyes
widened. She’d apparently jinxed it. Baby Phoenix was sitting back,
laughing, holding up the giant ruby in front of her happily.
Gryffon took it from her as she lifted it to her mouth.

“Our baby, the destroyer,” he commented
affectionately.

“Indeed,” Layna said, a small smile playing
on her lips. Hopefully none of the aides had noticed and they could
simply stuff it back into place before they noticed the
blasphemy.

“It’s hollow inside…” Gryffon’s muffled voice
came over the edge of the throne from where he was crouched down in
front of it.

Layna got down on her hands and knees with
him in front of the thrones. The casing where Phoenix had pried
loose the jewel was not a solid backing as would be expected, but
rather a dark opening into the center of the chair. She glanced at
Gryffon and raised an eyebrow.

He stuck his pointer finger into the hole and
tried to feel around, but it would only fit in up to his first
knuckle. He tried to pull it out, but it stuck.

“Curses,” he swore, biting his tongue on any
other words he may have been thinking after a glance at their
daughter. He yanked on his hand a bit harder, and a metallic click
sounded. As he drew his finger backwards, an entire section of the
throne moved forward with it, revealing a small drawer.

Inside was a carved wooden box. Gryffon
reached in a lifted it out carefully, replacing the drawer and the
gem knob.

“This must be it,” Gryffon exclaimed
excitedly.

“Careful,” Layna warned, feeling the power
within it and cautious of enchantments that may be placed upon it
to stop anyone from getting to his precious items. She should have
guessed that they’d be hidden underneath the throne, where he had
decided it was his place to be. “He may have trapped it.”

Gryffon nodded, and they hastily returned
Phoenix to the nursery to bring the box to the practice room. Once
there, the two of them huddled over it. They had brought several of
the royal mages as well, just in case. They sat there staring at it
for several long minutes.

“Can anyone tell if it is enchanted?” Layna
asked finally.

She was met with many uncertain gazes and a
few shrugs. No one could positively identify a trap on it. That
didn’t mean there wasn’t one.

“Well, here goes,” Gryffon stated with a
quick puff of air and put his hand over the lid. He held it there a
moment, readying himself, and everyone in the room tensed. Then he
flipped it open quickly, withdrawing his hand.

Reddish smoke snaked out of the box and all
eyes watched it warily. Then suddenly it shot outwards in many
different tendrils, one for each person in the room, which wrapped
themselves quite solidly around everyone’s necks.

Layna’s hands flew to her throat where the
smoky rope was tightening around her windpipe and crushing the air
out of her. The mages all were throwing spells at the offending
tendrils, or clawing at their throats in an attempt to gain some
hold on the vaporous weapons.

Stars danced in Layna’s eyes and she caught
Gryffon’s glance. He nodded towards the box meaningfully, and she
quickly realized that he meant for them to jointly attack the box
rather than the tendrils. It was the source of the murderous spell,
so they would need to somehow cut the tendrils off from the power
of the box that was keeping them going.

Layna ignored the burning in her lungs, as
they begged for oxygen, and closed her eyes to combine her power
with Gryffon. The two of them dove into the material of the box and
quickly found the stone that was embedded under its lid, from which
the spell was drawing power. They balled up a burst of energy aimed
directly for this ball and set it loose, exploding the stone into a
thousand tiny pieces.

Layna gasped for breath as the magical rope
around her neck disappeared. Gryffon and the mages around the room
did the same and looked around to make sure everyone was alright.
Other than all being slightly short of breath and all no doubt in
for some serious bruising the next day, they were all fine.

“Yet another lovely surprise from Lord
Telvani,” Layna commented lightly.

Gryffon reached into the box and drew out
several objects – six of them to be exact – and smiled. “I think
we’ve found what we’ve been searching for.”

They had gathered all of the Council members
into the royal infirmary in order to keep an eye on them and she
and Gryffon hurried inside with the objects. They did not want to
simply destroy all of the objects at once in case something went
wrong, but deciding which to start with would be a difficult
decision.

They had not been able to determine the exact
mechanism of the spell even with Alina’s description and the notes
that they had discovered among Farthen’s belongings. They were
hopeful, however, that if they incinerated the object with a
magical flame that it would sever the connection from Telvani to
the Council members. Lord Telvani was worsening, and there was no
telling what would happen to them if they were still connected upon
his death. They had to act now.

They chose one of the items at random, not
bothering to try and guess which it belonged to in order to avoid
making any kind of choice between them. Holding hands, they focused
on creating a flame and incinerating the item. It was slow to catch
fire, resisting the flame, but once it caught it burned
rapidly.

Gryffon and Layna waited.

One of the Council members suddenly coughed
and sat up, coughing more violently as though choking on smoke.
They rushed to her side and Layna brought her a glass of water. She
took this greedily and drank it down.

“Where am I?” she asked, seeming to be back
to normal, and they smiled in relief. It had worked!

*

“Psst,” Lorcan whispered through the cell
window, panting hard to catch his breath.

There was some shuffling around inside and
then Hunter’s face appeared. “Lorcan,” he greeted him, “Are you
alright?”

“I’m fine,” he answered hurriedly, “but I
just found out what the Elders are up to.”

“You mean what the curse on the Princess
is?”

“Yes,” Lorcan agreed excitedly. “It’s meant
to spread itself through the Princess to any that have even a
droplet of the Dark King’s blood within them.”

“To do what?” Hunter asked, his voice
bordering on impatience.

“To sterilize them,” Lorcan spat out.

He heard a sharp intake of breath from within
the cell. “They’re sterilizing people?” Hunter hissed.

“Yes,” Lorcan nodded vigorously, “and it gets
worse.”

“How?”

“The stone that they sent Katya after will
solidify the spell. They used the essences of the other four stones
of the tribes to first perform it, but because we aren’t on good
terms with the Dena’ina anymore,” he felt his heart constricting
painfully and he fairly growled at the mention of the traitorous
tribe, “they could not completely make it irreversible. The five
stones were once as one, made by a circle of the most powerful
mages of the Dark King’s era in order to survive in the chaotic
magic of this place as well as hide them from the Dark King. After
the immediate threat was over and the leaders of different factions
decided to go their separate ways, the stone was split into five
parts so that no one tribe held such a powerful artifact. Each
tribe possesses one of these stones to this day.”

“Do you know of the Myaamia’s stone?”

“I didn’t until we found this text,” Lorcan
said bitterly, “Yet another piece of information that the Elders
are withholding from us.” He returned to his explanation, “The
Arrival allowed them to enlist the use of four of the five stones,
from each of the tribes who answered the summons, thinking that
they were cleansing the child of an ailment. If Katya brings back
the final stone, the Elders will be able to complete the curse,
making it unbreakable. Every soul in the Lost Lands who holds even
the tiniest portion of the Dark King’s blood will be rendered
childless.”

Hunter was silent for so long that Lorcan
wondered if he was still there. “Hunter?”

“I’m here,” the man answered, his voice
drawn.

“Has Gareth woken yet?” he asked, eager for
the man to wake to ask for his advice. After what they had learned
about his background, he had many questions for the man. Like why
he had destroyed the stone in the statue’s hand. Had he known what
the Elders had been up to even then? And if so, why hadn’t he done
anything about it? Had he known about his parents’ deaths?

“Gareth is gone,” Hunter answered softly.

“What?”

“They took him away earlier today. I think he
was dead.”

No, no! That couldn’t be. He needed to get
those answers.

“I’m sorry,” Hunter offered his sympathy.

Lorcan had a moment’s silence, sending a
prayer to the gods for the old man. Though he had not been able to
ignore his more abrasive qualities quite as well as Katya, he had
come to think of the old man as a friend since the two of them had
helped Katya escape. And since everything he’d recently learned
about the man, he suddenly had a lot more respect for him.

He sighed in frustration. “What are we going
to do?”

“You said that people don’t know what’s
really going on, right?” Hunter asked.

“No, it appears that Kali and the Elders have
been lying to us all.” He added bitterly, “Except a select few that
apparently believe her misguided views. Like my brother.”

“If people knew would they stop it?”

“I don’t know,” Lorcan sighed, this time in
resignation. “I don’t even think that they’d believe me. Raina says
that they’re starting to question things, but I don’t think it’s
enough yet. I was hoping that Gareth could help with that,
but…”

“What did your brother say?”

Lorcan felt his cheeks getting hot in anger
once more. He could hardly believe that Slade knew so much and
still believed in Kali. “He says that it’s for the greater good,
that it really is helping the Lost Ones.”

“Would most others think that way too?”

“I don’t know,” Lorcan repeated, annoyed.

“But if they would, why didn’t Kali invite
them into the secret?” Hunter mused.

Lorcan pondered this a moment. That was true.
Kali must have at least been concerned over the reception that her
plan would get if she had gone to the trouble of making up a lie to
cover it up.

“So maybe if you tell people what’s going on
they’ll help stop it.”

“Maybe,” Lorcan agreed noncommittally.
Discouraged, and not in the mood for Hunter’s questions, he stated
shortly, “I have to go.”

Hunter didn’t try to make him stay, and he
wandered the walkways aimlessly for a while. There was so much
going on that was simply beyond his control. Would people believe
him if he told them? Most just thought of him as Slade’s awkward
younger brother, always getting himself into trouble. Would they
assume that his information was just a cry for attention and brush
him off? Could he face the humiliation of being rejected?

Lorcan spent the night in a hammock on the
outskirts of the city. He couldn’t face Slade after their
confrontation. Not only had Slade lied to him about their parents’
deaths, but he’d also had the information about the Elders all
along and had been keeping it from him. And worse, he apparently
bought into Kali’s twisted logic whole-heartedly. He felt as though
he’d lost a brother too.