Fireshaper's Doom (38 page)

Yeah, that made sense: send a human to steal a valuable Faery artifact, and the human naturally gets killed, but he also gets the blame, and maybe Lugh gets really pissed at the human race in general and decides to have it out with them once and for all.

Why else would the High King not have acted, if the Horn of Annwyn was the most precious thing in his kingdom?

Unless David was being set up. Unless Lugh
wanted
him to take the Horn, had some plan of his own of which David was unwitting executor.

But that didn’t make sense either, because if Lugh and Morwyn had been working together to contrive Ailill’s downfall, he saw no reason why the Ard Rhi would not simply have given her the Horn, or used it himself. What
was
the Horn, for that matter? What did it do? He didn’t really know.

No, it was simply too easy.

Still, he knew, he had no choice but to fulfill the quest as best he could. That in mind, he squared his shoulders and turned toward the lacy metal gateway of the pavilion.

And then something moved among the tangled vaults overhead, wrenching him abruptly from his reverie. A shadow fled across the floor before him. He jerked his head up in horror, found he had raised the sword by pure instinct, then hesitated, staring at the blade foolishly. He didn’t want to kill unless he had to, wasn’t even certain he knew how, but—

Something was falling toward him, falling fast. Something he had mistaken for a carved decoration upon the ceiling: a shape of silver-gray that seemed all talons and wings and scales and teeth.

And that would be upon him in a bare instant.

Sword up again, higher—too late.

But whatever it was did not smash him to the floor. At the last possible moment, it swooped toward the opening of the pavilion where it landed neatly, its feather-eared head towering twice his height in the air. Tiny silver scales glittered across its body.

It’s a wyvern!
David almost gasped aloud; it looked just like the pictures he had seen in heraldry books. All at once he felt very guilty about the material from which his boots and scabbard and pouch were made.

The wyvern advanced a step. Its neck snaked down to eye level.

David backed away, assuming a defensive stance he had never consciously learned
— The sword’s influence?
he wondered. What had Morwyn said?
Perhaps the sword will find a way to use you, then?

The wyvern squinted in his direction, its tongue flicking, barbed tail thrashing across the floor. Its red eyes narrowed, and its nostrils flared. The fanlike ears twitched at his every breath.

It knows I’m here.

The creature folded in upon itself, squatting on hind legs like those of an immense ostrich; coiled its neck even lower.

—And struck: launching itself abruptly toward him by force of legs and massive tail.

David leapt back—too late.

The creature was upon him,
above
him; he was lying on his back with one three-clawed foot pinning his chest and right arm to the floor, a single talon inches from his unprotected throat; while the other foot poised above his stomach for what he very much feared was to be a quick disemboweling stroke. The sound of his own heartbeat echoed back at him through the stone floor, even as he scrabbled vainly for the sword he had dropped a few feet away.

The claw flexed; raised. Opened.

He closed his eyes and prayed.

The lizard made frantic chirping sounds by his ear.

—But the claw did not fall.

Through slitted eyes David looked up—and saw a puzzled expression widen the wyvem’s eyes. The grip on his body relaxed a fraction.

Incomprehensible thoughts buzzed in his mind, seeming more curious and confused than threatening.

He risked a movement, tried to slide out from beneath the creature.

Its grip relaxed, but a tug at his throat told David it had tangled its claws in the fabric of the cloak. Another tug, though, and it freed itself, leaving a visible rent in the material.

Carefully he stood up, and to his surprise the wyvem bounced away to stand by the open entrance to the domed chamber. It bowed its head slightly. David was reminded almost exactly of the doorman in one of those fancy Atlanta hotels.

David took a deep breath.
Heeeere we gooooo! All or nothing—before it changes its mind.

He ducked inside—and caught his breath in wonder. Gold was everywhere, in bars or coins or armor or weapons, or vast, jeweled chalices and massive flagons and bowls. And there was silver as well, and every surface was carved or jeweled or inlaid or wound with wire in an infinity of shapes and patterns. He could have spent a lifetime there
—two
lifetimes—and never seen it all. A thousand pieces called out for examination. Ignoring them was the hardest thing he had ever done.

And in the exact center of the chamber, on a plain pedestal of black stone, stood the ornate ivory curve of the Horn of Annwyn, its jeweled bands flashing even in the subdued light. Almost without conscious volition, David found himself reaching toward it.

Still too easy—far too easy.

He had it then, and slung the plain leather strap across his shoulder under the cloak.

The sudden effusion of elation and relief that filled him was almost more than he could contain. He had completed the first part of his quest, even if he could not trust the means of that completion. He was almost high, high as only certain books had ever made him, books like
The Lord of the Rings
or
Gods and Fighting Men.
He was Frodo and Aragorn and Angus Og and Finn MacCumhail all in one.

He made himself slow down, though; for he still had to escape and the wyvern had damaged his cloak. He didn’t know how much longer it would be useful.

As he reached the entrance, he paused, peering outside to see if the wyvern was still there. And as he did, something caught his eye in a rack immediately to his right, something that sent an unexpected thrill racing through his body—or was it simply the lizard’s sudden excited trilling in his ears? He frowned and turned to take a closer look.

It was a bow of plain white wood, bound with gold about the tips. There were others with it of far finer apparent workmanship, yet he found himself drawn to that one in particular. It looked vaguely familiar. Completely by reflex he found himself reaching toward it, then hesitated, puzzled at his own action; for an instant it had seemed as if some other will had controlled his body.
That bow is so damned familiar…

Sudden realization dawned as he gave in to the compulsion and lifted the weapon from its place. It was
Fionchadd’s
bow! Goibniu the Smith of the Tuatha de Danaan had made it, the boy had told him. It was the most precious thing he owned. A piece of master weaponwork worthy of the High King of the Sidhe in Tir-Nan-Og—especially when its original owner conveniently seemed to have left no heirs.

Perhaps Morwyn would like it as a reminder of her son, David decided, as he took the smooth wood into his hand. She had more right to it than Lugh, after all.

The decision made, he sheathed his sword and slung the bow over his shoulder, adding a moment later the quiver of white-fletched arrows that lay beside it. And thus encumbered with sword and Horn, pouch and water flask, quiver and bow—and a cloak of invisibility bunching in and out of the multitude of straps—David began thread his way out of the vault.

Something whirred in his ears, and he realized finally that it was the lizard humming happily inside his cowl. Well, if the lizard was happy, so was he.

The wyvern had resumed its place amid the carvings on the dome. David shrugged and hastened on his way, finding a path out of the maze of shifting floors and walls and doorways more quickly than he had earlier by the simple expedient of walking against the rotation of the walls, so that the openings came up more quickly.

Up the stairs now, and onto the Iron Road, suddenly acutely aware of the thump of his tread, of the dry hiss of his panting as he struggled to maintain a quick pace up the slope.

The slit of doorway lay before him; freedom beyond—and he was through!

Sunlight hit him; his shadow flickered before him as he ran down the hillside.

His shadow!
Not full dark, as it should be in so intense a glare, but his shadow nonetheless. The cloak was beginning to fail.

Down the slope at a sliding run, the quiver bouncing on his back, the sword pounding against his thigh, one hand firmly fixed on the hard curve of the Horn of Annwyn.

It was all downhill now. He would go overland, he knew the way. A fringe of lower trees reared ahead. In a moment he would be among them, free from casual observation. In a moment he would be safe. In a moment—

“Thief!” a clear voice sounded behind him. “Thief! Thief! Thief!”

David spun around just in time to see a file of armed warriors issuing from a door concealed in the marble wall above him and to the left.

And as his last shred of invisibility faded, those warriors lowered their swords one by one.

Chapter XXXVIII: A Debate in the Night

(Sullivan Cove, Georgia)

JoAnne O’Brian Sullivan eyed Katie McNally dubiously. “I can’t go with you, I gotta stay here an’ wait for my boy.”

Cold dew sparkled on the grass at her feet. She curled one set of toes across the other absently.

“I can’t go alone.”

The younger woman bit at her upper lip and stared at the ground. The arcane light in the sky gave her an unearthly shadow and imparted a greenish sheen to Little Billy’s blue eyes. She clutched his wrist firmly.

“Then don’t go. Stay here. I got at least one extra bed, God knows.”

Katie reached out shy, knotted fingers and touched JoAnne’s hand. “Why won’t you believe me?”

“Believe
what?
I seen the cross in the sky, same as you. But I don’t take it as no sign. It scares me, if you want to know the truth about it.”

“You ever know a woman my age t’ lie?”

JoAnne heaved a weary sigh and rubbed a bare wrist across her forehead. She shook her head.

The Trader looked up at her: so tall, so pretty—so closed to the wonder of living. “I’ve seen some things, girl. Eighty years an’ two countries. I’ve seen things most folks say can’t
be
seen, ’cause they ain’t there to see. But they are: I’ve seen the Fair Ones—once as a girl, and once as you see me now—an’ they scared me to death both times, but I’m still here. An’ I heard the banshee cry when my grannie died, an’ that scared me worse than I ever been. But lightnin’ I’ve seen crashin’, too; an’ storms at sea; an’ heard the thunder, and they’re frightenin’ things as well, ’cause they come when God wants ’em to, and leave by His will, and there ain’t nothin’ none of us can do but wait ’em out. But I rode in a airplane to get to this land, an’ that wasn’t no pleasure’, let me tell you. An’ I been ninety miles an hour in a box o’ flimsy tin an’ rubber, with my drunken son a’drivin’.”

“But what makes you think that thing in the sky’s got anything to do with Davy?”

The old woman’s brow wrinkled further. “I told you. I saw him this evenin’, saw his friends again a little later, an’ them scared to death ’cause he’d vanished. Saw a pretty red-haired girl so eaten up with love an’ fear for him she’d risk everything to find him, an’ a brown-haired boy near as bad. I ain’t got time to make things like that up. An’ I sure don’t go a’botherin’ honest folks in the middle of the night.”

“That ain’t no proof.”

“Well, I seen the ones who went with ’em, too. I seen the old man with the whiskers.
He
believed.” She glanced down at Little Billy. “This boy believes old Katie.”

JoAnne found tears welling up in her eyes as worry and confusion warred within her.

Katie reached into her heavy canvas bag—too shapeless to be called a purse—and felt for a hanky. Her nails clinked against metal.

The chains. She’d forgotten about them; her mind wasn’t what it once was, even with a mission from God at hand. Or
was
it God? Or Those Ones—or both? Or were they all the same in the end? The stars shone on them all.

Katie handed David’s mother the square of soft linen, then set the bag on the ground, and drew out one of the lengths of chain. “Ever see this?”

“That’s Alec’s!” Little Billy squealed. “Or Gary’s or Runnerman’s one! I seen ’em all wearin’ ’em!”

His mother’s eyes widened and she snatched it up.

“Where’d you get this?”

A trace of self-righteous arrogance ghosted Katie’s face. “Fell out of the sky. Out of that cross in the sky.”

“Well, it belongs to one of my boy’s friends. I’ve seen them usin’ chains just like this for belts.”

“It fell out of the sky,” Katie repeated. “As the Lord is my Witness.”

JoAnne eyed the old woman suspiciously. “How do I know you didn’t steal it? Or find it? Hell, how do I know you didn’t kill them for it, an’ it just cheap chrome steel?”