Silver Hollow (40 page)
When Dameri gave Amie the signal and slipped behind a nearby tree trunk the situation became even more real.
Lure them out…yeah, sure, no problem.
She shivered because she was wet and had forgotten Dameri’s little thermal mind trick. So she took in a deep breath, ignored the deep guttural sounds emitting from the black burrow breathing foul air in front of them, and walked into the clearing.
When a stray acorn plopped roughly
off
her shoulder blade she shot a dark glare where she knew Emrys was now hiding.
Yeah
,
I get the message
,
I’m hurrying here
,
Rambo.
Shutting her eyes tightly
,
Amie waited a rain
-
soaking moment before striking her palms together in a loud clap. Hopefully she got this right. Purple sparks of energy escaped her fingertips, pulsed through her veins and back again in the craziest light show Amie had ever seen. It was a trippy moment to know this was coming from her.
“Again!” Emrys called from his night watch.
Rolling her eyes Amie clapped again and spread her hands wide. Silver ripples of light created a dome over them all, brought fresh life to the decaying thicket, flowers and vines sprouting everywhere in a mad frenzy. Amie felt a little like a DC superhero, until the squatty dark creatures emerged from their pit. Amie had watched every movie from every genre invented. She knew what goblins, ghouls, zombies and other foul creatures were supposed to look like. But she wasn’t prepared for this.
Some wore clothing and carried crude weapons while others moved on already maimed limbs in a freaky zombie crawl. All had glowing ruby red eyes and hatred spitting in some foul tongue from rows of rotting teeth. And right now their gaze
was fixed on her, this obvious f
aerie friend and powerful enchantress in her own right. They smelled
that
her tasty human flesh was riddled with Sidhe blood
and surrounded her as
close
ly
as they dared step into her light
. T
heir
threats carried in a garbled nightmare chorus so Amie saw what an infestation meant here in the Hollow.
Everywhere they touched their spit sizzled on the freshly grown plants
,
turning them to ash and rot. Cries echoed throughout the forest in answer to this intruder
in
their domain.
“Emrys!” Amie’s voice trembled as she pushed her lights further into the wood, felt her energy draining surely. He did not answer her and Dameri had yet to make use of her crossbow.
What the deuce are they waiting for?
Her strength was quickly fading. Amie hardly understood her own powers or where they came from, but she knew when the
g
remlins’ scowls turned to eager grins she was in trouble.
“Dameri!”
s
he tried, pushing harder through her hands, until the pulse of her energy rippled farther. Gremlins hissed the moment the waves of her inner nixy brushed them, cowered from it in fear.
And
Amie knew her companions were not there to help her or even protect her.
“This better not be some other stupid test!” No answer came and her protests were falling weaker on deaf ears. New determination rose this time not from her anger but a wholly unexpected force. Pulsing only slightly softer than her own, Amie delved into a deeper power hidden inside herself and pulled at it, shared her own to nurture it. Her creations grew stronger with every increasing moment, trailed and wove over her arms and her chest, through her curls and her leather tight clothes.
The forest
,
Amie instinctively realized
,
and the sudden rush nearly knocked her off her feet as its l
ife force joined hers. Several g
remlins
kam
i
kaz
e
’d
into her reclaimed turf, fried to gooey bits on impact
,
the core of silver light increasing by the second.
She could feel every creature in the forest, some corporeal and others invisible to the naked eye, could feel the roots of every tree and plant and the long memory of the forest. Only now did she understand her inherent gift and embrace it.
Opening her eyes
,
she laughed, saying, “Go ahead
.
I’m ready now
.
” With a sigh she let loose the tightly bound sphere of light and let it explode in a loud gale that swept through t
he trees. Too late for the g
remlins, for the ones who weren’t taken over by
nixing
were
caught by the Hunter’s
bolts
and the Trapper’
s
clean sweep after, until a clear dark film coated the earth in the wake of the dead.
The sound of Dameri’s crossbow exacting damage sounded in the near distance. Amie struggled to catch her breath and figure out why it was light as day suddenly. Emrys stuck his
hands in the burrow after sweeping the field one last time. Amie frowned over his actions and asked, “What are you doing?”
“We set the trap and won back lands
which
have been kept dark far too long. Ye gave back the forest its memory
,
Jessamiene. Now it can grow freely again. So I must be certain we did not leave any evidence behind.” H
e winked at her
before
crawling
, head first, into the foul tunnel.
Henry and Emrys flanked Amie on the road leading back to the castle. Amie was relieved they were not spending the night at Xcalibure. Before they had left Dameri began talking of trapping yet another mythical creature. Emrys explained that after so long trapped in the Borderlands, humans tended to lose a bit of their sanity. It was simply program
m
ed in them to die and when their bodies no longer could they unintentionally put themselves into dangerous situations.
While not making sense scientifically, it wouldn’t take a genius to figure out the odd couple was ancient. Judging by the stories
Dameri
heaped over Amie’s head all afternoon
,
Amie
was willing to bet their time
had
taken place just before the Middle Ages. Yet Dameri talked about her homeland as if she had seen it only yesterday. Sometime soon Amie was going to sit Henry down and squeeze the answers out of him.
The trip to Xcalibure had been educational, and it was worth it to see Emrys emerge from the monsters’ burrow covered in black goo. But something had got under her skin ever since she climbed trees with Arthur, a tugging sensation
stemming
from the back of her head she couldn’t quite shake. She kept twisting her father’s ring for the rush of comfort it offered with every brush of the stone against her fingers. The closer the horses drew to Wenderdowne, the more at ease Amie felt. Now she was itching for some peace of mind before the ball Morcant was dead set on throwing her.
Slaine was all peals of laughter as he pried his sleeping Master from his horse. Winking at Amie, he supported Henry in their drunken stumble back to the house with a shake of his head. “Still haven’t learned how to level Hawkeye’s ale, have ye
,
lad?” he said.
Her protector was most reluctant to leave her side and only obeyed once she smiled up at him coyly and offered, “Promise I’
m all yours tomorrow morning. But I
need some time to think.” Amie was a hundred percent certain she hadn’t pulled the wool over h
is eyes. It was to her mystery
he seemed satisfied and
,
for once, eager to return to the castle. She watched his retreat with narrowed eyes.
What’s he up to?
Once the soft tread of his boots had faded behind the closed door to the kitchens she pressed her forehead to Beans’ nose and said, “You are so lucky you don’t have to deal with one of
those
.” Bean breathed his sweet hay breath onto her neck. Giggling, she perked up and raked her nails across his belly. “Guess you’ve got me there. I’m not exactly a piece of cake either.”
Bean whickered softly and nudged her hair, but when he started nipping at it she broke away. “Hey! I happen to like my hair! You don’t see me coming at you with a pair of scissors…”
A strong hand clamped
over
her mouth from behind, interrupting her scream, pulled her away from Bean and behind the stables. Before she could protest she looked up and caught a glimpse of a familiar cap. Without a word he pulled her to the secret door, on through to the subterranean underworld and straight into his cottage.
O
nce they were sa
fely behind the other side,
she jerked her hand from his and shouted, “What the
deuce
was that? Dearg, you don’t just grab people without letting them know you aren’t a crazed psychopath, okay?” Her heart was racing painfully for the second time
this
day. Nettled nerves shot, she did not protest when he silently unclasped her cloak and set it on a nearby hook for her. Wringing his hat in his hands, he veered a safe distance from her, into his little kitchen. Amie followed, wondering why he seemed so frazzled, until she recalled the fact Emrys had ridden Ambrose to Xcalibure. It was no secret Emrys was probably Dearg’s least favorite person in the Hollow.
Dearg must have seen him go, maybe even helped him get ready,
she thought with a shudder.
Sitting on a chair, so ancient the seat bowled out to mold to her buttocks, she watched him set the tea kettle over the makeshift iron stove. She smiled because no one used iron around Wenderdowne except for him. How refreshing to see someone so different from everyone else she had met. How surprising it turned out to be the one person she had the least expectations of.
Softly, she tried to peel back his armor and asked, “So why did you just kidnap me? We could have talked out there.” She watched his shoulders tense and his hand lift to comb carelessly through golden hair.
“No time for pleasantries,” he finally offered. “Not safe when they could be listening.”
Her eyebrow quirked into a graceful arch as she said, “Would it really be so terrible if they knew about my visits?”
Dearg turned to face her so quickly she would have missed the movement were she only human. His azure eyes were ablaze with golden flecks and such intensity, she was surprised by his mouth
-
tilting grin.
“I am not afraid of
them
, Amie.” His unspoken threat was loud and clear.
They are afraid of him.
“But why?” she mused aloud and realized she was asking a different question.
Clutching his discarded cap, Dearg wrung it out to its full capacity before flinging it across the room to land on the hook behind her head. As if he couldn’t bear to hold it in any longer, he said, “I do nay like people a
nd they do nay like me. Sidhe, h
obgoblins and one crazed Tuatha are not enough of a threat to silence me. But they fear for you
,
Amie, like their long lives depend on it.” Lowering his eyes to the ring on her finger
,
he murmured, “I only wanted a bit more time,
’
tis the long and short of it.”
Softly, with new understanding, Amie nodded. Thinking of the fact he separated himself from society, a habit she was inclined to share, she said, “So you remove yourself from the equation, keeping everyone at a distance. I get it. I like it.” A frown sharpened his profile, though he tried to hide it by tending the kettle. Biting her lip nervously
,
she pressed on because she sensed she had hit a sore spot and because she truly was curious. “So does Slaine live here too? Where does he sleep?”
His grin widened until it seemed to split his face in two. “Further back in the cave,” he said. Which meant he knew but was not about to tell Amie.
Crossing her arms over her chest, she pressed him further. “What exactly are you two keeping back there?”
Dearg glanced over his shoulder while fiddling with the steaming kettle. “You shall wish you had never known, but someday I
am
going to show you,
Sidhe bloodletting
opinions be
blithered
.”
She laughed at the vehemence behind his curse and followed him as he took their ready tea to sit before the steadily burning fire. “Someone needs to make a catalogue of all the things you people say. I could publish a dictionary and make a fortune.” Kicking her feet up onto the wooden stool before her chair, she sighed after sampling her tea. Few men knew how to make a decent spot of tea a
nd after a night spent hunting g
remlins in the rain, this was heaven.