The Rival (51 page)

"And he didn't use it?"

"It required an Enchanter."

"Ah."  Rugad sighed.  He had forbidden the Enchanters to go with Rugar.  So they might have conquered the Isle after all, if he hadn't made that decree.  Was that what Ghost was bringing to him?  Knowledge of Rugad's own culpability in the death of his son?

"That's not all," Ghost said.  "They found an Enchanter."

Rugad looked at him.  Ghost's eyes were dark in his victim's face.  "Who?" Rugad asked, not daring to hope it was one of his great-grandchildren.

"He was an Islander child."

Rugad nodded. That made sense.  The mixture of Fey blood and Islander blood had produced a strong Visionary and a strong Shifter.  There was no reason why it wouldn't produce an Enchanter.  "Born how long after the Invasion?"

"Before."

Rugad blinked.  He had expected Ghost to say many years after the Invasion, the child being too young to use its magick yet and the Fey biding their time.  But this, this made no sense.  "There were no babies on that Force."

"I know.  The child was Islander."  Ghost said that with the precision of someone who was repeating himself.

"Pure Islander?"

"Short, blue-eyed, round-faced, blond-haired, born several months before the first invasion fleet arrived.  Solanda found him."

Solanda.  Despite himself, Rugad looked toward the prisoner tent.  She had withheld even more information from him.  To what purpose?  He almost felt like stopping the death.

But he couldn't.  It was too late.

"How long ago?"

"Nineteen years ago."

The Enchanter was an adult then.  "What happened to him?" Rugad asked.

"He lived in Shadowlands for years before anyone realized what he was.  When they did, they approached him wrong and terrified him.  He escaped Shadowlands with another Islander prisoner, and even though the Failures searched, they never found him."

"His name?"

"Coulter."

Through the entire explanation, Ghost hadn't raised his head.  He knew even more.

"What else?" Rugad asked.

"He saved your great-grandson's life.  He remained close to Gift.  And Gift never let the Failures know where he was."

"Gift kept them imprisoned in here."

Ghost nodded.  "He knew that the Enchanter could give them the antidote to holy water, and he did nothing."

Rugad clenched his fists.  But he had Seen his great-grandson leading the way to Leut.  Seen it clearly.  Yet the boy had acted in the interest of the Isle, not the Fey.

It made no sense.

"You're certain of this?"

"Positive," Ghost said.  "This Warder that I inhabit, Touched, was the one who discovered the Enchanter, and the one who tried to talk Gift into bringing him back."

"And he refused?"

"Gift claimed they were going to hurt this Coulter, and he wouldn't let them do that." Ghost licked his lips.  "In all fairness, Touched was afraid the experiments the Warders planned would hurt or kill the Enchanter.  Coulter was only five years old at the time."

Rugad clenched his fists, then unclenched him.  Solanda had warned him.  Gift was raised by Failures, she had said.  She had had no hopes for him.

But she had had hopes for his sister.

"What happened to the Enchanter?"

"As of this morning, he was still alive," Ghost said.  "Touched could feel him.  But since I only have an echo of Touched's powers instead of the actual powers, I can't tell you more than that."

"Protecting Gift?"

"One could assume so."

Rugad nodded. So he had met this Enchanter already, the furious presence that had interrupted the Link, then closed and locked the doors.

A powerful Enchanter.  Of Islander blood.

He had always assumed the Enchanters Boteen had felt were born to Fey on the Isle.  He had thought they would die with the Failures.

He was wrong about one.

Had he been wrong about the other?

FIFTY-SEVEN

Nicholas paced the Uprising Room.  He was alone except for Sebastian.  Monte had gone to lead the troops within the palace.  Arianna still wasn't back. 

Nicholas didn't want to think about that.

The sunlight had grown thinner.  Smoke from all over the city blocked some of the light.  Below, on the birds, the sunlight was still bright.

Sebastian was watching him, eyes wide.  The boy didn't say much, but he knew what was happening. 

So did Nicholas.  The moment of leadership had truly arrived.  He had just sent men to their deaths.  He knew it, Monte knew it, and Sebastian knew it.

The men probably knew it

But he had learned once before that one life meant nothing compared with hundreds of lives.

Unless that life had Black Blood.  Somehow the Fey had even turned that one simple rule around.  Nicholas's children, his real children, meant more than everyone in the palace put together.

He wondered if Sebastian understood that.

He stopped pacing near Sebastian.  Sebastian took a deep slow breath.

"Will … Ari … be … able … to … come … back?" 

Sebastian meant would she be able to come back after the battle started.  Could she get in?  Would she be safe?

"I hope so," Nicholas said.

Sebastian peeled himself away from the wall, and linked his arm through Nicholas's.  Together they walked to the windows overlooking the courtyard.

"So … many," Sebastian said.

Nicholas nodded.  So many birds.  The glass felt like thin protection, and the height felt like no protection at all.

Birds.

They could be at his level in a heartbeat, and their Fey riders could shatter the glass in no time.

Then Sebastian squeezed his arm.  Two guards emerged in the courtyard below.  They wore no hats, and their hair shone like spun gold in the sun.  They walked with their backs straight and their shoulders squared, and never once did they look at the birds around them.

Only at the birds on the gate.

Nicholas looked at those as well.  Hawks, ravens, eagles, along with smaller birds, robins, wren, and sparrow.  There were several birds he didn't recognize in the mix, birds larger than ten-year-old children, with brightly colored plumage and beaks that were as long as his hand and as thick as his arm.

He held his breath.  Sebastian's grip grew tighter.

The men walked side by side.  Wings rose and then settled again.  Feathers ruffled as if a wind blew through them.  But leaves didn't move. There was no wind.  The guards made the birds uneasy.

Tiny bubbles were imbedded in the glass, making his view imperfect.  He leaned as close as he could get, his fists resting on the sill beneath his waist. 

The guards had crossed the courtyard.  They had nearly reached the first layer of birds.

Then, as if by an unseen command, a flock of birds rose from the right side, and attacked the guard nearest them.  They covered him, pecking and cawing, and ripping at his skin with their talons.  His blood flew everywhere.

Sebastian moaned and turned away.

Nicholas couldn't.

Another flock, almost at the same time, surrounded the second guard, but did not touch him.  Blood spattered him, but he stared straight ahead as if it did not matter to him.

Maybe Nicholas had been wrong.  Maybe the training he had ordered had worked for some of the guards.

The attack was oddly silent.  The guard did not scream, and the birds didn't make a sound.  The guard raised a bird-covered hand.  Bits of skin flew in all directions.  A dove rose from the melee below and flew to Nicholas's window, the Fey on its back holding something the size of an egg.

It was an eyeball.

As the Fey passed Nicholas, it held up the eye and grinned.  The eye was nearly as big as the Fey was. 

The Fey was female.  Blood covered her bare breasts.  Nicholas had to force himself to keep watching, force himself to keep his expression impassive.

When she got no reaction from him, she tossed the eyeball at the window with such force that the eyeball spattered when it hit.

In spite of himself, Nicholas took a step backwards.

Sebastian cringed at the sound, covering his face with his hands.

The Fey woman laughed.

The dove dipped below the window, flying out of his sight.

He stepped to another window and looked down.

The left guard was still surrounded by birds.  His companion was sprawled on the courtyard, clearly dead.  His face was pecked raw, a bloody mass of tissue and bones, not recognizable as human any more.  His uniform hung in tatters around him, and the center of his body, from his intestines to his heart, was gone.

Nicholas swallowed.  He had seen worse, but only once.

When Jewel died.

And that was worse only because he loved her.

The birds were all staring up at him.  So were the Fey on their backs.  The second flock herded the second guard back to the palace's door, then sat outside until he went in.

The message was clear.

Too clear.

The birds would only attack anyone trying to leave the palace.  They were all to remain inside, for reasons that Nicholas didn't know yet. 

He wasn't going to wait to find out.

Sebastian raised his head.  He stared at the blood streaking the window.  "Oh … Pa-pa … " he said, and shuddered.

Nicholas touched the stained glass.  It was cool, smooth, and dry against his fingertips.  The blood didn't touch him yet.

But it would.

It would.

"This is only the beginning, Sebastian," Nicholas said, and wished it weren't true.

FIFTY-EIGHT

Flurry had forgotten how tiring war could be. 

He had been flying consistently since he had given Rugad's message to the palace.  After he had reported to Rugad, he had been allowed one half day's rest before flying back north.

And now they were sending him south again.

Only this time he knew where to go.  Rugad believed one of his great-grandsons was on farmland.  Flurry had flown over more farmland than he cared to think about.  All of it was in the center of Blue Isle, and it stretched forever.

But he had an advantage over the other Wisps who were searching.  He had actually seen the great-grandson, and had known which road the boy was on.  The farm couldn't have been too far off the main road, not with the time involved.

Flurry swooped low.  He had flown quickly since he received the instructions, going around Jahn, over the river, and cutting across the nobles' lands on the south side of the Cardidas.  Then he reached farm country quicker than the others.

His companion, Cinder, was having trouble keeping up with him.  She had only flown across Blue Isle as part of a Wisp unit, going from south to north.  She hadn't flown freely like he had.

They were of an age, but Flurry had risen in the Fey ranks until he worked as messenger for Rugad on occasion.  Cinder only took low ranking assignments, and had tried, so she told him, to get out of the trip to Blue Isle altogether.  She preferred Nye.  But Rugad had needed all the Wisps, all the Beast Riders, and all the Doppelgängers he had.  He hadn't let any stay behind. 

Rugad was leaving nothing to chance on this trip.  It was almost as if he were afraid of Blue Isle, but unwilling to admit it.

The road finally appeared, wide and brown, like a river frozen below him.  Flurry swerved until he was over it, then he glanced over his tiny shoulder and looked for Cinder.  She was far enough behind him that he had to stare before he saw her, a black dot against the blueness of the sky.  She was having trouble keeping up, as he expected her to.  He bit back irritation.  Epo, the Wisp leader, had insisted that they fly in pairs.  That way, if the great-grandson were spotted, one member of the pair would stay with the boy, and the other would report back as quickly as possible.  Epo had also paired the Wisps strong to weak, which annoyed Flurry.  He would have to stay with the great-grandson, and hope that Cinder would make it back to Rugad in record speed.

She wouldn't, of course, but there wasn't much Flurry could do about that.

Farms started dotting the sides of the road, like black spots on the face of a quilt.  Flurry swooped lower, then cursed under his breath. 

It was midday.  Islanders were out, working the land.  On every farm, he saw three, four, sometimes five Islanders bent over the crops, occasionally using a horse to pull equipment or carrying buckets from their water pumps toward the fields.

If the great-grandson made a Shadowlands, the Circle Door would be difficult to see in this light.  Just as Flurry was difficult to see. 

This would take longer than he thought.

He hovered, waiting for Cinder.  She arrived beside him, her wings fluttering like a hummingbird's, sweat beading her face.  She was breathing hard.

"Was it necessary to go that fast?" she asked.

"It'll be necessary to go even faster when we find him," Flurry said.

"We won't find him, not in all of this."  She swept a tiny arm across the panorama before her.  Fields everywhere, farmers, Islanders.  She was right.  It would be a lot of work.

"We will," Flurry said.  Her negative response angered him.  It was as if she hated working for her Black King, as if she hated her life.  He didn't.  He was proud to be on the Black King's team and at his side.  "He's part Fey.  I've seen him.  He's tall and darker than the others.  He looks Fey.  He should stand out."

Cinder grunted.  She looked down.  The farms stretched before them as far as the eye could see.  "We don't even know he's still here," she said.  "If the Black King were coming after me, I would move as quickly as I could."

"How would he know  — ?" Flurry stopped himself.  The great-grandson was a Visionary too.  He might know.  He might know a lot.

The other Wisps would be looking on farms, for the very signs that Flurry was talking about.

"How would he know what?" Cinder asked.

Flurry held up his hand.  Hovering was making him thirsty.  He wanted to land and have something to drink, but he wasn't ready yet.  He needed to think.