The Veil (Fianna Trilogy Book 3) Read online

  They scattered like cockroaches, leaving their dead and bloodied behind, flinging themselves over the edges of the pier. Sarnat straightened, wiping the knife on her skirt and slipping it away. “Well, you’re a mess.”

  I looked down at myself. Felt the sticky, cooling blood on my face and my throat, dripping from my hair.

  “Don’t tell me you’re going to swoon,” Sarnat said. “You can’t be so useless as that.”

  “No, I—”

  “Let’s go, then. Before some others decide to come at us.”

  My feet were wooden, my legs not quite working. She grabbed my arm, and I felt my power responding to the pull of her magic. I jerked away. “Don’t touch me.”

  “Listen, veleda, we can’t tarry. Look about you.”

  People had gathered to watch. I remembered where we were, what I was supposed to do. The rivers guard treasures with no worth.

  “Where is he?” Sarnat hissed. “I can’t feel an archdruid. There’s no Druid here but you.” Spoken with contempt, which I supposed I deserved.

  I closed my eyes, using my power to listen to the music of rats gnawing and squeaking, the horrified whispering of the river boys dragging the fallen bodies of their friends from the dock, creaking and water splashing, and stones rolling beneath feet on the riverbank. Arguments and someone laughing, a shot glass slamming on a table, doors opening and closing, and children murmuring as they huddled sleepily in doorways and alcoves.

  “Hurry,” Sarnat urged.

  And then . . . the tinkling of bells, not just one, but many. And beneath those, the archdruid’s song—otherworldly and at the same time earthbound, a melody both sad and joyous—the same I’d heard as I listened for him from Governors Island. A dog howling. The clack of . . . of hooves on a wooden floor, and through it all, the song winding, the direction—

  I opened my eyes. “This way.” I dodged a drunk lurching from the saloon. I hardly saw the shadows or the horses or the people we passed; I was dimly aware of Sarnat behind me. I followed the song, which grew louder with every step.

  The street was narrow and pitted, broken pipes bubbling sewage into gutters already running thick and slimy with horse piss and emptied chamber pots. The stench was terrible. We stumbled over piles of garbage. Drunks and the homeless curled in the corners. Down one block, turning onto another.

  Here.

  I stopped short. Sarnat barreled into me. The moonlight illuminated a dark window painted with “Roddy’s Grotto, Sell or Trade.”

  “This is it?” Sarnat asked dubiously.

  The door was locked. I rattled it hard, knocking.

  “No one’ll be answering at this time of night,” Sarnat said. “Why don’t you just summon him with your veleda power?”

  I just looked at her.

  “You can’t do that either? What can you do?”

  “I can find the archdruid,” I said, rattling the handle again, trying to peer through the glass into the darkness inside.

  Sarnat said, “Are you sure of that? I hate to tell you this, but I don’t feel him. There’s no power here, not like yours—”

  “Hold on! Hold on, I’m coming!” The voice came from inside, muffled and weary.

  The music in my head grew louder. The archdruid at last. The man who could help me. I saw a flash of pale in the darkness beyond the glass, and then the door opened to reveal a man wearing a nightshirt. His white hair was rumpled in all directions, his nose large and hooked.

  He looked at me, at the blood, and then at Sarnat, and then he stepped back, his small eyes bright with fear. “No. You must go. Please. I don’t know why you’ve come, but you must go.”

  I pressed my hand on the door to keep him from closing it. “I know who you are. I know you’re the archdruid. I’m the veleda, and I’ve come all this way—”

  The old man grabbed my arm. The music crescendoed in my head and then stopped abruptly and completely, and I stared at him in consternation as he said, “Quiet! Quiet, do you hear me? Say nothing more! Go away. ’Tis dangerous for you here. You must go.”

  I recognized the way this man looked. I recognized his words and his fear. He was like the Druid that Diarmid and I had met on Coney Island. I saw the madness in his eyes.

  No. Please, no.

  Sarnat said, “My people have been here.”

  His eyes flicked to hers, and I knew.

  The sidhe had already got to him. He was the archdruid, but his power was gone.

  They had sucked him dry.

  That same night

  Diarmid

  Oscar groaned as Conan laid a slab of raw meat on his swollen, black eye. His white-blond curls were matted with blood, his face lumpy and bruised, a seeping cut on his cheekbone. “By the gods, be gentle! Where’s the light touch of a maid when I need it?”

  Conan grunted. “Stop your whining, or I’ll take the meat back. I’d rather cook it for dinner than waste it on your sorry self.”

  The others laughed, but Diarmid could barely smile. He leaned against the wall, arms crossed, watching. He’d returned to the squalid basement flat to find Oscar safe and in better condition than he’d expected. He guessed they had Patrick Devlin to thank for keeping the Fomori from doing worse.

  Diarmid had never expected to thank Patrick for anything, and now he had two things for which he had to be grateful to Grace’s fiancé. Because Patrick had saved his life tonight as well. During their rescue of Oscar from the Tombs, the city’s House of Detention, Diarmid had been trapped. It was Patrick—his supposed enemy—who had helped him to escape.

  Why?

  The question troubled him, as did the words Patrick had whispered in his ear.

  “Keep her away.”

  He’d meant Grace, of course, but it made no sense. Patrick had done everything he could to get Grace back. He’d put up “Wanted” posters and offered rewards. He’d announced his engagement to Grace and taken her mother and grandmother into his house. He had Fomori on the police force and in city government searching for her. After all, the Fomori needed the veleda as much as the Fianna did.

  So why now had he told Diarmid to keep her away?

  “Ouch!” Oscar said, pushing at Conan. “Stop! Get out with that stinking fleece.”

  Conan tugged at the filthy sheepskin he never took off, no matter how hot it was. “Tend to yourself then, addle-cove.”

  Oscar’s father, Ossian, laughed and shook back his curls—the same color as his son’s. His relief over Oscar’s rescue made him look younger and more like Oscar than ever. “He’s always been a bad-tempered patient.”

  Oscar settled himself more firmly on the rickety crate that served as a chair. He put his hand to the beef to keep it in place and cracked open his other eye. “Where’s Derry? I haven’t heard his voice in a while.”

  “Right here,” Diarmid said.

  “I heard Balor went after you.”

  Diarmid winced at the memory of the chase, the poison-eyed god gaining with every step. “Nearly got me, too, but for some gang boys that came between us.”

  Oscar tilted his head back. “You shouldn’t have come, Derry. ’Twas too big a risk.”

  “He knows that. He’s going back in the morning.” The command rang in Finn’s voice. An oil lamp dangled from a hook above his head, and although it didn’t do much to illuminate the basement—which was dank, with seeping brick walls and a dirt floor—it lit Finn’s golden-red hair with a fiery glow, haloing him so he looked like a god. Diarmid wondered if Finn had chosen that spot on purpose, just for the effect. Probably. Finn knew how to impress. It was one of the reasons he was their leader.

  “So the veleda’s safe?” Oscar asked.

  “Safe and bound,” Finn said with satisfaction.

  Oscar cracked his eye open again, looking at Diarmid. “You used the ball seirce?”

  “Aye.” Diarmid’s hand went involuntarily to the mark on his forehead, the gift from a fairy that made any lass who gazed upon it fall in love with him. He’d hated i
t for years, kept it hidden behind a shock of dark hair, rarely used it. He glanced at Aidan, Grace’s brother, who favored him with a hostile stare, and Diarmid felt guilty and ashamed. Finn had ordered him to use the lovespot on Grace, but Diarmid had been unable to do so. He had hoped Grace would want him for himself. He hungered for her love, but he’d wanted it to be real.

  And then she’d seen the lovespot. It had been an accident; he’d been caught off guard. He hated himself for what had happened after, how he hadn’t been able to resist her, even knowing her feelings for him were a lie. He’d felt bewitched, fated to love her. And it turned out he was—her power was released when they lay together. One good thing to come of it, he supposed; but still, he wished . . .

  What was the point of wishing? The geis was still in place. “’Tis by your hand the veleda must die.” That was the law laid upon him by his old teacher, Manannan, the god of the sea, a spell that bound him. If Diarmid didn’t kill the veleda, he and the others would fail and die. He had Grace hidden on Governors Island so he could help in Oscar’s rescue, but now that Diarmid was here, he wished he was with Grace, helping her search for the archdruid they both hoped could change fate—hers and his.

  Oscar said, “Patrick Devlin told me to keep Grace out of the city.”

  Diarmid straightened. “He said that? When?”

  “During their ‘questioning,’” Oscar explained. “None of the others heard it. ’Twas a surprise. I thought he was in league with the Fomori.”

  “He said the same to me,” Diarmid said. “In the Bummers’ Cell, when I was trying to escape. I would have thought it the last thing he wanted.”

  “He said exactly that? Keep her away? You’re certain?” Aidan asked sharply.

  A little too sharply, Diarmid thought.

  Finn’s eyes gleamed. “Do you know something of this, stormcaster?”

  “How would I? I find it as strange as you do. Patrick loves her, and he knows about the geis. I can’t think he’d want her anywhere near Diarmid. Especially because of the lovespot.”

  That guilt again.

  “’Tis curious,” Finn said. “But for now, let’s take Devlin at his word. Diarmid, you’ll keep her on Governors Island until I say otherwise.”

  Diarmid couldn’t hide his dismay. “At least let me take her to Brooklyn. How can I find an archdruid from Governors Island?”

  “You were nearly captured in Brooklyn,” Finn said. “‘Wanted’ posters are everywhere. Keep her where she is, and let us worry about finding the archdruid.”

  “Are you even looking for him?” Diarmid asked.

  Ossian’s green eyes narrowed. “Do you doubt us?”

  “No,” Diarmid said. “No. But . . . I think the Fomori have us running so there’s no time to think. We can’t forget that we need the archdruid. Grace doesn’t know the incantation.”

  “None of us have forgotten that,” Finn said. “Leave the search to us. You’ll go back at dawn.”

  The discussion was over. Finn went to talk to Cannel, their Druid Seer, who was alternately laying out tarot cards and running his hands nervously through his reddish hair, pulling it into little spikes. Dark-headed Keenan watched him carefully. Goll sat on a pallet of rags beside them, jerking his newsboy’s cap to cover his eyes as he shifted his bony limbs to find a comfortable position.

  Diarmid thought of Grace on Governors Island, no doubt asleep by now, perhaps dreaming of him. It only raised a desire he had no right to feel. He forced it away and went to Oscar.

  “I feel like I’ve been trampled by horses,” Oscar grumbled. “How do I look?”

  “I wouldn’t be asking a lass for a kiss anytime soon.”

  “That bad?”

  “That meat on your eye looks better.”

  Oscar cursed and motioned for Diarmid to come closer, saying quietly, “You did use the lovespot?”

  “I told you I would.”

  “Aye, but . . . you’re still in love with her?”

  “Did you expect it to go away?”

  “It usually does—sooner or later.”

  Which had been true in the past, Diarmid had to admit. But this was . . . different. He’d never felt anything like he felt for Grace. “’Tisn’t the same.”

  Oscar sighed. “There’s still the geis, Derry, don’t forget.”

  “Believe me, I haven’t.”

  “You haven’t told Finn why you really want to find this archdruid, have you? You haven’t told him you’re hoping there’s a spell to save her.”

  “He’d only doubt me,” Diarmid said. “And I’ve got enough of that from you.”

  “I don’t doubt you—”

  “Aye, you do. But I understand. Just . . . I’ve got to go back, but I’m not likely to find any archdruid there. If you discover where he is first . . .”

  “I’ll ask him if he knows of such a spell,” Oscar agreed, but it was clear what he thought the answer would be.

  Diarmid didn’t press it, not wanting to make Oscar’s doubts worse, nor reveal his own. “I’m glad you’re back. But you should lie down, brother. You look a little green.”

  “I’d welcome a bed,” Oscar said. Diarmid helped him to his feet, leading him over to one of the two stinking, thin, and stained mattresses against the wall. The other beds were only pallets of straw or heaps of blankets.

  After that, Diarmid felt restless and uneasy. Ossian and Finn and Cannel were debating some plan or another. Conan and Keenan played cards as they drank the last of a keg of ale. Goll was finally still and sleeping. Only Aidan was separate, as he usually was, staring into space as if there was something to see beyond crumbling brick and mortar or the shallow puddle of water in a corner.

  Then Aidan rose and went up the stairs.

  Finn said over his shoulder, “Go after him, Diarmid.”

  Diarmid was annoyed, but did as he was told, following Aidan into the kitchen above, which was packed with people, all of them asleep, and then out the open back door. At the edge of the cesspool, Aidan stopped.

  Diarmid hung back. He had no wish to talk to Aidan, who was obviously angry about what had happened between his sister and Diarmid. But Finn had given the order, and Diarmid was already on shaky ground with his captain, and so reluctantly, he went over.

  Aidan didn’t even turn as Diarmid approached and said, “Finn sent me after you.”

  “He’s worried I might run off to a saloon.”

  “Is that where you were headed?”

  “No. I think I’m done with that. To be honest, I’d like to, but there’s too much else to think about. Being addled doesn’t help.” He flung a thread of purple lightning into the cesspool, where it reflected crazily before it sizzled and turned to smoke.

  Diarmid glanced over his shoulder at the people sleeping on the roof. “You don’t want to be showing that off too often.”

  “I know.” Aidan curled his finger back into his palm. “If I asked you to tell me the truth about something, would you?”

  The words echoed; Grace had said nearly the same thing to Diarmid only a few days ago, when she’d asked him what it felt like to die. “About what?”

  “About your intentions toward my sister.”

  Diarmid stiffened.

  “Don’t misunderstand me. I don’t like what you did, but I know her power required the two of you to—” Aidan swallowed, obviously uncomfortable. “You even probably felt . . . I don’t know . . . compelled . . . yourself.”

  It was exactly how he’d felt. Compelled, out of his head in love, helpless. “How do you know this?”

  Aidan stared off. “It’s hard to explain. Mostly I feel connected to Grace and . . . and to you too. Which is strange, because I don’t like you.”

  Diarmid was startled, though not surprised. He’d never liked Aidan much either. Whatever powers Grace’s brother had now, in the past he’d been a wastrel and a drunk. He’d caused Grace endless worry. He’d destroyed his own family.

  Aidan’s smile was grim. “Grace was a
n innocent. She’d had a few kisses, I think, but that was all. And now you’ve ruined her. What do you intend to do about it?”

  Diarmid was taken aback. “D’you mean—Are you asking if I’ll marry her?”

  Aidan laughed. “Marry her? Do you take me for a fool?”

  “It seems to be what everyone in this world expects—”

  “But she’s not just an ordinary girl, is she? She’s the veleda, and there’s the ritual. The geis. Things like marriage . . . how can they matter?”

  Exactly what Diarmid thought too. “Then I don’t understand what you want of me.”

  “I want to know what you feel for her, you idiot. Do you care for her at all? Or is it only that you’re following Finn’s orders? I know you used the lovespot—”

  “That was an accident. I didn’t mean for her to see it.”

  “Just like the story, was it? Of you and the first Grainne. It was an accident then too?”

  Uncertainly, Diarmid admitted, “Aye. That was an accident too.”

  “But you ran off with Grainne. The legend says you loved her.”

  “’Twas . . . more complicated than that.”

  “Was it?” Aidan’s gaze was searching. “Is it complicated with my sister too? I thought the question simple enough. What do you feel for her?”

  Diarmid hesitated. But there was no point in hiding it from Aidan, who probably sensed it anyway. “I love her.”

  “Enough to save her life?”

  “If I could change everything, I would. I’d thought—I’d hoped—the archdruid might have some answers. Another spell, something . . .”

  “So it’s not just the incantation you care about?”

  “No. Oscar knows that, but not Finn or the others. If there’s a way to avoid her death, they’ll take it. No one likes blood sacrifice. But . . . this kind of magic . . .” He let the words trail off, unable to say what was probably true. That there were no other spells, that the sacrifice was necessary.