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Sionnach’s eyes roll back in his head, and for a moment I think he’s going to pass out. I pull his face to mine so he can hear me over the rumble of the crowd. “Look at me.”
The panic in his voice lights a fire of the same flavor in my gut. “I can’t hear Pwyll.”
I tug on his sleeve. “Let’s head for the trees and call him from there.”
Sion nods, a furious haze of ringlets frame his face. We slam our way between lights, priests, protestors, and dumbstruck participants in this media circus to run for a cluster of trees at the side of the castle. After squeezing through the place where a waterfall of broken stone pieces offers an opening in the wall, we make our way to the spot near the edge of the cliff where we rendezvoused with Pwyll five hundred years in the past. Sion cuts a path in the wet ground, pacing back and forth. Fragments of the otherworldly language he and Pwyll spoke hang unanswered in the air.
I get out of his way and lean against the ropy trunk of a tree. Lights from the front of the castle bounce off the clouds to wake the fox red of Sionnach’s hair. He’s a walking torch, threatening to ignite every branch and leaf he passes.
I tuck my hands inside my sleeves and grip the fabric. I’m not certain the Catholic prayers I grew up on hold any weight with druid spirits, but I give it a shot. If it’s true—if Pwyll has been exorcised—does that mean he was a demon? Druids do have the rep of human sacrifices on their scorecard. I push the thought away. A demon would never lead us to Matthew Kennedy to send his mother’s soul to heaven. Pwyll is one of many threads weaving between now, then, the Veil, and who knows how many dimensions not comprehensible to my limited human mind.
Sion drops his hands to his knees. His body shakes, and I hear the quiet sound of weeping. I rush to his side, throwing an arm around his shoulders.
“I can’t hear him. I don’t see him. There’s a terrible chasm opened around the castle, and he’s fallen into it.” He buries his head against my shoulder. “He’s gone, Eala. Gone.”
Feeling helpless, I stroke his hair. “He might be hiding.” Voices rise in a hymn of salvation. “I’d run from this crazy bunch too.”
“I’ve been in the thick of mess and danger too often to miss the stink of it.” Sionnach drops to hands and knees, crawling around the base of an oak while he pats the ground. A choked sob bursts through his bared teeth as he holds a splintered section of board.
A shattered coffin lies in the grass. The last identifiable piece left intact is its pointed gothic top. My body collapses against the tree. “Oh, Pwyll.”
Sionnach’s skin turns dark chocolate in the shadows. Crouching like a feral cat, his head whips side-to-side in search of prey. Spittle flies as a snarl rips from his mouth. “Something foul ripped Pwyll out of existence.” He surges to his feet with one hand reared back, fingers folded into a fist. For an ugly moment, his stance suggests the blow is intended for me. Before I can force my legs to move, Sion’s knuckles collide against the woody trunk with a loud crack.
At impact, shards of bark as sharp as knife points fly at me. I cry out as one digs into the side of my neck before it falls to the ground. Blood covers the fingers I press to the sting. Sion doesn’t react to my distress. He’s oblivious to anything but fury. His shoulder smacks hard against mine as he muscles past, hunting for an invisible foe. I use the tree to keep from being knocked down by his rampage.
Just beneath my hand, fluid spurts from the wood where Sion struck the blow. It drips down the trunk, disappearing and reappearing through crags in the bark as a metallic tang fills the air. The moon clears the tower of Leap Castle, revealing a crimson line of liquid as viscous as blood. What the fuck is this? A tree spouting blood screams of darker forces Sionnach’s kept from me.
He is in no state for me to ask. The fox circles in front of me. Half his speech is in a language I can’t follow. The other half is pure rage. “A thing vile and evil. That fiend in the Veil.” He shakes a bloody fist at the sky. “Damn you to hell.”
I back away from the bleeding tree and the ferocity burning in his eyes. My Sionnach is gone. This being before me has transformed into a primal entity. He’s energy condensed to the killing point of a sword. Prism glass walls of the Veil blink into existence around him. “I’ll chase the bastard down.”
I’ve given my all to be brave, to serve something greater than myself, and possibly even started to fall in love, but this tree-punching version of crazed Sionnach rips jagged gashes in my thin layer of confidence. How can I follow violence personified, this conflagration of wrath unleashed, into a Veil consumed by fire with a creature lurking inside that might be responsible for wiping an ancient druid spirit from the world? Sion knows this shocking, dangerous facet of himself exists and has hidden it from me until now. No wonder he detests my endless questions that may lead to revelations of his murkier truths. I’m barreling full speed to the place where every risk I’ve ever taken ends up—in fear and the feeling the world waits to swallow me.
The raw truth of the man before me, a being not quite human, obviously capable of violent rage, burns my heart to ash. I can’t find the Sionnach I just made love with inside this raving creature. He’s the biggest risk I’ve ever taken. From him, I’ll fall the farthest and land in a bloody heap.
Unless I run.
I tear past trees, through the opening in the wall, and back to the chaos brewing at the doors of Leap Castle. The crowd buffets and shoves me behind the row of reporters with their lights blazing. Through the tangle of bodies, my eyes catch the movement of a shadow seeping upward along the castle wall. It spreads, tendrils stretch like limbs of an ancient tree as the figure grows toward the moon. Outlines sharpen and the wavering essence takes human form.
I stare into the collection of holy men, trying to define the image as a macabre distortion of one of the priests created by the lights of the news teams.
I can’t.
The tangle of vestments on the ground blend into a multicolored tapestry as the fathers collect into a singular body with no one form distinguishable from the others blocking the light. The source of the shadow remains elusive as its darkness flows higher and higher, overtaking one Gothic window and the next until it swallows both front towers and the row of crenellations joining them.
The shadow splits to become two men. One dark angel cradles the wilted form of a second in his arms. A jolt in my gut tells me I’m watching a death. I frantically check the people around me, but no one else watches the shadow play.
The horrifying spectacle expands past two dimensions into a disturbingly lifelike three. The fallen man disappears as the inky arm of the other reaches through the night. Its outstretched finger draws closer and closer to where I stand. This time, I’m the target of the unnamed assailant. I pivot, exploding through the crowd before the malevolent touch finds me the way it did Sionnach outside the Veil forest.
My scream garners no attention. It’s just one more voice crying to the night in thanks or recrimination for Pwyll’s demise.
Elbowing aside anyone in my way, I head toward the outermost layer of the crowd, praying Sion left the keys in the car. Once I reach the lane between castle and gate lodge, I break into a sprint. A figure jumps out to block my path, and I plow straight into the rock-solid chest I left ranting like a madman in the forest. Sionnach locks his arms around me.
I thrash and try to escape. “Let go of me. I’ll scream for the Garda.”
“Whisht. Whisht.” Despite my slapping and twisting, he manages to maneuver us to the car, yammering in my ear the whole time. “I’m sorry, Eala, love. I lost my wits back there.”
I’ll never fight my way out of his grasp. He’s too strong. Too fast. I go boneless in his arms, and he nearly drops me.
