NICOLE HAD TO STRAIN TO HEAR THE DRUID’SNEXT WORDSover the ringing in her ears.
‘I don’t know how many of the Fomóiri rule the Wake,’ the Druid continued. ‘I know of one that runs it, and then there’s a woman, some kind of right-hand.’
Terror seeped into Nicole’s stomach. It was one thing believing gods hadoncewalked the earth.
But that they still did, and ran the Wake?
Gods weren’t something they could defeat. Gods were beyond the scope of the supernatural and into the divine.
She looked to Kyan for confirmation, but his eyes were still on the Druid, his jaw hard as stone, brow carved into a scowl of concentration.
‘What did you think? That the world was just Seers and Empyreals and creatures?’ The Druid stared out at the landscape for a moment before softly saying, ‘If only.’
‘How do you know this?’ Kyan asked.
Her eyes – green as the forest – slid to Nicole. They were greener than Kyan’s, but matched the immortal loneliness in his; the sense of duty that kept them going through the ages. A twist of grief that they hadn’t been able to support one another like she could with Dylan and Bells made it through Nicole’s ringing mind. Had this girl been alone, all this time?
‘Not only have I lived long enough to know, but your mother has done a lot of … reconnaissance.’
Nicole recalled the vision the portrait had shown her: her mother, Elisabetta, and the whisper of another person there in white and emerald. ‘You’re the Druid who was there when her portrait was painted?’
An echo of softness bled into the girl’s eyes. ‘Yes. There are a fair few immortals that knew her. But she said that one of the most auspicious times to rise against the Wake was once you and Kyan had met each other.’
‘S-she knew Kyan and I would meet?’
The Druid’s head dipped in confirmation.
‘How? A Seer told her?’
A flicker of confusion sharpened the girl’s gaze. ‘Your motherwasa Seer as well as an Empyreal. She knew a great deal of information, but her visions were threatening her sanity towards the end.’
‘No, my father is the Seer.’
The Druid’s eyes didn’t leave Nicole’s. ‘Is he.’
It wasn’t a question. It wasn’t a suggestion.
A peal of unease echoed through her. How did she know all of this? Kyan stroked his fingers across Nicole’s lower back.I’m here, that touch said.We can tackle these revelations together.
‘The Wake told me you’ve been killing people,’ Kyan said.
‘I have indeed killed and I’ll kill again. But it’s most likely not the deaths they’re trying to pin on me. Once, my role was to contact the gods and distil their wisdom to guide royals and heroes. Whatever I do, I do it to get information, protect people, or keep my existence a secret.’
‘What do the Wake want with the Wild Hunt?’ Nicole found herself asking. ‘If they’re gods, what do they want?’
‘To keep control. If your Siren friend succeeds in reharmonising the spheres, and you find the messages your mother has left, or manage to break the Wake’s control and allow the Old Gods back—’
‘Woah, wait, who said anything aboutallowinggodsback?’ Nicole asked. She had to quell the urge to pace. ‘You mean they’re … What? Trapped away from here? On those—’ She recalled what the Muse had told her. ‘Those islands in the Otherworld they came from?’
‘In a manner of speaking, yes.’
A realisation whispered through her mind. ‘The blood in my mother’s painting, where did it come from? Whoseis it?’
The Druid’s lips pulled up slightly. ‘It’s the blood of a goddess.’
The words rang through the forest, as if merely uttering the truth sent a tremor through this sacred slip of the world.
It made a divine, awful sense. This was why Verin hadn’t been able to identify it, despite having a library with the blood of every creature …
