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Morgana’s gasp seemed far away as Malcolm lunged for the portal, calling out to the man on the ground.
Sean’s dark head lifted, sightless amethyst eyes searching blindly for his voice.
“Malcolm?” he choked as desperate tears streaked the grime on his face. Struggling to his feet, he put out his arms as if to reach for him, though it was obvious that he couldn’t see in the pitch-black prison. “Malcolm, are you here? I can hear you.”
Badb clenched her fist and the portal disappeared.
“He’ll think you came for him,” Nemain giggled. “How cruel.”
Morgana lifted both of her hands, making an intricate sign with her fingers and commanded a pillar of water to rise from the loch and douse the small fire witch. “Silence, you vicious harpy, or I’ll forget that I’ve taken a vow never to take a life.”
“Let him go,” Malcolm commanded, the ground beneath them trembling with the force of his rage.
“You know my price,” Badb countered. “Cast with us, and open the First Seal. Help me unleash the Horsemen into this world and wipe out all the useless tribes of people who will only become like a scourge to this earth whom you love so much.”
“We are not a scourge of this earth, we are her children, and I am her protector.” They knew this, but Malcolm wanted them to remember that he had the power of the Goddess behind him.
Badb slammed the book shut, pulling it close into her robes. “Nemain has seen the future of this world. If we don’t end it now, people will multiply until they spread over every continent and every land. They will build machines that belch poison into the sky and taint the rivers with their rubbish. They’ll use everything the earth and the seas have to give and still demand more. You are not saving this world for anyone who matters. You can prevent all that. Join me now.”
“Don’t you dare!” Kenna threatened as she, Bael, and Niall drew up behind them leading none other than the Four Horsemen in their wake like giant, mounted sentinels.
They looked both mortal and inhuman, mounted on horses unlike any Malcolm had seen on this earth, their colors as vivid as the book prophesied, and their potency just as terrifying.
“I’ll not believe your lies.” Malcolm addressed the Crone. “Now hand over the book or I’ll crush you to claim it.”
“I’m not lying!” she screeched. “Ask her!”
Kenna jumped as Badb thrust a finger in her direction.
“Ask your seer if what I say is not the truth.”
Malcolm turned to Kenna, whose eyes were filled with pain. “She’s not lying… I’ve seen this in the flames, as well.”
The image of Sean’s despair flashed in his mind’s eye. Could he carve out a life for them in this new world of darkness and subjugation Badb wanted to cultivate? Would it be any worse than the picture she’d just painted of earth’s own future?
“You would be dooming poor Sean forever, and for what?” Badb pressed. “For a species bent on destroying themselves. They can’t escape the inevitable, King Malcolm. Someday, somehow, the prophecy must be fulfilled. Why not now, when we can seize the outcome and turn it to our favor?”
Shame burned beneath the temptation, and Malcolm turned to glare up at the Horsemen, searching for answers in their inscrutable eyes. “You want this?” he asked them. “You want me to cast with them? To unleash you to wreak the bloody swath of your destiny on this earth?”
The pale horse stepped away from the line, and Death turned his dark head to survey the gathering Druids and Berserkers, poised on the brink of the End, ready to fight the final battle and finally put to rest the argument of destiny versus free will.
His voice evoked brimstone as he spoke. “If the Apocalypse begins this day, we will fulfill our final duties. And then, what is left for immortals such as us? What purpose will we have but to become agents of chaos and devastation? We will be what we are meant to be, and whatever is left after the End will be an unyielding temptation for the four of us… Think on that, Druid King, before you make your decision.”
Death’s answer chilled Malcolm to the very core of his essence. Badb’s paradise could easily be turned into an unimaginable hell were these Horsemen to challenge her, or each other, for it.
Malcolm reeled as he cast his gaze about, to his family, to his enemies, to the smoke covering the sky, and to the faces of his people, who poked out from behind the village walls, awaiting his word to seal their fates.
A gentle hand touched his arm, and he looked down at Kenna as though she might be a stranger, willing his pounding heart to slow. “Dear Malcolm,” she said quietly, her voice a warm flicker like a candle in the gathering darkness. “I have seen the shadows and suffering in the days to come, as the Wyrd Sisters predicted, but there is a reason I have not succumbed to despair, as you are about to do.”
Despair didn’t seem like a strong enough word for the bleak void inside of him.
“I’ve seen other things, as well,” Kenna continued. “Sparks of transcendence from within the devastation. Marvels of ingenuity. I’ve heard poetry that would make your heart sing, and music that would cause the wounded to dance. There are those whose love will inspire entire generations toward change and hope. There is a limitless potential within us all, and how can we, in this very moment, take that potential away from those who would realize it?”
“Don’t be a fool!” Badb scoffed, the wind blustering through the gathering with an angry hiss. “Humanity will always be ruled by fear like the sheep they are. They will be controlled with rhetoric and lies, and ultimately, their stupidity will be their downfall. Why prolong the inevitable?”
“The future is never certain,” Kenna insisted. “But we owe the world a chance for redemption.”
Malcolm stared down at his cousin with new eyes. She was right, damn her. He was wrong to be tempted by a future at the cost of humanity. How could he have even contemplated it?
