Mage of Clouds (The Cloudmages #2) (53 page)

“Dhegli!” Splashing, she nearly leaped toward him, her still-knitting ribs pulling so that she winced at the same time she laughed.

Laughing with her, he swept her up in his arms, twirling her around once and kissing her. She returned the kiss fiercely, hugging him to her without caring about the cold water that soaked the front of her léine and dripped from the hem of her clóca. “By the Mother, I thought I might never see you again,” she said when they finally broke apart, gasping for breath. She kissed him again, laughing and crying all at once, pulling his head to hers. “I’ve missed you so much. Did you know that Owaine managed to find me after you brought him over here . . . ?”

She glanced over her shoulder, gesturing to where Owaine had been sitting, but her voice trailed off as she realized that no one was there. “Owaine?” she called. She let go of Dhegli to turn. She saw Owaine then, walking quickly away from the lough, already over the second stone wall of the High Road and nearly to the trees. She started to call to him, but Dhegli touched her shoulder.

“It hurts him to see us together,” he said, her ears hearing the sounds of the Saimhóir language while his words echoed in her head. “He’s in love with you, too.”

“I know, but . . .” She turned back to Dhegli, touching his face with her hands, enjoying the feel of his wet skin.

“Do you like Owaine?” Dhegli asked.

“Owaine? Aye, but not . . .” She stopped, puzzled, wondering why Dhegli was saying these things. “I love
you,
Dhegli.”

“And I, you,” Dhegli answered with a laugh that pulled at the corners of her mouth. “But it’s possible to love two people at once in the same way, Meriel.” He kissed away her protest. “Come,” he said when they broke apart. “Come swim with me again.”

She felt the change surge within her with the words. He helped her strip away the clóca and léine, tossing her clothing onto the shore until she stood as naked as he. Together, they dove in with human shapes and emerged as Saimhóir.

The lough was different than the ocean: murkier, the water tasting sweet, the sounds hushed and quieter. Distantly, she could hear the roar of the falls of the Duán where the river tumbled into the deep rift in the land that held the lough. Where there had been schools of brightly-colored fish in the water around Inishfeirm, the fish here were smaller and plainer, quick to scurry away to hiding places.

They swayed and fluttered through the shoals—Meriel more gingerly than she would have liked; she was still not completely healed and the change hadn’t altered that, the effort of swimming sending minor twinges through her body—down the muddy, algae-slick slopes into the starlit darkness of the water, chasing each other. They surfaced in exuberant sprays of water, huffing as they inhaled the cold air and dove again. They rubbed flanks, slid glistening furred bodies over each other, tasting each other’s arousal.

After a time, in human form again, they hauled out on rocks near the shore. Meriel was laughing, her hair streaming in curls down the bare curve of her shoulders and back. She hugged Dhegli, bringing him to her.

She heard the bark of a seal, and turning her head on his chest, saw another Saimhóir watching them, a cow. Dhegli called back to her in their own language as Meriel regarded him quizzically. After the exchange, the seal dove back under the water and vanished. “Her name is Challa,” Dhegli’s voice sounded in her head, and she heard the deep affection in it. “She saved my life at Inishduán when I went to help your mam and came with me here.”

Meriel stared at the blackness that was the seal’s eyes, the moon touching them with silver. “Can she . . . ?”

“Change? No. She has none of your people in her blood.”

Meriel nodded. Somehow, that made her glad. There was another question she wanted to ask, but though her mouth opened she said nothing, afraid she knew the answer, afraid to hear it. She clutched Dhegli to her.

Under the leaves of Doire Coill, a dire wolf howled.

The Ríthe left Dún Laoghaire the morning after the Óenach, six trains of retainers and gardai taking six different directions on the High Roads. Doyle was at West Gate to give his leave to Rí Mallaghan, returning to Lár Bhaile, but Torin said little to him. “Do what you can,” he told Doyle, “but it may be all you can do just to stay alive. I can’t do anything to protect you now—none of the Ríthe can without risking open war between the Tuatha, and I’d rather see the Order of Gabair retain the Clochs Mór we have than lose them in a futile battle. Without knowing whether Edana will ever . . .” He shrugged. “Do you understand me, Tiarna Mac Ard?’

“I do, my Rí.”

“I hope you do.” He sat back in his seat, looking away from Doyle, and gestured to the driver. Doyle watched the Rí and his entourage leave the city, feeling more afraid than he’d ever felt in his life.

Dún Laoghaire—both the city and the keep that brooded on a low rise near the harbor—vibrated with tension. The streets were uncommonly empty that morning, half the market stalls closed, shutters latched on the shop windows in the business sector, worried faces peering out between the slats. Those who went out hurried quickly about their business, giving furtive glances around them. The gardai still walked slowly through the streets but their hands stayed near the hilts of their weapons and under their cloaks one could catch the glimpse of leather armor or hear the clinking of the iron rings.

Shay O Blaca had sent, via Quickship, two new cloudmages to Doyle. Alaina Glanchy and Shéfra Cahill had been given the Clochs Mór whose Holders had been lost at Inishduán. Alaina now held Weaver while Shéfra carried Sharpcut, but though O Blaca had chosen the two for their skill and their loyalty to the Order (and the political strength of their families), both were new to their Clochs Mór. Together with Doyle’s Snapdragon, the trio made a formidable force, but Doyle wondered how the two would handle the rigors of fighting cloch against cloch, if it came to that. He was afraid that he would find out.

Dún Laoghaire moved warily through that day and slept uneasily or not at all that night. The first killings came the next day: a battle at the morning shift change between squadrons of the Dún Laoghaire gardai whose families had come from different Tuatha left four dead and several injured; then a midday riot in Findhlay Market put the casualty figures in the dozens while half the stalls in the market were destroyed and looted; in the evening, news came to Doyle that a tiarna of Tuath Locha Léin who had remained behind at the Banrion O Treasigh’s request had been attacked and killed in the bailey of the keep itself—by what appeared to be either slow magic or a cloch na thintrí.

Doyle met in his chambers that evening with two of the lieutenants of the Rí Laoghaire’s gardai—significantly, the keep’s captain had refused to come to the meeting. “. . . you all know Enean and his difficulties,” he was saying to them, trying to see some hope in their set jaws and averted eyes. “I know you have sympathy for Tiarna O Liathain and admire his courage. But you also know his limitations and you know Edana. I think it’s obvious which of the two would make the better ruler for Dún Laoghaire.”

“We know what you’re saying, Tiarna Mac Ard,” one of the men said finally. “But Bantiarna O Liathain isn’t
here
and some of the rumors that are flying around the city are troubling. Tiarna O Liathain, at least—” He stopped, eyes widening as a long wailing scream came from beyond the door to the chamber, trailing off into a horrible wet gurgle. The gardai drew swords and rushed from the room, Doyle following. Across the hall, Alaina and Shéfra came from their rooms. “Clochs?” Alaina asked, but Doyle shook his head. “Not yet,” he told her, “but be ready.” They followed the gardai, running down the hall and turning at the stairs that led up to Enean’s chambers.

Dragonfire smoldered in Doyle’s stomach.

The door to Enean’s private chamber was open; they rushed in. MacCamore was sprawled faceup on the tapestried rug near the door, mouth and eyes open, his abdomen slit wide with a horrible, long diagonal wound that his blood-soaked, still hands could not hold shut. An irregular pool of red was still spreading from the body; a knife lay near the edge of the stain. Enean was there, half-dressed, the back of his hand to his mouth as he stared at MacCamore; Nuala, a blanket wrapped around her form, leaned against the doorway to the inner bedroom, weeping with her face turned away. And Labhrás Ó Riain . . .

Ó Riain was there also, his sword drawn though held down at his side as blood drooled from its tip.

“Take him!” Doyle barked to the gardai, pointing at Ó Riain. None of them moved. Ó Riain’s mouth twitched.

“What’s the matter, Tiarna Mac Ard? Having trouble with the gardai?” More footsteps came from the corridor. Doyle knew others had arrived but he didn’t dare look behind.

“What happened here?” he demanded. “Enean?”

Enean shook his head. “I don’t know, Doyle. I heard a knock and MacCamore went to the door. Then I heard MacCamore arguing with Labhrás and I came out. MacCamore had a knife, and Labhrás unsheathed his sword, and . . .”

“The old man came at me,” Ó Riain said. “I had to defend myself.” He tossed the sword down contemptuously. “And Enean.”

“MacCamore would do nothing to harm Enean,” Doyle spat.

“I believe his exact words were ‘I’d rather see Enean dead than under your influence.’ Ask Enean. He heard.”

Doyle glanced at Enean, who was nodding. “He did say that, Doyle. Then he took a step toward Labhrás.”

“There it is,” Ó Riain said. “Are you satisfied now, Tiarna? This was simple defense—both of myself and Enean.”

Doyle glanced down at the knife on the rug. “That knife is Connachtan-made,” he said. “Strange, isn’t it, that MacCamore should have that?”

Ó Riain gave him a tight-lipped smile. “A weapon like that is easily obtained here in Dún Laoghaire. Perhaps MacCamore had a taste for expensive weapons. Or perhaps he was at Findhlay Market this afternoon with the other scofflaws and found a weapons shop open for the taking.” Ó Riain gave a sniff and a contemptuous look at the corpse. “It doesn’t matter. The old bastard won’t interfere anymore.”

The insult stoked the fury and frustration in Doyle, blowing the coals into sudden white heat. His hand found Snapdragon and his mind ripped open the cloch: as Ó Riain responded in the next breath; as he felt Alaina and Shéfra do the same behind him, as out in the hallway, other clochs opened as well. The dragon appeared in his cloch-vision, snarling and ready and he would have sent it rushing forward against the shadowy forms of wolves that were rising around Ó Riain, heedless of the consequences.

But it was Enean who stopped him. “No!” he heard Enean shout, and he pushed himself between Doyle and Ó Riain as Nuala screamed from the bedroom archway, as the bright clochs sparked into life around him. “I won’t let you do this!”

The dragon coiled, rising until it seemed to fill the air, fire spouting from its open mouth, ready to strike. Enean glared up at it as if daring Doyle to unleash the beast— as the wolves howled around Ó Riain. “Enean! Get out of my way!”

“No!” Enean shouted back. “You told me that if I were Rí, you’d obey me, Doyle. Edana’s not here, so right now I’m the Rí.”

You can win here. You’re stronger than Ó Riain.
The temptation made his body tremble with the effort of holding back the power.
You can win . . .
He could have ignored the boy-man. He could have sent the dragon’s head snaking around him, could have tried to avoid hurting Enean as the clochs came together in rage. But the others, the allies Ó Riain had here, the gardai . . . The conflict would spread out from this center, engulfing the entire keep and the city and the countryside all around, and even if Doyle did take Ó Riain and even if he did manage to spare Enean, eventually he would have to ride against him because Enean
wanted
to be Rí. Doyle could see that in Enean’s face and stance. Even damaged and scarred, he wanted the legacy that should have been his, and if Doyle won this battle, it wouldn’t be the last. The Enean standing between Doyle and Ó Riain wouldn’t go back to being the pliable child-man: not without Edana, not without MacCamore. Enean had tasted power; he would try to keep it and those behind Ó Riain would help him.

Doyle might win this battle, but the war would come and Enean would have to fall. Doyle couldn’t do that. He would lose Edana as well as Enean if that happened, because Edana wouldn’t hurt her brother.

There were times when the only way to continue to fight was to retreat. It was the hardest lesson he’d ever had to learn.

“Enean, tell Tiarna Ó Riain to release his cloch,” Doyle said. “If he does that, I’ll do the same. I’ll kneel to you as Rí, Enean. Right here and now.”

Ó Riain scoffed, the wolves snarling, but Enean smiled warmly at Doyle, his eyes full of trust. He turned to Ó Riain. “You heard Doyle,” he told the man. “Let go of your cloch.”

“Enean, it’s a trap . . .” Ó Riain began but Enean’s face flushed. He reached down and snatched Ó Riain’s sword from the floor, brandishing it in front of the man.