The Morrigan's Curse (7 page)

The touch of the silver coin compelled her talent even more than Bran's request and the intensity of the situation itself, but Aine fought it. Her body shook, and her eyes rolled up until they showed mostly white. Nevertheless, her trembling
lips curled in a smile. “I'll gladly foretell the fate of Griffyn Llyr, who will die by the hand of an innocent.”

Griffyn's face blanched at her words. Then he cursed vilely in Welsh, threw up a hand, palm out, and struck Aine with a bolt of electricity.

ADDIE SCREAMED. THE CHILDREN
echoed her.

Dale ran toward Aine as she collapsed, but Bran swung his staff to block him, striking him in the head. Dale staggered and fell. The children sobbed and clung to Emma, who moaned and pressed their faces against her dress. One of the older kids, a boy named Gawan, picked up Brigit to keep the toddler from seeing what had happened.

Addie threw herself to the ground beside Dale's crumpled body and cradled his head. Blood oozed from his scalp, but he was breathing. It only took a glance to see that Aine was not, although Bran knelt beside her to check anyway. Then he looked up at Griffyn and said something in Welsh. Addie's command of Welsh was poor, but she thought Bran was calling his son a cretin.

A monstrous, murdering cretin!
Addie thought, tears running down her cheeks. But that didn't change the fact that
she'd
brought him here. She'd led these violent people to her
home and put everyone who lived here at risk—all to impress Bran Llyr.
It's my fault he killed her!

“The woman prophesied my death!” Griffyn said to his father indignantly, as if his act had been justified.

“Did you think this would undo it?” Bran growled. Oracles spoke of what would be; the speaking itself did not
make
it be. Killing Aine wouldn't stop the future she foretold. Impatiently, Bran beckoned for Ysabel.

Even Ysabel, who was normally Griffyn's biggest fan, shot him an angry glance as she approached Aine's body. A live oracle would've been useful to them in the future. However, with an Arawen present, death wouldn't stop them from getting the prophecy they needed right now. Ysabel squatted and placed a hand on Aine's forehead.

Addie shuddered at the foul, black cloud of Arawen magic at work, but forced herself to watch as Ysabel stiffened and voiced words pulled from the dead woman's mind.

“Four treasures from the land of frost:

One corrupt and long ago lost,

Another repaired by girl's command,

Two, spoils of war,

Claimed by the voice and the hand.”

Ysabel took a long breath and withdrew her hand. When she stood up, Griffyn growled at her, “Forget the Treasures!
What the woman said to me—that was a lie, wasn't it?” Ysabel didn't answer.

“Are we taking the children?” snapped Madoc. “Even the small ones?” He was either unconcerned with Griffyn's future demise or trying to divert attention from it.

“You can't take the children,” Emma protested, her voice shaking. “I won't allow it.”

Addie frantically signaled her to not argue with them, terrified that one of them would strike her down next, but Bran ignored Emma completely. “The infant isn't old enough to be weaned. Leave it. The others are our future allies. If that little girl is a Corra like her mother, she will be a great advantage to us someday. Put the Transitioners in the house and find a place to lock them in.”

Lock them in.
Addie sagged with relief. He wasn't going to kill them. It didn't erase her responsibility for Aine's death, but at least her foster parents would be spared. Griffyn hefted Dale's limp body over his shoulder. Ysabel pulled Emma away from the children and toward the house. Emma clutched Aine's baby to her chest and looked back at Addie in despair. Addie wanted to sink into the ground with guilt and regret.

“Help me get the children back to the plane,” Kel whispered in Addie's ear, pulling her gently but firmly away from Aine's body. Addie thought he was trying to distract her from what had happened. It wouldn't work, but perhaps she could prevent anyone else from being hurt.

Wiping tears from her face, Addie went with Kel to corral the children. She tried to take Brigit from Gawan, but he recoiled from her. “Traitor!” he hissed.

I'm not,
Addie wanted to protest.
I'm trying to do right by us. I want candy stores and libraries for you and every other Kin kid. I want us to have a future in the real world. We didn't do anything wrong. It's not right for us to be imprisoned in this eighth day like criminals.
But she didn't say any of that. It suddenly sounded very naive.

“Do what you're told before worse happens,” Kel told Gawan. Taking small children by the hands, Kel turned away from the house—and froze.

A large black bird swooped down and landed in the street in front of the children.

Then another. And a third.

A dark-haired girl walked up the street toward them. Wherever her bare feet touched, worms and insects bubbled up from the pavement. She wore a shapeless white dress. No, Addie realized—not a dress, an oversized white T-shirt with faded letters printed across the front. She wore shorts too, barely visible below the hem of her shirt. Her arms were bare, her left wrist unmarked. She wasn't Kin, and she wasn't a Transitioner. This was a Normal girl, not much older than Addie, whose body was hosting something that wasn't normal at all.

The Morrigan.

Kel pushed all the children in his reach to their knees.
“Close your eyes. Don't look at her,” he whispered. Drawing the attention of the Morrigan was dangerous. She was known to choose sides, select victors . . . and casualties. Addie sank to her knees, but kept her eyes open.

Madoc kneeled and stared at the ground. Bran bent on one knee as well, holding his staff in front of him. “Great Morrigu,” Bran greeted her with an old Welsh version of her name. “We are honored to serve you.”

The girl's face was blank, her eyes wide but unseeing. From behind ordinary brown pupils, something dark and dangerous peered out. “Do you serve me?”

“I do,” Bran swore. “When I saw you at Oeth-Anoeth, I knew the time had come to redeem pledges my ancestors made to you centuries ago. By your grace, we escaped that prison.”

“The prophetess has given you your oracle,” the Morrigan said.

“Yes. But an Emrys tried this once already, and even with two Treasures recovered, his venture failed.” For all he spoke on bended knee, Bran came perilously close to complaining.

“
He
failed,” the Morrigan replied. “It is up to the progeny to fulfill the failed destiny of the parent, and to that end, a gift has been bestowed on her that will aid you.” The girl's eyes—unfocused and unseeing but still chillingly inhabited—glided past Bran to Addie.

Addie recognized that gaze. Not the girl; Addie had never seen the girl before. She recognized the entity
inside
, the same
one who'd looked out at her through a set of much older eyes a year ago.

The Morrigan was three deities in one: the Old Crone, who touched key figures with the hand of destiny; the Washer Woman, who washed the clothes of those who fell in battle; and the Girl of Crows, who gathered combatants and drove them toward their doom. Addie had met the first incarnation already, and now she found herself transfixed by this one, who always appeared in a young body even though the being inside was as old as time itself.

You were chosen,
the Morrigan conveyed to Addie in her gaze.

Addie trembled.
I know.

And Bran knew, too. Addie saw it in his unguarded expression. He might have suspected before—Addie had certainly given him a good enough hint—but now the source of her altered talent was confirmed. Addie Emrys could master spells and mimic other people's talents with almost no effort. This was the gift meant to aid them in their cause.

“The Stone of Fal and the Sword of Nuadu are in the hands of our enemies and must be recovered,” Bran said, addressing the Morrigan. “But the Spear of Lugh”—he lifted his staff—“this is all that remains of the Spear. It was broken long before it was passed to me.”

“I knew it,” Kel whispered to Addie. “I knew he had the Spear.”

“Not broken,” the Morrigan said. “The Spear was disguised
so your ancestors could smuggle it into Oeth-Anoeth. Bring me the knife you passed to your son when you received the staff.”

Griffyn and Ysabel had stopped in the doorway of the house after locking up the Carroways. Fingering a knife sheathed near his right hand and looking as if he'd rather do anything else, Griffyn descended from the porch. He knelt and handed the knife to his father with his face turned away from the Morrigan.

“The knife and staff have passed from Llyr father to Llyr son for ten generations,” Bran said. “We always believed they were made from the Spear, but no magic could reunite them.”

“No magic of
yours
can reunite them.” The Morrigan reached for the items.

To Addie's astonishment, Bran withheld them. “Forgive me, Great Morrigu, but once in the hands of the proper Llyr heirs, no one else has ever been able to hold either the knife or the staff without harm. And you are using the body of a Normal girl.”

“This girl is no longer merely human.” The Morrigan took the staff in one hand, the knife in the other, and Addie squeezed her eyes shut an instant before a blast of brilliant magic flared against her face. Her ears rang, and she swayed on her knees. When she opened her eyes, the Morrigan was handing back the whole Spear, which Bran accepted reverently.

“The Spear embodies your intention and purpose,” the
Morrigan said. “You will never be deterred from your path while you hold it. Now, find the Stone and the Sword.” The crows surged up from the ground in a flurry of wings and beaks, causing the children to shriek and flinch. The Morrigan vanished like a flame blowing out, leaving worms and beetles wriggling on the pavement where she'd been standing.

Bran whirled, holding aloft his restored Spear, and shouted triumphantly at the sky. A bolt of lightning—not from Bran's hand but from the heavens—struck the side of the Carroway house with a mighty crack. The wood siding ignited, and Ysabel launched herself from the porch just in time.

“No!” screamed Addie, staggering to her feet. “You promised!”

But he hadn't promised. Deep down, Addie knew he'd never promised not to harm the Carroways. He'd flattered her and praised her, and she wanted to believe they would work together as mentor and student. She'd been as stupid as Dr. Morder had been, expecting him to reward her.

Bran admired the flames, then hoisted the Spear again and repeated his incantation twice. Two more lightning bolts fell in quick succession, striking the houses to the right and to the left.

“Stop it!” Addie shouted. “Don't do this! Stop!”

Three more bolts of lightning. Three more houses full of Normal people Addie had never met, people who would die when their homes burned down on a day they could not escape. Bran looked at Addie, expectantly. For every outcry
of defiance, he was going to set another house afire.

Kel grabbed her around the waist, pulling her backward. “Help me get the kids to the plane. Now, Addie!” The children were crying, even Gawan, and Kel's eyes darted from child to child like he was wondering who Bran and Griffyn might kill next.

They can't kill
me
,
Addie thought.
The one person they dare not kill is
me
.

She pushed Kel away. There was nothing she could do to save the Normals, but she refused to abandon Emma and Dale. She'd already lost her real mom and dad; she would not allow her foster parents to die, too. She was going to run into the Carroway house and . . .

Griffyn cuffed the side of her head with his fist, making the world spin. “Stupid girl,” he said, throwing her over his shoulder and carrying her back to the plane.

Addie didn't make it easy for him. She kicked and pounded him with her fists. She bit him.

But her home still burned with people she loved inside it.

ON GRUNSDAY MORNING, RILEY,
Jax, and A.J. met Deidre at a private airfield in central Pennsylvania. Jax was already familiar with Deidre's car, a blue Thunderbird convertible. So he wasn't surprised that her air transport was something equally cool: a four-prop plane from the 1960s. The interior had been gutted and replaced with modern leather seats and tables. There was a tiny kitchenette and a fold-down bed. Deidre could live in it.

“Were you mugged by a barber?” Deidre asked Riley, staring at his hair when he climbed aboard with Jax and A.J. Then she looked behind him. “Where's Evangeline?”

“Not coming,” Riley said shortly. He didn't explain further, so Deidre raised her eyebrows in speculation and went to ready the plane for takeoff.

They'd departed the mountain cabin on Wednesday evening in A.J.'s truck, leaving the Land Rover—and Evangeline—behind. On the day of the Impossible Storm,
Evangeline had been exhausted from scrying and sick with a migraine after being attacked through the spell. So, the idea had been for Mrs. Crandall to meet her when she reappeared in the Land Rover at 12:01 and whisk her off to bed. By this morning, however, Evangeline had probably recovered enough to ask where Riley and Jax were, and Jax didn't envy Mrs. Crandall the job of explaining.

Addie knew where the Carroway house was, and Addie might be working with the enemy. That was Riley's thinking. He'd called the Carroways ahead of time, warned them that they could be in danger, and told them to have all their foster Kin children ready for transport when Deidre's plane arrived on Grunsday. Mr. Carroway hadn't wanted to believe Addie might betray them, but in the end he'd agreed to an evacuation.

Riley's original plan had been to leave in the early hours of the eighth day, but Deidre—newly returned from the ongoing search for the Kin hideout—had called him saying she needed a few hours to sleep and to service her plane. Riley had been impatient at the delay, which he thought increased the danger, and had almost changed his mind about bringing Jax with them. But it was Jax who'd made this arrangement with Sheila Morgan: safe transport of the orphan kids for an introduction to the woman with visions. He had to see it through. He was representing Evangeline's interests and paving the way for a possible Emrys-Morgan alliance. The firmer the bond
he could establish with Sheila Morgan on behalf of a Kin clan, maybe the less willing she'd be to see Kin wiped out in an unfair, one-sided assault.

“At least Jax will run if I order him to,” Riley had muttered to A.J.

Jax knew it perturbed Riley that Evangeline was capable of fighting off his commands, and he also knew Evangeline was going to be ticked off when she found out they'd left her behind.

“C'mon, cutie.” Deidre patted the copilot's seat. “You ride up here with me.”

Jax grinned. He'd face Evangeline later.

Somewhere over upstate New York, Stink popped out of the ceiling and landed on Jax's shoulder. Deidre burst out with a creative string of swear words, but her hands remained steady, and the plane never wavered.

A.J. groaned. “Is that thing going to follow you everywhere?”

“What's it doing on my plane?” Deidre exclaimed.

Riley laughed. “That's Jax's pet, Stink.”

Deidre threw a look over her shoulder at Riley. “Tell it to stay out of my food stores and not to poop on my new carpet or anywhere else.”

Riley looked sternly at Stink. “You heard her.”

“All right. 'Fess up, Riley,” said Jax. “What's with you and the brownies?”

Riley shrugged innocently, but Deidre grinned. “Don't you know? About the Pendragon talent? Voice of Command and King of Brownies?”

“Ha, ha. Very funny.” Riley turned up the sleeves on his jean jacket with injured dignity. “The thing with the brownies is
not
part of the Pendragon talent.”

“Oh sure,” said Deidre.

“Alanna used to make them fetch and carry for her, remember?” A.J. asked Deidre, referring to Riley's sister.

“Oh, I remember. Personally, I wouldn't want the adoration of glorified rats, but Alanna seemed to enjoy it.” Deidre glanced sideways. “No offense, Stink.”

Riley ignored them both and explained to Jax, “As near as we can figure, they obey us because sometime in the past, a Pendragon did the brownies a really huge favor. Maybe even the Big Guy himself.” He meant King Arthur. Then he added quietly, “I'd forgotten how much Alanna liked brownies.”

“Maybe because you never talk about her,” A.J. pointed out.

“Or any of your family,” Deidre murmured.

Riley grunted something that might have been agreement or just
mind your own business
. Jax understood why Riley didn't want to talk about his family. But Deidre and
A.J. were right. It was like losing people all over again if you shut them out of your memory.

Stink chattered loudly and leaped off Jax's shoulder to the control panel where he pressed his flat nose against the window. “Hey, you!” Deidre protested. “Off!”

“Come here.” Jax leaned forward to grab his pet, but then he spotted what Stink was looking at. “Deidre, do you see that smoke?”

“I see a
plane
.” She was staring at a speck silhouetted against the clouds in the distance. Deidre slammed her hand flat over the radio, not bothering to flip any switches or pick up the mike, just calling on her talent to make it work. “Mother, come in! We've got a plane out here. Too far away for me to make out the model, but there are houses on fire at our destination. It's got to be them. Over.”

“Roger that,” replied Sheila Morgan's voice. “Is your plane armed? Over.”

“Negative. I only have my personal weapons. I was expecting to transport children. Over.”

“Pursue them. But keep your distance. Over.”

Riley shot out of his seat and grabbed the back of Deidre's seat. “Not with Jax on board you don't! After what they did to your other planes?”

Jax swallowed hard. “Deidre.” He pointed a shaky finger at the smoke coming from the ground. “People are in danger down there! We have to do something.”

Deidre cursed, then said, “Negative on the pursuit, Mother. I've got a child aboard and a rescue in progress.” She rattled off a string of coordinates estimating the flight path of the enemy plane and yanked her hand off the radio while her mother was still trying to give her orders.

Deidre landed as close as she could to the burning houses, taking out a row of hedges and someone's garden. Riley and A.J. unlocked the plane's hatch door, swung it open, and leaped out. Jax followed, with Stink clinging to his shoulder. He'd seen from the air that the Carroway house was one of the buildings on fire, as if there'd been any doubt.

“A.J.!” Deidre yelled from behind them. “This way!” A.J. looked back, and so did Jax. Deidre was pointing in another direction. “I need muscle! Stat!”

“Go!” shouted Riley. A.J. turned and headed back while Riley and Jax kept running toward the billowing smoke.

The last time Jax had been here, the Carroway house had been invisible. But there was no missing it now. Flames climbed the right side of the house, consuming one section of the wraparound porch and spreading toward the front. The houses on either side of the Carroways were also on fire, as well as three across the street. Six houses total.

Riley, several yards ahead of Jax, slowed and bent briefly over someone lying in the street. But he paused only a second before straightening and running up the front steps. “I'll see if anyone's in here,” he shouted over his shoulder.
“Stay outside, Jax!”
Riley pulled his shirt up over the lower half of his face and disappeared.

He'd used the voice of command, darn him. Trust Riley to run into a burning building but order Jax to stay out of it! Jax let fly with the string of curses he'd just learned from Deidre and stumbled to a halt beside the woman on the ground. Immediately, he saw why Riley hadn't stopped to help her and recoiled.
Oh no, no, no . . .
He turned away and bent over, hands on knees, trying not to puke. Jax hadn't even known this woman's name, but he remembered the way she'd helped Evangeline, and the message she'd given to Jax in a trance. She'd been a good person.

He turned in a circle helplessly. Smoke poured from the Carroway house, but Riley's command prevented him from going in.
What can I do? Where are A.J. and Deidre?

Stink squealed from a perch on the garden-hose reel of the house next door. “If that's all we got,” Jax said, running across the yard. He twisted the faucet open as far as it would go, then unwound the hose. Stink scrambled back to his shoulder, and Jax turned on the hose full blast. He pointed it at the Carroway house, then the neighboring house, alternating pelting at the flames with a stream that
was about as useful as a water pistol. The fire had spread to the Carroways' kitchen, and the house next door was going to lose its screened-in porch. Jax couldn't even reach the other houses with this hose. “Riley!” he yelled. Why wasn't he coming out?

A car hurtled into view, barreling out of a side street and skidding sideways before screeching to a halt. The driver's door flew open, and Jax recognized the man who leaped out as Mr. Carroway's son. “Are my parents in there?” he shouted.

“I don't know!” Jax sprayed the house with his hose.

Carroway Jr. dashed up the porch steps and encountered Riley coming out with Mrs. Carroway in his arms. Riley called out directions to the newcomer then staggered down the steps to the ground. Jax dropped the hose and helped Riley lower the old woman to the grass. She was choking and struggling for air.

“Those barbarians stuffed them into a bathroom with no window and barricaded the door.” Riley's voice was hoarse. “Jax, you gotta help.” He unzipped his jean jacket, fumbling out a bundle of cloth—no,
a baby
—wrapped in a wet towel. “Is he breathing?”

“Crap!” gasped Jax.
Is he breathing? He's blue!
Jax had never held a baby in his life, but he snatched the infant out of Riley's hands. Laying the little body flat on the ground, he opened the baby's clothes and felt along his
breastbone.
Two fingers, quick compressions, thirty of them.
He tipped the baby's chin up and enclosed the tiny nose and mouth with his own lips.
Two breaths, one second each. Back to compressions.

He was on his second round of chest compressions before he understood
why
he knew how to do this. In phys ed last year, while running laps as slowly as his gym teacher would allow, Jax had amused himself by surveying the posters hanging on the gymnasium walls.
CPR. Heimlich. First Aid.
He hadn't realized he'd absorbed the information until now.

Carroway Jr. returned, carrying his father. Jax saw blood on the old man's face, but he was coughing and therefore breathing. Jax kept his attention on the person who was not.

Thirty compressions. Two breaths.

The baby twitched. His chest expanded on its own, and he began to cry.

“Attaboy, Jax!” Riley clapped him on the shoulder. “I knew you'd know what to do.”

Jax gulped. “
I
didn't know I knew.” Mrs. Carroway held out her arms, and Jax lifted the baby awkwardly. Now that he was crying and wiggling, Jax was afraid to pick him up.

Carroway Jr. pulled off his shirt and made his father press it against his head wound. “I'm going back in, to check upstairs,” he said, standing. Riley stood, too.

“No, don't,” Mrs. Carroway said, reaching out toward her son. “The children are gone.”

A fire-truck horn blared then, low and loud, and a pumper tanker sped up the street. It was brand new, shiny, and probably full of so many computerized systems and gauges that it shouldn't have worked at all on the eighth day. But Deidre stood in the cab, her hands on the dashboard, willing it with her talent to do its job. A.J. steered and blew the horn, even though there was no one to get out of the way and no one to warn.

Jax didn't blame A.J. He would've blown the horn, too.

To put out all six fires they had to drain the tank and hook up to the hydrants. Riley, A.J., and Carroway Jr. handled the hoses, while Jax operated the switches on top of the fire engine—flipping the correct ones with talent and adrenaline instead of conscious decision. Deidre treated the old couple and the baby with oxygen, bandaged Mr. Carroway's head, and occasionally coaxed an electronic switch into working. Stink ran around underfoot and managed not to get trampled.

As soon as he found a spare second, Jax took a blanket out of the medical supplies and covered the dead Kin woman's body. He really didn't want to approach her again, but the Carroways were weak and injured, everybody else was busy, and he owed her that bit of dignity. Even though
it made him cry a little when he did it.

When the fires were out, they broke into the houses that had been in danger. “Is this what you call adding insult to injury?” Jax asked, as Riley kicked in a front door.

“Can't be helped,” Riley said. “Check every room. Don't leave anything smoldering that could reignite after we leave. Open the windows to make sure the smoke clears.”

“The people will be okay, right?” Jax asked.

“They weren't here when their houses were filled with smoke, and by the time they reappear, the smoke should be gone. Hopefully, everyone is okay.” But all six houses had inexplicable fire damage—blackened siding, burned roofs, warped doors, verandas reduced to kindling, and screened-in porches gutted. Riley didn't say it, but Jax knew that if any of these homeowners had been out of bed on Wednesday at midnight, watching late-night TV in their sunroom or admiring the stars from the veranda, they were likely dead despite Riley and A.J.'s best efforts.

Jax took a deep breath. “Mrs. Carroway said Addie was here with them.”