Darach Read online

  Residual wards circled him, and a random lattice of energy pulsed and hummed and twisted sound in his head. It would be a good few hours before he was fully healed, and he threw up his own wards so as to stay hidden in the dark, presenting the image of a dead man to anyone who cared to look. He slept—the best way to heal—relaxing and drifting on crimson seas that enveloped him and carried him along the flow to healing.

  He was finally closer to having the wherewithal to make sense of all of this. Guardian had somehow betrayed him and sent him to a fate even he couldn't imagine in his worst nightmares. Guardian had been Ceithin's only hope of finding out where Trystyn was. Ceithin's dreams traveled beyond his anger at betrayal, and his Fire balanced him until he slept shallowly, half aware of his surroundings.

  When he woke, someone had entered the space with him. The presence was unsettling. A man. He was certainly not one of the three who had been there before, and his Fire was stronger than the empty things he had seen in the courtyard. This was another, a youngling, with Fire so juvenile it tumbled and spat inside him with little sense or direction. Recognition snapped inside him, this was the one he was told would try to find the Cariad. Kian had told him there would be another who would attempt to follow his steps and might find Ceithin, some name starting with a D. Derrin, Darrin, a spiky name, the letters hard and sharp, and eyes filled with blue Fire.

  Halting, hesitation in every word, the youngling was attempting magik. Ceithin raised his eyebrows in surprise. The words of enchantment to manipulate Fire slipped into Ceithin's incomplete sleeping dreams. They were snapped, stuttered words—not smooth with practiced magik but harsh and shocking in their simplicity. Suddenly his dreams turned to blue. The crimson inside him tried to hold tight, but slowly it transformed to orange, then through the entire spectrum until it finally transformed to a sapphire so bright it hurt. The iciness of the blue cooled his own Fire and he started to wake.

  "Cariad?" Definitely a new voice, not one of those who had been with Sulien. This was the young voice of Kian's friend, resonant with false bravado. "Cariad?"

  "Nguh," was the most coherent response he could form. He pushed himself back up on his elbows, blinking into the dark. He tried to move more, but a new ward had been cast inexpertly around him to keep him still.

  "Don't push," the voice said, and the glow of blue, apparently as young as the sapphire in his dreams, haloed a young man, clearly only at his Fire birthday. He was blond, beautiful, and his eyes were the same stunning, unreal blue as the Fire he had so recently received and was currently struggling to control. "You can't move," the voice added hurriedly.

  Ceithin relaxed, giving the impression the magik cast actually held him still. He was intrigued by this strange development in his incarceration. How was it that Kian's friend had chanced his luck by coming to the Council prison? How had he managed to break through? Had the Council decided on a new strategy to try and break him, using this boy as some kind of trick?

  "What is this?" He waited for the younger man to move closer, watching him crouch low. Ceithin observed blue on the young man's shaking fingertips and determination on generous lips.

  "I'll ask the questions," his visitor countered without hesitation. "Are you a Cariad?"

  "Who are you?" Ceithin's throat, still not fully recovered from its injuries, tightened.

  The stranger ignored the question and snapped his finger so his Fire flared stronger, brighter. He edged closer, leaning in with what Ceithin assumed was the young man's most threatening expression. "Tell me about the Cariad."

  "The Cariad?" Ceithin coughed dramatically to hide his visceral reaction to the direct question. Not many of the New World, especially one so young, spoke of the Cariad with such issue or demand. "It's a story, a fairytale to scare small kids."

  "No." The stranger's voice was strong and determined. "The Cariad aren't a story. And you're going to help me to find them, because… you know."

  "I don't understand." Ceithin didn't know whether to admire the youngling or laugh at his avid determination to question him. Had he really thought this through? He clearly feared the Cariad, yet, at the same time, demanded their location so he could… do what? Try to steal something from the Cariad themselves? He tried to remember what Kian had said, something about how his friend would be utterly determined to follow him.

  "I know you're of the Cariad. It's why the Council has you here."

  Ceithin tested his bonds with an exaggerated huff of exertion. No sense in letting the other know that his puny, infant Fire had no power to hold any Cariad.

  "There are no Cariad." Ceithin could be equally as stubborn. He cast a glance to either side of his visitor and judged the possibility of escape from the dim, murky, unlit part of the stone prison he was held in. There was no need for bars and locks in any Council jail. Each space for a soul was simply carved from the ancient mineral rock the City stood upon. The members of the Council were, in the City, all-powerful and had the strongest of wards, bonding any prisoner to the stone and stopping them from leaving. Granite reinforced by warding was impenetrable by all, apart from the three in the Council. Well, that's what they thought, anyway. Council members couldn't know, but there was no kind of ward strong enough to keep Ceithin, or indeed any Cariad, if they wanted to leave.

  If he hadn't been taken by surprise, betrayed, he wouldn't even be here. He'd have done what he came for and been back in the Valley with his family before anyone really missed him. In the convoluted history of his tribe, there existed no record of any Council Mage imprisoning a Cariad, and it was his shame he had been trapped. Damn Guardian and his lies and half truths.

  "There are Cariad." Annwn, this youngling—Darach, he suddenly remembered—was a stubborn idiot. "Kian wrote—"

  So this was the youngling Kian had warned him of? Still, he was startled by the use of the name, aware of what its use meant to his own future. Ceithin decided that enough was enough. There was no time to indulge questions or be cautiously diplomatic. He needed to be away from here, and with a growing dread, he realized another fact. There was nothing Ceithin could do but bring the stranger along with him; he had promised Kian he would look out for this Darach. Damn it to Annwn.

  In one surge of movement, Ceithin snapped the fragile blue Fire trying to hold him in place and had the younger man pinned to the floor in bonds of crimson. His visitor opened his mouth. Ceithin silenced any potential shout for help with a casual flick of his wrist and a spell to silence him. Carefully, he eased to kneel next to his new prisoner. He only had one question for the newborn. A rhetorical question given the frightened boy was spelled into silence, but a good one to get out into the damp cold air.

  "What are you doing here, you idiot?" He rolled to his feet and looked down at the figure prone on the floor, and sudden uncertainty tugged at him. "Darach ab Owen." The harshness of the syllables scratched at his throat when he spoke them, and he sensed immediate shock from his prisoner. He leaned closer. "The one who wants to follow. Kian told me, warned me you would try to find the Cariad."

  Darach shook his head, and his eyes widened in the dim light of crimson.

  "I'll let you loose. Are you going to scream? If I lift the hold, don't make a sound, all right?" He waited until Darach nodded, then breath by breath, he snagged the bands of his Fire hovering around Darach's face.

  "You… How… Kian—" Darach wasn't making any kind of sense, but at least he didn't shout and lose them the safety the half-dark provided.

  "He said you would look for him, and you would need me," Ceithin stated simply.

  Blue sparked around Darach's face, an unearthly glow shimmering and snapping on his skin, and confusion carved into his features. "But you're a Car—"

  "How the hell did you make it in here?" Surely, there was Guardian to pass by? The Council wards?

  "It was easy," Darach boasted, pride in his voice. "I do have magik."

  Magik? This youngling thought he had magik? That was laughable. However, the fact he got p
ast the wards and Guardian meant only one thing. He was allowed through. Which meant this was either some kind of Council trap or this youngling was in as much danger as he.

  "We need to get out of here." He didn't want any more of the nightmare-story-from-my-childhood-Cariad shit, not from Darach with whom he needed to work to escape.

  He had made a promise to Kian. A simple one. He promised he would watch out for Darach if he came to him, and he would remove him from harm's way simply because Kian had begged him, his gaze so damn serious. The Cariad did not break their promises.

  But how in Annwn had Darach got by Guardian, past the library, and across the Council wards? Doubt and suspicion prickled his thoughts as he turned over possibilities in his head. Darach was like a child, a newborn, with his Fire. Nothing the youngling possessed in him would have protected him or made it easy for him to penetrate any kind of magik, let alone magik placed by the Council or Guardian. It must be some kind of set-up, which only reminded Ceithin of his need to leave. Whether Darach was an innocent part of an anti-Cariad trap or the instigator was a thought he had to push to one side. He had no time to consider delays, or double deals, or any kind of what-ifs and maybes.

  Cautiously, he touched the wall, tendrils of his Fire following, the scarlet inquisitive. Feeling the stone delicately, he traced one seam of pure quartz in the granite, looking for an opening, anything where the granite wasn't entirely solid and impenetrable.

  "What are you doing?" Darach asked, and Ceithin grasped Darach's arm, encouraging him closer. The rock was solid beneath his touch, but he sensed the water, the path of a thousand tiny streams passing through the rocks around them. Carved by erosion, these hollows could be expanded. Inspiration was there in an instant. Darach had fire so blue it was incandescent and near white in places. Water, the element, was driven with the blue Fire in a symbiotic relationship, and if he could manage to pull Darach into—

  "I need to get us out of here," he half-whispered, his voice low. "I can cast the magik, but I need your element as well."

  "I don't understand. My element? I don't have—" Darach looked bewildered, and Ceithin just stopped him there and then with his own input.

  "The Fire, the element, water. Look, just give me—"

  Words weren't going to explain this. He moved his own hand to Darach's and laced their fingers, placing them flat against the stone, mumbling the words of ancient power and taking another step closer to the sudden vortex that opened in the rock. The swirling aura was stable at least ten or so feet ahead into the mountain, but the space was tight. Steam swirled in a corona around them as the Fire and Darach's element worked to hold back the quartz.

  "No—"

  Darach near whimpered as he tried to pull his hand back, but Ceithin couldn't let him. They had to keep the magik in place or they would become a permanent part of the Earth. He tightened his grip and yanked hard. The solid rock in front of them was now altogether something different. The watercourses inside split and widened, and the motion of the magiked barrier was dizzying and bright. Darach tugged away, frantic, a single word on his lips; no.

  "Stop it," Ceithin snapped, pulling Darach into the space, sensing water and earth parting to let them through. Darach's element was so deeply hidden in the younger man it was a wonder Ceithin could get a hold of any of it. He thought he heard Darach whimper again. Terror filled the tiny sound, and a part of his hardened heart splintered.

  "Nearly there," Ceithin said simply, his way of attempting to reassure the young man, concentrating on the vision of the sky that would be evidence of their survival. The oppression of the magik and detested, enclosed spaces caused his breathing to hitch. He desperately needed the wide open stretch of grass and trees. At last, the wash of cool air touched his skin as he stumbled out of the rock and fell to his knees, Darach collapsing beside him, heaving great lungfuls of air.

  He looked up at the face of the rock through which they had just passed. It was closing even as he tried to still his breathing, until finally there was nothing left to prove what had just happened. The rock was a sheer face, the towers of the old City thrusting skyward above them and the glass of the new city sparkling in the sunlight off and away to the right. This place where the City lived was such a contradiction in terms, a jumbled mess of old and new.

  Ceithin flopped his head to the left and had his first proper look at this Darach that Kian had told him about. Impulsive, loyal young Darach. He was slight, the same as Kian had been, pale-skinned, and his hair as white-blond as Kian's. His eyes were nothing like Kian's, though. They were not the forest green that had entreated him so earnestly for help. No. These eyes, these gorgeous eyes were an incredible blue, perfect enough to incite poetry. And his face… He was pretty. It was the only word for it. Pretty, and so damn young. He had Fire, sapphire sparks that traveled his skin, so he had to have reached the maturity age of twenty-one, but he looked so much younger. He was lying flat on his back, still breathing deeply and rather loudly, and Ceithin was suddenly concerned his companion would start to hyperventilate. He reached over, touching Darach briefly on the arm, allowing a small amount of scarlet to filter in past the skin and chase down the panic in the boy's chest.

  He narrowed his eyes as Darach twitched at the simple contact, but he didn't pull back from his charge. He simply filed away the spark of connection between his Fire and Darach's. There was nothing more than anger and distrust between them, and no way on this earth was there anything like a real connection. Not with the boy. Not with him.

  Stifling his train of thought, he cast a net of protection about them and clambered to his feet. He held out his hand to help Darach up.

  "Who are you? And how did you do that… wall thing?" Darach asked. He was immediately on the attack, although his knees wobbled and he shivered in delayed shock, his gaze flicking to the solid rock behind them.

  Ceithin noticed the sharp look and considered how the hell he was going to explain the concept of the whole elements/Fire thing to the near virgin standing before him. Instead of worrying about it, they needed to be concentrating on getting away from the Council and their stone fortress. They needed a way of disappearing into the forest. Ceithin knew the forest like the back of his hand, and no one followed in there where Cariad marauders waited to kill and rape and main. Horses. They needed horses. Ceithin focused for a second on locating a likely source.

  "I said, Cariad… Who. Are. You?" Darach was persistent, whimpering less and speaking with more confidence. Ceithin gave him that. "And how do you know Kian?"

  "We don't have time for this. You stay, you die a traitor. Simple."

  "No, but I'm not a traitor. I'm not going with you. Why should I go with you? Do you—"

  "Enough questions, youngling," he snapped. His patience was low as he began the cautious steps towards the transport he could see in his mind's eye. Horses, and not far.

  "I am not a youngling," Darach answered quickly, and not without a whole lot of posturing. "I have my Fire, you know."

  "And one day, youngling, I am sure you will learn to use it."

  "I won't stand here, Cariad, and—"

  "Enough, I said." He spun on his heel to face Darach, who took a step back in response, his sapphire Fire throwing up a slight barrier in defense. "We need to get away from this godforsaken City before the Council knows we are gone. The forest is our best place to hide. We need to find horses." If anything, Darach grew paler, but Ceithin couldn't get a sense of whether it was the mention of the Council or the mention of the horses.

  "Horses? I haven't… I don't… Can't we use—" Darach was flustered and waved his hand in front of him. To indicate what, Ceithin didn't know, although it made Darach look pathetically hopeless. "Not horses."

  Great. It was the horse thing scaring Darach and not fear of the Council who ruled by keeping the population blind to what was around them, the Council who demanded killing, kidnapping, and banishing with no rhyme nor reason. No, it was fear of the gentle beasts that would be car
rying Darach to safety.

  "No, we can't use a fueled vehicle, and yes, you will ride a horse." There. He had said it firmly, the tone of his voice leaving little room for Darach to argue. "Come on."

  He didn't wait for Darach to follow. They didn't have time for contemplation or contention. Guardian would discover their escape, because his Fire was amber gold and all-seeing. The pathetically-easy-to-break wards Ceithin had cast to cover their tracks wouldn't last long and would quickly fall under Guardian's hands. He had little time to get his new charge away from the stone and glass City fortress and to the Valley.

  "I'm not going with you. All I want is answers to my questions, and then you can go." Darach stood with crossed arms, his expression stony and unyielding. "I am not getting dragged away from the city, Cariad bastard." The word Cariad was spoken venomously, spat out with hatred, which only intensified the wrongness of a word so foul coming from the innocent-looking mouth.

  Annwn, it wasn't a new thing. Cariad he was, and Ceithin had been born the bastard son of parents who'd never joined with the full ritual of Council ordained marriage; he had heard worse. The population of this world had little time for the old ways or the travelers that banded together and held traditions close. Darach damn well was coming with him, because if he knew Kian, then he might know something about Trystyn; and that was information Ceithin was determined to get out of him.

  "Yes. You are." A simple statement, and one Darach had better listen to and abide by.

  "No, I'm not. You will stand here and talk to me—"

  Ceithin stepped into Darach's space, drawing to his full height, easily half a head taller than Darach, and gripped hard into the soft silky material of Darach's coat.

  "You helped a Cariad escape from the Council. You crossed Guardian to do so. Clearly, you're a Cariad sympathizer. Your sentence is instant death or, worse, removal of Fire and a death so slow it will drive you insane with grief. You want to stay to talk, then you stay to die. We run. Now."