Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
Ward wasn’t sure when the screaming had become background noise; he only knew that it did.
He stood in the middle of chaos so visceral it felt like he’d cracked open the lid on a forgotten nightmare.
Battle raged on every side—gunfire, swords, blades crashing against metal, and bodies slamming into the dirt with bone-breaking force.
Horses screamed. Men roared. The smell of blood, sweat, and scorched air churned in his lungs until he couldn’t tell if he was breathing or choking.
This isn’t real.
It couldn’t be. Portals weren’t real, Tír na nóg was a myth, and Fionn Mac Cumhaill was a bedtime story.
But the ground beneath him was wet with blood.
The cries of the dying were not echoes in his head.
And that was a chariot—an actual chariot—that had just raced past them in a screech of leather and bronze.
He flinched as another warrior charged by, a blade swinging wildly, eyes manic with fury.
His legs refused to move. His brain screamed to run, to hide, to do something—but he was frozen.
His hands, so familiar with delicate tools and careful notes, shook around the strap of his satchel like it was a life raft in a hurricane.
This is a hallucination. It has to be.
But the bullet that whizzed past his ear was very real. The scream that tore itself from a throat too young to die—real. The splash of something warm against his cheek—real.
“Down,” someone bellowed.
He dropped too late. A spear arced through the air, whistling past his face so close he felt the rush of wind it carried. Time slowed to a breath.
I’m going to die.
A massive shadow hit him from the side, tackling him hard enough to knock the wind from his lungs. They rolled through blood-streaked mud. Ward gasped, clawing for purchase.
“Stay the fuck down,” Reaper barked, yanking him behind the remnants of a boulder.
The irony hit like a punch to the gut. A man called Reaper had saved him from having his soul fucking reaped by a goddamn barbarian with a spear. His laugh came out half-hysterical. “This is a dream. This is a fever dream. I hit my head. There’s no other explanation.”
Reaper gave him a grim look, raising his rifle. “If it is, you’re bleeding in it.”
Ward looked down at the gash on his arm, fresh and raw. Real. He was grateful that they surrounded him, because without them, even if this were a dream, he’d be the first to die. He wasn’t like these men. He was without a doubt the weakest link. He wasn’t and would never be a fighter.
Then a horn blew, and shattered the sounds of battle. More warriors thundered over the ridge, painted and screaming, led by gods who didn’t belong in this world. The Fianna, at least he thought they were the Fianna, and his heart stuttered.
Oh God. It’s real. All of it’s real.
And I’m not ready.
Ward crouched behind the boulder, heart jackhammering against his ribs as the battlefield erupted around him like the climax of every war epic he’d ever studied.
The Fianna had come—real flesh and blood warriors who were supposed to exist only in myth.
But there they were, crashing into the enemy lines like a tidal wave of bronze, muscle, and death.
He couldn’t look away as chariots barreled through the enemy flank, wheels rimmed in bronze catching the failing light as they spun, slicing through flesh like it was paper.
Horses screamed, their hooves kicking up blood-soaked earth as they trampled through bodies without mercy.
Ward watched one rider—Oisín, someone had shouted—vault from his chariot mid-charge, landing in the middle of the enemy like a god of war.
His sword moved too fast to track, cutting a path through half a dozen men before his feet even touched the ground.
Steel screamed against steel. Arrows snapped through the air like angry wasps.
The enemy faltered. Some turned to flee—but the Fianna didn’t let them.
A warrior leapt from horseback with a roar that shook Ward to the marrow.
Twin blades flashed in his hands, cutting arcs of blood through the thick of the enemy.
Beside him, Trace—still half-naked, blood-streaked, and laughing like a lunatic—fought barehanded, a broken spear haft in one hand, using it to crack ribs and shatter knees.
Bran was gone, but his fury remained in the way Trace moved—like he’d tasted blood and decided the world owed him more.
Viper moved like a shadow through fire, laying down rounds with methodical precision.
His guns barked with the wrath of a dying god, each shot sending another body to the mud.
The tattoos on his skin shimmered faintly as if fire kissed his veins with every heartbeat.
Ward wasn’t sure if he was seeing things or if the magic that had carved open the world was still clinging to them, reshaping them in its image.
Blood splattered across his face again, hot and thick. He flinched again as it fully sank in that this wasn’t a dream. This wasn’t a story in a book. This was history, raw and real, screaming and unfolding in front of his eyes.
I don’t know if I should be enthralled, trying to write everything down, or pissing myself in fear.
To his left, Reaper dropped a charging warrior with a vicious burst to the chest, then turned to nod once at Ward, eyes wild but focused.
Behind them, Juice and Kaze stood back-to-back, swords salvaged from fallen warriors in hand now that their ammo was spent, fighting like they’d been born for this world.
Maybe they were.
Maybe this is where we are meant to be.
What had started as a bloodthirsty charge devolved into chaos as the enemy finally broke.
Warriors dropped their weapons, fleeing into the trees with the Fianna hot on their heels.
The earth trembled under the weight of hooves and feet.
Screams turned to silence. Victory fell hard and fast. Ward rose, shaking to his feet.
The battle was over. He wasn’t sure if he would ever be the same.
He wasn’t sure any of them ever would be… or if it mattered.
He barely remembered moving. One moment he was staring at the carnage—the field slick with blood, steam rising from the bodies, the scent of copper and fire choking his lungs—and the next, he was stumbling forward through it all.
Like his legs had decided for him that if this was history being made, he wasn’t going to miss a second.
The Fianna were rallying and forming ranks with a precision that was both military and tribal.
The air was thick with battle cries, which had turned to whoops of victory.
Warriors clashed forearms, clasped shoulders, and shouted oaths in a language that sounded like thunder rolling through valleys.
It was chaos, it was batshit, and it was surreal.
From opposite sides of the bloodied hilltop, two titans strode through the mist. Fionn, High King of the Fianna—shoulders squared, body rimmed with battle-glow, and eyes fierce as the storm he’d walked through. And the man the myths and legends said was his son, Oisín.
Ward’s breath hitched. He didn’t need someone to point him out.
He knew. The warrior bore the same weight of power as his father.
He had the same carved-from-mountain presence.
His golden hair was matted with blood, streaked with ash, and war paint.
His blade still dripped red. But his face—his face was thunderstruck as if he were staring into the sun for the first time after lifetimes in the dark.
Neither man spoke that Ward could hear. Fionn dropped his weapon and crossed the last few feet with a gait that swallowed the ground whole.
Oisín moved the same way, reckless and unguarded, until they slammed together like warring gods.
Arms wrapped tight around shoulders thick with muscle, fists pounding backs with the force of celebration and sorrow all at once.
“Mo mhac,” Fionn bellowed, voice ragged, unashamed at the tears rolling down his cheeks. “My son!”
“Da!”
The sound tore from Oisín like a war cry dragged from the bottom of his soul, and Ward felt something wrench loose in his chest. They didn’t speak like men reunited after millennia.
They spoke like a torment had ended in their souls.
Like every moment of grief had collapsed under the weight of that single embrace.
Warriors lined the ridge around them, shouting, thumping weapons to shield rims, and raising fists to the sky as their King and Prince reunited in the middle of a battlefield.
It was primal and unapologetically epic—the likes of which Ward had never witnessed before.
Trace stood just off to the side, eyes rimmed red, but his chin lifted high. Bran was visible in his stance—proud, still, protective. His gaze locked on the two warriors and didn’t waver from the reunion playing out before their eyes. Behind him, Juice reached out, threading their fingers together.
Ward recognized a silent vow when he saw one, and he swallowed hard against the emotions rioting through him.
The rational part of his brain still insisted this couldn’t be real.
But the part of him that had seen the legends, heard the roars of gods reborn, and witnessed that raw, bloody battle?
That part whispered, It’s real—every gods-damned second of it.