Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
By the time the road crested the final hill, Ward wasn’t sure if his spine would ever be the same again.
His teeth had rattled for the last mile, his ass was numb from the hard edge of the chariot, and his fingers ached from gripping the side rail so tightly.
But when they rolled past the last rise and the fortress came into view, the breath caught in his throat like he’d been punched.
Dún Fianna wasn’t ruins or some half-collapsed hillfort like he’d studied in books or excavated in frozen mud with aching knees. It was alive, whole, and real in a way nothing ever had been before.
The outer wall reared high with stacked stone and ancient mortar fused by time and magic.
Carved into the face of every boulder were swirling glyphs that shimmered faintly under the dying light, as if someone had etched the stars themselves into the rock.
Vines crawled across the surface, blooming with bluebells and primroses larger than he’d ever seen before.
Torches burned along the ramparts—not orange, not yellow, but a searing blue-gold that made the shadows dance in colors that didn’t exist in the real world.
There were guards at the gates. Dozens and dozens of warriors.
They stood in two flanking columns, armored in boiled leather and bronze, spears held upright, and their helms decorated with feathers, boar tusks, and carved antlers.
They didn’t move—not even when the chariots thundered through.
Not even when the horses screamed and reared in the churned earth.
They were like statues carved out of stone.
Above the gate hung three banners, each worn and fraying but proud.
He recognized the symbols immediately. The Triskele.
The Hound. The Stag. Symbols of the Fianna clans, ancient houses that had only ever existed in myth.
To see them waving in real wind over a living fortress—it nearly short-circuited his brain.
“I’m dreaming,” he whispered, not sure if he meant it anymore.
Viper, who stood braced beside him with one arm casually looped around the chariot rail like they weren’t riding through a myth, glanced down. “You keep saying that. Might be time to accept the dream isn’t ending.”
Ward didn’t answer. There weren’t words to explain what was running through his mind when the gates opened without a sound, revealing a courtyard lit by floating torches and stone braziers carved into the shape of hounds.
Warriors spilled into the yard, shouting greetings, pounding shields, and laughing like a good battle was the best part of their week.
In the center of it all, rising above the keep’s inner wall, was a massive tower carved into the mountainside itself—each level banded in more glyphs, each window glowing from within with a pale golden light that pulsed in time with the heartbeat of the land itself.
Tír na nóg wasn’t a fantasy story anymore.
It was stone, fire, and legendary warriors of old.
It was carved history and living myth, and they were riding on a chariot through the gates of the only fortress ever built to house the legend that was Fionn Mac Cumhaill, the high king of the Fianna.
God help him… it was beautiful, terrifying, and far too real.
The moment Fionn dismounted, the world seemed to tilt.
It wasn’t the chariots slowing or the shock still ringing in Ward’s bones.
It was the way the warriors of Dún Fianna moved.
One by one, they dropped to a knee like their souls demanded it.
Their fists slammed to their chests in a rhythmic thump that echoed off stone and sky alike.
Not a single one looked away. Their eyes stayed locked on Fionn like he was the rising sun after a century of darkness.
Ward had never seen anything like it. Not even in military ceremonies he’d seen on TV, back home.
This was reverence stripped bare of pretense—worship born of blood oaths and bone-deep memories.
Not one man cried out. Not one voice shouted.
It was silent except for the sound of fists to heart, the crackling of those otherworldly blue-gold flames, and the low rumble of the wind wrapping around the stones like it too remembered the name of Fionn mac Cumhaill.
Oisín stayed atop his warhorse, flanked by a handful of others, his expression fierce and unreadable.
But when Fionn lifted a hand to him, Oisín moved.
He swung down in a fluid dismount that belied his size, stalked forward three steps, then dropped to one knee and pressed his forehead to his father’s.
No words were needed, and Ward sucked in a breath as if he’d heard the thunder roll and was counting the seconds to see when the lightning would flash to judge how distant the storm descending from the heavens was from him.
Then the chant began. It rolled from the warriors in waves, a low, harmonic pulse of syllables older than Ireland itself.
The cadence rose and fell like the tide, filled with longing, with triumph, and with the unshakeable truth of their king returned.
Ward didn’t understand the words, not fully.
But he felt them. They vibrated in his chest, curled around his ribs, and sank into the marrow of his bones.
“Mac an Rí… Cloch an Fhírinne… An Fhuil a d’Fhág Rún…”
The Son of the King… Stone of Truth… The Blood that Left a Secret.
Fionn stood among them, neither grandstanding nor posing—but simply being, and that, Ward realized, was the most enthralling thing of all. Fionn didn’t have to try. He was a legend by existence alone.
A child, with wild curls and a tunic too large for his tiny body, no older than six or seven, darted forward from the crowd.
He skidded to a halt in front of Fionn, and his tiny hand trembled as he offered a sprig of what looked like wild heather.
Fionn crouched down, took the sprig with both hands, and bowed his head in gratitude.
The people erupted with cheers, and drums pounded from somewhere unseen. Horns sang from the ramparts. Smoke spiraled upward from the great hearths. The gates thundered shut behind them with a boom that felt like a heartbeat. Dún Fianna had its king back.
Every archeologist on the planet would sell their soul to be here to witness this.
He didn’t realize he’d moved until his boots hit the ancient stone underfoot.
The air inside the fortress tasted different—richer, heavier, like it had soaked up the breath of every warrior who’d ever walked these halls and now whispered their stories to the walls themselves.
Everything pulsed with the memories of the warriors who had lived there for thousands of years.
Ward found it pressed against his shoulders and hummed through his soul.
The inner courtyard unfolded in layers of impossible beauty.
Stone towers curved in seamless spirals.
Their surfaces were carved in a language older than Ogham, and each rune glowed faintly as they passed.
Ropes of silver moss dangled from high beams. The walls had no mortar, yet the stones held tight, wrapped with intricate knots of sigils and symbols Ward had only ever seen faded and half-buried in tombs.
Even the symbols look like they’re alive.
His gaze bounced from feature to feature.
He didn’t know what to focus on first. He craved seeing everything, absorbing it all, soaking it in.
To his left, warriors stripped off their armor and laid it reverently across ironwood racks, chanting softly under their breath.
He caught flashes of tattoos glowing faintly blue beneath their sweat-slick skin.
Not one of them looked shaken by battle.
They looked ready to do it all again. Hell, some looked like they missed it already.
Ahead, a long hall stretched between two towers, framed in thick timber and bones, bigger than any he’d seen on a modern-day animal.
Rib bones as tall as a man curved overhead in a macabre arch, lashed together with sinew and runes.
The centerpiece was an iron-banded, double-width door, carved in the image of a stag’s head crowned with vines, its antlers curling across both doors like an oak tree.
It’s a fucking cathedral to war and nature all at once.
Viper walked beside him in silence, his gaze sharp.
Based on what he’d seen of the man so far, he was probably cataloguing threats, exits, formations—the soldier in him unable to shut itself off.
The tattoos on his neck shimmered faintly, as if the very air inside the fortress was breathing power into them.
Ward wanted to ask if he felt it too, but the words were caught in the net of his awe.
Bran loped ahead in wolf form, tail high, sniffing at the doorway before circling back to Juice with a low chuff that felt more like approval than anything else.
A different chant started, this one was lighter, rhythmic, almost playful, and the crowd parted. Two older warriors stepped forward, each carrying a banner woven in deep navy and bronze. Ward didn’t recognize the sigils, but the way Fionn paused for a heartbeat told him they were important.
Family. Clans. Maybe both.
The banners dipped low, and the warriors dropped to one knee again. Behind them, the rest of the stronghold’s residents echoed the movement like a single body.
Ward and Viper glanced at each other. He’d never seen power like this, and if Ward had to guess, he didn’t think Viper had either.
Fionn didn’t wave or grandstand. He lifted one hand, laid it on his chest, and whispered something Ward couldn’t hear—but whatever it was, it made every man and woman in Dún Fianna rise in unison like a tide on command.
The king had come home, and their world was already beginning to shift around him.