Chapter Thirty-Seven
Daegal left, Setreg carried Brendan away, and Remy started propelling me toward the exit. I thought that signaled the end of the ball, but the other guests remained, many of them talking in hushed tones as they stared after us.
“Take care of the humans,” Remy said to Jessica. “I don’t need them remembering the last twenty minutes.”
She only nodded like that wasn’t a very odd directive.
I would’ve asked what he meant, but I was still mystically gagged. I glared at Remy as we left the ballroom, but then I was distracted by a sparkling fog that rose up around us.
“Don’t breathe once it reaches your face,” Remy warned me, his steps quickening. “It’ll erase your memory of everything that happened over the past twenty minutes.”
I took in a deep breath, since the fog was only at hip height now. Then I held it as Remy and I hurried past the grand staircase and the main hall. By the time we reached the side exit toward the front, the fog was over my head.
We exited through the side door. Once outside, I took in several breaths. Mandal already had the Rolls-Royce pulled up. Setreg was in the front seat and Brendan—still unconscious—was in the back. We ducked into the back, too, and Mandal drove off.
That tingling sensation left my mouth once we were away from the Cipriani. “What the fuck?” were my first words, followed by, “Don’t you ever do that to me again!”
“I had to,” he said coolly. “You were going to out yourself as a Beast, and that would have made tonight even worse.”
“Not when it would have voided the contract I didn’t realize I activated when I healed Brendan’s mind,” I countered. “Did you know about that? No, you couldn’t,” I answered my own question. “Or you never would have made that deal where you traded your power for my trying to heal your grandfather.”
“I didn’t think you’d try it without me,” he gritted out.
“And I didn’t think it mattered if you were there, because we’d already agreed to it!
I didn’t know that it had worked, either.
Brendan was the same when I left him earlier today.
” My voice suddenly softened. “I know you don’t want people to find out what I am, and I understand a lot more about the very real dangers if they did.
But now your lands are on the line. Proving I’m the Beast who healed Brendan’s mind when I’m not the same one Daegal gave Juli means their contract isn’t fulfilled—”
“But it is,” Remy interrupted.
“No,” I breathed out. I’d immediately rejected Daegal’s assertion that this Beast was all that was left of the original ones. Now, Remy seemed to be confirming that, and I still didn’t want to believe it. “Tell me I’m not carrying the same Beast that Daegal delivered to Juli all those decades ago!”
Remy merely took my hand. That was answer enough.
I snatched it back. “How can you touch me when the thing inside me murdered your grandmother!”
And mine, and my mother, too. This Beast had wiped out most of my and Remy’s immediate families in addition to countless other people. Now it was causing Remy to lose his lands, too?
“I knew which Beast it was the moment I saw it.” Remy’s gaze was unflinching. “I was there the day Juli died.”
Right, that’s when he heard her prophecy about him “keeping the cage” that held the Beast. I’d thought Juli had meant any Beast. I hadn’t realized she’d been very, very specific.
“Are you sure?” I asked, grasping at straws. “If you only glimpsed the Beast for a second, it might have been a different one. Beasts probably look very similar—”
“They don’t,” Remy interrupted. “Especially ones that came from the original summonings. As Daegal said, there are almost none left. I killed the only other one I found, so I know that they’re much darker than the newly summoned ones.
I also got a good look at your particular Beast decades ago when I had to fight it off to keep its claws from turning Juli into ashes.
Then I tried to save her instead of finishing that battle, which is how it got away. ”
No wonder it had been so pissed when Remy trapped it that day at his hotel. The Beast must have recognized him, too.
“It tried to kill you twice,” I whispered. “It’ll try a third time, too, if it ever gets out near you. How can you stand to have me in the same room with you, let alone anything else?”
“Because you are not it.” Remy’s voice was whiplike.
“Knowing which Beast it was only made me respect you more. It’s harder to control one of the originally summoned beithíochs.
They’re much more powerful. The newer ones might excel at violence and brute strength, but they fail at sensing other Beasts, consuming life forces, and the power to heal.
You bent an original Beast to your will, and it’s that unbreakable spirit I see when I look at you, Raine. Not anything else.”
Brendan’s groan cut off the sudden urge I had to throw my arms around Remy. I didn’t know how he could so thoroughly separate me from the monster inside me. I hadn’t even been able to do that yet. One day maybe I would, but it wasn’t today.
“My head,” Brendan groaned, holding it as he sat up.
“Sorry about that,” Remy said, helping him into the seat. I scooted over, giving them more room.
Brendan gave Remy a baleful look. “You’re not sorry.” Even his voice was completely different; a commanding baritone instead of his former tremulous cadence. “But I’m still your grandfather, so if you do anything like that again, I know spells that will put you in hard time-out for over a year.”
Remy’s laugh ended in a harsh sound. “How I’ve missed you.”
Brendan held Remy to him in a tight hug. “I saw, lad.” Now his Irish accent was thicker from emotion. “Everything you did for me, all the ways you protected me … all these years, I saw.”
I choked back a sob. I’d give anything to have my mom or grandmother back like this. I hoped it didn’t end up costing Remy his territories, but if it did, and it was me, I’d consider the price a bargain.
“I had no idea you were still in there.” Remy’s voice was ragged.
“Everyone said that what you did was irreparable. If I’d known you were trapped inside your own mind, watching us…
” Remy drew back. His eyes were very bright.
“Nani knew, didn’t she? We thought her denials were caused by grief, but she knew. ”
Brendan gave a short, sharp nod. “After she used a new beithíoch’s blood trying to heal me, for a minute, I was myself again. Then my spell overcame it, and I was lost once more. But in that brief minute, she knew that I was still in there.”
Remy let out a harsh laugh. “That’s why she went to such extremes, including her bargain to get an original Beast. They can heal, while the newly summoned ones can’t.”
Brendan let Remy go with a final pat. “Yes, but an original beithíoch’s host must want to wield that power. Their blood alone isn’t enough if magic is trying to overcome magic, nor is their will alone sufficient when it’s magic versus magic.”
Remy looked at me. “That’s why your blood didn’t immediately break the blocking spell that was keeping me from finding Ellie.
But you willed it to work, didn’t you? I saw your face when it failed.
You were so stricken, you held on to the kettle for support, and that kettle was covered in your blood. ”
Wow, he was right. I’d gripped the kettle and thought that we needed the spell to work right now. And then it did.…
Brendan grunted. “Blood, magic, and will. Those three were behind the creation of the original beithíochs. Only when all three are present can an original beithíoch’s full power be utilized.
Juli was very clever to figure that out.
It wasn’t in any of the ancient scrolls, probably because none of the original hosts were interested in anything beyond having more power to kill. ”
They were both silent a minute, remembering the woman who’d meant so much to them. Then Brendan turned to me.
“Thank you, lass. When we met and you used the beithíoch’s power to mend me, I knew I finally had a chance. When did you figure out that you also needed blood and will to fully heal my mind?”
“I didn’t,” I said softly. “My hands were cut up from something else. That’s why my blood was on them when I tried to heal you again today.”
Brendan let out a bark of laughter. “All the knowledge in the world can’t compare to luck sometimes. This truth has humbled Records Keepers for generations.”
“Yes, you were a Records Keeper for six centuries,” Remy said. “And you cast that spell after Daegal’s people kidnapped you. What was Daegal trying to learn that was so damaging you gave yourself a magical lobotomy to keep him from discovering it?”
“I,” Brendan began, and then stopped, rubbing his head as if a migraine had suddenly come on.
“What’s wrong?” Remy asked at once.
I snapped into nursing mode, checking Brendan’s face for any sudden drooping on one side. Nothing, good. Now … “Brendan, do you feel any numbness or tingling?”
He dropped his hands to give me a wry look. “I’m not having a stroke. I’m frustrated. The spell I cast fried away parts of my memory entirely. I know there’s something on Juli’s lands that Daegal wants, but I don’t remember what it is.”
Remy’s exhale came through a clenched jaw. “Do you happen to remember where it is?”
After a moment, Brendan shook his head. “I must have been thinking of it when I enacted the spell. It’s meant to eradicate whatever’s in the forefront of your mind, and to bury the rest beneath your reach. That’s why it’s so powerful, and so rarely used.”
Remy growled with his own frustration. The sound scratched against my skin like a graze of claws. “Whatever Daegal wants must be very powerful, too. And ancient. Otherwise, Juli would’ve known what it was, and told me about it when she warned me that Daegal would be coming for our lands.”
Brendan took Remy’s hand. “As Records Keeper, there were many things I couldn’t tell Juli, but I must have hinted at this one.
She wouldn’t have done what she did to you otherwise.
It was wrong of her, but she needed you to be strong enough to hold Daegal off so he never gets whatever is hidden on your lands. ”
Remy’s jaw flexed and his gaze hardened. This was clearly a touchy subject. Maybe Brendan was referring to how Juli forced Remy to become the new Warden. If so, no wonder Remy looked upset. That had been a terrible betrayal of Remy’s free will, no matter how noble Juli’s intentions.
“What’s done is done” was all Remy said.
I’d been holding off because this was the first real moment Remy had had with his grandfather in over sixty years, but I couldn’t wait any longer. “What is clause ninety-two?”
“Is this something I missed?” Setreg asked. That’s right, he’d been busy hustling Brendan out of the ballroom when Remy found that clause and demanded its enforcement.
Brendan stared at Remy. “Is that what I think it is?”
“Yes,” Remy said flatly.
Brendan sighed. “See? I told you that’s why Juli did it. You wouldn’t stand a chance against Daegal otherwise.”
My temper flared. “What is the damn clause already? And if you even think of lying to me, Remington Byrne, I’ll find a spell for the world’s most scorching case of hemorrhoids and use my freaky ‘blood and will’ abilities to give them to you!”
Both Remy’s brows shot up.
Brendan laughed. “No wonder you like her. Juli could be vicious, too, when the circumstances warranted it.”
“Clause ninety-two,” I repeated.
“It’s the right to contest the entire contract via trial by combat,” he replied.
I knew what that meant. I just didn’t want to believe it. Still, nothing else made sense with Daegal’s ominous parting comment. “You and Daegal will fight to the death over who gets your lands?”
Setreg whistled. “Juli was clever, indeed. Are you permitted to have a second in this combat?”
Remy met his gaze. “The clause requires seconds.”
Setreg’s smile bloomed across his face. “Then I insist.”
“And I accept,” Remy said with a smaller, harder smile. “You’re one of the few who knows what needs to be done.”
Oh, I knew, too. He’d try to hit Daegal with the Flay spell.
It had killed over half a dozen dragons in one shot, so it should be strong enough to take out Big Daddy Dragon, too.
But Remy had needed a few minutes to cast that spell, and Daegal wasn’t going to sit back and give him those minutes.
Setreg also had to be far enough away to not get torn inside out, too.
And all that was only if Daegal didn’t kill them both first.
“We’re here,” Mandal said, speaking for the first time since we’d gotten into the Rolls.
I looked out the tinted windows. We were back at Remy’s New York City hotel. Valets rushed to open the car’s doors. I hit the Lock button before they could touch the handles.
“Wait,” I said. “You’re his chief advisor, Mandal.
I can’t be the only one thinking that if Remy dies, Daegal still gets his lands, and then no one’s left to stop him from finding and using this secret object.
Don’t you think the better option is for Remy to forgo clause ninety-two and live to fight another day?
There has to be some other way for him to get his lands back. ”
“Even if I did think that,” Mandal said with a sigh, “Remy won’t withdraw his challenge. His mind is made up.”
“It is,” Remy said, staring at me.
I unlocked the doors and got out before the valet could open my door. Then I strode toward the hotel. I wanted to walk right by it and keep going until I walked off some of my fury, but this gothic ball gown with its sweeping skirt and platinum bodice was already drawing too many stares.
My teeth ground as I felt a hand on my elbow. Remy had snuck up on me faster and quieter than my own shadow.
“Good luck, lad,” I heard Brendan say from behind us.
Oh, Remy didn’t need luck. He needed to look at this situation without the arrogance, pride, or recklessness that made him want to continue on this deadly course.
Mandal might think Remy’s mind was made up, but I had twenty-four hours to change it, and I was damn sure going to try.