Chapter 6
CHAPTER SIX
brEN
Ileft my car parked at the entrance of a dirt road that sheepherders used to get up the hillside just outside Killarney. My buddy Cormac climbed from the passenger seat as I stepped out, and we both looked up at the gray sky.
He glanced at me, humor sparkling in his dark eyes as we set off. “If we hurry, we might not get drenched. You wouldn’t want to ruin that nice coat.”
Managing a Veil breach hadn’t been my plan for the day, but when duty called, I answered.
I shot Cormac a sideways look, heavy with doubt as a light, misty rain fell upon us. “You didn’t have to accompany me.”
He scratched his dark beard and grinned. “You know I enjoy a good hunt.”
That he did.
We quickened our steps as we headed up the hill. “Want to bet a pint on the rain? If this is the worst we get, I’m buying.” It was a safe enough bet.
Cormac drew his beefy fingers through his damp hair. “You should buy anyway. It’s my birthday, and I’ll take a whiskey, thank you.”
I chuckled beneath my breath, realizing I’d walked into that one.
It was a rare occasion these days that Cormac could drag me out to the pub. But he was the one who always had my back. “Fine. We’ll have that birthday whiskey. You deserve it.”
The sky spat a heavier mist as we followed the road up the hillside, and his hopes that we wouldn’t get soaked were about as likely as finding a nun in a brothel. I didn’t mind the rain, but my suit jacket likely wouldn’t survive.
Cormac pointed toward the shimmer on the horizon. “Over there?”
I lifted my chin in answer. “You’re getting better at spotting the disturbances.”
“That I am.” He drew his brows. “Full breach, or just a tear in the Veil?”
“Something’s come through.” I’d hunted enough of them over the centuries to recognize the sharp pull of it. “Nothing too dangerous though.”
He heaved a sigh. “I was hoping for something bigger.”
At my raised brow, he grinned and changed the subject. “Wasn’t today the meeting with those assholes in Dublin? The Preservation Council, or whatever the hell they’re calling themselves these days.”
I’d waited months to gain an audience, and now this. I clenched my jaw in annoyance. “It was. Not that it would do me much good. Margaret’s set against giving me access to the castle, and she holds sway over the others.”
Cormac shrugged. “Maybe getting delayed is a good thing. A gift from the gods to give you more time to prepare.”
I scoffed. “If the gods cared about the Veil anymore, we wouldn’t be cleaning up their mess.”
He squinted one eye as he shook his head.
“That’s not entirely true, is it now? It might be that your father and others would prefer the Veil to fall so they could come and go as they pleased, but if none cared, it would have already evaporated.
The contract made centuries ago stands strong, even if some challenge it. ”
I scrubbed my face with my hands, wiping away the dampness from the light mist. The frustration remained. “Maybe it would be good if it did.”
My friend huffed. “You don’t mean that. All of this would be desecrated.”
“So? I’ve been fighting this gods-damned battle nearly my entire life.” I shot him a dark look. “On someone else’s terms.”
Cormac commiserated with a grimace. “That’s the curse of being a child of Selmira.” He reached over and clapped me on the back. “Your problem is you’re only focused on your work. You need to have more fun with what your blood affords you.”
I snorted. “What? Endless drinking and women?”
His gaze turned serious. “Christ, do you know how many men would give their left nut to have your charisma, to have women falling at their feet as if you’re a full-blooded god?”
His long whistle echoed over the green hills. “Pretty much all of us.”
I grunted in response. The argument was familiar and pointless. I understood his point of view. But he’d think differently if he walked in my boots. The only women who were indifferent to my charm were other demigods, and all they wanted was to use me for my power.
We turned to cross the uneven land toward the crumbling remains of a tower house. Long grass at my feet waved in the cool breeze as I searched for the exact spot of the tear and for whatever had slipped through it.
When I spotted the fracture, it stopped me in my tracks. “There.”
It ran like a hairline split through the air above the toppled boundary stone at the base of the tower, thin, almost elegant. A lesser guardian might have missed it.
I did not miss things.
I strode forward and opened my palm, allowing my stored moonlight to gather there, and then directed it toward the damaged seam in the air. The Veil resisted and then smoothed beneath the pressure like cooling glass.
Cormac reset the crossing’s boundary stone with steady hands. “I’d thought it might have been someone in the north letting things drift. Guess not.”
I crouched beside the cut piece of limestone, brushing my fingers over the images carved into it centuries ago. The symbols that marked the crossing hummed beneath my touch, faintly out of rhythm with the earth. “It’s a natural tear, caused by the Veil weakening over time.”
Cormac straightened and surveyed the area. “Do you see signs of what came through?”
I rose slowly, scanning upward over the stacked stones towering over us as my guardian blood prickled inside me. “Not yet. It may be just one.”
The breeze grew stronger, and I pushed my dark hair out of my face just as the rain increased. It wasn’t a downpour yet, but the scent of the sea on the wind told me we didn’t have long.
We skirted the edges of the castle tower, both of us on high alert. I spotted the distortion of heat over a stone a second before Cormac did. It coalesced into something almost shaped like a man. Its edges blurred, fed by the lingering residue of longing.
It was small and only appeared curious. Not dangerous. “A common wraith.”
Moonlight condensed along my forearm as I held it out, silver sharpening into a blade. I took a step forward, and the wraith recoiled, sensing structure where it preferred softness.
Cormac swore. “Wily little bastards.”
I didn’t strike its body but cut the anchor instead. My sword passed through the space beneath it, through the place where it fed. The distortion collapsed inward, unraveling like smoke.
Silence returned, except for the now even hum that only I could hear. The Veil smoothed, and my blade faded into nothing.
We made our way back toward my car. As we passed the boundary stone, Cormac caught my attention with a lift of his chin. “Third breach this month?”
“Fourth.”
“Christ. It was only two last month. Doesn’t that make you more suspicious of someone on this side of the Veil? What are the chances Doherty or one of his relations unleashed this beast?”
Maybe. My suspicion ran elsewhere.
I shrugged. “Him or Margaret. Maybe both. They’d already canceled our meeting once. They didn’t mind missing it today either.”
He grunted. “Maybe they caused this breach specifically to waylay you.”
It was likely. “They don’t want to hear me tell them they need to let me do my fucking job properly.”
Cormac lifted his chin in agreement. “Members of my pack talk of the rumors of a dark faction operating on our side of the Veil. I’d like to think none of the guardians are part of it and would turn traitor, but you never know, do you?”
A sudden wobbling of the Veil hit harder than anything I’d experienced. My guardian senses snapped back to high alert. “There’s—”
Before I could finish, a shock tore through the atmosphere, sudden and violent, a bowstring snapping across my chest.
I stilled.
Cormac felt it too. I saw it in the way his shoulders locked. “That wasn’t from here.”
I slowly shook my head. The strength of it led me to consider a Veil Sovereign.
But the energy was wrong. It was warmer. Human.
I swept the open valley with narrowed eyes, searching for the source, and kept my voice low. “The Veil thrums in response to someone powerful who’s just entered my territory.”
Not much caught Cormac off guard, but this did. “A person, you say?”
I nodded slowly as energy gathered at my fingertips. Their essence was odd. It didn’t push outward like something ready to attack.
It pulled.
“They’re strong,” Cormac said in a low voice. “Whoever it is.”
I forced my pulse to steady as I expanded my awareness, scanning for nearby corruption or distortion. There was nothing.
It was someone powerful. Someone unaccounted for.
“They’re currently in Killarney.” I kept my voice even. “Not far from the old castle and the clearing.”
His expression turned dark and determined. “That’s highly concerning. Especially when you’ve been prevented from reinforcing the castle’s crossing. We should go.”
I agreed with a single nod and strode toward my car, not wasting any time. Something powerful enough to ripple the Veil had entered my region. Something I could not categorize.
That unsettled me more than any breach.
Whoever it was, I would find them.
If they threatened the Veil—
I would end them.