31. SEARCHING FOR ANSWERS
The Trium had received orders to secure the other entry points and be on standby, while Niall and I addressed the problem at the northern gate.
Once we had returned, Niall summoned everyone back to The Keep’s meeting room, and they arrived without a moment’s delay, along with Silas, Morah, Maeson, and Nivelle.
Aremis was instantly at our sides. “What happened?”
“It was a woman,” I answered.
“A woman? Human?”
“No. She had rounded ears like one, but she had power. She got past the wards and The Veil.”
Beside me, Niall was breathing heavily through his nose. I placed my hand on his arm, and he lifted his eyes to mine. For the first time, I saw fear in them. Not fear for himself, but fear for me. Fear, because his wards hadn’t protected me, and therefore, he felt like he couldn’t protect me.
He looked at Aremis. “How is it possible that she bypassed the wards?”
Aremis seemed truly perplexed. His fingers fidgeted in the air as he searched for an explanation. “Old Magic, perhaps? She would have to be awfully powerful to break them that easily.”
“She’s not of this world. Old Magic would mean nothing to her.”
His second’s frown deepened. “How do you know she’s not from here?”
“I felt it.”
“What, exactly, did she do?” Roirdan asked.
“She grabbed Auren by the fucking throat, that’s what!” Niall shouted.
I flinched at his tone. So did Aremis. Roirdan balled his fist on the table, and both Remic’s and Silas’s wings flitted in agitation.
I pulled Niall to the nearest chair and forced him to sit. His arms slid around my waist, tugging me onto his lap, but he remained staring straight ahead, focused on the shadows across the room, jaw clenched with anxiety.
“She said her name was Skadi,” I announced.
Nivelle became gravely still. “What did you just say?”
“Skadi. That was the name she gave.”
Nivelle shook her head, her skin blanching paler than normal. Worry bled into her features as she glanced over at Silas. “That’s impossible.”
“Who is she?” Niall bellowed.
Silas stepped forward, dragging a chair away from the table and flipping it around to sit on. “Torin’s sister—a goddess of Skotos. The goddess of shadow.”
“What the hell is she doing here?” Aremis asked.
“She should not be here,” Nivelle said. “It isn’t possible, unless . . .” Her eyes widened. “Someone figured it out.”
Silas weighed her words.
“Figured what out?” Niall growled at the witch.
“How to open portals. Skadi is no witch. She cannot use spells or open portals the way that we can, but . . . there were witches who defected to her forces. Though, they would have gone to eternal rest long ago . . . Their offspring could have found a way.”
“Someone must have succeeded if the goddess is here, in the flesh,” Aremis said, grimly.
Morah stepped closer to the table, eyes fixed on Nivelle. “Witches can open portals?”
“A very powerful witch can open small ones. It takes a great deal of power, and it is only reliable for short distances. Opening a portal off-world would kill any witch who tried—it would require too much power. Torin was only able to bridge a portal of that magnitude because she is a goddess. Her wealth of power made it possible.”
“Skadi would have had to sacrifice many of Torin’s witches to be able to achieve that same feat,” Silas concluded.
Nivelle’s lip curled in a snarl. “That murderous monster!” A pulse of blue light rocketed through the room as she clenched her fists at her sides.
“They had it coming, Velle,” Silas said. “They chose to abandon their own kind.”
“I don’t care,” she hissed. “They were good, once.”
“Before they were corrupted by Skadi’s evil.”
“But they were good! Why must the gods allow such evil to even exist?”
That was the question all of us had been asking our entire lives.
The room remained quiet for a long moment, until Aremis spoke. “If she was coming from The Wastelands, it’s safe to say she’s found Lyceius, or he has found her. And if he sent her, she was likely here to confirm that Auren is in Calledan, and that she has powers.”
Remic stepped up to the table, laying his palms flat on the stone surface. “If the two have somehow joined forces, we have a much bigger problem on our hands.”
“Well, fuck,” Roirdan said, scrubbing a hand over his scruffy cheeks.
“But her interest in me seemed secondary compared to Niall,” I said, thinking back to how Skadi had looked at my mate like he had stolen something from her.
“What do you mean?” Aremis asked.
“The moment she saw his power, she knew exactly what it was, and she said she was going to take it from him.”
Nivelle crossed her arms. “I told you that I sensed his power was not of this world. It has an essence of the one we come from—my blood recognizes it. And if that is indeed true, it would only be natural that Skadi is drawn to it.”
“But how is that even possible? It makes no sense.” I was becoming even more frustrated by the fact that we knew nothing of Niall’s power, or its origins, and no one had the answers we needed.
No one . . . except for—possibly—the wraith. And even that was a gamble.
Maeson broke the silence from where she had been standing. “Regardless of who she is, whatever power she possesses was no match for the wards. We all felt her trying to bring them down, but they remained.”
Niall shook his head. “That wasn’t her. Those were the creatures that had come before her to test the integrity of our defenses.”
“Could she have broken through if she’d been given the chance to?” Morah asked.
“The wards were infused long ago with a very powerful form of Old Magic. They cannot be easily broken. She may have pushed a shadow through it, but her body never crossed the barrier. I think, if she thought she could have crossed, she would have tried.”
Aremis drummed his fingers on the wooden table. “Be that as it may, I don’t think we’ve seen the last of Skadi.”
Niall tilted his head, as if recalling a memory. Then, he said, “That was the presence I felt a few weeks ago. It looked like a dark storm of shadows over Salterra. It was her.”
I remembered what he spoke of. The shadowed mass that had churned on itself as it tore across the horizon over The Wastelands, then disappeared as quickly as it came. “Do you think that was her . . . arrival?”
“Could have been. Or, it could have been the two of them preparing for something.”
Skadi . . . and Lyceius.
Niall worked his jaw, deep in thought. “Nivelle,” he said, “do not speak a word of this to Torin.”
The witch narrowed her gaze at him. “I wasn’t planning on it . . . but, why?”
“Because if she knows her sister is here, she may very well abandon her plan to help us.”
“But she made a bargain.”
“She’s a goddess. Do you really think she’s going to uphold a bargain with a fae for some land in the mountains, when her sister, who wages war in her wake, has found a way to show up here?”
“The gods are bound to honor bargains just as we are.”
Niall considered that for a moment, then said, “Regardless, Skadi’s arrival stays between us, for now. Until we figure this out.”
Nivelle dipped her head in agreement.
Roirdan leaned forward and met Niall’s stare. “Say the word, and I’ll have the army on standby immediately.”
“Do it,” Niall answered. “I want a patrol at the northern gate indefinitely. Remic, see to it that we are alerted to any movement in The Wastelands. If a bird flies in the wrong fucking direction, I want to know about it. Aremis, Nivelle, Auren, we’re headed east—now.
Silas, I need you here, guarding The Keep and watching out for Maeson, Morah, and Fallon while we’re gone. We’ll be back before nightfall.”
Everyone nodded.
We needed answers.
If the wraith truly existed, all that we could do was pray she had the information we sought . . . and was willing to give it up without consequence.