The knock on the door made her jump, but as Bollocks just wagged, she had to assume friend not foe. She went back in, closing the terrace doors behind her.
“It’s Tarryn.”
Relieved, Breen hurried to unlock and open the main door. Tarryn stepped in, then simply folded Breen into a hug.
“I came to see for myself you’re not harmed.”
“No, I’m not. Jittery—shaken up a little—that’s all.”
“Sure and who wouldn’t be—jittery. I like the word.” She closed the door, drew Breen to a chair.
“Marco?”
“I told him I’d check on you myself, and report back to him. Not all know, but as Brian’s been called into the search … We’ll have some wine. You had little, as we kept you busy dancing.”
She poured two cups, then sat. “And to speak truth, I’m bolstering myself, as when I leave you I have to go to Shana’s parents. They need to know of this before the rest. And this will break their hearts so they’ll never again, never again be mended.”
“It’s so hard for you.”
“Duty often is. And I’ll tell you now, as I’m sick in my heart, I’m asking myself if I could have done or said something at the right time, in the right way, to stop all of this.”
“She made her choice. Isn’t choice the core of Talamh?”
“It is, aye, it is. I’m so fond of her parents, but I never had fondness for their child. She used her beauty, she used their love, used the loyalty of a dear heart like Kiara’s, the love of Loren, and so many others. In small ways, in small, selfish ways. And when she caught Keegan’s eye as well—she has beauty and charm and wit—I worried. Not that his heart was in danger.”
She sat back, sipped wine. “I worried because I could see what she wanted—not him, I could have softened toward her if she’d loved him. But it was what he is, not who, she wanted. And I worried what she would do when she understood, at last, he would never give her what she wanted.”
Tarryn squeezed her eyes shut. “But even then I never thought this. I thought of tantrums and hard words, some scheming to gain some power on the council. I thought of that, but never this. And I think I never thought of it because I disliked her, and saw myself with that bias.”
“I don’t know her, but I don’t think … The love potion, I can see her holding that as a kind of last resort. But the rest—what she did to Kiara, what she tried to do tonight? That came from rage, impulse, fury, not planning.”
“She would have taken your life tonight. And so there’s no coming back for her, as the judgment’s clear. There was hope before. Loren, and she deceived him, stole from him, used him to try to bind Keegan to her—he asked Keegan to allow him to take Shana away. To ban her from the Capital, and let him take her away.”
“Yes, Minga told me.”
“Keegan agreed to that, and would have persuaded the council. She could have had a life with a man who loved her. A different life, aye, than she wanted, but a life where in time she might have been content. And now, when she’s found, she’ll be cast from Talamh to the Dark World. And my son will carry that weight.”
Now Tarryn leaned forward, reached out to take one of Breen’s hands. “You’re the key in the lock, Breen Siobhan. The bridge, the shield. She would have cut you down. Taking a life, any life, would have damned her. But taking yours, if she’d succeeded, could have damned us all. There is no one in Talamh who would give her shelter.”
“Where would she go? I was trying to think where I’d go in her place. The Welcoming Tree?”
Tarryn nodded. “It’ll be guarded and well. And the falls.”
“The falls? That leads to …”
“Aye, to Odran. We take no chances. I can only hope they find her quickly, and before she harms another.” She set the cup aside. “Should I send someone to keep you company?”
“Thanks, no. We’re fine.”
Tarryn smiled down at Bollocks, stroked the head he’d propped on her knee to comfort her. “You are well guarded, no doubt, by such a brave heart, and you’re safer here than anywhere in Talamh. That helps keep Keegan’s mind clear while he deals with this.”
She rose. “Try to rest. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Alone, Breen sat by the fire and began to search the flames. Maybe she’d see, though as yet she’d been unable to call a vision, only see what came when it came.
But she sat, as Bollocks curled loyally at her feet, and tried to look through the smoke and flames to the heart. Nothing cleared for her, and she wished she had her globe, that she’d thought to send for it.
And remembered how once Keegan had shown her how to transport something as simple as a glass of water.
So she visualized the globe sitting now beside her bed. The size of it, the shape, the weight, the colors. How smooth it was in her hand, how worlds shifted inside it.
She imagined its path to her, through stone and wood and air.
And cupping her hands, she called it to her, let the power inside her rise, spread, reach.
“I am Breen Siobhan O’Ceallaigh,” she heard herself say. “I am child of Fey and man and god. I am my gift, and my gift is I. Now I use it for the light.”
She felt it burst, so strong, so hot, so bright.
A violence in it, as something turned in her, as for a moment, just a moment, she no longer sat in the chair, in the tower, in the castle.
A fury and a purpose, a striking out.
For an instant she stood somewhere else, with water drumming onto water, with chants and screams pounding in her ears.
For an instant her eyes met Odran’s.
Then she stood in front of the fire, in the tower, in the castle with the aftershocks of power coursing through her.
And in the firelight, with the candles flickering, she held the globe in her cupped hands.
“Was that the same as before? Was it then or now or not yet? God, my blood’s on fire. And it feels … right.”
She looked down at the globe, saw her hands held steady. “What does it mean that I can do this, and feel I’ve crossed some bridge or boundary, scaled some wall?”
It left her breathless and thrilled and triumphant.
She lifted the globe, watched the firelight play over it, watched the glow from the candles, from the lamps swirl into it.
“Show me what I need to see.”
And she saw, in those depths, a figure running through shadows, through forest shadows that shifted and swirled like water.
Shana.
But that shifted, changed, and the figure she saw running was a child. A faerie, for she saw wings, just the blur of them fluttering.
Very deliberately, Breen focused, looked deeper.
A child, a girl. Of the Sidhe. Naked.
The child from the waterfall. The sacrifice. Odran’s side—where, somehow, she herself had just been.
She wanted to push herself into the globe, push herself into that world again, to the child. The child, she saw now, shivering with cold and shock as she ran, as her wings lifted her up a few inches off the path.
Dilly. Her name was Dilly. She was only six.
“This is happening now. It’s all happening now.” She was as certain of it as anything she’d ever known. “And I was there, even though I was standing right here, I was there to stop the knife, to break the chains holding the girl. How did I do it, and why can’t I get back and help her?”
As she tried to clear her mind again, bring back what had flooded into her, she saw the cat.
The silver cat streaked across the child’s path, so she stumbled to a halt, breath heaving, eyes glassy with fear. Then he became a man, and Sedric brought a finger to his lips. He laid the other on his heart as he crouched down.
When he opened his arms, the girl fell into them, and holding her close, laying a kiss on her tangled hair, he slid into the shadows.