The Morrigan tilted her head at me. “You would truly offer arms against him on this plane?”
“Aye, I am resolved.” I wasn’t. But the Morrigan is not renowned for her bullshit detection. She is more renowned for whimsical slaughter and recreational torture.
The Morrigan sighed. “I think it smacks of foolishness more than courage, but so be it. Let me see this amulet, then, your so-called defense.”
“Gladly. Would you mind clothing yourself, however, so that we may avoid any further shocks to mortal eyes?”
The Morrigan smirked. She was not only built like a Victoria’s Secret model, but the sun streaming through the windows lit up her smooth, flawless skin, which was white as confectioner’s sugar. “It is only this prudish age that makes a vice of nudity. But perhaps it is wiser to bow to local custom for now.” She made a gesture, and a black robe materialized to cloak her form. I smiled my gratitude and picked up my amulet from the counter.
It would perhaps be more accurate to describe it as a charm necklace—not charms like you will find on a Tiffany bracelet, but charms that will quickly execute spells for me that otherwise would take a long time to cast. It took me 750 years to complete the necklace, because it was built around a cold iron amulet in the center designed to protect me against the Fae and other magic users. Aenghus Óg’s constant attempts to kill me had made it necessary. I had bound the amulet to my aura, an excruciating process of my own devising but worth every second in the end. To any of the lesser Fae, it made me an invincible badass, because as beings of pure magic, they cannot abide iron in any form: Iron is the antithesis of magic, which is why magic largely died on this world with the advent of the Iron Age. It had taken me 300 years to bind the amulet to my aura, providing me with tremendous protection and a literal Fist of Death whenever I touched one of the Fae; the remaining 450 were spent constructing the charms and finding a way to make my magic work in such close proximity to the iron and my newly tainted aura.
The problem with the Tuatha Dé Danann was that they were not beings of pure magic, like their descendants born in the land of Faerie: They were beings of this world, who merely used magic better than anyone else, and the Irish had long ago elevated them to gods. So the iron bars around my shop would not bother the Morrigan or any of her kin, and neither would my aura do them any damage. All the iron did was even the odds a bit so that their magic would not overwhelm me: They had to stoop to physical attack if they wished to do me any harm.
That, more than anything else, was the reason I was still breathing. The Morrigan aside, the Tuatha Dé Danann were loath to subject themselves to physical combat, because they were as vulnerable as I to a well-timed sword thrust. Through magic they had prolonged their lives for millennia (just as I had staved off the ravages of aging), but violence could bring an end to them, as it had to Lugh and Nuada and others of their kind. It made them prone to use assassins and poisons and other forms of cowardly attack when their magic would not suffice, and Aenghus Óg had tried most of them already on me.
“Remarkable,” the Morrigan said, fingering the amulet and shaking her head.
“It’s not a universal defense,” I pointed out, “but it’s pretty good, if I do say so myself.”
She looked up at me. “How did you do it?”
I shrugged. “Mostly patience. Iron can be bent to your will, if your will is stronger than the iron. But it is a slow, laborious process of centuries, and you need the help of an elemental.”
“What happens to it when you change your shape?”
“It shrinks or grows to an appropriate size. It was the first thing I learned how to do with it.”
“I have never seen its like.” The Morrigan frowned. “Who taught you this magic?”
“No one. It is my own original craft.”
“Then you will teach me this craft, Druid.” It was not a request.
I did not respond right away but rather looked down at the necklace and grasped a single one of the charms. It was a silver square stamped in bas relief with the likeness of a sea otter, and I held it up for the Morrigan’s inspection.
“This charm, when activated, allows me to breathe underwater and swim like I was native unto the element. It works in conjunction with the iron amulet here in the center, which protects me from the wiles of selkies, sirens, and the like. It makes me second only to Manannan Mac Lir in the sea, and it took me more than two hundred years to perfect it. And that is just one of the many valuable charms on this necklace. What do you offer me in exchange for this knowledge?”
“Your continued existence,” the Morrigan spat.
I thought she would say something like that. The Morrigan has never been noted for her diplomacy.
“That is a good beginning for negotiations,” I replied. “Shall we formalize it? I will teach you this new Druidry, painstakingly formulated over centuries of trial and error, in exchange for your eternal ignorance of my mortality—in other words, you will not take me, ever.”
“You are asking for true immortality.”
“And for this you receive magic that will make you supreme amongst the Tuatha Dé Danann.”
“I am already supreme, Druid,” she growled.
“Some of your cousins may beg to differ,” I replied, thinking of the goddess Brighid, who currently ruled in Tír na nÓg as First among the Fae. “In any case, regardless of your decision, you have my word, freely given, that I will not teach this magic to any of them under any inducement.”
“Fairly spoken,” she said after a pause, and I began breathing again. “Very well. You will teach me how each charm on this necklace was achieved under the terms you described and how you bound the iron to your aura, and I will let you live forever.”
Smiling, I told her to find a lump of cold iron to use as her amulet and then we could begin.
“You should still fly from here now,” she told me when we had sealed the bargain. “Just because I will never take you does not mean you are safe from other gods of death. If Aenghus defeats you, one of them will come eventually.”
“Let me worry about Aenghus,” I said. Worrying about him was my specialty. If love and hate were two sides of the same coin, Aenghus spent an awful lot of time on the hate side for a god of love—especially where I was concerned. I also had to worry about the effects of aging, and if I lost a limb, it wasn’t going to grow back. Being immortal did not make me invincible. Look at what the Bacchants did to that poor Orpheus fella.
“Done,” the Morrigan replied. “But beware the agency of humans first. Working at the behest of Aenghus, one of them found you on some sort of new device called the Internet. Do you know of it?”
“I use it every day,” I said, nodding. If it was less than a century old, then it qualified as new to the Morrigan.
“Based on the word of this human, Aenghus Óg is sending some Fir Bolgs here to confirm that Atticus O’Sullivan is the ancient Druid Siodhachan Ó Suileabháin. You should have used a different name.”
“I’m a stupid git, and no doubt about it,” I said, shaking my head, piecing together how they must have found me.
The Morrigan’s expression softened and she grasped my chin in her fingers, pulling my mouth to hers. Her black robe melted away into nothingness, she stood before me like a Nagel poster come to life, and the heady scent of everything desirable to a man again filled my nostrils, though the effect was muted since I was now wearing my amulet. She kissed me deeply and then pulled away with that same maddening smirk on her face, knowing the effect she had on me, magically assisted or not. “Wear your amulet at all times from now on,” she said. “And call on me, Druid, when you have need. I have some humans to hunt now.”
And with that she turned back into the battle crow and flew out the door of my shop, which opened of its own accord to grant her passage.
Chapter 3
I have been around long enough to discount most superstitions for what they are: I was around when many of them began to take root, after all.
But one superstition to which I happen to subscribe is that bad juju comes in threes. The saying in my time was, “Storm clouds are thrice cursed,” but I can’t talk like that and expect people to believe I’m a twenty-one-year-old American. I have to say things like, “Shit happens, man.”
The Morrigan’s exit did not put me at ease, therefore, because I fully expected the day to get worse from there. I closed up my shop a couple of hours early and headed home on my mountain bike with my necklace tucked inside my shirt, worrying a bit about what might be waiting for me there.
I headed west on University from my shop and took a left on Roosevelt, heading south into the Mitchell Park neighborhood. Before the dams got put up on the Salt River, the area was floodplain land, with very fertile soil. It was farmland originally, and the lots were gradually subdivided and built up from the 1930s through the ’60s, complete with front porches and irrigated lawns. Usually I took my time and enjoyed the ride: I would say hello to the dogs who barked a greeting at me or stop to chat with the widow MacDonagh, who liked to sit on her front porch, sipping sweaty glasses of Tullamore Dew as the sun set. She spoke the Irish with me and told me I was a nice young lad with an old soul, and I enjoyed the conversation and the irony of being the young one. I usually did her yard work for her once a week and she liked to watch me do it, declaring loudly each time that “If I were fifty years younger, laddie, I’d jump yer wee bones and tell no one but the Lord, ye can be sure.” But today I hurried, tossing a quick wave at the widow’s porch and churning my legs as fast as they would go. I took a right onto 11th Street and slowed, stretching out my senses in search of trouble. When I pulled up to my house, I did not go in right away. Rather, I squatted near the street and sank the fingers of my tattooed right hand into the grass of my lawn to check on my defenses.
My house was built in the fifties, a north-facing cottage with a white-posted raised porch and a flower bed in front of it. The lawn in front is dominated by a single towering mesquite tree planted to the right of center, while a driveway on the right leads into a garage. A flagstone path goes from the driveway to my porch and front door. My front window told me nothing, being cast completely in late-afternoon shadow. But by examining my wards through the grass … yes. Someone was there. And since no mortal or lesser Fae could ever break through the wards on my house, that meant I had two choices: Get the hell out now, or go find out which member of the Tuatha Dé Danann had untied my knots and was waiting for me inside.
It could be Aenghus Óg, and the thought chilled me even though it was nearly a hundred degrees outside (Arizona does not cool down to sensible temperatures until the second half of October, and we were still a week or so away from that). But I could not imagine him leaving Tír na nÓg, despite the Morrigan’s insistence that he was on his way. So I checked in with my pet—well, I should say in all honesty, my friend—Oberon, with whom I was specially bound.
How goes it, my friend?
Oberon answered from the backyard. I did not pick up any tension in his thoughts. I rather got the impression that his tail was wagging. The fact that he had not been barking on my arrival was another clue that he thought everything was fine.
I know. Who is it?
She spoke to you? In your mind, like me? It took some effort to make an animal understand human language; it was not a simple binding, and not all of the Tuatha Dé Danann would bother. Most often they confined themselves to communicating emotions and images, as one does when speaking to an elemental.
High praise. Oberon was indeed a magnificent specimen of Irish wolfhound, with a rich dark-gray coat and sturdy constitution. His sires of old were called warhounds, not wolfhounds, and they accompanied the Irish into battle, unhorsing cavalry and attacking chariots. The warhounds of my youth were rather less friendly creatures, not like the gentle wolfhounds of today. Indeed, most modern wolfhounds are so mild, bred for gentle dispositions for centuries, that they can scarcely conceive of attacking anything beyond a bowl of dry kibble. But Oberon personified a fine blend of characteristics, able to turn the savagery of his heritage on and off as occasion demanded. I found him online at a rescue ranch in Massachusetts, after becoming frustrated with breeders in Arizona. Everything they had was too tame. Oberon, once I flew out to visit, was practically wild by modern standards, but of course all you needed to do was talk to him. He simply wanted to hunt once in a while. Allow him that, and he was a perfect gentleman. No wonder you like her. Did she ask you any questions?
That was encouraging. She obviously wasn’t looking for any of my treasures—and that meant she might not be in the employ of Aenghus Óg. I see. How long has she been here?
Dogs are not all that great with time. They understand day and night, but beyond that they are nearly indifferent to its passage. So “recently” could mean anything from a minute ago to hours. Have you taken a nap, I asked, since she got here?
Thank you, Oberon.
That depends entirely on the visitor. Whoever she is, she was not invited.
A hint of uncertainty crept into Oberon’s thoughts.
Do not worry, Oberon, I said. I am not displeased with you. But I am going to come back and get you, and we will enter the house together. I want you to guard me in case she proves not to be as friendly as you thought.
Kill her. One does not give the Tuatha Dé Danann second chances.
She hasn’t been human for a very long time.
You mean nonhuman. Inhuman is an adjective, I said, as I rose from the lawn and padded softly around the left side of the house to the backyard.
I left my bicycle resting in the street, hoping that it would not be stolen in a few minutes of neglect. Oberon was waiting for me as I opened the gate, his tongue lolling out and his tail wagging. I scratched him briefly behind the ears, and we walked together to my back door.
The patio furniture seemed undisturbed. My herb garden, planted in rows of boxes along the back fence and in much of the area normally reserved for a lawn, grew unmolested.
I found the visitor in my kitchen, trying to make a strawberry fruit smoothie.
“Manannan Mac Lir take this cursed thing to the land of shades!” she shouted as she smashed her fist onto the buttons of my blender. “The mortals always push these buttons and the bloody things work. Why won’t yours work?” she demanded, flipping an irritated glance my way.
“You have to plug it in,” I explained.
“What is this plug?”
“Insert the two-pronged device at the end of that cord into the slots on the wall there. That will give the blender its, um, animating force.” I thought I could explain electricity later if necessary; there was no use burdening her with new vocabulary.
“Ah. Well met, then, Druid.”
“Well met, Flidais, goddess of the hunt.”
Oberon said.
I had to admit that of all the Tuatha Dé Danann it could have been, Flidais was one of the most agreeable to find in my kitchen. But you know that old saying about storm clouds being thrice cursed: Flidais brought the second one rolling behind her, and I never saw it coming.
Chapter 4
“You know you cannot get one of these drinks in Tír na nÓg?” Flidais said above the whine of my blender.
“I thought as much,” I replied. “Blenders tend to be in short supply there. So
how did you hear of them?”
“Only recently, as it turns out,” Flidais said, puffing an errant wisp of curling red hair away from her eyes as she watched the strawberries puree. It was a somewhat windblown mane she had, a bit frizzy and so natural that I thought I spied a twig or two reclining lazily in her locks. “I was guesting in the forest of Herne the Hunter, and I caught a poacher driving through it in one of those monstrous truck things. He had taken a doe and covered it up in the back with a sheet of that black plastic material. Since Herne was not with me at the time, I took it upon myself to avenge the doe, and I followed him in my chariot to the city.” She began to pour some of the smoothie into the glass, and it looked pretty good. I found myself hoping she was in a sharing mood. And then I remembered that Flidais has a chariot pulled by stags, and I thought that even the reserved British of today would behave badly when confronted with something like that on the highway.
“You were invisible to mortals during this chase, I presume?”
“Of course!” Her hands froze and her green eyes flashed at me with a temper that matched the flame of her hair. “What kind of huntress do you take me for?”
Whoops! I lowered my eyes and spoke down to her boots, the soft brown leather sort with tough yet pliant soles like moccasins. They rose to her knees, where she had some tan leggings tucked into them—also leather and well worn. But the leather didn’t stop there; she’d never met a piece of it she didn’t like, as long as it wasn’t black. Her belt and sleeveless vest were dyed forest green, and some supporting material underneath, the same chocolate brown of her boots, suggested that it loved its job. A strip of green rawhide was wrapped repeatedly around her left forearm to protect it from the lash of her bowstring, and it bore signs of recent abuse. “The very best, Flidais. My apologies.” Flidais was one of the few who could pull off the invisibility trick. The best I could manage was a decent camouflage. She nodded curtly, acknowledging my apology as her due, and continued as if I had never bothered her with such sauciness.