Keir continued to stare at his sister in silence, as if he feared his eyes were deceiving him, then he looked up and frowned.
“Prince Mochriadhemiach—or am I mistaken?”
“Nay, Your Highness,” Miach said gravely, “you aren’t mistaken.”
“You look like Gilraehen the Fey.”
“So I’m told,” Miach agreed. “Often.”
Keir didn’t smile. “You also look a great deal like yourself, though you too have grown since last we met. Why are you following my sister?” He looked at Morgan. “Why are you here? Where did you learn to fight as you do? Where have you been?” He frowned at Miach again. “Why are you with her? Does my grandfather know she’s alive? If he does, he certainly wouldn’t approve of a wee mage prince keeping company with her.”
Miach opened his mouth, but found there wasn’t a good answer to any of Keir’s questions. Damnation. Yet more relatives to appease.
“Don’t you know?” Morgan asked. “Don’t you know anything about Miach?”
Keir’s expression darkened considerably and he pulled Morgan to stand under the protection of his wing, as it were. “The tidings that reach my ears are few and far between indeed, but one thing I can tell you, sister, is that we don’t associate with mages. They aren’t our sort of people.”
Miach would have laughed, but he didn’t dare. Keir couldn’t have sounded any more like Sìle if he’d been reading from a script Sìle had prepared for him. Miach also refrained from pointing out to Keir that he was something of a mage himself and had no room to criticize. Then again, perhaps Keir chose to ignore parts of his heritage in favor of the more savory ones.
Miach understood that very well.
He dragged his hand through his hair, searching for a decent way to begin to answer Keir’s questions. The next thing he knew, Keir had hold of his right hand in a grip of iron. He shoved Miach’s sleeve up his forearm and looked down at the runes surrounding his wrist in astonishment.
“What,” he began in a garbled tone, “are these?”
“Ah—”
“Did you steal them?” Keir demanded.
Miach shot him a look. “That’d be a bit difficult, wouldn’t it?”
“You insolent boy, how dare you speak to me that way,” Keir said haughtily. “I am a prince of the house of Tòrr Dòrainn. You, however, are—”
“A prince of the house of Neroche,” Miach said wearily. “And the youngest of that house, aye, I know. I also happen to be one who loves your sister.”
“Love?” Keir echoed incredulously. “Who in the hell do you think you are presuming—”
“I—”
Miach found himself suddenly with Morgan standing in front of him, as if she were protecting him, which he wasn’t altogether certain he didn’t need at the moment. Keir’s expression was thunderous.
“Mhorghain, come away from him.”
“I will not.” She held up her left hand. “Here are my runes, runes which are echoes of Miach’s. Grandfather gave them to us freely when he gave me the gift I wanted most, which is the man standing behind me. If you intend to do damage to him, you’ll go through me first. Otherwise, cease. I’m tired, hungry, and I would very much like to simply sit down.”
Keir opened his mouth, apparently to protest a bit more, then he scowled. “I’ll give this more thought later.” He turned a much lighter expression on his sister. “I’ll have food brought. It won’t be particularly edible, but it might be hot if I’m very cross with my servant. Perhaps if we feed the mage there, he’ll release you.”
“I’m the one holding on to him,” Morgan pointed out, pulling Miach’s arms around her.
Keir grunted, then turned a glare on Miach. “You would be better served to keep your hands to yourself, little lad.”
Miach only nodded to Gair’s eldest with what he hoped was the appropriate amount of gravity as Keir walked away. Then he took a deep breath and turned Morgan around.
“Well?”
She looked almost as devastated as she had when she’d first realized who she was. “This was not what I expected to find here,” she said, her voice barely audible. “Do you think Rùnach knows?”
Miach brushed her hair back from her face. “If he did, he didn’t say aught to me. You know, I’ve heard various rumors over the years about how Keir met his end. I always thought it curious that no one seemed to know exactly what happened. I don’t think anyone believed anyone had survived the morning at the well, but the makers of tales are often wrong. We should ask him what happened—if you can bear it,” he added.
She shivered as she put her arms around his waist. “It can’t be any worse than my dreams. Aye, I’d like to know. I’m also curious why he remained here when he’s but a handful of days from Seanagarra.”
“He must have his reasons, just as Rùnach does.”
She nodded, then fell silent. Miach turned them both so he could watch the door. He couldn’t have said why, but he didn’t think Keir had all that much control over his servants. In time, the door opened and Keir came back inside the solar with a tray laden with food. He stopped halfway across the chamber and almost dropped their supper. He righted the tray and scowled.
“Sorry,” he said gruffly. “ ’Tis a bit startling to see my sister as a grown woman. ’Tis more startling still to see her touching the youngest prince of Neroche.” He continued on his way over to them, then deposited the tray on a small table. “I never would have considered such a match, though I’ll allow that your mother and mine did discuss such a calamity more than once. My father was not at all pleased with the idea.”
“I can’t imagine he would have been,” Miach said ruefully, “though I daresay I’m flattered to have been discussed.”
Keir threw him another glare, then dragged up a chair to the table. “Sit. I cannot guarantee the quality, but at least ’tis hot.”
Miach found chairs for himself and Morgan, then sat down next to her. Keir didn’t seem particularly pleased with that arrangement, but he didn’t draw any weapons or cast any spells, which was progress. Things could have been worse.
What was worse was the food. Miach ate it anyway, gratefully, and so did Morgan. He watched Keir watch his sister and couldn’t help but smile at the continued look of disbelief the man wore. Miach supposed the kindest thing he could do was leave them both a bit of privacy to digest the morning’s events. He finished a glass of terribly bitter ale, then turned to Morgan.
“I should see to my spells,” he said quietly. “If you wouldn’t mind?”
“I’m perfectly capable of seeing to my sister,” Keir put in pointedly.
Miach nodded deferentially. “I never doubted it. I was just trying to be polite.”
Morgan leaned over and kissed his cheek. “I’ll save you a spot for a nap.”
Miach rose and walked away before he had to listen to Keir’s response—which he was sure, based on the tone of his voice, had not been polite. He pulled up a chair in front of what small windows there were in the solar, then sat down and let out a long, slow breath. He was slightly ill from the Olc he’d covered himself with even briefly to follow Morgan, and the Lugham he’d used downstairs, and yet again by the Olc that drenched the castle they were in. Truly, Sarait had borne much to even set foot in it, though perhaps Gair hadn’t been so open about his preferences in the early years of their marriage. In this chamber, though, it was not so oppressive. He looked up at the ceiling and examined what else it was that he felt.
It was the slightest hint of Fadaire.
He knew he shouldn’t have been surprised. For whatever reason, this had been Keir’s home for the past twenty years and he was, as he had said earlier, a prince of the house of Tòrr Dòrainn. He never would have subjected himself to the brunt of Olc, or Lugham, or whatever else the mages of Ceangail favored.
Miach looked over his shoulder at Morgan and Keir sitting in front of the fire. Keir was holding on to her hands and wearing again that expression of incredulity.
Miac
h understood. He smiled to himself, then turned back to his own business.
It was late afternoon before he came back to himself. The spells of defense he’d set along the borders of Neroche—and Wychweald too—were unsettlingly intact. Lothar was obviously concentrating his efforts elsewhere—no doubt trying to find someone to open Gair’s well for him.
Miach rubbed his hands over his face and grimaced. They had to find the proper spell and use it, sooner rather than later. And once the well was shut, Miach had a slew of things he was going to pile atop it, things that would take even Droch several months to undo.
There is a book in the library at Ceangail, hidden, a book containing all my father’s spells in their entirety.
Rùnach’s words came back to him as clearly as if he’d been standing there speaking them, and Miach felt the urgency of them. If the book was as difficult to find as Rùnach had suggested, the sooner he got to looking for it, the better.
He turned to find Morgan asleep on a hard, high-backed bench near the fire. Keir was simply sitting there, watching her. Miach looked at Gair’s eldest son and marveled that in all the years he himself had lived, he’d never considered that one of Gair’s children might have survived that horrible business at the well.
Keir didn’t look to have borne the ravages of time very well. Being heir to Sìle’s wellspring of youth, he should have looked no more than a score and a bit. Instead, his dark hair was heavily sprinkled with white, and his face was lined with care and sorrow. His had certainly not been an easy life and the past twenty years had obviously taken their toll.
Miach rose, stretched, then walked over to the hearth. He took a blanket from off the back of the bench and covered Morgan with it, then sat down opposite Keir. “Your Highness,” he said, inclining his head deferentially.
Keir studied him for quite a while in silence, then cleared his throat. “She says you’re the archmage now. And that Adhémar is king.”
Miach nodded.
“I’m surprised there’s anything left of Neroche with him looking after it,” Keir said with a snort. “Your brother is an ass.”
Miach suppressed a smile. He might have felt sorry for Adhémar and his reputation, but his brother had certainly gone out of his way to earn it. Miach suspected there wasn’t an elf living that Adhémar hadn’t insulted to some degree. He certainly never had an easy time of any of his blessedly infrequent visits to either Ainneamh or Tòrr Dòrainn.
“How did your parents die?” Kier asked.
Miach managed not to flinch, especially since he had equally prying questions to ask of Morgan’s brother. He took a deep breath. “My mother died rescuing me from the dungeons at Riamh, where I had been held captive for a year. My father died a fortnight later from wounds received in that battle.”
Keir’s mouth had fallen open. He shut it with a snap. “You poor fool.”
“Aye.”
He considered for another moment or two. “Mhorghain says she loves you and that Grandfather gave you permission to wed her.”
“I think she does love me,” Miach said slowly. “And ’tis certain that I love her. And aye, your grandfather did give me permission to wed her.” He paused. “I would have asked you for her hand, Prince Keir, if I’d known you were alive. I will ask you now, if it isn’t too late.”
“I imagine it is very much too late,” Keir grumbled, “since Mhorghain seems to consider the matter closed. I don’t suppose I can credit you with enchanting her.”
“I don’t enchant,” Miach said. “Actually, I haven’t even wooed her very well yet. Ask her as much when she wakes.”
“I already did. I understand you made her a pair of blades, which she approved of, and that you braved the gates of Gobhann to bring her to her senses. She mentioned something about hay, but wouldn’t elaborate. Do you care to?”
Miach smiled in spite of himself. “I don’t think I dare. Nothing untoward happened, if that eases your mind any.”
“I’m not sure anything would ease me at present.” He sighed deeply. “Perhaps you might be so good as to distract me with tales of the outside world. If I think on my sister, I will weep. Again.”
“I wouldn’t blame you if you did, and I imagine your sister is just as overwhelmed. But I’ll happily give you whatever tidings you want. Where shall I begin?”
“I’ve been here twenty years, lad,” Keir said grimly, “with scant contact with the outside world. Anything would be new to me.”
Miach waited, hoping Keir would elaborate, but he seemed disinclined to do so. Once Miach realized that no details would be forthcoming, he helped himself to a glass of wine, sat back, then worked his way from one end of the Nine Kingdoms to the other. Keir merely listened greedily, like a man who had been perishing from thirst without realizing it. He smiled at some things, cursed at others, and shook his head at most everything else.
“Well told,” he said after Miach had finished, “and I thank you for it. It has been many years since I had such accurate reports.” He studied the liquid in his cup for a moment or two in silence, then looked up. “I must now admit to being slightly confused as to why you’re here, you and Mhorghain both. It cannot be mere chance.”
“Nay, Your Highness,” Miach agreed, “it isn’t chance. We’re here for a particular spell.”
“And what is this spell to do?”
Miach knew there was no point in not being honest. “We’re trying to shut your father’s well. I understand there is a book here, a private book that contains all your father’s spells. I hadn’t expected to have you here to help me in finding it, but I’m grateful—”
“It’s gone.”
Miach was fairly certain he’d heard that awrong. “I beg your pardon?”
Keir smiled without humor. “I watched the library downstairs be reduced to ashes soon after I arrived. If the book had been there, it is there no longer. I can personally guarantee it isn’t anywhere else in the keep. I would have found it by now if it had been.”
Miach looked up into the blackness of the vault above him. It had been a brief hope, but perhaps ’twas one better left unfulfilled. If Gair’s lifework had fallen into the wrong hands . . . well, that didn’t bear thinking on. It was better to believe it had been burned.
“I don’t know why you’d want it anyway,” Keir continued, “for it wouldn’t serve you. Only someone with my father’s . . . blood . . .” He looked at Miach in astonishment. “You can’t mean . . .” His mouth fell open. “You can’t mean for Mhorghain to close that bloody well.”
Miach looked at him in consternation. He realized at that moment what that feeling was that he’d had when he first realized Keir was alive.
Relief.
Morgan was no longer the only one with the power to shut the well. Rùnach could not aid them, but Keir was whole and sound.
He wondered, absently, why Keir didn’t look equally relieved.
“That was our plan,” Miach admitted, “but that was before. Now that I know you’re alive—”
Keir threw himself to his feet and walked away with a curse before Miach could finish. He paced about the room in a frantic fashion, much like a man who had just learned a truth so dreadful, he couldn’t take it in. Miach could offer him no comfort. The reality was the well had to be closed and Morgan had been the only one to do it.
She wasn’t now.
Keir finally came to a halt in front of him. “You cannot be serious.”
Miach looked up at him, confused. “But I am. That well is still spewing evil even after a score of years. Lothar has found it and is using what evil still seeps forth to create monsters to hunt those with Camanaë magic, as well as those with Gair’s blood in their veins. I have reason to believe that Lothar is actively looking for a way to open it. Worse still, I fear there are others with the same idea. I must shut it before Lothar—or anyone else—is successful. Can you imagine the devastation that would cause otherwise?”
“Actually,” Keir said curtly, “I can.”
/>
Miach closed his eyes briefly. “Forgive me, Your Highness. I spoke without thinking.” He paused. “I know you’ve been away from the world, but surely you’ve heard tell of those creatures roaming through Neroche—through all the Nine Kingdoms now. Have you seen none of these monsters of Lothar’s make here at the keep?”
Keir cast himself back down in his chair. “No one comes here,” he said flatly. “There is a very substantial, if not a bit tatty, spell of aversion laid over the keep. I’m surprised you didn’t feel it.”
“Oh, I did,” Miach admitted. “I just ignored it.”
Keir looked at him. “Who told you to come here?”
“Your brother, Rùnach. He’s hiding at Buidseachd.”
Keir shook his head, wearing again a faint look of wonder. “I didn’t dare hope anyone else had survived, but I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. I’m also not surprised he made his way there. I take it he’s lurking in the library?”
“Aye, whilst also posing as Soilléir’s servant.”
“That surprises me even less,” Keir said with a sigh. “Soilléir is likely the only one who has the power to protect him from Droch. Not that he has any power left for Droch to take.”
Miach watched Morgan’s brother again study his cup, as if it contained answers he couldn’t bring himself to look for elsewhere. Miach looked up and watched the shadows dance from the light of the fire and wished for a few answers himself. Why hadn’t Keir been able to stop book-destroying mages who had surely been inferior to him in both power and skill? Why was he hiding in Dìobhail, and why had he had no tidings of the outside world?
He also wanted to know why Keir hadn’t gone back to the well and tried to close it himself before now.
“Do you know anything about that day?”
Miach pulled his attention back to Keir. “At the well?” He waited for Keir’s nod, then shook his head. “I’ve heard your sister’s memories and read your uncle Làidir’s diary. I have a letter your mother sent to Sosar detailing her plan. But as to the actual events, nay, I don’t know enough.” He paused and wished for a better way to ask the question that burned in his mouth. “My lord, perhaps this is an impertinent question, but I can’t help but wonder why you couldn’t simply shut the well your—”