The Maebown

  “Her-Lang, we are not here to hurt you,” he blasted the area telepathically. “We need to put an end to this conflict without taking human or Fae lives.”

  Her-Lang, the eldest of the Ancient Ones and one of the original ten, did not answer.

  “We have not hurt any of your clan—yet. If this continues, I cannot make any additional promises. You know me to be Fae of my word, do you not?”

  Her-Lang finally answered back. “Ozara warned us that you’d come, but I didn’t believe her.”

  In the distance, I felt the unmistakable energy of water. A cataclysmic force I’ve never experience before. A mountain of water rumbled across the surface of the sea faster than a jet. The tether yanked me back half a mile. One Coalition Fae raced toward it—he must have been an Olympian, as I’d never encountered him before. The mountain gained height a few miles from the fleet. It was taller than the aircraft carrier by ten times.

  A voice rumbled out of the sea, in a rushing, crashing boom that made me think the sea itself was speaking. “Not this day,” it blasted. The lone Coalition Fae fought Her-Lang for control.

  It’s Poseidon. It has to be. Through the howling winds and horizontal rain, I moved closer. The wave slowed and reverberated as the two struggled. The enormous volume of water stopped advancing on the angry surface, and I felt my physical body gasp for air. Huge geysers of black liquid erupted from both sides, spiraling like serpents across the sky, toward one another. They were much larger versions of the tubes Chalen had attacked me with at the Seoladán the night Gavin disappeared. The watery tubes, the size of freight trains, grappled like wrestlers’ arms, each struggling for position, crashing and striking like two giant octopi fighting to the death.

  At first, neither Her-Lang nor Poseidon seemed to have the advantage, but that changed when two Olympians I didn’t recognize joined Poseidon. The mountain of ocean shuttered, backlit by flashes of distant lightning. Then, as quickly as it began, it ended. The sea absorbed the water back into itself. The surface still roiled violently, but the threat to the fleet was over. Poseidon roared in victory.

  “Fine, Bastien. We cannot repel you. Do you intend to conscript us like you have the Sidhe and the Olympians? I would prefer death if given the choice.”

  Almost immediately, the storm weakened. The violent black clouds remained, but everything else seemed calmer.

  “I am not conscripted,” Zeus replied. “We are here of our own volition.”

  “Not possible,” Her-Lang bellowed. “Do you think I’m foolish enough to believe the Kobold and the Sidhe have sided with the Ohanzee and the Olympians without the threat of death from the Second?”

  Volimar, the Kobold elder, reassured him. “We are here voluntarily—Ozara’s threat is that great.”

  The Ancient Ones fell into formation behind Her-Lang, and below them just under the surface, the Oceanids and Nereids joined them—five hundred Fae between the three clans.

  “If you are not here to conquer and conscript, then why have you come?”

  “For the same reason you have. To resolve the threat that human war brings,” Bastien said.

  Her-Lang’s laughter echoed off the sea. “You expect me to believe that Zeus is worried about human lives beyond the rabble living in the Mediterranean?”

  “They are more civilized than the brainwashed fools on that peninsula who would sacrifice themselves for an ignorant, obese man they believe to be a god,” Zeus snapped.

  “Your problem with him is self-deification? Ironic. But I suppose that is solely your province, Zeus—father of gods and men.”

  “An insult, from the Fox god himself. Laughable,” Zeus roared.

  Like a thunderclap, Bastien bellowed, “Enough.” The power of his voice was astounding, flattening the violent ocean surface as smooth as a mirror for several miles. “I am not here to listen to either of you bicker about who is the more epic buffoon. What you did in the past is of no consequence. We are here to prevent calamity, and as the two of you argue like pre-pubescent teenage humans, the fleet draws closer to the coast and the danger grows. We do want you to join our cause, Her-Lang. I will not waste my breath trying to convince you with words—we shall show you with actions. Retreat or stay, that is of no consequence to us, but do not interfere. Maggie?”

  “Who is Maggie?” Her-Lang asked.

  “The Maebown.”

  “Maebown…here?”

  “Yes,” I projected. “I’m honored to meet you.”

  “It is good to meet you.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You travel by Gan comhlacht? Fascinating.”

  “Maggie, can you tell us if Ahriman is still in the same location?”

  “Just a minute.”

  Like a yo-yo, I zipped to Ahriman and then popped back to the gathered Fae. “No, he’s in Naeshura—he’s next to a missile of some kind, it’s streaking over land and headed out to sea. He’s wrapped it in energy, but I don’t know why.”

  “Remarkable,” Her-Lang said.

  “It is nuclear. Ahriman has compelled them to destroy the fleet with the device. He hides it from their sensors—they are sailing blindly into oblivion,” said one of the Fae in the water.

  “Derketo, are you sure?”

  “Yes. A large contingent of Alliance, including Ozara, entered the area two days ago. Our sources on land informed us.”

  “Fae?”

  “Terrestrials,” Derketo said.

  “Bastien, accompany me please,” Caorann snapped. “Tse-xo-be, if you will?”

  Tse-xo-be nodded and wrapped the area in Clóca, hiding the Fae before Ahriman got too close. I felt an odd presence at the moment Bastien and Caorann shot toward the incoming warhead. It was accompanied by a hint of consciousness. I pursued it and found myself trailing Bastien and Caorann. Intuition told me it was Chloe providing Ozara with a play-by-play from a world away.

  I sensed the warhead and Ahriman a half mile from the fleet and miles overhead. Caorann and Bastien closed. The Unseelie elder sensed nothing until it was too late. Bastien reached him first, shredding him into a dozen pieces just before Caorann incinerated the parts in Aether. Ahriman’s death flash backlit the gray clouds, highlighting the missile as it raced downward. In the distance, I heard warning buzzers as the ships finally found the projectile on their screens. The rocket plunged at the open space between the aircraft carrier and a smaller vessel a half-mile below. I braced myself for an explosion that never came. The rocket hit the surface and disappeared like a rock in a pond.

  “You got it.” I said, fighting my tether.

  “Yes, I turned the warhead into lead,” Caorann said.

  “Oh my god, thank you. Thank you so much.”

  The consciousness disappeared.

  “You need to get back to Cnoc Aine, now—Ozara was watching.”

  Caorann moved past me in Naeshura. In moments, the Coalition took their natural forms and flashed back toward the northeast. I felt certain there was a Seoladán located in that direction. Bastien drifted back down to the Ancient Ones, the Nereid and the Oceanids. I let him go and snapped back into my body.

  All hell was breaking loose.

  TEN

  SPARRING

  The instant before I slid back into my body, my mind popped through a Clóca barrier near the center of the living room, and then another, just inches from Gavin and me. Alliance Fae were in the cottage, and they were undetected. A sense of danger jolted my consciousness and something in my mind took over. The room filled with energy—Fire, Air, Water, and Earth, highlighting the intruders. The one closest to me had its hand positioned inches from my sternum. From somewhere, Aether severed the Fae’s limb at the elbow. After that, I was fighting to open my eyes.

  An agonized scream ripped at my eardrums the moment I found my body, and instinctively I covered my ears. The screeching Fae with a missing limb struck Gavin across the jaw, knocking him through the masonry wall, kicking up a cloud of dust, and sending debris everywhere. The hulking b
ronze-skinned Fae leapt toward his severed limb, but not before Gavin charged back through the gaping hole in the wall. It swung again, knocking a two-foot chunk out of the wall, but Gavin was faster. With molten Plasma swirling at the end of his muscular arms, Gavin ducked and lunged, pressing both of his fists into the Fae’s head. Another howl erupted from the wounded Fae’s mouth. He fought to keep his dark eyes on Gavin, and swung with his remaining arm. Long white claws ripped through the linen material on Gavin’s thick shoulder, but didn’t penetrate the barrier that hugged his olive skin. Gavin spun in a blur, wrapping his leg around the struggling Fae’s neck. They went to the ground in a thud, the Fae’s neck caught in the bend of Gavin’s knee. With both fists, Gavin slammed down on either side of his muscular thigh, separating head from body. A flash lit the room.

  A dark-skinned female disappeared behind Clóca, leaving a third snarling in the corner. Pale white fur formed on his body, his chest expanded, and he dropped on all fours, forming a long muzzle with yellow canines and incisors. Amber eyes set in wrinkled white fur darted from Dana to me, and then to Candace and Ronnie who were separated from us.

  “I’ll kill you if you do,” I seethed, getting to my feet and connecting to the energy around me. Dana flashed behind the beast, dodging the snapping jaws, and struggled to pin it to the floor as the Fae finished transitioning into a white wolf.

  I looked for an opening to help, but bodies were moving too fast, and I didn’t want to wound my own party. Sinopa wrangled with the invisible intruder, twisting through the air in a blur. She reached through the Clóca barrier and slamming the dark-skinned woman to the floor.

  “Submit,” Sinopa commanded.

  “Jinn do not submit,” she growled. “Especially not to homeless Ohanzee filth.” Fine ink-black hairs erupted from every part of her skin. She stood, her arms and legs elongating, the muscle fibers expanding.

  “Escape while you can, Ohanzee,” she growled a warning. Her face flattened and her jaw broadened as it turned black, like everything else on her face, save the jade green eyes. Her feline ears swept back, and long panther-like fangs sprouted from her gums as fingernails turned to long sharp claws. Half-human, half panther, she snarled and moved slowly to the side, sizing up Sinopa, who’d transformed into the Ohanzee’s favorite combat form—a towering, rusty-brown Sasquatch.

  “I will break you, Hathor,” Sinopa growled, bearing enormous canines of her own.

  I lined up a shot, the first spark of Aether forming at my fingertips. I hesitated an instant too long.

  A sharp pain in my shoulder broke my concentration—a clamped hand with jagged nails appeared out of nowhere and dug into my flesh. Before I could react, it flung me across the room at impossible speed. Dizzied, I caught a glimpse of a wood beam where the ceiling met the wall above the door to the kitchen. Then chaotic images of splinters and wall fragments filled my field of vision and the crash of destruction filled my ears. Candace screamed my name. I expected pain or worse, unconsciousness, but found neither. Subconsciously, my mind threw up a barrier. I passed through the wall without injury. I even landed on my feet—angry and terrified.

  The Fae who’d flung me hid in Clóca. That didn’t make sense—they were all using Clóca, but only a handful of Fae in the world were supposed to know how. Guess that was some terrible recon.

  I spread energy around me and sensed my adversary immediately. I pierced his veil with Aether and dragged him toward me. With dark copper skin, smooth black hair pulled tight at the back of his head, and light brown eyes, he looked Ometeo.

  “You’re a fool,” I said.

  “Kill me. I’m ready to die,” he said, wincing as Aether bonds cut into his skin.

  A part of me was ready to snuff him out, but something was wrong. In the field behind us, Sara fought with two Fae. I was standing in the open, uncloaked, and completely vulnerable. Where was the rest of the Alliance?

  I cleared my head, fighting homicidal urges. “Why are you here?”

  “To kill you, of course. You just woke up a split-second too soon.”

  “You lie. Where is the rest of your group?”

  He flashed a smile of brilliant white Fae teeth.

  “I can spare you, you know?”

  “I am dead either way,” he said, shaking his head.

  “I saw what Ozara did to your leader, um…Tonitueth. It was Tonitueth, wasn’t it? I know you’re being forced to fight.”

  “You know nothing.”

  “I watched Ozara rip Tonitueth’s heart out. I saw your clan, the Ometeo, forced into submission at the steps of the pyramid.”

  His face twisted when I said the name of his clan.

  “You are Ometeo, are you not?”

  He nodded.

  “I know a lot more than you think. I will spare you—you can leave this place if you promise not to fight us. Well, that, and if you give me a little information.”

  I had no idea what made me offer him his life—maybe I felt empathy because I’d seen what happened to his clan.

  The muscles in his jaw relaxed and his shoulders hunched. “It is not possible. I failed and now I am marked, just as Tonitueth was. We shall share the same fate, it seems.”

  “You can hide.”

  “Ozara has Ulindi. I cannot hide.”

  “Ulindi? Is that your—”

  “Yes, we are paired,” he whispered.

  Gavin flashed to my side, clothes torn and filthy, but otherwise unhurt, plasma twisting and boiling on his fists. Sara, unscathed, led a female Fae, a small blonde with large green eyes, to Gavin’s side. Sara had pierced the Fae’s hand, preventing her from transforming to Naeshura. Sara had killed the other moments before. Dana walked out of the Cottage with Ronnie and Candace in tow. Sinopa strode behind her with two more enemy Fae: the white wolf, limping on a broken leg, and the bruised and bleeding Jinn she’d undoubtedly pummeled senseless.

  Something was very wrong. “What is your name?” I asked him.

  He smiled. “I am Saccimi Becab of the Ometeo.”

  “Where is the rest of the Alliance?”

  “It is too late, Maebown,” he said, closing his eyes.

  “Gavin, do you have him?”

  Gavin grabbed Saccimi’s arm and snapped it above the elbow. I winced when Saccimi muffled a scream.

  “Sorry,” Gavin said, “We can’t let them transform. He will heal.”

  “No, I know. It’s all right. Give me a minute.”

  I closed my eyes and concentrated on Ozara. Dana caught me in a cradle of air before I hit the ground. At first, there was no connection and my mind didn’t move away from the damaged cottage. Then it shot east.

  She has just emerged from a Seoladán.

  My guess was right. Ozara turned and stared back at the energy well as Fae after Fae passed through. Several hundred stood in ranks around her, and every second more poured through the portal. Instinct told me they were preparing to attack someone. Great, you know nothing. Who is the target and where is this place?

  I spiraled out in an expanding circle to look for some clue. It was mountainous and green immediately around the Seoladán. Further away, blue-purple snow-capped mountains rose thousands of feet. You have nothing, keep searching.

  I sensed water and people a few miles away, so I compelled myself to them. A beautiful three-tiered temple with a flared roof and red trim stood on the side of tranquil lake. It was a pagoda, so I knew I was in Asia, but not where in Asia. Snow-capped mountains, doesn’t that mean China or Tibet?

  Then it clicked. The Ancient Ones are in trouble. Ozara saw them when the missile was destroyed.

  I knew I had to be right. She was going to force their hand, or worse, eliminate them. I concentrated on Her-Lang.

  I zipped a very short distance, no more than forty miles and still uncomfortably close to the Alliance at the Seoladán. Three hundred Fae were spread through the most alien looking landscape I’d ever seen. Jutting out of the steep terrain were hundreds, possibly thousands, of g
ray and white stone pillars set in a carpet of green grass. I felt slightly disoriented, awestruck by the bizarre beauty of the place. Snap out of it, idiot. They’re in danger.

  If the Ohanzee were Native-American supermodels, the Ancient Ones were their Asian equivalent. Her-Lang stood silently with seven Fae, separated from the rest of his Clan by a hundred feet. If my guess was correct, they were the elders Caorann told me about—known in Chinese mythology as the Eight Immortals. After the Ohanzee and the Sidhe, they were the most powerful of the original clans. One being standing in the mass of Fae confused me. A middle-aged Chinese woman in a woven tunic and britches stood among the rocks. Ignoring her, I focused on the eight in the center. They were deep in conversation and I feared they would be offended when I interrupted. I had no choice.

  “Her-Lang?”

  The eight Fae fell silent. Her-Lang, donned in a simple but sleek red robe cinched tightly around his lean muscular body, turned into the sun facing my approximate position. His raven-black hair, tied tightly behind his head, glistened in the late afternoon sun as he shook his head. “Does Bastien see fit to invade our council?”

  “Espionage, no doubt, to determine whether we have made a decision,” a female Fae said.

  She twisted her slender neck and glared in my direction.

  “Bastien doesn’t know I’m here—they haven’t returned to Ireland yet.”

  “Then Caorann’s bidding?” another younger male interrupted, his tone sharp and frigid.

  “No, I’m here because you’re in danger. I was just attacked in Ireland—I thought the Alliance was trying to ambush me while I was projecting—”

  “Danger?” the woman interrupted. “Then why are you here?”

  A familiar voice sounded from behind her. “Let her speak,” Guanyin said. “I know Maggie. She can be trusted.”

  If I could manifest physical arms while projecting, I would have hugged her. Guanyin had always defended me when she was a member of the Seelie Council. It was nice to have an ally.