The Embers of Light Read online

  The Embers of Light

  Copyright © 2014 by Tammy Farrell

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  Cover art and design by Nathalia Suellen

  Developmental Editing by Julie Hutchings

  Line Editing by Todd Barselow

  Formatting by Caitlin Greer

  ISBN-13: 978-1505434989

  ISBN-10: 150543498X

  FOR MY DAD.

  I couldn’t ask for a better one.

  The Realm of Gwynedd

  Wales

  519CE

  Tristan settled on the ledge of the crag to watch the murder. The wet wind ruffled his black feathers, and his claws shifted on the uneven stone. He wasn’t cold, but he shivered anyway.

  He didn’t like to watch these things, but it was his duty as a watcher, a spy, and a specter. If he had to witness death, he would do it as a raven, from high on the cliff, far enough away so that the screams carried on the wind just above his head.

  What made his burden worse was that his sister was the murderer, lingering near the water like a snake, waiting for the perfect victim to pass. Why she insisted on killing, Tristan could not fathom. It was her gift, she said, and in this world full of agony and unrest, it was her duty to free the mortal souls from the clutches of humanity. Tristan didn’t agree, and decided that the decades of isolation, the decades spent in squalor had withered his sister’s mind, if not her soul.

  An old woman with a young maid’s countenance could never be a good thing.

  Never.

  But still, he loved her. And as a devoted brother, he would watch her work, while secretly mourning for the life that would soon die by her hands.

  As the wind picked up, a whistle carried its way to him from the lake below. He let out a gentle caw, knowing what was to come.

  On the earthen road between the rolling hills, the source of the whistling came into view. A man with threadbare woolen clothes and a sack slung over his back strolled along the path, his gaze leisurely shifting across the hills with no hint of the impending rain dampening his mood.

  When the man walked dangerously close to the lake, he stopped. Something had caught his eye. He bent down near the edge of the water and picked a single violet, the first bloom of spring. He smelled it and tucked it in the pocket of his tunic and just as he was about to continue on his way, a gentle mist rose from the lake, a warm breath of air mixed with the cold spring breeze.

  That’s when he saw her, sitting on a rock, lustrous brown waves of hair cascading down her back and tears streaming down her face.

  Tristan watched with anticipation. What sort of man would this one be? A lone maid on the moors was a vulnerable thing, and this man had already picked the first flower.

  The man cocked his head to the side, spoke softly to the young woman and reached for his sack. Tristan waited for the draw of a weapon, an eating knife perhaps, a dagger? But no, the man withdrew an apple and offered it to her.

  Tristan’s heart sank, and he prayed that maybe this time his sister would change her mind. But his hopes were quickly dashed when she took the apple, a sweet smile playing across her lips. She reached for the man’s hand and lured him in for a little kiss. He took the bait, the claws of her mental gift now perilously wrapped around him.

  She pulled back and crooked her finger, motioning towards the lake. The man moved mindlessly, his steps heavy and awkward, his gaze vacant. At the foot of the water, she set the apple down and undid the laces of her dress, letting the fabric fall to the ground. In all her nakedness she stood before him, her golden eyes fixed on him, her slender finger tracing his jaw before she pressed up on her toes and kissed the poor man like it would be his last.

  And it would be.

  The moment she stepped back, she picked up the apple, shoved it in his mouth and waved her hand as if sending him off. Her little tricks were never swift, always playful. The man lifted his feet one after the other into the lake, and when his boots were in the water, he laid down, apple in mouth, eyes to the sky. He floated there for a moment, stuck in her trance, and then he turned over, face down to drown himself.

  The wind turned cold again and several seconds passed before the young woman, still naked, waded out to the man, and at the exact moment he began to struggle, she placed her hand on his head and held him under the water, her slight arms as strong as iron bars pushing him down.

  The broad man, at least three times her size, stood no chance, even though she held him down with no more than a finger. After a long while, she smiled as the last struggles of life left him, and when the last bubbles of air drifted up around her, she dragged the man’s body to the shore.

  She stopped and looked up to Tristan, her golden eyes beckoning him to join her.

  Tristan cawed and flew down, landing in front of her. He didn’t bother to divert his gaze from her nudity. Nothing she did surprised him anymore. With the dagger in her hand, she began to cut through the man’s belly. Tristan let his human form take shape, twisting up and then bending down to meet her gaze.

  She took a bite from the apple and set it down beside her. “Don’t give me that look.” She dug her hands into the man’s stomach, pulling out his entrails and examining them. This is what she did with her victims, claiming she could see their souls in the blood.

  Tristan picked up her dress and handed it to her. “Why him? He was a simple farmer. Why did he have to die?”

  Seren shrugged as she worked. “He was dying anyway.”

  “Just because they’re mortal does not mean they are all dying,” Tristan said.

  Seren rolled her eyes. “I am a Seiren, Tristan. It is my gift to give mortals peace.”

  “That didn’t look peaceful to me,” Tristan muttered. “And this is no gift to mortals.” He didn’t say it, but he wanted to remind her that a Seiren is a murderess, a vixen whose sole purpose is to lure men to their deaths. Even though it was her nature, she didn’t have to kill them, no more so than he had to fly.

  Seren gave him a hard look. “Well, it was. Why else would he walk into the water willingly? I gave him a beautiful death. Would you have him die from the sickness or starvation?”

  Tristan gave up. He loved her too much to argue. “We should return to the village.”

  She shook her head. “I’m not finished.” Pulling her hands from the man’s stomach, she examined her palms. “You know this is the only way to know our fortunes. How many times do I have to tell you? Look here.” She held her bloody palm up to him as she had so many times before. Lines appeared like cracks beneath the blood. “We don’t have life lines like mortals. Only blood let’s me see what’s to come.”

  Tristan examined his own palms. The skin was smooth and without any lines at all.

  “There are changes coming, I can feel it. Can’t you?” She looked up at him, her golden eyes crazed, and for just a moment, her true form showed through—a glimpse of an older woman with lined skin and sallow eyes.

  Tristan waited patiently as she studied her hand before she gasped.

  “He’s coming, Tristan! The one who will save us! The one who will free us!” With her eyes still on her hands, she got to her feet. “Look, do you see it? Do you see him?”

  Tristan looked, but only saw a hand covered in drying blood. He nodded anyway.

  “Our time is coming, Tristan. The greatest power we have ever known will cross our path, and we must be
ready for it.”

  There was a gleam in her eye that made Tristan shudder. “Your predictions have been wrong before,” he said softly.

  Her face fell, making him sorry for saying it.

  “Not this time,” she insisted. “This time it’s a vision from the gods.” She dipped her hands in the lake to wash off the blood. “This time we will be freed.”

  Tristan nodded to pacify her and followed his sister back to their village. He doubted anyone could set them free. And if they did, how many more innocents would die at his sister’s hand? No. He would resist it. Or at least he would try. But even Tristan knew that the bonds of blood were too strong to forsake. He would follow her to the edge of the earth if that was where she wanted to lead him.

  Malcolm sat perched like a caged bird in the window of Valenia, watching the four boats drift up the coast. The small ships, all wrapped in hides, had tall linen sails and thin wooden oars. Long-haired men, one at the helm of each ship, navigated closer. Malcolm saw three passengers per vessel; their heads hung low, their hands in their laps. He couldn’t take his eyes off them, so unused to seeing other living beings.

  His heart fluttered as they came closer, and when the boats finally reached the beach in front of Valenia, the men jumped into the water and pulled the little ships, with the occupants still seated inside, onto dry land.

  These boorish oarsmen with matted hair and ragged, torn tunics and gigantic arms had Malcolm entranced. They were giants, these men. With the group closer, Malcolm now saw the ropes around the wrists and necks of those still in the ships. Some of the captives were emaciated, resembling little more than skeletons covered in skin, while others were so filthy, it was hard to tell whether they were old or young. One of the four men shouted something at the peasants and the other three laughed.

  “Who are they?” Malcolm asked Daria, the spirit standing behind him. She had once been his mother, but was now no more than a specter of her former self, known as a Revenant—a soul without form.

  Daria stepped to the window and almost disappeared in the light, her white hair and gown becoming translucent.

  “Slave traders,” she said. “They sack villages and capture the survivors to sell across the sea.”

  “Saxons?” Malcolm asked.

  Daria shook her head. “These are men from our land, Dyfed or Gwynedd perhaps. They sell their own people to the Irish.” She watched them closely with an inexpressive stare. “These men are tribal warlords.”

  Malcolm nodded and returned his gaze to the beach.

  One man gathered driftwood, while another two guarded the captives in the ships. The oldest of the four, a man with long hair filled with strands of gray and a forehead etched with lines, stood with his hands on his hips, facing Valenia, and for a moment, Malcolm thought the man’s eyes met his.

  “I feel like he can see me,” Malcolm said.

  “No,” Daria said. “He may just sense the magic veiling this place. His mind can’t comprehend more than that.”

  Malcolm clutched his hands together.

  Two years had passed since he’d been made a prisoner of Valenia, robbed of his power and cursed to live as a mortal. His heart had long since gone cold with longing to feel the sun and warm breeze on his skin, let alone to feel some semblance of the power he’d once had and so mistreated.

  Any hope he’d had of escape was lost. Even though he was left without his power of Light, he’d hoped he possessed the Revenant ability of his mother. In spirit he might be able to break free from the spell that trapped him. But he’d suffered failure after failure in his attempts to detach from his body, and when he glimpsed success and finally separated, he was dragged back by his earthly form.

  A glimpse of freedom stolen away by a life of imprisonment. He felt himself an utter failure, an embarrassment compared to the powerful Dia he’d once been.

  Malcolm sighed listlessly and watched the beach. The slavers made camp against the setting sun on the horizon, and when the fire was lit, each man marched towards the boats and shouted at the captives. The men and women cowered, too afraid to move. In a fit of growls and shouts, the slavers dragged the prisoners from the boats by the ropes around their necks like cattle. The oldest warlord pulled three men towards the fire. Another struggled with a man and two women, who barely had the strength to walk, while the third dragged three more women behind him.

  The slavers settled down in front of the fire, with the cowering peasants slumped on the sand just out of reach of the fire’s warmth. Then the men divided up bread and dried meats amongst them, speaking to one another in a language Malcolm didn’t understand.

  After they’d downed what was in their water sacks, one of the warlords turned his attention towards a young girl, still plump with youth, behind him. She recoiled when she felt his eyes on her. With a grunt, the man got to his feet, lumbered towards her, and reached for the long knife at his side. A gasp, loud enough for Malcolm to hear, came from the girl when the slaver brought the knife down to her neck. And in one swipe, he cut the rope that bound her. She screamed when he pulled her from the rest of the captives while the other men laughed.

  The slaver dragged her up the beach and almost had the fighting woman under his control, when suddenly a man broke loose from his ropes and ran. It took a moment for the men to notice the escapee and when they did, the three by the fire jumped to their feet and the fourth hauled the young girl back to the group and shoved her down into the sand.

  The emaciated man struggled to run, stumbling several times on the soft sand. Malcolm looked back to the oldest of the warlords, who stood calmly with his eyes fixed on the escapee. Then he lifted a small axe, pulled his long arm back like a catapult, and hurled it. It spun through the air, turning over and over until it struck the runaway right in the back.

  Malcolm heard the gasps of horror from the other prisoners and watched the runaway fall to the ground like a sack of meat. The older slaver grunted and marched over to the man, lying dead on the sand. He nudged him with his foot and then reached down to pull the axe from the man’s flesh. With one more kick to the dead body, he turned back to the fire, barking orders at the others. The slavers rushed to ensure the rest of the captives were properly bound before sitting down.

  Malcolm pushed himself from the window with a rumble of frustration and threw himself down into a chair.

  “Why are there humans on this beach? They shouldn’t even be able to see it under the veiling spell.”

  If he were still a Dia, a descendant of the ancient gods, he would have been able to read the minds of those barbaric humans. He could have toyed with them the way they toyed with their prisoners. Watching the dreadful scene below made Malcolm almost forget that he, too, was a prisoner, though no beastly warlord guarded him. Instead he had a nameless, faceless spell, cast by Mara, keeping him sealed within the walls of the fortress he’d once called home.

  He hated her.

  At one time he thought he loved her, thought he wanted her to love him. But she’d been nothing but cruel to him. In a fit of savagery, he took what he wanted from her and showed her that she was his to command—but her vengeance proved stronger than his desire. She took his Light, all that had made him powerful, and trapped him like a dog.

  “I have to get out of here,” Malcolm muttered, taking a large swig of wine from the jug in front of him.

  Daria swept across the room, took a seat, and rested her icy-white eyes on him. “Perhaps if you didn’t drink so much you would be able to leave your body.”

  Malcolm scowled at her and shook his head. “I am too weak, Mother. Without my Light I am tethered to this mortal form. There is no more use in trying.” He took another long draft from the jug. “She took my Light, made me mortal. Is that not enough? Why trap me here as well?”

  Daria gave Malcolm a look that told him how ridiculous he sounded. He knew why Mara trapped him. Light or no Light, he would go after her, and she knew it.

  “You wouldn’t have been so obligin
g if you’d succeeded in capturing her,” Daria said.

  Malcolm didn’t respond. Daria was right.

  He tilted the jug to his lips, emptying it, and set it down on the table with a loud thud just as a rattling sound came from the hall. The heavy wood door to the large chamber swung open and in walked Eli, carrying a silver platter of food.

  Malcolm’s blood boiled. He loathed seeing his once fierce warrior reduced to this mindless being that now only existed to serve him. This was Mara’s doing as well. If only Malcolm hadn’t let her get a hold of the Lia Fáil, the ancient stone of destiny, she wouldn’t have gotten her Light back and he would still be a Dia.

  He’d been a fool.

  He knew that now. His obsession was certainly his downfall, and while he still thought of Mara almost every waking minute, it was now with burning hatred.

  Eli shuffled to the table, unaware of Malcolm’s glare, and set down the tray. Malcolm looked at it with disgust. Whatever the concoction was, it looked revolting. Malcolm pushed the tray aside, despite the rumble of hunger in his stomach.

  “Bring me another jug of wine,” Malcolm ordered Eli.

  Eli shook his head with a vacant look in his eyes and simply said, “No more.”

  Malcolm groaned and got to his feet. “Well, bring me some ale, then.”

  Eli nodded mechanically and shuffled out of the room.

  “For the love of the gods, how am I to endure this any longer?” he growled, moving back to the window.

  The slavers and their captives had settled down for the night; the dead body of the escaped captive lay untouched down the beach.

  Malcolm examined the one slaver still awake, watching the waves rolling onto shore. He was clearly the leader—older than the others, the one to bark orders. He’d shown such little concern for his captive, and kept a steady hand while throwing that axe. This man must have rivers of blood on his hands, and a heart a hard as stone.

  If only Malcolm could read his mind, he’d know this barbarian’s evils.