Brothers: Legacy of the Twice-Dead God (31 page)

“They lied to MacNamara about it being theirs
and they covered it up,” I said, once the roar died down some.
“Because of that, their seeking spell won’t work. It might have,
but Ethan broke them off the Swords completely and that’s what they
searched for, the bindings.”

“Actually,” Ethan interjected, “I only
removed a small part of them. They shook the rest off on their own.
Pretty neat trick, too.”

“Technically,” said Kieran, “they didn’t lie.
The binding was theirs, just as you avoided telling MacNamara that
you had the Black Hand’s weapons.”

“Yes, Ehran, I caught that,” I said smugly.
Kieran grinned, watching the Queens’ display appreciatively.

In the Arena, MacNamara stood slowly as the
Queens’ podiums lowered at the same rate. The Queens vanished from
sight very quickly but their presence was still felt in the
auditorium. They had not left, just out of sight. Elvis had not
left the building.

MacNamara did nothing to relieve the sexual
tension in the air. He smiled, surveying the auditorium like a
shark in freshly chummed waters, hungrily.

“Let the Challenges begin,” MacNamara said,
smiling evilly down on the auditorium. “The Games are on!” He
exploded in a flash of light, blazing through the Arena like a
solid gel filling the air with his presence and his power, and then
darkness fell completely. Even the fountain of power at the center
of the Arena was dark for a few seconds and with it total silence.
Until small lights started sputtering on slowly around the exits,
then some around the walls. It took five or six minutes for the
Arena to return to its former lighting and sound levels. That was
pretty amazing with eighty or ninety thousand people packed into
such a small volume. That still felt like a light estimate.

We all relaxed some, then. “What, no parade
of elves?” Peter asked, somewhat sarcastically.

“Speaking of elves, where’s Shrank?” I asked.
“I haven’t seen him since MacNamara visited.”

“I asked him to go up the hall to see if he
could acquire the first cards,” said Kieran.

“First cards?” I asked.

“Listings for the first fights,” answered
Peter.

“Lord Kieran,” Shrank squeaked from the
doorway. He was barely visible, hovering carefully in one place
next to the doorjamb. “If I may speak to you… privately?”

Kieran made an odd yet concerned face and got
up from the table, leaving the balcony. Peter and I exchanged looks
with Ethan then all three of us turned to stare at the door,
waiting for Kieran’s return. After five minutes, we started to get
worried. I could see him in the apartment, near the front door. His
aura as bright as usual, in no danger, but very concerned about
something that was just outside the range of my vision. Shrank was
bobbing excitedly beside him. He came back toward us, but stopped
at the couch and sat.

Shrank zipped out to the balcony and said,
“Kieran requests that you come inside now, sirs.”

“Thank you, Shrank,” he said, as we filed in.
He had filled the coffee table with papers, one large stack in the
top with five single sheets in a row on the bottom. The pixie
beamed at him and landed on the back of the couch. Kieran continued
reading, then moved to another paper. I wondered if he knew how
crazy he was making us. I sat on the couch beside him while Ethan
and Peter took chairs opposite us and leaned forward to look.

“Well?” I asked anxiously. Ethan and Peter
moved closer to the table, too.

Kieran glanced up nervously and said, “Well,
we have a problem. A very interesting problem, really.”

He started collecting the five single sheets
together, fanning them so that the signatures at the bottom of each
were visible.

“One Seth McClure has been challenged in solo
competition in the games,” he said calmly, “by no less than five
masters of combat.”

“Ain’t happenin’!” I said loudly, sitting up
straight. “No way, no how!”

“And I agree, wholeheartedly,” Kieran said,
nodding. “We all know that. And we know that who issued the
challenges could tell us something, even though they would all be
declined. But that’s not the interesting part of this. Look at
them.” He slid the fanned papers in front of me.

I looked at the paper. It looked fairly
normal. Expensive, well, what I’d call expensive. Written in black
ink in a fine script in English. “I, Clifford Harris…” Freakin’
Asshole. Blah, blah, blah, “…challenge Seth McClure…” Oh, I see
what Kieran’s getting at now: my name. “What is that?” I asked,
picking up the paper and looking at the odd way my name was written
twisting my head around is if it would help. I looked at the next
challenge, scanning down for my name. Different handwriting, paper,
and ink, but my name had the same shifting, multicolored,
overwritten look. I flipped quickly through the other three to find
them all the same only in that respect.

“There is a spell on my name on each one.
Why? What’s it do?” I asked again.

Kieran explained, “It is a Named location
spell. The challenges are spelled to find you within this realm by
your name. Once you touch them, the spell releases energy so that
the sender knows that you have received it. If the sender is strong
enough, perceptive enough, he will know exactly where you are.”

Looking down at the top paper, Harris’. “It
found me, but it’s still charged. All of them. What’s wrong?”

“That is the interesting part,” Kieran said
softly, leaning back on the couch. “Something we must understand
quickly. It is amazingly good luck or someone has placed a very bad
hex on you. We need to decipher which is true.”

“How do people like MacNamara get around the
Name issue?” I asked.

“By not letting their True Names be known,”
Kieran answered.

“No birth certificates in Faery then, huh?” I
asked.

“Not as such, no,” Kieran answered. “There
are official records that hold names of births and deaths, but
those have official names, never True Names.”

“Would this have anything to do with why
Peter can’t see me but you can?” I asked, hopeful.

“I hadn’t considered that,” he said,
thoughtfully. “Peter, do you know how to send a Named Tracer?”

“Yes,” Peter said, “it’s a simple trick,
especially with a Name.”

“Send one to Seth from where you are now,
please,” Kieran requested.

Peter sat back, staring at Kieran, then
shrugged. He raised his right hand and tugged lightly for energy in
the room. Whatever he was going to do required very little energy
from what I saw him pull in. A sphere of azure blue light popped
into his hand as he concentrated. I watched with interest, but he
was right, it was easy. The light was there just to signal the
path. The real, significant magic was what pulled the light balloon
along and even that was simple. It all hinged on the astral plane
knowing where to etch the path placed by the Name.

“Seth McClure,” Peter said, with force. I
felt it—my name had power. It felt alarmingly good. Peter released
the sphere as he said my name and the power of the location spell
seared to life on the astral plane. And it just sat there, hanging
in space in front of Peter.

Another sphere, slightly smaller, tapped me
repeatedly in the side of my head and I jumped, falling off the
couch into the floor. Kieran and Ethan burst out laughing, but
Peter was staring at his tracery in confusion.

“That answers that question. Sorry, Seth, I
didn’t realize that would shock you so badly,” said Kieran, helping
me off the floor. “You can release that, Peter. I know what the
problem is now. My little brother has a new name!”

“What?” Peter and I asked at the same time,
surprised.

“How is that possible?” I asked. Peter
dispelled the energy bubble with a wave.

“It is a function of power, Seth,” said
Kieran. “You are more powerful than we know. Perhaps not in obvious
ways. Actually, nothing about you is obvious.” He smiled at me,
again. It was more of a smirk really.

“Yeah, like anything about you is obvious,” I
snorted out. “Do I get to know my new name?”

“You know it already, Little Brother,” he
said softly. “And let us take the lead of the elves and keep it
hidden, at least until I can teach you enough to protect yourself.
Okay?”

“I don’t understand,” said Peter. “Who
changed his name?”

“He did,” said Kieran. “And it is highly
likely that he will do it again at some point in the future.”

“I’d say he was a quick study,” said Peter,
pouting, “but he hasn’t studied anything yet. This is so unfair! I
bust my ass for years and he does things without trying that most
councilmen can’t manage.” He looked like a puppy who’d lost his
bone.

“Don’t beat yourself up,” Ethan said to
Peter, patting his shoulder from the other chair. “You’re more than
you think you are, too.”

“What? I haven’t done anything,” Peter said,
turning to Ethan with disdain.

“Haven’t you? I bet if you ask Seth what he’s
done, he’d say the same thing,” he retorted, with a smile on his
face. “Yet you have both done things that neither Kieran nor I
would have thought to do or been capable of doing. If you think
about it, the person who has actually contributed the least to this
entire situation is Kieran.”

Ethan finished his cheer-up speech with, “And
he is inarguably the most knowledgeable and powerful here.”

Kieran barked out a laugh and stood up.
“Shrank, is there some paper and a pen in here?”

“Yes, lord,” Shrank sang out as he jumped off
the couch into the air. “I believe it’s over here,” he said, flying
over to a small table against the wall underneath a tall, narrow
mirror. Kieran opened the drawer and removed a leather portfolio
and silver case. He paused for a moment, then placed both back in
the drawer, closing it firmly. Shrank looked up confused.

“Thank you, Shrank,” he said, “but I think a
more active and personal touch will be more interesting right now.”
He turned back to us and asked, “What do you three say? Interested
in going to a party? Stretching our legs a bit?”

“We’re here to talk to people,” I said,
standing. “Might as well be now.”

“Let’s go, then,” he said, smiling. “Just
stay close to me. You are supposed to be apprentices, after all.
Seth, bring the Challenges with you, please. We’ll take care of
those first.”

We left the apartment with Kieran leading. He
turned left down the hall from the front door, the direction we
hadn’t been yet. I still hadn’t figured out the lighting
completely. Some places had definite fixtures while others, like
this hallway, just appeared to be lit as if the ceiling glowed with
its own internal source. I supposed that could be it, looking at
it. Realizing I was trying to distract myself, I forced myself back
into the issues at hand and started reading the Challenges I held,
again.

Harris’ was a piece of work. He’d worded it
so that it almost looked like an arrest warrant. He stated that I
was wanted by the United States Government for the same crap he
spewed at me the last time I faced him. As if I didn’t take him
down a few pegs before, now he’s seriously pissing me off. The
other four were pretty much the same text, almost boilerplated
even.

“Can you believe this guy?” I said shaking my
head in disbelief, passing Harris’ Challenge to Peter to read.

“Actually, yes,” Peter said, passing it to
Ethan when he held his hand out for it. “That’s him all over. No
accounting for stupid.”

“Do you think he actually thinks this way?”
asked Ethan, as he read. “I mean, really, this is so wrong.” He
handed it back to me as we slowed at the end of the hallway. The
right side opened up into a lavish and huge room. The left led to a
vestibule with a small contingent of elves that appeared to be
controlling the entrance to guests. Kieran was unsure as to how to
proceed but decided quickly, turning right into the larger room and
ignoring the vestibule.

Kieran strode calmly into the center of the
room, his green eyes bright as he surveyed the established groups
of people. The room was curiously empty of any Fae at this point,
at least curious to me. Everyone was dressed in what my mom called
“black tie” attire and my dad called “stuffed shirt.” I’d only seen
it from a distance a few times, when I’d traveled with them on
business, and they had to attend dinner parties. I’d hide on a
balcony and watch people go in and out in, men in their shiny black
suits and the women in different dresses, few of them were as
pretty as my mom was in hers. I’d whine about not getting to go and
Dad would whine about having to. Now here I was, at one and I
didn’t want to be here.

But that reminder steeled me. I already knew
how to deal with the first Challenge. That one was simple. And he
was right... Over… There.

“Hold these,” I said to Kieran, shoving the
other four Challenges into his chest and started across the room,
not taking my eyes off my stumpy target on the far side of the
room. I could feel Kieran and the rest less than three steps behind
me, which was fine. I expected no less. But they didn’t interfere,
knowing I wouldn’t lose control of myself, especially here. We cut
a noticeable green swath across the room as I straight-lined to my
target: Harris.

His back was to me and he was telling some no
doubt pretentious story to a tall, bored looking man sipping
champagne. There were about fifteen people in the group around him,
all of whom started backing away subtly when they saw me coming.
The bored man definitely saw me, too, but stayed where he was. He
wanted the ringside seat he’d been paying for, obviously.

With my left hand, I grabbed Harris’ right
shoulder, swung him around, and punched him with my right, hard, in
the face. I might have even added a little kinetic power into it,
I’m not sure. He flew back a few feet, hitting the exquisite
parquet floor hard, sending his wire framed glasses flying in
opposite directions to his champagne flute, both breaking. I’m
pretty sure it dented the floor, too, but I was too pissed to care
at that moment.