Shatter - Sins of the Sidhe (2 page)

Rowan gasped and watched the woman struggle to focus on the cards. The redhead fumbled with her hands and gave another anxious glance towards Rowan. The act told Ro one thing: the woman was scared.

“I, I can’t read your cards. I am sorry.” The gypsy collected the cards and restacked the deck. “Here, take your money back,” she threw the twenty back on the table.

Brinley looked disappointed and a bit pissed, “What do you mean? Why not? Is it bad?” Worry lit her face and she glanced at Ro for reassurance.

“Nay, it is not bad, just unreadable. There is a shadow over the cards and I can’t see anything clearly. Please. You must leave.” With a huff, the gypsy pushed her chair away from the table and quickly left the tent with her two customers staring at each other in frustration.

“Well that was sucky.” Brinley picked up her money and the two of them headed back to where Christine was watching the human chess match on the grassy hill.

“So how was it? Tall, dark and handsome coming soon?” Christine teased as the two women plopped down on the grass beside her and passed around a bag of freshly made kettle corn.

“Uneventful and disappointing,” says Brinley while shoving a fistful of the sweet and salty into her mouth. Tipping her glass back, she swallowed that last few drops of wine that was left. She needed a refill. They watched as a knight in white shining armor took a scruffy looking pawn on the perfectly manicured chessboard. It was neat to watch, but they were women who were doers, not watchers. The game got boring quickly and they got up to see what else was around for entertainment. Walking past the tarot card tent once more, Rowan saw the cloth tent was drawn closed and boasted a sign that said “Be back in 5 minutes.” Ro gave her friend one of those
oh well
looks and coaxes her bestie to spend the refund on filling up their cups one more time before watching a local band play and then heading home.

Behind the tent, the gypsy shuffled a deck of tarot cards in her hands – a nervous thinking habit to be sure – and she studies the trio as they walk arm in arm looking like they were off to see the wonderful Wizard of Oz. She kept a close watch on them while they went about the rest of their afternoon. She wasn’t about to lose the woman, not when it had taken so long to find her. Digging her cell phone out of the deep pocket of her rented costume, she dialed a number that has been saved for just this moment.

A deep voice answered the other end and she said, “It’s Ava. I have found the Shadow Breaker.”

Pulling up to her little old farmhouse, Ro was exhausted. The rest of the day was fun, silly and long. The buzz from the wine had dissipated after the disappointing tarot card fiasco and the trio spent the last of the afternoon catching up on each other’s lives, gossip from their old neighborhood and sitting back to people watch. The drive home wasn’t quiet but it wasn’t energized like it had been in the morning. Dusk was rolling in and both Rowan and Brinley had work to do in the morning. Being a responsible adult sucked.

“I leave for New Orleans in a few weeks,” Brinley checked her makeup in the mirror one last time, “another CEU thing. I hope to do some cemetery tours and go to some voodoo shops if I have a chance. Want me to bring you back a souvenir?”

“Nah, not unless it’s a hunky witch doctor. Or Lestat.”

They laughed and hugged each other goodbye, promising to call each other soon, and then Brinley drove off down the dark road. With their busy schedules, who knows when the next time they’d see each other would be. Life. It had a talent for getting the in the way of fun.

Ro shuffled through her purse, pulled out her keys and unlocked the door. The smell of her house always made her feel instantly at peace. Herbal scented candles in every room were at the ready to light. She’d just cleaned the house and the smell of Windex was still detectable. She looked around her kitchen and grabbed an orange out of the bowl. Rowan was always eating, always hungry, hungry, hungry. Glancing around, she decided there was nothing to do now but take a hot bath, read some more of her sultry book, and hit the bed. Boy, a day out in the crisp fall air, walking for what had to have been about six miles around the faire and then add the food and wine, she was exhausted. Probably means she was getting old. Damnit.

Leaning down to start the hot water on full blast, the phone rings. “Hey mom.” Ro knew it was her mom before she even looked at the caller ID. It might sound crazy, but she swears the phone just sounds louder when her mother is ringing.

“How was your day, baby? Did you girls have fun?”

Yup, still her baby. Her thirty-year-old baby. Rowan was an only child, and was a lonely only child.

“Yeah, it was great. Sucks we can’t see each other more often, but to be honest, we’d probably go broke. Spent too much, ate too much, and laughed so much my cheeks kind of hurt.”

“Well that’s the best kind of hurt you can have.” Her mom was silent for a few seconds.

“So, what’s up mom?” Ro figured she’d best get the ball rolling on this phone call if she was going to enjoy her hot bath and novel while they were both still steamy.

“I just wanted to tell you I love you.”

Uh huh. Rowan waited for the other shoe to drop.

“It’s just that, well, I’ve had a terrible feeling all day.” Clunk, there went the shoe.

This is not the first time her mother has said those words. Ro rolled her eyes, “Well everything is fine here. Are you and dad okay? Dad watching his sugar?” Rowan’s father had diabetes and clogged arteries. He thinks candy and bacon are his friends, if only the candy and bacon knew that.

“Yes, we’re fine. And don’t roll your eyes.”
How did she know?
“I have this feeling in my gut of impending doom. I thought I should call you and check to make sure you’re okay.”

Well there’s some drama from your momma for you. Ro assured her she was fine. House was locked up tight and the only thing she was doing tomorrow was going into the shop to finish the final touches on a new mirror she’d created. Satisfied, her mom hung up and Ro sank into the hot and steamy, book in hand, ready for an evening with Hotty MacHunky in her newest highlander fantasy novel.

Adam couldn’t believe it. She was found. The one they had been searching for. For truth, they had been in need of this chosen one for centuries, but it wasn’t until the Goddess Morrigan came to Adam nearly twenty years ago to say that the Shadow Breaker had been chosen, and then charged him with a new quest to find her. She was a precious, unique weapon–the one who will break through the darkness shadowing their worlds and balance the scales once more. Waiting this long was a small drop in the bucket of life for Adam, but for a mortal, time is short and life is shorter. He had no idea if he’d find her in time or if her death would beat him to the finish line in this very precarious race. And now she has finally been found: a true miracle. They’d been searching blindly for years - having no idea what she looked like, how old she was, or even if she was human or Fae. Talk about a needle in a haystack. This hunt was more like finding a pin of light in the sun itself. Ava had called Adam that very afternoon to say that she met the girl at her tent at a Renaissance Faire. What the hell a Renaissance Faire was, he had no clue.

Rowan. Her name was Rowan. A natural at divination, Ava had predicted that the Shadow Breaker would be drawn in with the crowd and find his or her way to Ava’s card table eventually. Magic always seeks magic. Ava had been going to these things for years in hopes to be right – and she was (usually is, Adam grimaced). But what she didn’t predict was what kind of human the Shadow Breaker would be. They had been searching blindly for years, Ava, Adam and his Druid friend, Devlin. The Goddess Morrigan had given them a charge, but not much more to go with. Such is the way of the Gods. They leave you to figure things out on your own most of the time. Probably for their personal entertainment, Adam grumbled to himself.

Ava reported Rowan was a beautiful woman, full of fire and zest. She said you could tell by the way she held herself: confident walk, the way she laughed with abandon - she was a woman who enjoyed life. Eyes are the windows to the soul, Ava explained, and Rowan’s eyes were fierce. The stare she gave Ava was enough to send chills even down her half-Sidhe spine. Indeed, this was a woman to be reckoned with. Small in stature, she looked in her twenties, but they knew she was a wee older. Adam thought she was but a babe in Sidhe years. Too bad she wasn’t Sidhe, mayhap then they’d have more of a fighting chance. It was a little unnerving to know the fate of the worlds was very much in her small, oh so human hands.

Excited to track the woman down immediately, Adam called the Druid to tell him the news. Their wait was over. “Pack your things. Tonight. We have much to do in the morning,” and tossed his phone down on the desk.

By Danu, Adam was a ferocious wreck, already kicking into battle mode to the point his legs had him pacing and his hand itching for his sword. It had been a long time since he felt like this. Bloodlust started to pulse in his veins causing his muscles to bunch and flex. Thighs thick and hard, he paced like a caged animal in his room. Lorcan. That whoreson was out there hiding, and now Adam had a way to find him and the way was Rowan.

Adam and Lorcan have a long history together and they had unfinished business. As two of the original seven Fae created by the Gods, they were warriors that protected their lands under the Goddess Morrigan’s hand. They were Sidhes, the strongest and most powerful of the Fae. But Lorcan wanted more than a sword and his honor, he wanted power.

Greedy and selfish, Lorcan wanted his own domain and fell from grace after trying a ruthless and corrupt attempt to seize a power belonging only to the Gods themselves. Lorcan was cast out of the Faelands and banished from all other Fae worlds. He was a great loss to the Fae, or so Adam once felt. Lorcan was a damn skilled fighter. But the Gods saw him for what he truly was – weak, selfish, and greedy.

Cast out and stripped of most of his power, Lorcan was forced to live in the human world, a degrading punishment indeed. He suffered much. Too much iron, too many humans and not enough magic to help him sustain even a basic level of power. Mayhap the Gods thought it would humble him to walk among the lowly, but it only fuelled his need for more power. Walking tirelessly through the Highlands, Lorcan searched for some lesser Fae hidden in the trees or under a rock. He planned to coerce the stupid creature into helping him, suck their energies dry if he could. But none such gullible creature was found... until one day when he heard the ranting of a small boy under a tree. As he crept closer to the child, Lorcan watched in awe as the boy’s aura pulsed and vibrated in swirls of vibrant colors. The boy was a very young Druid.

The child was but fourteen summers old, young and green in the ways of the Fae, and clearly just starting to practice his magics. He was pleading for the Gods to save his mother and young sister from the plague that had reached his village. Ah, the Fates were smiling down on Lorcan for once, how simple this would be. Lorcan took advantage of the desperate boy, tricking him into opening a forbidden door that had been locked with the promise of returning with healing powers to help his sick mother and sister. Said the God Belenus himself had sent Lorcan to the boy after hearing his pleas for mercy to spare his family from such illness. Backing his claims, Lorcan shed his glamour and showed his true form, revealing himself to the young Druid, proving that he was indeed a creation of the Gods. Lorcan looked the part too, fierce and strong, though with little power of his own now, Lorcan still stood over seven feet tall, had black wings that stretched the length of his muscular body, and a face of an angel. The young Druid fell for his lies. Desperation can lead to stupidity; it was what Lorcan was hoping for.

Anxious, scared, and foolish, the Druid used what little Fae magic he had already, along with the guidance of this newly found saviour, to unlock a realm that Lorcan told him about. It was a place abandoned and long forgotten to the Fae. Lorcan had remembered it from a battle he’d fought long ago. It was the perfect hiding place for the banished Sidhe.

Blood was offered, words were said, and a hole opened like a spread of black smoke in the air. Lorcan disappeared into the blackness, barring entrance to any outsiders, and left the gullible Druid behind to bury his family. What cares had he for such petty things as family and love? Druids were few and only barely more than human and certainly not as superior as the Fae. Lorcan did not think they were worth the trouble that the Gods put into helping them all the time. Fools. All of them are weak and stupid fools.