Sons (Book 2) (117 page)

Jimmy got on the other side of the bed and helped me pull back the bedclothes.  Then we gently tugged off the bandages while the treed druids climbed down.  Several of the wounds were already festering and going septic.  Four druids from the thicket came into the clearing, alarmed from the shouts of the two in the tree.  Jimmy barked at them to bring clean linen, bandages, and hot water immediately.  Any kind of healing on Cornell was going to be difficult, I knew that going in.  He really didn’t have any natural life to draw upon and he’d used much of his stolen energy in staying alive through what they were doing to him.

Moving on instinct I pulled a mortar and pestle from somewhere in my room.  When I looked back, I found I had a laboratory wedged in between my office and the kitchen, behind the ovens specifically.  Don’t know if that matters.  Picking up a knife, choosing the berries, leaves, and fruit was the next problem.  Cornell needed restoratives, not regeneratives.  His mind was shut from the pain his body endured, maybe even shut down. 
Esteleum
was the first ingredient, properly de-seeded. Mixing bowls of various sizes appeared at my side as I cut a quarter of the fruit off into the mortar.  A small wedge went into his mouth, under his tongue, while the rest I set aside.  Leaves and bark from their sacred trees—the oak, ash, and thorn—went in next, picked and scraped from the tops of their favorites.  I began chanting as I picked up the pestle and ground these together into a paste.  That mixture went into one of the mixing bowls.  Handing the mortar and pestle off to a druid to wash, I grabbed another from my lab.

I was moving faster than Jimmy and the druids.  They were carefully cleaning the wounds, washing away excess blood and pus and other noxious fluids.  That left the specimen collections to me.  Thankfully, the Adjudication left me with a sense of their other properties and most of them were farms of some kind.  I could get the animal parts I needed without the slaughter.  Fresh goat’s milk mixed gently with goldenrod and thistle along with a few unripe mulberries.  That got handed off to a druid to simmer on the fire.  Trading the druid my clean mortar for the dirty one, I went to another farm for the horse’s urine and the sheep’s uterine cells to mix with another quarter of the
Esteleum
, and—okay, very strange—garlic and bay leaf.  This went on for twenty minutes and over three hundred ingredients.  In the end, I found myself standing by the fire, stirring a large cooking pot and being watched intently by Hamish, Kendrick and nearly two dozen priests of the inner circles as I stopped chanting.

There were six levels of goo in the pot and I only wanted two, the first and the fifth.  Pulling a shallow ladle from my lab, I drew the iridescent green fluid off the top and poured it into a drinking glass, thinking of the horse’s urine and the goo’s pale yellow tinge and shuddering.  The next four layers I just raised up out of the pot and inverted, then brought the entire pot to Cornell’s bedside.  I wanted sterile gloves for this part, but beggars can’t be choosers. 

Jimmy did a good job with the druids in cleaning him up, but Cornell had bled and seeped more in the time I was preparing my gunks.  Scraping out a good amount of the brackish paste out of the pot with my knife, I peeled the biggest bandage slowly away and smeared the mixture onto the wound, pressing it closed as I went.  Jimmy pressed another bandage into place, careful not to tape across another wound.  Cornell groaned in pain, the first sign of life he’d made since we came into the copse.  Encouraged, we kept going until he was almost a mummy.  When I checked his mind, surprisingly he was actually awake.

“Cornell,” I said gently, my voice rough from so much singing in so many voices.  I had zoned out, working on instinct and trusting Jimmy to watch my back, trusting my brothers to watch our backs.  I’d actually have to think about what I did.  “We need to sit you up a little, so you can drink something.  You know how this works.”  I gently lifted his head up and Jimmy slid a pillow under his shoulders to cushion the bandages.  Cornell’s dark eyes watched me through slits as I held the drinking glass to his lips and began the guttural chant to bind the three together.  It was a bit of a gamble to sing in their original tongue since I wasn’t exactly certain how many would recognize it.  Cornell finished the whole glass without complaint and Jimmy and I eased him back onto the bed.

In an excessively good mood, Hamish stood and started adding the power of his circle to the binding, the first compassionate act I’d seen from him.  Kendrick came to my side of Cornell’s bed and did the same.  Then I shocked them both by going to the end of his bed and closing their circle, empowering it to its fullest extent and intent.  Eight druids fell into an incomplete circle around us, flowing east to north to west and chanting to empower their own circle of protection and health.  This was Davis’ sacred circle, the one he was thrown out of yesterday.  I raised a second voice and closed it for them.  Then another sacred circle of this glen began chanting but moving with the sun, east to south to west.  They were only six in number until Jimmy joined them, singing with two voices, and again, I closed their circle.  I crackled with power and all druid eyes were on me as I funneled the energy into Cornell.  The four elemental energies of earth, air, fire, and water coursed through me and into him, working the bindings I placed on his body as he convulsed and spasmed uncontrollably on the bed.  I stopped the power flow when the spell I wrought no longer had effect on him.  It resonated against the veils hiding the glen from London and told everyone that High Magic was performed here.  High Magic that they weren’t privy to.

Ethan brushed against the anchor lightly as the high priest of each circle broke its sacrosanct nature, last to first.  I let him see what was happening, but I still held considerable energy until Hamish broke his.  There were still a dozen or so druids and acolytes in the copse that simply stared in awe of Jimmy and me.  The Hilliards were the only ones to know what exactly was done here, but they all knew power when it rolled over them.  Hamish fell back on the bed, giggling and clapping like a little girl.  Neither of us knew what to think of that.

After shoving every dirty item remaining into every free hand I encountered, all that left was three mixing bowls and the big pot.  The remaining contents had to be destroyed in specific ways, so I paired a druid with an acolyte and explained the process for each.  The steps were familiar to them, but the magnitudes of energy and the order I required was more extreme than they were used to.  These would take awhile to clean, but the rest went back to my kitchen on Gilán to be washed again.  I told Cornell’s physicians to remove his bandages in an hour, but to feed him before then, a light chicken broth only.  Then Jimmy and I turned to leave.

“Archdruid McClure,” Hamish called after me, trotting up to us like a puppy.  He held out two thick manila envelopes to me, one labeled ‘Names’ and the other ‘Rites.’  “Your lists, Lord Daybreak.”

“Thank you, Hamish,” I responded with a tired smile, then we left the copse and re-entered the world at large.  Looking up at the sun, I estimated the time at ten-forty.  “Crap, we still have time for the opening ceremonies.” 

Jimmy laughed, the bastard.

We walked.  That was my mistake.  I just wanted a few moments of relative quiet. 

But for all my new knowledge in druidism, I really didn’t understand the true power of speech, I suppose: Gossip travels at light speed.

The druids provided crowd control, ushering the incoming magicians and wizards into the main pavilion near the single building at the center of the glen.  The newly outed druids surprised most of the wizards since the practice was thought to have gone wholly into the realm of New Age romanticism.  The presence of the Breach warning and over two hundred druids cast considerable doubt on that belief.  The resonance of High Magic shattered it completely.  The Hilliards’ protections around the glen were amazing.  Regardless of which entrance a person or group used, he, she, or they were shunted to one place and led here and if you weren’t meant to be here, you didn’t see an entrance at all.  If you weren’t on the guest list, you weren’t here.  Except for Davis, who came in with us.

We arrived five minutes before the ceremonies started, thinking the large number of druids at the back of the pavilion would allow us to sneak around to the podium casually, unnoticed.  I think I would have been less noticed if I dropped into the Summer Court.  One druid turned and saw me, whispered, “Archdruid,” and started an avalanche of genuflects. 
Every
druid in sight turned and fell to his or her knees, bowing repeatedly.  It was embarrassing.

“Ha!  A bell!” cried Bishop from the podium.  “Somebody tack a druid on his ass!”  My brothers erupted in laughter around him and I heard Gordon’s deep-chested laugh in there as well.  We walked straight through the druids now that our cover was blown.  I’d thought they’d change their tune about me before the day was out, but I didn’t think it would be such a radical change.  And the murmuring of “Archdruid” was… unexpected.  Why Hamish said that, I don’t know, but I saw how the information moved.  The new head of Hilliard Brothers stood beside Bishop on the podium, Simon Lynton, along with his second and third.  And there were three or four acolytes in the crowd that had been in the copse and a few druids who were around the sinks earlier.  Gossip, faster than light, Einstein got it wrong.

“Mr. Lynton,” I said hoarsely from the front base of the podium, “Would you mind standing up, please?  You all look a little silly at the moment and you have work to do.”

“Yes, Archdruid McClure,” Lynton said, smiling as he rose to his feet.  He was of average height, but a broad man with a round face and bright blue eyes.  He had the confidence and sense of power for the job, but lacked Davis’ overt honesty.  Ryan exuded honesty–whether he was or not remained to be seen.

“Didn’t you skip a few steps there, Seth?” Peter asked laughing lightly.  “Don’t you at least have to be a druid first?”

Davis snorted, scoffing.  “More than that,” he muttered.

Dropping the envelopes of rites and names onto my desk on Gilán, I plucked another
Esteleum
from my garden and munched away on it to soothe my battered throat.  Then I looked around for a free table.  Plenty of free space at tables, but none were actually free.  I recognized about a third of the people here by sight from previous encounters, mostly public ones like the Arena, but some I met at Fuller’s party or saw at Grammand.  Some of the rest I knew by reputation, like Arthur and Guinevere.  But I didn’t know well over half the people here.  I glanced up at Kieran and was about to ask when Jimmy beat me to it.

“Ehran, do we have a table?” he asked from beside me.

“You’re kiddin’ me, right?” Kieran said, grinning.  He waved at Bishop.  “He thinks you’re the greatest thing since buttered bread!  He’s got us all up here like we’re going to do something.”

“You’ve convinced him otherwise, right?” Jimmy asked as we walked around to the back of the podium.  The pavilion had gotten eerily quiet since we’d entered.  The druids weren’t the only ones enraptured by my presence and it was starting to freak me out.

“We tried,” Ethan said, laughing at me and echoing the laugh through the anchor.  “Then some idjit just
had
to perform some sort of High Magic on the premises and scared everybody.  We had to tell them who the idjit was.” 

Every druid in earshot started bristling in anger at the insult, especially Lynton.  Bishop leaned over to him and said quietly, “The McClure brothers have a very special relationship, Simon.  They play hard together.  Don’t get in the middle or you’ll get crushed.”

“But ‘idjit’ sounds perilously close to ‘idiot’,” Lynton complained to Bishop in a whisper.

“And Seth isn’t the slightest bit bothered by it,” Bishop said dismissively.

“He’s right, Mr. Lynton,” I said taking my seat at the podium.  “Besides, if Ethan actually meant to insult me, he would have chosen a more precise word than ‘idjit’.”  Kieran sat down on my left with Ethan, then Peter on my right.  We looked out at the expectant crowd of magic users and waited for Bishop to begin.  He tried.  He did.  No one would give him attention for long.  Even Kieran got aggravated at them.

“Seth,” he said gently, without looking at me.

“Yeah, I know,” I whined and pulled the envelope into my cavern, then turned to Bishop.  “Sorry, Thomas, but I seem to be too much of a distraction.”  I wrapped a portal around myself and jumped to a nice sunny spot on a hill.  Pushing on my awareness to let Jimmy see me, I laid down in the grass and cloud-watched.  At least for a few minutes, before I started multitasking and dropped down into my cavern.

In the center sat the Pact atop the foundation Stone gleaming brilliantly in its own light.  The Day and the Night Swords floated to the sides of the orb with each scabbard slightly behind them, like a lord and his knight.  Lying as if tossed lazily aside at the base of the Stone were the Crossbow and Quarrel.  This was my personal arsenal.  It bonded to me—they liked me—for some unknowable reason.  I didn’t complain.  They’d saved my life on several occasions and have been incredibly useful as tools on others.

Time to look at the Hilliards’ list.  Picking up the envelope that was now sitting at my feet, I started to unwind the string on the clasp when I realized I already knew the contents.  The moment I pulled it into my cavern, I knew.  Moving away from the center, I held the envelope up and blew gently on the back.  Pages shot out of the front at tremendous speed, whirling about as if caught in a wind tunnel.  Once I stopped blowing, the pages started collecting under pictures of each man and woman the Hilliards reported.  In some cases, they were actual photographs, but mostly the pictures were photocopied reductions of hand-drawings.  The druids had some exquisite artists among them.  Now I was going to have to find their pictures of us and steal them.  And probably keep stealing them, now that I was an Archdruid. 

Now I had a wall of fifty-seven magicians who the Hilliards knew committed acts of blood rites.  Their files were extensive on the history of these people, not that I trusted it.  This was only a guide, a probability to index in some way.  The pictures helped a lot.  A few of them were actually here under other names.  Aliases and multiple names weren’t unusual, from what I’ve learned, but it still makes me suspicious.  Bringing up the information I gleaned from Sondre and adding what Kieran wrenched out of Dieter and her, I created a wall similar to the first. I cross-referenced the two and came up with a few more possibilities among the current population of the glen. 

“Ethan,” I called out mildly as I pushed the walls back and pulled the five files together.

“It’s about time!” Ethan said, appearing in front of me.  “I am
so
bored!  And you’re going to have to make an appearance shortly.  The druid is getting close to saying too much.”  Multitasking again, I keyed into Jimmy’s mind and listened to what was said at the lectern.  Lynton was explaining in very vaguely specific terms—that special language that only lawyers can speak—how the Hilliards challenged and lost a breach of the Accords.  I had a few minutes before he might go over the line.

“Don’t blame me!  I didn’t ask to be
stared
at or I’d be there, too,” I said, then waved at the pictures.  “I cross-referenced Sondre, Dieter, and the Hilliards’ information.  These five are currently here.”

“They don’t look too powerful from this,” he commented.

“From this, no, but we don’t know what they’ve learned from other sources, like experimentation,” I reminded him.  It was time to interrupt Simon.  Tossing a Tower of Babel spell on him until I got there, I wrapped myself in a portal and jumped under the pavilion again.  “That’s enough, Simon,” I said calmly, giving him back his capacity for communication.  “It is enough that it is known a  Breach occurred between Lord Bishop and the Hilliard Brothers and the matter has been attended to.  Nothing else needs to be said.”

A general rumble of discontent rolled across the tables under the tent like distant thunder.  A Greek man near the front in center right stood and called for my attention, “Lord Daybreak!”

“Yes, Mr. Milykos?” I asked, turning and adjusting Bishop’s acoustics to include the Greek speaker.  He was the eldest son of the Greek attendant and was acting as his translator.  The father didn’t need one as he spoke nine languages fluently.  The younger Milykos was setting out to prove himself and Daddy was letting him have an international stage to play on.

“Why do you set the limits on information?  Much has happened here!  A Breach of the Accords has occurred!  As Signatories, we have the right know what has happened here!” Milykos challenged dramatically, his English perfect.

“Would all the druids and other security personnel please step outside the pavilion?” I asked loudly.  As soon as the tent was clear of non-magicians, I raise a thin sheen of Gilán-blue energy.  Steadying myself, I put my game face on and forced my countenance forward a little.  Then I walked down the main aisle even with the Greeks and raised up with the Stone.  “I, Mr. Milykos, am the Arbiter.”

He cringed, visibly, but he was made of sterner stuff and he meant to show it.  “So as Arbiter, you can change the provisions of the Arbitration as you wish, after the fact?”

“Within the provisions of the main arguments and depending on the language, yes,” I said.  “Did you not read what you signed?”

“Yes, I read it!” Milykos objected strongly, offended by the guess.  But his memory of signing rose quickly to the top of his mind and slipped out.  He not only didn’t read it, it was one of eleven papers he signed in a stack that day and he barely acknowledged the oath.  It definitely wasn’t the Unseelie Accords.

“Tell me, Mr. Milykos, once a matter has been shown to be sufficiently important enough to warrant an arbitration on a Challenge and an Arbiter is selected by the challengee, what is the only possible outcome?”

“There are several possibilities…” he started, confused.

“That is incorrect,” I said.  “That leads me to believe that not only have you not signed the Accords, you have not read them either.  This seems to be a recurring issue.  Someone should investigate why because I really don’t have the time.”  Closing my eyes, I turned a quick circle, examining everyone in the room carefully to see who among them could wield the Oath of the Accords.  Only my brothers held enough raw power, cascading through our kinship bond, however that had developed.  “How many of you claim to be Signatories of the Accords?” Well over half raised their hands in answer.  Thankfully, neither Bishop nor Gordon was among them.  Unfortunately, Fuller was.

“Thomas, you’ve recently suffered Arbitration as the challenged party,” I said, still turning slowly.  “What is the only outcome once an Arbiter has accepted?  And what is the proscribed penalty?”

Bishop stood up solemnly and said, “The only outcome is a Breach of the Accords by one party and the only penalty is the destruction of the breaching party.”

“That’s right,” I said brightly to the audience.  “But you’ll notice that the Hilliards were not destroyed.  I did not believe that the Hilliards’ crimes warranted the deaths of over four thousand people.  The Arbiter has broad discretionary powers.”

Milykos thought he had me on that and got excited.  Hushed whispers behind abruptly erected privacy shields rose from the Greek table, then a few more tables as well.  Then Milykos rose again.  “Lord Daybreak, do these ‘broad discretionary powers’ including changing the provisions of the penalties?”

“Depending on the main arguments and the language, yes,” I said, suitably surprising the Greek.  He expected me to say no.  “I have not yet done so.”

“But you just stopped Lynton…” he objected, but I interrupted him.

“From being destroyed by the Authority, yes, I know, I was here,” I said, getting more exasperated by their lack of understanding.  “Let’s get past this, shall we?”

A new voice entered the fray and I really wasn’t looking forward to this.

“Pray, a moment, good Lord, but the rules do not work that way,” a gentle, avuncular voice permeated the pavilion.  A brief flash of light down the aisle and a man appeared inside.  He wore an ermine mantle and purple robes over beautifully wrought armor of silver over iron plating.  A circlet of gold crowned his grayed head, adding to his obvious portrayal of a regal.

“Arthur, I presume,” I said patiently.

“I am he, yes,” he said, politely, bowing his head slightly then throwing back his robes to reveal more of his armor, including the impressive broadsword at his side, the reputed Excalibur.  The Day and the Night both hummed in warning, but stayed in my cavern.