Page 64

“Cyerra!” Bryn yelled, opening her eyes and swinging her arm out, the crow squawking in annoyance as she flew to the headboard. “I’m beyond irritated with you.”

“I am aware, but I have no answers to give you. Everything you are and everything you need are inside of yourself or for Danu to provide. I am not privy to as much as you think.”

Bryn narrowed her eyes.

“I bet you’d have answers about Kian and who he is.”

“Ask him yourself. I had nothing to do with that demon when he was whole, and I’ll have nothing to do with him in his spirit form.”

She knew he was Fomori but hearing it again made it even more real.

“I was there at every battle that demon was. We did not chat in between the bloodshed. I did not have you telling me your secrets either, and you were powerful enough should I have pushed, I’d be nothing but ash and feathers.”

Fair enough. She let some of her ire at the crow go.

“They worship Balor here,” she confided to the crow, the beady eyes staring at her.

“Disgusting.”

Yeah, Bryn couldn’t disagree with that.

“It makes me wonder about some of the customs here. Surely you knew of Balor if we battled side by side in the past?”

“As much as Danu—”

“Quit foisting me off on her! You were in battle withme! You can help me find the memories of the Morrigan so we can defeat him, and you know it.”

Cyerra moved back to settle on the pillow near Bryn, picking at a feather before looking back up at her.

“Balor feared you all and knew his power was weakened when you were near. Now, I cannot imagine how difficult it will be to beat him with the natural world so very ill.”

“So, there is no hope.” Bryn felt her newfound fight dwindle at those words.

“No, it means we must find another way to do so, and that requires all the Tuatha Dé Danann together. Including Danu. If she dies, it will push all of you, and humanity, across the veil. The Fomori will roam the earth in your absence.”

Cyerra’s head turned to the window as the church bells rang out for one of the daily services.

“I will go explore this religion of Balor. Perhaps I might glean something for our cause that is helpful.”

Without a word from Bryn, Cyerra was gone, leaving another feather after her disappearing act.

“At least it’s not poop,” Bryn muttered as she grabbed the feather and tossed it away, turning and letting out a scream at seeing Kian there.

Kian was back and sat on the chair next to the bed, half shadow, half-ghostly figure as he stared at Bryn.

Shoving to sit up against the headboard, she noticed the dangerous look in his eyes, and her muscles tensed as she reached for the dagger under her pillow that Kessler had made for her.

“I should kill you.”

Bryn waited for him to say something, anything, else. He remained silent as he stared hard at her.

“If you even could in your state of being, well for lack of a better word... dead, would you? After speaking to me every day, knowing me, would you still choose to do it?” she asked, pulling the blanket up like a shield with her free hand.

“When I saw the painting of Balor in your chapel of worship—”

“Not mine,” she corrected, but he ignored her.

“There was something that told me we were in fact enemies, but that I do not have the whole story. That you are not the enemy I think you are. The enemy that I know you were.”