Page 29

CHAPTER 28

“Y ou should leave, too, Fin,” Ardghal said, after the others had gone.

“No. I’ve Siren DNA, and she’s my mate,” Fintan replied. “I’m never leaving her to fend for herself again.”

A bittersweet smile curled his ancestor’s mouth. “If I haven’t said it before, boy, you do our clan proud.”

Fintan wouldn’t have thought it, but Ardghal’s praise touched some long-forgotten need for paternal approval. Familial love wasn’t new to him, but his family was small. He extended his arm. The Siren prince reacted in kind, and clasping forearms, they mutually agreed to save the girl.

“Let’s go.” Ardghal waved his free arm toward the rocky ledge. A flat stone, wide enough to support them both, detached and sliced through the water until it was directly beneath them. In a musical language unknown to Fintan, Ardghal sang, and the water eagerly responded, gathering beneath the stone and acting as an escalator, guiding them to the grotto’s bottom. Taryn’s whirlpool had made a tunnel from floor to ceiling, allowing for easy breathing.

Fintan was grateful.

Yes, his Siren genes would’ve helped, but the energy required to survive underwater was great, and he wanted to be at full strength should Ardghal and Taryn need him to be.

“She’s awake!” he said, surprised to find her back with them. “Taryn!”

Facing them, she glared. Her visage was twisted with suspicion as her gaze darted between them.

“Why is she actin’ afraid?” he asked Ardghal in an aside.

Through narrowed eyes, Ardghal studied her, as warily as she them. With an abrupt laugh, he elbowed Fintan. “She thinks you’re trying to trick her, boy.”

Through their link, he said, “Why would you believe I’m after trickin’ ya, Taryn-Taryn?”

Relief flooded her face, and she shook her head with a snort.

“You never call me just Taryn, you damned idiot. I was worried Micha stole your body or something equally outrageous.”

Her smile was luminescent as she held out her hand, and Fintan was quick to grab it.

“What are we doing down here, aoibhneas mo croí ?”

“We need to work in harmony to open Ari’s treasure trove. I want those fuckers at the Authority stopped.” An evil grin curled her lips. “And if we can make Micha pay in the process, even better.”

“You’d be the perfect Siren ruler, love,” Ardghal replied. “You’ve only to say the word, and?—”

“Zip it, Ari. I’m Fintan’s.”

With a chuckle, the Siren prince gripped her other hand. The water separated, granting them access to the boulder they approached.

“This is it,” he said. Glancing down at her, he raised a brow. “Do you recall being Elizabeth, or do you need assistance?”

“What would that entail?”

He grinned. “A kiss.”

“If it’s from anyone but me, she’ll not be rememberin’ shite,” Fintan growled. He’d damned well find another way to break the spell hiding their treasures.

Taryn laughed. “We needed to work in harmony, remember?”

“Work, not snog.”

“Would it help to know you’re my favorite snogger?” she teased.

“Sure, and that’s grand. But just so ya kin, you’ll not be snoggin’ anyone but me,” Fintan said with a warning glare.

“He’s a sore winner,” Ardghal quipped. “Come, we need to get this done.”

Releasing Fintan, Taryn stepped up to the first boulder and examined it.

“Here goes nothing,” she murmured, pressing her palm flat against the surface.

Ardghal placed his hand over hers, and she gasped as his collective magic, Siren and Demigod, flowed through her. The churning water picked up speed, toppling over itself from the center outward. It was a living entity, like his life force prior to latching onto Fintan to be reborn.

Bolts of blue and white streaked from all the stones at once, twisting together and forming a helix around their bodies. As the coil lit, so did the symbols on the remaining stones. One by one, they ignited, climbing to the top of the boulders, displaying ancient ancestral runes known only to purebloods.

Taryn didn’t know what they represented, but she didn’t need to. This place recalled her spirit from her time on earth before, and it knew Ardghal.

The ground rumbled, and she had a momentary pause, fearing they’d screwed up. But Ardghal’s smile was reassuring, and she held fast as the helix swirled around them, gaining speed with each spin.

“What now?” she hollered over the howling wind it created.

He didn’t answer, and his knitted brows concerned her.

“We need Fintan. He’s my other half, and this won’t work without him,” he relayed through their link.

As if he’d heard, Fintan was pushing through the coil to get to them.

“What does it need from him?” Her shout became a scream as Ardghal’s hand transformed into a claw, and he cleaved through Fintan’s chest, shredding his heart. “No!”

The wind died.

“No! No, no, no, no, no! Fintan!” Taryn dropped to her knees, catching his head before it impacted the ground. She couldn’t catch her breath and hiccuped her sobs.

“Why, Ari? Why? ”

“Sorry, love. It required a blood sacrifice.”

“You could’ve used me instead,” she sobbed as she straddled Fintan and applied pressure. The gesture was useless, and his heart pumped no more.

“I am.”

The talon piercing her back was as brutal and painful as when Odessa gutted her earlier. But Ardghal’s betrayal cut deeper.

Ardghal scored his wrists next, opening the vein. As his blood mingled with Taryn’s and Fintan’s, he called it to him. Working quickly, he raced against the clock and the weakness beginning in his limbs. Ignoring Taryn’s accusing eyes, he dipped his fingers into the precious store of blood.

The first symbol belonged to Taryn, and on her forehead, he drew a spiraling wave intersected by a rising flame.

“Solmara,” he sang. “My flame. The one who creates storms in calm waters. Rise up, love.”

She rolled to her feet and awaited his command.

On Fintan’s forehead, he sketched a crescent harp entwined with vines, creating an infinity loop.

“Vaelthorn,” Ardghal sang. “My twin soul. The tethered one no more. You are the voice of our people. Rise up.”

Fintan climbed to his feet, prepared for whatever came next.

And finally, relying on feel, he drew a trident encircled by a serpent chasing its tail on his own forehead.

“Drekharn. The sovereign tide. One who rises and falls for love.”

All three of their wounds sealed with a sizzle, and the images he’d created melded into their skin, leaving only a red mark that would fade when their ceremony was done.

“Find your symbol and claim your birthright,” he sang in his birth tongue.

In a trance, they moved, each to a different boulder. Once there, they knelt, awaiting the grotto floor to relinquish its prize.

Solmara’s box appeared first, delivering to her the Ember Pendant. Shaped like a teardrop mid-fall, the aquamarine stone would produce a faint ember glow when activated. Moving forward, Taryn would be protected from both the ancestors’ mental abductions and the Authority’s machinations. As long as she wore the charm, she’d be able to manipulate any spelled threshold, breaking through enchanted doorways, wards, prisons, or veils.

Vaelthorn’s relic was the Songblade. An obsidian dagger etched with voice-activated runes not visible to the naked eye. With his weapon, Fintan could disrupt magical influence and cut through illusions or constructs meant to control him. He was a Seer without chains.

Drekharn’s key arrived last. Tarnished with no teeth, it was smooth and cold to the touch. When they returned to the house, he’d work the metal into a ring, never to be removed. With it, he could access any charmed “locks,” including minds. When pressed to skin, the key would unlock the truth, revealing deception and those beneath a glamour.

He sang the sigils closed, waiting as they burned first gold, then green, then a blinding white before they were snuffed for good. If he needed them, they’d be here, but this sacred place deserved a respite from the centuries of guarding Elizabeth’s and his treasures.

The minute they were all rested and had conferred with the Aether, a reckoning would begin.

But of utmost importance was the apology he owed Taryn and Fintan for the attack they hadn’t suspected from him. He waited impatiently for them to recover their will. As strong and as stubborn as the two of them were, it didn’t take long.

“Come,” he said, as soon as their eyes were focused and their actions were their own. “We should get topside before the Aether and his friends become nervous.”

He held out a hand to help Taryn stand, but she knocked it away.

“That! That right there is why I left you back then, dickweed.” Her voice had reached banshee-level rage, and Argdhal winced at the disagreeable sound. “You could’ve let us in on the plan.”

“It required sacrifice, as I stated before,” he replied with a patience he was quickly losing. “It meant sacrificing the two things I loved most. You and Fintan.”

“You’ve a shit way of showing love,” she snarled, delivering a stinging kick to his shin.

“Leash your woman before I strangle her, boy,” he ordered through gritted teeth. “I swear?—”

His head snapped back under the weight of Fintan’s first blow. Getting struck by him was less punch and more an act of God. Ardghal wiggled his nose, suppressing a groan when he discovered it was broken.

“For fuck’s sake!” He barely managed to keep his voice in check. The ground rumbled with his anger. “Are you two done beating me up?”

Taryn and Fintan gave sullen nods.

“Lovely. Now, wait here while I dip into the water and heal my face.”

“Fuck all the way off,” they said in unison, teleporting away and leaving him alone.

The whirlpool dissipated, and the resulting tidal wave dragged him under. But he didn’t mind. This enchanted pool loved him, was bound to him, as he was bound to it. The current stirred the bottom, and a gleam caught his eye.

He swam for the spot and brushed aside the sand. When he saw the jewelry piece, his heart spasmed.

His signet ring.

The one he’d given to Elizabeth on their wedding day as a promise to love her always.

Ardghal slipped it on his pinky and kicked for the surface. Though the desire to grieve his lost love consumed him, he couldn’t rest until the Authority and Fintan’s ancestor problem were resolved. By then, if witnessing the love of Taryn and Fintan became too much, he’d return here for a permanent sleep.