Celtic Nights

Blood of the Marnad

Derryth tore at the ropes with her teeth like a badger but the strands would not give. Trust spider-worshippers to use silk, she thought with a curse as she cast around the cell for another way to free herself. The bars had been set there in the time of her great-grandfather and largely neglected until her daughter had taken residence in the clanhold. New steel locks had been added to the iron doors.

The druid fixed her attention on the grey metal. One edge of the latch had not been filed completely smooth. It was hardly knife-sharp but it might be enough. Derryth worked frantically. Since Lann had activated the silence spell she could hear nothing of the battle in the hall. There would surely be war raging for she had heard Fang’s voice and the half-elf took after his Viking father.

The ropes gave slowly. Never before had the druid pined so much for the teeth or claws of her animal friends. Even the grinding jaws of a cow would have shredded the silk faster. She had to get out to stop her children before they committed the worst sin. Derryth doubted they would listen to her as a mother. Avalon’s mists had seen to that but she could still do something to prevent kinslaying in their own clanhold.

Finally, the ropes gave and her hands were free. Lann had not bound her thumbs or fingers as cautious people did with spellcasters. Her daughter has seen her in the shape of a wolf so she knew of her powers. Perhaps the half-fomor trusted to the iron bars to keep her mother secured. Unlike their dark cousins, the danaan still suffered from a dislike of ferrous metal.

Months of travelling with Rinny had taught Derryth not to look at the doors but the hinges. The weakest point was the easiest way, the Roman lass had often said with a larcenous grin. If she got out, the druid promised she would let her halfling friend run free in the Marnad vaults. Assuming Lann or Malwas had not stripped them to the stonework.

The hinges were old and partially rusted. Had she not been within the reach of the silence, she would have made short work of them with a spell. This time, she took guidance from Inge and Horsa. With a chunk of broken chain link left from Dafydd’s manacles, Derryth pried the hinges off the cell door. She threw herself against the bars. It took all her strength and three attempts to wrench them far enough for her to slip out.

Derryth ran for the door with her favourite evocation on her lips. The sonic orb was not a powerful spell but it served her well and even demon blooded creatures found it difficult to resist. The druid did not know if she had it in her to raise her hand against her warring children but she had to hold off Lann long enough for Fang to get away. What she saw as she shouldered the door open made her forget the words of her spell.

Lann lay on the flagstones flat on her back with wings and arms spread as though she had been felled by a thunderbolt. It had not been a blow from the heavens that had struck her down but a red fletched arrow. Derryth fell to her knees beside her daughter and pulled free Fang’s arrow, the magical arrow he had shown her and boasted about to her. Carved into the wood a hand span from the head was her daughter’s name.

Blood did not well from the wound. There was no sign of pain on Lann’s face, nothing at all. Her flesh was warm and her eyes closed as though she was asleep. Derryth let out a shriek of rage and grief. She had been too late. Unwilling, the druid looked up expecting to see the triumphant gaze of her son, of her boy raised by Inge in his savage ways. Instead she saw the backs of two fomori guards standing over a fallen foe.

Derryth screamed again as she rushed forward to stop them. One of the soldiers turned at her cry. He had dropped his sword to clutch at a welling wound on his side so he grabbed her rather than run her through. The druid slashed her nails down his face as she fought to get to her son. The fomor caught her arm and fisted a hand in her leafy hair, forcing her to her knees while his comrade kicked an unconscious Fang onto his back.

“Kill them both.” A hard voice spoke in the fomor language. Derryth noticed then an officer, still out of breath from his charge down the hall, backed by a dozen more soldiers. For a moment she thought he meant her and her son until one of the guards dragged a small body forward and tossed it down beside Fang. Rinny’s eyes fluttered but she could do no more than groan feebly.

One of the fomori had stabbed her from behind, spitting her like a roast. Derryth could see the edge of ribs poking through the fiercesome wound on the halfling’s chest. Before the druid could draw breath to scream or utter a spell, the guards brought their swords down and opened the throats of her son and her friend. The officer watched without expression the blood fountain across the flagstones.

“Give the bodies to the necromancer. We need reinforcements in the hills.” He stepped over Rinny to look contemptuously down at Derryth. She barely registered his disdain. Her tear-blind eyes were on the spreading red pool and her son’s paling corpse. His words penetrated her shock though she heard them in Vread’s voice. The bard had explained that once animated as undead a spirit was forever barred from their own body.

Fang would not be coming back. Nor would he go to their ancestors although he had fallen in the Marnad clanhold. When she had presented her son to her grandfather, the old chieftain had put the matter of Fang’s acceptance in the hands of the scholars. If Inge’s people could be proven not fomor then the clan Marnad would accept the half-breed among them. No word had reached her of their decision before she went to Avalon.

“His majesty will be furious at his daughter’s death.” The fomor officer gave a nod towards Lann. Two of his soldiers moved to pick up their commander and carried her body away. Derryth watched them go wondering if the same demon blood that had gained her daughter maturity at only fifty would also bar her from returning to the mortal realm. The druid knew of no spell that could.

If the Marnads had been reluctant to welcome Fang into their ranks, they had at least acknowledged him as Derryth’s son. Her clan had outright refused to call a half-fomor kin even after the Queen had given audience to a representative of Prince Ilithan, leader of the rebel fomori. Lann gained her chieftainship through conquest and the imprisonment of the rightful head of the clan.

“Bind her properly this time and fetch a wizard to take her to the Palace.” The officer snarled. Sensing the coming storm and wanting none of the blame for their commander’s death, the soldiers moved quickly to obey. Their superior watched as Derryth was gagged and manacled. He smiled. “General Marnad planned to hand you over to her father as a gift. Give my greetings to the Spider Queen, danaan.”

One of the guards forced a sack over her head then dragged her upright. The druid knew she was being marched away but all she could feel was the stickiness of the flagstones beneath her feet. The officer spoke in fomori to someone who smelled of incense, who laid a cold hand on her shoulder and intoned the words of a spell of teleportation. Derryth wept as she was wrenched away from the land of her ancestors.