There was another row of seats behind them, and a couple of these were empty. One seat was presumably for Flidais, and I noted that the Morrigan was conspicuously absent.
While most of the Tuatha Dé Danann had dressed modestly and with very little ornamentation, Brighid had gone out of her way to look like a model for a Frazetta painting. Conscious of how it set off her red hair, she wore a sheer green sleeve on her left arm, bound at the top of the biceps and at the wrist with a circlet of gold. She had a golden belly chain holding up another sheer cascade of cloth between her legs, but it highlighted rather than concealed what was there. Aside from these purely ornamental accoutrements, she was na**d, the tattoos on her right side—among other bits—proudly on display. She also had two wolfhounds lying at her feet, their heads up and watching our approach closely. They were black hounds with glossy coats.
No commentary now, Oberon, I warned him. Remember, she can hear you.
I received the mental equivalent of a grunt in reply.
The last time I’d seen Brighid, she was similarly provocative. She’d asked me to be her consort, I refused, and then she tried to kill me when she found out I’d had sex with the Morrigan. Fragarach had helped me out of that fix, but I didn’t have that sword to get me out of this. Brighid’s eyes flicked down to Moralltach, so I sheathed it before getting any closer, thinking that might be a tad more diplomatic than pointing it at her.
Flidais halted before the wee knoll on which Brighid’s throne sat. It was made of iron she’d forged herself; originally a master of copper and bronze, Brighid had made a special point of becoming proficient in the magic-repelling metal when the Milesians had brought it to Ireland long ago. They thought they’d driven the Tuatha Dé Danann “underground,” but in fact they’d driven them to create a plane of magic, and so the Milesians were indirectly responsible for the birth of the vast panoply of magical “little folk” that plagued and blessed them and their descendants for generations afterward. Brighid’s throne was a palpable symbol of who exactly was master of the Fae. It occurred to me, for the first time, that my cold iron aura here, in her place of power, was a challenge in itself. I had visibly mastered iron to a degree that she had not. And I could move around and stuff. Her throne just sat there. But judging by the hardness in her eyes, that particular issue was far down on her list of bones to pick with me.
“Majesty,” Flidais said. “The Druid Siodhachan Ó Suileabháin, as you requested.”
A tiny nod of dismissal gave Flidais permission to take her seat amongst the rest of the Tuatha Dé Danann. I found myself wondering with mad distraction who Perun was currently staring at. Would he follow Flidais to her seat or fix his eyes on Brighid’s bare br**sts?
Brighid quirked an eyebrow at me, waiting to see how I would address her. It was the first of many challenges, I knew. If I called her Majesty, it would acknowledge her as my sovereign and establish her as someone who could order me about. Taking a knee would also signal submission, and I wasn’t about to do either of those things. Instead, I bowed quickly and courteously and said, “You wished for an audience, Brighid.” Conditioned by my years in the United States, I almost blurted out, “What can I do for you?” That would have been disastrous. Instead, I coughed once to cover my mistake and confined myself to stating the obvious: “I am here.”
“You delve quickly to the heart of the matter,” she sneered. The triple voice was gone; only the alto register remained. “I was told you died twelve years ago.”
“Whoever told you must have been mistaken.”
“The Morrigan is never mistaken about deaths.”
“Did she specifically say that I was dead?”
“Yes.”
“She used my name?”
“Yes. She said the Druid Atticus O’Sullivan lay chopped to pieces in the Arizona desert. This was corroborated by several thunder gods.”
“Begging your pardon, Brighid, but that is not my name.”
Brighid’s eyes narrowed. “So I have been intentionally duped.”
I did not ask forgiveness. I stuck to the facts. “It was a necessary deception, liberally applied to all. I did not wish to be pursued by the aforementioned thunder gods forever.”
“Why not simply slay them, as you did Thor?”
“I never slew Thor. That was someone else. And since I returned Fragarach, I thought that was sufficient payment for a harmless subterfuge.”
Brighid darted her eyes over to Manannan Mac Lir, who shrugged, obviously confused.
“Say that again, Druid,” the goddess said.
“I never slew Thor.”
“No. What was that about Fragarach?”
“I returned it. Via the Morrigan.”
Brighid’s eyes widened in fury. “The Morrigan!” she spat. “You gave Fragarach into the keeping of the Morrigan?”
“She promised to return it to Manannan Mac Lir,” I explained.
“I remember my promises well, Siodhachan,” a raspy voice chuckled from my left. The Morrigan stood there, na**d save for an iron amulet around her neck, skin like cream in porcelain and hair darker than a mine shaft. Her eyes glowed red as she stared at Brighid, Fragarach cocked over her head and her taut body ready for battle. “I never told you when I would return it.”
“Cathéide!” Brighid shouted, and she was suddenly transformed from barbarian princess to badass knight, covered from head to toe in magnificent armor she had made herself. It was one of the coolest bindings I’d ever seen.
I recognized the armor; she had made it specifically to counter Fragarach and be the immovable object to its unstoppable force. The armor came with a weapon: She hefted a massive bastard sword in her right hand and kindled a ball of flame in the gauntlet of her left, then set herself defensively on the hill next to her throne.
These two had hated each other for as long as I could remember, but I never thought they’d actually throw down. Maybe I just hoped it. But I never hoped I’d be in the way.
Chapter 4
A hush fell over the Court as the Morrigan and Brighid faced off. Perun could no longer contain his enthusiasm. After spending years as an eagle, within the past hour he’d been seriously flirted with, watched two goddesses appear starkers, then saw them prepare for battle. Joy in every syllable, he shouted, “Yes! I love Irish peoples!”
The Fae thought this funny and erupted in laughter behind us. The Tuatha Dé Danann, not so much—except the Morrigan. She chuckled and lowered Fragarach, but Brighid didn’t budge.
“You may relax, Brighid,” the Morrigan said, her red eyes cooling down to their normal dark brown. “I am not here for battle. I am here to fulfill a promise. You see that I have the Druid’s sword. I’ve been holding it for a good while now.” The tone of her voice made clear to everyone that she was enjoying the double entendre. The Morrigan’s mouth twitched upward at the corners.
“The Druid is quite the swordsman. I’m sure you can imagine. Of course, imagining is all you’ll ever be able to do.”
I wanted to tell the Morrigan to shut up, but I didn’t dare. She was dangerously close to revealing that she knew Brighid had offered herself to me. I’d promised Brighid never to tell anyone about it, but the Morrigan had guessed the truth. Brighid would probably not care about such distinctions if the Morrigan made it public now. She’d be humiliated in front of all Faerie and she’d want to char someone to a cinder as a result.
Brighid didn’t move or say anything, and it was her best option. The Morrigan would hardly want to charge her when Brighid held the high ground; it didn’t matter that the Morrigan was Chooser of the Slain—it wouldn’t be fun. She’d be set on fire, for one thing. And taking a quick glance at the hill in the magical spectrum, I could see that said hill was warded extensively and prickling with defensive traps. You’d have to be insane to charge Brighid there, and the Morrigan wasn’t; she was malevolent and petty and damn scary on a regular basis, but not insane.
She could see that Brighid was ignoring her gibes, so she resorted to outright mockery. “It’s odd that a goddess of poetry should be at such a loss for words. Does this mean no one in the mortal world can remember their dirty limericks right now?”
“Return the sword as you promised and leave,” Brighid said.
“There’s an effort!” the Morrigan crowed. “You managed a line of pentameter.” She rested the flat of the blade on top of her shoulder, holding it casually, the way a baseball player might while walking to the plate. With seeming indifference to Brighid, she strolled to her left toward Manannan Mac Lir. She knew Brighid wasn’t going to move off her hill; she’d effectively trapped her there. If Brighid left, she’d surrender all her advantages in battle—and you needed every advantage you could get if you were going to cross swords with the Morrigan.
Manannan stood from his chair and waited, his hood up and his arms crossed underneath his cloak. The entire Court grew still and strained to hear whatever might be said, for Manannan did not speak often in public. The Morrigan paused in front of him and brought the blade down horizontally in her hands, holding it chest high in a clearly ritualistic way, reminiscent of the formal transfer of possession practiced in Japan.
“Manannan Mac Lir, I am here to return Fragarach to you as I promised the Druid Siodhachan Ó Suileabháin I would. Its original scabbard was lost long ago. Will you accept it?”
“I will,” he said, disappointing everyone who was hoping for some more drama. I thought the Morrigan would have had a few more shenanigans up her—well, not up her sleeve. She didn’t have a stitch on. But then I flicked my gaze over to Brighid and realized what the Morrigan was doing. Brighid still stood as if she expected the Morrigan to charge her at any second. The Morrigan’s sudden appearance with the sword had goaded her into a defensive position, but now that the Chooser of the Slain was behaving in a completely nonaggressive and even polite manner, Brighid looked as if she had overreacted at best and like a frightened coward at worst.
The Morrigan placed Fragarach gently into Manannan’s outstretched hands and said, “It is done.” Then, without a farewell or even a backward glance at Brighid, she morphed into her crow form and flew into the grove surrounding the Court. She’d followed Brighid’s curt instructions precisely, and now Brighid looked ungracious on top of everything else. The ball of flame still glowed redly in her gauntleted hand, and all eyes swiveled to her and registered that she was ready to fight a nonexistent threat. Realizing this, she muttered a couple of words, and the armor and ball of flame disappeared. To Perun’s great delight, she was once again clad—if one could call it that—in nothing but wispy, transparent gauze.
She was seriously annoyed, however. Her eyes blazed with a glowing blue light. “How long has she had Fragarach?” she growled.
“About twelve years, I suppose. But I thought she’d returned it.”
“And what of the amulet?”
I shrugged. “I’m sure she’s been working on it, but you could see as well as I that it’s not finished yet.”
“The point,” Brighid said, her eyes cooling while her voice took on three notes of creepy, “is that it will be finished someday. And I would rather that day never arrive.” The unspoken bit we both understood was that Brighid did not want the Morrigan to be immune to fireballs hurled by the goddess of fire, as I was.
The two black wolfhounds near the base of the hill had remained stationary and quiescent all through the Morrigan’s visit; now they rose to their feet, bared their teeth, and growled. At me.
"Hey, that’s rude," Oberon said.
Stay silent for now, I told him.
“If you have naught but threats for me, Brighid, I will take my leave.”
“You may leave when I allow it.”
“We are none of your subjects, and you guaranteed us safe passage.”
“True, but I did not specify how long it would take you to pass through.”
I made a mental note to demand a fixed time period in any future negotiation with the Tuatha Dé Danann. Being duped twice by the same loophole in the space of a few minutes will drive a point home. Now you can growl, I told Oberon, and he did so with gusto.
“You and I had a conversation once, if you recall”—I raised my voice over the din of three growling hounds—“about the finer points of hospitality.” She could take that one of two ways. She could remember that I had completely outmaneuvered her, take it as a warning that I had similar plans laid now, and calm down. Or she could listen to her pride, already wounded by the Morrigan, and flare up. The building blue glow in her eyes pointed toward the second option, and my heart dropped as I realized I’d have to kill somebody to get out of here.
"This is awesome," Oberon said. "If I wasn’t already involved, I would totally want a bag of popcorn right now."
Chapter 5
“BWAH-ha-ha!” someone laughed amongst the Tuatha Dé Danann. I darted a glance that way and saw everyone looking at Manannan Mac Lir, who had clapped a hand over his mouth. Flidais threw in a girlish titter, and then they all erupted—which gave everyone else permission to laugh as well, though they had no idea what they were laughing at. What had happened is that the Tuatha Dé Danann had “heard” Oberon’s comment. My eyes slid back to Brighid, and her mouth was quirked upward on one side; as I watched, her hounds subsided and sat down. I told Oberon to lay off as well.
You might have just saved our bacon there, I added.