“Did he know all along that you were alive?” Isla asked. “Is he a part of… whatever this is?” Her sweeping gesture took in her mother, Fairly, who had risen from his hiding place and stood holding a pistol as if it were a writhing serpent, and their two surviving underlings, both of whom wore blood soaked clothing that indicated they were nursing wounds.
The odds were not yet in their favor, but there was hope. If Maddock could draw Brigid and Fairly out onto the island, maybe he and Bones could disarm them. Then it would be a fair fight.
“This is the Tuatha de Dannan,” Brigid said. “Meikle is not a member, but he’s been useful at times.”
Isla forced a small, sad laugh. “All this secrecy, all these years lost, and for what?”
“For what?” Brigid threw up her hands. “Isla, don’t you understand? It’s real. It always was. The United Kingdom is falling apart. The tenuous bonds that held Scotland and England together are dissolving. Britain is losing its identity, being overwhelmed by outsiders. Anti-Irish politics is on the rise. Europe as a whole is falling apart. The Celtic people have never needed the Tuatha more than now.”
Maddock frowned. Did this woman really mean this crap, or was she just trying to mesmerize Isla with a mad tale?
“Celtics?” Maddock said. “You mean the people that pretty much covered Western Europe once upon a time? You’re going to wave around a sword and spear and they’ll all bend the knee?”
“Most have lost their way,” Brigid said, “but let me ask you this. Where is the Celtic language still spoken? Ireland, Scotland, Brittany, Wales, Cornwall. We have not forgotten. Even Brittany remembers.”
“France?” Bones said. “Screw the French.”
Brigid ignored him. She continued to lock eyes with Isla.
“What do you think is going to happen?” Maddock asked. “The Tuatha will rise again?”
“The spirit of the Celtic people will rise. We will unite, break free of the yolk of the English. Soon our cause will spread as others remember their true roots. They will remember who we were before the Roman church broke us.”
“You think the English will stand still for that?” Maddock asked. He suddenly remembered that Isla had said something similar the night before.
“England is collapsing from within. They are torn down the middle politically. Terrorists on both sides fuel the fire. And as they fall apart, my allies are prepared to step in.” She beamed at Isla. “Isla, I am part of a new family, a sisterhood.”
The word pierced Maddock like a dagger. He and Bones had encountered a group called the Sisterhood before. Instinct, and Brigid’s emphasis on the word told him it was the same organization, and if that were the case, something had gone very wrong.
“I know this will be difficult to believe, but we are directly descended from the original Tuatha — my family and your father’s. We are royalty, and one day you will be queen.”
Isla’s eyes widened in amazement, her features softened. “No. That can’t be.” The smile slowly creeping across her face suggested that, deep down, she truly believed it.
“It’s true,” Brigid said. “Why do you think the Tuatha was always such an important part of our family? The focus of so much of our work.”
“Isla, don’t believe her,” Maddock said, but she clearly wasn’t listening. Maddock needed to break the spell.
“You never told Isla what happened to her father,” he said. “You have something to hide?”
Isla stopped short. Brigid flinched.
“He is lost to us and we have the corrupt government from which we shall break free to think for it.” She held out her hand to Isla. “You completed the quest. You proved yourself worthy. Join us. Please.”
“You have to let my friends go,” Isla said. “They did nothing wrong. If it weren’t for them, we wouldn’t have recovered the treasure. Will you guarantee their safety?”
“Of course,” Brigid said, but the semi-darkness could not hide the narrowing of her eyes, the forced tightness of her smile. Maddock knew she was lying.
Perhaps Grizzly realized it too, or maybe he was overcome by a momentary wave of heroism, but at that moment he leaped out from his hiding place. With a cry of, “No!” he snatched up the sacred spear and drew his arm back. “You won’t take her.”
Shots rang out. Grizzly uttered a low cry of pain as the impact spun him around and he fell, face-first, to the ground, clutching his shoulder. The spear clattered to the floor and rolled away until it stopped against the base of the statue of Danu.
“So much for the unbeatable weapon,” Bones said.
“Scratch that legend,” Maddock agreed.
Brigid had noticed, too. She frowned. “That shouldn’t have…” she whispered. As quickly as it had come, the frown was gone, replaced by a cold smile. “Come with me, Isla. We’ll get your friends out of here and then we’ll have all the time in the world to talk.”
“No!” Maddock reached for Isla, but she was already gone. He watched helplessly as she leaped out onto the stepping stones and ran to embrace her mother. He had lost her.
“Either of you guys got a bandage?” Grizzly groaned.
“Of course.” Maddock rose to his feet, but before he could take one step, one of the Tuatha fired, the bullet pinging the ground inches from his toe.
“I’m just going to bandage his wound,” Maddock said, hands raised. His eyes roved all around. There had to be a way out of this.
Isla and her mother had reached the shore. She whirled about at the sound of the gunshot. “You promised not to hurt them,” Isla said.
“They know too much. I’m sorry.” But there was no regret in Brigid’s icy voice.
“But, Mother!”
“Can you honestly say they would support our cause?”
Isla didn’t reply.
Maddock sensed they had seconds left. A whirlwind of thoughts spun through his mind. Should they grab the Tuatha weapons and try to fight? Could they swim for it? And what about Grizzly? Could he swim with his wounded shoulder?
And then he noticed something strange. A faint flicker deep within the crimson stone upon the spear of the Tuatha, as if the gem were coming to life. A second light, a silver shimmer, almost too faint to see, danced within the triskele carved on the floor.
It all clicked into place in his mind. The pattern carved on the floor of the chamber at Dunstaffnage. The same pattern encircling each gemstone. And here it was at Danu’s feet.
“It’s the triskele! Get the treasures inside it, now!”
He and Bones sprang into action as Brigid shouted, “Kill them!”
Bones shouted a question, but his words were lost in the torrent of gunfire.
Bullets sizzled through the air all around them as Maddock and Bones heaved the Stone of Destiny onto the ground at Danu’s feet. Maddock immediately knew he’d made the right call. Silver light danced within the onyx jewel, and the pattern on the ground shone brighter.
“I’ll get Grizzly,” Bones shouted.
Maddock nodded, then turned to grab the cauldron, which he set alongside the stone. The light within the triskele grew in intensity.
“Now we’re really sitting ducks,” Maddock muttered. “No more darkness to hide us.”
As Bones hauled Grizzly, still clutching his injured shoulder, to the center of the islet, Maddock took hold of the sword of the Tuatha and slid it free from the stone.
Holding it up before him, as if it could ward off the bullets, he stepped backward onto the triskele.
The blue stone in the pommel of the sword shone with brilliant light. Around him, the spear and cauldron added their red and golden glows; and atop the Stone of Destiny, the black gem spat flashes of silver light as the four treasures came together within the ancient Celtic symbol.