to her side.
As she appeared alongside the abbot, it triggered a fresh bout of howling, and the three crazed mortals staggered to their feet and began to run away, still clutching and beating at their heads.
‘Stop!’ she ordered in a loud voice, freezing them in midflight. Slowly she walked around, pressing her hand to each forehead, the face beneath a study in abject, frozen terror. The image of herself greedily winding out their intestines on a stick came through very clear from each one. What’s more, she couldn’t remove it from their minds.
She looked upward. It had to be that Twilight’s doing. He and his tyro were up there somewhere watching her. She couldn’t see any trace of them; they’d found a way of disguising their auras. Judging by the immovable images planted in these idiot’s heads they’d also traced her activities back to Donnchadh O’Brain at Cill Dara. This wasn’t turning out as planned. Time to flush them out - time for a venefical declaration of war.
I know you’re up there. Show yourselves. Only cowards hide their auras in the clouds. If you don’t I’ll start acting out the images you placed in their minds . . . now. What little girl would stand by and watch her relatives subjected to something like this without trying to stop it, eh?
Twilight put his index finger to his lips, indicating to Tara not to make any reply directly to her or through mind speak to him.
The lynx hissed and followed its mistress’s eyes as she scanned the skies.
Nothing.
Twilight indicated to Tara that they were leaving. The scene had been set, doubts sown.
‘She’s welcome to them this time,’ said Tara when they reappeared under the ancient elm tree next to Feasa and Eoghan.
‘But at the very least she’ll get a bad stomach-ache.’
She giggled, completely unworried by the fact that her father, grandmother, and probable birth grandfather were being consumed alive by a flesh-eating witch venefica.
Ekki Salonen and his men crept stealthily up to the compound on the outskirts of the hamlet of Avebury. Night was falling and they could hear the sound of a woman’s voice singing inside the larger of the two hovels. With their swords drawn they rushed through the flimsy willow gate and charged into the hovel where the melodious female voice was coming from. The singing stopped suddenly to be replaced by a muffled scream. Moments later they dragged an unconscious Katre from the hovel. The watching pica, fidgety because they knew their liege lord was too far away for them to reach, decided to keep a close watch on the Viking band with a relay of birds constantly reporting their position back to the compound.
Twilight must come back soon; otherwise Katre would be lost to them, forever.
‘The combined power of the two of us should easily overcome that of Leannan Sidhe, even though she has a good, strong aura,’ said Twilight.
‘What about the lynx?’
‘If it becomes a problem we’ll let Feasa and Eoghan handle it. They’ll have to make up for my lack of pica.’
‘There are plenty of pica around here. Why don’t you use them?’
‘It’s not fair on the local birds to suddenly pitch them into a life or-death battle without any warning,’ said the alpha astounder. ‘They would, of course, give it everything they had in service to me, but it’s too sudden, too savage. I have purposefully refrained from contacting any of them here in Ireland so they don’t know
I’m here. Let’s leave them in peace.’ Tara tickled the ears of the two big wolfhounds. ‘Hear that, my gray giants? You are to stand in for the mighty pica, and there just might be a big cat for you to play with.’
The dogs whined in happy unison. Just being with their beloved little redheaded, green-eyed, freckled, impishly smiling liege lord was enough for them.
They were still sitting under the ancient old elm tree in the small clearing outside of Skellighaven.
Twilight looked at Tara carefully.
‘Tara,
As she appeared alongside the abbot, it triggered a fresh bout of howling, and the three crazed mortals staggered to their feet and began to run away, still clutching and beating at their heads.
‘Stop!’ she ordered in a loud voice, freezing them in midflight. Slowly she walked around, pressing her hand to each forehead, the face beneath a study in abject, frozen terror. The image of herself greedily winding out their intestines on a stick came through very clear from each one. What’s more, she couldn’t remove it from their minds.
She looked upward. It had to be that Twilight’s doing. He and his tyro were up there somewhere watching her. She couldn’t see any trace of them; they’d found a way of disguising their auras. Judging by the immovable images planted in these idiot’s heads they’d also traced her activities back to Donnchadh O’Brain at Cill Dara. This wasn’t turning out as planned. Time to flush them out - time for a venefical declaration of war.
I know you’re up there. Show yourselves. Only cowards hide their auras in the clouds. If you don’t I’ll start acting out the images you placed in their minds . . . now. What little girl would stand by and watch her relatives subjected to something like this without trying to stop it, eh?
Twilight put his index finger to his lips, indicating to Tara not to make any reply directly to her or through mind speak to him.
The lynx hissed and followed its mistress’s eyes as she scanned the skies.
Nothing.
Twilight indicated to Tara that they were leaving. The scene had been set, doubts sown.
‘She’s welcome to them this time,’ said Tara when they reappeared under the ancient elm tree next to Feasa and Eoghan.
‘But at the very least she’ll get a bad stomach-ache.’
She giggled, completely unworried by the fact that her father, grandmother, and probable birth grandfather were being consumed alive by a flesh-eating witch venefica.
Ekki Salonen and his men crept stealthily up to the compound on the outskirts of the hamlet of Avebury. Night was falling and they could hear the sound of a woman’s voice singing inside the larger of the two hovels. With their swords drawn they rushed through the flimsy willow gate and charged into the hovel where the melodious female voice was coming from. The singing stopped suddenly to be replaced by a muffled scream. Moments later they dragged an unconscious Katre from the hovel. The watching pica, fidgety because they knew their liege lord was too far away for them to reach, decided to keep a close watch on the Viking band with a relay of birds constantly reporting their position back to the compound.
Twilight must come back soon; otherwise Katre would be lost to them, forever.
‘The combined power of the two of us should easily overcome that of Leannan Sidhe, even though she has a good, strong aura,’ said Twilight.
‘What about the lynx?’
‘If it becomes a problem we’ll let Feasa and Eoghan handle it. They’ll have to make up for my lack of pica.’
‘There are plenty of pica around here. Why don’t you use them?’
‘It’s not fair on the local birds to suddenly pitch them into a life or-death battle without any warning,’ said the alpha astounder. ‘They would, of course, give it everything they had in service to me, but it’s too sudden, too savage. I have purposefully refrained from contacting any of them here in Ireland so they don’t know
I’m here. Let’s leave them in peace.’ Tara tickled the ears of the two big wolfhounds. ‘Hear that, my gray giants? You are to stand in for the mighty pica, and there just might be a big cat for you to play with.’
The dogs whined in happy unison. Just being with their beloved little redheaded, green-eyed, freckled, impishly smiling liege lord was enough for them.
They were still sitting under the ancient old elm tree in the small clearing outside of Skellighaven.
Twilight looked at Tara carefully.
‘Tara,
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