Emerald Isle (17 page)

Birdie said, “He knows nothing about the council, about how any of this works.”

I rolled my eyes. “To be fair, Birdie, neither did I until a few months ago.”

“I have money. You never know when that will come in handy,” Gramps said, flapping a wad of bills in front of Birdie’s face.

“He has a point there.” Bribe money. Hell, maybe we could buy Mom’s freedom if things went sour.

Birdie said, “That won’t do us any good.”

Gramps remained composed. He looked like a man sitting on a royal flush. “Well, then how about a plane navigated by a pilot guaranteed to have no affiliation with the people who kidnapped our daughter? Not to mention the nut who came for our granddaughter.”

That clinched it for me. Having been hunted more times than I cared to count, I was all for flying friendly
skies and getting to the island with all functioning body parts still attached. I looked at Birdie. “He goes.”

I whistled to Thor, who galloped to my side. Gramps decided to quit while he was ahead and strutted away.

“Excuse me? What makes you think you get to decide?” Birdie poked my shoulder.

I shrugged. “Easy, Grandma. I’m the Seeker. I’ve got a sword and everything.” I grinned and kissed her cheek.

“Well, I’m the Mage, and you need me too. All four corners, right? So what if I decide not to go?” She raised one threatening eyebrow.

Fiona piped up, “Actually, Birdie, you aren’t technically the Mage.”

I whipped my head around. “What?”

Birdie glowered at her sister.

“Who is?” I asked.

“Technically, it was Tallulah who was confirmed,” Fiona said.

Birdie flashed Fiona an inflamed look.

I was flabbergasted. I stepped directly in front of Birdie. “Oh, come on, are you going to tell me that you’d let that bitch take your place?” I grabbed the purse from my grandmother’s shoulder. “Please.” I trekked toward the limo.

“I still don’t like this,” Birdie called from behind me.

“Protest noted,” I said. “Now get in the car.”

Except for the driver’s rigid disapproval of traveling with a dog the size of a pony, the ride to the airport was quiet and uneventful.

Birdie made a few phone calls, explaining the change in plans to whomever it concerned. She jotted down notes here and there and made assurances that we were still on schedule, whatever that meant.

Gramps was silently watching the scenery fly by, and Lolly and Fiona were indulging in the minibar.

Over an hour later, the sun was shining brightly as the limousine wove around a bend and into the small airport parking lot. Gramps went inside to “take care of paperwork,” and Birdie followed. I clipped a leash on to Thor so he could drain his breakfast.

A man came to collect our bags. I dug around for the maps Badb had given me. I didn’t want those in the belly of the aircraft. I was hoping to learn more about the council, the cauldron, Tallulah, and her grandson—perhaps even formulate some sort of plan—while we were in flight.

I also couldn’t wait to hear the Mage story. If Fiona insisted it was Birdie, yet the council had appointed Tallulah, what had happened?

As much as I was dreading this trip and the daunting task that lay ahead of us (because it was the only thing standing in the way of my mother’s freedom), I had to admit I was looking forward to a showdown with the almighty Tallulah.

I suspected perhaps Birdie was too. That boosted my confidence, knowing that we were on the same side, had the same goals in mind, even the same enemies. It wasn’t just my quest this time, it was a family affair.

A custodial twinge clawed at my ribs, a need to safeguard my grandmother from the demons she might face as she confronted her past.

How would she handle it?

How would I?

The engine of a plane rocketed to life, bursting my thought bubble, and I watched a small jet drift down the runway, nudging its way into position.

Gramps came out of the building and said, “Everybody ready?”

Birdie and I shared a look.

“Yes,” we said.

An hour into the flight, both Thor and Oscar had fallen asleep, upside down, with their tongues dangling over their cheeks. Birdie, her sisters, and her granddaughter were huddled around a table, maps spread out in the center. Birdie was enraptured by the transformation in her granddaughter. The girl seemed energized, but there was something else. It took Birdie a moment to discover what it was, but then she knew.

The light that had been switched off so long ago was back on.

Anastasia was explaining what the goddess had told her. “So the red circles indicate where the cauldron had been sheltered over the years, peacefully, and this”—she pointed to the location of Trinity College—“is where it was taken when it was last stolen, just before the Great Famine.”

The girl grabbed a bottle of water from the table and swigged it. Then she questioned Birdie and her sisters. “So what do you guys think? Any chance it’s there again?”

Fiona said, “I suppose anything is possible, but it was a professor who stole it then. A madman, really. He moved
it often, hiding it all around the campus, disguising the cauldron in plain sight.”

“Blasphemous,” Lolly said, sipping a whiskey sour.

Fiona continued, “He even put it on display for a time in the library.”

“So what happened?” Anastasia asked.

Birdie stood, stretched. “The Seeker of the era was nearly worn out, when she finally tracked him down.”

“What do you mean?” Anastasia asked, looking nervous.

“It was a long journey, six years total,” Birdie said.

Lolly said, “Many lives lost.”

Anastasia swallowed hard. “That long. Why?”

“For starters, he was the Mage,” Fiona said.

“And he had managed to convince the Guardian and the Warrior to join forces with him in his despicable plan,” Birdie said.

Lolly said, “Only the Seeker remained true to her cause.”

“Is that why there’s no mention of the Mage in the Blessed Book?”

Birdie sat back down. She clasped her granddaughter’s hands. “Yes. That was your great-grandmother’s way of locking up the most painful stretch of her life. You see, it was her cousin who was Seeker. The entire ordeal ravaged your grandmother. The eviction from her land, watching her neighbors, loved ones, wither away and die, the emigration from the ancient soil—it was a lot to bear.”

Anastasia looked at her shoes. Kicked the table. “Six years.” She stood, went to gaze out the window.

Birdie felt her heart tug at her granddaughter’s obvious worry. She wanted to tell her that everything would
be all right, that she was strong, that her destiny dictated she had to be. But the girl had to come to that conclusion on her own.

“She wasn’t you, Stacy,” Fiona said.

“But she was a Seeker,” the girl replied, her back to them.

“That is all she was. You are much, much more. Your talent, your abilities, surpass any I have ever seen,” Lolly said.

“Plus, you have mastered the gift of necromancy, become a leader for your familiar, honed your spell crafting. The visions, the dreams, you understand them now, even learned to tune in to the physical alerts your body sends to you.” Birdie paused to see if that had sunk in.

“I haven’t had any visions or dreams lately, and only one spirit has visited me.”

“Hecate’s skirt, child, you’ve been too busy summoning the goddess. Literally.” Birdie watched as the corners of her granddaughter’s mouth curled up.

Anastasia turned, smiling. “I guess I did do that, didn’t I?”

The Geraghty sisters nodded.

The girl stepped forward. “What I don’t understand is why the Mage stole the cauldron.”

“Greed,” Birdie said.

Fiona elaborated. “Ireland was a conquered country. It fell under the rule of the British government, became a member of the United Kingdom in 1801.”

Birdie said, “The Celtic grazing lands, held by the same families for centuries, were seized, colonized, and carved up by the new government. Lofty rents were enforced, along with exorbitant taxes.”

“And the money,” Fiona said, “was spent on England.”

“Farmsteads shrunk as middlemen began managing properties for landlords,” Birdie said. “More parcels meant more money to line their pockets.”

Lolly said, “And more tax dollars sent to the crown. Six million pounds in 1842 alone.”

Anastasia gasped.

“Evicted from their pastureland and forced to farm smaller patches, the Irish searched for a more suitable crop that would feed their families in tighter quarters,” Fiona said.

“So they turned to the potato,” said Birdie. “It became the sole source of nourishment.”

Anastasia said, “And then disease struck.”

The three Geraghty sisters nodded.

“I still don’t see what the professor’s goal was in stealing the cauldron,” the girl asked.

Birdie explained. “He saw what had been happening to his countrymen ever since the Act of Union. Farmers and the working classes were stripped to a shameful level of barrenness. So he accelerated the decline of an already impoverished populace by inciting a famine. He thought he had the key to riches. He was certain that the cauldron would fetch a hefty price from anyone who cared about the island and her people. He first approached John O’Connell, a politician who was born of wealth, but that backfired because the O’Connell clan had also been ripped from their homestead. He tried others, but he soon realized that there was no coin in Irish pockets. So then he approached Lord Heytesbury, lieutenant of Ireland, and his plan failed there as well.”

“What happened?” Anastasia asked.

Fiona interjected. “He underestimated the cruelty and apathy of the government. England, you see, was exporting crops from the land even during the harshest years of the Hunger.”

“The globe’s richest empire was systematically murdering the native people of the world’s most fertile land,” Birdie said.

“So why not return the cauldron if he couldn’t get a price for it?” Anastasia asked.

“Because by that time, the council had a bounty on his head. The fact that only he knew where it was located kept him alive,” Fiona said.

“Until the Seeker found him,” said Lolly gravely.

The girl looked at her grandmother, wide-eyed. “I hope you don’t expect me to…”

“We don’t do that anymore,” Birdie said.

“Good to know,” said Anastasia.

The girl took a deep breath and hunched over the map again, pointing out leylines and describing a Fae person named Pickle who would help navigate them for her. She explained the instructions given to her: that their best bet was to gather all four corners and head to the Hill of Summoning.

“I know what it looks like, they showed me a picture, but do you know where that is?” Anastasia asked.

The sisters exchanged glances, confused.

Fiona said, “Why don’t you describe it, dear?”

Anastasia described an ancient mound in the Boyne Valley, with steps planted in the grass that led to the top.

“It looked like it was in a rural area. More remote than Newgrange,” she said.

Birdie was grateful to hear that. Newgrange, while a spectacular example of the Tuatha Dé Danann’s knowledge of astrophysics, was a tourist mecca. The fewer people around, the better, for what they were up against.

Fiona said, “Could it be Fourknocks?”

Birdie pointed at her sister. “That’s it. I’m certain of it. I cannot recall another mound carved with stone steps.”

Anastasia was pleased. “Great. So then all we have to do, after each corner connects with its treasure, is meet there, stand at the top, and weave an enchantment. Danu said the cauldron will lead us to it.”

Fiona nodded, as did Lolly.

Birdie smiled, an anxious quiver pinching at her nerves.

She had the disturbing sense that their quest would not be so facile.

It was dark when we arrived in Ireland. There were no houses or businesses that I could see from the light cast by the plane. Just a hilly landscape that swelled and dipped for miles. The nose jerked and jutted for a few brief, terrifying moments before the wheels mercifully bounced down and we finally skidded to a stop on a stretch of pavement the size of a postage stamp.

There were no vehicles, no planes, no airport terminal. Nothing except green grass, a few looming trees weary from carrying their aging limbs, and a handful of painted sheep in the distance.

“Where are we?” I peered out the window opposite my seat.

Birdie said, “We’re in Connemara. A driver is scheduled to meet us here to take us to the castle in Cong.”

Birdie pulled Gramps aside to have a few words with him. He nodded and went to the cockpit to speak with Roger.

All I could think about, as we were led off the plane and Roger helped us collect our luggage, was that I was one step closer to seeing my mother.

My heart leaped at the prospect.

Thor pranced around the dewy grass, inspecting this strange new land. Lolly had packed sandwiches for us to eat on the plane. Since he had slept most of the way, I fed him his share now. I asked Birdie if we were going to pass a store on the way to the castle. Told her I needed food for Thor. She said we weren’t stopping, that we were headed straight there, and that there would be more than enough food and drink to feed all of us for a month.