Shades of Avalon (5 page)

Triona continued, “It all happened so fast…It’s hard to keep my mind linear.” She paused to close her eyes and suck in a breath.

I imagined her playing out the scene like a movie in her mind.

“We were deep in conversation and suddenly Caleb’s arm reached out across my chest. I didn’t know why.” She cringed at the memory and stopped to gather herself, breathing hard as we sat silently.

“A truck came straight at us out of nowhere. Caleb’s foot stamped down on the brake. I heard the floor crack, but something else hit from behind. The force flung us back in our seats, but the truck in front was still coming, and it seemed to be growing monstrous. I was convinced it would flatten us.”

For some reason I became intensely aware of every heartbeat, every breath, every crackle of wood in the fire. It was like some sort of vortex with our entire universe existing in this room. The world outside had simply stopped turning.

“Without thinking, I unlatched my seatbelt and hurled myself over the back of my seat. I think I planned to pull Caleb over, but I landed on my arm. The bone broke right through my skin. I must have blacked out for a second. Everything was so confusing. Caleb screamed something, and I reached for him. I had to get us out of there, but there was nowhere to go.”

The twisting of her hands intensified. Amanda attempted to still them. Triona’s eyes opened and flickered to her as if she hadn’t noticed Amanda had been beside her at all. Her body stiffened to the point I feared her bones might snap again from sheer tension. Triona allowed Amanda to take one hand, and the other moved in a repetitive motion up and down the outside of her thigh. This was an old habit of Triona’s, but she’d mentioned she was working on it—she reasoned a leader shouldn’t display such a nervous habit if they wanted to instill confidence in others. It flew in direct contradiction to her desire not to lead at all.

“Caleb swerved away from the oncoming truck,” Triona went on, stopping to swallow thickly. “I smashed the back of my head against the door. Suddenly there was a howling roar inside my brain. I still don’t know if it was a real sound. All I saw was red. It was like the entire world turned scarlet, and I tried to reach him…I did, I tried—” Pleading crept into her tone. Triona’s eyes widened, and her shoulders went up and down rapidly with each stilted breath.

“Hush.” Annice cut her off, her expression a serene mask. “No one in this room doubts you did everything you could.”

I didn’t miss how she paused a beat after “hush.” I’d seen Annice do this before. Unlike everyone else, she seemed to possess some control over Eila’s presence. Not that she prevented the truth from escaping her lips. It seemed she controlled how the truth came out, as though she had an ability to take a moment of stillness in herself to choose her words. At this point it seemed an instinctual response when Eila was in the room.

Triona nodded and continued. “He shouted for me to stay down, and all I kept thinking was
he can’t die
.”

Annice blinked rapidly. I noticed her first because I was still looking at her. She sucked her bottom lip between her teeth and bit down hard in a clear attempt to not lose it. I stole a quick glance in Samuel’s direction—the fingers of his right hand were rigid, although his expression remained impassive. Yeah, they suspected he was dead too.

Most likely they were reluctant to stick a pin in that particular balloon. I didn’t want to think about it at the hospital, so I had managed to force it from my mind until Triona said she couldn’t sense Caleb.

Magic had been used in Tír na nÓg to extend Amanda and Caleb’s lifelines. Amanda was human and Caleb already had well over a century on his clock—we would have naturally outlived them both. My memories of being there were vague, shrouded in a mist so thick it was impossible to tell how much was real. I didn’t know if they could be killed just like any other Guardian. If someone removed their heart from their chest…

“Everything swirled so fast that it was hard to see. Caleb managed to spin the car to the side of the road, but that only set us right in the path of a second truck. It was speeding toward us, gaining momentum. I didn’t understand, but I didn’t have time to. Blood gushed from my head. It all happened so fast that the wound just didn’t have time to heal.”

I lowered my head and imagined the scene. I could hear the engine protesting against the brakes with grotesque clarity, squealing like nails on a chalkboard. I saw the two huge trucks tossing Caleb’s Jeep around as though it weighed nothing, with him and Triona inside flailing like rag dolls as the metal twisted and crumpled around them, pliable as aluminum foil. Glass sprayed through the air and caught the dull sunlight, shimmering as it showered the ground.

“The whole side door pressed in. I braced myself against the front seat and tried to reach Caleb. He wasn’t making any noise. He didn’t cry out. I think I heard his head hitting the glass of the side door when it shattered. I don’t know if I screamed. I…”

I looked up when her words trailed off. Triona’s eyes darted back and forth as though trying to make sense of what had happened. Perhaps she was searching her memory for something she had missed at the time. Her eyebrows drew down, and she scowled fiercely. Anger and frustration rolled off her like plumes of smoke from a raging fire. I wished Amanda would move away and chastised myself for the thought—Triona would never hurt her.

“It ended as fast as it began. The very second we stopped I managed to crawl out from under the seat, but it was agony. Caleb was lying limply in the front. I only made it as far as window height when we were hit again, and this time I wasn’t holding on to anything. The last thing I remember was smoke and then waking up in the hospital.”

She swallowed hard and opened her eyes, fixing me with a direct gaze. The green blazed like lasers, and I shifted uncomfortably, knowing she saw right through me.

“Where is Caleb?”

“I don’t know.” The words shot out of my mouth before I realized they’d formed inside my mind.

“Eila, please give us a moment,” Samuel asked before Triona had a chance to speak again.

Tears formed in Triona’s eyes. The taste of salt prickled on my tongue. Her heart slammed against her ribcage, or perhaps that was mine drowning out every other sound around me.

“I’ll decide when
anyone
leaves,” she said coldly.

“Triona—” Amanda started. Triona silenced her with a glare.

Amanda’s hand slipped from Triona’s back, and she took a step away, confusion and hurt playing out across her expression. I had seen them argue before this. What best friends didn’t argue? Amanda never backed down this way—a single look enough to make her fold.

“You can’t lie to me,” Triona said, casting her watery eyes over each of us. She swiped at her cheek. “I don’t actually need Eila for that.”

No one spoke. I glanced at Lewis and Carmel. They seemed so out of place. Carmel clutched Lewis’s arm. His jaw was rigid, a sign he was struggling to hold his tongue. Humans had no place in this situation, family or not. In a dangerous circumstance, they would be lost first. I could never forgive myself if something happened to either of them.

“Then you understand this had to be Zeal’s doing,” Eila said plainly, “and you understand Caleb expected it would be a matter of time. You took everything from Zeal at Tara, including his son.”

“I killed his son,” Joshua added. “I’d do it again if I had to. The question is how do we get Caleb back?”

Eila’s lips spread into a tight smile. I often wondered how their relationship worked. It must have been strange to have no secrets at all, only brutal honestly all the time. It had to be emotionally exhausting. I was under no illusion about Amanda and me. She drank the tar I called coffee with a smile, and I told her she was a good driver.

Triona’s eyes lowered. “It’s my fault.” She rubbed her face with her palm and raked her fingers through her hair, dragging it away from where it fell.

I stood quickly, yanking at the waistband of my jeans and shuffling from foot to foot, hoping to spare everyone from Triona’s earlier suspicion there was nothing to get back. There had to be some other explanation. We needed to keep from jumping to conclusions. It didn’t make sense that Zeal would kill Caleb and leave Triona behind. What did he have to gain, other than torturing her?

“Suggestions?” I asked, darting my eyes around, all of a sudden worried I had answered my own question. Maybe he didn’t want to kill Triona, perhaps he wanted to hurt her…to make her suffer.

“Where do you start?” Lewis said.

“I’ve already sent out word for any information,” Samuel replied.

“I will need to return to New York as soon as possible.” Eila stood again and Joshua stood beside her. “We’ve established a temporary safe house upstate for those once loyal to Zeal. People who’ve had access to information Zeal would rather stay hidden, historians, scientists, and those with gifts he coveted. Someone must know something.”

“What about Vincennes?” I suggested, referring to the underground palace the Council had maintained in the small town near Paris.

“There is nothing there anymore,” Annice answered with an unfamiliar tremor in her voice. “Eila and Joshua took care of it. The Council chambers were all but destroyed.” She took a quick breath and rolled her shoulders back.

Joshua crossed the short distance across the room to his parents. He leaned in, placing one hand on his mother’s shoulder and pecking her cheek. Annice closed her eyes, as though absorbing the sensation and committing it to memory. Samuel stood and embraced his son warmly, slapping his back. Joshua appeared to melt into the comfort for a moment before he pulled back and nodded respectfully to his father.

He then turned his attention to Triona. Walking toward her slowly and calmly, his gait and posture betrayed nothing of the turmoil he had to be bearing. If our positions were reversed and it was Caleb standing next to the door rather than my sister, I doubted I would have been as sensible.

Amanda moved out of their way and came back to my side. Triona’s head tilted to the side almost indiscernibly. Her lips parted, and she blinked a couple of times, her long, dark eyelashes fluttering against her ashen skin. I wondered what was going on inside her head when she peered at Joshua. I didn’t think Joshua and Caleb looked alike, but I didn’t spend my time scrutinizing them. Perhaps Triona saw what I couldn’t. Whatever. The lingering seconds she spent contemplating Joshua’s expression—or the colors of his aura—appeared to soften her anguish. Her shoulders relaxed, and the creases across her forehead smoothed.

A twinge of sharp and bitter jealousy sprang forward chased swiftly by nauseating guilt. What did it matter who succeeded in easing her mind? Rationally, I had no right to feel so possessive. Irrationally, the muscles in my legs twitched with the instinct to protect. Triona was my sister first. She was my family first. No one else in the whole world got us the way we got each other. Not even Amanda or Caleb. No one else was like us—Guardian, both stronger and weaker because of the human blood lacing our system.

“There is one thing to consider,” Eila began, breaking the forced silence in the room. We all offered our immediate and rapt attention. “There was one other person at Tara. If revenge is Zeal’s motivation, he may be exposed.”

Triona shook her head. “No. John isn’t a threat to Zeal. He doesn’t remember any of what happened. I made sure of it.”

“His revenge is against you. John being a threat is irrelevant.”

Triona’s jaw slackened as Eila’s words sank in.

John, the guy Triona dated in London, followed us to Ireland in a misguided attempt to prove himself her knight in shining armor. As a human, he was a liability, but I understood his motivation. He was in love with her. In the end, it became too much for him to discover the distorted reality he knew wasn’t the real world. Like most humans, he wasn’t ready to accept things like magic and living demi-gods. Regardless, Triona’s heart belonged to Caleb. She had done John a kindness by taking his memories of the event and the truth about her.

“Who’s watching John?” I asked.

Triona stared unblinking at Samuel. She paled further, if that was possible. His head moved side to side, hardly more than a twitch.

“I have to go to London,” she stated.

So no one was watching him, but Triona was in no emotional condition to go rushing off anywhere. I leapt from my seat and blocked the doorway.

“I don’t think so.”

Triona spun on her heels, defiant and breathing through her nose in a clear effort to remain calm. “Move, Ben.”

“Ben, what are you doing?” Amanda demanded, balancing on the edge on the couch cushion.

“We can send someone else to check up on him.” My eyes darted past her to Joshua. He held his hands up, palms out, indicating he wouldn’t come between us. “I’m sure there has to be someone we can trust in London.”

Triona snorted, her entire body trembling with the effort to refrain from attacking me. My own instincts tingled in my bloodstream. Bile burned in my throat, my body fighting against the conflicting desires to fight and guard my sister.

“It’s not about trust. John is my responsibility.” She bounced foot to foot in agitation. “He’s involved because of me.”

“You don’t know he is involved,” I pointed out, bracing my hands against the frame and shifting my position repeatedly. Triona would look for weakness in my stance. Just like I would in hers. The wood creaked under pressure from my fingertips.