No, I cut in. Drop the shield.
And I mentally crossed my fingers that my father hadn’t been waiting for that very event.
The faint lilac haze around me flickered, then died, and Amaya’s blade became shadowed once more. I tensed but, despite my fears, my father didn’t immediately attack.
Not that I relaxed any. “It’s a failing also shared by the Aedh. I hardly think Lucian had planned to die so soon.”
“Perhaps not, but he was aware of its approach, as you well know.”
He paused, and that vague sense of amusement vanished. My grip on Amaya tightened so abruptly it was a wonder my knuckles weren’t glowing.
“Lucian’s plans are no excuse for you having lost the second key, however.”
“No, because you own some of that blame.” My voice was curt, which was perhaps unwise given the state of both my strength and Amaya’s. “You not only knew he was fucking the sorceress Lauren, but also that he was working with the sorcerer who stole the first key. You didn’t tell me the first fact until after I’d questioned you about her, and you didn’t even bother mentioning the second.”
“Because it should not have been relevant. No human should have been able to access the fields, let alone the gates.”
“But he had Lucian’s help, and he’s a very powerful dark sorcerer.”
“Lucian could not attain full energy form, and therefore should not have been able to step onto the fields.”
“So how the hell did the sorcerer get to the gates with the first key if he didn’t have Lucian’s help?”
His anger swirled around me, fierce and frightening, but this time, its force was not aimed at me. And it had a rather frustrated edge to it.
“That I do not know.”
And it killed him to admit it – a situation that cheered me up no end. “We think the sorcerer accessed the fields via stone portals formed by both black and Aedh magic —”
“While that is more than possible,” my father interrupted, “he should not have been able to see the light and dark paths, let alone access them.”
“Unless he had Lucian’s help.”
“Even Lucian would not have been so foolish as to direct a human to their location. Not when he had his own plans for them.”
“Lucian’s plans had nothing to do with the gates. He not only wanted revenge on the Raziq, who’d made him less than he was, but to turn back time and once again become full Aedh.”
An aim that seemed right up there with pigs flying, and yet Lucian had totally believed it was possible.
“Only the strongest magic raised on the strongest ley-line intersection could feasibly allow a human to achieve something like that.”
I frowned at his slight emphasis on the word “human.” “Meaning Aedh are capable of transcending time?”
“Of course.” Amusement filtered through his words again. “How do you think Lucian came to spend so much time here on Earth? He was not only stripped of his ability to become full Aedh, but he was relegated to suffering eons of human development.”
“And all it did was not only give him plenty of time to plan his revenge, but plenty of time to find a ley line strong enough for him – and his sorcerer buddy – to place their portal.”
And it was so well protected we’d yet to find the damn thing. According to Ilianna, the sorcerer had to be using a containment spell to keep us from sensing it, but surely the amount of power he’d need to suck from the intersection just to change form – let alone access the fields – would not be so easily restrained…
I added, “I’m gathering Lucian would have been able to access the fields that way?”
“Certainly. But both he and this sorcerer would have to alter the composition of their bodies to that of energy, if only temporarily. Souls are the only other entity outside Aedh and reapers who can walk the fields, and only then with the help of a guide.”
“What about the temples?”
“What about them?”
I bit back my impatience. I wasn’t about to rock the boat too much when my father was being helpful. Or as helpful as he was ever likely to get.