The Time Roads

“Send word to evacuate Osraighe,” I said softly.

“We don’t want to cause panic—”

“We have no choice,” I snapped. “They have laid traps for us. Even if we could discover the where, we cannot know when. Even if we knew when, we do not know how. Not yet.”

“What of our prisoner?” Ó Tíghearnaigh said. “With proper persuasion he might recall enough to lead us to the rebels.”

“No. No torture,” I said. “Whatever you call it.”

We settled into an uneasy and angry silence. Lord Ó Tíghearnaigh drank a second glass of whiskey. Lord Ó Duinn reviewed the collection of papers in his hands, as if hoping to discover clues on how to proceed. Lord Ó Cadhla had an air of resignation utterly foreign to all my memories of him. It was in this moment that Lord Ó Breislin arrived. He wore an expression far more hopeful than I thought possible

“I would be grateful for some good news,” I told him.

Ó Breislin took a seat and poured a glass of whiskey. “None, except that Commander Ó Deághaidh has been found. Found and found alive. Is that enough?”

My heart leapt. “He lives?”

“He does. The Garda discovered him half buried in the rubble of the station. His leg is shattered, and he has lost a dangerous quantity of blood. Even so, the doctors tell me he did not succumb gently to their care. They had to forcibly administer a sleep draught before they could properly attend to his injuries.”

Aidrean alive. I whispered a silent prayer of thanks to God and Mhuire and Gaia.

* * *

After that, there was nothing left for us to discuss. Commander Ábraham departed to keep watch with his agents for further news. My ministers and I agreed to meet early the next morning to discuss how to evacuate Osraighe. It was near ten o’clock when I retired to my bedroom and undressed. I lay down and closed my eyes, never expecting to find sleep …

… and woke at midnight, breathless and on edge.

At first I saw nothing, heard nothing except the fading chimes from the nearby clock tower. The moon had set and the palace lay in a smothering darkness, without stars or lamplight to relieve it.

Then I heard it—a faint exhalation, as though someone stood quite close to me.

Assassins.

I lunged from bed, shouting for my guards. My legs tangled in the linens and I landed with a thump on the floor. A wet gurgling noise sounded behind me. I scrambled away on hands and knees until I came to my wardrobe, then the wall of my bedchamber. I eased up to standing and turned to face the intruder.

Nothing. Only fluttering shadows.

Then came another audible gasp. I could not fix on where it came from. Where were my guards? Taking care to move as silently as I could, I crept toward the door and found the switch for the electric lamps. With a snap, light flooded my bedroom.

A man crouched at the foot of my bed, his head bent over his chest, and one hand clutching at the bedcovers, the other splayed against the carpet. Pale blond hair, so pale it appeared silver, tumbled over his face. His clothes were covered in dust, and a faint acrid cloud drifted around him.

Then he lifted his face and I cried out, or tried to, but panic clamped my throat shut.

Breandan Ó Cuilinn stared back at me. Oh, but a strangely altered Breandan, his face scored and seamed with age, his hair an unkempt tangle of silver and gray. Only his eyes were the same, that bright and vivid gaze that pinned my heart even after the absence of twelve years.

“Breandan,” I whispered.

His eyes stretched wide. “Áine. I … Have I found you at last? I thought—”

A spasm took him and his mouth twisted in agony.

Oh, my love. What have you done?

Breandan coughed, a harsh, bubbling cough that shook his body. Once more he lifted his head—I could see the effort it took—and stared at me. His eyes were dark now, with only a rim of blue around the pupil. His gaze flickered from me then away, to some point in the far distance. Then slowly, so slowly, all the brilliance faded away, and his eyes turned blank, as though a veil had fallen over them. Even as he reached toward me, his body collapsed into a heap.

“Your Majesty!”

The door latch rattled. I started. Of course, my guards. I glanced toward Breandan. For a moment, my vision wavered—I thought I could see the pattern of the carpet through his body—then, I blinked and the impression disappeared.