With a sigh, the Dagda pushed back his throne and walked to his slain lovers. He turned his staff around and touched its handle on each of their backs. The females stirred, pushed themselves off the table, and glanced around as though roused from a sudden sleep.
My heart quickened. What if that was the magical object I needed to awaken Drayce?
The Dagda turned to me, his teeth bared. “Now, fix my staff or once I’ve squeezed the life out of your skinny neck and cooked you until your meat falls off your bones, I will throw what’s left of you out into the Summer Court.”
“I…” How could I tell him that I had little to no control of my power? I could slice through things, open portals, but I hadn’t had the opportunity to train. Slicing things was the extent of my abilities.
Moments passed, and I stood locked in the Dagda’s golden gaze. Firelight flickered in his eyes, reminding me of the flames of his fury threatening to destroy me for the consequences of his bad temper.
Grumbles stirred around us from the dancers now complaining that the music had stopped, the lovers muttering about the mess on the table. The low, complaining voices spread across the dining hall, a swarm of discontent.
“Lock her away,” he snarled.
Rough hands grabbed my arms and hauled me off the bench and behind the Dagda’s table. I turned to the crowd, swept my gaze over the discontented musicians and merrymakers and met Aengus’ stricken gaze.
“Father.” Aengus reached out an arm. “Don’t—”
“Silence,” the Dagda roared, making everyone flinch. He clapped his hands together. “Play the music, clear up this mess, continue the feast!”
The fiddlers resumed their playing. The dancers retook their positions and laughed and clapped and swayed to the music. I struggled within the guards’ grip, tried to reach for the Sword of Tethra, which now lay on the floor behind the table.
The guards pulled me backward through an archway, their heavy feet echoing loud enough to drown out the sound of merriment. I screamed and tried lurching forward, my gaze fixed on the disappearing archway, but the hands restraining me were too strong, too tight, too unyielding. The clank and jingle of keys rang through my ears, a door creaked open, and they threw me into a dungeon lined with bones.
I fell onto my back, the knobbly surfaces of the bones kneading my ribcage and spine. Tremors of terror and disgust wracked my body. I stumbled to my feet and threw myself against the closing door, my lungs loosening a scream.
“Wait,” I cried.
The door slammed shut, knocking me back several paces. I glanced around at the tightly packed thigh bones and shuddered. Like the skulls on the outside of the Palace of Bóinne, they came in different sizes, ranging from the diameter of a dinner plate to bones as delicate as the tines of forks. There were no lights, no windows, no source of ventilation except for what streamed through the tiny gaps between the bones.
I wrapped both arms around my middle and leaned against the door—the only surface in this accursed cell that wasn’t made of a dead person. The power of becoming the Queen of the Faeries had dulled my instincts, made me overconfident and reckless. When I lived in the cottage with Father, I would never have spoken out against a faerie, even when the scales of power were weighted in my favor.
The old Neara would sneak about, always stealthy, always afraid. I had spent years watching powerless as people were victimized by faeries, and the moment I got a little power, I struck out. If Father was here, he would have scolded me for not holding my silence at the Dagda’s murderous instincts.
Despair washed through my insides. I had failed. Failed Drayce, failed Father, and failed Aengus.
A hatch at the bottom of the door creaked open, and a guard slipped in the pieces of the Dagda’s broken staff. “Join Lorg mór by nightfall, or the Dagda will execute you as part of the festivities.”
“Not without my sword of healing,” I snapped.
“What?” he said.
“The sword I used to slice through the Dagda’s staff. It works the same as Lorg mór. With one blow it cuts and with another it heals.”
Nothing happened for several moments, and I held my breath, hoping the guard would believe my lie. As far as I knew, the Sword of Tethra had no uses except to create rifts through the world. Father’s incantation could direct those rifts, and my blood on its own did nothing unless combined with something magical like a circle of mushrooms.
After several heartbeats of silence, the guard said, “I will speak to the Dagda.”
I picked up the two pieces of Lorg mór and examined the sharp ends made by my blade. Instead of creating a rift, the Sword of Tethra had cut them cleanly as though my blood hadn’t made an ounce of a difference. I leaned against the wall, pressed the two pieces together, and willed them to stick.
It didn’t work. Not that I was expecting anything, but I had hoped after two failed attempts to obtain the harp, that I’d suddenly get a run of good luck.
My eyes grew heavy, and sleep threatened to pull me under. Clenching my teeth, I fought the urge and tightened my fists around the broken staff. Now was not the time to fall into an accursed sleep. Not when the Dagda might carry out his threat to boil me in his cauldron and throw my bones into the darkness, where the Fear Dorcha might gather them up as an offering to Queen Melusina.
A deep breath shuddered out of my lungs, then I forced another inhale and exhaled it in a rush. I stamped my feet, clanged together the pieces of broken staff—anything
