THREE
Diarmid
They brought the man in cowering and trembling. His red hair was disheveled; there was a bruise on his pale cheek where Ossian had been a bit too persuasive. He wore an old deep-blue frock coat, and his gray tie was crumpled and loose about his throat.
“Please,” he begged, his voice cracking. “Please, I’ve done nothing. I don’t know what you want. Please—”
“Quiet.” Finn sat on the edge of the scarred, blood-stained table they’d raided from the Butcher Boys just last week—another gang, another fight that left them bruised and battered. But they’d won it, just as they’d won the others. They’d quickly gained a reputation as one of the most indomitable gangs in the city. Well, why shouldn’t they? Even without their familiar weapons, even in this strange world called New York City, they were the Fianna.
Finn spun his dagger between his fingers while the man watched, then stabbed the point into the wood—a bit too much, Diarmid thought, but Finn had always been dramatic.
Diarmid glanced away. He hated the way Finn toyed and played, like a cat with a mouse. It was that mean streak in him, one you forgot most of the time, because Finn was usually just, and generous, and he was so good at knowing what they needed that sometimes Diarmid believed Finn could read his thoughts. But Finn had a temper, too, and he could hold a grudge a long time, and if he wanted something you didn’t want to give him . . . more than the others, Diarmid knew what that was like. He loved and respected Finn. But Diarmid feared him in equal measure.
Finn said, “You’ve nothing to be afraid of.”
“No?” the man squeaked. “How is that, when you kidnapped me from the Luxe? There are people looking for me, you know. They’ll tell the police. You think I don’t know who you are?”
Finn raised a dark-blond brow. “Who are we?”
“Finn’s Warriors. I recognize you. We’ve all heard the talk on the streets.”
“What talk is that?”
“That you’re the worst gang since the Whyos. You wounded more than half of them in that fight even when you were caught by surprise. Seven against twenty-five. Everyone knows it. What you want from me I can’t imagine. I’m no one. I’ve got nothing. No money—”
“You’ve the gift of Sight, haven’t you?” Finn asked.
The man blanched. “No.”
It was a lie; even Diarmid could see that from across the room.
“Is that so?” Finn glanced at Goll. “How did you find him?”
“A boy told us about him,” Goll said, tugging at the newsboy’s cap that now covered his light-brown hair. “Said if we were lookin’ for magic we should get Cannel the Fortune-teller over on the Bowery.”
“A parlor trick,” Cannel protested. “Truly. I read people’s faces, that’s all. I tell them what they want to hear. It’s nothing more than that.”
Finn snatched the broadsheet from Goll, one of the many that adorned nearly every surface in the city. Finn glanced questioningly at Diarmid, who shook his head. He couldn’t read it though he was the most educated of them; he’d been fostered by the love god, Aengus Og, with Manannan—master of illusion and trickery—as his tutor. But even Diarmid found the language of this place inscrutable, and it troubled him that these people so casually ascribed their greatest secrets to paper. Did they not understand the power of words?
Finn handed the broadsheet to their captive. “Read it to me.”
The man licked his lips nervously. “‘Bond’s Circus. Three weeks only. Come see the Circassian Women! Magio the Sword Swallower! Chief Many-Scalps and his three wives!’”
“What’s a Circassian woman?” Finn asked.
“Women from a harem,” Cannel said. “They belonged to Turkish sultans.”
Whatever that meant. Finn grunted. “What else does it say?”
“‘Antonia and her amazing, three-legged dog! The Wild Man of Borneo! And introducing Cannel the Fortune-teller!’”
“The fortune-teller,” Finn said, jabbing his finger into Cannel’s chest. “Why would it say that if you weren’t?”
“It’s all a show!” Cannel cried. “It’s a sideshow, for pity’s sake! The Circassian women are just girls with curled hair!”
Finn gestured to Keenan, a tall man with a chiseled face and thick brown hair tied in a queue that flopped between his shoulder blades.
“He read your hand, didn’t he? What did he say to you?” Finn asked.
“That I’d cared for birds. That I had strength enough to kill a formidable enemy. Something to do with the sea, he said.”
Diarmid caught his breath. In Ireland, long ago, Keenan had been charged with the task of bringing two of every kind of bird as a hostage price to win Finn’s freedom. And it had been Keenan who killed Lir, the god of the sea, Manannan’s father, during the Great War between the gods.
Finn’s full lips curled. He turned back to Cannel. “I think you have more power than you’re admitting, cainte. Now why don’t you tell us the truth? We’re in need of a Seer, as it happens. If you do the task well, we’ll let you live.”
Cannel swallowed hard. “I can’t. I don’t think I’ve the skill you need.”
Finn asked Goll, “Did you bring his divining tools?”
Goll reached into his pocket and took out a deck of very worn, tattered-edged cards, handing them to Finn, who looked ill at ease as he touched them. He set them on the table without rifling through them—one did not meddle with another’s magic.
“Tell us what you know,” Finn ordered Cannel.
Cannel glanced around the room, and Diarmid saw the resignation on his face. “I need a chair.”
Finn made a motion, and Ossian brought over a barrel, setting it down with a thud. Cannel flipped up the skirt of his coat before he sat and picked up the cards. His hands were clumsy and shaking. “I need a question first,” Cannel said hoarsely. “Tell me what you want to know.”
“Where is the veleda?” Finn said.
Cannel frowned. “What’s a veleda?”
“A Druid priestess.”
Cannel swallowed again. “You won’t find that in New York City, I’m afraid.”
But he shuffled the cards, separating them into piles, murmuring the question. They all watched. It was never quiet in their flat; the sounds of outside—horses and wagons and children playing, couples screaming drunken obscenities at each other, gang fights—echoed through the thin walls and floors, but Diarmid felt the silence of his fellows like a force, and he knew the Seer felt it too.
Cannel fumbled with the cards, laying them out in a facedown formation. Diarmid had seen oracles divine with ogham sticks and the entrails of animals, the flight patterns of birds, or the movements of the heavens, but this was new. He watched curiously, feeling the power in the little man at the table grow with every passing moment. Whatever Cannel’s protests, there was some magic in him.
Finally, the cards were all laid out. Cannel turned them over one by one, studying them. No one said anything. They knew to be patient with Seers—interruption could be fatal.
“She’s here,” Cannel said. “You were right. This—What did you call her?”
“Veleda,” Finn provided.
“Yes. This veleda is in the city. I can’t tell for certain where. Somewhere near.” Cannel bent closer. “There are others around her. A society or . . . a club.”
“What kind of club?” Finn asked.
“I don’t know. I can’t tell.” Cannel lifted another card, studied it, frowned. He looked up, scanning the room, his gaze stopping on Diarmid. Uncomfortably, Diarmid shifted against the wall.
“What?” Finn’s gaze followed Cannel’s. “What is it? What do you see?”
“I think it’s him,” Cannel said.
“Diarmid? What about him?”
“Diarmid?” Something flashed in Cannel’s eyes, some troubling understanding. He looked again at the cards, turning up another, frowning more deeply. “Yes. A dark-haired young man with blue eyes. And . . . and a spear. A bad death.”
Diarmid’s gut began to churn.
Oscar said with a nudge, “Well, that would be you, wouldn’t it, Derry? What does it say about him?”
“That he’s been chosen.” Cannel pursed his lips. “There’s a prophecy. A promise.”
Finn’s gaze hardened. Diarmid’s dread grew as his leader took a few steps toward him. “What prophecy would that be, my friend?” Finn asked very, very softly. “What promise?”
“Something about this veleda.” Cannel looked up from the cards. “His aspect surrounds her.”
Diarmid’s mouth went dry. He’d faced a hundred warriors alone, warring kings and thundering gods and vengeful men shape-changed into angry boars. But Finn’s measuring expression was worse than all of them.
Diarmid wanted to turn away, but he pulled himself off the wall, standing straight. “There was a prophecy. Manannan told it to me. There was no veleda then—it didn’t matter. I’d forgotten it.”
Finn waited.
“He—he told me that it was by my hand that the veleda must die. That if I didn’t do this, we would fail, even if she’d chosen us.”
“I see.” Finn’s expression was grim. “And you didn’t think it important enough to tell me before now?”
“Do you see a veleda?” Diarmid asked evenly. “Where is she? Even he”—Diarmid pointed to Cannel—“can’t see where she is. I would have mentioned it once we found her. Once she chose.”
“I should have known this before.”
“How does it matter if we don’t find her?” Diarmid asked.
“And if we do?” Finn countered. “Can you look into pretty eyes and wield a knife, Diarmid?”
It was a fair question. Girls were his weakness. They had always been. “She’s a veleda,” Diarmid said. “She’ll know what has to be done, won’t she? ’Tisn’t as if I’ll be killing an innocent.”
“Killing an innocent?” Cannel’s voice went high. “You mean to kill her?”
“Can you do it?” Finn demanded again.
Diarmid heard the challenge. He met Finn’s gaze. “Aye. I can do it.”
Cannel rose. “Look, I want no part of this. Not killing. I don’t know what you need with this veleda, but—”
Finn set his hand on Cannel’s shoulder, pushing him down. “Shall I tell you who we truly are, cainte? You’re a Flannery, aren’t you? Have you heard of the Fianna? Of Ossian and Oscar? Diarmid Ua Duibhne?”
Cannel’s eyes widened. “Yes, of course I have, but—”
“We are the Fianna,” Finn declared.
“The Fianna? The warriors of the High King? But . . . it’s a tale told to children.”
“Called back from undying sleep, tasked with helping Ireland in her hour of need,” Finn went on. “The prophecy is laid: when we’re called, the veleda must decide whether our fight is worthy. And then she must sacrifice herself to her choice. If she does not choose us, we fail and die.” He paused. “And so we find ourselves in a confusing state. No caller or veleda in sight. We don’t know why we were summoned or why the horn brought us to this place instead of to Ireland. These are things we must discover. And we need your help for it.”
Cannel looked at each of them. Diarmid felt the truth land on the Seer—settle, stay.
“Help us find her,” Finn said. “So we can win her power. So we can discover why we’re here and return to Ireland. Once we’re gone, you can go back to your life. We won’t hold you.”
“You’re the Fianna,” Cannel murmured. “It can’t be true. This isn’t some . . . this is impossible.”
“Is it?” Finn asked. “What do your cards say?”
“I don’t need the cards.” Cannel glanced back to Finn. “You’re Finn MacCool. Truly Finn MacCool.”
“In the flesh. And I’ve made you a promise, Seer. I’ve never yet broken a vow. Help us find the veleda and our task, and we’ll release you.”
Cannel nodded. Hero worship was in his eyes now, an expression Diarmid had known well once upon a time, and one that he was just beginning to see again since they’d defeated the Whyos and the Butcher Boys. When they passed, little boys turned to their friends and whispered, pallid-faced girls tendered hesitant smiles. Diarmid had to admit that he never grew tired of it—though he tried to remember that pride had been their undoing.
Cannel fingered the cards. He turned over another. And then he noted, “It says here that we haven’t much time.”
“What do you mean?” Finn demanded.
“This card signifies the Otherworld. The door between worlds.”
“This we know. The sacrifice must take place on Samhain, when the veil between worlds is thinnest,” Finn said. “We have until then to win the veleda’s choice.”
Cannel nodded. “That’s October thirty-first. It’s already May. Only five months.”
“And if we don’t find who called us?”
Cannel looked back at the cards. “Death. Disaster. Chaos. I can’t see you past this. Any of you.”
“You’re certain of it?”
“I’m rarely wrong.”
“That isn’t what you told us when you arrived,” Finn pointed out.
Cannel flushed. Finn turned to the rest of them. “Well then, it’s quick work, but nothing we can’t handle.”
“I’m betting a week or less before we find her,” Ossian boasted, tossing his white-blond head. “We’ll be in the hills of Ireland before we know it.”
The others cheered.
Only Diarmid was quiet.
This was a place of marvels. Messages traveled through wire, paper so common—and printed, no less—that it fluttered from every post and wall. Ships ran on steam, and streetcars raced on rails. Houses were piped with light, and black stones burned for hours to heat even the largest rooms. Miracles.
Though few of those miracles seemed to reach this part of the city. Even the streetlamps seemed dim here, as if the light were afraid to reach out into the darkness. Just now, the moon was full, and its brightness barely sneaked past the tall buildings leaning together to block the sky. Darkness was always the way of it here; the warrens of dead ends and alcoves were always shadowed, where men too drunk to walk—or dead—huddled. Dust rose in clouds and hazed both sun and moonlight. Narrow, unlit hallways and stairs so dark they were impenetrable even at noon, hazardous and slippery with wet and slime and sometimes other things. Piles of garbage in the streets that came to Diarmid’s knees, riddled with rats.
He missed the green hills of home. More than that, he missed the peace of it. Here, even at night, the streets were full, people camping out on the flimsy landings of fire escapes, trying to flee the stink of the tenement flats and the heat—only late spring, and the rooms were already too hot and suffocating to bear. There were people on the rooftops too: women doing laundry in the cool of the night, children shouting and racing, couples courting, and men and women drinking and talking. From down the street came raucous yelling from some stale-beer dive or a two-cent lodging house.
Diarmid sat on the stoop, leaning back against the wooden rail. He tilted his head, trying to see the sky, instead seeing people leaning out of their windows.
“Going out tonight, Derry?”
“I heard you boys was going after the Black Hands next. I got a wager on ya!”
“You look lonely, lad. Want some company?”
The last was from Mrs. Mahoney, who never failed to give him a grin and a wink when he went by. Diarmid called up, “When I do, you’ll be the first to know.”
She laughed, and he looked down at his legs, covered now with coarse trousers and his boots, which were dirty with dust and manure. They’d traded their grave raiment for modern dress. It had bought enough to clothe all seven of them and to buy food for a time. But now the money was mostly gone. Dry and moldy bread yesterday, purloined from ash cans and garbage piles. A few limp and rat-bit carrots. There would need to be more coin and soon, especially with the challenges they faced: rival gangs wanting to test them, simply surviving. Not to mention the task they’d been brought back for, which they didn’t yet know.
He heard footsteps behind him, felt the heaviness of a hand on his shoulder, and he looked back to see Oscar, whose hair—the same pale blond as his father’s—shone like a beacon in the night even without any light shining upon it.
“You didn’t want any ale?”
Diarmid shook his head. Conan had managed to find a small keg somewhere, and the others were celebrating that they’d found a Seer who’d agreed to help them—not that he’d had much choice.
Oscar sat beside him, settling his forearms on his knees, letting his hands dangle. “What are you doing out here?”
“Nothing. Thinking.”
“I’d give almost anything for a good bed and decent mead. Last night I dreamed of a roast. I was chewing straw when I woke up.”
“We’ll have those things again,” Diarmid said.
“Aye.”
Diarmid wasn’t surprised when Oscar asked quietly, “Was it a geis Manannan put on you? To kill the veleda? Or just a prophecy?”
Prophecy could change as events changed. Where there was free will, nothing was absolute. But a geis was something altogether different. It was a spell of sorts, a condition, a prohibition. To refuse it meant shame and death.
“A geis,” Diarmid said.
“Ah. You didn’t even tell me.”
Diarmid shrugged. “I never thought any of this would happen, did you? Called back to help Ireland . . . a pretty dream it was, I thought.”
“I hoped for it,” Oscar said. “But no, I didn’t really think it would happen.”
“I’ll do what’s required. You know I will.”
“I don’t doubt you.”
“Finn does.”
“Well. Aye.” Oscar chuckled. “Can you blame him? When it comes to you and the lasses—you’ve the softest heart of all of us. But I guess that’s what comes of being fostered by Aengus Og.”
“I won’t give Finn another reason to doubt my loyalty.”
Oscar sobered. “It’s been a long time since Grainne, Derry.”
“He’ll never forget it.”
“He regretted it. Letting you die. He won’t risk losing you a second time.”
“I wish I had your faith. But I promise you: if something comes between us this time, it won’t be some lass.”
Oscar nodded. “Speaking of which, how about the two of us go out and find one or two? The others won’t miss us for a while.”
Diarmid smiled. “You never learn.”
“Come on. Don’t tell me you don’t long for a soft breast to lie your head upon. It’s been what . . . two thousand years, give or take?”
“There are ten saloons at least on this block alone,” Diarmid pointed out. “Take your pick. I’m sure you’ll find a lass or two among them.”
“I haven’t time for wooing. ’Twould be easier if you were along to flash that lovespot.”
Diarmid’s hand went to the spot on his forehead, the ball seirce a fairy had bestowed upon him because he’d been the only one of them to recognize her magic. It felt as it always did—a raised scar like a burn. He kept his hair long, falling in his eyes, to cover it. He’d enjoyed it at first—any lass who saw it fell in love with him, and he’d liked having anyone he wanted. And then he began to feel . . . empty. Now it was more a curse than a gift. He’d stopped being able to tell—was it really he those girls had loved, or was it just the spell? Even with Grainne—especially with Grainne. He swept his thick, dark hair forward again to cover the spot.
“Excess, if you ask me,” Oscar grumbled, as he had a hundred times before. “You’re handsome enough already.”
“The ball seirce wouldn’t help you anyway. It’s me they’d want, and I don’t want to have to fight you over jealousy.”
“Ah, but what kind of a friend would you be if you didn’t throw one my way?”
“I don’t even know if it works in this world.”
“Why not try it out? What can it hurt?” Oscar asked.
“We’ve trouble enough without courting more.”
Oscar sighed. “Aye. I suppose you’re right. But any bed would be a sight better than that pile of straw.”
“Ask Conan to borrow his sheepskin.”
“By the gods, I swear I’ll throw that thing from the window before the week is done. If it gets much hotter, the smell of it will make us all sick.”
Diarmid laughed.
“That’s better,” Oscar said. “All right then, no lasses. But how about we go on down to the Bowery and see the sights? I’ve a wish to be out and about tonight instead of locked up in that flat with a bunch of sweaty soldiers.”
The Bowery was a street of theaters and pleasure houses, saloons and dance halls and shops, lined with gaslights of colored glass globes unlike anything Diarmid had ever seen. Gang boys roaming and drinking, girls sashaying, pickpockets and thieves and very rich men with top hats and polished boots and everyone having a good time. Tonight it sounded fun, something to lift his mood, to ease the dread that had settled in his chest and didn’t seem to want to let go.
He smiled and rose. “To the Bowery it is.”