S Farrell - Holder of Lightning

A stream of rich azure slithered through, burning her while a funnel of utter black whirled above, its

mouth twisting ravenously. She could feel the power of Lamh Shabhala being leeched away by the tornado. .

. . the war-keening had died. Around her, the soldiers milled, confused and stymied. Rams were brought forward to break down the gates, but archers on the walls cut down half the men wielding them. The gates shuddered with the impact but held. MacEagan's lava-creature-bright in the growing darkness- came lumbering forward to smash open the iron-barred wood, but the mage-demon, returning to the battlefield, met him, the two struggling before the gates so that none could get past. The moving shadows of their contest played over the faces of the soldiers, and Jenna could see the despair and resignation there. Jenna knew that the gates must go down now or they must retreat. To stay would mean being decimated by the archers on the walls and the Clochs Mor. .

. . This was the end, Jenna realized, even as she fought the Clochs Mor arrayed against her, even as she tossed wild power around her and threw them all momentarily back. She was stronger, aye, but they would bear her down under sheer numbers. The Inish hope had been that the army could gain the keep, that sword and spear would cut down a few of the Mages or cause them to look elsewhere. Mac Ard's cloch attacked her again, and this time she could not push it aside. The force struck her, enveloping her in fire, and she screamed as the blow sent her reeling backward and her freshly healed wounds ripped open again. Unseen hands caught her and held her upright, but they, too, shouted in pain as they touched Mac Ard's blaze. Jenna held Lamh Shabhala aloft in futile defiance, gathering power in the fist of her mind and sending it smashing down to where she sensed Mac Ard standing-but the other clochs inter-posed themselves, shunting the energy aside or absorbing it themselves. She could feel their realization that victory was to be theirs, that they were enough to overwhelm Lamh Shabhala. Their colors circled her, like hun-gry wolves harrying an injured but still dangerous storm deer stag. They would come in for the final kill now, and Jenna found that the anger inside her, even toward Mac Ard, had dissolved into resignation. She hadn't wanted this fight in the first place, and people all around her were dying, all because of the cloch she held. .

the men around the mage-demon hacked at it,

but it kicked them aside as if they were bothersome flies. It leaped upon the lava-creature, and Jenna saw its clawed hands grasp the glowing head and twist it. A sound came like stones splitting, and MacEagan’s clock-created creature was gone. She saw MacEagan, several yards away, collapse as Alby wailed, dropped his sword, and sank down alongside him, cradling the unconscious tiarna in his lap. The mage-demon began rampaging through the Inishlanders closest to the gate, and Jenna saw men starting to retreat in panic into the gathering night, pushing back against the ranks behind them. .

. . her cloch-vision was filled with the lights of the Tuathian Holders. She gathered a shield around her; they broke it down. Lamh Shabhala was weakening now; she was using its stores quickly.

She could prepare a final stroke, perhaps aiming it at Mac Ard, or she could simply allow it to happen-quickly and hopefully without too much pain. The mage-demon had fastened its eyes on her, and was plowing through the soldiers between it and her. .

. . now. It’s better that we die now, she told herself and her unborn child. 1/ we die, this ends. The Tuathians will have what they want, and Inish Thuaidh will have to retreat and then negotiate for peace, but the battle will end. In the final tally, we will have saved hundreds of lives. Won’t that be better. .?

. . but there was something else in Lamh Shabhala’s vision now, mov-ing swiftly toward them from the tumbled rocks at the feet of the moun-tain close to the keep, and there was the sound of rocks clashing together in furious handclaps, a storm of sound, and mingled with it a musical warbling that Jenna remembered well. She blinked, wonderingly. The Creneach. .!

In their valley near Thall Coill, she had never seen them move this quickly. They were surprisingly graceful despite their size and appearance, their craggy bodies sliding among the amazed Inishlanders. The mage-demon howled, fluttered its leathery wings and flung itself at them; one of the Creneach slapped at it with a bouldered hand and the mage-demon shattered like glass. Several more of them went to the gates of the keen The archers sent a hail of arrows down at them, but the shafts clattered and broke on their smooth, dark skin. The Creneach placed their hands on the great doors and their fingers seemed to sink into the wood as if the oak were no more substantial than newly-churned butter: they ripped the gates open, splinters and shards of reinforcing metal flying, the portcullis torn out and flung aside as if it were made of sticks. The Inish troops cheered; they began to surge forward again. A ferocious battle was quickly underway at the ruins of the gate as the defending soldiers within came forward to meet the Inishlanders.

"Holder of the All-Heart!" Jenna heard Treoral’s voice, mingled with the warbling sound of its true language. "We tasted the need of the All-Heart, and so we came." Jenna wanted to answer, but the clochs had not forgotten her with the appearance of the Creneach; as she heard the call and felt Treoral’s presence approaching from behind her, they attacked again as one. Forms and shapes and colors swept over her like a tide, too quickly for her to do more than glimpse them. A dire wolf flew at her; she split it asunder with a blade of energy; lines of bright color wrapped around her like a snake; she tore them away. The yellow dragon coiled above her; the black funnel began to draw power from her; Mac Ard's fire spitting at her like great glowing meteors.

In the cloch-vision, an ebon wall interposed itself between Jenna and the others. They shattered against it, energy flaring in a mad explosion. For a moment, the wall held, but the massed clochs continued to strike, battering it. With her own eyes, she saw Terrain shamble forward to stand facing her, and she heard the shrill trill of Treoral’s voice. "The Soft-flesh must give in to the heart that you hold in your hand," it said. "Find Ceile inside. You must-"

"I can't," she told Terrain, not knowing if the Creneach could hear or understand her. "It's too late."

"If not for you, then for the life you carry,"

Terrain answered. "You can, if-" Its hand plunged into its own chest, ripping a fissure in its body, and emerged again holding a tiny blue crystal. "Give this to her. . Treoral’s voice went silent as the clochs broke down the wall. Jenna heard the sound of falling stone; before her, the bodily form of Terrain collapsed into a heap of rocks and boulders. The crystal fell to the ground.

The Clochs Mor surged toward her.

THEY hammered her down. They took her cowering to her knees. Jenna shrilled her pain to the world, nearly losing her grip on Lamh Shabhala as she fell. Her own sight was gone now; there was only the terrible light and agony of the cloch-world, and she sank down inside Lamh Shabhala as she had with An Phionos at Bethiochnead, desperately seeking a place to hide from the assault. The voices of the Holders shrieked at her or laughed or shouted contradictory advice.

She burrowed deeper, seeking escape. The Clochs Mor followed her. She tumbled into a crystalline, twisting well. The faces of the ancient cloudmage Holders flashed past her: the Daoines, then the Bunus Muintir, then tribes and peoples for whom she had no names at all, falling deeper into the past. And there, at the bottom. .

Lamh Shabhala throbbed like a live thing, waves of colors pulsating around her. This was the place.she had glimpsed during the Scrudu, the place she’d not been able to reach. She went toward it as the Clochs Mor continued to pummel her, and again she was held back. "No…" a voice whispered. "You’re not allowed here. You have not passed the test."