S Farrell - Holder of Lightning

Mac Ard reined up his horse before the ruins of the largest building- the inn, Jenna decided. He walked carefully over the stones and timbers, his boots crunching through the wreckage and sending plumes of ash up with each step. Once, he stopped and bent down, then came back out.

"There are two dead in there," he said. "Maybe a few more that I can’t see. Some, perhaps most, I hope, ran before the fire and are still alive." He looked around. "There’s nothing we can do here. I’ll feel safer once we reach Ath Iseal."

"If it hasn’t been attacked as well," O’Deoradhain replied but Mac Ard shook his head.

"There weren’t that many here, by the signs. A dozen, perhaps a few more. This is the work of marauders, not an army."

As Mac Ard spoke, Jenna closed her eyes for a moment. The cloch burned in the darkness behind her eyes, and she could see the webs of connection to the other clochs na thintri. One of those connections, she suddenly realized, snaked over to Mac Ard, and another. .

She opened her eyes. Against the ruddy western sky, on a bare knife — edged ridge half a mile away, she could see a rider. "Tiarna," she said, pointing, and as Mac Ard turned to look, the rider turned his horse and vanished. A faint voice called in the distance, and others answered. Mac Ard muttered a curse and mounted.

"Ride!" he cried. "And let’s hope that the crossing is still open."

They urged their horses into a gallop in the growing dark, moving quickly while they could still somewhat see the road ahead of them. At the juncture of the roads, they turned east toward the river, a few miles ahead. Jenna kept looking back over her shoulder at the road behind, expecting to see riders coming hard after them, but for the moment the lane remained empty. As they left the village, the walls closed in again to border the road, and they moved into a wooded area. There, night already lurked under the trees, and they had to slow the horses to a trot or risk being thrown by an unseen root or hole. By the time they'd emerged from the trees, the sun had failed entirely, the first stars emerging in the east. The waxing moon-now nearly at a quarter-lifted high above the west and painted the road as it swept down in a great curve over low, flat lands. Far ahead, a row of trees ran nearly north to south across their way, marking the line of the river, which sparkled just beyond. Across the Duan, the road lifted again; on the banks of the hills beyond, yellow light gleamed in the windows at Ath Iseal.

And between the four of them and the river stood three horsemen, moonlight glinting from ring mail leathers laced over their tunics. They didn't appear to see Jenna and the others yet, against the cover of the trees. Behind, from the direction of the village, Jenna could hear hooves pounding and men calling.

Mac Ard pulled his horse up "Trapped," he said, "and it's no good cutting across the field when the ford is ahead. Jenna?" Mac Ard looked back at her. "Can you. .?" He didn't finish the question, but Jenna understood. Wanly, she shook her head. Her arm already hung cold and heavy; she could not imagine what it would feel like to use the cloch again so soon. "These are the same people who killed the people in your village, who killed people you know, who burned your house and ran down your dog," Mac Ard reminded her, and Jenna lifted her head.

"If I must," she said wearily. She reached for the cloch, but Mac Ard stopped her hand.

"Not yet. If we can cut the odds down somewhat, we may not need to reveal what we have. O'Deoradhain, it's time to see how useful that knife of yours is. Maeve, Jenna, as soon as we have them engaged, ride on past. Go off the road around them if you need to. We'll follow as soon as we can. Now, let's see what we can do before they realize we're here."

He reached back and pulled the bow from the pack slung behind his saddle. Hooking a leg over one end of the weapon, he bent the bow and strung it, then nocked an arrow in the string. "I'm not much

of a bowman but a rider’s a large target."

He drew the bowstring back and let the arrow fly. Jenna tried to follow its flight but lost it in the darkness. But there was a cry from the riders, though no one fell. She could see them looking around, then one of them pointed toward the group and they came charging up the road toward them. Mac Ard nocked another arrow, letting them approach as he held the bow at full tension. Jenna could see muscles trembling in his arm. Then he let it fly, and one of the horses screamed and went down, the rider tumbling to the ground as the other two rushed past. "Now!" Mac Ard shouted, tossing the bow aside and drawing his sword. He kicked his horse into a gallop. "Ride for the ford!"

Maeve and Jenna both urged their horses to follow, but as Jenna kicked the mare’s sides, O’Deoradhain’s hand reached out and grabbed her reins. Mac Ard was already flying down the road with sword raised and a loud cry that they must have heard in Ath Iseal. Maeve’s horse was close be-hind. "Let me go!" Jenna cried. Her horse reared, but O’Deoradhain held last. Jenna tried to wrench the reins away from him, and reached for the stone, a fury rising in her.

"Wait!" he said. "It’s important-"

"Let go!" she shouted again. Maeve had realized that Jenna hadn’t fol-lowed and was stopped in the middle of the road between Jenna and Mac Ard. Jenna heard the clash of steel as Mac Ard and the riders met. O’Deoradhain continued to hold her. Jenna’s fist closed around the cloch.

Her arm was ice and flame. Lamh Shabhala seemed to roar in her ears with anger as she brought it out. "Get away!" she screamed at O’Deoradhain, and at the same time, she opened the cloch in her mind, releasing just a trickle of its power. Light flared from between the closed fingers of her right hand, and a jagged beam shot from her hand to smash against O’Deoradhain, lifting him out of his saddle and throwing him against the fieldstone wall. He slumped down, but Jenna didn’t stop to see what had happened to him. She was free, and Lamh Shabhala threw shimmering brilliance over her, as if she were enveloped in daylight. "Ride!" she called to her mam, and kicked her own horse forward.

Ahead, Mac Ard fought, but he was in desperate trouble without O’Deoradhain, the two horsemen flanking him. Jenna saw him take a blow to his sword arm, and his weapon went clattering to the ground. She clenched Lamh Shabhala tighter, lifting her hand. "No!" she screamed as swords were raised against Mac Ard, now weaponless and injured.

She imagined lightning striking the two riders. She visualized savage light darting from cloch to riders.

It happened.

Twin lightnings flared in searing lines from her fisted hand, slicing around Maeve and Mac Ard without touching them. The riders' swords shattered, molten shards exploding in bright arcs as hilts were torn from gloved hands and flung away. The lightning curled around the riders, lifting them in a snarling coil of blue-white and hurling them a hundred feet into the fields as their horses screamed and fled.

Behind them, there were shouts of alarm. Jenna turned. Four more riders had come from under the trees. Jenna waved her hand, and the earth exploded at their feet, a line of bright fireworks erupting before them as horses reared and bucked. The riders turned and fled back the way they'd come. Jenna saw O'Deoradhain, back on his horse, riding wildly south across the fields and away.

She let him go. The angry glare faded in her hand, and Jenna screamed, this time with her own pain, as every muscle in her right arm seemed to — lock and twist. She bent over in her saddle, fighting to stay conscious. You can do it. Breathe. Keep breathing. You can't stop the pain, no, but put it to one side. . The voice inside didn't seem be hers. Riata? She fought the inner night that threatened to close around her, pushed it away, and forced herself to sit up in the saddle. She rode to her mother. "Mam, are you all right?"