The Immortal's Redemption

“Gareth.” The man’s name was little more than an exhale between Dylan’s lips. His companion didn’t stir.

Dylan dared not speak louder. Instead, he moved to position himself between the cave mouth and the sleeping Druid.

“Rest easy, child of mine.”

The feminine voice startled him, and he moved back a step. Shifting his dagger to an underhanded hold, he regained the ground he’d lost to surprise. Using darkness as another type of weapon, he sidled up to a small rock outcropping. It didn’t hide him entirely, but it would give him an advantage if she tried to enter.

“Dylan.”

The voice came from behind him and he whirled, sword and dagger raised. Both immediately clattered to the floor.

It was a rare man whose destiny was molded while he listened and watched. And for better or worse, Dylan was just such a man, for it was the goddess and Mother of All, Danu, who now stood before him, her face smooth and serene.

“We may speak at ease, for Gareth has been sent into deep slumber,” she said, her voice as gentle as mist yet as powerful as lightning. “I must forewarn you, Dylan. There is a time coming, a time when you will rise to power and position, only to be tried in the greatest challenge you shall ever face.”

“Why tell me now, Mother?” His voice cracked on the last word, and he blushed. He wanted her to see him as strong and capable, not a boy. Squaring his shoulders and taking a deep breath to emphasize the baritone he was developing, he asked again. “Why tell me now, Mother?”

She’d stroked his head then, and reality had gone soft. He’d seen a woman with a mane of black hair in a world that was not his own. Her eyes had been bluer than the shallows near the cliffs. Her mouth could only be considered wanton. She was the most stunning woman he’d seen, yet there had been something slightly off about her.

Danu removed her hand and reality snapped back into being, clear and stark.

Despite the fact Dylan had been trained to recall finite details, he couldn’t remember anything that had gone on around her other than it hadn’t made sense to him. “Who is she?” This time his voice did not break. Instead, it was heavy with reverence.

“She is your truth, the answer to your ultimate reckoning with an imprisoned god of the Shadow Realm. The wards that bind the gods there were not cast in a manner to make them infinite, and in your woman’s time, they will begin to fail as Samhain draws ever closer.”

Dylan’s gaze shot to the goddess’s. “Wait. What do you mean, my woman?”

“Do not question me. I risk the wrath of the All Father, Dagda, in coming to you now.” Her words were soft but laced with power that burned along his skin. “You will find the woman and your truth within her. This will empower you to save not only mankind and the Druid race, but also the world as it will come to be. To fail and let the truth escape you will mean the release of the imprisoned gods. Chaos will reign as they seek to remake the universe as they would have had it, seating themselves as the supreme gods. Be assured that should you fail, Chaos will bring certain death. You will be the first to taste it, young assassin. In order to survive, you will be required to willingly lay either the truth or sufficient sacrifice upon the altar, to offer the lifeblood of faith to rebind the wards.”

“What is sufficient sacrifice, should the truth not be found?”

“That is for you to discover. Begin seeking her in what will be a new world to you, Dylan, for she is the only one to hold the truth. You must find Kennedy Jefferson before all is lost. She holds within her the single truth you must reveal and accept.”

Then she’d disappeared.

Chapter 1 (#ulink_d236cb74-aa05-572d-89c2-20af9b462720)

County Clare, Ireland, Present Day

Dylan O’Shea leaned back, arms crossed, one booted foot pressed against the stone wall of the westernmost battlement. His gaze was locked on the storm brewing over the Atlantic. Violent winds drove sheets of rain across the Cliffs of Moher. The green of the grass echoed the peaks and valleys of the sea, where waves rose and crashed forward. He watched, unblinking, as lightning struck shallow water.

A sound not unlike a woman’s sigh wove through the shrieking wind. He glanced up and shoved his drenched hair back, looking around. No one there, but he wasn’t surprised. Still, the sound had his mind pulling up the image of a black-haired beauty with eyes bluer than the shallows near the cliffs and a mouth he couldn’t help but consider wanton.

For three hundred years he’d searched for her on the goddess, Danu’s, directive. Three hundred years he’d conjured her image during every empty night. Three hundred years he’d spent with that face, and he’d come to want her like he’d never wanted another. And now her time—their time—was coming. He knew it with the same certainty he knew this storm wasn’t a natural occurrence. Not with the extremes he witnessed. No, the balance of the elements was already out of order. It left him uneasy, bordering violent, as he considered how the woman might fit into the threat that built on the air.

And if he knew the elemental balance was threatened, the Elder Council did, as well. It also meant it wouldn’t be long before they sought him out, and it was about time. Idleness was driving him mad. Or, if he were dealing in honesty, madder.

As if summoned by his thoughts, one of the very men he’d been considering pushed through the iron-banded wooden door. “It’s time,” he said.

“Time.” Dylan blinked slowly before turning his attention back to the sea. “It’s a subjective topic, is it no’?”

“Stalling will do little but delay the inevitable.”

“You engage me, of all people, with talk of delaying the inevitable?” The bite of his voice broke through the storm’s fury, and the man in the doorway bristled.

“The Elder Council waits for no one, Assassin, not even you.”

The slamming of the door would normally have made Dylan smile. Not today.

Shoving off the wall, he dropped his hand to the door latch when a whiff of citrus and heavy spice tickled his nose, the long-forgotten scent called up from memory with the same gut-churning effect as a roller coaster’s first radical drop. Dylan froze. Rain still ran in rivers down his face, but the pelting he’d been taking faded. Uneasy, his free hand drifted to his dirk, fisting the handle.

“I would think you’d willingly, and wisely, speak to me without violence, Assassin.” The musical lilt of her voice hadn’t changed, not in three hundred years.

“You use my title but expect me to behave peaceably?” He let go of the door handle and turned toward the woman who stood untouched by the rain.

“And you, you won’t use my name.” She tucked long-fingered hands into the bell sleeves of her robes; at the same time she cocked her head to the side, openly considering him. It was the equivalent of calling him a coward, and he would suffer a lot of shit, but not that.

“A gracious welcome to you, Danu, Mother of All Things.” Dylan’s numb lips struggled with the formal greeting. His belly tightened, and he absently rubbed it as he considered the goddess. She hadn’t shown herself to him other than that one night three centuries ago when she’d changed the course of his life.

Danu reached for him, dropping her hand when he stepped back. “You are still angry with me for delivering your solemn responsibility at such a young age.”

Dylan’s mouth opened and closed, his ability to speak lost in a turbulent sea of emotions. Barking out a laugh, he shook his head. “I’ve spent my life wondering if I’d dreamed the whole conversation, thinking myself mad at best.”

“Yet you acted with faith, preparing yourself for the inevitability of death.” She closed in on him, laying a hand against his near-frozen arm.

All he could think was that she was neither hot nor cold. Odd that he’d handled meeting her as a lad much better than he was handling this moment. “So I’ll die, then, the last of your direct line to hold the position of Assassin, to wield justice as deemed fit by the gods.”

Danu stroked his cheek. “It does not have to be so. You must find the truth of which I spoke that night and stop the goddess Cailleach from breaking the chains that bind. Until you have found the truth and made your decision, nothing is guaranteed.” She smiled gently. “Man’s free will is a factor that tends to skew even the gods’ predictions.”

Cailleach. The anger that always simmered so close to the surface of his consciousness flared. “Free will, is it? Then I’d have you go back and return mine to me. For I’m nothing if not a man. I’d be something other than what I’ve become because of your blessed intervention. You gave me nothing, nothing more than a vague promise that I’d perish if I didn’t find this truth you referred to. Yet you delivered your jaunty news and disappeared, leaving me with nothing more than your charge. What the hell good has that done me, then?”

The goddess’s hand stilled, then fell away, her face transforming. Gone was the compassion of only a moment before. In its place was a cold and deadly stare that told him precisely how far was too far to push her—and that he’d crossed that line with a running leap of the mouth. Damn if he’d back up or apologize or—

Dylan’s back slammed onto the stone he’d been standing on moments before. Air knocked out of him, he wheezed in an effort to regain his breath.

Danu stood over him, glorious in her fury. “You will comport yourself with respect, Assassin. Furious or not, your time has come. You will discover the truth you lack before Samhain or you will damn mankind and the Druid race to the end of life as it’s known. Extinction would be a kinder fate.”

He slowly pushed himself to his feet. “Will you not give me more to go on than that? Or will you charge me to continue to search the world over with nothing more than faith?”

Her lips thinned. “Still you show such belligerence. My hope for victory fades with every word you utter.” She stepped back, putting distance between them. “In order for all to survive, you will have the slimmest of opportunities—hours—to lay either the truth or yourself upon the altar. Regardless of your choice, the sacrifice must be made willingly.”

He blinked rapidly. She’d failed to mention that little fact the first time she’d come to him. Opening his mouth to speak, he realized he was again alone.

Fucking gods and their fickle demands.

Fighting to breathe normally, Dylan hauled the heavy door open and stepped inside, shaking the rain from his hair like a dog exiting a lake. He pushed the wet mass off his face then started down the spiral steps. There were one hundred forty-two treads to the bottom, and each one seemed to propel him forward faster and faster until he fought the urge to run. He never ran unless he was the one doing the chasing. Deliberately leaning back far enough he nearly ass-planted on the steps, he forced himself to move slower. The Assassin wasn’t running, even from this.

Particularly from this.