Scars of Silver Read Free Page B

raw until it
closed up and he couldn’t make any sound. Teeth clenched. Tongue
swollen and stuck to the roof of his mouth. Pain beyond his ability
to support it. Until… mercifully… he blacked out.

Chapter Six
     
     
    “We’re not interested, Jhaer.” Seamus dug his hands
into the metal guts of some rusted contraption on wheels. A
ridiculously tattered straw hat shielded his face from the sun. Oil
might stain his denim overalls, but the very humanness of the
outfit and the shabby shack of a farmhouse stained the Sidhe
wallowing in them.
    “Donovan now,” he corrected. He swept his critical
gaze over the place. A flock of muddy sheep in the back pen. A barn
so weather beaten a moderate wind could cut through all the missing
and broken boards. Random chickens milled about. A Sidhe girl of
perhaps only a decade old perched on the porch roof, her colorless
dress ill-fitting. Her too thin arms hugged her knees under her
chin. Her dark, dark eyes watched Donovan, rarely blinking.
    Seamus knocked his hat further back on his head with
a flick of his finger on the brim. “You call yourself what you
want. We left the Mounds. And the politics. And the infighting. And
we were right to do so.” He banged down the wrench. “My family
won’t be part of it. Not before. Not now. Not ever.”
    Honestly, Donovan hadn’t expected any different. All
too often exiles dug their hiding holes like mice and nested in
them. Finding security in squalor, when any decent village of
lesser fey would clamor for the chance to cater to a noble elf.
Doing such a grand job of isolation in service to their cowardice
that no one even noticed as they vanished one by one, taken by
predators. “It’s not about politics. It’s about survival. How soon
until the wizards catch wind of the Mounds collapse? Without the
Sidhe to mount a defense, how soon until they begin raids on
Ireland in earnest?”
    Donovan lifted his gaze to the child’s once more, the
intensity with which she watched him, nearly palpable. When Seamus
stubbornly held his silence, Donovan persisted, “And what of your
children? Is this what they want for themselves?”
    The farmer laughed at that one. A forced, dry laugh.
“Regan’s not of age, Elite. You’ll have to look elsewhere.”
    Though spoken softly, the child’s words rang with
musical clarity. “What about Malcolm?”
    “Away with you!” Seamus snapped and waved a hand at
the child to shoo her, but she didn’t even flinch.
    “Malcolm ran off. He hated it here,” she said,
matter-of-factly. Regan’s little chin stayed on her knees. “Da and
him had a row.”
    “That’s enough, Lassie.”
    “Tell me you taught your son more than how to tend
chickens.” Donovan glared at Seamus, knowing all too well the
answer.
    “I told the boy if he stayed here we would protect
him. He got all these notions in his head about going out into the
world. Sixteen at the time. Seventeen now. The lad needs to stay at
home. Does the daft boy listen? We finally told him what we are.
Why he and Regan could never go to school or go out on their own.
Did he listen? Not a bit of it!”
    Donovan’s eyes narrowed. “And now he is at the mercy
of all that prey on the fey. Vampires. Werewolves. Wizards.” He
sneered, “Your son could very well be dead right now, and you have
done nothing to aid him. And I thought only the Seelie were so
selfish.” With disgust, Donovan stormed off.
    “Wait!” Regan cried in protest. Donovan paused,
giving her time to scramble down the trellis from the roof and run
to him. She reached up as if to hug him. Donovan leaned down to
her. Her thin arms circled his neck. She whispered against his ear,
“Find Malcolm.”
    Donovan leaned back to study those serious, dark eyes
of hers. “I won’t stop looking for him,” he promised. “Not
ever.”

Chapter Seven
     
     
    “Holy crap, Wood Worm.” Rand’s voice penetrated
Malcolm’s haze. “You should have called me before beating the
living spit out