The Dark Divide Read Free

answer her — because he really didn’t know exactly what he was supposed to do to break the curse — she added, ‘Besides, these samurai look like they don’t miss very often. Owls don’t take off that fast.’
    She had a point, Ren supposed, but still, he thought she at least might want to try. They were prisoners here and things were only likely to get worse. Now, while they were still in the open, she might have some chance of escape.
    Rule Four of the What To Do If You’re Kidnapped rules drummed into him by his mother’s bodyguards leaped to mind.
    Run if you get the chance.
    Never run in a straight line.
    Make a ruckus.
    Get somewhere public as fast as you can.
    Granted, they hadn’t been kidnapped exactly — they’d voluntarily jumped through a dimensional rift to trespass in this reality — but the situation seemed close enough. Regardless, they had to get away, either by talking their way out of it or escaping, although where they might escape to was almost as big a problem as staying put. They couldn’t waste time hereas prisoners of who-knew-what. Somewhere out there in the maelstrom of infinite realities, his brother, Darragh, and his friend, Hayley, were trapped.
    If they weren’t in this realm, they were in another — maybe back in Ren’s magic-less realm, maybe in the one Darragh and Trása came from or maybe another random reality like this one. Hayley had stepped through the rift into Darragh’s realm a moment before Ren and Trása did, so Ren assumed she, at least, was safe and well. Ren had jumped through after Hayley, and he was here with Trása, so he figured Darragh was most likely still caught back in his world with only Sorcha for company and aid.
    But who knew for sure where Hayley had finished up?
    Was she stuck in Darragh’s reality now? Blind and helpless … although even blind, knowing Hayley, she wouldn’t be helpless for long. Was she trapped in that incomprehensible world of Druids and Faerie? A world that made very little sense to Ren, even though apparently he belonged there.
    How would it seem to someone like Hayley who had no idea what she was stepping into?
    And who would explain it to her? His friend Brógán? The great, but scarily taciturn warrior, Ciarán?
    Ren wished he’d had time to study Darragh’s memories — time to get a handle on this magic thing. He could feel it. The very air in this place trembled with magical power waiting to be tapped. Even more frustratingly, buried in his head was the knowledge to do something with it. Hidden in his mind was all the magical expertise he needed to be gone from here. He simply hadn’t had time to think.
    Trása elbowed him and pointed to the main house with its upturned eaves and intricately carved lintels. ‘He’s back.’
    Ren turned to discover the warrior who had ordered the others to watch them, had appeared on the veranda of the main house. A moment later, a woman stepped out of the house andstopped next to him, and beside her was the largest dog Ren had ever seen. The woman was a walking Japanese cliché — dressed in a red silk kimono embroidered in exquisite golden dragons. Ren had to stifle the urge to laugh, an urge that vanished almost immediately when she stepped forward with small steps and a hollow tapping sound, her wooden geta echoing on the veranda’s decking. The dog compelled much more respect. Powerfully muscled, with a sleek tan coat, it looked like a well-trained mastiff, the way it walked by her side. It also looked as if it could eat either of them in one or two bites. The woman stepped down into the raked sand of the courtyard and shuffled forward.
    She stopped and studied Ren and Trása with dark, cold eyes. The dog sat beside her, his eyes also fixed on them.
    ‘Lord Hayato says you claim to be lost travellers,’ the woman said in the same, almost-the-Japanese-he-knew the warriors spoke. Even wearing the wooden sandals, she was only shoulder-high to Lord Hayato, but somehow she