Flame of War (Binding Words Book 5), page 33
part #5 of Binding Words Series
~*~*~
Sean grunted as he sat up, but he was alone in the darkness. “Fiona?”
The sound of a spotlight kicking on got him to look behind him. The circle of light illuminated Marjorie, smiling at him from her seat at her kitchen table.
“Sean,” Marjorie greeted him, “I died.”
Throat tightening, Sean nodded. “Yes.”
“Because of you.”
“No. It was—”
“Because of you!” Marjorie cut him off, slamming her fists onto the table. “You kill my son, make my daughter your plaything, and then I die for your sins!”
Taking a step back, Sean shook his head. “No. You’re wron—”
“They even attacked your home!” Marjorie spat. “My daughter might have joined me, but at least your hounds are more useful than you...”
“What about us?” Brendon Knox’s voice chimed in, another spotlight illuminating him and his dead wife. “Teach me for a few tendays, then toss me out? Only good thing you did was help me meet her.” Brendon reached out to touch his wife, but his arm fell to the ground. “And what did that get us?”
“Brendon, it wasn—”
Brendon crumpled to the ground, and his wife was suddenly bent over the sofa as their home burned around them. Sean turned away from that to find Marjorie huddled in a ball, her clothing gone. She whimpered when he looked at her, curling into a tighter ball. Bruises, cuts, and worse marked her naked body.
“What?”
“I would have been better off staying with Weaver,” Marjorie’s whisper was loud to Sean.
“Death, it follows you,” Whelan’s voice floated out of the darkness when Marjorie’s light cut off. “What else should anyone expect from the Tuatha’s dog? The battle crow herself sent you here, after all.”
Spinning around, Sean looked for Whelan. “You’re dead.”
“Yes,” Whelan agreed as he appeared in a spotlight of his own. His body was held up by a spear that had been punched through his chest. “Killed by you. Me, my friends, and the entire village dead, all because of you. The harbinger of change... death is the greatest change.”
“You would have killed them all even if I hadn’t been there,” Sean spat at the dead man.
“Yes,” Whelan smiled with wild eyes. “I would have met her, with Dark Cutter in hand, to be praised and rewarded. Instead, you… you… killed me. My blood is all over your hands.”
Sean looked down to see his hands dripping with blood.
“Not just him, either,” another voice said.
Sean spun to find the guards of Pinebough broken and dead on a stage. One of them got to his feet jerkily, his whole body burnt badly.
“You attacked us!” Sean yelled.
“On orders,” the fire mage wheezed. “You enjoyed it, though, killing us. Whelan, his friends, and us. Death, pain, and destruction follow you.”
“You were going to kill me and rape my wives!” Sean hissed.
“What about us?” Oriv and his gang stood in another light. “We didn’t plan rape. Didn’t even know you had those damned bitches with you.”
“Ambushed with poison,” Sean growled. “You have no room to talk.”
“Ryann should have joined us, but instead, you seduced her. Seduced her and use her now. Does it feel good knowing you broke her better than I did?”
“What?” Sean said, thrown off balance by the accusation.
“His bitches killed you and us,” Landis added as another light came on. “We were cut down in the street, and he was let off by the guard for it. All for the same piece of ass he gets now. She good, is she? Fucking innkeeper’s daughters are the best whores.”
“I just wanted my sister to be free,” another voice spoke up and all the other lights vanished, leaving a man barely into adulthood standing there alone. “Pressured her into a Bond with you. Using the promise of helping our mom to get her into your bed. All the other guards laughing about how my sister whored herself to a nobody.”
“Rupert?” Sean asked.
“Keep my name out of your mouth!” the dead man spat. “You failed to save her. I could have if I had been alive...”
“No,” Sean said softly.
“I could have. But even if I had been alive, she wouldn’t have listened to me. Not after you had your whore play with her mind, making her worship you. Did that feel good? My sister and mother both praying to you? What did their prayers accomplish? She’s dead now. Dead, because of you!”
“Hold him down,” Fiona’s voice cut through the darkness. “Quinna, Quilla we need you! Hold his legs down as best you can. Pile onto his arms, hold them still!”
“Fiona?” Sean called out, alone in the darkness again. “Fiona?”
“Sean? Why?” Fiona asked as she stepped into a circle of light. “Why did you have to challenge them? Chastity is broken because of Marjorie’s death.”
Chastity appeared a few feet from Fiona, huddled on the ground, crying hard as she looked at Sean. “I believed in you... Why didn’t you bring her back? You did for Myna and Ryann. Why not her?”
“I was going to, Chas. I wanted to,” Sean said, kneeling down so he could speak with her easier. “Her soul was already gone before I got to her. I would have done everything I could if—”
“You didn’t even try!” Andrea spat as she touched Chastity’s back. “He never tried! You saw him. He just stood there blankly when he came home.”
“We got him,” Ryann’s voice cut through the darkness. “Now, Felora! Now!”
Darkness swallowed everything and Sean felt himself falling.
The sensation ended abruptly and Sean blinked. He was inside a living room, sitting on a sofa. The TV across from him was off.
“What the hell?” he whispered as he got to his feet. “This is—”
A knock on the door made him whip around to face it. Swallowing, he ran to it, jerking it open to find all of his wives standing there. A long second passed as they stared at each other before Sean stepped out and into their arms.
The world shivered, and they were suddenly in the front room of their new home, all of them holding him and each other as they cried. Sean shook with emotion. All of the repressed emotions he’d carried since he’d died on Earth came rushing out to him now.
Eventually, they were able to compose themselves. Sean was passed from wife to wife, kissed on the cheek, forehead, even his nose. Sean felt drained, worn thin, and about to fade away, but each kiss helped him.
“What happened?” Sean asked.
“You overexerted yourself and then fainted on us. We’d just managed to get you to bed when you began to thrash.”
“Oh,” Sean sighed. “Must have been the nightmares.”
“We tried everything to soothe you,” Andrea said with a sniffle, “but it wasn’t working.”
“Felora tried to help, but when she tried to enter your dream, you became more frantic and threw her across the room,” Ida explained. “We had to enlist the others to hold you down.”
“Sean,” Chastity said softly, her red-rimmed eyes meeting his, “it wasn’t your fault. I only ask that you find them and make them pay.”
Those words cut into him like a knife, and he closed his eyes. “I’ll gut them. What they did— they’ll pay.”
“Ryann told us what she could,” Lilly said.
“You were spraying water like a waterfall and Shaping at the same time,” Ryann whispered. “We felt your need and gave back to you, but you kept taking and we grew worried.”
“We will help you, Sean,” Fiona said softly, “but we need a plan. With no solid proof, we can’t just attack others.”
Sean took a deep breath. His rage from earlier was still there, but back under control. “It was Denmur, or one of his associates. They are the only ones who’d go to the lengths that they went to. Just arson, that’d be one thing. But killing them and raping the women…? No... it was Denmur, Klein, or Evan.”
“It’ll be known what you did,” Fiona said.
“Yes,” Myna nodded. “The run, the water, bringing the dead out... All of it will spread.”
“I wonder if that will worry them,” Felora said. “They poked a sleeping creature, thinking it was possibly a dog. Instead, they have roused a dragon.” Felora stepped before Sean. “Sean, take me with you, please. I know you intended to take Aria, but I can be of greater aid to you. I can speak back against those voices that will seek to harm you.”
“If it’s going to be a fight, he needs me, Felora. Not you,” Ryann said.
“Or me,” Myna said. “You are his shield, Ryann, but I am better suited at stopping the hidden attacks.”
“Stop,” Fiona said softly. “We’ll not argue about this. Sean will take whom he thinks is best for him.”
“All of you,” Sean said. “I want all of you beside me. If that was possible, it would be best.”
Fiona gave him a smile. “I’ll make it happen, Sean. We’ll finish your gift for the party. You need to rest as long as you can to replenish as much energy as you can.”
“Yeah. Thank you,” Sean said.
“Come, ladies, give our husband a kiss and then let him sleep,” Fiona said as she stepped back.
Felora was the one in front of Sean, so he kissed her first. Felora pressed herself against him and returned the kiss with all the passion she felt for him. Both of them were breathing hard by the time she stepped away.
The others claimed their kisses one by one, until only Fiona was left. With a soft smile, she encircled his waist with her arms and leaned gently against him. The kiss was soft and loving, lingering longer than any of the others.
“Thank you. I’m sorry I scared you all,” Sean said.
“You looked like you’d fight the Queens,” Ryann said. “We’ll fix the carriage door, too.”
Sean winced. “Thanks.”
“Sleep well, dear,” Fiona said.
Felora waved her hand and the others all vanished, leaving just her and Sean alone in the room. “Sean, no matter what happens tomorrow, we are all with you. Sleep well.” She vanished once those two words left her mouth.
Sean took a deep breath. “Tomorrow is going to change things... I just pray it’s for the better.”
Chapter Forty
Sean rubbed at his eyes, rubbing the sleep away as the sun filled the room with light. He felt a bit lethargic and knew it was because he was still recovering from last night. “Morning, Sean,” Chastity said from a chair beside the bed.
“Morning.”
“It’s about noon,” Chastity said as she got up. “Everyone is already getting things ready for the party.”
“Did Fiona manage to find a way?”
“She couldn’t get all of us,” Chastity said sadly. “Lilly and I will be staying behind. Considering the attack on the bathhouse and the probe here last night, though, maybe it’s for the best.”
Sean exhaled slowly. “Maybe, but I’d feel better if you all came. The cuons and the staff should be able to handle anything. Besides, I expect tonight everything will be at the party.”
“Sir,” Ven said, landing on the bedside table, “an update from Fiona: all of them will be coming. MacLenn and Kuhns have been summoned to the party and will be happy to take Chastity and Lilly along as their guests.”
“Mageeyes and Sharpeyes probably had something to do with that,” Sean said as he got out of bed. “Thank you, Ven. Let her know that I’m glad it could happen.”
“I need to get ready,” Chastity said. “I stopped preparing since I wasn’t going.”
“Ven, let Lilly know, too, please?”
“Yes, sir.”
Chastity gave him a quick kiss before she hurried over to one of the dressing rooms. Sean watched her go, the nightmare from last night still on the edge of his memory. Frowning, he went to get dressed.
Brunch was frumenty with honey and fruit, as it was the easiest thing to keep ready and waiting for him. Sean thanked Glorina, who had been uncertain that the meal would be well received. As soon as he was finished, he went to find Felora.
“Fel,” Sean said after finding her in his workshop, “didn’t expect you to be out here.”
“I wanted to copy your patterns exactly,” Felora said as she brushed her hair behind her ear. “Should I have asked?”
“What’s mine is yours,” Sean said. “I will never have anything my wives can’t have, too.”
Felora’s eyes glowed briefly, but she took a deep breath and they stopped. “You’re a drug, Sean. Your love and care makes me want to please you all the more.”
“I’m already a bit tapped,” Sean chuckled. “Let’s not do that right now. How did you manage the dream and not take more from me?”
“I took from the others more than you,” Felora said.
“Huh... okay. You had trouble helping me last night, right?” Sean asked as he took a seat at his desk.
Felora stopped what she was doing. Turning his way, she looked troubled. She moved over to him and sat in his lap, leaning against him. “I did.”
“Do you have an idea why?”
Taking a deep breath, she nodded her head. “Yes... I don’t like what it probably means.”
“That one of your sisters was involved?”
Felora’s head snapped up and she stared at him. “You know?”
“Delia is with Evan and if the attacks last night are part of their plans, it could have included my nightmare,” Sean said, his arms going around her waist.
Felora lowered her head and leaned into him again. “It’s not easy to do. Giving nightmares is something we can do, but mother forbids us doing so. It means Delia has distanced herself even more from our family.”
“That’s a shame. Saret is going with Amedee to the party. I had half-hoped that she and Delia could mend the fence. Now it sounds like Delia broke it entirely.”
“Yes,” Felora said softly. “Mother will be devastated. Unless…”
“Unless Evan made her do it,” Sean said, knowing what she was thinking.
“Yes.”
“How much strain would it put on her to do what she did?”
“Depends on the distance. If they had anything of yours… the figurines you made. They were suffused in your energy…”
“Ah, that’s not something I knew would cause a problem,” Sean said. “Too late now. Could she have done it from the Lord’s manor?”
“Not unless they gave her a lot of energy. It would be easier to have her in a carriage nearby.”
“When you came to me, what then?”
“The nightmare would have rebounded back to her. It’s one of the problems with doing it. If the one you’re inflicting the dream on breaks it, the nightmare comes back to us.”
“So you can do dreams from a distance, then?”
“Yes, but we get nothing from it, and she can’t be there to actively try to control it.”
“Which is why it was a hodgepodge of my guilt,” Sean murmured.
“I’m sorry, Sean,” Felora whispered. “I didn’t think about setting up barriers against intrusive dreams. It would inhibit me a little, but that would have been fine. I never thought anyone would know what happened. I set up barriers this morning.”
Kissing the top of her head, Sean squeezed her. “It’s not your fault.”
“I feel like I failed.”
“Silly Succubus,” Sean murmured, kissing her head again. “If you failed then, I did, too. We had Fairies at the bathhouse, and…” Sean trailed off as he suddenly remembered the Messenger Fairies that should have been at the bathhouse. “Ven!”
Ven appeared in a blur. “Sir?”
“The Fairies at the bathhouse?”
“They are alive, sir, and are quite upset,” Ven said. “They didn’t see anyone enter the building after close. They would have come to warn us, but the first they knew something was wrong was when the fire started. It didn’t start small, Sean. It went up in a blaze right from the start. Once they were out of danger, they came to inform me, but you were already running for the bathhouse.”
“Camo or something similar...” Sean said, looking into the distance over Ven’s head. “They knew we had Fairies there because of Justin.”
