Page 93 of The Seer

“Sorry, love. It required a blood sacrifice.”

“You could’ve used me instead,” she sobbed as she straddled Fintan and applied pressure. The gesture was useless, and his heart pumped no more.

“I am.”

The talon piercing her back was as brutal and painful as when Odessa gutted her earlier. But Ardghal’s betrayal cut deeper.

Ardghal scored his wrists next,opening the vein. As his blood mingled with Taryn’s and Fintan’s, he called it to him. Working quickly, he raced against the clock and the weakness beginning in his limbs. Ignoring Taryn’s accusing eyes, he dipped his fingers into the precious store of blood.

The first symbol belonged to Taryn, and on her forehead, he drew a spiraling wave intersected by a rising flame.

“Solmara,” he sang. “My flame. The one who creates storms in calm waters. Rise up, love.”

She rolled to her feet and awaited his command.

On Fintan’s forehead, he sketched a crescent harp entwined with vines, creating an infinity loop.

“Vaelthorn,” Ardghal sang. “My twin soul. The tethered one no more. You are the voice of our people. Rise up.”

Fintan climbed to his feet, prepared for whatever came next.

And finally, relying on feel, he drew a trident encircled by a serpent chasing its tail on his own forehead.

“Drekharn. The sovereign tide. One who rises and falls for love.”

All three of their wounds sealed with a sizzle, and the images he’d created melded into their skin, leaving only a red mark that would fade when their ceremony was done.

“Find your symbol and claim your birthright,” he sang in his birth tongue.

In a trance, they moved, each to a different boulder. Once there, they knelt, awaiting the grotto floor to relinquish its prize.

Solmara’s box appeared first, delivering to her the Ember Pendant. Shaped like a teardrop mid-fall, the aquamarine stone would produce a faint ember glow when activated. Moving forward, Taryn would be protected from both the ancestors’ mental abductions and the Authority’s machinations. As long as she wore the charm, she’d be able to manipulate any spelled threshold, breaking through enchanted doorways, wards, prisons, or veils.

Vaelthorn’s relic was the Songblade. An obsidian dagger etched with voice-activated runes not visible to the naked eye. With his weapon, Fintan could disrupt magical influence and cut through illusions or constructs meant to control him. He was a Seer without chains.

Drekharn’s key arrived last. Tarnished with no teeth, it was smooth and cold to the touch. When they returned to the house, he’d work the metal into a ring, never to be removed. With it, he could access any charmed “locks,” including minds. When pressed to skin, the key would unlock the truth, revealing deception and those beneath a glamour.

He sang the sigils closed, waiting as they burned first gold, then green, then a blinding white before they were snuffed for good. If he needed them, they’d be here, but this sacred place deserved a respite from the centuries of guarding Elizabeth’s and his treasures.

The minute they were all rested and had conferred with the Aether, a reckoning would begin.

But of utmost importance was the apology he owed Taryn and Fintan for the attack they hadn’t suspected from him. He waited impatiently for them to recover their will. As strong and as stubborn as the two of them were, it didn’t take long.

“Come,” he said, as soon as their eyes were focused and their actions were their own. “We should get topside before the Aether and his friends become nervous.”

He held out a hand to help Taryn stand, but she knocked it away.

“That! That right there is why I left you back then, dickweed.” Her voice had reached banshee-level rage, and Argdhal winced at the disagreeable sound. “You could’ve let us in on the plan.”

“It required sacrifice, as I stated before,” he replied with a patience he was quickly losing. “It meant sacrificing the two things I loved most. You and Fintan.”

“You’ve a shit way of showing love,” she snarled, delivering a stinging kick to his shin.

“Leash your woman before I strangle her, boy,” he ordered through gritted teeth. “I swear?—”

His head snapped back under the weight of Fintan’s first blow. Getting struck by him was less punch and more an act of God. Ardghal wiggled his nose, suppressing a groan when he discovered it was broken.

“For fuck’s sake!” He barely managed to keep his voice in check. The ground rumbled with his anger. “Are you two done beating me up?”

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