Philip said. “The strength of the Templar Knights has grown as that of the Tuatha de Dannan has diminished. If not for the Carn Cavall Mountains, Snowdon, and the Nharth who shield them both, the war would be long been over.”
“Master Wace would preach caution. The Seelie Court—”
“The various courts are broken, leaderless,” Philip countered. “But you are wise to fear the possibility. Caer Llion will not be left unguarded. Have faith in that, John.”
“I do, my king. Our work is nearly finished.”
“Not finished, John,” Philip said, already thinking ahead. “Only just begun.”
John nodded stoically.
“Be sure the Cailleach is given payment,” Philip said. “She will need fresh breeding materials for the army. No reason to anger her as before.”
“A lowborn child from town will be given upon our return,” John assured.
“Leave now,” Philip commanded. “And I’ve changed my mind. Take Gwawl with you. He would do well to witness our new strength, and what we do to our enemies—a little reminder for his rebellious nature. Include Evinnysan; Fodor, son of Ervyll; and Sanddev, along with some of the pets from the dungeons. Take the boy and the knight alive. I want their reeducation to begin in earnest and in health.”
John nodded but lingered.
Philip stared at him hard. “Something else?”
“If the boy escapes, we will have to release the bodach to hunt him—to kill him. He and the knight cannot be left to their own devices. And releasing such a powerful tool weakens our burgeoning strength, no matter how slight.”
“See that it does not come to that,” Philip asserted.
“Your will is my will, my king.” John bowed low and left.
Alone once more, Philip breathed in the warming morning air and gazed over the land. He was happy John had left. The marriage his advisor hoped for, while practical, did not interest him this day. Instead he thought of the trap.
John had little cause to worry. The Cailleach would be a hardship the knight would not overcome. She was highly intelligent and too powerful, even for one bearing Arondight.
The High King turned back to his table and the unrolled floor plans of the Vatican and its catacombs he had attained two centuries earlier. The ghost of a memory surfaced unheeded: his father, grown old from family machinations, standing in an altogether different crypt near a tiny royal sarcophagus. The buried boy—Philip’s older brother, William—had been murdered during infancy by evil banished from Britain centuries before. Sorrow trailed down the face of Henry II, moved to tears by a long-held angry grief. That day he proposed a life to Philip different from any other. With several heirs in front of Philip, Henry II decided to make a weapon out of a son who would never have vast amounts of wealth or significant title. The King of England offered him a new world, but one only a man with courage, conviction, and the Lord’s grace could attain.
Philip lost the dwindling remnants of his boyhood that day. He had been thirteen.
The classic and military education Master Wace gave Philip granted him the tools to enact what was needed—a wealthy world awaiting conquest, ripe with possibility.
The sounds of the new day caught up with the sun, the town below his window and the castle around him coming to life.
Philip smiled. After centuries of fighting, Annwn was his.
The world of his birth would not be far behind.
When Richard stepped into the portal, the world of smell and touch disappeared.
He could see Bran behind him, but the boy appeared translucent, concealed by blankets of mist. Arrow Jack was nowhere to be seen. Neither Richard nor the boy spoke, both fixated on the path before them, their footsteps silent as they fell on vertigo-inducing nothingness. Richard forced himself to put one foot in front of the other, hoping he had not made a mistake in coming. With the decayed odor of Old Seattle and the adrenaline from the gunfight fading, he fled from a past filled with pain into an uncertain future.
All the while, the mysterious words of Merle haunted him.
The gray lightened, a point as blinding as the sun growing in front of the two travelers, until Richard had to shield his eyes. As the illumination grew, the feeling of being pinched—of being reduced in physical size by a force more commanding than gravity— squeezed the air from his lungs. Just as he was in danger of passing out, a blast of light surrounded both men, and the shock sent Richard to his knees.