The Sun Sídhe

16 - Burning Darkness

Aeden crashed into Ronan with the speed of an arrow. The two collapsed to the polished, wooden floor in a tangle. I froze, staring down at Aeden. His hair was more tangled than ever, his usually-green eyes overcome by a storm of gold. Something was wrong; I felt it, and a glance at Morrigan's face proved she did too.

"Oi!" my brother cried, rubbing the back of his head. "What are you—"

He cut himself off as Aeden scrambled off of him and retched. His breathing came in shallow pants, and he lacked his usual agility. Iron chains bound his hands behind him, tied in some intricate knot I couldn't make any sense of. Deep cuts lined his wrists, hidden beneath a generous layer of blood.

"Sun and moon," Morrigan breathed. The words trembled. She crouched beside him, her fingers hovering uselessly over the chains.

"Don't touch me." Aeden's voice was wound tight, so cold I almost didn't recognize it. His eyes were wild; he looked like a drunk man, dazed, confused, detached from his senses. Yet the edges of fear and anger lingered in the set of his jaw, the way his bloody fingers dug into his palms. Power coiled in the air around him, crackling and unruly, wavering in and out of sight with a faint, golden light. For the barest moment, I detected a seed of icy darkness within it.

Aeden abruptly shoved himself to his knees. His gaze jerked about—he made to stand, but his knees buckled. Ronan caught him, easing the young man back down to the floor. It was obvious he was confused, but he'd always been good at focusing on the problem at hand.

"You're hurt," he said, adopting a soothing tone he reserved for injured children. "Let me help you."

Aeden's gaze finally focused upon my brother, recognition flitting through it. "Ronan." His voice rasped. "Get the chains off."

"I will, but you need to be still."

The young man bared his teeth, the gold in his eyes flaring brighter. "Now, damn it!"

Ronan opened his mouth, then pressed his lips together and bent his head over the chains. Aeden shifted so he could work, which turned his face away from the rest of us. There was no longer any trace of his humour or flippant attitude—it was a sudden shift from his usual demeanour. I'd known he often faked his smiles, but to see him without any trace of that facade was jarring. We'd gotten to him as fast as we could, but the passage of time meant little here—especially this deep into Natír. What had happened before we came?

I knelt, stiffly tucking my bad leg beneath me, but was careful not to draw too close. Instinct warned me to keep my distance with him in this state. "Aeden," I said, unsure how to deal with this. "I'm sorry. We took too long, didn't we?"

"Every moment." His shaggy hair obscured his eyes, but his jaw tightened. "Every second was too long."

The slither of metal caught my ear as Ronan unravelled the chains, the links sliding through his fingers to collapse to the floor. He pushed them aside hastily. "There."

Aeden wrenched his hands away, pressing them into his chest. The blood from his wrists smeared across the cape Mam had given him; it left a stain on the green wool, an ugly, dark scar. He swallowed, and an instant later his form had melted into that of a wolf. A low growl shredded from his chest as he looked about at us, ears pressed flat to his skull. Then he fled down the hallway, little more than a blur of black fur. His paws skidded on the floor as he passed the corner, limping slightly.

We all stared at the place he'd disappeared.

"We... we should go after him." Ronan stood first, his face creased with worry. He looked between Morrigan and I. "Right?"

"Right." I firmed my shoulders and reached up—he offered an arm and pulled me to my feet.

Morrigan didn't move, her lavender skirts pooling around her knees, her white-tipped hair curtaining down her thin shoulders. She was a mere girl in that moment, thin and trembling. "Not me," she whispered. "I'll only make it worse."