“Out of time,” Maeve said to Siobhan. “Finn, help your lass up the ladder.”

Siobhan glared at Maeve as she ascended.

Donal looked through one of the front windows.

“Nobody’s out there,” he said.

“Nothing at all?” Siobhan asked. “I wouldn’t put it past that Dother creep to camp out down there, but Breaslin had to have arrived after us. Our horses still there?”

“Unbothered,” Donal said.

“Everyone to the horses, then,” Siobhan said. “Do not let that sorcerer get between us and the main road.”

Maeve took Niall’s injured shoulder and Donal took the other. Finn stood ready to grab Niall’s legs. They lifted him up and made their way through the graveyard that surrounded the abbey.

“Carefully, now,” Maeve warned as they reached their wagon, still secured to along the treeline south of the abbey. The trio slid Niall headfirst across the bed of the wagon. Donal and Maeve mounted their horses. Finn stopped Siobhan before she climbed in the back.

“Wait, we need to work on your arm.”

“You’re joking,” Siobhan said. “They’ll be popping up out that well at any moment.”

“If we do this now, you can better tend to Niall while we run,” Finn said. “Can two people intertwine their spells?”

“I’ve never seen it done, but I’ve never heard of a need for it, either. I’ve read exchanging too much energy with one plane in one location is risky. Why are you asking me this now?”

“Because you’re twice my skill when it comes to healing spells,” he said. “And I think if we’re casting the same spell at the same time, it’ll be faster.”

“I love this newfound confidence,” she said, “but in this case, it’s closer to three times your skill right now. And we would be tapping different planes. This is not the time or place to test this.”

Finn’s eyes drifted. Siobhan stepped toward him to recapture his focus.

“You’re right, though,” she said. “I’ll touch up my shoulder first so I can tend to Niall better.”

Finn nodded and climbed into the front. The group eased their way down the slope and found three horses standing next to the main road.

“Stall it!” Donal yelled.

He slid down and ran to the horses.

“We don’t need more horses right now!” Maeve yelled.

Donal whooped and drove the enemy horses away. He winked at Maeve as he climbed the saddle.

“Fair play,” Maeve said. “Can we go now?”

“Which way, though?” Donal asked.

“Left,” Siobhan said from the wagon. “We need to head east to Kilmacrennan.”

She no longer labored to speak.

“How did you come by that?” Maeve asked.

“Himself,” Siobhan said. “That’s what I was trying to tell you. Breaslin let it slip while he was threatening us.”

“That might explain some of his wording,” Finn said. “I bet he’s got it in the old abbey there.”

“Does he have a thing for abbeys?” Donal said.

“Let’s not tell this story standing,” Maeve said.

Maeve led the group east as directed. Donal hung back behind the wagon, periodically looking to the rear for any pursuers.

“So why abbeys, again?” Donal asked between glances.

“I reckon it’s just like Murrough and Niall were suggesting,” Finn said. “They’re going to use a ‘pagan’ curse to start a blight from a Catholic abbey. To further divide the two groups and make them easier to manipulate. If it’s symbolism he looking for, I know where he’s got the real cauldron: in the abbey just east of town, where St. Colmcille was first educated.”

“St. Colmcille?” Donal asked. “Again?”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“He’s Tyrconnell’s patron saint. And don’t forget that some people here in Tyrconnell don’t consider Balor to be the clear-cut villain that most of the tales make him out to be. Breaslin is pushing symbolism and spectacle to maximize the outrage and conflict.”

The only major crossing for miles approached. The northern turn led past the corrupted pond and back to Doe Castle.

“Oi! Someone’s approaching from the north on horseback,” Maeve said.

“Couldn’t it be some poor fella wandering around at an unfortunate time?” Finn asked.

“It could,” she said, “but it could be one of of Breaslin’s men. A scout or messenger, maybe. Just be ready is all I’m sayin’.”

They were a quarter mile from the crossroads when the unidentified rider turned west without slowing their pace. Maeve grabbed her bow with her left hand and held her right hand over the quiver on her waist. The rider slowed as he neared. He was close enough to see Maeve’s wary posture but did not reach for a weapon.

“Don’t shoot!” the man said. “I’d hate to be killed with one of my own arrows.”

Maeve’s tone lightened.

“I suppose I could nick your arm as a courtesy. What are you doing here?”

“Did you not ask me to come to this very spot?” Gavin asked.

“I did, but I didn’t think you’d change your mind.”

“I’m not sure I have, but I couldn’t let you face all this while I was sittin’ on my arse,” he said. “Or any of you for that matter—hang on, where’s Niall?”

Maeve pointed her thumb over her shoulder.

“He’s… not good. We finally met Breaslin and it went badly. We’ve got to get him out of here.”

Gavin slid off his horse and ran to the wagon. He walked between the back of the wagon and Donal and saw Niall laying in the back of it. He ran his hands over his forehead and held them at the back of his head. He looked away from Niall and Donal could see his eyes were coated in a thin layer of glass.

“How did this happen?” he asked Maeve.

“Breaslin laid a trap for us, and we ran right in,” Maeve said. “He’s had the cauldron for months; the one we came to protect was a fake.”

Gavin regained enough composure to look upon Niall again.

“His arm,” he said, “how did you close it up?”

“We seared it,” Siobhan said.

She shifted her weight and tucked her right hand between her leg and the wagon bed.

“How?”

“We heated my sword,” she said.

“You didn’t have time to stoke a fire,” he said. “Show me.”

“What?”

“Show me, Siobhan!”

Siobhan raised her hand. The effects of Finn’s spell gave it the appearance a week's recovery, but the pattern of her sword’s hilt had been burnt into her palm, complete with the broken line left by its golden thread.

He stepped away from the wagon and shook his head.

“You know this isn’t your fault,” Siobhan said.

Gavin looked back at her, then looked at Finn and Donal.

“You should know that somewhere along the way the phrase 'it's not your fault' became little more than a sequence of noises to me," he said. "I stopped fighting because I couldn't prevent the people I cared about from getting hurt. I focused on making things to protect them, and your luck's still not improving."

Maeve patted Gavin on the shoulder.

“Stay with me, here, Gavin,” Maeve said. “We're standing here having this conversation instead of being left for dead under that Abbey because of you. My bow. Siobhan's sword. Donal's spear. That bleedin' knife you made Siobhan's mom has now saved her twice."

Gavin looked at Donal. His mouth was drawn back so tight his chin trembled. Finn stepped up and pointed to the tears on the left shoulder of his gambeson.

"Gavin, a sluagh caught me unawares and I'm not even bleeding from it," Finn said. "You're clearly carrying something around with you--and have been for a while it seems. So I'm just going to say, 'Thank you,' because I'm alive right now because of you."

Gavin slapped a hand on Finn's right shoulder and nodded several times before he turned away from the group. He ran a hand past his nose and walked to his horse.

"Where we going, then?" Gavin said.

"We’re going to Kilmacrennan," Siobhan said. "I fear this little reunion has given Breaslin just enough time to catch up.”

Donal looked at the crossing and the hills that towered over it.

“Which way takes us to Kilmacrennan fastest?” he asked.

“If we go straight, the road travels past the north side of the hills,” Maeve said. “It’s a nicer road but longer. If we turn right, it’ll take us to a road that passes the south side of the mountains and towards town. It’s shorter, it can be covered in less time.”

“Either way is too far for a day’s travel, correct?” Finn asked.

“They are,” Maeve said.

“Let’s force them to take the long way,” he said.

“How are we going to do that?” she asked.

“Fog seemed to work pretty well on us,” he said.

“Nobody here is digging up a graveyard,” she said.

Finn canted his head and grinned.

“I think I can conjure the variety that doesn’t bring the dead back to this mortal plane.”

“Grand," Maeve said. "I’d rather not put all our hopes in a fog cloud, though.”

“See that river that runs just south of the crossing?” Donal asked.

“The Bullala?” Finn asked.

“Nobody cares that you know the name!” Maeve said. “What about it, Donal?”

“I was wondering if Siobhan could do that bit where she turns hard ground into mud on the bridge after we cross it.”

“Great idea,” Siobhan said.

Maeve kicked her heels, sending Scáth into a gallop down the road.

Gavin let out a single chuckle.

“She agrees, apparently" Donal said.

Gavin climbed into Cáemaid's saddle and the rest of the group set off after Maeve. Finn didn’t even leave the wagon to fulfill his part of the plan.

“Ceó.”

He spun his hands for several minutes until visibility had dwindled to a few hundred yards. Once they all had crossed the bridge, it was Siobhan’s turn. She slid out of the wagon.

The bridge needed no arch to clear the river below it. Its sides were made of large rectangular stones but still had the aesthetics of any pile of stones stacked between two farm fields. Siobhan walked up to it and raised her arms.

“Linn lathach.”

The middle of the bridge began to dip. The depression expanded until the walls on either side of the bridge tilted inward and collapsed upon the mud and broken stone under it. Coupled with the uneven terrain on both sides of the rubble, this was now too treacherous a terrain even for a single horse and rider to cross.

“Fair play,” Gavin said.

“That was the easy part, if you can believe it,” Siobhan said. “We have to figure out how to infiltrate an abbey full of creatures and sorcerers with our leader left maimed and unconscious. And we have less than two full days to do it.”

“First thing’s first,” Maeve said. “We need to find a place to rest and plan that’s out of the way—just in case they’re as good as building bridges as you are tearing them down.”