Beyond the Highland Myst(757)

Jessi bristled. Cian was a good man. She was about to open her mouth and say so, but Cian said coolly, “I have done sorcery. It appears your brother has dispensed with the occasional Keltar oath, as well.”

Right. So there, Jessi thought. Nobody was perfect. She wasn’t quite sure she’d followed whatever it was Dageus had done, but it’d sounded pretty bad.

“Dageus did so of love. You’ve told us neither how you came to bear such extensive protection runes tattooed across your body, nor how you ended up in that mirror.”

“ ‘Protection runes’?” Jessi echoed. “Is that what your tattoos are, Cian? I’ve been meaning to ask you if those runes are a language. What are they for?”

It was Chloe who answered her. “They hold the repercussions of meddling with black magycks at bay,” she clarified helpfully. “I’ve been reading about them lately.”

“Oh.” Jessi blinked, wondering what black magycks Cian had been messing with. She decided there was too much going on at the moment to press him on the subject. Later, when they were alone, she would ask him.

Right now, Cian was holding Drustan’s gaze, his lips curved in a mocking smile. She wasn’t sure she liked that smile. It was cold. It seemed doubly so after the wickedly heated ones she’d seen curving his sensual lips mere hours ago.

“Nor do I plan to discuss it,” Cian growled. “ ’Tis of no consequence. What is—is. What’s been done, cannot be undone. All that matters now is stopping Lucan.”

Dageus began, “Not necessarily—”

“Och, aye, ‘necessarily,’ ” Cian cut him off. “I’ve not yet told you, Keltar, but Trevayne recently located several pages from the Unseelie Dark Book. He’s been hunting it since the ninth century. Are you familiar with the Unseelie relic?”

Dageus’s golden eyes narrowed and he stiffened. “Blethering hell!”

“Precisely,” Cian said flatly.

“He’s seeking the Unseelie Dark Book?” Drustan exclaimed. “Think you he might actually find it?”

“Aye, he will. ’Tis but a matter of time.”

“Wait a minute,” Jessi interjected. “What is ‘the Unseelie Dark Book’?” Although Cian had mentioned it once before, she’d been so preoccupied with her own worries that she’d not absorbed what he’d said.

“Do you know who the Unseelie are, lass?” Drustan asked.

Jessi gave him a dubious look. “Um . . . fairies?” Oh, that just sounded abjectly silly. Even for a girl who now believed in sorcerers and spells and Druids.

But no one else in the room seemed to think so.

Matter-of-factly, Gwen said, “We call them ‘Faery,’ Jessi, but they’re actually a race of beings from another world, an incredibly advanced civilization known as the Tuatha Dé Danaan. They came to Earth thousands of years before the birth of Christ and settled in Ireland.”

Jessi sucked in a breath. “Oh, God—I read about the Tuatha Dé Danaan in the Book of Invasions! They were one of the mythical races, along with the Fir Bolg and the Nemedians. Supposedly they came down from the sky in a cloud of mist and fog. You’re telling me they’re real? That they actually did invade Ireland?”

“Aye. They’re real, though they didn’t invade Ireland—initially they were welcomed there amongst her people,” Dageus said. “It wasn’t until much later that bitter dissension arose. They arrived long before the Book of Invasions purports. And here they remain, though they are now hidden from us. The Tuatha Dé is divided into two courts. The Seelie are the Court of the Light Fae—the ones whom we Keltar serve. The Unseelie are the Court of the Dark—to be given wide berth. Though separate, they are inseparably bound. Some say the Seelie created the Unseelie, others say that the Seelie themselves mutated over time. No one knows for certain. Indeed, ’tis rumored they may not even be of the same race. But all the legends agree that where goes one, so must the other. That they are like the Roman Janus heads of yore—two faces, sharing a single skull.”

“So they came to our world—oh, that’s just so weird!—and brought these Dark Hallows with them?” Jessi asked.

Dageus nodded. “The Unseelie brought the Dark Ones. The Seelie brought the Light Hallows. Both courts have their own relics of power. According to ancient lore, long ago in their past, the horrific Unseelie were somehow ‘contained’ by the Seelie. Though they are here with us, in a manner of speaking, sharing our world, as are the Seelie, the Unseelie cannot leave wherever it is they are being held. ’Tis written in ancient scrolls that shortly after the Tuatha Dé’s arrival on our world there was an uprising and some of the Unseelie nearly broke free. In the skirmish, their Hallows, including the Dark Book, were lost. Men and Fae alike have been searching for these relics of power for thousands of years. Allegedly, the Dark Glass was originally used to keep one of the Unseelie’s mortal mistresses imprisoned. Over time, it has transformed, as many Unseelie things do, into something else. A thing with multiple purposes, or so ’tis said. See that band of black that rims the perimeter?”