Holder of Lightning

She stared at them, a fingertip brushing each and feeling the spark within. Da? But he had never held the active Lamh Shabhala, and the times she had called him up, he had seemed more frightened and con-fused than she was, and she had ended by comforting him. Eilis? Jenna had called the Lady of the Falls only one other time after that day in her burial chamber behind the Doan’s waters, and the ghost had been as angry and fey as during their first encounter; though Jenna knew that the ghost couldn't touch or harm her, she would call that Holder forth only in great need.

Jenna picked up Sinna’s torc. She started to place it around her neck..

"You’ll just have to explain to her again who you are because she won’t remember you. She’s not your friend. She doesn’t care about you-to her, you’re as much a ghost as she is to you."

Across the fire, O’Deoradhain was watching from his blankets, up on one elbow. "Her time wasn’t like our time, and she isn’t like you. At all. You need to find your own path, not tread along someone else’s," he finished.

"Which is the path you want me to take, no doubt." She hated the disdain in her voice. She thought of offering an apology-He’s done noth-ing but help you, and yet you keep pushing him away-but then it seemed that she’d waited too long. The muscles along his jaw clenched, and he blinked. She pretended to look away from him, to be absorbed in the torc.

"I’m not forcing you to go anywhere, Holder," he said. "Remember when I said earlier today that the dead can’t hurt you? Well, they also can’t help you."

’"Only the living can do that.’ Is that how that ends? Meaning I’m supposed to trust you?"

O’Deoradhain took a long breath. His eyes held hers, and she saw the hurt in them. "You do what you think you need to do, Holder, and believe what you must." He lay back down and snapped the blankets around him, turning his back to the fire and her.

Jenna held the torc in her hands for several minutes, watching the fire shimmering in its burnished surface. Finally, she placed it back in her pack. "I’m sorry," she whispered to the night, not sure to whom she was speaking.

The spring sun beat down on the bright carpet of silverweed, primrose, and heather in which Lough Crithlaigh rested; the sky was cloudless and deep. Yellow siskins, song thrushes, and warblers darted among the wild-flowers. Mountains lifted gorse-feathered heads to the west beyond the hills, and they could see deer grazing near a foaming rill winding toward the lough. The day was pastoral; even their horses seemed affected, neigh-ing and lowering their heads as if they wanted to linger here forever.

"Those are storm deer, not the normal red," O'Deoradhain commented then glanced back at Jenna. "You're frowning."

Jenna turned in her saddle. She tried to give the man a smile and failed. "I'm sorry," she said. "It's just. ." She stopped; he lifted an eyebrow."… a feeling."

O'Deoradhain pulled back the reins of his mount, his gaze searching the terrain.

They'd debated whether they should go through this expansive but open valley, or take the much longer and difficult path through the hills. She wondered now if they'd made a mistake. She touched the cloch, let-ting tendrils of energy spread outward. In that invisible cloud, there was a twin disturbance. She could sense it in the pattern of Lamh Shabhala’s sphere, like a wave disturbed by the presence of unseen rocks just below the surface. "There are two other clochs na thintri close By," Jenna said. She could feel a cold apprehension spreading out from her stomach. "Powerful ones: Clochs Mor. I can feel them."

O'Deoradhain rose up in his saddle again.

"Where?" he asked. "In what direction?"

"I'm not certain," Jenna said. "To the south, I think. They're trying to keep themselves hidden, but one of the Holders isn't particularly good at keeping his wall up and so I can sense them both."

"By the Mother-Creator," O'Deoradhain cursed. His hands clenched into fists around the reins, the knuckles going white with pressure. "I was afraid this would happen. Well, we don't have a choice. All we can do is ride on, and see if they show themselves."

"O'Deoradhain, what should I do? What happens if they attack with the clochs, or if they're part of the army the Ri has raised. .?" Jenna remembered the battlefield and saw herself as one of the corpses. Her breath was coming fast, and panic roared in her ears.

"You'll do what you can," O'Deoradhain told her.

"I will do what I can, also, but if the clochs enter the battle, you must deal with them." Then his voice gentled, and his eyes held hers. "You're the Holder of Lamh Shabhala, and it's stronger than the other clochs na thintri. Remember that."

She did. She also remembered the words of the Lady of the Falls: ". . even the strongest can be overpowered by numbers, or make a fatal mistake…" "I don’t know what to do."

"You will, if it comes to that," O’Deoradhain told her. "And if we’re lucky, they won’t see us. If we can reach the hills beyond the lough. .’