Holder of Lightning

skeleton lay, its empty-socketed eyes staring at Jenna. The body had once been richly dressed-a woman, adorned with the remnants of brocaded green silk, with glistening threads of silver and gold embroidered along the edging. The arms were laid carefully along her sides, and under her head was a pillow, the stuffing spilling out from rotting blue cloth, a few strands of golden hair curling below the skull.

Rings hung loose on the bones of her fingers; jeweled earrings had fallen to the stone alongside the skull.

You look on the remains of Ellis MacGairbhith of Inish Thuaidh, and I was once the Holder of Lamh Shabhala, as you are now. .

The voice was as liquid as the falls, and it sounded inside her head. Jenna stepped back, her hands to her mouth, until she felt the roar of the water at her back. "No," she said aloud. "Be quiet. I don’t hear you."

A laugh answered her. The skeleton stared. Take one of my rings, the voice said. Place it on your own finger. .

"No. I can’t."

You must. . The voice was a bare whisper, fading into wind and the falls’ louder voice. For a moment, Jenna thought it had gone entirely, then it returned, a husk--please. . one of the rings. .

Her hand trembling, Jenna stepped toward the body again and reached out to the hands crossed over the breast. She touched the nearest ring, gasping, then pulled back as the golden band wobbled on the bones. Taking a breath, she reached out again, and this time pulled the ring from the unresisting hand. She held it in her fingers, turning it: the ring was heavy gold, inset with small emerald stones, filigreed and decorated with knotted rope patterns-an uncommon piece of jewelry, crafted by a mas-ter. The ring of someone who was once wealthy or well-rewarded.

She put the ring on her own finger.

At first nothing changed. Then Jenna realized that the hollow seemed brighter, that she could see as if it were full day. A bright fog filled the recess and the sound of the falls receded and died to nothing.

A woman, clad in the green silk that the skeleton had worn, stepped through the mist toward Jenna.

Her hair was long and golden-red like bright, burnished copper, and her skin was fair. Her eyes were summer blue, and she smiled as she came forward, her hands held out to Jenna. The sleeves left her arms bare, and Jenna saw that her right hand was scarred and marked to the elbow with swirling patterns, patterns that matched those on Jenna's own hand and arm.

On one of her fingers sat the same ring Jenna wore.

"Eilis," Jenna breathed, and the woman laughed. Aye," she said. "That was once my name. So you're the new Holder, and so young to be a First. That's a pity." Her hand touched Jenna's, and with the touch, Jenna felt a touch in her head as well, as if somehow Eilis were prowling in her thoughts. "Ah.

Jenna, is it? And you've met Riata."

Jenna nodded. "How. .?" she began.

"You are the Holder," Eilis said again. "This is just one of the gifts and dangers that Lamh Shabhala bestows: the Holders before you-we who held Lamh Shabhala while it was awake and perhaps even some of those who held it while it slept-live within the stone also." Jenna remembered the red-haired man she'd glimpsed when she first picked up the stone. Had he been a Holder, once? "At least," Eilis continued, "some shade of us does. Come to where a Holder's body rests, or touch something that was once theirs, and they can speak with you if you will it. They will also know what is in your mind, if you allow it to be open. Tell me, when you met Riata, did he give you a token?"

Jenna shook her head. "No. He only spoke to me."

Eilis nodded at that, as if it were the answer she expected. "I met him, too. Riata prefers to be left alone in death. He knows that should you need him again, you can find him in the stone or go to where he rests. I went there once, myself. That's how I came to know him-a wise man, wiser than most of us Daoine believed possible of a Bunus Muintir. We're an arrogant people. ." She seemed to sigh, then, and looked past Jenna as if into some hazy distance. "He told me I would die, if I followed my heart. I didn't believe him." Another sigh, and her attention came back to Jenna. "You will meet the

shades of other Holders, inevitably, especially if you go to Lar Bhaile as you intend. And I’ll warn you; some you will not like and they will not like you. Some will smile and seem fair, but their advice will be as rotten as their hearts. The dead, you see, are not always sane." She smiled as she said that, a strange expression on her face. "Be careful."

"Why didn’t Riata tell me this?" Jenna asked. "There’s so much I need to know."

"If he told you all, you would have despaired,"

Eilis answered. "You’re new to Lamh Shabhala, and you are a First besides." She shuddered. "I wouldn’t have wanted to be a First."

"Riata… he said that the stone was a curse, especially for the First."

"He was right."

Jenna shuddered. "That scares me, the way you say the words."

Her gaze was calm. "Then you’re wise."