Silver's Lure. Anne Kelleher

      

      SELECTED PRAISE FOR

       ANNE KELLEHER

      “Anne Kelleher will not disappoint…[she] keeps you glued to the pages with anticipation and rewards your diligence with every word.”

      —Writers Unlimited on Silver’s Bane

      “Anne Kelleher has written a spellbinding work.”

      —Futures Mystery Anthology Magazine on Silver’s Bane

      “A stand-out fantasy/romance from this talented author.”

      —FreshFiction.com on Silver’s Bane

      “Silver’s Edge is a first-class fantasy.”

      —In the Library Reviews

      “Pure fantasy with a cutting edge.”

      —Romantic Times BOOKclub on Silver’s Edge

      “This book has it all…. Set aside a few hours to read this one. You will not want to put it down.”

      —Writers Unlimited on Silver’s Edge

      SILVER’S LURE

      ANNE KELLEHER

      For Donny.

      Glossary of People and Places

      Meeve—High Queen of Brynhyvar, Queen of Mochmorna

      Briecru—her Chief Cowherd

      Morla—Meeve’s twenty-seven-year-old daughter, Deirdre’s twin sister

      Bran—Meeve’s fifteen-year-old son

      Lochlan—Meeve’s First Knight, head of the Fiachna

      Connla—Meeve’s older sister and Arch Druid (Ard-Cailleach) of all Brynhyvar

      Catrione—druid and daughter of Fengus, King of Allovale

      Deirdre—Meeve’s other daughter, druid

      Cwynn—Meeve’s son, raised by his grandfather

      Auberon—King of Faerie

      Finnavar—Auberon’s mother

      Loriana—Auberon’s daughter

      Tatiana—Loriana’s friend

      Timias/Tiermuid—Auberon’s foster brother

      Macha—the Goblin Queen

      Brynhyvar—the Shadowlands, inhabited by mortals and trixies, call khouri-keen by themselves and gremlins by the sidhe

      Ardagh—central point in Brynhyvar

      Mochmorna, Allovale, Gar and Marraghmourn—four main provinces of Brynhyvar

      Lacquilea—country to the south of Brynhyvar

      Eaven Morna—Meeve’s principal residence

      Eaven Avellach—Fengus’s principal residence

      Dalraida, Pentland—territories lying within Mochmorna and Gar, respectively

      Far Nearing—peninsula on the eastern shore of Brynhyvar

      White Birch Grove—druidhouse where Catrione and Deirdre live

      Faerie, TirNa’lugh or the Other World—otherworldly country bound to Brynhyvar, inhabited by sidhe and goblins

      Contents

      Before

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

      Chapter 12

      Chapter 13

      Chapter 14

      Chapter 15

      Chapter 16

      Chapter 17

      Chapter 18

      Chapter 19

      Chapter 20

      Afterward

      BEFORE

      Below

      At the bottom of the World, the Hag crouched on the jagged stone lip of her fire pit. Her face was washed with an orange glow by the crackling flames. Her breath whistled between the gaps in her teeth as she chanted, “Now the fire’s nice and hot, now’s the time to stir the pot. Take the changeling, toss it in, stir it hard and watch it spin.” She cackled softly in anticipation. Her claws skittered across the surface of the milky moonstone globe she cradled in the crook of one arm like an infant. “Make the water into stew, season it with something new, hair and bone and blood and skin, once we put the changeling in, boil brew and fire burn and dark to light will then return…” Her voice trailed off, but her words continued to echo off the lichen-lit vault above her.

      She was waiting for Herne to bring her the changeling whose birth had turned her from Mother into Hag. The birth of her first offspring, the goblins, had turned her from Maiden into Mother. Mortals and sidhe had followed, but it was the last birth that signaled a turning of the Wheel in the Worlds above. The mortals, bless them, would react like ants dispossessed of their hill, the sidhe—who alone would know what was happening—would shake their heads at the mortals’ antics and the khouri-keen would burrow deep into their dens beneath the surface, only emerging when all was renewed. But the goblins—they would see it as the opportunity it was.

      “And why shouldn’t they?” she whispered as she worked. Of all her children, she had come to love them best. They were the easiest to satisfy.

      She hawked and spat onto the moonstone, and images of the dark, dirt-lined cave swirled through its milky surface. In it, she saw Herne’s fire-lit face as he bent over her mountainous belly, and for a moment, she was Mother once again, back in the birth chamber, red skin flushed and wet with sweat, body wracked with birth pangs. They’d both known this infant would be their last in this particular incarnation of reality.

      The memory of herself splayed like a spider, arms back, thighs thrown wide flashed through her, even as she saw its image reflected in the globe. Her belly contracted once more in a painful heave, doubling her over, causing her to nearly drop the moonstone. She clutched it close, closed her eyes, and saw against her eyelids her final impression of Herne as he caught the caul-covered infant as it slithered out, slick with blood. Through the translucent whiteness of the membrane, she glimpsed a squirming body covered in matted hair.

      One blink, and she’d found herself here in her cavern, skin mottled blue-gray, teeth yellowed and jagged, her stick clenched between contorted fingers.

      She set the stick aside and for a while, she was busy. The blood that rolled between her thighs and down her legs dried to a slow drip, then stopped and crusted, falling off in flakes that the thirsty stones absorbed. She filled the cauldron, sorted through the contents of the feathered bags made from the carcasses of the Marrighugh’s ravens, summoned up the fire sleeping at the bottom of the fire pit. Finally she turned to her globes that formed the supports on which her cauldron rested.

      Besides the cauldron, which was as much a part of her as her own belly, they were her dearest possessions. She cherished and prized them above all else. Originally there had been four, one for each of the primal Elements that made up the Worlds. They had come to her, one by one, when the World was new, and she and Herne were young. With them, she and Herne had created all that was and would ever be.

      Now