“Can,” Brogan said, lifting her chin defiantly. There was something about her, fiery and brave. “But I don’t. I hate the Crom. He springs from Annwn to claim the souls of his victims with a whip made from the bony spines of cowards. He rides a pale horse with luminescent eyes that can incinerate the guilty and innocent alike should they happen upon him and stare into them. None are safe in his path. To the very pit with him and his insanity. I’ve no use for the likes of that beast. You’ve no idea what it’s like to live in its shadow. Subject to its pitiless whims.”
Though she’d just met her, Medea felt horrible for the woman. “Can you be freed?”
She shook her head. “Not even death can free me, as I am bound to him for all eternity. What’s done is done. I only want to be released from this realm so that I’m no longer used by the dökkálfar fortheirschemes where he’s concerned.”
“Used how?” There was no missing the suspicion in Falcyn’s tone.
“They can bargain with the Crom for my services, and when they do so, I have no choice except to give them whatever it is they’ve contracted for. I’ve no say whatsoever in the matter.”
Medea grimaced at the nightmare she described. “Will that change once you leave here?”
“It will weaken their hold over me. Aye.”
Suddenly, Brogan stopped moving.
Medea became instantly nervous at a look she was starting to recognize. “Is something wrong?”
“We’re approaching the porch,” she whispered.
“Is that bad?”
She didn’t answer the question except to say, “The Crom is here.”
5
“So that’s a Crom.…” Medea felt her jaw go slack as she caught sight of the massive glowing horseman. At first, he appeared headless. Until she realized that his head was formed by mist at the end of the spiny whip he wielded as he rode. The white horse was giant in size… almost as large as a Mack truck. An awful stench of sulfur permeated the cavern, choking her and sticking in her throat as if it had been created from thorns.
Even more disconcerting, the baying horse made the sound of twenty echoing beasts. And its hooves were thunderous—like an approaching train. The sounds reverberated through her, rattling her very bones.
“I won’t do it!” Brogan shouted. “I refuse you!”
The horse reared as the Crom cracked its whip in the air. Fire shot out from the whip’s tip as more thunder echoed.
Unfazed and with fists clenched at her sides, Brogan stood stubbornly between them and the Crom. “Beat me all you like. I will not give you that power. Not again! Not over my newfound friends!”
“What’s going on?” Medea asked.
Brogan kept her gaze locked stubbornly on her master. “He wants the ability to speak. But if I give it to him, then he can call out your name and claim your soul to take it with him to hell. And I will not allow it.”
With a long, bony finger, he pointed at Brogan.
She shook her head at him. “Then take me, if you must. I’m all you’ll be getting today! I won’t let you have them! You hear me? No more!”
He charged at her.
In an act of absolute bravery, she stood her ground without flinching.
Blaise caught her an instant before the Crom would have mowed her down. Lifting her in his arms, the mandrake whirled her past the razor, blood-encrusted hooves that were mired with the remnants of the Crom’s past victims.
Falcyn and Urian went charging in to cover them.
Rolling her eyes at their brave stupidity since none of them were armed, Medea joined their cause. She manifested her sword and twirled it around her body. Falcyn unleashed his fireballs while she watched the fey creature turn around for another pass.
It started for them.
Until it saw her sword.
With one last shrieking cry, it vanished in a puff of pungent green smoke.
