The House Of Gaian

of it, Lucian screamed—and Morag heard Death howl. She watched the dark shape of a horse rear, too panicked now to remember the crippled leg until it buckled under him. As he fell, as the smell of burning flesh reached her, she gathered him. Tore his spirit out of that burning body and pulled him to her.
    Ari’s legs slowly buckled. Neall changed form and ran toward her, his limp becoming more pronounced with each step as his body finally recognized the burn on his hip. He caught her as her knees hit the ground.
    “Ari? Ari!” He looked around, as if desperate to find someone to help.
    Morag saw him pale when he noticed her. She didn’t have time to tell him that Death had turned away from their cottage and was summoning her to many other places around Bretonwood because Padrick rode up at that moment.
    “Mother’s mercy, Neall! What happened?” Padrick demanded. “Did the Black Coats slip past us and attack you?”
    Neall shook his head, then looked at the column of fire that had died to a flicker around the burned corpse.
    Padrick stared at the charred lump in the meadow. As he turned his head toward Neall, he saw Morag.
    His eyes flicked from Ari and Neall back to her. She shook her head, brushed her heels gently against the dark horse’s sides, and rode away.
    She circled around to a place that would be an easy distance from the Clan house before she opened the road that led to the Shadowed Veil. The dark horse faltered halfway up the road, dropping back from a canter to a trot. His breathing still sounded too labored. She pressed a hand against his neck, noticing the bloody pock marks where he’d been burned. Death was close by, calling her, but not for her loyal dark horse—and not for her. Whatever harm the fire had done to them would heal.
    When she finally reached the Shadowed Veil, she released Lucian’s spirit. His ghost appeared before her in human form, and he stared at her with gray eyes full of hate.
    “At least now you’ll have to keep your bargain, Gatherer,” Lucian said.
    “I made no bargain with you, Lucian,” Morag replied.
    “Of course you didn’t,” he sneered. “But we all know you’re a liar, Morag, so there’s no reason to think you won’t lie about this, too.”
    “I didn’t lie. I told you Ari was gone. And she was gone. Neall got her away from the Inquisitors, got her away from Brightwood ... and got her away from you.”
    “And now that you’ve gathered me, you’ll return Ari to her proper place at Brightwood.”
    Morag shook her head. “That wasn’t the bargain. You didn’t offer your life in exchange for hers.”
    “What man would make an offer like that?”

    “Neall did.”
    Lucian stared at her.
    Morag smiled sadly. “That is the difference between you, Lucian. You wanted her. Neall loves her.”
    “ I cared about her !” Lucian clenched his fists. “And she cared about me. I know she did. She was mine until that mongrel enticed her away from me. She turned me away without giving me a chance to show her what I could give her. And even if she didn’t choose to be my lover, she still belongs at Brightwood.
    She would be there now if you hadn’t lied to us, made us believe she was dead. Dianna wouldn’t have been trapped there and—”
    “You,” Morag snapped. “Dianna. It’s always about you and Dianna, isn’t it? What you want, what you didn’t get, what someone else should do or give up so that nothing inconveniences you .” She bent in the saddle and leaned toward him. “Are you going to stamp your feet and throw a tantrum now, child? ”
    He took a step back from her, stunned.
    “I am the Gatherer of Souls,” Morag continued. “I answer to no one, and I do not care what you want.”
    “You have to care!” Lucian shouted. “ I am the Lightbringer .”
    “You were the Lightbringer.” Morag brushed the reins against the dark horse’s neck to signal him to turn and go down the road. “Now you’re a spirit who has to finish the journey to the Summerland.”
    She rode back into the human world, then reined in and sat for a moment, listening. No whispers from the direction of Neall and Ari’s cottage. But in the direction of the Bretonwood Clan house, Death was a chorus, and the woods still burned.
    As she turned the dark horse toward the Clan house, she heard the first rolls of thunder and felt the first drops of rain.
    Morag rode toward the cottage, swaying in the saddle from exhaustion and grief. The fire hadn’t reached