Free Emily's House (The Akasha Chronicles) by Natalie Wright

dagger, whole.
    As quickly as the rumbling and shaking had begun it stopped, the cracks now gone. The sky returned to its overcast grey, and the thunder ceased. There was no trace of Saorla. Even the bloodstains on the ground were gone. It was as if she had never existed.
    Even after seeing the pixie and Dark Wizard magic; even after his run-in with the Lianhan Sídhe; after seeing the vines and trees come to life to protect the Grove; even after all the magic he had seen, Dughall still had a hard time believing what he had just seen. For a moment, he questioned whether any of it was real.
    “Ah, ashes to ashes,” broke in Cian. With that statement, he turned to leave.
    “Where do you think you’re going?” asked Dughall.
    “It is done here,” he replied. “You have failed, oh angry one. Time for you to go on to your next conquest.”
    “I do not accept failure,” Dughall hissed. “Someone took that torc, and whoever has it can’t be far away from here,” he said.
    With that, he turned on his heal and ordered Macha and the Dark Wizard to come with him. He would find that torc if it was the last thing he did.

14. Search For The Torc
    Dughall tromped through the thicket, back to the Great Hall. When he got there, he expected to see his men finishing off the last of the women he had ordered them to kill. Instead, he saw his soldiers fleeing. Grown men, running and screaming like little girls.
    “What is the meaning of this insubordination?” he bellowed as he charged up the steps of the Great Hall and opened its doors. Inside, he saw piles of bodies, mostly his own soldiers, lying in heaps. And there, at the center of it all was Bian Sídhe. Like her sister Lianhan Sídhe in her fearsome aspect, Bian Sídhe had large red wings covered in scales like a dragon. Her long, dark hair whipped wildly about her head and shoulders. Full of anger and fury, her red eyes shot torch like flames at all that stood in her path.
    The women warriors and faeries stood behind her, guarding the younglings, arms still drawn. And fighting at Bian Sídhe’s side was Madame Wong, still hurling her little body about and swinging her swords. Any ill-fated man who happened to get close would either be incinerated by Bian Sídhe or sliced and diced by Madame Wong.
    Dughall now understood why the men fled. There was no point in fighting more. As he left the Great Hall, Dughall barked out the order for his soldiers to torch the place. “Burn it all down,” he yelled.
    “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Macha curtly said.
    “Macha. Again with the ‘I wouldn’t do that’,” said Dughall. “Okay, why? Why should I spare this pathetic group of shacks?”
    “Because there may be clues here. Clues about the torc and where it has gone. Clues about the portal and how to get in,” she coolly replied.
    In his anger, Dughall hadn’t thought of the possibility that he could still find the torc there. Yes, search for clues and find the torc. Its power would be his.
    Dughall, Macha, and Cian split up and searched the sleeping huts and other buildings for clues. Macha happened upon Saorla’s own small thatch-roofed cottage. As she rifled through her belongings, she came upon a small leather-bound book with vellum pages, way at the back of a high shelf. As she opened the book, she knew she had found exactly what they looked for.
    She quickly flew to Dughall with her prize, her wings a shimmery luminescent orange. “Here,” she said as she flung it at Dughall.
    “What is this?” he asked.
    “Open it and see,” she said. “That is, if a brute like you can read.”
    “Of course I can read, you impudent insect,” he snarled.
    As Dughall opened the book, his eyes grew wide. He couldn’t believe what he had. All that he had hoped for and more. This was a written guide for the secrets of the Sacred Well. In his hands, he held immortality.
    “Macha, you endearing little gnat,” he beamed. “I shall spare your life after all,” he