Oracle's Curse: Book Three of The Celtic Prophecy Page 9

  Andy stuck out his hand, “We’ll take that under advisement.” The man looked at it, scowled, and turned to walk away. Andy looked down at Maggie for an instant with his arm still foolishly extended. He looked vulnerable for that instant, and Maggie reached out to touch his ankle. He looked down at her, frowning. His hand at first went to his side, and despite the hardening of his features, and perhaps it was because of her touch, he immediately brought his hands up and raked his fingers through his hair.

  He grunted and stalked out of the room leaving Maggie with Linda. She was quick about her duties, bedpan first, then instructed Maggie to make use of the newly filled wash basin, drink, and eat; Maggie did as told. Then the before mentioned injections: antibiotic and sedative, had Maggie drifting off before she had put her head down again.

  Maggie woke sometime later to find the overheard fluorescents on and Andy sitting on the other side of the room reading a book. “Sleep well?”

  Maggie opened her hands and looked around, not bothering to answer him.

  “You’ve had the last dose of antibiotics and no more sedatives before the healer comes. Apparently, you have to be awake and sedative free for him to do what he does.”

  “I’ve seen healers at work. That part makes sense from what I’ve observed.”

  “I never have seen a healer work. What was it like?”

  “An extreme case, he was dead.”

  “Dead? Like as in dead, dead?”

  “Yup. There was no doubt.”

  “No way! That can’t be.”

  “It’s the truth. Multiple stab wounds and he was gutted.”

  “Get the hell out of here!”

  “Wish that I could. Have you ever seen an animal gutted?”

  “Can’t say that I have.”

  “One of my mother’s boyfriends was a hunter. Took me along when I was twelve. We sat in a tree blind for days it seemed before a stag wandered in. The deer was impossibly thin, I didn’t think it was a good choice being so thin. What did I know?” Maggie shrugged her shoulders and looked up at the ceiling for a long moment before continuing. “He told me that it was the end of rutting season, and stags don’t stop to eat, the instinct to mate overrides all others. The asshole was a good shot at least, one arrow from his crossbow killed it. He strung it up and wrapped my hand around the handle of his knife covering it with his own and gutted the deer. All of its insides fell out. There was so much there, hardly seemed like it all could have fit inside. That was the way for Al—the man.”

  “What did the healer do first?”

  Maggie laughed sardonically, “What do you think? She scooped up the entrails and shoved them back in, then sewed up the abdomen.”

  “Holy shit, that must have been something to see.”

  “Oh yeah, sure, after I vomited from the sight, I don’t know how I was able to thread needles for the stitches. I know I threw up afterward too.”

  “Did you know him?”

  Maggie looked at him, lips tight, and shook her head unwilling to continue the conversation. “How long was I out for?”

  “Two days. We put a catheter in.”

  Maggie lifted the blankets, and gasped. “I’m never getting out of here, am I?”

  “Relax. It was just temporary.” He got up from his chair and placed the book face down on the seat. Turning to her again, “I could take it out now if you’d like.”

  “No! Don’t come near me!”

  Andy stepped back holding his hands up. “You need to relax. Who do you think undressed you in the basement? Moved you from there to here? Attended to your needs while you were sedated?”

  “Didn’t give it too much thought, but it wouldn’t have been Cormac. It’s beneath him to do so, and Linda, for that matter, resents me or the idea of babysitting. Since you and Linda have been here since the beginning it’s either or both of you. Then of course, you’re asking stupid leading questions now, so my guess is you.”

  “Exactly.” He came over and squatted down near her. “If I wanted to take advantage, I would have already.”

  “A gentleman and a kidnapper. You are quite the hero.”

  Andy sighed, “It’s the best you are going to get. I’m sorry. We all have our roles to play. Don’t hate me because this is yours.”

  “I don’t, not at all.” She tore off the blankets and hiked up the skirt of her dress and laid back down turning her head to the wall. “I hate you because you chose to play your role.”

  Chapter 14

  Alex sat across from Cernunnos, a chess board in between them. A goblet of ambrosia sat next to him untouched.

  Cernunnos cleared his throat, causing Alex to look up. “Time passes differently here, but it does pass.”

  Alex smiled and moved his bishop to a4.

  “Yer head t’is no’ in the game, Reliquary,” as he moved his pawn resulting in a Bad Bishop. “Something on yer mind? Check in two.”

  Alex laid down his king. “Aye, preoccupied. Thinking on the priestess.”

  “Doonae be worrit. Amergin is with her now. They’ll be leaving yer brother’s keep ta journey to Bryn Celli Ddu on the morrow.”

  “Early, is it no?”

  “For the Rite. Aye. T’will be less than a fortnight’s travel, but methinks he means ta instruct her along the way.”

  Alex sighed, “A task for her protector.” He surged to his feet and grabbed the goblet, downing the ambrosia in one swig. “I should be there, but I’m stuck here playing games with you.”

  “Dae I detect a note o’ cynicism? Not a good stratagem ta curry favor from yer god. T’is yer luck that I am in a forgiving mood. E’en though I canna send ye back, lessons can be learned. Ye need ta pass the time. Study. Ye ha’ access ta my libraries if ye wish it. May I suggest The Art of War by Sun Tzu?

  “Reading…ye?”

  Cernunnos gave him a withering look.

  “That didnae come out the way I meant it. T’is just that reading is so inefficient, so time consuming for one such as ye. Ye can glean the meaning in more effectual ways.”

  “T’is truth what ye say, but,” he smiled looking through Alex, “someone once showed me the pleasures o’ it, and since then I indulge, partly as a way o’ honoring she who showed me.”

  “Brenawyn will like that. She’s a teacher—tutor rather.”

  “Dae ye think so? I admit that I’d no’ given thought ta the aftermath o’ her discovery. I wonder what she learned in her own studies. Nimue, yer mother, informed me that she doesnae ha’ languages. Easily rectified, but t’is disconcerting. How does she communicate?”

  “Things are different, times ha’ changed. Ye’d ken this if ye spent any time in the mortal realm. Not just any time either, her time, that’s important, ye ken? May I suggest that ye dae that ‘afore she comes o’ her own accord? Depending on yer motivation o’ course, if ye expect ta ha’ a relationship with her.”

  “My motivations are none o’ yer concern.”

  “Granted.” Alex held up his hands, “but knowing might make ye understand her better.”

  “Carrying yer progeny will delay bringing her here. I understand that mortal gestation is a delicate time. I will thus wait until she births yer son.”

  Alex stopped his pacing, pride swelling, “My son?” My son. My boy. Then guilt barged in. He’d forgotten her. Forgotten that she was carrying his child. He was unfaithful, a rutting beast, incensed with the need to copulate, to spill his seed into any willing cunt. Would do so again and again when the beast next arose. How could she return his love once she found out what he truly was? And even if she did he wouldn’t be able to be with her. He’d never be able to be the man she needed. He would be ashamed. He was ashamed. He wouldn’t be able to go to her in faith, look her in the eye, and expose himself and all his foibles knowing he was unworthy. He didn’t even know how he’d next handle seeing her.

  He knew the cultural context of monogamy, though it was not one that he was raised with. Druids saw sexual congress through a different
lens, but even in his culture, it was not uncommon, later in life for a man and woman to only seek out each other. If he was just a man, there wouldn’t be a question. He had burned for her solely, long before he had taken the vow, the same that would make him Gancanagh. He was the Reliquary, and if that were it solely, he’d be able to manage it on the requisite days of celebration. She was the high priestess no less. The gods would turn their eyes from their raw emotion, but they would not be offended.

  Brenawyn saw with her own eyes his cockstand after his shifting back from Wolf, even if she had no cause to think of the ramifications of it. That obstacle was manageable; no worse than the biological need to copulate after the fight or flight response. But his new, unwitting promotion from prey to hunter in the Wild Hunt was too elemental, too bound in the balance, to fight against. He was only mortal, and he hated the acknowledgement of his limitations. It was an excuse for bad behavior. He was no better than his students rationalizing their lewdness with the similar ideology as its human nature to cheat.

  When Brenawyn did not return his feelings, he’d eventually become the monster, in truth, that he was already ashamed of being. His future as a gancanagh, the male version of the dearg due, an incubus feeding on the sexual desires of women where their every orgasm he brought them to would take them one step closer to addiction. Once there it would be a breathless promise cried out during climax to push them over to an eternity as a dearg due. Would he care?

  Pulling himself out of his reflection, “The priestess will be almost four months along by Samhain. T’is nay wonder that her powers are developing exponentially. She’ll need ta be protected from the Coven until her safe delivery, else they’ll get the idea ta use her for their own purposes.” Alex continued, “Afterward, the boy will need protection, if what ye ha’ in mind for her takes her away from her mothering duties.”

  “Doonae presume ye are the only one ta best protect either o’ them. T’is solely the flaw o’ arrogance that makes ye kin that ye are meant for her. As for the boy, ye only supplied the seed o’ what’s ta come. Doonae get attached, down that road only heartache lives. But as for protection until her safe delivery, I ha’ heard, and grant ye leave ta do what ye can ta insure the safety o’ the priestess and her child. We will attend the Rite, and afterward ye may stay ta protect them.”

  Alex bowed low, “I thank ye, my lord.”

  Chapter 15

  Riding a horse in the countryside was a pastoral fantasy next to the reality of the slow-moving, muscle-cramping, monotony that Brenawyn was currently in. She envied the others in the group who looked like they were born on the back of a horse. This was no relatively flat, well-worn trail led by a guide as her mount followed the lead horse in the Watchung Nature Preserve. Here there were hills, unremarkable she thought, if she were walking, but mounted she felt like if she didn’t grip the saddle with her thigh muscles, she’d go tumbling off head first. She was having involuntary muscle spasms, a new, alarming development. She had thought she was in shape after spending years on the elliptical and taking Pilates classes only to find that there were new ways her muscles could be worked.

  She wasn’t a novice rider, but this was no steeplechase. She had taken some beginning classes when she was a teenager, but lost interest the first time she was thrown from a horse. His name was Blueberry, but Lucifer was more apt she thought, as she remembered him now. He was on the smallish side, a mottled grey almost blue in certain lights—hence his name. But he was the most cantankerous horse, she’d ever seen in her life. She’d been bitten by him more than once. The instructor’s idea was for the horses to get accustomed to their new riders, and every time she approached him with apples in her hand, he’d opt to try to take a bite out of her instead. It didn’t make one bit of sense because she was always tall, certainly the tallest in the group but she was always given the smallest horse—Blueberry. She’d beg her father to get her there early, and vie for Bailey, a lovely chestnut mare who loved to be brushed on the neck and withers. She’d muck her stall, bring new hay, and saddle her; but the instructor always gave her Blueberry.

  Brenawyn had this daydream of galloping across the fields, her hair blown back by the wind that the episodes with Blueberry never quite crushed. Now, riding this amiable animal, another idyllic daydream was squashed. It didn’t surprise her other than to note how unprepared for life here she was.

  She was cranky, trying unsuccessfully to shift once again, stuffing her skirts under her posterior to give some cushion to the growing blisters that were sure to be forming. “When are we stopping for the night?”

  Amergin sighed, “That is the sixth time ye’ve asked that question in the past hour.”

  “I’m sorry. I have no sense of direction.” This last was true enough, but her sense of distance was off, too. She was told that the trip would take just ten days. How far could the horses go in a day’s travel? Twenty, thirty miles before they were overtaxed? Three hundred miles would be an afternoon in a car. She missed slipping behind the wheel of her car and hearing the throaty, hungry sound it made when she started its 470-hp 6.4-liter V8. She didn’t have to look at the tachometer; she’d know by the feel of the gears that it was time to shift. It was too much car—was told so mostly by men—but what the hell did they know? She was too dainty, too pretty, perhaps a Volkswagen would suit her better? She scoffed aloud at the memory. Sure thing, right down to its little bud vase on the dash. She should get something with better gas mileage her teacher friends would tell her. No. She was attracted to the power, and considering everything, it was a safe avenue. Even with the memory bindings in place, she had to know on some unconscious level, and if that were true, perhaps what they said about men and sports cars was true in some regard with her. She was trying to prove something.

  She reached out to pat the neck of her mount. She chortled, horse power indeed, of one, and as long as she kept the apples coming beyond resting and watering, he’d be responsive.

  The gentle nature of her mount and his plodding along, however jauntily, was not going to be enough to keep her mind off her body aches. She turned to Amergin. “Where’s our first stop?”

  “Tonight? A place called Melrose Abbey.”

  “An abbey? Is that wise? William was concerned about the bishop arriving before you did.”

  “Aye, t’is a concern, surely, but we’ll ha’ ta chance it. There are those there that I trust. Despite what ye may ken about us, there are those that are learned and not so easily given ta hysterics o’ witchcraft.”

  “But, you’re not concerned for yourself?”

  “Och, no. I am a crotchety wee bastart most o’ the time, but when I want ta be I still ha’ me charms and I can play the game. Ye’re a different matter altogether, though. Yer smart, that’s for sure, and yer bonny and that might get ye out o’ some entanglements, but the moment ye open yer mouth, ye’ve announced ye’re a foreigner and thereby suspect.”

  Brenawyn frowned.

  “That might be overlooked, but the wide-eyed look that ye ha’ it just declares ye as a member o’ the faerie folk.”

  “What? You don’t believe that!”

  “Nay, no’ I, but the way ye look at everyday things…t’is with an interest that belies logic. E’en though there are many who doonae believe, no’ so much time has passed that the stories are all forgotten. They’re still exist mostly ta scare children ta behave, but in all tales o’ faerie folk who cross the veil, they are full o’ wonder and mischief at what this realm holds. Ye ha’ that look about ye. T’is no’ me that ye ha’ ta convince either; and I wasnae there when ye appeared in the glen, my lady. T’is obvious that ye come from…elsewhere. Ye’ve heard what they call ye?”

  She nodded, realizing the enormity of her situation. “I wasn’t allowed to wander the Keep. The day that you found me in William’s garden was the only time I was given to be alone with my thoughts. I was escorted to Hall for dinner and then back again to the tower. On two occasions I was taken to the solar. When was it
do you think that people were able to observe me being…I don’t know, odd?”

  “Dinner is a very telling time, I’ve found. People are pre-occupied with eating; they lower their guard. It allows for a rather uninterrupted view. I ha’ been observing ye from the first.”

  “Really? That’s a bit unnerving, and pray tell what did you observe? Any secret cackling, evil-eye giving moments that you caught?”

  Amergin glowered at Brenawyn. “Doonae be a petulant child, and doonae jest about the evil-eye. Say that ta the wrong man and ye’ll be arrested and burned ‘afore ye ken it.”

  She made a distraught sound stopping Amergin’s chastisement. He sidled his horse up to her, patting her on the shoulder. “There, there. T’will be a’richt. Ye willnae go the way o’ the flame, naught if I ha’ any say about it.”

  Brenawyn scoffed, “That’s very comforting.”

  “T’is the time we live in. Think back if ye will. Can ye tell me what overall feeling ye had from the crowd gathered for the meal?”

  She considered. The Hall was loud with the bustle of people. Servants ran to and fro with trays laden with food and drink intent on filling larders and pint glasses. It was also loud with a multitude of conversations and the music from the dais. She didn’t think anyone paid her any mind, so intent they were on the food in front of them or the conversation at hand. No one had bothered to engage with her. They were tired and dirty, often stretching to ease their aching joints. They didn’t look about. And that’s what Amergin was speaking of. She did gawk at everything, so thrilled that she was witness to an actual medieval Hall. She wasn’t bone-tired as everyone else was from hard labor, but she showed wide-eyed enthusiasm that trumped any exhaustion.

  Amergin nodded as she relayed her observations.

  “So, what do I do?”

  “Ye ha’ no choice but ta trust that I will keep ye safe. At some point, we may ha’ ta break with the guard. Two can escape notice much better than a dozen armed mounted men and their contingent. We just need ta get ta Melrose so I can meet my contact. Afterward I’ll ha’ a better bead on what awaits us.”