SONS of DON

by Brenda L. Harper

  “Where’s Cei?”

  “Waiting for us.”

  And, sure enough, he was. Cei was sitting behind the wheel of a slick black BMW Gwen had never seen before.

  “Where did you get this?” she asked as she slipped into the front seat.

  “It’s Rhein’s.”

  Gwen glanced back at their benefactor, and he offered her a subtle shrug, as though it was no big deal.

  “Being immortal must be quite lucrative.”

  “Not always,” Cei mumbled as he started the car and took off at a faster speed than was probably necessary.

  “Where are we going, anyway?”

  “Didn’t you tell her?” Cei asked, glancing in the rearview mirror at Rhein.

  “Wasn’t time.”

  “Is there time now?” she asked.

  “Tony thinks he found something,” Cei said.

  “Something…?”

  “Something that will tell us what this curse is that Bran put on the sons of Don,” Morgan said.

  Gwen was pretty sure that was the first time she had heard his voice in weeks. She tried to look at him, but his head was hung so low that she could only see the little curls of blond hair that covered his face. She wanted to reach back and ruffle it, like one might a child they felt sorry for. But she didn’t. She didn’t want to embarrass him. Or embarrass herself.

  The university was only a few blocks from their school. Cei pulled into the faculty parking lot next to Tony’s little Toyota, the BMW making the Toyota look even sadder than it normally did.

  Gwen hadn’t been back to Tony’s office since the day everything imploded. The last time she was there, Tony was bleeding on the floor when she walked in. She still had no clue what had happened that day, but suspected it had something to do with this curse, with her parents, with Morgan’s parents, and everything else that was going on. But she was afraid to ask because she really didn’t want to know how much trouble they were in.

  If someone like Tony could be hurt enough that he was clearly incapacitated for a while despite his immortality, how was she supposed to survive this ordeal?

  She dragged her fingers through her hair as they walked across the building’s lobby. She had seen Bran here once. He helped her out of the elevator when she had a panic attack. What if he was here now? What if he was watching them, laughing at their cluelessness when it came to his curse?

  Cei touched her arm, a gesture of comfort. She glanced at him, but he wasn’t looking at her. He was looking everywhere but at her. He knew she was angry with him and he’d been trying to give her space…she knew that was what he was doing. There was something about the way he looked at her when he thought she wasn’t aware of it. It was melting the ice that had built around her heart the day she found out he’d been lying to her.

  But it wasn’t completely melted yet.

  She stepped onto the elevator and purposely stood beside Rhein.

  “Aw, great. I’m so glad you came right away,” Tony said as they walked into his office a few minutes later, stacks of books in his arms, a pencil lost over one ear, and that ever-present distraction in his eyes. “I think I have an idea where to start.”

  “Start on what?” Gwen asked.

  Tony shot Cei a searching look. “You haven’t told her?”

  “Not everything.”

  Tony shook his head as he carefully made his way to his desk, stepping gingerly over the stacks of books, magazines, and papers that Gwen had been in the process of organizing before his accident. Morgan and Rhein stood against the back wall, choosing not to venture into the minefield. Gwen curled up into a club chair that was pushed into one corner, a perfect chair for a long afternoon read—she almost wished that was the only reason she was here. And Cei perched on the edge of Tony’s desk.

  “So,” Tony said, settling in his desk chair, his books open and scattered in front of him, looking at Gwen as though she was the only one in the room and he was about to give a nice, long lecture on history—his chosen field of study. “You know that there is a curse on the sons of Don that has them trapped in Annwn.”

  “I do.”

  “And that Bran put the curse on them, so he can’t touch you, the savior, without ending the curse himself.”

  “I know that, too.”

  “Bran believes that there is a ritual you can perform that will reverse the curse, but he has kept the ritual a secret. Not even his closest associates seem to know anything about it.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  Tony seemed surprised. He glanced at Cei again. Cei just shrugged.

  “So, anyway,” Tony said, tapping the open page of one of his books, “I think I have an idea of the type of ritual that must be performed. My only problem is…we know so little about Druid rituals that I would hate for you to perform a ritual and have it turn out to be one that will make things worse rather than better.”

  “Can’t you ask them?” Morgan asked, pointing toward Cei, his comment clearly meant to include Rhein, too. “They were alive back then, right?”

  Tony inclined his head slightly. “They were. But—”

  “But Druid rituals are very secretive. I only witnessed a few during my time with Gwydion,” Cei said. “I can’t speak for Rhein.”

  Rhein shook his head. “The only ritual I can accurately tell you about is the one that made me immortal. Even then, I was only conscious for about half.”

  “But you lived during this time period—”

  “We lived during a lot of time periods.” Cei shook his head as he turned and looked down at the books Tony had open on the desk. “Doesn’t make us experts on each one.”

  “It should,” Morgan muttered under his breath.

  Rhein reached over and hit his arm lightly, a puzzled look in his eyes. Morgan wouldn’t even look at him—Rhein had been his best friend for several years, yet he seemed less interested in his attempts at reconciliation than Cei’s gestures of mentorship.

  “Anyway,” Tony began again, his head no longer turning like he was watching a tennis match, “we need to find the right ritual before we can do anything.”

  “But I thought you had,” Gwen said. “I thought that was why we’re here.”

  “No. I didn’t find the ritual, but I found one that might be similar. It’s very beautiful, really, a ritual that takes place in a forest under the canopy of a million trees.” Tony’s face adopted this dreamy expression that made Gwen think of a child on Christmas morning. “I wish I had been born during that time period. But, alas, it was my bad luck to be born a millennia later.”

  “When were you born?” Gwen asked.

  “1795. A quite boring year.”

  “Boring?” Once again, Morgan came back to life. “Isn’t that the year the Eleventh Amendment to the US Constitution was passed? And the year the University of Carolina, the first state university, opened?”

  Everyone turned to Morgan and kind of stared at him. He never seemed to pay attention in Ms. Dru’s history class…how did he know all that?

  “Well, yes, I believe you’re right,” Tony said slowly.

  Morgan just nodded and went back to staring at the floor.

  Tony kind of shook himself before he again focused on the book in front of him. “Gwen,” he said, looking up at her, “I’d like for you to take a look at this ritual and go through it a few times with Cei—not performing it, of course, but get yourself familiar with it so that when the time comes to perform the real ritual, you can do it without any trouble.”

  Gwen crossed to the desk and studied the book Tony kept referring to. There were a lot of words she didn’t understand, but recognized as Gaelic. She chewed her lip as the idea of trying to say those words out loud began to make her heart pound a little.

  “I don’t know…”

  “It’s fine,” Cei said, moving up behind her. He slipped his arms around her as he lifted the book off the desk and held it up where they could both see it. “The words aren’t as difficult as they lo
ok. You simply need to learn the basic pronunciations.”

  “They look pretty complicated,” she said, suddenly very aware of his closeness.

  “I’ll help you.”

  Gwen closed her eyes, Cei’s scent filling her senses until she felt dizzy. He didn’t wear cologne, but there was something very spicy, very masculine, about him. It reminded her of that night…of kissing him in the privacy of his bed. It would be so easy to slip back into that moment, to remember how safe she had felt.

  And then her heart reminded her of the pain that stole through her when she heard him discussing knowledge about her he never should have had.

  She twisted, slipping out from the embrace of his arms.

  “I guess we better get out of here and get started.”

  Chapter 5

  “I know this word,” Gwen said, touching the print on the book’s page. “And that one.”

  “Good,” Cei said. “That’s a good start.”

  Gwen studied the page a moment longer and realized she knew more of the Gaelic than she had given herself credit for. A lot of these words appeared in the books she had, the diary she took from Tony’s office and the untitled one that appeared mysteriously on her window ledge. She had stared at the words written in those for so long that the Gaelic had made an impression, translating itself when they turned into readable English.

  She turned the page, reading further into the ritual. It was full of instruction, but gave little indication of what the actual ritual was for. Gwen, however, was beginning to get a good idea.

  She’d read the other book—the one that appeared mysteriously on her window ledge—cover to cover three times now. It was instructions. How to become one with nature. How to use that connection to control her powers. What her powers were and how they should be used. It was basically a manual that explained what she was and how to use it to the best of her ability.

  She was pretty sure she knew now what had kept her from mastering the talents Rhein had been working with her on. She was just a little afraid to put into practice what she had learned. If that book was correct, her powers were a lot more intense than anyone had told her…or maybe anyone knew.

  So, looking at this ritual kind of freaked her out a little.

  “What makes everyone think that I would even be capable of pulling something like this off?”

  Gwen sat up and backed away from the book. They were sitting on the floor in her bedroom, the door open to the chaos that seemed to constantly be taking place downstairs. She heard Tommy yell something at his twin, Richie. And—surprise!—Anna answered back. Anna was another of their foster siblings, but she rarely ever interacted with anyone, preferring her own company. Gwen understood that. Gwen had been that in her last four foster homes.

  Would have been here if things hadn’t changed.

  “You are a child of light and humanity.”

  “So is Morgan.”

  Cei inclined his head slightly. “But you are female.”

  “So?”

  He closed the book and climbed to his feet, taking a seat on the edge of her bed so that he was looking down on her. It was a position of superiority. Cei seemed to need that sort of symbolism when he talked to her about all of this Druid—demigod—stuff.

  “There is an engraving near the entrance to Annwn that tells of the curse. On it, it is said that the savior will be a female, the child of light and humanity.”

  “But there have been others.”

  “And none have been successful.”

  “Have any even gotten this far?”

  Cei inclined his head slightly. “One got so far as to perform half a ritual at the entrance. But Branwen arrived and things did not go well.”

  “If someone performed a ritual before me,” Gwen said, starting to climb to her feet, “then why don’t I just try the same ritual?”

  “Because it wasn’t the right one.”

  Somewhat deflated, Gwen settled back down on her bottom. “How do you know?”

  “Because we know.” Cei set the book on the bed and stood, crossing to the door. “Keep studying the book.”

  “That’s it?” She climbed to her feet, this time with success. She snatched the book from the bed and held it against her chest. “Just study it and hope that we find the right one?”

  Cei didn’t respond at first. He stood in the doorway, looking across the landing to the door to his own bedroom, as though wrestling with his thoughts. When he spoke, his voice was low, quiet, as though he wasn’t quite sure he wanted her to hear his question.

  “Why were you with him that day?”

  “Who?”

  “Rhein.”

  Gwen could have asked what day he was talking about, but she was pretty sure she knew. She crossed to her narrow, student’s desk and set the book down. She stood with her hands resting on either side of it, as though she needed the added support to hold her up. Then she turned, and tried to adopt the same sort of casual stance he always seemed capable of portraying no matter the circumstances.

  “I was hurt. And angry.”

  “So you ran to him?”

  “I ran to the first person I thought…”

  She paused, not because she didn’t want him to know what she thought, but because she wasn’t sure what she was thinking in that moment. She went to Rhein after learning the truth about herself from Bran and then her confrontation with Paul. Something inside of her broke that day, something that had been the only pillar of strength that had been holding up her ability to trust. It was instinct to seek out a companion, someone whose sole purpose it would have been to help her forget the pain and the disappointment and the fear that were overwhelming her.

  How did she explain that to Cei?

  “Do you care about him?”

  Cei’s voice was even lower—if that was possible—and hard, as though he was trying to pretend he didn’t care.

  Did he care?

  “I barely know him.”

  “But you want to know him.”

  Gwen dragged her fingers through her hair and then consciously made herself stop. It reminded her too much of Paul, of his nervous habit of doing the same whenever he didn’t want to tell her something unpleasant. Instead, she dug her fingers deep into her jeans pockets and turned slightly, her eyes falling on the window and the trees beyond it. Peace flowed over her despite the emotions roiling around in her stomach.

  “I wanted to know you. But when I heard you saying those things about Paul, about the truth, about things you had no right to know—”

  “I was protecting you, Gwen.”

  “You were lying to me.” She shook her head. “I can’t trust someone who lies, and I can’t know someone I can’t trust.”

  “You can trust me.”

  He moved up behind her and, almost hesitantly, set his hands on her shoulders. His scent surrounded her again, making her heart shiver in her chest. He pulled her back against him as he slipped his arms around her shoulders, his fingers caressing her neck.

  “I knew who you were before I met you,” he said quietly. “But the moment I saw you, I knew you would get under my skin in a way that would change everything.”

  “I don’t know, Cei. You should have told me the truth.”

  “I know.” He sighed, his breath washing over her ear, the side of her neck. “I know, and I regret that I let Tony and Theresa talk me out of it. I can’t take it back now, but I can promise that nothing like it will happen in the future.”

  “Can you?”

  He turned her around, lifted her face with a finger under her chin. “I can. I do.”

  His lips brushed hers ever so lightly. She gasped a little, the shock that made her every nerve tingle washing through her so quickly at his touch. He pulled her into him, deepened the kiss until each breath was flavored with his. It made her body come alive in a way she had never known before. You hear about these things—read about them in trashy novels left lying around by previous foster kids or the foster parents—
but you never truly appreciate the amazing factor until you experience it for yourself.

  It would have been a perfect moment except for a little voice at the back of her mind that kept warning her…he lied once. What’s to stop him from doing it again?

  Chapter 6

  Gwen stood in the middle of the backyard, the dawn breaking just over her shoulder. Her eyes were closed as she concentrated. At first, her mind was completely blank, only the doubts that she could never quite silence playing on repeat. But after a few minutes, even those began to quiet.

  It began with a slow leak of light. She thought for a moment that the sun was rising quicker than she had thought and was shining in her eyes. But then she felt that…it was hard to describe. This sense that she was connecting with something.

  Welcome, my child, a voice whispered, as though from inside of her.

  Gwen bit her lip, the slight bit of pain almost pulling her from the connection. Not for long, but long enough that the doubts began to whisper again. She took a deep breath and renewed her concentration, that light again filling her eyes, her mind, until that was all there was.