Alex leaned down and whispered into Valeria’s ear, “I hope that was all right with you.”
A tear escaped her eye. “All right? You have no idea the gift that you’ve given all of these people! I adore you!” She squeezed his hand. Morgana was home now and always would be.
Trays of food and drink started arriving by uniformed waiters coming from a trailer that was set up along the road to Mani’s house. Another round of “Opa!” passed through the group.
Valeria sat watching the festivities and Alex said, “I’m going to chat with Doc for a minute. Is it all right if I leave you here?”
“Of course! I’m with family!”
Within a few minutes, Max approached.
“Hello, Max!” Valeria said.
“Good evening, Mistress Morgan!”
“Please, call me Val,” she said.
“Val. That is a beautiful name,” he said as he sat down next to her. “Forgive my ignorance. I’ve been absorbing the changes in language and customs. I’m not certain that casual communication is an asset. There is something to be said for a well-composed sentence and thought before speech. Still, I am enjoying the learning adventure.”
“I agree! Still, it seems you are picking up the customs and language quite well,” she said with a smile.
Max shrugged. “I have always had a way with language and hanging with the kid has been helpful.”
Valeria raised her brows. “Caleb?”
“Yeah.” Max smiled. “See, I am catching on! Incidentally, please tell your husband I said thank you. Evidently, he’s established funds for all of us. Some ridiculous amount that I’m certain, with practice, I will be able to squander in a lifetime.” Then his gruff mask reappeared as he saw Elliot approaching Olivia. “Oh, for the love of God! That man and his romance will drive me to drinking!”
Valeria watched Max for a moment and then raised a brow.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Sometimes it seems as if you despise Elliot, but I have an inkling that there is another emotion at play,” she said.
“He’s an imbecile!” Max said in defense. “He falls in love at the drop of a hat. He has these ideas about impropriety that drive me mad.”
“But…” she said.
Max lowered his eyebrows and shook his head as if that was all there was to say. Valeria waited and finally Max sighed, and said, “But, I love him like a brother.”
Valeria raised her eyebrow and the corners of her mouth turned up.
“I had some…issues. I guess that’s what you call them now. Issues. And Elliot was there for me.”
“Can I…can I intrude on your privacy to ask what kind of issues?” Valeria said, feeling quite self-conscious. As much as she respected other’s privacy, for some reason, she felt compelled to ask.
“Love,” Max said with a sardonically musical lilt. He shook his head as if he couldn’t believe that he had been affected by Cupid’s arrow. “Love…love left me sad and depressed and crying like a baby. It left me drinking too much, far too often, in an attempt to erase my unholy turn with immortality.”
“Circe?”
The line on Max’s mouth widened in a grimace. “Christ, that woman ruined me for life.”
“What happened, Max?”
“Come now. I’m certain you have better things to do at your birthday celebration than to listen to my pitiful story.”
Valeria tilted her head to let him know she was interested. Max rolled his eyes again and dropped his head as he pushed his fingers through his hair.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” he said with a side-glance. “I met her during the War of the Titans while she was Hecate’s priestess and I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Oh, I had my fair share of women…” Suddenly, Max realized that was a fairly indelicate matter to be discussing with a woman. He turned to study her reaction and saw that she didn’t seem offended in the least. “Forgive me.”
“It’s all right, Max. Go on.”
“I met with her on several occasions. Eventually, I found myself completely obsessed with her. I even asked her if she had cast a spell on me—to which she sobbed for hours and refused to see me for days. Women!” he said with a huff. “Finally, I begged her to marry me and she agreed. As a gift of our union, she wanted me to grant her immortality. When I told her that I would give her the world but that I did not have that gift to give her, she asked me to take her to Apollo so that we could be together forever.
“Finally, Zeus awarded her 1,000 years of life. I thought that would make her happy and we would be able to settle down. And for a while, she was satisfied. It was I who suddenly became obsessed with her immortality. As hundreds of years went by as if they were nothing, I began to feel terrified at the thought of losing her. I made the unforgivable error of accusing her of bewitching me.”
Max looked down as if stricken with the repercussions, and when he spoke again, it was with great sadness. “She refused to ever see me again.”
“You never saw her again?” Valeria asked, placing her hand on his arm. Max continued to stare at the ground.
“Years later, I heard that she had gone to Myrdd to seek his assistance in the matter. Myrdd admitted that a woman had gone to see him and that he had first given her visions of the future. My guess is that she used those visions to convince Aegemon that she was a sibyl. It was then that I realized that she had bewitched Myrdd with her herbs. Then, in order to destroy the evidence, she drugged him further.
“Several centuries later I was travelling in what is now Southern Italy. I stopped for the night and awoke to the feeling that I was being watched. When I opened my eyes, I saw her outline in the starlight. She was kneeling beside me in the darkness. I believed her to be visiting me from the underworld and I begged her to take me with her.” Tears formed in his eyes and he swallowed them back. “That night I dreamed that we...” he sighed heavily as he picked up a stick and tossed it into the brush. When he spoke again, his voice was cold and indifferent. “In the morning she was gone and I was even more certain it was only a dream. Still, her sweet smell lingered on my bed.”
“Four years later, I was drunk—as I was most of the time. She again came from the underworld into my dreams. This time, she was not so welcoming. I asked her how it was that she was permitted to leave the underworld and she blamed me for her plight. She said that she had decided to give me one last chance...because of our child.”
“You had a child?” Valeria asked.
“According to...the apparition. As I said, I believe it to be only a dream. She went down the trail and returned a moment later with a beautiful dark-haired boy. I kept my distance, knowing that it was not possible for the child to be mine. Circe demanded that I take both her and the boy to the River Styx so that we could all be together forever. Perhaps it was all a dream, but it felt very real. I told her that I could not violate Apollo’s sacred trust by bringing a mortal to Delos.
“She asked me if I truly wanted her to be gone. I was desperate, but I told her that there was nothing that I could do. I pleaded with her to take me with her to the underworld where we could stay together forever. Then she told me that, although it had taken many years, she now loved someone else.”
He sighed heavily. “I made several attempts to end my sorry existence. Elliot decided that he was my nursemaid and nursed me back to health many times. Despite being an idiot...he’s a good lad.”
“And he loves you, too.” Valeria said.
“Yeah—the imbecile should have better sense than to hook up with a cynic like me,” he said.
Valeria smiled softly. “I think he has excellent taste in friends…and so do I.”
Just then, Alex returned and slid onto a bench near Valeria. “Flirting with my wife again, Max?” he teased.
“Only mildly, but given the appropriate opportunity, you do know that I am completely without scruples,” Max said with a smile.
Lowering an eyebrow Alex said, “Max, remember that I do know
you.”
Max shook his head. “Obviously you have manufactured evidence to the contrary. However, your dear wife has heard my tale of woe and can confirm my selfish nature.”
“While I’m certain that you treasure your reputation as a rogue and a scoundrel, I do know the truth,” Alex said as the corner of his mouth turned up. “Val, did Max tell you why he was executed?”
Taking Alex’s hand in hers Valeria said, “I thought Max also signed the petition.”
Max scoffed. “I have absolutely no interest in a council of immortals.”
“Is that why you swore to Jeremiah that you were the one who had drafted the petition?” Alex teased.
Max huffed and rolled his eyes. “Elliot is the walking-talking poster child of naivety. He believes the best in everyone—including me. Damn fool! However, I assure you that my response was due to a brief moment of idiocy—of which I have been known for.”
“Max insisted that Elliot had only signed the petition at his demand. As a result, Max was executed first,” Alex said.
Max shrugged. “The boy hasn’t even bedded a woman.”
“You’re a good man, Max,” Valeria said with a smile.
Smiling kindly, Max said, “It has been my pleasure dominating your time. But I had better resume my role as chaperone or Elliot may find himself engaged to a woman with whom he has never even kissed! I’ve advised him to bed them and then you may never need to marry them.”
“Spoken as a man with experience,” Alex said with amusement.
“Yes, and it has been far too long.” He pointed toward Ava. “So, is that one spoken for?” Max said eyeing Ava as she laughed in conversation with Tavish.
“Definitely,” Alex said.
Max’s eyes roamed and his eyes enlarged staring toward Camille. “That one?”
“Probably,” Alex said.
“It would appear that I am cursed this evening to be only a chaperone.” Max rambled over to Elliot and Olivia who were facing away from each other. He slipped into the seat between them and rolled his eyes.
As the clock ticked toward midnight without incident, Alex’s mood soared. While they ate dinner, one waiter occasionally breathed out fire, causing the familiar “Opa!” shout. Then the dancing began.
Tavish danced while balancing one leg of a chair on his forehead. Two of the revived oracles formed a human pyramid and did amazing flips and jumps. Ava actually managed to balance the leg of a chair on her forehead for a number of seconds before it fell toward Max’s plate. Of course, she caught it just seconds before it hit. Tavish gave her an approving nod as everyone applauded.
Ava laughed as she pointed to Tavish. “I told you I’ve been practicing!”
The crowd responded with, “Opa!” Glasses and a few bottles were clinked. Alex’s eyes filled with joy as he began to speak to the crowd. “My father used to say that having been fed and quenched our thirst, and having enjoyed friendship and love, that we are filled with hope and confidence; that life abounds with all that we need and all we can say is…” Alex lifted an arm encouraging the oracles to answer.
“Opa!” the crowd responded.
“Well done!” Alex said with a laugh. “A year ago, I had the extraordinary good fortune to celebrate my wife’s birthday here with our family. Tonight we celebrate not just the return of so many good friends, and not only my wife’s twenty-eighth birthday…” A tear came to Alex’s eyes. “Tonight, we also celebrate something that is as thrilling as it is a bit terrifying to me.” Alex grimaced and several people chuckled. “In several months, I will become a father!”
Grabbing a plate from a passing waiter, Alex continued, “We break plates as a declaration of the hope that tomorrow there will be more.” He squeezed Valeria’s hand and kissed her hair. “Though this past year has been an extraordinary gift to me—I dare to dream of more! I dare to dream of a life lived here at Morgana with my beloved and,” Alex sucked in a breath and then said in nearly a whisper, “our child.”
He smiled with joy and threw the plate to the edge of the fireplace where it shattered to another round of, “Opa!”
Lars picked up his mandolin, while Tavish grabbed his fiddle. Various oracles joined in adding their voices or instruments to the mix until the music held a vivid richness that could be seen and heard and felt by all.
A team of waiters brought out trays of flaming deserts, followed by another round of, “Opa!”
Alex kissed Valeria as his eyes shimmered with candlelight. “I hope you are enjoying yourself,” he said. She nodded, unable to speak of the joy she felt.
A few tables over, Olivia and Elliot sat blushing, still facing away from each other with a reluctant Max serving as a chaperone between them. Max looked disgusted and bored. Just then, Ava and Camille walked over arm in arm and sat on the bench next to Valeria.
“Hey, remember last year when Valeria thought we were fixing her up with Tavish?” Ava teased.
Alex’s head rolled back as he released his beautiful, musical laughter that made Valeria certain that it must be near midnight, when Alex could finally be free from the dark fears of the curse.
“Please don’t tell Tav! I don’t need him getting any more ideas about my wife!” Alex quipped as Valeria pulled his face around and moved her lips to his.
When she glanced back, Ava had placed a stack of wrapped gifts next to her on the table. “You shouldn’t have gotten me any presents!” Valeria said, and blushed.
“Oh, there are a lot more than this! This stack is from the family,” Camille said. “Frankly, you don’t have the ability or desire to shop and you are going to need a lot of things.” Camille glanced at Valeria’s belly and then at Ava. “Looks like we should have picked up some maternity clothes.”
The first package contained a framed picture of Valeria, Ava, and Camille on her wedding day. Valeria’s hair was in large rollers and they had their arms around each other in a beautiful and very cheesy shot—the Three Musketeers! She loved it.
“The rest are your wedding pictures. We couldn’t replace the pictures that were destroyed in the fire, but we thought this might help make up for them,” Camille said.
The next was a picture of Valeria in her wedding gown, hugging Tavish wearing his kilt. The soft look in his eyes touched her. Then there was a picture of Caleb nervously making the toast. The next was Lars pronouncing them husband and wife with Camille and Caleb standing on either side. She brushed her finger lovingly near the picture of Alex and choked. It was the beautiful expression of love in his eyes that would always be in her heart.
There was a picture of Weege and Kenny dancing, and a portrait of all of the guests surrounding Alex and Valeria taken from one of the bedrooms upstairs.
“We saved the best for last,” Camille said as Valeria stared at a close-up of the bride and groom staring dreamily into each other’s eyes.
“These are…just beautiful!” Valeria sobbed. She would have sobbed even without the hormones, but with them, all she could do was blubber. Alex kissed her neck.
The music started slowly with a mandolin and guitar. Alex rolled up his sleeves as he smiled seductively at her.
“Do you recall our first dance?”
“How could I forget?” she said. It had been the night that she realized she belonged here at Morgana—with her family and with Alex. It was the night he had proposed to her and presented her with the ring that he had created for her eons before.
“I believe that I am going to have to dance,” he said. That made Valeria sob more. Her Alex was so joyful that he needed to dance!
Dancer’s surrounded Valeria and began to step slowly to Zorba the Greek’s sirtaki dance. As the musical energy built, over each round of the music more and more of the revived oracles joined in and the mood went from quiet conservatism and thoughtfulness about all of the years lost, to a spontaneous burst of enthusiasm.
Elliot found himself so euphoric that, without considering his actions, he sprung to his feet and dragged a shocked
and elated Olivia to the festivities. Max rolled his eyes, but within minutes, he succumbed to the music and joined the rest. Valeria clapped and laughed.
As the music ended, Alex moved toward her with a glow of absolute pleasure, and everything but her husband became background noise and lights as the waiters and guests began to throw plates at the stones by the bonfire, yelling, “Opa!”
Alex lifted her from her seat and sat down on the bench with her in his lap. Taking her face in his hands, he kissed her with so much passion that her arms wound around him tightly, wishing he could carry her off somewhere more private. When they pulled apart, he stared at her for a moment—reminding her of the beautiful close-up picture of the two of them at their wedding.
“This past year has been the happiest, the most joyous time in all of my existence and it is because of you!” Alex said with such an exuberance that she immediately knew it was past midnight.
“It’s been the best year of my life, too—and the best of every lifetime I can recall,” Valeria choked. Her eyes widened and she smiled. “I want you to feel something.”
She took his hand and moved it to her belly. He immediately became concerned.
“Is something wrong?”
“No. Shhhhh,” she said, in an effort to calm him. Then she closed her eyes, concentrating. She felt the thump from the inside her belly and smiled. Alex knitted his brows in concern.
“What was that?”
“That was our daughter saying hello.”
Alex’s eyes lit with wonder as he wrapped his other arm around her and placed it on her belly. Suddenly he jumped. “She did it again!”
Valeria laughed softly. “Yes, she wanted to be very certain that her father heard her.”
“Father! I’m going to be a father!” he said, as if he had just realized it. His eyes filled with tears of joy and he tried to swallow them back. She leaned her head against his chest and he stroked her hair.
The Last Oracle Page 29
