Alainn noticed Trow had become much more pleasant when he believed there might be some way to undo the curse placed upon him and his kind.
“That is precisely the reason why you should not be forced to live out another day in such an unfair manner.”
He nodded and Alainn thought it was surely a smile that crossed his peculiar face.
“You’re absolutely certain you will be able to locate the child of the witch and the wizard? What age is the child if it has been seven centuries?” Danhoul inquired.
“The boy became a man, but as with any immortal creature once they reach adulthood they do not age.”
“And, since the trows raised him, does he know anything of his magical connections, or of his parents?”
“He has been told of his parents, but not that his mother left him to be stolen away.”
“Well, there will be no benefit of him ever learning that unpleasant tale.” Danhoul who knew nothing of his own parents agreed.
“I’ll see to it the young man is brought here. After you summon the wizard and he sees his son, he will surely agree to immediately remove the spell on the witch.”
The trow was clearly becoming more excited and he slapped his feet upon the ground this time in anticipation rather than annoyance.
“Would that be the wisest of considerations to have him remove the spell before she has agreed to end the curse?” Killian debated as he drew nearer and joined the conversation. “If she is entirely filled with lasciviousness that has not been sated in seven hundred years, I doubt ending a curse will be first and foremost on her mind at the moment the spell is removed.”
“Don’t think that thought hasn’t crossed my mind several times this night, but she is most unlikely to end the curse if she remains under the spell,” Alainn deduced.
“You may be at a stalemate,” Conner suggested. “If one wilna give before the other and if you do not wish for the witch to see her child.”
“Well, he is a male,” Alainn added.
Conner and Killian stared at her as if not entirely understanding the meaning or unwilling to think upon it.
“Aye, a lusting witch will mate with her own child and see absolutely no wrongfulness in so doing. Lusting witches and shees do not fall remotely short of incestuous relationships or interspecies unions or even mating with animals,” Danhoul agreed and elaborated.
“If she’s willing to mate with a troll, I suppose she’d fornicate with most any being,” the trow suggested. “Although ironically it is said, of all the creatures a lusting witch will mate with, trolls are the least likely for apparently witches are mostly repulsed by them. Yet trolls are uncontrollably attracted to witches. Perhaps another curse placed so many centuries in the past no one remembers any longer.” The small creature had spat several times during his revelation.
Killian was intent on the dilemma at hand. “You’re sayin’ that she may not remove the curse if the spell isn’t undone first, but sure she won’t be induced to remove it if it is undone beforehand.” Killian’s lack of sleep was obviously weighing on his patience in attempting to understand.
“I know how impossible it sounds, Killian, and I am not saying it is a quest that will be without risk, I am only suggesting I must see if I am able to accomplish it.”
He stared at her and apparently noted the determination on her face. He nodded and attempted a smile before he walked away once more and began to pace, which was common when he was particularly vexed about something.
*
The trow had returned to his place beneath the ground during the daylight hours while Alainn and Danhoul magically prepared the location. Killian and Conner assisted as well. They prepared an outer circle with heavy rocks that Alainn moved by way of her magic. The inner circle had small stones and crystals placed about and all were assembled by using the number thirteen in various manners.
Alainn was busily digging up pebbles, brambles, thistles and nettles within the inner circle and disposing of them when Killian questioned her regarding her reason for doing so. It was Danhoul who offered a solemn reply.
“Alainn believes the witch will be capable of using nearly anything against her as a weapon or a threat, so she intends to remove whatever she is able.”
Killian shook his head once more, but went to assist her. After sunset, the trow reappeared with the wizard’s son. Alainn placed him behind a tree encircled by a solid concealment spell. Alainn summoned the wizard and he appeared before them.
Alainn had never actually seen a wizard before although it was believed the man Aine had mated with to produce her grandmother Ainna, had been a wizard. The man before them now appeared like any other man, but he wore a dark cloak that nearly touched the ground and he carried an oaken twig fashioned into a wand.
He stared back at her as if to assess her as well. “You have summoned me here by way of magic and told me it has to do with my child?”
She only nodded.
“You are a witch?” he questioned with some disdain.
“Aye.”
“I’ve no fondness for witches if I’m being truthful.”
“Well, obviously that wasn’t always so or we wouldn’t be needing to meet like this.”
“True enough,” he replied. “But that was back in the days when I was young and foolish, using my magic to ends that were not honorable.”
“If you are a powerful wizard, as I have been assured, why is it you have not been able to locate the child… the product of the union of you and the eternal lusting witch?”
“She has placed a warding spell on her and anyone of her line.”
“So she is more powerful than you?”
“She has more natural abilities I suppose, but I have learned much of magic, trained all these centuries, perfected my magical abilities and found a way to become eternal myself. She simply wasted all this time lamenting in not being able to lure males to her.”
“Well, she is a lusting witch; she is truly helpless to resist that primal impulse.”
“I am much aware of her lusting for she had no qualms in allowing me to have her when I was in the form of a most repulsive troll, and believe me when I say trolls are nasty beings and hideously ugly creatures.”
The trow who stood near them continued to spit at every time the word was mentioned. The wizard looked at him with some displeasure, but mostly ignored him.
“What are your intentions toward your son if we should locate him?”
“I have a son!” The wizard smiled with sincerity.
“You weren’t even aware of that information?”
“No, his mother’s concealment spell allows me to know nothing of the child.”
“What do you hope to do should you meet your son?”
“I want to school him in wizardry, of course. I want to teach him all I know of magic.”
“Are you an evil wizard?”
“I may be given to evil tendencies at times, usually in retribution for something wrongful done to me, but mostly I am a benevolent wizard.”
Alainn appreciated his candor. “If we agree to bring your son to you, would you force him to go with you if it is not his wish?”
“I would be incapable of forcing him to do anything. If he has even a portion of his mother’s abilities, he would be forced to do nothing he does not agree to.”
“But if he has lived his life without knowledge of his abilities, surely they won’t be as developed as they might be. You must promise never to use his powers to an evil end.”
“Certainly, for it would be best to have my son, schooled wisely and purposefully. I promise you, if he accompanies me, he will be counseled to use his magic only for the purpose of goodness.”
Alainn was appeased by the wizard’s replies and intuitively believed he spoke the truth. She nodded. From the concealment of the bushes, Danhoul escorted the young man toward his father. There was little doubt they were related for the resemblance was unmistakable.
The young man had been rai
sed by the trows and seen very few humans before, bar the other children the trows had taken, but he seemed to possess an inherent ability and recognized his father. There was a dawning within his eyes as his father went to him and even never having seen him before, there was pride and notable paternal affection in the wizard’s eyes.
“I have been searching for you for centuries, my son!” He beamed and the young man smiled happily.
“You will remove the spell as we have discussed?” Alainn looked at the wizard as she spoke.
He nodded, and pulled his wand from within his cloak, but she stopped him.
“If you would agree to wait until the other magical creature is here so that we might deal with them first, I would be grateful.” She tried to shield the young man from the knowledge of his mother.
“I will not allow myself or my son to be anywhere near that being.”
“I will place a spell of concealment on the both of you,” Alainn argued hoping to persuade the wizard.
“It is done now before I leave or not at all,” the wizard said with finality.
“Could it be done from a distance after the being arrives?”
The wizard had grown impatient and shook his head. Now that he had his son it was apparent he simply wanted to be off without delay. He moved his wand through the air in a purposeful manner and spoke an incantation.
“It is done.”
“Sure it must be somewhat limiting needing a wand to perform magic!” Alainn sniped at the wizard after his unwillingness to consider her suggestions.
“My wand is most powerful, I assure you, witch!”
Chapter Fourteen
Alainn and the wizard stood staring at each other and the tense magical presence was palpable in the air. The wizard dared to lift his wand in a challenging manner and Alainn raised her hands, neither one turning away from the other’s eyes.
“Perhaps we don’t actually need to do battle over whose magic is the most powerful this day!” Danhoul remarked as he looked at Alainn and the wizard, eyeing each other competitively. “We might have quite enough to contend with as it is!”
Alainn rolled her eyes and the wizard stared at her as though he would most definitely like to see what she was capable of achieving by way of her powers, but he lowered his wand and Alainn clasped her hands together and looked away from him in silent agreement.
The young man went to the trow and carefully lifted him up so their eyes were level. They held their palms upward and placed them together as they closed their eyes and lowered their heads in what must have been the trows way of issuing a fond farewell. This left Alainn heartened to know the trows had never treated the young man in anything but a caring manner. Without a word spoken, the young man left with the wizard with no reluctance or reservations.
“Well, that was simple enough,” Conner declared.
“Perhaps too simple,” Danhoul suggested.
“Aye,” Killian said from where he stood leaning against a yew tree. “Although I don’t pretend to know so very much of magic, I would say that went entirely too smoothly.”
Alainn held time at a standstill and since Killian, Danhoul, and Conner were immune to her magic, they remained capable of watching all that transpired. Conner sat by the outer circle with uncertainty on his face.
“Now what?” he dared to ask.
“Now I must summon a lusting eternal witch who has not mated in seven hundred years and not because she hasn’t wanted to every minute through all those years. With the wizard’s spell removed, the witch will be undeniably appealing to all of you. She will be enthralling and bewitching and you may very well not be capable of resisting her.”
Conner and Killian stared at her as though she was surely exaggerating.
“We are all of us large, tall, strong men, more powerful and capable with our weapons than most. I canna believe we wouldna be able to fend her off,” Conner proclaimed.
“But the distinct truth of it is, Conner, you won’t want to fend her off, you will want to mate with her, torridly and repeatedly, and the need and desire will be so entirely primal and powerful it is unlikely you will resist her.”
“Och, I wilna believe that could be true.” He snorted.
“In truth, now that the spell is removed, if I cannot come up with a way to more capably ward you from her, and seal the circle, I would suggest I must send all of you far from here to where she cannot sense your presence. If you were not mostly immune to my magic I would simply employ my powers to send you off straightaway, perhaps to another realm so she cannot sense any connection to me!”
“And leave you here to deal with a malevolent witch on your own?” Killian suggested, “Not damnably likely.”
“Do you believe the three of you take turns having her with me watching if I am incapable of preventing it, would be beneficial to me in any way? For truly, Killian, if her powers of bewitchment and her lusting are as strong as I believe them to be, you will not care even that I am here to witness it. You will only want to have her again and again.”
He narrowed his eyes with some level of uncertainty and looked at Danhoul for confirmation.
“Most don’t have the misfortune of making acquaintance with a lusting eternal witch, but I once knew of someone who dealt with a shee. He was enslaved by her for weeks before he even allowed himself to think he might not actually want her.”
“And what happened to the man?” Killian inquired surely not certain he truly cared to know.
“He did not live long after that for he fell into a state of perilous exhaustion that caused him to be forever damaged, mind and body. He died shortly after.”
Killian and Conner both stared at her.
“You’re saying he swived himself to death?” Conner concluded.
Danhoul simply nodded.
“Create this damnable warding spell then, Alainn, and make haste, for sure you’ll not be capable of holding time at a standstill indefinitely,” Killian demanded.
*
Alainn placed another potent individual protection spell around each of the three men, and then a powerful spell around the outside circle. She had found several more shielding stones and safe-guarding crystals and used them to form the inner circle. She warded it with many Celtic and druid symbols placed strategically around the circle.
The men were to remain behind the outer circle of large rocks. She had placed a lesser spell on the outer circle, but since the men were often immune to her magic because she’d healed them with her own blood, she believed that spell would not be entirely effective.
The spell on the inner circle had taken much time, in fact she’d spent hours just on the wording and several more hours obtaining what she needed to make certain nothing or no one would be capable of leaving once inside the inner circle unless she removed the spell or used her own magic to allow them to be sent out of the circle.
She planned to summon the witch inside the inner circle and she prayed her own magic would match the witch’s powers and she would be capable of reasoning with her. She stared at Conner, then Danhoul, and finally Killian.
“If she manages to break through the concealment spell, which I am reasonably certain she will be capable of doing possibly within minutes, then I will need each of you even momentarily to appear as if you do not find her appealing. All I ask is that you must look at her and then simply look away, for then she’ll believe the spell still holds. It will take all the will within you to turn from her once you have looked upon her. I only need to convince her the spell hasn’t yet been removed, but that it will be as soon as she removes the curse.”
All three men nodded though Alainn detected dread and uncertainty on each of their faces. “Under no circumstances are you to enter this inner circle. You must stay outside of the perimeter; no matter what she says or does, or how she tempts you, stay where you are. She will surely attempt much treachery to see you inside the circle. She won’t be capable of escaping or getting to you. Remember, if you don’t step within,
she can’t get to you. Of that I am certain. Once inside, no one will be capable of leaving the inner circle unless I undo the spell or use my magic to allow it to be so. So do not step inside, I warn you.”
“And if she attempts to harm you?” Killian asked with his hand instinctively on his sword.
“If she is able to harm me, you coming within the protective barrier will not prevent it. It will only put you severely at risk as well. And, if by way of her powers, she should kill me, still whoever remains within would be trapped in that circle for all eternity for I have included that condition in my spell. If the witch should refuse to remove the curse on the trows, I believe she will remain trapped inside. I do not think even the Celtic gods would be capable of leaving the protected circle.”
“I don’t pretend to like it, Alainn!”
“Killian, I ask you to promise me you will stay outside the barrier. She will attempt to call you within the circle, trick you to come in by any means she can, but I believe even if you are filled with lust for her unless you willingly step within the circle of your own accord, she won’t be able to get to you.”
“But you’ve said we will want to mate with her, why would we not simply step within the circle?” Conner queried still unsure of any of what was about to transpire.
“If you stay put outside the outer circle, you will be capable of resisting her. You may need to purposely use your wits and simply not give in to temptation, but no more so than perhaps resisting a beautiful woman already pledged to another when you’ve had a bit too much to drink and your impulses and judgment are slightly impaired. You will need to show restraint but it will be possible. But should you cross between the two circles the pull will be much, much stronger, and if you dared to enter the warded inner circle, be forewarned, it will no longer be within your power to resist her. I believe that with all the magic I possess and the intuition. It is an absolute certainty.”
“Nay, I’ll not agree to that, Alainn. I know I’ll not be capable of resisting coming to aid you if you are in certain peril. Sure I’d be filled with the need to protect you. It is not within my power as a man to simply stand by and see you hurt or worse… not within my ability as a man, and most certainly not as your husband.”
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