by Nora Roberts
She rose, took both their hands again, let the power spark from one to one. “I swear by our blood we will go home again.”
“I swear by our blood,” Eamon said, “we or what comes from us will destroy even the thought of him.”
“I swear by our blood,” Teagan said, “we are the three, and will ever be.”
“Now we close the circle, but never again close off what we are, what we have, what we were given.” Brannaugh released their hands. “We leave on the morrow.”
* * *
EYES WEEPY, AILISH WATCHED BRANNAUGH PACK HER SHAWL. “I beg you to stay. Think of Teagan. She’s but a child.”
“The age I was when we came to you.”
“As you were a child,” she said.
“I was more. We are more, and must be what we are.”
“I frightened you by speaking of Fial. You cannot think we would force a marriage upon you.”
“No. Oh no.” Brannaugh turned then, took her cousin’s hands. “You never would. It is not for Fial we leave you, cousin.”
Turning, Brannaugh packed the last of her things.
“Your mother would not want this for you.”
“My mother would want us to be home, happy and safe with her and our father. But that was not to be. My mother gave her life for us, gave her power to us. And now her purpose to us. We must live our lives, embrace our power, complete our purpose.”
“Where will you go?”
“To Clare, I think. For now. We will come back. And we will go home. I feel it as true as life. He will not come here.”
Turning back, she looked into her cousin’s eyes, her own like smoke. “He will not come here or harm you or any of yours. This I swear to you on my mother’s blood.”
“How can you know?”
“I am one of three. I am a dark witch of Mayo, first daughter of Sorcha. He shall not come here nor harm you or yours. You are protected for all of your life. This I have done. I would not leave you unprotected.”
“Brannaugh . . .”
“You worry.” Brannaugh laid her hands over her cousin’s hands, which rested on the mound of her belly. “Have I not told you your son is well and healthy? The birthing will go easy, and quickly as well. This I can promise as well, and I do. But . . .”
“What is it? You must tell me.”
“As you love me so still you fear what I have. But you must bide me now, in this. Your son, this one to come, must be the last. He will be healthy, and the birthing will go well. But the next will not. If there is a next, you will not survive.”
“I . . . You cannot know. I cannot deny my husband the marriage bed. Or myself.”
“You cannot deny your children their mother. It is a terrible grieving, Ailish.”
“God will decide.”
“God will have given you seven children, but the price for another will be your life, and the babe’s as well. As I love you, heed me.”
She took a bottle from her pocket. “I have made this for you. Only you. You will put it away. Once every month on the first day of your courses, you will drink—one sip only. You will not conceive, even after you take the last sip, for it will be done. You will live. Your children will have their mother. You will live to rock their children.”
Ailish laid her hands over the mound of her belly. “I will be barren.”
“You will sing to your children, and their children. You will share your bed with your man in pleasure. You will rejoice in the precious lives you brought into the world. The choice is yours, Ailish.”
She closed her eyes a moment. When she opened them, they turned dark, dark. “You will call him Lughaidh. He will be fair of face and hair, blue of eye. A strong boy with a ready smile, and the voice of an angel. One day he will travel and ramble and use his voice to make his living. He will fall in love with a farmer’s daughter, and will come back to you with her to work the land. And you will hear his voice across the fields, for he will ever be joyful.”
She let the vision go. “I have seen what can be. You must choose.”
“This is the name I chose for him,” Ailish murmured. “I never told you, nor anyone.” Now she took the bottle. “I will heed you.”
Pressing her lips together, Ailish reached into her pocket, took out a small pouch. This she pushed into Brannaugh’s hand. “Take this.”
“I won’t take your coin.”
“You will.” The tears fell now, spilling down her cheeks like rain. “Do you think I don’t know you saved me and Conall in the birthing? And even now you think of me and mine? You have given me joy. You have brought Sorcha to me when I missed her, for I saw her in you day by day. You will take the coin, and swear to me you will be safe, you will come back. All of you, for you are mine as I am yours.”
Understanding, Brannaugh slipped the purse into the pocket of her skirts, then kissed Ailish on each cheek. “I swear it.”
Outside Eamon did his best to make his cousins laugh. They asked him not to go, of course, asked why he must, tried to bargain with him. So he wound stories of the grand adventures he would have, smiting dragons and catching magick frogs. He saw Teagan walking with a weeping Mabh, saw her give Mabh a rag doll she’d made herself.
He wished Brannaugh would hurry, for the leave-taking was a misery. Alastar stood ready. Eamon—he was head of the family, after all, had decided his sisters would ride, and he would walk.
He would brook no argument.
Bardan came out of the little stable leading Slaine—Old Slaine now, as the broodmare was past her prime, but a sweet-natured thing for all that.
“Her breeding days are done,” Bardan said in his careful way. “But she’s a good girl, and she’ll serve you well.”
“Oh, but I can’t be taking her from you. You need—”
“A man needs a horse.” Bardan set his calloused hand on Eamon’s shoulder. “You’ve done a man’s work for the farm, so you’ll take her. I’d give you Moon for Brannaugh if I could spare him, but you’ll take Old Slaine here.”
“It’s more than grateful I am to you, for Slaine and all the rest. I promise you I’ll treat her like a queen.”
For a moment, Eamon let himself be just a boy, and threw his arms around his cousin, the man who’d been a father to him for half his life. “We’ll come back one day.”
“Be sure you do.”
When it was done, all the farewells, the safe journeys, the tears, he swung up on the mare, his grandfather’s sword and sheath secured against his saddle. Brannaugh mounted behind Teagan, leaned down once to kiss Ailish a last time.
They rode away from the farm, their home for five years, from their family—and south toward the unknown.
He looked back, waved as they waved, found himself more torn in the leaving than he’d expected. Then overhead Roibeard called, circled before spearing the way south.
This was meant, Eamon decided. This was the time.
He slowed his pace a bit, cocked his head at Teagan. “So, how does our Slaine feel about all this then?”
Teagan looked down at the mare, cocked her head in turn. “Oh, it’s a grand adventure to her, to be sure, and she never thought to have another. She’s proud and she’s grateful. She’ll be loyal to the end of her days, and do her very best for you.”
“And I’ll do my best for her. We’ll ride through midday before we stop to rest the horses, and eat the first of the oatcakes Ailish packed for us.”
“Is that what we’ll be doing?” Brannaugh said.
He tossed up his chin. “You’re the eldest, but I have the staff, however puny you might think it is—which it isn’t at all. Roibeard shows the way, and we follow.”
Brannaugh looked up, watched the flight of the hawk. Then down at Kathel who pranced along beside Alastar as if he could walk all day and through the night.
“Your guide, mine, and Teagan’s. Aye, we follow. Ailish gave me some coin, but we won’t be spending it unless we must. We’ll be making our own.”
“And just h
ow are we doing that?”
“By being what we are.” She lifted her hand, palm up, brought a small ball of flame into it. Then vanished it. “Our mother served her gift, tended us, her cabin. We can surely serve our gift, tend ourselves, and find a place to do both.”
“Clare’s a wild place I hear,” Teagan offered.
“And what better place than the wild for such as us?” The pure joy of freedom ripened with every step. “We have our mother’s book, and we’ll study, we’ll learn. We’ll make potions and do healings. A healer is always welcome, she told me.”
“When he comes, it will take more than healing and potions.”
“So it will,” Brannaugh said to her brother. “So we learn. We were safe five years at the farm. If our guides lead us to Clare, as it seems they will, we may have the next five there. Time enough to learn, to plan. When we go home again, we’ll be stronger than he can know.”
They rode through midday and into the rain. Soft and steady it fell from a sky of bruises and broodings. They rested the horses, watered them, shared oatcakes, with some for Kathel.
Through the rain came the wind as they continued their journey, past a little farm and cabin with smoke puffing out of the chimney, sending out the scent of burning peat. Inside they might be welcome, be given tea and a place by the fire. Inside the warm and dry.
But Kathel continued to prance, Roibeard to circle, and Alastar never slowed.
And even the gloomy light began to die as the day tipped toward night.
“Slaine grows weary,” Teagan murmured. “She won’t ask to stop, but she tires. Her bones ache. Can’t we rest her a bit, find a dry place and—”
“There!” Eamon pointed ahead. Near the muddy track stood what might have been an old place of worship. Sacked now, burned down to the scorched stone by men who couldn’t stop destroying what those they vanquished had built.
Roibeard circled over it, calling, calling, and Kathel bounded ahead.
“We’ll stop there for the night. Make a fire, rest the animals and ourselves.”
Brannaugh nodded at her brother. “The walls stand—or most of them. It should keep the wind out, and we can do the rest. It’s nearly end of day. We owe Mordan and Mabon who came from her our thanks.”
One wall had fallen in, they discovered, but the others stood. Even some steps, which Eamon immediately tested, circled up to what had been a second level. Whatever timber had been used had burned to ashes and blown to the winds. But it was shelter of a sort and, Brannaugh felt, the right place.
This would be the place of their first night, the equinox, when the light and the dark balanced.
“I’ll tend the horses.” Teagan took the reins of both. “The horses are mine, after all. I’ll see to them, if you make us a place, a dry spot I’m hoping, and a good fire.”
“That I’ll do. We’ll give our thanks, then have some tea and some of the dried venison before we—”
She broke off as Roibeard swooped down, perched on a narrow stone ledge.
And dropped a fat hare on the ground at Eamon’s feet.
“Well now, that’s a feast in the making. I’ll clean it, Teagan tends the horses, and Brannaugh the fire.”
A dry spot, she thought, and shoving back the hood of her cloak imagined one. Drew up and out what she was, thought of warm and dry—and flashed out heat so bright and hot it nearly burned them all before she drew it down again.
“I’m sorry for that. I haven’t done any of this before.”
“It’s a cork out of a bottle,” Eamon decided. “And it poured out too fast.”
“Aye.” She slowed it, carefully, carefully. She didn’t mind the wet for herself, but Teagan was right. The old mare’s bones ached, even she could feel it.
She eased back the wet, slowly, just a bit, just a bit more. It trembled through her, the joy of it. Loosed now, free. Then the fire. Magickal tonight. Other nights, as their mother had taught them, a body gathered wood, put the work into it. But tonight, it would be her fire.
She brought it, banked it.
“A bit of the oatcake, and some wine,” she told her brother, her sister. “An offering of thanks to the gods for the balance of the day and night, for the cycle of rebirth. And for this place of rest.
“Into the fire,” she told them. “The cake, then the wine. These small things we share with thee, we give our thanks we servants three.”
“At this time where day meets night, we embrace both dark and light,” Eamon continued, not sure where the words had come from.
“We will learn to stand and fight, to use our gifts for the right and the white,” Teagan added.
“In this place and hour, we open to our given power. From now till ever it will be free. As we will, so mote it be.”
The fire shot up, a tower, red, orange, gold, with a heart of burning blue. A thousand voices whispered in it, and the ground shook. Then the world seemed to sigh.
The fire was a fire, banked in a tidy circle on the stony ground.
“This is what we are,” Brannaugh said, still glowing from the shock of energy. “This is what we have. The nights grow longer now. The dark conquers light. But he will not conquer us.”
She smiled, her heart full as it hadn’t been since the morning they’d left home. “We need to make a spit for the hare. We’ll have that feast tonight, our first. And we’ll rest in the warm and dry until we journey on.”
* * *
EAMON CURLED BY THE FIRE, HIS BELLY FULL, HIS BODY warm and dry. And journeyed on.
He felt himself lift up, lift out, and fly. North. Home.
Like Roibeard, he soared over the hills, the rivers, the fields where cattle lowed, where sheep cropped.
Green and green toward home with the sun sliding quiet through the clouds.
His heart, so light. Going home.
But not home. Not really home, he realized when he found himself on the ground again. The woods, so familiar—but not. Something different. Even the air different, and yet the same.
It all made him dizzy and weak.
He began to walk, whistling for his hawk. His guide. The light changed, dimmed. Was night coming so fast?
But not the night, he saw. It was the fog.
And with it, the wolf that was Cabhan.
He heard the growl of it, reached for his grandfather’s sword. But it wasn’t at his side. He was a boy, ankle deep in mists, unarmed, as the wolf with the red gem glowing around his neck walked out of the fog. And became a man.
“Welcome back, young Eamon. I’ve waited for you.”
“You killed my father, my mother. I’ve come to avenge them.”
Cabhan laughed, a rolling, merry sound that sent ice running up Eamon’s spine.
“It’s spirit you have, so that’s fine and well. Come avenge then, the dead father, the dead witch who whelped you. I will have what you are, and then I’ll make your sisters mine.”
“You will never touch what’s mine.” Eamon circled, tried to think. The fog rose and rose, clouding all, the woods, the path, his mind. He gripped air, fisted it, hurled it. It carved a shaky and narrow path. Cabhan laughed again.
“Closer. Come closer. Feel what I am.”
He did feel it, the pain of it, the power of it. And the fear. He tried fire, but it fell smoldering, turned to dirty ash. When Cabhan’s hands reached out for him, he lifted his fists to fight.
Roibeard swooped like an arrow, claws and beak tearing at those outstretched hands. The blood ran black as the man howled, as the man began to re-form into the wolf.
And another man came through the fog. Tall, his brown hair damp from the mists, his eyes deep and green and full of power and fury.
“Run,” he told Eamon.
“I will not run from such as he. I cannot.”
The wolf pawed the ground, showed its teeth in a terrible smile.
“Take my hand.”
The man grabbed Eamon’s hand. Light exploded like suns, power flew like a thousand beating wing
s. Blind and deaf, Eamon cried out. There was only power, covering him, filling him, bursting from him. Then with one shattering roar, the fog was gone, the wolf gone, and only the man gripping his hand remained.
The man dropped to his knees, breath harsh, face white, eyes full of magicks. “Who are you?” he demanded.
“I am Eamon son of Daithi, son of Sorcha. I am of the three. I am the Dark Witch of Mayo.”
“As am I. Eamon.” On a shaky laugh, the man touched Eamon’s hair, his face. “I am from you. You’re out of your time, lad, and in mine. I’m Connor, of the clan O’Dwyer. I am out of Sorcha, out of you. One of three.”
“How do I know this to be true?”
“I am your blood, you are mine. You know.” Connor pulled the amulet from under his shirt, touched the one, the same one, Eamon wore.
And the man lifted an arm. Roibeard landed on the leather glove he wore.
Not Roibeard, Eamon realized, and yet . . .
“My hawk. Not yours, but named for him. Ask him what you will. He is yours as much as mine.”
“This is . . . not my place.”
“It is, yes, not your time but your place. It ever will be.”
Tears stung Eamon’s eyes, and his belly quivered with longing worse than hunger. “Did we come home?”
“You did.”
“Will we defeat him, avenge our parents?”
“We will. We will never stop until it’s done. My word to you.”
“I wish to . . . I’m going back. I feel it. Brannaugh, she’s calling me back. You saved me from Cabhan.”
“Saving you saved me, I’m thinking.”
“Connor of the O’Dwyers. I will not forget.”
And he flew, over the hills again, until it was soft, soft morning and he sat by Brannaugh’s fire with both his sisters shaking him.
“Leave off, now! My head is circling over the rest of me.”
“He’s so pale,” Teagan said. “Here, here, I’ll fix you tea.”
“Tea would be welcome. I went on a journey. I don’t know how, but I went home, but ’twasn’t home. I need to sort through it. But I know something I didn’t. Something we didn’t.”
He guzzled some water Brannaugh pushed on him, then shoved the skin away again. “He can’t leave there. Cabhan. He can’t leave, or not far. The farther from home, from where he traded for his new powers, the less they are. He risks death to leave there. He can’t follow us.”
“How do you know this?” Brannaugh demanded.
“I . . . saw it in his mind. I don’t know how. I saw it there, that weakness. I met a man, he’s ours. I . . .” Eamon drew a long breath, closed his eyes a moment.
“Let me have some tea, will you then? A little tea, then I have a tale to tell you. We’ll bide here awhile yet, and I’ll tell you all. Then, aye, aye, south for us, to learn, to grow, to plan. For he can’t touch us. He won’t ever touch you.”
Whatever boy he’d been, he was a man now. And power still simmered inside him.
