Dark and Stormy Knight (25 page)

“Welcome to Brocaliande.” His accent was Irish. “I am Cathbad, sage and seer.”

Her pulse quickened under the druid’s dark gaze. Psychic tentacles probed her mind. After several uncomfortable moments of this, Cathbad beckoned her to come forward.

Heart hammering, she did as he bade. When she was close enough to touch him, he shook the branch, setting off a sweet chorus of tinkling. He then set his free hand on her belly and closed his eyes. His touch triggered feelings of violation, but she couldn’t bring herself to object. This man, or whatever he was, held the key to her happy future. She couldn’t risk giving offense.

“The child you carry is a lassie.”

The pronouncement jolted. “Will I live to see her born?”

“That will depend.”

Dread closed a hand around Gwyn’s heart and squeezed. “On what?”

“On whether you prove yourself worthy of the magic you seek.”

Gwyn blinked at him, her mouth suddenly dry. “And if I do, you will break the curse?”

“I will,” he said with a nod, “but first you must perform a series of trials.”

Panic blossomed in her chest. “What kind of trials?”

“The first will be a series of riddles,” Cathbad told her.

Her mouth went dry. “And if I can’t answer them?”

He gave her a cold, distant smile. “You will return to the Hitherworld to face your fate.”

Holy smokes. She couldn’t let that happen. Especially now that she knew for a fact she carried Leith’s child. She could do this. Her father used to quiz her with riddles all the time. She’d gotten pretty good at figuring them out, too. She just prayed she wasn’t too out of practice.

“I shall start with an easy one.” His smile warmed her a smidge. “From her heavenly throne, she wields powers unseen; though ever-changing, she is a constant queen. What is she?”

Gwyn took a moment to absorb the clues. He was right; it was an easy one. “The moon.”

“Very good.” His dark eyes glimmered, worrying her. “Here’s the next one. Emeralds and diamonds. Lost by the moon, found by the sun, and picked up soon.”

This one, luckily, was one of her father’s. “Dew.”

“Excellent.”

Why did she get the sinking feeling this was only a warm up? The third riddle confirmed her suspicion.

“We four are brothers: the first can eat almost anything, but is always hungry. The second can drink any liquid, but his thirst is never quenched. The third sings a song that is displeasing to the ear. And the fourth can overcome any obstacle in his path. Who are the four brothers?”

Oh, dear. Four brothers. The four directions? No, that didn’t fit. The four horsemen of the apocalypse? No, she knew that riddle and this wasn’t it. Nor did the descriptions fit them. Four card suits? The four Grail Hallows? Nope, those didn’t fit either.

Damn, this was a tough one.

She bit her lip and scratched her head, thinking hard. Maybe if she could get just one, the others would fall into place. Ate anything but stayed hungry. An abyss? No, an abyss had no brothers that she knew of. Drank everything but never quenched its thirst? A sponge? That couldn’t be right. What brothers did a sponge have?

Shit. If she didn’t get this, she’d lose everything. And something told her it wouldn’t be the last of his riddles—nor the most difficult.

She racked her brain. She had to get this, had to. Her life and that of her unborn daughter were at stake.

A soft breeze ruffled her hair and whistled in her ear. Wind. Wind sang a tune displeasing to the ear. And wind had three brothers. Fire, which ate almost anything and was still hungry; earth, which absorbed any liquid; and water, which traveled over any obstacle in its path.

“The four elements.” She beamed with pride.

He gave her a superior smile. “Very good. But let us see if you can get this next one. Though sightless and unarmed, I combat evil and chaos. Balance is the goal I seek in trials big and small. What am I?”

Biting her lip, Gwyn took a moment to piece together the clues. Blindness. Balance. Trials. The answer was obvious.

“Justice.”

“You are clever lass,” he conceded with an approving nod, “but let’s see if you can guess this final riddle. The answer is a word. The first two letters suggest a man; the first three a woman; the first four a man of courage and honor; the whole a woman in a leading role. What is the word?”

She fought the smile tugging at her mouth. She knew this one. In fact, the riddle was her all-time favorite.

“Heroine.”

“Indeed,” he said with a twinkle in his eye, “which is what you must prove yourself to be in the final task.”

Uh-oh. That didn’t sound good. As harrowing images from
The Hunger Games
flashed behind her eyes, she blinked them away. Despite dreading the answer, she had to know. “And what might that be?”

The dark shadow that crossed his face raised goosebumps across her flesh. “You must bring me the enchanted chalice of the Queen of Avalon. For as a spell is cast, so must it be broken.”

* * * *

Gwyn and her escort, a raven-haired druid warrior who was far from hard on the eyes, left the grove an hour ago and were moving deeper into the forest. The druid, who had eyes as clear and blue as an autumn sky, would take her on horseback though the borderlands to the edge of the channel separating the two islands.

Once there, she would be on her own.

Ancient trees towered thickly all around, their great gnarled roots snaking across the path here and there. Moss and lichen clung to the grooved bark on one side of their massive trunks. Vines entwined their branches. Ferns densely carpeted the forest floor, encroaching on the narrow path. The whole scene had a primordial feel about it.

“How long before we reach the water?” she asked her companion.

His name was Bran, which meant “raven” in Gaelic—on account of his hair, presumably, which was so black and lustrous it shone blue in the sunlight.

“Two or three days, depending on what we encounter,” he replied in his baritone brogue.

“What might we encounter?” Her stomach knotted as her imagination conjured possibilities ranging from the Orcs of
Lord of the Rings
to the Rodents of Unusual Size from
The
Princess Bride
.

“The borderlands are home to roving bands of Goblin marauders who can make trouble for travelers.” His serene tone did not match his statement.

Her eyebrows drew together. “What kind of trouble?”

“Nothing you need fret about,” he assured her.

He slowed and, as she came alongside, he gave her a dazzling smile. She bit her lip. Holy crap. The man was gorgeous. Jaw-dropping, heart-thumping, pussy-dripping gorgeous. Yes, she was spoken for and pregnant, but she wasn’t dead. Not yet, anyway. And there was no crime in looking.

Actually, now that she thought about it,
was
she spoken for? Leith said he loved her and seemed happy about the prospect of a baby, but he’d made no move to put a ring on her finger. In fact, he’d never mentioned anything long term. Not that she would consider cheating on him, however alluring the temptation.

As she swept her gaze over the druid, she fought to keep her lust at bay. His wardrobe didn’t help matters. Or, rather, the lack thereof. His gleaming, muscular torso was bare save for the amulet hanging on a cord from his sinewy neck.

Below the waist, he wore only a belted plaid, a rougher version of the one Leith had donned that first night in the dungeon, and knee-high boots—the soft-leather sort that laced around buttons all the way to his knees.

Encircling his impressive biceps were the same tattooed bands as Leith’s. Leather bracers covered his forearms from wrist to elbow. He carried a dirk in his belt and a bow and quiver of arrows across his sculpted back.

He wasn’t better looking than Leith, just different. Leith’s good looks were rugged and rakish; Bran’s more ethereal and godlike. Leith’s eyes radiated the intensity of strong passions repressed. Bran’s reflected the serenity of deep inner peace. Both had black hair, but Leith’s was a soft brown-black, while Bran’s was a sleek blue-black. At some point along their journey, she planned to ask the druid about his beliefs. She’d been more or less adrift since turning away from her Catholic upbringing and the whole Celtic gestalt seemed pretty cool. What she knew about it, anyway, which could fill an acorn and still rattle.

For now, however, other matters occupied her thoughts. Stealing the chalice, breaking the curse, and now the added prospect of attack by Goblin raiders.

She wasn’t placated by Bran’s nonchalance. Everything she’d read described goblins as hideous, greedy creatures with unpleasant dispositions. In
The Princess and the Goblin
, one of the storybooks her father used to read her, goblins were former humans who could be frightened away by singing a rhyme at the top of your voice.

It was worth a try, but what would she sing?

All she could think of were the silly schoolyard rhymes from childhood.

Granted, one of them might work in a pinch, if singing rhymes worked at all, but she’d prefer something a bit more mature.

As she continued thinking, she shifted in the saddle to ease the growing soreness in her backside. She’d only ever ridden rental nags that plodded along like they were half-dead. The druids had insisted she wear the gown Belphoebe had worn at the time of her escape, to help her blend in once she reached Avalon. A diaphanous toga of sorts, the garment left nothing to the imagination. If not for her bra and panties, everything Gwyn owned would be on public display.

Bran seemed oblivious—just as well. Maybe he was gay. She’d read somewhere that the Celts prized masculine beauty and love above the heterosexual variety. At night, the soldiers would all do each other in a line like pop-together beads.

Her gaze swept from Bran to his horse. As gorgeous as its rider, the beast was black with flowing mane and tail, slender legs, and intelligent brown eyes. Its hooves were silver and its golden bridle adorned with tiny bells.

The mare she rode was almost as pretty. White and slightly smaller, but with the same silver hooves and bell-clad golden bridle.

The bells jingled with every step, a soft, magical sound that made her think of faeries—the tiny benevolent kind with gossamer wings and pointed ears, not the sort who stole the wounded from battlefields, ate their own children, and put cruel curses on handsome knights.

Gwyn set a hand on her belly, thinking of the life growing within. Would Leith be pleased she carried a girl? She was. She’d always wanted a little girl she could dress up in frilly things.

She turned to Bran. “Will the child I’m carrying grow like a human baby?”

“Is her father of the Fae?”

“Yes, but he used to be human.”

“I see,” the druid said, brow furrowing. “That makes the answer more complicated. Were she a pure-blooded faery, she would mature and age in the manner of a tree.”

Gwyn squinted at him, frowning. “Like a tree? What does that mean?”

Bran smiled as serenely as a saint. “In the same manner as trees, the natural-born Fae grow from seedling to sapling to adulthood over a time span similar to that of a human child, but once they reach maturity, age at a rate imperceptible to the naked eye.”

“And if she’s only half faery? Will she age and die like a human?”

“That will depend on her genetic makeup,” he said, still wearing his saintly smile. “But, in general, faery genes tend to dominate. Have you never wondered why there is no name for the offspring of a human-faery coupling?”

Now that he mentioned it, she’d never heard the hybrids called by a particular name, despite such couplings being commonplace in the lore. Her father often mentioned changelings in connection with the faery folk, but as the creatures left in the place of a stolen human, not the offspring of a human-Fae coupling.

“Why is there no name for them?”

“Because, for all intents and purposes, they are Fae.”

“So, my daughter will age like a tree?”

“Aye,” he said. “Just as you and your husband will.”

“He’s not my husband,” she replied with a lump in her throat. “But we love each other very much and I’m certain we’ll be getting married as soon as we break his curse.”

After all, there wasn’t much point in getting married if she’d be dead in a couple of weeks. The thought’s devastating kickback nearly knocked her off her horse.

Quick, think about something else, like what to sing if the goblins should attack… or how to steal Queen Morgan’s cup.

As much as Gwyn didn’t want to think about the mission ahead, she couldn’t help but be intrigued by the object of her quest. Might the cup be the long-lost Holy Grail of legend? She could not rule it out, given Queen Morgan’s role in Arthurian legend.

“Bran,” she began, pulse galloping, “what is the story behind the chalice Cathbad has ordered me to steal? Do you know?”

His serene gaze settled on her. “It’s the Cup of Truth the Lord of the Seas gave to King Cormac.”

“So, it’s not the cup Jesus drank from at the Last Supper?”

The druid shrugged one of his powerful shoulders. “That is debatable. There are many who claim the so-called Holy Grail and Manannan mac Lir’s Cup of Truth are one and the same.”

Leith gaped at Tom in disbelief as they climbed into the van at the Callanish car park. In the three days he’d waited around, he’d imagined a dizzying array of possibilities, but never the one the prophet had just described. He hadn’t imagined it, because he hadn’t believed it possible—and still could not! How could Cathbad send his darling Gwyneth, who carried their child—a lassie, if the druid spoke the truth—off to Avalon to face Queen Morgan alone? To steal her bloody chalice, no less, the source of the faery queen’s Unseelie powers. The task was impossible. Anyone crazy enough to attempt such a mad feat would almost certainly pay with his or her life.

Her life, in this case.

Regret wrung his heart like a blood-soaked sponge. Had he known she’d find herself on such a dangerous mission, he would have taught her to shift, bairn or no bairn. As grievous as the loss of another child would be, they could always make another. But he could not find another to rival his wee mouse if he were to search for the next thousand years.