Island Shifters: Book 01 - An Oath of the Blood (51 page)

When she opened her eyes again, a bright light hovered in the center of the room. It scared her so much that she sat up in bed and pulled the covers tight to her neck. For a moment, she thought Adrian Ravener was there to kill her.

“Do not be frightened, my love,” said a voice from the light, warm and loving.

She breathed a sigh of relief. She recognized the voice, and it was just a dream.

“It is me, Keke,” said the voice, and Queen Grace Kenley Everard, walked out of the light toward her bed, the body silhouetted in an otherworldly glow.

“Maman?” It was a child’s name for a mother, but all she knew.

“Yes, darling, it is me.”

“I love when you come to me in my dreams.”

“I am always with you, my darling, every moment of every day. But, this is not a dream.”

“I miss you so much.”

“I miss you too, Keke.” Keke was her mother’s favorite name for her as a child. “I have come to remind you that you cannot give up the fight. You are
Savitar
,” she said gently.

“You know of that?” Kiernan asked in surprise

“Yes,” the radiant wraith moved closer, her face pained.

Kiernan tilted her head in question. “Gemini said you wanted me to stay here, Maman.”

Her mother nodded and wisps of vapor trailed around her head sinuously. “That was the foolish wish of a frightened mother for her daughter. I now know that you must be there with the
Savitars
if there is to be any hope for the Island of Massa.”

“But, Maman…”

Grace Everard swelled in size. “I will not have my daughter, the Princess of Men, hide her head while innocent people die!”

The words caused the blood oath to stir in her body.

“You must fight, Kiernan!”

“Is that what you want?” she cried.

“It is what must be!”

“Then, I will do as you say, Maman,” she declared, all of the uncertainty shedding from her mind at last.

Her mother’s image receded and returned to its former size.

“Do you love him?” she asked softly. She did not have to say his name.

“With every fiber of my being,” Kiernan responded honestly.

“You hurt him badly.”

Kiernan buried her head in her hands. “I know, Maman, I know.”

“Fight for him, too.”

She shook her head. “He is gone.”

“No, he is camped off the road two leagues from the Illian. The darkness and his injuries have slowed his progress.”

Hope coursed through her body and all she wanted to do was to run to him. It took all of her willpower to ask instead, “Do you know the cause of the darkness?”

The wraith nodded. “Adrian Ravener has cast a spell over the world so his dark-dwelling Demon Army has the freedom to cause destruction day and night.”

“This is not a dream, is it, Maman?”

“No.”

“But why have you appeared to me now at this time?”

“Ask Bajan.”

“Bajan?”

“I must go. I love you very much, Keke, and so does your father. Remember that.” The glowing figure began to diminish until only a fading voice remained to cry out. “Tell Gemini that the cats are singing! She will know what it means.”

“I will and I love you, too, Maman!” and the light was gone.

Kiernan threw off her blankets and fumbled in the abrupt return to darkness for the tinderbox to light her candles. With trembling hands, she managed to get them lit and packed her belongings as quickly as she could. She took off the dress the Gems had given her and put on her blue gossamer dress with the arm veils and gold cuffs and sandals. Racing from the room, she ripped the braid out of her hair, tumbling it free.

Rushing along the poorly lit corridor and passing the fountain, she took the stairs two at a time, coming to a frantic halt in front of Gemini’s chambers. She pounded on the door. “Gemini! Are you awake? It is me, Kiernan!”

She heard shuffling from behind the door and waited impatiently.

When Gemini opened the door, her gray hair was hanging loose for sleep and she was in her nightdress holding a candle out in front of her. “What is it, dear? It is the middle of the night!”

“I am leaving,” she said without preamble.

Gemini’s eyebrows knitted together. “Does this have anything to do with that boy?”

She smiled. “It has everything to do with that boy. It also has to do with my mother.”

When Gemini did not respond, Kiernan said, “She came to me in a dream. I do not have time to explain. Diamond will figure it out before long.” She pulled Gemini into a hug. “Thank you for everything. I know you were doing what you thought my mother wanted, but circumstances have changed. She told me to tell you that the cats are singing.”

Gemini’s hand flew to her mouth. “How…how do you know that phrase?”

“I have to go, Gemini. Can I take a horse from the stables?”

The High Priestess looked dazed. “Yes, yes, of course.”

Kiernan started to go and then stopped in her tracks. “Gemini! My sword!”

The sorceress retreated into her room and returned with the sword, thrusting it into her hands. “May the Highworld be with you, Kiernan.”

“It already is!” she shouted and started to run.

It was dangerous to be running her horse at such reckless speed in the dark, but she had little choice. She had to find Beck and was putting her faith in the moonlight and the horse’s instinct to guide her. She did not realize it before, but Earthshine was only a few days away. It was impossible now to complete the mission they had set out to accomplish over a month ago. If she had stayed true and not become so lost. Wait!…that was one of the predictions that Mage Starr warned them about. One of them would be lost.

Well, she was lost no more.

Drumming the horse with her heels, she sped ahead into the night, the rushing air cleansing the murky tangle of her thoughts. Only when the brackish smell of the Illian River drifted to her nose did she slow the horse to a trot and frantically scan both sides of the road for Beck’s campsite.

“Beck!”

Bajan!

She continued to advance, cautiously now, along the road and stiffened when she glimpsed a soft glow from a small clearing in the trees. Heart racing, she dismounted quickly and ran through the coppice only to find the remnants of a discarded fire pit.

I am too late! They are gone.

Her legs threatened to collapse underneath her. What else could she do? Should she travel back to Iserport and then continue on to Sarphia? Beck now had her pendant, she reasoned, and the
Savitars
could carry on without her. She shook her head.
No!
Her mother said she had to be with them. Her only choice was to keep going no matter the circumstances.

Decision made, she ran back to the horse. The only marker she had in the darkness was the Illian River, and she should be able to follow it easy enough to Iserport as long as the terrain permitted.

She tried one more time.
Bajan!

Calm down, Princess, we are here. We have stopped at a small stream just through the wood ahead of you.

“Ahh!!” she screamed and hastily tied the horse to the bough of a tree and started running.

Prickly bushes and branches slapped at her face and arms as she dashed through the trees. She tripped over a log and her knee came down squarely on a rock, causing her to yelp in pain. She rose again, limping and bleeding, and finally crashed through the trees into a clearing.

Naked from the waist up with a wide bandage around his torso, Beck was leaning over the stream with cupped hands preparing to take a drink. His head whipped around when he heard her.

“Beck!” She started toward him, fell again and began to crawl, too emotionally and physically spent to continue.

He stood up slowly and stared at her in disbelief, but did not move.

“Beck! I am sorry,” she whimpered. “Please, Beck!”

He started toward her at an uncertain walk, and then began to jog, and then ran. She held her arms out to him and it felt to Kiernan like an eternity had passed, but then he was there, lifting her off her feet. She wrapped her legs around him and sobbed into his shoulder. Beck dropped to his knees and they fell to the ground in a tangled heap. She clutched him closely, afraid that if she let go, he would disappear and she would never get him back.

Kiernan untied her horse and slapped the animal’s rump to set him running free, hoping as she did that he would find his way safely back to the castle in Elloree. With the moonlight to guide her, she returned to the clearing.

Beck asked if she was hungry and offered her a pear.

“Famished,” she admitted, and bit into the fleshy fruit with relish, pleased that her appetite had returned after so long.

He reached out and fingered a handful of blond hair. “I like it much better this way.”

She grinned up at him. “Thank you, Beck.” She was not talking about the compliment and he knew that. “You took me back,” she said, incredulously.

“Yes,” he said quietly.

“Why?”

He gave her a crooked smile and then quickly went to his pack and pulled out a crumpled pink flower. He handed it to her. “Because of the list of things I cannot live without in this world, you are first.”

She batted back the tears that welled in her eyes and accepted the flower. “It is beautiful. Thank you.” She shook her head. “I do not deserve you.”

He laughed quietly. “Probably not, but you are stuck with me nevertheless, Your Grace.”

She playfully punched him in the side and he winced. “I am so sorry!” she cried.

He laughed again. “It’s fine. At least one rib is broken, but they do not hurt as much now that they have been wrapped.” He reached up, took her pendant from around his neck, and placed it over her head.

She felt him tense suddenly when they heard a sound, but then he relaxed. “Bajan has returned. We need to leave.”

She looked at him quizzically. “Now will you tell me why you had me send away our fastest means of transportation to Iserport?”

He grabbed her hand. “I will show you instead. And, we are not going to Iserport. We are going to Sarphia with a stop in Kondor first to see what we can discover about Rogan’s whereabouts.”

She shook her head in disbelief. “How in Highworld do you…”

“Trust me,” he interrupted.

She looked into his blue eyes and the love she found there staggered her. “I do trust you. Wherever you are headed, I will follow.”

He smiled.

“Go on ahead,” she said. “I want to have a word with Bajan.”

Nodding in understanding, he kissed her and walked away, and she fell back to wait for the Draca Cat. He had been out hunting and his muzzle was stained red. It would not last long. Bajan was meticulously fussy about cleanliness.

Welcome back, Princess.

Thank you, Bajan.
She paused.
Do you forgive me as Beck has?

The question is do you forgive me?

She snorted in her head.
What could you possibly need forgiveness for?