Reliquary's Choice: Book Two of The Celtic Prophecy (6 page)

Alex waded in to kneel behind Brenawyn, “Lean back.” Brenawyn looked confused, wary. “By touching, ye’ll be able ta use my strength ta help ye better deal with the pain.”

“No, I don’t want you in pain.”

“Sh. I willna be in pain. I’ll just be lending some o’ my strength ta ye. I’ll be fine. Doona worry. Eat the nut.”

Brenawyn settled against him, crackled the softened shell in her hand and picked out the pieces. She chewed and swallowed, not surprised when nothing happened. She sat looking at the image of the purple sky reflected in the surface of the water, at the dragonfly buzzing close to the surface, and at the frog on the bank off to the side of her vision. She turned her head to Alexander who sat cradling her body, her hands on his thighs as she sat crossed legged on the silty bottom of the well.

“The fruit that you just willingly ingested is the knowledge of all things. To eat it,” said Oghma as he cracked open another water-softened shell, “is to open yourself to that infinite truth. From the beginning of time to its end, knowledge will always be power. In the Old Ones’ great intuition, they granted favor in this well, but it does not come easily. For a prize such as this, the effort of will is necessary to seek the truth. You have given your consent when you asked to have the haze lifted from your mind. Once asked, gladly given. Once done, it cannot be undone. You will pass a threshold from which you can never return. Do you understand this, initiate?”

Her body bowed in that moment, racked and rigid with pain, Alex moved to cradle her close to him, and pour his strength into her, but it wasn’t enough. He repositioned her and pried her mouth open, and before he thought, his head swooped down to take her open mouth. He was batted away by an unseen force, but it was too late, Brenawyn’s pain was now his and his alone. He clawed at his head, fighting vainly to relieve the pressure, vomiting bile and sludge in the clear waters of the Well before sinking in the blessed arms of the warm water and oblivion.

Chapter 6

Oghma settled down and purposely eased the tension in his body, waiting for the one or another god to arrive. They were impatient; and to rely on such a weak-willed species with the delicacies of staving off another war was near unconscionable. But it was not his to say.

He was surprised that it was Nimue who appeared first.

“Greetings, brother. How dae ye pass the day?”

“Interestingly enough,” Oghma indicated the floating forms of priestess and her protector. “I thought that you might find it worthy of remark that your son has chosen to be her protector.”

Nimue raised an elegant eyebrow, “Did he now?” She stepped closer to the edge, turning her back to Oghma considering the two. “So chance intertwined the fates o’ those famed, ta be rejoined and set right when legacy is reclaimed.” She sighed, and then turned to face him. “It doesna surprise me at all. He is his father’s son after all; thaur is a sense o’ honor in all the Sinclair line.” She smiled, gaining a far-off look in her eye, “His father once offered ta champion for me, though he kent thaur was no need.”

Oghma bowed, “Just so then.”

“What did ye glean from the removal o’ the last o’ yer bindings?”

“Lines are being drawn and sides taken. As always, some wait to see the outcome. I do not worry over these. Those who claim to be with us are silent, though they are witnesses. Be wary. All who claim allegiance should not be trusted.”

“Noted.”

“As for the priestess … ”

“The would-be priestess, she has no’ given her consent fully yet.”

“As you say. She is unique. She can defend herself—actually fend off an attack. I smelt the burned flesh before I saw the ruin of what had been his right forearm. She healed her dog. Made a successful attempt at shape-shifting, stripped an Oracle of her ability, and helped in a resurrection spell.”

Nimue gasped. “How? She looks so … ”

“Feeble? Weak? Mortal?”

“Aye.”

“This I do not know, but she did it without preparation, training, or even the rudimentary knowledge of how it worked.”

Nimue rounded on him, pressing him to the ground. A stone shard dug painfully into his back. “Are ye telling me that she is anomalous, operating outside the bounds o’ fate and prophecy?”

Oghma pushed back against Nimue’s weight and sat up. “That is not all.”

“Tell me quickly.”

“She has an affinity for animals and can make the elements rise to her call.”

A sharp intake of breath and all noise of the forest and its life suddenly fell silent. “If it is how ye say, then the prophecy has come full circle, and we are looking at long last inta a possible end o’ times. Thaur will be several groups that willna stop until they wrest the power from her hands. Though this time I kin they will try ta kill her before she gives birth ta her progeny. She willna come inta her full power until then.”

~ ~ ~

Falling. The edge of the stair rushed up to make painful contact with her temple. She twisted to take the brunt on her side, protecting the baby, but end over end, heart pounding in her ears, she couldn’t control the momentum. Arms cradled her bulging stomach. Bruising contact, twice, an echoing crack and pain lanced up her arm, thrice, wrenching as a foot caught in the spindles. To land in a crumpled broken heap facedown, her weight pressing down and an answering stabbing pain before oblivion.
             

Brenawyn sat up in time to be violently sick in the long grass rushes on the bank. The heaving stopped, but she hung her head there not willing to move else another memory force its way in. Her hair hung in wet clumps, clinging to her face. She didn’t care. When she was sure that she wasn’t going to vomit again, she sat back on her haunches, wiped the residual spittle from her mouth with the back of her arm, and slicked her wet hair back from her forehead. Oh God, what the hell happened?

Her limbs felt heavy and it took all her concentration to breathe. In, out, in, out.

The pounding headache was gone, the pressure in her chest easing. She knew that she was changed, but how—she didn’t want to explore. Yet. Let her get her normal faculties back. Have her arms and legs respond when she wanted to move.

Feeling came back into her fingers and toes first, sharp tingling caused her to stretch the joints to ease the discomfort. The prickling radiated to the lower extremities. Inhaling through her teeth, she gritted against the pain as she flexed her toes, her calves, against the contracting muscles.

Memories came flooding back unbidden and a new nausea bubbled up. She tried to swallow the bile that was knowledge. Knowledge of the truth. Why? Why couldn’t she go back to the way it was before? It was easier to mourn Liam, the husband she thought she remembered. Those memories were gone. Did she even remember them? It must have been easier than this, to know without a doubt the man he was. What happened? How did he do this to her? How was he capable?

Sunshine and sweetness replaced by moodiness and sullenness in turn, losing patience and roaring at nothing, as if someone flipped a switch after we returned from our honeymoon. Shock when he first hit me, a stinging slap to the cheek, leaving a partially swollen eye. I never pleased him. He was always waiting for something, observing, rarely patient.

Once-soft memories of intimate, tender moments shared between husband and wife, replaced by moments of shame and humiliation. Face shoved into the pillow as he pumped into me from behind. Always behind.

Hospitals. A variety of emergency rooms. Never giving anyone a hint. Black eyes, bruised sides, broken bones … so many broken ribs. The reasons varied, accidents all, or most. There was that time he made me report it as an assault. Of course, not by him.

Then I got pregnant.

He seemed so …  pleased with himself for a time.

He stopped hitting me. Stopped touching me. Stopped looking at me.

All I felt was relief.

Snap.

I didn’t even see him. Realization and knowledge hit me at the same time as the boot to my lower back at the top of the stairs.

She glanced around and gasped, Alexander was floating face down. Gaining her feet, she trudged through the knee-deep water, but slipped into the deeper center, she swam to where he lay, “Alex. Alex. Please.” She grabbed his shirt and heaved his body over. Buoying his head up against her chest, she hooked an arm under his and backpedaled out of the water. The reed-covered bank was near, but the hard part of dragging his limp body was here too. She scrambled around, clasping him under the arms. Sweat beaded on her forehead and she cried out in frustration, “Damn it. You are not going to die on me.”

She stood over him, hands clasped still in his armpits, struggling. Planting her feet in the grass she leaned back to move his body infinitesimally. The muscles in her arms screamed as she bent to get a firmer grip again. How long had he been like this? Was it too late? She pulled until just his feet trailed in the water. The surface of the bank would have to do. Damn, why hadn’t she kept current on CPR training? How did it go again? She felt for a pulse in the wrist, nothing, in the neck—nothing. She ripped open his shirt, tearing the tails from the waistband of his jeans. Her ear was on his chest but she couldn’t hear anything. She straightened. “God, damn it.” To the cacophony of the forest, she screamed, “Shut up.”

Chest compressions were next. One, two, three …  “Come on, please. Don’t die.” Nine, ten, eleven.

“Most curious.”

Brenawyn craned her neck continuing the chest compressions to find Oghma and a woman, even more beautiful, behind a tree not far off. “Help me. Please. He’s …  he’s …  I can’t even say it. Please.”

Oghma slightly bowed his head and retreated leaving the new woman staring inquisitively.

“Why do you do this thing?” she said, flipping her hand to include her actions.

“I’m trying to save him.”

“He canna be saved.”

“No, don’t say that.” Brenawyn positioned his head, pinching his nostrils and blew into his mouth, twice. “Oh, God, please, please.”

She had seen Alex come back to life once before. Her grandmother claimed he was immortal. But they weren’t in the real world any longer. They were here in Tir-Na-Nog. Fairyland. Did the same rules apply here? Brenawyn couldn’t be sure. And this goddess was saying he could not be saved. It couldn’t be true. Brenawyn frantically resumed her compressions.

She didn’t hear the woman approach, but she was there, putting a hand on her shoulder to pull her away. Brenawyn rounded on her, “Please, do something. I’ll do anything.”

“Anything, child? Forfeit all ye ken. Take yer rightful place as priestess? Dae what ye can ta restore balance?”

“Yes, anything. Just save him.”

“I will need a token from ye ta seal the covenant.”

“Take it, whatever you want, it’s yours.” Her arms were screaming. “Do it.”

“In time.” A jeweled dagger appeared, “I am called Nimue, goddess of the moon.” She took Alex’s limp arm, slicing across his palm. The blood barely oozed from the wound and Brenawyn threw herself, ear to his chest, no heartbeat.

“Please, do it now, and I’ll give you all you want and more.”

But Nimue didn’t hasten her movements, she took Brenawyn’s wrist, yanked it toward her, and sliced across the palm. Brenawyn didn’t feel it, but next thing she knew Nimue was pressing the wounds together. “By yer vow yer fates are intertwined.” She grabbed a lock of Brenawyn’s hair under her right ear and with a swipe of the blade cut it close to her scalp.

Outraged at the further violation, Brenawyn pulled her head away. “Hey, enough. Save him now.”

Nimue ran her fingers down the length of the lock and looped it around her arm, tying in loosely around her armored bicep. “A token o’ yer oath. Be glad it wasna more. Now repeat after me.”

Brenawyn harrumphed, and pleaded, “Please!”

“Repeat.”

“Yes, Yes, anything.”

“I gi’ my blood oath,” Nimue paused when hesitation registered on Brenawyn’s face. “Dae ye want me ta save his life?”

“Yes, all right. I give my blood oath.”

“Good. Ta protect Alexander Morgan Sinclair, son o’ Robert Sinclair, grandson o’ Donald Sinclair, claiming him as my own.” She looked over at Brenawyn. “Say it.”

Brenawyn rushed through the words, “To protect Alexander Sinclair, son of Robert Sinclair, grandson of Donald Sinclair, claiming him as my own.”

“His life is more sacred and dear than my own, and if I am ta fail, may I wander endlessly without the eternal reward.”

“And, I have your promise that you’ll do everything you can to save him?”

“Hurry, girl. His light dwindles as ye hesitate.”

Brenawyn tore her eyes away to start chest compressions again as she repeated the last lines.

Nimue batted Brenawyn away and placed her hand on his chest. Scrolls lit up her arm and Alex’s red defensive ones responded. His chest rose, pushing her hand up until his back was bowed, arms out akimbo. He groaned, the first sign of life, and Brenawyn let out a breath she hadn’t known she was holding, relieved.

Nimue eased him back down, curiously, she brushed a stray lock of hair off his forehead and bent to kiss his forehead. “He canna be saved, but he still lives. He exists for the pleasure o’ the Hunter.”

“I don’t understand.”

A smile played on her lips, “Alexander Morgan Sinclair is the favored quarry o’ the Wild Hunt. He will be pursued throughout time because he has shown himself ta be  …  interesting.”

Brenawyn put her hand on his chest to assure herself that he, in fact, lived. He was hot. Too hot? The question ran through her mind. His chest rose and fell in shallow yet even breaths. Hesitant to break the connection, she turned to look over her shoulder, “The Wild Hunt? What is the Wild Hunt?”

“Why is it that ye ken nothing? Ha’ ye no’ learned? Who was yer teacher? This lack o’ education canna be abided.”

“Teachers? There were many throughout the years but somehow I don’t think this is what you are referring to. In what way is my education lacking?”

“Ye are unfamiliar with yer gods.”

“No. I am familiar, quite familiar, with my God.”

“Doona anger me, child. Doona assume anything from my meager appearance. I appear this way because t’is the only way yer puny mind can process my existence.” Nimue looked at her reflection in the water and held her hands out. Almost absentmindedly, she traced the lines of the palm of her hand, and scowled in disgust. “It is insufficient.” Getting to her feet, she strode away, then twisted back to face Brenawyn, “I am magnificent, blindingly beautiful in my power. All the gods are uniquely so, but ye humans and yer delicate minds. So many went mad with the revelation. Ye are useless, yer race, in so many ways. So flawed. Living the life o’ a single flame, consuming all around ye, until the very end as if ye ken it was yer last, ye glow brighter for a few infinitesimal moments and then, ye are dust again. Ye struggle so against the inevitable, but t’is …  most interesting.”