Shadow Magic (2 page)

             
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The moon hung heavy and ripe, as close to the vivid orange and gold of the sun as she would ever see.  Strolling out into the night, Deirdre closed her eyes and lifted her arms, imagining the cool moonlight as something different, even as she felt the siren song of the harvest moon begin to build within her.  Conscious of nothing else, she swayed, taking the first sinuous steps that would begin the seductive motions of her Shadow Dance.

             
Her people came slowly at first, pulled by her unvoiced music, watching in silence as she invoked three of the elements - earth, wind, and water - and the dizzying current of magic began to build.  She called to each of them and none of them, to something essential within and something wild without, and when the man with the golden hair rode slowly into the clearing on a huge horse so white it seemed to glow, none of them were surprised.

             
Such things had been known to happen when a truly powerful Shadow Dancer danced.

             
Unknowing and uncaring, Deirdre continued the dance, enthralled by the slow swelling up of power that never failed to take her with it.  She joined with her people, used with their consent their life-energy to help her as she tamed the magic.

             
The people's withdrawal came like a cold dash of sea water, making her steps falter, causing the spell to waver.

             
The golden one.

             
When she opened her eyes to see him, her first reaction was terror, that she'd stayed in the spell of the dance too long and failed to hide from the morning.  Her second was a strange lurch of her heart, then an all-encompassing relief that he had come at last.

             
The golden man who haunted her dreams.

             
"Give it to me," he ordered, his voice rough like cliff-stone, and the tone more authoritative than any usually dared to use with her.

             
She smiled, knowing he did not understand who or what she was, or that he had come here because her dance had called him.  "Give what to you?"

             
"That which you stole, under cover of darkness."   Dismounting easily, he strode to her and stood, towering over her in a way that both threatened and thrilled.

             
The people, seeing that she did not evince fear or distress, melted away, back into their cliff caves to wait or to listen to the music of the pounding surf below, leaving her alone with the golden stranger.  If she wanted them, she need only to think it, and they would return, ready to defend their Shadow Dancer - if necessary with their lives.

             
But, though she sensed his anger, the stranger did not frighten her.  After all, she knew him, had met with him daily in her dreams.  His next statement only confirmed her thoughts.

             
"I recognize you."  He ran a restless hand through his long, golden hair.  "And I want back what you took from me."

             
His dreams must have been different than hers.  Perplexed, she tilted her head and looked up at him, wondering how it would feel to have him take her in his arms in reality rather than fantasy.

             
"I have taken nothing but that which you gave to me freely."  Her face heated, thinking of all the things they'd done in her dreams, things no other man would have dared to do to a High Priestess of the Shadows.   She was glad the golden-haired one had been so bold, but she longed to experience his embrace in reality. 

             
"I would like you to kiss me now."  She spoke softly, startling herself with her own bluntness.  Still, daydreams were short, and if this warrior had stepped out of one of hers, she had no idea how long she would have him.

             
His eyes, the color of a moonlit ocean on a stormy night, darkened.  Still, instead of reaching for her, he crossed his massive arms and frowned.

             
"No tricks, woman.  I have come for one thing and one thing only.  You, I know, have it.  Give me that which belongs to me."

             
Give me that which belongs to me.
  Words of ancient legend, of prophetic song.  She had dreamt of him saying such a thing to her, but the manner of his speaking had been different.  Passionate instead of furious, fire instead of ice. 

             
In her dreams,
she
had been that which belonged to him.  And he'd known it then, as surely as she knew now that it could still be truth.

             
"Surely you have not come so far to settle for less than is yours by right."

             
"You have taken that which is rightfully mine."  Though he did not raise his voice in anger, she sensed this cold rage of his could be infinitely more dangerous.

             
"I have taken nothing," she said. "And I speak only truth.  Unless you talk of what has occurred between us in the world of dreams, and then I took only that which you gave to me of your own free will."

             
For the first time since he'd arrived, hesitation flickered across his hard countenance.  "You utter riddles and lies."  His tone harsh, he accused her.  "Be warned that I do not suffer thieves lightly.  Return my amulet and you have my vow that you shall not be punished."

             
Had her people heard his words, they would have laughed.  Everyone knew that a Shadow Dancer had no interest in thieving petty baubles.  In fact, usually a Shadow Dancer had no interest in anything but her dance. 

             
In this, Deirdre was not a normal Shadow Dancer. 

             
"It is plain you do not know who I am, or what I am."  She spoke with quiet dignity.  "If you knew me you would also know that I have no need of trinkets.  I did not take your amulet."

             
He took a step closer, putting them chest to chest.  Her blood thickened, the slow, aching heat that pooled within her bringing awareness of the sensual pleasures she had shared with this man for many weeks in her dreams while she slept.

             
A gentle breeze turned the night air cool, causing her to shiver. 

             
Seeing this, one corner of his mouth tugged up in a reluctant smile.  "I do not want you to think I would hurt you." 

             
For a moment she could not catch her breath, still reeling from the unexpected beauty of that smile.  Instead of responding, she took a measured step back, away from the compelling heat of his body.

             
His smile vanished. 

             
"I have said I will not hurt you.  I merely seek my amulet.  Tell me where it is."

             
She gave a slow shake of her head, forcing a smile to show that she was not afraid.  The breeze pulled at her hair, making the long, straight length of it dance teasingly around her ankles.

             
"You could never hurt me," she told him, again speaking only truth.  "And you'd best look elsewhere for your amulet.  I do not have it, nor do I know where it might be."

             
While he stared at her with narrowed eyes, a cloud scuttled across the face of the moon, obscuring it and dimming the light.  Though Deirdre was not dancing at that moment, still the omen was not a welcome one, and she shivered again.

             
One by one, she could sense her people creeping back to the clearing.  It struck her how rare this was, that such a combination came together.  The full moon, the time of her dancing, and the golden stranger, he of her sleeping dreams, he of the sun and daylight. 

             
He was everything she was not, she realized, and perfect counterpoint to her darkness.  And, though he did not seem to remember it, they completed each other, if only in her dreams. 

             
A perfect circle, like the dances she performed. 

             
"My people gather, " she said, hoping he would understand.  "It is time for the Shadow Dance, before the harvest moon sinks beneath the weight of her fullness.  Will you stay and watch, or must you continue on in search of this amulet?"

             
"I go nowhere."  His voice seemed to boom out in the small clearing.  "Until you return the amulet to its rightful owner. "

             
With an effort of will, she shrugged.  The wind blew the clouds skittishly; they had cleared off the heavy moon, and the pale, amber light compelled her to begin the dance again.               

             
Lifting her head, she scented the air and sighed.  "Then you'd best step away from the clearing, and go hold your horse's head."

             
Moving lightly on the balls of her feet, Deirdre reached inside for the echoing remnants from the first notes of the moon's song.  Arching her back, she tossed her head in restless anticipation as she waited for the silvery music of the moon to return to her, to claim her, to make her dance.               

             
She no longer worried about where she went while she danced; she thought it likely that she became one with the movement and moonbeams and, while so consumed, left her body and soared out with her naked soul in to the vast blackness of the velvet sky and twinkling stars.  Never before had she or her people allowed a stranger to watch her; when a Shadow Dancer danced the movements became sacred, the magic generated powerful and bendable only at her command.   For her people to use as they needed.

             
So it was for Deirdre, as it had always been for the Shadow Dancers.

             
The notes sounded inside her, one glittering shard of moon-music at a time.  Having no choice really, she gave in and used her body as a vessel, used it as her mother had before her, and her mother's mother, and so on.  With each movement she brought water to the crops, fertility to the fields, babies to those with empty wombs, and health to those who harbored sickness.  As long as the moon did not wane, she would dance and dance and dance, until the angry sun sought to push the moon from the sky and Deirdre collapsed in an unconscious heap on the ground.               

             
She trusted her people to take care of her then, to carry her from the clearing into her cave, to make ready her resting place in the cool, shadowy darkness, and to place her within it so she could hide from the wrathful gaze of the morning sky.

             
If they did not do this, she would die. 

             
And the magic of her people would die along with her. 

             
Now though, she simply danced.  Until she could dance no more and all went black. 

             
When she came back to herself, opening her eyes to blessed darkness, it was with a sense of aching loneliness, of longing.  Another day had passed while she slept, and her people would have attended to their lives like normal people do.   All while the sun blazed overhead and the birds sang and dogs barked and children played.  And their Shadow Dancer slept.   And dreamed.

             
Living her life in a world made up only of shadows, Deirdre longed only to see sunlight.  Glaring brightness she wanted; it haunted her dreams, both waking and sleeping.  She tried to imagine the eye-squinting brilliance of it and wondered constantly how the kiss of something that sounded as lovely as sunshine would feel upon her pale skin.  Would it feel like flame, searing her instantly into dusty ashes, or more like a benevolent caress, sensual like the first bite of fresh honeycomb unfolding in her mouth?

             
In a life where everything was viewed in varying shades of gray and black, she longed to see what others were free to see and she could only imagine.  Her own shadow, sharply defined instead of blurry. 

             
But she kept these wishes and fantasies to herself out of necessity, since everyone knew what she dreamt of was not possible.  In fact, it was strictly forbidden, taboo, and were she to try she would undoubtedly suffer the worst punishment possible - a slow and agonizingly painful death. 

             
Her attendant Liara, sensing her alertness, materialized at her side. 

             
"Water," she croaked, reaching gratefully for the proffered cup and draining it before she drew another, shuddering breath. 

             
"You completed the dance," the girl told her shyly, keeping her gaze averted.  "These last two days the people have made ready to pluck their bounty from the fields."

             
Deirdre heard only a few words.  "Two days?"

             
"Aye. You have slept for two days and one night."

             
She sighed.  Sometimes it was like this.  That alone told her that the magic she had danced had been great.  And she had dreamed, like before.  Only this time her golden warrior had been conspicuously absent.