The Silent Goddess: The Otherworld Series Book 1 (13 page)

“Your eyes,” Kat whispered finding her voice first.

“They’re different,” Griffin explained.

Annie shrugged.  She felt different.  She wasn’t sure what that meant and the alcohol running through her blood told her she didn’t care.  She fixed her gaze on Robert, who took an involuntary step back.

“Annie, are you okay?” Kat asked her voice full of concern.

She nodded curtly almost ignoring the question.  She had one of her own and she wanted an answer but he wasn’t here to answer it.  Instead she settled for another and hoped someone would give her an answer.

“What does
mo chroi
mean?” when the alien words passed her lips it sounded like ‘muy hree’.  At first no one answered so she asked the question louder.

An older heavy set woman with white hair and kind blue eyes answered her from the end of the bar.  “It means my heart,” she replied with a smile.  Annie thanked the woman and returned to the table to gather up her things.  The older woman’s voice seemed to break whatever spell the pub was under as conversation erupted in Annie’s ears.  Not everyone had returned to a state of normalcy.

Annie felt the familiar presence of her friendly trio gather around her as she rifled through her messenger bag. She found her wallet and dug out a twenty, slapped it on the table, then proceeded to fiddle with the tricky clasp of her bag.  Griffin’s hand shot out and grabbed her arm.  His warm comforting hand was almost her undoing.  She felt the sting of tears threatening to tumble out of her eyes.  She quickly wiped them away with the back of her free hand.  She shook her head groaning as the room began to spin.  She sucked in a lung full of air and plastered a watery smile on her face.

“Please let us walk you home,” Kat insisted.

“No,” she replied extracting herself from Griffin’s gentle grasp.  “I need to get out of here.  I need to clear my head and I can’t do that with you guys surrounding me.”  She shoved her head through the strap of her bag and marched out the door without looking back.

Duncan reluctantly left Annie to join Knackers outside.  He had almost given in, again.  In that moment the world had faded away when he heard her call out to him.  “I never left you.”  The empty void in his soul instantly filled with her presence.  He had rushed to her wanting nothing more than to pull her into his arms and crush her body to his.  Then he saw Annie and he had stopped himself but just barely. 

When she finally lifted her eyes to him he realized he didn’t care.  The mortal that stood in front of him and his Goddess were one and the same.  Once she had promised to give up her immortal soul for him and this was exactly what she had shown him she would become for him.  It was a memory he had forgotten existed until that one moment.  As her beautiful eyes fluttered closed he felt drawn to this fragile mortal.  The memory of who or what she was erased itself from his mind, all he cared about, all he wanted, was Annie.  He had lowered his head, his lips aching to touch hers, and then something in the corner of his eye caught his attention. 

He saw the wise woman he had met the first day he stepped foot into Annie’s world.  She drew his attention away with her magick, whispering into his mind,
“not yet.”
  The power of that magick fought with his own will.  In the end his will proved weaker than magick and he fled with a weak plea and a promise.  When the cool summer night’s air hit his inflamed skin he growled in frustration.  His hand balled into fists, clenching and unclenching as he tried to pump his anger out of his body.  He was tired of being used by the Sidhe.  Damn their interference and their curses, he would end his suffering tonight.  He would lay his own path, let the consequences be damned.

“What!” he barked at Knackers “is so important?”  He tried to force his vision back to normal instead of the red hazy film he saw.  He stalked away unsure of where his feet were leading him.  He could hear Knackers scurrying to keep up with his long angry strides.

“Please tell me I did no’ see what I almost saw boy,” Knackers called out.  Duncan swung around and stared down at his tiny companion.  Something in his gaze must have warned Knacker’s off because he quickly changed topics.  “So,” he said with a half-hearted chuckle.  “Good news first then.”

Duncan growled in response shoving a hand through his hair.  He prayed to the gods he swore to defy for peace and struggled to find calm.  “Speak,” he commanded as calmly as he could muster.

“Well,” Knackers began clearing his throat.  “What if I told ye this town had a Grant.”

After the night Duncan had just had he swore nothing could shock him.  He was wrong.  Grants were rare, they had been a dying breed when Duncan was just a lad, and many Fae thought they were already extinct.  Grants had protected the small Celtic villages from the Roman conquest.  Many had died in the battles that had ensued leaving them an almost instinct race among the Fae.  The fact that one may have followed the settlers to the New World was mind blowing.  Grants were protective of their chosen territory and only existed where great evil threatened.  Their main job was to warn the villagers of an imposing threat.  If a Grant was in Salem the danger to Annie was greater than he thought.

“If there is a Grant what is the bad news?” he asked.

Knackers hesitated for too long and Duncan knew the answer before Knackers could give voice to the truth.  “There is a Redcap.  An’ just as ol’ Pete claimed he be a nasty one at that.  Folks ‘round here call him by ‘nother name though.”

Duncan dreaded the answer even as it left his lips.  “What is that name?”  Knackers cringed at the feral tone but Duncan was unwilling to relent.  “Tell me!” he bellowed.

“Giles,” Knackers replied.   “Giles Corey.”  Duncan’s feet wanted to take flight but Knackers’ next words stopped him cold.  “Tis too late lad, he’s seen her.  An’ he’s coming.”

Just then a figure strode through the darkness in the distance.  “No,” Duncan growled. As Knackers squinted into the darkness his cat eyes widening in fear.

“Go,” he ordered Duncan.  “Doona leave the lass alone.  I’ll watch yer back.”  His small hand fell on Duncan’s fore arm drawing his attention.  “Convince her, wake her from the dark magickal hell she is living in.  If all else fails I’ll keep her safe at the cost of me own life.”

Duncan was barely listening to his old friend and companion.  His ears had turned off, his mind was racing with every probable outcome; but his eyes were focused solely on the figure of Annie walking alone and unaware of the dangers that surrounded her.  For a moment his heart stopped beating in his chest as he slowly became aware of just how much she meant to him.  Goddess, or mortal, Annie or her, it mattered not.  When he admitted that to his soul, only then did his heart begin to beat in his chest again.

Chapter Ten

The Curse and the Commons

              Annie allowed her feet to carry her with no destination set in her mind.  When her mind slowly became aware of her surroundings she realized she was in the Commons.  The earlier events of the evening flooded her mind.  She desperately tried to shove them away but they refused to leave.  She felt like she was being torn in two, like two completely different entities vied for control over her physical body; one half clung to what she had known the other to what she knew.  Her life had been perfect, well maybe not perfect but pretty damn good.  She had friends, a job she loved, a nice cozy place to call her own, she never looked to the future or dwelled in the past, she lived in the present.  She stumbled over a rock and grumbled a curse.  She shouldn’t have left the pub like that, but she could not stay and she didn’t feel like going home.  She shuffled over to a nearby bench and fell onto it.  She sighed heavily blowing a stray piece of hair out of her face.  She slouched down and rested her head on the back of the bench.  Large leafy oak branches encircled her making her feel dizzy.  She closed her eyes and tried to stop the world from spinning.  She was drunk.  This was his fault too.  All of this was his fault, her life had taken a sharp dangerous turn they day she had met him.

              An image of his blue-gray eyes flashed in her mind. They were so familiar.  His eyes closed, winking out of existence.  Another vision quickly replaced it.  She was staring at soft rolling hills covered in a blanket of green.  Nestled between the hills was a small dark lake.  A young boy barely a man sat on a large boulder his bare feet dangling over the edge barely skimming the water’s surface.  His long arms which were just beginning to develop the signs of corded muscle sat on either side of him holding him up.  His face was tilted away from her basking in the warm afternoon sun.  His dark almost black hair curled down his neck just brushing his shoulders.  A noise seemed to catch his attention, his head snapping towards the right, his attention focused on a small group of trees.  He jumped quickly to his feet and ran barefoot towards the trees.  A woman appeared out of the shade her golden red hair shimmered like a cloud around her.  She wore a long gown of yellow that seemed to move around her like water.

She spotted the man running towards her and reached her arms out welcomingly towards him.  An instant later he reached her, his hands found her waist and he lifted her effortlessly off the ground.

            Her elegant hands braced herself on his shoulders as her face tilted down towards his.  Her hair fell over their heads like a golden curtain as he slowly lowered her to the ground.  His arms wrapped around her waist pulling her up against him.  Her hands rested lightly on his shoulders as she whispered something into his ear; a whisper that continued to echo in Annie’s head when she opened her eyes to find Duncan staring down at her.

His face was hidden in the shadow the oak trees cast leaving her unable to read the expression on his face.  She slowly got to her feet, the memory of her vision and those secretly whispered words still vivid in her mind.  She wanted that vision, that dream, to become a reality.  She took another step forward as he retreated.  A street lamp illuminated his face, a wary look flashing in his eyes making Annie smile up at him wickedly.  A whispered word exploded in her ears along with a command to speak it.  Her mouth struggled to form the word correctly; it felt thick, and foreign and yet natural.  When the words finally left her lips her voice was dark and husky.  To her ears it sounded strange like two words forced together that made no sense in English.

“Rune shark,” they heard.  But her lips had said
‘runsearc’
.

She heard Duncan suck in a ragged breath, saw him shudder as she took another step closer.  She was standing so close to him now.  She could feel his warm breath on her face as he struggled to breathe.

“Why did I say that?  Why do I want to call you that?” she asked.

His eyes popped open. He stared down at her for a moment before taking another step back.  Anger boiled inside of her at his retreat.

“Tell me!”  She demanded in anger.  Her body quivered in rage as she took another unsteady step toward him.  He responded by quickly back pedaling into a tree and held his hands out in front of him in an attempt to ward her off.

“Please Annie don’t come any closer,” he begged.  She ignored him as she slowly stalked towards him.  When she reached the edge of his out stretched fingers she suddenly stopped short.

“What is happening?” she asked raising shaking hands to cover her eyes.  Visions and images rapidly flashed behind her eyelids.  She pressed the heel of her hands against her eyes trying to force them away.  “Who- what am I?”  She asked sinking to her knees as if gravity had suddenly become too difficult to resist.

“You are Sidhe.”

A hysterical giggle bubbled up inside of her and forced its way up her throat and past the tight confines of her mouth.  “Sidhe,” she spat.  “Fae, Faerie- Tinkerbell?!” she shrieked.

“No,” said Duncan’s voice.  “Sidhe,
bhanphrionsa
.”

“Van-frin-sha?” she asked struggling to pronounce the word