Goddess Rising

by Alisha Ashton

  Skye pulled back slightly to study his features, wondering what he meant.

  “Twice now ya have attacked Ciaran,” he reminded. “The first was the other day, when ya rose and tried to strike him before ya were fully awake. Now this? I know ya saw your scars returned. And then, ya could nah feel my heart beating. What else have ya seen?”

  Skye averted her eyes guiltily. She was unsure how he could have figured out the content of those other two hallucinations. Damned know-it-all ancients.

  “I have a recurring nightmare of coming home to the den… and finding everyone in our pack just… massacred…” she whispered and bit back tears.

  “As ya found your parents,” Taran pointed out regretfully. “D’ya see then? These are all things tha cause ya the deepest pain and distress, my love. Ya fear losing me. Ya fear losing your new life and family. Ya fear tha Brandubh will learn of Ciaran. Tha he will somehow be able to twist Ciaran into something evil. Tha he will come at ya through him. It’s all about your fear, wee one.”

  “My hallucination just now… I saw Ciaran as Brandubh,” she recalled in a strained voice. “The things he said…” She winced and trailed off. It was too painful to even broach. “At first, my mind was telling me it was Brandubh, but I couldn’t see him. I kept seeing Ciaran’s face and it was throwing me off. Then it started to shift to something different. A face I didn’t know.”

  Taran thought through the possible reasons behind that. “Perhaps your mind struggled because ya have no personal, visual reference for what Brandubh looks like?” he offered.

  “Maybe. But I… I didn’t know what to think,” Skye said. “I was afraid Brandubh had found Ciaran because of me. That he was able to control him the way he does the fògaraich. So much about this is beyond my ability to anticipate. What would Brandubh do if he knew? Would he want to kill Ciaran? Or try to turn him against us? Would he try to take him away? Would he hate him? Love him? Is he even capable of such an emotion? Would he feel entitled to him? I have no idea what we’re up against.”

  Taran nodded solemnly. His eyes went out of focus for a moment as he considered it.

  “What if Brandubh is the one sending all of this to me?” she asked in a panicked whisper.

  Her voice drew Taran back from his thoughts. He met her gaze as she began to ramble.

  “What if he was able to see what my mind came up with? What if he can hear my thoughts? What if I just let it slip by seeing him as Ciaran? What if…?”

  Taran leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers, silencing her. “Shh… We will figure it out,” he assured as he backed away just enough to study her eyes intensely. “I’ve nah any knowledge of magic to draw from, but I think… if this spell was nah able to readily show ya Brandubh’s face… if it had to use your knowledge of Ciaran’s appearance and then build a hypothetical image of Brandubh from tha, it bodes well.”

  “How?” she asked.

  “This spell wanted to play out your fears, but it could only work with what is already inside your mind,” he noted. “Perhaps, whoever is doing this does nah have enough influence to plant things in your mind. Perhaps they have no power beyond making ya see your worst fears.”

  Skye sniffled and nodded in reply.

  Taran kissed away her tears. “We will get through this, wee one. I swear it. And if Ciaran is in danger, whatever comes to pass, we will protect him.”

  After a moment, she said, “You’re his most trusted, beloved brother. Tell me what to do here. Should I tell him?”

  Taran’s eyes widened and he inhaled deeply before sitting back on his feet. He ran a hand roughly over his beard and exhaled slowly as he thought it over. Finally, he shook his head and answered honestly, “I do nah know, wee one. It is nah a truth to be hastily revealed. I fear the wound it will cause in his soul…” He trailed off as his features suddenly hardened in realization.

  “What is it?” she asked worriedly.

  “Tha meddlesome…” he hissed before biting back his fury.

  “Who?” she pressed.

  “Sorcha,” he ground out. “When she revived me, she spoke fondly of Ciaran, d’ya remember? Asked tha I keep him safe and happy?” He paused as he replayed the scene in his mind. His mouth dropped open. “Wait… she had just told ya about him right then, hadn’t she? Right before I came back?” He clenched his jaw when Skye nodded. He grumbled under his breath furiously in Gaelic for a moment, finally returning to English as he recalled, “Sorcha said, ‘Your friendship has gotten him through his times of greatest need – but there are more to come. Remember tha he trusts your word above all else. When he is broken, it is your heart tha anchors him.’ She was talking about this. About what will come to pass if Ciaran learned of this.”

  “I don’t want to make him ‘broken’,” Skye whispered.

  “Nor I,” Taran agreed.

  The pair descended into silence for a long moment before Taran finally reached a decision. “We wait. For now. With what’s happening to ya, we can nah put this on him yet. He is too busy worrying after your safety to deal with such terrible knowledge. And ya are in no shape to comfort him as ya will surely want to,” he said with his jaw set determinedly. He nodded and exhaled, certain that this was the best move. “We fix this first. We get this darkness out of your mind and ensure your safety. Then we can both devote the proper amount of attention to helping him get past this… because ya can be sure, it will wound him greatly to know the truth. And just in case it is as ya are fearing and Brandubh has learned of his existence, we will both stay vigilant. If – in order to keep himself safe or understand the threat he is under – Ciaran has need of this knowledge sooner than we have planned, we will tell him.”

  Skye took a staggered breath and whispered, “He’s coming.”

  “Ciaran?” he asked, and she nodded. “Surprised it took him this long.”

  “I’ve been blocking our link,” she said, motioning to the power that encased them.

  “He’s liable to be angrier about tha than the stake,” Taran joked. Seeing the wounded look that came to Skye’s face, he squeezed her hand. “It’ll be all right, my love. We will get through this together. ALL of us,” he reassured just as Ciaran burst into the room with a wild, determined look in his eyes.

  Skye allowed her power to recede. She struggled to breathe past the pain it caused to look at Ciaran. Hallucination or not – spell or not – she had hurt him. She had killed him. She winced and reflexively backed further into the cage, holding her traitorous hands up and away from him. She did not trust herself near him. She did not want to hurt him again.

  Ciaran’s hair was wet and disheveled. He had clearly changed clothes and showered in an effort to spare her the visible evidence of what she had done, but beneath the clean scent of his soap, she could still smell the blood on him. Tears rushed down her face as he crossed the room in a rush. He reached the cage she was hiding in and – upon seeing her attempts to break the lock and keep herself in – turned to Taran expectantly and raised an eyebrow. No words were needed.

  Taran nodded and stood. Skye put her head in her hands as she waited for the unavoidable. Between the two men, the bent lock and metal bar gave way with relative ease.

  Ciaran ripped the door damned near off of its hinges before rushing to Skye and pulling her into his arms. He sat on the floor of the cage, cradling her and pressing his forehead to hers. Unable to avoid facing him, Skye gave in. She bawled and held on to him for dear life – even as her mind screamed at her to stay away for his safety.

  “I’m sorry, baby. I fucked up. I couldn’t see you until after… I’m so fucking sorry,” she sobbed against his shoulder.

  Ciaran shook his head and held her tighter. “Nothin’ to forgive, a stóirín,” he assured and pressed a kiss to her brow. “This was nah a terrible thing ya did, it was a terrible thing done to ya – and don’t ya forget it. Let’s keep the blame solely where it belongs, yeah? On whoever or whatever is comin’ after ya.”

  Taran sat be
side them on the floor. He rested his hand on Ciaran’s shoulder and sighed in fresh relief that he was alive. Ciaran gave a matching sigh and reached up to squeeze Taran’s hand. He met his gaze and nodded in agreement of the fact that it had been short but horrible and he was glad it was over, too.

  “But I did it,” she said remorsefully. “I didn’t mean to. I would never willingly hurt you. But I still was the one who did it. And I have to live with it now. With the memory.”

  “I know, darlin’, and I’m so sorry ya had to go through it, but –” Ciaran began.

  Skye leaned back and gaped up at him in slack-jawed disbelief. “Do not sit here and say that you are sorry that I had to go through killing you!” she cried.

  Ciaran grinned and tapped the end of her nose with his finger. “You’re positively adorable when ya hit tha particular soprano note of indignant screeching, d’ya know tha?”

  Skye sputtered angrily for a moment before Ciaran clamped his hand over her mouth. She gave him a challenging scowl in reply. He grinned wider still.

  “It’s nah the first time I’ve died, love. Won’t be the last,” he told her in all seriousness. He could feel Skye frown severely in response beneath his hand. He pursed his lips and looked up at the ceiling thoughtfully for a moment before declaring, “Was certainly the most pleasant recovery process to-date, though.”

  “That’s not much consolation,” Skye grumbled against his palm.

  Ciaran chuckled and removed his hand. After a while, he began to shift uncomfortably. “Mind if we head upstairs? I’ve spent all the time on floors I can stand for one day.”

  “I’m staying down here,” she insisted, “in a HEAVILY locked cage, so I’m gonna need Drostan’s help with that. And let’s not act like this is me being overdramatic. In my current condition, I pose a very real threat to everyone in our pack, the Ashers, and even the mortals outside our gates. I can’t risk hurting anyone again.”

  Ciaran scowled and looked over at Taran. Taran appeared to be equally displeased with the arrangement, but he was at least willing to admit – however grudgingly – that Skye had a valid point. No matter how much they disliked the idea, they did need to protect innocent lives.

  Easily reading Taran’s agreement with Skye in the telltale lines around his mouth, Ciaran rolled his eyes. “Fine. Have it your way. But we’re makin’ it more comfortable in here first. I’m nah about to be sittin’ on cold, concrete floors when there’s a perfectly good bed can be brought down,” he stated matter-of-factly.

  “Ciaran…” she began to groan, but he held up a hand.

  “Oooohhh no. If ya get to be bullheaded, a stóirín, so do I,” he declared stubbornly. “Taran over there may see reason and logic and the like and nah dig his heels in petulantly, but lucky for me, I do nah possess anywhere near his level of maturity. So, if ya plan on lockin’ yourself up in a cage, then so be it. The least I can do is improve the scenery for ya.”

  11: Changes

  Aiyana and Miko crossed the courtyard together as they chatted. Ailean was following along at enough of a distance to grant the pair a small measure of privacy, but close enough to guard over the pack’s youngest member. His hypervigilance was partly due to Miko being outdoors so close to the start of his first transformation. It was also largely due to the fact that he had been responsible for Miko the night the then-mortal was beaten bloody, abducted (along with Skye), and very nearly killed in a car crash. Amazingly, Skye still trusted Ailean to guard over her pup. Ailean had no intentions of allowing any harm to befall so much as a single spiky hair on Miko’s tattooed, Mohawked head.

  In addition to keeping tabs on their surroundings, Ailean was watching the young pair with interest, noting the million little tells they had for the way they felt for one another. Neither was willing to address the issue, but Ailean had been around long enough to know such strong feelings could only be repressed for just so long. They would inevitably come to a head one day. He smiled hoping to be around when that day came so he could tease them mercilessly.

  Miko and Aiyana were speaking quietly, catching up on the day’s events and enjoying the rare one-on-one time. Not that either of them would put words to it, but they missed each other. The new distance between them was going to take a while to get used to. Sure, Miko only lived in the den’s main building. Sure, Aiyana was only a few minutes’ walk away in the Ashers’ building. But for years, they had been within sight or just down the hall most of the time. Whenever shit went wrong, they always knew where the other was.

  Not knowing where Miko was from one minute to the next was far more stressful for Aiyana than she cared to admit. They used their phones to text and check in, as well as to track one another, but that was only just so reassuring. Phones could be dropped in a scuffle. Signals could be hacked. The memory of finding him broken and at death’s door after the car crash was still a regular feature in Aiyana’s nightmares. If she could find a way to accomplish it and still perform all of her duties, she would spend her days watching over him as vigilantly as… She arched a brow. Well, actually, as vigilantly as Ailean back there. She turned and smiled over her shoulder at the ancient with renewed appreciation.

  Able to read the direction her thoughts had taken based on her scent and heartrate alone, Ailean smiled warmly and inclined his head to her in understanding.

  Unbeknownst to Aiyana, Miko had the same problem constantly worrying about her safety. He could still recall in perfect detail the hours after he had received her voicemail that fateful night. He could remember every second he had spent barely breathing with no way of knowing whether she had escaped the fògaraich alive. Unlike her, however, Miko had the advantage of new faol abilities to help him track her whenever possible these days. He could catch her scent sometimes through an open window. Or hear her voice carry across the parking lot. Once he had a good idea of where she was, he could lock on and push his senses further… close his eyes and home in on the familiar sounds of her footfalls and the jangle of her charm necklace.

  With a full-scale, global war going on, and with Aiyana being unnervingly mortal (a weakness not shared by 99.99% of the other participants), Miko liked being able to check up on her from a distance. He also liked the fact that Ailean had not called him out on his true motives when he asked the ancient to start his lessons in tracking several years ahead of schedule.

  Unfortunately, Miko’s new faol senses also made it a metric shit-ton harder to overlook everything he usually spent so much time and energy ignoring. Like the deep, chocolate brown of Aiyana’s eyes. And the way her lip gloss shined. And the ridiculously well-groomed shape of her eyebrows. He could see it all in HD now.

  And the way she smelled – fucking hell. Not a perfume or shampoo or lotion or anything like that. Just… her. Aiyana’s scent had been alluring to him as a human. It was like fucking catnip to him as a faol. It took an embarrassing level of restraint to keep himself from sniffing her. He would have asked Taran for tips on how to control that particular urge, were it not for the fact that the very first thing Tar did upon meeting Skye was – you guessed it – SNIFF her. If a 4,000-year-old faol was still struggling with this, there was no hope whatsoever for Miko. He was well and truly screwed.

  And then there were all of Aiyana’s little quirks and behaviors that sometimes used to make it hard for him to concentrate as a human. They were positively mesmerizing now. Like the way her hair cascaded over her shoulders and fell in her face. And the distracting way she pushed it back behind her ear and smiled over at him from behind her hand. The way she rolled her eyes and pretended he annoyed her when he goofed around – even as the corner of her mouth lifted in amusement. The way she squinted and massaged her hands when lost in thought – he knew it was to ease the pains of old fractures and dislocations. He liked that he knew her so well he could recall each injury and how she got it based on which part of her hands she massaged.

  And, of course, there was the absolutely a-dork-able way she thrust her lips outward, then t
wisted up her hair and draped it over her lips like a mustache when they were working on a particularly difficult problem. She never did that one in front of anyone other than him – probably because that shit would be hilariously unattractive to most people. But he actually found it kinda…

  “And she just… staked him?” Aiyana whispered in disbelief.

  Miko nearly tripped over his own feet as her voice knocked him out of his inner thoughts.

  Behind them, Ailean laughed knowingly.

  Miko scowled. Fucking ancients.

  “Like staked him, staked him?” Aiyana pressed.

  They were on their way back inside to get Miko caged for his first-ever transformation. Miko was about to become a full-fledged, furry, snarling WEREWOLF. Aiyana was already on-edge over that. Now to hear about this latest terrible development with Skye? Her nerves were fried for both of them.

  “Yeah. Like full-on, vamp-dusting staked,” Miko assured with wide eyes. “Which, I gotta say, is a lot messier and more intense with a living person… werewolf… faol… whatever. Dude pumped out every last ounce of blood before keeling over. And – of course – my dumb ass skated through all of it trying to get to Skye when she yelled.” He sighed in disappointment. “Had to toss my favorite boots and everything.”

  Aiyana suppressed a smile. She knew Miko used humor and whining as a means of distraction when he was worried or upset.

  A second later, Miko shook his head and scowled. “Eh fuck, this probably means we’ve gotta tear up that floor and install a brand new, brand new one!”

  Aiyana quirked a brow and gave him a skeptical look. “I’m sure Ciaran is terribly sorry to inconvenience you like that.”

  Miko rolled his eyes. “Not sorry enough,” he scoffed.

  “So… Skye wasn’t kidding. These hallucinations really are making it impossible for her to tell what’s real,” Aiyana breathed worriedly.

  She clasped her hands together tightly, absently massaging them. Miko pretended not to pay too much attention.