“Then that is where we’ll join her,” Syrie told him, tightening her grip on his hand. “I’ve but to call down the starlight for us to travel upon.”
“Starlight, eh?” Patrick shrugged and pulled her a little closer. “To think I never realized you knew how to do such a thing.”
Syrie only smiled, not wanting to make her companion nervous. No point in telling him she hadn’t ever known how to do such a thing. How she knew now was a complete mystery to her. But she did know, as if it were knowledge that had always been tucked away in some dark corner of her mind. A mind that now had no dark corners at all.
“Perhaps that’s what they fear most of all,” she murmured. “The light.”
“What?”
Syrie shook her head, and smiled at Patrick as she rose up on her toes. “You’ll need to kiss me now,” she said. “It’s part of the process of returning.”
“Kiss you? That’s not how it worked with Orabilis.”
Good thing, too. She’d not want to have to take on a feud with someone as powerful as Orabilis, but she would. If she thought the old Faerie had one single romantic thought about her man…Of course, considering the family connection Orabilis had to Patrick, that would be ridiculous.
Though, it was just possible that Patrick wasn’t aware of that relationship. After all, she hadn’t known of it until now. That knowledge had lived in one of those formerly dark corners.
“I’m not Orabilis. This is how I do it,” she said, threading her fingers into the thick hair at Patrick’s neck to pull his head closer. “Hold on tightly.”
“I think I rather prefer the way you do it,” he murmured, just before his lips met hers and his arms fastened around her.
All around them, the light brightened, turning an intense emerald shade of green.
Patrick might prefer her method of sending them through time, but Syrie quickly found its disadvantage as his touch distracted her from the Magic and the rainbow shards of light that had begun to dance around them disappeared.
“Let’s try that one more time,” she said, more for her benefit than his.
A life filled with Magic and Patrick was definitely going to take some getting used to.
* * *
One moment they had stood alone, wrapped in one another’s arms, isolated in a shimmering emerald cocoon. In the next instant, Patrick’s time of isolated perfection was shattered by a raspy voice he found irritatingly familiar.
“About time the two of you showed up.”
Patrick forced open his eyes to find Orabilis sitting only yards away as Syrie slipped from his grasp to join the old witch. It took all the strength he had to remain on his feet, fighting an overwhelming grogginess such as he’d experienced only once before.
“Thank you for convincing him to come for me,” Syrie said, dropping to her knees next to the rocking chair where Orabilis sat.
They were in the glen, in the exact same spot from which Orabilis had sent him to find Syrie. Everything was the same as when he’d left except for the rocking chair, a strangely out-of-place object that his sluggish brain couldn’t quite fit into his memories.
“Convince him?” The old woman snorted, patting Syrie on the shoulder. “Hardly. I doona think I could have kept him from it, even if I had wanted to.”
Syrie’s laughter tinkled through the glen, reflecting off the water and dancing around his head, much as the strange lights had done only moments before.
“What is our situation, Orabilis? Have we a chance against them?” Syrie asked, all signs of her joy wiped away.
“A state of near martial law exists in the capital of Wyddecol. The Goddess is held captive and the Council searches for any they deem to be in opposition to their rule.”
Syrie sat back on her heels, a stricken expression filling her eyes. “How do you know of these things? Who told you?”
We did, echoed through the glen, a chant carried by a multitude of voices, though Patrick could see none present other than the three of them.
“I ken yer too fearful to return to Wyddecol,” Orabilis barked over her shoulder in the direction of the deep pool. “But if yer to stay here, you’ve need to stay quiet, aye? I’ve business to attend to and need none of yer interruptions.”
A whisper of sound greeted her question, barely more than the whoosh of a breeze through the trees.
“Attendants to my son,” Orabilis muttered, shaking her head. “Almost as useless as he has allowed himself to become over the years.”
“They sent assassins after me,” Syrie said. “As if stealing my memories and casting me adrift in time wasn’t punishment enough. In all my days, I’ve never heard of such a thing.”
“I’d hazard a guess that there are any number of things you’ve no’ heard about, child,” Orabilis said, a tired sigh following before she spoke again. “Power is a seductive mistress. You’d do well to remember that now. There are many, Fae and Mortal alike, who canna resist her siren call. Reynalia Al’ Servan is one of those, though by no means the first, nor will she be the last. She cultivated her natural gifts and her family’s contacts as she rose through the political ranks. But Supreme Leader of the High Council is no’ enough for a woman like her. We should have known as much based on her bloodline. In spite of that, no one questioned her intent or her loyalty. No’ until it was too late. The lure of the Earth Mother’s power was too strong. Reynalia has surrounded herself with those possessed of weak minds and even weaker morals, who support her thirst for control of all Wyddecol. And once they’ve taken over there, they’ll make their move for complete domination.”
“But why come after me?” Syrie asked. “I’m a nobody. I was never more than a handmaiden at the Earth Mother’s Temple.”
“You were never a nobody, my dear,” Orabilis said, smoothing a hand down Syrie’s wild curls. “But even if you were, thanks to what the High Council did to you, yer anything but a nobody now.”
“It’s because she traveled with her Magic, isn’t it?” Patrick said, as two surprised faces turned in his direction. “Not stripped from her, but merely sealed away along with her memories.”
He remembered the conversations between Orabilis and Editha. The conversations that had felt such a great waste of time when all he’d wanted to do was to go after the woman he loved.
“It is,” Orabilis agreed before turning her attention back to Syrie. “They sent you, fully equipped with yer Magic, through the Time Flow of the All Conscious. The River of Time, some call it. A place of unbelievable power. And now yer Magic, and you, have gained the power that comes from the river. They sent someone after you because they have begun to realize their mistake and, in their mistake, the danger you present to them.”
“So you say, but I feel no different than I ever did,” Syrie said. “I cannot see how I am a danger to people as powerful as they are.”
“Regardless of how you claim you feel, you are different.” Orabilis tilted her head to one side, examining Syrie as she might some new type of flower or insect. “The walls you’ve built to protect yer heart are strong, child. But they hold as much in as they keep out. One day they will open and then you’ll ken the power that you possess. The High Council would prefer to stop you before you realize the extent of what you’ve become.”
Patrick didn’t care about any of that. Syrie was Syrie, as she’d always been. Her powers or lack of them meant nothing to him. Only having her home and safe were of any consequence.
“I will take her to Castle MacGahan,” he said. “Within those walls, she’ll be protected. No one can get to her there, not even yer mighty High Council.”
“Even if you could get there, she’d still no’ be safe. Mortal walls canna withstand the will of the Fae,” Orabilis said, shaking her head. “No’ when they’ve set their minds on destruction.”
“What do you mean, if he could get me there?” Syrie asked, picking up on the words Patrick had missed.
Orabilis shrugged, returning to the needlework in her lap
that Patrick would have sworn wasn’t there minutes before.
“A number of men surround the glen, waiting for us to emerge,” Orabilis said, her head bent over her work. “I’ve no doubt as to who sent them or why they’ve come. We willna be allowed to leave this place unmolested. No’ through any Mortal passage.”
Patrick bristled at the idea that anyone could think to keep them prisoner in this place. If only he could get word to his brother, those who kept them here would stand no chance.
“And innocent lives would be needlessly lost,” Orabilis said, casting an exasperated glance in his direction. “Yer true enemies canna be defeated in this world.”
“Then we must go to Wyddecol,” Syrie said, rising to her feet. “We must defeat them there.”
“Exactly,” Orabilis agreed.
No, no, no, the unseen voices protested, the leaves on the trees rustling with their intensity as if a storm approached. Unsafe, unsafe, unsafe!
“What did I tell you?” Orabilis barked over her shoulder before turning back to them, an apologetic smile on her lips. “They are correct, unfortunately. I canna go with you into Wyddecol. My presence would almost assure yer being found out the minute you entered. This is something you will have to do without my help.”
“You told us this High Council is searching for those who oppose them,” Patrick said. “If opposition exists, we have only to gather those who would see the Goddess returned to power.”
Fae or Mortal, battle was battle, and wars were often won in the planning and choice of allies.
“Where would I be without your counsel?” Syrie asked, smiling as she came to stand next to him. “Patrick is right. I’ll speak to my friend, Nally. She served at the Temple with me and would surely know of many who would help us.”
Orabilis stopped her rocking, fixing a look on both of them. “That would be a most unwise action, Elesyria. Someone inside the Temple helped to set up the Goddess in the first place. You need to stay as far away from there as possible.”
Shock registered on Syrie’s face and she moved closer to Patrick, as if to seek the physical comfort he was more than willing to provide.
“Where would you recommend we start?” he asked, looping an arm over Syrie’s shoulders.
“There’s a young officer in the Palace Guard. A captain. His mother has remained close to me in spite of my…” She paused, as if searching for the word she wanted to use. “In spite of my absence from Wyddecol. I would recommend you begin with him. His name is Dallyn Al’ Lyre, and if what my sources tell me is accurate, he will be an inroad to many more who would readily join yer cause.”
“How will we locate this man?” Patrick asked.
“It should be easy enough,” Orabilis answered with a chuckle. “When you enter Wyddecol from here, you’ll be arriving in his mother’s barn. I’m sure she can arrange a meeting for you when you tell her who sent you.”
Trust wasn’t something that any good warrior gave easily. Not if he wanted to live to be a good old warrior. But Orabilis had been a large part of Patrick’s childhood. If there was anyone he felt he could trust, it was surely her.
While Syrie and Orabilis busied themselves with a discussion of all that had passed in Wyddecol in Syrie’s absence, Patrick slipped away into the woods, intent on seeing for himself the size of the force Orabilis claimed surrounded the glen. Trust was one thing. Knowledge was quite another.
As it turned out, she hadn’t been exaggerating. If anything, she’d played down the threat in her disclosure.
“There you are,” Syrie said as he returned to the clearing in the glen. “I was beginning to worry about you.”
“No need,” he said. “Merely scouting our conditions here.”
The last he added quietly as she reached his side.
“And?”
“And it is worse than Orabilis suggested. A full company of men at the very least. Strange men.”
Before any battle, and certainly when an army felt itself in the superior position, men joked and visited. They prepared their weapons amid a constant din of chatter. Not so with these men.
“Strange how?” Syrie asked.
“Quiet. Not like any warriors I’ve known. Almost as if they weren’t even Mortal men.”
“They’re Mortal, true enough,” Orabilis called across the clearing.
The woman had the sensitive hearing of a wildcat.
“All held under a massive compulsion, is my guess. It’s what makes them strange, robbing them of any independent thoughts or feelings. All they know, all that is in their minds, is what they’ve been told to do.”
Patrick had heard stories of compulsions his whole life. He had assumed that was what afflicted the man who had attacked Ellen. But this? He’d never heard of a compulsion on such a grand scale.
“Then it’s settled,” Syrie said, giving his arm a squeeze before she left him to hurry back to Orabilis. “Straight to Wyddecol from here is our only option.”
Large bubbles had formed at the water’s edge by the time Patrick approached, appearing to lower the level in the pond. As he watched, the bubbles continued to grow, sucking up more and more of the water, forming a barrier that created a dry path leading to the waterfall at the far edge of the pool.
“You enter there,” Orabilis said, pointing a finger toward a dark opening that appeared just below where the water had been.
“We go now?” Patrick asked.
For some reason he hadn’t expected they would leave so soon.
“You don’t have to come along,” Syrie said, keeping her gaze turned away from him. “Wyddecol is a dangerous place for Mortals.”
“This one can hardly be called only a Mortal.” Orabilis cackled. “Though it’s dangerous enough for his kind, too.”
As if they thought danger would prevent him from going along. Danger was the reason he would insist on going along.
“Someone has to look after Syrie. As much as I risked to get her back here, I’ve no intent to see my hard work all gone to waste now.”
Syrie’s smile was all the reward he could ever ask.
“You might want to hurry yerselves a bit, dearies,” Orabilis said. “I canna hold this back forever, you know. I’m no’ as young as I used to be.”
Syrie grabbed his hand and pulled him forward, across the path between the large bubbles and into the dark opening.
Whatever happened next, he didn’t care. As long as he was with her, keeping her safe, nothing else mattered.
Chapter 22
“You’ve hardly touched your food, either of you. Is there something wrong with it? I pride myself in my ability to serve a Mortal dish at every meal.”
Leala Al’ Lyre dipped her spoon into the big pot hanging over the fire and lifted it to her lips, her brow drawn tight in concern.
“There is nothing wrong with the bounty you’ve served us, madam,” Patrick said, and downed two bites in quick succession.
“I think it’s exhaustion more than anything else,” Syrie said. “From our journey here.”
No point in explaining that Leala’s version of Mortal food in no way resembled anything Syrie would consider edible. No doubt Patrick suffered from the same complaint.
“Or nerves,” Leala said, her face breaking into a relieved smile as she laid her spoon on the table. “There’s so much distress in our world at the moment. So much uncertainty. My poor Dallyn only picks at his food when he comes home for a visit. Too much on his mind to simply relax and enjoy a meal.” She sat down in her chair and took a bite from her own bowl before her brow furrowed and she looked up again. “You’re not here to add to my boy’s distress, are you?”
A perfect opportunity to change the subject if ever Syrie had heard one.
“That is not our intent. Do you have any idea when your son might arrive?”
Leala shook her head, and rose to ladle seconds into Patrick’s bowl. Fortunately, their hostess was too preoccupied with serving to notice the look of resignation on Patrick’
s face as he set about the task of being a good guest by eating more of the bitter mush they’d been served.
“He should be here anytime now, my dear, any time. It depends, of course, on his ability to slip away from the palace unseen. Such troubled times we live in.”
Syrie refrained from pointing out to her hostess that most times in Wyddecol had been troubled in one way or another. The Fae had gone from one internal power struggle to another with only short periods of relative peace in between.
“Eat up,” their hostess said cheerfully, apparently satisfied with Syrie’s disclaimer. “There’s plenty more. Are you ready for seconds, my dear? I’ve made a huge pot.”
Syrie was saved from having to find an appropriate refusal by the door opening and a young man slipping inside.
“Dallyn, my sweet boy, you’ve arrived just in time to eat with us,” his mother exclaimed, jumping up from her seat to scurry over to him. Rising up onto her tiptoes, she pulled his head down so that she could kiss his cheek before turning a happy face to her guests. “This is my son, Dallyn Al’ Lyre, Captain in the Guard of the Realm of Faerie.”
“I doubt your guests are in need of a recitation of my rank and honors, Mother,” the young man said, a fond expression lighting his eyes as he placed a hand on the shoulder of their small, rotund hostess. “Especially not in light of your message as to who has sent them here.”
“Oh, you’re right, of course, my dear,” his mother said, patting his hand before hurrying over to her still-bubbling pot. “Shall I fill a bowl for you? You can eat while you all get to know one another.”
“I think not, Mother,” Dallyn said. “As a matter of fact, I think I’d prefer my new friends and I adjourn to the stables for our visit. Won’t you join me?”
“But surely you’d all be more comfortable in—” Leala began.
“I’d enjoy a tour of yer fine stables,” Patrick interrupted, rising from his chair to join Dallyn at the door. “I’ve heard much about the quality of yer horseflesh here in Wyddecol.”
“Men,” Syrie said with an apologetic smile aimed toward Leala before she followed after the two, who had walked out into the night.
Anywhere in Time (Magic of Time Book 2) Page 16