Predestined

by R. Garland Gray

  “A terrible plague has settled upon our land these past few years. I serve the invader, adding to the suffering and blight. Do you not wonder why?”

  “I have wondered.”

  “I am the guardian of the Lost One. Keeper of the prophecy until he becomes born of flesh and blood.”

  Bryna did not understand Derina’s reference to the lost one, but she understood the other. “You believe that warrior chained in the tombs is the Dark Chieftain.” It was a statement.

  “It is him, child. Mark me well.”

  “How do you know?”

  “My blood knows. Listen to me now for what I say, I say only once. During faeirin time, I found you on the sacred shores of Loch Gur.”

  “I know.”

  “You are the Lost One, destined to be the mate of the ancient lord.”

  Bryna scoffed in disbelief. “Prophecy says the ancient lord’s mate will be a territorial goddess.”

  “True.”

  “I am not a goddess, Teacher. I am a slave as you are well aware.”

  “Child, you possess the ethereal soul of the faery, though it is hidden by the layers of hardship you have had to endure.”

  “My destiny is fortitude and endurance, a slave’s fate, not a goddess of prophecy. I am not even sure that I believe in the stories you tell.”

  “You must believe.”

  “Why, because I was born cursed?”

  “Not cursed, blessed.”

  “Teacher, who else but one cursed can sense changes in the air like those of a coming gale? Who else but one cursed can sense the acid breath of a lie leaving a man’s lips?”

  “Those so gifted and of faery birth.”

  Bryna struggled to maintain her patience. “With respect, Teacher, I am not the territorial goddess. I know this because . . . because I dream of one of golden light and purity.”

  Derina tilted her head, a sudden pausing. “What do you dream, child?”

  Bryna scanned the countryside. “In my dreams I see a nighttime glade and a pool of dark rain. At the edge kneels a golden goddess with wings of white lace. She crushes a pink flower in her hand, a sign of her displeasure. All around her are shadows. I sense danger.”

  “She is the untrue goddess.”

  Bryna smiled gently. “I am not a goddess.”

  “Your time has come, child.”

  She turned her face away. Her teacher believed her to be of the faeries and there would be no changing her mind.

  “The wind blows across the dry fields, yet the mist does not move,” she observed quietly, hoping to change the subject. “The air feels thick in my lungs this morning.”

  “The land prepares for what shall come.” The druidess gestured toward the dungeons. “They veil the chieftain with magic and a spider spell.”

  Bryna turned back to the ancient. “What do you speak of? A spider’s spell?”

  “It is the Sorcerer’s name for it, not mine. It looks like a black spider to me. It feeds off the chieftain, stealing his sight and hearing.”

  Bryna covered her mouth in alarm, never hearing of such a thing. “Teacher.” Her gaze dropped to a glistening spider web in the crevice near her hip; the spider waited in the corner for its next meal. She pulled her hand away from the stone.

  “I hid in the dank tombs after you left, child, and watched the black rite,” the druidess murmured.

  Bryna felt ill to the depths of her soul. To do such a thing to a living being was worse than death. She remembered the tall, skeletal Sorcerer coming to the fortress on a rain-soaked night, many years ago. Some believed him to be the banished Dark High Druid of Leinster. Others whispered that he was the Dark Chieftain of Prophecy, fallen from the favor of the Faery Queen. Whatever his past, twisted evil reigned in him now. With his black candles and foul-smelling breath, he ruled the weak-willed Roman Centurion invader who favored his council.

  “What did you see?” she heard herself ask.

  “When you bring the chieftain to the waterfall cave I will tell you.”

  “Teacher, I doona understand you this morning. I canna bring the chieftain. He is a prisoner.”

  “Listen to me. The Sorcerer belongs to the other-world. He infuses a spider with black magic and the creature has attached itself to the chieftain’s temple. You must bring the chieftain to the waterfall cave and remove it there.”

  Bryna shuddered in revulsion. Normal spiders drank the blood of their paralyzed prey. This one drank a man’s senses.

  “Witcheyes!” A Roman soldier called abruptly from the courtyard below. That was her Roman master’s name for her.

  Schooling her expression into cool disinterest, Bryna turned to the soldier in the courtyard below.

  “Aye?”

  “You are wanted in the great hall.”

  “I come.” A summons from her master boded ill.

  “I must go now, Teacher.”

  The ancient touched her arm.

  “Remember what I told you, child. Come to me later and I will tell you what you must do. For now, go and meet your destiny.”

  Gazing at the druidess with uncertainty, Bryna turned and lifted her gray skirts. She hurried down the unfinished wooden steps to the courtyard below. She did not know what to make of her teacher this morning. The druidess had been acting strangely of late, walking the fields at night and whispering to the moon.

  Bryna ran to the massive keep at the south end of the courtyard, the morning dew staining the hem of her gown. Climbing the stone steps, she shoved open the wooden doors and stepped through the arched entrance.

  An arcane cold pressed down upon her.

  She stopped, sensing the . . .

  Daoine Sidhe. The Faeries.

  The air in the main hall grew silvery.

  In her mind, a whistling sound became butterfly wings, wrapping threads of copper and gold around her. FREE US. FREE US.

  Her heart pounded in her chest.

  She tried to remain calm.

  Daoine Sidhe. They call to me yet again. What do you want?

  Her hands fisted at her sides, but only silence answered her. “What do you want?” She whispered.

  The cold dissipated.

  Silver left the air.

  The soft sounds of the morning returned with the occasional bark of a hound, the whinny of a horse, the grumbling of men.

  Bryna blinked the hall back into focus.

  Before her, torches lit crumbling walls. A central gray stone staircase wound its way to the upper levels of the unfinished fortress.

  To the left of the staircase, servants scurried from large kitchens with meals on dishes of painted and glazed clay, unaware of the touch of the faeries just moments before.

  Gathering her courage, Bryna turned right and walked down the corridor to the great hall, pushing the thought of faeries out of her mind. Since the Roman invaders had come, a vast darkness had spread, shadowing the land with decay. No crops grew in the fields. No rain fell from the sky. Babes had been born dead.

  She paused at the entrance of the great hall and peered in.

  Red drapes hung in sections, in between the triple narrow windows. A roaring fire hissed and crackled in the stone hearth to the left, chasing away the dampness of the morning.

  “Witcheyes!”

  Clutching her gray skirts, Bryna hastened to where her Centurion master sat. She knew he was not a typical Roman soldier, but a senior non-commissioned officer, given governorship of the coastal fortress and surrounding land and villages.

  “Where have you been?” he demanded. Men wearing tunics of red and black parted, opening a path to the raised dais upon which he sat on his throne of embedded jewels.

  “On the parapets, my lord,” she replied.

  The Centurion’s swarthy cheeks flushed in anger. Dressed in his favorite knee-length red tunic, he reminded Bryna of a mean-tempered elf with sunken black eyes hinting at depravity.

  She knelt before him. Today would be a day for inner strength and submissiveness. “I am h
ere,” she said.

  “Lower those damn silver eyes, witch.”

  Bryna did as he commanded.

  “Do not make me wait again. Now, stand beside me.”

  Bryna rose on silent feet.

  “Stand there.” His bejeweled fingers gestured to his right, about two arm lengths away from his chair.

  She stepped up on the dais and pulled her hood back. Though the Centurion bathed daily in his private bath, he still smelled of sour sweat and unkempt habits and she was glad that he had not ordered her to stand close beside him this day.

  “Bring that warrior from the north to me. What do the Britons call them?” The Centurion turned to her for an answer.

  “I have heard the Britons call them the Caledonians, but they have other names.”

  “What do you and the druidess call them?”

  “We call them the noble people.”

  “I have heard another name for them, Witcheyes, something tuatha.”

  “Tuatha Dé Danann,” Bryna repliedreluctantly.

  “That was it, the magical people.” He snickered and then gestured impatiently to the guards at the back door. “Well, get him for me.”

  The two guards at the back door nodded and hurried to do their master’s bidding. While they waited, the men in the room huddled in groups, murmuring amongst themselves of painted men who dyed their bodies blue.

  Suddenly the sound of chains could be heard, drawing nearer.

  Clanggg . . .

  Rr-rattttttle . . .

  C-clank . . .

  Bryna stared at the doorway.

  The guards emerged, dragging the chieftain across the stone floor, a chained animal with no rights but to serve. They brought him before her master, a rebellious prisoner of obvious strength and endurance. Hair, long and black as a wild stallion’s mane, fell in plaits and tangled lengths down his back.

  The fat Roman guard forced the chieftain to his knees, pushing down hard on his shoulders.

  “He has hair like a woman,” the Centurion sneered loudly.

  Bryna’s heart ached for the chieftain. His large frame trembled with the coiled tension of a captured animal.

  “Show me the Sorcerer’s spider.” Her master sat forward on the edge of his chair with childlike eagerness.

  One of the guards grabbed the chieftain’s chin and jerked his head sideways.

  Bryna’s gaze locked on his bruised temple. The spider peeked from beneath a few shiny, black strands of the chieftain’s hair. It looked like a wood spider, brown and hairy with eyes that glittered red.

  The guard suddenly yelped and jerked his hand back. Blood dripped from teeth marks in his thumb.

  “The animal nips.” The Centurion chuckled loudly at his guard’s injury.

  Bryna did not understand this public display, this offense of life. As she stood there locked in dread, the chieftain wiped the blood from his mouth with an un-hurried movement of the back of his hand and she knew, knew he was not afraid.

  “Where is the Sorcerer?” Her master looked around, yet no one answered. “How do I question my prisoner if he cannot hear me?”

  A blond priest in purple robes pushed past Bryna.

  “My lord,” the priest said in hushed tones. “The Sorcerer said he would come this afternoon to deal with this one. He is in the castle’s tomb and not to be disturbed.”

  “I do not wish to wait.” The Centurion motioned the priest back impatiently. “I want to know why the Sorcerer thinks this tuatha prisoner special. He does not look special to me.” Several of the Romans nodded in agreement, which only fueled her master’s awful thoughts even more.

  Bryna knew the Centurion hated this place of magic. She had heard he made a slight misjudgment with a senator’s young son and had been banished here to supervise trade. The coastal fort housed only one legion of about four thousand men. He needed more legions if his plans for a glorious military invasion were to be met. She suspected that victory meant liberation to him. He would return to Rome a hero, his villa and slaves restored, the Senate heralding his praise. Bryna would rather die than be brought to Rome.

  “Witcheyes, can you tell me what he is thinking?”

  She startled out of her musings. “Nay, my lord.”

  “Try.”

  She stepped down from the dais on shaky legs. Taking two steps forward, she slammed into an unseen wall of rage from the chieftain. It took her a moment to recover.

  “What do you sense, Witcheyes?”

  “He is angry.”

  “Too bad. What else?”

  The chieftain tilted his head. Tangles of black hair hid his face. Bryna stared openly at him, unable to help herself.

  “Witch, tell me what you sense.”

  A terrible sadness gripped her heart at the imprisonment of such a beautiful creature. The chieftain shifted again, sending waves of primitive fury crashing into her body. Bryna bit back a sob, shaking her head, and stepped back.

  “I want to see his face,” the Centurion ordered.

  The fat guard immediately complied. Grabbing a handful of black hair, he yanked the chieftain’s head back.

  Bryna’s breath caught.

  The face before her was sculpted in hard angles, but what captured her attention were his large eyes. Thick sooty lashes framed violet irises beneath a milky white veil of sightlessness.

  The chieftain’s jaw clenched in rebellion. The veins in his corded neck bulged. A snarl curled his lips.

  Jerking his head out of the guard’s grasp, he elbowed his captor in the stomach.

  Bryna jumped back, startled at the suddenness of the violence.

  The fat guard let out a thick “oof” and fell to one knee. The other, taller guard whipped linked chains around the chieftain’s neck and jerked back.

  “Restrained, but not broken, I see.” The Centurion rubbed his face in disgust. “Well, Witcheyes?”

  “I sense nothing,” Bryna stated carefully. “I must hear his words to sense if he lies.”

  “That is not possible, it seems.”

  “ ‘Tis not.” Bryna agreed.

  “Where is the druidess?”

  “In the village.” She grasped her hands in front of her to keep them from shaking. Servants were lighting the wall torches about the great hall, yet she could not look away from the chains wrapped around the chieftain’s neck.

  “Ah, Witcheyes,” the Centurion sighed mightily. “You disappoint me.”

  Disappointment often meant death. She quietly repeated her claim. “I sense nothing from the warrior.” She dare not call him chieftain, for that would be a sure death sentence.

  “So it seems. Stand aside, then.” Her master dismissed her with a curt wave.

  Relieved, Bryna moved to the stone column on the right and waited.

  “Does the animal have a name?” the Centurion demanded.

  “They call him Tynan, my lord.”

  “Release him and step back.”

  The guard lifted the chains away and the chieftain heaved forward onto his forearms, gasping for air, the muscles in his back and sides flexing with each recovering breath.

  “Tynan.” The Centurion leaned forward in his chair, gazing thoughtfully at his coughing prisoner. “I am told that the Sorcerer suspects you are the Dark Chieftain, Tynan. Let me see if I remember this ancient keep’s oral tradition.” He tilted his head and tapped his chin with an index finger. “If you are Kindred’s ancient liege, then you have come to mate with the territorial goddess to restore the land, or,” he paused dramatically, “are you just a stupid barbarian?”

  Bryna started at her master’s understanding of the ancient chieftain prophecy, but he was not finished yet. “Or, should I call you Lord Tynan of the illusive Tuatha Dé Danann?” he snarled, leaning forward in his chair. “Which is it? Are you part of the faery tribe that plagues my garrison, or not?”

  The castle priest stumbled forward. “My lord, the Sorcerer wishes . . .”

  “Shut up, fool! How can you be a priest w
hen you serve a Sorcerer?”

  The priest flushed in embarrassment and moved back.

  Bryna watched Tynan sit back on his legs. With an arrogant toss, his tangled black mane fell down his back. A thin, red welt marred his neck where the chain had pressed hard into his flesh.

  “Who are you?” Her master rose from his chair, tugging at his red tunic. He stepped down from the dais and circled his prisoner.

  Tynan’s dark head followed her master’s movements, to Bryna’s growing apprehension. The Centurion huffed in annoyance. “Even spellbound, the animal senses me. Perhaps he needs a little pain to divert those superior senses.”

  “The Sorcerer, my lord,” the priest interrupted. Bryna could hear fear in the man’s voice. “He does not want this one harmed.”

  “Ah, the Sorcerer.” Her master returned to his seat, a disgruntled child. “The skeletal one knows I do not like to be kept waiting.”

  The servants, the men in attendance, all waited for what came next and then suddenly, the chieftain turned to her—a simple act. In that one defining moment, Bryna felt him, a reaching out for her, a touching of warmth and need that stirred her soul.

  The Centurion laughed from his seat on the dais. “He senses you, Witcheyes, like a lusty stallion sniffing out a ready mare in heat.”

  She stood white-faced, unable to move.

  “And like any prized stallion he must be taught who is his master. Twenty lashes should make him take to his master’s bit. Chain him in the dungeon when finished. I would not want to deprive the Sorcerer of his stallion.”

  The guards obeyed her master quickly and grabbed the chieftain’s upper arms, dragging him backward and out of the hall. Bryna could do nothing. The link between her and the proud chieftain had been severed, leaving her physically weakened.

  “Witcheyes, come here.” Her master waved for everyone to leave the hall.

  Bryna battled the urge to flee. She walked over to where her master sat in his red finery.

  “Lower your eyes.”

  Some arrogant mischief inside her heart made her disobey.

  “Do not test me, Witcheyes. Lower them.”

  Slowly, she dropped her gaze to the floor.

  “Who is this warrior to you?”

  “I have not seen him before, my lord.” She clasped her hands in front of her.