Predestined

by R. Garland Gray

  She stopped to catch her breath.

  The handsome chieftain was right behind her and came round to face her. “You canna run from what you are. Why do you deny the faery blood that flows in your veins?”

  “I doona know.” She had no answer for him, or an answer for herself. She wanted to drive him away; yet, she wanted to drive him closer.

  Silver-mists began to swirl about their ankles.

  “Shall I prove it to you, Bryna?” He pulled her close before she could escape.

  “Release me,” she said, not looking up at him.

  “Shall I take you now and make the land shudder with your unearthly passion? Shall I renew the promise between your soft thighs and bury my seed deep in your faery womb?”

  She began to tremble, fear and unknown wants taking hold of her.

  “Your moon time approaches,” he whispered huskily against her temple. “Your body readies itself for a mating.”

  Her cheeks flushed in mortification. “It readies every month, Tynan. That is the way of life.”

  “Aye, ‘tis life’s way.” He pulled back and Bryna watched a single bead of sweat run down his cheek to his jawline.

  “Let me go, Tynan.” She pushed against his chest.

  “I will.” His voice vibrated deeply with male need. He shackled her wrists. “But not before I taste what is mine.”

  Bryna looked up into a face chiseled in savage male beauty.

  “You would hold me against my will?”

  “I hold you so you doona hurt yourself. Your will is your own.”

  His gaze burned her with a deep, hard possession. “Fiery faery, I wish to taste that fire.” He buried his hand in the sweat-dampened hair at her nape and pulled her closer.

  “Doona fear me,” he said gently. “I canna let you go. You are mine by ancient promise as I belong to you.”

  His head lowered. “You are my destiny, Bryna.” Part of her wanted to be that destiny, but then the golden goddess of her dreams flashed in her mind and she could not help but say, “There is another.”

  “There is no other.”

  He tilted her chin upward. His eyes fixed on her face.

  “See the changing color in my eyes, Bryna. Know the promise of the ancient lord. Know that I will regain Kindred and build a kingdom of dawn as the faeries have foretold.”

  He framed her face.

  “Know that you are mine.” He closed the distance between their mouths and brushed her lips with his.

  “My faerymate,” he murmured, sliding his lips over hers and taking what belonged to him.

  Heat and need bloomed within her. Bryna closed her eyes. The legacy of her hidden faery birth shimmered deep within her heart, threatening to wreck the pattern of her ordinary life.

  “Taste me,” he murmured seductively against her sensitive lips. “Open for me, Bryna. Doona fear the ancient promise.” He held her face tenderly and she felt a strange compulsion to mimic what he did to her. She swirled her tongue in his mouth. He tasted of nighttime stars, of clear streams, of fragrant hills, and of all things magic.

  She whimpered and wrapped her arms around his corded neck.

  In her mouth, Tynan murmured encouragingly. He breathed deeply of his honor-mark calling him to mate now — with this young woman, in this unlikely place.

  He should stop this madness.

  His hands caressed her back and fitted low over her rounded bottom. Like the rhythm of waves upon her shore, he moved against her, undulating back and forth, seeking relief in her feminine response. His hands slid her gown up her slender thighs to silken hips, a reminder of what was forbidden. He pulled away from her.

  “Tynan?”

  Seeking respite, he turned from her lovely face and swollen lips and raked a hand through his hair. “Bryna, I canna forswear my oath but, by the gods, you are tempting.”

  Sidhe spells and honor. The words echoed in his heated body and mind.

  Sidhe spells and honor.

  He turned around, but his faery had flown from him over the rocky hill where his men had disappeared.

  He looked up into the new twilight sky, his body still hot and hard. A hawk soared above, caught in the deepening purple light.

  The ancient promise flowed in his blood creating a tide of lust pulsing with magic, a magic that shone in his eyes. He detested it, detested the loss of control.

  His life and his tribesmen’s lives were interwoven with the faery folk. They were no longer ordinary mortals, but caught in between the worlds of the mortal and faery.

  Suddenly the sound of droning bees filled his ears blanking, out his musings. Tynan had to smile in reluctant amusement.

  “I hear you,” he said.

  The invisible piskies, tiny kin to his faery folk, scolded him for his delay and then commented on the beauty of his faery.

  “I know.”

  It was believed that the piskies bore the souls of the virtuous. Although no one had ever seen them, except mayhap in dreams, their helpfulness toward the aged and infirm were often balanced with their prankish ways.

  Tynan looked where Bryna had disappeared.

  The earlier mist receded. Jagged shapes filled his inner sight. The men of his tribe waited for him just beyond the rise.

  “Tell Ian that I come.”

  A sprinkling of gold mist, and then they were gone. Silence returned to the air.

  Tynan let the silence soothe his ravaged spirit and started walking up the hill. He watched a red fox hurriedly cross his path and disappear in a thick hedgerow. The animal searched for its prey, as he had searched for the territorial goddess. Bryna was not at all what he had expected in a fey mate; too mortal, too innocent, and way too lovely for his peace of mind.

  They had reached the woodlands.

  Bryna inspected the roundhouse where Edwin had told her to wait. Built of oak timbers, it appeared slightly larger than the rest of the circular homes dotting the woodlands. The other homes were made of poles, stakes, twigs, and tree branches bound with clay and mud. Hazelnuts woven into animal skins hung over the door entrances.

  She glanced back into the house. In the center of the dirt floor lay a circle of small gray stones for the fire. Straw and fragrant rushes covered selected areas that were away from the fire pit. In the back, spread out in welcome, lay a large bed of sheepskins and woven blankets. A finely carved trestle table and benches stood to the right. On the table, white candles lit the space.

  She turned back to the music of the night, complete with the hum of frogs and crickets and an occasional hooting owl.

  To her right, a decayed ruin of fallen stones lay buried beneath a massive thicket of silver thorns.

  She watched brown wrens forage through the undergrowth at the edge of the woodlands, envious of their freedom. The active birds often startled decent people with their sudden movements and their constant searches for spiders and bugs, but they never startled her. A part of her always seemed to know when animals were near.

  The faery woodlands were a place of ancient oaks, red-berried rowans, and fine-grained yews whose wood was favored by archers. She felt the elemental cycle of nature in her blood. Every bracken, stone, and stream glimmered with enchantment. It was folly to deny her senses, to deny what she felt. She had always thirsted for the sweetness of the land. Do others feel like this? She often wondered. Do others feel the breath of a butterfly; hear the echo of a ripple of water, or the sighs of grasshoppers?

  She continued to look outward, cramming her senses with all that she could, her heart calming, sliding into a new-found peace.

  The faery tribe lived on the edge of a large sylvan thicket. Below the giant trees, silver mists lingered among the holly bushes and whispering ferns. Vines of tiny white flowers opened for the moon’s kiss. It was a fey place, a belonging place. Fires kindled and the smell of cooking meat made her mouth water.

  Smiling with a strange contentment, she went back into the roundhouse and stopped.

  “Oh, I dinna know anyone is he
re.”

  An ancient noble female stood in the candlelit darkness. Sprigs of holly and gold beads adorned her long, wavy black hair streaked with gray. Bryna had never seen anything like it. The older woman wore a green woolen gown beneath a girdle of silver chains. Around her neck rested a thick bronze torc. She wore arm bands, bracelets, and finger rings. She had heard the faery tribe was fond of personal decoration, but this seemed excessive to her.

  “I have brought warm water.” The woman gestured to the back where three candles lit a dark corner. “And clean clothes for you to change into. You may bathe. Then we talk.”

  Bryna looked past the woman to the back. Candlelight glowed over steaming water lapping in a brown bucket large enough to sit in. A white cloth and soap rested on the trestle table behind the bucket. The flames of three white candles flickered in the corner.

  “Do you know the meaning of the candles?” the woman asked.

  Bryna knew their meaning from Derina’s teachings. “The candles are a triad illuminating knowledge, nature, and truth.”

  “Go on.”

  “Some believe the triadic goddess embodies fertility, sexual pleasure, and magical warfare. My beliefs are simpler. They involve the maid, the mother, and the crone.”

  “So do mine. Bathe. I will await you outside.” Bryna watched the woman leave and then walked to the back of the roundhouse. The flickering shadows gave her a sense of privacy. Undressing, she stepped into the large bucket and lowered herself in. The warm water felt amazingly good. Her knees drew to her breasts, but she did not care. She washed her hair and body with the surprisingly fragrant soap. Finishing quickly, she rose and dried herself.

  The older woman had provided a simple dark green gown, which lay on the bed. Bryna slipped it on. The tight bodice fit snugly over her breasts, but the rest of the gown would do well enough. Twisting her hair into a tight rope, she squeezed the remaining water out.

  “Daoine Sidhe,” the woman called from outside. “Come.”

  Bryna went outside, feeling the chilling dampness against her skin. She did not correct the woman, but met her blue gaze, a gaze that regarded her from an ageless face shaped round and white.

  “Put this on.” The woman held out a green cloak edged with fringe, and a lovely bronze brooch.

  Murmuring her thanks, Bryna accepted the cloak and wrapped it around her shoulders. She clasped the brooch under her chin.

  “Come, let us sit by the west fire. I am Rose.”

  Refreshed from his bath in the chilled woodland stream, Tynan waited restlessly in Rose’s roundhouse. He donned forest green breeches and a tunic for the unusually cool night. A pair of calf-high boots hugged his legs. Around his neck, he wore his mother’s thin gold torc, a personal honor he kept quiet within himself. His hand rested easily on the belt dagger around his waist.

  Shelves of healing plants from Rose’s garden and wreathes cluttered the home. He stood in front of the table and leaned down to smell one of the dried herbs. Lavender. He would always associate that particular scent with Bryna.

  “Welcome to my home, Dark Chieftain,” the simpler said upon entering.

  Tynan glanced over his shoulder at the tribe elder and nodded his greeting, “Rose.”

  “What brings you here this late in the eve?”

  “Is Bryna of our faery brethren?”

  The simpler moved to her table of plants, her fingers gently working in the soil.

  “Rose, doona make me wait in this.”

  She glanced up at him with those gold-flecked faery eyes, full of wisdom and calm. “I doona know.”

  “You doona know?” He could not believe that. “Bryna feels things deeply, of that I’m certain. She guards her emotions behind a wall of remoteness. Me-thinks she is faery and mortal, most unusual. Her link to the land is shadowed by turmoil and inattentiveness, but her awareness grows.”

  “What does that mean?”

  The simpler continued to fuss with a remedy of Bilar Trá, for the malady of open sores in the mouth.

  “Rose,” he said impatiently.

  “What does your body say, Lordling? Is she faery? Is she the territorial goddess?”

  He looked down. His body hummed with the gá, the need, for Bryna. He did not want his male torment known.

  “Lordling, leave that plant alone.”

  Tynan pulled back his hands. In preoccupation, he had bruised the tender leaf of one of her plants.

  When he looked up, she watched him intently, her bushy brows drawing down.

  “You burn in the gá.”

  “Aye.”

  She faced him with her hands on her hips and Tynan prepared for the worst.

  “Why did you honor-mark her without consent?” He spoke slowly, calmly. “I was spellbound in magic by the Evil One.”

  “Yn Drogh Spyrryd.” Her eyes widened. “Did he touch you?” she asked hurriedly. “Speak to you?”

  Tynan frowned at the urgency in her voice.

  “The Evil One,” she prompted. “Did he touch you, Lordling?”

  Tynan blinked. The memory came unbidden.

  Be you mine, the Sorcerer had said.

  Tynan shook his head.

  “I doona remember,” he answered. “He had drugged me.”

  She nodded and turned from him to face the table. Her hands appeared to be shaking.

  “Rose?”

  She shook her head. “Your body and blood recognizes Bryna for what she is even though her heart is closed to the truth. She is hurt deeply and not open to her own nature.”

  “She is the territorial goddess?” Anticipation exploded in him.

  “I am uncertain. She is idir, between.” The simpler shrugged. “Mayhap the faeries test you as punishment for your father’s sins. Mayhap they hide the goddess so that you must prove your loyalty to them and the land. I doona know.”

  “The faeries punish us all, then. I ask again, simpler, can I take her to mate and fulfill the promise?”

  “I will speak with the elders about handfasting.”

  “Handfasting is a trial-marriage. It is only temporary.”

  “Aye, for year and a day unless she fulfills the goddess’ promise and conceives an heir. You must still seek our faery approval.”

  Tynan muttered an oath and stalked past the simpler without a glance.

  “Patience, Lordling.”

  “Patience,” he echoed caustically, and stopped just inside the entrance. He looked out to the starry night, the aloneness of his spellbound blood humming inside him. “The faeries are imprisoned in Kindred by the Evil One’s magic. To get their approval, I must first free them.”

  “The Roman invaders want the Dark Chieftain and use our fey brethren for lure.”

  “Aye, and I want Kindred, but to get Kindred I must mate with the territorial goddess. I canna . . .”

  “Wait?”

  He turned back to her, struggling with the fey compulsion inside him. “Speak with the elders.”

  “I will, but you must wait for their decision.”

  “Rose.” His voice lowered. His sense of destiny came from deep within himself and the need to right his father’s wrong. He learned early on that he must seize control to succeed and to live. “The forces inside me are strong and ancient.”

  “Strong and ancient you may be, my virile lordling.” She raked him with a disapproving look. “But doona voice your claim on her. Wait for tribe approval of the handfasting.”

  “I doona want a temporary arrangement. I want a full marriage.”

  “Go through the handfasting ceremony until we are sure of Bryna’s true nature. There are other ways to ease your manly plight.”

  A sense of doom filled him. Tynan knew he would never forswear the promise. He would never jeopardize his tribe’s future. His gaze returned to the unforgiving night.

  “Two days you have.” He glanced over his shoulder and met her gold-flecked faery cursed eyes. “Two days, Rose.” He turned and stepped out into the night.

  “
Willful,” Rose murmured, and then smiled.

  Back at Kindred, the Sorcerer’s black rage knew no bounds. He slaughtered innocents in a seething fury, and shredded men of warrior strength until the frenzy inside him lulled to a dull roar.

  People scurried from his path. Even the Roman Centurion had ordered his soldiers to keep their distance from him, afraid he’d conjure some terrible plague. If only it were so, the Sorcerer mused. If only he could change the past.

  He strode through the tombs until he stood at the edge of the stone crater. He studied the small mountain of red jewels. From within the prison’s faceted depths, unblinking faery eyes of gold, silver, and bronze watched him warily.

  Aye, he mused, they had come when he cried out for help. The small handful of woodland nymphs mis-took his spellbound voice for the younger version and fell into his trap.

  A wicked smile curved his thin lips.

  “Soon, my son will come.”

  He turned away. His mind filled with the best way to get his blood back.

  When only one Dark Chieftain remained, the faeries would have no choice but to forgive him. He licked his lips in eager anticipation.

  He’d make them slither in the dirt like worms.

  CHAPTER 8

  GLOAMING ARRIVED IN TRIUMPHANT SHADES of purple, changing the woodlands into a shimmering place. Shade and dimness vied for the gleaming of the silver tipped ferns, the luminescence of the air, and the dark moist bark of branches.

  Bryna felt a little dispirited as the day slipped into a cool evening. She did not notice the faery sparkle of the land, or the acorn-fed pigs that stared up at her curiously before moving on.

  Standing outside Lyn Cerrig’s home, she waited quietly for Rose. She had been assisting the simpler all day and had learned that the tribe of the Tuatha De Danann were a people of knowledge and crafts.

  Cerrig, the tribe’s blacksmith, was highly prized for his skill in chariot design. He had summoned Rose to treat a festering cut on his left shin and was now receiving a thorough scolding from the angry simpler for waiting so long.

  Bryna stared at the black dirt. Three days had passed since she met with the tribe elders and five days since Tynan had left. She spent most of her time with Rose, helping tend the ill as she had once done with Derina.