“Why is that?” Gideon wondered, thinking out loud. He was genuinely curious.
“Because the truth behind it is all too often too terrible to bear spoken plain…like now,” Lavilia said. “You want me to elaborate upon an answer I have already given you. Is it my fault that you are too dense to see the answer staring you in the face? I think not, dark one. You need to take stock. Your sight has grown narrow these days. Love does that to a body.”
“I’ve never had ‘sight.’ That is why I come to you.”
“You come to me because you have no other alternative,” she chortled. “You’ve made a grand muck of things blundering about on your own.”
“Then enlighten me!” Gideon thundered, his voice echoing repeatedly, amplified by the fog. “Come out! Show yourself and let me look into your eyes.”
After a moment, the mist parted and Lavilia stepped out of the writhing whorls of mystic vapor naked, her long gray hair barely covering her faded nipples. “Do not worry,” she said, sauntering closer. “I want none of you this time; it is our last time, and I would remember our coupling as it was upon your last visit. I have something else in mind.”
“She is with Marius. Is she safe on the Forest Isle until I resolve this?”
“Is that your last question?” Lavilia asked. “Think carefully, you only have one.”
Gideon already knew he and Rhiannon could be together, just not as he wished. That much he’d tricked her into telling, so he wouldn’t waste a question on that. He’d already wasted one when the nightmare began. He could ill afford to lose another.
“Yes,” he finally said. “Is she safe where I have left her?”
“Not for long,” said the crone. “You have angered the guardian of Outer Darkness, and none upon the Forest Isle are safe from that one’s wrath.”
Gideon gave a start. “Why did you send us back there then?”
“I didn’t send you anywhere, dark one,” Lavilia defended. “I got you out of hell to play out your destiny. That it is to happen on the Forest Isle is none of my doing. I haven’t the power to dictate destiny, only to reveal it. You set this course in motion when you struck out on your own without hearing what you needed to know that would have prevented all of this, impetuous one. Lay no blame for that blunder upon me!”
“And thrice now I have begged you to tell me the rest of that augur. You owe me!”
“Do I? Take care, dark one. You can ill afford to anger me now. I do not need to tell you what you were in too great a hurry to hear. Someone else will do that for me. But this much I tell you for free…You will not find your safe haven anywhere within the reaches, tracks, and climbs of Arcus. Waste no time seeking sanctuary here or anywhere that the watchers can gain admittance. They are relentless.”
“I have nothing left to lose,” Gideon ground out through clenched teeth.
“Nothing except Rhiannon,” Lavilia reminded him. “And your soul.”
Gideon gave it thought. There was no time to waste, but he was down to his last feather in her keeping. He needed to be certain. When he didn’t speak, Lavilia took the initiative.
“I can tell you no more,” she said. “Take great care calling back your last feather. That is all the free advice I can give you, and I’ve said it before. I will not cheat you, dark one, but I am bound by the oracle I’ve summoned to do your bidding in this, and if you do not choose wisely…”
“I understand.”
“I wonder that you do,” she said on a gusty sigh. “But no matter. It will play out as it is designed. Come! Embrace me…”
“I thought you said—”
“I am not asking you to put that grand magnificence inside me, there isn’t time for that. I ask only that you give it me in spirit. When I touch that body, it becomes a living memory, dark one, a vision imprinted in my mind that I might call up whenever I will to bring your image to me as if you’ve come in the flesh. Let me have my playthings. It will not hurt you, and it will bring comfort to a tired old succubus on dark and lonely winter nights.”
Gideon almost pitied her as she sauntered close, cupping his face with her wrinkled hands.
“I will miss you,” she said, sliding her crippled fingers down his neck. She was like a blind person seeing by touch.
Gideon took a closer look, and his breath caught in his throat. She was blind. Why had she never showed him this before? “You cannot see!” he cried. “How is it in all these years I have never noticed?”
“I am illusion, dark one, remember? You have seen what I have wished you to see. I need no eyes for the kind of sight the gods have bestowed upon me. It was my sacrifice eons ago in trade for my second sight. My third eye sees far more clearly than the two dead orbs you gaze into now, dark one. I see you with my spirit through these old fingers, and your image will forever live behind these sightless eyes.”
She continued to follow the contours of his shoulders, then traced his broad chest through the eel-skin suit. Spreading it wide, she reached inside and found the small, hard buds of his nipples set like gems in his pectoral muscles above the sleek, roped torso. When she fondled his penis, his posture clenched. She was making a mental image of every muscle, every crevice. He was already aroused when she began, as he always was after he’d flown. When she cupped his testicles, his hips jerked forward, and his shaft lengthened, the distended veins thrumming, straining the sensitive skin.
Gideon groaned and shut his eyes. He’d steeled himself against this very thing before he ever touched down, and convinced himself that whatever sexual favors she extracted from him were no worse than the Ancient Ones’ ministrations in Marius’s forest. His cock had needed milking since the watchers’ lightning strike as he set out. The wind hadn’t been enough to slake the need the lightning awakened, that was why the nymphs had always serviced him when they were near. Without release, the pain would be excruciating. Resigned, he opened his eyes and gave a lurch. Lavilia had shapeshifted into the young and buxom creature he had taken on his last visit.
“You will have to finish what you’ve started there,” he said, his voice husky with lust. “The lightning strike I suffered coming here needs purging.”
“’Twas my intent, dark one,” Lavilia said. “But you will not have to suffer putting this fine shaft I am holding inside of me this time. I need to hold it thus when you come to make the memory that will live in the legends of the Arcan Isles for all eternity. For soon, you come this way no more, Gideon, Lord of the Dark, but your legend will live on for all who will come after you through the mists of time. I will see to it.”
Cold chills raced the length of Gideon’s spine. “You make it sound as if I am about to die, old one,” he said, as cheerfully as her cryptic augur would allow.
“There is no death for an immortal, no matter what his plane of existence, you know that. Just as Simeon’s penis was once preserved at the height of its splendor for all to witness down through the ages, so will your magnificence be preserved at the moment of ejaculation. So it shall be with all the lords of Arcus before my days are done. It is my gift to the posterity of the archipelago, so that whatever occurs, all who tread these isles will know the greatness that once reigned here.”
Gideon gave an incredulous grunt. He’d seen Simeon’s phallus before Simeon consigned it to the deep by way of a tide pool on the Isle of Mists before he wedded his Megaleen.
“You sculpted that phallus of Simeon?” he blurted.
She nodded. “With my third eye, just as I sculpt you now. Yours will be my greatest work, dark one. Stand still! I feel the blood pumping through those rigid veins; how hard the head is, yet how silken soft the skin that sheaths that hardness. No marble mined of any quarry could ever really do it justice. Without my magic, it could not be done.”
“Touch my wings,” Gideon got out, trying to hurry the process. His need was such that he could bear no more without pain.
“Not…quite…yet…” she said, pumping his shaft with her hand in a circular motion from root
to ridged tip, avoiding the smooth, domed head that had begun to leak pre-come. His penis was so engorged it looked purple in the eerie light, as he watched her skilled fingers masturbate him.
“Mica’s teeth!” he seethed. “Have done! My wings! Stroke my wings and set me free from this torture…It is enough!”
Her deep, tantalizing revolutions pumping him steadily made him shiver with each thrust of her hand. Like any temperamental artist, she would not cease until she’d gotten the aspect just so. Finally, he could bear no more. He was ready to let his penis decide for her, when she stroked his wings working his shaft hard in rapid tugs, and Gideon groaned as he climaxed, his seed spewing out of him in a steady stream until she had pumped him dry.
Gideon closed his eyes as the rush of orgasmic fire overwhelmed him. When he opened them again, Lavilia had melted into the mist.
“Wait! Don’t go!” he cried. “Our business is not yet concluded!”
“Oh, aye, it is, dark one,” she replied. “Your phallus will be a grand tribute to your time among us. You are a living legend, dark one. All Arcus will hear your tale. Bards will sing your song. None will ever forget the Lord of the Dark. I shall see to that.”
“I care for none of it. I only want to live in peace with Rhiannon.”
“Then call back your last feather wisely.”
“Why can’t you give it now and send us where we need to go, Lavilia?”
“Because, for one thing, you do not yet know where that is, and for another, though I do know, were I to do as you ask, you would be leaving a loyal friend at the mercy of a reckoning that you have created. Eternal happiness cannot be bought with betrayal. You must live out the destiny you have created for yourself and others before you can be free. Remember…all of this could have been avoided but for your impetuous nature. There is no room for such as that here now.”
She spoke of Marius, of course, and she was right. He could not leave his friend, the Ancient Ones, and all the helpless creatures of the Forest Isle at the mercy of Ravelle.
“I must get back,” he knew, bolting toward the strand.
“Wait!” she shrilled. “What have I just told you of impetuousness? Have you not heard one word I’ve said? Take one more step before I’ve finished with you, and I will call back the contract and let you flounder on your own—you and your Rhiannon—to sink or swim as you will!”
“Then please be brief,” he sallied. “You were the one who said Rhiannon isn’t safe there for long.”
“Rhiannon is your soul mate, Gideon,” she said. “The female that began this nightmare with you eons ago was not. Had you not fallen, Rhiannon would have had lovers, but she would have walked through her life never knowing she had another half who would make her whole. You get only one soul mate for all eternity. All other romantic partnerships you engage in involve kindred spirits. These are souls attracted to your sphere, souls that through one similarity or another attach themselves to your aura. Hangers-on blinded by your light. They can be very intense relationships, like the one that damned you, dark one, but no other save this one—your Rhiannon—is your true soul mate. Think back…You knew it the minute you set eyes upon her, didn’t you? You knew this one was different.”
“Yes, but how can that be? I am…I was an angel created to serve the Arcan gods. How can I even have a soul?”
“Ah, but you do—a gift of the gods along with the gift of free will that has damned you. The gods expected you to obey the spirit side in you. Instead, you turned to the flesh, which is why the gods pursue you so relentlessly. It wasn’t so much the woman, as it was that you betrayed their trust. This they will not abide. And so they cursed you and sent the watchers to enforce your punishment. I will tell you one last thing for free. It is something that you know already if you’ve been paying attention, so it is no hardship, but something you haven’t really taken deep enough to heart…You will have no peace until you free yourself of the watchers. They, too, are eternal, but of a lower form. Unlike you, they are possessed of neither soul nor conscience, which makes them very dangerous.”
Gideon was beginning to think he’d asked the wrong question. She was right. Much of this he knew, but it had never really sunken in the way she presented it now.
It seemed to be her parting gift. There was wisdom to be gained in it somewhere, if only he could see it. Oddly, there was some comfort in what she’d said even if he didn’t fully understand it.
“Hail and farewell, old friend,” Gideon said. “If you are through with me, needs must that I return to the Forest Isle. I left without letting Rhiannon know in order to avoid a confrontation. If we are under siege, she will be frightened, and Marius will have need of me.”
“Then go, dark one. We will not meet again. Call back your feather when you will, and then our days are done.”
24
It had to be the longest night Rhiannon had ever spent. Not wanting to leave her alone at the lodge while he made his rounds, Marius had unchained Sy from the chimney corner and sent the faun on the errand instead. That had been hours ago, and Sy hadn’t returned. It was still several hours before dawn, and Marius had grown restless. It was plain he was concerned about the faun’s tardiness. He needed to go and look for him himself, but he dared not leave her alone long enough to do so, though she pleaded for it.
“If you want to go, please do so,” she urged him. “I am quite capable of fending on my own. I shan’t go off like I did the last time, I assure you. Believe me I have no desire to meet whatever we felt out there earlier.”
“I gave Gideon my word that I would not let you out of my sight until he returned,” Marius said. “We do not know what we are facing here, but I do know Ravelle, and he is a force to be reckoned with. I cannot leave you on your own to deal with that. I wouldn’t even if I hadn’t given Gideon my word.”
“But what of Sy?” she persisted. “He should have been back long before now, you said so yourself. Suppose something has happened to him?”
“Sy is a simple creature, easily distracted. I am hoping that is all this is. I am worried about the Ancient Ones. I do not like that they have gone inside themselves. I have only seen this twice before, the silence of the forest, and on both occasions catastrophe followed.”
“I do not understand it,” Rhiannon said. “Can you not call them back?”
“Folk tend to dismiss the Ancient Ones as mere trees, plants that grow and mature, and are cut down for firewood and for other creature comforts to serve man. They are so much more than that. Inside those aged tree trunks live spirits that are eons old, male and female, possessed of sage wisdom and compassion for all living things. Think of them as gods of the wood. The watchers will not harm them—not even to chastise Gideon. Their magic is great and inexhaustible. You’ve seen their shrines. They are to be respected, not terrorized and driven inward. They are gentle, harmless creatures for the most part, though I have met my fair share of those who have become disgruntled for one reason or another, and vindictive. These matters are usually handled amongst themselves, however. I rarely need to interfere. But such as these are vulnerable to the dark forces that lurk on every plane of existence since time began, and in their weakness, fall prey to such entities as Ravelle and his ilk. This is what worries me.”
“There has to be something we can do,” Rhiannon said.
Marius studied her for a moment. “You are a fearless sort,” he said. “I envy Gideon. You are well-matched.”
“I do not know if I am fearless or just foolhardy,” she said, “but I would follow him no matter where his footsteps lead. Did he not follow me into Outer Darkness? Could I do less? Whatever this is that we have brought down upon you is my fault, and I will do all within my power to set it to rights.”
“It was not your fault that the watchers cast you into hell, lady,” Marius said. “Fault doesn’t enter into it. Ravelle needs no provocation to set his sites upon me. We are old adversaries. He seeks out his victim’s most vulnerable spot to attack—never th
e victim himself. This way the wounding is crueler. In my case, it is my charges here—the Ancient Ones and creatures of the wood that I am duty bound to protect. I know each and every one of those trees in that forest on a personal level. Over time, they have become part of me, and I have become part of them. It is as if we have become one entity. I know no better way to explain it. He knows that whatever he does to them will pain me more than if he dealt a direct blow to me. I fear that is what is happening here now.”
“Is there nothing we can do?”
“We wait until Ravelle makes his next move. Then we shall see.”
Rhiannon said no more. She didn’t understand the demon’s glamour. Was Ravelle among them in the physical sense? It had certainly seemed that way when Marius had led her back to the lodge earlier, or had the demon merely projected his image into their midst?
She sipped the sassafras tea Marius had brewed, and nibbled at the hearty little breakfast cakes made of unborn grains, whole wheat, and honey that were a staple on the isle, and waited. But when the fish-gray streamers of first light finally broke over the forest, and the silence that had fallen over the trees like a pall hadn’t lifted, she knew that whatever the mystery surrounding the demon’s glamour was, there would be a reckoning.
By midmorning, the storm clouds hovering overhead were so dense and threatening, Rhiannon was having difficulty justifying that night had given way to morning. Marius went often to the threshold, shielding his eyes from the dusky glare that promised a deluge, searching the air for some sign of Gideon’s winged profile in bold relief against the roiling clouds. But it was nearly high noon before that image plummeted through the clouds dodging lightning bolts and disappeared inside the canopy of still branches bearing motionless leaves.
Marius seized his quiver and slung it over his shoulder. Snatching his longbow, he hesitated in the open doorway. “Remain here,” he said. “He needs my arrows, and I cannot be distracted over you if I would prevent calamity here.”
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