by Ann Gimpel
Her eyes rounded. “Awk. You believe I’ve been cursed. Isn’t that what a geas is?”
He shook his head. “Poor word choice. Aye, that is also a geas. In your case, someone decided ’twasn’t in your best interest for the gypsies in your caravan to recognize ye werena one of them, so they leveraged your power, mixed in some of their own, and created an illusion. One ye’ve worn ever since. How far back can ye remember?”
She studied her hands, clasped around the book. “Maybe as young as when I was two.”
“And ye were with the caravan then?”
“Yes. With Mother and Father, and my two sisters.”
“That would argue someone specifically selected your parents to raise you.”
Yara shook her head. “Not necessarily. I might have been a foundling. We came across abandoned babies from time to time; one wagon or another always took them in.”
“I doona believe this was unplanned. Mayhap for a garden-variety infant no one wanted, but someone went to a lot of trouble to mask who ye are. I believe they chose your parents, and rather carefully.”
She frowned, clearly taking in the implications. “But that would mean my parents knew…”
“Aye, lass, that it would.”
She raised tortured eyes to him. “That might explain why Father drank. The truth ate at him. If the magic was that strong, he couldn’t have told anyone about me, huh?”
“He might have been able to—if his magic was potent enough to overpower whomever cast the geas over you.”
“It wasn’t,” she said flatly. “Father could barely summon enough power to steal a few coins and not have someone notice.”
The book glowed brighter, and she started. “It’s like it’s urging me to stop procrastinating and get on with things.”
Stewart let his instincts guide him and placed a hand on her thigh. He could do a better job infusing confidence that way—plus, he had to touch her. Holding back was damn near killing him. Something about her sang to his soul, and he was tired of arguing himself out of the attraction spilling through him.
“Impossible as it is to believe, since ye stumbled on it in a cave ye also stumbled upon, that is your book. Its magic blends perfectly with your own. ’Tisn’t any way that can be accidental. Ye found it because it wanted to be found. Ye said ye were most of the way across the country when your caravan disbanded, yet ye ended up near the German border where the cave—and the book—just happened to be.”
“That might be coincidence,” she cut in, sounding rattled.
“Nay, lass. Not a chance. The book has your best interests at heart. It waited a long time for you. Trust it and close your eyes.” He tightened his grip on her thigh. “This willna grow easier with waiting.”
Her knuckles whitened as she clutched the book, but Yara closed her eyes, her breath ragged and uneven.
“Find your third eye,” he urged. “Open a conduit to your power and imagine it tracking through you to the spot between your eyebrows that I showed you.”
“Got it. Now what?”
“Breathe. Take a breath that goes to the bottom of your lungs. Blow it out, and take another.” He didn’t tell her she was strung so tightly, that the fact she could even find her magic was a miracle.
Nay, it speaks to just how powerful she is.
He resisted the temptation to push into her mind. She’d feel him, and it might make her skittish enough to ruin her tenuous commitment to delving into her origins.
“I— I’m seeing images. Visions.”
“Let them come, lass. Tell me what ye see.”
“Berlin. I’m in that huge, old Catholic church near the center of town. The one with all the stained glass. Rain is pounding outside. Lightning too. Between it and the votive candles, light is flaring all around me.”
Anticipation filled him. Most priests didn’t realize it, but churches were perfect for concentrating power. “Go on. I’m listening.”
“There’s a woman with long, red-gold hair dressed in wine-colored velvet. It’s soft against my cheek—” Yara’s voice faltered. “It feels like I’m there, watching, but the woman is carrying me, so I must be an infant. She’s wearing lots of gold. Necklace, earrings, rings. Some of the gold is set with gemstones.”
The scent of Yara’s magic thickened around them. Wet pine trees with piquant vanilla undernotes. He wanted to weave his power in with hers, ached to blend with her on a magical plane, but he quashed his own desires. This wasn’t about him—or them. She had to own what she was.
“She’s crooning to me in Gaelic,” Yara went on. “Telling me we won’t have to wait long. I reach up and tug on one of her long curls. Her hair is beautiful. It reminds me of liquid fire. Oh!” Yara yelped as if she’d been bitten.
The book’s magic thickened, forming a protective arc, and Stewart murmured, “Steady now. What did ye just see?”
“M—Mother and F—Father. They’re walking toward us, looking uncertain. Mother holds out her arms, and the beautiful woman—she looks noble, like a queen—hands me to her. Father is talking, asking if the woman is certain she can’t keep me. Her eyes get shiny, as if she’s trying not to cry, and she says she’d like nothing better, but that I’m not safe with her.
“Father is stern, almost angry, but Mother reminds him she saw the noble lady in a dream or a vision. She’s holding me close, but I reach for my first mother. I’m too little to have words, so I use my mind to ask if I’ll ever see her again.”
Stewart loosened his grip on Yara’s thigh. He had to be hurting her, but she hadn’t complained. They were close, so very close to the truth. “What did she tell you?”
Tears leaked from beneath Yara’s closed lids. “It’s so odd, I had no memory of this before, but right now, it’s clear as day. She said, ‘Aye, wee lassie, we shall meet again when the world teeters on the edge of destruction. By then, ye’ll have claimed your birthright, and we shall fight side by side.’
“I asked her if we’d win, but she didn’t answer. Her form took on an insubstantial aspect until I could see right through her. My mother was still holding onto me, and she cried out, ‘Rhiannon, do we need to know anything special?’
“My first mother replied, ‘Naught beyond what any parent would do. Love her. Keep her safe from harm. She has a role to play in history, and so do you for sheltering her when I cannot.’”
Stewart felt as if someone had slammed a nine-pound sledge into his chest. Rhiannon was Yara’s mother? He lived with magic, was steeped in it, believed in it, yet he struggled to wrap his mind around evidence of the goddess presence in Yara. Now that he knew where to look, it was obvious.
So apparent, he felt stupid for missing it.
The geas. It had obscured her from everyone. Even him.
Yara was talking again. “I couldn’t see my first mother, but her voice echoed around that empty chapel. She reassured my parents, thanked them, told them she’d make certain I was accepted as just one more Romani in their caravan. Her words faded, but I heard hoofbeats and the night cries of an owl on the hunt. The light that had pulsed through the chapel dwindled until the only thing left was the flicker of votive candles melting into pools of fat.”
Her eyes flickered open, and she turned to look at him. “Is that all? Am I done with that part?”
He nodded. “Dig deep, lass. Tell me what ye feel and how ye’re different.”
She shut her eyes again, taking stock. When she opened them, she drew her brows together. “It’s how I’ve always sensed myself, yet there’s another layer I didn’t have access to before. I’m still me—but not.” She shivered “Maybe the differences will become obvious next time I try to cast a spell.” Yara focused eyes that had shaded back to blue on him. “Who is Rhiannon?”
“Is your Celtic mythology so lacking?”
“Apparently so. I’ve heard of the Welsh goddess who rode a white horse and kept magical birds, but she’s just a myth. Besides, she had to have died centuries ago.”
Stewa
rt swallowed hard, but he had to know for certain. No reason to get Yara riled up about being descended from a Celtic goddess if he weren’t one hundred percent sure. “May I touch you and use magic to check something?”
She nodded and turned so she faced him. Doubt and confusion took turns on her expressive face, and her eyes developed an otherworldly aspect.
Stewart placed a hand gently on each side of her head. He wanted to lace his fingers into her thick, red hair, but if he did that, he’d be lost. At least he understood his attraction to her. Celtic magic called to its own, and she was stunning atop all that power.
He probed gently. He knew the feel of Rhiannon’s power since he’d sat with her in council meetings. Her and Pwyll, her consort. Unlike when he’d tried to look into Yara before, this time, the obfuscating layers were gone, and he saw through to her clear, pure center. A center stuffed so full of power, it shone bright as a hundred suns. Even though he wasn’t using his earth eyes, he still closed them reflexively against the pulsing light.
Definitely Rhiannon’s blood.
But not Pwyll’s. After her problems with Pwyll, Rhiannon had dallied with others, including an Irish sea god. One of them must have sired Yara.
At least it explained why the goddess had needed a home for her daughter. Men were far more unforgiving about infidelity in bygone years, and if Rhiannon envisioned a role for her daughter—one she needed to grow up to fulfill—she would have done everything possible to protect her.
Stewart moved his hands. He didn’t want to stop touching Yara, but his reason for doing so was gone.
She focused on him. “Did you get the answers you sought?”
He nodded. “Aye, that I did. Ye’re Rhiannon’s daughter. Rhiannon the Welsh horse goddess with her flocks of magical birds, whose songs healed people. She was a good witch, a healer, and many other things. She suffered greatly, yet through her trials, she showed great courage.”
“How is that even possible? How could she still have been alive twenty-five years ago?”
Stewart laced his fingers with hers. “The gods are immortal.”
She gasped and drew back. “Does that mean I am too?”
“I doona know. Depends who your father was. That I couldna determine, which might well explain why Rhiannon thought ye’d be safer elsewhere.”
She squeezed his hand before disentangling her fingers and getting to her feet. Yara laid the book on the desk where it glowed softly.
“What language is it written in?” Stewart nodded at the book.
Yara’s lips curved into half a smile. “It changes. Sometimes I open it and get Dutch. Sometimes German, and on rare occasions, Gaelic. I taught myself to read, but only Dutch and German, which are similar.” She turned her hands palms up. “No matter what language shows itself, I can find what I need and understand enough to make a spell that works.”
“Of course, ye can.” He smiled too. “Remember. ’Tis your book. Rhiannon left it where ye’d be certain to find it.”
Yara rounded on him, but she wasn’t smiling anymore. “Do you mean to suggest my real mother has been hovering on the sidelines watching me like some sneak thief all these years, but never showing herself? Never helping no matter how rough things got?”
The air around her crackled menacingly with power.
Stewart pushed to his feet. “Ye shouldna speak ill of the goddess. Even if she wasna your mother. And watch your magic. ’Twill be far easier to summon destruction now that ye have access to your full power. If ye’re not careful, ye could burn down the ship.”
“I’ll speak any way I wish. What kind of mother was she, anyway? She dumped me when I was small. And in a Romani caravan no less. A place where women have no standing at all. She—”
Stewart clapped a hand over her mouth. “Stop. Right now. Else ye’ll say something ye regret.”
Electricity zinged up his arm, shocking him, and he pulled his hand away. Pain reverberated along his nerves, creating waves of discomfort.
Yara shook her head, eyes wide as her gaze flitted from side to side. “I hurt you. Jesus Christ! I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.”
“Yara, I—”
But she spun on her heel, pulled the cabin door open, and raced through it.
Stewart stared after her, his arm still feeling like he’d stuffed it into a hill full of fire ants. He should go after her, but she was overloaded, overwrought. It might be best for her to have a wee bit of time to herself.
Rubbing his shoulder and the length of his arm, he left the cabin, intent on finding Vreis to see what his inventory had turned up. Yara might be outraged by Rhiannon’s proximity, but the possibility of having a goddess near to hand gave him hope.
The battle was heating up, and they needed every ally they could lay their hands on.
Chapter 8
Yara ran the length of the corridor and located another steep staircase. She stared at it, but not for long. If she went down, it would take her to where other people were, and she wasn’t fit company—for anybody. Grasping the metal railing, she clambered up the ladder-like stairs until cold salt spray blew in her face. The deck was slick with it, and she almost fell before magic intervened and kept her on her feet.
She hadn’t summoned power to bail herself out. It was just there, and that added to a creeping discomfort that already threatened to suffocate her.
She hunkered next to a bulkhead and dropped her head into her hands. What was happening to her? Would she turn into something alien? She’d been a fool when she’d said she didn’t feel different. It hadn’t been obvious in the cramped cabin, or maybe Stewart’s presence had a modulating effect, but magic pounded through her. Her head throbbed. Colors danced before her eyes, making the familiar world look like a Van Gogh painting gone bad. So much magic coursed through her, she clung to sanity by her fingernails, afraid if she wasn’t vigilant, she’d shatter into a million motes of light. At least then she wouldn’t have to live in a body that felt like it belonged to a stranger.
Yara winced. She’d longed for stronger magic many, many times.
Yeah, but people ask for all kinds of things. Wanting and having aren’t the same.
She rubbed her temples. Maybe the touch of her fingers would jolt her back to normalcy. Why had she been so angry? She should be delighted she had a mother, and a supernatural one at that. It was the kind of news people dreamed about.
What was wrong with her?
A snort blew past her pursed lips. Not much wrong at all—other than having enough magic to flatten the entire Netherlands.
Stewart should have known better, a sly inner voice piped up.
This isn’t Stewart’s fault. I agreed. Besides this isn’t about him. It’s about me. Maybe my time to be more and do more is here. The book seemed to think so. It would have found a way to warn me if it thought I was making a mistake.
Yara dissected her thoughts. The book had stepped in a time or two, alerting her to danger outside her cave. She’d come to rely on it for many things. As a repository for just the spell she needed. As an early warning system. As a friend. To admit that last was hard since books were things, not people.
Yes, well, it’s way more than a book, and I’ve always realized that whether I accepted the knowledge or not.
Out of all the things she’d brought with her, the book was the only one she’d never have left behind. When she’d asked it about leaving, it spontaneously flipped to a section that left no doubt about her path. She hadn’t fleshed out that part when she was talking with Ilona, but the book predicted misfortune if she didn’t go with the group of Rom and shifters. At the time, she’d rolled her eyes and thought it was being unduly dramatic. Not anymore.
The uncomfortable sensations cascading through her didn’t hold quite as bad a bite. Was acknowledging who she was the key here?
It is to everything else. Why not this?
Yara lifted her head and peered at a morning that was growing darker by the moment. Clouds roiled over the Nort
h Sea, and whitecaps formed on waves that looked bigger than they’d been an hour before. From her vantage point, she could see Cadr, his hands wrapped about the wheel. Magic streamed from him, and she suspected he needed it to keep the boat on course.
Vreis emerged from the same doorway she had and sprinted past her, arms extended to keep his balance on the rolling, heaving deck. He passed within a few feet of where she crouched, but didn’t see her. Or maybe he was intent on reaching his brother.
The wind howled and shrieked, whipping around her, but she heard Vreis say, “Jamal and I found something else in that hold.”
Cadr eyed the other man. “Besides the bodies?”
“Aye, true enough. Explains why the bodies were there. To discourage anyone from looking too closely.”
Cadr readjusted his grip on the wheel that seemed to be straining to escape his control. “I’m all ears.”
“’Tis a problem. Once someone discovers this boat’s no longer in port, they’ll come after us.”
“Not in this weather, they willna. The storm surrounding us is widespread, and ’twill only grow worse. I tried to skirt it, but something keeps drawing us into the center.”
“’Tis the current. It pushes hard across the North Sea. Always has.”
“I scarcely require a lecture on seamanship. What else was in the hold?”
Vreis set his even features into grim lines. “There’s gold in that hold. Lots of it. Mayhap a hundred pounds, and I doona mean British Sterling.”
Cadr’s eyebrows shot to attention. “Gold, eh? Bars? Coins? Sculptures? Mayhap a dragon lived aboard.”
Vreis laughed. “Ye wish. Nay. No dragon. I’d have noticed the stench. They reek of sulfur and charcoal and fiery steam. ’Tis mostly coins with a few bars tossed into the mix.”
“Coins from where? Can we spend them?”