Deep Magic

by Joy Nash

  “What … are ye doing?” she asked unsteadily.

  “This,” he said, and covered her with his mouth.

  The shudder that shook her body was so strong Gwen found herself grabbing fistfuls of blanket. Marcus’s mouth was hot, his lips and tongue relentless. He nipped and licked and suckled, consuming her intimate flesh in a way she had never dreamed was possible. It was too much; she couldn’t think. She tried to bring her knees together.

  She couldn’t. His broad shoulders were between her legs. His hands had slipped under her bottom, lifting her, giving him better access to take whatever he wanted. Give whatever he wanted. Swells of pleasure cascaded over her, each one higher than the one before. She clutched at his hair, not knowing whether to shove him away or pull him closer.

  He lifted his head and slipped a finger inside her, pressing deep. She gasped at the invasion, gasped again when a wave of indescribable pleasure broke over her. A second finger joined the first, stretching her. His mouth covered her again, seeking in her folds for the hard nub from which all sensation radiated.

  He went on and on, driving her to ever-increasing peaks of pleasure, then drawing back until the sensations faded. As soon as she caught her breath, he began again, pushing her toward some unknown goal. The rough coupling on the floor of the smithy had been nothing like this. That had shocked her—first with pain as her maidenhead broke, then with brief, violent pleasure when Marcus exploded inside her. But this … this rise and fall of bliss, this sweet aching pleasure, was completely unexpected. Was this what lovemaking was? She had never imagined something so … personal.

  The low points of her pleasure were shallower now, the peaks more pronounced. Each one hung higher, endured longer, was more intense. There was something just beyond, something that frightened her. It was akin to the joy she felt when the pain of her shifting fell away, leaving her wholly in the body of the wolf. It was a wild joy, an abandon she associated with Deep Magic. She was afraid if she reached for it, claimed it as her own, it would rouse the wolf.

  A sharp wave of bliss crashed over her; she all but drowned in it. She twisted to one side. “Marcus … nay …”

  “Come for me, Gwen.” His voice was ragged, his breath hot on her belly. His thumb found the place where his mouth had been. All coherent thought spun away. “Let go. Let me give this to you.”

  It was beyond her power to deny him. She gave herself over to his care, to his lips and tongue, to the heat of his body and the urgency of his desire. A bright light shattered behind her eyes as she came apart in his hands, carried on the brilliance of a pleasure so deep, so intense, that she was sure what she was, who she was, had ceased to be.

  And through it all, even when Marcus moved over her and slid inside, the wolf did not stir.

  She woke some time later wrapped securely in Marcus’s arms. His bed was not meant for two—she was sprawled half atop him, one leg flung over his thigh. The fire in the furnace had dimmed to a low glow.

  Through the smithy’s single window, she saw the sky had faded to pale gray.

  For a time she listened to the sounds of the farm drifting through the open window. Birdsong, the bark of a dog, the call of a voice from the stables. The scent of rain and the promises of spring teased her nostrils. For the first time in years she did not want to be anywhere other than where she was.

  If only it could last.

  “Night is falling,” she said with a sigh.

  Marcus kissed the top of her head. “So it is.”

  She pushed herself up, looking down at him. His brown eyes were soft and warm, and … satisfied.

  “How do you feel?” he asked, rubbing her back.

  “I …” She shook her head. “Truly, I do not know. Not like myself, in any case.”

  His expression turned wary. “Regrets?”

  “Nay.” It was the truth. She scooted higher on his body and kissed his mouth. He made a low sound in his throat and pulled her closer. His shaft lengthened against her belly, causing her insides to dissolve in liquid heat. Shifting ever so slightly, she opened to him and welcomed him inside.

  He slipped in easily. “I don’t want to hurt you. You’re sure to be tender …”

  “I do not care.”

  He needed no more encouragement. Guiding her hips with his hands, he began a slow, languid lovemaking that soon had her gasping. Her release was a quick-spreading heat that reached every part of her body—even to her toes and fingers. Marcus closed his eyes and groaned, his hips flexing in one, long upward thrust as he spilled his seed. He gathered her to his chest and kissed her again.

  She would have liked to stay in his arms forever, but night was falling. “I … I should go. I don’t want to leave Breena alone. Last night was peaceful, but—”

  “Of course,” he said, instantly lifting them both to a sitting position. “But you’ll need clothes first. Wait here—I’ll find something.”

  He disappeared out the smithy door. Gwen set her feet on the floor, wrapping the blanket under her arms. She walked barefoot to the furnace, gazing at the red coals. She cast her senses, searching for magic she’d sensed there before. It was there. A steady glow of Light, wrapped around something even more vibrant.

  Deep Magic. It pulsed like a thing alive. She felt a thrill of triumph, tempered by a healthy dose of apprehension. Would the Deep Magic submit to the Light? The spells she would set in the days to come, as Marcus fashioned the sword, would be crucial.

  Marcus soon returned, carrying her old tunic, freshly laundered. “I found it drying behind the bathhouse.”

  Gwen dressed and braided her hair the best she could. She bent to fasten her shoes, nodding toward the forge. “When will ye look at what we’ve wrought?”

  “The furnace is too hot to pull out the bloom now. I’ll tend to it after I walk you back to the house. In the morning, I’ll show you what we’ve created.” He touched her chin, lifting her gaze to his. “Together.”

  Marcus returned to the smithy alone after seeing Gwen to the main house. Restless, he hefted an iron rake and worked over the smoldering coals, seeking the new bloom that lay in the bottom of the furnace chamber. Misshapen, pitted lumps of various sizes, they looked like nothing so much as worthless lumps of rock. Taking up a pair of long prongs, he lifted one from the ashes and laid it on the anvil.

  He traded the long prongs for a shorter pair. Hammer in hand, he struck the newly smelted metal, mindful of a hot spurt of slag. Turning it over, he struck again.

  He settled into a familiar rhythm, hammering away ash and soot, smoothing imperfections, turning the bloom from one side to another as it flattened. Finally, he stopped, wiped his sleeve across his brow and stared.

  The metal gleamed like moonlight.

  Bright iron.

  Chapter Ten

  Gwen slept fitfully; dawn was far too long in coming. She lay on her back, staring at the shadows cast by the ceiling beams, reliving each touch of Marcus’s hands and mouth on her body. He’d tamed the wolf. She had not thought it possible, even for a Druid. But Marcus, a man with no magic, had done it.

  How? And would the beast stay away? Or was it merely biding its time?

  She had no answer—only hopes, mingled with fears. The night seemed to pass at a snail’s pace; the wind had risen, sending the shutter tapping erratically against the window frame. She dozed fitfully. Toward daybreak, Breena moaned in her sleep, then started muttering. Gwen was at the lass’s side in a heartbeat. She hovered uncertainly. Would Breena, while walking in her vision, remember the spell Gwen had taught her? If she did, would it be enough?

  Breena’s young face contorted in pain. Gwen resisted the urge to wake her; Marcus’s sister had to learn to navigate her visions on her own, especially if she meant to stay in Isca. Her breathing became labored and her slim body started to writhe. When Gwen drew the bed linens away from Breena’s neck, a choked cry erupted from the girl’s lips. She bolted upright, her hands clutching at her throat, her eyes wild. The strange silver
aura flared and sputtered around her. She tried to draw breath, but couldn’t; a gulp of air became a sickening wheeze. Before Gwen could react, the girl’s body twisted, flopping like a fish in the mud. She lurched sideways. Gwen caught her as she rolled off the bed. They landed in a heap on the floor.

  Breena rolled, her sleeping tunic tangling in her legs, her lungs straining for air. Gwen lurched after her, grasped her upper arms and gave her a violent shake.

  “Breena! Wake up!” The back of Breena’s head thunked against the tiles. The jolt shocked her out of her trance. She gasped, her chest heaving as air whooshed into her lungs. Her eyes snapped open. With a moan she broke Gwen’s grip and rolled away. She curled in upon herself, her knees drawn up to her chest, and let out a keening sob. “Oh, Goddess, it hurts …”

  Once the vision was upon her, she must not have been able to recall the spell Gwen had taught her. Gwen molded her palms to Breena’s skull. Light flowed into the silver shimmer surrounding Breena’s body. Pain rebounded into Gwen’s palms, scoring them like a jagged blade. Gwen gasped another spell, summoned more Light. Breena’s pain receded only slightly. Tears cascaded over the lass’s face as she rocked and sobbed and gasped. Gwen redoubled her efforts, summoning all the Light she possessed. Finally, Breena’s sobs quieted; her body slowly uncoiled. She lay on her side, panting.

  When she thought the girl could stand, Gwen helped her to her bed. Breena sat down heavily, gripping the wooden frame tightly. “I did as you said,” she rasped. “I cast the spell exactly as you taught me. But nothing happened.”

  “ ’Twas your first time,” Gwen said, sitting beside her, more disturbed than she wanted Marcus’s sister to know. She massaged Breena’s scalp.

  Tears oozed from beneath the girl’s eyelids. “I’m sorry. I’m a poor student.”

  Gwen’s heart twisted. She concentrated on sending healing Light through her fingertips. Breena’s shoulders relaxed, and her breathing became more even. She drifted off to sleep. Gwen eased her down on the bed and covered her with a blanket.

  She sat for a long time, watching Marcus’s sister sleep, dreading what she would have to do if her Light were not strong enough to keep Breena safe.

  The knock on the smithy door was firm and loud. It was hardly past dawn. Not Gwen, Marcus decided, as he finished tying the laces on a clean pair of braccas. Not Breena or his stepmother, either. He shrugged an unsoiled shirt over his head and went to answer the door. His brows went up when he found Lucius standing on the threshold.

  Marcus waved his father inside. “To what do I owe this rare honor?”

  Lucius shook his head. “Surely it has not been so long since I’ve visited the smithy.”

  “Surely it has been,” Marcus replied good-naturedly. His father had long ago resigned himself to his son’s unorthodox choice of vocation, but he’d never become truly comfortable with it. Nor was he especially enamored of the space’s usual disarray.

  Lucius advanced into the heart of the chaos, first inspecting the rack of unfinished swords and daggers, then coming to stand before Marcus’s worktable. Marcus squelched the urge to scuttle about, to replace pens and stack parchment in neat piles. He’d spent his life listening to his father extol the virtues of discipline and organization. Lately, Breena had taken up the cause as well. But Marcus had long ago accepted the fact that he had no talent for order.

  Today, however, his father did not comment on the mess. Turning from the worktable, he strode to the forge. His brows lifted when he spied the newly worked metal lying on the anvil.

  “You were successful, then.”

  “With Gwen’s help,” Marcus said. He came to stand beside his father, gazing meditatively at the chalybs. “There is magic in that metal, I am sure. But I can’t see it, or feel it.”

  “Nor can I. How long will it take you to forge Gwen’s sword?”

  “The bright iron is more difficult to work than the black. A fortnight, at least.”

  “Good. Breena needs Gwen here. I am not sure her first lessons in magic have done her any good. She was haggard this morning. But she would not speak of it.”

  The news was troubling. “She will improve.”

  “I hope that is true. But I cannot help considering that Rhys is right—Breena needs to learn magic on Avalon.”

  Marcus studied his father. Lucius was five-and-forty. Old, by anyone’s standard. But though more strands of white wove though Lucius’s dark hair with each passing year, his bearing was that of a much younger man. He’d never developed the paunch most retired soldiers sported; he didn’t lounge in the tavern, drinking unwatered wine and telling tales of past glory. Still, Marcus’s father wasn’t getting any younger. Today, the lines of worry in his face almost made him look his age.

  “Rhiannon is sorely troubled,” Lucius continued. “It cannot be good for the babe.” He paused. “You remember how it was when Breena was born.”

  Marcus nodded. He remembered vividly, though he’d been only eleven years old at the time. Breena had come early, and had nearly died. “Gwen will make progress with Breena.” She had to.

  “And if she does not, we will send Breena to Avalon once the babe is born.”

  It wasn’t a pleasant thought, but it was far preferable to the possibility that Breena’s visions would do her real harm if she remained here in Isca. “Perhaps that would be wise.”

  Lucius looked at his son with some surprise. “You offer no argument against Breena traveling to Avalon? Has Gwen changed your opinion of magic, then, where Rhys could not?”

  Marcus only shrugged.

  There was a moment of silence, and then Lucius said, “She is a striking woman.”

  “It hardly matters how striking she is. She’ll be gone once I forge her sword.”

  “But you don’t want her to leave.”

  “What I want makes no difference.”

  “And all this time I thought you brooded for Clara. Now I begin to wonder if it hasn’t been Gwen in your thoughts since you returned from Avalon.”

  “What if it has been? It changes nothing. She cannot stay here, and the Druids wouldn’t even let me set foot into their pitiful village.”

  “Her eyes follow you. And yours follow her. It’s clear enough there is something between you.”

  Marcus looked up at the ceiling and grimaced. “So much for discretion. But it doesn’t change who she is.”

  “I was once at war with Rhiannon’s clan. Owein tried his best to kill me.”

  “That has nothing to do with Gwen and me.”

  “No?” Lucius shrugged. A smile played about his lips. “My mistake, then.”

  Barefoot, his face and arms darkened with a thin layer of swamp muck, Rhys crouched in a shadowed crevice directly below the entrance to the Druid silver mine. Despite his best efforts to bolster the spell of protection shielding the cave’s bounty from Roman eyes, soldiers had discovered a trace of silver ore two days earlier. The deep, twisting passage had suddenly become the main focus of the Roman mining exploration.

  Riders had been dispatched eastward. Within a day, an officer had arrived on horseback, accompanied by an armed escort. Rhys recognized the man; Tribune Valgus, the arrogant senator’s son who had once been betrothed to Clara—a man with an endless need for coin to fund his enormous gambling losses. Valgus and Strabo had disappeared into the mine some time ago.

  Rhys glanced toward the swamps. If not for the mists, Avalon would be plainly visible. He could feel Strabo’s Deep Magic, searching. So far Rhys’s Light had confounded it, but the effort had cost him dearly. Occupied with Strabo’s magic, Rhys hadn’t been able to completely hold the spell on the Druid mine.

  Once the Romans realized what riches lay under the hill, they would build a permanent fort. Trevor would have to abandon his barley fields. Avalon would suffer—it would be difficult to grow all their grain on the sacred isle. Assuming that Rhys could even keep Avalon hidden.

  Where, where was Gwen? Together, they might be able to ensure Avalon’
s safety. Trust me, she had begged. But Rhys found his trust had grown dangerously thin. A deep, twisting resentment—an emotion reserved solely for his twin—snaked through his gut.

  Tribune Valgus and Legate Strabo emerged from the mine, coming to a halt just above Rhys’s hiding place. Rhys tensed, his ears straining for their murmured conversation.

  Valgus’s voice was laced with satisfaction. “I knew that misshapen dwarf’s wild tale of a hidden mine in these hills was true. I found a sizeable chunk of ore in his pack, after all.”

  Rhys swallowed his anger. Valgus could only be referring to Cormac, a Celt spy and sometime visitor to Avalon whom Rhys had never trusted, even before the man had aided Blodwen’s campaign against Avalon. Cormac had claimed Blodwen after her banishment; no doubt she’d told him of the mine’s exact location. Rhys might have expected the dwarf to pilfer some of the ore—but relay the mine’s location to the Romans? That betrayal was inexcusable.

  Valgus chuckled. “Prying information out of that dirty Brittunculus was quite an enjoyable task. By the time my men finished with him, he’d have sold his mother for a denarius.”

  Strabo made a derisive sound in his throat. “If your men had done their job correctly, the slippery bastard would not have been able to escape. His guidance would have saved you a month of searching.”

  “It will all be the same in the end. We’ve found the vein. We cannot be far from the lode.”

  “I hope you are correct.”

  Rhys had heard enough. He waited until the Romans moved away, then eased off the ledge and down the mountain. He found Trevor where he’d left him, guarding the raft that would take them back across the swamp.

  With so many soldiers on the hill, they no longer dared risk the crossing in daylight, even with the mist’s protection. Hunkering down, they waited for dusk. When dusk fell at last, Trevor poled the raft while Rhys laid a trail of illusion in their wake. He hoped Strabo was occupied—he was not at all sure the spell would hold up to the sorcerer’s close scrutiny.