Want won. “I didn’t kill him.”
***
Later, in bed, Morwyn stroked the short black hair of her Gaul as he slept against her breast. A constant pain bathed her heart, a pain born of the bitter knowledge that she had fallen in love with a man sworn to destroy not only the freedom of her people, but her Druidic heritage.
She pressed her lips against his brow and cradled his head in an oddly protective gesture. He wasn’t of Cymru. He wasn’t even a Briton. He was from Gaul, and the Gauls had been conquered by the Romans four generations ago. Her Gaul wasn’t a traitor because he had joined their Legion. He was just carving out a career. How could she condemn him for that?
As far as he was concerned, the Romans were a segment of his people. If Caratacus didn’t drive the invaders from Cymru and Britain, would they, in time, become assimilated to the Roman way?
Her heart twisted at such a foul vision. She didn’t want the old ways to be trampled underfoot, to be forgotten in the hazy streams of memory. Just because she had issues with her gods didn’t mean she wanted them replaced by the heathen idols of Rome.
Aeron had betrayed his people by lying to them, by pretending one thing while planning another. But her Gaul had never pretended to be on her side. He’d never pretended to be anything other than what he was. A Roman auxiliary from Gaul.
A shiver slithered over her arms. Was she truly contemplating turning her back on everything she had ever known? Considering the possibility of forsaking her duty to fight for freedom—because I’ve fallen in love?
Her breath hissed between her teeth. Why was she continuing to lie to herself? There was nothing left to consider. She would stay with her Gaul. Face the consequences of her severed loyalty.
And not think about the inevitable battle that was sure to occur between Caratacus and the Legion.
***
She was back in the Morrigan’s sacred grove on the Isle of Mon. But she didn’t want to be here. Not again. Would she forever be haunted by these nightmares? Desperately she tried to awaken, sinking to the grass and digging her fingers into the pungent earth. She would not be ruled by her fear.
A breeze drifted across her face. She frowned at her hands, pulled them from the ground and stared at them in confusion. What am I doing? Scattered memories fluttered through her mind, a sense of urgency, of denial, but she couldn’t grasp the essentials. Couldn’t recall why she had sunk to her knees. Why she had the fading need to flee . . . somewhere.
The sunlight bathed the grove, growing brighter, blinding. Squinting, she looked up and panic gripped her soul. The Morrigan stood in the center of the grove, a warrior maiden in all her youthful, terrifying beauty, her face turned upward to the perfect blue of the sky.
The great goddess extended her arm, and her sacred raven appeared from the forest to settle on her wrist. Storm clouds streaked across the sky, obliterating the sun, casting ominous shadows across the land. Morwyn shivered and tried to rise to flee, but couldn’t move her paralyzed limbs.
This isn’t what I witnessed before. The thought tumbled through her mind, almost making sense if only she could grasp their true meaning. Mesmerized, she could only stare at the goddess as terror and awe wrestled for supremacy within her breast. She’d turned from the Morrigan. Refused to honor her. But now the goddess had summoned her to her presence, and all the wonderful and fearful stories she’d ever been told of the goddess’ deeds flooded her mind.
Raw power, as elemental as the earth herself, surrounded the Morrigan and throbbed in the air like a living entity. Morwyn sank farther to the ground, trying to make herself invisible to the goddess’ wrath. For so many moons she’d deluded herself that the goddess was weak. Insignificant. Easily manipulated by the twisted will of Aeron.
Only now did she face the truth. Only now, when the great goddess slowly turned and looked at her, eyes blazing with rage and vengeance, could Morwyn finally confront her most guarded of secrets.
She was the weak one. She was insignificant and too easily manipulated by Aeron, their High Priest, the man she had trusted with her life and faith. And she had projected all her self-loathing and disgust onto the Morrigan. Because the Morrigan hadn’t peeled the scales from her eyes. Had allowed her to blindly follow Aeron without sending a sign or warning.
The raven soared into the darkening sky and circled three times before returning to his goddess. A single black tail feather floated to the ground by Morwyn’s clenched fingers, and iced fear froze her veins.
The Morrigan had sent her a sign. She recalled it as vividly as the moment it had happened. Sitting with Carys two days before the Sacred Spiral destroyed their cromlech, a raven’s feather had crossed their path.
She hadn’t understood its significance. Had thought it predicted war and death, and it had, but it had also meant so very much more.
Devastation. Betrayal. Why hadn’t she meditated? Learned the true meaning behind the message? Would it have made any difference to the outcome of that night? What else could I have done?
The Morrigan spread her fingers, her palm directed at the ground between them. Instantly a raging river bubbled to the surface, bisecting the grove, and Morwyn scrambled back before the water sucked her under.
Goddess. The soundless plea she’d used until the exodus to Mon slipped easily through her panicked mind. She didn’t know how or why but this river was familiar. The mountains, rising in the distance behind the Morrigan, were familiar.
Eerie shivers raced along her arms. Had she been here before?
Or is it a vision of what is to come?
And then she was beside her goddess, walking on the mountain next to the stone ramparts that afforded them protection from the enemy below. War cries split the air but they were distant, unconnected from her. Warriors fought, bodies fell, but it was as if she watched it all from behind a veil, untouched and isolated from the reality of the events unfolding.
The Morrigan halted in the midst of the carnage. Fury and betrayal vibrated from her, and Morwyn stumbled as the mountain shuddered in response. She knew why her goddess was angry. Because Morwyn had betrayed her, not only by discarding her but by taking a lover from their enemy.
Heart hammering against her ribs, she took a stealthy step backward. Deep in the most hidden corners of her heart she’d always known of the Morrigan’s strength. No matter how hard she’d tried, Morwyn had never quite managed to obliterate her ingrained reverence for her deities. They had been a part of her heritage since life first erupted from the womb of the earth.
She would face it now. Her gods had been deceived. Her gods had roared in vengeance. But they were still as powerful as they had ever been, as powerful as they would ever remain.
The Gaul had been her revenge on the Morrigan. She had intended to use him for her own pleasure and then leave him, dead or alive—such detail hadn’t been important.
But things had changed. She had changed. She wouldn’t desert her Gaul. Not for her people. Not for the Morrigan.
Not for anything.
The blasphemy of her thoughts thundered through her skull and she tripped on loose rocks as the goddess cast a disdainful glance her way. On her knees, palms bleeding from the fall, she watched, transfixed, as two figures materialized a stone’s throw from her.
Gawain. Talking to another man. Embracing him. Turning his back.
“No.” She heaved herself up, arms outstretched. She had seen this before, lived through this before, and, goddess show mercy, she couldn’t stomach to see it again. “Gawain.”
He didn’t hear her. Perhaps he couldn’t. The faceless warrior drew his dagger and it glinted in the ferocious gleam that emanated from the Morrigan, before he plunged the deadly blade into Gawain’s back.
And in that moment she recalled the countless other times she’d been forced to watch his murder, unable to move, unable to help, but this time she clenched her teeth, unsheathed her dagger and fought through the paralyzing fear that gripped her limbs.
She would avenge his death. It was the reason the Morrigan had brought her here, because this time she wasn’t dreaming. This time the events were real.
The warrior turned, his dagger dripping scarlet. Her heart slammed against her breast, disbelief collided through her brain and her own dagger slipped between suddenly lifeless fingers.
Gawain’s murderer was her Gaul.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Her eyelids jerked open but for a moment she could see nothing, feel nothing, except for the horrified staccato of her heart and the erratic gasp of her breath. The sense of overwhelming dread seeping through every nerve and blood vessel she possessed.
Her Gaul. But there had to be a mistake. She couldn’t believe it. Wouldn’t believe it.
“Are you all right?” The childish voice slashed through her turbulent denials and she blinked, trying to focus on reality. Gwyn sat cross-legged on the bed next to her, staring down at her with evident interest.
Morwyn drew in a shaky breath, lungs resistant, heart still jackknifing in protest. “Yes.” She struggled to sit up and drew the cover around her naked body, not because of modesty but because she couldn’t stop shivering. “Just a bad dream, that’s all.”
Gwyn appeared satisfied by the explanation and continued to fiddle with something on her lap. “I’m hungry,” she said at last, a hopeful note threading her words.
Just a bad dream. Morwyn repeated the mantra, and tried to believe it. It was impossible that of all the men in Cymru, she had fallen in love with the one who had murdered Gawain. She wouldn’t jump to any more conclusions without irrefutable proof. After all, she had been wrong about him killing Gervas. “Yes, we’ll—we’ll eat soon.” Distracted, she glanced around the room, although she already knew it was empty. “Where is the Gaul?”
Gwyn shrugged. “Don’t know. He said he had some business to deal with and that I wasn’t to leave the room or wake you up.” She gave a little bounce on the straw mattress. “I didn’t wake you up, did I?”
Morwyn shook her head. Did his business have to do with Gervas? He’d told her he hadn’t killed the other Gaul, but had offered no further explanation for why he had followed Gervas or why he’d drawn his dagger. In her heart she knew her Gaul had intended to end Gervas’ life last night. But why? And why had he changed his mind?
She hugged her knees with one arm and cradled her aching forehead with her other hand. It had just been a nightmare. Like all the other nightmares she’d suffered since moving to Mon. None of them had been visions from her goddess and neither had this one.
She no longer had visions. She would never again have visions. I don’t want to suffer from visions.
From the corner of her eye she saw Gwyn resume playing with whatever lay half-hidden in her lap. A flick of black gripped her attention and she snatched the feather from Gwyn’s hand.
“Where did you get this?” The words were hushed. She couldn’t take her gaze from the perfectly formed raven’s tail feather.
“I found it.” Gwyn wriggled. “Well, the man gave it to me. He found it outside the door when he left. But that makes it mine really, doesn’t it?”
Shivers crawled over her flesh, burrowed into her skin and chilled the marrow of her bones. The Morrigan, aware of Morwyn’s lingering resistance to accept what she didn’t want to acknowledge, had followed up her vision with irrefutable physical proof.
Her stomach cramped, lungs contracted and heart quivered in denial but she couldn’t close her eyes against the truth. Not anymore.
She believed in her goddess. Believed in her visions. In Camulodunon Carys had known the truth of the nightmares, and deep inside she had always known too. It was the reason she had been so angry with her friend’s insistence that the Morrigan was trying to tell her something. The reason she had left Mon with the intention of avenging Gawain’s death.
And now she knew, as surely as the sun set in the west, that the gods possessed a twisted sense of righteous retribution as vindictive as anything Aeron might have imagined.
How the Morrigan must have laughed when Morwyn had taken her Gaul as her lover as an insult to the goddess. How it must have warmed her stony heart to know Morwyn had broken her moons of abstinence with the one man she had vowed to destroy.
Nausea heaved and she hunched over the side of the bed, and the foul stench of the depth of her betrayal seared the air. Fingers clawed into the mattress, sweat dripped into her eyes and still she retched, helpless in the grip of self-loathing.
While Gawain’s body lay rotting, she had enjoyed fucking his murderer.
A small figure clambered to her side and pressed a cold, wet cloth to her cheek. Eyes still clamped shut, Morwyn took the cloth from Gwyn and covered her face. If only she could hide so effectively from the rest of the world. From her goddess.
But most of all from herself.
Moments passed. Silence heavy in the air around them. Finally she scrubbed the cloth up over her forehead and pushed back her lank hair.
She’d sworn an oath on the memory of her foremothers to find Gawain’s killer and avenge his death. It wasn’t her fault she hadn’t known the Gaul was responsible. But now that she did, it would be an easy matter to dispatch him.
He trusted her. She could poison him while he ate this night. Cut his throat while he slept by her side. And before anyone found him she and Gwyn would already be halfway to Caratacus’ camp.
Except she couldn’t do it. Even with the knowledge he might have murdered Gawain in cold blood, without provocation, purely because the other man was a Druid and her Gaul despised all Druids, she couldn’t exact justice.
How clever she thought she’d been, taunting the goddess with her refusal to enjoy her gifts. Flaunting her unsuitable lover in her face. It was madness to imagine a mortal could ever mock a deity and win.
Aeron had tried and lost his life. Morwyn had tried and lost her heart, her self-respect and her integrity. She had nothing else left to lose. If she couldn’t kill the Gaul, she owed it to Gawain to kill herself, as the failure she had become.
“Morwyn?” The anxious voice and tentative touch on her bare shoulder dragged her back to the present. Gwyn was gazing at her, her brown eyes fearful.
Morwyn sucked in a ragged breath. She had forgotten about the child. This child who, through no fault of her own, had been forced to live like a dog in filth-strewn alleys.
She didn’t deserve a reprieve from her fate, but how could she turn her back on Gwyn? Condemn her to a life of degradation and starvation?
This, then, was the reason the Morrigan had allowed their paths to cross. So that when Morwyn faced the enormity of her crime, faced the unpalatable truth that she’d rather break a sacred vow than harm her lover, she was unable to sacrifice herself instead.
The air seeped from her lungs in defeat. The great goddess wanted to keep her alive, to revel in her debasement. To punish her for daring defiance, for harboring the audacity to believe she could triumph.
“Today”—she attempted to offer the child a smile of reassurance, but the look on Gwyn’s face suggested that, even in that small measure, she failed—“we’re going to the forest, Gwyn. To find . . . our future.”
***
Bren sucked in a deep breath and resisted the urge to slump against the stone wall as two senior centurions passed him with barely a civilized glance. He’d needed to prove his cover was still intact. If Gervas had gone back on his word and betrayed Bren to the praefectus, every Roman and auxiliary would be on full alert.
But Gervas had honored his pledge. Which was more than Bren had done.
Curse the gods, what was happening to him? He’d pledged fealty to his king long before he’d exchanged that tentative bond of trust with Gervas last night. The safety of Caratacus was paramount. He could do nothing, allow no one, to jeopardize that, and the very fact Gervas knew Bren wasn’t who he said he was put that fundamental tenet in peril.
He’d followed the other Gaul with one intention in mind: to slit his
throat. The acidic sting in his gut and the insidious sense of wrongness were personal feelings, based on the knowledge of what Gervas had suffered at the hands of Dunmacos. It had nothing to do with this war. Nothing to do with the brutality of survival.
Without that shared knowledge he could have dispatched Gervas without a moment’s hesitation. Without a heartbeat of remorse.
He’d remained loyal to his king right up until the dagger was in his hand, its blade poised to end the other man’s life. But then, incomprehensibly, Morwyn’s face filled his mind, her eyes condemning, and he hadn’t been able to go through with it.
Instead, in that tortured heartbeat when his fractured loyalties thundered in his brain, he and Gervas had reached a silent understanding. And when he’d staggered back, dagger useless in his hand, Gervas had pledged to continue that silence to the grave.
I failed my king. The guilt scorched him, poisoned his veins as he finally made his way back to the lodgings. But inextricably entwined with his guilt was the stark realization that if he had murdered Gervas in cold blood, he would somehow have betrayed Morwyn’s trust in him.
He hadn’t been able to face her. Hadn’t been able to face himself. But even stinking drunk the fetid memories plagued him.
“Dunmacos.” The hated name jerked him back to his reality. He stared without masking his distaste at the speaker. Trogus. His fists clenched as the urge to punch the bastard’s teeth down his throat threatened to overcome his hard-won restraint.
Trogus strutted toward him. “Bitch didn’t murder you, then?”
With effort, Bren relaxed his fists. “Watch your mouth.” His words were low, even. Spiked with menace. He watched Trogus’ smug expression waver as if suddenly not so sure of the wisdom of confrontation.
“Just a civil question. Bi— The woman murdered my tribesman. It’s not unreasonable to think she’d do the same to any other man who got within spitting distance.”
Bren took one step forward and derived mild satisfaction from the way Trogus only barely stood his ground. “Touch her, or insult her by a single word,” he said as if they were discussing that day’s training schedule, “and I’ll break your neck, Trogus.”
Captive (The Druid Chronicles Book 2) Page 24