Again Talmadge stammered, and in the end, he just shrugged and offered, “I don’t feel that way now.”
“I know!” she said, and she kissed him. “And glad I am of it, because I am already in love with this place.”
Talmadge answered with a smile, and a silent agreement that he should have brought Khotai here years ago.
He thought again of Fasach Crann, where he hoped to be within a week. If their visit there went as he now expected, perhaps they would reconsider their future treks to Loch Beag and their prewinter returns to the yearly Matinee.
* * *
Aoleyn shoved and pushed through the tangled pines, bursting into the open night air. The main encampment was only a few dozen strides away, but it felt like a great yawning gulf to the frightened young woman. She had heard of the rascals, of course, creatures more commonly known as the sidhe. They all had. But she had never seen one, and from what she had heard, she didn’t want to see one now.
It took her only a few moments to sprint across to the encampment, but by the time she arrived, the entire tribe was rushing about, this way and that. She glanced all around, unsure, but settled her gaze on Seonagh, who stood by the blazing bonfire, along with the witches of the Coven. The warriors rushed up from every angle, all carrying their crystal-tipped spears, to thrust them into the flames.
It seemed similar to the ritual before the raids, Aoleyn thought, but abbreviated and with less somber ceremony, with the warriors retracting the weapons very quickly, never getting their hands near the flames, then running off, some to formations, a few select others with a single witch—their wives, Aoleyn realized—heading for their private tents.
Aoleyn didn’t understand that particular path. Wasn’t there an urgency here? Weren’t the warriors mustering?
“To my side, girl!” Aoleyn heard, and her attention went back to Seonagh, who was motioning to her furiously. Aoleyn rushed over to join her teacher, a hundred questions bubbling about her lips.
“Stay,” Seonagh instructed.
“What is happening?”
“Hush, no time. Stay by my side!”
For once, Aoleyn did as instructed, and even held silent as Seonagh went back to her task.
She grabbed one of the dancing witches and pulled her from the line, directing her to a warrior who had just freed his weapon from the bonfire. The two, witch and warrior, rushed together, then ran off for a tent—for their tent, Aoleyn realized, for she knew these two and understood them to be married.
A movement to the side of that tent caught her attention, and she glanced back to the flap of the other tent, where she had seen the other couple disappear. Now just the warrior emerged, spear in hand, eyes and expression fierce, ready for battle.
Aoleyn wanted to ask Seonagh about that, but a deep voice behind her called out to her. “Aoleyn! Wife!”
Aoleyn jumped at the sound, the hairs on the back of her neck standing up. She swung about to see Brayth coming toward her, spear in hand. She always found that one unsettling, but tonight more than ever. His movements, his gait, his eyes—oh, his eyes! More feral than human.
Aoleyn let out a yelp as he stabbed his weapon out right before her.
“Bless my spear, my woman,” he commanded
“I am not…” she stammered. “I do not know…”
“She is not your woman yet,” Seonagh told the man, drawing a scowl.
“We’ve shared the meal before the venerated,” Brayth said. “She has been to the trial of the cave. I will have my spear blessed, and will take her to battle with me!”
Aoleyn started to speak, but Seonagh put her hand up in front of her to silence her.
“She would be of little help to you,” Seonagh said. “She does not know.”
“Then show her,” came another voice, startling all three, and they turned as one to see Tay Aillig staring at them.
“I have earned her,” Brayth demanded. “I will not go out unshielded.”
Aoleyn started to speak again, but Seonagh shook her. The young woman looked up at her teacher, and gasped at the sight of Seonagh’s face, drawn and ashen, and so clearly afraid.
“Now!” Tay Aillig yelled at them.
Out from under the bonfire came Mairen, the Usgar-righinn, untouched by the flames. Watching her, Aoleyn wanted to use her own milky crystal and climb under that same fire right then!
But of course, she could not. She watched Mairen go to Tay Aillig, and the two walk off toward Mairen’s tent.
Seonagh grabbed the shaft of Brayth’s spear and wrapped Aoleyn’s hand over it, then guided the girl to thrust it into the flames.
Aoleyn didn’t know what to do, but Seonagh had not let go.
Aoleyn felt a tingling sensation almost immediately, not unlike the vibrations she had known in the crystal cavern. The fire was magical, she understood, created by the great woman, and through its magic, and the guiding energy of Seonagh, Aoleyn felt the various powers locked within the crystalline tip of Brayth’s spear. She felt her own magic drawn out of her, joining with Seonagh’s and flowing into the weapon, and then she understood more clearly than she had ever imagined.
Now the ritual before the raids made sense to Aoleyn. Now she realized the advantage the Usgar held over those they battled. Because Seonagh had just empowered the weapon, Brayth could bring forth the magical effects held in the flecks within this spear, including levitation and the healing wedstone, and the lightning of another gray stone.
“Come, and quickly,” Seonagh instructed, retracting the spear from the fires.
“Just her,” said Brayth.
“She cannot. Not alone. Not at the beginning.” Seonagh led them toward her tent.
“I will know her!” he said, his eyes boring into Aoleyn.
“You are not yet married.”
“We shared the meal.”
From Brayth’s tone, insistent, demanding, full of lust, Aoleyn figured out what was happening here. She wanted to scream out at the ridiculousness of it! The encampment was apparently soon to be under attack and he wanted to mount her!
As soon as they passed into the tent, Brayth reached for her, grabbed her by the shoulder, and closed his hand tightly on her shirt, as if to tear her clothing away.
Aoleyn didn’t doubt that he meant to do just that.
“Kneel,” he commanded, but Seonagh grabbed him by the arm once more and interrupted.
“We are too late,” she said. “There is no time, and it should not be like this for her first time. Not yet.”
Brayth stared at the older woman, and simply smiled, a perfectly wicked smile.
Seonagh seemed to wilt and backed away.
Brayth spun Aoleyn about roughly, grabbed the back waist of her trousers and shoved her over. He didn’t push her to her knees—she grabbed a nearby chair to steady herself—but tugged down her trousers.
And he stabbed her, from behind, and a sharp jolt of pain shot from her most private place as she felt her skin roughly tearing, her blood suddenly flowing. She tried to stifle a scream, only somewhat successfully.
Brayth grunted and slammed against her repeatedly, viciously. She glanced over at Seonagh, who had her hand up over her face and seemed near to tears, or perhaps was already crying.
Brayth growled like an animal and slammed his hand down on her back and she could feel him tensing up, every muscle.
She started to protest, but saw the look on Seonagh’s face, the woman shaking her head to stop Aoleyn from speaking, and silently mouthing, “No, no!”
Brayth grabbed Aoleyn’s thick black hair and yanked her head back, then growled and shook … and stopped.
He let go of Aoleyn and stepped back, and she hastily pulled up her pants, but didn’t turn to face him.
“You are ugly, but you did well,” he said.
“Go kill sidhe, warrior Brayth,” Seonagh said in reassuring tones. “The hero’s dinner will await your return.”
Brayth suddenly spun Aoleyn about and locked stares with
her, and all the girl could think of was how she might get some of Seonagh’s crystals—the green-flecked one, so that she could lift this man into the sky and drop him on his head if he came for her ever again!
Coincidentally, Seonagh took out one of her crystals at that very moment, and she touched it to the tip of Brayth’s spear and whispered some enchantment Aoleyn did not hear.
“Go, warrior,” she said.
The man yelled with full volume, a great battle cry, then charged out of the tent, the conquering hero.
“No,” Aoleyn said when he was gone.
“Shut up, child,” Seonagh scolded.
“I will not!”
The words had barely left her mouth when Seonagh grabbed her roughly by the hair and yanked her so hard that she nearly tumbled to the floor.
“This is your place,” Seonagh said.
“It hurt!” Indeed it had, though the physical discomfort was the least of it! And Aoleyn didn’t even know where to begin with the pain in her heart and soul!
“It will hurt less next time,” Seonagh promised, her tone softening.
“There will be no next time.”
The coldness in her voice struck Aoleyn as profoundly as a slap. Seonagh actually backed away. Aoleyn didn’t know that she could be possessed of such turmoil … such raw anger. She was afraid of what she might do if she admitted to herself what she truly wanted to do in that moment.
“Then they will murder you, slowly, and every man will have you before they do!” Seonagh promised. She sighed then and her tone became more sympathetic. “It is not that bad, child.”
“I don’t like him.”
“But surely by now you’ve noticed urges?”
“For him? No! Never!”
“That is not your choice,” Seonagh said, still with sympathy. “It is not that terrible. Pretend it is someone else behind you, or think of the magic of Usgar and dancing about the god-crystal under a wintry night sky. Oh, if you could only come to know the god-crystal, you will find pleasure, I promise. When next Brayth comes for you, take your mind away and let him be done and gone.”
Aoleyn winced, the advice reminding her painfully of that haunted look she had seen so many times in the eyes of the uamhas women.
“It won’t happen often,” Seonagh said. “Not if you join the Coven, as I expect. Then you’ll know the god-crystal more than you’ll know any man. Usgar will be your partner, and only rarely will you be called upon to satisfy Brayth.”
The whole conversation had Aoleyn’s belly tightening with disgust. This most intimate decision wasn’t hers to make? The voices in her head and heart shouted in denial!
“I won’t,” Aoleyn said, but her voice was a whisper now, and Seonagh didn’t seem to hear, or if she did, didn’t seem to care.
“What is happening?” Aoleyn pleaded.
“This is why the warriors fight to earn a witch,” Seonagh explained. “Those who do not have such a partner will go out to fight the sidhe alone. And Iseabal’s face is red this night, so the demon fossa may be about!”
“All the weapons were already blessed.”
Seonagh nodded. “But for those betrothed to a witch, there is more. The blessings of the weapon are but a minor power compared to that which we might do when the battle is near to us.”
“I’m not betrothed. I do not want…”
Seonagh slapped Aoleyn so hard that she was knocked to the ground before she even realized the movement.
“No more,” the woman warned. “Tay Aillig demanded it. You saw him go with Mairen, the Usgar-righinn, whose word is the word of Usgar. Your arguments are ended.” She presented a bundle of crystals, grasped in both her hands and holding them out to Aoleyn. “Count to ten, girl, then wrap your hands about the symphony of Usgar.”
Seonagh closed her eyes and began to hum softly, to chant, to find the song of Usgar, Aoleyn knew. So curious was she in watching the older woman that she forgot to begin to count. So she just picked up at five, then stumbled about, then just grabbed the crystals as Seonagh had instructed.
As soon as her hands touched them, Aoleyn felt their pull, insistent and powerful. Seonagh held many crystals, and Aoleyn did not have time to sort through them—the only one she felt for certain was the gray-flecked wedstone crystal, into which Seonagh was currently pouring her energies.
Abruptly, shockingly so, Aoleyn found herself pulled outside of her body, her spirit free from corporeal constraints. Seonagh’s spirit was there, too, she understood, and it felt to Aoleyn as if the woman’s spirit had taken her own by the hand, and insistently, as if she feared the girl might simply float away, unmoored. This sensation was so unlike anything she’d ever felt. She could fly! She could see the world around her, but it did not look real; most everything appeared faded, as if she glimpsed it through a thick fog. But the living things in the room, Seonagh and Aoleyn’s bodies, glowed comfortingly. Perhaps the most interesting, within their cupped hands she saw another light, white and beautiful, and startlingly bright. It came from one of the crystals, she knew, but not the wedstone. She would have to ask Seonagh about that after …
After what? What was the purpose of this, Aoleyn wondered?
She felt Seonagh tug at her hand. Unsure what else she could do, she allowed herself to be pulled along. Right through the side of the tent, they flew, up and out of the encampment, and soon Aoleyn saw the ghostlike shapes of the warriors filtering through the trees. She knew immediately where the Usgar warriors were heading: to some high ground they could better defend.
She and Seonagh hovered there for a few heartbeats—and strangely, she thought, she could still hear her heartbeat—then dived suddenly, and dizzyingly, directly toward a bright and living form below, directly at, and then into, Brayth!
* * *
The young warrior jerked at the sudden, unexpected, completely foreign feeling. He had been told what would happen, of course, but words could not describe … this.
This was violation! Suddenly, Brayth found that he was not alone in his own body, and his every sensibility rejected that thought.
He wrestled instinctively against the intrusion, for even though he rationally understood this beneficial joining, every instinct within Brayth screamed at him to make it stop. His resistance was futile, though, for Seonagh had done this many times before and the young warrior had no experience with such magic whatsoever. Within mere moments, he knew he was defeated. Brayth stopped struggling, and when he did, he heard a voice whispering in his ear.
No, not his ear. Whispering in his mind. But the voice he still recognized.
Brayth and Aoleyn are joined as one.
And with Seonagh, came another voice, Aoleyn’s voice, and it seemed on the edge of desperation, as if the young woman was as unbalanced as Brayth.
You are the weapon of Aoleyn’s magic, Seonagh imparted to Brayth. Just Aoleyn. I have done my part.
And she was gone, Brayth understood. Just like that. And Aoleyn felt Seonagh’s departure, too, he knew, for he could sense her unease. Now Seonagh’s words when they were heading to the tent made sense. Had it been Aoleyn alone coming out to join with him, the first time for both of them, he would have reflexively rejected her and she would not have been skilled enough to overcome that rejection.
“Do not fail me, young witch,” he said aloud. “Or I will beat you bloody when the night is done.”
He gulped when he finished, and realized that it was Aoleyn’s spirit making his physical form do that, making him gulp! It was so strange! And so intimate, more so, perhaps than lovemaking!
Even as that thought crossed his mind, he felt Aoleyn recoil.
You don’t need to speak aloud, Aoleyn prompted him, and though he couldn’t hear the words, he felt their coldness.
“I know,” he answered, again with voice. He took a deep breath and glanced around, silently imploring Aoleyn to help him.
He knew that she understood a moment later when his vision shifted, when suddenly he could see in the
starlight and red glow of the rising moon almost as clearly as on a sunny day. He took up his spear and ran off to catch up to the battle group. She was using magic, using the crystal flecked with spots that resembled the eyes of a cat to grant him such powerful nocturnal sight.
He found Aghmor near the back of the marching warriors, moving along cautiously, and easily caught up to the man—his poor friend, who had no witch to protect him and bring him great glory this night.
“The night is mine!” Brayth boasted, and he silently implored Aoleyn to offer a display.
A moment later, his spear tip flared to life with flames, burning with magical power. Aghmor nodded and slipped a step behind Brayth.
They came to the tree-covered ridge. It was not a dense wood, for the thin air up here kept the trees spindly and short.
Tay Aillig ordered them and all the others about, setting the defensive line, and not with a moment to spare as the frenzied sidhe scrambled up all about them. Nearly as tall as a man, the long-eared, long-nosed, gray-skinned sidhe ran on muscled legs and fought with thick and powerful arms.
They carried crude weapons: wooden spears and stone clubs, and some with thick hand-wrappings, laden with flat stones or actual claws taken from a great brown bear or a hunting leopard, to rake an enemy.
Before Brayth was able to sort out a target, the screams had already begun, cries of pain and those horrible shrieks only heard in the last moments of a man’s, or a sidhe’s, life.
* * *
Along with the folk of Sellad Tulach, Talmadge and Khotai stared up at the great mountain that anchored the southeastern corner of Loch Beag. They could see the distant fires, here and there, and whenever the wind blew just right, they could hear some commotion.
“Their fables?” Khotai whispered to her lover.
Talmadge merely shrugged. He didn’t know what was happening up there, but surely, something was, something exciting and likely dangerous.
“That tribe, the Usgar, they don’t seem huddled,” Khotai noted.
Talmadge looked all around at the folk of the tribe, most with their two-humped skulls bent back as they stared up at the mountain. Those faces he noted were filled with trepidation. Something was happening indeed, and it was obviously not a normal occurrence.