Awakenings

“I’m still trying to figure out how you know exactly where that howl came from,” Matt said, squinting against the late morning sun. “Every other time we’ve gone toe to toe with anything like that, they’ve come from the ravines.”

“Well, there’s a first time for everything,” Thordin growled, eyes narrowing as his gaze scythed across the hillocks of snow and brush. The remains of M-45 stretched toward the river, where the roadway ended abruptly, raggedly. “It came from this direction. Maybe they’re coming down from the north instead of west.”

“Maybe,” Matt muttered, hunching in his jacket and shoving his hands deeper into his pockets. “What do you think it was?”

“A wolf.”

“It sure sounded like one. You think it’s more than just a wolf?”

Thordin sighed, watching his breath steam in the air. “I don’t know. It’s hard to say, really. We’ll know once we find the trail.” Easier said than done right now. Either this is a damned smart wolf, or we’re dealing with more than the standard wolf. That boded ill, but they’d only heard one. One meant they were dealing with a scout or a loner, probably not another slew of hamrammr or worse.

We’ll have to hope anyway. I’m not too keen on going up against them again this soon. Hoping we sent them packing when we bloodied them south of here before Phelan got ripped into by the Dirae.

A flicker of movement caught his eye and he twisted, battleaxe coming to hand easily. He scanned a line of bushes dotted with trees every few feet, more decorative than functional.

“What is it?” Matt asked.

“Shh.” Thordin prowled forward a few steps, listening. He could hear the breathing of the man at his side and the sound of the wind. He strained his ears, eyes fastened on the bushes.

Come on. Move, you bugger.

There it was. A rustle of branches, a flash of gold.

“There,” Thordin whispered. “It’s right there.”

His weapon in hand and expression grim, Thordin marched forward, Matt trailing just a step behind.

“Leinth?”

Dark circles ringed the Otherworlder’s eyes as she clutched her dark cloak around her body, her shoulders slumped and her hair hanging in ragged tangles around her face.  Neve let go of Phelan and tentatively approached the newcomer, swallowing hard.

“How did you make it past the wards?”  Neve asked.

“I imagine it was because I feel no malice toward any of you,” Leinth said, swaying on her feet.  Phelan darted forward to catch her as her knees buckled.  She looked at him, surprise evident in her eyes as she struggled to find her balance again.

“So you lived,” she whispered.  “Good.  I was afraid that you wouldn’t.”

“My lover has a gift,” Phelan said, releasing her as she steadied.  “I was lucky.  I shouldn’t have survived.”  His gaze raked over her, brows knitting.  Neve spoke before he could, but the words could have been his.

“You look like hell,” Neve said.  “What happened?”

“I grappled with the Hecate.  I don’t think you’d look much better.”  Leinth shivered, her gaze drifting toward the fire.  “She escaped.  I thought I had her exactly where I wanted her, somewhere she shouldn’t have been able to win free of so easily, but I was sadly mistaken.  She’s craftier than I thought—either that, or she’s more able to tap the lines of power than I imagined she might be.”

“She’s the queen of hags,” Neve snarled, her nose wrinkling in distaste.  “The Witch-Goddess.  Of course she can tap the lines of power.”

“She shouldn’t have been able to when she was encased in Lake Superior ice,” Leinth said, her voice as cold as that ice must have been.  “Of course, I might have overlooked something.”

“Like what?”  Neve asked.

Phelan’s stomach dropped.  “Allies.  The Hecate has allies—Menhit, probably others.  They could have freed her.”

“And because I’ve helped you and yours, I’m a target now, too.”  Leinth slowly seated herself by the fire, resting her elbows against her knees.  “I know that you didn’t exactly view me favorably before, but I’ve come to ask your forgiveness for whatever wrong you believe I’d done in the past.  I didn’t betray anyone then.  I was trying to save us all—Seamus most of all.”

“Where is he?”  Neve asked, her whisper strangled.

“I wish I knew.”  One diamond tear tracked down Leinth’s cheek.  “If he lives, I can’t see where.  My power wanes with the fading winter and fighting Hecate…”

“It’s all right,” Phelan said.  Neve looked at him sharply and he touched her shoulder, squeezing gently.  “Truly.  We can’t change what’s gone before.  All we can do is move forward.”  He looked at Neve.  “I heard a wolf call a little while ago.  Did you?”

She nodded slightly.  “Thordin and Matt went to check it out.  We’re thinking it’s nothing.”

Phelan’s lips thinned.  “It’s never nothing.”

He turned to go and fetch his staff.

Something’s coming.  He could feel it in his bones.  We just don’t know what.

No one was near the fire when he finally made his way out into the tents beyond their sleeping quarters, but there was a kettle of water steaming on the stones around it.  He helped himself to it, making a mug of tea and lingering there, watching the flames crackle and dance.

“You slept late.”

Phelan glanced over his shoulder toward the sound of Neve’s voice, smiling faintly.  “Did I?  I’m not even sure what time it is.”

“Late morning.  Jac said you were still asleep but I didn’t expect you’d be asleep that long.  You never sleep this late.”

He shook his head, turning back to the fire.  “I guess I just needed the rest.”

“Maybe,” his cousin agreed.  “Or maybe a certain woman in your life did something that none of us have ever been able to get you to do.”

Phelan froze, looking sidelong at her.  “What would that be?”

“Start thinking about what’s best for you and someone else together instead of just what’s best for someone else.”  One corner of Neve’s mouth curled into a smile as she leaned against the single crutch she was still using.  Her leg was much better now, though probably not as much as she might have hoped—not fully healed yet, but slowly getting there.  “That was always your problem, you know.  You were always more concerned with everyone else and not taking care of yourself.”

“Everything I ever did was because I was a selfish ass,” Phelan whispered.  “Don’t delude  yourself.”

“I don’t think I’m the one spouting delusions,” Neve said.  “You may think you were being selfish, but I’ve known a lot of selfish men in my life, Phelan, and you’re not one of them.  Stupid sometimes, yeah, but not really selfish.”

His eyes slid shut and he tilted his head back, sighing softly.  “I wish you were right,” he whispered.

“I am right,” Neve said, poking him in the side.  Phelan winced, stumbling sideways.  “And the only one who could ever overrule me is your sister, and she’s not here.”

Phelan sucked in a breath, feeling a pang of guilt.  “Aoife.”

“I’m sure she’s fine,” Neve said quickly.  “Really, she must be.  We’d know if she wasn’t.”

“You felt it the same as I did,” Phelan said, staring at the fire again.  “She wasn’t fine then.”

“But she’s not dead.  I’m sure she’s somewhere safe.”

“I hope so,” Phelan whispered.  “She knew about Seamus.”

Neve shivered, leaning against him.  Phelan wrapped his arm around his cousin and squeezed her close.

“How could she have kept that secret from us?” Neve asked, her voice barely audible over the sound of the fire.

“She must have made a promise, something to keep him safe,” Phelan said with a slight shrug.  “Can you think of a better reason?”

“No.”

“Then that must be it.”  Phelan looked down at her.  “If he’s out there, we’ll find him, Neve.  You know we will.”

“Cameron said the same thing,” she said.  “I don’t want him to go.  I don’t want any of you to go.  It’s a fool’s errand.  He’s probably dead by now, even if he wasn’t then.  Even if he survived to have children with Leinth.”

“Just one child,” a woman’s voice rasped weakly.

Phelan almost jumped out of his skin.

He woke alone.

Phelan blinked up at the rafters, at the herbs he’d hung to dry from them, and counted his heartbeats for a few long moments before he stretched and groaned.  The spot where Jacqueline had been was cool; she must have been gone for a while.

“What did she do to me?” he murmured into the silence.  “That’s never happened before.”

The suggestion to sleep had pressed down on him like a heavy blanket, wrapping him in its warmth and carrying him away.  He’d felt magic before, but nothing like that.  His eyes slid shut again.

I knew that she had a gift.  I didn’t realize how strong it was.  Does she?

She’d healed him before—at least twice, now.  He didn’t remember what it had felt like either time, but he did know that she’d pulled him back from the brink of death both times.  No one needed to tell him that; he knew without asking, beyond doubt.  This hadn’t been healing, though, not like those times.  It didn’t seem right for that.

But it’s part of her power.  There’s no doubt of that.

He took a deep breath and opened his eyes again.  “Enough,” he muttered to himself.  “Get out of bed, Phelan.  Time to figure out what time it is and what needs doing.  Laying around isn’t doing anyone any good.”

He needed to check on Matt at the forge, to check on the wardings along the ravine and the wall.  He needed to talk to Neve, to pick her brain about who might be the next to come—her and Thordin both.  He needed to track down Marin and Thom and find out if they’d seen or sensed anything in the area that he might have missed in his addled and distracted state.

It’s only a matter of time.  He’d said that to Jacqueline the night before.  He remembered that.

The howl of a lonely wolf reached him, even tucked safely into the heart of their shelter, faint and far away.  He shivered.

It’s only a matter of time.

“Stop being alarmist,” Jacqueline said quietly.  She settled against him, her head against his shoulder and hair tickling his cheek.  “Who else would be coming after us now?  We’ve risen to the challenge of all comers, Phelan.  We’ve earned our quiet.  Everything’s going to be fine.”

“That’s a comforting lie,” he murmured, “but we both know that’s exactly what it is—a lie.  It’s the one we tell ourselves so we can sleep at night.”

“Neither of us appear to be sleeping right now.”

“No,” he admitted.  “I guess we’re not.”

“So are you going to tell me what’s actually bothering you, or are you just going to lay here in this bed and be vague and fret all night?  All that does it make me worry, y’know.  Then I look like hell in the  morning and Marin asks me if something’s wrong and I have to tell her and that gets her involved…”

Phelan groaned.  “Is this what they call the dark side to a relationship?”

“Possibly.  I’m not really sure.”  Her hand brushed along his healing side and he flinched slightly, reaching down to capture her fingers.  She sighed.  “I’m worried about you.  I’m always worried about you.  I’m not sure if I like it or not.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.  It’s not your fault—most of the time, anyway.”

He sighed and let go of her hand, wrapping his arms around her and holding on tight.  “The Hecate isn’t going to stop coming after me just because Leinth was willing to throw herself between us.  I don’t know why she wants what she wants, but once she’s got her sights set on something, she doesn’t back off until she’s gotten it.  I’ve seen it before.”

“How long has she been after you?”

“Gods only know,” Phelan said.  “I lost track of the years and who’s been hunting.  I’ve had a lot of time and opportunity to piss people off, Jac.  It’s just another part of my existence.  Can you—?”

“Handle that?  I wouldn’t be here if I couldn’t.”  She kissed his jaw gently.  “Sleep, Phelan.  She’s not coming for you tonight—and if she does, she’s not going to make it any closer than the walls.  We both know that.”

“It’s only a matter of time,” he murmured sleepily.

“Just like everything else.”  She kissed his ear.  “Sleep,” she whispered.  “Sleep, Phelan.”

He exhaled softly and drifted off into dreams.

“You’re trying to spoil me, I think,” Phelan murmured, fingers tangled in Jacqueline’s hair.

She laughed in the darkness.  “Really?  Is that what you think?”

“Absolutely.”  He grinned as her lips captured his again, her hands warm and gentle against his face.  He held her tight, rolling onto his side so they lay in the narrow cot belly to belly instead of her straddling him on the bed.  “And I know why, too.”

“Why’s that?”

“You’re making sure I won’t go anywhere,” he said, the tip of his nose brushing hers.  “And I would tell you that you don’t have to worry about that since I already gave my word, but…”

Jacqueline laughed.  “You found me out, huh?  Figured it all out.  It couldn’t have anything to do with the fact that I know you’ve had it rough and I feel like you deserve something good for once.  If I can give that to you…”

He closed his eyes and sighed, sagging.  “Jac.”

“Phelan.”  Her fingers brushed his jaw.  “I love you.  You deserve that, but that’s not why I love you.  I love you because I do.  Because I can’t not love you.”  Her lips brushed his cheek.  “You’re stuck with me,” she whispered.  “I’m not going anywhere.”

I wish that we’d met under different circumstances.  I wonder what it would have been like if we had.  “Sorry,” he whispered.  “I’m sorry, Jac.  This is…this is new.”

“I realize that,” she said softly, her arms sliding around him.  She tugged him close and tucked her body against his.  He shivered as he wrapped an arm around her, resting his forehead against hers.  “You’ve been alone for a long time.”

“I’ve never been in love,” Phelan said.  “I’ve never let myself be in love.”

“Maybe it’s time.”

“I know it is.”  He opened his eyes and stared at her in the darkness, barely able to see the outline of her face in the night.  “It’s just hard.  I’m sorry for that.”

“Don’t be.”  Jacqueline kissed his forehead.  “We’ll figure it out—we’ll learn together.”

“There’s so much, Jac.”

“So much what?”

“To do,” he said in a bare whisper.  “There’s so much to do and not enough time for any of it.

“We’re in trouble.  We just don’t know it yet.”

“Oh, Mar,” she said quietly as she wrapped her arms around me and tugged me into a tight hug.  “Don’t cry, deirfiúr.  It’s all right.  I just meant—”

“I know,” I whispered with a throat so thick it was hard to speak, hard to breathe.  “I know what you meant, it’s just that it’s so hard, Neve.  It’s too damned hard sometimes.  I see people getting hurt, people maybe dying and I don’t know what I can do to stop it from happening.”

“I’m sure you’ve heard this before, but I’ll say it again.  Nothing’s set in stone.”

“Some things are.”  I sucked in a breath and mopped at my eyes with the heel of my hand.  “There are some things that I see over and over again in different variations.  They’re the things I know I can’t stop but I can hope to maybe make better than the worst of what I’ve seen.”

“But you can change it,” she said.

I laughed bitterly, sagging back against the wall again.  “Only if I can figure out how, Neve.  I have to figure out how before I can do anything.  That’s what’s so hard.  I never know what I can do.”

“Have you talked to Thom about it?”

“Some.”  I closed my eyes, tilting my head back.  “But there are some things I can’t tell him—just like there are some things he can’t tell me.  We’ve learned to respect that about each other.”

“Phelan told me—”

“He knows.  He pretends that he doesn’t.”  I smiled weakly.  “It is what it is.  The reason Thom doesn’t tell me some things is the same reason I don’t tell him some things.  Before…before the end of everything, he and I had mostly broken up.  He thought that he was protecting me by doing that.  All it really did was hurt.”

Neve blinked.  “He thought he was protecting you?  Did he know about your…?”

“Thom’s always known,” I said.  “It’s part of why things happened between us the way that they did.  My insistence that we could both see things drove us apart because he was afraid.  Truth be known, I’ve always been afraid, but it didn’t do me any good to dwell on that fear.  Not back then, anyway.”

“It doesn’t do you any good now, either,” Neve said, squeezing my arm.  “Let it go, Mar.  Just let it go.”

I looked away, staring at the snow.  “I don’t know if I can.”

“Try.  It might be easier than you think.”

I slipped through the tent, wraith-quiet and trying not to draw anyone’s attention.  For once, no one waylaid me.  I emerged into the winter sunshine, clutching my journal against my chest.  The wind was still cold, but I was starting to be able to feel the very barest hints of spring.  It would come eventually.

The wards pulsed faintly, comfortingly, still strong.  I could feel them the same way I could feel the sunshine or the breeze.  I leaned against the wall for a moment, closing my eyes and letting their power wash over me, power I’d infused into them myself.

One hand strayed toward my belly, still mostly flat even though I could sense the spark that was my son.  Someday, Phelan and I would teach him to tend these wards, and he’d acquit that responsibility admirably.

Someday after I’m gone, it’ll be his duty.

I squeezed my eyes shut and swallowed a sigh.  It wasn’t a question of if.  It was only a matter of when.

“Are you all right?”

I winced slightly at the sound of Neve’s voice, opening my eyes and turning to look at her.  “You know that I’m not.”

“Yeah,” she said softly.  “But it seemed polite to ask first before I just jumped straight to what’s wrong.”

“You say that like you know.”

“I can suspect, anyway.  You saw something and it wasn’t good.  Was it about Thordin?”

I choked on a laugh.  “You’re way too good at this.”

Her shoulders rose and fell in a shrug as she joined me in leaning against the wall.  “I’ve had a lot of time to perfect my technique and a lot of family to practice it on.  Teague and Phelan and Seamus…they all liked to be closed-lipped about it all at the same time.”

“I saw him with Sif,” I whispered.  “I think she was dead.  There was a man in white and he was laughing.  He didn’t seem to notice or care when Thordin came after him.  It just…Neve, what good are my visions if I can’t stop some of the worst things from happening?”

“You know that it’s not all set in stone,” she said.

“I know.”  I squeezed my eyes shut and swallowed against a lump in my throat.  “It’s just so damned hard, Neve.  It’s too damned hard to know what choices not to make and what chances to take.  What if I make the wrong call and cause that to happen?  What if by trying to prevent it—”

She squeezed my arm.  “Stop,” she whispered.  “Just stop, Marin.  Don’t walk that path.  That way lies madness.  Just trust yourself.  Trust us.”

I stared at her for a long moment before I burst into tears.

I excused myself from the company by the fire a few minutes later, saying something about checking the wards and walls now that it was light enough to do it.  Thom tried to protest, but one look silenced him.  He knew the look well—it was the look I gave him when I needed a little time to myself.

The vision and what Neve said about the Ridden Druid—Ciar, Brighid’s beloved brother—had left me more unsettled than I cared to admit aloud.  I’d never considered the possibility of possession, but now I suddenly had to face it because it had happened once before.

The soul my brother’s got once shared a body with some kind of deity or spirit—whatever the hell Cernunnos really was.  I made a mental note to ask Phelan about that later as I headed back to my room.

Thom and I had talked months ago about writing down what we’d seen.  I’d balked, but he was right—we needed to document it somehow, even if doing it was a terrifying prospect.  I kept my journal beneath our mattress.  I’m sure Thom knew it was there, just like I knew that he kept his tucked into a leather satchel in the corner of Matt’s forge.  We’d promised each other not to read those journals of visions without permission.  I didn’t have his permission yet and he didn’t have mine, either.

Married or no, vows or no, we had to have some secrets, even from each other.

I needed to get mine now so I could write down what I’d seen before the details faded.  Every piece of what I’d seen could have significance, importance.  I had no chance of stopping anything from happening if I couldn’t remember what I’d initially seen.

I’m not going to let that happen to Thordin.  I can’t.

I shivered at the memory of the man in white and his laughter.

I needed to talk to Phelan badly.

After, I promised myself as I ducked into my room to get the journal.  Get it all down, then you can talk to him about it.

I took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly, sliding my hand beneath the mattress, fingers questing until they closed around the journal’s leather-bound spine.  It had been stuffed into the bottom of my duffle bag, the one that I’d planned on lugging along with me when I headed east back in August, back before all of this had happened, before the end of the world.

This wasn’t in our plans, but I can’t imagine life any other way now.

I almost laughed as I clutched the journal to my chest.  I must have broken somewhere along the way, just like the world had.

We all said this was our normal now, but I’d never realized that I actually believed that.

I allowed myself a quiet chuckle and then headed for the wall.

Sif swore softly under her breath, her gaze drifting toward Thom and I.  “And you two are…?  Truly?”

“So the dreams and visions indicate,” I said with a faint smile.  “Sometimes more welcome than others.  The insights help, though.”  Most of the time, anyway.

Thom frowned slightly.  “Why did you call him the Ridden Druid?”

“Because that’s who Ciar mac Dúbhshláin was,” Sif said, blinking at him.  “You’re—and you don’t—?”

“He doesn’t remember as often,” I said quietly.  “He sees the future more often than the past.”

Thom winced but didn’t disagree.  “So why is that who he was?”

“An accident,” Neve said with a wry smile.  “He visited a shrine to Cernunnos at the wrong time and ended up possessed by the Stag God.  Brighid chased him all over the known world and parts unknown as well.  She loved no one as well as she loved her brother—not even Finn.”

Thom and I exchanged a look.  I glanced away first, blushing.  Well, it’s good to know that time changes some things, at least.  “Is that how he ended up going blind?” I asked.

Neve blinked at me.  “I didn’t realize you’d seen—”

“I’ve seen a lot,” I said.  “Bits and snatches, enough to know that he at least looked like he was blind and that her—my—her wolf became his wolfhound.”

“Mm.”  Neve’s gaze drifted toward the fire.  “No one can be possessed by something like Cernunnos and emerge from the experience unscathed and whole.  He paid the price just like others before and since.”

I winced.

I don’t want to know.  I hope I never have to find out what that’s like.

A sick feeling settled in the pit of my stomach and I looked away.  Hopefully, paranoia was all it was.  Sometimes, we had to get lucky.

Sometimes.