Her hands stilled. “But how could that be?”
“He was a centurion eighteen years ago. Unknown to him, he had magic. Mama helped him discover his power. He wanted her to accompany him to Egypt, but she refused. He became enraged and killed her with the same magic she had helped him discover.”
“Oh, Rhys. I’m so sorry.” Her fingers started working on his rigid muscles again. She put all her weight into loosening a particularly tight knot. He let out a gasp, then a groan of deep pleasure. He felt her body go quiet.
“Lean forward,” she whispered.
Some subtle shift had occurred in their rapport. It had become much more intimate than anything he’d shared with Breena before. It was wrong—he should not be sitting half naked, taking a fierce and guilty pleasure in her touch. She was too young, too innocent. Even if she were older, and his life were not that of a homeless wanderer, he did not have the luxury of time. He should be gone, already on the road to Avalon with Trevor and his sister.
But he made no move to rise.
Instead, he did as she asked. He leaned forward, propping his elbows on his knees and letting his hands dangle between them. She went up on her knees behind him, pressing into him more deeply, using the weight of her body as leverage. He closed his eyes as her warm palms covered his shoulders. Her thumbs kneaded the tight muscles on either side of his neck.
She did not speak—sensing, perhaps, that he wanted silence. That was another quality that drew him to Breena. She had the uncanny knack of knowing just what he needed, and providing it.
Her soft hands urged his upper body toward the mattress. “Lie down.”
Gods.
“That’s not a good idea,” he replied shakily.
“You’re wrong, Rhys.” Her voice dipped so low he had to strain to hear it. “And … I think it’s time I showed you just how wrong you are.”
Her lips touched his neck, just below his earlobe.
Pure lust spiraled through his body. Her kiss felt like a brand on his skin. Her teeth, when they caught his earlobe and nibbled, sent a rush of fire to his groin. And when her tongue swirled into the shell of his ear …
Great Mother.
How did she know to do such things?
His mind reeled with shock as she licked a wet path along his jaw. She shifted onto his lap and entwined her arms around his neck. He was stunned. Paralyzed.
If the entire Second Legion had chosen that instant to pound down the door, demanding his head on a spear, he could not have moved.
“Rhys.”
She brought a heady breathlessness to his name. Unbidden, he began to harden. She melted against him with a sigh. Sanity slammed back into his brain; wrenching his mouth from hers, he gripped her shoulders and pushed her back. Blue eyes, filled with an adulation he absolutely did not deserve, blinked up at him.
He tried to keep his voice as gentle as possible, but his words came out rough. “Breena. What is this?”
“I love you, Rhys.” She shut her eyes briefly. “There. I’ve said it.”
“You don’t mean that,” he said hoarsely.
“Oh, but I do! I’ve always loved you!”
He swallowed around the lump in his throat. “Aye, Bree, but not like this. Ye love me as a sister loves a brother. Like ye love Marcus.”
“No.” She shook her head for emphasis.
“Never
like that. Not even when I was small. I always knew you were different. That you would marry me someday.”
“You cannot be serious.” A note of desperation crept into his voice. “It cannot be like that between us. I am fond of ye, ’tis true—”
“Fond? Is
that
what you call it? Odd, it felt more like—”
He launched himself off the bed, all but throwing her across the room. She stumbled and fell, landing with a sharp thump on the floor. Rhys caught a glimpse of the stunned hurt in her eyes before he turned his back to her.
He fled to the opposite corner of the room, shame obliterating every trace of desire. He schooled his features into a blank mask and pivoted.
Breena stared up at him from the floor, having made no effort to pick herself up. Crossing his arms, he stood looking down at her with what he hoped was an expression of amused condescension.
Her eyes filled with tears, making them bluer. “Rhys.”
“Get up, Breena. What could ye have been thinking, to shame yourself so?”
She scrambled to her feet, choking on a sob. “I … I thought you’d be pleased—”
“Pleased?
That ye would throw yourself at me?”
“Yes. And you were pleased, at first. You wanted me.”
Gods, how would he survive this?
“Breena, any man would respond so, to any woman. It means nothing. When you are grown, ye will understand.”
Her chin came up, her lips thinning with anger as her tears abated. Good. He preferred her angry to sobbing. At least, he thought he did.
“I
am
grown. I am nearly fifteen. Many girls my age are already married!”
“Ye know as well as I do that your father will not allow ye to marry for several years yet.”
“He would not object to
you,
Rhys. I’ve loved you forever, and I would make you a good wife.”
He felt a tugging sensation in the vicinity of his heart, but refused to be swayed by it. He let his tone grow harsh. “Put this fantasy out of your head. I am not the man for ye. I am too old, for one thing.”
“You are only five-and-twenty!”
“And ye are fourteen, and like a little sister to me.”
“You wouldn’t kiss a sister the way you just kissed me.”
His throat nearly closed. “Breena. I have no home, and seldom stay in one town or village for more than a fortnight. I travel long and hard, sleep in the forest, or someone’s barn, or, if I am very lucky, on the floor before a stranger’s hearth. It is not a life into which I would bring a wife, even one who is accustomed to hardship, as you are not.”
“I … don’t care.” But her voice wavered.
Thank the Goddess, her pouting expression reminded him of the child she’d been, rather than the woman she was rapidly becoming. He seized on her uncertainty. He summoned just the right tone—patronizing, with a large dose of amusement.
“Ah, but ye do care, Bree. Ye are so young, and have lived all your life in luxury. Ye have no conception of a grown woman’s life, especially a woman with no home of her own.” He forced a chuckle, because he knew she hated to be laughed at. “Ye are a child yet.”
“I am not a child!” She stamped her foot, looking so much like she had when she was a small lass that he would have laughed in truth, if the situation hadn’t been so delicate. Aye, he wanted her to abandon her romantic notions, but he didn’t want her to hate him.
“Ye dream of marrying me only because I’m familiar, Breena. Ye do not love me. Not really.”
“I do.”
“Well, I do not love ye. Not that way.”
“But—”
“Stop, lass. Before ye shame yourself even more.”
“You … truly do not want me?”
“As a wife? Nay, I do not. And I never will.”
She stared at him, light fading from her beautiful blue eyes even as her spine stiffened and her chin came up. Rhys’s chest tightened painfully. He ignored the discomfort. The sooner Bree accepted that her future did not lie with him, the better off she would be.
“Your life is just beginning, Bree. Ye are strong in the Light, and visited by powerful visions. One day ye will journey to Avalon to find your power. And join with a Druid worthy of being your husband. But that man will not be me. Put the notion from your mind.”
She stared at him for a long time, her tears drying on her cheeks, her hands clasped in front of her. The neckline of her tunic had slipped off one shoulder. Rhys kept his expression stern, his gaze fixed on her eyes.
“I understand,” she said finally. Her shoulders straightened. “I am sorry to have disturbed you with my childish fantasies.”
He gave a brief nod. “I accept your apology. Do not trouble yourself about it. A child is not fully responsible for her actions.”
Her eyes widened at this final insult. With a strangled sound, she turned and fled through the door. Rhys strode to the threshold just in time to see Trevor, who was coming up the passageway, stand aside to let her run past.
“What was that about?”
“Ye do not want to know.”
Trevor took him at his word. “Have ye seen Gwen, then?”
Rhys frowned. “Breena said she was with ye.”
“I went to look for her, aye, but she was not in the smithy. Nor anywhere else, and no one I questioned has seen her.” He paused, his expression grave.
“The sword is gone as well.”
The elm where Gwen and Rhys had played, where they’d seen Mama with Strabo—where Mama had met her death—was gone.
In its place was a warehouse, used to store goods arriving by boat; extensive docks marked the place where the River Usk ran into an inlet of the sea. Gwen hesitated, considering her path. Rhys and Trevor would surely assume she’d taken the shortest route to Avalon: south to Venta Silurum, across the Sabrina channel by boat, then along the edge of the Mendips until she reached the swamps surrounding Avalon.
But Gwen had no coin to pay a fisherman to take her across the channel. Also, she did not wish to argue again with Rhys. Aye, he’d agreed to see the sword presented to Cyric and the Elders, but it was very likely the Elders would order the sword destroyed. Gwen could not allow that. She would call the sword’s Deep Magic herself, once she neared Avalon—alone.
Rhys and Trevor would reach Avalon before her, but that did not matter. When she reached the coast road, she turned east. She’d take the same route home she’d traveled when she’d run to Isca as a wolf: east along the channel, until the inlet narrowed into a river and she was able to cross. Then she would travel south and west into the swamps.
She was not sure if Strabo would know immediately that she had left Isca, but she suspected he might—he’d known enough to appear in her dream. He might, even now, be following her.
Quickly, she put the thought out of her mind and adjusted the sword’s belt across her shoulder. The weapon was long; it hung almost to her knees, striking her hip with every step that took her farther from Isca. From Marcus.
Thinking of Marcus made her stomach turn to lead. She hadn’t wanted to hurt him, but she knew she had—deeply. But she’d had no choice! She was the only Druid willing to do whatever was necessary to protect Avalon. She couldn’t abandon that responsibility.
She’d known from the first that her time with Marcus would be brief. Her fantasy of living in Isca as his wife, was just that—a fantasy. She could not live in the Roman world; magic was the root from which her life had grown. And despite Marcus’s confidence that the wolf would never turn on him, she could not be completely sure that was true. The wolf was a creature of Deep Magic. And Deep Magic, ultimately, was out of her control.
Deep Magic. It sang within the bright iron, calling her, urging her to set it free. It reminded her of the wolf. Forging this sword had been a grave risk. Despite the confidence she’d feigned before Rhys and Trevor, Gwen had no way of knowing whether the spells of Light she’d woven into Exchalybur would fully contain the Deep Magic at its heart.
She set a swift pace. The dull no-magic aftermath of the wolf had passed, allowing her to lay spells of confusion in her wake. She did not want Strabo to overtake her until after she had set strong, Deep Magic spells of protection around the sacred isle. When Avalon was cloaked, then she would be free to turn and fight to keep it that way.
Day gave way to night. She did not stop, even when darkness descended. Rhys did not call to her in her mind. That was odd—she had expected to feel his anger as soon as he discovered she was gone. Which he surely had by now. But his voice in her mind was silent, as it had been for days before his arrival.
It was nearly dawn when she sensed she was being followed. She could feel a subtle vibration beneath her feet. The wolf inside her sprang up and held its body completely motionless, absorbing the threat. It raised its snout and sniffed the air.
She rebuffed the beast. If the wolf emerged now, she’d be unable to carry the sword to Avalon. That would be a disaster.
The vibrations resolved into the pounding of horses’ hooves. She moved off the road, angling her path towards the darkest part of the woods. She should have kept to the woods from the start, despite the slower pace that would have meant. Too late now. Casting her most potent
not-there
spell around herself, she prayed the rider would pass her by.
He did not. He left the road, closing the distance between them. Gwen slipped deeper into the woods, cast another spell, but her pursuer did not hesitate. Strabo. Could she face him here, so far from Avalon? She would have to. She moved into the shelter of a rocky cove. Reaching up over her shoulder, she grasped the sword’s hilt and eased the weapon from its scabbard. Holding it before her, point raised, both hands wrapped around the hilt, she opened herself to its magic. And waited.
He dismounted. His footsteps drew closer. Her fingers tightened on the sword’s grip. Light flashed along the blade, from crosspiece to tip, ending in a white streak of lightning. Wind filled her ears. It felt as if her body were expanding, rising. She was ready. She would battle him here.
And then, without warning, the unthinkable happened.
She began to change.
“Gwen?”
Marcus glimpsed a flash of light through the trees. It had to be Gwen—his horse had become increasingly nervous with every step it took. Dismounting, he tethered the fretful animal to a tree and moved toward her.
“Gwen?”
He called louder this time, but no answer came. Forging ahead, he kept his gaze fixed on the flickering glow between the trees. He was almost upon it when a blurred form leaped from the shadows, striking him squarely in the chest. Its weight threw him backward. He landed hard on his back in the dirt.
The silver-gray wolf loomed over him, paws pinning him to the ground, jaws open, teeth bared, ears flattened. Its eyes gleamed with a feral light. Hot breath bathed his exposed neck.