The Phoinix: Age of Demigods (6 page)

A lightning bolt crashed into the
stone. Any other rock would have exploded into a thousand pieces,
but this rock remained standing. Worse yet, it remained
unscathed.

“What did I say, Thor?
It
will
come to
pass. It is a future that none can change.” The Morrigan tried to
hide a devious smile with a cough.

“
What two halves?” asked
the Roman goddess of wisdom, Minerva. “The Power is a single ball
of energy.”

The Morrigan shrugged her shoulders
and left the council to return to Eversor. She immediately divulged
all she witnessed to him.

“
Even if the gods find one
half and you the other, you will have enough power to take revenge
for your wife,” The Morrigan instructed Eversor.

She gave him supplies for his quest in
search of The Power, and tattooed a spell on his chest to prevent
the gods from finding him.

Back at Mount Olympus, despite the
gods’ best efforts, no one could locate The Power. Zeus placed the
stone slab behind an impenetrable glass made by Hephaestus and kept
it in the corner of the throne room as a reminder of what is to
come…

Chapter 5

The Nightmare

I
n the year 264 B.C., Breanna woke on the floor of her
bedroom. She shivered at the state of her room. The furniture was
turned over and shards of broken vases littered the floor, covering
her body.

Every muscle throbbed as
she tried to sit up
, but her muscles were
too taught and weak from her violent convulsions.
Tears stung her eyes as
her body would not yield to her will.
She gave up and curled into a ball. “I can’t handle much more
of this.”

Outside her bedroom door,
the tapping of footsteps in the stairwell bounced off the walls. By
the hurried click of the
shoes
, Bre knew it was her mother
coming to wake her up.

“Please,”
Breanna
begged her body
to move, teardrops splashing on the floor. As if her muscles knew
who was coming, they gave way for movement. Limping and whimpering,
Bre tried to sweep as many
shards of glass
under her bed
as she could. She
turned the furniture upright. She jumped into bed
and burrowed under the covers with the
scrapping of the key in the lock and the
click
of its
release.

“Breanna?” Alina asked sweetly,
sitting on the bed. “Wake up darling, your father is waiting for
you in the throne room.”

Breanna pretended to yawn
lazily
.
“Good
morning, Mother.”

Alina noticed the popped blood vessels
in her daughter’s eyes and knew Breanna was hiding how bad her
nightmare was during the night.

“How bad was it,” Alina asked, rubbing
Bre’s hand with her thumb. Bre’s skin was tacky from sweating
through the night.

“I’m fine, wasn’t that bad at all,”
Breanna lied.

“Do not lie to me,”
Alina
warmed
,
picking a vase shard out of Bre’s hair and showing it to her before
tossing it to the ground.

Trying to hide her tears, Bre rolled
over to dry her eyes on her pillow. Bre’s heart broke when she
turned back to her mother. The sadness and fear in Alina’s eyes
twisted Breanna’s stomach. Attempting to focus on anything but
fear, Breanna noted Alina’s beauty. She was one of the most
beautiful women in the kingdom, Bre thought. Breanna was lucky
enough to get her looks from her mother, especially her hazel eyes
with gold flecks.

Bre remembered stories her father and
servants told her about Alina. She was the most sought after women
in all of Cymru, Alina’s home country. She was the daughter of a
former fairy goddess. Not surprisingly, Breanna’s father, King
Remus of Etruria, wanted her to be his Queen.

“Don’t worry, I am fine. Nothing I
can’t handle,” Bre assured her mother.

“
How much do you
remember?” Alina asked.

“As much as I usually do. It is not
the images that bother me, but the lingering feelings. All that
fear, anger, and pain; it is powerful. It is horrifying. They’re
not mine, yet they feel as if they belong to me,” Bre explained,
her eyes watering again.

Alina choked back her own tears and
stood up proudly, pushing her shoulders back with perfect
posture.

“Come now. As I said, your father is
waiting,” said Alina walking to the doors, not wanting to hear
more.

Breanna eased her aching body out of
bed and walked to her wardrobe. She grabbed her favorite blue dress
with white lace trim along the bottom. It had a train that flowed
from her waist that lightly swept the floor as she
walked.

She was about to slip into it when her
mother warned, “Do not wear your best dress this time, Propheteia
De’ Breanna Regina. You’ll get it filthy while riding and drive the
maids mad with laundry.”

Breanna winced at the sound of her
full name. She never understood why anyone would name a child
Propheteia.

Despite her irritation and her
nightmare, Breanna smiled. She was determined not to let anything
spoil her birthday weekend.

“And happy eighteenth birthday,” Alina
added. “It won’t be long until the Gàidheals arrive to celebrate
your and Eoghan’s birthdays. I cannot imagine what has delayed them
but I know Eoghan will show up with his usual bear hug greeting. He
would be a great match for you, you know. He is Celtic royalty.”
Alina raised an eyebrow followed by a smirk.

Breanna blushed and hid her face from
her mother’s as a shiver ran through her body. Just the thought of
her best friend being a love interest both shocked and nauseated
her. Nonetheless, Bre could never hide her excitement at the
thought of seeing him.

Alina laughed at Bre’s bashful
behavior.

Bre stared absentmindedly at the
wardrobe, thinking of Eoghan. She remembered his six-foot tall
frame perfectly accompanied by striking blue eyes with short dark
hair. Eoghan’s toned muscles yielding to nothing as he fought
against soldiers in practice and on the battlefield.

“Your Majesty! My Queen!” The Queen’s
maid sped into the princess’ chambers, snapping Breanna out of her
thoughts of Eoghan. “Hurry, the Gàidheals have arrived!” The maid
pointed to the window, terrified.

Alina walked to the window and inhaled
sharply at the sight. She made eye contact with one man, Brian
o’Conaill, who nodded at her through the window. Alina was easily
spotted, as her emerald green dress and blonde hair stood out
against the pale colored stone of the palace. Alina’s stomach
churned at what could happen next.

“I’ve always been afraid of this day,”
she whispered to herself. Before walking back to the door, Alina
kissed Bre on the forehead with trembling lips. “Never forget how
much we love you.”

Alina and the maid disappeared with a
soft click of the door. Breanna ran to her window to see the
arrival of the Gàidheals, the people she had been longing to see.
What she saw startled her. Instead of the calm and peaceful group
she knew so well, a war party greeted her gates. No wonder the maid
and her mother looked scared.

Bre watched them march up to her
palace. Their weapons and gold plated armor gleamed in the morning
sun. If a war party was arriving, something terrible must have
happened. Immediate concern for Eoghan plagued Bre’s
mind.

Breanna’s heart beat faster as she
frantically searched the party for Eoghan and found two men she
knew instead. A slight twitch of their necks and grounding of their
jaws hinted to Breana they were intentionally not looking at her.
Fondness and relief washed over her at seeing the o’Conaill
brothers were safe. However, she was suspicious of their
evasion.

The men avoiding eye contact with Bre
were the leaders of the o’Conaill clan. Brian o’Conaill, the same
man her mother found, walked next to his brother and second in
command, Cailean o’Conaill.

Memories flooded Bre’s
mind of the times Brian and Cailean taught her and Eoghan to fight
together. They also taught them the ways of the old Celtic
religion. She and Eoghan had been the strongest of their pupils.
Many people, including Breanna, thought she and
Eoghan
were invincible, so long as
they had each other. Her father would laugh and call them the
mischievous duo.

Panic returned with a sinking feeling
in her gut when she could not find Eoghan. “Where are you?” she
whispered to herself.

Bre anxiously ran to the
wardrobe
, the care for throbbing muscles
forsaken,
where the back panel loosened
and a secret passage lead to the throne room. She often used it to
eavesdrop on her parents and their counsel. She threw on a crimson
and gold tunic with a brown leather pant-skirt, and fastened it
with the gold Celtic buckle Eoghan gave her on their sixteenth
birthday. Dark brown, knee-high riding boots and a forest green
cloak completed the usually vain princess’ mismatched outfit. Bre
did not bother brushing her long dark curly hair, but ran as fast
as she could down the stone steps to the throne room without a care
for her appearance.

As Bre approached the throne room door
and reached for the handle, the door violently swung open. Standing
in the doorway illuminated by the morning sun was Eoghan. He
blocked her way before she crossed the threshold. Dark circles
under his eyes and a hard, angry look on his face frightened
Breanna. The harsh features made Eoghan a stranger to
her.

Breanna, startled by the volatile
foreigner, quickly tried to retreat up the stairs. Desperate to
escape Eoghan, she tripped on the stone steps and lurched forward,
letting out a squeal of panic.

Eoghan quickly grabbed Breanna,
violently yanked her to her feet and covered her mouth. He wrapped
his one arm tightly around her waist and hoisted her off her feet,
causing Bre to wince as his arm dug into her rib cage. Eoghan
shifted Bre so that she dangled from the side of his body as if he
were carrying a large bag against his hip.

Eoghan ran back up the stone steps.
The jostling made Bre short of breath as every bouncing step he
took forced air from her diaphragm. Starting to slip from his grip,
Eoghan swung Bre in front of his body so her head rested against
his collarbone and her back against his solid abdomen.

Panic subsiding with her growing
anger, Bre kicked and clawed at Eoghan forcing him to tighten his
grip as she struggled against him. Finally, she wiggled her head to
the perfect angle.

“Ow! Knock it off!” Eoghan growled as
Bre bit his finger. Eoghan repositioned his hand like a muzzle to
prevent anymore nasty bites. Bre flinched as Eoghan’s fingers dug
deeper into her.

Fear crept into her mind
from Eoghan’s aggressive actions.
What if
Eoghan and his clan are here to overthrow my family? What if they
pretended to be allies to discover my kingdom’s
weakness?

Tears stung her eyes at the betrayal
of her friend, the only person she thought of as a brother. For the
first time since they met, she was frightened of Eoghan and of what
he could do to her. He carried his weapons and she had foolishly
forgotten hers on the bedroom table.

Breanna was lost in her fearful
thoughts and pictured her father scolding her as she forgot her
weapons. When she finally came to her senses, she realized she had
never been through this part of the palace. This secret passage was
unfamiliar, dark, and daunting. She was lost in her own
home.

Despite her fear, her anger came
roaring back. She was enraged that Eoghan knew her home better than
she did. Bobbing and weaving through different passages, doors
opening without being touched: it felt as if they were flying. It
was then she noticed that the jostling stopped.

How is he not touching a
single step? Where is the pounding motion of his feet against the
stone steps?
she thought with a growing
knot in her stomach.
I don’t even know
him.

Bre could feel Eoghan’s heart pounding
in her back as he held her tight to his chest. His hand slowly
loosened and moved away from her mouth. He gently embraced the side
of her face, hoping she would not bite him again. It was a soft
touch not at all mirroring his aggressiveness earlier.

As he freed her mouth she felt no need
to scream or bite, but she was too angry to speak.

Eoghan whispered in her ear, “I won’t
let anyone hurt you.”

Finally, they stopped moving and
Eoghan released her from his restrictive embrace. Finding her
footing on solid ground, Breanna whipped around and slapped his
face, jerking his head to one side. The crack echoed off the walls.
Eoghan slowly turned back to Breanna revealing a bright red welt on
his cheek.

Eoghan sighed, acknowledging her
frustration. He swiftly moved towards Breanna, quicker than she had
ever seen. He grasped her tightly in a hug, cradled her head
against his chest, and stroked the back of her hair.