1
Winter 1263
NEAR THE SHADOW OF THE CASTLE, DEEP IN THE GREEN woods, Sorcha led her children through the gloom toward home. The two youngest rode the sturdy pony, with Teagan, barely three, nodding with every plod. Weary, Sorcha thought, after the excitement of Imbolg, the bonfires, and the feasting.
“Mind your sister, Eamon.”
At five, Eamon’s minding was a quick poke to wake up his baby sister before he went back to nibbling on the bannocks his mother had baked that morning.
“Home in your bed soon,” Sorcha crooned when Teagan whined. “Home soon.”
She’d tarried too long in the clearing, she thought now. And though Imbolg celebrated the first stirrings in the womb of the Earth Mother, night fell too fast and hard in winter.
A bitter one it had been, crackling with icy winds and blowing snow and ice-tipped rain. The fog had lived all winter, creeping, crawling, curtaining sun and moon. Too often in that wind, in that fog, she’d heard her name called—a beckoning she refused to answer. Too often in that world of white and gray, she’d seen the dark.
She refused to truck with it.
Her man had begged her to take the children and stay with his fine while he waged his battles over that endless winter.
As the wife of the cennfine, every door would open for her. And in her own right, for what and who she was, welcome would always be made.
But she needed her woods, her cabin, her place. She needed to be apart as much as she needed to breathe.
She would tend her own, always, her home and her hearth, her craft and her duties. And most of all, the precious children she and Daithi had made. She had no fear of the night.
She was known as the Dark Witch, and her power was great.
But just then she felt sorely a woman missing her man, yearning for the warmth of him, the fine, hard body pressed to hers in the cold and lonely dark.
What did she care for war? For the greed and ambitions of all the petty kings? She only wanted her man home safe and whole.
When he came home, they would make another baby, and she would feel that life inside her again. She mourned still the life she’d lost on a brutal black night when the first winter wind had blown through her woods like the sound of weeping.
How many had she healed? How many had she saved? And yet when the blood had poured from her, when that fragile life had flooded away, no magick, no offering, no bargain with the gods had saved it.
But then she knew, too well, healing others came more easily than healing self. And the gods as fickle as a giddy girl in May.
“Look! Look!” Brannaugh, her eldest at seven, danced off the hard path, with their big hound on her heels. “The blackthorn’s blooming! It’s a sign.”
She saw it now, the hint of those creamy white blossoms among the black, tangled branches. Her first bitter thought was while Brighid, the fertility-bringing goddess, blessed the earth, her own womb lay empty inside her.
Then she watched her girl, her first pride, sharp-eyed, pink-cheeked, spinning through the snow. She’d been blessed, Sorcha reminded herself. Three times blessed.
“It’s a sign, Ma.” Dark hair flying with every spin, Brannaugh lifted her face to the dimming light. “Of coming spring.”
“Aye, it’s that. A good sign.” As had been the gloomy day, as the old hag Cailleach couldn’t find firewood without the bright sun. So spring would come early, so the legend went.
The blackthorn bloomed bright, tempting the flowers to follow.
She saw the hope in her child’s eyes, as she’d seen it at the bonfire in other eyes, heard it in the voices. And Sorcha searched inside herself for that spark of hope.
But found only dread.
He would come again tonight—she could already sense him. Lurking, waiting, plotting. Inside, she thought, inside the cabin behind the bolted door, with her charms laid out to protect her babies. To protect herself.
She clucked to the pony to quicken his pace, whistled for the dog. “Come along now, Brannaugh, your sister’s all but asleep already.”
“Da comes home in the spring.”
Though her heart stayed heavy, Sorcha smiled and took Brannaugh’s hand. “He does that, home by Bealtaine, and we’ll have a great feast.”
“Can I see him tonight, with you? In the fire?”
“There’s much to do. The animals need tending before bed.”
“For a moment?” Brannaugh tipped her face back, her eyes, gray as smoke, pleading. “Just to see him for a moment, then I can dream he’s home again.”
As she would herself, Sorcha thought, and now her smile came from her heart. “For a moment, m’inion, when the work’s done.”
“And you take your medicine.”
Sorcha lifted her brows. “Will I then? Do I look to you as if I’m in need of it?”
“You’re still pale, Ma.” Brannaugh kept her voice beneath the wind.
“Just a wee bit tired, and you’re not to worry. Here now, hold on to your sister, Eamon! Alastar smells home, and she’s likely to fall off.”
“She rides better than Eamon, and me as well.”
“Aye, well, the horse is her talisman, but she’s near sleeping on his back.”
The path turned; the pony’s hooves rang on the frozen ground as he trotted toward the shed beside the cabin.
“Eamon, see to Alastar, an extra scoop of grain tonight. You had your fill, didn’t you?” she said as her boy began to mutter.
He grinned at her, handsome as a summer morning, and though he could hop down as quick as a rabbit, he held out his arms.
He’d always been one for a cuddle, Sorcha thought, hugging him as she lifted him down.
She didn’t have to tell Brannaugh to start her chores. The girl ran the house nearly as well as her mother. Sorcha took Teagan in her arms, murmuring, soothing, as she carried her into the cabin.
“It’s dreaming time, my darling.”
“I’m a pony, and I gallop all day.”
“Oh aye, the prettiest of ponies, and the fastest of all.”
The fire, down to embers after the hours away, barely held back the cold. As she carried the baby to bed, Sorcha held out a hand to the hearth. The flames leapt up, simmered over the ashes.
She tucked Teagan into the bunk, smoothed her hair—bright as sunlight like her father’s—and waited until her eyes—deep and dark like her mother’s—closed.
“Sweet dreams only,” she murmured, touching the charm she’d hung over the beds of her babies. “Safe and sound through all the night. All you are and all you see hold you through dark into light.”
She kissed the soft cheek, and as she straightened, winced at the pull in her belly. The ache came and went, but came more strongly as the winter held. So she would take her daughter’s advice and make a potion.
“Brighid, on this your day, help me heal. I have three children who need me. I cannot leave them alone.”
She left Teagan sleeping, and went to help the older children with the chores.
When night fell, too fast, too soon, she secured the door before repeating her nighttime ritual with Eamon.
“I’m not tired, not a bit,” he claimed as his eyes drooped.
“Oh, I can see that. I see you’re wide awake and raring. Will you fly again tonight, mhic?”
“I will, aye, high in the sky. Will you teach me more tomorrow? Can I take Roibeard out come morning?”
“That I will, and that you can. The hawk is yours, and you see him, you know him, and feel him. So rest now.” She ruffled his bark brown hair, kissed his eyes—wild and blue as his father’s—closed.
When she came down from the loft, she found Brannaugh already by the fire, with the hound that was hers.
Glowing, Sorcha thought, with health—thank the goddess—and with the power she didn’t yet fully hold or understand. There was time for that, she prayed there was time yet for that.
“I made the tea,” Brannaugh told her. “Just as you taught me. You’ll feel better, I think, after you drink it.”
“Do you tend me now, mo chroi?” Smiling, Sorcha picked up the tea, sniffed it, nodded. “You have the touch, that you do. Healing is a strong gift. With it, you’ll be welcome, and needed, wherever you go.”
“I don’t want to go anywhere. I want to be here with you and Da, and Eamon and Teagan, always.”
“One day you may look beyond our wood. And there will be a man.”
Brannaugh snorted. “I don’t want a man. What would I do with a man?”
“Ah well, that’s a story for another day.” She sat with her girl by the fire, wrapped a wide shawl around them both. And drank her tea. And when Brannaugh touched her hand, she turned hers over, linked fingers.
“All right then, but for only a moment. You need your bed.”
“Can I do it? Can I bring the vision?”
“See what you have, then. Do what you will. See him, Brannaugh, the man you came from. It’s love that brings him.”
Sorcha watched the smoke swirl, the flames leap and then settle. Good, she thought, impressed. The girl learned so quickly.
The image tried to form, in the hollows and valleys of the flame. A fire within a fire. Silhouettes, movements, and, for a moment, the murmur of voices from so far away.
She saw the intensity on her daughter’s face, the light sheen of sweat from the effort. Too much, she thought. Too much for one so young.
“Here now,” she said quietly. “We’ll do it together.”
She pushed her power out, merged it with Brannaugh’s.
A fast roar, a spin of smoke, a dance of sparks. Then clear.
And he was there, the man they both longed for.
Sitting at another fire, within a circle of stones. His bright hair braided to fall over the dark cape wrapped around his broad shoulders. The dealg of his rank pinned to it glittered in the light of the flames.
The brooch she’d forged for him in fire and magick—the hound, the horse, the hawk.
“He looks weary,” Brannaugh said, and leaned her head against her mother’s arm. “But so handsome. The most handsome of men.”
“That he is. Handsome, and strong, and brave.” And oh, she longed for him.
“Can you see when he comes home?”
“Not all can be seen. Perhaps when he’s closer, I’ll have a sign. But tonight, we see he’s safe and well, and that’s enough.”
“He thinks of you.” Brannaugh looked over, into her mother’s face. “I can feel it. Can he feel us thinking of him?”
“He hasn’t the gift, but he has the heart, the love. So perhaps he can. To bed now. I’ll be up soon.”
“The blackthorn is blooming, and the old hag did not see the sun today. He comes home soon.” Rising, Brannaugh kissed her mother. The dog trotted up the ladder with her.
Alone, Sorcha watched her love in the fire. And alone, she wept.
Even as she dried her tears she heard it. The beckoning.
He would comfort her, he would warm her—such were his seductive lies. He would give her all she could want, and more. She had only to give herself to him.
“I will never be yours.”
You will. You are. Come now, and know all the pleasures, all the glory. All the power.