She chose her spot, on the hard ground with snow lumped in the cool shadows of the trees.
“Should we get firewood?” Eamon asked her.
“Not for this. Stand here, together.” She moved beyond them, called on the goddess, on the earth, the wind, the water, and the fire. And cast the circle. The low flame bubbled over the ground, rounded until end met end. And inside, warmth rose like spring.
“This is protection and respect. Evil cannot come within, dark cannot defeat the light. And what is done within the circle is done for good, is done for love.
“First the water, of sea, of sky.” She cupped her hands, opened them over the cauldron, water blue as a sun-kissed lake poured out, poured in. “And the earth, our land, our hearts.”
She flicked one hand, then the other, and rich brown earth spilled into the cauldron. “And the air, song of the wind, breath of body.” She opened her arms, and blew. And like music, the air swept in with earth and water.
“Now the fire, flame and heat, the beginning, the ending.”
She glowed, the air around her simmering, her eyes burning blue as she threw her arms up, cast her hands down.
Fire erupted in the cauldron, shooting flame, dancing sparks.
“These your father gave to me. They are a sign of his love, a sign of mine. You are, all three, of that love.”
She cast the three copper bracelets into the flame, and circling it, added fur and hair and feather, added blood.
“The goddess gifts to me the power so I stand in this place, in this hour. I cast the charm, protect from harm my children three and all that comes from them, from me. The horse, the hawk, the hound, by blood they are ever bound to shield to serve from life to life in joy, in sorrow, in health, in strife.
“In earth, in air, in flame, in sea. As I will, so mote it be.”
Sorcha lifted her arms high, turned her face to the sky.
The fire shot up in a tower, red and gold, wild blue in its core as it spun and twisted into the cold winter sky.
The earth shook. The icy water in the stream went to roaring. And the wind howled like a wolf on the hunt.
Then it stilled, it died, and there were just three children, hand gripping hand, watching their mother—pale as snow now—sway.
Sorcha shook her head as Brannaugh started toward her. “Not yet. Magick is work. It gives, and it takes. It must be finished.” She reached in the cauldron, drew out three copper amulets. “To Brannaugh the hound, to Eamon the hawk, to Teagan the horse.” She slipped an amulet over each child’s head. “These are your signs and your shields. They protect you. You must keep them with you always. Always. He cannot touch what you are if you have your shield, if you believe its power, believe in mine and your own. One day you will pass this to one who comes from you. You’ll know which. You’ll tell your children the story and sing the old songs. You’ll take the gift, and give the gift.”
Teagan admired hers, smiled as she turned the small oval in the sunlight. “It’s pretty. It looks like Alastar.”
“It’s of him, and of you, and of me and your father, of your brother and your sister. And why shouldn’t it be pretty?” She lowered to kiss Teagan’s cheek. “I have such pretty children.”
She could barely stand, and had to bite back a moan as Brannaugh helped her to her feet. “I must close the circle. We must take everything inside now.”
“We’ll help you,” Eamon said, and took his mother’s hand.
With her children, she closed the circle, let them carry the tools into the house.
“You need to rest, sit by the fire.” Brannaugh pulled her mother to the chair. “I’ll fix you a potion.”
“Aye, and a strong one. Show your brother and sister how it’s done.”
She smiled when Teagan wrapped a shawl around her shoulders, when Eamon spread a blanket over her lap. But when she started to reach for the cup Brannaugh brought, her daughter held it back. Then squeezed at the flesh around the cut on her hand until three drops of blood plopped into the cup.
“Blood is life.”
Sorcha sighed. “It is, aye. It is. Thank you.”
She drank the potion, and slept.
2
FOR A WEEK, THEN TWO, SHE WAS STRONG, AND HER POWER HELD. Cabhan battered at it, he pushed, he slithered, but she held him back.
The blackthorn bloomed, and the snowdrops, and the light turned more toward spring than winter.
Each night Sorcha watched for Daithi in the fire. When she could, she spoke to him, risked sending her spirit to him to bring back his scent, his voice, his touch—and to leave hers with him.
So to strengthen them both.
She told him nothing of Cabhan. The magicks were her world. His sword, his fist, even his warrior’s heart could not defeat such as Cabhan. The cabin, hers before she’d taken Daithi as her man, was hers to defend. The children they’d made together, hers to protect.
And still she counted down the days to Bealtaine, to the day she would see him riding home again.
Her children thrived, and they learned. Some voice in her head urged her to teach them all she could as quickly as she could. She didn’t question it.
She spent hours at night in the light of the tallow and the fire writing out her spells, her recipes, even her thoughts. And when she heard the howl of the wolf or the beat of the wind, she ignored it.
Twice she was called to the castle for a healing, and took her children so they could play with the other youths, so to keep them close, and to let them see the respect afforded the Dark Witch.
For the name and all it held would be their legacy.
But each time they journeyed home, she needed a potion to revive the strength sapped from the healing magicks she dispensed to those in need.
Though she yearned for her man, and for the health she feared would never be fully hers again, she schooled her children daily in the craft. She stood back when Eamon called to Roibeard—more his than hers now, as it should be. Watched with pride as her baby rode Alastar, as fierce as any warrior.
And knew, with both pride and sorrow, how often Brannaugh and her faithful Kathel patrolled the woods.
The gift was there, but so was childhood. She made certain there was music, and games, and as much innocence as she could preserve.
They had visitors, those who came for charms, for salves, who sought answers to questions, who hoped for love or fortune. She helped those she could, took their offerings. And watched the road, always watched the road—though she knew her love was still weeks from home.
She took them out on the river in the little boat their father had built on a day of easy winds when the sky held more blue than gray.
“They say witches can’t travel over water,” Eamon announced.
“Is that what they say then?” Sorcha laughed, lifted her face to the breeze. “Yet here we are, sailing fine and true.”
“It’s Donal who says it—from the castle.”
“Saying it, even believing it, doesn’t make it truth.”
“Eamon made a frog fly for Donal. It was like boasting.”
Eamon gave his younger sister a dark look, would’ve added a poke or pinch if his mother hadn’t been watching.
“Flying frogs might be fun, but it isn’t wise to spend your magick for amusements.”
“It was practice.”
“You might practice catching us some fish for supper. Not that way,” Sorcha warned as her son lifted his hands over the water. “Magick isn’t every answer. A body must know how to fend for himself without it as well. A gift should never be squandered on what you can do with your wit and your hands or your back.”
“I like to fish.”
“I don’t.” Brannaugh brooded as the little boat plied the river. “You sit and sit and wait and wait. I’d rather hunt. Then you have the woods, and we could have rabbit for dinner.”
“Tomorrow’s as good as today for that. We’ll look for fish tonight if your brother has luck and skill. And perhaps a potato pie.”
Bored, Brannaugh handed her line to her sister, and gazed out over the water to the castle with its great stone walls.
“Did you not want to live there, Ma? I heard the women talking. They said we were all welcome.”
“We have our home, and though it was just a hut once, it’s stood longer than those walls. It stood when the O’Connors ruled, before the House of Burke. Kings and princes come and go, m’inion, but home is always.”
“I like the look of it, so grand and tall, but I like our woods better.” She leaned her head on her mother’s arm a moment. “Could the Burkes have taken our home?”
“They could have tried, but they were wise to respect magick. We have no fight with them, nor they with us.”
“If they did, Da would fight them. And so would I.” She slid her gaze toward her mother. “Dervla from the castle told me Cabhan was banished.”
“That you knew already.”
“Aye, but she said he comes back, and he lies with women. He whispers in their ear and they think he’s their lawful husband. But in the morning, they know. They weep. She said you gave the women charms to keep him away, but . . . he lured one of the kitchen maids away, into the bog. No one can find her.”
She knew of it, just as she knew the kitchen maid would never be found. “He toys with them, and preys on the weak to feed himself. His power is black and cold. The light and the fire will always defeat him.”
“But he comes back. He scratches at the windows and doors.”
“He can’t enter.” But she felt a chill through her blood.
Just then Eamon let out a shout, and when he yanked up his line, a fish flashed silver in the sunlight.
“Luck and skill,” Sorcha said with a laugh as she grabbed the net.
“I want to catch one.” Teagan leaned eagerly over the water as if searching for a likely fish.
“We’ll hope you do, as we’ll need more than one, even such a fine one. It’s good work, Eamon.”
They caught three more, and if she helped her baby a bit, the magick was for love.
She rowed them back with the sun sparkling, the breeze dancing, and the air full of her children’s voices.
A good, fine day, she thought, and spring so close she could almost taste it.
“Run on home then, Eamon, and clean those fish. You can get the potatoes started, Brannaugh, and I’ll see to the boat.”
“I’ll stay with you.” Teagan snuck her hand into her mother’s. “I can help.”
“That you can, as we’ll need to fetch some water from the stream.”
“Do fish like us to catch and eat them?”
“I can’t say they do, but it’s their purpose.”
“Why?”
And why, Sorcha thought as she secured the boat, had been Teagan’s first word. “Didn’t the powers put the fish in the water, and give us the wit to make the nets and lines?”
“But they must like swimming more than the fire.”
“I expect so. So we should be mindful and grateful when we eat.”
“What if we didn’t catch and eat them?”
“We’d be hungry more often than not.”