Celtic Fire Part 33

"Go home, then," said Lucius. He looked at Rhiannon, his gaze softening. "We cannot tarry here. We must be on our way south before the rest of your kin scent our trail."

Rhiannon's gaze darted first to Lucius's weary expression, then to Owein's anguished one. Her heart tore in two as a battle raged in her soul. Dear Briga. How could she choose between them?

The morning sun broke through the trees. "You mean to leave with-" Owein began, then choked on a sob.

She drew him into her arms, and he clung like a babe. She stroked his red curls as her own tears threatened. "Hush, darling, I'm here. I'll not leave you."

"Rhiannon-" Lucius began.

A rustling and heavy footfalls interrupted his words. A band of four Celt warriors burst into the circle, Rhiannon's cousin Bryan in the lead. Owein pulled himself from Rhiannon's arms and dashed the tears from his eyes with the back of his hand.

Bryan looked first at Madog's crumpled body, then at Lucius. "You will die for this, Roman." He drew his sword.

Lucius raised his weapon in response.

"Nay," said Rhiannon, placing her hand on his arm. "There will be no more fighting." She turned to face Bryan. "Ye will not harm him. I give him safe pa.s.sage south."

Bryan's sword wavered. He looked at Owein, eyes questioning. "But Madog ..."

"The hand of Kernunnos was on this contest, Bryan," said Owein. "Madog delved too deeply into the dark powers beyond death and they came to claim him." Owein met Rhiannon's gaze, eyes inscrutable. "We dare not draw the Horned G.o.d's wrath on our heads by killing the Roman."

He paced to the center of the circle and raised his uninjured hand. A single Word left his lips, a syllable of power bequeathed by the Old Ones. Bryan and the other warriors drew back as if scorched.

Owein turned his piercing blue gaze on Lucius. "Take the skull and go," he said.

Chapter Twenty-Five.

Lucius had but one task to complete before returning to Marcus's hiding place. He stabbed at the forest loam with a sharpened stick, gritting his teeth against the pain in his arm and ribs. The pit deepened, and still he dug.

Aulus lounged against a nearby pine, inspecting his fingernails. His bruises were gone and his chin had been shaved clean. He wore a white tunic and toga, but his face had not regained its pallor. It glowed with life and health, and if not for the rotted skull lying in the mud, Lucius might have believed his brother had risen from the grave.

The sun hung on the horizon by the time Lucius judged his labor complete. He stood silent for a long moment as the magick of the wilderness breathed its quiet spells about him. For the first time, the northern forest whispered to his heart, and he listened.

He would not leave Britannia without leaving a piece of his soul with this mysterious land and the woman he left behind.

"Perhaps the memory of her will fade," he told his brother.

Aulus looked up and raised his brows.

"We weren't fated to be together. She won't leave her brother, and I can hardly join her tribe."

Aulus pushed himself away from the tree and paced closer. He laid his hand on Lucius's shoulder, his fingers as warm and solid as a living man's. Though he didn't speak, his opinion was clear.

Lucius sighed. "You always understood more of love than I, but in this you are wrong. I cannot go after her." He covered Aulus's hand with his own. They stood unmoving while the shadows deepened and the sky darkened.

"Come," Lucius said at last. "It is time."

When he lifted his brother's skull, his vision blurred. "I'm sorry I wasn't here to defend you on that dark day."

A sad smile played about Aulus's lips, but he shook his head as if to say Lucius was a fool to question fate. He glided to the edge of the pit and looked down.

Lucius nestled Aulus's skull in the pit, weighting it with stones against the ravages of wild animals. Aulus lifted one hand in a gesture of farewell. When the first handful of dirt spattered the pit, he vanished.

Lucius stood for a long time, staring at nothing.

A tear tracked down his cheek. "Good-bye, brother," he whispered.

Rhiannon slipped out of the dun before sunset and followed the well-worn path to the sheltered glen where Briga's waters sprang from the earth. It was a place so unlike the pool in Lucius's house, but Rhiannon had felt Briga's spirit in the Roman fort as keenly as she knew it now in the forest. The Great Mother's arms embraced the entire world. Rhiannon suspected her peace flowed as easily through the streets of Rome as through the wilderness.

She imagined Lucius, garbed in a white toga, taking his father's seat in the Roman Senate. Would he think of her once he returned to his homeland? If he did, what would he remember-her love or her deceit?

The brush stirred behind her. "Rhiannon?"

Owein stood in the shadow of an elm a few paces away. Though the wound she'd inflicted had not been deep, she still shuddered when she thought of what might have happened if her blade had sliced his neck rather than his shoulder. She'd washed and rebandaged the gash upon returning to the dun this morn. In time, he would bear only a thin scar.

She waved him to her side. He came, hesitating only the briefest of instants before he bent and kissed her cheek. Rhiannon smiled up at him and lifted her hand to ruffle his red curls.

"The Roman and his son have set out on the southern trail," he said.

Rhiannon's heart cracked a little. "Ye've seen them?"

"Aye, though they did not know I watched." A solemn expression lit his blue eyes. "Go with them, little mama."

"What?"

"Go. Your spirit will travel with them in any case."

"But the clan-the tribe-needs a queen. Someone to draw them together."

Owein shook his head. "If the chieftains cannot come together in their own right, what good is a queen to draw them? Thanks to the Romans, the days when a Celt woman ruled alone are past. When the chieftains are through bickering, the strongest among them will claim ye as a prize to brace his position. Are ye willing to accept such a man?"

"Nay."

"Just so. But I am thinking with Edmyg and Kynan dead, no other will be able to hold the clans' allegiance. The Romans will come from the south. I See naught but blood and death. In the end, the conquerors will prevail and the Brigantes will be no more. There is nothing ye can do to stop it. Take what happiness ye can, Rhiannon. If 'tis with a Roman, so be it."

"But what of ye, Owein? I canna leave ye."

He lifted his head and looked through the trees with the eyes of an old man set in his young face. "I'll not be here, little mama."

"Not here? Where will ye go?"

"North to the islands beyond the mountains, where the hand of Rome will never rule. Madog once told me the stones there hold wisdom beyond a man's imagining. He abandoned that knowing in the end, but I would seek it." He sighed, his shoulders slumping. "I have the Sight, but 'tis not enough. I need the knowledge that will show me how best to use the gift Kernunnos has cursed me with."

Rhiannon took his hand. It was the hand of a man, not a lad. " 'Twill be a difficult pa.s.sage," she said.

"I know it, little mama. But I am thinking 'twill be no harder than the journey ye will make."

Chapter Twenty-Six.

They were being followed. Lucius knew it with a certainty, but when he c.o.c.ked his head to listen, he heard nothing. The twilight forest was still.

Too still.

"Draw your mount off the trail," he told Marcus.

Marcus complied, seeking shelter in a thick copse. Lucius reined in beside him and waited, sword drawn. Long seconds pa.s.sed, then the underbrush rustled and a dark form streaked toward them.

"Hercules!" Marcus flung himself from his pony's back. The dog launched itself at him and the pair crashed to the ground in a tangle of human and canine limbs.

Lucius resheathed his sword. "It would seem we're to be saddled with that creature for eternity," he said with a rueful smile.

Marcus beamed up at him. "See? He is a clever dog, just as Rhiannon said."

"Yes," a voice behind him agreed. "I had the right of it. He led me to you."

"Rhiannon!" Marcus darted toward her, stumbling against her snow-white pony's flank and causing the beast to shy.

Rhiannon slid from the animal's back, keeping her reins firmly in hand, laughing as she scolded him. "Marcus! Has your brain slipped out of your head?" Hercules pranced about her legs.

Marcus grinned back at her, unrepentant. "No."

Rhiannon gave her head an amused shake and opened her arms in the universal gesture of motherly love. Marcus went to her, wrapping his arms about her waist fiercely. Lucius dismounted and advanced more slowly, his gut churning like a river after a storm.

Rhiannon met his gaze over Marcus's head. "Lucius?"

"Why are you here?" He had to force the words from his dry throat.

"I've ..." She eased out of Marcus's embrace. "I thought to come with you. If you'll have me."

"What of your brother?"

Rhiannon gave a sad smile. "It was he who convinced me to follow my heart."

"And your tribe? You would leave your people without their queen?"

She shook her head, sadness showing in her eyes. "I've never truly been a queen. I've been naught but an excuse to continue the war that drains the lifeblood of my people. Whether I go or stay will make little difference. Men will still die, but at least their lives will not be lost in my name."

"Look," Marcus interjected suddenly. Lucius turned to see his son pointing at a place where sunlight splashed through a break in the forest to fall on a spray of red roses. Somehow seeds from a Roman garden had taken root in the wilderness.

Rhiannon touched the petals. " 'Tis a beautiful flower that springs from these thorns."

"It's like the witch who ate a bad boy and birthed a fair one," Marcus said.

"Yes," Rhiannon replied. "Beauty may rise from pain."

"As peace may rise from strife," Lucius said, drawing her into his arms. "For those who are willing to embrace it."

He brushed his cheek against Rhiannon's hair. "It's my dearest wish that you become my wife and Marcus's mother."

Marcus let out a whoop.

Rhiannon smiled and cupped Lucius's cheek. " 'Tis my wish as well. I love you, Lucius. Forgive me for not saying those words sooner."

"It's enough to hear them now," Lucius said, his voice thick with emotion.

"Where will we go? To Rome?"

Lucius looked down the trail. "Truly I do not know. At one time I was sure I'd take up the life my father meant me to have, though I never wanted it. But now ..." He drew a breath. "Now I've found life is too precious to waste. I intend to live each day as it comes, even if that means I don't know what road I'll take the next morning."

"As long as I am by your side, it matters not what path I travel."

"Then let us journey together," Lucius said.