Adrift (10 page)

Maybe the selkie in me would destroy us both.

But it seemed so unfair that I would never be given the chance to know.

To know if, as my heart insisted, we could be something special together.

“What is the Old Magic?” I asked Maura.  I was elbows deep in mud and my nose was itching.  Talking distracted me from wanting to scratch my nose with a very muddy finger.  I was digging up some young potatoes to go with dinner, while Maura sat whistling and casting her drop spindle.

“The Old Magic?” She repeated my question absently.  “It’s just what we call what’s left of magic on this side of the gate.  I guess it’s mostly here because of some of the Fae bloodlines.  Both Devin’s father and I have some of the Old Blood. She suddenly grinned wickedly.  “Would you believe that there are wood-spirits in our line?”

Looking at her, barefoot and ageless, resting under the tree, with her home-woven dress and the flowers of spring in her salt and pepper hair, I grinned.  “Yes, I can believe that.  I always thought,” I laughed at myself even as I confessed it, “I always thought Devin looked a bit like a leprechaun.”

She laughed until she had to wipe tears from her eyes.  “Oh, yes!” She chuckled again.  “I can see that so clearly, my poor boy.  And didn’t he have the spirit to match it when he was a little one!  So full of trouble!”

I rested my filthy hands in my lap and smiled at her.  The part of me that always felt empty, that hurt when I thought about the mother I had never truly had had, seemed to tingle inside of me.  Certainly, Maura had enough love in her great heart to share.

“So, Devin has Fae blood, like me?” I asked, it suddenly dawning on me, leaving me needing to swallow down the aching knot in my throat.

Maura blinked back from her reverie and started her spindle spinning again.  “Oh, yes.  It’s strong in him, being from both sides.  The last of the Old Blood always did seem to be drawn to each other.  Other than you, I would assume that he has the most of the Old Blood that this world has seen in an age.  You heard it, didn’t you, when you went to hear him play?”

I nodded, feeling my face flush.  I turned so Maura wouldn’t see and dug into the rich earth for another potato. 

“Be patient with him,” Maura said softly.  “My poor little boy… he is at odds with himself more than with you.”

When I looked up she had gone, so quietly I hadn’t even heard the rustle of her skirt.

Wood-spirit indeed.

Chapter Eight

 
“You do understand,” Maura started slowly, cupping her cup of herb tea in her hands and letting the steam spiral around her beautiful face, “that this is not something Devin would have chosen for himself?”

I blinked at her over my cup of fragrant brew for a moment, not sure what she was speaking of, or what had brought such a serious expression to her face.

“My son,” she said, slowly, drawing her finger against the grain of the wood of the table.  “He is a good man, but he has always known that he was to be a guardian.  Had there been more children as my husband and I had always wished, then perhaps there would have been some choice allowed, but it was always to be his to carry.  One of the bloodline had to guard.  It was his destiny, and not one, I think, he would have chosen.”

She paused then, and I watched her as she gracefully tucked a strand of her white streaked hair behind her ear and turned her teacup a quarter turn.

“I do not believe he would have chosen the life he has, but he never complains.  He accepts it.  He has always accepted it.  Perhaps, that is why… not that he doesn’t care for you… but perhaps why he resents you.  For you, difficult as the choice may seem to you, it is still a choice.  Devin never had one.  He still doesn’t.”

“Can’t he just walk away?” I asked.

She looked up and studied me quietly for a long moment.  “And put humanity at risk?  Even should Devin agree with some, that losing the magic in the world has thrown us into unbalance and turmoil, he would never be the one to walk away.  It is not his choice to make.”  She looked back at her tea and I knew that she was done speaking with me.

Then, I wondered, does she believe that it is my choice to make?

I washed my hands at the old pump near the garden and set the basket of potatoes on the back step.  I could feel the ocean breathing and calling to me, but I set myself against it, and instead turned to where the woods rambled and tumbled in graceful chaos.

My bare feet felt cool and soft against the bark of a fallen tree as I climbed over it.  Moss grew all along it and I dug my toes into it, savoring nature’s own velvet.

Kip leapt up beside me before I even noticed that he was there.  I looked down and around and found Devin sitting on the mossy ground, leaning his back against an aspen tree, his arms folded on his knee and a deep expression on his face.  He glanced up at me and I could feel myself shiver with the cold of his icy regard.

I had never set out to hurt him.  I had never even considered, for a moment, that I could.  His anger… his malice, his bitterness… it left me burning with frustration.

He stood up, brushing debris from his pants, turning his back on me.

“You have Fae blood, too,” I said slowly, calmly, trying to hide from him the rage that was seething under the very surface of my skin, burning like lava.  I hoped my nose wasn’t turning red, as it always did when I was upset.  I curled my hands into fists, trying to calm the pounding in my chest.

“Yes,” he said slowly, turning, but not truly looking at me.  “And?”

“So how do you know that you aren’t the one that is in my thrall instead of you always assuming that I am in yours?  You are as Fae and as mortal as I am.”

The look on his face would have made me laugh under any other circumstances.  His mouth opened, but nothing came out.  He closed it again and cleared his throat, then swallowed, then cleared his throat again.

“Honestly,” he said, in a low voice, “that possibility never crossed my mind.”

“And,” I said, boldly, “did it ever cross your mind that neither of us is under any kind of spell at all?  That we just happen to like each other?  Don’t you trust me enough to know that?  Don’t you even trust yourself?”

He stared at me for a long time.  When he did answer his voice was very low.  “No.”

 
I gaped at him.  How could he not even trust himself?  He turned his back to me.

“Don’t I deserve some kind of explanation?” I demanded, my voice cracking.  “I think this matters enough for at least that much.”

Devin sighed and rubbed his face with his hands.  He gestured me closer.  “Look,” he said, his voice low,  “it’s complicated.  Really complicated.”

I nodded.

“When I was ten years old,” he began, “my dad was my hero.  He was my whole world.  I wanted only to make him happy-- to make him proud of me.  I was going to grow up to be him when I got older, not just be like him, but actually be
him
. That’s the way I saw it. I followed in his footsteps every day.  Looking back I think I spent every waking moment memorizing everything he did, so I would know what to do when I grew up

“When I was ten, my dad was not much taller than I was, but he was also a giant. He was a giant to me, and to everyone who talked to him. I guess you could say he was literally larger than life. He had much of the Old Magic and he knew how to channel it well.  It made him powerful.  Watching him, I knew there was nothing he couldn’t do.  He was the Guardian-- the Paladin of the Earth, with a sacred calling to preserve humankind from the dangers of the Fae world. I mean this literally. It was his job and he took it to be more than a job or a calling.  Is it any wonder that I was in awe of him?  That I wanted to be him?”

Devin rubbed his hands over his unruly hair.  The distress was so palpable on his face that I wanted to comfort him – but I had to restrain myself. Such a gesture, I suspected, would only make him withdraw, when he was finally opening up even this much with me.  I clenched my fists at my sides as he struggled to regain his composure.

Devin frowned to himself, blinking hard.  “I felt so honored that he wanted me with him on his rounds, making sure the gateways were strong and solid, without any weaknesses.  It always felt like some kind of holiday, taking the boat to that speck of an island that sheltered the cottage, where we rode into the woods and camped overnight.  He never treated me like a child, never suggested for a moment that I might in any way hinder him.  He seemed to look forward to these times just as much as I did.”

He glanced up at me, absently twisting long stems of grass together in his hands.  “There are certain times of the year that the gates between our world and the land of the Fae are very thin.  They need extra care, extra power and diligence, to hold back all that pressure.  These times usually float around the equinoxes or auspicious times such as eclipses… even a comet passing can shift the flow of magic… it’s complicated, but are the general points clear?”

I nodded.  It all seemed to make sense to me, that the natural world would have a strong effect on magic.

“So,” Devin continued, “every auspicious time, Da and I would be off to check for weaknesses and to bolster the boundaries of the Gateway.  The Gateway itself is not just a single, simple thing.  It is almost alive with power.  It changes over time, in location and size.  It is, by all accounts, the greatest feat of magic ever performed in the history of mankind.”

I shivered, premonition creeping over my skull with icy fingers.  That much power, concentrated together, must be incredibly dangerous.

Devin closed his eyes, heaving in a deep breath.  His skin seemed to shudder all over, like a horse feeling a fly land on him.  He rubbed his eyes again.

“When I was ten, Da and I went out, as usual, at the summer equinox.  It was beautiful weather and the ocean was still, almost like glass, as we rowed out to check on the old cottage.”  He nodded at me.

“Where you found me,” I whispered.

He nodded, his eyes closed.  “Everything was as it should be there.  I loved going there, as a child.  It never changes.  It feels almost suspended in time, you know?” He swallowed.  “I remember running all over the island, having fun, while my father performed the equinox rituals, handed down from our ancestors for centuries.  When we were done on the island, we headed back to the mainland.  We were going to camp out all night, as we always did, so as to perform the rituals at exactly midnight on the equinox.  We gathered our things together, and Maura sent us off with a basket of goodies and a pot of stew for our dinner.

“We reached the main Gateway just as the sun was starting to go down. We were later arriving than usual, so we set up camp quickly.  I took care of the horses, while my father set up the tent and made a fire.

“Already the weather was starting to turn.  Storm clouds rolled off of the sea and the air was heavy, full of the promise of rain.  In the distance we could see the clouds flicker with bursts of lightning.

“Da wasn’t too concerned.  We’d had bad weather before.  There was nothing really to worry about.  At midnight we lit our torches from the fire, sprinkled about a little earth, a little water, and set up a banner to capture the wind.  The lightning struck closer and closer as we worked.  I have never seen a storm like that. It was furious, and so beautiful.  Da looked like a sorcerer from the old times, his hands thrown up in the storm, chanting.

“The next morning we packed up camp again, rolling up the tent and our supplies to put on the horses.  We ate a cold breakfast of Maura’s leftovers.  We were covered in soot and muck, dirty and happy.  Da tousled my hair as we worked, teasing me about something.  I can’t remember now what it was.

“We rode further into the forest.  Da could feel something wasn’t quite right, up the line.  I couldn’t feel anything, myself.  I suppose I was too young.  We rode further up the line.

“The horses were fresh and excited by the storm.  My little pony, Dragon, was playful.  I remember I kept jumping him over every little log I could find on the path.  Da cheered us on, though he had his hands full with Moose.

“We reached the spot that Da could feel, and I could see what was wrong.  The Gateway was all bright in that spot.  And the magic holding it together was tangled.  It was beautiful, a twisting and turning thing, bound all together.

“I rode closer, entranced, hardly hearing Da shout out a warning.  I halted Dragon and Da drew closer.  He threw up a hand and chanted something in Gaelic, something I didn’t recognize.

“The knot of magic pulsed.  It writhed and grew, almost angry in its reaction to Da’s words…”

Devin swallowed hard.  Again, I had to struggle not to reach out to him, to smooth away his sorrow and pain.

“I was closer, you see.  The power struggled, and Dragon shied… it all happened so fast.  Da was chanting, but when he saw that Dragon was going to pitch me, right there and then… he shouted ‘No!’

“I can barely remember what happened next.  Dragon reared.  Moose reared.  The light got brighter and brighter… next thing I knew I was on the ground, the horses were gone, and Da… he was on the ground too.  I knew immediately that he was… gone.  God, he was… he was dead.  It was my fault.  I distracted him and he… he died.