Born of Oak and Silver (The Caradoc Chronicles) (7 page)

If that was all she wanted, I was more than happy to comply
. My hand went to the ring around my neck. I pinched the band of it and began to lift it, its chain rising in slightly delayed unison up toward my head. The world lost most of its glittering haze as my fingers moved to allow for greater contact with the ring. I blinked profusely as my eyes worked to acclimate to their new way of seeing. My breath hitched, and my hand holding the ring abruptly stopped moving.

Maurelle seemed to be glowing with an effervescent light. As did everything she touched, or had touched recently. The rest of the world
, though clear, was dim in comparison.

I closed my eyes in an effort to re-center myself. When I again opened them, it was to look directly at Maurelle.
I blinked, and found that she now stood even farther away from me, close to the trunk of a tree in its prime.

Anger from an unknown source burned furiously inside of me. I glared
maliciously at her as I sat up. I removed the ring from around my bare neck and chest and slid it, with the chain still dangling from its band, onto my still too small finger. I clenched my hand tightly closed to hold it in place. With the ring on, her beauty was still unrivaled, but it did not cause my eyes to bleed from simply beholding it. Furthermore, I could see where her sparkling glamour abruptly disappeared. It was as if a large glittering bubble covered the landscape, and everything within it was under her rule and domain, and therefore subject to the manipulations of the Fae. That was exactly what she was, an unwelcome visitor from Faery—the
Sidhe
.

“Daine,” her perfectly feminine voice pet
itioned from beside the tree, “remove the ring from your finger, please. I cannot be everything we both desire me to be with it remaining anywhere near you. Come, let us leave this place and create paradise together.” Her voice echoed loudly in my brain.

C
ompulsion. I was sure that was what she was doing. She was trying to force me to do her will with influenced words. They rattled in my mind in an effort to control me. Had I not had the ring on, I would have unthinkingly done whatever she wanted me to. But, for whatever reason, the ring served as a buffer against all of her powers of persuasion and deception. There was no way that I would be taking the ring off as long as I was still breathing.

Something
else fluttered in my mind: a memory—or perhaps a knowledge—that was embedded so deeply inside of me that I had never noticed it was there. It tensed, and I felt a sense of recognition dawn. I knew Maurelle, from somewhere or sometime before. I knew absolutely that she wanted nothing more than to destroy me, and would use whatever means necessary to do so.

Outrage boiled in my heart.
I had done nothing to provoke such murderous intent. Aside from refusing to remove a seemingly innocuous ring, I had obeyed her in everything. It didn’t matter. I knew now of her intent. Like a wolf, cunning as it silently stalks its prey in the night, my dormant Druid flexed with power in a long-anticipated awakening.

“No, Maurelle,” I said coldly.
“I do not think I will.” I stepped toward her, my eyes focused and intent. “In fact, I have every intention of leaving this place without you, immediately. Should you try to move me as your kind is prone to do—to sift me, or in any way hurt me, I will guarantee you a very, very long time in an even smaller confinement.”

Her beauti
ful face imperceptibly wavered before she resumed her game of persuasion. I took another step toward her and the path, and saw her pretty fingers briefly tense.

“Daine, I am hurt,
” she cooed. “I have done nothing to warrant your callousness toward me. All I have done is offer you limitless delight. Any mortal would exchange their soul for such promises. But for you, and only for you, I have asked nothing in return. I offer myself to you freely.” Maurelle spread her hands at her sides in an action of mock, but innocent pleading.

“No
, Maurelle, with you there is nothing that is free.” I watched her carefully as I stepped back and began to climb down the rock to the ground. I deliberately choose my steps on the path as I backed away from her, watching her intently.

She
never moved, remaining always next to the tree. However, something about her perfect face had changed. I knew at once that she had given up on trying to tempt me. Instead of seduction, she had assumed her true attitude of superiority and complete annoyance. She leaned against the tree with her lean arms folded against her chest.

“Ha! Insignificant mortal
. If you think that you, a mere human child, can dismiss or think to threaten me, you are greatly mistaken.” She sifted and instantly stood on the ground before me. Her flawless face looked down on my own as her long fingers tightened around my throat. She pressed me backward until I was firmly against the trunk of another tree. Her perfectly straight and white teeth clashed together.

Prettily, she
growled, “It has been a long time that I have awaited your coming, Daine. Never forget—you belong
to me
. Neither you, nor anyone you call your own, will ever be free from me. So do not think that you can simply walk away. You. Are. Mine.” Her pouty lips formed themselves into a smile fit only for the bedroom.

My hands
fumbled uselessly at the hold Maurelle had on my throat. She was stronger than anyone I had ever known. She held fast, amused that I would even try to loosen her hold, and tightened her grip instead. I was beginning to see dark spots randomly in my vision. In a desperate last effort, I opened my fist and pressed the sapphire of my ring against her bare skin, just below the bow of her collarbones.

She shrieked an
unearthly scream, as the scent of burned flesh filled the air. She withdrew from me, holding her hands protectively over her brand. The radiant light that silhouetted her body briefly flickered before it disappeared. She removed her hands, looking down vainly as she tried to see what I had just done.

All I saw was the
perfect imprint the ring’s stone had emblazoned on her chest.

I did not wait to see what Maurelle would do. I turned and ran as quickly as I could up the path toward what appeared to be the boundary of
her realm. I willed the wind, currently absent from this place, to carry me faster than I was able to move on my own. Behind me, I could hear her shouting words from a language I couldn’t even begin to recognize. It grated in my ears. I kept going, afraid that if I faltered now I would not be permitted to live a moment longer. If she caught me, I was positive that my death would be torturous.

I burst through the
transparent wall that separated her from the rest of the world with a stumble. I looked around me, taking everything in. There was nothing that was vibrant, or richer in tone than it should have been. Nor was any of it sparkling, and for that I was eternally grateful.

I turned, and
staggered backwards as I saw that Maurelle glared inhumanly at me from behind the wall. Frantically, I looked up and down the length of the barrier to find its end. Glowing blue symbols marked the rocks, ground, and trees at varying intervals in every direction I could see along her prison line.

Maurelle stepped
mere inches closer, and I fell back, preparing myself to run if I needed to. She reached a hand toward the wall exactly where I’d come through, and instantly withdrew her fingertips as if wounded. She regarded her fingers, but her eyes made little pause before they shifted back to mine. “I may not be able to remove myself from this place as of yet, but make no mistake, you will always be mine.” Her eyes blazed an incandescent blue in her beautiful. otherworldly face.

I shuddered
in revulsion. Boldly, I looked directly into her glowing, blue eyes. “By the time you’ve finally managed that, I will have become something you will have every reason to fear,” I retorted tersely.

“Ha! Again with your distorted bravery. Your false courage is amusing
,
human
.” She sneered the word, as if there were not a caste or creature in all existence that she found to be more insignificant or disgusting. “I suspect that you are depending upon Bramwyll to instruct you in how to become something formidable?”

I said nothing
, but my defiance gave me away.

Smiling, her voice lost its terrifying tone
, and again became warm and alluring. “I see that I am right. Remember this well: just as Bramwyll counseled you against consorting with the Tylwyth Teg, I too must advise you to use caution in trusting the old Druid. He too will only use you for his own ugly purposes.”

And then
she was gone. Removed from this place or only invisible to my own eyes, I did not know.

I breathed raggedly.
I looked away from the hazy wall and down at the ring I still wore and held clenched in my palm. Shakily, I removed it. The blue symbols that I saw along the line disappeared, along with the visible boundary that had separated Maurelle from me. So too went the unmistakable presence of my long-unrecognized acquaintance. No longer called upon, the Druid inside of me directly returned to slumbering in my soul.

I noticed with sharp clarity that
I could hear the birds chattering away, and feel the cold spring breeze on my skin. I shivered, realizing that I was completely drenched in my own sweat. My face felt cool and tight. I touched my cheek, and my hand came away with the slightly tacky blood that my eyes had shed upon seeing Maurelle in her undampened form.

I r
eturned the necklace to my neck and turned away from the river, running as quickly as I could toward Bram’s home. Nervousness and fear pooled in my stomach, and I pushed forward all the faster. He was the only person I knew that could wake me from this nightmare.

“Bram?
!” I yelled as I burst into his house. He did not answer. I could not find him in the drawing room, nor was he in his study, library, or kitchen. Frantically, I ran upstairs.

I found him sitting upright and fully clothed on the bed in his room. His gnarled hands tightly gripped the blankets, and his wrinkled, caring face, was as white as his beard.

“Bram . . .” I said, my voice full of concern as I rushed to his side.

His eyes were closed and his breathing was so light
that I would have never noticed it without putting my hand under his nose. Panic filled me. Bram was never sick; I’d never even seen him catch a cold. I placed a trembling hand on his forearm and gave it a slight squeeze. When he didn’t respond, I shook him urgently. My fear grew rapidly as he failed to respond.

I stopped shaking him, it was useless.
I sat in the chair next to his bed and watched him carefully. Minutes later, his eyes slowly opened. They were as vibrant as ever and clear, but did not immediately see me. I began to shake his arm desperately. “Bram,” I shouted again, my voice cracking with emotion.

This time
he responded. He shook his head, as if to removing himself from a heavy daze. He made a small groan as he brought his hands up to gently cradle his apparently throbbing head. “Daine,” he gingerly whispered. He closed his eyes, but continued haltingly, as if the words hurt his mind to form them, “I felt you enter the wards. I had no conception of what Maurelle would do. I feared the worst, lad. She is evil.” His old wrinkled eyelids slowly opened to reveal watering eyes. “I thought I’d lost you.”

He
blinked against his tears, as well as the fading brightness of the room. “When I realized that you were on your own, I used the Earth to know what was happening. From so far away, it was . . . draining.” Bram began to massage his temples tenderly, muttering something occasionally under his breath. I retrieved a small, leather pouch for him, and filled a glass with water and a small amount of the pouch’s white powder. I stirred them briefly together before handing him the glass. He drank it quickly, and then resumed rubbing his head.

It didn’t take long for the powder to take effect. He winked at me, and that was all the reassurance I needed.
I was angry.

“Bra
m, why didn’t you tell me that there was a Fae living by the river!? She tried to seduce me. ME! I’m still a boy!” I said exasperatedly. And then my shame overtook me. I looked down at my dirty shoes as I quietly admitted, “She violated me Bram. I . . . I lost myself to her . . . twice.” I turned red with embarrassment.

Bra
m surprised me when he chuckled mirthlessly. “Daine, all men lose themselves when they see her—especially when she is undiminished, as she was with you. You met her in her true form. Whenever she is near, we become mindless, bumbling buffoons before her—slaves to her every whim. One look,” he snapped his fingers, “and we’re done for.”

He tentatively stood and walked slowly over
to the washbasin. Pouring cool water into it, he began to wet his face with hands cupped full of water. The color began to creep back into his face. He rolled his dampened shirt sleeves to the elbows, revealing iron bracelets on his wrists and swirling, black, tattooed forearms.

“Daine,
” Bram interrupted my contemplation, “you’d better come over here and wash up. Your mother cannot see you this way.”