Morrigan (4 page)

Her foster brother’s voice woke Morrigan from
her vision. She realized she was standing there, naked and
dripping, her towel a long since forgotten lump on the ground. She
glanced at her pale reflection in the mirror. All trace of her
mother’s visit was gone, but her warning stayed with her. Trust no
one, she had said. Morrigan decided she would follow those words of
wisdom. When her dark knight arrived, she wouldn’t let her guard
down. Just because they had to travel together, didn’t mean they
would have to be friends.

Morrigan left for school that morning,
telling herself her will was strong, and no one, especially not a
man, would break her resolve. No matter what resolutions she made
that morning, somehow she knew in her heart that keeping her knight
at arm’s length was going to be easier said than done.

Morrigan expected school to be uneventful. It
normally was, outside of the occasional bullying. She didn’t make
any effort to pay attention to the lectures. She figured it didn’t
matter much anymore. She wouldn’t be around long enough to make it
to graduation. In fact, the more she thought about finding her true
home, the more unbearable the mundane world of Maryland became.

Morrigan allowed her mind to wander. She
chewed absently on the end of her pencil as her thoughts whirled in
a million different directions. One minute, she was
excited—prepared to face her lifelong destiny. The next, she was
terrified, afraid to leave behind all she had ever known. It was in
the midst of these frenzied thoughts that she first saw him.
Instantly, all her worries and fears vanished. It was as if an
angel had miraculously appeared in her moment of turmoil, albeit a
scruffy and somewhat rugged looking angel. He was amazing—a walking
piece of medieval art. She swore beams of light illuminated him in
a strange, unearthly glow. She wasn’t even sure if he was real or
just another vision. There were two things she knew with absolute
certainty from the first second she saw him. She was recklessly in
love with him, and it completely terrified her.

The man was loitering just outside the
window, sitting down at one of the picnic tables outside the
cafeteria. If he was trying to make it look like he belonged there,
he wasn’t doing a very good job. It would have been impossible for
him to fit in anywhere, except for a Renaissance fair, and even
that would have been a stretch. Luckily, with classes in session,
there were no students hanging around outside, though a few cars
did slow down to gawk at him as they passed by.

Though the stubble on his chin might have
made him appear older, there was a definite youthfulness to his
face. He was probably eighteen or nineteen. His hair hung in long,
dark dreadlocks, reaching to nearly the center of his back. His
pants were fashioned from what looked like raw deer hide, stitched
together in mismatched patches. His shirt—if it could even be
called a shirt—had no buttons or snaps, and his firm chest met the
chill autumn air unflinchingly, perhaps because of the surprisingly
thick layer of hair that covered it. And his eyes! His eyes were
the most amazing shade of emerald green—so bright that even from
the distance, she could see them glittering in the sunlight like
gemstones.

All in all, he was hardly the kind of prince
charming most young girls spent their nights dreaming of. There was
no suit of armor or white horse. But for Morrigan, he was the man
of her dreams—literally. She had spent the better part of her life
dreaming of this exact man riding to her rescue. He was the dark
knight from her sketches and from the tarot reading. The man who
had come to save her from the world that shunned her. All her
mother’s warnings and her own firm stance to trust no one went
completely out the window with that very first glance. She could
only hope his intentions were honorable. Because she knew she would
follow him to the ends of the earth without question.

Morrigan kept her gaze glued to him until the
last possible second. She couldn’t help herself. If he knew she was
watching, he gave no indication. He sat quietly, with his face
raised to the sky, obviously enjoying the warmth against his skin.
When the bell finally rang, announcing her lunch hour had arrived,
Morrigan jumped up from her desk and headed for the cafeteria. She
skipped the lunch line altogether and bolted straight for the door.
But when she flung it open and examined the picnic tables, she
found that no one was there. The man seemed to have vanished.

She didn’t believe for a minute that he had
been nothing but her imagination. She knew her mystery man had been
out there. A sense deeper than any vision told her he still was
there—somewhere.

“Come out,” she called. She was proud of the
fact her voice revealed none of her wildly whirling emotions. “I
know you’re here. I can feel you.”

She heard a soft chuckle, and then he stepped
out from behind the shelter of a nearby tree. She was relieved to
see he wasn’t glowing anymore. It must have been a trick of the
light after all. Even in normal lighting, she still found him
strangely breathtaking.

“I should have known it would be impossible
to take a witch by surprise.” He took a few steps in her direction
and bowed deeply. “Greetings, Mistress Morrigan.”

His voice added a whole new dimension to his
rustic, earthy charm. His accent was somehow a cross between Irish
and English, yet it was neither one at all. It had a flow and an
inflection all its own. Each word was like a note of music. It was
unlike anything she had ever heard, and it made Morrigan feel
lightheaded. No man had ever had that kind of effect on her before.
She didn’t like it, and she did the best she could to hide it from
him.

She was even more concerned when she heard
the door creak open behind them. She peeked over her shoulder just
in time to see a few other students come out to enjoy the beautiful
weather on their lunch break. When they saw Morrigan and the
strangely dressed newcomer, they couldn’t help but snicker.
Luckily, they were far enough away that no one could overhear them
talking. But just in case, Morrigan gestured for him to follow her
behind a patch of bushes which blocked them from the view of her
nosy classmates.

“Who are you?” Morrigan demanded.

Her voice had lost most of its former
strength with the arrival of their audience—something that didn’t
go unnoticed by her dark knight, who was completely unaffected by
the laughter at his expense. He gave her a cocky smirk before
replying in his melodic accent.

“I am Filtiarn, your most humble and obliging
servant,” he told her with another exaggerated bow. “But, you,
fairest of maidens, may call me Tiarn. Your mother has sent me to
bring you back to your home in Tír na NÓg, where she awaits your
services most urgently.”

Morrigan narrowed her eyes. The speech seemed
a little too rehearsed, a little too phony. Yet, she knew she had
no other options. Even if she could get to where she needed to go
without him, she wasn’t sure she wanted to. She wasn’t sure she
ever wanted to be apart from him again, even for a second. The
warnings about deceit and betrayal were front and foremost in her
mind. She tried not to let her feelings interfere with her common
sense.

“Tír na NÓg?” she questioned. “Isn’t that
some sort of Irish myth? The land of eternal youth, right? It’s
supposed to be a magical place where everyone stays young and happy
forever.”

“For sure, it is a magical place,” Tiarn
acknowledged. “But you should not believe everything you read in
fairy stories, dear Morrigan. At the moment, the country is torn
apart by war and could hardly be called a place of eternal
happiness. Your mother, Queen Ceridwyn, and your Aunt Arianrhod are
vying for the crown. That is the way of it, you know. One good
witch and one bad witch do battle, and whoever wins will determine
the fate of all the people in Tír na NÓg. At the moment, Arianrhod
has the upper hand. Your mother and grandmother have been taken
captive, which is why your mother has sent me, a lowly changeling,
to bring you to her aide.”

Morrigan had to sit down for a minute and
catch her breath. Strangely enough, she didn’t doubt one word of
what Tiarn had just told her. His words had the ring of truth to
them. Nevertheless, it was a lot of information to have thrown at
her all at once, especially after years of knowing nothing about
herself. Add to that, the swoony affect that Tiarn had on her, and
it made for a very confused and particularly inarticulate Morrigan.
Yet, she did manage to stutter out one simple question.

“A queen? My mother is a queen?” It sounded
even less likely when she spoke it out loud. “But that would make
me . . . a . . . a . . . .”

“A princess?” Tiarn finished the sentence for
her. “Yes, Your Majesty. Indeed, you are the one and only princess
of Tír na NÓg.”

It was an overwhelming discovery, but Tiarn
didn’t seem to take that into consideration. He just kept plunging
on, trying to see how much she could handle before she cracked. It
was clear to see he was enjoying every minute of her trauma. She
had to wonder if he felt even a hint of the overwhelming emotions
she had felt for him from the instant she laid her eyes on him. If
he did, he certainly wasn’t giving her any telltale signs.

“There is not much time, Your Highness,” he
told her and somehow made the title sound almost like an insult.
“Your mother’s powers grow weak in the dungeons. If we do not move
quickly, we may be too late.”

“I’m ready when you are,” Morrigan announced.
She cursed the tremor in her voice that gave away the fact she
wasn’t nearly as brave as she was pretending to be. “Let’s go right
now.”

He shook his head. “No, not now. Tonight. We
shall leave tonight, under the cover of darkness. I will come for
you at midnight, the witching hour. Take only what you must. It
will be a long, hard journey. You will not want to be hampered down
by material possessions.”

“Tonight. Midnight,” Morrigan echoed with an
affirmative nod. “Sounds like a plan.”

Despite her former urgency, it seemed
terrifyingly soon. All at once, the world which had shunned her
seemed like a security blanket—one she wasn’t quite ready to cast
aside. Tiarn wasn’t giving her any options. He was already
shuffling down the sidewalk and out of sight.

“Wait!” she called. “How will I find
you?”

“I’ll find you.” He took a long, deep breath
through his flaring nostrils. “I could pick up your scent
anywhere.”

Then he was gone. He disappeared around the
corner of the building like the mythical creature he claimed to be,
leaving Morrigan trembling and breathless in his wake.

It was eleven-thirty. The sounds of distant
snoring echoed through the hallway. Everyone in the house was sound
asleep—except Morrigan. As quietly as possible, she pushed back the
covers, climbed out of bed, and pulled off her pajamas. Luckily,
Lauren slept like a rock, so the creaking of the closet didn’t
disturb her. Morrigan retrieved one of her long Bohemian skirts,
slipped into the loose-fitting garment, and pulled on her warmest
sweater over a spaghetti-strap top.

She stole a pair of Lauren’s black stretchy
leggings and tugged them on under the skirt. She had no idea what
kind of climate she was heading into, but she figured it was best
to dress in layers. She could always remove some of them later if
she stumbled into a desert. She completed the ensemble with a
sturdy pair of metal tipped, leather boots. The look was hardly
what she would call sexy, but she was going on a journey to another
world—not on a date. Why did she have to keep reminding herself of
that?

A picture of Tiarn popped unbidden into her
mind. Suddenly the bulky sweater seemed stifling as the images of
the long-haired man filled her thoughts and warmed her body. She
looked up at the drawing on the wall of her dark knight—the man who
had haunted her dreams for so many years. The fact he was suddenly
a living, breathing reality was a little overwhelming. It shouldn’t
have been any stranger than learning she was a princess from
another dimension. Yet, somehow she found the mysteriously aloof
Filtiarn much more intimidating than anything else she had faced in
the last twenty-four hours. She resolved that she would die before
she let him know he had such an unraveling effect on her.

“Meooowww?”

The plaintive whine of the cat instantly
brought her back to the task at hand. Lauren shifted on her bed as
Danu wailed pitifully and looked up at her with longing in her
eyes.

“Shhh,” she soothed. “Don’t worry. You’re
coming too.”

Danu and Dagda were both winding around her
ankles, as usual. She bent down to give them each a loving stroke.
She had no intention of leaving them behind to be thrown in some
inhumane animal shelter. They had been the only true friends she
had ever had. Tiarn had told her to bring only what was necessary.
Well, Danu and Dagda were necessary.

Morrigan grabbed her backpack from the floor.
The only things she didn’t dump out were her tarot cards, which
were wrapped securely in the bottom of the bag, her sketchbook, and
a few meager art supplies. She replaced her useless text books with
some extra clothes before tiptoeing out of the bedroom and clicking
the door shut behind her.

Morrigan had learned the hard way how to move
through a house full of sleeping people silently. One of her foster
father’s had taught her that particular lesson when she was only
five years old after he caught her sneaking outside for a night of
star gazing. He would never have managed to hurt her if she had
been more skilled in her abilities of telekinesis at the time.

Morrigan snorted lightly at the old memories.
They always had a way of creeping out of her subconscious at the
most inopportune times. With the cats still at her heels, she
pushed the negative thoughts away and crept into the kitchen. This
was a night for new beginnings, not a time to dwell on things that
couldn’t be changed. Firm in her resolve, she stuck her head in the
pantry and started poking around for supplies. She hadn’t asked
what type of traveling arrangements Tiarn had made, but she doubted
very much they would be staying at a string of five star hotels.
There was no way of telling what kind of food would be available.
Morrigan decided to fill her bag with whatever nonperishable items
she could find.