The Awakening Page 17

  Morena’s tone mirrored Breen’s frustrated circle. “We played, you and I, in the woods around Marg’s cottage, and in the dooryard of the farmhouse where you lived until your father left and turned it over to the O’Broins. We had tea parties and picnics and shared secrets whispering at night when we were supposed to be sleeping.”

  “I was three! I’m sorry I don’t remember. But you’re not helping by fostering my grandmother’s delusions about this being some sort of Brigadoon.”

  As if waiting for an insult, Morena’s eyes narrowed to slits. “What’s a Brigadoon?”

  “It’s a fantasy story about a place that only exists for one day every hundred years.”

  “Oh, it sounds like a fine tale.” Mollified by it, Morena reached down to pat the dog that trotted along with them. “But this isn’t that, as we’re here all the time.”

  “She put something in my wine.”

  “Ah, don’t be a git. Why would she be doing that to her own kin?”

  “It made me see her doing the impossible.”

  “Well now, there’s not much impossible for the likes of Marg. She’s as powerful a witch as I know.”

  As the crazy built around her, Breen considered pulling her own hair out. “Now you’re all witches? Look, I get Ireland’s got its folklore and its legends, but—”

  “Ireland’s on the other side, and I’m not a witch. I’m of the Sidhe.”

  “I can see you’re a woman.”

  “Sidhe,” Morena repeated. “I’m of the faerie clan.”

  “Faerie clan. Of course. I should’ve seen it right away.”

  Unfazed, Morena lifted a hand in a wave toward Harken as he led a spotted cow to what Breen assumed was a barn.

  “It’ll be easier on you going back through with me. Harken and Aisling said you took a turn coming through, and likely because you’d blocked it all out.”

  With the hawk circling above, Morena hopped the stone fence.

  For the first time, Breen saw steps carved into the rise leading up to the tree.

  “I fell. I lost my balance and fell, that’s all.”

  “As you like.”

  Seven steps, Breen counted as she climbed them. Steps of rough stone with mica gleaming in the bright sunlight.

  “I was going after the dog,” she said in her defense. “And distracted because the tree’s fascinating.”

  She gripped one of its curving branches, tried to climb up as gracefully, effortlessly as Morena.

  She felt herself start to fall, as if the ground vanished under her feet. Then Morena gripped her hand.

  The next thing she knew she stood on the path under a soaking rain.

  “I don’t understand how—”

  “Because I’m thinking you don’t want to.” Temper, very visibly, began to rise and spew. “You don’t want to take back what’s yours by right, by blood, would rather close your eyes to it and pretend.”

  “I think I’m standing on firmer ground than somebody who claims to live in an alternate reality as a freaking faerie.”

  “Firmer ground, is it? You’d best hold on as we’re about to see about that.”

  Before Breen could evade, Morena clamped an arm around her waist. They lifted off the ground.

  “Oh God, oh my God.”

  “Hold on, I said. You’re no bag of feathers.”

  With that Morena flew through the rain, several feet over the path. Tongue lolling, the dog raced under them. The hawk cried overhead as he soared.

  Instinctively, Breen reached out to grip Morena’s waist. Her hand brushed wings. Big, beautiful, luminous wings of violet edged in silver.

  “I’m dreaming. This is all a dream.”

  “My arse.” They dipped down, up again, to avoid branches. “There was a time you’d have given us a boost.” Turning her head, Morena looked into Breen’s shocked eyes.

  “This isn’t happening.”

  “I should drop you on your head and knock the sense back in you.”

  Instead, she burst out of the woods, skimmed over the wet grass and garden. She set Breen down on the back patio.

  “I’m going in to dry off a bit.”

  The dog followed Morena inside as if they both belonged there. Amish landed on a nearby branch and folded his wings to wait.

  Shivering now, Breen felt the rain soaking her to the skin. It felt real, but how could it be when she was obviously still in bed having a very long, very strange, very lucid dream?

  She stepped inside. Morena, her jacket drying on a peg, offered the dog something out of a jar on the counter.

  “He deserves one,” she said. “I see my grandmother brought them for him, and there, a bowl for his food, one for his water. The sack there would be his food.”

  “Your grandmother.”

  “Aye, Marg would have asked her to see to it. You know my grandparents. They’re Finola and Seamus Mac an Ghaill. McGill. My nan settled you and your friend into the cottage Marg made for you, and Grandda’s been showing you how to garden again.”

  “Again.”

  “Even when we were babes you had a way with living things. Plants, animals, people.” Morena wandered the kitchen as she spoke. “Not so fine a way now with people, I see, as you’ve yet to light the fire to warm me or offer me a drink before I take my leave.”

  Her ears rang. Spike in blood pressure, and no wonder, Breen thought—with she believed admirable calm. “You had wings.”

  “Had and have.”

  “Like . . . Tinker Bell.”

  “Oh, I know that story, and it’s a grand one. But she would have been a pixie. One of the Sidhe for certain, but a pixie. They’re very small.”

  “I’m not asleep,” Breen said slowly. “I’m dripping on the kitchen floor, and I’m cold and I’m wet.”

  “Then light the bleeding fire.”

  “I’ll light the bleeding fire.” As if dreaming, she walked into the living room, where she’d set the logs for a fresh fire only that morning.

  A lifetime and world ago.

  She set the starter under the log, reached for the matches.

  “Really now, that’s how you’d do it?” Morena, smelling of rain and forest, crouched beside her. “To light a fire is the first power of the Wise, and so a child must be taught, and carefully, of its powers, its dangers, its benefits.”

  “I don’t know any other way to light a fire.”

  “That makes me sad for you,” Morena replied as Breen struck the match.

  Breen simply sat on the floor when the starter caught. “I can’t think. I know this can’t be real, but—”

  “You know it is. I saw wine in the kitchen place, so I’m getting some for the both of us.”

  “Tell me how my father died.”

  “That’s for Marg.” Morena pushed to her feet. “It’s not right that I would take what’s hers to tell. I can say I know no man in any of the worlds was better than your da. I’m getting the wine.”

  The dog stretched across Breen’s lap, and somehow she felt comfort stroking his damp curls.

  “What kind of dog is this?”

  “He’s an Irish water spaniel, and you can trust he has a strong heart and a true one or Marg wouldn’t have chosen him for you.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Well now, that’s for you to choose, isn’t it? But we all have called him Bollocks because as soon as he was weaned he could find trouble without looking.”

  Breen choked out a laugh. “Bollocks?”

  “He earned that name, though Marg trained him well since we dubbed him. He’ll sit when you tell him, and do his business in the out-of-doors, and he won’t chew your boots, though he once had a taste for mine.”

  Morena sat, handed Breen a glass, then scrubbed a hand over the dog’s head. “Didn’t you, you scoundrel? She’s pined for you, has Marg, all these years. That I can tell you. And I’ll confess I went against her to go through to meet you that day in the woods by the castle.”

  “How did yo
u get there? You flew,” Breen answered herself. “On the wings.”

  “I’ve friends, and good ones, but I’ve never had one so tight in my heart as you. It may be we won’t like each other so much now with the years that passed.” She shrugged, drank. “But I wanted to see what you were about.”

  “I bought a gift for you.”

  Morena blinked at her. “A gift?”

  “A thank-you. I thought you were with the school, then I thought you must’ve been trespassing because nobody knew you. Anyway.”

  “What was it, the gift?”

  “I’ll get it.” She had to nudge the dog off her lap.

  “Tell him to stay if you don’t want him following after you.”

  “Stay,” Breen said. “I’ll be right back.”

  Everything in the cottage was the same. Normal. But she wondered, as she walked upstairs, if anything could or would be normal again.

  She got the little gift bag, then stood a moment, staring at herself in the bedroom mirror.

  She looked the same—not the same as she had before her life had changed in Philly, but the same as the woman who’d come to Ireland.

  But she wasn’t at all sure she was the same.

  She went back down and handed Morena the gift bag before she sat again. “There’s a card inside, too. I don’t know if you can read.”

  “Of course I can read, don’t be a git about it. We had poets and scholars in Talamh while those in this world were barely out of the caves.”

  The insult, clear on her face, faded as she took out the card and read. “That’s lovely, that is. I’m told you’re a writer yourself, and you do it well.”

  Then she opened the box, let out a gasp. “Ah, it’s a hawk. It’s a fine gift, a very fine gift. I thank you for it, and I feel I may not deserve it.”

  “Why?”

  “I didn’t lie, but didn’t give you the truth.”

  “You gave me the hawk walk, and I’ll never forget it. I didn’t know, um, faeries had hawks.”

  “We have each other,” Morena said as she fixed the pin to her shirt. “And it’s time I took him home again. I see, now that I’m not so resentful, why Marg wants to give you time. I grew up knowing, and you were made to forget. I hate being sorry.” She got to her feet. “Hate more having to say it, but it’s sorry I am for giving you a fright in the way I brought you back.”

  “I don’t understand any of this.”

  “I know it. I didn’t want to know it, but I do. So I’ll leave you be. Will I be welcomed back again?”

  “Of course.” Breen stood. “Yes, of course.”

  “That’s enough then.”

  She went back into the kitchen to put on her jacket.

  “How do . . . how do the wings come through the jacket?”

  Morena shook her head. “Because I want them to, and they’re mine, aren’t they? Don’t forget to feed the dog,” she said.

  Through the glass, Breen watched the hawk fly down, circle over Morena’s head.

  Then those luminous wings flowed out, and with the hawk, she flew through the rain and into the woods.

  “I’m not crazy.” Breen laid a hand on the dog’s curly topknot when he leaned against her leg. “I’m not hallucinating. I know what’s real.”

  She looked down to see him staring up at her. “It’s too early for dinner, and I need to write this all down. I probably shouldn’t give you another one of those cookie things, but what the hell, right? It’s been a day.”

  Even as she took one out of the jar, he sat, eyes gleaming.

  “Okay, can you shake hands? Is that stupid?” To test, she held out a hand. He offered his paw, making her laugh. She shook it, gave him the biscuit. “You’re a good dog, Bollocks.”

  She put water in one of the bowls, then got out a Coke for herself to take into her office.

  She tried to reconstruct everything from the moment she’d seen the dog in what she thought of as her secret journal. In writing it out she felt it again, the damp air, the light and shadows as Bollocks led her—no question he’d done just that—to the tree.

  The Welcoming Tree.

  To add to it, she uploaded pictures of the dog, of the tree.

  And wished she’d pulled herself together enough to have taken some on . . . the other side. In (on?) Talamh.

  The air, the light had changed. She could admit that now and document it. She wrote of the four people she’d met. Harken, Aisling, her grandmother, Morena.

  It struck her all at once she’d been in the house where her father had lived, where she herself—according to her grandmother—had been born.

  She sat back, sipped her Coke, stared at the rain outside. And noticed Bollocks had joined her and cozily curled on the bed.

  “I probably shouldn’t let you do that.”

  But he looked so comfortable, watched her so sweetly, she let it go.

  Her father was gone. She didn’t know how or why, but she had to accept that, too. He hadn’t abandoned her, hadn’t forgotten about her. He’d died.

  Years ago, years and years, but her loss was as fresh as the moment. And something she didn’t know what to do with. She had the picture of him in her bedroom, and memories that came and went. But she needed more.

  She needed to see his grave, and she’d ask her grandmother for something of his, just some token she could hold on to.

  “So I’m going back,” she declared. “I guess I knew I would, but I need to work up to it.”

  She described how Marg had made the air swirl and the fire roar, even as she asked how such a thing could be possible. How could Morena sprout wings and fly? How could . . .

  She sat back again, realizing what she wrote now ran along the same themes and directions as the story she worked on every morning.

  Not exact, no, not absolutely, but so close.

  Because she’d always known. However fantastic, however opposed to the practical bent of her life, part of her had always known. The memories might be locked up inside, but they eked out, didn’t they, bit by bit as she opened herself up to tell a story.

  To do what she’d wanted to do.

  So, she wrote, it’s not just a matter of finding out who I am—and I’ve made progress on that. But what I am. What am I? Daughter of Talamh, daughter of the Fey, one of the Wise. Wisewomen equal witches. I don’t feel like a witch.

  She shifted from the journal to a search on Irish water spaniels. The description fit Bollocks perfectly—and she found the nonshedding characteristic a nice bonus.

  The breed boasted smart, energetic, affectionate dogs. Inquisitive, a bit of a clown. Loved water, naturally.

  “In Irish folklore,” she read, “you’re supposed to be a descendent of the Dobhar-chú. And what the hell is that?”

  She did another search. “Half dog, half otter or fish? Really? Oh, and a fierce predator of the oceans and rivers. You don’t look so fierce.”

  He slid off the bed, stretched into a down-dog, and gave her a long, loving look.

  “Getting hungry? Me, too. This took longer than I figured.”

  He followed her into the kitchen.

  The handwritten note tied to the cloth sack told her how much to give him, how often. And that he wouldn’t mind a bit if she added a raw egg or a bit of yogurt to the chunky kibble.

  She chose the egg, as she had them on hand, and while he ate, scrambled some for herself with bits of Irish bacon, some cheese, tomatoes, broccoli.

  She ate with the dog stretched over her feet, and tried to work out how to handle her daily blog. She couldn’t leave out the dog—and didn’t want to. She could say she got him from a neighbor. It was close enough to true.

  She couldn’t write about her father’s death—not yet at least. And she wasn’t ready to. She couldn’t mention sitting in her grandmother’s kitchen, or—Jesus—alternate worlds.

  She’d figure it out, just as she’d figure out what to tell Marco.

  She got up to deal with her dishes, and the dog stood, st
aring at her.

  “You want to go out. Okay, do I just assume that because it’s logical, or do I know because . . . I can read you. It feels like that. It doesn’t matter, does it? Let’s go out.”

  He danced when she grabbed her jacket, then shot out the door she opened like a bullet.

  He tore around the yard as if he’d escaped from prison, then danced again until she walked toward him.

  At that he streaked—a curly bolt of lightning—toward the bay. Barking like a mad thing, he leaped into the water and swam, head bobbing, eyes full of joy.

  “Fierce predator of the seas,” she said with a laugh.

  Seabirds scattered, water splashed as he raced out, then in again.

  Breen stood as the long-lived summer sun pushed against the western clouds to add just a glimmer to the sky. And realized she was absolutely, perfectly content.

  She’d been happy enough in her solitude, but the dog—and yes, she’d always wanted one—added a shine.

  Like the sun in a cloudy sky.

  A change in routine didn’t hurt a thing. So Breen told herself as she adjusted hers to feed the dog his breakfast, take her walk with him before sitting down to blog.

  He’d slept at the foot of her bed, which she’d have to change. Probably.

  She sent Marco a text to give him a heads-up. After all, he was her roommate, and would be her housemate. He deserved to know they had a dog.

  She made sure to add the most adorable picture she could manage with the text.

  He responded.

  You what!! What kind of weird-ass-looking dog is that? And why’s he so damn cute? Look what you do when I’m not around a couple weeks. Send more pictures.

  She spent a happy few minutes texting back and forth before she settled down to—carefully—write the blog.

  “Pictures of puppies never fail.” She glanced over—and of course, Bollocks was curled up on the bed. “I’m going to work on my book for a couple hours, then we’re going out. We’re getting you a collar, a leash, some toys—and a dog bed.”

  He didn’t mind the collar, but he didn’t like the leash. While he didn’t put up a fight when she clipped it on, he looked at her with sad, sad eyes.

  “It’s not that I don’t trust you.” She’d have sworn that’s what he thought. “And we won’t need it at the cottage. But we’re going to walk around the village now, and we’ll need it when we visit some sights I haven’t gotten to yet.”