The Rising, page 24
Winsome touched her fingers to her forehead. ‘They’re mad,’ she said. ‘And I doubt it would be that easy. I don’t even know how it would possibly work. I don’t even want to know how it would possibly work. It’s mad.’
‘Would it come to that, do you think?’ Morghan asked.
‘There’s a good possibility,’ Winsome said. ‘The Dean may choose not to continue services here at all – this parish having a full-time clergy has always been a bit dodgy, and now of course, the Church is haemorrhaging money due to this virus, so they may just shut things down – or do the amalgamation thing, of course.’ She waggled her head from side to side. ‘I suspect it will be one or the other, and neither good for Wellsford. Or me.’ She shook her head. ‘I’ve been so foolish, Morghan – giving Mariah and Julia the ammunition they needed.’
Morghan stopped walking. ‘Don’t be silly,’ she said. ‘You’ve done nothing of the sort. You attended one ritual here, but as neither Mariah nor Julia did, they can only speculate as to what that actually means. And they caught you praying in the small temple? What sin could that possibly be?’ She paused, weighing her words. ‘Winsome, I feel that Wellsford is the right place for you – that Wilde Grove is the right place for you.’
Winsome’s eyes widened in shock. ‘Wilde Grove is the right place for me? What are you suggesting? That I leave the Church and join the Grove?’ She wondered briefly why she felt such horror over the suggestion – she’d had the same thought herself, once or twice, in the deepest hours of the night when none could overhear.
But Morghan was shaking her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘That is always an option, but it wasn’t what I was suggesting.’
Winsome frowned.
Morghan spread a hand – her golden hand – at the land around them that glowed with the slanted spring light. ‘This is a liminal place, Winsome – I think I remember telling you so during one of our very first conversations.’
After a moment’s thought, Winsome nodded. It sounded familiar.
‘Here,’ Morghan continued, ‘we straddle the worlds. Everyone can walk this way, but here we have been doing it for millennia and we have worn paths between the worlds, in and out of one and the other.’ She sighed. ‘You have already changed, Winsome – now you belong not just to the village and the church, but to the Grove as well. You straddle both, and I’ve a good feeling this is how it is meant to be for you. You are a bridge.’
Winsome turned away, stared out at the trees. ‘I don’t want to leave Wellsford,’ she said. ‘I don’t know past that fact, but I do not want to leave.’ Briefly, she shook her head. ‘There is so much I can do here – and you are right, I do move between the Grove and the village.’ She fell into thought. ‘So much is going on, Morghan. I’m confused by most of it.’ She thought again of the flyers she’d discovered plastered on every surface in Wellsford.
‘What about all the things Mariah and Julia said on that dreadful piece of paper they pasted everywhere?’
Morghan sighed. It really had been a nasty thing. ‘You’ve only to show your Dean that and he will dismiss everything those two have to say. That was tactically a poor move on their behalf. It’s impossible to take them seriously now – saying you’re part of a wider, satanic conspiracy? It’s that sort of talk that will get Julia out of her position, not you.’
‘Yes,’ Winsome agreed. ‘You’re right, and I actually feel more secure about everything now than I did before, precisely because of that. They’ve overplayed their hand.’
‘But?’ Morghan asked. ‘I can hear a but after that.’
‘Well,’ Winsome answered. ‘But what if I feel like I’ve strayed too far from what I’m supposed to be as a vicar of the Church of England? What if I’ve done that? You talk about me being a bridge between the village and the Grove, and I think I understand what you say, but in practical terms, how is that going to affect my calling in the Church?’ She shook her head. ‘That was a rhetorical question, Morghan – I’m the one needs to think upon the answer.’
They were back at the treeline, and the church and vicarage lay beyond the rock that hid the path. Winsome looked over at Morghan.
‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘For your company and your support.’
Morghan smiled. ‘Thank you, Winsome – for your precious friendship.’
* * *
Morghan wended her way along the thread of trees, watching the afternoon sun seep down in amongst the woods. Spring and autumn, she thought idly as she walked, were perhaps her favourite seasons. She could lose herself in the light, the way it lay upon the world in long golden shafts, setting the dust to shining as if made of precious metal. Letting go of her conscious thoughts, she walked and draped a hand through the light, watching as it moved and danced with the breeze in the tree’s branches. She let herself be part of the light, of the shadow, of the dance of dust, of the scent of the forest, the swaying of the trees, their long, low song, the almost-bursting readiness of their buds.
Erin was in her garden, arms lifted, spread to the sky, and Morghan stopped to watch from the woods for a moment before making her way down to Ash Cottage. The girl’s hair was like flame in the light, and Morghan felt the weight of the trees burning again as she’d seen them that morning, the air warping around her with the pressure of the vision. She blinked at the glinting red hair, then tipped her chin down and made her way along the path to the house.
Erin had moved into a swaying, stepping dance – just the way she’d been taught – when Morghan let herself into the walled garden she tried not to still think of as Teresa’s. She whispered a blessing to her old friend and looked upon Teresa’s shimmering granddaughter.
Erin had talents, Morghan thought, seeing the way she danced, almost but not quite holding the worlds within her. She was close, very close.
All she needed was to hold the dedication and keep up the practice.
And to learn some stillness inside that head of hers.
Morghan stepped forward and into Erin’s line of vision. Erin’s eyebrows flew up and she stuttered to a halt. Morghan shook her head.
‘No,’ she said. ‘Keep dancing. We will dance together.’
Erin hesitated a moment, then nodded, and moved again to music only she could hear. Morghan stilled herself, wrapped herself in the worlds and let them spin around her. She stepped into the rhythm of Erin’s movements and danced with her, feeling the expanse of the worlds, and drawing Erin into them with her.
Erin stopped dancing and looked around in consternation. ‘Where are we?’ she asked.
Morghan recognised the place at once. ‘I did not mean to bring us here,’ she said, and lifted a golden hand to her cheek and wiped away a sudden tear.
‘Your hand,’ Erin said, staring at the way Morghan’s hand gleamed. ‘It’s gold. Actually gold.’
‘Here, yes,’ Morghan answered.
‘You’re crying.’
‘I don’t come here often.’
Erin drew her embarrassed gaze from Morghan and looked around. She didn’t know what to say or do. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said at last.
There was a rustling behind her, and she turned, mouth falling open at the sight of a great cat stepping out of the greenery and padding towards them.
‘What sort of cat is that?’ she whispered hoarsely, backing away. It looked like its mouth would be very big.
‘A mountain lion,’ Morghan answered, bending down to stroke the animal as it pushed against her legs and nuzzled its head against her belly. ‘Her name is Amara.’
Erin licked her lips. ‘Amara?’
‘She is my wife’s.’
‘Your wife’s?’
Erin swallowed and flushed. She was sounding like a twit repeating everything, but really, a moment ago she’d been in her garden dancing before trying to go back to her new garden and maybe decide what she was supposed to do there.
And now she was here. And Morghan was patting a wild animal. And crying.
‘Grainne,’ Morghan agreed.
‘Her, like, spirit animal?’
‘Yes,’ Morghan said, feeling Amara’s heart beating under her thick fur. ‘And no, more than that.’
‘More?’
Morghan straightened. ‘Once, a great long time ago,’ she said, smiling faintly even as another tear tracked down her cheek. ‘There was a tribe of shapeshifters.’
Erin listened, confused, trying to understand. She pressed her lips together so as not to repeat what Morghan had said. Shapeshifters.
‘They took the form of large cats,’ Morghan said, her fingers resting on Amara’s head while the cat made a rumbling noise deep in her throat.
‘Cats?’ Erin asked, unable to stop herself. ‘Not really, though, right?’
‘Yes, I think so,’ Morghan answered. ‘I think they could, for all intents and purposes, turn into cats. People would see them as such.’ She blinked. ‘They were all women, and they were much feared and respected by those around them.’
Erin shook her head. ‘How do you know this?’
‘I remember it.’
‘What? Were you there?’ Erin asked. ‘Were you one of them?’
Morghan allowed herself a smile. ‘No,’ she said. ‘But I loved one of them. I would sneak from my family’s home to meet her in the hillside.’ The smile widened with the memory. ‘She called me kitten.’
Erin was fascinated, despite not knowing if she believed a word of it. People who could shape-shift? Really shape-shift?
She supposed it wasn’t impossible. As much knowledge had been lost over the centuries as had been gained, she suspected.
‘Were you a man or woman?’ she asked.
‘Does it matter?’ Morghan answered.
‘Well, no, I guess not,’ Erin said, wondering now why she had asked it in the first place.
Morghan looked down at the cat, who gazed up at her with great, golden eyes. ‘I have spent most of my lifetimes as a male,’ she said. ‘But have had plenty of experiences also as a woman. It is the same with all of us – we are one, or the other, depending on what will serve best for each lifetime.’ She shrugged. ‘And perhaps according to preference, as well, I do not know. It is hard to know much at all from this perspective.’
‘What happened?’ Erin asked. ‘In that lifetime, I mean?’
‘That, I also don’t know,’ Morghan said. ‘I’ve not explored much of it, except some of the intimate details of my association with one of the women – who was later to be Grainne, of course, and hence, why Amara is here.’
Erin struggled to follow that logic. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said.
‘Grainne kept some of the cat aspect in others of her lifetimes. She had some ability when I knew her to shift into the cat, and the cat also walked beside her much the same way Wolf walks with me.’
The answer brought another question to Erin’s mind. ‘Why do I not have Fox with me? I still catch only glimpses of her.’
Morghan gazed around the clearing where they stood. ‘She will come when she is ready,’ she said. ‘Or rather, when you are ready.’
‘When will I be ready, though?’ Erin asked, then winced at her tone. ‘Mary said the other day that I whine too much.’
Morghan laughed. ‘It’s somewhat true, but so do many.’
‘You don’t.’
‘No, and nor will you if you keep recalling the fact that you ought not to be at the forefront of every thought you have,’ Morghan replied.
Erin frowned, opened her mouth to ask for clarification, then closed it again. She would think on that one in private, she decided.
‘You haven’t told me what this place is,’ she said instead.
‘It is the place I mentioned recently,’ Morghan answered, looking around with a sigh. ‘My personal place in the Wildwood, where I might come just to be.’
‘But you said you don’t come here often,’ Erin said. It was impossible, she thought, not to ask a great many questions. Morghan didn’t tell her things unless she asked.
‘Nor do I, anymore,’ Morghan replied. She walked across the soft floor of the forest to the stony shore of the lake that twisted around her small promontory.
‘There’s an island!’ Erin cried, delighted at the sight of the small, rounded hump of land rising from the water. ‘Do you know that place?’
Morghan nodded, seizing on a way to make this unexpected jaunt a teaching journey for Erin. The tears were dried on her cheeks now and she breathed deeply of the cold taste of the lake.
‘This isn’t anything like the loch,’ Erin said. ‘Much friendlier.’
‘You did good work there with Kria,’ Morghan said, letting herself be drawn off-track. ‘She needed you and you found your way to doing what was necessary.’
Erin shuddered beside her. ‘I hope I don’t ever have to do anything like that again.’
Morghan turned to look at her and Erin raised her eyebrows.
‘What?’ she said. ‘Have you ever had to do anything like it?’
Blythe came to Morghan’s mind. And someone else.
‘Come,’ she said. ‘I’m going to show you something I’ve shown no one else.’
Erin was immediately impressed. ‘What is it?’ she asked.
But Morghan held up a hand and shook her head. She turned away from the lake’s edge and walked between the thin line of trees that rimmed her private clearing. She crossed the clearing and looked for the track that went onwards deeper into the woods. It was there, faint with disuse.
She did not want to walk this way, or to see what was still there. What she was fairly certain was still there.
But there was meaning to everything, and here she was, Erin in tow. Erin who would likely one day be Lady of the Grove, and who must learn that hard things can be done and done willingly and gracefully.
‘Wha?’ Erin stepped out of the trees behind Morghan and gaped. ‘What’s this place?’
Morghan stared up at the house with its weatherboards blackened from flame and soot. Burning was the running theme of the day, she thought.
‘Is this the original Hawthorne House, somehow?’ Erin asked. ‘Stephan said the original had been burnt down.’
Morghan shook her head, not taking her gaze from the house. It stood behind a chain link fence, in which a hole had been cut. She took a breath and slipped through the hole until she stood in the grounds of the house, staring up at it, her back to a large tree that grew perhaps as a guardian, perhaps just as a witness.
‘What is it then?’ Erin looked at the house, able to see inside the front rooms where the tatters of furniture remained. ‘It looks like the pictures you see of houses that were bombed in the Blitz. ‘It’s so out of place.’ Erin shook her head. ‘Who set fire to it?’
31
‘I did,’ Morghan said.
Erin swivelled her head to stare at her. ‘What? You did?’
‘Yes.’ Morghan could still smell the fire and the smoke, the dark, burnt taste of it.
‘You’re crying again.’ There was a lump in Erin’s throat, and she felt suddenly afraid. ‘Should we go?’ she asked, hoping Morghan would say yes. The tears down Morghan’s cheeks were silent, wet trails.
‘Maybe,’ Morghan said. ‘Or maybe we’re here because you need to see this place.’
Erin looked at the burnt-out house again. ‘Who lived here?’
‘Ah,’ Morghan said. ‘That’s the question to ask.’ She shifted her weight on the grass and glanced over to the fence. Amara sat there, silent, gaze locked on her.
Erin waited.
‘This is not the real house, of course,’ Morghan said after a moment. ‘This is my Otherworld version of it.’ She paused.
‘And you set it on fire here, or in the Waking?’ Erin couldn’t stop herself asking the question, although she couldn’t imagine Morghan doing arson. In either world, come to that. It seemed so…un-Morghan-like. What had happened there? Whose house was it? The question burned in her mind.
‘Here,’ Morghan answered. Then repeated the word. ‘Here.’
Erin waited.
‘You are aware that Ambrose is my brother-in-law?’ Morghan asked.
The question surprised Erin. She wondered where this was leading. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘But I don’t think you’ve really mentioned it.’ Or anything else much about her personal life. Her wife.
‘Ambrose and Grainne had the same father, although Ambrose was fortunate enough not to spend many years under his father’s roof. He lived with his mother and a little later, a step-father.’
Erin shivered. ‘This isn’t going to be a good story, is it?’ she said in a low voice.
Morghan turned and looked at her, a sad smile on her face. ‘So many stories aren’t though, are they?’
‘No,’ Erin said quietly, thinking of her own situation. Although perhaps she had been luckier than many. And she was certainly fortunate right now. On the whole.
Despite Wayne Moffat.
Morghan’s attention was back on the house. ‘This is Grainne’s house. The one she lived in as a child.’
Erin’s mouth was dry. ‘With her father?’
‘Who molested her, yes.’
Erin closed her eyes. ‘You don’t have to tell me anything more,’ she said. ‘I’d burn the house down too, if someone did that to someone I loved.’
Morghan nodded her head slightly, slowly. ‘One of the few times I’ve let my temper get the better of me,’ she agreed. ‘This lifetime, anyway.’
Erin wanted to explore that tantalising statement further, but she kept that to herself. ‘What else happened?’ she asked instead. ‘Why is the house here in your, well, personal area of the Wildwood?’
‘I don’t know why it is still here,’ Morghan said, gazing again at the broken building. ‘The events of Grainne’s early life caused her soul to shatter into pieces. Pieces of herself still stuck in the trauma, unable to get away, caught in the fear and horror and pain.’
The tears tracked steadily down Morghan’s cheeks. She sniffed a little and smiled. ‘She was the cutest little girl. Big eyes in the sweetest face.’
‘I don’t understand,’ Erin said, frowning. ‘Did you know her as a child? You couldn’t have, could you?’
