The Belonging, page 28
‘What?’ Stephan looked wildly around the clearing, as though hoping to find another person that Finn could possibly be speaking to. But there was only Hare who stood on his hind legs, whiskers twitching as he stared at Stephan.
Stephan shook his head. ‘Not me,’ he said. ‘Not me at all. I can’t do this.’
‘You have done this before,’ Finn replied, his voice calm and clear, and he nodded towards the old man. ‘All you must do now is remember.’
Stephan wanted to turn tail and run, shaking his head all the way. Run back through the Wildwood, until he regained the path that led through Wilde Grove to Blackthorn House. And there, he’d join Ambrose in some qi gong, and he’d stretch his muscles, and play with the energy between his hands, and brood a little over Erin.
But hadn’t going to Ambrose started this? Or led to this? Stephan was confused. It had been Ambrose who had insisted on Stephan learning to travel, to walk in the Wildwood, venture into the Otherworld. He imagined Ambrose now, the slightly raised eyebrow, and then the drum in his hand. The insistent beat that made him travel, that dug down deep into his chest and beat with his heart, sending him on his way.
He sucked in a deep breath, looking across at the small group of people gathered there on the other side of the clearing.
‘With Bear’s help?’ he asked, his voice cracking with uncertainty.
‘With Bear’s help,’ Finn agreed mildly.
‘And yours?’
‘I was hunter, not healer,’ Finn replied. ‘Bear Fellow will be with you. He will be your teacher from now.’
Stephan blinked at him. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘Bear brings strength and understanding in many ways to those that follow.’ Finn looked steadily at Stephan. ‘You are a healer.’ He nodded towards the clearing. ‘Begin,’ he said. ‘Inside you, there are the songs and the dreams; you must only remember them.’
One of the people broke away from the group, leading an elderly man with her. Glancing over at Stephan, she helped the old man to lie down on the soft grass, then waited.
Bear came out from the cave and sat on their haunches beside Old Bear Fellow, and they waited also.
Everyone, it appeared, was ready.
Stephan stepped forward over the beating of his heart, reaching for the dim strains of a song.
33
Stephan pressed his hands to a woman’s abdomen, not knowing how he knew to place them there, only realising that some deep part of him knew it was the right place. She looked up at him, eyes wide and trusting and he wanted to glance away, towards Bear, to check he was doing the right thing.
But there was something there, something deep under the skin, embedded in there, festering. It was maddening, to be able to see it there, and he breathed into the compulsion to draw it out, closing his eyes, working it to the surface of her skin with his mind. Knowing it was coming closer, knowing that he was drawing it out, pulling it from deep inside her.
She whimpered and he whispered to her. ‘Just a moment more.’
That was all he needed. Just a moment more. It was almost there. He almost had it.
And then he had drawn it from inside her, a deep, curving thorn. And from around it came a spill of viscous liquid, a stream of blackness that he drew up into his hands, and into himself, not knowing what else to do, only knowing that it could not stay inside her. He took it into himself, and watched as she cleared, grew healthier again, strength returning to her.
Bear passed a damp wad of macerated wild lovage root, and Stephan coated her wound with it, letting the goodness from the herb seep into her skin, healing as it went. He sang under his breath as he watched the wound heal. Sang a song with words he didn’t know, but which wove stories of wholeness and joy, and the strength and compassion of the Great Bear, and how there was a star in the sky to keep them on course while they ducked and wove their lives into being.
The woman smiled at him, rolled away and stood, walked from the clearing.
She had been the last.
Stephan turned to Finn, wiping his wrist across his brow. Then looked across at Bear Fellow who nodded and smiled widely at Stephan as though pleased with his efforts. Next to the old man, Bear swayed and yawned.
He went down on one knee to them both and lowered his head. ‘I am grateful,’ Stephan said. ‘For your lessons, and your help.’
Bear simply looked back at Stephan, then their long snout touched his cheek, and a moment later Bear was lumbering back to their cave, the old fellow following.
‘Come,’ Finn said. ‘You have done well. It is time to return.’
‘Return?’ Stephan asked stupidly, looking around.
‘To your world. You will need time to regain your energy.’
Stephan thought about this for a moment, then nodded. He was exhausted. He could sleep for a week, he reckoned. What he needed, was some of his grounding tea.
A whole pot of it.
But that was at Erin’s house, he remembered, getting up to follow Finn back into the forest the way they’d come. He blinked in the dimness of the trees.
Had he really just come here and helped heal a bunch of people?
‘Was that real?’ he asked.
Finn didn’t turn to look at him. ‘Was what real?’
‘Those people? Were they real?’
Now Finn did turn a curious eye on Stephan. ‘What is real and what is not real?’ he asked.
Stephan scrunched his brows together. ‘You know,’ he said. ‘Were they like, real people?’
‘They are like themselves,’ Finn answered. ‘And why would they not be real?’
Because you just basically let me operate on them, Stephan answered inside his head. ‘But this is the Otherworld,’ he said.
Finn kept walking. ‘Your question does not matter,’ he said. ‘What matters is that you remember and become adept once more. You must reawaken your skills.’
Stephan pondered this for a moment. ‘Why?’ he asked at last.
The question made Finn stop walking to turn and look at Stephan. ‘Why?’ he repeated.
Stephan shrugged. ‘Yeah, I mean, I’m cool with it, of course, you know – but like, is there a particular reason, or something?’
Finn stared.
‘Need,’ he answered at last. ‘There is need.’
* * *
Erin was scooted closer to the fire, Kria almost at her elbow. There was no flame on the tinder yet, and Erin was frustrated.
‘I can’t do it!’ she cried, flinging herself back onto the stones, then flinching away when she realised she sat almost directly in the spot where Kria would one day lie, her blood spilled to the ground and sky.
‘Tis almost the easiest of the songs,’ Kria said, looking over at the other, wondering about her lack of ability. To come from a world where the magic was no longer – what did that place look like?
She turned and gazed around her. Like this place, she thought. It would look like this place.
Erin sat up again and moved slightly, opposite Kria at the fire. She shivered again – the breeze from over the water carried a damp chill with it. There was a sound at her right ear, and she turned her head, distracted.
‘Have you lit your fire yet?’ Macha asked, amusement clear in her voice.
Erin turned and scowled at her. ‘Can you do this?’ she demanded.
Kria narrowed her eyes. ‘Who are ye talking to?’
Startled, Erin turned back to Kria, head spinning. ‘You can’t see her?’
A searching look around them. ‘I see only you, pestering spirit, and myself. As usual,’ Kria answered.
Erin looked at Macha. ‘Why can’t she see you, then?’ she asked.
Macha merely shook her head, the beads in her hair clacking. Her long fingers tapped the wood of her staff.
Erin closed her eyes and shook her head, then looked again at Macha. ‘Well?’ she demanded.
‘Well, what?’ Macha answered.
Erin nodded toward the fire. ‘Can you light it? Do you know how to conjure fire from nothing?’
Macha’s gaze did not waver from Erin’s face. ‘I do not know how to conjure fire from nothing,’ she answered. ‘But I can light that.’
A deep frown marred Erin’s forehead. ‘What?’ she said. ‘That doesn’t make any sense.’
‘Ye cannot make fire from nothing,’ Kria said. ‘This is what I’ve been trying to tell ye.’
‘You do exactly that!’ Erin said, looking from Macha to Kria. Right now, they were both infuriating.
‘Nay. I cannot make something from nothing,’ Kria said. ‘It is the song, the spark, that makes the fire.’
‘Fuck.’ Erin hunched down into the grass. ‘I don’t get any of this.’
‘But you do,’ Macha said. ‘Morghan has taught you how to do this. Kria has shown you it can be done.’
Erin’s eyes widened as she stared up at Macha. ‘Morghan has taught me to do this?’ She shook her head. ‘When was that? Because I think I’d know if she’d shown me how to light a fire out of thin air.’
Kria frowned at the invisible person her spirit was talking to. ‘But ‘tis not thin air,’ she said. ‘The fire is from…’
‘The Song, yeah, I know,’ Erin said, then heaved in a deep breath. ‘I’m not cut out for this, am I?’ she said, deflating.
‘You are uncommonly slow,’ Macha observed. ‘For one with such talent.’
Erin glared at her.
‘But then, so was I at the beginning.’ Macha nodded towards Kria and smiled.
‘I hate puzzles,’ Erin said, lifting her hands to tug at her hair. ‘Morghan did not teach me to do this.’
‘Who is this Morghan person?’ Kria asked, leaning closer. This was the most interesting time she’d had since she’d walked down the sides of the glen who knew how many moons ago. All perhaps, a fevered figment of her imagination, but it was better than nothing, that much was certain.
‘Morghan is my…my…’ Erin cast a glance at Macha.
‘Priestess and teacher,’ Macha said. ‘As she was once mine.’
Erin shook her head again, baffled. ‘I don’t think she taught me this,’ she said. But even as she said the words, something gleamed to life in her mind. She looked across at Kria, then up at Macha.
Macha smiled and the wind blew again, making her braids clack together. Under the grey sky, the blue swirls on her cheeks were bright.
‘That exercise we did,’ Erin said, slowly, trying again, feeling her way. ‘The one where we stood between the sun and the centre of the earth, and the spark…’ She closed her eyes.
‘We drew the spark in and through ourselves, until we were it, and we were connected.’ Erin opened her eyes and looked at the ground. ‘I remember now.’
‘As you should, since it was only a short time ago,’ Macha told her.
But Erin shook her head. ‘It was good,’ she said. ‘But I like the other way better.’
Kria was listening intently, even though she knew she was only getting half a conversation. ‘What other way?’ she asked.
‘Indeed,’ Macha said. ‘What other way?’ Her tone was knowing, amused.
Erin ignored her, following the threads of her own thoughts, blinking. ‘My morning routine now,’ she said, ‘is to go out to the well. There’s something special about the wells in Wellsford, although I haven’t figured that out yet…’ She trailed off for a moment, distracted, then shook her head.
‘Anyway. I do this sort of thing there, that Morghan taught Stephan and me right in the beginning. It’s kind of like the sun spark thing, but…’ She frowned, then shrugged. ‘More sideways.’
Kria was fascinated. It had been so long since she’d been with her fellow priestesses. She’d forgotten how much she’d missed their chatter.
‘Sideways?’ she asked.
Erin shrugged. ‘I don’t know how else to describe it.’ She held up her hands like she was holding a balloon then spread them slowly apart. ‘It’s like you expand your senses and you can see everything after a while.’ She strained to describe it. ‘Like, first you can see yourself, standing where you are, and you can feel the water in the well going so deep down into the earth, right? And then you can sort of sense – feel – the garden too, and after a moment, you’re also kind of over the fence and you can see inside the forest at the same time you can see the main street of the village, and then if you lift yourself up, it’s like being in a hot air balloon and you can see as far as you want to look.’ She subsided, shrugged. ‘It’s all there. Everything’s there at once.’
‘That’s the song!’ Kria said.
Erin looked at her, then shook her head. ‘The song? How can that be a song?’
Macha stood listening, leaning on her staff.
Kria shrugged. ‘The spark – it comes from being part of everything. And the fire – if you’re part of everything, then ye can reach for that bit of you that is fire.’ She cupped her hands together by her lips, closed her eyes for a moment, then blew into her cupped hands and spread them apart.
The tiny lick of flame fell upon the waiting tinder and Kria grinned, then bent and blew it out before it could take hold.
‘You do it,’ she said to Erin.
Erin bit at her lip, then cast a quick glance at Macha, who stood watching her, eyes lively. Erin nodded. ‘All right, then,’ she said. ‘I will.’
She sat forward, as Kria had, and cupped her hands in front of her lips. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Held it. Let it slowly out, relaxing sideways as she did so, letting her senses spill from her, her spirit loosen and flow. How wonderful it felt to do this, how alive she suddenly was. The air was still around her, but now she did not feel cold from it. She felt as though it flowed through her and was part of her and she was part of it. She felt as though the very molecules of her being were spread apart, with space between them for the world. She was sitting beside Kria’s stone hearth, the dried grass tucked under the twigs for tinder, and she was touching the lapping wavelets of the loch as well, and she was reaching out along the stones, towards the small stone building, digging spirit fingers between the stones, reaching inside, then up over the roof and all around in the air.
This was the song, then, as Kria called it. Erin began her search for the spark. She searched for the part of the world that was fire.
But it was not there, and she frowned. She was too amorphous, she decided. Too spread out, a cloud, a mist over the land, and it was all water and air and dampness. Where was the fire? She looked upwards, towards the sun, its rays diffused by the mists above. More water, she thought. Where was the fire?
She looked downwards, into the centre of the earth, digging deep under the soil, but without the sun to attach to, she could not go deep enough.
There was only wetness here in this winter light. Gritty soil, thick mists.
She turned and looked at Macha and reared back in surprise. Looked over at Kria, then back at Macha.
There was fire in Macha. She could see it. The sight made her mouth go dry. There, flickering inside Macha was fire. Everything else was there too, but she could see the fire, bright and fine, burning hot.
She reached for it.
And landed on her back on the stones, her breath gushing from her, head hitting the rocks with a dull thwack.
‘Oof,’ she said, winded, gasping for breath.
Dazed, she looked up at Macha, and reached to rub the sore spot on the back of her head where she’d hit the ground. ‘What did you do?’
Macha’s eyes were narrowed, and she pointed her staff at Erin. ‘You do not take the spark from others,’ she said, then straightened and waved a hand.
‘Get out of here.’
34
Morghan gazed around at the stone circle, seeing it as it would look the night of the winter solstice. She huffed out a breath that blew white into the cold air.
Today she had boots on, and a warm coat. Her gloves were in her pockets.
‘What are you smiling about?’ Clarice demanded.
‘Winsome,’ Morghan answered. ‘Poor Winsome, horrified at my going barefoot.’ She shrugged slightly. ‘Although perhaps she was right that day.’
Clarice shook her head. ‘I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about.’ She narrowed her eyes at her stepmother. ‘You and Winsome,’ she said, and her hands fluttered in the air for a moment. ‘You’re not, like…seeing each other?’
Morghan laughed. ‘No,’ she said, and cast a sideways glance at Ambrose, who remained bent over at the base of Grandmother Oak. ‘I like and admire our vicar very much, but it is only a friendship.’
Clarice followed her gaze to Ambrose and her eyes widened. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Ambrose? You and the vicar?’
‘There is nothing between us,’ Ambrose said, and straightened. ‘You and your chatter makes it impossible for a man to pray.’
Clarice gave him a wicked grin. ‘She’s a very nice woman. It’s probably about time.’
‘There is nothing between us. Do not tease me.’
‘My apologies.’ Clarice bowed her head. Then looked at Morghan. ‘She started it.’
Ambrose huffed a breath. ‘Enough,’ he said. ‘We are not here to discuss…Winsome.’ His face reddened in a dark blush and he turned away. ‘What do you envision?’ he asked Morghan.
They were there to plan the winter solstice ritual. It was astonishing that already the wheel had turned and that they were here again to celebrate.
‘It must echo what I have been shown in the Otherworld,’ she said.
‘Of course,’ Ambrose agreed. ‘It is important to find counterparts here to what we are given there.’
Charlie hugged herself in the cold morning. ‘It’s hard to believe that there might not be any here or there anymore, once the veil is down,’ she said and waved a hand at the sky. ‘That it might all just be more or less one place again.’ She swallowed, nervous at the thought of it.
