Return of the Danu Read online

  The magic allowed for communication between them, but it was not as if they were having a conversation. More it was that she was forming a connection that she could use to see through their eyes. Three she sent out among the humans, her mind jumping from one awareness to another until she saw what she was looking for. She sat down on the newly made bed and closed her eyes. Concentrating on the conversation the Innkeeper was having with several other men that looked a great deal like him, enough she could assume they were his sons, or close to it in blood ties.

  They were in a kitchen, even the mute man who had directed them was there. Three younger men, all similar in coloring and build to their father, the mute, and the Innkeeper all sat around a table and discussed hotly what they should do.

  Elena listened to all of it, repeating the conversations nearly word for word for Ansgar’s benefit. And Lor and Beck as it turns out when they opened the door to listen from their posts in the hall.

  “If we don’t get word to the foreign gent and he finds out we reneged he’ll come looking for his money back.”

  “Let him come, I’d rather deal with him than Ansgar the Bloody prince, and a Danu witch. He was scary, but not that scary.”

  “Father, they say that the foreigners from across the ocean practice death magic and can kill anyone with just a touch of their hands.”

  “They say they wear hidden marks all over their bodies in the likeness of deadly creatures that can come alive and strike with poison when darkness falls.”

  “They can send nightmares that kill…”

  “Stories and lies spread by their own people to strike fear in the hearts of their enemies no doubt. Everyone knows that the Danu hold the power in the Green, and we live too close to the wilds to dismiss the real threat in favor of something we have never seen. No, if the Danu are working with Rek Morten and his cursed demon spawn now I’ll do no dealings with these foreigners. Nobody with a bloody brain will stand against both the Southern armies and the Danu, not in these lands.”

  “But what if the foreign man returns?”

  “What if he does? It was the gypsies who were to take him word and the girl, not us. We were only to watch and report any news to them when they came through with the female they were sent for. If he comes, we will tell him we saw no sign of the gypsies and that will be that. I’m not going to mention any Danu witch, and neither are any of you.”

  “They say they have ways of knowing…”

  “And I say we stay out of it. That bloody prince already suspects we are involved and I’m not going to make an enemy of him or the Danu witch he travels with, not for money, or superstitious fear. A fool I might be, but we have not survived out here for six generations by being as foolish as that. Now scatter, all of you and get some bloody work done before this place falls down around our ears.”

  When Elena returned her consciousness to the room around her, she swayed a bit from the vertigo and had to put her hands down on the bed beside her to steady herself. It was always harder to work without direct contact to the land. She looked up blinking to find all three warriors looking down at her with varying degrees of appreciation and thoughtful silence.

  “That,” Lor said finally smiling when he saw her attention had returned to the room and her eyes no longer glowed Green. “Is a handy trick to have.”

  Beck snorted behind him and Ansgar looked her over with narrowed eyes before he finally spoke. She half expected him to be derogatory and suspicious again, but he surprised her by merely saying thoughtfully. “So, the ferret is not such a fool as he seemed. Perhaps he can live after all.”

  “I don’t think we are going to get any more out of them than that,” Beck said finally. “And I for one do not want to stick around in the slim hopes that the foreign man will return in a timely manner. This place is a hovel.”

  It was a long moment while Elena felt Ansgar's eyes on her as if he could read the future in her face. She met that look with a stubborn up-tilt of her chin but said nothing. He already knew she would rather sleep in the wilds then in this stone monstrosity of an Inn, and since she was not about to apologize for her abilities if that was what he was waiting for she stayed silent and let him make of that what he would.

  Finally, Ansgar spoke again. “Agreed. Sleep light tonight. We leave with the first light in the morning.” He raised a brow at Elena. “How far until we get to the proposed sight of the growing city?”

  The growing city, as they were calling it now, was the land that would be cultivated for harvest to feed the small combined settlement of Danu, Southern Warrior and Northern people who would, they hoped one day live there. It was the first and most important step in their new accord as it would provide both guaranteed harvests for their peoples but also a city cut out of the wilds for future growth. The first of two such cities it would either make or break their alliance, and Ansgar’s agreement to its placement was the first hurdle they would face.

  Elena blew out a breath and thought about the distance they still had to travel, and in what terrain. “Two days if we travel straight through the Green. Roads end is exactly that, after this I will be showing you the true wilds, unless you want to take the longer route into the mountains and travel over the hard rock of the high places as the gypsies do? Then you are looking at double that, and we will have to backtrack South West once we hit the Eastern Sea shore and are clear of the Green.”

  Lor and Beck both shifted restlessly, the only sign that the trails she was offering were making them uneasy.

  “Our scouts that have traveled that far North from Horth reported the terrain to be inhospitable.”

  “Oh, it is,” Elena agreed. “Especially for the Danu. The magic of the Danu is based in the wilds of the Green. We do not do well near the ocean or its scraggly sand dunes and rock cliffs. But if you do not trust me to see you through the truly wild places then it is the only other choice,” she shrugged, “short of making our way South and circling back to Horth, then traveling by ship up the Eastern coast from the other direction. Which would take significantly longer and is not a journey I can make with you.”

  That had Ansgar’s eyes lasering to hers again. “Why can you not?”

  She did not think he was truly considering it but if he was, she needed him to understand she was not speaking lightly.

  “I told you,” she said giving him serene eyes. “The Danu do not do well by the sea. We are beings of land and life, to separate us from one is to separate us from both.”

  “Are you saying,” he asked his voice grim his eyes going flint hard. “That a trip on the sea would physically harm you?”

  “Yes,” she said letting him see the seriousness in her eyes. “That is exactly what I am saying. No Danu can survive away from the Green for long, we must always return, and while I have more room to maneuver around that then most with my affinity with animals, and ability to connect to the weave through them, even I would not survive leaving the land of my birth so completely.”

  “Well, then we have two choices,” Beck said when the silence between them stretched thin. “Do we trust the Danu witch who has gotten us this far, or do we take the mountain paths and skirt the wilds and the Sea?

  Ansgar had not looked away, and Elena waited for his verdict. They all knew what it would mean if they traveled the wilds. It meant they would be trusting their lives to her, completely. Whereas if they took the rock paths around the Green, she would be the one left at a disadvantage. The weave stretched thin over the barren rocky places to the high north, and the Danu did not travel that way if they could help it. It also meant that as a guide she would be useless to them until they reached the sea and could begin the journey back south west.

  She braced herself for what she was sure would be a decision putting Ansgar the Bloody firmly in control of their route, knowing it would sting more than a little to hear he still did not trust her after all this time.

  “Two days in the wild,” he finally said in his deep sure voice. And Elena was ha
ppy she had already been sitting so great was her surprise at his words. Then he smiled at her, and though it was his usual predatory smile that showed a lot of strong white teeth it was still a smile and his words a gentle tease. “I do not suppose we could have a more competent guide than a Danu witch with an affinity for the wild creatures.”

  No they could not, Elena thought a little dazedly after that smile and his words, but she was fast realizing it was the wild creature in the room with her that was going to give this competent guide the most trouble. She did not know how it was possible, but she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Ansgar the Bloody was going to be even more dangerous for her as an ally, then he ever had been as an enemy.

  “Fine,” she finally said looking away from the trap of that smile and trying to save face by making her voice firm when she made her own demands. “But in the morning I am finding a horse of my own to ride.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Whatever Ansgar had been expecting, an almost disappointedly uneventful two-day ride through the wild that ended in paradise was not it.

  But that was exactly what he found. Paradise spread out before them in the form of a valley of wild lands the likes of which he had never seen before.

  He had to stop to catch his breath, and he heard Lor and Beck doing the same. On her commandeered wild horse, a horse that had wandered out of the wilds to her call just as they headed for the stables at Roads End, Elena radiated tranquility and for once he knew it was not a shield she wore like armor, but true peace. The black horse beneath her radiated wild magic and Ansgar had been sure the beast had never felt a rider on her back before, but once again Elena had surprised them all by practically floating onto that broad wild back and looking as if she had been born there. Now both woman and beast looked as if they had come home. And utter peace suffused both wild creatures equally. They felt safe here.

  He knew it because looking at the beauty spread before him, even he, battled hardened warrior that he was, could feel it. This was not the wild and dangerous Green he was used to, but a beauty devoid of teeth and claws, a sanctuary.

  “This was what the Green was everywhere before the fires,” Elena whispered, and Ansgar felt that in his gut like a blow. He received a second one when he turned to look at her and found her crying silent tears as she took in the beauty before them. “There are still such places to find if you know where to look, but you have to go deep into the wild places and know what you are looking for.” She wiped the tears away and turned to meet his eyes. She pointed at the rock face that rimmed the whole of the valley. She waved her hand and a wave of magic lit up a tree shaped mark in Danu Green. She looked at them and then motioned to the mark, her eyes gleamed with Green power. “These are protected lands. The Danu would migrate to these places seasonally, and it is where we came as children after the fires. Since everyone is away with the queen trying to bring peace to the rest of the Green, we will find shelter here. Tomorrow I will take you to the lands adjacent that we think will work for a small agricultural city to grow food for your people. It stands between this,” she gestured with a sweep of her arm at the valley. “Where the Danu who cultivate it can live in peace, and the rocky crags of the sea shore, where your soldiers can set up a post and guard the North Eastern Sea from invaders.”

  Ansgar raised a brow at that. “You seem to have it all planned out.”

  She smiled at him suddenly, mischievously, daring him to find fault. “Well, you and your fathers’ meetings were not the only ones I attended while I worked in the garden at Haven.” She shrugged blithely. “You will have to approve of course, or we will find somewhere else, but I do not see why you would disapprove. All of our people can find a place here.”

  He looked down at her for a long moment and waited for that mischievous smile to fall from her lips. Then he spoke. “Did my brother know you were there in the form of a mouse? I would have liked to have seen his reaction to that.”

  Elena smiled at him again, this one full of relief and a twinkle lit her eyes. “In that instance, I was listening with the ears of a wild hound.” He knew from that twinkle that there was more to the story. And he was not disappointed when she went on with obvious humor. “He tried to slay it twice, before the Queen convinced him she was in no danger.”

  Ansgar threw back his head and laughed. From the story or her reaction to it he did not know, but he had no trouble picturing his brother stepping between a wild hound and his mate. He could not say he would not have done the same and the idea of those massive beasts with their red eyes, sharp fangs, and armor-plated bodies. No, he had no trouble seeing his brother’s reaction, or his exasperation at being held back.

  Beck looked from Ansgar to Elena and raised a sardonic brow. “By wild hound you do mean the ones who regularly take down full battle horses when they stray too close to their dens?”

  “Yes,” Ansgar said smiling down at Elena and speaking dryly. “I think we can safely say those are the ones she means.”

  Lor cursed long and loud as he shook his head. “I wonder how Ragnar is faring in the Green.”

  Ansgar nearly laughed again, trying to picture Ragnar Stalrask, ‘The Hammer” in the Green with the gaggle of Danu that was left, from what he understood, all female but for Elena’s annoying brother Quain and one other child. It tickled him to think on that, and he could not stop another chuckle from escaping when he met Lor’s merry eyes.

  Picturing the Hammer among the Danu females surrounded by the wilds and the immersed in the magic of the Green, was nearly as funny as his brother being king of it all to Katrine’s Queen. Having spent time with Elena, enough to understand what the Danu truly was, picturing two of the souths most respected warriors was amusing. The Danu valued peace and harmony with nature, but like the wilds they sprang from, they could grow teeth quite quickly if they needed to, and there was very little use a man could find in a sword or battle axe when they controlled the very ground you walked upon.

  “Any chance we will find the hammer with flowers woven into his war braids and magic children at his heals, with wild beasts as their pets?” Beck asked in his usual dry way.

  “Please tell me we will eventually get to see what I am picturing in my head,” Lor said at nearly a whine.

  Elena laughed but shook her head at them all and started her horse down into the valley. “Those two may be among the Danu and in the wild, but they have lost none of their Southern barbarian ways. I do not think you are going to find them as much changed as you seem to think.”

  “Hush Elena,” Lor said waving away her words as he set out with the rest of them to follow. “Don’t ruin the fantasy.”

  ***

  Elena listened to the sounds of the Green all around her and did not have to wonder where the men had gone to. Patrolling, she knew, checking the safety of the valley, despite her assurance that the wards were intact. Well, she had expected nothing less, but it still felt strange to be on her own after so many days of constant company. Even before that she had never had a great deal of time on her own, what with taking care of the younger children and training them as they grew older.

  She had been only a child herself when it fell to her and her brother to lead the others to safety after the battle had decimated the Green and the Danu connected to it. Only the very young had been able to survive the loss of the Green, not having come into their powers enough to have joined the weave completely. And now here she was returned to her former place of refuge, and for the first time that she could remember there was no one who needed her, and no brother trying to protect her. At least not yet. She had the feeling she would see him before too much longer, but it would not be here, and it would not be now. So, she was alone with her thoughts, and it occurred to Elena that she had some decisions about the future to make. She had been simply surviving each day as it came for so long the idea that there might be a future where she was able to choose her path was almost daunting.

  Feeling restless, and completely incapable of d
ealing with the thoughts that were bombarding her, about the future of the Danu, and the idea that soon enough she would be returning to that life, and leaving behind the one she was presently living, and the men she was living it with, she opened the chest at the end of the bed and pulled out a clean sheath dress. It was barely more than a sack of cloth, but it would work well enough to sleep in after she bathed. It would be the first time in a long while that she would have a room to herself. Even if Ansgar did not trust it, they were safe enough in the valley. She would sleep well tonight after she bathed, she assured herself heading out of the tree house she called home when the Danu were in the area. She caught a vine and swung up into the canopy and headed for her destination with a speed and dexterity few who were not Danu born could have managed.

  She would not miss the company of Ansgar the Bloody, not a bit. She assured herself as she dropped down to the valley floor of the grotto that bordered the mineral springs she had been heading for. Even she did not believe her own assurances, but she had always been fine without a barbarian following her around and giving her orders in the past, she would be so again. Soon enough they would part ways, and he would return to his stone cities and she to her wilds.

  Elena stripped and threw herself over the edge into the pool, knowing she was thinking in circles and desperate to make it stop. She sunk under the hot water and nearly swallowed from the shock of the heat, so close to being too hot even so far North. The water of the stream might be close to freezing now, but the hot spring was fed from a different source. She should have checked the water before she threw herself in, after all her people had been gone a long time, the water could have been too hot to bare.

  A stupid and painful way to die, she thought. But at least it drew her mind from the turmoil she could not escape any other way. Luckily after a moment she adapted to the water and was able to sink into the heat. She did her best to blank her mind and find the serenity that she was more and more having a hard time finding on her own. But the magic of the Green here was deep, and the water nearly pure magic along her skin. She sunk to her neck and sighed. Absorbing the power the Danu needed to survive, and letting it heal her body and her mind.