Divine Beginnings

Chapter Fifteen

“Don’t go,” Tegan said sleepily.

Aine looked up from lacing her dress. “If I don’t return the warriors will come looking for me. They may be able to track me to you.”

“Then we’ll find a new place-deeper in the mountains. Just don’t go.”

Aine stroked the downy underside of his wing. It quivered, causing Tegan to close his eyes and moan softly.

“I will come back to you.” She kissed him.

“Tomorrow?”

“I’ll try. Rest and finish healing. I have a plan.”

He raised a brow. “A plan?”

“I’m going to tell the Lord of Guardian Castle that I’m not happy there. They’ll have to find a new Healer. It won’t surprise any of them. Maev was my only friend, and now that she’s gone there’s really nothing for me there.”

“Then you will come to live with me?” Tegan rolled a dark lock of her hair around his finger.

“Yes.” She was unable to keep the sadness from her voice.

“Why does the thought of being with me sadden you?”

“My family is going to have to believe I’m dead. That’s what makes me sad.”

Tegan didn’t speak. There was no other way. With what was coming no one would accept their love-Aine wouldn’t even accept it if she knew. That was why he had to get her away from here-before what they had was destroyed by an evil he couldn’t stop.

“Perhaps you and I will begin a new family.”

She looked startled. “Can we?”

He smiled and shrugged. “After the miracle of you, I believe anything is possible.”

Tegan thought she looked a little dazed as Aine wrapped her cloak around her shoulders. He stood up, flexing his leg, pleased at how good it felt.

“It’s much better,” she said.

“Because of you.”

Even when they couldn’t walk beside one another, Aine and Tegan made sure their bodies touched. She brushed his wing with her fingertips. He stopped often to pull her into his arms. By the time they came to the edge of the mountains, dusk was near.

“I have to hurry.”

Tegan kissed her once more, long and possessively. “Come to me tomorrow.”

“I’ll try,” she assured him.

He watched until he could see her no longer.

“Healer! Where have you been?”

The Monro’s gruff voice accosted Aine as she slipped quietly inside the front gates, thinking she was well hidden in the deepening shadows of dusk.

“I went to-” Aine paused. She’d left the funeral urn in Tegan’s cave! Thinking quickly, Aine glanced around them. They were alone with no Edan nearby to contradict her. If she was lucky, he’d been hunting all day and hadn’t even spoken to the Chieftain. “I went to Maev’s pyre and offered more prayers for her.”

“You should have been here. You’ve been needed.”

“What is it?” Aine frowned. The Monro’s words weren’t slurring, but he smelled like a pub. How could the Chieftain of a Clan, and Lord of Guardian Castle be a drunk?

“The warrior Edan was wounded while he was hunting. It was that same Goddess-be-damned boar.”

“Edan! Is he in the infirmary?” Monro’s drunkenness forgotten, Aine began hurrying through the castle grounds.

“No. We thought it best not to move him. His spine may be broken. You’ll have to go to him. He’s not far outside the rear gate.”

“Oh, Goddess! I’ll need my surgical box and a board to brace his back.”

“Those things already await you.”

Aine jogged beside the Chieftain down the path that emptied into the Wastelands side of the pass, feeling a terrible sinking in her stomach. The air was thick, oppressive. This was too much like what had happened to Maev. Then she noticed that Monro was wheezing and dropping behind her. He stumbled and almost fell. Aine paused, but he brushed off her aid.

“Go on.” He motioned feebly down the path. “Take the first right hand fork. Edan and the rest of them are waiting. I’ll catch up.”

Aine nodded and jogged away from him. Pathetic. Before I join Tegan I’ll get a message to the Muse. Guardian Castle needs a change in leadership.

When she came to the fork in the road, she sprinted to the right, finding her second wind. In the thickening darkness she almost fell over Edan. He was lying in the middle of the path-alone. He had been disemboweled and his throat had been ripped out.