Sorceress

Chapter 28:

As soon as we step into the shadows, Corey opens his palm, and a flame bursts out, "You as well," he nods at my hand. I whisper to it, and a warm flickering swipe of orange casts a looming light against the walls surrounding me. We are faced by a wall with three corridors- somehow like the entrance to the hill- with a lit one in the middle, again, and the framing two dark and foreboding. Corey makes for the centre doorway,

"Where do these other two lead to?" I indicate to the other passages, Corey turns to me,

"If you want to find out, have a look, but don't expect to return the same person," my eyes never leaving the two dark archways, I step after Corey. As my eyes adjust from the low light of the cavern, to the brightness through the middle doorway, I extinguish the flame in my hand. Looking around, I see that I am in another cavern- a well lit one- and there are more passages, about ten of them carved into the wall of the cavern, this time, all lit. Corey pushes me into one straight in front of me, following after me as soon as I pass into the tunnel. As I follow the passage, I notice turnings off to the left and right, but Corey pushes me forward, telling me to continue straight- until I come to a large room with a luxuriously large bed taking up most of space. In the room, where there should be a wall on my right, it is gone, and the room opens onto the lagoon that Corey and I exited from a while ago- the large one with the pouka. I would not have been able to notice the room before, because of the size of the lagoon; you could not see the banks clearly, "This is the room for you," Corey sits on the bed, his legs not quite reaching the floor, 

"Why could we just not go straight to it from the lagoon," I ask, shocked that I will be sleeping in a bed, when for the last half year I have slept on the ground,

"The tunnels we came through are for the lesser faeries- like me- we are allowed to only be on the water of the lagoon when ferrying someone across the lagoon, but we are only allowed onto the banks of the smaller lagoon- we call it Nios Liu, as the banks of the larger lagoon, Nios Mo, are only allowed for the greater faeries, the elves and the Tuatha De Dannan- and their guests," Corey jumps off the bed, and goes to the water lapping against my bed, "Don't worry about the pouka, it won't attack anyone staying on the banks of the greater faeries," Corey waves his hand over the water, and the water closest to the bank lifts up, to the height of my hips, and then drops back down. Once the water has cleared, a boat rises up from the water, Corey jumps onto it, "Good luck sorceress, you're not actually that bad," giggling he glides away. I watch as he disappears into the distance, a caw to my left shocks me, and I see the hawk perched on the bed, he must have followed me through the tunnels. Sitting on the bed, I address him,

"Don't you miss the open sky, the trees, the grass, the crystal clear streams..." I look in dismay at my damp dress, almost falling apart, "If only Allil was here to reassure me that it would be okay, that I can get through this, that I will be able to stop the Vikings." I pause, getting my thoughts together,"You know... last night I was thinking about Raina, the girl I knew when we were being sold by the Vikings as slaves. I am pretty certain that the night I saw Brea being killed, that she was watching. I was wondering what took the Vikings so long to find me, and I think that she held them up momentarily. That is bravery, you know, and that is something that I don't posses. The night that I was spying on the Icelandic noble, and he noticed me in the tree, when he asked me my age, I wanted to defy him, but I was in so much pain that getting out of that pain was the only thing I could think of. Does that make me weak? And now, I am thinking that I should hide here, stay away from the Vikings, stay safe, leave the South to whatever it will endure. I know that I am by no means safe here, but I would rather die around nature, than by the industrial hand of the Vikings. But I know that I can't, I can't be the only free Celt left in this land. I would wait out my years like the sidhe; wasted, uneventful, waiting for the eventual day that I will die- for even the immortal will die." The hawk flies onto my shoulder, "You need a name," I stroke his silken feathers, "How about Deegan, my mother was thinking that if her baby was a boy, then she would name it Deegan," Deegan caws, and I laugh, "So you like that name?" He flies off over the lagoon, I laugh, "Or maybe not, but too bad," as Deegan disappears into a brown speck, I notice another speck on the horizon coming closer and closer to me. Walking ankle deep into the water of the lagoon, I notice another barge heading towards me. Trepidation makes me think to prepare a defensive spell. Thinking about what I have learnt from Corey, I consider whether I have the ability to create creatures out of the elements. As it nears to me, I relax, Finn is heading to me. As he bears down to my chamber, I notice that his grotesque appearance has changed to that of an ordinary elf- like his father. The Tuatha de Dannan may be the royal faerie race, but after the war a thousand years ago, one of the remaining elves crowned himself king- until another war comes about, and a Tuatha De Dannan monarch takes over once more. Finn draws his boat up to my bank, and jumps out, letting the boat disperse into the water,

"Hello Aine," he addresses me.