He rose like the winds and took her, joining their bodies and their hearts a final time. He thrust into her and she took him in, accepting his force, his strength and his desire. He filled her with love and power and life itself.
They melted together and cried out their pleasure into the winds and the sky and the sea. It echoed across time and across space. It echoed . . .
Then Ran and Soren were alone, lying together, still joined, in the middle of the stones. The goddess whispered to her, and then walked away. She turned to see the goddess and the god fade into the stones in the ring.
They lay there in the silence now, replete and satisfied and safe. Soren rolled to his side and held her close.
“What did she say?” Soren asked, kissing her gently.
“That I will bear you a son,” Ran said. “A son who will inherit great power.” Ran felt life stir within her.
“Do you?” he asked, sliding his hand over where hers now rested. She nodded.
“Soren! Ran!” Ander’s much stronger voice carried across the stone ring to them.
“At least they left our garments,” Ran said, pointing to the pile of clothing next to them.
When they were garbed, they left the ring and walked up the path out of the lake. Ran found her father’s body, killed by Hugh’s hand and left there next to the lake. Soren remained with her as she sat, grieving for the loss of the man who’d given her life.
More of the followers and priests had arrived, but the cry that pierced the air told her that Aislinn had found Marcus. Even with her loss still fresh, Ran’s heart broke more when she saw the young woman grieving at Marcus’ side, holding his hand and praying.
Each priest and priestess came up and knelt for a time beside him, offering prayers, but Aislinn never moved away.
“He was like a father to her,” William explained. “He raised and taught and loved her since she was brought to him as a child.”
When the final person to pray at his body knelt, Ran began crying too. Father Ander, in his priestly garb, with his prayer beads in hand, remained there, holding Aislinn’s other hand and praising Marcus for his sacrifice. Finally they wrapped his body in a clean cloth and blessed it.
Ander went and offered prayers at her father’s body and then came to where Ran and Soren now stood with William and Brienne.
“’Tis their custom to burn their bodies after death,” Ander said. “Aislinn told me it purifies their soul.”
“I think we should do it in the stone circle there,” Soren said.
“Our circle disappeared after we sealed it,” Brienne said. “If this is still here, it is for a reason.”
Aislinn walked up to them and Ran held her close, both of them losing fathers in this battle against evil.
“Ander suggested we place Marcus in the circle, Aislinn,” Ran said. “What think you of that?”
“He said he wanted us to learn more about our earlier practices. He did not have to be the first to teach us,” the woman said sadly. “But he will be honored by such a thing, too.”
Twenty-Four
They builtthe funeral pyre not in the center of the circle, but in front of the stone marked with the sign of the priest. Ander, in a touching gesture, escorted Aislinn who led the procession of priests carrying Marcus’ body down the path to the henge. William and Brienne and he and Ran followed next. Then the rest of those in their company. For once, the Norman guard was not at Aislinn’s side, but offered begrudgingly-accepted help to another of the injured priests.
Of all those mourning, William’s man Roger seemed the most devastated by Marcus’ death. Though Aislinn openly grieved, Roger did so in silence, holding the mark on his arm that Soren learned Marcus had made to link them all.
When they entered the outer ring, they turned and walked around the perimeter seven times. Then entering the inner circle, they walked in the other direction seven more times. Reaching the pyre, they placed his body on top of the wooden slats and branches.
Aislinn offered a final prayer aloud and then the priests surrounded the pyre and prayed in silence for a short time. As the sun rose to begin a new day, Ander lit the fire under the body and stepped back. Kneeling next to Aislinn, his friend offered prayers in the Latin rite for the dead.
They would remain for a time and then leave, also in procession; any remains of the body left to excarnate on the pyre.
Just as Aislinn began to rise to signal their departure, Ander grabbed her hand and held her there. Aislinn stared at his friend and shook her head. Soren took several paces toward them when she waved him off.
Ander spoke out in a loud voice then and it carried out over the circle.
“When the threat is revealed and the sleepers awaken, a Warrior seeks the truth while the Fire burns away the deception. Begin in the East then North, then South then West, find the true gate amongst the rest.”
