Darci froze. A blue-eyed bird?
The air shifted around the raven. A black tornado swirled and grew until it morphed into a tall, glowing form. Her heart banging wildly against her ribs, Darci edged back, and watched the figure take shape. The glow faded. In the bird’s place stood a woman. She pushed back the hood of her dark green cloak, revealing a face of such incredible beauty, that Darci simply stared.
Pale skinned and with eyes so blue it hurt to look too long into them, the woman was stunning; in the same way the warriors were ruggedly handsome. Was she one of them, too?
Darci kept a careful distance from her. “Who are you?”
The woman’s cool gaze skimmed over Darci. “I am left with little choice but to seek you out.”
“Me?” Darci eyed her warily. “What did I do?”
“Not a lot, from what I’ve seen.” Her tone was filled with annoyance. “Since you find it difficult to remember, I am forced to appear.”
There was something vaguely familiar about her, and then it clicked. “You. You watched me at my home as a bird—you came to me in that dream—the shadow woman. You scared the hell out of me!”
“It appears I must prod you forward every step of the way.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Let’s not waste time. Blaéz. Only you can save him from eternal darkness. Without his soul, he will be lost soon. He hovers too close to the edge.”
Darci’s stomach flipped over in dread. This woman reiterated the very thing that worried her. “How do you know this? Who are you?”
“I am The Morrigan.” She gave Darci an imperious stare. “Blaéz is my son.”
“Your—” Darci’s lungs shut down and nothing but a croak came out. “Yourson?” Blaéz’s mother was the great queen of the Celtic pantheon? The goddess of war and death? She’d read about her, but never thought she’d see her in reality.
And just as fast, fury overrode her shock, surging through Darci like a dam breaking its banks. “Then why have you waited this long to help him?”
“I tried—”
“Obviously not hard enough,” Darci retorted.
The Morrigan’s eyes became blue ice—crystalizing the very air in the room. It hurt to breathe as power flowed around Darci. She gasped, stumbling back and rubbing her sternum at the suffocating pain. Then the dense air eased. Coughing, Darci dragged in a huge amount of air and wondered at her foolishness in antagonizing a goddess who could probably end her life with a flick of her fingers. She didn’t care. This woman had left Blaéz to suffer.
“Do not speak so foolishly and listen well, mortal. Without his soul, there is nothing here to serve as tether for Blaéz,” The Morrigan said. “Evil gathers its forces. Soon, he will be drawn deeper into the darkness. There is no return from that.”
As if she didn’t know that. If it meant going into Hell herself, Darci would. Not even Blaéz’s wrath could stop her if what this goddess said was true. “What can I do?”
“It is good you want to help”—her blue eyes glowed eerily—“because you are the only one who can. You and Blaéz are connected in a way that led to this moment.”
Uneasy, Darci rubbed her damp palms down the hips of her tee. “I don’t understand.”
“Have you not wondered why your eyes appear so?” The Morrigan drew closer. “The colors unusually jagged and yellow instead of the browns, blues, and greens mortals are commonly born with?”
Her eyes?“What about them?”
“That yellow is just a side-effect of what happens when you house a god’s soul.”
It took a moment for the words to connect in her brain. A hysterical laugh escaped Darci at the absurdity. “I don’t believe you!”
At the goddess’s cool stare, Darci’s disbelief morphed to horror; the truth crashing into her like a wrecking ball.
Shepossessed Blaéz’s soul?
No—no!God—no! Darci reeled back. Her legs banged into a padded surface and she fell into an armchair.
At the thought of all that Blaéz had gone through—the humiliation of being tied to and violated by an insane demon—hit Darci hard. She wrapped her arms around her waist, trying to hold herself together. He may not feel emotions, but its absence had dug deep, leaving scars in his psyche. She’d seen it.
