Shadows of Desire Ch. 09

"Oh, I have something worthy." Ellarian sneered at him. "It's what you've come here for, the magic of the Tuatha, the magic of the Gods."

Desmond smirked as his eyes lit up at the mere mention of the Tuatha. Their magic was legendary and, as far as any one knew, lost to time.

"If you speak the truth..."

"I never lie." Ellarian narrowed her eyes. "I have what you desire."

"Where?"

"Right here." Ellarian touched her heart. "The magic lives within me. I am the daughter of Morrigu of the Tuatha. I am the daughter of the Goddess. Her magic resides within me."

"My Lady..." Asgall sighed as he closed his eyes.

Desmond grabbed Ellarian's arm and pulled her to him. Asgall tried to stand between them, pushing Desmond away from her but Desmond shoved him back hard and he fell to the ground. The two guards were beside him in an instant, restraining him as he fought against them but, to no avail. They were too strong.

"Get your hands off me you brute!" Ellarian growled at the King as she struggled against his grasp.

"If what you say is true," The King hissed. "What is stopping me from piercing your pretty throat and drinking all of this power of yours into me?"

"You think it would be that easy?" Ellarian began to laugh. "This is ancient magic. Passed down from generation to generation. You can not simply absorb it through my blood. There is a ritual that must be preformed to awaken the magic within me and only I know how to preform this ritual."

"No, Ellarian!" Asgall shouted, tears falling from his eyes. "You can't! You'll lose yourself to the darkness, please, reconsider this."

"It's far too late for that, my friend." Ellarian said sadly. "This is the only hand I have left to play."

"What is he talking about?" Desmond asked. "What darkness?"

"He speaks of the darkness inside of me that I have repressed for so long. For thousands of years I have kept it locked away, never allowing it to surface. To do so would be like losing my very soul. Morrigu passes it on to all of her children. It's a reminder of the cruelty of men. It's her rage and her anguish. The pain of loss and watching her people fade into oblivion. The darkness is hate and death. It's the end of all things and it sleeps within me."

"And, you would be willing to awaken this darkness to save your people?"

"I am willing to do whatever it takes to save them." Ellarian told him.

Desmond laughed again. He released her arm and took a couple steps back then he stood, for the first time, really looking her over. "I can see the Goddess looking back through your eyes. Of course, all I know of her are paintings. I've never had the pleasure of meeting her face to face. It would be a great honor to be in her presence. Even in the presence of her daughter, I feel her strength in you."

Ellarian raised an eyebrow. "Strength, or evil?"

Desmond shrugged. "Either. Both. It amuses me that you are willing to share this power with me. You could have used it to destroy me and my men, but you did not. Why, I wonder? Why not put an end to all of us and free your people yourself?"

Ellarian sighed. She looked to the ground, her face full of sorrow. "Because, to wield this power would mean my death and possibly the death of all those around me. It's far too dangerous. But, I have no intention of sharing it with you. Through the ritual I told you about, I will transfer this magic to you. What you do with it then is up to you. Use it, at your own peril if that is what you wish, or suppress it as I have done. The choice will be yours."

"And all this, just so that I will spare your people?"

Ellarian nodded. "Pull your army back. Leave this place and my people in peace. Take no slaves, and kill no more of my tribesmen. Promise to leave and never come back and I will go with you willingly. Once we are safely away from the village I will give you my magic."

"And after that?" Desmond asked. His eyes raked over Ellarian's body, taking her in. Every inch and curve of her and she could see the lust building in his eyes as he looked at her. "Once you give up your magic, what shall I do with you then?" He licked his lips and grinned. Ellarian's stomach turned at the sight. Every word he spoke, every action, made her hate him just a little more.

"You will do nothing with me." She sneered. "After I give up my power, I will return to my mother, to the Tuatha. My time on earth will be done."

"Are you so ready to die? You could have requested to be returned to your village, to your tribe."

"There is no death for my kind." Ellarian told him. "Only a changing of energy. I'll move on and exist in a place outside of this realm. It's where I belong now. I am the last member of the Tuatha on earth. As long as I know that my people are safe, I can move on and be at peace."

Desmond stroked his beard thoughtfully as he weighed the choices before him. "I accept your proposal." He said. "Give me what I want and I promise to take my men and leave this village."

"And never return?"

Desmond pursed his lips then nodded. "So long as I live, no vampire will ever attack Pickaway village again, nor harm any member of the Shee tribe. You have my word."

"Then we have a deal." Ellarian turned to look at Asgall with tears in her eyes. "Take care of them." She whispered. "And promise me, you will live a well and full life with love and many children."

"Ellarian..." Asgall shook his head frantically as he cried her name. "Please, you can't...I won't let you sacrifice your life for us. We'll find another way."

Ellarian smiled. Her eyes glistened with her tears as they began to fall. "Goodbye, Asgall." She said as she turned her face away, bowed her head, and wept.

Asgall struggled against the guards holding him, demanding they release him as he tried with all his might to reach Ellarian. He would have dragged out out of that tent if he were able and carted her off someplace safe. Someplace where the wicked vampire King could never find her. He wished he had been able to do something but it was useless. He felt something hard and cold hit the back of his head. He assumed it was the hilt of a dagger but he was not sure. The moment he was struck he felt an explosion of pain and he fell to his knees. He looked up to see Ellarian being put in shackles before he lost consciousness.

When Asgall awoke again the sun was coming up and he was laying on the ground. His body was wet from the morning dew and he was covered in mud. His head still stung from the blow he'd received but the pain was beginning to fade. He pushed himself up from the mud and dirt covered ground and looked around at what was left of the village. A great pyre had been erected to burn the dead and all around, people were cleaning up, searching for loved ones, and trying to recover from the devastation caused by the vampire army.

It was in that moment that he realized there were no vampires in sight. Not one. True to his word, Desmond had ordered his army to pull out and leave. The King's tent was gone as was the King himself. Asgall searched for Ellarian. He searched for days even though he knew he would never find her. She was gone and his heart was broken. He'd failed to protect her, and that was something he would never forgive himself for, ever.

Present day...

"I never saw her again after that day." Asgall said, looking up at Rowan. Rowan's eyes were locked on the man but he seemed a million miles away. "With Ellarian gone and her father dead we were in need of a new tribal chief and the village elected me to fill that role. They thought I was a hero. I had entered the vampire King's tent and lived to tell the tale. I was no hero though. Desmond allowed me to live because of the deal he'd made with Ellarian. Her life for ours." Asgall sighed and ran a hand through his thick, red, hair.

"What happened to Ellarian?" Thaden asked, his voice breaking through the tension that had built up in the room. "How did she end up as Desmond's Queen?"

"That I do not know." Asgall admitted. "We never heard from her or any news regarding her. Until this evening when Una came to find me, I had assumed she died after being taken captive. It was her plan, after transferring her magic to Desmond, to return to the Tuatha. She would simply leave her body behind and her spirit would rejoin her mother and the other ancient Gods. Something must have happened to keep her here. I just don't know what."

"It was me." Thaden and Asgall both turned to Rowan who spoke up for the first time since Asgall had begun his story. "I'm what kept her here." He said. "She stayed to protect me until she felt I was old enough to protect myself."

Rowan pushed himself up from the table then began to busy himself cleaning up the tea cups and sweet rolls that he had set out. He didn't know what else to do, or even what to say. Keeping busy seemed to be the only thing he could focus on at the moment. He was still reeling from Asgall's story. Everything he had thought he knew about his parents, the ideas he'd had about them, it had all been shattered with the new information that Asgall had shared with him.

His mother had never loved his father. That much he now knew. She was little more than a treaty bride, forced to marry a man that she despised. Now her somber and bleak demeanor made more sense to him. It wasn't abandonment by the man she loved that had caused her so much pain and heartache, it was being torn from her village, her family and friends, and kept captive for nearly thirteen years that had broken her. Rowan suddenly felt a pang of guilt at the thought of his mother's misery. He was, in part, the cause of it. If he'd never been born, if she hadn't loved him as much as she did, she could have escaped. Rowan was the reason that she remained. He was the reason she'd finally given up. He was the reason she was dead.

"I'm sorry if this news upsets you." Asgall said with a twinge of sorrow in his voice. "I just thought that you deserved to know the truth. You deserved to know who your mother really was and where her people, your people, come from."

"She never told me." Rowan said softly, holding a wet cloth in his hands that he had been using to wipe the counter top, he suddenly clutched it now to his chest and sighed a shaky breath. "Why had she never told me? All these years I thought..." He shivered, shaking his head. "Her life was ruined all because of me."

"No." Thaden stood and went to Rowan. He wrapped his arms around him and held him close. "It wasn't because of you. She stayed in Basmorte because she loved you and wanted to protect you. It's what a mother does."

"But she sacrificed so much." Rowan sighed. "For me and for her people, never once thinking of herself. She allowed herself to suffer all those years and for what? If not for me she could have escaped years ago. Had a happy life. She might even be alive still."

"Stop it." Asgall rose to his feet and stood beside the couple. He looked down at Rowan and Rowan could see the pain in the man's eyes. "When Ellarian agreed to be King Desmond's captive it was with the realization that she would never return here. She intended to give her life the day she left. What happened after I can not say but, I had known your mother for many many years and I know, without a doubt, that she loved you very much. She must have. She would not have endured a life in Basmorte otherwise."

***

Rowan walked the darkened path of garden flowers much the same way his mother used to do. Fireflies were the only illumination that lit his way. The flowers, vibrant and cheerful in the morning light, seemed cold and dark now. They thrived in the sunlight. The members of the Shee tribe thrived in sunlight. Thaden and Tally, thrived in sunlight. Rowan did not. He thrived in the darkness. The darkness gave him strength and revitalized him. It shouldn't have been that way though. If circumstances had been different, he could have been born in Pickaway village, fully Shee and he could have had his mother by his side. Asgall may even have been his father as he now realized, Asgall had been in love with Ellarian. That much was obvious now.

Rowan's life could have been so different if only Desmond had never invaded the Shee village. If Ellarian had never sacrificed herself for the good of her people. Maybe Rowan would never have been born at all. What upset him most of all though was the fact that his mother had never told him anything of her past. She'd never spoken of her parents or where she had come from. She had never spoken of her life before Rowan was born. Maybe it was too painful for her to bring up or maybe, she was trying to protect Rowan from the truth. He still had no idea what happened to her after she left Pickaway village with Desmond. Maybe the truth would always be hidden from him. Maybe she preferred it that way.

Rowan's wanderings led him into the forest, into a thick grove of full, blossoming trees. The cool nights of the changing season had not touched the forest surrounding the Shee village. Their magic, which came from nature itself, kept the trees, shrubs, and all flora alive, even in winter. Rowan remembered the garden at Ravenskeep being the same, beautiful and alive all year round. Only days before his mother's death did he notice her garden begin to wilt. He wondered what the garden looked like now. Was it even still there? Was there any life left in it? Could he, being part Shee, revitalize it if there was? He pushed the thought out of his head as soon as he had thought it. It was unlikely that he would ever see Ravenskeep again.

Rowan stopped suddenly and looked up. He realized that he was now in the very center of the grove and right before him was a beautiful tree with full, thick leaves, and red, berry-like pomes. He recalled seeing a tree similar to the one he was looking at in his mother's garden. It wasn't in the center of the garden as her beloved oak had been but nestled in the back, almost hidden from view. He once thought of the tree and it's location as a secret and magical place for there was definitely something magical about it. Past the countless plants, flowers, and shrubs, and up a set of stone steps he would find the tree standing alone, surrounded by a wall of brick that, as a child, had nearly reached his chest.

He would go there and hide while he played, imagining some dragon or troll was after him. He knew somehow that the tree would protect him. It was magic after all. Once though, he had been playing, running from some imaginary witches, and had gone straight to the tree but stopped when he saw his mother there. She was kneeling in front of the tree and weeping. One hand was outstretched, touching the trunk as she whispered something in a language that Rowan didn't understand. Something in the way his mother looked, shoulders drooped, falling tears, and the utter lack of happiness that he could feel coming off her, had stopped him in his tracks. The tree no longer seemed mysterious and magical. It was a place of sorrow and regret. He never visited it again after that day.

The tree before him now reminded him so much of that tree in his mother's garden that he could have sworn it was the small one, if he had not known that that was impossible. His mother's tree had probably died years ago but still, there was something familiar about it, something that was almost...comforting. Not sure why he was doing it, Rowan walked to the tree and gently lay down beneath it. He pulled his cloak around his body and closed his eyes. Maybe it was the quiet seclusion of the area, or the soft rustling of the leaves as a soft breeze blew through them, or just the stress of the evening finally being too much for him, but as soon as Rowan closed his eyes he felt himself begin to drift off.

All the sounds of night lulled him off to sleep and when he was finally deep into his slumber, he had the most wonderful dream he'd ever had in his life.

DESTINY

Rowan opened his eyes to the soft hum of voices speaking beside him. At first he wasn't sure what they were saying but as the fog of sleep slowly lifted and his mind cleared, their words became more intelligible. His first impression was that there were two women. However, a third voice broke into the conversation and Rowan realized that there were at least three women speaking. He remained quiet, pretending to sleep still as he strained his ears to listen.

The voices sounded familiar, at least two of them. The third he honestly had never heard before but the first two voices he knew from somewhere. He continued to listen to their conversation for another several minutes until he suddenly realized where he knew the first woman's voices from. He sat up in surprise, eyes wide, as he stared at the trio of women who were sat upon three tree stumps not far from where Rowan had been lying, asleep. He knew in an instant that he must be dreaming.

"You really should have told him the truth." The first voice Rowan had heard said, speaking to the woman at her side. The woman who, from what Rowan could see of her, as her back was to him, had long, flowing, raven hair that twisted and curled down her back, nearly reaching her seat. The speaker, was a young maiden with fiery red hair and and a personality to match. She was lively and animated as well as fiercely beautiful. She stood, walking around as she spoke, turning every so often to gauge the reaction of her companions.

The third woman, who had so far remained silent, was older though still uncommonly beautiful. She, like the second woman, had long black hair that was pulled back into a braid and draped over one shoulder. She sat silently, listening to the others speak, while working on a piece of embroidery. Rowan had never seen this woman before but she looked oddly similar to the painting of Morrigu that Una had been working on earlier.

"I always knew the truth would be revealed to him, eventually." The second woman said softly, her voice barely rising above a whisper. "It was only a matter of time."

"But you should have prepared him." The red haired woman said, frowning.

The raven haired woman sighed and looked up, addressing the first woman. "He had to find out the truth on his own. It was necessary for him to follow the path that was laid out for him."

"And now? The poor child has more questions than he does answers."

"Perhaps, it would be best to allow the boy to speak for himself." It was the third woman who spoke now. The others stopped and turned to look at her. Rowan could tell that the woman's words held weight with the others as they seemed to regard her with total reverence. "I believe that he is finally awake."

The red haired woman as well as the elder then turned to look at Rowan. He sat up, no longer able to feign sleep, and slowly rose to his feet. Rowan bowed respectfully to the women and then waited for them to address him. Honestly, he had no idea what to say to them. He wasn't sure why they were there or why he was dreaming about them. All he knew was that they had been discussing him for some reason though why was still a mystery to him.

The woman with the red hair smiled and stepped forward. She looked familiar to him. Her face, her hair, even the warm, friendly eyes that were now focused on him. Looking into her eyes, it finally dawned on him why she looked so familiar. "Folen?" He whispered with uncertainty.

The woman touched her heart as she looked at him. "Sweet boy." She said, looking at Rowan with love and affection. "My name is Brigid." She walked forward and touched the side of Rowan's face. "I have been watching over you since the moment of your birth. We all have."

Morrigu stood, setting her embroidery aside and joined Rowan and Brigid. "This is my sister, Morrigu." Brigid introduced her. Morrigu stepped closer then kissed Rowan on the cheek. "I've been looking forward to meeting you for a long time." She said, smiling at him.