Belladonna (37 page)

"That isn't right," Brighid said quietly. "The Light should not be hidden away."

"It should be protected!" Merrill protested.

"A beacon of hope must be seen, Merrill, or it cannot shine in the dark and warm the hearts that need it most." She focused her attention on Glorianna. "What must we do to touch the world again?"

"Glorianna?" Lee asked softly.

She waved a hand in his direction. "Go. Travel lightly." She waited until Lee was gone before leaning back in her chair and looking up at the ceiling, as if she needed
a moment to mentally step away from all of them.

Michael watched her. There were fine lines at the corners of her eyes. Had they been there before now, or had the strain of this journey cut those lines into her skin? Was he partly responsible for those lines? Was Caitlin, with her childish tantrums that created consequences not easily fixed — if
they could be fixed at all?

"Is that how it is then?" he asked no one in particular. "People do foolish things, or say things in anger that they would regret in a clear-headed moment, and the world changes?"

"Opportunities and choices, Magician," Glorianna said, sitting forward, "Every day, every person makes a hundred small choices. Most of them are not so clear-cut as choosing between Light and Dark. There is so much room in the gray spaces of the world. But when weighed at the end of the day, that heart leans a little more toward the Light or the Dark — and then resonates a little closer with the Light or the Dark. Make enough choices, one way or the other, and the day comes when you have grown beyond who you were and it's time to take the next step in your life's journey."

"To cross over to another landscape, you mean?" Michael asked.

"The world doesn't care if you call it crossing over to another landscape or if you believe a spirit will remove a key from your Heart and tell you to
choose
the lock that will open the door to the next stage of your life. What matters is that where you end up will match the resonance of your heart, good or bad, Light or Dark." She rested her forearms on her knees and clasped her hands loosely in front of her. Then she looked at each of them in turn. "Life journeys. On the way, you are influenced by others, helped by others, harmed by others. Some things happen because you have earned them. And some things happen because cruelty flickers through the Dark currents and rises up without warning, causing harm, causing pain, causing tragedies that can devastate one person or an entire village. What I feel in this room is a conflict of hopes and dreams and desires. No one who stood at that gate is innocent of shattering the White Isle. And no one is more to blame than the others. So many choices were made to bring you to this moment.

Now that you know what your choices can do, make the next ones with care."

She pushed up and went to the door.

"What about you, Glorianna Belladonna?" Brighid asked. "Are you accepting responsibility for the choices you made?"

Oh, the look in Glorianna's eyes when she said, "I always accept responsibility for my choices." Then she slipped out of the room and quietly closed the door.

M
ichael spread the blanket at the top of a gentle slope that led down to the lake. Maybe he should have offered to set things up where there was a bit of shade, despite the coolness of the day, but right new he needed to feel the sun's warmth seeping into him, and despite being so fair-skinned, he didn't think Glorianna wanted to hide her face from the sun today either.

"You're more practical than my brother," Glorianna said as she walked up to him, her saddlebags over one shoulder.

"How so?" He smoothed the last corner, feeling more awkward than the first time he'd had a private picnic with a girl. Woman, really. She had been older than him and knew a few things he was more than willing to learn. Still, that first time with a new girl, when a boy wasn't sure if he'd get a hand cracked across his face or if the girl would smile and say "more," always made the heart beat a little harder.

"Lee would have put the blanket
on
the slope and then gotten stubborn about moving it until he'd spilled something on himself. You chose flat ground."

"I prefer eating food to wearing it." The image flashed into his mind, of him dipping his fingers into whipped cream and mounding it, ever so gently, over her bare breasts. No need to add a berry on top because the berry —

"Are you all right?" Glorianna asked. "You look flushed."

"I'm fine." He shifted on the blanket and sat in a way he hoped would hide just how fine he was feeling.

She waited for a beat, then set the saddlebags down on the blanket. "Why don't you set out what's there while I get the rest."

He winced at the tone but didn't offer to get up and help. Despite feeling troubled by what he had seen during their ride that morning, this was the first time they had been alone since he'd showed up on her island, and he was hoping for a little romance before they got back to Lighthaven's community. He didn't want to scare her off by having her notice just how ready he was for a little romance,

"This is a clever idea," he said with hearty enthusiasm as he lifted the container of cold chicken out of one saddlebag, followed by the water skin that had been nestled beneath it. Judging by the way her eyebrows rose, maybe he'd sounded a bit too hearty.

"Well, it is," he muttered.

"No one has ever thought to fill up a water skin and put it in the ice house overnight, and then use it to keep food fresh when you're traveling?"

"If someone has, I haven't heard of it."

They divided the food, then settled down to eat.

As long as he kept his eyes away from the lake, he could enjoy having a picnic with the woman who heated his blood and warmed his heart, and could imagine them having more times like this, a lifetime of days like this. But the lake always intruded.

"It's not a natural fog, is it?" he asked, turning his head to look at the lake — and the fog that still shrouded its surface.

"Since that is the nature of this lake, you could call it natural," Glorianna replied.

He shook his head. "If it was just fog, it would have burned off by now."

Setting aside the bones of the chicken leg she'd devoured, she delicately licked her fingers clean. Watching her just about broke his restraint.

"Fog obscures," Glorianna said. "It hides things — dangerous pieces of ground ... or dangerous facets of a person's nature. It's also a warning about the nature of a landscape, that the Dark currents are strong there."

"Lady of Light, have mercy," Michael murmured, dropping his head to his raised knees.

"Michael?"

Her hand on his shoulder, a comforting stroke. He turned his head to look at her. "The place I wanted you to see is called Foggy Downs. They're good people, Glorianna. I was hoping you would know how to help them."

"Wanted me to see?"

She was closing herself off from him, backing away emotionally. He could see it in her face. When she stretched out on her back and stared at the sky, he knew he'd slipped badly, but he wasn't sure what he'd done to upset her.

Then he thought about what he'd said and just sighed. No point chiding himself for words being taken in a way he hadn't meant. At least he knew how to fix this.

He packed up the remains of their meal and set it aside. Then he stretched out beside her, propped on one elbow so he could see her face.

"I still want you to see it," he said quietly. "I want that for myself and for those people. But I'm beginning to understand how much weight you already carried on your shoulders, and now you have more. I don't want to add to the burden more than I've already done."

She'd been staring straight up, ignoring his closeness even though his face must have blocked half her view of the sky. Now she frowned, and those green eyes shifted to look straight into his.

"Ever since I met you, you've been helping my family in one way or another — and putting aside your own tasks to do it.

You haven't been on your island looking after your own because you've been looking after me and mine."

She gave him an odd look. "What makes you think one is different from the other?"

Am I yours?
Something in him shimmered with joy, and for a moment he could have sworn the air tasted sweeter and the sun shone brighter. Suddenly, this delicate connection between them was more important than anything else in the world. Her feelings were more important than anything else.

He shifted until he halfway covered her, so that, when she looked up, he was all she would see.

"If I'm yours, how would you feel about a few kisses?" he asked, giving her a smile that was equal parts playfulness and charm in an effort to lighten the mood.

She looked more amused than charmed. "Why are you so interested in kisses?"

He did his best to shift his expression to confused sincerity. "I'm a man."

Laughter lit her eyes while she struggled to keep a straight face. "I suppose we could indulge in a few kisses."

"Maybe more than a few," he said, touching his lips to the corner of her mouth as he changed the tone of the song forming between them. "But not more than kisses. Not here. Not today." He raised his head and saw the confusion in her eyes. "Not for our first time. For that, I want a bed ... and candlelight. I want to drift on the scent of your skin and float on the touch of your hand.

And in all the years to follow, when we're laughing and quarreling and living, I want to see the memory of that first time shine in your eyes whenever I touch you, fill you, love you. I want that, Glorianna, for both of us. So, for today, I promise nothing but kisses."

"Do you keep your promises, Magician?" she asked, her voice husky with desire.

He brushed his lips against hers. "I do." And the truth of that was bittersweet. "I most certainly do."

Then his mouth closed over hers, and he spoke to her in a language that had no need of words.

Who was this man who could kiss her and make the world melt away and still had the self-control to roll to his side of the blanket and say, "Best to stop now, darling, while I still have a few brains left in my head"? How could he understand so much and still understand so little?

But he understood the land, understood what he was seeing — and not seeing. It had sobered both of them after they'd gathered up their things and continued the ride.

No word was spoken, but they both reined in as soon as they came within sight of Lighthaven's buildings.

"Well," Michael said. "It could have been worse. There's fresh water and fish in the streams. There's woodland, so there's game for food and wood for the fires. And there are meadows and pastureland and the acreage that's been farmed."

"The land is sound and can sustain itself," Glorianna agreed. "Can the people?" She noted his reluctance to look at her and had her answer. Unfortunately, it matched her own opinion of the people who tended this Place of Light. "They hobbled themselves, Michael. The Places of Light tend to be separated from the world around them because, long ago, the Guardians who took up the task of nurturing the Light decided that a simple life helped the heart and mind remain at peace. But the people who live in those places usually are not without resources ... or knowledge. They may live simple lives, but there is nothing simple about their skills. If isolated, they could survive."

"Until they died out." Now he looked at her. "I don't know how it is in the other Places of Light, but I'm not blind to the look and feel of
this
place, Glorianna. Lighthaven belongs to the Ladies
of Light. Men may come up from Atwater and the surrounding farms to do manual labor — of all sorts —" he added in a mutter, remembering the hungry, speculative looks he'd gotten from some of the younger Sisters while was saddling the horses. "But they don't live here. And I'm thinking we're not going to find anyone outside this community on this land. Not a cottage, not a farm. No one."

"My concern is more immediate," she said. "How many of these women have ever nocked an arrow to a bow and gone out to hunt their dinner? How many have chopped down a tree or even chopped wood? How many have thrown a line in the water to catch fish? How many have tilled the land before they planted a kitchen garden? What about feed for the animals? Oats?

Hay?"

He swore softly and scrubbed his fingers through his hair. "Well, can't you — no, I guess it would be Lee, wouldn't it —

can't he put in one of those bridges?"

"To go where?" She waited to see if he understood the question, but there was only confusion.

Reminding herself that, until a few days ago, his view of the world had been fairly linear, and a straight road between two places actually would have taken him between one place and the other, she dismounted and gave the horse a long rein so it could graze while she gave the man her full attention.

He hesitated, as if trying to figure out the reason for her action, then did the same. "Borders and boundaries." She fisted her hands and held them out, pressed together. "When two similar landscapes belong to the same Landscaper, they can be fitted together as a border — a place where people can cross over without using a bridge."