Powerful Magic (14 page)

          
"No."
 
She slid a frozen hand from under her cloak, daring to reach up and slip it under his, to the back of his neck.
 

          
He jumped.
 
"God's blood, you are like ice."

          
Withdrawing her hand, she said nothing.
 

          
"There is no place to take shelter."
 
He told her, while Lancelot continued to push bravely forward.
 
"If we stop now, we will die.
 
I do not know from whence this storm came - there was no sign of it when we left the cave."

          
Despite the truth she sensed in his words, stopping was beginning to sound lovely.
 
An incredible lassitude seemed to have taken over, taking her past the bone wrenching chills, the icy numbness and the cold.
 
She could barely hold her head up.
 

          
She, who had lived her entire life in the Southern part of the United States, knew nothing of blowing snow, gale force winds, or sub-zero temperatures.
 
Of freezing to death she knew only what she had read or seen in the movies.
 
It appeared she was about to experience it, first hand.
 
Megan knew enough to know she should fight it, that she should not let her eyes drift closed.
 
But she hadn't known until now how overpowering the urge would be; such a simple thing really, to drift off to sleep for eternity, to finally escape the miserable stab of the frigid cold.

          
"Megan."
 
The deep voice seemed to come from a long way off.

          
Bone weary, she forced herself to lift her head.
 
"Cold."
 
She mumbled.
 
"So cold."

          
With fumbling fingers, Kenric reached beside him and withdrew his sword.
 
Even the sound of leather releasing steel seemed muffled in this dizzying world of white.
 

          
Curiosity warred with the need to sleep.
 
This time she fought the urge to close her eyes.
 
The sword reminded her that she needed to live. Surely she had not survived a lightening strike and traversed so many years to die a frozen death.
 
There had to be some reason for her arrival here, something to do perhaps with Kenric and his magical sword.

          
Thunder
.
 

          
Opening her eyes wider, Megan peered around.
 
She was so cold she no longer shivered, her teeth no longer chattered.
 
She seemed to have almost transcended the world of mere mortals, feeling nothing now, not even the overwhelming need for sleep.

          
Again she heard it... had she imagined it, the deep rumble in the sky that precedes a thunderstorm?
 
Surely she had, for though she didn't know much about blizzards, she didn't think snow clouds thundered.
 
Or that lightening occurred, like the marauding Welsh riders had said.

          
Kenric continued to hold his sword up, his arm and the metal a straight line pointing to the sky.
 
Again the weapon seemed to glow, a soft light that grew brighter as she watched, pointing a path through the swirling mist and snow.
 

          
Again she thought of King Arthur and Merlin and the powerful sword in the stone.
 
For the first time she wondered if the legend had some basis in fact.

          
"That way lies safety."
 
Though the words came from her throat, slurred, Megan knew she had not meant to say them.
 
But Kenric, his dark shaggy head covered in white, nodded and turned the great horse towards the glowing beam of light.

          
They left the path and rode into the dense trees, Lancelot picking his way carefully.
 
The snow did not seem to fall as heavily here; the close knit branches formed a canopy of sorts.
 
The light did not waver; as long as Kenric held the sword in front of them it lit the way.

          
The trees grew closer together, the going more difficult for the large war horse.
 
Until finally he had to stop.
 
They had reached a place where the trees grew so intertwined that they formed an unbroken wall.

          
"I like not the looks of this."
 
Lowering the sword, Kenric once again sheathed it.
 
The light glimmered and slowly faded, the snow and the otherworldly mist coming up once more to swirl around them.

          
Megan shook her head.
 
For some reason her lethargy seemed to have vanished.
 
So had her chills.
 
Blood rushed back into her limbs, making them tingle and ache so that she shifted uneasily behind Kenric.
 
Something about this place...

          
"It's magical."
 
Kenric said flatly, letting her know that she had spoken out loud.
 
"I like it not."

          
"The mist?"
 

          
"This place.
 
I sense magic here.
 
Somehow the sword has brought us to a place of magic."

          
She couldn't see what the problem was.
 
After all, he had said his sword was a magical sword.
 
It only made sense.
 
           
"Do you think it will be warm?"

          
His face might have been carved from ice itself.
 
"It does not matter.
 
We will not go there."

          
The trees seemed closer, impossible to get through, either forward or back.
 
Even if it was her imagination, she didn't see how he meant to turn Lancelot around.
 
          

          
"What are you going to do?"

          
"Go back."
 
His voice sounded more frozen than the wind that howled outside the protection of their corpse of trees.

          
"How?"
 
She leaned in close to him, her breath making a plume of frosty smoke on his cheek.
 
"Back the horse out?"

          
His expression now left no doubt that was exactly what he meant to do.
 

          
"I will think of a way."
 
He told her.

          
Megan cast one final longing look at the wall of trees, from behind which she imagined she could see a soft glow of warm light.
 
Somehow she had no doubt the wall would somehow part for them, allowing them to enter the magical and safe - and warm! - place.
 
Where this notion came from, she had no idea.
 
But too much had happened to her recently for her to doubt her instincts now.

          
"I want to go
there
."
 
Her hand held remarkably steady as she pointed.
 
"I'm cold, I'm tired, and I want to get warm.
 
I don’t want to freeze to death in that blizzard."

          
After a moment of silence, Kenric laughed, a humorless bark of sound that seemed to echo in the still forest.
 
"You speak with the tone of a queen."

          
She raised a brow the way she imagined a real queen, might raise it.
 
"Maybe I am."

          
He did pause at that, cocking his head to study her.

          
"A queen?"
 
He growled, looking annoyed and grim and maddeningly arrogant all at once.
 
"Of what place, my lady?
 
Perchance do you come from a place not of this world?"

          
Stunned at first that he believed her, it took a second

for it to dawn on Megan that Kenric thought she came from the realm of magic, the realm of what - faeries and elves?
 
To her this seemed even more improbable and fantastic than the truth, at least the truth as she knew it - that she'd traveled through time.
 
But this man carried an enchanted sword.
 
To him, she had no doubt that faeries and elves were real, even if he seemed to loathe them.
 
           
More real than the year 2010 could ever be.

          
"It all fits."
 
Kenric breathed, fury filling his face.
 
"Your odd attire, the strange words you use.
 
You are not Welsh.
 
You are from the land behind the veil, the place where some say my sword was forged.
 
And you say you are a queen?
 
Or maybe only a princess who aspires to become a queen?"

          
"No. I was just kidding."
 
She refused to allow herself to panic.
 
If this man, who seemed to abhor magic, truly believed she was some sort of elfin royalty, what would he do?
 
Dump her to freeze to death alone in these woods?
 

          
She couldn't believe they were having this conversation, only minutes after nearly dying of frostbite.
 
Then again, there was much about what had happened to her lately that she found difficult to believe.

          
His eyes narrowed in speculation.
 
"A princess of Faerie."

          
"No."
 
Megan said again, beseeching him with her gaze to believe her.
 
"I’m human, as human as you are.
 
I don't know anything about magic or faeries or any of that.
 
And I was only teasing, er jesting, about being a queen."

          
"As human as I?"
 
Kenric's voice dripped ice.

          
She swallowed as another thought occurred to her.
 
"You are human, aren't you?"

          
Though he gave a slow nod, his frozen expression told her something was terribly wrong.
 

          
Again, the chill of the air began to seep once more into her bones.
 
Megan shivered and cast a look of longing towards the place that had, moments earlier, seemed so welcoming and safe.
 

          
Magical
, he'd said.
 
She really wanted to see this magic stuff for herself, especially if it would get her warm.
 
After all, maybe someone with a little bit of magic power could help her to get home.
 
Maybe even help her with the problem of Roger once she got there.

          
She wanted to go to this Faerie, this place behind the veil.
 
But how to convince Kenric to take her there without him thinking she was some sort of faerie herself?

          
Lancelot solved that problem neatly.
 
The huge war horse, snorted once, then took the bit in his teeth and began lumbering toward the wall of trees.
 

          
Kenric cursed, pulling back on the reins.
 
It made no difference - the horse ignored all of Kenric's efforts to make him stop.
 

          
"You."
 
Turning to pin Megan with a furious gaze, Kenric put one hand on the hilt of his sword.
 
"You had something to do with this, did you not?"

          
If looks could kill...
 

          
"No, I swear to you, I didn't.
 
How could I?" she pleaded with him to understand, "I've never been on a horse in my life.
 
I wouldn't even know how to make Lancelot move."

          
Again he shot her that icy glare.
 
"My war horse carries no name.
 
Cease calling him Lancelot."