THE SOUND OF famhairean uttering their scratchy shouts dragged Oriana from her slumber. She sat up on the cot to see Hendry rush past her and out of the cottage. Murdina followed, pausing long enough to give her a filthy look.

The crazy druidess didn’t want her sleeping under the same roof, that much she’d made plain. Her fits of jealousy amused Oriana. Did the old bat think her that stupit? She might seduce Hendry after she dealt with Murdina. Bone-conjuring her beloved Gwyn into his immortal body might finally reunite them forever.

Gwyn, I’m so close now. You must return to me when I summon you, my darling soul-mate.

Once she pulled on her cloak Oriana trudged outside to see a few stray giants trotting down the path to the barn. She followed them, yawning as she went, and then smirked when she saw the open door. The dark druidess and her Skaraven would not be found inside, she suspected.

“I came with Ochd to bring food,” she heard Dha telling the druids. “We find barn empty, and Ochd descend, go.”

Hendry paced around the furrow mound in the icy soil, his expression dark. “He’s betrayed us for that deceitful wench.” He lifted his gaze to see Oriana, and beckoned to her. She drew nearer. “The Skaraven shall come for us. You must cast the awakening spell to bestir the totems.”

Oriana had no desire to linger now. During a battle with the clan she might be killed. With no druid newborn readily at hand to possess, Barra would be cast from the mortal realm.

“No, she shallnae,” Murdina said and clutched her lover’s arm. “I shall cast the spell to awaken our giants, Hendry. I’ve but to gather a few herbs and…and…you will tell me what I must do.”

“We cannae use tribal magic here, beloved mine,” the druid told her. “I shall need you to be vigilant while we do this. Dha, take my lady to keep watch for the highlanders.”

Now Oriana understood why Hendry had taken her as an ally, and had brought the dark wench into the settlement. Their immortality likely prevented them from tapping into the source of the Wood Dream tribe’s power. Whatever it was, it no longer recognized them as druid kind.

As she accompanied Hendry to the clearing, the druid gave her the spell she would have to cast, which required a great deal more power than she possessed. Oriana considered all the possible sources around them. Locked in death by the unfinished spell, the land and trees and water offered nothing. Whatever sacred stones the tribe had once used had over the centuries been broken or worn down to useless.

When Hendry at last halted she glanced at the pitted snow around them. “I dinnae see how I may aid you in this, Master Greum.”

“Can you cast the spell?” When she nodded, Hendry clamped a hand around her wrist and drew his dagger. “Dinnae struggle, Sister Embry. I require only a few drops of your mortal blood.”

She gritted her teeth as he scored her palm with his blade, and then watched the scarlet drops stain the dirty snow between them. A rumbling from deep beneath the surface rose to shake the ground. She felt a hot vein of power seeping into her.

“Cast the spell now,” Hendry snapped.

Dutifully she repeated the incantation, and felt the power fly out from her in dozens of glowing amber spheres. Each flew to a totem and sank into its chest, disappearing. She expected the army of wooden behemoths to stir to life at once, but they remained unmoving and blank-faced. Snatching her slashed hand from the druid, she pressed her sleeve over the seeping wound.

“It seems that I bled for naught.”

“Our defenders dinnae come to life until ’tis an attack on the settlement.” His reptilian gaze shifted to her neck. “We must be patient a little longer.”

Oh how she understood that greed in his eyes. The dark-hearted bastart wished to cut her throat. Caused by the smell of her mortal blood, perhaps, or how she had so easily tapped into his tribe’s power source. Whatever the case, Oriana knew she had to remind him of her worth.

“We both ken that your lady slips from reason more each passing day,” she said, stepping closer to demonstrate trust she no longer felt. “She accused me of killing that giant with the scarred head, when you ken that none may end your famhairean.”

His nostrils flared, and dislike crowded out the blood lust in his eyes. “She’s ever been fond of Tri, and ’tis no’ like him to stray from his brethren.”

“The last I saw him, he went with Ochd into the forest.” She pretended to start. “Yet I never saw Tri return. Mayhap you should speak to Ochd on it if—when—he returns.”

Her lie made Hendry’s expression darken. “Aye, Ochd shall have much to explain.”

Oriana walked back with him, but once among his giants Hendry ignored her and began issuing orders. Relieved to have diverted his suspicions, she went to the cottage to prepare a morning brew and tend to her wounded palm.

Murdina looked up from the pot she was stirring over the hearth fire. “So, you pleased my mate again. ’Tis all you ever do of late.”

“I but did as he asked, you old fool.” When she was alone with the crazed druidess Oriana didn’t bother to mask her contempt. “Bring me some food. I need break my fast.”

“I’m no’ your cook,” Murdina said, and added a handful of pungent herbs to the pot. “When I took the dark lass to the clearing she told me that Bhaltair Flen yet lives. You didnae kill him, as you promised Hendry. He and the Skaraven deceived you.”

Oriana went still. “No, I…I saw him fall with my arrow in his gut. She told you these lies to turn you against me.”

The other woman chuckled. “Her sister’s a far-seer. She warned Bhaltair of your intent. You failed yet again, wench. Hendry willnae be pleased when I tell him thus.”

Rage gripped Oriana’s throat. Her injured hand throbbed miserably, and something inside her twisted and struggled as if trying to emerge.

“You’ll say naught of this,” she managed to say through clenched teeth. “Master Greum has enough to concern him.” Blood from her wound seeped through her fingers. “Where do you keep the clean linens? I must bandage my hand.”

Murdina nodded toward the trunk beneath the window. “In there.”

Oriana went over and crouched down to open the large chest, but found it filled with old garments. “’Tis no linen–”

“You shallnae take him from me, Slut.”

Murdina loomed over her, and brought down something heavy. As Oriana’s head shattered with pain she sank into oblivion.

Sometime later the feel of sharp stones dragging under her back roused her from her stupor. She tried to cry out, but a rag filled her mouth and stifled the sound. She wriggled, discovering that her wrists and feet had been so tightly bound she could no longer feel them. Above her Murdina grunted as she dragged her into a grove of dead oaks.

“Come here with your coy looks and cunning ways to steal my mate,” the mad druidess ranted as she dropped her inside an old, worn circle of stones. “I saw it from the first, you thieving hoor.”

Oriana stopped struggling, and made her eyes tear as she gave the mad druidess a beseeching look.

“You dinnae deceive me. I ken what you desire.”

Murdina bent down and jerked Oriana’s hands out away from her body. She lifted her boot and stomped on them.

As her finger bones snap Oriana screamed. Blood spattered the barren soil, and then the portal opened, threshing as it whirled and expanded.

Murdina grabbed her by the hair, and thrust her face close to Oriana’s. “Never come here again, hoor, or I shall end you slowly.” She drew back, and then delivered a vicious kick that made Oriana’s face explode with pain.

This time darkness swallowed her in one gulp.

* * *

In the void Barra Omey floated, at first unsure if Murdina had taken her life. She then felt the other soul that inhabited the body. No, neither of them was dead. But as Barra watched, the nothingness of the portal became the workroom in her beloved Gwyn’s cottage. There stood the spirit of the true Oriana peering at one of her grandfather’s scrolls.

So, the sacred grove had seen into her and now played some game of its own? Barra grinned. There was naught she liked more.

Barra manifested herself as a duplicate of the acolyte, and took a moment to savor the illusion of Gwyn’s cottage. Here again were all of the clever druid’s scrolls, his paints and inks, and the many quills he’d fashioned for his writings. All his things remained neatly stowed where he had left them. Beautiful spell crystals occupied niches in the walls, and sparkled with light as well as power. She imagined she could still smell the scent of the wild honeysuckle and lavender that Gwyn hung in dried bunches by the windows to scent the air.

Being close to her soul-mate in this place had comforted and encouraged her. Now it only brought back the bitterness she felt when she’d learned of Gwyn’s murder.

All this might have been ours together, if no’ for Flen and the Skaraven.

She went to join the other manifestation of Oriana. Since Barra could no longer feel their body, that meant the soul born to it commanded its senses.

“You made that wud lady hurt me.” The lass tried to touch the scroll, but her fingers passed through it. “I’m weary of waiting. You vowed you would bring grandfather back to the me.”

“I soon shall, my sweet.” Barra felt impatient at having to yet again reassure the little wench. To do otherwise, however, might prompt a struggle for control of their shared body. “First, we must punish those who took Gwyn from us, as we agreed. Only then may we make the mortal realm safe for his return.”

“Soon.” Oriana’s young face grew pale as her manifestation faded along with the chamber.

Barra’s soul merged into Oriana’s body, and she opened her eyes to see living oaks towering above her. She had been flung from another grove portal against a wall of high stones that she didn’t recognize. When she lifted her hands, she saw that her broken fingers had been made whole by her passage. She used them to touch her face, which had likewise been healed, and finally pushed herself up on her feet.

She had to climb over the stones to better see her surroundings, which appeared to be an ancient highland forest. Although ice glazed most of the trees, a scattering of evergreens told her she had been transported beyond the Wood Dream tribe’s dead settlement.

Making her way carefully from the hidden grove, Oriana reached the bank of a frozen river. On the other side rose a high slope covered by a massive rockfall. She froze as she saw two Skaraven come into view, and disappear again into a labyrinth of stacked stone at the base of the slope. Slowly she hid herself behind a tree and pressed her cold hands to her hot face. Bhaltair had once mentioned that the highlanders had somehow cleverly concealed their stronghold. No attacker would go near a rockfall for fear of disturbing it.

This, then, had to be the Skaraven Clan’s Dun Mor.

How had the grove brought Oriana to the one place for which she had so long searched? After kicking her unconscious Murdina must have pushed her into the portal. Certainly, the mad druidess hadn’t asked the sacred grove to deliver her here. No one knew its location except the Skaraven and Flen.

Smug joy suffused her.

Only the Gods could have sent me here. ’Tis how they’ve chosen to aid me in seeking justice for Gwyn. They ken that I’m righteous in my quest.

Oriana knew that the clan would have many warriors patrolling the forest, so she retreated down river until she found a narrow spot where she could cross it quickly. She followed in the tracks of larger boots to another stone maze at the slope’s side, and climbed up to hide in some brush. Within a few minutes more Skaraven emerged from the side maze as others entered it. From her vantage point she could see all who came and went from the stronghold, and how to enter.