“But there is something she said to you that you have never forgotten,” the Goddess said.
“Yes. My mother told me that before I drank of the Chalice I must face my greatest ally and my most powerful enemy.”
“And the two are one in the same,” the Goddess finished for her.
“Yes. All that I’ve faced in your grove has been my brother-and I don’t believe he is my greatest ally, though he could be my worst enemy.”
“He is neither,” Epona said. Then she gestured at the basin. “Look within the waters, Brighid Dhianna, and you will find what it is you seek.”
Resolutely, Brighid turned back to the basin and peered down into the water. The living liquid swirled and then became still and glassy, perfectly reflecting her face. She looked deeper, bending over the basin, and her body jerked. She was staring at her own reflection, yet within it she could clearly see her mother’s face. And she suddenly understood. Her greatest ally and most powerful enemy was herself. If she accepted the power of a High Shaman, she would also be drinking in that which had corrupted her mother-and that capacity for corruption lurked within her. It had been born there, with her spiritual gifts.
“You can let the knowledge paralyze you,” the Goddess said. “Or you can accept that she is a part of you and know you must guard against her weaknesses, which are also yours, as well as embrace her strengths.”
Brighid turned from the basin and met Epona’s eyes. “Why do you allow those who can be corrupted to drink of your Chalice?”
The Goddess smiled kindly at her. “I granted my children free will. It is the greatest gift of all, but with the freedom comes pain and evil, as well as love and courage. Great good is not possible without great evil. One cannot exist without the other. And, child-” she touched Brighid’s face in a motherly caress that had the centaur’s eyes filling with tears “-just because there is a chance of corruption it does not mean that chance will grow to fruition. Remember always that I believe in the good within you, Brighid.”
“Thank you,” the centaur whispered to the Goddess. Then Brighid closed her hand around the thick stem of the Chalice, dipped it into the basin, and while the Great Goddess and Cuchulainn watched, she drank of the living waters.
Power flooded Brighid’s body, and within its swirling chaos she felt her mind unravel and unfold. She was at once a part of the earth and the heavens and the moon, sun and stars. She saw that everything was, indeed, ensouled and that they were all interrelated. The concepts of real and unreal stretched and bent within her and she understood with a new sense that the spirit realm and the physical world were nothing more than points on a flexible branch that could be bent, curved and rewoven so that the end points of reality and unreality could meet and become one in the same.
It’s how I will shapeshift to mate with Cuchulainn. I will simply bend reality… The thought emerged from her tumultuous mind, and it grounded her. She blinked her vision clear and she was once more standing in the Goddess’s grove beside the sacred basin, holding Epona’s Chalice.
“Brighid?” Cuchulainn was there beside her, looking worried and, she thought, rather pale.
“All is well.” She smiled reassurance to him. Then she bowed deeply before the Goddess. “Thank you for your great gift, Epona.”
The Goddess cupped Brighid’s chin in her hand and raised the centaur’s face. “I believe that you will use it wisely, child.” Then she smiled at both of them. “Now you must return. You were right to act with haste. Time is short and you have much to do.” Epona clapped her hands together and the ground gave way beneath Brighid and Cuchulainn’s feet. They floated down in a gentle spiral unwinding to the left. From behind them Epona’s powerful voice cradled their spirits and held them awash in warmth and love.
Know that my blessing goes with you, my children…
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Coming back into their bodies was definitely not the gentle experience departing them had been. Brighid found herself gasping and coughing and struggling not to retch.
“Here, drink this. It helps.”
Cuchulainn was holding the wineskin against her lips. She obeyed him, drinking deeply. As the warmth of the wine spread throughout her body she felt her trembling cease and the nausea recede.
“Your turn,” she gasped, handing him back the wineskin so that he could drink his fill.
“My father,” he said, then paused as he drank. “He was always pale after a spirit journey, and when I was a boy that used to frighten me. Then he explained that it was really not so bad as long as he ate and drank quickly after his spirit returned.”
While he was talking Brighid unwrapped the loaf of bread and cheese, broke off a hunk of both and handed them to Cuchulainn. He smiled his thanks.
“Next time I see Father I’ll have to tell him that ‘really not so bad’ does not come close to describing being tossed back into your body.”
“I’m grateful that because of him you thought to leave all of this ready for us.” She bit into the bread and then frowned. Brighid sniffed the cheese. She looked at Cuchulainn and saw that he was doing the same.
“It’s old,” he said.
“The bread is stale and the cheese is half covered with mold.”
Then their eyes met and widened with understanding.
“I left the venison hunk hanging in a tree.”
He chugged another drink of wine, then stood unsteadily. Brighid surged up, hating the way her legs quivered and her powerful equine muscles twitched. Cuchulainn handed her the wineskin.
“Drink some more of this. I’ll check on the venison.” He stumbled from the cave.
She was too weak to argue with him. Instead she knocked the mold off the cheese and ate several bites quickly, as well as forcing herself to chew a hunk of the stale bread. When her legs felt like they would carry her, she followed Cu out of the cave. It was a clear, warm night. Brighid thought back. When they began the spirit journey it was early evening, and it felt as if they had been gone from their bodies only minutes. But the facts were that the bread was stale and the cheese…
Brighid had been staring out at the night and suddenly what she was seeing registered in her mind.
“The meat is totally rancid, and the damned gelding broke his hobbles and is gone. First thing in the morning I’ll have to-” He broke off, noting the shocked expression on Brighid’s face. “What is it?”
“The moon. It’s in its fourth quarter.”
Both of them gazed at the crescent-shaped sliver of light that hung in the inky sky.
“But it was full just last night. Wasn’t it?” he said.
She nodded. “It was full the night before we entered the Otherworld. I remember it because it illuminated everything so clearly.”
“During your Magic Sleep journey to MacCallan,” he said.
“Ten days, Cu. It is at least ten days from the full moon to the phase of the last quarter.”
Cuchulainn ran his hand through his hair. “No wonder we feel so awful.”
“Cu, it might have been days since Bregon left the grove. We have no way of knowing how long we were in the presence of the Goddess.”
He took her hand. “It’s true. We have no way of knowing right now-and there is nothing we can do about Bregon or the other centaurs of your herd tonight.” When she started to speak he shook his head. “No,” he said firmly. “It would be foolish of us to do anything tonight except eat and sleep and replenish our bodies and spirits. In the morning I’ll track the gelding and we can decide what to do from there.”
“I already know what we must do,” Brighid said. “Bregon’s words were blustering and bragging. I won’t need an army to take my rightful place as High Shaman of Dhianna. Once the herd knows I drank from Epona’s Chalice they will accept me.”