“The All-Father and the All-Mother. But they do not appear as you do—they remain present in everything around us, watching, waiting.”
She considered his response. “It seems then that I have either cousins or adversaries.” She shrugged. “Either way, it matters not. They have no jurisdiction on our land. But here, you must answer to me and mine.”
Tritus had no choice but to nod. Her expression minutely relaxed at his inclination to her power.
“How long have you been here?” she demanded.
“Six turns of the moon, my lady.”
“And what is your craft given you denied your calling?”
“I’m a smith, my lady.”
“A creative trade and one that still adheres to your calling.” Her expression was sly as she added, “It was earth, wasn’t it? It called to you.”
Tritus inclined his head.
“And why did you deny it?”
His breath squeezed in his chest as the memory blasted through his defenses, a memory he’d tried to contain, burying it deep down where it wouldn’t see the light. “There was an accident—I killed someone.”
He felt her eyes on his face, watching his expression, the pull of his features.
“I see.”
Tritus hid his sigh of relief when she didn’t push him for more, but rather asked, “And your family? Where are they?”
“At home, across the salty sea.”
Cailleach lifted a hand to twirl a strand of her long ash-blond hair around her finger. “So, you’re alone here in this new land?”
“Not quite,” he murmured. “I came with some of my people. And my family will soon make the crossing.”
A frown marred her smooth brow. “Are your family like you? Able to close their minds to me?”
Tritus tensed, aware of the thin line he trod upon. She’d been forthcoming to this point, relaxed. But it was all a front. Tritus would be foolish if he wasn’t aware of that. “I’m not sure, my lady.”
Tritus had not been aware he even had that power. Had never met a god or goddess before until he met her earlier that morning.
“Explain!” she demanded.
Tritus carefully phrased his response. “Our gods do not walk the earth as you do. They make their presence known in the air around us, and in the deeds that befall us. I have never looked upon their true form.” He bowed his head slightly as he added, “You are the first deity I have ever had the honor of meeting.”
She paused, dissecting his response. The silence lengthened to the extent that he raised his head to look at her nose again, trying to ascertain what she was thinking. He stilled as he saw her face had darkened, a scowl between her brows.
“Lies!” she hissed in a voice that echoed like a thousand clanging bells. Tritus winced as the word assaulted his eardrums, as he felt the blood trickle down the side of his face. But she was ignorant of his reaction to the power that emanated off her like a fine cloak.
She whirled in a swirl of white, billowing skirts, her feet stomping upon the forest floor. “No man—Druid or not—has ever closed his mind to me before, nor to any other god for that matter! That gift is ours—a gift of the gods!” She whirled to face him, her mouth pinched, gaze narrowed. “You are more than what you seem, Druid from across the salty sea. I ask again: Who. Are. You?”
The woods around them had become deathly silent, not a creature stirred. Even the slight breeze had completely died. Tritus was aware it was a false security, that it was the calm before a storm. He dared not shift his gaze from the bridge of Cailleach’s nose, even though he was tempted to make her see with his eyes that what he said was the truth. “Please, my lady, I did not lie—I am no one.”
Something in his voice pierced the veil of her anger for Tritus just caught her blink, and the movement was enough to shift her focus back to the deadly sonata she had begun to weave. Her voice was low, angry. “That may be true in your eyes, but there is no denying you are different to the others, that you are more than just a Druid. I can feel it. And now that I’m aware of it, I can see it too.” She tilted her head to the side, and he felt her gaze crawl over his face again, as if she demanded to know every secret inside his head.
Her next words were absent, as if she spoke to herself. “It is possible you are ignorant of your birthright; that you were hidden from the truth.”
The words ignited a prickle of awareness down his spine. Tritus had no idea what she was referring to. But before he could voice his question, she crooked a finger at him.
“Come closer.”
Even though self-preservation was telling him not to, Tritus moved forward, unable to deny her call. Cailleach enticed him. At her request, all sense of danger fled, so blinded was he by her rosy red lips and the lush promise of her feminine curves.
He came to a stop directly in front of her, skin burning and eyes streaming with tears. This close, he could feel the full brunt of her power. Through his blurry visage, he saw her head move closer, and then her breath was on his cheek. “Only those who hold one foot in this world and the next are capable of such power,” she whispered softly into his ear.
Tritus tensed, understanding what that admission meant—he threatened her power, her dominion over all. He scrambled to appease her. “You have nothing to fear from me, my lady. I promise.”
Her voice was a whiplash. “Lies! The obvious answer is that I should kill you and be done with it!”
“Killing me won’t give you what you want,” Tritus responded desperately, blinking furiously to clear his vision. The tendril of fear that had bloomed in his chest was growing with each passing second. This woman was a double-edged sword. She wasn’t just beautiful, she was the most dangerous entity he’d ever come across, and he was playing with fire the longer he stayed in her presence.
“Why not?” she demanded.
“Because knowledge is power,” he forced out on a gasp, the pressure of her strength a knifepoint at his throat.
Cailleach paused, and the silence stretched. He trembled upon the ledge he stood on—aware that life or death awaited her verdict. He took a deep breath, but she spoke before he could. “You’re right. Killing you will leave me nowhere.”
Tritus felt her fingernail trail down his left cheek. “I need answers. Especially if there are more like you.”
Before he had time to ask what that meant, her hand grasped his forearm in an unbreakable grip. The blast of power emanating from that spot was like a shock wave of energy. It obliterated his body as if his very bones were pulled apart and mangled into another form. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, it was as if his whole world was turned upside down.
His eyes shuttered closed as he succumbed to her intrusive power. In the next moment, she was there, inside his head. She stood before him, her eyes blazing with inner fire, silver bursts of color swirling in their depths. Her gorgeous lips, full and utterly kissable, said, “If you want to live, let me in.”
On the heels of her request, Tritus felt a sharp, probing white-hot bolt of pain at his temples. He stumbled, her punishing grip on his arm the only thing holding him upright. “How do I let you in?” he gasped out.
“Relinquish control of your mind. Let me in, and you will live.”
Even though every particle of his being rebelled against anyone’s intrusion, Cailleach’s ruthless demand was not abhorrent to Tritus. For since his first glimpse of her, he’d been fascinated. She was all he had thought of since he’d met her all those hours before. Thoughts of her desires, her actions, her words—these were what had driven him to tackle Talorgan when he would have shot that majestic stag. Knowing it was her most favored creature in all her domain, he had not wanted her to feel the pain of its loss, regardless of whether Talorgan thought it was her gift to him or not.