DEEP MAGIC
Book 2, Druids of Avalon
by Joy Nash
ISBN: 0505527162

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Deep Magic. 

Primordial power, older than Light and Dark. Dangerous, unpredictable, forbidden. Ancient might no human can tame.  

One woman will try. 

Gwendolyn -- Druidess, Daughter of the Lady. Her Light is not enough to save the Druids of Avalon. For help, she turns to Marcus Aquila -- Roman, blacksmith, hater of magic. To banish his sister's terrifying premonitions, Marcus barters his skills, but dares not trust the Druidess who sparks a dangerous passion. 

Together, they create Exchalybur. Dangerous. Unpredictable. Forbidden. A weapon no human can command.  

One woman will try.

AWARDS & REVIEWS

Chapter One

AD 132

A wolf could go where a woman could not. 

Gwendolyn padded through night-shrouded mountains, her tracks disappearing like whispers of forgotten breath. Newly budded branches, colorless under the spring moon, sighed in her wake. Human thoughts tumbled behind gray lupine eyes. She risked much, venturing this close to the cavern where she'd once been a prisoner of Deep Magic. The heart-wrenching despair of that time clung to her paws like refuse from a dung heap.

The teasing scent of a hare wafted on the thin breeze. Her wolf's heart battered her ribs, urging her to the hunt. Panic flashed. The part of her mind that clung to humanity recoiled. She did not dare sink so far into the wolf's instincts, for fear of not finding her way out again.

Bounding up a rock-scrabbled path, she put temptation behind her. Dawn was not far off. She could not afford any distractions.  

Her destination came into view. Lupine ears flattened. Delicate nostrils flared, plucking the odor of a man from the mix of scents in the air. He was but a single Legionary, leaning on his spear, but like rats, more of his kind lurked nearby. Torchlight glinted on his armor, a harsh note in the dark melody of wilderness.  

The man guarded an encampment the Roman army had recently constructed on a bluff overlooking the swamps surrounding Avalon. Gwen crept as far as she dared to the edge of the camp's encircling ditch. The excavated turf had been piled high and topped with a row of wooden stakes to form a tight palisade around rows of tents. The structure had an air of permanence Gwen did not like.  

She'd been watching the camp since the first day the soldiers had arrived, a moon ago. At least thirty men, far too many for comfort. Avalon had fewer than twenty Druids--and that was if one included the children. If soldiers discovered the illegal settlement, retribution would be swift and horrible. 

So far, the Romans had not ventured into the swamps. Their days were spent exploring the warren of caves and abandoned mines below their camp. This did not reassure Gwen in the least. The soldiers could only be looking for silver. If they found it--and Gwen knew it was there--they would never leave.  

Cyric, of course, had set powerful spells to hide the Druid mine. And Gwen knew her grandfather's Light was more than enough to deter a hundred inquisitive soldiers. But she could not seem to quench the acid panic that ate at her gut whenever she imagined the Romans somehow stumbling past his illusions. She wanted to add a spell of Deep Magic to Cyric's protections. But there was no sense in even suggesting such a thing. 

Cyric forbade Deep Magic.  

The fur on her neck bristled. Still crouching, she hid herself more fully behind an unruly clump of moor grass. A faint, rhythmic vibration shook the ground beneath her paws. A horseman, traveling toward the camp. A moment later, the sentry heard the traveler's approach. He unsheathed his sword and peered up the muddy track. 

A huge black war horse cantered into view. Gwen blinked. Dark light--deep blue eclipsed by fathomless black--illuminated the rider's helmeted head and armored shoulders. But surely, the aura was a trick of the moonlight. She rubbed a paw over her eyes. The light remained, streaming in black sparks along the newcomer's billowing red army cape. Her stomach lurched. She'd encountered magic of that color before. The Dark spell that had trapped her had carried that same blue-black aura. 

"Who goes there?" 

The man reined in his mount with a negligent motion. "Titus Opimius Strabo. At ease, soldier." 

Gwen felt the guard's astonishment. His sword dropped; his spine snapped into a rigid line. "Legate Strabo! We had no advance word of your arrival." He shot a glance down the path in the direction from which Strabo had ridden. "Your escort..." 

"No escort. I travel alone." 

"But sir, is that wise? There could be brigands about. Brittunculi--" 

Strabo swung from his saddle, his booted feet striking the ground with a thud. He was a tall man, much taller than the sentry. When he spoke, his voice held a knife's edge of menace.  

"You doubt my ability to best a barbarian, soldier?" 

The smaller man backed up a pace, hastily sheathing his weapon. "No, sir. Of course not. My apologies, sir." 

Strabo advanced toward the man. The shimmering aura trailed his movement. Gwen could not tear her eyes from it. Magic was rare among Romans, yet this man's magic surrounded him with a halo of Dark Magic no Druid dedicated to the Light possessed. 

Deep Magic, bound by Darkness. A chill chased along her spine. Her tail lowered. Who was this soldier? Why was he here? His aura was strong, and unrestrained by Light. If his Deep Magic pierced Cyric's wards, it would mean disaster for Avalon. 

Strabo's gaze swept the camp perimeter, lingering uncannily on Gwen's clump of grass. She went still as death. A Word sprung to mind. A not-there spell seeped into the space between them.

He looked away. She exhaled. 

"Have you seen movement in the past hour, soldier?" 

"Movement? No, sir. The night has been quiet."  

Strabo stared out over the swamp to the mist beyond. "I'm in pursuit of a Celt male. A traveling minstrel." 

Every muscle in Gwen's body went rigid. Rhys. 

"He entered the swamp just below this camp. Within sight of your post." 

The sentry shifted on his feet. "I saw nothing, sir." 

"Difficult to see anything with eyes closed, I'll wager. Ten lashes for your slothfulness, soldier. Inform your centurion in the morning."  

"Yes, sir," the man all but choked out. 

Strabo eyed the man, frowning. "I'll give you another chance to be useful. Is there a barbarian settlement nearby?" 

"No, sir. There's the odd band of brigands, but permanent settlements were cleared from this area decades ago." 

"Then where, I ask you, might the minstrel have gone?" 

"I'm sure I don't know, sir." 

Strabo gave a derisive snort. "Of course you d--"  

He cut off abruptly, pivoting, his gaze once again veering to Gwen's clump of moor grass. The night sky was retreating before a pink glow. The dawn wind shifted. Strabo's war horse, which had been tearing at a clump of mud-spattered turf, lifted its head, nostrils flaring. It tossed its head and pawed the ground. 

At Strabo's sharp order, the sentry caught the animal's reins. Strabo himself did not look away from Gwen's hiding place. A heartbeat passed...two, three... 

The Roman's Dark aura deepened. Swirled. Sparked. The display was plain to Gwen's eyes, though the mundane-witted sentry, occupied with soothing Strabo's mount, took no notice.

Deep Magic sought her with tendrils of Darkness. Gwen gathered her Light and bolstered her protection. Her magic was strong, almost as strong as Cyric's. It would hold. It had to. 

Look away. There's nothing here. 

But Strabo did not look away. He paced to the edge of the camp's encircling ditch, his gaze narrowing dangerously. Gwen shrank back, paws slipping on the mud.

"Lupus." 

The sentry's head jerked. "A wolf, sir? Where?" 

"There. Behind that clump of grass." 

"I don't see it, sir."  

"Nevertheless, it is there." 

Strabo snatched the sentry's spear, his eyes burning with a predator's fire Gwen understood only too well. But when the weapon flew, she was already gone.   

#

Gwen's paws scrabbled for purchase on the muddy slope, her heart pummeling her ribs. The startled shout of the sentry scattered into the wind behind her. Strabo had seen through her illusion. He'd trailed Rhys from Isca. Why? Had her brother known he was being followed?  

Thank the Great Mother he'd disappeared into the mist before this Roman sorcerer caught him.

She bolted deeper into the hills, praying she could reach her secret sanctuary undetected. She circled it once, scouting behind to be sure she'd outrun any pursuit. Slipping under the outcrop of rock and into the narrow crevice, she turned to keep the dawn light in view as her pulse slowed and her wits calmed.  

She crouched, silent, her ears slanted forward. Nothing. A sniff of the air revealed only the scent of spring. Mud and moss. A young clump of goosefoot.

She nosed to the cave's entrance and peered down the slope into the deserted ravine. The sky was awash with color; the sun would soon break over the ridge. Another slice of panic cut, one that had nothing to do with Roman soldiers. If she were missing from the village at dawn, she would suffer Cyric's disapproval. And Rhys, if he were on Avalon, was surely looking for her. He would not be pleased to find her gone--again. And if he guessed what she'd been doing... 

Gwen's guilt, never far from the surface, rose. She scuttled backward into the shadow of the cave until her tail struck stone. She wished Ardra were beside her; the she-wolf never failed to calm her. But Ardra had given birth to six mewling cubs just the night before. Gwen's companion wouldn't run far in the far hills for some weeks yet. 

She drew a centering breath and summoned the Words to mind. Words of Light to chase the Deep Magic of the wolf into the recesses of her consciousness.  

The wolf refused to go. 

Nauseating terror bled through Gwen's veins. A year had passed since the time she's spent trapped as a wolf, but the effects had not faded. If anything, they'd grown worse. Her control on her Deep Magic had slipped dangerously. She could not always control the wolf's emergence, and that was bad enough. But her greater fear was that the time would come when she could no longer banish it. 

With desperate effort, she quieted her terror. The Words rang again in her mind, like bells inside her skull. They were sounds in the language of the ancients who had raised the mysterious sacred stones across Britain. Words of Light, taught to her by Cyric. But Cyric did not know of the wolf--the spell she'd crafted to banish it was her own. A chain for the beast's Deep Magic. So far, it had not broken. 

After a fierce hesitation, the wolf inside her bowed before the Light. Relief flooded Gwen's veins, even as the change ripped through her body. Her lungs constricted, her guts twisted. Bone, muscle, and sinew burned. With a shudder, she surrendered.

The agony tore at her with wolf's teeth. Clamping her jaws shut, she willed herself not to cry out. There were spells she could use to mute the pain, spells she had crafted for others, but she did not use them for herself. She deserved the pain. She was weak. Too weak. She could not resist the lure of the magic Cyric had forbidden her. 

Searing heat spread, melting her bones. Her limbs stretched; her body elongated. Her face contorted, skull and skin shifting. If she could hover above her own body, what would the change look like? Horrible, surely. Evil. A perversion of nature. Anyone watching would surely avert his eyes. 

But Marcus Aquila had not.  

The thought shone like a beacon in her mind as fur smoothed into skin. Flesh tingled. The worst of the pain passed, lingering only as an uncomfortable vibration in her bones, a dim buzzing in her ears. Gwen lay on the damp earth, panting, too tired even to curl in upon her naked human body. 

Marcus Aquila had seen the change, and he had not looked away. 

She closed her eyes. The heat blossoming in her cheeks had nothing to do with magic. A man's face appeared in her mind--familiar, because even though she'd only seen him once, he'd lived in her dreams ever since. He was exotic and beautiful, with eyes and hair the color of freshly tilled earth. His golden skin was so unlike the ruddy complexions of the men who lived on Avalon. His clear brow, firm jaw, and straight nose were engraved upon her memory.  

Marcus Aquila, a Roman, was--improbably so--her brother's closest friend. When Gwen had been trapped in darkness, Marcus had been the only man Rhys had trusted to help free her. As such, Marcus was the only person apart from her twin brother who knew the secret of the wolf.

But only Marcus had seen her change. 

While Rhys had worked feverishly to dismantle their cousin's Dark spell, Marcus had entered the twisted bowels of the cavern. The wolf had wanted to kill him. If Gwen hadn't been wounded, weak to the point of exhaustion, Marcus Aquila would now be dead. 

She'd collapsed and he'd scooped her into his arms. His touch, surprisingly, had comforted the wolf. Just when she thought her humanity had completely vanished, Marcus had called her back. He'd watched as she'd reclaimed her woman's body. His woolen shirt had been rough against her bare skin, his breath warm on her temple. Some unfathomable emotion flickered in his eyes. His arms flexed around her, his muscles banding like iron. Vaguely, she remembered emerging from the cave. But afterward... 

Days later, when she woke from her fevered sleep, Marcus had been gone. 

She pushed herself upright, trying to shake off the memories. Like burrs, they clung to her soul. Her chest felt strange, as if the past bound her ribs too tightly for breath. There was no use dwelling on such things, no use allowing her thoughts to drift so often to Marcus Aquila. He was Roman, and had no magic. Gwen was Druid, chosen to be the next Guardian of Avalon. They were as far apart as the earth and the moon. 

Woodenly, she groped for her tunic, slipped on her shoes. She lifted her mother's pendant from its niche, and placed it around her neck. The silver was old and powerful, imbued with the protection of the Light. The wolf did not like it. The triple spiral of the Great Mother rested in the center of the pattern. A four-armed circle woven with vines encircled it. Gwen passed her hand over the pendant's face, straining to feel a spark of its Light. She could not. This was the price her treacherous Deep Magic demanded. Her powers were gone; they would not return before sunset.  

A basket lay nearby, half-filled with the herbs she'd gathered as an excuse for crossing the swamps. She grasped the handle, and eased into the burgeoning daylight. Thankfully, not a soul was in sight. Out of habit, she cast out her senses, searching for hidden dangers. She came up against a wall of deadness before she remembered her power was gone. The sun hadn't yet appeared over the high ridge of hills. Perhaps, if she hurried, she could reach Avalon before Mared awakened. She was in no mood to endure the old healer's scolding. 

She hurried downhill, intent on reaching the cove where she'd left her raft. It was cloaked in illusion--she hoped it would not take long to find. In the aftermath of shifting, she was as much at the mercy of her own spells as a stranger.  

She skidded down the steep slope to the muddy shore bordering the swamp, searching the bank for non-magical landmarks. A clump of willows, an oak sapling. The lair of a fox. A large hazel shrub stood between her and the raft's mooring place. As she rounded the newly budded fronds, she swallowed a cry of shock.  

Strabo stood examining her raft. 

He'd removed his helmet. His complexion was swarthy; his black hair was clipped short in the Roman style. Mud spattered his muscular legs, and his boots had sunk into the silt at the edge of the swamp. He was not a young man, but far from softened by age. His body looked as if it were hewn from rock.  

With her magic muted, Gwen couldn't see his aura. Often, she could anticipate a person's magical intent by noting subtle changes in the color encircling his head and shoulders. To be deprived of this talent now, when she desperately needed it, was like walking with her eyes covered.  

She started to ease away. The Roman's head came around sharply, his heavy brows slanting downward as he focused on the hazel shrub. Great Mother, what should she do? Run? Remain motionless and hope that by some miracle she escaped his notice? She couldn't fight him, not without her magic. 

Flat, dark eyes locked with hers. His eyes widened slightly. His lips parted, revealing even, white teeth. For several long heartbeats, time was suspended. Then he lifted one hand, with fingers spread. The gesture seemed almost like an entreaty. Or preparation for a spell.

Gwen's wits abruptly returned. She turned and fled, scrabbling up the steep trail with all the desperation of a hunted beast. Deprived of her own magic, her only hope of escape was to reach the shelter of Avalon's mists before Strabo's spell caught her.  

Basket thudding against her thigh, she swerved onto the trail that afforded the thickest cover. It skirted the swamp, disappearing into a heavy fog. No ordinary morning mist, but part of the spells of protection Cyric had woven around Avalon. She prayed her grandfather's magic would hold. 

The mist closed about her like mother's arms. She ran until a stabbing pain in her side forced her to draw up short. Another mooring place was just ahead; the Druids maintained several such hidden refuges. If Gwen's luck held, a raft would be waiting. But she couldn't risk leading her pursuer to Avalon.  

Dropping into a crouch behind a curtain of willow fronds, she strained her ears for the Roman's footsteps. She let out a long sigh when she heard nothing. Had she eluded him, then, even without magic?  

She waited, barely breathing. The birds that had been startled by her passing renewed their morning songs. Even then, she remained motionless a while longer, until she was sure the threat of discovery had passed. Finally, she took a deep breath and rose, murmuring a prayer of thanks to the Great Mother. She made her way through the thick mist to the dock, where two blessed rafts bobbed gently against a mooring post.  

"Gwen?"

She shut her eyes and halted, expelling the air from her lungs in one sharp breath. Goddess, not Trevor. Not now. Not when her magic was gone and her mundane senses overwhelmed. 

"Gwen? Is that you?" 

What was Trevor doing on this side of the swamps so early in the morning? Belatedly, Gwen realized her haphazard flight had taken her to the edge of his carefully hidden barley field. One of the rafts was Trevor's; he always kept his craft in this mooring place while he tended Avalon's crop. 

His firm footsteps came up behind her. Constructing a smile on her lips, she turned, her fingers clutching the handle of her basket far tighter than necessary. Trevor was a large man, tall and thick with muscle. Rhys had encountered him on the far northern isles of Caledonia last summer, and had brought him to Avalon at the first frost. Eleri and Siane called him handsome, and even Dera, who was handfasted with Howell and should not notice such things, smiled widely when Trevor came near. Gwen supposed the man was striking. His eyes were a piercing blue. His waist-length blond hair was bound so tightly in its queue she wondered if his scalp ached. His beard and moustache were braided in the northern style, and he wore a silver torc at his neck, the adornment of a chieftain or king. But he spoke so little, as if words were jewels and he was a poor man.  

"I sought ye afore dawn." Trevor's northern burr held no hint of anger. But then, of course, it wouldn't. Trevor never lost his temper. Never. 

"Did ye?" 

"Ye were gone."  

"I left early to search for bindweed. 'Tis more potent, ye know, if gathered under the moon, with the flowers open." 

"Ye shouldna be here alone." 

"Ye are alone," Gwen observed. 

Trevor sighed, rubbed the back of his neck, then seemed at a loss as to where to place his hand. Finally, he anchored it on his hip. The pose gave him the look of a disapproving husband. Gwen's irritation grew, though she knew he'd done nothing to provoke it.  

"Cyric forbade your wanderings," he said at last. 

"Cyric does not need to know." 

"Ah, Gwen." 

The two words communicated a wealth of frustration and reproach. Sudden guilt swamped her. She had promised Cyric she would stay on the isle. It was a promise that had proven impossible to keep. She could not risk shifting into wolf form in the middle of the village common!

"I...I had trouble sleeping." That, at least, was not a lie. Since her captivity, she'd not slept through a single night.  

"Ye could finish Eleri's pendant. Rhys brought her to us two moons past." 

"I cannot do that at night. It would disturb the village."

"'Tis dangerous, Gwen, wandering outside the mist. What if ye cross paths with a soldier from the Roman camp?" 

Trevor had no idea his fear had already come to pass. She didn't wish him to guess, so she forced a laugh. "The Romans bundle themselves tight in their camp after dark. Their sentries are blinded by their own torches." 

Trevor laid a hand on Gwen's arm. The unwelcome touch jolted her to the core. "Your safety is important to Avalon. After we are handfasted and the babes come, this need to roam will pass." 

Gwen forced a swallow down a throat suddenly thick with dismay. Trevor might be dull, but he was a good man, loyal and steady. His magic was of the earth, pure and strong. Under his influence, living things thrived--plants, animals, children. She should be glad he wanted her as his wife.  

Cyric had asked for the union. And in truth, Gwen liked Trevor. Or at least she had before Cyric announced his wish they should handfast. She knew little about Trevor's past in the northland, for he did not speak of it, and Rhys would not elaborate. She suspected he'd endured much, for his eyes held shadows. But he was not ruled by them. Unlike Gwen, Trevor had banished his demons. His hand on her arm grew unbearably heavy.  

"Do not fear for me." Her tone was deliberately willful. A man like Trevor did not want a willful wife. "I go where I will. No plodding Roman will catch me, I assure ye." 

She'd thought to annoy him with her defiance; her words summoned an opposite effect. His blue eyes darkened; he leaned close, his palm traveling up her arm to her shoulder. "Ye dinna need to be so strong, lass. Nay with me." 

Sincere affection thickened his accent. For a brief moment, Gwen imagined coupling with him. She'd never lain with a man, but she knew enough of the way between a man and a woman to picture the deed. He would be gentle. 

Marcus Aquila would not be gentle. 

Great Mother, where had that thought come from? 

Trevor's fingertip drew circles on Gwen's nape. Her stomach turned to cold lead. Even so, she might have forced herself to smile up at him, if not for her secret. Trevor knew nothing of the wolf; if he did, he would not want her. 

"Gwen, I know ye dinna feel for me as I do for ye, but..." 

She shifted her basket to her other arm, dislodging Trevor's hand without seeming--she hoped--too blunt about it. She made a show of squinting at the dawn.  

"The sun rises swiftly. Mared will worry when she wakes and I am not there." 

Trevor sighed and stepped back. "I'll take ye home, then." 

"Nay. Finish your work in the field. I do not need ye."  

"'Tis my duty to protect ye."  

"Nay, Trevor, 'tis not. I--" 

"Cyric wants us to wed."  

Gwen bit her lower lip. "Aye, I know that well enough. But Trevor...do ye not want a marriage born of love?" 

"I do love ye." 

It wasn't what she'd meant, and Trevor knew it. The man might not be garrulous, but he was no fool.  

"I would not make ye happy," she said gently. 

"Let me be judge of that." When she didn't reply, he plowed on. "Cyric grows frail. I know the duty of taking on the role of Guardian when he passes weighs heavily on your spirit. I would help ye with that burden, if ye would but let me." 

"Trevor, can ye nay see that--" 

The screech of a merlin interrupted her words. The bird flew low out of the mist, narrowly missing Trevor's head.  

A genuine smile sprung to Gwen's lips. "Hefin!"  

She extended her arm; the merlin alighted. The bird ruffled its wings and cocked its head, blinking. Hefin was Rhys's companion, as Ardra was Gwen's. Her twin could not be far.

"Is my brother in the village?" Gwen asked Trevor. 

"Aye, he arrived before dawn," Trevor said, clearly not pleased to have Gwen's attention turn from talk of handfasting. "He wasna happy to find ye gone." 

"I imagine he was not." Gwen sighed and turned her attention back to Hefin. The bird was one of the few animals, other than Ardra, that did not cower in fear of the wolf. The small falcon shared a magical bond with her twin, but with her magic dimmed, she couldn't feel it.  

Gwen looked to Trevor. "I would seek my brother alone. Would ye excuse me?" 

Trevor's disappointment was clear, but Gwen knew he lacked the self-conceit for protest. She felt his gaze on her as she climbed aboard one of the rafts. Hefin took wing when she lifted the long pole laid crosswise atop the craft.  

Trevor's outline faded as the mist closed about her. She felt a twinge of guilt at treating him so poorly, but her regret was small compared to her relief at leaving him behind. She inhaled, filling her lungs deeply with damp, fragrant air. Thank the Great Mother, she was free of the man, if only for a while.  

It was hard to breathe in the face of such unfaltering decency. 

Chapter Two

"Marcus, why do you stare so at that wolf?" 

Marcus Ulpius Aquila started at his half-sister's exclamation. The silver wolf figurine slipped though his fingers and fell to the scarred surface of his worktable with a thud.   

He swung his head toward the door with a scowl. He hadn't even heard her enter the smithy. "By Pollux, Bree. Must you sneak about so? You're disturbing my work." 

Breena snorted and tossed her head. She'd made a valiant attempt to tame her wild russet locks, but the ladylike coils she'd pinned at her nape were already beginning to unravel. Marcus couldn't suppress a chuckle. Having passed her fourteenth year, his little sister thought she was a woman.  

"You're hardly working. The furnace is cold."  

Marching past him, she peered around the wooden screen that shielded a rumpled bed from the rest of the room. It was the only soft place in a building constructed of stone, slate, and heavy timber. "You slept here again last night, didn't you? You know Mother hates it when you don't sleep to the main house. And she's so fretful about everything these days." 

That was certainly true. His stepmother was with child, more than halfway through her term. The pregnancy had been a shock, both because of Rhiannon's age--forty--and the fact that she hadn't carried babes easily, even when young. Breena had been the only child she'd managed to carry to birth, a month to soon, at that. Three other babes had not survived past their quickening.  

"I wasn't sleeping." At least, not more than an hour or two. Whenever he closed his eyes, he saw the wolf. "I was drawing. I didn't want to disturb the household by coming to bed." 

Breena eyed the fallen figurine. "What is it about this wolf, Marcus? Every time I come out here, you have it in hand."  

"It's nothing," Marcus mumbled, scooping up the wolf and setting it on the shelf with its companions. Making animal figurines from scraps of silver, iron, and bronze left over from more functional items was a hobby of sorts, begun when Breena was young and Marcus was just discovering his passion for working metal. He'd made most of the figures for her.  

Except for the wolf. He'd fashioned that piece last spring, upon his return from Avalon. 

"What are you doing here, anyway?" The words came out sharper than he'd intended. His habitual good humor was in short supply this morning.  

But Breena had never been one to take quick offense. Her smile was suspiciously sly as she held up a covered redware bowl he had not noticed earlier. "I brought you this." 

He eyed the offering with grave mistrust. He'd heard the gate bell ring, but hadn't thought much of it at the time. "Please do not tell me that's another of Lavina's cream puddings." 

Breena set the bowl on his worktable. "Aye, brother, it is. With honeyed figs this time." She gazed at Marcus thoughtfully. "Do you think perhaps she wants a portly husband?" 

Marcus swore under his breath. "Is she still here? Is Mother demanding I greet her?" Rhiannon never allowed him the luxury of avoiding a female visitor. 

"Luckily for you, Father took Mother to town to visit Morwenna and her new babe. They were gone when Lavina arrived. I told her you'd gone to town as well, but I'm not sure she believed me--she gave a very hard look across the yard to the forge. If there'd been smoke curling over the roof, she would have marched out here to investigate." 

Marcus rose abruptly. "Why can't the woman understand I don't wish to marry her?" 

"Perhaps because you haven't told her?" Breena suggested with characteristic sarcasm. "Really, Marcus, even I had begun to think you were considering the idea. You're never anything other than friendly to her." 

"What else am I to be? Rude? It's not as if I dislike her. It's just that I don't wish to marry her. She looks at me as though I were her next meal."  

Breena burst out laughing. "Oh, come now, Marcus, don't pretend to be the shy, virgin lad. You know what to do with a woman." Her tone turned a shade darker. "You and Rhys certainly spend enough time at that broth--" 

"Stop," Marcus interrupted, holding up a hand, as if such a gesture could stop one of Breena's tirades. "Stop talking now, Bree. I will not discuss brothels with you." He frowned. "In any case, one has nothing to do with the other. Brothels are entertainment; marriage is...not. Getting married would change my life."  

"For the better, in my opinion. Ever since Clara chose Owein over you, you've barely glanced at a respectable woman." 

Marcus was silent. True, Clara Sempronia had declined his offer of marriage in favor of a Druid handfasting with Rhiannon's younger brother, Owein. Breena had latched onto the idea that Marcus was still brooding over the rejection, and Marcus hadn't denied it. But the truth was, he hardly thought of Clara these days. An entirely different woman filled his mind.  

He turned away. "I'm not interested in marrying. At least," he amended, "not right now." 

"Lavina is pretty, and kind, and intelligent. You could do far worse." She stuck a finger in the bowl and brought a dollop of cream to her lips. "And you must admit, she makes a lovely pudding." 

"Once she realizes I'm not marrying her, she's liable to leave out the figs in favor of belladonna," Marcus grumbled. 

Breena laughed and pushed the bowl toward him. Marcus ignored it. He watched as his sister crouched to retrieve several balled-up sheets of papyrus he'd thrown on the floor. 

"Leave those," Marcus told her. 

She only shook her head as she gathered the trash and pitched it into a barrel he'd reserved for that purpose. "Really, Marcus, the pig barn is neater. How can you think while surrounded by such clutter?" 

"I like clutter. Neatness stifles my imagination." 

"I suppose you must be right, since you seem to thrive amidst chaos."  

"Just as you thrive in Father's library." 

She crawled under the work table for another crumpled drawing. When she resurfaced, Marcus snatched it out of her hand and tossed it in the air. Breena jumped to catch it, but missed. The wad landed on the ground and bounced under the work table, coming to rest very close to its original position. 

"See? That drawing knows where it belongs, even if you don't." 

Breena laughed then, and he laughed with her. The vast difference in their preferences for neatness was a long-running joke between them. 

Still smiling, she settled herself on Marcus's stool and smoothed her skirt over her knees. Pulling an uncrumpled sheet of papyrus across the table, she bent her head to examine it. 

Marcus gave a sigh of mock exasperation. "Don't you have work to do?" 

"Of course. We live on a farm. I always have work to do." 

"Then go do it." 

"In time, brother, in time." Leaning close, she peered at the drawing of a sword and its accompanying notations. "What's this? A new commission?" 

"No." 

"Then what?" 

Marcus shrugged. "It's just an idea." 

Breena's eyes lit up. She loved his "ideas."  

"Tell me," she demanded in the imperious tone she'd perfected when she was five years old.

He chuckled. "It's a new type of sword, Bug." 

She shot him a dark look but didn't comment on his use of her childhood nickname. "But it's so oddly proportioned! The blade is too long." 

"It's not a gladius. Or a Celt sword."  

She looked up, interest kindling in her eyes. "Then what, exactly, is it?"

 "A new design. My own." Her enthusiasm sparked his. He reached for a second and third sketch and arranged them on either side of the first. "This is a gladius," he said, pointing to the drawing on the left. "It's short, light, and easily maneuvered. The Celts prefer a longer blade." He tapped the drawing on the right. "But with length comes increased weight, making the weapon harder to control."

 "But your new sword is even longer!"

"Yes, but it's thinner as well. That will make it easier to handle. It will have the reach of a Celt sword, but weigh no more than a Roman sword."

 Breena's brow furrowed as she compared the three designs. Marcus watched her with true affection. His half-sister was no typical girl. For one thing, she was more intelligent than most men. For another, her interests were not anything one might describe as womanly. She could read and write both Latin and Greek, for one thing. When she wanted entertainment, she did not shop for imported silks and shoes. She studied Aristotle and Euclid.

 "It won't work," she declared after a moment. "The slender blade won't be able to counter the strike of a heavier blade. It will break."

 Trust Breena to focus on the heart of the matter. "It won't," he told her. "Not if I succeed in smelting bright iron."

 Breena's blue eyes fixed on him. "Bright iron? I've never heard of it."

 "It's the latest talk at the blacksmith's collegio. A very hot furnace produces a stronger, brighter iron. The new metal is properly named chalybs, after an ironworking tribe in Anatolia."

 "If this chalybs is so wonderful, why aren't all swords made of it?"

 "It's extremely difficult to smelt. The heat that's needed is incredible, and must be sustained for hours."

 "Ah," Breena said, reaching for yet another drawing. "Now I understand what this is."

She smoothed the wrinkled page, which bore a diagram of a furnace. She squinted, trying to read the notations Marcus had scrawled in heavy, messy letters.

"Will building a deep furnace chamber within the existing chamber and increasing air flow truly produce enough heat for your purpose?"

Marcus grimaced. "I'm not entirely sure. A higher quality of charcoal will also help, I expect. I mean to explore all possibilities."

Breena grinned, showing the gap between her front teeth. "You'll do it, Marcus. I cannot remember one of your designs that didn't come to life." Her gaze drifted to the shelf above the worktable. "But that silver wolf you're always playing with is more alive than anything you've ever made. Look at its face! It almost seems human."

Marcus closed his eyes, his throat suddenly tight. The wolf was human. Memories, more than a year old but still as vivid as yesterday, flashed behind his eyelids. He was back in the dank, dripping cave, the dying light of his torch illuminating feral gray eyes.  

The she-wolf snarled and leapt. But weak as it was, the attack fell short. The animal collapsed at Marcus's feet. Battling every sane instinct he possessed, he bent and gathered it in his arms. The beast shuddered, sending vibrations up his arms. And then it began to change...

Until the wolf's fur smoothed into a woman's damp and feverish skin, Marcus hadn't fully grasped the depth of the magic he held in his arms. Rhys called it Deep Magic. It was the raw power of the gods, a primal force that existed independently of any human notion of good and evil, Light and Darkness. It was a primitive and dangerous force. Unpredictable. So much so that Cyric, Rhys's grandfather, had forbidden the Druids of Avalon from calling it.

Deep Magic. The refuge of the truly desperate, and the truly depraved.

Which was Gwendolyn?

The transformation he'd witnessed had been a perversion of nature. Why, then, had it aroused him so? What did it imply about his character that now, more than a year later, he still woke in the dead of night with his cock stiff and his stones aching for...her.

And for her magic.

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