Ritual Reality
12 A Walk in the Park
Friday, 30 May 1969
“Okay,” Jim said as the cast stood to leave after Friday night notes. “We’ve got it pulled back together. Good rehearsal.” The cast cheered. “Don’t forget the reception Sunday afternoon. Dr. Crowell has gone to a lot of work to get us funding for the tour. It’s only right that we show our best side to the patrons on Sunday. Be there at 12:30 for lunch in the Lilly Room. Anything else?”
“Party tomorrow!” yelled Steve. “Spring tour of Brown County. Meet in Nashville at the town pump at two o’clock.”
“And drive carefully,” added Jim. “We don’t need any accidents at this stage of the game. Stay sober.”
The cast filed out of the auditorium with various hoots of freedom. Rebecca stopped Wayne with a hand on his shoulder.
“Well, coach?” she said. “How’d we do?”
“You heard him,” Wayne answered. “Right on!”
“Yes, but how did you feel?”
“It’s going to be better than it was in the fall,” he smiled. “And it was all pros then.”
“Good! I finally feel like it will be fun.”
“Are you going to the party tomorrow?” he asked.
“I hadn’t really thought about it.”
“I’d… uh… pick you up if you want to go,” he stumbled. She thought for just a moment before she responded.
“Well, I am part of the cast. I suppose I should act like it. What time?”
“How about nine. Take a spin through the park and poke through the shops in Nashville before we meet the group,” he bubbled.
“You’re on,” she said. She walked out the door toward home. He looked after her as she disappeared down the street.
“Wow!”
“Judith’s going to kill you.” He turned around to see Lena, the assistant director standing behind him making notes on her clipboard. Down the hall he heard Judith’s voice and looked up to see her talking animatedly with the actor playing Hamlet. They left together. He smiled sheepishly at Lena and backed toward the door at the opposite end of the hall.
“What a way to go,” he said.
Saturday, 31 May 1969, early morning
“No, seriously. It’s supposed to fill itself with water?” Wayne asked Lissa late that night. “How am I supposed to believe that?”
“Did you call wind with your blade?” she asked.
“Well, a wind blew each time I did a ritual. The last one was more controlled than the first. I guess I must have been responsible. But that’s just moving air currents. This is actually drawing water from someplace it is to someplace it isn’t.”
“What is so different?”
“It’s… I don’t know.”
“Each tool has its own element that you tune it to. Your Athamé is attuned to air. Your cup to water. Your pentacles to earth. And your wand to fire. In order to work the spell, you have to work with the tool, practice with it the same way you do with the woodworking tools in your shop.”
“May I have another cup of coffee, please?” he asked. She reached for the pot and refilled his cup. “It worked!”
“Smartass. Still… in a way you got it right. You fully expected the cup to be filled. Not only do the tools represent an element, they represent a power… a personage that has power. There are different traditions. Some practitioners use angels—Michael, Uriel, Raphael, and Gabriel. I always name them clockwise from East to North. Some practitioners use demons, Native American spirits—Raven, Coyote, Beaver, and Badger—fairies, Celtic gods, Norse gods, Greek gods. It really doesn’t make a difference whom you choose. In fact, I suspect they might all be one. So, when you cast a spell, especially an elemental, you invoke the name of the power for that element and ask him or her to serve you. Respect them because they are powerful, but be firm. You have to be in control.”
“That’s what Dad says. Like a motorcycle, it’s only dangerous when it’s out of control,” Wayne mused. He neglected to add that his dad was talking about women.
“Smart man.”
Wayne pulled up in front of Rebecca’s house promptly at nine o’clock Saturday morning. She was sitting on the front porch with a cup of coffee and a newspaper, but scarcely glanced when he pulled up.
“Rebecca?” he said, stepping up to the porch.
“Hi!” she said in surprise. “Oh! My God! That was you?”
“Were you expecting someone else?” he asked.
“I wasn’t expecting…” she stared at the street, “…a motorcycle.” Wayne burst out laughing.
“I thought you knew.”
“I knew you rode one, but I didn’t know that was how you intended… Oh, my God!”
“Well, would you like to try it out?” he asked. “If you’re really uncomfortable, we could still catch Glenn and hitch a ride with him.”
“It’s… I…” Rebecca stammered. “Do you know how old I am?” she said finally.
“A gentleman would never ask, but I have to assume you are over eighteen. I hope.”
“I don’t believe I’m doing this,” she said, walking to the motorcycle with him. “I’m a mature, stable, responsible adult and I think I have just lost all my marbles. What do I do with Pele?”
“Who’s Pele?”
“My walking stick.”
“You can put it here,” he said, showing her how to strap the stick into place.
“Her,” corrected Rebecca.
“Okay,” responded Wayne. “Put her here, but don’t try to swing your leg over the back of the bike or you're likely to get a good sharp poke.” He mounted the cycle and kicked it to life, then assisted Rebecca with her helmet. “Climb aboard,” he called to her. She slid easily into place behind him and he felt her arms lock firmly around his waist. He accelerated away from the curb.
“This is crazy,” she said and he felt her bury her head against his back. Fifteen minutes later they were cruising south on Highway 31.
“How’s it going?” he called over his shoulder.
“I love it!” she yelled into the wind.
By 10:30, they were in Nashville and entered the gates of the state park a few minutes later. He parked the motorcycle and they got off to stretch.
“Well?” he asked. “Like it?”
“Other than being passed by semis,” she answered. “It was wonderful. But parts of my body may not stop tingling for a while. Is it always like that?”
Wayne laid down his helmet and reached both hands behind him to rub his seat. “Every time I’ve ever ridden it has been. But it’s worth it!”
“A girl could get to like that too much,” Rebecca muttered as she unstrapped her staff. They walked along the trail through the woods and fresh greenery a while in silence. Finally, it was Wayne who spoke.
“So, are you glad you joined the cast?” he asked.
“It’s had its little trials and tribulations, but yes. I’m having fun.”
“I wanted you to know,” he said quietly, “that I’m really glad that I’ve been able to work with you. I mean, getting to know you as a person instead of a professor has really… I mean you’re a neat person.”
“Thank you, Wayne. May I say that getting to know you as a person instead of a somnambulist has been a treat, too.” They laughed and walked on in silence for a long way.
“Say, what’s Serepte doing today?” he finally asked. “I haven’t seen her in a while.”
“She’s been around, but since school is out now, she’s visiting her godparents. I told you he was ill. There’s been some trouble around campus this spring and I don’t want her here when we go to England.”
“I didn’t hear about trouble, except the damned theatre break-ins. One of the frats getting high?”
“No. No. It was a personal problem.”
“Gosh, I’m sorry,” Wayne said. “It must be really difficult being a single parent.”
“It’s not between Serepte and me, Wayne. I really can’t get into this…” They were cut off by a voice not far away.
“Bloody, bawdy villain! Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain!”
“Someone’s rehearsing,” Wayne said. They shared a surprised glance at each other and proceeded forward into a clearing. They stopped just at the edge beneath a large tree to watch. There, Judith stood with her back about three-quarters to them. Beside her stood Chuck, the actor playing Hamlet.
“No!” Judith said. “You’ve got to know precisely where that throne is. You can’t turn around and hunt for it. Mark the spot. Now watch.” They all watched as she raised the knife in both hands in a self-sacrificial pose. She drew her first syllable out over a full range of emotions from self-pity to a roaring inferno of rage. “Oh, Vengeance!” she shouted. She spun toward Rebecca and Wayne. He saw a flash in the air and shoved Rebecca to the ground.
The knife hit and stuck in the tree under which the two had been standing. Wayne scrambled to his feet swearing at Judith. He could hear her equally uncouth reply. He helped Rebecca to her feet and apologized for the roughness. Rebecca, however, seemed totally absorbed in the knife that protruded from the tree. Wayne laid his hand on the hilt and worked the blade free.
“Damn it, Judith!” he shouted. “Who checked this out to you?” These props are all supposed to be crated and ready to ship now.”
“T-take it easy, Wayne,” Chuck said. “We looked for you last night, but you were gone already. I n-need the practice and talked her into bringing it down.”
“It wasn’t made to be stuck into trees,” Wayne lectured the two. “You’ll split the handle off, throwing it around like that.”
“I’m supposed to throw it on stage.”
“Into a beadboard-backed throne, not into a chunk of wood.”
“Wayne,” said Judith next to him. Her voice was low but edged more sharply than the knife itself. “Give me the fucking knife. Take your lady friend and get lost. Or did you forget that this was supposed to be our date today?”
“It looked like you already had an alternate plan,” Wayne said, matching the edge in her voice. “If you’d spoken to me anytime in the last week it still would have been our date.”
“Give me the knife!”
“Hell no! This is going into my bag and straight to the props chest.”
“What are we supposed to rehearse with?” she demanded.
“Here,” said Rebecca. “I’m sure you can use this one. And I don’t think I’ll be needing it anymore.” She produced the flat steel blade from her bag that had landed in her circle a few days before. She laid it flat in her hand and held it out to Judith. The younger woman looked startled for a moment.
“You’re going to replace it,” Judith said in disbelief. “After all the warnings, you’re still going to do it.” The two locked eyes. “Don’t do it, Huntress,” Judith whispered, her back to Chuck. “Please, don’t do it. I love him.”
“The task has to be completed, Swordmaster.”
The words hardly reached Wayne’s ears. His attention was captured by the blade being passed between the two women. In his mind, he saw the drawer in which he kept steel blanks for swords and knives. Of the two matched blades he ordered, was one still in the drawer with the other blanks? He wasn’t going to fight them for that one right now. His stomach was churning so hard he felt like throwing up. Huntress. Swordmaster. It should mean something to him, but it was as if it were behind a veil. Another of his elusive dreams.
“Just be careful, would you?” he shot across to the two. “That scene’s too damned dangerous on stage anyway. Get in lots of practice, okay, Chuck?”
“Sure. Look, would you just let us get on with it?”
“Yeah,” said Wayne. He looked into Judith’s eyes. They dropped slightly and he shook his head. Why was it so difficult with them? “Enjoy yourselves,” he said shortly. He led Rebecca out of sight. They stopped at a picnic area where Wayne worked vigorously at a pump and took a long drink. He kept pumping long enough for Rebecca to drink before they sat at a table.
“I’m sorry,” he said at last. “Things have been up and down between Judith and me lately.”
“Dating can be like that. I’m sorry I’ve come between you.”
“It’s not like that, exactly. I mean… I hope I didn’t hurt you when I pushed you down.”
“I learned how to fall a long time ago,” Rebecca said. “You have good reflexes and reaction time. You just need to learn economy of action.”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“I’ve had some pretty good teachers—almost as good as Judith’s, though I’m not as skilled with a blade as she is. If a simple move of your head will save your life, you don’t need to roll on the ground. If you react as little as possible, you will be upright, positioned to defend yourself. You will be the calm in the midst of the storm.”
“With the winds whistling around me,” Wayne said. It meant something, he was sure. Rebecca looked at him intently. “You always expect to be attacked, don’t you? Why?” he asked.
“It’s a paradox. I was attacked several years ago and found myself defenseless. I swore I’d never be unprepared again. The more prepared you are, it seems, the more likely you are to attract attacks. It’s a hopeless circle.”
“Nixon should take lessons from you,” Wayne cracked. “How many times have you been assaulted?”
“Three, on campus. Four if you count the most recent. But I never saw the attacker that time.” A sudden moment of enlightenment struck Wayne.
“That knife you just gave Judith?” he asked.
“Arrived at an unexpected moment in the middle of the night,” she answered.
“It wasn’t Judith.” The idea was too diabolical to put into words.
“I don’t know.”
“I know where that knife came from,” Wayne said into emptiness. “It’s a perfect match for this one.” He held out the prop knife. “I buy them in pairs. I’m sure I’ll find the mate to this missing when I get back to the shop. That must have been what was taken in the last break-in. Only I know that it’s not Judith. I was… with her then.”
“Regardless, it wasn’t meant to hurt me… this time. Maybe it was a message. Maybe it was meant to scare me.” Wayne listened to the words, still thinking of Judith even after vindicating her.
“Away from me?”
“Or toward someone else. Say,” Rebecca broke the train of thought. “May I see the other knife?”
“Sure,” Wayne said, handing her the hilt of the knife. The weapon was smooth, shiny and very plain, like a key blank that was waiting to be cut. The handle was of ebony and reminded Rebecca of what her own Athamé had once looked like.
“Where did you locate this?” she asked.
“I made it,” he answered. “I like crafting things out of wood mostly, but some metal. Especially jewelry and that sort of thing.”
“Really? Where did you get the pattern?”
“My…” Wayne was suddenly confused. He felt like he should be able to talk to Rebecca about this, but something prevented him. When he tried to get to that part of his brain, it was all muzzy. “I found a picture that I liked. I have a favorite uncle who sends me stuff like that.”
“You must be very close,” Rebecca said.
“One of those weird things, you know,” Wayne said. “We write to each other a lot. I have all his letters. But we’ve only ever met twice. Or three times,” he added, thinking of that night in March. “Isn’t that weird?”
“Stranger things have been known,” she said, handing the knife back to him. Their hands touched briefly as he took the knife from her. Neither made any effort to hurry as they slid slowly apart. He tucked the knife away in his travel bag and coughed slightly.
“That sure is a beautiful cane you’ve got, by the way,” he said pointing at her walking stick.
“Cane?” laughed Rebecca. “No woman who rides a motorcycle behind a man for an hour and a half to take a walk in the woods and have a knife thrown at her is old enough to use a cane.”
“I didn’t mean that! I mean… walking stick, then,” he spluttered. “I mean, I was just thinking that the first time I ever really looked at it, it was raised over my head like a club.”
“She’s very protective,” said Rebecca.
“You said ‘she’ once before.”
“Sure. Every walking stick has an individual personality,” she answered. “It retains a part of the character of the person who shaped it, held it and used it. I suppose there are ‘its’ in the world, but I’ve never met one. In my experience, they’ve all been ‘he’ or ‘she’.” This sounded familiar to Wayne. Something about the tool retaining the spirit of the maker. What was it?
“That’s neat,” he said at last, grasping a simile he could understand. “It’s sort of like building a set. You feel like there’s a part of you in every paint splash. Only then you strike it and it’s gone. That’s why I take so much time making some of the props, like the swords for Hamlet or the masks for Antigone. I buy the materials for special items myself and keep them when it’s over. I’ll have a little bit of each show reserved for old age.”
“What a wonderful sentiment,” she said. “I had no idea what it really meant to you.” They sat silently for a few minutes listening to the birds and the wind. When Rebecca spoke again, her voice was far away. “Pele was cut not far from here. Doc Heinrich and Margaret Jacobsen brought Wesley and me down here before my first trip to the British Isles, fifteen years ago. Doc told me all about wood and trees and staffs. Then he helped me cut her out of the forest.”
“Is Wesley your husband?” asked Wayne quietly.
“Mmmhmm.”
“Serepte told me he was gone. I’m sorry.”
“Gone but not forgotten,” she said. “He used to teach at the college. He was lost on an archaeological expedition with Doc and Margaret in Greece. He’s still alive though, I’m sure. I’d know if he was dead. He’s either wandering around not knowing who he is, or imprisoned somewhere, unable to get out.”
“God, I’m sorry. It must be awful. My uncle told me about the unrest in Greece. He used to live there.” They were quiet. Listening.
“Look, young man,” Rebecca turned the subject aside abruptly. “Margaret once told me that you could wander the world in any condition you wanted to, but you couldn’t tour Great Britain without a walking stick. Come on. Looking at you, I’d guess that hickory would be your wood. Let me tell you about it.”
In three-quarters of an hour they had located a stand of young hickory trees and Rebecca helped select a piece of standing deadwood for his walking stick. It was a sturdy two inches across at the base, tapering to a little over an inch about six feet up.
“Just one problem,” Wayne said. “We don’t have a saw.” He involuntarily jumped as Rebecca’s knife materialized in her hand. His eyes never left the straight thin blade of her Athamé. “Gees!” he exclaimed as she opened her hand to show the entire knife to him. Attached to the four-inch blade was the charred remnant of a wooden handle. “That was a slick maneuver. Where do you keep that thing?”
“Hidden but at hand,” she said. “I prefer my staff for protection, but sometimes the blade is necessary.”
“It’s not a weapon, though.”
“Look at the stone over there,” she said, pointing to a fist-sized rock. “It is neutral. It could be used as a weapon. It could be used as a building block. It could be ground up and used as cement. It could be carved into an idol and worshiped. You could simply fall over it if you weren’t looking where you walked. Stones are defined by their use, not by their nature. The same is true of any tool. I use this knife for… ritual. But it is quick at hand if needed for something else. Like cutting your walking stick.” She wasn’t sure Wayne got the message, but she saw a glimmer of recognition in his eyes. She assumed Judith had placed a block against him talking about his instruction, a sensible precaution. She would have to do the same thing if she taught him more. Like the importance of his staff.
“Ach! Hickory is hard wood,” she complained as she cut at the dead sapling.
“Here, let me work at it a bit,” he volunteered. She stopped cutting and stood up, ready to simply decline. The intense look of excitement on his face changed her mind. She remembered when she cut her own stick, impatiently waiting for Doc to let her help. And that was before…
“Let me see your hand.” He held out both hands, palms upward. “Elhin is very cautious about who touches him,” she said.
“You named your knife, too?”
“Is that so unusual? I heard you calling your motorcycle ‘Troilus’ this morning. Regardless, he is very dear to me and to place him in another’s hand is a sign of perfect trust.” His eyes didn’t waver from the knife as she lightly traced a star in the palm of his left hand, the point of the blade scarcely touching his skin. “I do trust you, Wayne, as you obviously trust me.” In the center of the star she pricked his skin. Then she did the same to her own left palm. They clasped their hands together. “Your blood now courses through my veins and mine through yours. Our tools unite to our common good for all time.”
“So mote it be,” Wayne whispered. Rebecca smiled. She laid the blade across his open palms. The grove went silent with her whispered invocation and Wayne stood as if he were simply absorbing the power from Elhin. He bent to finish cutting his staff. When he had finished, he straightened with the stick held firmly in his left hand, the knife held out in his open right hand.
“What are you called?” Rebecca asked softly.
“The Unbound.”
“A vagabond,” Rebecca gasped.
“Like Keats,” Wayne answered. Finally, he could let her know he understood.
“Exactly like Keats,” Rebecca answered. “I am called The Hart, or more commonly now, The Huntress.” She took the knife from him.
“Two sides of the same coin.”
“Indeed.”
“What happened to the handle?” he asked softly.
“It was in a fire,” she answered. “A long time ago.”
“I’ll make a new one for him if you’d like,” he said.
“Would you? I’d be very pleased and proud.” Their eyes locked together for a moment. She could see him leaning toward her, her upturned face a magnet for his lips. She was a woman and unmistakably responded to him as a man. She turned away and the moment was gone. “Let me tell you how to care for your companion there,” she said as she led him from the thicket.
Saturday, 20 August 1955, Kastraki, Greece
His lips irresistibly pressed against hers and she was locked in the embrace before she was fully awake. She opened her lips to accept the invitation of his tongue and their kiss rose in passion. How odd for Wesley to make such an open demonstration in the courtyard. He took her so much by surprise while she was still in her half-waking state that she could not help responding to the intimacy.
He lifted her, dancing around the courtyard… dancing like they had on the mountain, still lost in that intimate kiss. Flickering images behind her tightly closed eyelids reminded her first of the dance on the mountain and then of the dances around the fire at Carles. Naked dancing bodies circling the fire. The intimacy of the spiral dance, of feather caresses against each of the coven dancers. Her lover was even more passionate than he had been in the City of the Gods, in their bed, on the bridge.
She felt her body lifted in the air as if she weighed nothing—perhaps supported only by the passionate kiss. She was raised and lowered horizontally to their bed, yet so much higher than the bed in their cottage. Still, the breeze began to play beneath the buttons of her blouse and she felt the fabric fall away. She felt his soft caress of her breasts and moaned into his mouth.
When a sharp point began caressing her flesh, dreaming fled from her head. She’d felt the bite of this knife at the stone circle when she was initiated. It traced a familiar pattern between her breasts and then slid beneath the front of her bra, slicing through the fabric and letting it spring away from her tender breasts. A sickening sensuality mixed liberally with fear and revulsion as she pushed away from her lover. He held fast to her lips with a hand clenched in her hair and the knife continuing to trace patterns on her bare torso. It generated a pain in her stomach—a sickness that made her revolt from the continued passion. She drew into the sickness and exploded outward, thrust her sadistic would-be lover away from her, and opened her eyes to see Ryan McGuire grinning above her.
She lay stretched out on the platform that had been built to hold the old man’s funeral pallet, her breasts bare to the sky. Surrounding herself and the entire well was the shimmering light of a warded circle through which she could scarcely define the shapes of the surrounding cottages. Beside her, stood The Blade, a black leather-gloved hand still stretched out to touch her with the ritual Athamé of Cobhan Carles.
“What is this?” she demanded, taking control and pushing his gloved hand away from her. “Are you afraid to leave fingerprints in your criminal activity?” The arousal and passion had fled from her as soon as she opened her eyes. She could stand naked before this man and have no response.
He grabbed her healed hand and looked at it, then held his gloved hand up next to it.
“I am not as quick to heal as you, Hart. Or were you faking an injury at the hospital?”
“There is no faking the power of the goddess,” intoned Rebecca. “Let me help you—heal you.”
“Oh, you will help me. You will help me raise the power that I need to open the veil. Your friends failed to bring down the goddess. I will not.”
“There was no failure. You seek something that is not there.”
“I have already searched and have found nothing, but your husband’s notes. They will be helpful in opening the gates.”
“It doesn’t help to know how to search if you have no idea what you are looking for. You will find nothing on the mountain either. There is nothing there. And I’ve no interest in helping you raise power.”
“You are past choosing,” Ryan answered, pushing Rebecca back down on the pallet. “I want the goddess and you have the power. There may be more pleasant ways to raise it than under a sacrificial blade.”
“Forget it, Blade. You are not who I thought you were. Not who I ever thought you were. You are far too late for a virgin sacrifice.” Her hands darted out and clasped his gloved fist. She squeezed the injured hand with all her might, remembering the pain in her hand that she had suffered. The tender burned flesh beneath the glove tightened around the hilt of the Athamé and he yelled in anger and pain. The back of his good hand connected with her face, knocking her back down on the bier. The knife changed hands and Ryan’s anger turned to laughter. There was a manic glow in his eyes.
“So, you like pain, do you? I’m very good at that.” He moved toward her again with the knife poised, confident in his superior size and strength. This time the steel was met with her own blade and she rose upon the platform again, swinging her feet over the edge.
“A blade between us, as you told me,” she said. “I’ll leave now. I think you should, too.”
He laughed. “Leave? You have missed the point. This is my warded circle. You cannot walk through someone else’s wards. You can’t leave me. We are locked here until love or death sets us free.” Rebecca looked critically at the wards as she circled the well, staying on the opposite side from Ryan.
“Where are your pentacles, Blade?” Rebecca asked. She flicked her knife back and forth. A worn engraving caught her eye. “Did you give me something more than your Athamé when you attacked me? You did, didn’t you? You combined your Athamé and your pentacles into a single tool and now they are in my possession.”
“What difference does it make? Don’t believe all that rubbish about witch’s tools. They are merely symbols of the power held within. Magic is all in your head. The more powerful your mind the more powerful your magic.”
“I see. And is the power of your mind supposed to make me fear your wards?” He lunged at her but she slipped beneath his guard in a feinted lunge. He spun on her and tripped her. Rebecca rolled away and placed herself between Ryan and the shimmering wall of light that surrounded the well.
“You are a pretty fighter, Hart. Circle now. The power is rising. Power is neutral. It is as strong in anger as it is in sex. You can feel it swirling around you in a vortex—yours to raise, mine to command.”
“It’s about to end,” Whispered Rebecca. “You don’t understand the powers you have been playing with. I can see from here that the lust for power has consumed you and controls you.” Rebecca lifted the star stone from her pocket and held it between her fingers. “Have you looked deeply into your heart? Look at my pentacles, Blade. A hungry star-shaped void in space.” The jewel sparkled in an odd way, as if the rays of light that missed it were more pronounced because of those that hit it and disappeared. She placed her stone against the engraving on the knife and could hear it his as the image on the blade disappeared. “It likes you, Blade. I like you, too. If we had met under other circumstances… Well, never mind about that.”
She reached toward the warded wall of light with the black shimmering jewel in her fingers. Where it touched, the light ceased to be. The empty space in the ward grew until the entire shimmering wall of light was absorbed—sucked into the jewel—and was gone.
Ryan sank to his knees and dropped the Athamé. Both hands came to the sides of his head. “Stop it, Hart! For the Goddess’s sake, please stop it!”
Rebecca placed the black void stone in her pocket. Ryan still knelt with his hands clutched against his forehead.
“My head. It tried… Battering my head.”
Three days later, The Blade, the Athamé, her husband, and the teen who guided them were gone. The Hart was left with her daughter growing inside her. Rebecca Hart Allen swore she would never again tap the destructive power that she now knew lay dormant within her. And that was enough.
Until the High Priestess announced her intent to step down and her choice that Rebecca would take her place.
Friday, 21 June 1968, Northern England
“No!” the anguished voice cried out. Rebecca watched the young blonde step into the circle. “You can’t, mother! She hasn’t the power to lead the children. You can’t make her the high priestess. I challenge her!”
Rebecca was prepared to lay down her tools and leave the circle rather than face the challenge of the High Priestess’s daughter. She simply wouldn’t do it. But the High Priest stepped between them.
“The words of the High Priestess have been challenged. But it is not to you to determine the nature of the challenge, Swordmaster.” The Barber—his name a satirical nod to his profession of doctor—had been chosen High Priest five years ago, a decision many in the coven regretted. “You challenge the power of The Hart, Swordmaster. Therefore, our decree is thus: The Hart shall have one year to use her power to gather the Four Faces of Carles. At Litha next year, she will present those tools to the gathered children. As she is the last person known to have seen Creüs, it will fall to her to call him to her or to consecrate a new blade for the coven. This will be done on the shortest night of the year, thirteen moons from now.”
“That’s not what I meant,” The Swordmaster objected. The Barber smiled. The blonde marched to the northern gate, swept her sword in an arc and left the circle.
The priestess collapsed as Rebecca rushed to her.
“It is not what any of us wanted,” she said. “From this moment forward, The Hart has become The Huntress. May you dream true. Blessed be.”
“Blessed be,” the circle chanted before it dissolved.
Sunday, 1 June 1969, Indianapolis, Indiana
The way had been shown to Rebecca. There was never a doubt that the other tools would come to her. The Water Maiden placed the cup Cottus in her hand that night, defying the High Priest. The staff had already been sent to her. The pentacles of the circle were known and would come when bidden. The proof of her power would be to either draw Creüs to her or to consecrate a new blade.
The blade that had found its way into her circle was an exact match for the lost tool, albeit without a handle or engravings. A blank waiting to be formed. Then she had seen the blade at its second stage, shining if not sharp, with an ebony handle polished to a dark sheen.
And she had discovered that Wayne Hamel, her one-time student, was a toolmaker.
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