Across Time Part 33

Cate sighed and fought back tears. "When I tell her what you have just told me, the Isle of Mona will be exactly where she will want to head. She will want to save as many of us as she can. It is how she is, and I would expect no less from her."

"And Lachlan?"

"He goes where Maeve goes."

"Where are you now?"

"Nearly two days' ride from the coast."

"Then you still have time to have the Chieftain stop sending Druids to Mona."

"Jessie, it is possible that the Chieftain may not even believe my report."

"Why not?"

"I am supposed to tell the greatest warrior of the Silurian people that there are sixty thousand soldiers preparing to run us all through, and that those sent to a sanctuary will be run down like wild boars by *

218 *219.

men on horses? He will be disgraced. Disgraced men do not often act in the best interest of their people."

"Then forget him. You take Maeve and Lachlan to Mona if you must. If you're going to save lives, it will only be from there. That's what the historical information reports."

Cate looked up at her for the first time. "What historical information?"

"Your people's written history, what little there was of it, will be largely destroyed by the new religion called Christianity. The Catholics will do everything they can to eradicate your people's philosophies from history."

For a long time Cate said nothing, she just stared at Jessie. "I have so many questions, but I am afraid my heart would break in the knowing."

Jessie sighed. "I apologize I don't have more for you, but there isn't much. Believe it or not, the first mention of Druids that we can find comes from Julius Caesar."

Cate held up her hand signaling Jessie to stop. "Please. I can bear it not. I wish I would be able to hear it, but it is too hard to think that my people have nearly been forgotten, remembered only by a man who reviled us. It is as if all the work we have done has been for naught."

"But that's not true. The Druids who do survive Mona keep your religion alive. It is during a time now called the Dark Ages that Druids make a comeback and actually have kings consulting them."

Cate's dark expression brightened. "For truth?"

Jessie nodded; glad she could offer some, any positive news to Cate.

"For truth. A guy named Merlin comes along, and there are great tales told about his powers and his love of a king called Arthur."

"Then why are the times considered dark?"

"Well, I don't know much about history, a fact I intend to rectify, but Christianity and religious fervor took over for rational thought and people stopped learning."

"Stopped learning? How can that be so?"

"You'd be amazed. Like I said, I don't really know much about history, or I could tell you more. I just know your people and the *

220 *221.

Druids make a big comeback."

"It does my heart good to know that we are not entirely extinguished by the blood-thirsty Roman army."

"The Roman Empire will extend quite a ways, Cate, and for hundreds of years longer. They do not get their comeuppance until the fifth century."

Cate once again held up her hand. "No more. Maeve tells me that too much information from you will cloud my true vision-but-it is good to know they do not go unpunished."

"Let's just say they lost it all except for a country now known as Italy."

"No!"

"Yep."

"Oh-my." Cate leaned forward and gazed into the fire. There was so much she wanted to know, so many things she wanted to ask, but there just wasn't time, and she needed to heed Maeve's words because- "Because I would be disappointed in you if you did not."

Both Cate and Jessie wheeled around toward the mist, where the third voice had come from. Out of the fog that swirled around her head walked a tall, auburn-haired woman wearing the same robe Cate most often wore.

Jessie immediately knew who it was. "Maeve."

Maeve glided across the surface of Cate's Dreamworld to where they now stood.

"You've come," Cate whispered greeting Maeve. "It has been a very long time since you visited my dream self."

Maeve lightly brushed Cate's cheek before turning to Jessie and greeting her. "It would be rude of me not to come and thank the woman who helped save my life. h.e.l.lo, Jessie."

Jessie walked up to Maeve and, oddly enough, bowed. "It feels like I have known you forever."

Maeve smiled and repeated her gesture on Jessie's cheek. "You have."

Cate agreed. "You just did not know it."

220 *221.

Jessie looked up at Maeve, amazed at how tall she was, at how beautiful and regal she was. "How-"

"How is it that I am here in Catie's Dreamworld?" Maeve smiled.

"You need more information about the nature of the creatures we are.

There are many other worlds one can visit if one knows how. Normally, I would never presume to come uninvited, as it is a very invasive act, but under the circ.u.mstances, I knew Catie wouldn't mind."

Cate shook her head. "I learned long ago, Maeve, that you come and go where and when you please."

Maeve's eyes softened as she looked at Cate. "Indeed." To Jessie, Maeve said, "If, as I suspect, your world no longer honors the true soul of the earth, then the very fact that you listened to the warning regarding myself and Lachlan says a great deal about the power of the craft residing within you."

"The craft? You mean . . . Druidry?"

Maeve nodded. "Even if the last Druid were destroyed, Druidry will exist forever because we are in the souls of the trees, of the animals, of the ground and the sky. While we may not roam the earth, the earth carries us within her. We may perish in this life, but the soul of a Druid goes on into others. It is a marvelous thing, really."

"And I have powers?"

"Do you think it is a coincidence that you were the person chosen to unlock the secrets of the portal?"

Jessie shook her head. "I no longer believe in coincidences, Maeve.

I know better."

Maeve smiled as a teacher would at a student who finally fully understands the answer to a problem. "Yes, you do. Do you now understand why you could never embrace your family's religion?"

Jessie's eyebrows shot up. "How did you know?"

Maeve held up a hand to silence her. "There is a place in your heart that is closed off from their belief system for a reason. At the time, you believed that you were making a conscious choice, but it was so much more than that. Your spirit, that of you and Cate, and countless other individuals before and after her, has deep Celtic roots . . . Celtic and Druidic, for our people have existed far longer than the great historians *

222 *223.

have thought. Your spirit, Jessie, will never accept the idea of one G.o.d commanding all, because it knows better. You never made a conscious choice not to follow their path-your soul made it for you long before you were even born."

So much of her own life was beginning to make sense to Jessie now.

The Celtic crosses she always looked at, the Celtic violins and music she listened to when no one was looking; her new attention to nature, were all part of who she was, now and eternally.

"So, Cate's spirit still strives to be heard even two thousand years away."

Maeve nodded. "Catie is to become a very powerful Druid in her life, and not even death will be able to diminish her powers. You see, Jessie, it will fall upon Cate's shoulders to keep our memory alive. I came to Britannia to teach her how to do that, and how to become one of the greatest priestesses of her time. Catie will be talked about long after her corporeal form has vanished."

"That's a heavy burden and a gift wrapped in one package."

Maeve grinned slightly. "Is it?"

Staring at Cate, Jessie realized how intertwined their destinies were.

"Knowledge, Jessie, must always pre-empt action." Maeve's gray eyes were so mesmerizing, Jessie wondered if one could be hypnotized in a dream. "There is much for you to know . . . much more for you to learn in order to remember the vast amount of knowledge within you. But you must be patient, for some of those lessons will take years.

You must be open to all sorts of people, all different kinds of ideas, no matter how foreign or unfamiliar to you, because you may never know if the people you meet are questers seeking knowledge you possess."

Jessie nodded almost mechanically. "In California, I probably never would have given Madam Ceara a chance. I mean she-"

Maeve and Cate both looked so stricken, so pale, that Jessie stopped in mid-sentence. "What?"

"Who did you just say?" Maeve's eyes changed from gray to a bright blue in such a flash, Jessie wasn't sure she saw what she thought she saw.

"What was that name? That name you just said."

222 *223.

"Madam Ceara? She's the woman who has been helping me understand all of this." Jessie glanced over at Cate, whose mouth hung open and whose eyes were wide with surprise.

Maeve turned to Cate and they locked eyes, sharing words that need not be spoken. "Pray to the G.o.ddess. Can it be? She-she made it."

Cate murmured, "Unbelievable. We thought-"

"We obviously thought incorrectly. Something must have happened."

Jessie rose and jammed her hands on her hips. "What are you two talking about? Who made what? What happened?"

Maeve rose and stood closer to the fire. For a moment, Jessie thought she might be praying. When at last Maeve turned, tears brimmed in her eyes. "Of all the news you have brought to us this day, Jessie, that news will stun Lachlan the most."

"What news?"

Maeve looked down at Cate before turning her now gray eyes back to Jessie. "The news that his mother is alive and living in the twenty- first century."

Jessie's hand went up to her mouth as all of the innuendo, dropped sentences, and mysterious lines uttered by Ceara came at her all at once. Could it be? Could the woman she had trusted with her greatest secret truly have come from this age? "You don't mean-"

Maeve nodded. "Your Madam Ceara is Lachlan's mother."

When she came out of the room, she had no idea how much time had pa.s.sed, nor did she care. All she could think about was talking to Ceara.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Jessie asked the second she saw Ceara sitting on a small stepping stool outside the supply room. "How could you have kept something like that from me?"

Ceara rose and took Jessie by the arm. "It's been hours. We must be off."

"How could you not tell me?"

224 *225.

"We can talk about it at the beach house. A friend of mine is off visiting her mother and I am house-sitting. Let's go there and talk.

According to Tanner, your parents are still out of town, so you're safe for the time being. Tanner will let us know when they're on the way back."

"Tanner again? Who's he? Merlin?"

Ceara grinned softly. "Not quite, but I advise you never to underestimate him or his abilities."

"Abilities?" Jessie groaned. "Do I want to hear this?"

"Hush yourself, my dear. Hurry along now."

Jessie managed to keep quiet during the ride to the beach house owned by Ceara's friend. It was a high-ceiling palatial estate overlooking the ocean. Jessie surveyed the home and marveled at how beautiful it was. The great room overlooked the coast and had a cathedral ceiling giving the room an open-air feel.

"Would you like some tea?"