The Dark Witch And Her Knights

47

Taking in the naked and strung-up Belenos it was difficult to contain our laughter. "Guess he was telling the truth," Tovias surmised after searching his entire nakedness, absent of a hunter's mark.

"Maybe." Taking a rather thin plank of wood off the floor I began spanking Belenos' rump. "Wake up you austere bastard." After the second hit, he was wide awake and struggling in his binds. His glare was like fire when he looked at me. "Here's how this is going to go. The absence of a hunter's mark does not make you innocent. So start from the beginning and tell us what you want and what you are. We no not of seers."

"I came to deliver an important message. And this is how you treat one with the same plight?" he breathed between clenched teeth.

"Do they hang your kind on every corner bare of a body?" I didn't give him the chance to respond. I already knew the answer. "No. I don't think so!"

"Of course not, because we're all enslaved to the Beldams in their damn Tower to the north." He yanked against his binds trying to break free.

"Tell me about these Beldams. I've heard of them a time or two before."

"Only if you promise to free me from these ropes." His face grew more flushed the longer he struggled.

"I promise to free you." Expectantly he glared at me waiting for release.

"When I feel like it." I sneered.

"For god's sake, woman!" I flinched at the mention of the holy lord. "At least cover my cock and spare me some humility. The indecency. You are my Queen."

Using the point of my shoe I kicked up his soiled cream shirt and flung it over his waist covering his junk. The look he gave me was one of pure antipathy. "You should know my kind is not far off from your own. A coven of witches cultivated and bred by Beldam decrees to produce the strongest seers. Tools for their craft. As babes, they snatch us from the arms of our mothers and steal us away to the Tower of Caelum. We can not cast the simplest of spells but some of us can predict futures hundreds of years to come. Some can even change destiny."

"Yet you could not see the Beldam enslaving your kind?"

"They are a great force, wicked and hidden by the devil himself from the all-seeing eyes of the seers."

"And how did you escape the Tower?"

"At the cost of a dear friend's life, I fought my way out. I have seen what awaits us under Beldam claw and fang. This story shall end one of two ways and neither of those paths are pleasant. The crones have tampered with destiny. And without the deliverance of the prophecy, I fear they have already set you down the path that will destroy our kind."

"How?" I didn't mean to ask. I didn't even want to know.

"Arbor." My hand came over my heart clutching at the remnants of the curse I had been freed from. The ache was just a memory but I know deep down I fell in love with that man. That's why I ached. "It was never supposed to be him. It was always meant to be someone else. They cursed both of you to force the prophecy to move faster. Everything is different now."

"We already suspected the Beldams were the only ones powerful enough to place such a curse on either of us. Tell me something I don't know."

"When the vermillion moon lights the night,

a new queen shall rise with eyes of velvet skies.

With the power to hold those from death,

and the will to create those new.

She will walk the gifted threw the arms of death,

to wake in the hands of the ancient world of mysticism.

A true silver path to lead our kind to an age of peace.

A shadow path drowning all in a spell of devastation.

For one is kind and true, the other a disguise meant to trick you."

The silence was deafening. The only sound was the bustle of the harbor outside, the caw of seagulls flying by, and the crash of the surf against the shore. My hands trembled and for the first time, the prophecy had been spoken to me. Tovias wrapped a hand around my unsteady one. Bringing it up to his lips he brushed a kiss against my knuckles calming the shakiness there.

It was too soon when Belenos opened his mouth and started speaking again, "They wanted Arbor and you to sire an heir. An heir they knew would be the most powerful warlock born in centuries. And they would have stolen him just like the others." Tears were pricking my eyes. "They saw it in the mirror. After they cursed you, I was forced to show them what a future with him looked like. I saw the child."

"Stop it." It was an order.

"Onyx hair,"

"Stop it."

"and marked like a seer. Do you know how you can tell if a baby will be a witch or a seer? It's in the eyes. Like the eyes, your son would have had."

"Stop it."

"One green. One Purple. He would have been both."

I lashed out. Tovias released me as I lunged slapping Belenos across the face. His skin instantly swelled and reddened. The imprint of my hand marring his cheek. "We are done here." I stormed from the room not knowing what to do. I was completely lost in thought and one thing kept coming to the surface. It stunted my steps. Belenos should die here and now with my secrets. "Tovias."

"Yes, Mistress."

I wanted to tell him to end Belenos, to blind him, or to cut out his tongue but I couldn't. Something wouldn't let me. "Leave him. He should have seen his fate coming here." I continued walking out of the bar.

Belenos began to cackle.

"Maybe the rats will eat his junk before he frees himself."

"I can only hope."

Tovias jogged past me to stand before the carriage door before I could get in. He stared at me for a moment before shaking his head. Taking my hand in his he kissed the palm I used to slap Belenos with. "Next time you shall not soil such beautiful hands tolling out punishments I would take sheer pleasure in doing for you."

I grinned. "I too enjoy dealing out punishment."

"Then I will take great care in healing any wounds you cause yourself." He stepped aside and opened the carriage door for me.