Daniel shrugged, not looking at her. "Only if you"re doing drugs again." Now, he looked up at her. "Are you?"
Jessie squatted down now so she could be eye-to-eye with him. "No, Daniel, I am not."
"Swear?"
Jessie held up the hand with the spoon in it. "I swear. I"m done with drugs forever, Daniel; at least, the illegal kind."
"But where were you then?"
"I was hanging out with this lady who tells people"s fortunes."
"What"s she like?"
"Well . . . she"s very wise. She knows a lot of things about people and places. Oh, and she lives on a boat. We sat and chatted, and because she was burning incense, Mom and Dad think I was smoking dope."
"What does incense have to do with marijuana?"
Jessie took a big spoonful herself and closed her eyes as she savored it. "Not important."
Daniel shrugged. "My friends say everyone in town calls the inn the Haunted Money Pit."
Lowering her spoon, Jessie nodded. "I"ve heard. Does that bother you?"
"Sort of. I mean, not the money part, but the haunted part. They said if I didn"t believe them, I could go to some historical society or something. I forgot. I guess there"ve been things written about this house because she"s a painted lady or something. They say this house has been cursed forever."
"Well, we"re here and we need to make the best of it, whether the house is cursed, haunted, or just a stupid old money pit."
Daniel grinned, a drop of ice cream stuck to his chin. "Does that mean you"re going to stay? I wake up every morning wondering if you"re going to still be here. The whole time you were in that place, *
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Mom and Dad treated me weird. It was a b.u.mmer."
That place had always been what Daniel had called the rehab center she"d been sent to. He saw it as some sort of evil ent.i.ty that took his sister away for a couple of weeks. "Well, there"s no rehab for me, and I"m not going anywhere until after school gets out. By that time, you"ll have so many new friends, you won"t even know I"m gone."
Daniel looked at her and shook his head. "I"d always know."
Jessie dug into the half-empty pint of ice cream. "You know, this place is beginning to grow on me, so don"t you worry any more about whether I"m going to stay, okay?"
Nodding, Daniel sc.r.a.ped the bottom of the ice cream pint and finished it all. "Okay. But I think you"re wrong about those noises I hear. Do you believe in ghosts?"
Jessie sighed. "I"m not sure what I believe in anymore." As she started out the door, Jessie could only think about that gray-eyed woman somewhere across time. "Daniel, what would you do if the voices you hear were asking for your help?"
Daniel swung his feet into the bed and leaned against the wall. "You mean, if I could understand them and they needed me to do something for them?"
"Yeah. What would you do?"
Daniel thought about it a moment before shrugging. "I"d help them out, I guess."
"Why?"
"Because it"d be cool to talk to ghosts and because I think we should help people who need us. Don"t you?"
It was at that moment, at the urging of an innocent little boy, that Jessie committed herself to doing whatever it was that needed to be done. She would go back through the portal, and this time, when she returned, she would remember.
The next morning, Jessie busied herself with painting and weeding, just waiting for the moment when her parents would have to go into town. She felt a sick delight knowing she"d been restricted to the very *
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place she actually wanted to be. Once they were gone, she took the keys off the hook and made her way quickly up to the third floor, where, sure enough, there stood the numberless door.
Jessie stood and stared at it for a moment. Behind that door was a world she knew nothing about, except that someone needed her.
Sliding the big skeleton key in the door, she felt a surge of adrenaline. She was excited and trembling with antic.i.p.ation. Now, if only she could remember where she was going and what she was seeing, she could understand and appreciate whatever it was she was supposed to be doing.
Opening the door, Jessie was not surprised to see the forest before her. She stepped into the room which immediately transformed from an old, dusty bedroom to the oak grove she had seen before. Glancing down at her clothes, she was no longer surprised to be wearing the white hooded robe. Looking about her, she recognized this as the Sacred Place, but she couldn"t remember . . .
Remember.
Cate gathered her robe around her and quickly made her way through the forest. She"d been gone longer than she realized. The dawn was breaking through the trees and there was no bonfire to guide her.
Still, she knew these woods better than she knew the paths of Fennel because she had grown up in them. It was here, with her brother, Liam, where she learned how to wield the long sword and to protect herself with a shield. Liam had been such a wonderful brother and she ached for him daily. He, more than anyone she knew, would understand why she was doing what had to be done.
No, he hadn"t understood her decision to become a Druid priestess, but that was because he"d half-convinced her that she would be a warrior by his side. That women fought battles next to their brothers, sons and husbands, was one of the anomalies that puzzled the Romans occupying much of Britannia; for Roman women had no rights like those of the Silurians, the Ordovices, and the Iceni, not to mention all of the women in Alba. Cate did not wish to think about the oppressive customs of the people who were now governing most of the country.
The Romans did not understand them, and they never would. The *
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Romans were a people who conquered and turned whole societies into Roman culture. It had been their way for hundreds of years, and only Britannia had managed to resist.
But times were changing, and the Roman governor Suetonius Paulinus wanted to make a name for himself by conquering the people who had managed, thus far, to preserve their own traditions and customs even in the midst of Roman occupation. He was a danger to them all, in particular to the Druids, whom he saw as a threat to his power. Liam had paid the ultimate price in protecting Fennel from Roman occupation, as did many other young men who saw themselves as the protectorate of the Silurians. He had died for his beliefs, and oh, how she had grieved his death. Not a day went by that she didn"t think about him.
As she came to the clearing, she saw Maeve and Lachlan sitting and leaning against two large boulders which had stood there for hundreds, if not thousands of years. Both were sound asleep, and Cate suddenly felt the exhaustion that had come over her the first time she had slipped through.
Lying next to Maeve, Cate closed her eyes and instantly fell asleep.
The dream that came to her was far more than fantasy. In it, a young red-haired girl struggled beneath the weight of a truth that someone older and wiser than she would be able to grasp. In it, she saw herself, at least as a young woman, trying desperately to recall memories from the temple of her soul. But this was such a different world than Cate"s world. Dishonesty, distrust, corruption and a complete lack of morals and ethics pervaded this culture. Had it learned nothing from the past?
People no longer lived in clans, but were separated from each other with walls and fences, religion and race, money and poverty. It was sad, really, how advanced a people could be and yet, still manage to maintain their barbaric ways. So much had changed and so little had changed, at least from what she could tell from the meager memories of a seventeen-year-old. While the physical environment had certainly changed, people still condemned that which they did not understand, races could not cohabitate peacefully together, and the wealthy still made their own rules. How odd that so much time would go by and *
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there be so little change in the soul of mankind.
With one huge exception.
The many G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses who guided her and her fellow Druids had been replaced by the G.o.d of the Jews and the man some called Jesus. He had been just another victim of Roman persecution, but in the future, he was the only G.o.d Cate could see. What had happened to Brigit, Danu and Morgan? What had happened to the Norse G.o.ds, to the Romans" own Venus and Apollo? What catastrophe had occurred that people relinquished their deities to one G.o.d?
In her sleep, Cate shivered.
It was no wonder then, that the body housing her soul so far into the future should feel so hollow, so disengaged, and so very, very alone.
The young girl wasn"t even remotely connected to the land. No one was.
The land had been used up, annihilated, as it were. It was no wonder the people were so miserable; they had lost their G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses and had no reverence for the life-giving, life-sustaining land.
Cate could feel Jessie"s spirit reaching out to the land, whether it was a conscious act or not. She was beginning to notice the smell of pine, the scent of the salty sea air, and the feel of sand beneath her feet.
Somewhere in the back of Jessie"s mind, she was beginning to remember who she was. Some of Cate"s pa.s.sions were coming through to Jessie now, whether Jessie knew it or not. The thought delighted Cate. Jessie was beginning to remember. She would be fine. They would connect in the Dreamworld, and Maeve would be saved.
Maeve.
Would Jessie remember? Would she feel within her the eternal love and lasting friendship that had endured all these years? Would Jessie be able to comprehend a time when caring for others was more important than meeting your own needs?
Cate could only hope so.
Sitting up slowly, Cate brushed off the last vestiges of her dream, along with several dry sticks and twigs, only to find Maeve and Lachlan staring at her in antic.i.p.ation.
"You"re back," Maeve said softly. Reaching out, she pulled a dried leaf from Cate"s hair.
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Cate nodded. "I had to rest. It is very tiring to go through the portal."
"You were talking in your sleep," Maeve explained, cutting a hard look to the impatient Lachlan. No one but Maeve could still the head Druid with a look. "Do you remember your dream?"
Cate sat up a bit more, her robe askew. "It was no dream, Maeve. It was a memory in the form of a dream."
"Are you certain?"
Cate nodded. "I am."
"Was it a dream of Jessie"s?"
Cate"s eyes grew wide. "Yes!"
"You spoke her name. She is a she?"
Cate nodded. "Yes."
Lachlan bit his lip so hard, it nearly bled, but he managed to still his tongue.
Maeve glanced over at Lachlan and shook her head. "We will not pressure her, Lachlan. That was our compromise long ago. If she needs to eat-"
"No, Maeve. I can tell you along the way." Rising, Cate readjusted her robe, but left her hood off. "The future is a hardened place with little joy. The G.o.ddesses are all gone, there are no ties to the earth, and people appear to be caught up in this whirlwind of trade and ownership. They seem almost enslaved by things. It is odd to feel Jessie"s thoughts of things. She is-she does not quite belong."
Maeve and Lachlan exchanged glances. "So, you are remembering?"
Lachlan said, hope in his voice.
Sending forth a successful quester had been his sole purpose these past ten years. He had been searching for a Druid who could go into the future to save them from the destruction that his mother had foreseen. She had known it, had known it for a very long time, but Lachlan had never hoped, never imagined he would find their answer in the likes of Cate. He had always thought it would be Maeve; she was the most powerful of them all, but even she did not have the power that Cate had shown. He had found the one who could do what even his mother had failed to do.
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"She is very young, our girl. I do not know that she is-that I am-Oh-but this is all so very confusing."
Lachlan reached out and gingerly took Cate"s hand. It was the gentlest gesture he had ever made toward her. "Think of them as memories shared from a friend. The house for your soul is different in every time, during every age, but your memories remain with your eternal soul. This Jessie is you, but there are so many memories your spirit has gathered from the you that exists now to the you that existed then."
Maeve nodded. "Think of her as a sister. Once she remembers you and her destiny, this will not feel so strange or awkward."
Cate studied the sunlight as it streamed through the leaves of the great oaks onto the grove floor. She wondered if Jessie appreciated the beauty of the sun, the peacefulness of the forest, the strength of the eagle"s call. She hoped so. She hoped that, somewhere in the far reaches of Jessie"s spirit, she could recall a time when the earth was sacred and powerful.
"You do not understand, Lachlan. I am there, inside her, but I am invisible. The people of her time are so completely dispirited, so devoid of any connection to nature and to themselves, that they cannot hear their past memories. Jessie cannot connect, at least not on her own."
Cate frowned, thinking about her dream. "But there is a sage working with her."
Lachlan and Maeve said in unison, "A sage?"
Cate nodded and shielded her eyes from the sun. Something with ephemeral wings hovered just outside the sunbeam. "I believe that is her role. She is helping Jessie understand. I believe she is a seer."
"This woman-does she know what is happening?"
Shrugging, Cate tried to ignore the growling in her stomach. "I am unsure what she knows, but she is very wise and very patient. Her presence is a strong one."
Lachlan nodded. "The future has lost our G.o.ddesses, yet retained seers? Do the villages hold her in high regard?"
"Oh no, not at all. They believe her to be addled, but then, there is little belief in anything of any import."
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Maeve draped her arm across Cate"s shoulders. "You remember much this day."
Cate nodded. "It was the dream. I believe my spirit opens up to hear and see those things I experience when I go to Jessie"s world; a world that values possessions over all else. It is a cold, black void, that future."
They walked through the forest toward the center of town, each wrapped in a cloak of their own thoughts until Maeve quietly asked, "Catie, when you return to the Sacred Place and carry within you your soul"s memory those parts of Jessie"s life, do you feel her within you?"
"You mean, do I bring her back with me?"
Both looked to Lachlan for an explanation of both the question and the answer. He lowered his hood and stared at one and then the other.
"Cate"s soul exists in this time with her body. It remembers the future because we sent her soul to retrieve information that could save us.