The clearing mist left me on the shore of a white river. The sun had just set recently allowing the foreign stars above to shine bright. Water rushed in a wide, and powerful torrent. If I slipped in I’d be dragged away to a watery grave. Under my feet water crept its way through pebbles. On my left was the river and on my right the rocks grew in size until they were as large as bowling balls. And further to my right was a great forest. Above the tree line in the distance cutting into the horizon with a large hill or small mountain.
Instantly I recognized the place even though I had never been there and stepped towards it at a fast pace.
OtherSean disappeared into the thick forest affirming my choice of direction.
Each step drew me closer, each step giving me more and more confidence. I made my way along a dirt path that wound between the trees. A thin layer of mist hovered just above the ground guiding me. After some time I stepped out of the forest and found myself at the precipice of the small mountain. The natural looking structure was made entirely of boulders placed atop one another. The smallest one was the size of the tank, while the rest were easily the size of basketball courts. At first it looked like a natural formation, but I knew that somehow these massive boulders had been placed one atop the other to create a fortress of cold unforgiving stone. Dim fire light flickered from within the crevices between the boulders revealing inhabitants within.
A breathless voice whispered in my mind.
Carrig-Cleena.
That was the name of the fortress. Somehow I knew it. I’d always known its name.
I felt no fear. I belonged there. Something within called to me, had been calling me this whole time, beckoning me into Tir na nOg. Not to mention OtherSean waited for me at the entrance. He stood, half turned peering into the mouth of the fortress, half turned to me. He seemed to know I was right on top of him, but this time he didn’t bolt.
I followed the dirt path right up to the base of the mountain into a cave-like entrance. I looked over OtherSean’s shoulder to see torches lighting the pathway inside. I waited for him to proceed but he didn’t. Reaching out, I tried to nudge his shoulder but my hand passed through him and he evaporated.
My head jerked from side to side trying to find him. Had I seen another me at all?
Who had I been following?
Wait.
Where was I?
Had I followed someone here?
Doubt crept along my spine.
I turned circles trying to pinpoint how I’d gotten here, wherever here even was.
Dang.
In my dream-like stupor I could not for the life of me remember.
The song that had not ceased, played on and I focused on the melody. It put me at ease again.
Crude stone steps descended basking under torchlight before me.
I entered the stone fortress.
Numerous pairs of yellow, orange, and red eyes stared at me from the darkness beyond the reach of the torchlight. The creatures hissed at me like feral cats but dared not approach while I had Jade and Fragarach at my disposal, not to mention the foreign power coursing through my veins.
After winding through the narrow cave-like hall, the pathway opened up to a massive room lit by more torches mounted high on the walls whose flames licked the scorched stone ceiling. In the dead center of the hall an opening in the ceiling of piled boulders allowed moonlight to spill into a natural pool of water. I could see now that the glowing eyes belong to hundreds of women who danced around the pool. Beyond at the back of the hall on a raised dais hewn out of the stone itself sat a crude throne.
Judging by the number of warriors that guarded the throne I could only surmise that this was the queen of the fortress, and the one who beckoned me with her sweet song.
Notes of some foreign minor melody fell from her lips. Her voice reverberated off the stone walls filling the room. It was even louder than the chants rising from the women, yet subtle, as if it cut through the physical plane entirely.
So engaging was the melody that it had beckoned me all the way from Earth to the Otherside. I had been summoned by the queen herself.
The queen’s skin stretched over her white cheekbones. She peered at me with blood orange eyes sunken in black eye sockets. Stark white hair with streaks of black fell down to her waist. The jawbone of some monster adorned her forehead as a makeshift tiara, complete with fangs pointing towards the sky. Though her body was merely flesh and bone, she stood with the undeniable strength that was apparent in the sound of her voice, her song. From the queen to the warriors, to the women dancing around the pool, the unifying look marked them all.
Other than the handful of male warriors guarding her throne, I was the only other male in the room. As I skirted the edge of the water the crowd of pale sickly women parted around me, no doubt aware of the aura of power I emitted.
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Despite me never having met one of them, I knew they feared me, for I had slain not one, but two of their kind. They were Banshees, and the woman before me on the throne was their queen.
The warriors descended from the queen’s side and surrounded me with spears made of bone. I reached for my sword hilts, but the queen rose from her throne and stepped down cold stone steps to meet me. As she neared me the melody of her song reached a crescendo and I reveled in the beauty of the dark motif.
My hands eased off my hilts and rested at my sides. She circled me in silence and I longed for that dark melody to continue as its echoes faded, my breathing now filled the void.
Faint torchlight mingled with moonlight, both danced across her bony face as the queen of banshees circled me.
“I entrusted two of my daughters to Donn the Red,” she said. Though she spoke in old Gaelic, a deep, dark part of me understood. “You are the opponent that slaughtered my two daughters.”
She said it is a fact, but I felt accused, guilty. I had no words, no excuses to give her. I had ended them both in violence.
A brash warrior leveled her spear my throat. “Do you fail to answer Queen Cliodhna when you stand accused?”
The Banshee queen held up a hand to her warrior and she backed down. “Do you think he simply walked into Carrig-Cleena, my fortress, without my knowing?”
Her guard hung her head.
Queen Cliodhna turned to me. “Nay. I summoned him. Though he is not one of us, our mark, our calling resides on him, and in him.”
She brought slender fingers up and traced my jawline and I resisted the urge to shudder.
“What are you known by?”
“Sean O’Farrell of the Bay Area.”
“Explain to me the circumstances under which you felled my daughters.”
I recounted the two tales to her, explaining that I had acted out of protection of myself the first time. The second time was out of vengeance. I was honest, I could not lie. But it pained me now, and I didn’t know why it had not brought me to sorrow earlier, that I dared to kill the daughters of Queen Cliodhna, Mistress of the Banshees.
She must have heard the sorrow in my voice for she offered me forgiveness. “Though your transgressions are great my son, you can be restored. A war wages around us, but also within you.”
She dipped her hand into the cold water, cupping a small amount of it. She beckoned me closer and urged me to gaze into her hands. The water, though clear had enough reflection for me to see my eyes staring back at me.
She commanded me with a whisper. “Drink.”
Awkward as it was, I lapped up the water out of her hands. Frigid liquid pierced my throat, burning as it went down. A violent cough erupted out of me.
“Do not fight it,” she encouraged.
The cold reached my chest and spread from there. It ran deep into my bones and I trembled.
She touched my chest, her hand resting on my Keening. A burning sensation filled me, the Keening at the epicenter. It was a good kind of burning like resting in front of a fireplace, or hot chocolate melting down your throat on a freezing day. Despite that, a look of disgust crossed Cliodhna’s face and she recoiled.
“There is great power within you, though it is of Order, but is there is great potential for you to serve Chaos, to be one of its strongest warriors.”
She guided me to peer into the larger pool then. My reflection peered up, but his pale hands rested against the water’s surface, as if he were locked behind a liquid glass wall. He pressed closer to the surface, not looking at me as any normal reflection should, but gazed with longing at Queen Cliodhna, his eyes black inside sunken sockets.
It happened so quick, too fast for me to catch myself. Her clawed hands shoved me and I fell like a fighter that had been KOed into the dark pool, my reflection coming up to meet me face to face.
My arms flailed struggling to stay above the water but another pair of hands clasped my wrists in an iron grip. We struggled spinning head over heels in the murky depths. I lost all sense of up and down, survival my only thought. A clenched fist pummeled my face over and over. With each strike my thoughts few more clouded.
Strike.
Punch.
Elbow.
I pulled my fist back and haymakered the reflection that held me down, that had tried in vain to suppress me. He hung limp under my grasp and floated up to the surface.
Then I crawled out of the water a new man.
Water drops rained from my soaked hair. I brushed a milky white strand out of my eyes.
“Rise anew, my pale champion. Cast off the chains of Sean O’Farrell that shackle you no longer.”
I stood as if for the first time on legs that wobbled. Out of the corner of my dark eyes I spied movement in the dark pool. My reflection changed now. A redheaded Sean pounded the surface of the water, his eyes burning emerald, seething hatred at me and my queen. Ripples raced across the water’s edge every time he struck the surface. His jaw flapped as he yelled beneath the pool, but the queen and I had locked him in a watery tomb from which no sound could escape.
She turned my chin to face her with a bony finger. Her eyes were void of pupils, only blood-saffron bulbs stared back at me. Before I could react or recoil she leaned in and planted a long kiss on my lips. I reveled in that passionate, dry kiss. When she pulled away she had to push me back gently to keep me from her pale cracked lips.
The burning in my lips brought fire to my eyes. I blinked, opening them again and they blazed with blood orange devotion.
“Sean O’Farrell is dead. You are my pale shadow, Asen Scáth.”
She turned her back on me and ascended the steps to her throne. She spoke again as she turned and seated herself. “Find and fight the goddess Brigid. Harm her and you will be forgiven. Slay her and I will make you my right hand and give you this army of daughters to lead, my son. For now, take these two.” She motioned and two Banshees clad in light leather armor and armed with bone spears stepped forward, flanking my sides.
“I’ve no need of them. I’ll handle Brigid myself.”
My queen’s lips twitched, but she nodded.
I nodded back and resisted a grin that wanted to spread across my face. I didn’t want to seem too eager, but anticipation filled me as I considered the kindness of my Queen that she would even offer me a second chance, that she trusted me to confront one of her enemies. A goddess, no less.
“I will bring you her head if I can.”