Page 41 of A Dance with the Fae (Mistress of Magic #1)

‘In the castle of Murias, the cup is its magical symbol and greatest treasure,’ Levantiana said, watching Faye’s face as she admired its beauty.

Now, she waved a censer of sweet-smelling incense over the top of the chalice. ‘Pay attention.’

It was two weeks later and Faye’s second magic lesson, and she was keen to learn more.

What Levantiana had already taught her was incredible.

She’d had no idea that the wand was capable of so much.

As soon as she’d returned home, she’d taken the Morgan wand out of the locked cabinet and practised summoning water.

It was more difficult, outside Murias, as Faye was literally out of the element.

But it still worked. Faye had managed to make it rain inside the shop, though she had stopped it almost immediately when she’d realised it was going to ruin all of the shop stock.

As Faye gazed obediently into the chalice, where images formed and bled into each other as the candlelight flickered on the water, Levantiana chanted strange words in Scots Gaelic and something shifted.

The perspective in the room changed, yet, as she looked around, the room was at normal proportions; it was the chalice that had grown and was suddenly impossibly large, and she found herself inside it as if she was in a deep golden pool.

It made Faye think of Alice in Wonderland for a moment.

The water was cold but not freezing; her clothes had disappeared and the water covered her naked shoulders as she stood with her feet on the bottom of the… cup? pool? – she didn’t know.

Levantiana stood outside of the chalice and stretched into it, pulling her wand over the surface of the water.

‘ Mar sin tha deuchainn an uisge cuideachd na leigheas air; mar sin tha draoidheachd an uisge. So is the test of water also the healing of it; so is the magic of water ,’ she intoned, in Gaelic and then English, and drew a seven-pointed star on the top of the water.

As she did so, the star lit up in blue and Faye felt the temperature of the water change, warming to something more pleasant than the initial cold.

‘See your power on the surface of the water,’ Levantiana instructed, as images and sequences, symbols and faces came up as if from the bottom of the chalice, breaking onto the skin of the water like drowning faces fighting for air.

Faye stepped back, horrified at the effect, but Levantiana held her shoulders and forced her to stay where she was.

‘No,’ she said, firm but not unkind. ‘You must do this. To have the power of Murias, you must accept your shadow and heal it. Our power is different to that which you have been taught, but you must welcome it in. You must integrate your fae and human selves to have the power you desire. You have already met some of your shadow in Murias. You know of what I speak.’ Levantiana gave her a meaningful stare, and Faye felt herself blush.

She knew what the faerie queen meant: her behaviour with Finn.

Playing the slut. The whore. The concubine.

Faye’s relationship with Finn was complicated.

It was not consensual. He had abducted her to faerie and kept her drugged with the magic of his touch, so that she forgot the outside world and wanted only to submit to him.

The sexual things they had done together were outside the frame of her usual experience.

But she had enjoyed it. She had derived a dark thrill of joy in letting go and allowing him to pleasure her.

On the surface of the water the faces were becoming familiar.

They were women’s faces, and, Faye realised, they bore a common resemblance to hers.

She watched as the features morphed from one woman to another: sometimes a longer nose, sometimes the hair a different colour or style, but all of them somehow similar.

She recoiled from them, feeling haunted, but she took a deep breath and gave herself over to it.

It wasn’t until Grandmother’s face blended into Moddie’s and then hers that she realised she was seeing her ancestors, an unbroken line of Morgan women, stretching through the years like a ribbon unrolled. Her voice caught in her throat.

‘Oh…I…’ She didn’t know what to say, and felt tears welling up in her eyes.

‘Don’t fight it. This is your magic. Take it.’ Levantiana’s hands on her shoulders felt more like support rather than restriction now, and Faye was grateful for them.

In the water, the Morgan women clustered around Faye, wanting to be acknowledged. Wanting to give her something of themselves. Each one held out a gift, and she knew that she had to take them all, even the things she didn’t want to receive.

Some of the women held out bones and skulls.

Some held spheres of light or swirling darkness.

Some gave her plants and flowers; some handed her crude figures that appeared to be crafted from mud and old pieces of cloth, or swatches from their dresses.

Everything she took was made of water and disappeared as soon as she held it, but she had the sense that she retained all the gifts somehow; each was like a memory, firmly committed into her ancestry.

Each Morgan woman said something to her: their voices were real, not imagined.

‘I give you my knowledge of herbs.’

‘I give you my psychic ability.’

‘I give you my insight.’

‘I give you my kindness.’

Many of the gifts were beautiful. Faye felt them enrich her soul.

But there were as many women that gave her awful, terrible gifts that made her heavier, darker, sadder.

‘I give you my pain.’

‘I give you my hopelessness.’

‘I give you my loss.’

She took it all, going around and around in the chalice until she had taken everything the women had to give. And then, she stood at the centre of the cup, facing Grainne Morgan.

‘To you I give my bravery. You are no man’s whore, and no man’s servant. Faerie or otherwise,’ Grainne said to her. ‘Your desires are not wrong. Your desire in whatever form it takes is your power. But do not give yourself to anyone who would treat you less than a queen, dear daughter.’

Faye nodded. She remembered the moment she had witnessed Grainne curse the people who had lashed her to the stake for being a witch.

Confess, and ye shall go to your death godly. Not as the Devil’s whore , the man had said to her as she stood defiantly in front of the crowd . I am no whore. I am Grainne Morgan, Beloved of the Good Folk! she had replied, and the faerie had spirited her away.

‘Are you here, too?’ Faye asked Grainne. ‘In Murias? Like Moddie?’

‘No, child. I was there for a while, healing, but then the fae took me to my rest. I was a friend of Murias, and it was a friend to me, then. But times have changed. You must be careful now. The faerie kings are corrupt. He would own you, and a Morgan woman will never be owned,’ Grainne replied.

‘I will be careful,’ Faye said.

Grainne took both of her hands in hers. ‘I am with you,’ she replied.

Finally, Faye stood face to face with her grandmother and her mother.

Moddie. Grandmother.

Tears started rolling down Faye’s cheeks as the two people she had loved most in the world walked out of the mist and materialised in front of her.

‘Hello, my darling girl,’ Moddie said, and enveloped Faye in a hug.

‘I cannot stay long. But I give you my love for always, which you already had. And I give you a gift of protection.’ Moddie handed her a small silver charm; it looked like it was from a charm bracelet.

It was in the shape of a kelpie: a water horse.

‘Like poison heals in small proportions, this protects against that which it represents,’ Moddie said, pressing the charm into Faye’s hand. ‘You know of whom I speak. Wear this around your neck and he will not be able to take you. I love you, always.’

Moddie started to fade away.

‘Mum. No!’ Faye cried out, but Moddie was gone as soon as she had come. A terrible ache of loss filled Faye’s heart. ‘Please. Come back,’ she said, like a child. ‘Please.’

Faye turned to her grandmother.

‘Grandmother. I have missed you,’ she said.

‘I miss you too, but I am with you. In the grimoire,’ Grandmother answered. ‘I give you knowledge. Knowledge is power, my love.’ She kissed Faye on the cheek. ‘Do not be sad, child. We are all with you, now. Forever.’

They all stepped forward, then, into her.

It was disorienting, terrifying and beautiful at the same time; Faye heard Levantiana’s voice in the distance telling her to ‘accept, just accept this’.

‘We were always with you,’ they said, the mothers and grandmothers who had helped shape every single part of who Faye was.

Whose breath was in her lungs, whose blood ran in her veins, whose weaknesses and strengths were hers.

They surrounded her in circles, four or five deep and radiating out, outside of the chalice and into the walls of the castle.

Faye had the sense that the mothers went on forever, and that from now on they would always be watching over her, loving her, supporting her so she would never feel lonely again.

She felt their embraces and closed her eyes, secure in the love of her grandmothers.

It had always been there, waiting: Levantiana had merely shown her the way.

And she was only dimly aware of Levantiana snapping her fingers, making the chalice shrink back to its ordinary size on the altar, returning Faye back to normal, standing beside her in the faerie castle.