The Witch: Book Two of The Sorceress Saga by Taliesin Govannon (top 10 novels of all time .txt) 📗

                “The circle is about us,” Raina announced, “and the Lord, Lady, and ancestors are here with us. Let us now work the Old Ways!”

                “So mote it be!” I cried next.

                “So mote it be!” everyone else said back.

                “The Horned One walks these woods.” I said, walking the inner ring around the fire. “While the Goddess dwells with the ancestors beneath the slumbering earth. It is the time for the sun to be reborn, so that the earth may warm and new life may spring anew. The mystery of how the Lady may give birth to the new sun even as she rests in the lands beyond is the eternal mystery of new life arising in the shadow of death, and though it mystifies it also consoles, for it shows that life is truly eternal and unstoppable!”

                “So mote it be!” called Raina.

                “So mote it be!” answered all assembled.

                “Great Horned One!” Raina called out. “You who move in our bodies as they move, and who calls to us in the lust for living and life that springs unbidden in our hearts and loins, we do call to you again! Come and give us visions of the year to come… open our inner eyes so that we may truly see!”

                I looked, and an odd glow seemed to settle on to the assembled celebrants. As I watched, the glow started to warp and move on a few people while leaving everyone else alone. Raina, Gaia, Tiffany, and Katsu all morphed until it looked like the energy was in the outlines of stag antlers on their heads.

                Okay Lady Arianrhod, what does THIS mean? I wondered.

                Later, once all of the visions were over and we were relaxing around the fire, I lit my second post-ritual joint. Our closing ritual was easy enough to do in full blackout mode, so we were already kicking back.

                “What kind of visions did everyone get?” I asked.

                “I saw Raina, Gaia, Tiffany, and my girlfriend with funky looking antlers on their heads.” Jack said quickly.

                “That’s not what I had.” Katsu said quickly. “I saw what you guys would call ‘the Horned God’. He had a cup, and he offered it to me.”

                “What was in it?” asked Jack.

                “I don’t know.” Katsu replied. “It smelled like… courage. Peace. So I drank.”

                “I saw the same thing.” Tiffany said. “Mine smelled like… love. I drank too.”

                “I saw the horns.” Evelyn piped up next.

                “I saw the Horned God.” Raina said. “My cup smelled like coffee… of course I drank it!”

                We laughed and continued sharing our visions. There were only two… Raina, Gaia, Tiffany, and Katsu saw the Horned God offering a cup, and the four of them drinking. Jack, Evelyn, and I all saw the horns grow on their heads.

                “So what does that mean?” Jack asked.

                “I think it’s obvious.” Tiffany said, lighting up her own joint. “The four of us… Katsu, Gaia, Raina, and I… we’re protectors. Like Herne, the Horned One. We’ve been given the sacred charge of protecting the Sorceress.”

                “And how much experience with Wicca do you have?” Raina asked, grinning.

                “Over a decade.” Tiffany replied. “Half of the people in my Uncle’s employ are Wiccan. It’s a religion that doesn’t freak out around the paranormal.”

                “So we’re what,” Gaia said, “Annabelle’s antler-buddies?”

                Katsu pulled her sleeve up to reveal a brown stain on her skin in the shape of a stag’s head, antlers to the sky. “Uh, guys… “

                Tiffany, Gaia, and Raina pulled their sleeves up to reveal identical stag-shaped marks.

                “Welcome, sisters,” Raina said, “to the Order of the Stag.”

                                                                                                *                *                *

                “There is, of course, plenty of historical precedent.” Angelique said. “Many past Sorceresses have had a court about them of trusted friends and sworn allies. The most stable ones, actually.”

                We all sat around the parlor, few of us feeling the need to be right up on the fire. Many of us kept smoking, the air growing thick with sweet-smelling smoke.

                “It’s really nothing to worry about.” Vincent concurred. “Though the shared marking is new. It makes me wonder what’s coming.”

                “We're going to take this seriously." Raina said. "We've already decided to re-examine the security plan for the grounds and re-formulate it to reflect a new, shared approach."

                Tiffany, Gaia, and Katsu all nodded.

                “I understand what it is to be chosen.” Katsu said, nodding to her sister Hatsu.

                “Indeed,” Hatsu continued, “If Katsu has been chosen by your Horned God for this, then our own Gods must have allowed it. We will not question their judgment.”

                “I’m just amazed that your ass didn’t get caught up in all this!” Trevor said to Evelyn.

                “I was willing.” Evelyn shrugged. “I just wasn’t chosen.”

                “Well, I just texted Uncle Jex,” Tiffany said, putting her phone down, “and he’s thrilled, of course. Said that he’d send any tactical gear we needed.”

                “Ooh!" Katsu exclaimed. "Can I get one of those bulletproof bodysuits?"

                “Or at least the deploying mechanisms?” Gaia asked next. “I have something better than Kevlar, and it’s in colors other than black!”

                “Now you’re talking my language!” Raina said, and the meeting broke up.

                As I was walking out, Angelique stopped me with a look.

                “You’ve been avoiding me.” she said. It wasn’t an accusation, more a statement of fact.

                “You’re right.” I replied, choosing the easiest course of action.

                “I take it that it wasn’t something I said?” she asked, her head tilted.

                “Not in this life, no.” I answered. “I just… I have a lot to process, what with our… extensive past. I can only really process so much in a healthy way at once, and when I’m around you it’s all I can think about. So I’ve been getting some distance.”

                “You know,” she said, smiling, “I think that you’re more intelligent and mature in this incarnation than in any other life we’ve spent together.”

                Of all