“Don’t open your eyes yet. It’s easier for your body to re-accustom itself if you keep them closed and rest.”
Again, that elusive familiarity in his voice.
“Drink this—it will help.” I kept my eyes screwed shut while a strong hand helped raise me into a half-sitting position so that I could sip a warm, sweet mixture. I drank slowly, willing my stomach to stay still. When the mug was empty, I fell back against the pillow, exhausted by the small effort.
“Rest,” the voice said. “Everything’s okay. You’re home.”
As enshrouding sleep covered me, I realized that it was ClanFintan who was speaking, only his voice sounded odd. I struggled to stay conscious and understand what it was that was different about him, but my eyes were too heavy. Sleep won the battle.
Coffee…the smell tickled my senses, bringing to mind sleepy Saturday mornings when I used to brew a fresh pot of dark breakfast beans and lace it (liberally) with Irish Cream before retiring back to bed with my steaming mug and a good book.
But Partholon didn’t have any coffee.
Memory rushed back with my swift intake of breath. My eyes opened and my vision swam. I blinked and rubbed my eyes, disturbed by the weakness of my muscles as they sluggishly obeyed my orders.
The only light in the cabin came from a low-burning fire within a hearth built in the wall directly across from my bed. I looked around, being careful not to make any sudden movements with my head—scared I would throw my body into another revolt. It appeared to be one large room, which served as a bedroom with a kind of den area partitioned off in front of the fire by two cozily situated rocking chairs which had little whatnot tables standing next to each one. Each table held a modern version of an old-time kerosene lamp, though neither was lit. There was a book opened, facedown, beside the nearest rocker. I could see that there was some kind of loft above my head and another room to my far left divided from the rest of the cabin by a wall. That’s where the coffee smell was wafting from—must be the kitchen. The shuffle of tired feet echoed from that vicinity, seeming to come closer. I braced myself.
And ClanFintan walked around the wall.
I must have made some kind of wounded sound, because he jerked, almost spilling the liquid in his mug. Then his handsome face broke into a smile that was ghostly in its familiarity.
“Are you feeling better?” he asked.
I understood now why his voice had seemed so familiar yet at the same time so odd. It was his voice—ClanFintan’s voice. But it was devoid of the power of a centaur’s lungs and the musical lilt of a Partholonian accent.
“Where am I?” My gravelly voice was flat and emotionless.
Still smiling, he set his mug down on the small table and approached my bed. I couldn’t help shrinking back into the pillows. He must have noticed, because he stopped several paces away from the edge of the bed.
“You’re home, Shannon.”
“And just where the hell do you think home is?”
His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Oklahoma,” he said, and his matter-of-fact voice severed my heart from my body.
I could feel the blood draining from my face, and the room abruptly began to spin.
“No!” I whispered, and slammed my eyes closed, willing the room to be still. After taking several deep breaths, I reopened them to see he had moved toward me. “Don’t come any closer!” I snapped.
He stopped, holding his hands out in a peaceful offering. “I won’t hurt you, Shannon.”
“How the hell do you know my name?” My voice shook with the effort to keep my stomach and the room still.
“That’s a complex story…” He hesitated.
“I want an answer.” I was glad my voice no longer wavered.
He hesitated.
“How do you know my name,” I repeated slowly and distinctly, turning the question into a declarative sentence as only an English teacher can do.
“Rhiannon told me,” he said with obvious reluctance.
“Rhiannon!” The name came out as a curse. My eyes flitted around the room, expecting her to leap from one of the shadowy corners.
“No! Not here,” he said consolingly. “She’s back in Partholon where she belongs.” He sounded pleased with himself.
I locked my eyes with his and spoke through gritted teeth, “She does not belong in Partholon. It is my home. He is my husband. They are my people.”
“But—” he looked confused “—I thought everything would be okay if I just re-exchanged the two of you…” His voice trailed off.
Purposefully I sat up straighter and swung my legs over the side of the bed. Looking down at myself, I saw that I was wearing nothing but a man’s pajama top, and I scowled up at him.
“Where are my friggin clothes?”
“I—” he stuttered “—they’re—”
“Oh, never mind. Just give me some pants and my boots and take me wherever it is you made the switch, and switch us back.”
He opened his mouth to answer me, and the ring of a phone interrupted him. Its sound was a bizarre jar to my senses, which had accustomed themselves to Partholon’s technology-free lifestyle. It rang again, and he regained movement in his legs, hurrying over to a portable phone that rested in a row of shelves built into the wall beside the fireplace.
“Hello,” he said, keeping his eyes on me. Then he blinked and stepped back as if he had received a blast of fire from the receiver.
“Rhiannon!” The name was like a sheet of darkness covering the room.
I felt a chill rush down my spine, and I clenched my teeth together to keep them from chattering.
CHAPTER 2
The man’s face looked as drained of color as mine felt. He continued to hold my gaze as he spoke in swift, hard words into the receiver.
“I told you it must end.” He paused for a moment then broke in. “I will not listen to your lies again.” His voice was ice. “No, I—” He was interrupted. He didn’t speak for several breaths, and when he did his voice had taken on the flat affect I had come to recognize in ClanFintan’s voice when he was issuing commands in a deadly situation. “Shannon is here.”
I could hear the answering shriek all the way across the room. He cringed in response to its volume, and then placed the phone back in its bed with a determined click. He wiped a hand across his eyes, and for the first time I noticed the network of fine lines at the edges of his eyes and the dusting of silver in his thick dark hair.
For a moment I felt my heart go out to this man who looked so much like my beloved husband, then the short, almost military cut of his hair jolted me back to reality. It was because of this man that I had been wrenched away from ClanFintan. He was not a friend.
“I thought you said Rhiannon was back in Partholon.”
“I thought she was.” He sounded exhausted.
“You’d better start from the beginning. I want to know everything.”
His eyes locked with mine again, and he nodded slowly. Then he said, “Would you like some coffee first?”
“I’d like some coffee during.” My stomach growled violently, so I added, “And I need some bread or something to settle my stomach.”
He nodded again and disappeared around the wall. I resettled myself against the pillows, carefully covering my bare legs. He returned shortly, carrying a tray with a steaming mug of coffee and a nice selection of homemade muffins. He placed the tray over my lap, being careful not to touch me, then he turned away to feed the fire more logs until it flared and crackled. Pulling one of the rockers nearest the bed over to him, he sat facing me, sipping slowly from his own mug.
He studied me carefully before he spoke, and when he did begin to speak, his words surprised me.
“It is amazing how much the two of you look alike. More than twins—more than anything I’ve ever seen before. It’s like you literally mirror each other.”
“In Partholon some of the people mirror the people from this world.” I paused and flicked him a begrudging half smil
e. “I’ve felt how disconcerting it can be at first. But don’t let it confuse you. Just because we look alike, it doesn’t mean we are in the least bit alike inside.”
He met my gaze steadily, and I was taken back by the force of his words. “For your sake I hope you’re nothing like that—” he hesitated before continuing “—woman.”
“I’m nothing like that bitch.” I filled in the blank for him. Then it pissed me off that I was bothering to explain myself to him at all. “But what I am or am not is really none of your business. All I want to know is how this happened, and how it can be undone.”
“I’m afraid I can only answer part of that for you,” he said sadly.
I felt my stomach tense and forced myself to swallow the moist muffin, willing myself not to be sick.
“Just start at the damn beginning and let me sift through this mess,” I said through another mouthful of muffin.
“How about I introduce myself first?” he said with the hint of a smile and a soft Oklahoma drawl.
I set my jaw against the familiarity of his expression. “Fine. Whatever. Just talk.”
“My name is Clint Freeman.” He tipped an imaginary hat. “At your service, ma’am.”
Clint Freeman—my mind went round and round the name that sounded so like my husband’s.
“Shannon?”
The question in his voice brought me back. “Okay—now I know your name. You already know mine, so get on with your story. How do you know about Rhiannon and me?”
“She told me.”
I waited impatiently for him to continue and felt my foot tapping restlessly.
He sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “She showed up here one night in the middle of June.”
Here I interrupted. “What month is it now?”
“October—the last day of October.”
“So time passes the same,” I breathed in relief.
“That makes sense. The worlds are mirror dimensions of one another.” His voice was matter-of-fact, like we were discussing Oklahoma’s changing weather.
“You certainly seem comfortable with all of this.”
“I’ve seen too much to pretend disbelief.” His voice had gone hard.
“Try explaining the ‘too much’ to me.”
He drew a deep breath and continued. “Rhiannon showed up here in the middle of the night, just ahead of a nasty summer thunderstorm.”
“Figures,” I mumbled. He ignored my comment.
“She appeared at my door like a forest sprite.” He shook his head and his voice mirrored his self-disgust. “She looked wild and beautiful. I asked her in, half expecting her to disappear in the light of my lamps.” He laughed dryly, like he was making a bad joke. “I wish to hell she had disappeared.
“Of course, I thought she was lost and I asked if I could help her.” Suddenly his eyes wouldn’t meet mine. “She said she wasn’t lost—that she had followed my magic and that she had come for me.”
“Your magic?” I asked, and his eyes once more found mine.
“I have a way with the woods,” he said slowly.
I raised my eyebrows and waited impatiently for him to finish his explanation.
“I haven’t always lived here.” He made a gesture that took in more than just this cabin. “Five years ago I lived in Tulsa. I worked and behaved in what I guess society would call a normal manner.” He paused, choosing his words carefully. “I always liked camping—always felt most content in the country. Five years ago that feeling of contentment changed, broadened, into more than a feeling.” He took a deep breath. “I started to be able to hear the land around me.” He smiled a little sheepishly.
“Distinct words, or just a feeling?” I inquired.
He seemed relieved that I hadn’t called him insane and he hurried to answer. “Most of the time it’s just a feeling.” His eyes took on a far-off cast. “It was like the land welcomed me. The farther I was from civilization, the more content I felt. I started spending every free moment camping and hiking. Then I had an accident at work and injured my back, effectively ending my career.” He didn’t appear too upset at the notion. “So I took my disability pension and retired here.”
“Where exactly is here?”
“Southeastern part of Oklahoma.” He smiled. “Smack in the middle of Okie nowhere.”
“Great,” I muttered. “It was after you moved here that you started to hear the land speak to you?” I couldn’t keep myself from asking. Besides being honestly curious about this land-speaking stuff, I needed to follow any magical lead I had here in The Real World. Where there was magic, there might just be a way to return to Partholon.
“Yes.” His gaze turned far-off again. “The trees whisper—the land rejoices—the wind sings.” His eyes found me again. “I realize it sounds overly poetic and schizophrenic, but I can feel it.”
“Which is why Rhiannon targeted you.”
“Yes,” he snarled the word. “She said she was a goddess’s incarnation and that she was like the land and the elements—something to be worshipped and adored.”
I tried to stop the sarcastic snort that built in my throat.
“Let me guess,” I said. “She screwed your brains out—literally—and then you believed her.”
He hesitated only briefly. “Yes, I believed her. There was something about her that made me want to believe her.”
“Yeah,” I harrumphed. “Her crotch.”
He frowned and looked more disappointed than embarrassed or angry. “Maybe, but you should know that you have it, too.”
“Oh, please.” I rolled my eyes, telegraphing my disbelief.
“You make me feel the same way she did.” He didn’t say it like he was coming on to me or making excuses; he said it almost like he was apologizing.
“That’s crap. There’s no hanky-panky bullshit going on between us. I’m a married woman, and I don’t even know you.”
“It’s not about that.” He held up his hand to stop my interruption. “Yes, I did sleep with her. Yes, I did want her. But it wasn’t just that.” Here he faltered, searching for words. “This may sound ridiculous to you.” He gave a sharp, dry laugh. “It certainly does to me. But I feel, I don’t know, right around you, like it’s where I belong. With you—both of you.”
I opened my mouth to tell him he was full of shit, but the memory of ClanFintan’s words suddenly played through my mind. I was born to love you, he had insisted. I had come to believe my husband. And the man who sat before me was, unquestionably, my husband’s mirror image. Rhiannon and I didn’t behave the same; didn’t make the same choice, but most of the mirror images I’d met, Suzanna and Alanna, Gene and Carolan, were more alike than different. Already I was getting the distinct impression that this man was disquietingly like my husband.
“All right, well, uh, whatever,” I prevaricated, feeling uncomfortable. “If you liked her so much, what woke you up?”
“I didn’t, as you put it, wake up at first.”
“Translation—she didn’t let you out of bed for a while.” I knew Rhiannon’s M.O.
He had the good grace to look chagrined.
“You could say that. And when she wasn’t in bed, she was either out in the forest or on the Internet.”
“She’s computer literate?”
“Very,” he responded dryly.
“So she pretended to be all into the land so that you would stay hooked on her while she obsessed on the Net?”
“Actually, her affinity with the land wasn’t a pretense. She seemed to draw something from the forest. She would go hiking alone, didn’t want me along, and come back hours later filled with energy.”
“Hmm.” I filed that away for later. If Rhiannon drew some kind of power from the land around here, maybe I could, too. Maybe it could get me home. “What was she looking for on the Internet?”
“Money—she told me she was into Net trading and she had to keep a check on her stocks, but the property she was after was more than stocks and co
mmodities…” His voice trailed off.
“Well?” I prompted.
“She was after men. Rich, old, single men.”
I blinked in surprise. “Did she find one?”
“Yes. Sinclair Montgomery III. Seventy-two, widowed and stuffed with Tulsa oil money. A philanthropist and an honestly nice guy who hadn’t had sex since the seventies.”
“Sounds like easy pick’ns for Rhiannon.” The name vaguely rang a bell. I was pretty sure I’d read it in the I-Have-More-Money-Than-God social page of the Tulsa World.
He nodded grimly. “She started an e-mail relationship with him. Said she was a local teacher who would like to begin a career in public speaking.”
“Good God, Rhiannon as a public speaker! What the hell was she going to speak about?” The possible topics boggled my mind.
“How to inspire young people to be creative and stay in school.”
“I hesitate to ask, but just how was Rhiannon going to inspire public school children?”
“I don’t think she ever had to actually outline her speaking platform. As far as I could tell, she cast out the local teacher/speaker bait, and he bit, granting her an appointment.”
“And a meeting in person was all that Rhiannon required to land that old trout.” I completed his analogy.
He nodded grimly.
“And you just let her walk out of your bed and into Mr. Moneybags’s bed with your blessing?” If he was anything like ClanFintan there was no way he’d be okay with that.
“Actually, I was so busy hating her friend—” he said the word like it tasted bad “—that I didn’t realize what was going on until it was done.”
“Wait.” I shook my head in confusion. “She has a friend here?” My mind rifled through the list of my buds, and I didn’t come up with any that would tolerate Rhiannon the Psycho Bitch.
“He called himself Bres, and said he was her follower, if you can believe that.”
“Tall, skeletal, stinky-breathed?” I asked dryly.
“Yes!” He said, surprised.
“He is her friggin follower. He followed her here. No, scratch that—he came here first, making sure the trip could be completed successfully. She followed him.” Along with his inclination to worship dark gods (which makes sense after ClanFintans’s explanation). Alanna had told me about Bres’s bizarre infatuation with Rhiannon, and how his initial switch with a mirror image from this world had provided Rhiannon with a person to sacrifice so that her trip could be completed safely.