Excerpt #3 from 'Dancing With Fate'

In this excerpt, Terpsichore and Myrddin are travelling together.  Just before dawn she is awakened by eerie lights that draw her to them.

The glowing red sparks appeared a few hours before dawn. Terpsichore looked across to where she could just make out Myrddin, lying close to the fire, apparently asleep. She stood and wrapped her brat around her shoulders. What unearthly lights were these? In the name of Hades, she had never seen anything like this before. She watched them as they advanced and retreated, advanced and retreated. They seemed to beckon to her. She walked forward a few steps. This was not natural. She sensed evil, but of a kind she had never come across before. 

She tried to turn her head, to look away and move back to the fire. Some force compelled her to keep staring at them, to move forward. Further and further from the campfire she wandered. The air grew chill and she pulled her brat more closely around her. The flickering lights gyrated in a wild dance, inviting her to follow them. Dawn was approaching. In the dim early morning light, she could make out demon faces, red glowing eyes, hands outstretched, with flames at their fingertips.

She recoiled in horror. Somewhere in her subconscious, she knew she was in deadly danger, but still she moved forward. They summoned her to follow and she could not help but obey. She tried to call to Apollo, and her father, but her mind was numb. She could reach no one on Olympus. 

"Myrddin!" No sound came from her lips. Still, a strange unearthly power obliged her to walk forward toward those eerie, mesmerizing points of light.The ground grew soft beneath her feet. Cold mud oozed between her bare toes. The further she walked, the deeper the mud became; eventually, she realized she was up to her waist in chill, muddy water, and she was powerless to turn back, or evento move any more. 

"Zeus, oh, Father, please help me...don't desert me now."

For the first time in her eternal life, she knew fear. These creatures of nameless evil had her trapped. They would drag her down to the underworld and she would never see Olympus or her family again.

Then strong arms encircled her, swung her round. 

"Cora, look at me." She gazed into two pools of azure blue, filled with concern, and a pale face set in resolve. Still she had an irresistible urge to look at those weird, flickering lights. She turned her head, and at the same moment, there was a flash like lightning. The ground behind her burst into a wall of blue flame. It blotted out everything, engulfing the demon lights and the hideous forms that a moment before had lured her onward.

"Look at me. Look at me...don't look back again." 

Before she could reply, he swept her up and carried her back toward the campfire.

Eos in her chariot had started her journey across the sky and the pearly light showed their camp and the two horses grazing nearby. Never had anything looked so welcome. Never had Terpsichore felt so safe in a man's arms. 

He set her down, near the fire, and wrapped his own brat around her. He wore only his truis, and was bare-chested. "You're trembling, you'll catch your death of cold...but that would be better than the fate which almost befell you." 

Her eyes brimmed with tears as she gazed up at him. Neither her tears nor her trembling had anything do with her recent encounter. Being so close to him unnerved her even more than the fiendish, fiery lights. The thought of his protective arms around her, just a few moments ago, sent searing heat through her veins. There could be no point in trying to deny it any longer. Despite her vow, she'd fallen in love with this mortal. She loved him more than she'd ever loved any man, or any god, either. She looked at his slim body, firm and athletic without being too muscular, golden hairs sprinkling his broad chest, and she ached to touch him. 

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