Flidais asks about Fand and about Manannan Mac Lir. About their plans. Their defenses. How she learned to siphon energy. To all these questions nymph only screams and struggles. Peoples begin to look our way, which is not good.
Is clear nymph has lost most of mind, and I grow frustrated. Is all wasted effort, and I feel like pawn sacrificed in meaningless game. In truth is not even my game: Is Irish game and I should not be involved.
“Nine bloody hells,” Flidais mutters, and pulls hunk of cold iron out of inside coat pocket. “It wasn’t supposed to go this way.” Is mercy when she presses iron to nymph’s forehead.
Nymph gives short scream, turns to ash, and power she took from me crackles in air and returns where it should. My body is strong again, the wind whispers in my thoughts, the thunder and lightning booms and cracks too. Is like dive into refreshing pool, swimming in health. I have not felt this fine in ages. Is good to be reminded of my gifts, of what my peoples granted me with their beliefs. And Flidais thought these gifts were hers to play with.
The never-ending summer of Tír na nóg is pleasant but is perfect example of how the Tuatha Dé Danann manipulate natural order of things. I am Slavic god of that natural order, and I too was manipulated. Is time to be free again, to let rain wash away resentment and renew my peace of mind.
We have to spend short time waving away peoples who come to investigate screaming and lights. We assure them all is well. The nymph is scattered in wind, or her remains are invisible in darkness. There is nothing to see. When they go away I look at my lover and do what I must.
“You remember what Paul, funny dancing man, said?” I remove coat and unclasp harness, leaving on collar and jock. “He said, ‘Consent is prime importance.’ He was talking sexy things, but applies to other things also. You did not have my consent to do this. You thought it okay to use me. Is not okay, Flidais.”
She stretches out hand to me, shaking her head. “Perun—”
“No. I am very thankful for good times with you. Will always be, in fact, for they are truly good times. But I think is over now. Weles is dead and Loki cannot find me. So I stay on earth and enjoy stormy weather again. Please do me favor and leave my axe with the Druid Atticus. I will pick up later. Goodbye.”
As Flidais protests, I change my shape into eagle, step out of jock and duck out of collar, then take wing into cool moonlight sky darkening with thunderclouds. I bank east to make flight across oceans and plains and mountains to neglected land of my peoples. I have been gone for very long time, and now I want nothing so much as to be home.
This story of Granuaile’s takes place after the events of Staked and Oberon’s Meaty Mysteries: The Purloined Poodle.
I have had only one tutor for so long that having thirteen is like learning that ice cream comes in more flavors than plain vanilla or feeling the delicious chill of a swelling chorus that touches the soul where a solo voice cannot. There is richness and variety and a shared joy—they love to see me learn and I exult in their approval. Learning Polish not only from the words of Wis?awa Szymborska but from the Sisters of the Three Auroras and the many customers at the pub where I work now in Warszawa is so rewarding. I pretty much come home to Oregon and do little more than collapse, for which I feel guilty, but fortunately Atticus is a patient man who can take the long view. He has given me no grief over my hours spent abroad. He had me all to himself for twelve years, after all, and a little more besides, and he knows very well the importance of developing multiple headspaces.
I smile when I think of the concatenation of events that led me to bartending again. When I worked at Rúla Búla, it was a prelude to becoming a Druid. I wonder what grand adventure awaits me now at Browar Szóstej Dzielnicy?
The brewpub is busy and I have a good co-worker, Oliwia ?uraw, who’s bilingual and happy to help me improve my Polish when I need it. She spent some years in the UK, so her English is a delightful blend of Suffolk and Warszawa.
But the customers are equally happy to help. The men, especially, are eager to first correct me on my pronunciation and then, when I say it precisely the way I said it the first time, tell me I’m getting better. I field plenty of questions about my tattoos—tatua?e—and I’ve found it’s difficult to give an answer anyone will like.
If I say it’s just personal, they feel like I’m blowing them off. If I tell them the truth—that I’m a Druid and the tattoos bind me to Gaia—they kind of smile uncertainly, nod, and then very carefully order their next round from Oliwia. Same reaction if I tell them I got inked in prison—though one guy does ask what I did time for.
“I killed a man…with this thumb!” He doesn’t get the reference to Ratatouille. He thinks I’m being serious and squints at me.
“You were in for murder and you’re already out?”
“Shh. They didn’t let me go. I escaped. But don’t tell anyone, okay?”
He finally understands I’m kidding at that point but isn’t amused, and apparently he’s a regular. “Hey, Oliwia, who is this new girl?” he says.
“Just another American hiding from all the other Americans with guns,” she tells him, and he cracks a smile at that.
“Well, she kills people with her thumb!”
After that particular shift I head to Malina Soko?owska’s house, across the river in the Rado?? neighborhood, to continue my Polish-language studies with the coven. I work mostly with Anna, who enjoys Szymborska’s poetry so much, but I make a point of posing a question to Agnieszka, who’s very accomplished at wards and took the lead in cloaking me from divination.
“Do you think it would be possible to put some kind of cloak on my tattoos?” I ask. “People keep asking me about them at the brewery and it’s annoying.”
“This is merely a visual cloak, yes? Not something that would cloak the powers or the bindings in any way?”
“Right.”
“Hmm.” She taps her chin as she considers, and Roksana pokes her head around the corner to speak up, her curls spilling free for once instead of bound up behind her head.
“Not to eavesdrop, but I overheard your question. What if we did a reverse charm instead of a cloak?”
“What? Encourage the eye to look elsewhere instead of ‘look specifically here’? I’m afraid that would make people look away from her altogether. And what about the part of that charm that affects desire? If we reverse that, then we could be encouraging people to be revolted.”
“Well, obviously I don’t have it all figured out,” Roksana replies, blinking rapidly through her glasses. “I’m just offering a starting point.”
“Oh, yes, I understand. There’s certainly plenty to consider.” Agnieszka turns to me and asks, “Give us some time to think about it?”