The Battle of the Trees - Sword, Ring, and Crown Book Two

Chapter Thirty-Six

"Crazy lady says what?" I gasped as I backed my way down the stairs.

"What?" she said with a frown.

A hysterical giggle bubbled up as the woman so quickly fell into the trap of the old joke. I shook my head as I kept easing myself down the stairs until I was at the bottom again. "You're not my mother."

I didn't have time for this when Dimini was bleeding out somewhere.

And Mother was a sacred word to me. This woman wouldn't make me profane it.

She had some similarities to me; I had to admit. Her mouth shape had the same bee-stung puffiness, and her cheeks and chin were sharp like mine.

Even so, I resembled my father more, and my hair was curly like Brigid's. That this woman also had curly hair was immaterial.

She stood on the platform on the top of the stairs, staring down at me with a stricken expression. "Who sent you on this path? You were never supposed to be involved with the things of Aleria."

I waved that away. The number of people to blame was too numerous.

"Never mind that. How can I find Joseph?"

She smoothed her waist-length, bone-white hair and straightened the plain black gown she wore. "I am Iodha, as I said. I am the one who tests, and I am also your mother."

If it weren't for the fact that this was the woman my father wanted me to find, I would not be entertaining her.

My impatience clenched my jaw. "Stop saying that. My mother is dead."

She looked around herself. "Yes. That is so."

I looked away from her, unable to handle all her crazy. "Can you just tell me if someone came by here dragging an injured Lunantisidhe?"

She tilted her head to the side and gave me a creepy smile. "Would you not like to know why I call you daughter?"

"No, not particularly." I should have just told her about Straif, but it seemed like she was part of the test,  so I knew I had to listen, even if I didn't want to.

As though I'd never said anything, she proceeded to explain. "I wanted a child. As you might have been told, that was impossible for me.  When Brigid came down here to the trial, her drink from Bran's cauldron caused her to have a vision. In it, she saw a blessed child that wasn't hers entirely but came from her."

I nodded for Iodha to go on, and she seemed delighted at my attention. She took a step down, and I tightened my grip on my sword.

"I shared her vision, and we realized together that we were made to create a child that would belong to us both and be fathered by The Straif. Before she left the Labyrinth, she had the seed of energy that I placed within her, the child that I could neither bear in the Labyrinth nor up above. New life cannot exist in the land of the dead."

A surrogate. My head shook, even though it made sense.

Brigid was too perfect, and I had never fit the picture of her daughter.

"Wait a minute. The Straif said that I was a successful experiment using a Sidhe mother."

"Yes. The seed I placed within her was made between the Straif and me."

The mental altar I had built for my mother teetered, and I raised my voice to drown out her logic.

"The only person who was my mother was the woman that died for me. Whatever biological additions you supplied were only material because she's the woman that raised me." My voice quavered as I struggled under the shock of this new secret.