Page 145 of A Winding Wave of Magic
A voice. I knew it well. Deep and solid. Stable. Yet a voice that shook me to the core.
I wobbled on my board, then toppled into the wave.
My feet were rocks, pulling me down, down. The kinship I had always felt in the water disappeared. This wasn’t peace,but war. Bubbles shot up toward the waning light of the sun. Darkness folded around me. Voices, so many voices shouted from the depths.
“Cassandra!”
His voice was strangely clear through the murkiness.
Kelp locked my ankles and wrists. I tried to shout, only to receive a mouthful of water. The black was closing in.
Why was this happening? Water was my friend, my solace, my refuge. Now it was my prison, my death sentence.
A hand found mine through the thickening deep as the darkness stole my vision.
Then…freedom. The seaweed released me, and I was carried to the surface, through the waves and the whitewash, then onto the rocky shore of an unfamiliar beach.
“Cassandra!”
Gasping, I opened my eyes into the mist swirling around me in place of that dark water. , though the water was gone. The rocks, the trees, the pebbles, the sand. Everything seemed tenuous, spinning, unreal.
In front of me was a big cat that maybe stood to my hip, its spotted yellow and black fur soft and sleek, lichen-colored eyes bright through the haze.
“Jonathan?” My voice was a warble.
The cat blinked and approached. It touched its nose to mine, then slid its face across my cheeks, marking me in its feline manner. A thrum emitted from its chest. The chaos around me disappeared as I threaded my fingers into its fur.
Cassandra.
My name was in its thoughts, its knowledge, that deep voice that seemed to calm me, the touch that seemed to know me to my core.
And the world stilled at last.
43
EGGS AND TOAST
I set my face
To the road here before me,
To the work that I see,
To the death that I shall meet.
— P.H. PEARSE, “IDEAL, OR RENUNCIATION”
Abird was screaming in my ear. Or whistling. Odd that it could do both. I’d never heard of such a creature.
My eyes opened, and for a moment, I wasn’t sure where I was. Then, reality set in.
From the wide beam rafters of the attic room, dusty and worn with age, a few cobwebs danced in the breeze that wasn’t quite stopped completely by the thatched roof. Whitewashed stone edged the low walls, meeting the battered wood floors like an old friend. There was an ancient dressing table under the single tiny window that faced the ocean, along with an old-fashioned ewer and washing bowl set atop.
A bouquet of dried sage lay in a ramekin on the bedside table, its edges burnt from hasty saining before I’d fallen into the sheets.
Connolly Cottage.
In Ireland.
