Chapter Twenty-Four

  A Prayer to the Red Lady

  “I love you!” Gwen cried out after Cailean slapped her horse’s rear. She tried to look over her shoulder, but the steed was a Hunter-trained mount. It knew that it had a duty, just as Cailean did, and drove her forward down the path. She grabbed the reigns and turned back from her hero and looked forward to the great Severed mountains that lay on the horizon.

  Gwen felt so empty as her horse led her down the clear path toward the Severed Mountains. No monsters came, Cailean was fighting damn near every monster that would be in the area. He was fighting Wood Scrapers, Spider Folk, Ursalings, and Knifewolfs. He was fighting for the Spring, fighting for her.

  Now came the time for the Winter Hunter to do his duty, fulfill his oath and satisfy his destiny. He would fight to see that the Spring would come again. Damn him for putting this responsibility on her, damn him for leaving her. She couldn’t stay mad at him though, he was the man she loved, though she only got to love him for one night. It was her first night of ever truly loving a man just as it was his first night ever truly loving a woman.

  She cursed Cailean for not taking her that first night they met, taking her on the last night of spring. She cursed him for being so honorable, so noble. Cailean was a Winter Hunter who would see the Spring found. If he had taken her that first night, at least they could have had more than one special moment together. It was a jest when she said he could take her. Nothing more than a play on the reputation for a quality she thought all Winter Hunters had to take the women they wanted. She should have known then when he refused and made up some excuse about his body being too tired, that he was a true Winter Hunter, a man devoted to the coming of spring. Damn him for not giving them at least one more night together.

  “Not today, please not today,” Gwen said holding tight to her reigns as she rode towards her destiny, towards the great spiked mountains that reached so high they pierced the sky itself. When she came to those mountains she would find the Druids, and they would tell her how to bring the Spring back. What was the point of bringing the Spring back if its bravest defender was dead? Cailean was the only man who could see the Spring come again. He fought for her, he was ready to die for her.

  No, the Goddesses wouldn’t kill a man as noble as him. That lady he told her about, the Red Lady, she was the goddess of war. What goddess of war would see a warrior like Cailean dead before he could truly prove himself. Cailean had survived everything the Winter had thrown at him. He survived for a reason, survived the Spider Folk, that wild old man Duncan’s training. He survived a charging Ursaling head-on. He took down a werewolf, young as it was, if there was ever a Winter Hunter that could win the un-winnable war against the darkness of Winter it was him. He defended her through all the threats of the winter woods and promised her a world where Spring would come again. If there was any man who could see himself through that epic battle Cailean all but consigned himself to die in, it was him.

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  She pulled the reigns on her horse, disobeying Cailean’s command to ride straight to the mountains, and the horse raised its legs as she held tight to her saddle. When the horse settled she bowed her head, “Red Lady, I’ve never prayed to you before,” she said, her eyes shut so tight as they began to water, “Red Lady, I didn’t even know you existed before he told me about you, but I’m praying to you now,” she held her horse, looked up and saw the mountains of her destiny right there on the horizon. She saw the safety Cailean promised her but refused it. There was no safety for her without Cailean, Cailean was her safety, Cailean was the only man who could see her through to her destiny if this really was her lot in life. If Gwen was to bring the spring back, she could only do it if she was in the arms of her Winter Hunter, her man, her love. She closed her eyes tight, bowed her head, and prayed, prayed to a goddess she wasn’t even sure she believed in.

  “Please, Red Lady, I don’t know if your real, I don’t know if the visions he had of you are real. I don’t know what's real anymore. All these notions of destiny and fate are so otherworldly to me, I never thought I would ever have a part to play in the turning of seasons. I never thought I would have any role to play in the workings of the Goddesses,” She took a deep breath and prepared herself to beg, “Please, please, don’t take him, not yet,” she said. Her horse neighed, bucking her again as she held to the saddle.

  “I’ll bring the spring, that’s what you want right?” she asked, looking up to the endless dusk sky. “That’s what you want, isn’t it, you’re a goddess of war, you want men who will fight for you, he’ll fight, I know he will, I know he has,”

  “You showed yourself to him, I know you did, he told me so!” Gwen yelled at the wind, “Don’t take him, please don’t take him! Let my beloved Cailean come back to me, even if it’s just for one more night, one more night with my love, please, please, Red Lady I beg you,” she said as she started to weep, and another cold breeze of winter, one harder this time came over her. She looked up and it started to snow. Another damn punishment of winter. Snow started to fall on Gwen and her horse as the sun slowly sink over the horizon, bringing the darkness of winter with it.

  “Please, I’ll bring the spring, just give me one more night with him, that’s all I ask, please let me see my Winter Hunter again,” she looked up and found nothing but a cold breeze of winter passing over her prayers.