I remembered his little tкte-а-tкte with my guards and grinned. “You won’t have to.”

He looked smug and happy.

“Hey!” I felt the need to add, “This goes both ways, you know. It’s not okay for you to mess around, either.”

He looked shocked. “Of course not. I will always be faithful to you.”

“Good.” I raised my eyebrows at him menacingly. “I’d hate to have to chase down and beat up some lady centaur. I guess Epi could help me, but I think it’d be very stressful.” And probably not particularly attractive.

His laughter rolled over me. We ate in companionable silence. I was thinking how easy he was to be around, and what a witty sense of humor he had. And he definitely wasn’t a short guy. Actually, the fact that he wasn’t technically a guy didn’t seem very important.

I was finally feeling full, so I poured myself a new goblet of wine. Before I could curl comfortably against him, the mood was broken by me having the Mother of all Yawns.

“Come.” He rose gracefully from the chaise. “You are exhausted.”

“No, really, I’m not tired.” I tried to hang back and drag my feet as he pulled me toward the bed. But try stopping a horse from pulling you somewhere. It wasn’t exactly an equal tug-of-war contest.

We got to the bed and stood looking at it. It was, as I may have mentioned before, a really big bed. But, as I glanced from ClanFintan to the bed and back, I realized that no matter how big it was, it would be incredibly awkward for my centaur husband to sleep next to me on it.

I walked over to the edge of the bed and pulled back the gorgeous golden embroidered comforter and sheets so that I could inspect the mattress. It was a huge, thick, down-filled bag, which hung suspended on lots of leather straps. I retied my towel into a more secure position, and started stripping the bedding from the top of the mattress. When the linens were out of the way, I grabbed one side of the mattress and started to tug.

“Well, aren’t you going to help me?” I asked over my shoulder as I struggled to pull the mattress off the bed frame.

“Yes.” He sounded doubtful as to my intentions, but he added his considerable strength to the maneuver and pretty soon we had the mattress lying on the ground. I put the sheets and comforter back on it and stood back to survey my work.

“It looks like a giant marshmallow.” Which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.

“I have two questions,” he said.

I gave him an attentive look as I crawled onto the marshmallow bed.

“First, why did you do that?”

“Well, it didn’t appear too likely that you were going to climb your half-horse body onto that bed and be comfortable.” I looked him over carefully and added, “And you might have broken the dang thing if you’d tried. I want you to sleep with me, so I thought we’d be more comfortable down here together.”

“Oh.” He looked enlightened, and stepped gingerly onto the marshmallow with me.

“What’s the second question?” I asked as he folded his equine legs and lay down next to me.

“What is a marshmallow?”

I snuggled into his body while I answered him. “It’s kind of a dessert. It’s puffy and white and very sugary. They’re good toasted over an open fire.”

He pulled me against him, spoon style. The sides of our feather bed fluffed up around us. He smiled and kissed the side of my head. “It is certainly puffy.”

“That’s what I thought.” I ended the word on another big yawn.

“Relax, you need to sleep.”

I felt myself starting to relax, when a shudder ran through me and I jolted awake, remembering the mission that waited for me in my sleep.

“I don’t think I want to. I’m scared.”

“I will be here with your body, and Epona will be there with your spirit.” ClanFintan’s hand found the outside of my leg and he began a hypnotic caress that ran the length of my thigh, to the sensitive spot behind my knee and all the way up to the small of my back—and then repeated over and over again.

I felt my body relaxing and my eyelids fluttering.

“Don’t let go of me…” I whispered, and felt his arm tighten in response as sleep claimed me.

I was a guest at an exclusive spa getting a massage from…I looked over my shoulder…Batman (must be one of my “bad boy” dreams). The massage table was on a terrace, which overlooked a countryside that reminded me of the Lake District of England, except instead of shaggy English sheep, fat black-and-white cats grazed in meadows of mice grass.

Batman had just bent down to whisper in my ear that I had the most perfect ass in the world, when—

My body was sucked up through the ceiling and I found myself looking down on what had become a familiar view of Epona’s Temple. The night was clear but the moon wasn’t fully risen yet, so the stars were really showing off by lighting up the sky with a brilliant display of priceless jewels. From overhead it was easy to see how crowded the temple and the surrounding grounds had become. Tents and campfires spotted the land. It was late, but I could make out the forms of centaurs and humans who were still awake, busy with uncompleted tasks.

My body floated in the soft breeze, which was blowing toward the river. The river, too, was alive with motion. Barges jockeyed for position, lanterns were lit and voices carried over the water. I watched the action below me as my body turned slowly north, then began to pick up speed. The sensation of traveling so quickly was the same as it had been the other two nights my spirit had been sucked from the comfort of DreamLand. It was like I had become a gust of wind that had been blown from the mouth of an irritable giant. The sensation was as unpleasant as the analogy made it sound, especially now that I had a pretty good idea of where I was heading.

I left the river’s side and veered to the west. Looking down, I saw a huge expanse of dark water passing swiftly by, obviously Loch Selkie. Much faster than should have been possible, I came to the northern bank of the Loch. I noticed a large stone structure a little way from the water’s edge. It sat silent and dark. I averted my eyes and sent a silent plea to Epona that she not take me there. I didn’t want to see what the creatures had left at Laragon Castle. It was probably cowardly of me, but I breathed a spiritual sigh of relief when my body didn’t slow or change direction toward the dead castle.

Far too soon I began to see lights ahead of me. I recognized the dark stone of Guardian Castle’s walls as I floated over them, and my body began to slow and descend.

“Please don’t make me stay here too long,” I whispered to the air around me.

Be brave, Beloved. The words flitted through my mind so quickly I couldn’t be sure that I hadn’t made them up myself. I drew a deep breath and tried to prepare myself for something awful.

My descent brought me over the middle of the same courtyard I had visited on my previous dream trip. Apparently, it was still being used as a campground for women, because I could see shabby tents reflecting the dim glow of flickering fires. Blanketed shapes huddled around the fires. I drifted closer and I could tell that the number of women had increased considerably. An unusual silence hung over the courtyard. Normally, this many women, even late at night, would be chattering and gossiping in friendly groups. This gathering was so silent I could hear the popping and crackling of the campfires. This time none of them seemed to notice my presence, and I did not pause over them. Instead, I felt myself moving off to the western wing of the castle. My body stopped when I reached the flat balustraded roof of a section of the castle that was lit brightly by many flaming torches.

The whispered words Prepare yourself, Beloved echoed through my mind. Then suddenly I was dropping down through the roof below me.

I snapped through the ceiling into a large bedroom chamber. The room was filled with lit torches and candles. Two hearths large enough for several men to stand upright within were ablaze. Well-illuminated in the firelight overkill, the predominant feature of the room was the huge bed situated directly below me.

At first I thought the room was empty. Then a rustling sound drew my eyes to the center of the bed. The thing on the bed stirred and pulled his wings back, and I realized with a shudder of revulsion that what I had thought was an empty bed draped with blankets was really a bed on which lay a creature whose wings had been outspread, like a bat-winged bedspread. Ugh. Without willing it, my body drifted down.

The creature’s wings shifted again, and I saw that they covered more than its own body—they had been covering the naked body of a human girl. She was so pale and she lay so very still that I thought she might be dead, then I saw her jerk convulsively as the creature reached his hand down and cupped her naked pubis.

“So sweet,” he hissed.

His hand kept traveling down to her inner thigh, and his fingers slid in a circular motion, playing in the wetness he found there. Her legs spasmed, allowing the flickering candlelight to illuminate the liquid, so that I could see it was thick and red with blood.

“Oh!” My breath left me in a horrified rush.

Instantly, the creature’s head swiveled up in my direction and his eyes narrowed as he searched the area above his bed.

I recognized him as soon as I saw his face—it was Nuada.

“Get out,” he ordered. With a taloned foot he pushed the girl to the edge of the bed. She fell to the floor, then picked herself up and staggered quickly to the door. As soon as she had left the room, Nuada crouched near the headboard of the bed, still looking intently above him.

“I know you are here.” His breathy voice was fearless. “I have felt your presence before.”

My body, which was floating directly above the foot of his bed, sank a few feet lower. I studied the smug creature. His face looked as if it had been carved from pale granite—it was all hard, sharp lines. His body was lean and free of hair, except the silver mass that fell from his head past his shoulders. Huge batlike wings kept shifting, as if to cover his nakedness, but they did little to hide the bloodstains that were smeared all along his thighs and now-flaccid genitals.

I had thought I would be terrified, so it was with surprise that, instead of fear, my foremost emotions were anger and revulsion.

“You make me sick,” I spat at him, and saw his eyes narrow in response.

“I can tell you are female.” He enunciated the last word slow and long, like it was a curse. “Show yourself, unless you are too weak and afraid.”

I had heard about guys like him. They were the kind of “men” who found pleasure in abusing women and children. As anger filled me I felt a change in my floating body. I glanced down to see myself become suddenly semivisible. I was naked, and I floated enticingly over the bed, like I was a dream made almost substantial.

His eyes widened and he licked his lips as he stared.

“Do you like what you see, Nuada?” My spirit voice resonated with an unearthly quality.

“Come closer, and I will show you what I like,” he leered cruelly.

“Maybe I will…” I let the sound of my words hang in the air between us. “Or maybe you should come to me.” I extended one hand and beckoned to him, like a snake charmer teasing a cobra. My other hand reached up and touched the pulse point in my neck, then moved in a long, slow caress down my body to finally come to rest on my inner thigh. There I made my fingers mimic what his had done to the newly raped girl.

His eyes watched me with an obscene hunger that made my stomach roll. As he began to collect himself to lunge at me, I noticed that his wings, as well as his all-too-human-looking penis, had begun to stir and swell.

Through my mind drifted the words Laugh at him, Beloved, and I obeyed, letting my ghostly, taunting laughter echo off the walls of the fiery chamber. The moment he lunged at me my body shifted, disappearing up through the ceiling. I burst into the night with the sound of his enraged shriek shattering the deceptively peaceful silence.

And my eyes flew open.

“You are safe.”

I had a horrible moment of panic as I tried to remember where I was. Then feeling rushed back into my body, and I knew ClanFintan’s arms were wrapped around me. I rubbed the mist out of my eyes so that I could look clearly at his face. He smiled at me, but his brow was creased with lines of worry.

“You have returned to your body.” He sounded almost as glad as I felt.

“Yes,” my throat felt scratchy. “I need something to drink.”

He let me slide out of his arms so I could retrieve my wineglass from the table. Filling my goblet, my hands were shaking so badly that I made a mess, splattering red drops on the white marble table. I found my eyes were drawn to those scarlet spots. The liquid transformed into spattered drops of blood—red against the inhuman white of Nuada’s skin. I couldn’t pull my eyes away and shake the image of how the girl’s blood had been splattered across the creature’s body.

“Rhea?” ClanFintan’s voice broke the spell, and I breathed a shuddering breath then hurried back to bed. Rearranging myself comfortably against him, I took a long drink, trying to steady my frayed nerves.

“Tell me,” he coaxed.

“Epona took me straight to him. He had just finished raping a young girl.”

“Did he sense your presence?”

“More than that. He could hear me, and Epona did something to my spirit-body so that he could see me. Kind of.”

ClanFintan nodded in understanding. “Epona is using her powers to get our message to the Fomorians.”

“I just hope she remembers to watch out for me during all of this, too.” I know I sounded kind of whiny, but this whole dream-magic-goddess-creature stuff was more than a little nerve-racking.

“You are Her Beloved, she will always protect you.”

I was about to open my mouth and make a snide comment about wishing I could be so sure, but then I remembered the voice in my mind that had whispered the warning Prepare yourself, Beloved, and kept my mouth shut.

I took another long drink of wine.

“Did you tell him of the Muse?”

“I didn’t get to it this time. Epona jerked me out of there just as he was leaping at me.” I remembered Nuada’s frustrated shriek at not capturing my body, and I took another long drink.

“He leaped at you? It will please me to skewer him on my sword. Soon.” His voice was hard and angry.

“I’m not usually a big proponent of violence, but this time I’ll make an exception. That thing seriously needs skewering.” I took another drink, and was mildly surprised to find it was the last in the goblet. I yawned. “I hope Epona’s done with me for tonight. I’m tired.”

ClanFintan took the empty goblet from my hand, and used his long arms to put it on the floor next to our marshmallow.

“I think the Goddess will allow you what remains of the night to sleep.” He pulled me close to his body.

“Good.” I patted a down-filled pillow into place and snuggled up into a comfortable ball. My husband’s hand found the small of my back, and I sighed gratefully as he rubbed up and down my spine.

“Sleep, my love,” he whispered. “I will let no harm come to you.”

I’m pretty sure I fell asleep with a big smile on my face, Nuada and his evil temporarily rubbed away by ClanFintan’s gentle touch.

6

“Rhea?” The distant voice broke into my dream of being granted an unlimited shopping spree at Tiffany’s.

“I’m over here, in the diamond-tiara section,” I mumbled sleepily without opening my eyes.

“Why are you on the floor?” The voice was closer, and I was (unfortunately) awake enough to realize it was Alanna.

I opened my eyes slowly and stretched, noticing that my husband had disappeared.

“Have you ever tried getting a horse into bed?”

She covered her giggle with her hand, shaking her head from side to side.

“Hard to imagine, isn’t it?” I noticed I was naked and asked, “Could you toss me something to cover up with? I really need to visit the little girls’ room.”

She gave me a quizzical look as she handed me a night robe—probably because by now it was obvious I wasn’t a “little girl,” but she got the idea and followed me as I scrambled to the door, pulling on the robe.

The hall that joined my room to the bathing room was unusually crowded with guards and women, who solicitously moved aside and bowed or curtsied a good-morning at me. I nodded sleepily in return, wishing I’d taken a few minutes to fix my hair or pick the sleep from my eyes.

Soon, I darted gratefully into the privacy of my bathroom, glad that my ever-present guards were there to close the door securely behind us.

“Jeesh,” I shouted from the “facilities” section of the bathing chamber. “What’s up with all the people?”

“More people are arriving constantly—even a temple the size of Epona’s has to get crowded eventually.”