Page 48 of Dark Rival

“Aye.” He wondered if he should tell her the rest of the truth now, or later.

She whirled. “What else is there? I can hear you—debating what to tell me, what to hide! All this time, I thought my mother was a Healer and a pagan. I even thought she might, possibly, be a good, powerful witch. I thought that explained our religion—the prayers, the healing, our sense of evil!”

“Elasaid was not a witch. Yer nay a witch, Ailios.”

She stared breathlessly at him.

“She was our Priestess, in the days when we still had one.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

ALLIE SAT THERE IN SHOCK.

Her entire life, she’d thought her mother a woman blessed with extraordinary healing powers. Not once, however, had she guessed or even considered that Elizabeth Monroe might not be entirely human. Although she believed in the Ancients, it hadn’t occurred to her that one of them could sire or mother a child with a human being. Her heart thudded painfully in her chest. Her grandfather was a god. Her mother had been a High Priestess centuries ago.

“Have some wine,” Royce said softly.

She jerked, having been entirely unaware of him. He sat beside her, a mug of wine in his hand, offering it to her. He was grim, as if her shock upset him. “I had no idea,” she whispered unsteadily. She met his gray, searching gaze. It was kind.

And she felt his concern, a soft, comforting wave, undulating in the air about her.

But she was too stunned to dwell on Royce’s sudden sympathy now. Her mother was the daughter of a god. What did that make her?

And she thought about how her mother had hidden their powers and their religion from her father, so carefully, so deliberately. She thought about the secret room where they’d prayed. “She made me take vows of secrecy,” Allie whispered. “My God, did Dad ever suspect the truth about her? About me?”

Royce clasped her shoulder. “I dinna ken, Ailios.”

She began to feel sick. Her father had been a no-nonsense, ambitious, brilliant man. And while he had been Episcopalian, Allie was pretty certain he didn’t really believe in any god at all. He had been a workaholic and as different from her mother as possible. Had he suspected anything? How could he not—he had been so smart! Allie tried to recall his life with her mother, but all she could remember was his grief over her death. “He loved her,” she whispered. Royce didn’t answer and she met his searching gray gaze. “What does this make me?”

“A great Healer,” he said softly.

She had the odd urge to cry. But was she crying for herself—or for William Monroe, who had been betrayed by them both, in a way? “How long will I live?”

“I dinna ken.” He handed her the mug. “Take some wine, lass.”

The endearment rolled off his tongue like smooth, aged Scotch whiskey. Allie stared, then set the mug down. “Did you know her a long time?”

“Aye, for centuries.”

There was so much comfort in his presence and she felt like going into his arms. She did not. Instead she thought about how much the gods meant to her. “I’m not a Priestess, too, am I?” Was this why he was intent on refusing her advances?

His gaze was serious, moving over her face. “Yer a Healer. There has nay been a Priestess in centuries. Worshiping as we do is a grave heresy, so we follow the Catholic ways in public. Yer mother was our last Priestess.”

“Can you tell me about her? And how on earth did she wind up with my father? They were so different!” She was starting to worry about that marriage. Her mother had lived through centuries, and of all men, she had chosen someone with no faith whatsoever.

Royce began to speak, distracting her from a new, great unease. “She was a great beauty, like ye, but fair. An’ she was always spilling her pure light on those in need. Had she been ye, today, she would have healed old Coinneach, too.”

Allie smiled. “I remember that. We couldn’t even step into an ice-cream parlor without her showering someone with healing light. She died when I was ten years old—and no one knew why.” She wiped her cheek with her hand. “Was it her time to die, Royce? She died in her sleep! Can the daughter of a great god die that way?”

“If she died in her sleep, it was the will of the Ancients. Mayhap she was very old. The Masters are nay immortal, Ailios, even if it sometimes seems so. Yer mother was nay immortal, either.”

Allie smiled sadly, in that moment missing Elizabeth very much. “I never grieved when she died. That night, she came to me in my dreams, comforting me. And it was the first of many visits while I was a child.”

Royce was silent.

“The night we met, she suddenly appeared again—telling me to trust you.”

Royce started. “Ye saw her? Ye heard her?”