Eleven
G lastonbury Tor was a conical hill of clay that rose from the Somerset Levels. Its sloping hills were terraced on either side of the path that led to the top. Archaeological excavations had revealed some aspects of the history there from as early as the Iron Age. The Church of St Michael was built on the site in the fourteenth century, but all that remained was a roofless tower.
It was clear that coming here was the right decision. Poppy kept up a steady stream of information as they climbed to the top of the Tor. “I know a lot of people come here at sunrise, but I’m more centered in moon magick. Watching the sun rise with you today as we drove from Kent to Somerset was magical enough.”
There was magic present, but he was pretty sure it was coming from her. The incline on the Glastonbury Tor was intense, but he was good in shape. Poppy was sweating a bit, and he offered her his water bottle as they stopped partway up the hill.
“Other than churches, what else makes this spot special?” he asked her. Anything to keep his mind off the way her butt looked in her leggings as she walked ahead of him.
“The Celtic name for it is Isle of Avalon, so that draws a lot of connection to the Arthurian legends.”
“Him, I know about. When I was twelve, I was obsessed with Thomas Malory’s stories. I even talked George into taking me to Winchester to see the round table that Henry VIII had made during his reign.”
“Really? How did I not know this about you?” she asked.
“I guess were both hiding parts of ourselves,” he said with a shrug. By the time he’d met Poppy, that boy who used to love legends and myths had been smothered under the weight of expectations and his own need to prove he wasn’t just the spare. Though there wasn’t a throne involved in their family hierarchy, taking over Lancaster-Spencer was a close second. He’d craved what was only George’s by an accident of birth.
“Maybe. Well, you’ll love this next bit... In 1191, two coffins were found that were labeled Arthur and Guinevere.”
“Seems a little sus,” he said.
“Yeah, but it’s fun. Another legend ties the Tor to the Holy Grail because the Nanteos Cup used to be in the monastery here.”
“What is that even?”
“It’s a cup that was reputedly made from a piece of the True Cross and could heal anyone who drank from it,” she said with a tinkling laugh. “Is that too woo-woo for you, or is it more palatable because it’s based in organized religion?”
“I’m not into organized religion,” he said. “I’m sorry I called anything woo-woo. It’s just that I didn’t have another way of describing it. What do you call it?”
“Spiritual.”
He repeated the word softly. There was something almost glowing about Poppy now. Another facet that he’d somehow missed even though he’d known her since she was eighteen.
“Don’t backpedal when I tell you the last legend associated with this place. It’s from Celtic mythology. But when I first heard about it, I thought of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream . It’s about the King of the Fairies. So many different belief systems see the Tor has an entrance to another world. In this case the land of the fairies. Others say it’s the land of the dead. A portal allowing both fairies and spirits to cross between worlds.”
Was she teasing him? There was a spark in her eyes as she waited to see how he’d react. Honestly, he didn’t know if they were closer to the land of the fairies or the undead. But something was changing in him the closer they got to the top.
His fierce conviction that Poppy was the key to his freedom from the past was fading. She no longer seemed a stepping stone to a life he wanted for himself. Just the woman that he wanted to keep by his side.
Except that wasn’t happening. He didn’t have to have otherworldly magic to figure that out. She was here because she had a good heart. He wasn’t ever going to be a man she’d trust with it again.
“Exciting. So which of those is the reason you wanted to be up here tonight?”
“Neither.” She beamed at him. “There is one more thing. This entire area is important to the modern-day Goddess movement. There’s a festival here where the Goddess leads a procession.”
He could see that. A very feminine energy wrapped around him. In the past, he would have felt threatened by it, responding with his own version of masculine energy, which always manifested itself in the worst way. He’d never been comfortable owning his interest in things that weren’t necessarily defined as masculine.
“Thanks for sharing this with me,” he said, catching up to Poppy and slipping his hand into hers. Their fingers twined together, and a tingle went up his arm and then straight to his core. His entire being embraced this energy.
As the warmth and sensuality wrapped around him, he slowly started to realize that the feminine essence wasn’t just for women. Glancing over at Poppy, it was hard to separate these new feelings from her.
Was she The One?
Of course she was. Everything always came back to Poppy.
Touching Alistair should always be approached with caution, but she found right now, in this place, there was no need for caution. The Goddess wrapped her in a comforting embrace that encouraged her to claim her full power.
She always pulled back, afraid of shining too bright or drawing too much attention to herself. Even with Liberty and Serafina. But her friends seemed to know this and saw past those moments.
That was the beauty of finding women who were kindred spirits. They got her, and she didn’t have to explain everything to them. They gave her space to make her own way into her strength.
Honestly, she still wasn’t sure what her strength was. Tea making was her legacy, something her family had always done and something she had a natural ability to do. But the thing that was Poppy? That was still half formed and nebulous.
She’d been thrilled when Alistair offered to bring them here, because she wanted to be as close to the Goddess and the sun as she could today. She needed to be near the fairy kingdom now, when the veil between worlds was so thin. She’d even made a wreath of flowers after seeing Solange’s at the shop. Afraid that Alistair might not get it, she’d been carrying it in her backpack instead of wearing it.
But the energy between them had changed on the walk up. They were more than halfway to the top when they stopped again. She felt the pull of magick the way she did when she was with Liberty and Sera at the top of Hanging Hill in Birch Lake.
She took her long sarong scarf from her backpack, wrapping it around her waist into a skirt before shimmying out of her leggings and putting the flower wreath on her head.
“Titania,” Alistair said almost reverently.
That was all it took. It felt like she was being lit from the inside of her soul. There was no need to keep any part of herself locked away. Not here. Not with Alistair.
Maybe for tonight?
Once doubt seeped into her thoughts, she couldn’t shake it, remembering how Titania and Oberon fought bitterly over a child in A Midsummer Night’s Dream , and how Oberon used poison to make Titania fall in love with the first person she saw.
Was there a warning in this realization? Or was she so used to seeing deception and lies when she was around Alistair that even now, at this magical moment where the sun was still full on this longest day of the year, it plagued her? Couldn’t she let herself enjoy this time with him?
“What is it? You’re frowning. Are you okay?”
Trust yourself , a voice whispered in her mind.
Lingering doubt was drawn away at the same moment, Alistair put his hand on the side of her neck, his long fingers rubbing her nape as he lowered his head. “Is it me? Do you want me to leave?”
“Don’t go,” she said, turning her head into his shoulder and letting the energy that had been swirling around them before come back.
Alistair wasn’t the only reason for the fear deep in her heart. Yes he’d hurt her. But now the truth seemed blindingly obvious. She’d expected him to betray her from the moment he asked her to marry him. By never believing she was enough for him, by twisting herself into what she thought he wanted. Their marriage hadn’t stood a chance.
Leaning against Alistair, feeling his strong body holding hers, he supported her. Gave her the space to sort out the mental chaos that swept in from the magic of this night, this day.
The power of the solstices and the equinoxes always affected her and brought clarity, helping her to move forward. Normally, she had her soul sisters at her side to ground her and keep her focused. Tonight there was just Ali and the moon.
“Let’s go up. Sorry for that. The energy here is so intense.”
“I feel it too. I read that the Tor is built on a ley line. They have powerful energy,” he said.
Alistair seemed to be affected by the energy here as well. She pulled away from him and picked up her pack. “When did you read up on it?”
“As soon as you agreed to come to England with me. I knew this time had to be different than when we were here together before,” he said.
“Are you trying to win me over for any reason other than myself?” she asked.
There was a part of her that felt the censure of the Goddess as she asked the question. She had to stop looking for signs and then ignoring them.
But that was a hard habit to break.
Alistair was figuring out what to say, so she shook her head. “Don’t answer that. Either I believe you’ve changed from the man who hurt me or I don’t. I can’t keep asking you to prove it to me.”
“Poppy—”
“No, it’s okay. Let’s make a last push and get to the top. I brought some fairy cakes and tea for us to have up there.”
When they got to the top, they could see for miles and miles. Poppy led him to a spot near the crest of the hill, took another scarf from her backpack and spread it on the ground. She’d told him she wanted to watch the sunset at 9:16 p.m., and then she wanted to watch the moon rise.
“What’s special about the moon at the solstice?” he asked her as he filled two picnic champagne flutes from the small twist-top bottles of prosecco he’d carried in his bag.
Poppy tucked a long curly strand of hair behind her ear as she pulled out the fairy cakes she’d mentioned, as well as two salads they’d picked up in town. She handed one to him. “June is a time of heady power, and its moon is the moon of horses. Tomorrow night is the full moon, so that’s when the power will be highest, but we’ll be at Gemma’s wedding... I might try to step out to see it.”
He’d be at her side. This feeling stirring inside of him was the answer to the emptiness that had been eating a hole in his soul for so long. He liked the feeling. He liked sharing it with her.
There were still so many unspoken things between them, and he wasn’t sure he’d ever have the courage to speak them out loud. “What does the moon of horses mean?”
That tinkling sound of her laughter rang out and wrapped around him like the warm breeze that blew strongly up there. It stirred him, body and soul. Being this close to her was beating at the walls of his resolution to keep his distance. To respect her desire for this phase of the relationship to stay platonic.
Right now, as she talked to him quietly on the highest point in Glastonbury, he was struggling. He wanted to sit behind her and pull her back against his chest. Let his hands caress her body while she wove her fairy magic all around him.
It took all his willpower to resist. That breeze carried the scent of her perfume, and he closed his eyes in a bid to win control over the lust that was rising in him as she softly told him about the moon. Maybe this was how they were meant to be. This pain, a wedge between them that their bodies didn’t seem to want to acknowledge.
“This moon is about breaking free from whatever holds you down,” she said. “I think it’s a portent before meeting with your family tomorrow. I wanted to come up here to step fully into my strength and my power.”
Breaking free.
There hadn’t been a day in the past eighteen months that he hadn’t tried to undo the bands of anger and doubt and fear—and more anger—that had been wrapped around him. Trapping him in a bent-and-bound position that he could never untangle himself from.
“You always have power over me,” he said.
“Always?”
“Even now.”
“Sexually, right?”
Was there a good way to answer?
“I want the power to stand up for myself. Not allow fear to make me take an offer that I know is less than I deserve. But I’m so afraid if I don’t take what I’m offered, everything I’ve built for myself will fall apart.”
How could he help her through this? “Do you want to break away from me?”
She chewed her lower lip and turned her head into the breeze, tipping her head back and not saying a word until she finally glanced over at him. “I think I have to.”
Well, that was the answer he’d expected. “Of course. How can I help?”
“You are,” she said, putting her hand on his. “Being here with me, talking about the past and letting me work through that girl I was...it’s giving me a sense of clarity I never would have found on my own.”
“I’m glad,” he said. But that tightness in his stomach was back. The power he’d felt on the walk up was so far away from him at this moment. He’d never felt more like the second son. The spare that no one needed once George married and took over the vice-chairmanship of Lancaster-Spencer.
Maybe Poppy wasn’t the only one who needed to break free. Hell, he was brokering a deal between her and his family so he could have his freedom. His chance to step out of the shadow that Lancaster-Spencer cast and become his own man.
Until he broke free of those chains that kept him in this holding pattern, he couldn’t be the man she needed or deserved.
“Oh, Ali,” she said.
“Oh, what?”
She just shook her head, tugging his arm, and he allowed her to pull him to her. She wrapped her arms around him, and that scent of summer flowers and vanilla filled his senses again.
He put his head on her shoulder as she ran her hands down his back, soothing him in a way he wasn’t sure he deserved.