I saw the familiar figure of Victoria firing off arrows quickly, each finding its deadly mark. Between loading and shooting, her attention suddenly wavered, and she met my gaze.

“Get them to the river or we will be overrun!” she shouted at me. Her face was set in stone and she was already spattered with gore. She was a silver goddess of death.

My attention was wrenched from her as a creature clawed his way through the men in front of us. Carolan pushed me aside and met it with a borrowed claymore. It seemed as if it happened in slow motion. Carolan parried the creature’s razorlike talons, and the thing grabbed the Healer’s sword arm. Ramming himself forward into the creature, Carolan shoved it off balance, and with a sweeping motion brought his sword up, then back and down, slicing through the Fomorian’s exposed neck.

Alanna covered her face with her hands, sobbing, and Tarah and Kristianna clung to each of my hands. I couldn’t take my eyes from the decapitated creature. Neither could Carolan. We stood there, paralyzed in the center of a world of chaos.

Look, Beloved. Understand what you are seeing whispered through my mind, and I blinked in shock.

“There are sores on its body!” My excited exclamation made Alanna uncover her face.

“That is it!” Carolan yelled. “That is why it was so much weaker than I expected. They have the pox.”

And then the suspended moment in time came to an end, and our group was stumbling forward again. More and more dark shapes joined fallen comrades as the warriors struggled to keep their women safe. I could see that the Fomorians were easier to kill—that the disease had obviously weakened them. But there were still simply too many of them.

With a detached sense of calm, I realized that we would not make it to the river, that we were actually still closer to the temple than to the water. Logic said we should return to the safety of Epona’s walls. But we couldn’t, at least not without more help.

Then you shall have more help. The Goddess’s words sounded clearly inside my head.

Through the confused haze of battle, I caught a flash of silver. Not the silver of Vic’s sleek hair, or the pale, dead silver of the Fomorians, but the otherworldly silver of an ethereal mare.

“Epi!” I cried as I saw her circling around our phalanx as she tried to catch a glimpse of me.

Call her, Beloved. Without conscious thought, I obeyed by lifting my fingers to my lips and splitting the air with a sharp Okie whistle.

Epi’s head jerked up in response and she galloped purposefully toward me.

I started shoving my way to her, yelling, “Let her through!” to the warriors in front of me. The phalanx parted and my mare slid to a stop in front of me, blowing hard.

Mount her, Beloved, and see how the Chosen of a Goddess triumphs.

I looked around hastily and found—not to my surprise—Alanna running to join me.

“Alanna! Help me to get up on Epi.” I turned and grabbed a fistful of shining mane.

“What are you doing?” she asked as she took my bent knee in her hands and boosted me up.

“Getting help,” I replied, finding my seat easily. “I want you to get the women and children back inside the temple grounds.”

She started to interrupt and I stopped her.

“No. Trust me—and trust my Goddess. Lead them home.”

She closed her mouth and nodded solemnly. “I trust you. Both of you.” Then she began calling the women and children to her, shouting that Epona wanted us to return to the temple. Soon she had the attention of the warriors. From the corner of my vision, I saw Alanna run to Victoria, grabbing her arm and earnestly motioning back toward the temple walls. I met Victoria’s gaze long enough to nod my agreement, then the Huntress’s voice joined Alanna’s and the phalanx began shifting direction.