That memory made her wince too. Sometimes seeing the sight of her mother lost in that drunken stupor was more frightening than any nasty thing a man could conjure up. She gulped, and pressed Lúnasa’s head against her chest.

  It would be different with her own daughter.

  They passed through the large doors, and Augusta felt the smell of dark incense whiff through her cheeks. And the stumbling after-effects of every goddess in the Hibernian Otherworld getting drunk after tasting freedom for the first time in aeons.

  She looked around. The place was in much better state inside than Augusta had expected. The walls were still dark. The paintings upon them were still grim, not unlike the ones she’d seen in the Hibernian caves with Eithne, but it wasn’t so bad.

  She looked around, and saw that everyone from the Hibernian mountains was accounted for, lost in conversations with small drinks in hand. Brigid was in the centre, the only one of the goddesses sitting on the long row of stools, conversing with a man who appeared to be the teach’s owner.

  This was Donn. And he was exactly how Augusta pictured a man called Donn to look. He was wrapped up in a sombre cowl with a hood over his head, and his skin was like the dark grey of an old tree. He looked much older than the building he inhabited, but then Augusta caught herself, and realised everyone here but her and Lúnasa was probably much older than this place.

  It was then that Donn caught her eye lingering for too long on the contour of his skin, and pointed her, Lúnasa and Eithne out to his bar-side companion. Brigid turned, and then, in an odd way, only the rest of the women turned to look at them, and Augusta felt her sense of confidence being squeezed out of her.

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  She’d never been one for the spotlight. Not now, when she was a centurion, preferring to put on the mask of the reserved leader who didn’t mix with the few legionnaires her father had tasked her with to practise. It was against her nature. Someone who observed rather than someone who was supposed to lead.

  Of course, Brigid and the others weren’t watching her. They were watching the young girl in her arms, who seemed to be sprouting up more and more with every hour that passed. Eithne led the two of them along to Brigid and Donn.

  “That is the child?” Brigid asked.

  Eithne nodded. “Yes, we had her earlier this morning. Or night. It was dark then, even if we knew it to be morning now.”

  “The lightbringer,” Donn heaved out. His breath had the scent and the depth of a lifetime spent among wines. “The one who’d cleared up all the darkness outside.”

  Lúnasa whimpered a bit, and Augusta clenched her tighter. To hell with what Brigid or Eithne thought — she didn’t like Donn at all now if her daughter was scared of him.

  “I hope that isn’t a bad thing,” Augusta pressed.

  “Augusta…” Eithne mumbled out, but Brigid motioned her hand to let them know it was alright.

  “Donn’s just not used to all the light,” Brigid explained, “or people.”

  “Or people crashing in my teach,” he added. “There hasn’t been an abundance of people here since the end of the first Cath of Maige Tuired.”

  “Cath?” Augusta said. Again, a Hibernian word would come out instead. Whatever magic they used in the Otherworld didn’t always work to the best of its abilities.

  Eithne squeezed Augusta’s butt. “Battle,” she whispered. She could be very unashamedly handsy when—

  “The first battle?” Augusta said. “You mean there’s another?”

  “We’re already in it,” Donn said flatly, “and that one, we hope, will bring an end to it.”

  He pointed a horribly rotten finger at Lúnasa. Oh, that’s right. The whole Balor vs Dagda thing. The Fomorians vs the Tuatha Dé Danann. The reason Augusta had spiralled into this place after Eithne had whisked the two of them with her magical shawl.

  Augusta realised she shouldn’t be so hard on herself. She’d had a daughter this morning, and then spent most of her day wandering around a strange new place with her lover as she breastfed her daughter on the walk from time to time. Keeping up to date with the battles between men was near the bottom of her list of priorities right now