The Latest in Long Swords, Hot Heroes, & Warrior Women

Cheers everyone, I’m passing (virtual) heather mead around, please grab a goblet and drink down the heady brew as I tell you about my latest release Druid Bride. It is my ninth Celtic/Romance as I love history and have an unquenchable passion for all things Celtic. I believe it began when I saw the Disney movie, The Sword and the Stone at age five. Speaking of movies, Druid Bride is set against the same historical backdrop of 1st century AD Scotland as the new movie, Centurion.

It’s a mystical, romantic tale, full of adventure that will sweep you away to the period in history when the Boudica revolt failed in England and the Pictish tribes of northern Scotland took up the battle against the Romans. It is a time of long swords, hot heroes and warrior women. Brude is my hot hero, a Pictish warrior, with shoulder length hair thick from lime wash and spiked like a hedgehog’s, with strands ranging from dark brown to a golden hue. Danger shines in his alluring grin and the gleam of his brown eyes. He is tall, young, muscular, well built and his body is covered with blue, Pictish woad tattoos of Celtic beast and curving symbols. My warrior woman, Tanwen, has long, straight, copper toned red hair and large green eyes, she wears the white gold speckled robe of a druidess. They are physically attracted to each other and they respect each other. But they do not trust each other.

I think the best way to describe a historical time period or events is to just bring the reader into it. Here are some tidbit excerpts and character quotes to take you to the wild world of the Pictish tribes in first century AD, Scotland.

Excerpt:
The tattoos covering his arms and legs were similar to the sacred images engraved on the long stones which stood all over Caledonia. The largest swirl began small and curved into a larger loop, with a little one for wings, and long, thin lines as legs. So his patron goddess was Corra—the crane goddess—which revealed his closeness to the otherworld and his gift of prophecy

2nd Excerpt:
Together they gulped down the golden mead. Never, not once, did they tear their eyes away from each other.
“As the mead flows through you, let the spirit fill you.”Tanwen walked over to the cauldron and dipped her hand in the dark, gooey, blue dye.
Her finger slinked down his face, streaking both cheeks blue. The woad was warm, her touch hotter. His tinted checks burned. After dipping her hands into the dye again, her ring-bedecked fingers danced over the muscles rippling down his arms, tracing each of his tattoos, following the lines as she painted them blue. He quivered. The gods shielded him through these symbols. The first was a wolf, with an open mouth drawn as a curve. Then the boar with tusk made from a circle, with a line drawn though it and two knots on each end. His flesh tingled as she painted the lines of a swirling snake.

3rd Excerpt:
There she was, standing on the hill, enveloped in a flowing, speckled, white cloak held with a gold brooch, and wearing gold clasps on her ears and a thick gold torque around her neck. Brude watched as the villagers took the nine sacred woods and built the great fire. He felt like he didn’t know her. He didn’t think of her as Tanwen while watching her there, but simply as a druidess, a human personification of a war goddess. A woman yes, but one who spoke for the gods, and therefore had more power than the mightiest chief of the land. Not the woman he longed for when the Smertae captured her in that botched cattle raid. Not the fiery lady he’d slept with, who filled his dreams.

And I’ll leave you with these two character quotes from Druid Bride:

“Oh woman, loved by me, give me your heart, your soul, and your body. I swear by peace and love to stand, heart to heart and hand to hand.” Brude

“I have drunk mistletoe afore, stronger than what is given to the sick. I use it to aid travel through the oak door.”Tanwen