The first book of the
trilogy Morrigan’s Cross opens to an old man starting to tell the tale. The first one began with a sorcerer from 12th century Ireland, Hoyt of the Mac Cionaoiths, challenging the queen of the vampires, Lilith in a battle to avenge his twin brother, Cian who had been changed. It was all hard winds and blue lightning that streaked in the sky that made even the fairies tremble in their raths.It was one heck of an opening scene. Hoyt was “drafted” by the goddess, Morrigan to search for the
circle of people who will ultimately save the world from destruction. For when the feast of Samhain comes, the fates of the worlds, of all humankind, will be put on the line when the
gods (or those who were enlisted by the gods) and the demons (in this case, vampires) battle in the Valley of Silence. The goddess, Morrigan is the Celtic
goddess of war in Irish Gaelic literature. In some of the stories that I’ve read about her, she was evil and usually depicted as a crow or a crone. In the first book of the trilogy, Morrigan was a beautiful goddess who was just, and helped our heroes all through out the tale. Anyway, Hoyt fights with Lilith in the cliffs and wounds her, scars her with a pentagram, then faces off with his brother, Cian whom she had newly changed. He (Hoyt) gets drafted by the goddess to look for the 5 others who would complete the circle of the would-be heroes. He has to look for a witch, a warrior, a shifter of shapes, a scholar, and his brother, the vampire, and himself, the sorcerer, will complete the circle. Morrigan then sends him through time and space.In this story, we are introduced to the circle. Hoyt walks from the Dance of the Gods into Cian’s office in 21st century New York. He is now called Keene McKenna and owns a nightclub called Eternity. Cian fast became my favorite character. Aside from being the vampire, he has a dry wit and says the funniest, most sarcastic things. Aside from Cian and Hoyt, we meet the witch next. Her name is Glenna Ward, a modern witch from New York who makes a living designing (of all things) greeting cards, and painting. The romance element revolves around her and the serious, broody Hoyt. In this part of the trilogy, the battle for the fate of humankind seemed to have taken the front seat, and the romance element had become the secondary story. The other characters were introduced as well. We also get to meet the scholar Moira, princess and future queen of the mythical land of Geall; her cousin Larkin Riddock of the MacDara, who can change his shape into any animal; and the warrior, Blair Murphy, the demon slayer, descendant of Hoyt and Cian’s younger sister, Nola. The book revolves around the start of friendships and the establishment of trust among all the characters. Hoyt and Cian, though brothers, had been separated by centuries. Although to Hoyt, his
brother had just died a week ago. To Cian, it had been 900 years. And they did try to kill each other. Cian, by trying to take a big nasty bite out of Hoyt; and Hoyt, by trying to push Cian off a cliff. It hurts them both to be twins, and to not be the same. Cian, after all, had become a vampire. Then there’s the Geallians.
vampires had killed Moira’s mother so how can they trust Cian? And there’s the problem that the demon hunter Blair had to fight side-by-side with that which she had been born to hunt and kill? Both women had tried to stake him the first time they saw him. Training also took most of the story’s bulk so on most parts, our characters are bruised, bloody and sweaty from hand-to-hand combat and weapons training. Hoyt and Glenna, as the group’s magic users, also trained with their spells and chants and herbs and crystals. Of course, they fell in love and all that. This book was used to establish a base for the whole trilogy, and although this is my least favorite of the lot, it was well written with the Nora Roberts flare for word artistry and imagination. I still like it because, for someone who looks farthest from a goth chick, I’m fascinated with vampires, demons, witches, sorcerers and whole shebang. The title, Morrigan’s Cross, was taken from the silver crosses that the goddess had given Hoyt to leave his family as protection against the vampires.
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