Time's Legacy Read Online Free PDF Page A

fists, then forced himself to relax them again. ‘We pray if people are ill. Laying on healing hands is not acceptable in my parish I’m afraid. End of!’ He stood up. There was a moment of silence as he looked at her. ‘Anger suits you, Abi, if you’ll pardon the cliché! It makes you look quite beautiful.’ He reached forward and playfully tugged at a lock of her hair. The clips that normally kept it restrained on the nape of her neck had come free and a heavy lock had fallen across her shoulder. ‘We are going to have to tame you, I can see.’ She jerked back out of his reach. ‘That hair is a bit too wild, isn’t it. Perhaps it would be better if you cut it.’
    She stared at him. ‘I will do no such thing!’
    ‘Then keep it under control, Abi. It makes you look far too enticing.’
    She thought long and hard that night up in her flat as she stood at the window looking out across the rooftops. So, healing was not acceptable and neither it seemed was her hair. She shivered. She had first discovered she had what was, for the want of a better term, the power of healing, when a fortune teller at a fairground had told her so when she was sixteen. The old gypsy in a colourful caravan had taken her hands and scrutinised them for several seconds, then she had shaken her head as though puzzled by the wonders she found there and begun to speak with, as it turned out, quite remarkable accuracy. ‘You will have a life of service, dear,’ the old woman had said. The great black gaping holes between her teeth gave her the expression of a storybook elf as did her mischievously sparkling eyes. ‘You are a sensitive and you have healing hands. I can feel their power. You must train yourself to use your powers for good. It is too easy to go to the bad! You will have the potential to do so much for people.’ Abi had been a bit miffed at the time. She bet herself that the woman said that to everyone and that was not what she wanted to hear. She wanted to hear about future romance. The old woman, effortlessly reading her thoughts, had sighed. She looked again at Abi’s hand, tracing the lines with a grubby forefinger. ‘I see two men here. More than two.’ She glanced up disapprovingly. ‘But one is special. The trick will be to decide which one he is.’ She had cackled with laughter. Abi remembered wondering cynically if she had trained herself to laugh like that or if it was natural.
    The remark about her healing hands had however lodged somewhere in her unconscious and years later, after yet another person had told her how good it was after she had massaged a neck or laid a cool authoritative hand on an aching head, she had enrolled for a course with the National Federation of Spiritual Healers. One of the many things she had not told her parents about. The course was fascinating. It showed people how to channel energy. To be aware. To work with the body of the sick person, to remove pain and direct healing. The spiritual side of it was non specific. It did not involve prayer, but even now as a priest Abi still found herself instinctively using the skills she had learned on that course. She prefaced her actions with prayer now of course and gave thanks afterwards. She could not believe that what she did was evil.
    She recalled the expression on Kier’s face as he had brought up the subject. Sandra had warned her. There was something strange going on here and she did not feel comfortable about it. Any more than she had felt comfortable with him touching her hair. She was finally beginning to wonder if she was really enjoying living that close to him. Her initial attraction to the man was waning. She could never quite put her finger on it, but there was something about him which was increasingly making her uneasy.
    From then on she began to notice things; from time to time their hands touched accidentally when they were sitting at his desk, their heads together over parish reports; once or twice they brushed against one