Shadow's Curse

by Alexa Egan

  Even so, if she could shoot flames from her eyes, he’d be dead a thousand times over. “It’s my way of telling you and Miss Hawthorne that we do not take orders for magic like a village dressmaker with a new gown. There is much to consider.”

  “Like whether you want to save the life of an Imnada rather than kill me now.”

  “The sisters of High Danu do not commit murder, Mr. St. Leger.”

  “What about the Amhas-draoi? They’re known for stopping at nothing in defense of you Fey-bloods.”

  “The brotherhood has heard the rumors of the Imnada’s astounding survival, but there was no proof. No evidence the shifters were more than a drunkard’s tale.”

  David spread his arms. “Here I am. In the flesh . . . or the fur, as you like.”

  “Yes,” she said, her eyes raking his attire, a borrowed pair of breeches and a scrounged shirt that barely fit across his shoulders. “That’s more than clear. We’ll have to consider all this carefully.”

  “My current existence or my future health?”

  “Both,” she snapped.

  Callista stepped in front of him like a martyr before the pyre. Her chin tilted defiantly, her shoulders squared. “He’ll die without your help, Aunt Deirdre. I’ve heard the voices on the wind and seen his future through the eyes of those whose spirits wander the paths of the dead.”

  The Ard-siur grimaced, her hands lying knobbed and crooked on her desk. “Your mother should never have taught you such things. She gave up that privilege when she chose that man over her birthright.”

  “That man was my father.”

  “That man,” Ard-siur snipped, “was a cunning social climber who thought he could seduce himself a fortune. He was mistaken. The Armstrongs of Killedge Hall do not pay blood money, as he found to his cost.”

  “No, they don’t. They hurt and insult and ignore.” Callista pulled a packet of letters from her pocket. Tossed them on the desk in front of her aunt. “She wrote to you over and over. Begging for forgiveness. Wanting only to know you cared, that you loved her. You gave her nothing.”

  “Not really the way to persuade her to help,” David whispered in Callista’s ear.

  Ard-siur stared at the battered cache of letters tied with a faded blue ribbon. Her face was as white as bone, the skin drawn and smooth as old leather.

  “What did your mother give us? Shame, disgrace, and lowly connections. Roberta Armstrong had everything a girl could want. A good home, parents who doted upon her every wish, and a glorious match with a man of wealth and prestige. What did she do? She threw it away on a charming smile and a pleasing word.” She shot David a contemptuous look. “Like mother, like daughter, it would appear. St. Leger’s handsome enough and, no doubt, he knows the words that will flatter you, but what is he beneath it all? A beast wearing the skin of a man. A treacherous creature who would rip your heart out as soon as look at you.”

  “So, that would be a no on the cure?” David quipped, choking on his dagger-sharp fury. It would do him no good and only worsen Callista’s situation.

  “You’re right, Aunt. David St. Leger has ripped my heart out and claimed it for his own. I love him. An emotion unknown to you.”

  Color splotched ugly across Aunt Deirdre’s sunken cheeks while David simply boggled. Fury forgotten, he put a hand against the small of Callista’s back, and let her warmth ease his jangled nerves and relax muscles tight as wires.

  “I was wrong to come here,” she said, her voice calm and carrying. Only David, feeling the tremors underpinning her words, knew how much she was really hurting. “Wrong to think I could ever find a family among you. Family isn’t about blood. It’s about love and compassion and the unselfish giving of yourself. I had more of that with Nancy, Captain Flannery and his wife, the Duncallans. Even Lucan Kingkiller and Badb. They cared about me and worried over me, and when I was lost or sad or upset, they stood by me. Can you say you would ever do the same?”

  Ard-siur’s face was expressionless, her eyes flat, but her hand clenched the letters in a white-knuckled fist. “You’re welcome to stay as a guest of the convent until your strength returns, but I do not think a life among the bandraoi is suitable for someone so volatile and capricious. As for you . . .” She turned her attention to David. “You will remain with us for the nonce. There are many questions and much to discuss.”

  “Is that your subtle way of telling me I’m your prisoner?”

  “It wasn’t meant to be subtle.”

  * * *

  “It’s not exactly how we would have planned such a meeting, but it’s past time the sisters of High Danu knew the truth about the Imnada,” Katherine said as she curled in an armchair, a blanket drawn across her legs.

  Just as old the innkeeper’s wife had predicted, the sun had returned and with it, warmth enough to melt the snow to slick black mud, the icicles dripping long and thin from every eave.

  “James is with David, and despite your aunt’s unfortunate opinion, there are plenty who feel differently upon hearing the clans survive. We’ll win our way out of this mess, wait and see.”

  “I think it’s brilliant,” Sister Clara piped up.

  The young priestess had arrived with dinner and stayed for conversation. Her cheerful chatter as much as her tray of food had done much to restore Callista’s equilibrium, though nothing could erase her last look at David as they led her from her aunt’s office while he remained behind. His grin was cocky as ever, but she saw the careful way he held himself and the caution in his gaze.

  “I had an old auntie that used to tell me stories of the shifters,” Sister Clara said, drawing Callista back to the conversation. “Hair-raising they were, sent shivers right up my spine, but I loved them.”

  “See?” Katherine said confidently.

  Still, Callista couldn’t shake the sense these high walls she’d run to for refuge were closing around her like the jaws of a poacher’s trap. She kicked herself for being such a dim-witted optimist. She’d been foolish to believe her aunt would welcome a niece she never knew and stupid to think the order would overlook the fact that David was Imnada and help him break the curse.

  “. . . baths, milady? Aye, they’re still here. Hardly used anymore, though. Ard-siur discourages it. I’ve only been down there once since I arrived as a novice.”

  Dreams of a lifetime lay shattered around her, but Callista refused to give in to the heartbreak. She refused to sit and weep over a pile of old letters and useless regrets. Her mother had done that, finally surrendering to grief and loss and loneliness.

  Callista was made of sterner stuff.

  “. . . mum lives on the southern shore near Kinloch. Sister Walda’s not supposed to, but she lets me visit her each morning and take a bit of soup and bread from the kitchens.”

  “Can you get a note to Mr. St. Leger for me?” Callista asked.

  Sister Clara and Katherine looked up as one.

  The priestess’s eyes lit up. “You mean a secret love letter? That kind of note?”

  “Can you do it?” Callista repeated.

  The girl bit the tip of her finger as she thought. “I heard whispers he’s being held in the north tower. That’s usually Sister Lissa’s domain, but I can manage easy enough.”

  “Callista, what are you planning?” Katherine asked, an uneasy look on her face.

  “I can’t allow David to be locked away forever because of me. I need to see him. Need to let him know . . .” She shook her head. “I need him. That’s all. I need him.”

  Sister Clara jumped to her feet. “You write the note, miss. I’ll deliver it.”

  Callista sat down at the desk. Stared long and hard out the narrow window onto the busy yard below, where sisters in gray moved about their daily chores, a herd of cows was being shepherded by a girl in a kirtle and apron, and a boy was riding a mule with a dog at his side. Riders streamed in through the fortress gate, with nothing about them to signal who they were but for the swords at their hips, the daggers at their belts, and
the stern looks in their hard faces—Amhas-draoi. Scathach’s warriors. Guardians of the divide between human and Fey. Was this the beginning of the war Gray and the Duncallans feared?

  With a shiver, she bent pen to paper in a frightened scribble and prayed David would come.

  * * *

  “Callista? Are you down here?” David’s footsteps and voice echoed against the brick walls as he stepped off into a long room lit only by high slitted vents, a welcome breeze riffling down to stir the hairs at the back of his neck. Otherwise, the air hung heavy and damp against his skin. Stone benches ran the perimeter of the room, rounded and softened by thousands of years of use. High buttresses of intricately carved marble rose and then were lost in the dark of the ceiling, while steps to his left descended into a murky green pool.

  He knelt and dipped his hand in the water. Pleasantly hot. Horribly stinky. And bitter on his tongue. He splashed it on his face to relieve his faint dizziness; let it trickle under his collar to ease the fever heat and the tightening and cramping of his muscles. Too much magic. Too small a space. It was like having every nerve plucked and every breath laced with needles. His brain hummed while his flesh crawled. He doused his head with another handful. Slapped his wet hair off his face with a flick of his neck and closed his eyes until the worst passed. Felt a hand on his shoulder.

  He wheeled around, reaching for the dagger that wasn’t there, his body a live fuse.

  “David, it’s me.”

  He breathed a silent prayer to the Mother. Callista. Whole. Unharmed. A few shadows that hadn’t been there before. A strain in her face and around her eyes, but otherwise untouched. He could take solace knowing that whatever else happened, Corey had failed. The door to death would not swing open. Callista would not be the key to the king of the stews becoming the king of the world.

  “Orneai aimara,” he said in the language of the ancients. “My beautiful.” He cupped her face in his hands and drank in a deep thirst-quenching kiss, his body alive now with more than sickness.

  “You’re ill. And burning with fever.”

  “It’s nothing.”

  She gave a small shake of her head, but otherwise didn’t argue. Instead she gripped his arms, her gaze clear, though he saw the fear lurking just beneath the surface. “I wasn’t certain you’d get my note . . . or if you’d be able to come.”

  “I’ve offered my parole. I’m free to move about the fortress as long as I don’t attempt to leave. Your aunt is playing nice for the moment.”

  “For the moment is well and good, but you need to escape before they change their minds. Sister Clara can smuggle you out when she goes to visit her mother tomorrow at dawn. She thinks you’re brilliant and our story’s a romantic adventure straight out of Sir Walter Scott.”

  “Did any of those stories end well?”

  “Don’t joke, David. The Amhas-draoi will never let you go. They’ll hold you captive until they pull every last secret of the Imnada out of you. Then they’ll go after the clans. You have to run while you can.”

  “I thought you didn’t want me running.”

  “It’s different now. Didn’t you say this place was the heart of the enemy? That you’d never be caught within its walls?”

  He took her hands. Brushed a kiss upon her forehead. “Don’t fear for me, Callista. As long as I’m their only connection to the Imnada, they’ll treat me with respect.”

  She opened her mouth to argue, but he placed a finger on her lips. “To show their good faith, the commander of the garrison sent men to search for Corey and your brother. An army of dead ravaging Great Britain is in no one’s interest, shapechanger or Fey-blood.”

  She molded herself against him, the leap of her pulse in her throat and the catch of her breath making his own body respond.

  “You’re finally free, my love. No longer forced to hide. You can find a life anywhere and be anyone you wish to be.”

  “With you?” she asked.

  He couldn’t keep the sorrow from his gaze. It reflected back to him in the dark of her eyes.

  “I meant what I said to my aunt, David. Every syllable. I love you.”

  “Then unsay it. Take it back and never think on it again.”

  “Love doesn’t work that way.”

  “I did what I set out to do, Callista. The book is safe with Gray. You’re safe from Corey. And Beskin is a frozen corpse. I can die a happy man.”

  She frowned. “Stop it. Stop talking that way. There are other convents and other priestesses. We’ll search them out. Scour their libraries and their archives. Find a bandraoi more powerful than any living here and convince them to help, but you need to escape before it’s too late.”

  “Is this what the spirits have shown you? Is this my future?”

  Anger flashed in her face. “The spirits know nothing.”

  “You saw my death, didn’t you?” he asked. She did not deny it, but there was a stiffening of her body and she slid her gaze to the wall behind him. “You saw your death as well, didn’t you?”

  “Prophecies are not fact,” she argued.

  “Why ask the question if you won’t believe the answer?”

  “To change the answer. I’ve stepped from the path once. I can do it again.”

  He pushed a curl behind her ear, caressed the curve of her cheek. “You make me almost believe.”

  “I won’t stop trying until you do.” She pulled him down to her, her kiss sweet with sherry. Her tongue dipped to taste, her teeth nibbled at his lip. He drank her in, the scent of her hair and her skin, the honey warmth of her mouth. She answered with a rising passion, her back arching as she melted into his touch.

  Then, just as suddenly, she stepped clear of his arms. Holding his gaze, she unbuttoned the ugly brown wool gown they had given her and let it fall to the bricks. Slowly, sensuously, she untied the prim ribbons of her chemise, drew one arm free and then the other, and the slip of cotton soon joined the gown as a puddle at her feet.

  Her skin glowed pink and silver, golden and white as milk. The heat from the baths moistened her breasts, a trickle of sweat sliding into the valley between them. Her dark hair curled over her shoulders in the humid air, little ringlets damp against her forehead and temple.

  She passed him, hips swaying with just a hint of come-hither sensuality, the earthy scents of sex mingling with the mineral tang of the baths. Stepped into the murky water, a slow step at a time. It lapped at her ankles, her knees, the junction between her legs.

  A smile lit her face, and she slapped at the surface of the pool, sending spray to douse him. “Wake up!”

  He answered her smile with an encouraging grin. “Minx.” Shed his clothing, pausing upon the top step, his need for her evident. “Where’s the shy maiden who knew nothing of kisses and shrank from my touch?

  “I left part of her in a closet in Cumberland Place, another piece in a wagon between Grantham and Newcastle, and finally shed her in a castle bed high above the North Sea.”

  He descended into the bath, dropped below the water, letting it wash away his last hesitation. He surfaced with a flick of water from his face to find her molten gaze devouring him as if he were a confection. “Much warmer than that creek.”

  She took his hands. “You didn’t touch me then.”

  “I wanted to.”

  “Touch me now.”

  “Gladly.”

  He lapped at her skin, sucking the water from her shoulders, her collarbone, her breasts; took her nipples in his mouth and suckled until they hardened under his tongue. His hands moved in the water, gliding over hips and the flat of her stomach, touching the brush between her legs, the cleft of her mound. She gasped, the water moving with them, stirred by their desire.

  She guided him inside her, the dark wrapping close around them, the damp air warm in their lungs, dripping down their cheeks, silvering their hair. He held her, feeling her close around him, sheathed tight inside her. He made no move. And then slowly . . . very slowly he withdrew and plunged deep ag
ain. Each stroke a torture. Each thrust dragging him closer to the edge. He locked his gaze with hers, dilated pupils and parted lips, clawing fingernails and wet skin. Her pleasure aroused him further until lightning licked along every raw nerve.

  This was the end between them. He tried to console himself. She was not the first woman he had walked away from without a backward glance. Yet his heart ached as he pictured the future that might have been theirs, the family they might have had, the life they might have lived. And for the first time, David felt an irresistible urge to fight tooth and claw against his fate rather than resign himself to the inevitable. Because, for the first time, he had someone worth fighting for.

  * * *

  Callista wrapped her legs around David’s waist, lifted her hips to take him deeper. Head thrown back, she groaned as the water sluiced over them and between them, as she felt her blood pouring volcanic through her body. She’d heard the act of love called the tiny death, but there was nothing of death in this giving and receiving of pleasure. Death was a cold and frigid place, a vast empty landscape, a gray forever where no sun burned or stars shone. This was light and heat and life and blazing, heart-stopping emotion. This was the promise of bliss shadowed by the fear of despair.

  This was what she had told herself she would not and could not do.

  Love.

  She arched against the sweet friction of their joining as he kissed her in a sweeping, heated, toe-curling, stomach-knotting kiss. Felt the cresting wave of her bliss pull her under, and cried her climax into his mouth. His sending struck hard as a warrior’s vow in her dizzy head.

  I love you, Callista.

  The groan of door hinges broke the spell, the splash of lantern light over the bricks tore them apart, and the soft shush of robes over the stone had David bracing for attack.

  “Down here, Ard-siur.” A grizzled priestess with a mole on her chin wobbled down the stairs. Two more followed, the last gripping the wrist of Sister Clara, who shot Callista a look of frightened apology.

  The outraged group drew to a halt at the bottom of the steps, Aunt Deirdre close to boiling over as she took in the scene. “How dare you!” She fairly trembled with rage. “I offer you comfort and you repay me with lechery. I offer you aid and you pay me back with whore’s gold. Mr. St. Leger, you’re to return to your rooms. Tomorrow you’ll be turned over to the Amhas-draoi. You can be their distraction. I hope they offer you the hospitality that one of your kind deserves.”