Water, Circle, Moon

by Sally McBride

She put her hand over Bethea’s. “Mom, what did Jaird do to you? I know he’s my and Innis’s father. You need to tell me everything.” She shot a look at Arren. He nodded briefly. “You can trust Arren.”

  Bethea looked up at last and bared her teeth at him. “Trust him? He’s one of them too, isn’t he? I can tell.” She husked out a bitter laugh. “You can never trust him. He wants to possess you, impregnate you, rule over you. That’s all any of them want!”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Laine stared at her mother, anger and pity warring inside her. “Then why on earth did you go back to Jaird? What were you thinking?”

  Bethea’s lips twisted, and she buried her face in her hands. Laine ground her teeth. She wished her foolish mother would just take a drink already and return to normality. What Laine had always known as normality: her mother insulated from the cruel, uncontrollable world.

  No. Laine grabbed her ugly wish, hauled it down into the lowest depths of her subconscious and locked it up.

  She stood, went around the table and bent to wrap Bethea’s thin, bony shoulders in a gentle hug. At this small gesture of compassion, her mother burst into racking sobs. “Why? You ask me why, when you have him?” She glared at Arren, then let her head fall to Laine’s shoulder. “I loved him. I hated him. I still hate him.”

  “And you still love him.”

  Her mother subsided into trembling silence. She looked like someone who’d barely survived a bomb blast.

  It wasn’t love, Laine knew; it was obsession. A powerful and all-consuming fire. “Come on,” said Laine. “I’m putting you to bed.”

  Together she and Arren led Bethea Summerhill up the stairs to Laine’s room. Arren waited in the hall as Laine got the exhausted, shaking woman settled, pulled down the blinds and walked to the door. She glanced back. Bethea’s eyes were on her.

  She was almost as pale as the sheet pulled up to her chin. “Oh, Laine . . . I’m so scared.” Her eyes drooped as sleep claimed her. “I . . . don’t know what to do . . . ”

  “Just sleep, Mom. Everything will be fine after you’ve rested.”

  Of course it would. She gave a bright, brave and altogether false smile and tiptoed out, shutting the door softly.

  Arren thought about Bethea as he leaned against the wood-paneled wall outside Laine’s room. She and her mother were alike neither in looks nor temperament, Bethea being a certain type of pretty, manipulative female he’d seen plenty of, and Laine . . . Laine. Laine was perfect. When he was with her, he felt able to take on anything the world threw at him.

  If she’d captured him in her human form, what in hell would happen when—if—she became cabyll ushtey?

  He was even prepared to forgive her for concealing the fact that Jaird had shifted for her. The creature hadn’t hurt her. But why hadn’t he taken her then? Why didn’t Laine tell him about it? She hadn’t trusted him, of course. If Jaird Fallon was her sire, he would assume his daughter was his already, by rights, and that was why he hadn’t forced her into the change then and there.

  Jaird’s urge to toy with his victims had given them a reprieve.

  He dragged his thoughts back to Bethea Summerhill. Bethea had known what he was right away. The woman was cabyll through and through. He hadn’t touched her—she’d ignored his offered hand when they’d met—but he knew it. The alcoholism might be her reaction to denying her alternate self.

  He shook his head. And this was what resulted from that denial: a sick, shaking wraith barely able to walk. Did he want to court that fate for himself?

  Yet she’d made it here, across an ocean. There was something strong inside her, despite her addiction and fear. But was it love, hate, or slavish allegiance to a cabyll chieftain she still loved?

  I have no allegiance, Arren reflected. I belong to no chieftain; no herd holds me in its thrall. I’m just as much a rogue as Jaird Fallon. The thought gave him a chill.

  But he wasn’t Jaird Fallon, nor would he ever become him.

  His thoughts went further. What if all his folk could be so free, unfettered by ancient blood ties that controlled, restricted, and stunted what they might become? Arren knew, then, that his fight was not just for his beloved Delsie, not for Laine’s safety, not on behalf of his own restricted and stunted self, but for all of them. All the cabyll ushtey. The future of his own kind.

  Melved Gibbs, as he lay dying, had hinted at that very thing. A peaceful, civilized being himself, he saw what their kind could become if archaic savagery were left behind.

  Or what it was doomed to if that savagery took control.

  Humans wouldn’t rest until the cabyll race was extinct.

  Arren looked up as Laine finally appeared, softly closing her bedroom door on her mother.

  “I’m sorry about this,” said Laine in a low voice. Together they headed downstairs and out the back door to the garden. “Hopefully she’ll feel better when she wakes up. Which shouldn’t be for several hours.”

  It was now late afternoon; the rainstorm had passed, and the sky was a glowing robin’s-egg blue between low and still-sodden clouds that were shedding their moisture on some other part of Warks. The oppressive heat of the last few days was gone. Arren felt energized, even though he’d had only a few hours’ sleep over the last week now.

  He wondered if he should call Delsie’s parents and update them on his investigation. He had nothing to report, though, other than a lot of circumstantial evidence against Fallon. If anything legal was going to be done, they needed a lot more than what amounted to a fairy tale gone horribly real. Arren suspected that official involvement was the very worst way to go.

  He’d been expecting a request from Detective Inspector Watley to come in for an interview, or more likely a spirited grilling, but it hadn’t materialized. He knew he was being watched, but since he’d stayed put in the area like a good lad, he assumed he was on the back burner. He was sure Watley and his team were being given the runaround by the locals; the man didn’t know what or whom to believe. His team of investigators would sift the soil, comb the forest for evidence, question the villagers, and find nothing. Watley wasn’t the superstitious type; he wouldn’t place credence in tales of shapeshifters. And Arabella Griffin and her cronies, adept at their dual roles and very good at obfuscation, were well-liked in the area. Guests and friends of theirs would enjoy a certain level of protection. But not forever, and not if another killing happened.

  The stone bench was still too damp to sit on. Arren found himself leading Laine along the path to the stables. Always, the pull of one’s equine nature. They checked the stables—empty—and strolled hand in hand along the path to the river. Laine stopped well back to watch its quiet flow, diminished again to normal size, from a safe distance.

  He said, “I’ve got to find Jaird, you know. Are you sure you can’t remember where he lives?”

  “I could try to get close, at least. I could take you to the road Innis was blasting along like a maniac, but I’m not sure I could find the spot where he turned off.”

  “Do you want to try? Or you could just describe it to me, and stay here. I’d prefer to go alone.”

  She gave him a disgusted look. “Sorry, sport, but you’re not getting away that easily. This is my problem too.” She smiled, which took the sting out of her words, but then grew wistful. Probably thinking about that damned brother of hers. Her expressions were as fleeting and revealing as sun or shade on water, lighting or darkening her face and hiding nothing.

  The river sang in his blood. Take her in. Just walk together into the water . . .

  He shook his head and grunted. Briskly he turned and steered them back the way they’d come. “All right then. Your car or my motorcycle?”

  Immediately he felt her brighten. She gave a tiny skip as they trod the path.

  “Motorcycle, please! I don’t suppose you have an extra helmet?”

  “I don’t, but I know where to get one.”

  Tommy Cardew, clad in a teal velour jogging suit and nursing
a mug of tea, was glad to lend Laine his stylish black-and-red headgear. He didn’t ask any questions.

  Laine could not picture Tommy on a motorcycle. He was more the bicycle type, jaunty bell and wicker basket mounted on the handlebars. His helmet fit her just fine, though, and the feel of Arren’s broad back pressed tightly against her breasts was heavenly. Arren’s machine had a windscreen that deflected most of the air, making her position tucked behind him both comfortable and wildly exciting.

  She grinned behind his back and heard him laugh, their speed flinging the sound over her shoulder and away. He could feel more than her body pressed against his, just as she could feel more from him. Right now their moods were in sync: they were on the hunt. The throbbing between her legs increased, given a deep bass note by the roaring engine under her ass.

  The road was shaded now by huge maples and oaks on either side, with shafts of watery sunlight striking across their path. Arren slowed, the motorcycle’s wheels hissing along the still-damp pavement.

  “Does this look familiar?” he called.

  She relaxed her grip on him and peered over his shoulder, searching the right-hand side of the road for signs of the lane Innis had veered into only two nights—but still an eternity—ago. “No. Keep going, but slower.”

  They’d rounded a bend, she remembered that, but was it this bend? Maybe . . . the next one? Yes. “Okay, see that sort of bare area just past the purple flowers?”

  Arren pulled over and drew to a stop. Laine thought the flowers might be asters, and remembered noting their rich color in Innis’s headlights as they’d flashed along. He’d braked jarringly just past them and nosed the car into Jaird’s hidden lane. Arren set the bike on its stand and they dismounted to examine the verge. Could she see tire tracks, partially obscured? They’d been swept with a branch in an effort to erase them, or maybe they had erased themselves. Just as likely, around here.

  “This is the place,” she affirmed. “Should we drive in, or walk? It wasn’t far.”

  “Walk. I’ll stash the bike out of sight. You sure you want to do this? Remember, we’re only reconnoitering. Nothing more.”

  “Fine with me.” Laine felt chilled. Which could be from not having her arms wrapped around Arren now, or could be from fear. She was betting on fear, though she hoped Arren didn’t sense how reluctant she was to see Jaird again.

  Am I afraid of Jaird? No. Even after what she’d seen Jaird do, after he had chased and taunted her, what she felt was anger and righteous indignation, not fear.

  It was the tears on her mother’s cheeks that had done it.

  Had Jaird been a good man, she might have felt respect and reverence, even love, for him. But he was not a good man. Jaird Fallon was not a man at all: he was a beast that needed to be contained. A malignant cancer among the magical, gentle folk she’d met. His brutal dominance must end.

  But first they had to track the bastard down.

  “I’m putting the motor out of sight.” Arren coasted his machine off the road into a patch of bushes. He slung their helmets over the handlebars and gave her a steely look. “You’re absolutely sure?”

  “I’m absolutely sure.”

  He took her hand, and together they ducked under the lush, heavy branches that obscured the hidden lane.

  “Tell me something,” she said.

  He shoved a branch out of the way. “What?”

  “Why does Jaird Fallon live in the middle of nowhere when he’s got a whole big inn? If I’m right, he owns the place, doesn’t he?”

  “Unfortunately, I think so. I’m told he forced Arabella to sign the deed over to him after her husband’s death.”

  “Cold-blooded bastard. So why doesn’t he live there in style, with all his women waiting on him?”

  “Arabella put her foot down. He could have technical possession of the property, but she got him to agree to visits only. He pops in and out at random, and believe me, she doesn’t like that much better.”

  “Huh. So he gets the bachelor life as well as access to his herd of females.”

  “Chap has it made. If he could only restrict himself to the females he already owns.”

  Fifteen minutes later, Laine found herself performing a familiar routine: turning in a circle, trying to figure out where the hell she was. This had to be the right place. She recognized a row of neglected rhododendron bushes that must have been planted years ago along the curve of the lane. Okay, good. She’d seen those before. But underfoot was nothing but grass, sun-starved brush and saplings. No sign of tire marks. When she looked up, the rhodos were gone and what looked like baby pine trees were there instead. The track she and Innis had followed was grown over and invisible, and the saplings had multiplied somehow. “Damn it! I know it was here. The lane was wide enough for Innis’s car! It should be easy to follow.”

  Arren grunted, peering west through the canopy of leaves to determine the sun’s position. A miserly glow showed where west was, but clouds had returned to obscure the remaining light. Such as it was. Evening was creeping close.

  “It’s these trees and plants doing it, I’m sure,” she said. “Everything is moving and shifting to hide Jaird’s house.”

  “It’s happened to me every time I’ve thought I was getting close. I know where he lives; I just don’t know how to get there.”

  They looked at each other, equally frustrated.

  Arren spread his hands, blew out his cheeks and said, “We just have to keep going. Don’t worry, I won’t let us get lost. I have a feel for north.”

  “Like a migrating bird, eh?”

  Then, like the sun returning, he grinned at her. His eyes were gleaming in the gathering dusk. “I don’t know about you, but I’m enjoying myself. Wish I’d brought a torch, though.”

  She touched his lips with one finger. “Don’t get to like exploring the forest too much, Mr. Tyrell. It’s dangerous.”

  He moved closer and caught her hands, bringing them to his lips again to kiss. “You’re the dangerous one, Miss Summerhill. How am I to keep my mind on business when you look like a thoroughbred ready to run?”

  The word run sent a shiver down her legs.

  After a few seconds he let go and stepped back, shaking his head. “Right. Looking for the estimable Jaird Fallon.”

  “Estimable. Ha. That bastard is getting no pity from me.”

  “Pity is the last thing a cabyll chieftain needs. I doubt there’s much hope of redemption for him.”

  “I don’t want him redeemed. I want him dead.” Very, very dead, preferably with a stake through his evil heart. She thought inevitably of vampires at that image, then of the sharp, non-horselike teeth she’d seen gleaming in Arabella’s and Jaird’s mouths. If Arren changed shape, he’d have them too. Arren’s parents had been slaughtered with a silver knife, and burned too. Her stepdad Martin possessed a sharp sterling silver letter opener, and she wished for it now.

  Laine peeked surreptitiously at Arren’s face as they forced their way through the annoyingly agile vegetation, Arren helpfully swatting branches out of her way. Night was falling fast, but she could see the gleam of his still-ordinary human teeth. He was smiling. He was enjoying himself.

  “Arren, have you ever seen Jaird in his cabyll form?”

  “No. Not for lack of trying, though; the creature is wily as the Devil.”

  “Isn’t he, though.” She watched, fascinated, while Arren prowled along, sniffing the air. Could he smell another cabyll ushtey? Perhaps he was trying to detect woodsmoke from Jaird’s cottage, or a whiff of oil that might affirm the hidden roadway.

  With deceptive mildness, Arren said, “But you’ve seen him. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  She’d been waiting for the other shoe to drop. “I . . . don’t know.” Because he’d try even harder to send her away. Because she didn’t want to go.

  “He didn’t get you to touch him, or we wouldn’t be here now.”

  Laine was only too aware of her fate if her skin had come into contact wi
th Jaird’s. “No. He chased me for a while, taunted me. He could have taken me easily, done whatever he wanted. But he didn’t, Arren.”

  Arren merely looked at her, his lips thin with rightful skepticism.

  “Arren, he let me go. I don’t believe he wants to harm me.”

  “Then you’re a fool.”

  She refused to look down. His arms were at his sides, his fingers curling, and he again was the angry man she’d first seen at the inn. “I know he wants to change me, but I don’t think he means to kill me. I . . . I think I’m different from the other women.”

  “Of course you are. You’re his blood kin. Not like my Delsie.”

  It felt like a slap. She closed her eyes. Jaird had toyed with Arren’s young stepsister, found her to be too troublesome to keep, and then savagely murdered her. As he’d done to so many others. “He let me remain human. For now. I have no illusions that he’s going to treat me like a daughter.”

  “He let you remain alive, for now.” He took her hands in his.

  Guilt gave her heart a twist. “Arren, I’m sorry. I want him dead as much as you do. You’ve seen my mother—he wrecked her life. And never mind my stupid brother. Jaird already sent him after me once and may well be teaching him murder techniques right now.”

  What on earth could the two of them do against Jaird? Touching Arren was making her brain fuzzy. She jerked away and dug her fingers into her temples. A million fears chased each other around in her skull: Jaird, Mother, Innis and Anya; the police who hunted like well-meaning bumblers; all the cabyll ushtey she had met, benign or malignant. Jaird’s oiled-metal hooves slashing the ground beside her head.

  “We’ve got to keep looking,” she said, dismayed at the effort it took to sound determined.

  “No,” Arren said. “Not now. We’re just asking for trouble now that it’s dark.” He reached for her hand again and turned to retrace their steps. “We’re leaving.”

  Laine was ashamed of the relief she felt.

  But it was too late. Their first steps splashed into water.

  Chapter Twenty-Five