Highland Sorcerer

by Clover Autrey

  It took time and an inordinate amount of squirming and shifting into angles that would make her yoga instructor proud, but Charity managed to finally shimmy her arms free of the long plaid and after that the damn cloth was simple enough to get out of. Now to figure out how to wear it properly and get away from this hut. The thing folded and wrapped in far too many lengths.

  "You'll find these more to your liking." Edeen crouched through the doorway, carrying a bundle of dark wool and what she supposed passed for boots. Rough stitched leather with cross-lacings. "We seem to be of a like size."

  Riiiight. If Charity had been blessed with something larger than a B cup.

  "Uh, thank you." Grateful to have anything besides an overlong blanket, Charity lifted the coarse purple dress over her head and let the plaid drop around her ankles as the gown settled around her body. It was surprisingly comfortable and warm.

  Tapping a finger at the side of her cheek, Edeen's brows furrowed. "You've put it on backwards. Let me to assist. You're really from centuries beyond, aren't you?"

  "Yes. I told you."

  Edeen helped her shift the gown around and cinch up the cross ties in the back, pulling the waist in form-flattering tight. "'Tis difficult to think of it."

  They sat on the ground and Edeen showed her how to wear the long hose and lace up boots. Edeen's voice lowered. "The bands on Toren's wrists were covered in symbols, aye?"

  Charity's fingers stilled on the boot laces.

  Edeen's eyes flicked up and locked with hers. "Can ye recall them?"

  "You're going after him, aren’t you?"

  Edeen glanced toward the short doorway and quickly nodded.

  "Shaw doesn't know, does he?"

  "He will never allow it."

  "Why? Does he not care about his own brother?"

  Hurt and temper flashed across Edeen's features. "He cares. If anything, he cares too deeply, but he understands our duty to the magic, our charge to never disrupt the balance. If Aldreth turns even one of us to her darkness, all is lost."

  “Why?”

  “Our magic, the magic of our clan, is shared. In times of great need, Clan Limont can come together and bolster our magic through our High Sorcerer especially, through Toren, yet also through any of our family, myself, Col, or Shaw. Should the witch or any other of dark power lay claim to that…”

  “That combination of magic would be tremendous.”

  “Aye, and unbalanced. It cannot happen. If we cannot save Toren, we must cut him off from the clan.”

  "Toren would never—"

  "He will fight her to the end of his sanity, he will, but magic cares naught if its keeper is in his right mind. The witch will win. Eventually.” Her voice cracked. “She will corrupt my brother, though his mind and spirit will be destroyed in order for her to do so. We cannot blend our magic with a wielder who has consorted and taken from demonkind. Aldreth’s magic will join with him and her evil taint will tilt the balance to a black stain. Though our clan will fight the pull of it to our very cores, together she and Toren will be too much for even all of us together. Ye have no notion of what that will unleash."

  "Monsters." Charity's vocal chords felt raw, though her small plea silenced Edeen. "Vampires, werewolves, hobgoblins, ghouls, the dark Fae..."

  Edeen's chest heaved in and out as though she'd been running. "We cannot allow that to happen. All we can do is go into the Shadowrood before Toren is touched by darkness. If his magic is unbalanced, ‘twill filter into all our magic. Our clan has to leave and take our magic that once belonged to the Shadowrood with us to keep the world safe from the darkness. Safe from what we will all become. Otherwise...."

  "Otherwise your clan that is so strong together and meant to hold off the darkness will become the worse darkness. The taint will grow and fester and my century will be overrun with everything evil that exists with magic." She shivered. A thin layer of ice formed around her heart. History had already claimed the Limonts. Their clan had already gone into the Shadowrood, disappeared. And if they did not, the magical balance would be disrupted and evil would overcome light. The clan had done what they could, sacrificed themselves to another realm so that her time, her family, her sister—would not be overrun in darkness.

  The entire future from this point forward would be changed.

  "Is there…?" Edeen drew back, her fingers pawed at the folds of her gown over her bent knees. "Is your time bereft of magic?"

  Charity frowned. "There's some, though mild. We sift what we can from the land."

  "Earth magic." Edeen nodded. "'Tis good that some remains. So we succeed? We leave this world?"

  She probably shouldn't tell her this what with messing around with fate and the Butterfly Effect, but who says she wasn't fated to spill the beans anyway? After all, Shaw and Col had been scouting Aldreth's place to rescue Toren when she'd popped in on them. Shaw had changed plans, making the decision to take the clan into the Shadowrood after she'd told him about the spelled bands. Who says she wasn't brought here for that very purpose? "Your clan vanishes. No one knows what happened. You and all your clan simply ceased to exist as far as history recounts."

  Edeen nodded solemnly, though there was a tiny flutter of her fingers. "Then… mayhap Shaw is right." Her eyes glistened with unshed tears. "We must leave Toren to his fate." Her eyes lifted, pleading. "Do your histories reveal what happens to him?"

  Charity could barely speak around the closing muscles in her throat. The woozy drop of blood pressure threatened to pull her under. "No. There's nothing."

  Chapter Twelve