“And if the stone is hidden? The estate is a large one.”
“The woman will know where it is.” He directed the full power of his gaze onto the messenger, a taste of what failure brought as its reward. “She will be made to reveal it.”
Well satisfied with the interview, Máelodor flicked his bony fingers in dismissal. “Oss, show the man out.”
Once more alone, he surrendered to infirmity. Closed his eyes against a pain fast growing unbearable. So much he’d lost to his cause. Youth. Health. The powers needed for these darkest of arts draining him of both. But soon—when Arthur stood before him. When the Other marked their king’s return and rose up as one—he would take the final step needed to secure victory in war and his own personal renewal. An alliance with the Unseelie. A loosing of the demons from their Dark Court.
With their legions riding at the side of this greatest of kings, even the staunchest of Duinedon armies would fall. His own bodily sufferings eased.
Worth it at twice the price.
For the man who controlled the Dark Court controlled the world.
four
It had taken Elisabeth most of the day, but she’d finally made up her mind. She would confront Gordon with her concerns about his plans for Dun Eyre. She didn’t want her home to become a pale imitation of some Englishman’s country house. Its charms were its own and not to be tampered with.
Stepping off the bottom stair, she followed the sound of men’s voices to the billiard room. Peeking round the door, she spied Uncle McCafferty, Lord Taverner, and Cousin Rolf deep in play, a footman clearing away a picked-over platter of sandwiches. “Have you seen Gordon?”
Rolf took his shot, the balls cracking against one another. “I believe he and his brother drove to Ennis. Took a bag with him, so I don’t expect he’ll be back before tomorrow.”
“Oh. He never said he planned on leaving.”
Uncle McCafferty chalked his cue. “Not going to be one of those kinds of wives, are you, m’dear? He’s not under the cat’s paw yet.”
Heat rose into her cheeks. Grabbing up a sandwich, she ducked out of the room, followed by the sound of hearty laughter. Had her tone been nagging? She didn’t think so. Disappointed, perhaps. Discouraged. Now she’d have to wait until Gordon’s return to take up her case.
Left without a purpose, she couldn’t decide what to do. Sit with the ladies in the drawing room, where gossip flowed freely as the tea? Join the younger crowd in the rowdy game of lottery tickets being played in the Red Salon? Perhaps a rummage among the kitchens to turn up some of Cook’s leftover sponge cake?
But none of those choices appealed to her. Perhaps she should just retire. Put this entire horrid day behind her. At least Brendan had somehow managed to stay out of trouble. She’d not seen him since dinner and even then he’d been subdued, his gaze somber, his manner guarded. She’d almost thought to goad him into speaking before coming to her senses. What did she care if he seemed uneasy? It wasn’t her concern. Against her better judgment, she’d kept his secret. Beyond that, his worries were his own and nothing to do with her.
The soft chords of a pianoforte slowed her steps as she passed the music room. Barely heard above the sounds of merrymaking elsewhere, the melody rose and fell in soft echoes before dying away. Began again. Clearer. Louder. And this time unmistakable. Mozart.
Pushing wide the door, she squinted through the dark. Shadows lay thick about the room, but for a branch of candles blazing upon the pianoforte. The light carved deep lines in the face of the man seated at the keys. Flickered over cheekbones and deep-set, heavy-lidded eyes before splashing across long-fingered, capable hands.
Elisabeth listened from the doorway, the familiar, heart-rending melody pushing against her anger like water against a dam.
He stumbled over a chord, his hands coming to rest still and gentle upon the keys.
“Try again,” she murmured from the doorway.
He spun in his seat, scrambling to build his fith-fath. His eyes widened then narrowed, his disguise abandoned. It was Brendan before her. Not the man she remembered. But not the stranger with Brendan’s golden eyes either.
His gaze fell to the sandwich in her hand. “For me?”
“If I gave you anything, it would be poison in your soup,” she snapped, annoyed that a mere melody could wreak such havoc.
“I’d no idea you could hold a grudge so long. Were you always so resolute?”
“Always,” she said, her feet guiding her farther into the room before her brain could counter. What harm was there in staying to listen? A few moments only and then she’d leave.
He began playing again. The music rippled and curled over her like water. Filled her ears. Sank into her blood. Made her heart race. She closed her eyes. Let this once-favorite composition sweep her back to a time when she’d been young and giddy and naive. Full of anticipation for a life with Brendan.
She’d understood it was a marriage of convenience, but in her fantasies she gained his undying devotion, their marriage rivaling the great love stories of history. Mark Antony and Cleopatra. Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. Elisabeth Fitzgerald and Brendan Douglas.
What romantical claptrap.
The piece died on a sour note, bringing her back to earth with a thud. That was Brendan all over. Always the dream of him carried her along until the reality of him smacked her over the head. She opened her eyes to catch him watching her, a wry twist to his mouth.
He kneaded his left hand as if it pained him. “What’s it like wearing a king’s ransom in jewels?”
“Uncomfortable,” she said, fingering her gaudy sapphire choker.
“Love often is.” He chuckled. “I haven’t told you yet, but you look stunning this evening.”
His gaze scoured her, the candlelight making wicked flames of his eyes. She felt suddenly self-conscious. The way her gown clung to every curve. The tightness of her stays. The plunge of her neckline. “I look passable, which isn’t the same thing at all.”
“Now you’re fishing for compliments. You know full well how beautiful you look. Always have. You used to spend hours primping in front of your mirror. I never knew a girl more taken with fribbles and furbelows than you.”
“And yet, I could still outride you over any distance or ground.”
His smile widened, losing the cynical edge. “I was being gallant.”
She sniffed. “You’ve never had a gallant bone in your body. You hated when I won. Sulked for days and wouldn’t speak with me. Said it wasn’t seemly for a mere chit of a girl to beat you.”
“Gods, did I say that? To your face? I really was a pretentious son of a bitch. How did you put up with me?”
“I could ask you the same. I was an awful tagalong. You couldn’t turn around without stumbling over me.”
He ran a hand through his hair. Thick and dark and overlong, though now it fit his rugged features. If he’d been porcelain pretty in his youth, age had hardened that delicacy to a knife-edge elegance. Dangerous in its perfection.
Nerves fluttered her stomach. If she weren’t diligent, she’d be right back to head-over-heels infatuated.
He moved to make room for her on the bench. She hesitated before chiding herself for a silly gudgeon. This was Brendan. She certainly didn’t have to worry about any predatory motives on his part. Not like most of the men she met, who were always trying to maneuver her into secluded corners or onto quiet balconies. Well, everyone but Gordon, who’d remained a proper gentleman throughout their courtship. Perhaps that’s what drew her to him—a change from the usual. Certainly, Brendan had never shown that kind of admiring interest in her. Not even when they were engaged—much to her chagrin.
She slid in beside him, annoyed all over again. What was so wrong with her that he’d rather be assumed dead than marry her?
“You still play magnificently,” she said, trying to fill the awkward silence.
“I’ve not had much practice lately. Nor have I been in much of a playing mo
od.” He pulled free his watch to check the time.
Her eyes lit on the intricate scrollwork of the gold case, the enamel inside face painted with the Douglas spread-winged eagle bearing a crooked sword, and the complicated gadgetry of hands and dials. “You still have it.”
He snapped the watch shut with a decided click, his lips thinning in agitation.
“Your father’s watch. I’d forgotten all about it.” A gift for his sixteenth birthday, Brendan had guarded it with his life. His most cherished possession. “Do you remember when I borrowed it?”
“Let’s call it what it was.” He chuckled. “You pilfered it.”
“Your brother dared me.”
“My brother was a nuisance and a bully.”
“Only because you fought back. If you’d ignored him—”
“He’d have thrashed me twice as often and with double the ferocity. Thank heavens I could run faster than him.” He grew solemn. “A lucky skill as it turned out.”
“Where have you been all this time, Brendan? Aidan searched everywhere, but after years with no word from you, he finally gave up and believed you were dead. We all did.”
“Right about now, Aidan probably wishes I’d stayed dead.” He glanced over at her. Gave an offhand shrug, as he realized she’d not be put off with another non-answer. “Where was I? Let’s see. The Low Countries. Spain. Italy. Though it was difficult during the war, and I finally fled farther south. North Africa. The Levant. Spent two years in Turkey before settling in Greece.”
She envisioned Brendan attired in sultan’s kaftan and turban, reclining upon a seraglio’s carpets and cushions. Given his dark hair and tanned features, not a difficult image to conjure. Actually embarrassingly seductive. “Complete with your very own harem, no doubt,” she scoffed, praying her face didn’t betray her thoughts.
“Nothing that exciting. Actually, it was devilish uncomfortable. Staying alive can be a deuced difficult job.”
“It still is, isn’t it? You said you were in hiding.”
He played a sad little run of notes before wincing, a grimace of pain passing over his face.
“You are hurt.”
He shook his fingers out. “A disagreement with someone’s boot heel. Staying alive doesn’t always equal staying in one piece.”
The darkness seemed to close in on them. A listening, watching hush, pregnant with stale regret. Elisabeth’s skin prickled, though not due to mage energy this time, but to Brendan’s diamond-edged charisma. He’d always possessed spellbinding self-confidence. It glittered off him. Sparkled the very air he breathed. Everyone who knew him fell under that strange mixture of cynicism and magnetism. It made him seem almost otherworldly. As if the blood of the Fey ran thick and icy just beneath his skin.
Tonight, that crystalline brilliance seemed tempered. That white inner light dimmed to mere humanity. Or perhaps the scales had finally fallen from her eyes and she saw him for what he was. Not glittering and silver perfect as the Fey. But a man chained by years and exile and events she couldn’t begin to imagine.
She asked the first question that swam to the front of her mind. “Did you kill your father, Brendan? I never thought . . . but . . . you said you’re hiding and . . .” Once the words were out, she wished to call them back. The stricken look on his face cut her like a whiplash.
His hands curled to fists. Dropping them to his lap, he flexed them loose before laying them palms down against his breeches.
“Forget I asked,” she entreated. “I know you didn’t have anything to do with his death. I should never have said. It was—”
“Long ago? Murder is murder, isn’t it? Makes no difference whether the crime happened a week ago or an age hence. The stain remains.”
“But the two of you were so close. He loved you. It was plain to everyone who saw you together.”
“It makes the sin all the greater then, doesn’t it?”
She chewed her lip. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
“No, Lissa. I didn’t murder my father. But I didn’t prevent it either. And isn’t a sin of omission still a sin? Burying one’s head in the sand is not a defense.”
He began playing. The hop-skip tune of “The Girl I Left Behind Me” rang out. His idea of a joke? If so, she wasn’t amused, but it did serve to snap them from the quagmire of this hushed room, these sinister broodings.
“Should I worry you’ll turn me in for the bounty on my head?” he asked over the music.
“Is there one?”
“Oh, to be sure. I mean, as long as I’m to be hunted as a criminal, I may as well bring a high price. It’s undignified to be worth any less than a thousand pounds.” He joked, but a trace of unhappiness showed through his banter.
“You won’t tell me what you’re hiding from, will you? Or who hunts you?”
“Trust me, my love. You don’t want to know. And wouldn’t believe me anyway.”
He finished the piece, the tension following almost palpable. It pounded against her ears. Throbbed in the air like the beating of great wings.
“This is all to do with magic, isn’t it?” She caught herself peeking over her shoulder at every flickering dance of the candelabra’s flames. Feeling the gaze of unseen creatures lifting the hairs at the back of her neck. “Something to do with the Other.” She jumped at a breeze rattling the casement.
“Easy, now. There’s no one there. You’re tying yourself in knots.”
She continued to peer into the corners of the room. “So you say.”
“Believe me. After seven years, I can sense danger a mile away. But aye, my difficulties originate within that world. So, keep my secret, Lissa. And when it’s safe, I’ll vanish as fully as I did the last time. You’ll wonder if I wasn’t just a figment of your imagination.”
“What if I told you I was happy to see you again?” The words caught in her throat, low and halting.
“I’d know you were lying. Shaw will whisper sweet nothings in your ear, and you’ll remember why it was you wanted to marry him. And why I’m the last person you want in your life.”
He was right, of course. What on earth had she been contemplating in the dark with the music in her head, the listening shadows surrounding them, and Brendan’s dangerous magnetism working its spell? She shook off her fancies with a stern inner reproof. “Gordon is a good man, isn’t he?”
“I’d say he’s a typical representative of the male species.”
“You don’t like him.”
“Does my liking him signify? It’s your feelings that matter. Do you like him?”
Angry with herself for being taken in—even momentarily—by lost dreams, she straightened, scowling down at him as if he’d thrown her a challenge. “I love him as I ought to.”
“Then marry him and be happy.” He quirked a teasing eye in her direction, and the lovelorn strains of Mozart’s concerto rang once more. “Sleep well, Lissa. If luck is with us both, I’ll be gone from here when you wake.”
She left him still playing. But alongside her relief, grief spiked her heart and hot tears burned the backs of her eyelids. She’d marry Gordon. And be deliriously, ecstatically happy. So take that, Brendan Douglas!
Brendan followed the riverbed from Dun Eyre, picking his surefooted way through stands of birch and willow, the pungent scent of ferns and boggy earth filling his head, the river a slow lap and gurgle against the muddy banks.
Joining the lane skirting the village, he climbed the hill leading away from the cluster of cabins to the far meadows. From here it was a short hike across the fields to Belfoyle’s eastern boundary. Spring fragrance laced the night air, carried on the ever-present wind as it swirled up over the nearby cliffs, blew out over the wide, treeless meadows. The towers of the house rose up to his left, a roofline glimpsed between trees, a lighted window, a horse whinnying from the nearby stable block.
The sky burned with a million stars while a low moon rose up over the far hills behind him, casting its borrowed light out over the
landscape, his shadow stretching long in front of him as he walked. His aim was true. Even now, his feet led him unerringly in the right direction.
Ahead of him, the ward stone stood like a sentry, moonlight glittering over the uncut ridges and folds within the ancient limestone. One of four set at each corner of Belfoyle’s boundary, the stone released mage energy that flowed southwest and north in a never-ending invisible wall. No magic-bearing creature could pass through without first appeasing the silent guardian.
Still fifty feet away, he felt its power spreading outward within the earth, pushing up through him like an infinite vibration. Closer, and the mage energy coalesced into a constant pulse like a second heartbeat.
It had been years. Years since he’d exercised his powers. In the beginning, shock and revulsion and self-loathing had led him to deny his Other blood. Later, surviving meant leaving no trace. No trail of magic for any to follow. He had lived by his wits and his dagger alone as a Duinedon.
Only since returning to Ireland had he allowed himself to draw upon his Fey blood. And only then had he come to realize the wraith he’d become. Neither Other nor Duinedon. Neither living nor dead. A man of naught but shadows.
The way he needed to be if he was to remain free long enough to complete his task.
He placed his palm upon the standing stone and the mage energy burst in a flash of ribboning rainbow color. Numbing his fingers, singeing up his arm with a heart-stopping jolt before burying itself deep within him as it sought to identify in all ways who and what he was.
Closing his eyes, he focused on the space around him. The feel of the grass beneath his boots, the moon above, the wind upon his face, and the push of his blood through his veins. Braced himself for the blasting rip curl of denunciation and refusal.
Nothing.
The caress of welcome sank through him like a soft weight, settling itself in the center of his chest. His name whispered in the oldest of ancient tongues.
Son of the house of Douglas. Son of Kilronan.
Breán Duabn’thach.
If he wanted to, he could follow the path down to the house. Cross the courtyard to the iron-hinged front doors. Wander the familiar corridors or stand as he used to at his bedroom window, staring out over the stretch of ocean below to the far horizon. The stones would not impede him.
Heir of Danger Page 5