She learned that, had she not shown up and signed the paperwork within ninety days, Blackthorne Manor would have been completely demolished and its surrounding four thousand acres put on the market and sold. Its worth? Over eleven million dollars. The funds from its sale would then be rolled back into the corporate entity that was Blackthorne Enterprises, itself to be dismantled. Morgan had obviously laid the plans for his departure very carefully.
Formalities completed, Julienne became the legal chatelaine of the manor.
The scent of cloves mingling with rich tobacco tickled her nostrils, bringing her out of her thoughts.
Catching Morgan's reflection in the window, she started. She hadn't even heard him walk up behind her. He moved with the stealth, silence and grace of a cat.
Turning around, she glanced up. Cigarette clenched between his teeth, he set a small wooden chest roughly a foot wide and just as deep on her lap.
"Immee royd!" he said to Lynar. "Troggal, nishtagh!"
Confronted with the single person he dare not defy, Lynar hopped off the window seat. Clutching his toy, he scurried across the library and disappeared into Danielle Yames's adjoining office. Maybe she had forgiven him for taking her car keys.
"What did you say?" Shaking her head, chuckling, Julienne had to smile. He was in full by-god-and-begorrah mode today, his speech colored with that intriguing Irish brogue.
Catching his cigarette between two fingers, he exhaled. "I told him to buzz off. I needed an elf like I need another hole in my fucking head. Got no use for him."
She shrugged. "Be that way." She turned her attention to the small chest. "What's this?"
She ran her fingers across the darkly varnished wood. Its surface was carved with an assortment of strange symbols. There was a lock, but no key.
Morgan retrieved that from his pocket and handed it to her. "Open it."
Julienne's fingers shook a bit as she slid the key into the lock and turned it. Lifting the lid, she peered inside and saw a stack of thick, clothbound diaries.
"What are these?"
"Anlese's journals. She wanted you to have them before she died, to begin teaching you."
"I wish you had let her." Her fingertips bushed the coarse material covering the journals. The faint scent of vanilla tickled her nostrils. Lifting them out, she saw they were bound together by a leather thong. Threaded onto the leather was a small charm. Looking at it closer, she saw the shape was feline.
"What does this mean?"
He put out his cigarette, flicking the butt toward the fireplace--and missing, a habit that exasperated Melissa. "It is peach wood, a symbol of immortality. And all felines have nine lives. Wear it around your neck, and when you are in danger it will grow warm against your skin."
Julienne untied the books, knotted the ends of the thong and slipped it over her head. She opened the cover of the top journal. Strange symbols and odd lettering covered the pages. She glanced up. "I can't read these."
He reached out and tapped her forehead. "You already know how. You only need to find it inside yourself."
At his touch, heat rose inside her; and she licked suddenly dry lips. Her heart rate sped up. They were lovers and the knowledge whet her appetite for more. She wanted to touch him, feel his skin against hers. The promise was there, but she was holding back from the physical, until…
Thought of the creature inside her squelched her desire. She put the journals back into the chest and closed the lid, setting it aside.
"I wonder if I'll live long enough to find it."
His eyes narrowed. "Has the time come?"
"Soon. It's close, but not quite yet." She sighed, the feeling of carrying a heavy burden washing over her again. The little demon she'd tried to banish crept again into the forefront of her mind. "I don't think I can do this. I can feel that thing inside me. What it wants sickens me."
"But, in a way, you want it, too?"
"I know the hunger because it has known it. I know the taste because it knows." She shivered. "I don't know if I can accept what it wants."
His gaze met hers. "I fought it, too--the change. I spent thirty-seven years trying to deny it, escape it."
"But you were born into it."
"Just because I was born into it does not mean it was easy to accept."
Unbidden tears stung her eyes. "It feels…"
"It feels like a pack of demons have descended to pick away at your soul."
Unable to speak, she nodded.
His voice came light, low and tinged with a hint of sexual promises yet to be fulfilled. "You will not go through it alone," he said. "When your time comes, do not fight it. I will bring you over."
She went perfectly still. "What's going to happen to me?" she asked in a thin voice.
He thought a moment. "The first thing you will probably notice is an extreme sensitivity to sound and light. You sense of sight will be sharper than any human's. It will take awhile to adjust to the altered textures of the world around you. There will be days when you will not be able to stand to be around anyone--everything will annoy you."
"It bothers you sometimes, doesn't it?" She knew what the signs were, things that he still had not told her about. The headaches that plagued him. She could tell when they were coming. His whole personality turned inward and he retreated behind closed doors to battle it out with the demons that harried his mind.
He nodded. "Yes. There are times when I can not stand it myself."
"That doesn't sound too bad," she commented.
"There might be other drawbacks--a slight allergy to the sunlight."
"I won't turn to dust, will I?" she joked, trying to find humor in a grave situation. She had noticed that her skin was already beginning to fade to a delicate porcelain white; it was a trait evidenced by all light-skinned beings inhabiting the night. Morgan's own skin was very fair. He rarely went out of doors during daylight hours and when he did, he was heavily shielded behind a pair of dark sunglasses.
He unexpectedly laughed and the sound was warm, rich and deeply masculine. "No, you will not turn to dust."
The levity between them had lightened a bit. It was a relief to be able to laugh. Soon the laughter would vanish. "What about fangs?" She grinned. "Those might be cool."
A fire of amusement lit his eyes. "Fangs might be possible," he said slowly.
"Really?" she squeaked. She'd just been kidding. He, however, appeared to be taking the notion very seriously.
"Let me work on it," he said, more to himself than her. He opened his cigarette case, selected a fresh one and lit it. "I have an idea." He was absolutely serious.
Wondering what the hell he had in mind, but certainly not daring to ask, she studied the chest he'd given her. She touched its carved lid. Another gesture of his acceptance. Once, he'd warned her not to pursue the gifts Anlese had passed to her when she died. Now, she must.
Needing to take her mind off her impending change, she said, "Grandmother once told me you were the history of us, taught us the ways of the arts you'd been born to. How did that happen? How did we women come to be with you?"
He raised his eyebrows, as if arranging the pieces of the story in his mind. She could almost hear the gears in his brain grinding. She waited, curious.
"You remember when I told you that you yourself held an Irish heritage?"
"I do. The day I arrived."
Morgan leaned against the wall. "At the beginning of my exile, I returned to the land of my mother's people, near the Wicklow Mountains."
"You went back to Ireland?"
"That I did."
"What's it like there?"
His eyes seemed to soften with memory. "When I was a child, it was beautiful, untamed, lush woodlands and abundant green fields. It was truly a place of the gods--miles of deep valleys and gorges, dark lakes and dizzying waterfalls."
She smiled dreamily. "It sounds lovely. I'd like to see Ireland someday."
The hard glint returned to his gaze as he took a deep drag. "No
t so lovely when I returned. Nearly a millennium had passed since I had last walked that land; and just as Sclyd changed during its wars, so had your world. In the late seventeenth century, colonial Ireland was under the rule of the Anglican landed gentry, English Protestants who would soon effectively outlaw the Catholics from society."
She gave a hesitant smile. "You'll have to forgive my lack of knowledge when it comes to Irish history. I dropped out of school."
Listening to him speak, she thought it must be strange to belong to two different yet parallel worlds, each having separate histories. How did it feel to walk in both, yet belong to neither? She supposed she would soon learn.
He flagged a distracted hand, sending gray ashes flying without regard to where they might fall. "It is not a pleasant one. From the Vikings on, the Anglos have been stomping our little island to pieces. Kill the men, breed the women and eradicate the natives. Ciara was eleven years old when I found her. Her village had been burned by the invading English army. It was a massacre of unarmed people. Her father had been strung up, her mother brutally raped before her throat was slashed."
She shivered. Those were details she could have done without. "That's horrible."
Haloed by the rich tobacco smoke, he fell into a pensive mood. "You are still young, but you will learn that such conquest is a story as old as time. It is never going to stop. I know you condemn Sclydian entities for their war atrocities, but how can you honestly judge when mortal man has engaged in equally devastating acts of brutality? From the holy Crusades down to Hitler's vision to eradicate the Jews and create the perfect Aryan blond-haired, blue-eyed race, man's inhumanity toward man is a sorry and sickening story."
"I can't disagree. As ugly as my world has been, though, I believe there's still good to be found in it. It's a matter of faith."
His brief story evoked a flurry of reactions in her mind. His revelation had thrown a new light on him, making his multi-faceted personality even more difficult to define. Though he often appeared frozen through and through, under his unruffled demeanor lurked a past that still carried a deeply emotional impact.
She studied him for a moment. Ciara's tragedy strangely mirrored his own distorted childhood. Had Morgan rescued her because he wanted to fix for her what he could not repair in his own shattered life? Or had he taken the girl under his protection as penance in memory of the child he'd sacrificed?
He didn't reply immediately. Instead, he surveyed her from the top of her head to the tip of her toes. Did he see reflected in her the image of that young girl who'd witnessed such unspeakable atrocities?
"I have seen the worst of both, and I have little faith in either."
She cocked her head, ignoring his embittered denial. "I think you do."
He killed his cigarette, saying as he smashed it out, "An rud nach gabh leasachadh, 's fheudar cur suas leis."
"What does that mean?"
"What cannot be helped must be put up with."
"How apt," she commented.
"Ciara was the one who chose the sacred tree of the druids, the blackthorn, as the name of this place." Flicking. Another miss. "She wanted to learn the ways of magic so badly. She saw how weak mortals were, but she did not understand how the occult also punishes."
"Grandmother told me you kept the true gifts from us."
"Anlese felt I slighted the Blackthorne women by never according any the full rights of a priestess of the Gwyd'llyr," he said with a restraint that gave emphasis to his reply. "She claimed a place for you no other has ever tried to invoke."
"Do you wish she hadn't?" she whispered, recalling more of her grandmother's words. At that time, Anlese had been close to death. Prematurely aged, her body eaten up by cancer, the old woman had patiently woven a web that would save two lives--and possibly help preserve two very different realms.
Shooting her a glance, he took out his cigarette case again, opened it, looked inside for a moment, then snapped it shut. That was odd. He was never fidgety.
She had noticed how he used those cigarettes to reflect his moods. Lost in a haze of smoke, he was in a relaxed, easy mood. Lit but not being smoked, it was a wand that punctuated his words. But fiddling with the case--this was something he had never done before.
"Anlese knew I faced execution if I returned to Sclyd," he said. "I was once willing to welcome that death. But I welcome it no more, as long as you are with me."
Julienne was astonished by the degree of pleasure she felt. This certainly didn't sound like Morgan at all. She'd never thought the man standing before her would attempt to change his ways.
But he wasn't the sort of man to make such a statement lightly. If he said something, he usually meant it, to the bitter end.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Julienne barely managed to enter Morgan's third floor penthouse before she stumbled and lost her balance. She fell heavily with a thud softened by the thick rug. Strength seemed to have totally deserted her.
Lifting her head, she pushed strings of hair off her clammy skin. Her skin was deathly white. She was starving, and in denying the mutant, she was forcing it to turn on her. Her eyes were vague and unfocused, glazed with an agony no human could endure and live.
She sensed his presence. Earlier, he'd left her, forcing her to seek him out. She knew where he was if she needed him.
She needed him now.
He left the mantel by the fireplace and crossed to stand over her. He had taken off his silk vest, his broad shoulders encased only in a white shirt. From her vantage point, he seemed broad, tall and very male.
The air was redolent with the scent of his rich foreign cigarettes and the scented oil burning in the lamps. The lighting was low. Intimate. Three sets of bay windows punctuated the rear wall, blinds closed to exclude the outside world, prying eyes. The suite was beautifully laid out and furnished to suit a masculine personality.
His gaze traveled over her. "Your time has come."
Not a question. He made no move to help her.
She groaned. Panting, she lifted herself up. She swallowed, and her heart pounded as she surveyed every inch of him. She wished he would take her in his arms, kiss away her pain.
"It…wants me to…hunt…feed it." She doubled over when hunger twisted her guts with cruel hands, silencing her as a fresh spasm tore through her bowels.
"If you want to live, you must give in to it."
"I…can't. I won't let…it make me…a monster!" Surrendering to the pain, she sank back to the floor. She could no longer fight the thrashing of the mutant demanding satisfaction.
Silence hovered. An object landed by her outstretched hand, its fall muffled like her own. Forcing open burning eyes, she stared at the silver glittering against the carpet.
It was his dagger.
The wickedly sharp blade glinted in the lamplight sneaking around the furniture. Temptation was outlined in its clean steel lines.
Julienne's hand slithered out and her fingers curled around the elegant pearl-inlaid hilt. It felt warm, comfortable in her hand, the blade etched with the Ese-Yeveanston coat of arms, the Celtic lion. She lifted it off the floor, turning it inward. Her hand trembled; her whole body shook. The touch of metal against her wrist was a spellbinding sensation. She understood why he'd chosen it.
He sat down on the floor beside her and lifted her to confront him. She was a doll in his hands. Moving her hair off her damp forehead, he stroked her face.
"Now you must choose--death or existence as an occult being. You know you will not live forever, but in the time you do, your existence will depend on stalking humans. The shadows are your home, the night your destiny now."
He bent closer, and his hand circled hers, holding the dagger. Twisting, he brought the blade up between them.
"If you choose to die this night, I will help you."
She stared with listless, empty eyes.
Reaching out, he claimed her free hand.
"Look at me."
Inclining her head, Julienne let
herself fall into the depths of his serious black eyes.
"In my centuries, I have come to learn nature is a series of balances. Life and death, natural and supernatural. You have the right to choose life--to survive--even if humans must fall prey to your hunger." He pulled her closer. She acquiesced without struggle. "Do you understand what I am saying? I will not condemn your means of survival." He hesitated, his richly accented voice growing gentle. "But I will also understand if you cannot face what I have offered you."
His eyes searched hers for a glimmer of understanding.
The spark was there.
"I don't want to die." Her voice trembled, revealing her lack of assurance in the sincerity of his promises. She could accept any fate as long as he supported her. Though he had never voiced any opinion, she had feared he would despise the creature she would become. A single tear tracked down her cheek. Another followed.
"Then choose to live." Unable to restrain his passion for her any longer, he drew her to him. As he wiped away her tears, his lips met hers in a kiss of ineffable desire.
Abandoning her fears and doubts, Julienne responded, returning the embrace, her tongue teasing his, coaxing, tantalizing. Their hands touched, stroking and petting until both were breathless and aroused. The savagery of her hunger spurring her on, her body moved with a will beyond hers. Her spirit fought with all its strength, but there was no escape. She was unable to break free of the alien thing alive in her, its desires ringing loud and clear in her skull. Her own self-control wasn't lost and adrift. It was drowning. For a terrible instant she floundered in the jumble of two conflicting viewpoints. Her world blurred as two different sets of images from two different minds--hers and the mutant's--were superimposed on one another. Though she ordered the mutant inside to let go, it wouldn't obey. She simultaneously felt exquisite pleasure and unendurable revulsion at what she was about to do. Blackness cut through her consciousness and she lost all control.
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