The Irishman (A Legacy Novella) (The Legacy Series Book 7)

by Sheritta Bitikofer

  The weather had turned cold in the progression of the afternoon and a stiff wind hit her face as soon as she came around the side of the house to the well. The bucket wasn’t halfway down the shaft when she caught a bit of movement out of the corner of her eye. Katherine looked up and saw a man coming forward out of the woods, his clothes sullied as if he had been on a long journey and feet completely bare to the elements.

  It took a moment for her to realize who he was and she nearly let go of the rope between her hands. Too surprised to see her brother, she didn’t move from the well. Neither did she speak, though she wanted to start shouting at him for not only leaving Cassandra the night before, but also for not coming to the funeral to pay his respects. He had better have a good excuse.

  Only when he drew closer did she see what kind of state he was in. The clothes didn’t fit him, so she knew they couldn’t have been his. And along with the muddy splotches of mud along his skin, she spotted some traces of blood around his chin and down his neck.

  “Good God,” she whispered under her breath, even though she knew he wouldn’t have heard her. “What happened?”

  He was still some distance off when he shook his head. “I don’t know,” he called back.

  How could he have heard her? She made a motion for him to keep his voice down and pointed toward the house. “He’ll hear you.”

  Announcing Dustin’s arrival to Samuel was unwise. If the old man somehow partially blamed his son-in-law for the murder of his daughter, they would have another funeral to plan.

  Quickly, she lowered the bucket and brought it back up once it was brimming with water. Dustin came to the well and set something down on the stone ledge before slowly bringing the bucket closer to him. She let him take a long drink and splash his face before starting in with her questions.

  “What happened last night? Where did you go? We’ve all been worried sick! I thought you were dead too.”

  Dustin shuddered and turned his face away from her. Did he know what happened to Cassandra? By the way he didn’t probe into her suggestion that he might have been dead along with someone else, Katherine suspected that he must have known. At least he showed some remorse. Was that a good sign that Samuel was wrong about him being the murderer?

  Dustin, his face dripping and the front of his shirt drenched, leaned against the well and wouldn’t make eye contact with her. “I was hoping you could tell me what happened,” he mumbled in monotone.

  Katherine brought the bucket closer to her and unhooked it from the pulley. “No one really knows what happened and you would have been the only one to see it. They found her in the bedroom, torn to pieces.”

  Uttering these few words brought a fresh wave of anguish to Dustin and he shook his head.

  “I don’t remember anything,” he replied, voice thick with emotions that she couldn’t even begin to understand.

  She had lost her parents, but never a lover. She didn’t even want to think about the day when she’d lose Shawn and hoped dearly that she would die first, so she’d never have to bear the loss.

  “Not a thing? What happened after you came back to the house? Where did you go?”

  “I said I don’t remember!” he snapped.

  Katherine flinched away. Dustin wasn’t usually the one to lose his temper with her, but plenty of things had happened in the course of a day. He might not have been the same man anymore. Looking him up and down, he did seem a bit taller and broader in the chest than he had been during the wedding. That, joined with his disappearance and the sheer amount of blood that she could see through the thin material of his shirt, inspired even more questions.

  “What was the last thing you remember?” she asked, lowering her voice, so she wouldn’t rile him into agitation again.

  Dustin took a calming breath before saying, “We came back from the reception. We were in bed… That’s all. I blacked out and woke up a mile or two outside of Kenmare.”

  “Kenmare?” she hissed. “How did you get to Ken-“ She stopped herself before she could finish, knowing what his answer would be. He didn’t remember. He couldn’t remember any of it. Asking him about the blood would prove just as pointless.

  Dustin’s throat worked as he tried to form the next words. “I don’t know what’s happened to me. If I knew anything, believe me, I would tell you.” He lifted his eyes and regarded her with a certain pleading look that must have been mirrored in her own expression. “But something has happened to me… And I’m scared, Katey Kat.”

  She pitied him, and though he smelled foul, she came forward to wrap him in a hug. “You lost your wife, Dustin. That’s what’s happened to you. It’s happened to many other husbands.”

  He returned the embrace, his powerful arms encasing her. “No, it’s more than that… I can do things now. Things that no one else can do.”

  Katherine pulled away and eyed him curiously. “What do you mean?”

  He went on to explain how fast he could run and how he could almost hear her heartbeat when they were standing this close together. He could smell the stew on the stove inside the house and the leftover crops in the field that Samuel had neglected to take up during the harvest. She listened, and wanted to doubt him at first. But, when he mentioned the stew she prepared and the soap residue on her hands, she knew there was some credit to what he said. She couldn’t even smell either of these things and she didn’t tell him of it before.

  She took a step back and remembered what Samuel had said about a beast killing Cassandra. Her eyes darted to the blood stains as her mind began to put each of the pieces together. Maybe Dustin did kill her, but not intentionally.

  Katherine folded her arms and looked away. She believed in the fairy folk just as much as Dustin did – which was not at all – but she was raised up with the stories that had been passed down through the generations. Christian faith took the place of such beliefs, but some traditions were hard to kick, as was the case with Samuel. He believed in magic more than anyone she knew in Glengarriff. And the rampant thought entered her mind that, perhaps, he was right.

  Though, all of this didn’t suggest that Dustin was a changeling. They didn’t kill people and it wouldn’t explain his heightened senses. A far darrig maybe? No, they didn’t kill people either. They were just mischievous spirits who went about wreaking havoc for the Irish.

  If Samuel’s earlier mutterings about a beast were true, that meant Dustin would have shifted into another form. The form of an animal that could rip through flesh. An animal like a wolf.

  “What is it?” Dustin demanded after a long stretch of silence between them.

  Katherine looked up and searched his face for any sign to confirm her foolish assumption. None of them knew of Dustin’s heritage. Could he have been a faoladh? A descendent of the wolves of Ossory? They were alleged to be relatively harmless, unlike the wolf warriors of Tipperary who ate the flesh of babies in exchange for their mercenary services to the king. Both fables were so old. Ossory didn’t even exist anymore. Could Dustin have faoladh blood in him?

  “Are you sure you don’t remember anything?” she asked again, tempting his rage. “Did you see an animal? Maybe a wolf that might have come in the house?”

  Dustin shook his head, but a sudden look dawned in his eyes that told her he did remember something, but not until just now. He blinked a few times and then lowered his gaze to the bit of ground that separated them. His face lost all color, gone pale by whatever it was that gradually crept back into his mind. She could see the struggle as he tried to grasp that elusive memory.

  Once he finally grabbed hold of it, she noticed his breath quickened into a panic. She reached out for him once again, but he shied away, refusing what comfort she was willing to give.

  “What is it?” she begged. “What do you remember?”

  A muscle in Dustin’s jaw jumped and he shook his head again. “I… I can’t stay.”

  She stared in disbelief. “What? What do you mean?”

  Dustin snatched
up the flower from the ledge on the well and turned as if he were ready to bolt away into the forest again, but he came back to Katherine.

  “Tell no one that you saw me,” he said hastily. “I was never here. Do you understand? I can’t stay. I… Please, forgive me?”

  Katherine grabbed for his sleeve before he could run again. “Forgive you for what? Tell me, Dustin. You can tell me anything.”

  He shook his head again, fresh tears filming over his eyes. “I can’t. Just say you forgive me.”

  It was then she understood. He must have realized the truth that he had something to do with Cassandra’s murder. She nodded in response. “I forgive you,” she whispered, sorrow stealing her voice. If Dustin did kill her, it had to be unintentional. He didn’t know what he had done. Whatever he was, whatever happened to him, it was against his will and she could never blame him for that. And she’d take the secret to her grave.

  They embraced for the last time and she couldn’t form the words she needed to say to him. If he had to leave Glengarriff, she only hoped that wherever he went, he would find some peace.

  They released and Dustin gave her one more heartfelt, apologetic look before he fled for the forest again. She saw the kind of inhuman speed he mentioned. Her brother was no more than a blur, and if she had blinked, she would have missed his departure entirely.

  With shaking hands, she picked up the mostly-full water bucket and went back into the house. It would take a moment for her to compose herself before facing Samuel, but at least no one would question her sorrow. She not only lost a dear friend in Cassandra, but also her beloved brother to a future that she couldn’t begin to imagine.

  Chapter Four

  I killed her. I killed her.

  The words wouldn’t stop echoing in his brain, and with each new repeat, Dustin’s legs carried him a little faster through the woods. He didn’t even care that he was beating himself against nature, crashing into trees and rolling headlong down hills as he went. All he knew was that he needed to get away from Glengarriff, away from Ireland, away from Cassandra.

  When Katherine mentioned an animal in the house, it all came back to him. He remembered the pain and how it felt as if every bone in his body was being broken apart and spliced back together. The agony, the terror, Cassandra’s blood-chilling scream, the black fur and the claws. Everything was plain in his mind’s eye now.

  Dustin didn’t know what he had turned into, why, or how it could be possible that a man could be anything more than he really was. The only thing he felt was confusion, self-hatred, and absolute disgust for the crime he had committed against Cassandra and God Himself.

  His heart burned in his chest as he continued to run, not caring where he was headed or what he would do when he got there. Villages and towns flew by with little notice as tears streamed down his face. Voices and noises became nothing more than a cacophony in his ears, meaningless and unimportant while he blurred down roads and straight across farmlands.

  Soon, darkness fell and Dustin hated the way he could still see his way so clearly in the pitch black countryside. Dark clouds that had withdrawn on that terrible day, now came floating in to mask the moon and stars above. Dustin hardly had time to see the cliff up ahead before he realized he had come to the end of Ireland.

  He stopped, breathing heavily as the muscles in his legs began to twitch with minor fatigue. He had run all the way from Glengarriff, past Bearhaven, past Castletown, and to the rocky coast that overlook the ocean.

  The drop down to the foaming waves below was significant and Dustin looked down, his mind and soul reeling with the temptation. He had killed his wife, his best friend, his only love in this life. The fact that he was some unnatural creature came second to this reality. He didn’t care what he was and he didn’t want to know, not really. The only thing that mattered was that Cassandra wasn’t breathing, her lovely and tender heart wasn’t beating anymore, and it was all his fault.

  Dustin looked to the sky as a strong wind whipped his hair back, cooling the sweat on his brow. His lips moved and words came out in muddled apologies to everyone. To God, to his parents, to Cassandra, and whatever other powers may be that cursed him to endure so much tragedy. This should have been the first day of a blissful and happy life. Now, he hoped, it would be his last.

  He closed his eyes and toed up to the edge of the cliff. At least he knew that wherever his soul ended up, it wouldn’t be with Cassandra. She was too pure, too innocent to be anywhere else but in heaven. Dustin wouldn’t join her, wouldn’t have to face her in all his shame and iniquity. Hell seemed like a fitting place for a murderer. He refused to be afraid of death. Not now.

  When his body plunged below the surface of the tempestuous waters, he made no attempt to swim up for air. The waves and current tossed Dustin out to sea, deeper into the black, freezing depths.

  Arcachon Bay, France, Two Days Later

  “Papa! Watch me!” Lucy cried from the water’s edge as she prepared herself for another stunt.

  Darren looked away from his wife’s bewitching brown eyes to watch the way his daughter’s dark locks fluttered in the coastal breeze.

  “I’m watching,” he called back with a smile.

  With his attention fully focused upon her, she started out in a run and performed a rather pitiful cartwheel. Sand scattered in all directions by her hands and feet. When she managed to right herself again and held up her hands with childlike glee, he nodded and repressed an amused laugh.

  “Did you see it?” she asked, eyes bright and cheerful as if she had really accomplished something great. Darren had to inwardly admit that she was improving.

  “I did! Excellent job.”

  Eleanor leaned over to whisper in his ear, “You encourage her so unnecessarily.”

  Darren turned to his wife and shook his head. “A child can never receive too much encouragement.”

  She pulled away, ready to give him a light scolding for his doting disposition. “Cartwheels and backflips are not becoming to a lady. What if she grows up thinking it’s fine to let her skirt go billowing out like that without any consideration for whose company she finds herself in?”

  There was truth in what she said, but Darren would hear none of it. As long as Lucy was happy, then he wouldn’t be the one to disappoint. Let other fathers be harsh with their children. Darren refused.

  “Ellie, she’s only six years old,” Darren reminded her. “She has plenty of time to be a child. Let her.” To seal his plea, he kissed Eleanor in that special, tender way that always made her heart flutter. It was that same kiss he gave her on the night he proposed in her father’s house in Bordeaux.

  She was the daughter of another loup-garou, like himself. Though she didn’t share in the gift of the wolf, Eleanor accepted its existence in the world and loved Darren despite that. Her father, a noted alpha in Bordeaux by the name of Gustav Couture, was a good friend and former pupil of his own mentor, John Croxen, who still resided near Albi to the south.

  Eleanor’s concerns about their daughter’s manners and utter lack of decorum was understandable. Having been raised in a fine home with all the comforts her father could easily afford as a prominent lawyer in eastern France, she was exposed to a part of society that Darren didn’t particularly care for. All the rich and affluent families he had met over the last century and a half carried themselves with a proud air that he detested. Eleanor was different and he knew that the moment he met her after arriving to Bordeaux.

  At the time, he had a mind to return to England and see what kind of life he could live as a lone loup-garou, but she had other plans for him. Her sophisticated beauty, her honest and open character, and those dazzling brown eyes captured his heart. He knew he could never leave France as long as she was in it.

  They married after courting for just six months. Much to the annoyance of her father, they moved away from Bordeaux to take up a quiet residence in the forests just a day’s travel away from civilization. Eleanor was in complete agreement wit
h the plan and they became self-reliant as a newlywed couple. Lucianna Dubose was born nine months after the wedding – almost to the day. She had her father’s dark brown eyes with flecks of deep gold, while she inherited her mother’s slender nose and soft, aristocratic features. From that proud moment when he first held his daughter in his arms, life had never been better.

  “Mama!” Lucy squealed. “Come here!”

  Eleanor detached herself from Darren, though he knew in the way her touch lingered over his hand, she didn’t want to leave the comfortable place by his side. She rose and dusted off the sand from the back of her skirt and went to meet her daughter near the water.

  Darren leaned back on his hands and watched as his favorite girls ran and chased one another in the surf, splashing up water around their ankles and drenching the hems of their dresses. So much for being concerned with sedateness.

  He smiled to himself and, for the thousandth time, he had to reflect on how perfect his life had become. Compared to other loups-garous, he was still young, but he had come a long way since his days under John’s tutelage at the chateau.

  He had spent a little over three years there until he was permitted to leave, his final test being his proficiency in changing into his full wolfen form at will outside of his monthly cycle. Put under the care of another alpha to the east of Albi, he took up a variety of trades to see which one suited him. He tried being a blacksmith, wheelwright, farrier, bookbinder, and even tried his hand at apprenticing to a doctor at one point. Though he proved that he could be accomplished at anything he put his mind to, none of them seemed to bring him any real enjoyment.

  It was only when he started to help other younger loups-garous within the pack that he realized what he was best at. Teaching. Darren felt a certain thrill when he was able to help other loups-garous in their training, whether it be in academics or in the harnessing of their supernatural abilities. Perhaps he could have become a tutor or teacher in England if he had carried out his intention of returning to his old home in Warminster.