“Look around for what? Do you think Isolde is hiding under a rock? Or maybe she can turn herself into a toad.” She rolled her eyes at him. “I’m just saying we should look around. This is the only property we have a record of her owning in Wales.”
“The place is cursed then,” Cai said. “Because you’re nuts if you think we’re going to find anything out here.”
“Fine. Nutty me will go by myself.”
“Jordy—”
She ignored him and climbed out of the car, then began picking her way up the rocky hillside.
Cai watched her trip and almost fall before he slammed out of the car. “Jordy, come on. It’s too dark too see anything anyway.” He was walking up the hill after her.
“Cai, come here!” Jordy knelt in front of the stones that once had formed part of the doorway or entrance. “Look!”
He made his way there and stood over her. “What is it?” The heavy sense of foreboding hanging over him had only grown worse the closer he got to the ruins. “Back out of there, Jordy.”
She looked back over her shoulder at him. “What? Look, there are symbols carved in this stone.”
He leaned forward and grabbed her shoulders just as she went to run her fingers over the badly worn symbols. The air seemed to shimmer around them for a second. Cai blinked, thinking his vision had blurred, knowing it hadn’t. “Come on. Now!” He didn’t wait for her to argue, but grabbed her hand and all but dragged her downhill to the car.
“Get in.” He opened the door and shoved her inside, then climbed in his side.
“What in the hell has come over you?”
Cai didn’t answer, he was too busy trying to back down the godforsaken mountain onto the main road.
“Cai, I think those symbols are like the one she sent to you. We need that book of Alfred’s. Dammit.”
Once he was on the main road back to Mrs. Evans’ he thought he’d feel better. Safer. But his foot pressed even heavier on the gas pedal.
“When you put your hand near that symbol, did you … you know, feel anything? Anything unusual?” He’d meant to keep it to himself, but found he couldn’t.
Jordy shifted in her seat. “Unusual how?”
He hesitated, then spoke. “Something’s not right about that place. I can’t explain it any better than that.”
“Maybe it was just Mrs. Evans’ talk about the curse. She was even creeping me out there toward the end.”
“Yeah, maybe.” He sure as hell wanted to believe that.
“You know, now that I think about it, something did strike me a little weird. The symbols were definitely not new, they were well worn, but you’d think, with all that wind and rain and being exposed to all the harsh elements, that they wouldn’t still be readable at all hundreds of years later. And being in the entrance, wouldn’t they have been even more worn down by the inhabitants treading over them every day?” She sat back and stared out the window. “I’m surprised they’re still there.”
Cai had thought the very same thing. But the possible explanations for that, and for that odd sensation he’d had, were in the realm of things he badly wanted to leave unexplored. “I’ll get a call out to Crystal Key and see if they’ve called in. Maybe Mrs. Evans will have found out something at her meeting.”
He felt her eyes on him. She wasn’t going to let this slide. But she said nothing. Instead she slid the map book from the visor and dug a pencil out of her purse. She turned on the overhead light and made a quick sketch on the inside cover.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I’m making a sketch of the symbols while I can still remember most of them.”
It didn’t make any sense, but he didn’t like the idea of even a sketched representation of those symbols riding around in the car with them. But short of ripping the map book from her hands and tossing it out the window, there wasn’t much he could do. He’d already alarmed her with his behavior back there. Hell, he’d alarmed himself.
She flicked off the light as they pulled up to the small white stone house. In the sudden silence after he cut the engine, she said, “We’re going to have to talk about this you know.”
“Jordy—”
“You said we were in this together. Don’t shut me out now. What happened to you back there?”
He hesitated, then said, “You’re a lot more willing to jump headfirst into all this magic mumbo jumbo.”
“Does that mean you’re beginning to believe in some of what Alfred said?”
He turned to her then. His eyes were adjusted to the dark now. She was beautiful in the patchy moonlight. Shadows shifted suddenly across her face, casting her features in a wash of deathly white. He felt a sudden chill, as if something portentous was about to happen. He had this insane urge to grab her and hold on as tight as he could, as if some unseen forces were about to rip her away from him.
“Let’s get inside.” He didn’t explain—couldn’t—he just knew they shouldn’t be out here, in the car. Out in the open. “We’ll talk inside.”
Mrs. Evans was still out. Cai added a chunk of coal to the stove she’d left burning, wondering if there was a heat pervasive enough to ward off the cold that seemed to have taken up residence inside his very bones.
He sat on the small couch and Jordy sat beside him. He kept his gaze on the fire as he spoke. “When you went to touch that stone it was as if the air almost, I don’t know, shifted or something. I felt this dark sense of dread, like something bad, something irrevocably bad, would happen if you touched those symbols.” He finally looked at her. “I had to get you out of there.”
She rubbed her arms and he pulled her into his lap, giving in to the need to hold her close. To keep her safe.
“I’m worried, Jordy. About Alfred, about Dilys. About you. About all of this.” She tried to look up at him, but he didn’t want her to see what was in his eyes. His fear was deeper than worry, more pervasive than concern. He was scared. He was feeling things that made no sense. And yet, the feelings were undeniably there.
He stroked her short hair, weaving his fingers through the wisps that framed her face. The power of his feelings for her washed over him once again. If anything happened to her …
He tilted her mouth up to his then and took it, pouring in everything he felt, but could not say.
When he lifted his head, he found her staring deeply into his eyes. “Cai, what can I do to help you?”
“Stay here. Right here.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
They sat like that, for a long time, until the coal had almost burned down to nothing.
“You know,” he said into the shadows. “For someone who makes his living with words, I can’t seem to find the right ones to tell you how I feel about you.”
Obviously surprised, she leaned back and looked up at him.
He smiled a little and pulled her head back to his chest. “And it’s even harder when you look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
He heard the smile in her voice, and relaxed slightly. “Like you see all the way down inside me.”
She rubbed her cheek against his chest. “Well, isn’t that interesting. I’ve felt the same way about you. I chalked it up to all that people analyzing thing you do for your writing.”
“This has nothing to do with that.”
“Yeah. I didn’t buy it either.”
He pressed his lips against her hair. “Jordy, when this is all over, whatever happens, I—”
Just then, the front door banged open and Mrs. Evans bustled in, her arm full of bags. Cai and Jordy moved off the couch and relieved her of some of the heavy ones.
“So, did you enjoy your trip to the ruins? I see you made it back in one piece,” she said, bubbly as ever. “No word on your friends, I’m sorry to say. But I thought you might find it an odd coincidence that Isolde Morgan made the evening news. Apparently she collapsed in some restaurant near her apartment in Paris and has been taken to the hospital there for obse
rvation.” She lowered her voice. “The same one where they took Princess Di. I hope they do better by Ms. Morgan, if you know what I mean.” She tsked. “Such a tragedy that.” She shifted her parcels and smiled brightly again. “Well, I’ll ring when dinner is ready.” She bustled out, leaving Jordy and Cai dumbfounded.
THIRTY-TWO
“I don’t see any of them listed in here.” Jordy tossed the map book on the nightstand. Dinner was over and Mrs. Evans was out for the evening, leaving Cai and Jordy alone.
Cai stood and paced to the window and back. “Isolde is in a Paris hospital.” They’d seen the reports themselves now. “The places in Alfred’s notes appear to be nonexistent.” He shrugged helplessly. “I’m not certain he ever really had a clue about what was going on, with the kidnappings, the whole thing.”
She walked over to him and tugged him around. “You don’t want to believe in this. No rational person would.”
“But?”
“But you felt something on that mountain this afternoon.”
“Nerves. Exhaustion. Jordy, there are a million explanations for what I thought I felt.”
“And Dilys? She believes him.”
“What are you saying? That you believe he’s lived as some Keeper of a magic pearl for over a thousand years?” He stepped back. “Do you honestly believe that?”
“Rationally? No. In here?” She tapped her forehead. “No. But here?” She laid her hand on her heart. “Here, I’m not so sure what I believe. Your grandfather is a powerful storyteller, Cai. He makes me want to believe.” She looked past him, outside, into the dark. “And here, in this country, a place so old, so filled with history that I almost can’t comprehend it. Anything seems possible here.”
“I just want to find my grandfather and Dilys and take them safely home.”
“What about those two women? Do you not believe in them, either?”
Cai stalked to the other end of the room. “I don’t know what the hell to believe anymore. For all I know, Alfred is wandering around Miami in some hallucinatory fog and I’m half a world away chasing shadows and demons that only exist in his disintegrating mind.”
“Then what do you want to do?”
“I said I don’t know, dammit!” He swung back around, then stopped abruptly. He lifted his hands, then let them fall helplessly to his side. “I’m supposed to take care of him, Jordy,” he said bleakly. “And I don’t know how to do that anymore.” His breath caught. “I’m afraid I’m not going to find him until it’s too late.”
She stopped fighting and went into his arms then. And held on. She just held on.
Jordy and Cai thanked Mrs. Evans for breakfast the following morning. They’d barely touched it, but had forced down enough so as not to insult their hostess.
They had argued on the next step to take, but hadn’t come to any conclusions. “I just wish we’d been able to find out more about Alfred’s past here,” she said.
They’d received a message from Eric about where Alfred had lived in Anglesey, but the house had been razed long ago for a row of shops.
“I can’t believe we can’t find anything more about his younger years. What about his parents? Where did they live? You’d think there would be a paper trail.”
“We checked into all that. Nothing.”
“Maybe we should go to Paris,” Jordy said as they climbed the steps back to their room.
“Excuse me?”
She sat on the bed. “Just because the e-mails came from here, doesn’t mean she was here. If she hired some guy to watch us in the Keys, who’s to say she didn’t hire someone to send the e-mails? But we know where she is now. Maybe that’s where she’s holding the women. And if she collapsed, then they might be trapped somewhere. And nobody would know about their existence.”
He crossed his arms. “I’m no longer so certain Isolde Morgan has anything to do with this. I think it’s a fantasy Alfred concocted in his mind, maybe from their past history together or something, and has somehow managed to convince Dilys of the whole thing. She’s not exactly in the spring of her youth either.”
Jordy crossed her arms. “Okay. Then explain what you felt yesterday at those ruins?”
“I told you before. It could be explained a million different ways, Jordy.”
“I want to go back and check out that symbol again. I didn’t get it all down. It could be an important clue.”
“Absolutely not.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “If you don’t think she’s connected, what difference does it make? What’s the worst that could happen?”
I could lose you. The words just came into his head, but once there, they wouldn’t be dismissed.
“I know how hard all this is on you, but if we really are relying on each other, we’re going to have to learn to trust each other. It’s important to me to check those ruins out again. That’s all I want. After that we’ll do whatever you think we should do next.”
Cai felt the tension knot up in his neck, but he nodded. “I do rely on you, Jordy. More than you realize. And I do trust you. It’s just hard, when what’s in the balance is so critical, to let anyone else be part of the decision making process.”
“You’ve been making all the decisions on your own for a long time.”
“Not entirely. Alfred has been there.” A ghost of a smile curved his lips. “And Dilys’ commands have saved me from making numerous decisions.”
“I relied on Suzanne far too heavily for too many years. Once the trial started, I found out quickly it’s not much fun being the only one in charge. The key, I guess, is balance. I think you had that with Alfred. I’d like for us to find that, too.”
“So would I.” He took her face in his hands and kissed her deeply. “I want you to stay close to me, though. And don’t touch the symbols.” She gave him a look and he could only shrug. “So, I don’t want to take any chances. Promise me, Jordy.”
“I promise. And thank you, Cai.”
He wasn’t so sure she should be thanking him. He had a very bad feeling about this.
Cai turned slowly onto the rutted track. This was just a quick stop, he told himself as he stopped the car when the ruins came into sight once again. That unexplicable dread filled him once again, both frustrating and angering him. This was all nonsense! And he wished like hell he could believe that. He wasn’t suffering from jet lag now.
Jordy ran a finger along the crease beside his tightly clamped lips. “Are you sure you want to walk up there with me?”
He wanted to back down the hill and get as far away from this place as he could. “Come on, let’s get this over with.”
They climbed the hill and stopped several feet away from the entrance.
Jordy saw it first.
“There’s something stuck in the wall remains, next to the entrance. See it?” She was already walking closer before Cai caught sight of the fluttering piece of white.
He reached out and pulled her back. “Wait here.”
She opened her mouth to argue, but shut it again and nodded. “Be careful.”
His lips quirked. “That would be the last thing you have to worry about. Fox Mulder I am not.”
Jordy smiled, but it wasn’t too reassuring. A shiver raced over his skin as he walked closer. There was no wavering shift of the air this time, just the steady chill breeze. The sky was metal gray, lending to the ominous feeling.
“It’s a piece of paper,” he called out. But it was no errant piece of trash. The paper wasn’t snagged in the rocks. It had been purposely pinned down.
Cai walked to the wall. He could read the neat black writing from where he stood.
She is a beautiful one, Malacai, but the Dark Pearl she is not. I warned you to leave her behind once before. Do not test me any further. Do not return here again with empty hands or you will not enjoy the consequences. Neither will she.
Jordy watched as Cai turned back to her, face as pale as the piece of paper he’d been studying. “What?” She stumbled up the slope.
Her movement seemed to galvanize him into action. He took her elbow. “We have to get out of here. Right now.”
“What’s wrong? Tell me. What was on the paper?”
“A note.” He pinned her with a dark look. “From Margaron.” He said nothing, but went back to the car.
They were backing down the rutted path when she asked him what the note said.
“She said not to return empty-handed again.”
“How did she know? She’s in a hospital in Paris.”
Cai stopped at the bottom of the track. “Obviously Margaron is not Isolde. I don’t know who in the hell we’re dealing with.”
Jordy sat back, rubbing her arms, trying to take it all in. “How does she—whoever she is—know we’re here?”
“I have no idea. But she has to be connected to Isolde somehow. This is her property.”
“You think they are working together or something?”
“Your guess is as good as mine at this point.”
“She knows we’re here. So she’s close by.” The realization made her shudder.
“Which is exactly why I have to get you the hell out of here.”
He put the car into gear and didn’t speak until after they were back in their room.
Jordy sat on the bed. “You know, if Alfred sees on the news that Isolde is in a hospital in Paris, do you think he might go there?”
Cai paced. “He might. It’s been three days. I don’t know where he is, what kind of shape he’s in, what his plan is.” He raked his fingers through his hair.
Jordy rubbed her chin. “She wants the Pearl.”
Cai looked at her. “I don’t think I want to hear this.”
She took his hand and wove her fingers through his. “I think you should give her what she wants, Cai. Lure her out and end this part of it. We even have the perfect way to communicate. You can leave her a note at the ruins. Tell her where to meet you. We’ll call the police here. Someone will know who we should contact on a case like this.”
Cai knew she was making sense. Far more rational sense than he was making. But the sense of danger was palpable. He had been warned not to go back there empty-handed and he was just spooked enough to not dare it. Not with Jordy here. And there was no way he was leaving her unattended while he went alone.
Legend of the Sorcerer Page 21