by Megan Chance
The steamer dock. The way back to Manhattan. Diarmid saw what he hadn’t seen before, what he’d been too aroused to notice. The way she’d pressed against him. She’d told him once that she didn’t like it when he flirted with her, but today she’d been the one flirting. She’d turned him inside out with it. “I’ll let you kiss me all you want. I won’t say a word to stop you,” when despite the obvious fact that she wanted him, too, she’d never stopped fighting it.
She’d been on her toes, playing with his hair. “I want to give you a surprise.”
Then he discovered that the ogham stick was no longer in his pocket, and he knew she’d played him completely. She’d blinded him with her kisses. She’d bound him the same way the first Grainne had, tangling his weaknesses into a noose. “It would make me so happy.”
He was a fool. Once again and forever. Diarmid’s anger erupted, along with a terrible fear. He rushed from the platform to the steamer docks. One boat was already pulling out, its whistle piercing the roar of the waves. He’d let her go. He’d even given her the coin to buy a ticket. She could be on that ferry, and he would never see her again—because he knew without a doubt that if Patrick got hold of her, the Fianna were done. He was done. Finn would never forgive him for this, and Diarmid would never forgive himself.
He reached the station, grabbing the doorjamb, slinging himself through the open door and into the depot. People stared at him; one or two women leaned to whisper warnings to their children. He ignored them. Grace wasn’t near the ticket booth, nor sitting on the wooden seats in the outside foyer. He ran to where passengers were boarding the next boat.
There she was. Standing on the stairs, fanning herself with a ticket. His relief was overwhelming.
And on its heels came his fury.
She turned at just that moment, nervously, as if she were afraid someone—he—would come after her. Her brown eyes widened when she saw him. She whispered something urgently to the young woman ahead of her, who moved out of her way, and Grace began to hurry up the steps.
He ran to the stairs, heedless of the complaints of those he shoved as he took them three at a time, jerking people out of his way. He heard a man below say, “Now there, young man—you can’t do that. You must wait your turn—”
She was just before him. He grabbed her arm, yanking her to a stop. She said in a low voice, “Diarmid, I’m going home. You can’t stop me.”
“I just did.” He dragged her back. When she tried to pull away, he said between his teeth, “Don’t try me, Grace, or I’ll haul you over my shoulder. I don’t care if you scream. Just let anyone try to stop me.”
He saw when she understood he was serious. When he pulled her with him back down the steps, she didn’t fight him. He ignored the scandalized glances, the frowning men who seemed as if they might intervene in the moment before they saw his face and thought better of it. At the bottom of the stairs, he snatched the ticket from her hand and gave it to a young woman standing near the ticket booth, saying, “We won’t be needing this.”
Once they were out of the station and away from other people, he spun to face her. “Quite a surprise. But I thought you said it would be one I liked.”
“I had to try. Don’t do this, Diarmid. Let me go.”
“Why? That’s what I want to know. Haven’t I been helping you the way I promised?”
“I had to! You know how things are. I don’t belong to you. I’m engaged to be married.”
Jealousy and misery put an edge on his anger. “That doesn’t matter anymore. It can’t. Or do you kiss Patrick the way you kiss me?”
“The way I kiss you is a lie. We both know it. You’re trying to convince me to choose the Fianna. You plan to . . . to seduce me. You’ve bewitched me, but you don’t mean any of it. All this is just a means to an end—”
“No.” He said the word almost desperately, as if it erased everything Finn had ordered him to do. “No. If anyone’s bewitched, it’s me.”
“Don’t lie to me,” she said. “Please. You owe me that. None of this is real. At least admit it.”
His anger faded at her plea. “I wish it were that easy. ’Twould be better, wouldn’t it, just to say that I feel nothing? That this is all some game to win you to the Fianna’s side. And I’ll admit that’s what my brothers want of me, what Finn wants. But that’s never . . . that’s never been what I wanted of you, Grace. Not from the start. You were just a lass and I liked you. I don’t want you to be the veleda. I wish I could change everything.”
She shook her head. “I can’t stay with you. Please, Diarmid. If I have any chance at the life I want, any chance at all, you have to release me. Patrick has my family. He’s told the whole world we’re engaged. And he truly loves me, I know he does. He’ll find the archdruid for me, because he doesn’t want me to die.”
“Why do you believe it when he says it, but not when I do?”
“You’re not telling me the truth. You never have. I don’t know what you really want or what you really think. When you tell me things, I don’t know what to believe.”
And then he said, helplessly, “I love you. You can believe that.”
He saw the flash of something in her eyes—joy, perhaps?—chased by wariness and fear. She didn’t trust him, and she was right not to, because while he’d told her the truth, he hadn’t told her all of it. A giant lie of omission was sitting right between them: I love you but I have to kill you. And there was no way around that.
“I don’t believe you. You would say that too. Just so I would choose the Fianna.”
“D’you think so? Then tell me why I feel set afire when I touch you. How is that a lie? Why do I feel as if we’re fated to be together? Why do you run every time I kiss you? Is it because you feel the same? Why are you so afraid, Grace?”
“Because it doesn’t matter how you feel about me! You’ll always choose the Fianna.”
He stared at her.
She went on, whispering, “You regret the only time you didn’t. You regret Grainne, and you will always regret her. You’ll do whatever you must to make it up to Finn. Whatever it costs you. Or me. That’s why I’m afraid. And that’s why I want you to let me go.”
“I can’t.” He had to force the words. “I have a . . . duty to keep you safe. To protect you. And I . . . I do have to convince you, Grace. I have to at least try. Finn expects it. They all do. Whatever happens with the archdruid, you’ll have to choose. Whatever you think of me, I need for you to see the truth of what we are.”
She made a sound—frustration, fury—and threw the ogham stick at him. “Here, take it. I can’t even hold it. Look at me! I don’t understand it, and I’ll never find the key, and I can’t do anything.”
Diarmid picked up the stick, sliding it back into his pocket. Very carefully, he said, “I can’t bear the thought of you dying. I can’t. I said I would help you find the archdruid, and I will. If it takes my last breath, I’ll find him. Just please . . . stay. Let me help you. I know I can.”
She considered his words, but gave nothing away.
He continued, “You say Patrick will find him for you, but he wants you to sit in his parlor and drink tea while everyone else is searching.” By her expression, he knew he’d landed on the truth, and he pressed his advantage. “He’ll have the Fomori looking, but whatever you think, they’re lying when they say they want to save you. What they want is the incantation. Patrick’s not strong enough to control them, Grace. The whole of the Brotherhood isn’t. The Fomori will do what they want, and they’ll say whatever convinces you to choose them.”
“Just as you will.”
“Don’t make the mistake of thinking they care, Grace. Not like . . . not the way I do. This quest belongs to you. Don’t let Patrick take it away. You’ll never trust the truth if you don’t see it for yourself. You told me that already, and you were right. You should hear what this archdruid h
as to say about your power and your fate. Patrick won’t let you do that. I will.”
She was quiet, and he waited tensely.
Finally, she said, “For now, I’ll stay. Only because you’re right about Patrick—about the fact that he won’t let me search. And my mother doesn’t believe the legends. She’ll want to plan a wedding I don’t even know if I’ll be alive for, and neither of them would let me out of their sight, and . . . and you’re right that I need to learn the truth for myself. You know how to manage the sidhe and I think you can help me find the archdruid, and so I’ll stay. But there’s one condition.”
“Anything.”
“I don’t want you to speak of love anymore. And you won’t touch me. You won’t kiss me.”
His relief turned into something heavy and rotten.
“I’ll have your word, Diarmid. Promise it. Or I promise you that I’ll keep trying to escape, and I promise I’ll never forgive you when I get home again. Which I think you don’t want, however you truly feel about me.”
He nodded. “As you wish.”
She was staying with him. Together they would find the archdruid, and he could convince her to choose the Fianna. It was what he’d wanted. He’d won.
Why didn’t it feel like victory?
The same day
Patrick
The Fianna weren’t there?” Bres asked. He seemed calm but his voice was icy, and Patrick saw the anger in his flinty blue eyes. “I thought you said the information was correct.”
Balor didn’t look the least bit cowed. “We were lied to.”
“We require better informants. And where are our spies? Have they nothing for us?”
“Our spies can’t penetrate the Fianna. They’re too protected. But we’re hearing about a riot planned at Tompkins Square. The Fianna will be leading it.”
Patrick asked, “What about the sidhe boy we captured? What has he said about the archdruid?”
“The boy escaped before we could get him to the police station.” Balor folded his massive arms across his chest so he looked like an immovable boulder. It didn’t stop Patrick from challenging him.
“Escaped?” Patrick echoed in disbelief. “From Fomori hands? How is that even possible?”
Balor shrugged. “They’re cunning creatures.”
“There will be others,” Bres reassured him. “We’ve seen the sidhe all over the city. They’ll find this archdruid eventually.”
“You mean to just watch them? That’s no plan at all! It’s almost August. Samhain is coming. We need the spell to save Grace.”
Bres steepled his fingers and smiled at Patrick. “Yes, indeed. There’s no need for concern. I promise you we have things well in hand.”
Bres’s smile reassured Patrick. He was too tense, jumping at everything. He’d had too many strange dreams and was sick with worry over Grace and her mother and Aidan, especially after that meeting in the park, when Patrick had seen the sidhe’s effect on Aidan. Patrick had told the Fomori that he’d gone to Battery Park to walk and think, but he hadn’t mentioned his meeting with Aidan. He wasn’t certain why. Something in him told him to wait. Aidan had said nothing of importance anyway.
Daire Donn appeared in the doorway. “Downstairs we’ve a witness who saw Diarmid and the veleda.”
Patrick was out of the meeting room almost before Daire Donn finished his sentence. He heard Balor and Bres and Daire Donn behind him as he ran down the steps, rushing into the clubroom to see Lot, luminous in pale-blue silk, and Rory Nolan. In a chair, flanked by two Fomori policemen, sat a young man.
“You saw them?” Patrick blurted.
The young man nodded. “I’ll say I did. He tripped me. Put out his boot and took my seat. Smiled when he did it too.”
“Where?”
“The Coney Island steam car.”
“They were on the car?”
The man nodded again. “Went to the beach same as the rest of us.”
Balor stepped forward. “You’re certain it was them? The same two on the drawings?”
The young man’s eyes widened at the sight of him. His hands clutched nervously at the armrests. “Yeah. ’Cept she was prettier—and dirtier. But that was him; I’d swear to it. I saw the poster and went right to the police. When do I get my reward?”
Balor growled, “If your information leads to their capture, you’ll get it.”
The man looked pleadingly at Patrick. “Hey, that weren’t the deal. I gave up my only day off for this. I could still be at the beach with my friends.”
“Give it to him,” Patrick ordered.
“We already knew they were in Brooklyn,” said Bres.
“Just give it to him. There’s more if we need it.”
Balor reached into his pocket and pulled out a small purse. He took out a gold coin and handed it to the man. Balor jerked his head at the police. “Take him away.”
They took the boy out, and Balor closed the door.
“We’ve got Manhattan and Brooklyn blanketed with spies, and Diarmid’s enjoying the day at Coney Island,” Patrick said.
Balor settled his great bulk on a settee that looked as if it might collapse beneath him. “We’ll have her back within hours. But you’d best expect to find her changed, at least for a time.”
“I’ll win her back,” Patrick said, with more certainty than he felt. “It’s me she loves. And then we’ll find the spell to save her.”
Lot’s eyes were dark with pity. “I know you mean to do what’s right, but I think it’s time you considered that society will never accept her now. The rumors . . . well, I’ll be blunt: People will think you a deluded fool if you marry her. Diarmid has already compromised her. Most believe she ran off with him of her own accord. She’ll be shunned. Perhaps . . . perhaps ’twould be better for you both if she dies in the ritual as she should.”
“What?”
“Lot isn’t wrong, my friend,” Daire Donn said gently. “The veleda will never outlive the rumors.”
“What do I care for rumors?” Patrick couldn’t keep his voice from rising. “I’ll take her to Ireland. That’s where our fight truly is. What do I care what society here believes of her?”
“Think of her, darling,” said Lot. “A woman needs the support of society, of friends. Things will be very difficult for her. Perhaps she would not want to be saved.”
“Of course she wants to be saved! She’s seventeen. Her whole life is ahead of her. A life with me.”
Lot came over to Patrick, pressing his hand, filling his nose with the scent of water lilies. “I’m sorry to speak of such difficult things, my darling, but I merely mean to warn you. We will save her life. But she may wish we hadn’t.”
“I’ll let her make that choice herself,” Patrick declared.
“But first we must find her,” said Balor.
Patrick’s step was heavy as he walked home. There were voices in the parlor—his mother and Lucy and Mrs. Knox. He thought of the news he had and wished he could leave it unsaid.
His mother looked up with a quick smile as he stepped through the doorway. “Patrick! You’re home early. Won’t you come and have tea with us?”
He shook his head. “I just wanted to let you know: a witness spotted Grace at Coney Island. We’ve sent men over. We’re hoping to have her by tomorrow.”
“Oh thank God,” Mrs. Knox gasped.
Patrick’s mother touched her shoulder. “It will be a happy time indeed when Grace is brought home.” But Patrick saw the doubt in his mother’s eyes.
Lucy asked, “Was she with Derry?”
Patrick hesitated, but there was no way around the truth. He nodded.
“What were they doing at Coney Island?”
“I don’t know,” Patrick said.
“Swimming, perhaps?” Lucy’s voice was touched with hysteria. “Taking in
the sights? Having a good time?”
“Lucy, please,” said their mother.
“It’s true, isn’t it, what everyone’s saying?”
“What are they saying?” Patrick asked, though he knew.
“That it wasn’t a kidnapping. That she went with him willingly. That she doesn’t want to escape him. She’s run off with him. You all know it. She’s in love with him and she’s run off with him and I don’t know why none of you will admit it!”
“Lucy!” their mother scolded.
“Well, it’s true. It’s true! She pretended to help me and all the time . . . all the time she was—” Lucy looked at Mrs. Knox and clamped her mouth shut, and then she ran sobbing from the parlor.
“Maeve, dear, I’m so sorry. Lucy’s just so sensitive these days . . . you know how it is with young girls.”
Patrick didn’t stay to hear the rest. He didn’t want to think about his own fears, or Lot saying, “Perhaps ’twould be better for you both if she dies in the ritual . . .”
He went to his study, to the glass cases, and braced his hands on one, staring at the illustration he’d shown Grace not so long ago. The painting on bark of a young, dark-haired man offering a handful of berries to a blond woman. Diarmid and Grainne. Grace’s favorite of the old legends. “Let me be your Diarmid,” Patrick had said to her that day, before either of them had known that the real Diarmid was here, and Grace had already met him.
It almost felt . . . fated.
“Right now, she needs him more than she needs you. But I don’t know if that will always be true.”
It was all he could do not to fling the relic across the room. No. Grace wanted to come home. She wanted to be with him. She wanted Patrick to save her.
And he would find the archdruid if it took everything he had. He could not lose her. Not to Diarmid Ua Duibhne.