Nora Roberts's Circle Trilogy

by Nora Roberts

  She went out, slammed the door.

  “Make it quick,” Cian snapped. “I’m suddenly weary of humans.”

  The worst of the temper had faded out of Larkin’s face. “You think I hit you, that I’m angry because of what you are. I would have had the same reaction, done the same to any man I’d found her with like this. She’s my girl, after all. It wasn’t part of what I was thinking, as I wasn’t thinking in any case.”

  He shifted his feet, blew out a hard breath. “And now that I do, well, it adds a complicated layer to it all. But I don’t want you thinking I planted one on you because you’re a vampire. The fact is, I don’t think of you that way unless, well, unless I think about it. You’re a friend to me. You’re one of the six of us.”

  Even as he spoke, the flush of temper came back. “And I’m saying clear, me demanding, here and now, what the sodding hell you were thinking of taking advantage of my cousin has nothing to do with whether or not you have a fucking heartbeat.”

  Cian waited a moment. “Are you done with that part of the speech?”

  “I am, until I have an answer.”

  With a nod, Cian sat, picked up his cup again. “You put me in a position, don’t you? Calling me a friend, and one of you. I may be the first, but I’ll never be the second.”

  “Bollocks. That’s a kind of way out of things. I trust you as I trust few others. And now you’ve seduced my cousin.”

  Cian let out a snorting laugh. “You’re not giving her enough credit. Neither did I.” Idly, Cian traced a finger over the beaded leather. “She unraveled me like a ball of yarn. It doesn’t excuse not making her leave, but she’s persuasive and stubborn. I couldn’t—I didn’t resist her.”

  He glanced over at the maps he’d neglected since she’d knocked on the door. “It won’t be a problem as I’m leaving tonight. Earlier if the weather cooperates. I want a firsthand look at the battlefield. So she’s safe from me, and me from her, until this is over.”

  “You can’t. You can’t,” Larkin repeated when Cian merely lifted a brow. “If you go like this, she’ll think it’s because of her. It’ll hurt her. If I’m responsible for you planning to leave—”

  “I’d decided it before she came here last night. Partially because I’d hoped to keep my hands off her.”

  Obviously frustrated, Larkin dragged his hands through his hair. “As you didn’t make it away quick enough for that, it’ll just have to wait. I’ll take you there myself, by air, in a few days or whenever it can be done. But we six need to be together.”

  Calmer, Larkin studied Cian’s face. “We need to be one circle. This is bigger than lying with or not lying with each other. And that, now that my blood’s cooler, I can say is between the two of you. It’s not my place to interfere. But damn it,” he continued, “I’m going to ask you one thing. I’m going to ask you as a friend, and as her blood kin standing for her father. Have you feelings for her? True feelings?”

  “You play the friendship card handily, don’t you?”

  “You are my friend, I care for you as I would a brother. That’s the truth from me.”

  “Damn it.” Cian slammed down the cup, then scowled at the blood that splattered on the maps. “You humans crowd me with these feelings. You push them at me, and into me without a single thought for how I can survive them.”

  “How can you survive without them?” Larkin wondered.

  “Comfortably. What difference does it make to you what I feel? She needed someone.”

  “Not someone. You.”

  “Her mistake,” Cian said quietly. “My damnation. I love her, or I would have taken her before this for the sport of it. I love her, or I’d have sent her away from me last night. How, I’m not sure, but I love her otherwise I wouldn’t feel so goddamn desperate. And you repeat that to anyone, I’ll snap your head from your shoulders, friend or not.”

  “All right.” With a nod, Larkin got to his feet, offered his hand. “I hope you’ll make each other as happy as you’re able, for as long as you’re able.”

  “Hell.” Cian accepted the hand. “What the hell are you doing here at this hour anyway?”

  “Oh, I forgot completely. I thought you’d not yet be in bed. I wanted to ask if you’d be willing to let us—my family—mate your stallion with one of our mares. She’s in season, and your Vlad would be a fine sire.”

  “You want to use my horse as stud?”

  “I would, yes, if it’s no problem for you. I’d have her brought to him this morning.”

  “Go ahead. I’m sure he’ll enjoy it.”

  “Thanks for that. We’ll pay you the standard fee.”

  “No. No fee. We’ll consider this a gesture between friends.”

  “Between friends then. Thanks. I’ll just go and find Moira, and let her break her temper over my head as I deserve.” Larkin paused at the door. “Oh, the mare I’ve in mind for your stallion. She’s fetching.”

  The quick grin, the quick wink as Larkin went out had Cian laughing despite the mess of the morning.

  Chapter 11

  At Moira’s orders, the flags flew at half-staff, and pipers played a requiem in the dawn light. She would do more, if the gods were willing, for those who gave their lives in this war. But for now, this was all that could be done to acknowledge the dead.

  Standing in the courtyard, she was torn between grief and pride as she watched the men and women—the warriors—prepare for the long march east. She’d already bid her farewells to her women, and to Phelan, her cousin’s husband.

  “Majesty.” Niall, the big guard who was now one of her trusted captains, stepped before her. “Should I order the gates opened?”

  “In a moment. You wish you were going today.”

  “I serve at your pleasure, my lady.”

  “Your wishes are your own, Niall, and I understand them. But I need you here a bit longer. You’ll have your time soon enough.” They would all have their time, she thought. “Your brother and his family? How are they?”

  “Safe, thanks to Lord Larkin and the lady Blair. Though my brother’s leg is healing, he won’t be able to fight on his feet.”

  “There will be more to this than swinging a sword on the battlefield.”

  “Aye.” His hand closed over the hilt of the blade at his side. “But in truth I’m ready to swing mine.”

  She nodded. “You will.” She drew a breath. “Open the gates.”

  For the second time she watched her people march away from the safety of the castle. It would be a scene repeated, she knew, until she herself rode through the gates, leaving behind the very old, the very young, the ill and infirm.

  “It’s a clear day,” Larkin said from beside her. “They should reach the first base safely.”

  Saying nothing, Moira looked over to where Sinann stood, a child in her arms, another in her belly, one more at her skirts. “She never wept.”

  “She wouldn’t send Phelan off with tears.”

  “They must be like a flood inside her, yet even now she won’t let her children see them. If courage of heart is a weapon, Larkin, we’ll sweep the enemy out of existence.”

  When she turned to go he fell into step with her. “There wasn’t time,” he began, “to speak with you before. Or after.”

  “Before the ceremony.” Her voice was cool as the morning now. “After you invaded my private life.”

  “I didn’t invade it. I was just there, at what was an awkward time for everyone involved. Cian and I resolved matters between us.”

  “Oh, did you?” Her eyebrows winged up as she spared him a glance. “Hardly surprising, as men will resolve matters between them one way or another.”

  “Don’t take that royal tone with me.” He took her arm, drew her toward one of the gardens, and more privacy. “How, I’m asking you, would you expect me to react when I’ve seen you’ve been with him?”

  “I suppose expecting you to be well-mannered enough to excuse yourself is too much to ask.”

  “That�
�s damn right. When I think a man of damn near eternal experiences seduces you—”

  “It was the other way around. Entirely.”

  He flushed, scratched his head, turned a frustrated circle. “I don’t want to know the details of it, if you don’t mind. I’ve apologized to him.”

  “And to me?”

  “What do you want from me, Moira? I love you.”

  “I expect you to understand I’m a woman grown, and one capable of making her own decisions about taking a lover. Don’t wince at the term,” she snapped impatiently. “I can rule, I can fight, I can die if need be, but your sensibilities are bruised at the thought I can have a lover?”

  He thought it over. “Aye. But they’ll get over it. I only want, more than anything, never to see you hurt. Not in battle, not in the heart. Is that enough?”

  Her feathers smoothed out, and her heart softened as it always did with him. “It must be, as I want the same for you. Larkin, would you say that I have a good, strong mind?”

  “Almost too much of both at times.”

  “In my mind, I know that I can’t have a life with Cian. In my head I understand that what I’ve done will one day cause me grief and pain and sorrow. But in my heart I need what I can have with him now.”

  She brushed her fingers over the leaves of a flowering shrub. The leaves would fall, she thought, with the first frost. Many things would fall.

  “When I put my head and heart together, I know, in both, that he and I are better for what we gave to each other. How can you love and turn away?”

  “I don’ t know.”

  She looked back toward the courtyard where people were once again going about their business, their routines. Life went on, she mused, whatever fell. They would see that life went on.

  “Your sister watched her man ride away from her, and knows she might never see him alive again. But she didn’t weep in front of him, or in front of their children. When she weeps, she’ll weep alone. They’re her tears to shed. So will mine be, when this ends.”

  “Will you do something for me?”

  “If I can.”

  He touched her cheek. “When you have tears, will you remember I have a shoulder for you?”

  She smiled now. “I will.”

  When they parted, she went to the parlor where she found Blair and Glenna already discussing the day’s schedule.

  “Hoyt?” Moira asked as she poured herself tea.

  “Hard at work. We had a slew of new weapons finished yesterday.” Glenna rubbed tired eyes. “We’ll be charming them twenty-four/seven. I’m going to work with some of those who’ll be staying here when the rest of us leave. Basic precautions, defensive, offensive tutorials.”

  “I’ll help you with that. And you, Blair?”

  “As soon as Larkin’s finished playing pimp, we’re—”

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “He’s got a horny mare, and cleared it with Cian to have Vlad give her a bang. She doesn’t even get dinner and drinks first. I thought he told you.”

  “No, we had other matters, and it must have slipped his mind. So he’s having Cian’s stallion stand as stud.” Her smile came slowly. Yes, life went on. “That’s a fine thing. Strong and hopeful—and damn clever, too, as he may be starting a brilliant line there. So, that’s what he was about, knocking on Cian’s door before sunrise.”

  “He figured if Cian gave the go-ahead, he could—Wait.” Blair held up a hand. “Replay. How do you know he knocked on Cian’s door before sunrise?”

  “Because I was just leaving the room when Larkin arrived.” Moira sipped her tea calmly while Blair slanted a look at Glenna, then puffed out her cheeks.

  “Okay.”

  “Aren’t you going to berate and damn Cian for seducing an innocent?”

  Blair ran her tongue over her teeth. “You were in his room. I don’t think luring you in there to look at his etchings is his style.”

  Moira slapped a hand to the table with satisfaction. “There! I knew a woman would have more sense—and a bit more respect for my own wiles. And you?” She lifted her eyebrows at Glenna. “Have you nothing to say about it?”

  “You’re both going to be hurt, and you both know it already. So I’ll say I hope you’re both able to give and take whatever happiness you can, while you can.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Are you all right?” Glenna asked. “The first time is often difficult or a little disappointing.”

  Now Moira smiled fully. “It was beautiful, and thrilling, and more than I imagined. Nothing I’d played through my mind was near the truth of it.”

  “A guy isn’t good at it after a few hundred years’ practice,” Blair speculated. “He’d be hopeless. And Larkin walked in when…he must’ve flipped.”

  “He punched Cian in the face, but they’ve made it up now. As men do when they pound each other. We’ve agreed that my choice of bedmate is mine, and moved on.”

  There was a moment of unified silence as all three women rolled their eyes.

  “There’s little time left before we leave the safety of this place. And, we can hope, plenty of time after Samhain to debate my choices.”

  “Then I’ll move on, too,” Blair told her. “Larkin and I—after considerable browbeating by yours truly—are heading out in a couple of hours to see if we can wrangle ourselves some dragons. He’s still not sold on the idea, but he’s agreed we’ll give it a shot.”

  “If it’s possible, it would be a great advantage for us.” Propping her chin on her fist, Moira turned it over in her mind. “I think we could cull out those we feel may not be as strong on the field. If they could ride…archers in the air.”

  “Flaming arrows,” Blair said with a nod. “Their aim doesn’t have to be on the money.”

  “As long as they don’t shoot the home team,” Glenna finished. “There isn’t much time left to train, but it’s worth the try.”

  “Fire, aye,” Moira agreed. “It’s a strong weapon—stronger yet coming from the air. A pity you can’t charm the sun onto the tip of an arrow, Glenna, then this would be done.”

  “I’m going to see if I can move Larkin along.” Blair got to her feet, hesitated. “You know, my first time, I was seventeen. The guy, he was in a hurry, and left me thinking at the end: So this is it? BFD. Something to be said for being initiated by someone who knows what he’s doing, and has a sense of style.”

  “There is.” Moira’s smile was slow and satisfied. “There certainly is.” She sensed Blair and Glenna exchange another look over her head, so continued to drink her tea as Blair left the room.

  “Do you love him, Moira?”

  “I think there’s a part of me, inside me, that’s waited all my life to feel what I feel for him. What my mother felt for my father in the short time they had. What I know you feel for Hoyt. Do you think I only imagine it’s love because of what he is?”

  “No, no, I don’t. I have strong, genuine feelings for him myself. They have everything to do with who he is. But, Moira, you know you won’t be able to have a life with him. That is because of what he is. What neither of you can change any more than the sun can fly on an arrow.”

  “I listened to everything he and Blair have told us about…we’ll say his species.” And read, Moira thought, countless volumes of fact and lore. “I know he’ll never age. He’ll be forever as he was in that moment before he was changed. Young and strong and vital. I will change. Grow old, frailer, gray and lined. I’ll have sickness, and he never will.”

  She rose now to walk to a window and the slant of sunlight. “Even if he loved as I love, it’s no life for either of us. He can’t stand here as I am now and feel the sun warm on my face. All we’d have is the dark. He can’t have children. So I won’t be able to take away from this even that much of him. I might think, just a year together, or five, or ten. Just that much. I might think and wish for that,” she murmured. “But however selfish my own needs might be, I have a duty.”

  She turned back. “He
could never stay here, and I can never go.”

  “When I fell in love with Hoyt, and believed that we’d never be able to be together, it broke my heart every day.”

  “But still, you loved him.”

  “But still I loved him.”

  Moira stood with the sun slanting at her back, glinting on her crown. “Morrigan said this is the time of knowing. I know my life would be less if I didn’t love him. The more life, the longer and harder we’ll fight to keep it. So, I have another weapon inside me. And I’ll use it.”

  Moira discovered a long day of teaching children and the old how to defend themselves and each other from monsters was more tiring than hours of sweaty physical training. She hadn’t known how hard it would be to tell a child that monsters were real after all.

  Her head ached from the questions, and her heart was bruised from the fear she’d seen.

  She stepped out into the garden for some air, and to check the sky, again, for Larkin and Blair’s return.

  “They’ll be back before sunset.”

  She whirled at the sound of Cian’s voice. “What are you doing? It’s still day.”

  “Shade’s deep here this time of day.” Still, he leaned back against the stones, well out of direct light. “It’s a pretty spot, a quiet one. And sooner or later, you end up here for a few minutes.”

  “So, you’ve studied my habits.”

  “It passes the time.”

  “Glenna and I have been with the children and the old ones, teaching them how to defend themselves if there’s an attack here after we leave. We can’t spare many of the able-bodied to hold the castle.”

  “The gates stay locked. Hoyt and Glenna will add a layer of protection. They’ll be safe enough.”

  “And if we lose?”

  “There’ll be nothing they can do.”

  “I think there’s always something, if you put choice and a weapon in someone’s hands.” She walked toward him. “Did you come here to wait for me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Now that I’m here, what do you choose to do?”