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“Enough,” Jeremy said, and took my elbow, encouraging me to rise. “Let’s get some food. I’m starving and you must be as well.” He eyed Devin. “Magic takes a lot out of a witch.”
I frowned. He was stalling and I knew it, but I was hungry. I pulled out of his hold. “I am perfectly capable of walking on my own.”
“Are you? And from the blood on your hand, how capable is that?” Jeremy snapped.
He had figured it out. I had left out the part about the Blood Oath I had taken and given to Beyland, but as I stared at my blood stained hand, I knew that he knew. “Oh, this. Well, did I leave out the part about the Blood Oath? I took one from him.”
Apparently this astonished them both into total silence.
Devin was the first one to speak, if you can call his explosion speech. “Blood…Oath…? Nae, I dinnae believe it!”
“You think I am lying?”
“Are you sure it was Beyland’s blood?” Jeremy asked.
“I am an immortal witch. Illusions don’t work on me, if that is what you are asking. Yes, I am sure. He has a goal in this and it has nothing to do with Devin…other than getting hold of the notes on day-walking.”
“But he gave you a Blood Oath?” Jeremy seemed stuck on this point.
“He wouldna do that.” Devin shook his head. “Lass…ye have been taken in…”
I put up my chin. “No, I haven’t. I know I haven’t been able to free you yet, Devin, but that doesn’t make me less than what I am, and I told you, I can detect illusion. I sliced Beyland’s hand open myself. We mingled our blood in that same second.”
“Depicting illusion from reality is a rare gift. It took me a hundred years to get it down solid. Are you telling me that you are already skilled at it?” Jeremy sounded impressed.
“Oh, yes. My mother began schooling me in the skill when I was five, how to create illusion, how to know illusion from reality…all of it. By the time I was ten, I was quite well versed in the skill, and then practiced it after I lost my mom.”
“Right then, we have that point settled, Devin,” Jeremy said. “Now…we need food!”
Devin walked with us, talking at me the whole time, telling me he couldn’t let me go to the manor. Finally he got my attention. “Bobbie!”
I stopped and turned to him. “You can’t talk me out of this, Devin.”
“Lass, do ye nae see how helpless ye make me feel when ye make decisions I can do nothing about? I dinnae want ye to go, please. I cannae protect ye when ye put yerself in danger on yer side of this blasted wall.”
My heart ached for him. In the world he was raised, a man, a real man was expected to protect the people—the woman he loved. I understood his point of view, but I couldn’t sit this one out.
I said quietly, “Devin…you know, though I love your need to protect me, I am fully capable of protecting myself.”
“Nae, ye were just with a Dark Warlock whose reputation is…”
“Kitchen!” Jeremy said, and held the door open for me. “Let’s take this discussion with sandwiches, lots of sandwiches.”
“You know, Jeremy, I can open doors for myself,” I told him as I walked through.
He mimicked me, “Also I can open doors for myself.”
I laughed and let it go. I was starving and at that moment, my stomach announced the fact. “Okay, food. I’ll get the bread and lay it out…you get the filling.”
As we put some bread, cold cuts, cheese, and mustard together in several sandwiches, I had an uneasy feeling and said, “I don’t know if it is the hunger or if something feels off…really off.”
“Yes, I felt it earlier when we were outside,” Jeremy agreed, and took a huge bite out of his sandwich before sitting at the table.
Watching him, I realized that I had begun to think of Jeremy as an older brother. I suppose in a manner of sorts, he was. After all, I had learned today that we—our families, came from the same realm. It was as though our meeting here and now was an inevitable fate.
Mrs. Tunny came into the kitchen and put on her apron. We cooed and coddled her but she shooed us off, saying she was fine and didn’t know what had gotten into her.
