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“Wear it into battle to show I’m Troll fierce.”
“Uh-huh.” When they broke through the trees, he simply picked her up and carried her the rest of the way.
“Just need to sleep.”
“That’s what you’re gonna do.”
He got her inside, laid her on the sofa, where he and Bollocks could keep their eyes on her. He crouched down to build a fire, but the peat sparked, then flamed.
She smiled. “I still got it,” she murmured. Then closed her eyes and slept.
“Yeah, my Breen, you still got it.”
He slid a pillow under her head, gently removed the diadem. Then tucked a throw around her.
Bollocks sat to take first watch.
“That’s a good boy. You do that, and I’ll go put something together so she has herself a good meal when she wakes up.”
Watching her just a little longer, he brushed the hair back from her face.
“All that magick, it puts something in you, but it sure can take something out.”
When she woke, the fire simmered, the lamps glowed on low, and candles flickered. Music played, as low and warm as the lamps. She smelled something wonderful, something merging with the peat fire and candlewax that reminded her stomach she hadn’t eaten since breakfast.
And she found, tucked against her neck, the little stuffed lamb that was Bollocks’s current favorite sleeping companion.
She saw Marco, his head haloed in the light, sitting in a chair, his feet up on the coffee table and a book in his hand.
Bollocks curled by the fire, dozing, but as she surfaced, his eyes opened. His tail wagged as he uncurled to prance to her and lick her face.
“And there she is! Sugar pie, you went out like a light and stayed there.”
She sat up, tried to stretch and nuzzle the eager Bollocks at the same time. “How long?”
He picked up his phone from the table to check the time. “Four solid.”
“Fourhours? That’s a nap squared.”
“You needed it. You had us worried, girl. Harken and Morena came over about an hour after you crashed to check on you, and Harken said the sleep was the best thing. I guess he had it right, ’cause your color’s all rosy Breen again.”
“I’m sorry all of you worried, and honestly, I feel great now. Starving, but great. What is that turning the cottage into heaven?”
“Beef bourguignon, Marco style. It’s gonna be about ready. I figured you need some red meat. Since Brian doesn’t figure to make it back tonight, it’s just you and me and our pal here. Stay.”
He pointed at her, not the dog, and rose to go into the kitchen.
On his way back with what Breen recognized as one of his famed charcuteries, he opened the door. And tossed Bollocks a bite of meat on the dog’s race out.
“He wouldn’t go out the whole time you were,” Marco told her. “Went upstairs to get his lamb and laid it up there with you when I came in to sit and read, but that’s it.
“Best dog in dog history.”
“I’ve got the best friends in friend history.”
“Stay,” he repeated, and went back for wine and glasses. “We’re going to sit here, have some wine while you fill the hole some off that tray. It’ll give our dinner time to finish up while you tell me what the hell went down up there with the Trolls.”
She grabbed finger food, stuffed it in. “Good. God. Good. Let’s start by saying I’m glad Brian was with me. I don’t know how I’dhave managed without him. Thar? He was a lot like that girl Cait Connelly. Bitter.”
