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Aidan struggled to master a calm he didn’t feel. “A long time ago.”
“A good lad, Brendan. Gifted with the kind of powers I’ve only ever read about. Never came back. Did he survive? Do you know?”
“I don’t know, Daz. I haven’t heard from him in years.”
“Tempted, he was. We all were, weren’t we? Tempted to do things we shouldn’t. Lured by the darkness. By the power it gave us. Kilronan made it seem so right. Made it seem so . . . bloodless.” He paused, his knobbed fingers pulling out thread after thread. “It wasn’t, though. Blood flowed. Deaths. More than I could count. Funny, how callous we grew. We didn’t start out that way.”
Aidan sought to redirect the conversation back to the letter. “What does my father mean when he talks about a tapestry? A stone? They must have been important if he sent both away ahead of the attack.”
Which meant he’d known the Amhas-draoi were coming. He’d known he had little time left and had the presence of mind to prepare. Prepare. Not run. Had he thought he stood a chance against Scathach’s brotherhood of warrior mages? Had it been pure hubris, or had his father been stronger than Aidan had ever imagined? Yet in the end, not quite strong enough.
“Years and years, he hunted. And in the end the tapestry and the stone both came to his possession. Worth a king’s ransom for those who understood what they were,” Daz answered.
“What are they? What do they do?”
“I would have kneeled before him. Had he returned as they promised, I’d have followed the High King’s standard. He’d that kind of power.”
“Who, Daz?”
“The kind of natural charismatic radiance that made men follow him.”
“Who did they promise was returning?”
“I always imagined him like Brendan. Young. Golden. Alive.”
“Damn it, Daz. Who reminds you of Brendan? Tell me.”
Daz’s vacant stare sharpened to almost-sanity. “Arthur, of course.”
The gardens stretched in a wild riot of green, though the bones of a once well-ordered series of parterres and pathways, avenues and orchards, existed still. One just had to look for them. Inhaling the pungent smells of loam and the damp woodsy smoke from some gardener’s fire, Cat felt years of city living slough off her in the space of minutes. Felt the tension thrumming her body ease.
Slightly.
After all, she remained caught in
an insane limbo between lives. Hunted by a killer whose cold-blooded viciousness was matched only by his apparent invincibility. Trapped with a man who snuck beneath her guard at every turn. Who caused her not only to remember her past but to dream of a future.
She’d not breathe truly easy until she was rid of them both.
Coming to an impenetrable bramble fence, Cat doubled back to where she’d last caught sight of a path. Struck out toward the sloping green roof of a folly or summerhouse or pavilion. Sensed the surge of charged air and the inside-out feeling of mage energy like a brush of silk across her skin, a lurching of her stomach.
Someone else walked these paths. Someone else rambled this verdant jungle. She froze, aware the house lay east, though hidden from view. Too far to scream. Too far to run.
She was on her own.
“Damn it to hell.” Words followed another prickling rush of mage energy. “Thrice-cursed damn magic. Bloody pain in the bloody ass.”
She let out a terrified breath on a half giggle of hysteria.
Aidan.
She followed the chain of blasphemy to a small clearing amid a profusion of wild-growing rose elder.
He stood, shoulders squared, back straight, a hand up as if he attempted to ward off the tree in front of him. The flash of his emerald caught the sun. “Treusfurvyesh goea dhil dowsk. Nerthyoest dhil gwanndesk.” This time the mage energy released by his words sank beneath her skin. Sent a flush of heat through her body. Flip-flopped her stomach before evaporating.
“A lest tarenesh dhil—ugh.” He doubled over, knees buckling, head bowed as if he’d been struck a knife blow.
She ran to kneel beside him, trembling with fresh memories of the horrible, vicious-eyed creature unleashed by his last stab at spell casting. “Are you all right?”
