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“No. I won’t believe that.” She couldn’t because that meant she’d been wrong. Stupid. Naive. And Daigh’s insults had been true.
“You forget. I’ve crossed paths with him before.” He placed a hand over his heart with a wince hardening the already sharp lines of his face. “I could show you the scar.”
She lifted a stubborn chin. “And Daigh’s scars? Máelodor has tortured him into subservience. Has infected him with evil. It’s not Daigh’s by right. Not his by choice.” She fisted her hands together. Sucked in a ragged breath. Was this her chance? Could she tell Aidan about her visions? Would he believe her, or would he dismiss the connection as a girlish fantasy as Daigh had?
Brendan would listen. Would believe. But Brendan wasn’t here. Aidan was. And for better or worse he was her only family. Perhaps he’d even understand what was happening to her. She surely didn’t.
Her voice dropped low as she struggled against the weight in her chest. “I’ve met him before, Aidan. Known him. Not as he is now, but as he was. Before Máelodor’s summoning. Before he was brought back against his will.”
Aidan paused, one hand upon the mantel, his gaze fastened on the refreshingly fire-colored flames. A tiny victory amid Aunt Delia’s decorating extravaganza. “What are you talking about?” he growled.
“Daigh.” When he tried to interrupt, she rushed ahead. She had to speak of it. To explain herself. To make him listen and not just push her story away as a child’s silliness. “I know it sounds like insanity, but I’ve traveled into Daigh’s past. I’ve walked with him. Spoken with him. Loved him. At first I thought I was dreaming, but Daigh remembers me too. He remembers us together. I don’t know how or why, but when I’m in Daigh’s past it’s as real to me as this moment.”
He cast aside her words with a careless wave of his arm. “More of Máelodor’s black magics. You see what he wants you to see.”
She hadn’t thought of that. Could it be? Could Daigh have cast some demonic spell over her? No. Her visions were too full of hope and life and affection to be the work of dark powers.
“Máelodor will stop at nothing to gain his victory. And if it includes destroying an innocent girl, so be it,” Aidan scoffed.
“What does Máelodor want? Who is he? You talk of his malice. Daigh spoke of his evil
. Even Cat trembles when she speaks his name.”
“It doesn’t matter. You’ll leave for Belfoyle, and that will be an end to it.”
She stiffened. “If I go anywhere, it shall be back to Glenlorgan.”
He sank into a seat nearby. Stretched his bad leg in front of him, kneading his thigh. “Rejoining the bandraoi is out of the question. Father’s murder won’t continue to splinter our family as it has for the past seven years. You’re my sister. You belong with me.”
“I may be your sister, but I’m not your child. So stop acting as if I am. My future is my own, Aidan. And if I choose to return to the bandraoi, there is nothing you can say. I’m a healer. It’s my birthright and my calling. It’s who I am. I can’t turn my back on that gift any more than you could . . . could turn your back on Belfoyle or the earldom.”
He lifted his head, crossed his arms. The picture of unyielding obstinacy. Any more arguing would only set his back up higher. She subsided. For now. “You haven’t answered my questions about Máelodor.”
“Tell her, Aidan.”
Sabrina hadn’t heard her sister-in-law enter the room, but there she was. Her black hair and green eyes emphasizing her ghost-white skin. She crossed to Aidan’s side, resting upon the arm of his chair. His hand came up to run over her back. Rest there possessively.
Their affection made Sabrina hurt with a jealousy she couldn’t put into words. If her visions were of Daigh’s true past, she’d had this same closeness once. Had it and lost it.
“Sabrina’s as involved as any of us,” Cat urged. “And as she’s found at great cost, what is unknown can be as dangerous as what is known.”
Sabrina added her arguments to Cat’s. “Máelodor has tried to kill you. He’s used me to find Brendan. What does he want from the Douglases? What have we done to be singled out for his animosity? Please, Aidan. Tell me.”
Aidan glanced at the door. Hunched deeper into his chair. Stared long and intently into the flames before giving a faint nod as if coming to a decision. He paused, seeming to weigh his words. “Máelodor was one of the mages who studied with Father. Driven by the same sinister ambitions. The same hellish dream as Father and all of his associates. They believed in a world where the race of Other would not only be free to live without fear of persecution, but would control that world and the destinies of the Duinedon who served us.”
A cold wave of nausea washed over her. “Impossible. It could never happen.”
“Father believed it could if the Other were united under their last and most legendary king. A warlord who wielded his considerable power during the last golden age of Other dominance.”
“Arthur. But how on earth . . . Arthur’s dust. He’s . . .” She clamped her mouth shut. Of course. A soldier of Domnu. One of the Domnuathi built from the bones of his former life.
Aidan nodded. “Father and the mages he’d turned to his cause strove to resurrect Arthur as a new leader—literally. To use him as a rallying point for all Other. Máelodor searches for the map that will lead him to Arthur’s tomb and the stone that will open the protective wards. Once these treasures are in his possession, he’ll have all he needs to complete the Nine’s work and bring the High King back from the dead.”
A question she hated but had to ask. “Brendan was involved, wasn’t he? The Amhas-draoi didn’t lie when they accused him.”
“No. They didn’t lie.”
The days leading to Samhain. A pile of dead wood heaped in the inner courtyard in preparation for the bonfires lit to signal the day of the dead. Brendan in a quiet but heated discussion with Father, both men staring at each other, eyes matching in intensity and cold arrogance. A hand upon Father’s arm shaken off. Brendan disappearing into the stables. Father closeting himself in his library. Unease blanketing the house. Shortening tempers. Filling reproachful silences. Brendan’s sudden departure from Belfoyle only adding fuel to the gathering storm.
