AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He could do this. He just had to ignore the hard-on that had him shifting uncomfortably, and pray she didn’t realize what she was doing to him, although by that smug look in her eye, she knew exactly. In fact, she counted on it. “How do you know the men were waiting for you?” he asked.
She fumbled with the fresh gown she’d pulled out. Shot him a curious look. “For you?”
“Don’t look so shocked.” He forced himself to watch as she dressed, his gaze as calm as if this sort of thing happened every day.
In his dreams.
Long-since-discarded dreams.
“And they succeeded in that, didn’t they? They stabbed me. Would have killed me.”
“Only because…”
“Only because I jumped without looking. You can say it. I…” He shook his head. “Stupid me. I thought you needed my help.”
She took a seat at a dressing table. Began violently brushing her hair until it crackled. Her face in the mirror was grim. As if he’d annoyed her. “Well, next time think before you act the hero,” she snipped. “As you saw, I’m not helpless.”
Here he was, trying to apologize and she was still carping at him. What did she want? A full groveling confession? Well, damned if he was going to give it to her. He didn’t care how hard she made him. He clenched his jaw. Began working his arm again.
“No. I can see you do very well on your own.”
Morgan avoided it as long as possible. But it had to be done.
She’d hoped to be alone. Hoped Cam would use the excuse of his injury to stay lounging in comfort at the inn. But he’d surprised her. Gritted his teeth. Shrugged into his clothes. And ridden the three miles with almost no complaining.
She would scry the stones. Pull the memories stored within the Giant’s Fist and pray they showed her Doran. She needed to see his face. Or rather the glamorie he’d woven to conceal himself. He wouldn’t keep to his true form. Not when he knew he was being hunted.
She’d last seen the rogue Amhas-draoi in Skye two years ago. A tall, barrel-chested man, he’d been polite, but distant. Holding himself apart from the daily life of the school. Spending long weeks away, or alone in his chambers. Yet when asked, he did what was demanded of him. And did it well. He was a skilled mage. An amazing fighter.
He’d been a man to respect. Now he was a man to fear.
Why? What change had occurred within the Amhas-draoi to send him down this path? Or had he always planned for this? Had his time with Scathach simply been a way to gain access to the knowledge he needed? She couldn’t believe that. The head of her order would have read the signs and understood the danger. Doran couldn’t have hidden so much of what he planned for so lo
ng. Could he?
The questions worried at her, but in the end they mattered little against the task she’d been assigned. Doran’s motivations aside, he needed to be stopped and the sword regained. Why he did what he did could be left to others.
Her scrying might or might not work. Stone was the most impressionable, but only the most forceful emotions, the most powerful images would imprint themselves and remain. Whether Traverse’s terror had burrowed itself into the rock he stood bound to was a big if.
Wind plucked at her as she climbed the rocky, scrub-covered hill to the group of five stones. Weathered and gray with moss, they seemed to have erupted from the landscape as if the earth had spat them out.
Once free of the sheltering valleys, the wind picked up. As it swirled through the stones, it became sour and cold, smelling of decay and death. The soldier’s had not been the only blood spilled in this place. Only the most recent.
Morgan glanced over her shoulder. Still stiff, Cam followed more slowly, his blond head bent against the hillside.
He stopped halfway up. Called to her. “Was it worth the trip?”
She hoped to hell it was. Doran was good. She had no idea what form he had taken, and he cloaked his magic. The traces and glimpses of mage energy she’d tracked in town had been slight compared to what he would give off. And Neuvarvaan’s power would shout itself to her if it were unsheathed. But that hadn’t happened. Which was a small victory. No sword. No Undying. She and Doran were at a standoff.
Cam joined her at the top of the hill. Looked around at the sweep of rocky wilderness. “Reminds me of Strathconon,” he remarked. “So why are we here again?”
She had a sudden urge to reveal the truth. Doran’s defection. The seizing of Neuvarvaan by force with three Fey killed in the ambush. All unimaginable offenses. Unthinkable to one of her kind. Yet Doran had done it, and taken pleasure in the heinous crimes by the accounts of those he’d left alive. Those sins would be enough in her eyes to take him down. But he’d gone one step further. Involved the mortal world in his madness. And that could not stand.
Would Cam comprehend the significance of Doran’s betrayal? Or would he dismiss it as more of her nonsense? Or worse, run to General Pendergast with what he’d learned?
There was too much at stake. She couldn’t risk it. Not with a heart so bruised that any glimpse of the old Cam was enough to make her forget all her well-founded intentions.
Stay away from him. Keep quiet. Once she’d found the sword would be soon enough for Cam to learn the truth. By then, it wouldn’t matter.
