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A crushing squall tore him from the cliff. He dangled one handed over the precipice, his shoulder screaming as tendons stretched to the breaking point. Then, his hold collapsing, he plummeted earthward, the ground rushing to meet him. No time for panic. No time for regret.
And just as in the dream when he woke before he struck, the rope caught, strained against the anchor, his harness jerking him to a stop with a bone-rattling jolt.
Rain sluiced over his face. Soaked him to the skin. He squinted up into the downpour. Into the flickering clouds. And swore he saw the ghost of a shape upon the cliff’s edge. The gleam of a blade.
His scar burned as if someone had jammed his frozen axe head into it, and he gasped against the glacial agony, tears gathering at the corners of his eyes as he fought back a scream.
The wind laughed at his pain. “Skoa.”
Soon.
“There’s nothing here, Aidan. Not even a veiled reference.”
Cat pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes, but the imprint of the words remained etched on the backs of her eyelids. Sharp as if they’d been penned in blood.
Arthur’s return figured more and more among the pages now, as if the unfocused ambitions of the group slowly coalesced to a single goal. And sprinkled throughout, references to the tapestry and the stone, both items inextricably linked to this resurrection. Yet nowhere was any mention of the whereabouts of either object. If old Kilronan had recorded it anywhere within the pages of his diary, he’d been too clever for her.
She closed the book, sickness dogging her, a malaise sucking at her like soggy ground. Making every thought, every breath as exhausting as if she’d fought a battle. Ended on the losing side. Pushing the book farther away as if distance might ease the worst of it, she made her decision. “I’m finished, Aidan. I can’t do this anymore.”
Aidan peeled himself from the shadows. He’d been skulking all day. A simmering anger to his words. A brewing violence to his actions. A new restless purpose, as if he knew Belfoyle’s sanctuary would buy them only so much time.
“Fair enough. Give it to me.” He held out a hand, a shuttered expression in his eyes.
She checked a quick breath, her hand instinctively curling around the book. “What are you going to do with it?”
“Lazarus is after the diary. Why? Because he’s been ordered to retrieve it for Máelodor. Why is Máelodor after it? Because he thinks—or knows—it contains the location of the tapestry and the stone. They’ll kill for it. And I’m tired of the two of us being their number one target. They can have the diary. I’m through with it. I’ve learned all I want to of my father’s crazed and ruthless ambitions.”
“Lazarus will never let you live. He’ll tear you apart, leaving less than enough to fill a canvas sack.”
“Perhaps. Perhaps not. I have a few tricks that may surprise.”
“Aidan, you can’t think you’re a match for—or perhaps you do. After all, you did it once, didn’t you?”
He turned toward her with slow deliberation. Tracking her with a stare that had naught of the lover in it, but instead a savagery as relentless as the parasitic Unseelie. An image assailed her. The glimpse she’d caught long weeks ago upon her first reading of the diary of Kilronan as ironfisted conqueror. Sword upraised. Streaked with gore. A mythic, battle-maddened demon.
She forced herself to remain still beneath his fathomless gaze despite the panic assailing her. Had Aidan been forever altered by the sinister shadows? Was this what she’d been witnessing in the stretched and uneasy hours? Daz had referred to it as an addiction. A craving for the beast that would live within Aidan as a splinter of dark mage energy. Tempting him always. Luring him with clawed hands toward the chasm.
“I’ve grappled with every angle, Cat. If Máelodor wants the tapestry, who am I to stop him? Let him have it. Let him try his madness. What is it to me?”
“It’s everything. It makes him one step closer to succeeding. To resurrecting Arthur as a slave born Domnuathi. Using him to sway the world of Other to Máelodor’s side. Can you imagine the horrors a war between Duinedon and Other would bring to the world? It can’t be allowed to get that far.”
He fell into a chair. Clo
sed his eyes. When he opened them again, the creature had receded into the darkest corner of Aidan’s soul. This time his stare burned clear of shadows. Made his words all the more frightening.
“Did you ever think, Cat, that the war has already started?”
She cast a quick glance around the darkened room, the furniture no more than black shapes against the gloom. But this time she knew where she was going. There was no hesitation. And only one or two second thoughts. The ones that had escaped her earlier exorcism.
Aidan wouldn’t like what she planned. But Aidan wasn’t here to stop her. She’d left him sleeping. Finally.
It had taken hours of tortured pacing—his limp growing more pronounced with every pass, his brow growing heavier with unspoken troubles—before he finally fell into an exhausted doze.
Hours in which she’d hatched her plan. Worked up her courage. Hardened herself to her purpose.
Her talent for languages had begun her involvement. Her talent for thievery would end it.
Conjuring flame to candle, she set an unerring course. Left her coal bucket at the hearth. Crossed to a low chest opposite a high tester bed.
