Claire Delacroix (37 page)

His hands were shaking, his heart was racing. He threw himself out of Aurelia’s bed, well aware of her gaze following him, and scanned the shadows. Baird checked every nook and cranny, he checked the closets, looked under the bed, and behind the drapes.

There was no intruder in the room.

Aurelia sat up to watch him, folding her arms around her knees. But Baird didn’t have any easy explanation for disturbing her sleep.

His chest ached with the memory of the wound.

Baird dropped into a chair and rubbed a hand over his eyes. He exhaled shakily and remembered his first dream. He had died in that encounter, as well.

Were these dreams memories, too, or were they symbolic?

He swallowed. Maybe he was a little worried about Dunhelm’s location, despite his assurances to Julian. And if he had chosen the site out of some emotional desire to own it, it might not really be the best place for his resort.

What if he had made a mistake? A shadow of fear crossed over Baird. If Dunhelm failed, the entire company could be in jeopardy because of the cost of this renovation.

Had he stretched too far?

Was that the reason for this nightmare?

“Bard, son of Erc,” Aurelia asserted quietly.

Baird blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“It was Bard who killed you in that dream.” Her fair brows pulled together in thought. “It must have been him the other time, as well, though I was not certain before he spoke.”

The hair on Baird’s neck snapped to attention. Surely, Aurelia couldn’t know what he had dreamt?

“Spoke?”

“Do not imagine that I will let you claim what should be mine!” she quoted the last line of Baird’s dream with eerie accuracy, then shivered. “Truly, the man had a malice that could not be denied.”

Baird pushed to his feet and crossed to the bed. He leaned over Aurelia, willing the truth from her. “You can’t know that. You can’t know what I dreamed.”

Aurelia laughed. “Well, of course I do!” She reached out, her eyes shining and took Baird’s hand. With consummate ease, she echoed his own gesture from the dream and pressing a kiss against the back of his hand. “Awaken to me, destiny mine,” she murmured, a smile quirking her lips.

Baird snatched his hand away and backed against the wall. “How do you know what I dreamed?”

“Because I made you dream it,” she said easily, then patted the mattress beside her. “Come back to bed, Baird. It is too early to be awake. And you, sir, have left me tired, indeed.”

But Baird didn’t move. His gut was tight with the memory of Jessica’s cold-hearted manipulation.

“How could you make me dream anything?” he asked hoarsely.

Aurelia heaved a patient sigh. “Because that is the second gift from my naming. I have the power to summon the Dreaming, deep in my mind there is a dreamstone of rare power.” She snuggled beneath the covers and yawned. “Could we not talk about this in the morning?”

She had made him dream.

Baird didn’t know how she had done it, but the fact remained that Aurelia had done it. And all the dreams that unlocked the secret doors inside of him had just been the keys in Aurelia’s deception. Somehow she had gotten into his mind and played him like a cheap guitar. Baird didn’t know how she had figured out what made him tick, but she had manipulated him brilliantly.

He hadn’t lived before.

He hadn’t had a father who loved him.

He had never been to Dunhelm or Inverness.

And he certainly wasn’t destined to be with Aurelia.

One more time, a woman had played Baird Beauforte for a fool. And one more time, he had seen the truth in the nick of time.

“No, we can’t talk about it in the morning,” he said tightly and scooped up his clothes.

Baird knew what he had to do, even though the prospect made him feel physically ill. It was horrifying that even knowing what Aurelia had done didn’t loosen her spell over him.

“What do you mean?” Aurelia asked with surprise. She sat up and her glorious hair tumbled over her shoulders, her blue eyes filled with concern.

It was all a brilliant act, Baird reminded himself as his heart clenched. “We won’t talk about it, because I won’t be here.”

Aurelia sat bolt upright. “But, where are you going?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Baird set flatly. “I’ve had one Jessica in my life and sure as hell don’t need another.”

With that, he walked out of Aurelia’s room.

He should have known better, he told himself grimly as he fought his way into his clothes. No one had ever wanted him just for himself.

And nothing had changed.

* * *

By the time Aurelia realized that Baird made no jest, she could hear Tex complaining at being roused from bed. She threw on her clothes and ran down the stairs, but her pursuit came too late.

The dawn was just tinting the horizon when Aurelia burst onto Dunhelm’s lawn. She ran for the chopper, but its rotors sped more and more quickly.

It lifted off the ground before she was halfway to the paved pad. Aurelia cried out Baird’s name, but he did not look her way. She watched him point to the south, the chopper turned and lifted higher, and in the blink of an eye, he was gone.

Aurelia fought against her tears as she watched the silver dragonfly fade into the pale blue of the morning sky. She could not chase him, she could not force him to listen, she could not take away her hasty words and explain the Dreaming to him in another way.

It was too late. The damage was done.

And Aurelia did not know how she would ever make it right.

She could not go back to the bed they had shared. Perhaps later, she would cherish Baird’s scent on the linens, but the blow to her heart was too fresh.

Aurelia lifted her chin and began to walk.

* * *

Chapter Twenty-Three

It was late afternoon by the time she came back to the hotel. Aurelia had no sooner stepped into the foyer, than Elizabeth came running to her. The older woman’s usually cheerful features were drawn in concern and she twisted her hands together.

“Oh, Aurelia, I do not know what to do!”

And then Elizabeth burst into tears.

Aurelia slid her arm around the older woman’s shaking shoulders. “Elizabeth, what is wrong? What has happened?”

“Talorc’s mother, Ursilla, she...she...”

Elizabeth took a gulping breath and Aurelia’s heart clenched. “What has happened?”

Elizabeth rubbed ineffectively at her tears. “She passed away in her sleep. The funeral is on the morrow.”

Aurelia felt a pang of loss, even though she had not know Ursilla well. There was something about her that drew Aurelia her way. Oddly enough, she had considered seeking out the older woman on this very day.

But she was dead.

“Oh, no, Aurelia, you must not be dismayed. Ursilla was elderly and truly it was the kindest way for her sweet soul to pass from this world. It’s Talorc I’m worried about!” She sniffled into her hankerchief and seemed to be fighting to compose herself. “He’s not talking to anyone, and worse -” Elizabeth lifted a pale face to Aurelia. “He will not eat a speck of anything.”

She swallowed as Aurelia absorbed this news and within a heartbeat, Elizabeth’s words fell in their characteristic torrent again. “It’s not good for him, miss, it’s not right for a man to lose his appetite. I don’t need to tell you that I’m terribly worried about him. He just won’t eat a bite!”

She caught her breath. “He looked so drawn and serious when he brought the news, it’s not healthy, Aurelia, that it’s not. I know they were powerfully close those two, but still, Ursilla led a good long life.”

“Surely it is only natural for him to mourn,” Aurelia suggested, but Elizabeth shook her head firmly.

“I know mourning, Aurelia, but this is more than that. He’s left us, slipped away into some corner of his mind where none can reach him. It’s not natural and it cannot be good. Even now, he’s a shadow of himself, a man I barely recognize, and that will only get worse if he doesn’t eat.”

Elizabeth inhaled shakily and her tears gathered as she stared at Aurelia. “I don’t know what I would do with myself if something happened to Talorc,” she confessed in an uneven whisper.

Aurelia gave the older woman’s shoulder an encouraging squeeze. She had noticed the way Talorc’s glance followed Elizabeth and despite her own woes, Aurelia could not turn away from the opportunity to lend her help. “Do not worry, Elizabeth. I will talk to him.”

“Please, miss. He seems to like you.”

* * *

Talorc was standing on the cliffs, staring out at sea, his hands shoved deep in the pockets of his baggy trousers. There was something about the way the wind ruffled his hair, perhaps about the way the late sun picked out the silver in the gray that made Aurelia’s heart ache with familiarity.

She made her way towards him, not having the faintest idea what she would say to him or what she could discover to ease Elizabeth’s mind.

In the end, she did not have to find the words.

Talorc did.

Aurelia came to a halt slightly behind the older man and he tossed a wry smile over his shoulder. “Don’t be telling me you’re sorry, Miss Aurelia, my mother had a long and happy life. Indeed, she was blessed with uncommonly good health right to the end.” He sighed. “It was easy for her.”

“But not for you, I would imagine,” Aurelia commented softly as she stepped up beside him. The sea was a silver mirror stretching to the horizon, the lowering sun painting a swash of orange across its gleaming surface.

Talorc shrugged but did not look to her. “Harder than I expected it to be, that much is for certain.” He cleared his throat. “Have you ever had the feeling that you have been through something before? That you have lost someone before and that the ache in your heart is all too familiar?”

He held up his gnarled hand before Aurelia could answer and she saw a sad smile curve his lips. “No, don’t be answering that. It’s what she said at the end, preying on my mind and making me fey.” Talorc sighed. “I suppose it was a disappointment to see a woman who always clung to her wits losing her grip, even so slightly, at the very end. Sad it was, there’s no mistake.”

“I thought she passed away in her sleep.”

“Aye, that she did, but when my mother went off to her bed last evening, she said the strangest thing. I thought nothing of it at the time but it has troubled me ever since, perhaps only because it makes no sense at all.”

“What did she say?”

Talorc exhaled heavily and frowned. “She touched my arm and when I looked to her, she told me not to be afraid, that all that was begun had been set to rights.” His frown deepened. “She said that all tasks left unfinished had been done, all debts settled and balances paid.”

Aurelia could see nothing confusing about any of this, for she had oft seen that people sensed when they had lived their due. And Ursilla had had time to settle all her affairs to her satisfaction.

But Talorc’s silence hinted that this was not all of the tale.

“Did she say anything else?”

“She called me Hekod,” Talorc admitted and fired a fierce blue glance at Aurelia.

She caught her breath at the familiarity of that stubborn sapphire stare, but Talorc did not notice her response. He glared out to the sea once more and she could see that his hands had balled into fists in his pockets.

“You must understand that there was a day when my mother often called me Hekod, though it was but a joke between us,” he continued tightly. “She meant no ill will by it, to be sure. She often jested that she would have given me the name in truth had it not been such a portent of bad luck. But I, I was blessed with uncommon good luck, despite her nickname for me.”

Talorc sighed with the memory. “In my youth, I could not shake the dust of this island from my shoes quickly enough. I joined the merchant marine as soon as they would take me, lied about my age as was easily done then. My mother never protested, though I came home seldom enough in those days.” A smile of affectionate recollection curved his lips. “I sent her postcards and she always had them tacked to the walls. Souvenirs from Hekod gone a-viking, she used to say.”

Aurelia’s throat tightened painfully.

“The war came and, of course, I signed up immediately, anxious in my ignorance to do the right thing.” Talorc shuddered. “It was horrible, more horrible than anything I could have imagined, and it all was over, it still cast a long shadow in my mind. Perhaps it was the senseless killing, but that taste for travel was my war casualty. The only one and a comparatively low price to pay against that of the many who did not come home again.” He took a breath. “I came home, here, to Dunhelm, as there seemed no more right place to be.”

“And here you stayed.”

“Yes,” Talorc admitted thoughtfully. “And have wanted nothing else, all these years.” His voice was tight when he finally continued. “But even knowing that, you must understand that her last words gave me a chill. I have to believe that is only because they made no sense at all.”

“What did she say?”

Talorc exhaled shakily. “‘Hekod Viking and lover true, my time is over and yours yet new. Our paths now part, though memory will be true. Go! Follow your heart now, for its aim is true.’“

Aurelia stared at the older man, unable to summon a word to her lips. Her pulse thundered in her ears.

It was all true. The people she had known and loved all those centuries before had come back to Dunhelm, drawn here time and again, to finish the deeds they had left undone.

Drawn here to help her and Baird.

Ursilla had been her mother Gemma so long ago. A part of her had been compelled to wait at Dunhelm, to try to fix what she saw as her own failure to protect her daughter.

And she had died only when she believed the matter resolved.

Her words implied that Ursilla would not be back again.

Aurelia wondered how many times Gemma had come, how many times she had tried to set matters aright. She thought of Baird’s repeated memories of returning here and was humbled that those she loved cared so much for her welfare.