Shadow Spell (17 page)

She searched for the words. “He was like the shadows that play there, when the sun dapples through the leaves. More formed than that, but not formed. I felt I could almost see through him, though I couldn't. The horses saw or sensed, I couldn't say which, but the riders behind me, they didn't. They kept on talking together, even laughing. It was no more than a minute, and Roibeard flew in. The wolf, it didn't run away so much as fade away.”

“A projection,” Fin suggested.

“Not in the usual way.” As he ate, Connor shook his head. “As I saw it as well. A shadow's close. My sense was of something not quite here, not quite there. Not as he was outside here, not a thing with weight and full form, but with power nonetheless.”

“Something new then,” Fin considered. “Balancing between two planes, or shifting between them, as he can shift time at Sorcha's cabin.”

“It pulls from him though. If you watch the stone, his power source, it ebbs and flows.” Meara glanced at Connor for confirmation.

“That's true enough, but as with any skill, the power of it grows as you hone it.”

“The McKinnons, the people I guided,” Meara continued, “they saw nothing.”

“To them he was a shadow,” Fin said. “Nothing more.”

“A shadow spell.” Branna considered it. “I've seen a thing or two in Sorcha's book that might be useful.”

“And did you get the way of this from her book?” Fin asked as he ate. “For it's magick. I've had this dish at a tony restaurant in Paris, and it didn't match yours.”

“It turned out well.”

“It's brilliant,” Boyle said.

“It is,” Branna said with a laugh. “It takes forever as the sauce is fussy, and not something I'll do often. But today it gave me time to think in the back of my brain. He's pushing at Meara now as he did with Iona before. Testing the edge of things, we could say. And it's Meara, I think, because, in truth, it's Connor he wants to take a run at.”

“He went for the boy first.” Fin sipped wine as he considered. “A boy, an easy target he might think. But together, Connor and the boy hurt him, drove him away again. And that would be . . . disappointing.”

“So he's after a bit of revenge,” Boyle continued. “And got a good lick in when he took Connor on. But only a lick come to that. And next he takes aim at Meara.”

“After she and Connor had their hot time in the lorry,” Iona pointed out. “The power of a kiss.”

“Oh, for pity's sake,” Meara muttered.

“Sure it's true enough.” Under the table, Connor danced his fingers up Meara's thigh and down again. “And when things progress as things do, he comes again. With a shadow spell.”

“Could he do harm in that form that's not a form?” Meara wondered.

“I think yes. A delicate balance from what I know,” Branna added. “And the conjurer of the spell would have to be able to shift—away, or into full form quickly—without losing that delicate balance.”

“If he can do that, why didn't he come at me today? I had a knife, and I'm not helpless, but it would've been his advantage I'd think.”

“He wants to unnerve you more than cause you harm,” Fin told her. “Hurting you gives him some satisfaction, of course, as causing harm feeds him. But you'd be worth more to him in another area.”

“He wants you,” Connor said flatly, and with the bubble of that pure rage she'd seen rippling, “because I do. He thinks to seduce you—spellbind you or shake you enough so you don't fight, but run or plead—”

Her eyes fired, black suns. “Neither of those will ever happen.”

“We won't underestimate him,” Connor snapped back. “It's what he seeks so he can take you. And taking you the way he seeks would harm us all. He understands we're bound, but sees it as a binding for power—only that. Taking you breaks our circle. Be grateful he doesn't understand it's not just a binding for power, but one of love and loyalty. If he understood that, the power of that, he'd hunt you without ceasing.”

“You've caught his eye,” Fin added, “as he understands sex very well—though with none of its true pleasures or depth. It's another kind of power to him, and he has desire enough for the act of it.”

“So the last day or two has been a kind of . . . mating dance?”

“That's not far from the mark,” Branna said to Meara. “Sorcha writes of the weeks and weeks he tried to seduce her, bribe her, threaten her, wear down her mind and spirit. He wanted her power without question, but he wanted her body as well—and he wanted to make a child with her, I think.”

“I'd slit my own throat before I'd let him rape me.”

“Don't say that.” The bubble of fury burst as Connor rounded on her. “Don't ever say such a thing again.”

“Don't.” Iona spoke quietly before Meara could fling words back. “Connor's right. Don't say that. We'll protect you. We're a circle, and we protect each other. You'll protect yourself, but you need to trust us to protect you.”

“I'll say something here.” Before he did, Boyle helped himself to another ladle of stew. “The four of you can't and don't fully understand what it is for Meara and me. We have our fists, our wits, a blade, instincts, strategies. But these are ordinary things. I'm not after poking at a spot still sore, but when a thought from you can lock us away, out of the mix, it comes home we've only those ordinary things.”

“Boyle, you have to know—”

Fin stopped Iona, a light brush on her arm. “And I'll say something back to that—as an outsider. One step back,” he insisted as Iona sent him a sorrowful look. “We're not the three, but with the three. Another delicate balance we could say. What we bring to the circle is as vital as the other end of that balance. The three might think it different from time to time, and some with the three might think different, but it is what it is, and that's for us all to remember and respect.”

“You're eating at my table,” Branna said quietly. “Food I made. I've given you respect.”

“You have, and I'm grateful. But it's come time for you to open the door again, Branna, and let me work with you without me having to pry that door open. It's Meara we're speaking of, and the whole of it that hangs in that balance.”

Branna's fingers tightened on the stem of her wineglass, then relaxed again. “You're right, and I'm sorry for it. And I see he's shaken us. That's a victory for him, and it ends now.”

“We can't understand what it is not to be what we are. Iona would, I think,” Connor continued, “as what she is, and has, was held back from her for so long. But I think you—and you as well, Fin—don't understand that for Branna and for me, knowing you're with us, when for Fin, going back to Paris and his fine restaurant would be an easier choice, for you, Meara, and for you, Boyle, not having power but being with us, is braver by far than going on with this, as Branna and I, and now Iona must do. We must, but you, all three of you choose. We don't forget that. Don't think, don't ever think, we do.”

“We're not looking for gratitude,” Boyle began.

“Well, you have it, want it or not. And admiration as well, even if there's been times, and will be again, we don't show it.”

Rising, Branna got another bottle of wine, poured it all around. “For feck's sake, do you think I spend hours cooking a meal like this for myself? I do fine with a bacon sandwich. So we'll all of us stop feeling sorry for ourselves, or sorry to each other, and just be.”

Very deliberately Meara scooped up more stew. “It's a gorgeous meal, Branna.”

“Bloody right it is, and unless all of you want nothing but that bacon sandwich next time you come, we'll set all that business aside. Now, why do we think Cabhan jumped on the bonnet of Connor's lorry?”

“I might be risking that bacon sandwich, though they're tasty enough,” Fin said, “but answering that, for what I think myself, digs back into the other a bit.”

“Answer.” Branna waved a hand in the air. “I'll decide whether you eat at all next time.”

“He wanted to see what would happen. He was fully formed.”

“He was,” Meara agreed. “Muscle, bone, and blood.”

“But he was quick about it. A leap without warning—where Connor had no sense of it, nor did I, and we weren't far off. Then a leap back, wherever he's biding his time. But in that time, what did he learn?”

“I'm not following you,” Boyle said.

“What did he see Connor do? Get out to face him alone—deliberately alone as he closed you and Meara inside. Protected you. And he saw Branna run out—armed, but again alone—to go to her brother.”

“Then Iona and you,” Meara added.

“He was gone by the time I joined, by the time we made the circle. Watching?” Fin shrugged. “I can't say for certain, but I had no sense of him.”

“Nor did I,” Connor said when Fin glanced at him.

“So it showed him Connor's first instinct is to protect. His woman— Oh, don't be so fragile about it,” Fin said when Meara sputtered a protest. “His woman, his friend. Move the risk away and protect. Branna's is to go to Connor's side, as his would be to go to hers. But she protects as well, as she didn't move to release Meara or Boyle to increase the numbers.”

“It was wrong of me as well, and I've apologized to Meara already. Now I apologize to you, Boyle.”

“We've covered it all, and it's forgotten.”

“He won't forget.” Iona glanced around, understanding. “And he'll use what he knows, try to use it, work it in somehow.”

“So we find a way to use what he knows, or thinks he knows, against him.” Pleased with the idea, Meara grinned around the table. “How do we use me to trap him?”

“We won't be doing that.” Connor put a firm cork in that idea bottle. “We tried it, didn't we, with Iona, and it didn't work—nearly lost her to him.”

“If at first you don't succeed.”

“Fuck it and try something else,” Connor finished.

“I choose. Remember your own fine words. I'll ask you,” she said to Fin. “Is there a way to use me to lure him?”

“I can't say—and not because I don't want to tangle with Connor, or Branna come to that. But because we'd all need time to think it through, and carefully. I'm no more willing than Connor to risk as close a call as we had with Iona on the solstice.”

“I've no argument with that.”

“We'll think on it, and all must agree in the end.” He looked at Connor, got a nod. “And we'll work on it, use what we know, refine what we had, as it was close to the mark.” He looked at Branna.

“It was, as Sorcha's poison was. But neither finished him. I can't find what we missed—and yes, we should work together. You've a good hand with potions and spells. We have until Samhain.”

“Why Samhain?” Connor asked her.

“The beginning of winter, the eve of the beginning of the year itself for us—the Celts. I thought on this while making this meal. We thought the longest day—light over dark—but I think that was wrong. Maybe this is something we missed. Samhain, for we need some time, but as he's coming after one of us so blatantly, we can't take too much of it.”

“On the night the Veil is thin,” Connor considered. “And where it's said no password is needed to move from realm to realm. That could be it, one of the things we missed. He can pass easy as walking across the room. On that night, it may be we can do the same without struggling first to find where, or when.”

“The night when the dead come to seek the warmth of the Samhain fire,” Fin added, “and the comfort of their blood kin.”

“The dead—ghosts now?” Meara demanded. “Witches aren't enough for us now.”

“Sorcha,” Branna said simply.

“Ah. You think she could come, add to the power. Sorcha, and the first three as well?”

“It's what we'll think on, work on. If we're all agreed to it.”

“I like it.” Boyle lifted his glass to Branna. “All Hallow's Eve it is.”

“If we can hold him off that long, and learn enough,” Branna qualified.

“We can. We will,” Connor said decisively. “I've always been partial to Samhain—and not just for the treats. I had a fine conversation once with my great-granny on Samhain.”

“Who was dead at the time, I suppose.”

He winked at Meara. “Oh, gone years before I was born. When the Veil thins I'm able to see through it easier than other times. And since we're all thinking he's testing me, in particular, it might be I'm the lure we're after. And you thought of that,” he said to Fin.

“It crossed my mind. We'll think a great deal more, talk it through, and work carefully. I can give you all the time you need, Branna. At any time.”

“No ramblings coming up?” she asked carelessly.

“Nothing that can't be postponed or put off. I'm here till this is done.”

“And then?”

He looked at her, said nothing for a long beat. “Then, we'll see what we see.”

“He's only made us stronger.” Iona took Boyle's hand. “Families fight, and they make mistakes. But they can come back stronger for it. We have.”

“To squabbles and fuckups then.”

Connor raised his glass, the rest lifted theirs, and with a musical clink, sealed the toast.

12

H
E KNEW IT FOR A DREAM. IN HIS MIND'S EYE HE COULD
see himself, tucked warm and naked in bed with Meara, and could—if he drifted back, feel her heart beat slow and steady against his.

Safe and warm in bed, he thought.

But as he walked the woods, the chill hung in the night air, and the clouds that flirted with the three-quarter moon deepened dark shadows.

“What are we looking for?” Meara asked him.

“I don't know till I find it. You shouldn't be here.” He stopped to cup her face in his hands. “Stay in bed, sleep safe.”

“You won't lock me in or away.” Firmly, she gripped his wrists. “You promised it. And it's my dream as much as yours.”

He could send her back, into dreams where she wouldn't remember. But it would be the same as a lie.

“Keep close then. I don't know the way here.”

“We're not home.”

“We're not.”

Meara lifted the sword she carried so the blade caught the filtered light of the moon. “Did you give me the sword or did I bring it in myself?”

“I don't know that either.” Something shimmered over his skin, teased the edges of his senses. “There's something in the air.”

“Smoke.”

“Aye, and more.” He lifted his hand, held a ball of light. He used it as a kind of torch, dispelling shadows to better see the way.

A deer stepped onto the rough path, its rack a crown of silver, its hide a glimmer of gold. It stood a moment, statue still, as if allowing them to bask in its beauty, then turned and walked regally through the swirl of mist.

“Do we follow the hart?” Meara wondered. “As in song and story?”

“We do.” But he kept the light glowing. The trees thickened, and there was the scent of green and earth and smoke as the hart moved with unhurried grace.

“Does this happen often for you? This sort of dream?”

“Not often, but it's not the first—though the first I've had company from my side of things. There, do you see? Another light up ahead.”

“Barely, but yes. It could be a trap. Can you feel him, Connor? Is he here with us?”

“The air's full of magicks.” So full he wondered she couldn't feel it. “The black and the white, the dark and the light. They beat like pulses.”

“And crawl on the skin.”

So she could feel them. “You won't go back?”

“I won't, no.” But she stayed close as they followed the hart toward the light.

Connor cast himself forward, let himself see. And made out the shape, then the face in the shadowed light.

“It's Eamon.”

“The boy? Sorcha's son? We're back centuries.”

“So it seems. He's older, still a boy yet, but older.” So Connor cast out again, this time speaking mind to mind.
It's Connor of the O'Dwyers who comes. Your blood, your friend.

He felt the boy relax—a bit.
Come then, and welcome. But you are not alone.

I bring my friend, and she is yours as well.

The hart drifted off into the dark as the lights merged. Connor saw the little cottage, a small lean-to for horses, a garden of herbs and medicinal plants, well tended.

They'd made a life here, he thought, Sorcha's three. And a good one.

“You are welcome,” Eamon repeated, and set his light aside to clasp Connor's hand. “And you,” he said to Meara. “I thought not to see you again.”

“Again?”

Now the boy looked closer, looked deep with eyes as blue as the hawk's-eye stone he wore around his neck. “You are not Aine?”

“A goddess?” Meara laughed. “No indeed.”

“Not the goddess but the gypsy named for her. You are very like her, but not, I see, not her at all.”

“This is Meara, my friend, and yours. She is one of our circle. Tell me, cousin, how long has it been for you since you saw me?”

“Three years. But I knew I would see you again. The gypsy told me, and I saw she had the gift. She came to trade one spring morning, and told me she'd followed the magicks and the omens to our door. So she said I had kin from another time, and we would meet again, in and out of dreams.”

“In and out,” Connor considered.

“She said we would go home again, and meet our destiny. You have her face, my lady, and her bearing. You come from her, she who called herself Aine. So I'll thank you as I did her for giving me hope when I needed it.”

He looked at Connor. “It was after our first winter here, and the dark seemed never to lift. I pined for home, despaired of seeing it again.”

He'd grown tall, Connor observed, and confident. “You've made a home here.”

“We live, and we learn. It's good land here, and the wild of it calls. But we, the three, must see home again before we can make our own, and keep it.”

“But it's not time yet, is it? I'll trust you'll know when it is. Your sisters are well?”

“They are, and thank you. I hope your sister is the same.”

“She is. We're six. The three and three more, and we learn as well. He has something new. A shadow spell, a way to balance between worlds and forms. Your mother wrote something of shadows, and my Branna studies her book.”

“As does my sister. I'll tell her of this. Or will you come in. I'll wake her and Teagan as they'd be happy to meet you both.”

Eamon started to turn to the cottage door.

For Meara it all happened at once.

Connor whirled and Eamon with him as if they were one form. The big gray—and it gave her a jolt to see Alastar, the same as the stallion she knew—charged from the lean-to. Almost as one, Roibeard dived, Kathel leaped.

Before she could fully turn, Connor yanked her back and behind him just as the wolf sprang.

It came from nowhere, silent as a ghost, quick as a snake.

In a blur, it dodged Alastar's flashing hooves and charged. Straight at the boy, she realized, and without thought, shoved Eamon to the side, swung her sword.

She struck air, but even that sang up her arms to her shoulders. Then the full force of the wolf struck her, sent her flying. Pain, the shock of it, the bitter, bitter cold of it ripped through her side. Instinct—survival—had her clamping her hands around its throat to hold back the snap of its jaws.

And again, it happened at once.

The hound attacked, and light burst so bright it burned the air to red. Shouts and snarls tore through that searing curtain while her muscles quivered at the strain of holding back those snapping jaws. She heard herself scream, felt no shame in it as the wolf screamed as well.

She saw rage in its eyes, murderous and crazed, before it wavered, faded, vanished as it had come. Out of nowhere.

Her name, Connor saying it over and over and over. She couldn't get her breath, simply couldn't draw in the air—air that stank like brimstone.

Warm hands on her side, warm lips on her lips. “Let me see now, let me see. Ah, God, God. Not to worry,
aghra
, I'll fix it. Lie quiet.”

“I can help you.”

She heard the voice, saw the face. Branna's face, but younger. She remembered that face, Meara thought through the pain, the liquid daze of it all. Remembered it from her own youth.

“You'll look like her in a few years. Our Branna's a rare beauty.”

“Lie quiet, lady. Teagan, fetch—ah well, she already is. My sister's getting the rest I need. I'm skilled, cousin,” she said to Connor. “You'll trust me to this?”

“I will.” But he took Meara's hand. “Here now, darling, here,
mo chroi
, look at me. At me, into me.”

So she went dreaming, dreaming into those green eyes, outside of pain, outside of all but him. And him murmuring sweet things to her as he did when they loved.

Then Iona—no Teagan, the youngest—Teagan, held a cup to her lips, and the taste on her tongue, down her throat, was lovely.

Now when she drew in breath, true and deep, it tasted the same—of the green and the earth, the peat fire, and the herbs thriving nearby.

“I'm all right.”

“Another moment, just another moment. How could he come here?” Brannaugh asked Connor. “We're beyond him here.”

“But I'm not. Somehow I brought him, gave him passage. A trap it was after all. Using me to get to you, Eamon, and your sisters. I led him here, led him to this.”

“No, he used us both, our dreams.”

“And drew us in as well,” Brannaugh said. “There's none of his dark left in you, my lady. Can you sit now, easy and slow?”

“I'm fine. Better than I was before the wound. You have her skill, or she has yours.”

“You stood for my brother. If you hadn't risked yourself, he would be hurt, or worse, for Cabhan wanted his blood, his death.”

“Your sword.” Teagan laid it over Meara's legs.

“There's blood on it. I thought the strike missed.”

“You struck true.”

“'Tis shadow magick,” Brannaugh stated.

“It is,” Connor agreed. “As long as I'm here, he can come again. I do you more harm than good by staying.”

“Would you take this, if you please?” Teagan held out a flower topping its bulb. “And when you can, if you'd plant this near our mother's grave. She favored bluebells.”

“I will, yes, soon as I'm able. I must go, must take Meara back.”

“I'm fine,” she said.

“I'm not. Have a care, all of you.” He wrapped his arms tight around Meara, pressed his face into her hair.

She woke in bed, sitting up with Connor's arms around her, with him rocking her as he might a baby.

“I had a dream.”

“Not a dream, or not only a dream. Shh now, give me a moment.”

His lips pressed onto her hair, her temples, her cheeks, all slow and deliberate.

“Let me see your side.”

“It's fine. I'm fine,” she insisted as he shifted her, ran his hands over her. “In fact I feel someone dosed me with a magick elixir. And I suppose that's just what happened. How did it happen? Any of it, all of it?”

“Eamon dreamed of me and I of him. He drew me to him, and I drew you with me. And likely Cabhan set the stage for it all.”

His hands fisted in her hair until he carefully relaxed them again.

“To use me, my dreaming, to attack Eamon.”

“You pushed me behind you.”

“And you did the same with Eamon. We do what we do.” On a sigh, he laid his forehead on hers. “Your sword struck his flank, and his claws yours, but he was still part in shadow so the blade drew his blood, but didn't stop him. That's my theory on it.”

“He came out of the air, Connor. How do we fight what comes out of the air?”

“As we did. The light drove him back—Eamon's and mine joined, then the girls.”

“He screamed,” Meara remembered. “It didn't sound like an animal, but a man.”

“Balancing between worlds, and forms. It's catching him when he steps off on one or the other, I think. It's near dawn. It'll be an ugly business, but I'm waking Branna. I'll leave it to you to ring up the others. This is something to share with all and straightaway.”

But first he cupped her face in his hands as he had in the dreaming time. “Don't be so fucking brave next time, for the next time might kill me where I stand.”

“He was just a boy, Connor, and straight in its path. And he looks like you, or you look like him. The shape of the face,” she added, “his mouth, his nose, even the way he stands.”

“Is that so?”

“Harder to see it yourself, I'd think, but it's very so. I'll ring Iona, then she'll be in charge of waking Boyle, who can wake Fin.”

“All right.” He ran his hands through her hair, long and waving as he'd released it from its braid the night before. “Whoever gets downstairs first puts on the bleeding coffee.”

“Agreed.” Because she could see the worry in his eyes still, she leaned in to kiss him. “Go on, you've got the worst job between us in waking Branna when the sun's barely up.”

“Have the first-aid kit ready.” He rolled out of bed, yanked on his pants.

As he left, Meara reached over for her phone, and saw the bluebell. Thinking of Teagan, so like the girl Iona must have been, she rose, fetched a glass of water from the bathroom, set the bulb in it.

For Sorcha, she thought, then called Iona.

She made it down first, did her duty with the coffee. She considered making oatmeal, the only breakfast meal she had a decent enough hand with. And Connor nearly always scorched the eggs if he had charge of breakfast.

She was spared when Branna came in. Her friend wore blue and green striped flannel pants with a thin green top. She'd tied a little blue sweater over it, and that somehow matched the thick socks on her feet.

Her hair spilling free to her waist, Branna marched straight for the coffee. “Don't talk to me, not a word, until I've had my coffee. Put some potatoes on the boil, and when they're soft enough, chip them up for frying.”