Shadow's Curse

by Alexa Egan

  Beneath the water, David squeezed Callista’s hand. Touched her leg. “You can’t keep him against his wishes, Aunt,” she argued. “He only came with me because I asked it of him. He’s only here because he worried about my safety.”

  “Perhaps it’s best this way,” David murmured, and she knew he recalled his dangerous dream. That the fear of what he might do to her still gripped him. She would not believe. She could not believe that so soon after such joy there would follow such pain.

  Ard-siur dismissed Callista with a scowl. “You will leave Dunsgathaic at first light. I’m sorry you traveled so far with nothing to show for your journey.”

  David’s hand froze, his breath caught in his throat.

  Callista had been wrong. It could happen. She closed her eyes and refused the horrible, violent images assailing her.

  “Don’t be sorry, Aunt Deirdre,” she answered, defying her aunt as much as the voices raking her skull with whispers of death. “I’ve gained far more from these past few weeks with David than I could have found closeted away here with you in a hundred lifetimes. Love.”

  20

  The sun broke above the ocean’s horizon, throwing diamonds across the water, while far to the north, clouds hung low across the distant hills and wide, brown moors of the Cuillin. Callista cast a final glance over her shoulder as Dunsgathaic disappeared from view, and tried not to imagine the worst that her dreams last night had shown her.

  She sat back against the lumpy seat, hoping to empty her mind of the whirl of useless, plaguing thoughts. Hard to do in a coach that smelled of mildew and rattled like rocks in a pail, but sleep had been scarce in the long dark hours and her eyelids soon grew heavy as the coach crawled over the bumpy track toward the ferry crossing.

  From there . . . who knew?

  She’d no destination in mind, no schedule to which she must adhere. There was no one to tell her what to do or how to do it. Her future was finally her own. And she’d never felt lonelier.

  Should she return to Gray de Coursy at Addershiels? He might not welcome her when he heard about David’s capture by the Amhas-draoi, but she’d a notion to read more of those stories she’d found in his library, to discover the lost history of the Imnada among those dusty stacks.

  She smiled. One Fey-blood at a time, David had once said.

  The coach hit a rut, knocking her to the floor. As she clambered back onto the seat, she saw that they had turned off the road and onto a narrow track winding up into the rocky hills rather than down toward the nestled village and the ferry crossing. A slithering tendril of fear curled up from her stomach and snatched her breath.

  The landscape grew wilder as long-haired cattle wandered the wide, barren uplands and the sea shone like glass away to the south. Off to her right, a thatched crofter’s cottage stood alone in a narrow valley.

  The track ducked beneath a rusted iron gate into a courtyard, drawing up in front of a tall stone house of turrets and towers with moss growing thick up the walls. Seabirds wheeled and dove from the cliffs into the pounding surf and the ever-present wind carried a salty spray.

  The coach drew up on the gravel. The door opened. Callista’s fear blossomed like an icy fist around her heart.

  Victor Corey held out a hand, his twisted smile never reaching his hard glittering eyes. “And here’s my blushing bride, just in time for our wedding.”

  * * *

  David stood, hands braced on either side of the window, body thrumming with rage and an almost consuming panic.

  “. . . back from my ma’s house . . . go every morning . . . she’s not well and there’s the cows to look after . . .” The young priestess gabbled her story in a frightened and breathless half whisper. “I tried telling Ard-siur, but she wouldn’t listen . . . said it wasn’t our concern . . .”

  “You were right to come to us,” Lady Duncallan said before looking to her husband. “Could you speak to them, James?”

  “I could, but I doubt it would help. It took all my persuasive abilities just to keep David from being tossed in a cell to rot while they bicker over what to do with him.”

  “So we do nothing while Callista’s in trouble?”

  “Not nothing.” Duncallan spoke a low string of indistinguishable words, the air shimmering gold and orange and green as he summoned the power of his kind, shaping it, manipulating it, training it to his hand.

  The hair on David’s neck rose at the confluence of such potent Fey-blood magic, and he turned, stomach churning, just as a wraithlike figure flickered into being in front of him. Tall, broad-shouldered, steel-gray eyes, and a jaw set like stone.

  “You did this?” He touched his ringer, half expecting his hand to pass through the tangle of mage energy like drawing aside a curtain. Instead, he touched warm flesh, hard muscle. “It’s like looking in a mirror.”

  “The illusion won’t last long nor is it strong enough to fool the Amhas-draoi for more than a few minutes,” Duncallan said, “but it should buy you the time you’ll need to escape . . . if that’s your plan.”

  “Damn Corey to hell.” David closed his eyes, but there was no blotting out the horrors imprinted upon his mind: Callista kneeling before him as he lifted his blade high. Her body limp in his arms as her life drained away. No matter how he’d run from it, this was the future awaiting him. Perhaps it was time to stop running and start fighting.

  “You will go after her, won’t you?” Duncallan asked.

  David took a deep breath. Then another. But the wolf would not be denied. It boiled to the surface, every heartbeat twisting him into a creature of Fey-blood nightmare. Every breath torching his body with the savagery and skill of the predator.

  Corey had searched for David from one end of Great Britain to the other. Today he would find him.

  Then the bastard would die.

  That was the future David would focus on. That was the vision burned on his heart.

  He opened his eyes to meet the Duncallans’ gold-flecked, inquiring gaze. “Of course. What are friends for?”

  * * *

  She paced the room where they’d locked her, a bedchamber as ostentatious as it was uncomfortable: furniture polished to a mirror shine, a chimneypiece of rose marble veined in cream, enough bric-a-brac to keep maids dusting for years, and, in the middle of the spectacle, an enormous bed decked in purple damask and crimson tassels.

  Corey watched her from a seat by the fire, his smile as twisted and harsh as his mind. “Anxious for your wedding night? I am, too, sweetling, but a few hours more and I’m all yours. Even better, you’re all mine.”

  “You’re mad.”

  “Shrewd is the word. Your beloved aunt was a mirage. She didn’t want you. Nobody wants you . . . but me, my dear. I’ll care for you like my finest treasure. I won’t even punish you for running away from me in London. Instead, you’ll be waited on by a dozen maids. You’ll have a coach and four and be mistress of a house as big as Blenheim or Chatsworth or any of the nobs’ finest. Duchesses will kneel for your favors, dukes will kiss your slippers, and maybe the prince regent himself will wipe your pretty ass. It’s there for the taking.”

  “Branston was a fool to entangle himself with you.”

  “I’ll agree the man had the business acumen of a brainless slug. It’s best he’s dead. You should be pleased I killed him. Left under his care, you’d never have amounted to anything more than a third-rate fortune-teller in a fourth-rate circus, but with me . . .” He rose from his chair to cross to her side. Lifted his hand to touch her hair, her cheek. “With me, you’ll rise to the rank of queen.”

  She refused to flinch. Instead she raked him with every ounce of dripping contempt she could muster. “Queen of the stews,” she spat. “I don’t care how you pretty yourself up, you’re still naught more than the stunted offspring of a hedge whore and a rat catcher.”

  The slap knocked her to the floor, her cheek on fire. He stood above her, his scar white against the red of his face. “Your brother wasn’t wrong about on
e thing. He said you needed a strong whip hand.” He grabbed her by the arm, wrenching her to her feet, his breath hot on her face. “What’s a few words when we’ve a lifetime ahead of us?” He dragged her toward the bed. “I’ve a mind to shove myself between those sweet thighs. By the time I’m done, you’ll be begging for my touch.”

  She dug in her heels, but he slapped her again before he shoved her down on the bed. Panic skittered cold across her skin. She couldn’t swallow. Couldn’t breathe. Her gaze locked on his white-lipped mouth, the hunger in his eyes.

  “Take the gown off or I’ll cut it off you,” he hissed, pulling a blade from his waist.

  She fumbled with clumsy fingers at the buttons and tapes. Slid free of the muslin, chin up and unashamed. Time, she needed time. If she closed her eyes and lay very still, perhaps he would finish with her quickly and leave. She would think of the friendly glow of a cookfire and laughter over a shared jest, quiet conversations and delicious kisses. Corey might have her body. He could not steal her memories.

  He knelt over her to fondle a breast. Pinched her cruelly. Held her chin tight as he forced his tongue into her mouth, his breath sour. “Did St. Leger take you as man or beast? Did he mount you like a dog? Did he fuck you hard and fast like I will?” His face grew flushed with arousal as he shucked off his jacket and loosed his breeches. A rigid cock sprang purple from a thick bush of hair. “You do what I want when I want it or I’ll make you hurt, Callista. If I can’t have your respect, I’ll have your fear.”

  Callista’s expression hardened to marble, her blood as cold as ice water.

  A knock at the door slammed her heart into her throat. “Corey, sir,” a voice called through the crack. “All’s ready.”

  “Right.” Corey rolled away from her and out of bed. He fastened his breeches and pulled his coat back onto his shoulders. “Our pleasure will have to wait. Duty calls.”

  “You won’t win, Victor. David will find me.”

  Corey’s leer became a smile of wild-eyed triumph. “I’m counting on it.”

  * * *

  He slipped free of the concealing shadows in a flash of speed, slaver dripping from his jaws, muscles wired taut as they ate the distance to his prey. A man guarded the main door armed with knife and musket, but his attention was all for the gathering storm clouds, their bellies slashed with green lightning.

  It was an easy thing to take him unawares. A crouch, a leap, and the man dropped with a spine-snapping blow to his chest, his neck ripped wide. The wolf lifted his head to the wind, blood sliding hot down his throat. The doors opened, men tumbling like spillikins onto the gravel. They stank of sour wine and stale sweat. A silver dagger swiped down to tear into his shoulder. Another slashed at him with a blade of steel, its bite twice as sharp. It took David in the haunch. He yelped and danced away, leaving a blood trail behind.

  He heard the cocking of the pistol before it exploded with smoke and flame, avoided the crush of a bullet into his skull with a wild leap that nearly pulled his shoulder from its socket. The man with the dagger was quick and cunning. He ducked beneath David’s reach, the knife falling again. David twisted away before it could slice his stomach open, but all the time he felt his strength failing. Withdrawal from the draught had left him weak and feverish, and the curse’s reemergence meant a slowing of his mind, a sickening of his body. Blue and silver flames rippled at the edges of his vision. The curse rose from the same well as the wolf. And every moment he delayed was a moment lost.

  David growled, his fangs dripping with blood as he shook off the illness and surrendered himself completely to instinct and bloodlust and a savage brutality. Ignoring the jagged rake of the blade and the silver burning his flesh, he sprang. Felt the crunch of bones as he bit down, the screams and useless flailing as the man scrabbled to free himself, and the final wrench that left him armless and bleeding his life away. The wolf lunged again, his claws tearing into another man’s stomach, spilling his entrails, shredding the man’s face and then his chest. Corey’s third hireling sought to run, but the wolf brought him down, snapping his neck, smashing his skull.

  Were these all the protection Corey boasted, or did the house hold more of the same, the wretched refuse of every stew and thievers’ den from London to Fort William?

  David’s stomach rolled while his head pounded as if a spike had been slammed between his eyes. Blue and silver flames leapt, crackled, torched him from the inside out. He took a step and then another, but the wolf’s strength left him.

  He fell to the gravel, the pain as intense as the ripping free of his signum, the curse infecting his mind, burning away his powers like acid on steel. A hot wind curled around him, the air beating like wings against his muzzle, his paws. He couldn’t breathe lest it singe his lungs. He squeezed his eyes shut. And waited.

  “Here’s the little mouse now. Just in time for my big day,” a voice sneered.

  Rough hands gripped David. A heavy knobbed cane descended in a blur. A white light exploded behind his eyes.

  Callista! he shouted.

  * * *

  She was wed.

  A ring and a few mumbled words by a bought priest, and she’d chained herself to Corey forever. Anything to stop his men from hurting David. She’d been brought a lock of his guinea-gold hair first. Then a bloody fingernail. Finally a finger.

  She’d surrendered, retching up her breakfast, dry gulping sobs tearing raggedly up her throat.

  Corey had come to her, proud as a peacock, and the marriage had been performed. Thankfully, he’d left straight after, and she could only wait in half-panicked frustration as the hours ticked past.

  Circling the bedchamber, she paused at the window. No escape there. Far too small for her to climb through, and the only way was down—far down, over the sheer, knife-edged cliffs to the gray-green sea below. And if they caught her attempting to leave, what would happen to David? Bile curdled her stomach. She knew all too well.

  The door opened, and Corey entered, dressed as if he were preparing for war, with a pistol and a sheathed dirk at his waist. He motioned to a wiry man, his shaved head and stubbled jowls giving him the look of a belligerent mastiff. “Bring her.”

  They climbed two sets of stairs to a narrow wooden door leading to a wide bricked parapet and a low, crenellated wall running the length of the house. The sea churned and growled below, the cliffs a tumble of jagged rocks and broken boulders. This morning’s sun had given way to heavy clouds licked black with storm shadows. The wind flapped at Callista’s skirts and tore the pins from her hair as it shoved her unwilling toward the wall. It wouldn’t take but a quick wrench to escape her captor. A few steps to the edge and she’d be free.

  She glanced down at the foaming surf and the wild spumes of icy spray and knew she’d never be able to do it. Not while David lived. Not while there was still a chance. Killing herself was the coward’s way. And the weeks past had proved her no coward.

  A table had been set in the middle of the walkway. Beside it rested her box. Upon it stood her bells. Corey’s smirk grew.

  “This is madness, Victor,” she pleaded. “You’ve more wealth and power than half the nobility already. What more could you want?”

  “I want those nose-in-the-air toffs with their high breeding and their ancient pedigrees to admit that I’m just as good as they are. After that, I want them to fear me and know their lives depend on my goodwill. A wrong word, an ill-thought whisper, and I’ll make them wish they’d never been born.” He motioned to the bells. “Open the door. Open the door and summon me an army.”

  “I won’t.”

  “You will, my dear, or I’ll slice off another finger. He has nine more he doesn’t need.”

  She glanced to the door where her bribed coachman stood with a pistol to David’s temple. He knelt upon the bricks, head bowed. Blood-spattered and shoulders hunched. She couldn’t see his face. Afraid she wouldn’t want to. Not after the hours he’d spent with Corey. Not after the sight of his finger laid on a bed of velv
et as a bridal gift.

  Don’t fret, sweet Callista. I’ve been in tighter places than this. David’s voice curled warm and protective against her heart.

  This is my fault, she pathed.

  He lifted his head for a moment, and she caught back an anguished gasp at the wreckage of his face. There’s only person to blame. And he’s a fucking dead man.

  Callista scanned the hills for hope, praying to see the dark wings of a crow against the clouds. To catch sight of a troop of Amhas-draoi riding to the rescue.

  Nothing. And no one.

  She stepped to the table. Knelt. And laid her shaking hand upon Key.

  * * *

  Blood . . . pain . . . fire . . .

  The only part of his dream yet unrealized was death. And that would be denied him as long as Corey believed him worth more alive. David focused on the pattern of the bricks on which he knelt, the mossy cracks, the ants crawling, the wind moving across his raw and broken flesh, the cold of the pistol’s mouth against his skull. It kept him from dwelling on the agony of his maimed hand, the savage pain gnawing at his innards, the blue and silver flames tearing through his mind.

  Nine fingers they would take. Ten toes. An eye. Or two. A nose. His tongue. The process had been recounted in gory detail in the hell of Corey’s basements. But that was nothing compared to the threats the bastard had made toward Callista, the whispered promises that left David struggling against his bonds, every word a hurled curse.

  Corey had laughed.

  Corey wouldn’t be laughing soon.

  Back and forth. Over and over until blood and torn skin slickened his wrists, his jaw clamped against the agony of his smashed hand. He kept his head down as shadow and sun passed across the surface of the stone. Smiled, for none knew it yet, but freedom was almost his.