I slid the ladder across the room and climbed up a few rungs. There were two books sticking out further than the rest—Castle Architecture and European Travel. Behind them was something leather; Cullen had hidden it flat against the back of the shelf. I could see why he’d chosen those books as they were smaller and oddly shaped and didn’t stick out as much as others would have. Good job.
I looked at the book and rubbed my hand across the cover experimentally, waiting to see if it hummed or if Rochus called to me. Rochus was a magical man—an alchemist—I’d met on my time traveling adventure into Princess Sapphira’s 19th-century Monaco. Rochus was her friend and the keeper of the book: chosen to watch over the sapphire, to make sure it was never removed from the temple, and armed with a spell book in case it ever was. He was the one who pulled me into the 19th century the first time, when attempting to help Princess Sapphira. We’d communicated with one another through the book before.
But there were no visions from him this time. Instead, I felt a surge of energy.
I held the book to my chest and carried it over to the window seat.
The study used to be my favorite room in the house. What librarian didn’t love being surrounded by history? The floor-to-ceiling built-in bookcases crowned with classical molding made me feel like hope and creativity were all within fingertips’ reach. I could almost picture Cullen here with me, working at his desk while I read. I set the book down and hugged one of the pillows to my chest, stroking the fur, inhaling the scent of Cullen’s cologne … whether the smell was real or imagined. The room had acquired a sad, deserted air since Cullen was missing.
Sighing, I picked up the book and retreated down the stairs to the kitchen table where I would be less distracted. I opened the book, and began skimming pages.
In about twenty minutes I’d skimmed half the small volume. I’d never believed I’d be searching this book again, let alone willingly looking to time travel. Hadn’t I had enough of the past for one lifetime?
I picked up my phone and sent Leslie a text. I needed her home to help. She was the master of research. As a matter of fact, she’d been the one to find the communication spell the last time I reached out to Rochus.
While I waited for her to get home, I opened my laptop and began to search some of the sites from Cullen’s phone’s browser history. It was easier on a larger screen. One of them was a costume shop here in Dublin. My heart beat rapidly. This was really happening. Cullen had looked up a costume shop. He was really trying to time travel. But why? God I needed help. “Leslie, where are you?” I said, and slammed my fist down on top of the book.
The book buzzed under my hand and then flew open. I looked at the page that it had opened to.
“Summon a Witch,” I whispered.
The candle in the window flickered, and then went out.
Did the book want me to attempt a spell? Was it trying to once again put me in contact with Rochus?
I closed it.
A gust of air swept in through the fireplace, blowing ashes onto the hearth and re-opening the volume. I glanced at the page once again.
“Fine, you want me to read. I will, but I’m not lighting candles or drawing a pentagram.” I looked down at the spell. It was written in English, but there were also more lines below. Sanskrit, maybe?
“I call forth from space and time matriarchs from the Lovari line!” I shouted, reading the spell. A blinding light blazed through the window.
I awoke to the sound of my name being repeated over and over. I shivered a little, recalling the spell—hands brushed my hair back.
“Sophia?”
“Leslie?”
“When did you get home?”
“A few minutes ago. You scared me. I had trouble waking you up.”
“I attempted a spell but I guess it knocked me out. What time is it?”
“Midnight. I just got home from dinner. I was going to stay at Sam’s place but I grew worried when you didn’t text back. Not to mention you said you needed my help. What’s up? Why didn’t you want me to say anything to Sam?”
I was going to need coffee to go over everything. In fact, I was so foggy that I could swear that I smelled coffee. “What is that smell?”
She handed me my favorite mug and I smiled gratefully at her. She was in a black dress and high heels.
“I have a lot to tell you but you’re gonna want to get comfortable,” I said taking a sip of the coffee. It was delicious, a perfect, strong, black cup of coffee.
She came downstairs a few minutes later, in a turquoise tank top and a pair of my grey sweatpants. She poured herself a coffee, adding milk and sugar and grabbing a cookie from the jar. Leslie didn’t do much without eating.
“I went through Cullen’s phone,” I said, taking another sip. “I think he may be trying to time travel which doesn’t make any sense to me.”
“Oh,” she said, dunking her cookie in the coffee. “What did you find?”
I grimaced at her sugar consumption. “Well in addition to researching time travel and costume shops, he was looking into his past-life self, Conal Ó Catháin.”
“You told him who’d he’d been in that life, or he figured it out?”
“I told him, but he didn’t seem overly interested at the time, outside from being jealous that I’d….” I cleared my throat. “You know…anyway, I’m not sure why he would have suddenly cared or wanted to go back.”
“You think he was seriously doing that—planning to go back there?” she mumbled. “Why would he want to go there?”
I looked out the window above the sink and stared into the darkness. “I have no idea but I need to figure that out and I may need to add some liqueur to this coffee to work up the courage.”
I opened the drawer of a console and pulled out the McQuillan materials, setting the box on the table with a clunk.
“When I used the book and disappeared from the basement of the 16th-century castle, Sorely had wandered into the basement and saw me so it makes sense that he would have found the real Sive in the spell room in my place. But before that…I told Uilliam who I really was—a time traveler named Sophia Marcil. I wonder what he did to Sive after that. I wonder if that has something to do with Cullen’s disappearance. If either Sorely or Uilliam were in fact Liam then he could have used the spell book to come after me.”
Leslie and I both started pulling papers from the box and then Leslie stopped and held up a piece of paper.
“Oh my god, Sophia, I think you changed some things when you went back. Either that or Cullen’s already time traveled and he did.”
I threw her a quizzical look. “Like what?”
Leslie turned the picture around. It was a picture of Dunlace taken within the last decade. “Well for one thing, it looks like Cullen’s out of a job, or at least he won’t have as much to do.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean you can’t exactly call Dunlace Castle a ruin anymore. It’s basically intact.”
“Really? I wonder why Sam didn’t mention that. You’d think he would notice that half of his castle is back together.”
“Or maybe he doesn’t know any better. We haven’t actually talked to him in detail about it since before you went back. Perhaps he thinks he hired Cullen to update the castle with modern amenities. Only you would know the truth, right?”
“Then how come you know?”
“That’s a good point…maybe it has something to do with me handling the spellbook. I’m in the magical know.”
“Well I guess that means I stopped the battle so that’s good news.”
Leslie nodded. “Let’s hope so. Either that or Cullen did. Keep digging.”
I pulled one of the death certificates out. “Sorely’s death certificate has changed. He didn’t die that day. As a matter of fact he lived to be an old man. But where’s Conal’s certificate? They were together.”
“I don’t see it.”
“It was right here in this file with Sive’s marriage cert
ificate. Wait a minute; Sorely and Sive’s marriage certificate is gone, too. Oh no, wait, it’s here, but it looks like he married someone else.”
“Well, that makes sense; you jilted Sorely at the altar.”
“And he lived…I wonder why marrying Sive was a death sentence for Sorely before. You know what doesn’t make sense? How could Sam be Sorely’s descendant if he died prior to your time travel.”
“True. Maybe he never really died.”
“Do you think you married Conal instead? Perhaps the two of you ran off.”
I looked up at Leslie. “That’s a nice thought but I somehow doubt it. My past lives are never that neat and tidy. More like he was killed instead of Sorely because he married me. Would you mind closing the window, Les? The rain seems to be blowing in.”
Coffee mug in hand, Leslie moved over to the window, leaning forward to breathe in the wet air through the screen.
“It smells so lovely, and the wind actually feels kind of nice. Do you want to go run around in it?”
I snickered from across the room just as she let out a gasp.
“What is it?”
Her eyes were wide as she shut the window and walked to me, “There’s someone out there.”
“Who?” Instantly my thoughts teetered between Cullen and Liam. I flicked off the kitchen light so we could better see out into the darkness.
“Did it look like Cullen?” I reached for my sweater and brushed past her.
“It’s dark outside. How would I be able to tell?”
“I know it’s dark,” I said, as I pulled the sweater over my head and tugged the French doors open. “Are you coming with me?”
She shook her head. “We can’t go out there. What if it’s Liam?”
“What if it’s not—what if it’s Cullen and he needs help?”
I tugged both French doors open and marched onto the back patio. I couldn’t see anyone and my frustration grew with each step. I wanted to lay eyes on Cullen so very badly.
Leslie stepped beside me. “I could have sworn I saw someone right there in front of that tree, but maybe it was just the branches. It does kind of look like a person.”
The wind blew fiercely and I tugged the tails of my wool sweater tight around me. I’d seen a shadow in that very same spot once before. The night we’d had a party and Liam had slaughtered a badger and dumped the blood on Cullen’s truck. Or at least I’d assumed it was Liam, although he’d faked being attacked that night to throw us off.
“Well, if there was someone here, there’s no one now.”
Chapter Fifty-Four
Don’t Turn Around
She looked terrified but beautiful. She was breathless, shaking all over, but still even in the dark he knew her eyes held a curiosity and fearlessness that he admired. She was looking for him.
He wanted to reach for her, to pull her against him and into an embrace so that his fingers could wind their way up into her locks of hair—messy hair that was being blown in every direction. He’d been told she was a witch; she looked the part right now, and maybe she was, for he felt she bewitched his very soul.
He stepped back once again so that he was hidden underneath the overhang and out of the rain. He wondered if she’d had a chance to scroll through the phone yet. Hopefully she’d discover the clues he’d left for her. Then everything would come together. They could be together. He watched her from the trees, she’d gone back inside. It killed him to be around her and not be able to touch her but it was only a matter of time.
Chapter Fifty-Five
The Past
I flicked the light back on as we returned to the house. Leslie locked the door and checked to make sure all the windows were firmly closed.
“I have to find out what happened,” I whispered more to myself than to Leslie. The spellbook caught my eye. It lay closed on the table where I’d left it.
Leslie returned to the kitchen just as I sat down in front of the book. “I can’t help but feel like Cullen’s odd behavior and disappearance have something to do with all of this. Going back is the only way I’m going to know for sure.”
“Sophia, it’s too dangerous. What if I know of another way?”
I wrinkled my forehead, trying to anticipate what she was going to say.
“Remember that magical mirror spell in the book? I saw it the last time we went through it. We can use the large mirror in the living room. Let’s try that first, so then at least we know what you’re going back into if you wind up having to go back.”
“How do you always know more about my book than I do?”
Leslie shrugged. “I like to read.”
“So, what’s a magical mirror spell?”
“I think it’s similar to a crystal ball. You bless a mirror and then you can look into the past or the future but you need names and a specific date in history.”
She hovered her hand over the book as she’d seen me do and it opened to the correct page.
“Hey! When did you learn to do that? That’s my trick.”
Leslie shook her head. “I don’t know. That was the first time. I guess it likes me, too. See, I told you—I’m in the magical know.”
Chapter Fifty-Six
Raw Deal
Northern Ireland, November 1551
“What have ye done to her, Sorely? I swear if ye hurt her I’ll kill ye myself, even if ye are kin! Open the door!”
He continued pounding.
“Stop it, ye fool!” Sorely yanked the door open and stepped away as Conal pushed into the room.
“Where is she?” He walked quickly through the room, looking behind curtains, turning over tables, looking for Sive. “What have ye done with her?”
“She’s no here, Conal.” Sorely stood still in the doorway, watching as his cousin tore through his room. “What the hell do ye think ye are doin’? She was my bride-to-be, and an unfaithful whore at that, and ye dare ask me what I’ve done with her?”
“I do. Now tell me where she is or suffer the consequences.” Conal pounded his fist against the wall and whirled on Sorely.
Sorely moved to place his hands on Conal’s shoulders, but Conal quickly moved out of his way.
“Ye won’t be seeing her again, cousin, none of us will.”
“Like hell!” He stepped away and tightened his fists to keep from striking his cousin. “I will see her and I will make sure that ye have no harmed a hair on the lass’s head.”
“Do ye really think I’d kill her?”
“If ye didn’a kill her, then where is she?”
Sorely flinched. “She’s where she belongs, according to that hell-born beastly father of hers!”
“Uilliam? Ye mean she’s at Dunlace still with her Da? Thank the heavens. So, ye just gave up? That’s hardly believable.”
“We made a deal of sorts.”
“Careful now, Sorely; lie down with dogs and you’ll rise with fleas.”
“Aye, that’s true enough, but there was no point in tearin’ the castle apart—not if it was to be mine anyway. As it is I’ll have to repair the east wing where the fire was set.”
“He gave ye the castle if ye left his daughter unharmed? That’s a relief; maybe he’s reconsidered her happiness.”
“I dinna think he cares whether or not his daughter is happy. He was black as night with rage when I left him in the witches lair, dabbling in black magic. So if ye want to see Sive, ye are more than welcome to go after her but I warn ye, he’s probably already killed her.”
In a flash Conal’s fist hit the side of Sorely’s face. It pushed his body sideways, but Sorely quickly recovered, charging toward his cousin as Conal screamed at him between blows.
“What the hell is wrong with ye? Ye saw that he meant to kill her and ye left? Ye made a bargain with the devil, ye coward.”
Pent-up rage erupted as Conal slammed into his cousin, sending them both to the floor in a whirl of kicking legs and surging fists.
“I dinna think we have much say in the matter, cousin
. She’s his daughter and if she’s not already dead then he’s locked her away to rot.”
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Magical Hangover
I stepped into the kitchen to be met with a sympathetic gaze from Leslie. “Feeling any better?”
Two magical spells in a row had wiped me out. I’d thrown up immediately after and then passed out. Leslie must have somehow carried me to bed—although I couldn’t imagine how—but I had no memory of getting there myself.
I walked to the French doors and surveyed the backyard beyond the glass—gardens tumbled in wild disarray.
“I feel like I’m hungover.” I pinched my eyebrows together.
Leslie laughed in response. “You look like it too. You’ve never reacted this badly when we’ve done spells in the past. I wonder why it was so hard on you this time.”
She motioned me to the chair across from her and set a cup of coffee in my hands. “We need to talk about what we saw last night.”
I looked back at her plate of food: eggs, bacon and toast. She was shoveling it into her mouth. I could only assume that was her third meal of the day.
“Do you want some bacon? I made extra.”
I gagged. A week ago the world had seemed like such a different place—a wonderful place, full of promise, excitement, and endless possibility. “Goodness, no. I think I might throw up again.”
She smirked. “So I’ve been doing a little more digging today into the box and I found Conal’s death certificate. I also found out how he died.”
I nodded, “Okay, spit it out.”
“He was killed by Uilliam a week later—after the scene we saw last night in the mirror. After the fight with his cousin Sorely, Conal went after Uilliam with about a dozen men. He attacked the castle in an attempt to rescue Sive. But Uilliam knew he was coming and unfortunately Conal never really stood a chance.”
Temple of Indra's Lies (Time-Traveling Bibliophile Book 3) Page 17
