Gift of the Realm

by Mackenzie Crowne

  She reread the names on the page. “Fitzgerald Quinn was Saraid’s father,” she considered, studying the chart. “I’ve heard the tale about his first love; the fairie princess who gave him her fortune when her father refused to let her marry a human. The mystical connection is a little coincidental, don’t you think?”

  “There are others who claim Fitzgerald Quinn came by his fortune through piracy,” Colin pointed out.

  “Which do you believe?”

  “I can’t say as I believe either, but then, a man would tend to lean toward a story of theft on the high seas, while a woman’s heart would sigh at the idea of lost love.”

  “That’s a bit sexist, don’t you think?”

  “Aye, it is,” he said with a grin, “but I’ll wager it’s true just the same. Either way, there’s no way of knowing if Fitzgerald was involved in whatever happened.” He indicated the book. “Not from this, anyway.”

  “You’re right. The point is, they were real, Colin. Saraid and Owein were real, not just fictional characters from a heartbreaking legend.”

  “So it would seem.”

  “They’re your ancestors.”

  “And yours,” he reminded her. “You’re a descendant of Saraid and Owein, too.”

  “I didn’t miss that detail.”

  “Yes, but has it occurred to you what that means?” At her blank look, he added, “We carry Owein’s blood, Keely, as well as Saraid’s.”

  She stared at him for a moment. Her disbelieving laughter took care of the residual tightness in her belly. “Fairie blood?” she scoffed. “Please!” A lifted brow was his only response. “That’s as ridiculous as it is impossible.”

  “As ridiculous and impossible as sharing your dreams with a handsome Irishman for a decade?”

  She narrowed her eyes at his taunting grin, but had to admit, he had a point. Fairie blood. Good God! How was she supposed to feel about that? She had no clue. She was going to need some time to come to grips with all she’d learned in the past few hours—if coming to grips with the unbelievable was even possible.

  “What happened to them? According to Sean, legend had Owein taking Saraid to live with him in the fairie realm. Why would she be calling out to him at the Door? If they were in the realm together, why would she be looking for him on the surface?”

  He shook his head, giving no answer. With a despondent sigh, she closed the book.

  “All of this is amazing and it’s interesting, but it doesn’t really give me any answers.” She eyed the library’s darkened window. The day had passed into night during their search. “We need to visit the Door, Colin,” she said simply.

  His lack of enthusiasm for the idea was clear in his shuttered expression.

  “You may be right,” he said, adding before she could suggest they go immediately, “but not tonight. I’ve business in Galway in the morning. I’ll be home in a few days. We’ll talk of it then.” He rose then, reaching for her hand and pulling her to her feet. He tugged her into his arms, his mouth covering hers in a gentle kiss that ended more swiftly than she could have hoped. “But for now, you must be tired, darlin’. Eileen will have left a plate or two warming in the kitchen. A picnic in bed is what you need at the moment.”

  “What I need or what you want?” she asked breathlessly.

  “I’ll admit to being a bit hungry myself.”

  His wolfish smile said the hunger had nothing to do with anything Eileen would have prepared. She couldn’t help laughing. No subtle pass for Colin Quinn. He left no doubt of his intentions when he made his move.

  A few minutes ago, she would have jumped at the invitation, but the momentary break in his seduction had allowed reason to get a foothold over lust. Self-preservation kept her from throwing caution to the wind by accepting the promise of untold pleasures in his eyes.

  “As tempting as that sounds,” she said, disentangling herself from his embrace, “I am tired.” And more than a little rattled. “I think I’ll call it a day.” She nodded at the ledgers on the table. “Do you mind if I take a couple of those along? I’ll be careful with them.”

  “Take whatever you want.”

  He helped her gather up several of the notebooks and insisted on accompanying her on the short walk home. The summer night was warm and welcoming, the gentle breeze scented with lilac from the row of bushes Gran had planted along the border separating the cottage from the lane.

  She didn’t object when he captured her hand, linking his warm fingers with hers, even as her heart twisted on a painful roll in her chest. She cast a furtive glance at his strong profile, barely visible in the shadow of the leafy canopy of the trees. A heavy sadness filled her at the acknowledgement that she hadn’t just been foolish—she’d been lying to herself for years.

  Risk her heart again? How could she risk a heart she’d already given away? She loved Colin Quinn—had loved him from the moment she’d met him a decade ago. The dreams aside, there had never been another man who could make her breathless and needy without even trying. And the need wasn’t just a physical reaction, though God knew he could touch off feminine wildfires within her with a simple look. It was more than that. She didn’t understand the how, or the why of it, but from the moment she’d met him, Colin had been a requirement of her soul.

  She’d tried to outrun it, telling herself the dreams were just that...dreams. In truth, they’d fed her need to be with him, even if only in her subconscious. Fear of severing their connection kept her from returning to Ireland and solving the riddle of the dreams.

  She was back now and had his promise to help her with the task. He’d also made it clear he was interested in her physically, but she held no illusions about a future between them. The Don Juan of Dunhaven wasn’t a settling down kind of man. He’d move on eventually.

  What would happen to her heart and her soul, then, when they’d finished and she was denied his companionship even in the dreams? She was very much afraid of the answer.

  He pulled her from her musings when he lifted their joined hands to press a kiss to her knuckles. They’d reached the cottage and he paused at the foot of the path leading to her door. He turned her until she faced him.

  “Will you dream?” he asked quietly.

  “I’ll dream,” she said on a short, self-deprecating laugh, and did her best to banish the grief from her heart. “About the only time I don’t is when I’m ill. If it’s crazy to look forward to getting sick, then I’m certifiably insane. What I wouldn’t give for a raging case of strep throat.”

  He grimaced then chuckled. His eyes gleamed when he crooned, “Ask me in, darlin’. I make a mean chicken soup.”

  She laughed, as she knew he’d intended. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  Rising on her toes, she pressed a kiss to his mouth, stepping back before he could take it deeper. Though she wanted nothing more than to take his hand and lead him inside, she had a decision to make. Should she deny herself the pleasure of knowing him in the biblical sense, hopefully blunting the sense of loss when they went their separate ways? Or should she grab hold and greedily take all she could before that happened? At the moment, her mind and heart were too raw to make the call.

  She reached for the ledgers he carried, tucking them against her chest to race up the path and through the door.

  Chapter Ten

  Keely ran a fingertip over the leather binding covering one of the thousands of books lining the walls, and tried not to think of the kiss she’d shared with Colin in this very room, last night. With him out of town, she’d divided her time between pouring over his mother’s ledgers, and telling herself considering the possibility of fairie blood running in her veins didn’t make her a crazy person. As Colin pointed out, her experiences made it impossible to dismiss what she’d found in the ledgers as ridiculous, but her mind still insisted there had to be some other explanation.

  It was the new millennium, for heaven’s sake. Fairies and curses were the stuff of Ireland’s primitive and superstitious past,
and had no basis in reality for a modern woman.

  Early this morning, she’d finally concluded she was too emotionally involved to think the situation through clearly. Between her feelings for Colin and the intensity of the dreams, she barely knew which way was up. If anyone could talk her back to reality, Kathleen would be the one. Like Keely and Colin, his great-aunt was also a descendant of Owein and Saraid, and yet, Kathleen had always been the most grounded person Keely knew.

  Now, if she could find the words to explain.

  She glanced Kathleen’s way.

  Seated across the room in her favorite wingback chair, Kathleen waited, all patience and concern, the book in her lap forgotten.

  Keely took a bracing breath. “Do you think it’s crazy for a person in this day and age to believe they’re descended from fairie blood? I mean...that would be nuts, right?”

  “If I did,” Kathleen said without hesitation, “I’d have to proclaim myself nuts. I can assure you, that is something I’ll never do.”

  Keely was sure she must look like one of those cartoon cats that had just been smacked upside the head with a frying pan. Shocked by what amounted to Kathleen’s casual admission of believing in something impossible, she practically heard the boi-oi-oing of her brain ricocheting back and forth in her skull. Her mouth gaped open.

  Kathleen pointed to the chair across from her. “Have a seat, my dear. You’re looking a little pale.”

  Like a robot, Keely did as she was told, moving to the chair and dropping to the edge. “Are you saying you...that you believe you’re descended from fairie blood?”

  “Of course I believe it. Why wouldn’t I, when it’s true?”

  Keely pressed several fingers to her pulsing temples, and rubbed.

  “Morna and I wondered when you’d finally ask about your heritage.”

  Keely’s fingers stilled. “Gran?” she squeaked.

  Kathleen nodded.

  “My Gran?”

  “Yes, your Gran. Though her fairie blood was never anywhere near as strong as what she saw in you, she did come from the same line, you know.”

  Keely’s hands dropped to her lap and she flopped back in the chair. “I don’t believe this,” she groaned.

  “Don’t you?” Kathleen asked with a raised brow, suggesting she doubted it. “Fairie blood is stronger in some than in others, Keely. In you, well, let’s just say it’s rare for the blood to manifest itself so powerfully in anyone except for a pure fairie. And the stronger the blood, the more extreme the gifts. Much to our disappointment, your grandmother and I were only blessed with simple ones.” She laughed remembering. “As girls, we bemoaned the fact neither of us could fly.”

  “Fly?” Keely croaked.

  “It’s a rare gift of the realm, and one we both coveted. But, after a time, you grow to appreciate what has been bestowed upon you and use it to your advantage. Morna could charm a rock into doing her bidding,” she proclaimed with a reminiscent smile. “Myself, I can spot a person’s weaknesses from a mile away. It’s a useful tool in business, as you can well imagine. When combined with my natural outspokenness, however, my gift has caused more than a few disappointments in my personal relationships.”

  “Gifts?”

  The conversation wasn’t going the way Keely had expected. And if her one word questions were any indication, she’d finally completed her trip down Insanity Street.

  “Gifts,” Kathleen stated, “like your dreams. Each time one of your letters arrived in the post, your Gran would be on my doorstep, your latest story clutched in her hands.”

  “They were dreams, Kathleen—figments of my overactive imagination, woven into stories for my own entertainment.”

  “Dreams full of details,” Kathleen insisted. She leaned forward, her eyes sparkling with excitement. “You’ve traveled beyond the mound to join the fairies in their realm, Keely. That is something no other human I know can claim. You’ve witnessed first-hand a wild and wonderful world most people don’t believe exists.”

  “I’m not sure I believe it exists myself.”

  “If you didn’t, you wouldn’t be sitting here, your eyes full of questions. You’re a Halfling, Keely. Like me and your mother and grandmother before you.”

  Halfling. Fairie blood. Gifts. First Colin and now Kathleen. Maybe insanity was contagious.

  Keely hadn’t considered that if she was part of Owein’s line, so too were her mother and grandmother, but now... Gran she could almost see as some kind of fairie wannabe. Morna had always accepted the unexplained with a philosophical shrug, embracing Ireland’s magical history with a knowing smile. But her mother, Shannon O’Brian, wife of one of Wall Street’s most influential financial attorneys? No way. Keely had never seen evidence of anything even remotely mystical in connection with her straight-laced mother.

  “If all of this is true, why wouldn’t my mother have explained it to me? She knew I had the dreams.”

  “It always embarrassed Shannon whenever your grandmother brought up what she termed ‘superstitious baloney,’” Kathleen revealed. “It’s no surprise she didn’t discuss your heritage with you. You were a babe at the time, but Morna and your mother had a terrible row the last time they spoke of it. Shannon forbade your Gran from filling your head with such nonsense. It’s the reason Morna never spoke of it to you. But, she wanted to, Keely. She worried such a strong gift would be confusing to you without someone there to guide you.”

  “You think?” Keely grumbled.

  Kathleen laughed and reached across the distance to pat her leg. “I would have stepped in if it looked as if you needed help. Shannon would have been furious with me, but it wouldn’t have been the first time I’d angered someone I love. And now, I don’t have to,” she grinned, “as you’ve come to me with your questions. So, tell me why you finally have.”

  Keely started from the beginning, filling in the details of the dreams of her childhood. She told of the many fanciful adventures and the black wolf that always accompanied her on those magical escapades. She explained how the dreams changed when she’d first come to Dunhaven, of her sudden, uncomfortable obsession with Dunhaven’s Door, and the sense of urgency.

  Choosing her words carefully, she admitted how Colin had taken the wolf’s place as she walked the cliffs each night, and how he’d continued to share her dreams ever since. She ignored the brow Kathleen raised at that. The incident in the gazebo was too embarrassing to share, but she did her best to convey the desperation she’d felt at leaving Dunhaven. She told her of the dream two nights ago, about Colin entering the ring for the first time, about the rosebush and the woman’s pleading cry, and how she believed the dreams were somehow connected to the legend of King Owein and Saraid Quinn.

  “Colin thinks there might be some clues in his mother’s papers,” Keely said. “He’s letting me look through them.”

  “You’ve spoken to him about this?”

  “Yesterday. And to tell the truth, I was surprised when he agreed to help. I expected him to dismiss me as a complete lunatic.” And he had, she reminded herself, before changing his mind for reasons of his own.

  Kathleen chuckled and shook her head. “I’m sure you gave him quite a shock, but my grandnephew is too Irish to dismiss your claims out of hand. And as he carries the blood of the realm himself, he’d recognize the possibility of a fairie connection.”

  “Does Colin have any of these gifts you keep mentioning?” Keely asked, her lingering doubt evident.

  “Several, I would say, though he keeps the details of his gifts to himself. His fairie blood is as strong as yours.”

  “Well,” Keely said on a sigh, “at least he doesn’t have the gift of mind reading. He was speechless when I finally worked up the nerve to tell him about the dreams.”

  Kathleen said nothing to that, commenting instead, “I know the legend of King Owein. Why do you believe the woman you heard in the ring was his Saraid?”

  “She was calling out to Owein. It makes sense she would be his wi
fe.”

  Kathleen nodded.

  “Anyway, it’s driving me nuts, waiting for Colin to get back. In the dreams, he’s reluctant to enter the ring. He didn’t exactly promise he would, but I’m hoping to convince him to visit the Door when he gets home, and to enter the ring with me. I need Saraid to speak again, if I’m ever going to figure out what it is she needs.”

  “I agree, but do you need Colin here to do that?”

  “I think I do. I’ve been drawn to the Door for a decade, but not once have I heard or seen anything within the ring, not until the other night, when Colin accidentally followed me inside for a moment.”

  “No. I mean, do you need him here? You say you dream every night and Colin is always with you. Why can’t you just get him to accidentally enter the ring in your dream again, to get your answers?”

  “How am I supposed to do that?”

  “You’re a beautiful woman, Keely. Colin may be a powerful Halfling, but he’s still a man.” Her smile declared her confidence in the strength of feminine power. “I’m sure you can think of something.”

  Keely burst out laughing. “Kathleen!” she charged, “Are you suggesting I use feminine wiles to maneuver him into the ring? Shame on you. He’s your grandnephew!”

  Kathleen snorted. “Like I said, he’s still a man, and a stubborn one at that.”

  Keely grinned, but then she shrugged. “Well, I don’t see how it would work anyway. Feminine wiles aren’t exactly my strong suit, and it’s not like I control the dreams. They just sort of happen.”

  “Don’t you realize how rare your gift is, Keely? You have a power, a power transcending both worlds. Have you ever tried to control the dreams?”

  Keely shook her head.

  “Well then. Maybe it’s time you did.”

  ****

  “Colin?” Whispered appeal. A pale hand to his whiskered jaw. The ring at her back, the pad of her thumb sliding over his bottom lip.

  Male hunger in his wary eyes.

  Tension and desire.

  Closer now, up on her toes, lips replacing thumb. Tongues tangling. Velvet warmth. Pressed close. Curves molding to sculpted angles. Full body caress.