“What kind of bargain are we talking about?” Ryan questioned warily.
“Give me the card you possess, and I will let her live,” Moira answered. “Keep the card, and she dies.”
“The card I possess?” Ryan repeated in confusion.
“She’s talking about the Death card!” Shana gasped. “Don’t give it to her, Ryan. It’s the transformation card. It must contain the power she needs to transmute from a spirit. Without it, she can’t regain existence!”
“Silence!” Moira screeched, turning her attention back on Shana. “The battle is over, and the card is mine. I can take it whenever I wish!”
“You’re lying, Moira,” Shana replied. “You gave the card to Ryan. The only way you can get it is if he gives it back to you. And without the card, you lose!”
“Is that true, Moira?” Ryan demanded. “If I refuse to give you the card, do you lose?”
“You won’t refuse—can’t refuse—me, mortal,” Moira said, her voice suddenly turning into a seductive croon. “It’s me you want. It always has been, and it always will be.”
She didn’t move, but as had happened before, Ryan felt her invisible hand stroke his chest. When he felt it begin to move unerringly lower, he cursed and stumbled back a step.
“Leave me alone, Moira,” he ordered harshly.
She released a throaty laugh. “You don’t want me to stop, mortal. You crave my touch, and you know it. You’ve never been able to turn away from me.”
“Aric couldn’t turn away from you,” Ryan responded, swatting at empty air as he felt her invisible fingers trace the length of his zipper. “But I am not Aric. I am Ryan, and your touch sickens me.”
“Liar!” she accused, but at least she stopped touching him.
“If I’m lying, then why am I not aroused, Moira?” he asked. Before she could respond, he relentlessly continued, “I’ll tell you why, because it’s Shana I love. It will always be Shana until the day I die, and no other woman will ever appeal to me. So answer my question. If I refuse to give you the card, do you lose?”
“The only one who will lose is you!” she replied furiously, “If you do not give me the card, she will die. I will kill her, just as I killed Terza.”
“And if you kill her, what reason would I have to give you the card? Revenge alone would make me keep it from you,” he countered. “You’ve painted yourself into a corner, Moira, and there’s no way out. I am not going to give you the card, so go back into the Tarot deck where you belong.”
“Do you think you can beat me so easily?” she shrieked, raising her arms over her head. “Shana is under my spell now. In order to save her, you must give her the card. But will you be able to recognize her? Will you make the right choice? I think not, mortal, for I am Moira, the most powerful witch who ever lived. You cannot defeat me, and your Shana will die!”
Before Ryan could assimilate what she’d said, a lightning bolt shot from the sky and struck the ground between them. As the crack of thunder reverberated through the air, he heard Shana scream. With a gasp, he spun around in time to see her falling.
“Shana!” he bellowed in terror, as he raced to the cliff ledge.
Fearfully, he glanced down, expecting to see her body lying broken and lifeless in the ravine below. But she wasn’t there. Frantically, he searched the area for her, and when he finally spied her, he caught his breath in horror. She was standing on a small ledge several feet beneath him, and he could see it beginning to crumble beneath her feet. If he didn’t get to her quickly, she would fall to her death for sure. There was only one problem with rescuing her. There were two Shanas standing on the ledge!
That’s right mortal, Moira’s voice whispered insidiously in his mind. To save her, you must give the card to the right Shana. But she will not he able to speak to you. You must make the choice with your heart. Do you love her enough to do that mortal? Can you recognize her without her words? Without access to her mind?
Even as Moira tormented him with the questions, he climbed down the cliff. When he reached the small overhang above the ledge, he dug the Death card out of his pocket and stared down at the two women beneath him.
He searched their faces, looking for something—anything—that would help him distinguish Shana from Moira. But they were identical, right down to their pleading eyes that were widened in fear. How could he possibly choose the right Shana?
What’s the matter, mortal? Moira taunted. Isn’t your love strong enough that you can see beneath the surface to her soul?
At her words, Ryan closed his eyes and gave a desperate shake of his head. This was worse than the nightmare that had haunted him for months. To save Shana, he was going to have to go with his instincts. But was his love deep enough, profound enough, to trust his instincts? If he made a mistake, Shana would die!
Time has run out, mortal. You must make the decision now. Who will you save? The one you claim to love, or me, whom you truly love!
“I do not love you!” Ryan yelled, opening his eyes and glaring down at the two women. “I never loved you. I love Shana.”
Then prove it. Save her. Now!
There was a loud cracking noise, and he realized that the ledge was giving way. He had to make the choice, and he had to make it now!
He lay down on his stomach and extended the card, glancing frantically between the two of them. Suddenly, one of them raised her hand for the card. The other one merely stared up at him sorrowfully, her eyes filled with love and resignation.
That has to be Shana! he thought, quickly shifting to extend the card toward her. Only she would look at me with love in her eyes when she knew she was condemned to die.
But would Shana give up that easily? an inner voice prodded. She loves you, and she knows that if she dies you will be condemned for eternity. She wouldn’t give up. She’d fight to live so you’d be saved.
The resigned Shana had just begun to reach for the card, and he snatched it back, returning his attention to the other one. Was his conscience right? Was this the real Shana?
Unfortunately, there was another loud crack, and he knew he didn’t have time to contemplate the issue. He had to deliver the card now, or the question would be moot.
“God help me, I hope I’m making the right decision,” he declared hoarsely as he handed the card to the Shana who was frantically reaching for it. She snatched it out of his hand just as the ledge broke and both women began to fall.
“Nooo!” he screamed in agony, closing his eyes at the realization that he’d waited too long. “Shana, I love you!”
“I love you, too, Ryan,” she yelled joyously. “And it’s over. We’ve defeated Moira!”
His eyes flew open, and he stared in disbelief. Shana was again perched on the hand he’d conjured up to save her when he had thrown her off the cliff.
“Shana?” he gasped, scrambling to his feet as the hand moved to gently deposit her beside him.
“Yes, Ryan, it’s me,” she replied, throwing her arms around him and hugging him tightly. “It’s me.”
“Oh, thank God!” he murmured, crushing her to him and burying his face in her hair. “Thank God.”
Suddenly, she pulled away from him, stating urgently, “We have to find the card, Ryan.”
“The card?” he repeated in confusion.
“Yes, the card,” she answered eying the ground. ‘It’s the end of the cycle, and Moira has to deliver the card. It will determine—”
“Determine what?” he asked, when she suddenly bent to scoop a Tarot card off the ground.
She stared at it for a long moment, and then glanced up at him, her face so pale she looked ghostly.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” he gasped, grabbing her shoulders, as fear stirred inside him.
“It’s The World, reversed,” she answered, holding the card up
so he could see it.
He shuddered as he looked at it. Moira was naked and standing with her feet braced apart on top of a globe of the world. Her hands were outstretched, and she held the sun in one hand and the moon in the other. A dark mist curled around her like a sinuous snake. Suddenly, the card faded to black.
“What does it mean?” he asked, glancing back at Shana.
“It means that Moira has given herself a loophole,” Shana answered, gazing up at him with so much misery in her eyes that fear shot through him.
“What kind of loophole?”
“The wishing wand.”
“The wishing wand?” he repeated as a sense of doom began to mushroom inside him.
She nodded. “Moira is the one who introduced you to the wand. She was counting on you using it, and now . . .
“Now?” he prodded, grabbing her shoulders again and giving her a slight shake.
She sighed heavily and looked down at the ground. “Now you have to pay the price for using the wand, and that price is the choice between eternal freedom of your soul or me.”
“What the hell does that mean?” he demanded, giving her another shake.
“It means you have to leave me,” she said, raising her tormented gaze to his. “If you don’t, you’ll have to fight Moira again in another five hundred years.”
“You’re wrong!” Ryan said, shaking his head frantically.
“I’m afraid she’s right,” a man’s voice drawled from above them.
Ryan jerked his head toward the voice just as Shana cried, “Sebastian! You were right!”
Before Ryan knew what was happening, she broke away from him and scrambled up the cliff. A bolt of jealousy shot through him as she threw herself into the man’s arms and buried her face against his chest.
“There is no need for jealousy,” Sebastian told him, his lips twisting into a grim smile. “It is you she loves, and it will always be that way. Now, come, Dr. Alden. The past is over, and you’re back in the present. You and Shana have much to work out before you can determine your future.”
“I am not going to leave her,” Ryan stated staunchly as he climbed the cliff to join them. “And if anyone, including her, thinks otherwise, they’re crazy.”
Sebastian merely gave him another grim smile, and then turned, leading Shana down the path. Ryan quickly followed, fighting against the panic threatening to overwhelm him.
I will not leave her, he silently vowed.
So why did he have the horrible sensation that he was not going to have any other choice?
Chapter Twenty-One
The Hanged Man Card
Self-sacrifice
“YOU DON’T NEED to borrow Lucien’s car,” Ryan stated angrily as he glared at Sebastian. “I told you, I’m not leaving.”
A moment before, Shana had run into the house after asking Sebastian to get the car so he could drive Ryan away from Sanctuary. They were standing in her front yard, and instead of responding, Sebastian bent to pick up a rock. He studied it for a long moment, as if he found something particularly interesting in its unremarkable appearance.
“Ignoring me is not going to change my mind,” Ryan snapped.
“I’m not ignoring you,” Sebastian replied, tossing the rock to the ground and raising his disturbingly probing gaze to Ryan. “I’m merely giving you some time to think.”
“I don’t need time to think. I know exactly what I’m going to do, and that’s stay here with Shana.”
“And if she doesn’t want you to stay?”
“Of course, she wants me to stay. She loves me.”
“Exactly,” Sebastian said. “And that’s why I’m going to go get the car.”
“Damnit, man! What does it take to get through to you? I am not leaving here, or at least I’m not leaving without Shana.”
“If that turns out to be your choice, then I can always return the car,” Sebastian said, turning away from him.
Ryan opened his mouth to argue further. Realizing that Sebastian was not the one he should be arguing with, he closed it and headed for the house. If Shana thought she was going to send him away after all they’d been through, she was nuts!
I am not crazy, Ryan. Come to the repository, so I can explain.
As Shana’s voice echoed in his mind, Ryan staggered to a halt and shook his head in shock. He’d been so focused on Shana’s determination to send him away that he hadn’t realized he was now powerless. When had that happened?
When you gave me the Death card—the transformation card. Come to the repository, and I will explain everything.
Reluctantly, he did as she instructed. Was that why she wanted to send him away? Because he was now no more than a mortal?
Don’t be ridiculous! she chided. I love you, and I will love you until the day I die. Your being a mortal doesn’t change that.
“Then why do you want to send me away?” he questioned hoarsely. When she didn’t answer, he felt his stomach twist into a knot.
By the time he reached the repository, the knot had become the size of a boulder. Drawing in a deep breath, he forced himself to open the door and step inside.
Shana stood beside one of the tables; she glanced up at him, giving him a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “Come and look at this, Ryan.”
He unwillingly walked to the table and looked down. He saw a bunch of black cards scattered around it in various piles.
“Obviously, these are Moira’s Tarot cards,” he said.
She nodded. “This is the spread Moira had me lay out the night I released her. All of the cards are here but one.”
“There’s a card missing?”
She nodded again. “The Hanged Man.”
He curled his lip in distaste. “Sounds like a disgusting card.”
“It’s not disgusting at all. He’s hanging upside down, with a rope around his ankle, and he’s done this by choice. It takes great courage for him to put himself in that position, but he is a man of self-sacrifice. A man who will do what must be done, even at the risk of losing what he wants the most.”
“Damnit, Shana! Don’t play this game with me. I couldn’t leave you if I wanted to, and I sure as hell don’t want to.”
“Don’t you understand the seriousness of this situation?” she asked impatiently, gesturing toward the cards. “If you don’t leave me, then Moira will have another chance at your soul. This way it’s over. You’ll be free.”
Ryan stared at her in disbelief. “Free? My God, Shana. I love you. If I leave you, I won’t be free. I’ll spend the rest of my life grieving for you.”
She gave an adamant shake of her head. “You’re wrong, Ryan. When you first arrived, Lucien made me cast a spell over you. For a while, I wasn’t sure it had worked. Then, you were able to pick up on my thoughts yesterday afternoon when your weakened powers should have prohibited you from doing so without great concentration. Do you remember that?”
“Of course I remember it,” he said gruffly, his gaze automatically dropping to her breasts. “I tried to mentally seduce you when you wouldn’t tell me what I wanted to know.”
“Yes, and that’s what I was reluctant to tell you. That I had cast a spell over you. As you’ll recall, you weren’t in a particularly cooperative frame of mind.”
“Yeah, well, I finally came around,” he muttered, dragging his gaze back to her face. “What does this spell have to do with our situation?”
“Because of the spell, once you leave Sanctuary, you’ll forget me and everything that’s happened here.”
“That’s impossible!” he declared, his eyes somber. “Not even a spell could make me forget you.”
She gave him a sad smile. “Yes, Ryan, it will. The moment you leave coven land, I will no longer exist for you. You’ll be free to love again, to ma
te again.”
“Damnit! I don’t want to be free to love again, and I don’t want to be mated with anyone but you,” he stated angrily, passionately.
He reached out and clutched her arms. Pulling her against him, he stared deeply into her eyes. “You can’t do this to us, Shana. We were fated to be together. You said yourself that if that weren’t true, I couldn’t have accepted the witch’s vow from you. So don’t do this to us. I love you, and I need you. If that means having to fight Moira in another five hundred years, I don’t care. Having you will be worth it.”
“But it won’t be worth it to me!” she cried in frustration, pulling away from him. She began to pace, and then she stopped to look at him, her eyes filled with such torment that it broke his heart. “I also love you, Ryan. You’re the very essence of my soul, and just the thought of losing you is killing me. But can’t you see that if you stay, you’ll be giving Moira a double victory? She’ll not only have another chance at your soul, but because of her, every moment of happiness we share will be overshadowed by her lurking presence. For the rest of my life, her threat to you will be my first thought when I wake up in the morning, and my last thought when I go to bed at night. Losing you will make me miserable, but it won’t compare to the anguish I’ll suffer if you stay with me. Surely, you can understand that I can’t live with that.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, hoping that would help protect himself from the pain. “I do understand what you’re saying, Shana, but you have to understand my side in all of this. Until I met you, I was nothing but an empty shell. I had no reason to live, and if I leave, I know that’s what I’ll become again. You say you love me, so how can you let that happen to me?”
“That isn’t going to happen, Ryan,” she said, stepping forward and placing her hand against his arm. “Now that I have my powers back, I know what you’ve suffered through since Samhain. Moira was the cause of your torment, and now she’s gone. With her no longer lingering over you like a death sentence, you’ll go back to being a doctor. With each child’s life you save, you’ll come closer to fulfilling the karmic debt you owe for the death of Aric’s child.”
Touch of Magic Page 32
