by Allie Mackay
Yet she felt a presence.
Whoever it was, the energy was strong, lifting the fine hairs on her nape. And—this surprised her—the longer she looked about, the more certain she became that the entity wasn’t in the room with her.
The vibrations came from outside, meaning the source was exceptionally powerful.
Knowing she wouldn’t sleep unless she knew who was causing such a rift in the atmosphere, she went to the window and pulled back the drapes.
She saw nothing.
She’d expected to see the spectral herring fleet, the boats crowding Pennard’s tiny harbor. At the least, she’d tipped on the phone-box ghost. It wouldn’t have surprised her if he’d crossed the road and manifested beneath her window.
But Harbour Street was empty, its asphalt shimmering with nothing more ominous than the sheen of a light drizzle.
The few boats in the marina were equally quiet, their crews nowhere in sight.
Pennard was still, nary a ghost anywhere.
But there was a white minivan turning slowly onto Harbour Street from Cliff Road, the steep and harrowing nightmare-of-a-ribbon road that plunged down Pennard’s sheltering bluff.
Curious, she stepped closer to the window. At once, a flash of chills rushed up her neck. When the multipassenger van drew to a halt near the stone slipway, parking behind her car, shivers also rippled down her spine. Whoever drove the vehicle was the source of the strong vibes she’d felt upon entering her room.
There could be no doubt.
With her heightened senses, she could see energy pulsing around the minivan’s exterior.
The strange luminosity was brightest where bold lettering adorned the van’s right-hand driver’s door. But the light rain and mist blowing along the road made it difficult to read the advertisement’s words.
Taking care to stay behind the curtain, she pressed her forehead to the window glass and cupped her hands around her eyes. But the only word she could make out was Heritage.
The rest was blurred by rain and mist. And just when she scrunched her eyes, trying harder to read the sign, the driver’s door opened and a tall, heavyset man climbed out.
Kendra blinked, certain he must be six and a half feet tall, at least six-four. He wasn’t a hunk. His loose black trousers did show off his long legs. But the effect was spoiled because his white shirt, long sleeves rolled, revealed a good-sized paunch. His thinning hair—red, Kendra guessed, but unable to tell for sure in the dark, wet night—also didn’t enhance his appearance.
Most notable of all, besides his height, were cheeks that shone like polished apples, making him look like an oversized teddy bear.
For a beat, Kendra doubted herself.
Surely such an innocuous-looking man hadn’t been responsible for the heavy air in her room. There had to be another source for the chills that swept her.
But she couldn’t deny the strange shimmer circling his van.
When he set his hands on his hips and looked up and down Harbour Street, surveying the village in a proprietary manner, Kendra knew why the Otherworld was marking him so clearly for her.
He had something to do with the Pennard Project.
But before she could focus strongly enough for one of her spirit guides—or a talkative Pennard ghost—to respond to her and reveal the connection, the man returned to his van and drove away.
Kendra’s chills vanished at once.
She rubbed the back of her neck, glad she hadn’t summoned Raziel, her main spirit guide in the Otherworld. A powerful entity who’d never had a human existence, his messages were often cryptic. Raziel believed she should find her own way. He held disdain for Kendra’s other supernatural contacts, Saami and Ordo, who’d once walked the earth and were more inclined to divulge information when called upon.
Unfortunately, Saami and Ordo enjoyed spirit guiding so much, they spread themselves thin. As a onetime flower child of the 1960s, Saami believed in sharing her love. Ordo, famed in the Viking Age as a far-traveling Norse trader, simply enjoyed keeping busy. They helped many sensitives like Kendra and so they weren’t always available when she needed them.
Raziel, intimidating as he could be, remained her last resort.
So she scanned the street again, making certain the energy she’d felt truly had vanished with the departure of the man and his minivan.
Unfortunately, her skin pricked anew when her gaze lit on the shadowed alley between the two cottages where Graeme had taken her earlier.
The mist drifting along the waterfront wasn’t thick enough to hide the man standing there.
He was Gavin Ramsay, staring after the departing minivan with venom in his gaze.
Kendra’s breath caught, her pulse quickening, ratcheting with edginess.
Worse, looking at him turned her blood cold and filled her with creeping ill ease. He wasn’t just an oily Romeo. He had an agenda. And whatever it hinged on, the in-between time when the veil separating the Otherworld and the mortal one was at its thinnest.
Kendra sensed his menace as surely as she knew the remaining hours of the night would fly by at light speed, ensuring she’d waken without enough rest. She’d be doomed to greet Graeme with puffy eyes and a fuzzy mind.
She handled mornings so poorly.
And even as she watched Gavin Ramsay saunter down Harbour Street, making for the cliff path to his house, she knew that she’d need all her wits when the morning sun peeked above the horizon.
She just wondered if Graeme knew the strength of his foe.
Somewhere deep inside her, a strong voice warned that she must alert him.
But how could she explain knowing?
Much later, in the small hours of the night, Graeme stood at the front window of his cottage and watched moonlight glimmer on the bay. He could hear the incoming tide washing over rocks on the shore and the soft chink of boats rocking at their moorings. A light rain continued to fall. Harbour Street appeared quiet, though a few lights twinkled here and there, proving that some villagers hadn’t yet sought their beds.
Jock was also restless.
Well tuned to Graeme’s moods, Jock had enjoyed enough lifetimes at Graeme’s side to read him. Just now, the dog’s perked ears and his pacing was a sure sign that he knew Graeme was planning to do something important.
Jock insisted on participating in vital matters.
It was tradition.
One they’d kept for centuries.
“We’re almost ready, lad.” Graeme looked to where the dog fretted on the far side of the lounge.
Small and tidy, it was the Keel’s best room, as Highlanders called such rarely used sitting rooms. And with so few visitors as came to Graeme’s door, he saw no point in not enjoying the lounge’s comforts. A peat fire always glowed in the hearth, and the armchair beside the fireplace was worn, welcoming, and never off-limits to Jock.
Instead of claiming a seat on the less-cozy sofa, Graeme left the lounge and went down the dark entry hall to the cottage’s front door. Jock stayed behind, dropping onto his haunches and assuming his most grieved expression. It was an old trick, as well used as feigning sleep and employed in the hope that Graeme would swiftly return and man and dog could enjoy a few hours together before the hearth fire.
Jock’s strategy failed.
Admitting defeat, he padded down the hall, joining Graeme at the door.
“One look, old boy. That’s all.” Graeme reached to pat the dog’s head before he opened the door and stepped out onto the stoop. “I can’t risk doing what we must if there’s even a hint of Ramsay in the air.”
Unfortunately, there was.
Graeme caught his foe’s scent the instant he turned his face into the wind. The smell was faint but unmistakable: a trace of musk and citrus, the costly cologne tainted by an edge of sulfur only Graeme would detect.
Luckily, he could also tell that the whiff of scent was residue.
Wherever Ramsay had been on Harbour Street, he’d le
ft now.
Even so, it didn’t hurt to make certain.
Graeme stepped from the stoop into the street, ignoring the drizzle. He looked across the road, opening his senses as he focused on the bay’s dark, glassy water. All appeared calm, with only a light chop stirring the sea. Moonlight silvered the road and the narrow stretch of shingle beyond. Otherwise, the village was still.
Not yet satisfied, he tipped back his head, clearing his mind. He inhaled deep, probing the night. The air smelled of the sea, cold rain, and peat smoke.
They were familiar smells and made his heart clench.
The essence of this whole coast, the scents reminded him of why he did what he did. They brought home the importance of keeping Pennard safe, preserving village dignity and the pride of a place so deeply ingrained in every inch of this magnificent stretch of shoreline.
Graeme took one more deep breath, letting his senses search for his enemy.
Gavin Ramsay’s taint was barely discernible now.
“Ramsay’s no longer about, no’ now.” Graeme glanced at Jock, not surprised to see the dog tilt back his head and sniff the mist rolling down the street. Jock loved mimicking Graeme’s postures.
He growled on hearing Ramsay’s name.
The dog would keep excellent watch when they went into the Keel’s kitchen and Graeme retrieved his Book of Shadows, the ancient Grimoire—a tome of meticulous records—kept by his family ever since they’d been named Guardians centuries ago.
Guardians of the Shadow Wand, that was.
Graeme fisted his hands, wondering, as so often, why his clan had to have such a dubious honor placed upon their broad, plaid-draped shoulders.
But he knew why.
In times of old, honor and integrity meant something.
Great and selfless acts done for the greater good were noted and rewarded unnumbered years ago when Scotland was yet young.
And all the railing against the past and the heroic deeds of his forebears wouldn’t change anything.
So he gave Jock’s ears one more rub and then started down the narrow path beside his house. The rock face behind his barrel shed needed checking. It was there, deep inside the cliff’s stone, that the Shadow Wand rested, not far from where young Ritchie Watt had flung himself in his haste to escape Graeme earlier.
To Graeme’s relief, the small area behind his cottage and, more importantly, the bluff itself, felt clean. There was no trace of any visitors. All he sensed was the low pulsing of the Shadow Wand.
He frowned, not surprised when Jock bolted in front of him, his hackles rising as he snarled at the wet stone of the cliff face.
“Thon relic cannae harm us, laddie.” Graeme wished that was true.
It would be true as long as the wand remained where it was.
The Shadow Wand was a highly polished relic of jet and amber, its spiraled length banded by narrow rings of clear, shining crystal. Once the most dreaded weapon of a dark druid named Morcant, the Shadow Wand earned its name for its terrifying ability to draw out a man’s soul if the wand was thrust into a victim’s shadow. The person was left hollowed and died, while the wand fed off the soul’s energy, gaining power for its wielder.
In time, Morcant fed the wand so many souls that a single victim no longer slaked the wand’s hunger.
Morcant soon learned that if he stabbed the wand into the shadow of a tower or stronghold, the souls of everyone within would be consumed by the wand.
When the dark druid’s thirst for power brought about his own demise at the gates of Castle Grath, Graeme’s ancestors took possession of the dangerous wand. The clan’s fate was then sealed, their path forever altered. The Old Gods, preferring not to delve too deeply into the lives of mortal men, gave the MacGrath chief a span of seven days to decide the Shadow Wand’s fate.
After much debate, clan elders wisely decided to bury the wand deep in the stone of a nearby cliff. There, it would never again see the light of day. Even so, the MacGraths vowed to guard and protect the secret site from anyone who would attempt to make use of the wand and its terrifying powers.
Pleased because the MacGrath chief wasn’t tempted to seize the wand’s power for himself, the Old Gods smiled on Clan MacGrath, naming them Guardians of the Wand. They were also entrusted with watching over the whole, formidable coast. And, not entirely to the chief’s liking, they were given the magical powers to do so.
From that time onward, every MacGrath chief possessed strong ancient magic and the knowledge to wield it for good.
It was a responsibility Graeme could’ve done without.
But it was also a duty he honored.
The consequences of shirking such a legacy were unthinkable. Even if Graeme occasionally did contemplate walking away, damning heritage and liability, Gavin Ramsay’s odious presence made any such relinquishing of his obligations an impossibility.
Ramsay was a direct descendent of Morcant.
And he’d inherited his ancestor’s penchant for causing trouble and his boundless quest for power. In recent years, he also seemed to be gaining Morcant’s talent for spellcasting and other witchery.
Graeme was certain of that.
He was also fairly sure that Ramsay had guessed Graeme’s most hedged secret.
That like his father before him and his father before him, Graeme had also been granted a lifespan of seven hundred years and a day.
His time ran out in seventy-five years.
He was the last MacGrath.
And he’d take his legacy with him, leaving no future Guardians to suffer his fate. Before he went, he’d fulfill one final duty, even if it wasn’t exactly what his responsibilities demanded of him.
He’d destroy the Shadow Wand.
The relic would never fall into Ramsay’s hands.
Graeme glanced at Jock and went back inside his cottage. He needed to study the Grimoire. A crack had sprung in the cliff face behind the Keel, and it was only a matter of time until the break widened, exposing the Shadow Wand’s centuries-old hiding place.
Most alarming of all, he hadn’t caused the crack.
It was the work of someone else.
And that meant trouble.
He’d been studying the Grimoire for ages, poring over its brittle pages and scrutinizing near-indecipherable text penned in old, faded ink, in search of a way to destroy the relic. Many of the tome’s strange symbols and illustrations were even harder to grasp than the ancient words. So far, he hadn’t found the answer he needed. He had hoped to have time to keep looking.
He’d have to search faster if Ramsay, or some potent energy drawn by his darkness, was responsible for the split in the cliff’s stone.
Too bad haste wasn’t known for improving matters.
Chapter 8
“Dinnae look at me that way.”
Graeme slid an annoyed glance at Jock, almost wishing the dog had retired to his cozy armchair beside the fire when they’d come back inside the Keel. That was well over an hour ago, and Jock had been treating Graeme to his you-dinnae-ken-what-you’re-doing stare ever since. It was a look the dog gave him every time he lifted a certain slab from the kitchen’s stone-flagged floor and retrieved the ancient tome known simply as the Book of Shadows.
His family’s most prized possession, the book was leather bound, heavy, and so old Graeme often worried it would turn to dust in his hands.
But somewhere within the Grimoire’s cracked binding and inked on brittle parchment stood the key to destroying the Shadow Wand.
At least Graeme hoped so.
He’d been studying the book for centuries. Sadly, to no avail.
And each time he tried to glean the tome’s secrets, Jock looked on with his unblinking canine stare. Until, at last, he grew bored watching Graeme turn the fragile pages. Then, as if washing his paws of his master’s foolishness, he’d sit by the kitchen door, waiting for Graeme to take him for their late-night walk along the shore.
“I’m not done here.” G
raeme peered harder at the Book of Shadows, trying to decipher the strange words and symbols. Encoded secrets, conjurations, charms, and rituals that imparted mystical knowledge, allowing those adept to gain love, power, and riches. There were also instructions on how to punish enemies, avert evil, and divine the future. The tome was even rumored to offer an invisibility spell. The easiest-to-read notations covered natural magic, giving descriptions of medicinal herbs and enchanted gemstones. Sprawled in faded ink across the Grimoire’s yellowed pages, the shrift belonged to a distant
time.
An age before even Graeme’s great-great-grandfather had walked the hills.
Yet some of those forebears had managed to unravel the meaning of a few words and symbols. Their helpful notes were penned in the margins, giving Graeme his only clues to what he sought.
In nearly seven hundred years, he hadn’t come close to his ancestors’ successes in cracking the maddeningly illegible writing and weird sketches. He’d made progress, but not enough. It seemed that time was starting to run out.
Yet the answers he sought eluded him.
He bit back a curse as he turned another page.
Swearing in the presence of a book so magic laden wasn’t a mistake he’d make. The air in the kitchen hummed with the tome’s power. And the pages warmed beneath his fingers, as if the parchment lived and breathed. Only absolute reverence was acceptable when handing the Grimoire.
Graeme treated the book with care.
Behind him, Jock showed less respect by whining.
But when Graeme shot him a look, the dog flopped down on the floor and wagged his tail. His expression turned hopeful, full of barely repressed excitement.
“No walk yet.” Graeme straightened and rolled his shoulders. He’d placed the Book of Shadows on the kitchen’s sturdy oak table, and bending over the tome for the past hour had made his back ache.
His head hurt, too.
And the trace of sausage, bacon, and eggs that lingered in the air—a reminder of his midnight snack—was making him hungry again.
