As hard and often as she’d castigated herself for it, hearing the ugly truth hurled at her like a stone from her own mother made her gasp. Fresh tears flooded her eyes.
Grimly, Linnet straightened her shoulders and absorbed the blow.
“I never meant to leave him, Mother. But aye, we both failed him. I’ve sought comfort in prayer, and knowing he’s gone to a better place.”
“He’s returned to the Goddess.” Again, Catriona touched reverent fingers to the crescent at her throat. But her shimmering gaze had moved past Linnet, and her mother’s slight frame stiffened. The pink flush of her anger faded, leaving her pale and fragile once more.
“Daughter, ye should never have brought him. This is nay place for his kind.”
Linnet didn’t need to turn to sense Zamiel’s approach. He’d hung back courteously to allow her this private moment. Now she yearned for the solace of his ready understanding, his openhearted acceptance, with a hunger that went bone-deep. Without turning, she reached for him, and the solid reassurance of his gloved hand clasped hers.
Zamiel swept the Dowager Countess an elegant leg, incongruous in the open field but beautifully executed, like everything he did.
“It seems I need no introduction, madam?”
“Ye’re the Morningstar’s son,” Catriona said, unsmiling, clearly no more surprised by his sudden appearance than her daughter’s. “Son of the Destroyer, the Horned God. Ye’ve no place here among the Fair Folk, on the very threshold of the Summer Lands.”
“Which raises an interesting point,” he said lightly, as though he saw nothing lacking in this chilly greeting. “I refer, of course, to the question of where exactly we are. I recognize this stretch of shore from a...previous visit, shall we say? I’d hazard the guess we’re in Cornwall, and that castle is Tintagel.”
“Aye,” Catriona said briefly. “Though a mortal traveler who seeks this place may wander long without finding it.”
Linnet raised her eyes to the Faerie tale castle, perched high above the shining sea. The border laird in her appreciated its defensive placement, linked to the mainland by a narrow causeway that might well be underwater at high tide. Yet this airy, fantastical vision was so unlike the blocky, prosaic, unlovely fortifications of the world she knew that she could have been dreaming.
Tintagel, castle of myth, legendary birthplace to Arthur of Camelot.
And the mist that swirled around it, twining ethereal fingers around the towers and battlements, reminded her of...something...
“Is that the Veil?” she heard herself say, with no notion what she meant.
“Aye, lass,” Catriona murmured. “The mists are a curtain that separates the mortal and Faerie realms. Not long ago, the Veil wrapped these walls so thick aboot, no mortal could hope to find the place, unless the poor wandering soul bore Faerie blood and Faerie magick. Then he might blunder through the Veil by mischance.
“These days, the wall between the worlds grows thin. Ye’ll have heard of the Convergence?”
The words she spoke were strange...the Veil, the Convergence...yet somehow Linnet knew them. They skirted close to the secrets of her lost years and where she’d spent them.
“Tell me,” she whispered.
Catriona stirred, impatient as a child. “Ah, lass, do ye recall naught of it? Think back to yer time with Rhiannon, the Faerie Queene’s daughter.”
The familiar sense of futility rose like a wall before her. Her throat tight and aching, Linnet shook her head.
“I’ve heard that name, Mother, but I tell ye I don’t know her.”
“But ye helped her, did ye nay? ’twas ye helped Rhiannon reach Elizabeth Tudor, to sign the enchanted treaty and keep peace between mortals and Fae on the English isle. ’twas ye launched her to France, with Elizabeth’s blessing, to bring the same peace there.”
Linnet battled the swelling rise of panic. “I don’t remember, Mother. Why can’t I remember?”
Zamiel squeezed her hand, and the contact anchored her. She shot him a grateful look.
“You’d best explain, madam,” he said firmly, “for your daughter’s benefit. Start with the Convergence.”
Catriona sighed, as though the effort had grown tedious beyond bearing. “It comes every thousand years, aye? The twin realms of mortal and Faerie are like ships on the sea of time. When they drift too close in the mist, the two realms collide. Now this Convergence is upon us.
“Tintagel has always straddled the border between the worlds. These days, any mortal who wills to come here will find us—usually.”
“Usually?” Linnet asked faintly. “But not always?”
Her mother smiled, golden eyes glimmering with secrets. “Nay, not always. On the high holidays, still, this place resides firmly in the Summer Lands—the Faerie realm, where the Fair Folk walk.”
Linnet felt ghostly fingers tiptoe up her spine and shivered. She raised a hand to cross herself, then stilled, knowing her mother wouldn’t like it. But this mention of high holidays brought another question to mind.
“Tell me, Mother, if ye ever loved me—what’s the date?”
Catriona’s reddish brows lifted. “Did ye think yerself lost and adrift in time? Well, and if ye passed through the Veil, ye’d do well to fear it. ’tis the year fifteen hundred and fifty nine, the first year of Elizabeth Tudor’s reign. And tonight is one of the high holidays, aye? ’tis Midsummer Night.”
The answer could have been far worse. They’d lost four months passing through the mirror. They could easily have lost four years or four decades. Sweet Jesus, she could have fallen asleep in a ring of Faerie stones and wakened four hundred years later.
She swayed on her feet. But Zamiel was there, one wiry arm sliding around her waist to hold her up. She turned her face into the smoky darkness of his hair.
Dimly she heard her mother’s query—polite concern, no more, such as one would show a stranger who met some minor misfortune. A deep weariness seeped through her, sharpened by the acrid bite of disappointment. Her mother had failed her again, just as she’d always done.
Mortal or Fae, Catriona Norwood would always be a child, heedless of the harm her choices brought others—even her own daughter.
Shaking her head, she twined her arms wearily around Zamiel’s neck.
Effortlessly he lifted her into his arms. She bowed her heavy head against his leather jerkin. He was saying something about food, a bath, lodging. Catriona hesitated before granting the hospitality of Tintagel. For it seemed she was its lady.
As Zamiel bore her through the sweet-smelling grass toward the legendary castle, Linnet wondered why her mother seemed unsurprised to see them.
Chapter Thirteen
During his exile in London, Zamiel had explored most of the sybaritic pleasures the mortal city had to offer, everything short of the sexual consummation that would complete his plummet from grace.
Yet he’d never enjoyed anything quite so decadent as this Roman bath where he lolled in indolent bliss.
Around him, vaulted ceilings and walls glittered with friezes of seaweed and exotic fish in semi-precious stone. Colorful mosaics tiled the floor—the bones of ancient shipwrecks, treasure spilled across the ocean floor, many-armed sea creatures twining through the ruins.
Here in the Roman baths, one wall lay open to the sea, bordered by a row of slim alabaster pillars. Filmy draperies swirled between them in the cool salt breeze. Far below, the sea murmured to itself as it foamed over the rocks. Nearby, water purled as it trickled into the bathing pool.
Steaming water lapped against him, cloudy with minerals, piped from the depths of the earth. Blissfully he floated in it, naked as a newborn, arms draped across the pool’s marble rim. Steam swirled across the floor, pearly in the shimmering light. Facets of radiance from the water danced against the ceiling.
He could almost have been in Heaven. On either plane, he was achingly alone.
He hadn’t seen Linnet since he’d yielded her, faint with exhaustion, to her mother
’s care—if one could call Catriona Norwood anyone’s mother. His nostrils flared. Tintagel’s diminutive half-Fae mistress seemed more like a child herself. She’d abandoned Linnet and all her children for her own pleasure, so far as he could tell.
Let her grant Linnet the truth about her parentage. That much, at least, Catriona surely owed her. Then Zamiel would be more than ready to quit this place. Floating as it did between the borders of England and the Summer Lands, it was no place for an angel—fallen or otherwise. His scalp had been prickling since they’d found Catriona so calmly and conveniently waiting for them.
The very air tingled with Faerie magick.
He’d nearly refused the food and drink they brought. Privately, he’d been amazed to find himself entertaining the old superstition about eating Faerie food and falling under their spell.
As he frowned over the thought, the distant lilt of feminine laughter drifted to his ears. He swallowed a sigh. When he came to bathe, all the castle youth had been sporting here, alight with holiday spirit, nubile bodies darting across the mosaic floors, diving like eels into the silky waters. They’d welcomed him, the newcomer, with cries of delight. And several of both sexes had been more than willing to make the welcome personal.
He’d fended off these overtures with good-natured courtesy. In time, they left him soaking, hidden by a pillar and blankets of steam.
Now, hearing the echo of approaching footfalls, he thought it time to affect a discreet retreat.
He was only mortal, after all. No matter the consequences for his immortality, his cock possessed no fine sensibilities. He’d been aching, body and soul, since the day he’d met Linnet Norwood.
As he gathered himself, a pair of slender damsels strolled into the caldarium, arms entwined. An errant ray of sunlight slid through the blowing draperies and lit tendrils of fire in a river of mahogany curls. Zamiel subsided into the waters as though he’d been slain.
Catriona had led her daughter straight to him.
But nay. Clearly unaware of his hidden presence, the lady of Tintagel was leading Linnet to the portico. She parted the draperies to reveal a stunning view of the rugged Cornish coast, ashen rocks and emerald moss and the shimmer of sunlight on the sea.
Safely concealed, Zamiel filled his eyes with the sight of his beloved. She’d abandoned her English riding habit for a flowing gown of seafoam green with trailing sleeves. The antiquated style clung to her magnificent breasts in a way that stole his wits.
She was tall and statuesque and milk pale as a Greek goddess, dark curls tumbling free down her back beneath a circlet of starflowers. The shimmering light limned her alabaster profile as she stared out to sea, pink lips parted, while her mother prattled.
He was forcibly struck by the aura of sorrow that haunted her lovely eyes. Gradually he realized Catriona sought to persuade her to remain at Tintagel. He could have told the woman to save her breath, if she’d bothered consulting him.
“Nay, Mother, leave off,” Linnet said gently. “My place is at Glencross, not here. They’ve no one else to look after them, aye? They need a respectable lady who’s secure in her place, with no hint of scandal about her. And they need a proper laird.”
“Piffle!” Catriona waved an airy hand. “Ye can never be that to them. Ye’re my daughter, aye? And ye’ve reasoned it through by now, nay doubt, that ye’re none of Edward Norwood’s get?”
So her worst suspicions were confirmed. Linnet gasped and gripped a pillar to steady herself. Zamiel barely restrained the urge to erupt from the pool, mother-naked, and gather her into his arms. What possessed Catriona Norwood to drop such devastating revelations so casually? Did the woman think of no one but herself?
“So it’s true,” Linnet murmured, staring out to sea. “I’m Henry Tudor’s bastard, just as ye’re James of Scotland’s?”
“Aye, ye’re royal on both sides.” Her mother lifted her pointed chin, so like the dark-haired sylph at her side. “Scottish James worshipped the Goddess and lay with a Faerie maid on Midsummer Night. She gave birth to me nine moons later. Ye’ve the blood of two kings in yer veins, lass, and ye’re one-quarter Fae.”
Linnet flung out a hand to stop the flow of words. But Catriona pushed ahead as though she were blind.
“James sired a legitimate heir for Scotland, aye? But by rights, my daughter should be sitting the English throne.”
Linnet straightened her shoulders and spoke out strongly. “And that I shall never do. Elizabeth Tudor is the Great Harry’s legitimate heir, and me naught but a by-blow!”
“The Goddess draws nay distinction for Christian notions of morality—”
“But I’m a Christian, Mother, and a loyal Englishwoman. I’ll play no part in any ungodly scheme to overthrow the rightful Queen.”
“Then ye’re a bloody fool!” Catriona paced the portico like an angry kitten, her petite frame bristling with temper. The sea wind snapped and fluttered her buttercup skirts and unfurled her red hair behind her. “Ah, this is useless. I’ve nay gift for this mortal blethering. I told Morrigan ye’d never heed me.”
“Who?” White-faced, Linnet stilled.
Catriona turned to survey her daughter, head tilted, as though she were some curious new creature. “Morrigan, eldest child of Maeve the Faerie Queene. She’s soon to become Queene herself, with poor Maeve on her deathbed. Have ye never heard these names, daughter?”
“How should I?” Linnet said faintly. She looked queasy, as she always did at any mention of Faerie matters. “I take no part in such pagan nonsense.”
“Oh, don’t ye? It’s true then—ye recall naught of the years ye fled Glencross and vanished from the mortal realm?”
“The lost years?” Linnet hugged herself.
Fists clenching, Zamiel battled the urge to go to her. Surely she wouldn’t welcome his intervention at this pivotal moment.
“I know I wandered witless in the wild,” she whispered. “Afterward, James sent me to the abbey to regain my wits. Those grim years I recall well enough.”
“Then Morrigan was right,” her mother said softly. “Her magick worked. For two mortal years, lass, ye dwelled in the Summer Lands among the Fair Folk. She cast a spell to make ye forget, for she’s a powerful witch and priestess. And so ye recall none of it.”
“I recall none of it because I was mad!” Linnet flashed. “After ye left us, yer son Jasper made my childhood a living hell. I was fleeing him when a rockslide occurred, and that was when the madness took me.”
“So many accidents.” Catriona watched her. “Do ye never wonder about it? Yer brother James and his heir murdered, yer brother Colin slipped from the heights, Jasper taken by mischance and never found.”
“What are ye saying, Mother?” Her voice quivered. Submerged to his chin, Zamiel wrapped his arms around his knees and ached for her.
Catriona shrugged. “What I meant. Someone murdered yer brothers and nephew, even the wee bairns.”
“There’s no proof of that, may God have mercy on their souls.” Linnet crossed herself, which Zamiel could have told her was a bad idea. The palace trembled around them, as though the earth shook beneath them. For an instant, their surroundings wavered and seemed to fade.
Catriona clung to a pillar for support. “By the Chalice, lass! Doon’t ye know ye must never call on yer Christian god in this place? We straddle the borders of Faerie, aye?”
“By all the saints, this is an unholy place,” Linnet muttered.
Catriona drew herself upright.
“Proven or nay, someone murdered them—yer mortal kin. And now the same ‘someone’ seeks yer death, do they nay?”
“Sir William Cecil wants me dead,” Linnet said flatly. “And no wonder, if he knows I’ve the blood of two kings running through my veins. But I believe he’s acting on his own authority. I’ll not believe the Queen turned against me without cause, not after she was persecuted so unjustly herself, under her sister’s reign. She’s no tyrant like her father or sister Mary before her.”
Her mother’s eyes glimmered. “She’s a Protestant, and ye’re a Papist. Ye’d be their best hope to regain the throne.”
“Mother, I’ve said nay.” Linnet did some pacing of her own, anger and worry simmering in her features. “I’ve traveled all this way to find ye, by means I can scarcely believe or stomach. Is this all ye have to tell me? That I’m a bastard, and like a bastard I should overthrow my rightful sovereign and claim the throne for myself?”
“Nay, not for yourself! For the Goddess,” Catriona flared. “Who else do ye think gave ye the magick, aye, the power to open a portal between realms? ’tis an awesome gift.”
“Perhaps She ought to have given it to you,” Linnet said.
A look of naked yearning, quickly concealed, chased across her mother’s winsome face.
Oho! Zamiel thought. The Goddess she worshipped had given Linnet this magick, and Catriona Norwood was green with envy.
“Ye blethering bampot!” Catriona stamped her tiny foot. “Doon’t ye know even pure-blooded Fae can only walk between worlds where the Veil is present? And it moves, aye, in ways none can understand. Through the mirror, ye can go places none of us can venture—enchanted lands that have receded so far into the mists even the Fae can’t find them.”
So here was the secret of Linnet’s strange magick. Her face twisted.
“Then I renounce this so-called gift, Mother, this witchcraft I never wanted, for the tool of Satan it is.”
“Fool!” her mother cried. “Only She can withdraw it. And She wants a daughter of the Fair Folk on the English throne, one who’s allied with Morrigan as the next Faerie Queene. Ye’ll usher in a new age for these isles, in the Goddess’s name.”
Linnet voiced a bleak laugh. “That argument I’m even less likely to heed. Do ye know me so little, for all ye gave birth to me?”
“I know ye better than ye know yerself, with that great gaping hole in yer memory!” Catriona’s voice softened. “Do ye nay wish to remember, daughter? To regain what ye’ve lost?”
Linnet clutched at her hair like the madwoman she feared herself. Her anguish was so obvious that Zamiel hissed, silently cursing his impotence to shield her.
Laura Navarre - [The Magick Trilogy 02] Page 22
