“Okay. I think I should know your name first.” Beth grinned as she slid her palm into his.
“Dáire McClaine.” He gave her hand a firm pump. “And you are?”
McClaine? No way. It couldn’t be…
Beth blinked at him, seeing his tattoo in a whole new light. “Did you say McClaine? You’re visiting your brother?”
Puzzlement crinkled his brow. “Yes, and yes. He’s…ill. I was supposed to meet a woman who was going to help…care for him…for a short time. He’s just thirty miles west of here. We’ll go right past the old family castle—quite a view.”
Castle. Beth’s stomach dropped to her toes. As far as she knew Fintan wasn’t ill, but the matching surnames, the castle that was too close to the airport to be any other castle but the one she wanted to get back to. Half-afraid to hear Dáire’s answer, she asked, “Is your brother Fintan McClaine?”
All traces of humor drained from Dáire’s face. He cocked his head and squinted at Beth, studying her. After several uncomfortable seconds, he exhaled, “Son of a bitch…you’re Beth.”
As everything clanged together in Beth’s head, her knees threatened to give way. All the implausible claims she’d been trying to ignore rose to the surface and swamped over her. She didn’t believe in coincidence. Fintan’s brother had flown in from New York on the very day she was leaving. Now, when no other cabbie could be found, he was standing before her, offering to give her a ride.
The same tattoo, the same not-quite-Scottish burr that clung to his speech. Her head filled with the words Ealasaid recited, the sound of ancient people chanting a language she didn’t recognize before the chaos erupted. Identical to the underlying melody of both Dáire’s and Fintan’s speech.
Panic hit her. “Fintan’s sick?”
“I thought he told you…” Dáire’s hand fisted around her wrist. “Never mind. We’ve got to go.”
“He wasn’t sick this morning.” She stumbled along behind him, struggling to keep up with his long, determined strides.
“Yes he was.” As he pushed open the exit doors, he glanced over his shoulder and shot her a frown. “We’re cursed, Beth. He fell in love with you…and it made him…sick. Are you coming or not?” He shook his head, picked up her suitcase, and tugged on her hand, near-dragging her into the cold. “No, scratch that. You’re coming. You’re the only one who can save him, whether you want to or not.”
Like the lightning that had illuminated the long-ago ring of standing stones, understanding flashed. My sire is a demon…Whatever was wrong with Fintan, he’d been telling her the truth all along. It didn’t matter how it could possibly occur, didn’t matter how impossible it sounded. It was true. Every last word of his fantastic, zany stories.
Chills raced down her spine as she jogged along behind Dáire, but not from the snowflakes that pelted her face or the bitter wind that whipped through her coat. Like a voice whispered to her from the grave, goose bumps broke over her skin. Fintan was in danger. She didn’t know how she knew…but she couldn’t shake the instinctual awareness.
Chapter Seventeen
Jaw clenched like an iron trap, Fintan walked through the snow toward the standing stones and the blazing fire within. Each step required monumental effort. Awakened by the Sabot’s rising hour of magic and the weakening veil between the mortal and ancestral realms, the darkness fought to keep him chained within the castle. Away from the summoned power of Nyamah’s teachings.
Away from the stronger, ruling desires of the lighter half of his soul.
Beneath his long indigo ceremonial robe, his mother’s ritual rested against his side. Hidden where Brigid, who would most certainly be attending the Imbolc ritual, couldn’t discover it. Dáire would take it with him, across the ocean, and wait for Fintan to deliver it to Beth—if he survived. Fintan didn’t believe for a moment that his sire and sister wouldn’t make an appearance tonight. That they wouldn’t extract revenge. Brigid for the physical blow he’d dealt her. Drandar for the betrayal Fintan already engaged in. His sire had waited years for opportunity, a reason to punish the children who sought his destruction.
But although Drandar’s power was immense, Fintan was no weakling. Nor were the members of his coven who gathered around the fire, drumming, chanting the ancient Selgovae melodies. They couldn’t terminate Drandar’s existence, but together, they could deal enough damage he would fade into the mists for another night.
“I can feel the rise of energy,” Andra murmured as they neared the Sacred Tree’s stump.
Fintan nodded. The surrounding buzz of summoned spirits, elementals, and nature agitated his skin. Made both halves of his soul restless. His nerves were raw, and his thoughts were becoming more and more difficult to sort. The scroll didn’t help, either. As if it recognized the Sabot as well, the contained power within the handcrafted runes burned where the leather-wrapped parchment pressed into his ribs.
Brigid would sense that power. As would Fintan’s sire. But they would have discovered the scroll tonight no matter where he tried to hide it. After they finished with him, they’d have turned the castle inside out until they found and destroyed Nyamah’s writings.
“Ah, beautiful.” Andra stopped at the arched branches that opened to the sacred circle, staring at the leaping flames, the crackling kindling gathered in the center near the ancient altar. Candles burned on the worn stone. Three long orange tapers along with a solitary ivory. In the hands of those coven members who didn’t drum, the rest of Brigid’s Imbolc candles glowed steadily, small flames that flickered in the gentle stir of a passing breeze.
The sight took Fintan back in time. Though he’d performed countless rituals here throughout the centuries, the scene he looked on now only drew him backward to the last ritual he’d witnessed with his people. The last time a Sabot had been so important.
“Fintan, you okay?” Andra peered at him in concern. “You’re as pale as the moon.”
No. He wasn’t okay. Not by any vague sense of the meaning. He felt as if he were being cleaved in half by a pair of jagged claws. Beth, the only person who could end his torment, was across an ocean. The vile thoughts of harming her continued to plague him, and he was about to confront his sire when he could barely remember the words to the ritual he’d performed for centuries. If Dáire didn’t hurry, if he failed to overcome the weather and arrive to aid Fintan, people were going to die.
He should have insisted Dáire bring Isolde.
“I’m fine. Just tired. It’s been a long day.”
Andra flashed him a grin. “Let’s finish this then, and we can end the night with Muriel’s homemade heather mead.” She took a confident step forward.
Fintan clasped her shoulder, drawing her to a halt. He couldn’t let Andra go in unprepared. The others—well, half of him didn’t give a damn. The more rational half, however, insisted he couldn’t let innocents suffer. “Andra, concentrate on the energies surrounding you.”
A blonde eyebrow arched. “Here?”
“Yes. Here.”
Obediently Andra closed her eyes and turned her focus inward. After a few quiet moments, she shuddered. When she opened her eyes, a frown darkened her usually jovial expression.
“You feel it then? The darkness looming?”
“Yeah. Whatever it is, it isn’t happy.”
Understatement of the year. “No it isn’t. Be alert. Discreetly pass the awareness. And…” He took a deep breath, exhaled hard. “Run if you must.”
The harsh lines in Andra’s forehead deepened. “Run?”
“I’ve encountered the presence before. You could say there is unfinished business between us.”
“I see.” She pursed her lips, glanced at the men and women seated inside the stones. “Are we in danger?”
Fintan stared at the altar where Brigid stood, her eyes flashing with deadly light. As her gaze met his, the fire emitted a hollow thoomph, and the flames shot toward the heavens. Sparks crackled, rained down on the altar. Warning. A promise she had not
forgiven the wound he’d dealt her.
“Yes,” he murmured.
“Then let’s begin. We are strong. Together, we can defeat it.”
Doubtful, but Andra’s confidence helped strengthen Fintan’s. He entered the circle, stopped to murmur a prayer that would seal it shut from those not already present. The last thing they needed were opportunistic negative energies latching on to Drandar and Brigid’s dark strength.
He moved to the altar, avoiding eye-contact with his sister, and braced his palms on the smooth stone. “Blessings up on all of you. We gather on this night of Imbolc to celebrate the maiden and the returning of the sun. It is a time of renewal.” Taking the central white candle, he touched the elegant flame to a stick of sandalwood and myrrh incense. “The candles you hold represent the heat and light that has been cloaked through winter. They are also fire, one of the most cleansing elements in nature. Let the flames you see tonight eradicate the darkness.”
In that moment, a sharp pain lanced through Fintan as Drandar’s presence descended around them. Raw agony drew his lungs together as his pristine spirit recoiled. The darkness, however, arced in excitement, welcoming the formidable creature it spawned from.
He clutched the altar’s edge to keep from stumbling. Whether the rest of the coven understood the vile energy or not, he couldn’t be certain, but they all shrank away from where he stood. Andra bent to a woman on her left, whispering something at her temple. The woman nodded hesitantly, then with more conviction as she drew back. Her gaze jumped to Fintan, back to Andra, before she turned to the man on her left and said something in his ear.
The man’s reaction was the same—as was every other in the glade. Fintan continued while Andra’s warning made its way around the circle. He lifted his hand to the man standing in the shadow of the westernmost monolith. “Captain.”
The man bent at the waist to pick up an iron cauldron at his feet. Solemnly, he carried it to the altar, then returned to his post, hands clasped at his waist, expression serene.
Fintan looked to the sparkling stars overhead. “Ancestors, we welcome you to join us.” Welcomed all who shared Nyamah’s purity, for they would be needed. He paused for a moment, fighting back the churning beneath his calm exterior, trying to recall what came next.
Andra moved to his side. “Come to us from the four quarters of the earth.”
Her clear, strong voice triggered Fintan’s memory, and he joined his voice with hers. “Bring your minions to these sacred stones.”
A low, malevolent laugh filled the glade. “Minions, my son? Why call upon minions when you may have the master?”
Fintan barely registered the sound of screams before white fire exploded through his ribs.
****
Beth threw open the door, her heart in her throat and hammering like she’d just run a marathon. Her feet hit the snow on Sgàil na Faileas’ driveway running. Beyond the castle’s imposing silhouette, the grove of trees that hid the standing stones glowed with orange firelight. Over the whistle of wind that swept off the mountains screams echoed.
As if she had stepped right into her nightmare.
“Beth, slow down!” Dáire called as she cut a path around the thick stone walls toward the trees.
Slow down? Never. Not after the secrets she’d learned on the agonizing hour-long return drive. They’d had plenty of time to talk. Plenty of time for Dáire to cement Fintan’s claims about their past as truth. Plenty of time for her to realize the magnanimity of his earlier remark, you’re the only one who can save him.
She didn’t know what was required or what she might find in that ancient ceremonial glade, but she knew Fintan would be there. That was all she cared about.
Behind her, Dáire’s boots crunched through the snow, long strides that grew louder as he closed the distance between them. Strong fingers latched onto her wrist, jerking her to a painful stop. “You can’t just rush in there. Drandar is here. You can’t possibly not sense him.”
Oh, she sensed him, all right. The air bore a strange energy, full of what she could only describe as…hate. But she shook her wrist free of Dáire’s tight hold. “I’ll be fine.”
A blood-curdling feminine laugh rose over the cacophony of noise. Branches snapped as someone, or something, came barreling through the overgrowth toward them. Worry settled into Dáire’s bright azure eyes. She turned her back on him and continued to pick a path through the dark forest. “We’ve got to hurry. You’ve got to hurry. The scroll’s out here too.”
“How do you know?”
She glanced over her shoulder, meeting his frown for the briefest of seconds. “I don’t know. I just do.”
Silence bonded them for a heartbeat, thick and heavy, full of comprehension neither had words for. Then with a jerky nod, Dáire cut to the right, motioning her to follow. “This way.”
Beth surrendered the lead, though impatience held her in a chokehold. Fintan, I’m coming. Doubtful he could hear her, but if he could…Maybe…
She couldn’t finish the thought. A robed man crashed onto the path in front of them, eyes widened in terror. He clutched at Beth, short nails carving half-moons into her forearm. “Turn back. The ritual…”
Beth caught Dáire’s troubled gaze over the man’s shoulder. Understanding the conflict between needing to aid this man and needing to aid his brother, she nodded permission for him to go ahead. He at least had an understanding of how to help Fintan. She would likely be just another body in the way.
She set both hands on the man’s shoulders and gave him a shake. “Listen to me.”
“The shadows, the fire...” He shook his head, panic turning his complexion a pasty shade of grey.
“Stop it!” Beth shook him again. “Go to the castle. Find the housekeeper. Tell her we’ll need towels, bandages.” A sharp scowl took root on her brow. Would Muriel understand? It didn’t matter. “Tell her she needs to turn that castle into a hospital, damn it.”
A touch of color returned to the man’s face as he swallowed. Slowly, he answered with a nod, and Beth released him. When he set off down the path once more, he no longer stumbled blindly.
Beth turned toward the ring of stones and the chaos just beyond the massive old Oak stump. Inhaling, she took a last breath of courage, said a silent prayer they’d all come out of this alive, then jogged into the grove.
Just like her dream, chaos surrounded her. Only this time, the people weren’t warring with each other. They fought to escape, their terror clouding their minds and hiding the exit that was hidden within the trees. She grabbed the first body she encountered, turned the woman around unceremoniously, and pointed at the hidden path. “Go.”
The woman didn’t delay.
As she fled, a chilling howl coursed through the night. Vile and terrifying. A malignant sound unlike any noise Beth had ever heard. Drandar.
Beth’s gaze drifted toward the center of the stones where she’d last witnessed his horrifying presence in dreams. Just like in the nightmare she couldn’t escape, Drandar stood behind the altar…only the woman at his side wasn’t blonde. Brigid’s fire-red tresses whipped wildly, mimicking the unfettered flames that snapped at overhanging boughs of pine.
Her smile was as malicious as the laughter coming from her father.
But where was Fintan? Beth frantically surveyed the glade.
Movement near the altar drew her attention to the ancient stone. No child lay broken on the surface tonight, though streams of crimson ribboned across the surface. Blood. Whose blood?
Beth’s pulse bounded. Dear God, where was Fintan?
Chapter Eighteen
Someone crashed into Beth, throwing her off balance. She stumbled sideways, out of the fleeing stream of bodies, into the open. Unable to regain her balance, she fell to one knee. Her gasp cracked in her ears as her frantic gaze landed on the man she loved. Writhing at his father’s feet, Fintan struggled to right the leg that twisted at a grotesque angle. Each twist pulled anguish from his throat, and as he ki
cked to one side, Beth’s stomach heaved. His blood flowed from the altar. Dripped down legs of stone to stain the barren earth where it pooled with the crimson that flowed from what remained of his back. A gaping hole seeped dangerously, spilling precious life. He writhed again, and through the tattered strips of clothing, bone flashed white.
A scream tore from her throat.
Drandar’s laughter ebbed. His attention locked on her. Brigid’s smile vanished, and she backed away from her father, closer to the thick trees. In that split-second of time that stretched out timelessly, Beth stared into soulless eyes and the energy in the sacred glade shifted. Brighter now. Filled with the familiar pulse of…hope. It filled her like sun breaking through a long night. Ray after ray, bit after bit, until anger replaced Beth’s fear. She didn’t know the first thing about killing demons, but those two were going to die.
“Here,” Dáire hissed at her side. “Take this. Defend yourself.” He shook a hand at her shoulder, though his attention remained on his sire.
Beth glanced at the bone-handled knife in his grasp. Firelight glinted off a long straight blade of steel. She wrapped her fingers around the handle, and memory flashed with blinding force.
Ealasaid. The altar. Her blood pooling on the stone.
Surging to her feet, Beth ran headlong at the timeworn table, barely hearing Dáire’s shout of warning. Her gaze connected with Fintan’s anguished grey eyes for a heartbeat. Then, before regret and sorrow could lodge in her heart, she blocked the sight of his suffering. As if guided by an invisible hand, she stuffed the blade between her teeth and vaulted onto the altar.
“You are a fool, mortal!” Drandar thundered. “He will live a crippled life, but you will walk with me in death.” He approached slowly, kicked Fintan in the spine. “Watch, ungrateful child, as I take her life.”
“Beth!” Dáire’s bellow blended with Fintan’s guttural whisper.
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