“The Celtic gods, Gwydion and Arawn?” Breath whooshed out of her, making a hissing noise. The car swerved, narrowly missing colliding with another one, and a hellacious blatting filled the air.
Her next words sounded thin, strained. “Surely you must be talking about men like yourself. Others who were trapped in the same time warp that snared you. You couldn’t mean the warrior magician and god of the dead.”
“What the hell was that hideous noise?” Lachlan stared out the car’s windows.
“Just the other guy’s horn. I pissed him off, and he honked at us. It’s nothing. Go on.”
“Aye, I did mean the Celtic gods, but Gwydion is better known as a master enchanter. In any event, Rhukon and Connor—and their dragons—joined forces with the Morrigan. Do ye know who she is, lass?”
Maggie nodded. “The Battle Crow. She’s like a goddess of war or something.”
Lachlan took a measured breath. “The Morrigan feeds off energy from the dead and dying. She wanted more battles. Bloodier ones. Rhukon and Connor simply wished to rule the world. To do that, they’ve made things so unpleasant for other dragons that many retreated to Fire Mountain.”
Maggie swallowed, the muscles beneath her jaw working. “You said this Fire Mountain place is somewhere outside of time, so I guess it’s not on Earth.”
“Nay, lass, ’tisn’t.”
She cleared her throat. “Recapping here. There’s a black dragon, and a red one—both shifters—and the Celtic Battle Crow?”
He nodded. “Arawn and Gwydion intimated there might be other dragon shifter-mage partnerships that have shaded into darkness.”
“Oh.”
Lachlan kept his gaze on Maggie. The lass looked battle-shocked. “Was aught I said unclear?” he asked softly.
She shook her head. “I feel like I fell asleep and woke up in a fairy tale—and not a very nice one. We’re nearly at the hospital. Maybe you should come in with me. You could wait in the lounge. We have a security team in house.”
“I’ll be better off out of doors, lass. I can make myself invisible.”
“You can?” Her voice cracked. “Sorry. That shouldn’t surprise me. Not really. Hell, Grannie can do that.” She maneuvered the car beneath a sign that said Physician’s Parking. “I won’t be long.”
Lachlan wrapped a hand around her wrist. He reached across her body with his other hand and turned her head so she had to look at him. “I know ’tisn’t easy, but doona be afraid, lass. There hasna been a chance to speak of this, but we, ye and I, hold a power betwixt us strong enough to unravel the Morrigan’s plans.”
She gazed at him out of her beautiful, blue eyes, looking troubled. “I had more-or-less figured that out on my own. Something cut me off from my dreams from the time I came to Scotland—”
“Why did ye come here, lass?”
“I—” She captured her lower lip between her teeth and shut her eyes. When she opened them, she met his gaze evenly. “I don’t have a good answer for you. Something—God only knows what—compelled me to apply for the rural psychiatry fellowship advertised at the hospital here. Even at the time, I knew it was a bad career move. I was done with residency and had received several attractive job offers, offers that wouldn’t still be there a year later, once I was done with the fellowship.”
“Yet ye came anyway.”
Maggie nodded. “It was what I had to do. I tried to explain what I was feeling to my grandmother. She started to tell me something but never did.”
Understanding raced through him like a lightning bolt. “Aye. Ye came here to find me. Somehow your grandmother must’ve realized that.” Two white-coated physicians waltzed past. Both stared frankly into the car. Lachlan glared back. “I could show them a thing or two about manners. Young pups without even so much as a ribbon to denote their clan.”
“Not a good idea. It’ll draw attention you don’t want.” She pulled away from him. “Look, I really do have to check on my patient. Don’t do anything foolish. I need you to be here when I get back.”
“Doona worry, lass. I willna stray far from your side again. Ever.”
****
Maggie got out of the car. Rather than his spoken words, the ones she’d heard him say in her dream rang in her mind. I was born loving you, and I will die loving you. Before she shut the door, she bent her head and said, “I don’t know what this thing between us is, but I want to live long enough to find out.”
“That makes two of us.” He smiled softly. “Go. The sooner ye go, the sooner we can move on to what we must do next.”
“Good that he seems to know what that is,” she muttered half to herself as she strode toward the hospital door. She keyed in the code and pushed her way inside. Maggie jogged down the hall, anxious to discharge her duty to her patient and do what she could to soothe Berta and the other nursing staff. It seemed odd they’d be so upset about a suicide attempt. After all, they worked in a mental health unit.
Maybe it’s not like it is in the States. Perhaps suicide’s not quite so commonplace here.
Maggie thought about it. Inverness was fairly rural. While the big, urban areas, like Glasgow and Edinburgh, likely saw their share of suicides, there were probably fewer of them here.
She took a hard left into the ICU. It was a small unit, and she located Chris immediately. Maggie picked up his chart—this hospital was years from an electronic records conversion—and glanced at his vitals. She blew out a tense breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding. He was stable and improving. From the looks of things, if they withdrew the IV sedative, he’d regain consciousness.
Maggie pulled up a chair and took Chris’s hand. She bent her head and spoke low near his ear. “I’m not certain if you can hear me, but maybe you’ll be able to. What you did upset the nurses. They care about you. So do I. We’ll be discontinuing the drug keeping you asleep. When you come around, we’ll get your family in here, and we’ll all put our heads together and decide what will work best. I promise you that you’ll have a say in things.”
“Now why would you tell him that?” a male voice said.
Maggie whipped her head around. She got to her feet and turned to face Dr. Frank MacDuff, chief of the psychiatry service. In his late fifties, he had a full head of steel-gray hair, sharp blue eyes, and a rangy build. Like most native Scotsmen, he had well-defined cheekbones and an angular jaw. Though he usually preferred dress shirts and slacks, today he wore green scrubs and a white lab coat with the hospital’s insignia on its collar.
“Let’s talk in the lounge,” she suggested.
“No need for that. He’s the only patient here, and he’s unconscious.”
Maggie latched a hand through the other doctor’s arm and pulled him away from Chris’s bed. “Research suggests patients can hear when they’re comatose,” she hissed into Dr. MacDuff’s ear.
“Aye, I read that paper, too. Never put much stock in it.”
“Humor me.” She tried a fetching smile and didn’t point out that it had been far more than a single paper promulgating that finding. “Come on.” She tugged again.
“For a bonny lass, anything.”
Maggie would’ve rolled her eyes, but things were going well, and she didn’t want to rock the boat. As they walked to the physicians’ lounge, she asked, “What’s your suicide rate here?”
“Very few. Less than half a dozen each year.”
“No wonder Berta was so upset.” Maggie went through the door into the lounge and straight to the teapot. She poured herself a cup. “Would you like one?”
He nodded. They took their tea and settled across from one another in the rather spartan lounge. Medical reference books lined one wall. The floor was linoleum and the walls an industrial green. The ever-present scent of antiseptic was just as strong in here as it was in the wards.
“Were you the one on duty last night when he was found?” Maggie asked.
“Aye, and I’ve talked with his two sisters. They can’t handle him at home. Oh,
they say he’s fine enough if he’s sober. Problem is he’s rarely that way anymore.”
“I see.” Maggie sensed a fait accompli and trod lightly. “What did you work out with them?”
“There’s an establishment not far from their community in Fort William that caters to men with bipolar disorder and drinking problems. Everyone is in agreement—”
“Except me. I’m his attending, and I didn’t know.” Maggie couldn’t help herself. Outrage flooded her.
“Dr. Hibbins.”
Oh-oh. Maggie recognized that tone. It was the I’ve-been-a-doctor-for-longer-than-you’ve-been-alive one. “Yes, sir.” She looked away, so she wouldn’t seem too argumentative.
“Better,” he snapped. “You might want to take a few days off. I’m certain you’ll be feeling more…rational once you’ve had a chance to rest up. I took a look at your timesheets. You haven’t taken as much as a long weekend off since you came to work for us.”
“Really? I wasn’t aware of that. It’s just there’s so much to learn and I—”
“Americans,” he cut in, his tone making it clear just what he thought of people from the States. “Always so driven. You need perspective, Dr. Hibbins.”
“Maybe you’re right,” she murmured. “I’ll just check in with the nurses because I promised, and then I’ll take the rest of the week off.”
“Perfect.” He beamed, ill-humor apparently forgotten. “I knew you’d come to your senses. You’re just tired. It’s why you’re wound so tight. My dear.” He leaned forward and laid a hand on her knee. “I know just the antidote to physician burnout. Have dinner with me tonight.”
Crap! Just what I need, a middle-aged lothario. But I can’t piss him off, either.
“Thanks for caring about me, Doctor—” She moved his hand off her leg.
“Frank, call me Frank.”
Maggie dredged a smile from somewhere. “Sure, Frank. I think I caught a bit of food poisoning yesterday. I was up most of the night, and I’m still feeling a bit under the weather. I’d planned to stop by here, catch a few hours’ sleep, and then drive to Glasgow. My grandmother is arriving on an early morning flight.”
“Excellent. You have family coming to visit. Another perfectly despicable American trait—estrangement from blood kin. Maybe once you bring her to Inverness, you could be my guests for supper.”
“Let’s give her a chance to get over jet lag, first.” Maggie stood. “If there’s nothing else, I’d like to stop by and see the nurses.”
“Go on, Maggie. Enjoy your time away.”
“Thank you, sir, er, Frank.” She scuttled out of the doctors’ lounge, so anxious to get away from Frank MacDuff, she could almost taste the relief once she escaped. She’d thought he had designs on her, but thank Christ he kept them under wraps.
Until now.
Look, she spoke sternly to herself as she walked briskly toward the psychiatric unit, whether I complete this fellowship isn’t even marginally important. I can always show up from my few days’ vacation, give them thirty days’ notice, and quit.
Chapter Eight
Lachlan sank back against the cramped seats in Maggie’s car. At first he warded himself, and then he extended his enchantment to include the car, casting a don’t look here spell. He’d have to keep an eye out for Maggie’s return. If he didn’t loosen his spell, she might think her car had been nabbed.
“We must speak with other dragons who returned to Fire Mountain,” Kheladin said, his voice a quiet rumble in Lachlan’s mind. “The ones here on Earth and on other worlds as well.”
“I agree. Other tasks take precedence, though. Ye heard the discussion with Gwydion and Arawn.”
“Aye, but I dinna agree with much of it.”
Lachlan shook his head. The dragon was willful and headstrong, yet he had a pure heart and a generous soul. “If we canna get this problem with Rhukon, the Morrigan, and the red wyvern—Connor—well in hand, ’twould be an excellent time to call on your kin for assistance.”
“We could live in Fire Mountain. Gwydion told us other dragon shifters went there with their dragons.”
Lachlan’s eyes widened. That option hadn’t even occurred to him, though he’d certainly heard what Gwydion said. While Lachlan had traveled outside the British Isles, so far as he was concerned the Scottish Highlands were his home. Despite their current level of contamination with modernity, he had no desire to leave. Because he didn’t want to hurt Kheladin’s feelings, he said, “Aye, ’tis a possibility. At the verra least, we could plan a visit.”
A long silence ensued. Lachlan gave the dragon space. When he finally spoke, he said. “I’d like that. Ye willna forget?” Kheladin’s fretful tone didn’t sound at all like him.
“Nay. I promise. If there’s a way for us to visit Fire Mountain, I shall do everything in my power to make certain it happens. In the meantime, surely we can locate dragons who havena been tainted by evil on this side of the time veil.”
“If they’re here, they’re well hidden,” Kheladin groused.
Lachlan inhaled through his mouth, tasting the air. It held a metallic undercurrent that stung his nose and dried his throat. Without fully understanding the why of things, he thought about what Gwydion and Arawn had shared. The conversation was brief, but they’d hit a few salient points. Water was fast disappearing from many places on Earth, and species were dying every day. Manmade chemicals were well on their way to poisoning the oceans and the air. Brighid, Danu, and Ceridwen, most powerful of the Celtic goddesses, were so furious, they’d washed their hands of humans.
Lachlan shook his head. How could things have gone to hell in so little time? Humans had been around for thousands of years. According to Gwydion, it took less than a hundred to wreak the current disaster.
’Twas the Morrigan’s prodding. She thrives on chaos. Rhukon and Connor are merely bit players she snared to move her scheme forward.
Lachlan ground his teeth together. He could just see Rhukon and the Morrigan chortling with delight over the disaster they’d created, with Connor cheering from the sidelines.
According to Arawn, humans had welcomed one convenience after another into their lives, apparently not paying one whit of attention that all their labor-saving amenities were destroying Earth. Lachlan felt infuriated and incredulous by turns. Had men turned into such stupid fools they’d sully the very ether that sustained them? His hands were fisted so tightly they ached. He stretched out his fingers to get circulation back into them and thought about the rest of what the Celts told him.
With Rhukon and Connor by her side, the Morrigan was in her element during various wars riddling Europe, Asia, the States, and the Middle East. Flitting from battle to battle in her crow form, she’d positively glowed as blood dripped from her beak and feathers.
Long ago, Arawn and she had an alliance. It was a logical coalition since she chose who was to die in battle, and he was god of the dead. Lachlan asked Arawn about it, but the god waved him to silence, saying, “The partnership has eroded beyond hope of repair.”
Lachlan took stock. The world was in serious trouble. In a large part, it was a result of Rhukon, Connor, and the Morrigan. For some curious reason, no one opposed their efforts to sow disorder. He asked the Celts why the gods hadn’t stepped in. Gwydion raised a bushy brow and reminded him, “We doona trouble ourselves with mortal concerns.”
“Even if the world is at stake?” Lachlan asked, finding it hard to believe they’d turn a cold eye in the face of such a major disaster.
“Even if,” Arawn concurred. “We can always retreat to the Dreaming. Some Celts already have.”
Probably egged on by the Morrigan—or maybe because he was feeling invincible—Rhukon finally made a significant error. In dragon form, he’d rained fire on a gathering of the Celtic Gods. They fought back, driving both black wyvern and red from the skies, but they hadn’t been able to capture them once the Morrigan flapped her way into the melee.
Aye, ’twas only then, when Rhuk
on was hard pressed, that he withdrew power from the magic keeping Kheladin and me ensorcelled.
Lachlan knit his brows together. He’d give a lot to know which god or goddess was behind making certain Maggie got to Scotland. Mayhap not a god. Perhaps ’twas that witchy ancestry of hers. Magic-wielding humans all had agendas, and their magic had a mind of its own. Sometimes everything meshed. More frequently, the witches, druids, and human magicians ended up at cross purposes.
He rolled first one shoulder and then the other. The car was deucedly uncomfortable, and it was becoming unpleasantly warm from sun reflecting off its glass. He craned his neck and looked out all the windows. The parking area appeared empty. He spoke a word to sever his spell, making certain no one saw Maggie’s car appear where nothing had been seconds before. Manipulating the door handle, he got out and stretched to his full height. Even if the air stung his lungs, it was still better than being folded like a child’s doll in a metal box.
A few trees grew next to the building Maggie had disappeared into. He walked over to them and laid his hand on a large ash’s trunk. The tree sang into his mind, grateful for the touch of one with earth magic. Lachlan let his thoughts drift to Maggie. Heat flared in his loins, mingled with tenderness and a savage protectiveness. He’d never met a lass such as her. Women from his own time were more…submissive to men’s suggestions.
The way Maggie gazed right at him—and broke in whenever she wanted to say something—made him proud of her mettle. The lass must be made of steel to survive a dream visitation from Rhukon. Doubtless, the black wyvern had planned to enter her dream and shanghai her.
What happened? How did she fight him off?
“Hey!” Maggie’s voice trilled from behind him. “I thought you were going to wait in the car. I nearly had a heart attack when I got there, and you weren’t in it.”
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