by P. N. Elrod
"Oh, dear, did I startle you? I'm so sorry. I just thought I'd take the opportunity while that male is out of the way." A woman, dressed in period Elizabethan garb complete with green-and-gold-patterned flat-fronted corset, long row of beads, and tiny neck ruff, strode forward and grabbed my hand, hauling me to my feet. "So sorry. Not hurt? Excellent. I'm Lily Summerton. I'm so very glad to see you! You have no idea how long I've waited for someone to help me."
"Lily… Summerton?" I asked, gazing with openmouthed astonishment. "You're… you're…"
"The fabled Green Lady of Fyfe Castle, yes," she said, preening just a little as she patted her hair.
"I see. Hello. I'm Joy Randall… er…Joy St. John. You're… a ghost?"
"Yes, of course! I couldn't very well be the Green Lady if I wasn't one, now could I?"
"I suppose not."
"And you're a Beloved."
"Well, kind of. Not really. That is, I am and I'm not," I said hurriedly. "We don't actually mention the whole Beloved thing very much."
"You don't?"
"My husband gets a little bit testy when he's reminded that I was born to be the soul mate of someone else, especially when that someone is a vampire, although why he gets quite so upset is beyond me. Everything worked out wonderfully. I think it's just a territorial male thing, to be honest," I said, giving her a little smile.
She pursed her lips for a moment, looked like she was going to ask a question, then shook her head. "Where is your Dark One? That male who was just here certainly isn't he—everyone knows therians can't be Dark Ones—and I desperately need the latter. Could you summon him, please?"
"Er…" I glanced toward the door and wondered if I yelled loudly enough, if Raphael would hear me before he left the castle.
"Oh, it won't take long, I assure you," she said with a kind pat of my hands. "A half an hour at most, I promise, and then you can get back to your man. Surely you can see your way clear to helping me?"
"I'm not quite sure what it is you want me to do," I said slowly, edging toward the door.
"Oh, didn't I mention that? My memory has been shocking the last few hundred years. It's quite simple, really," she said with a bright smile. "I'd like you to curse my husband to eternal torment. I won't be able to rest until you do so."
Chapter Two
"SORRY, SWEETHEART—NO WHIPPED CREAM. THE GIFT SHOP was just closing up, but I did manage to get this before the girl left." Raphael held up ajar of clotted cream. "I know it's not the same, but perhaps you can imagine it's whipped cream. Erm… why are you still dressed? Why aren't you waiting for me naked and warm, in bed? And why are you wearing an expression of a woman who is annoyed, rather than one who is about to be pleasured from the top of her adorable head to the tips of her delectable toes?"
"—very nice, although to give the bastard credit, Alec was ahead of time so far as having a privy indoors. He had one in his bedchamber, which admittedly wasn't terribly pleasant on warm summer days, but as I spent so little time in his room… Oh. The male is back." Lily emerged from the bathroom, where she had been admiring the plumbing. She turned a cold, hard face to Raphael, her eyes narrowing for a moment. "Have we met? No, that's silly, we couldn't have. Still, you look somewhat familiar…"
"Who the hell is this?" he asked, waving the jar of clotted cream toward her. He checked, and added, " What the hell is this?"
"I could swear…" She shook her head at herself. "My imagination has been running wild of late. My name is Lily Summerton. You may refer to me as Lady Summerton. This, I take it, is your mortal husband?"
"Lily Summerton?" Raphael repeated, suspicion rife in his voice. "A… a…"
"A ghost, yes, I'm afraid she is." I slid off the bed and twined my fingers through his.
"Oh, hell, this is Christian's doing, isn't it?" he demanded.
"Is Christian your Dark One?" Lily asked me, ignoring Raphael.
"He's not her Dark One. He's got a perfectly good wife of his own! Who's going to be a widow if he doesn't keep his paws to himself—"
"Bob, calm down. Christian didn't set this up. It's just coincidence that we found a castle that was really and truly haunted."
He turned to me, his eyes a bit wild looking. "You know how I feel about all this sort of thing."
"I know," I said, squeezing his fingers again. "You don't like vampires or ghosts or anything of that ilk. But it seems that Lily has a task that must be performed before she can rest, and she's picked us to do it."
"No," he said, his expression darkening. "This is our honeymoon. We're not going to get involved with any more of your crackpot woo-woo friends."
"Crackpot!" Lily gasped.
"Sweetie, I don't think we have much of a choice," I said, pulling Raphael aside.
He glared at Lily. She glared right back at him, her arms crossed over her chest.
"We certainly do. We'll ring up Allie and have her do whatever it is she does to ghosts to get rid of them. I'll be damned if I let anyone ruin our honeymoon."
"She said she will haunt us if we don't help," I whispered, sending Lily what I hoped was a confident smile. "She said if we don't take care of a little situation concerning her mortal life, she won't give us a moment's peace."
"We'll leave, then," Raphael said loudly, hitching up his glare a notch or two. "We'll find somewhere else to stay."
"I'll find you," Lily answered unconcernedly as she examined her fingernails. "You can't hide from me, you know. No matter where you go, I'll find you. If you won't give me the peace I desire, then so shall you have none."
"Why us?" Raphael roared, seeing, as I knew he would, the inevitability of the situation.
"Your wife is a Beloved. She's the first one to come to Fyfe Castle who had the ability to help me. Now, if you're done wasting time, perhaps we can get under way?" She evidently saw the objection Raphael was about to make because she added quickly, "I have told your wife it will take only a half hour to do my bidding, after which I will happily leave you in peace."
Raphael grumbled a few things to himself, but both Lily and I thought it was best to ignore them.
"We would be happy to help you, but I'm afraid a cursing is out of the question. Not only am I opposed to cursing someone I don't know, but even if I wanted to, I wouldn't know how to go about doing it," I said.
Lily's gaze rested on Raphael for a moment. "A curse can be cast only by someone of dark origins. Most people use demons, but Dark Ones are an acceptable substitute, since they themselves are more or less cursed. Your man seems to get upset when I mention your Dark One. Why is that?"
"It's a long story, but basically, somewhere some wires were crossed because I was born a Beloved to a very nice man named Christian, but Raphael was the man I was meant to end up with." I gave Raphael a kiss on the chin.
His eyes flashed for a moment, before they narrowed again on Lily. "Not to mention the fact that Christian found a woman who wasn't born his Beloved, but she turned out to fill that role, so Joy has nothing whatsoever to do with him."
"Well, how are you going to curse Alec if you don't have a Dark One?" Lily asked, her hands fluttering in an agitated manner. "I must have reparation! I will never find my peace without it!"
"I'm sorry, but a curse is out," I said, feeling bad that we couldn't help the distraught ghost.
"So you might as well just run along and let us enjoy our honeymoon," Raphael said with an absolute dearth of tact.
"Bob!"
"What?"
I nodded toward Lily, who was now pacing back and forth, muttering to herself. "We have to help her."
"Says who?"
"Says me! We were clearly meant to help her. She said herself that we were the only ones who could do it."
Raphael grumbled again.
I put a hand on his sleeve and batted my lashes at him. "I couldn't possibly relax enough to enjoy clotted cream knowing there was a ghost around whom it was in my power to help."
His lips thinned. "You don't play fair, do you
?"
"Never have, sweetie."
"Very well." He heaved a heavy sigh and turned back to face Lily. "Right. The cursing aside, what is it you want us to do?"
"He must be destroyed. That is the only way I can have rest," Lily insisted as she continued to pace. "But how to do it, that is the problem. Oh!"
"That sounds hopeful. You thought of something?" I asked.
"I'm a lackwit," she said, slapping her forehead. "I can't believe I didn't think of this first, but it's better, so much better than just a cursing!"
"Oh?" I asked, suddenly wary. "If it's anything involving a demon—"
"No, no, I've given up on the curse idea. I have a much better one! You will destroy the stone!"
"The stone? What stone?" Raphael asked.
She stopped pacing to face us, an earnest expression on her face. "There were three stones bound to Fyfe Castle: the castle stone, representing the castle itself. That was placed into the wall of the foundation, so it will not be destroyed unless the castle is razed. The second was the lady's stone, which signified the lady of the castle. That stone Alec says was lost, but I'm not sure he didn't destroy it himself—he certainly wasn't above such an act to ensure that the women of Fyfe have naught but ill luck. The third stone, the laird's stone, is in the Stone Room. That is what you must do."
"Er… what, exactly?" I asked, confused.
"Destroy the stone, naturally!" she answered, rubbing her hands together with much pleasure. "It's only fitting! Just as Alec destroyed the lady's stone, thereby damning all ladies of the family, so now must you destroy the laird's stone. It will affect not only Alec, but all his descendants as well—a just punishment, don't you think, for a man who killed his own wife for bearing him a daughter?"
"To be honest, I don't think that's very fair," I said slowly, and to my surprise, Raphael interrupted me.
"We'll do it. Where's this laird's stone kept?"
Lily shrugged. "That I do not know. Alec would never tell me the location of the Stone Room. There was some curse on the men to keep them away from it… You'll have to ask him for that information."
"But—," I started to protest.
Raphael clamped a hand over my mouth, and hustled me out of the room before I could say anything.
"Don't let Alec bully you!" Lily called from the bedroom. "Be firm with him!"
"Why all of a sudden are you so hot and bothered to help her?" I asked a moment later as we hurried down the hall.
"It's like you said—the sooner we help her, the sooner she'll go away and leave us alone to enjoy our clotted creamapalooza. Where did she say we'd find her husband?"
"The long gallery, which is evidently on the ground floor, or the stable yard, or possibly the dining hall. But sweetie, we can't destroy the laird's stone, not if it will affect a bunch of innocent people!"
"Who says it will?" Raphael flashed a quick grin. "Fiona said the family line had died out, so there won't be any descendants to harm, in addition to which, I don't believe at all that a stone has anything to do with people's health and happiness. So we'll just find this stone, drop it into the moat, tell her the job is done, and our way will be clear to enjoying our honeymoon."
"I don't know. I don't think it's going to be a good idea to mess with something so historic," I said.
"You worry too much. Everyone concerned is dead already, aren't they? It's not like there's anything we can do to hurt them now."
I held my tongue, but I wasn't so sure on that subject. Allie, a woman who had made her living summoning and releasing ghosts before she met Christian the sexy vampire, had told me that ghosts could be bound to a spot, but since Lily and assumedly her husband were already stuck at the castle, it didn't seem like breaking a stone would change their status.
"I don't see why she couldn't come with us to find him," Raphael muttered as we hurried down the pinwheel stone staircase.
"She said she doesn't go down where her husband roams. I can't say I blame her, given what he did to her. Have you ever heard of the word 'therian'? As applied toward a person, that is?"
"Therian?" Raphael thought for a moment before shaking his head. "It's Greek for 'wild animal.' I can't imagine it being applied to a person—good Lord!"
A woman's scream rent the night, coming from the floor below us. Raphael dropped my hand and dashed down the stairs. I hurried after him, slipped on the highly polished wooden floor, and ended up falling against him where he stood in the middle of a long hallway, his hands on his hips. Despite the fact that my mother describes me as being built like a brick house, Raphael didn't budge when I slammed into him.
"Who is it?" I asked, collecting myself enough to peer around him.
His indignant snort told me everything I needed to know. A moment later, a woman's scream echoed down the long passage, but this time, it was followed by feminine giggles and, "Stop it! Ye're goin' to make me wet myself if ye keep ticklin' me that way! Alec, stop! Nay, ye mustn't!"
Although the hallway was lit with night-lights at either end, there was sufficient illumination from outside to highlight the two nearly translucent figures that came down the hallway toward us. In the lead was a woman with her skirts hitched up and breasts almost wholly out of her corset, her hair tousled halfway out of her French hood, and bare legs flashing as she barreled down on us. In close pursuit was a bearded man clad in a flapping linen shirt and pair of breeches. "Run from me, will ye, ye lusty vixen? Ye'll not be escapin' me that easily!"
The look on Raphael's face was not welcoming, but it was no cause for the woman racing toward us to shriek loud enough to wake the dead. So to speak.
"Lord bless me!" she gasped as she caught sight of us. She came to an immediate stop, her hands on her cheeks for a moment before squeaking and hurriedly rearranging her breasts back into her corset. "Hsst! Alec! We're havin' visitors!"
"Aye, I see them." The ghost who was evidently Lily's husband cleared his throat, puffed out his chest, and strode toward us in a haughty manner. "I am Lord Summerton. By what right do you come to my home and stare at my wife?"
"I have my own wife to ogle, thank you," Raphael said stiffly. "Perhaps if you kept yours confined rather than let her run the hallways half-naked—"
Sir Alec had been in a stretch of shadow, but as he stopped in front of us, he was lit by both the outside light shining through the window, and the slightly orange glow of a security night-light.
My jaw dropped as I got a good look at Sir Alec. "Holy Moses! Raphael, do you see that?"
"By the saints!" Sir Alec said at the same time, his eyes wide as he stared at Raphael.
"Ooh," breathed the disheveled woman. She looked from one man to the other. " 'Tis like seein' twins!"
"My boy!" Sir Alec shouted, enveloping Raphael in a bear hug.
Chapter Three
"ERM…" RAPHAEL WAS OBVIOUSLY TOO DISCONCERTED BY THE fact that he was being hugged by an Elizabethan ghost to rally much along conversational lines. "Do I know you?"
"Ye're the very image of me when I was a lad," Sir Alec answered. "Ye can be no other but the spawn of my loins!"
"Didn't you say you had Scottish ancestry?" I asked Raphael as I continued to marvel at the ghost. He had a beard, but it was close-cropped enough to make out the shape of his jaw. He had the same stubborn chin as Raphael, the same strong jaw, wide brow, and brown curly hair. Even their eyes were the same, a tawny amber that I knew could glow with molten heat, or glitter with cold intent.
"Yes, but way back. My mother's family. They weren't named Summerton, though."
"Ye've the look of me! Of course ye're my kin!" Sir Alec crowed, giving Raphael another hug. "Grizel, 'tis one of my descendants, come back to the ancestral home!"
"How d'ye do," the woman answered, bobbing a little curtsy at us. "Pleasure to meet ye."
"You, I take it, are Sir Alec's second wife?" I asked. Grizel nodded, a faint blush visible on her cheeks despite the dim light and her transparency. I eyed her curiously, expecting to see a
much harsher woman, the type who wouldn't mind coming between a man and his wife. But this woman was fresh-faced, bearing an air of innocence that made me wonder if Lily had told me everything.
"This lovely is Grizel, the light of my heart," Sir Alec said proudly, wrapping his arm around her and hauling her up to his side. "She's not related to ye, though, more's the pity. I only had one brat, and she was off the she-witch who was my first wife."
His expression turned sour as he spoke. Grizel elbowed him, whispering, " 'Tis not fittin' to speak ill of the dead, husband."
Sir Alec suddenly grinned, making my knees wobble for a moment, so similar a sight was it. "That'd be us as well, ye daft hen!"
"Oh, aye," she giggled. "I'm ever forgettin' that."
"She's soft on the eye, but a bit light in the head," Sir Alec said fondly, giving his wife a squeeze to take the sting out of the comment. "Now then, ye'll be wantin' to have a tour of the castle, won't ye? I'll be happy to show it all to ye… all but the Stone Room."
"Oh?" Raphael and I exchanged glances. I cleared my throat. "Er… why not the Stone Room?"
Sir Alec shot me a sharp look. "The laird's stone is there. The stone was cursed centuries ago, and so long as it's kept in peace, so will be the happiness of the men of Fyfe."
"But we're not from Fyfe," I argued.
"He's the spittin' image of me!" Alec said, nodding toward Raphael. "I cannot allow him into the Stone Room. 'Twould be a great danger."
"How so?" I asked as we started down the hall.
" 'Tis the curse, lass. The Thane of Fyfe shadowed be, thrice around the stone bound; in its light, the devil can see, and the beast within be found."
"What does that mean?" Raphael asked, frowning as he tried to puzzle it out.
"Any man of Fyfe who sets his hands upon the stone will be forever changed," Alec answered with a meaningful look.
"Oh? What about the women?" I asked.
He shrugged. "Only the lady's stone affects them, and even if the laird's stone would, they don't know where the Stone Room is. It's a secret room, ye ken, its location told only to the ruling master of Fyfe and his heir."
