He bled, and it was Cabhan who’d drawn that blood.
“It’s an unnatural wound. I’ve studied it, if you’ll trust me.”
She laid her hand over the shallow gash, closed her eyes. She saw his hand—strong, broad, the fascinating scarred knuckles from his boxing days. The blood, and deeper, looking deeper, the thin black line of Cabhan’s poison.
Just as she’d feared.
Draw it out, she told herself. Out and away. White against black again. Light against dark. Out and away before it sank deeper, before it could spread.
She felt it go, little by little, felt it burn away. She knew by the way his hand stiffened, it caused him pain. But now the wound ran clean. Slowly, carefully, she set to the healing of the shallow gash. Now the pain—small, sharp stings were hers. But they faded, faded.
Just a scratch, as he’d said, once the poison had been drawn out.
She opened her eyes, found his on her.
“You’ve gone pale.”
“It took some doing. My first try at this kind of thing.” Her head spun a little, and her stomach did a couple of slow rolls.
But the wound was clean, and it was closed. She studied his hand, satisfied. “He used poison. I don’t know if it would’ve done anything, but it might have spread. It wasn’t much, but it’s gone now. You could have Connor take a look.”
Boyle continued to study her as he flexed his fingers. “I’d say you did well enough.”
“I don’t know if he expected me to pull you with me. And I don’t know how I did. But you told me what needed to be done. The fire. You told me, and it worked.”
“Burned him to ashes.”
“Well, wouldn’t be the first time, and I really don’t think it’s the last.”
“No, not the last of it.”
“I’d say I’m sorry I dragged you into that, but I’m awfully glad you were with me.”
“It was an experience for certain.”
One that left him shaken, and more, puzzled him. During it he’d felt such calm, and such absolute faith she would do what needed to be done.
“It seemed like a dream,” he continued, “the way your mind can be a bit slow, and you don’t question the oddities.”
“I’ll do a charm for the bed, or better, have Branna do one. It should help.”
“I hurt him.” Again, Boyle flexed his fingers. “He wasn’t expecting a punch, I’m thinking. I know when one lands well, and it did. I’m thinking as well, the poison was for you. Could I have pulled you back out, as you did me? Do you know that? And if I did that, could I have gotten you to Connor in time to deal with the poison, if I’d thought to?”
“You knew what to do.” Instinctively, she lifted her hands to rub at his shoulders, found them knotted. “You knew we needed fire, and you stayed so calm. I needed you to stay calm. I’m going to believe you’d know what to do if and when he comes at us again.”
She let out a long breath. “I’m starving. I’ll go fix breakfast.”
“I’ll do it. You’re a terrible cook.”
“That’s so entirely true. Fine, you cook. I’ll give Branna a call, tell her, just in case. Are we still on for that rambling?”
“I don’t see what this changes about it.”
“Great. I’ll grab a shower, then call Branna. It’s early, and she’ll be less cranky with another fifteen minutes’ sleep.”
“I’ll put the kettle on.”
But he picked up his phone first and, while she ran the shower, punched in Fin’s number. He’d sooner know what Fin had to say before he fried up the bacon.
15
IT WAS THE COUNTRY OF HER BLOOD, AND AS SHE WATCHED it rise and fall and spread outside the truck window, Iona understood it was the country of her heart.
It settled into her like a sip of whiskey on a cold night, warm and comforting. Green hills rolled under a sky layered with clouds, stacked like sheets of linen. The sun shimmered through them, making intermittent swirls of blue luminous as opals. Fat cows and woolly sheep dotted emerald fields bisected with rough hedgerows or silvery gray rock walls.
Farmhouses, barns, pretty little cottages scattered over the land with postcard charm as the road twisted and curved. Dooryard gardens reached for spring, with brave blooms opening in wild blues, sassy oranges, delicate whites, topped here and there by the heralding trumpets of daffodils.
She would have spring in Ireland, Iona thought, the first of a lifetime. And like those brave flowers, she determined to bloom.
The road might turn, curve out like a tunnel with high, high hedgerows of wild fuchsia hugging the sides of the twists, the turns with their blooms dripping like drops of blood. Then the world opened again to the hills, the fields, and, thrillingly, the shadows of mountains.
“How do you stand it?” Iona wondered. “Doesn’t it constantly dazzle your eyes, take your breath, make your heart ache?”
“It’s home,” Boyle said simply. “There’s nowhere I’d rather be. It suits me.”
“Oh, me, too.” And finally, she thought, she felt she suited it.
The wind kicked, and a splatter of rain struck the windshield. Then the sun ran behind it to turn the drops into tiny rainbows.
Magick, Iona thought, simple and mysterious.
As was Ballintubber Abbey.
Its clean lines lent a quiet dignity to the old gray stone. It made its home on pretty grounds backed with fields of sheep spread before the green hills, the loom of mountains.
Simple grandeur, she thought, finding the oxymoron the perfect description of the ancient and the life going quietly on around it. She climbed out of the truck to study the pathways, the gardens defying winter’s last shivers, and smiled as the breeze carried the baaing of sheep.
She thought she could sit on the grass and spend an entire day happily just looking, just listening.
“I suppose you’ll be wanting the history of the place.”
She’d read some of it in her guide, but enjoyed the idea of Boyle giving her his take.
“I wouldn’t mind.”
“Well, it was Conchobair who built it—Cathal Mor of the wine-red hand, of the O’Connor clan, so he’d be one of yours.”
“Oh. Of course.” How deep her blood ran here, she thought. And how marvelous was that? “Like Ashford, before the Burkes won it.”
“There you are. Back in 1216 it was. I know the date, as they’re after restoring the east wing, I think it is, for its eight-hundred-year celebration. And so the legend—or one of them—says while Cathal was the son of King Turloch, he was forced to flee from Turloch’s queen, and spend some time laboring and in hiding before he took the throne. And there was a man who treated him kindly, and Cathal, now king, asked him what he could do to repay him. It was a church that the man, now old, wanted, in Ballintubber, and so Cathal ordered it built.”
They walked the path as he told the tale, with his voice rising and falling on the words, the sheep baaing their chorus. Ridiculously happy, Iona took Boyle’s hand to link them, to seal the moments.
“After some years, the king saw the old man again, and was scolded for not keeping his word. It seems the church had been built right enough, but in Roscommon.”
Laughing, Iona looked up at him. “Oops.”
“So you could say. But Cathal ordered another church built, and it came to be Ballintubber Abbey.”
“A man of his word.”
“So it’s said.”
“I like knowing I have a grateful and honest king in my ancestry.”
“And it’s a lasting legacy, as it’s said to be the only church in Ireland founded by an Irish king and still in use.”
“I think that’s wonderful. People too often knock down the old for the new instead of understanding that legacy.”
“What comes before now matters,” he said simply. “Pierce Brosnan was married here a few years back, and that’s been a newer claim to fame. Older it’s the start of Tórchar Phádraig.”
“The pilgrimage route to Saint Patrick’s mountain. I’ve read about that.”
“It’s also said Seán na Sagart, who was a nefarious priest hunter, is buried in the cemetery here. There.” Boyle lifted his hand to point to a large tree. “So it’s said.”
“It’s a good place. Clean, powerful. And I feel this recognition somewhere deep, this connection. Is that weird?”
He only shrugged. “Your blood built it.”
“So you made it our first stop.” Smiling, she leaned her head against his arm. “Thanks.” She glanced down at an old, pitted stone and its carving. “The Crowning?”
“Oh well, they’ve more than the abbey, and the graves and such. That’s part of the Stations. They’ve added that, a Rosary Walk, and over there, a little cave that’s fashioned as a stable, for the Nativity. It’s a bit odd.”
“It’s wonderful.” Tugging his hand she followed the path, finding other stones and markers among the trim and pretty gardens. “It’s so abstract, so contemporary, and a really creative contrast against the antiquity.”
She paused at a little stream, its bank blanketed with low, spreading bushes as it rose to rough stones. Three crosses topped it to represent the Crucifixion.
“It should be sad, and I know it should be reverent. It is, but it’s more . . . compelling. And then this.” She stepped into the cave to look over the statues of Mary, Joseph, the Baby Jesus. “It’s wonderful, too—sweet and a little kitschy. I think Cathal would like what’s been done.”
“He’s made no objections that I know of.”
They went inside, and there she found hushed reverence.
“The Cromwellians set fire to the place,” Boyle told her. “You can see from the ruins outside the monastery that the quarters and such fell. But the church stood, and still does. The baptismal area there, they say, is a thousand years old.”
“It’s comforting, isn’t it, to know the things we build can survive. It’s beautiful. The stained glass, the stone.”
The way her footsteps echoed in the quiet only added to the atmosphere.
“You know a lot about it,” she commented. “Did you study up?”
“Didn’t have to. I had an uncle worked here on some of the repairs and improvements.”
“So my blood built it, and yours helped keep it. That’s another connection.”
“True enough. And I’ve had two cousins and a couple of mates married here, so I’ve been around and about it a few times.”
“It’s a good place for a wedding. The continuity, the care, the respect. And the romance—tales of kings and priest hunters, Cromwellians and James Bond.”
He laughed at that, but she only smiled. She felt something here. A kinship, a recognition, and now a kind of knowing.
She’d come here before, she realized, or her blood had come.
To sit, perhaps, in that quiet reverence.
“Candles and flowers, light and scent. And music. Women in pretty dresses and handsome men.” She wandered again, painting it in her mind. “A fretful baby being soothed, a shuffle of feet. Joy, anticipation, and love making a promise. Yes, it’s a good place for a wedding.”