“Well said,” Fin murmured. “Put on your gift, as it brings your grandmother close. Branna and I will shroud the house. No eye, no ear, no mind but ours will know what we do here, say here, think here tonight.”
20
THEY USED LIGHT, NOT DARK, TO CLOAK THE COTTAGE AND ALL IN IT. If Cabhan looked, as shadow, as man, as wolf, he would see only the light, the colors, hear only music, laughter.
It would, Branna explained, bore him, or annoy him. And he would think they simply played while he plotted.
“At moonrise, on the longest day, we form the circle on the ground where Sorcha lived, and where she died.”
Candles flickered throughout the kitchen where Branna spoke. The scents of cooking, the simmering hum of the fire, the steady breaths of the dog who slept under the table all spoke of ordinary things while they talked of the extraordinary.
And that, Iona realized, was the point.
“It’s for Fin to seek him, to lure him. Blood to blood.”
“You still doubt me.”
Branna shook her head. “I don’t. Or only a little,” she admitted. “Not enough to stop doing what has to be done. What I understand is this can’t be done without you, and shouldn’t be. Isn’t that enough?”
“It’ll have to be, won’t it?”
Their eyes held, a long, long moment. In it Iona felt thousands of words, scores of impossible feelings passed between them. Only them.
“I’ll get him there,” Fin said, and broke that moment.
“Meara and Boyle must stay inside the circle—at all costs. Not just to protect yourselves.” Branna turned to them. “But to hold it strong. And Fin as well must stay within it.”
“Damned to that.”
“Fin, you must,” Branna insisted. “Within the circle he can’t use what runs in you against you, or against us. And what you have will hold it without chink.”
“Four of us outside it, against him, are stronger than three.”
Facing him, Branna lifted her hands, palms up. And the flames of every candle burned brighter. “We are the three. We are the blood, and we must be the way.”
“Within the circle I’ll stay,” Fin told her. “Until or unless I feel we’ve more chance ending him with me outside of it. It’s the best bargain I can give you.”
“We’ll take it.” Connor spoke up, shifted his gaze from Fin to Branna, left it coolly on her. “And done.”
Branna started to speak, sighed instead. “And done then.”
“We have to take our guides,” Iona realized.
“We do, yes.” Branna drew her amulet from under her sweater, ran a thumb over the carved head that so resembled Kathel’s. “Horse, hound, hawk. And weapons and tools. I have a spell I’ve worked on for some time, and I think it’s an answer, but only if we draw him to the right place, the right time. And then we’ll need his blood to seal it.”
“What spell is this?” Fin demanded.
“One I’ve worked on,” Branna repeated. “I’ve used bits of Sorcha’s spells, others that have come down, something of my own.”
“And practiced it?”
Irritation flickered over her face. “It’s too risky. If he learns of it, he can and will block against it. It must be done the first time on Sorcha’s ground. You need to trust I know what I’m about.”
“You must be trusted,” Fin repeated.
“Bloody hell.” Branna started to shove back from the table, but Iona raised a hand.
“Just wait. What kind of spell? I mean, a banishing, a drawing, a vanquishing spell? What?”
“A vanquishing, a light spell, a fire spell. All of them in one, sealed with blood magick.”
“Light defeats the dark. Fire purifies. And blood is at the heart of all.”
Branna smiled. “You learn well. But it may come to nothing if not done at the right time, at the right place. It will come to nothing if we all, each one, don’t agree and stand together, in that time and place.”
“Then we will.” Iona lifted her hands as she looked from face to face. “We all know we will. You’d do anything you could to destroy him,” she said to Fin. “For Branna, for yourself, for the rest of us. In that order. And Branna would do anything to sever whatever link he might have with you, so you’d be free of it. Connor and Meara would stand for love and friendship, for what’s right and good whatever the risk or cost. Boyle would fight because that’s how he works. You just have to say when and where, and he’d be with you. And because, whatever’s changed between him and me, he’d never want anything to happen to me. And I would never want anything to happen to him.
“For love and friendship, for family and friends, we’ll stand together in the right time, in the right place and fight with each other. Fight for each other.”
After a moment’s silence, Fin picked up the champagne he’d ignored, lifted the glass toward Iona. “All right, deirfiúr bheag. We’ll be your happy few.” He shifted toward Branna. “Trust,” he said, waited.
“Trust.” She lifted her own glass, touched it to his. In that quiet clink a spark of light flashed, then softened away.
“With that settled, let’s get down to the nitty of it then.” Connor leaned forward. “Step-by-step.”
Boyle said nothing as Branna walked them through her plan, as that plan was revised, questioned, adjusted. He said nothing because looking at Iona as she’d spoken had given him all and every answer.
He’d hold on to them until it was time to give them back to her.
* * *
SHE COUNTED DOWN THE DAYS AS MAY DRIFTED INTO JUNE, and let herself cling to each one for itself. She could prize the blue skies when she had them, welcome the rain when it fell. She came to believe that whatever happened on the longest day, she’d had these weeks, these months, and these people in her life, and so her life, even for that short time, had been richer than ever before.
She’d been given a gift and learned how to use it, how to trust and respect it.
She was, and ever would be, of the three. She was, and ever would be, a dark witch of Mayo, charged with power and with light.
She believed they would triumph, her nature demanded she believe. But that gift she’d been given demanded the respect of caution and care.
As the solstice approached, she wrote a long letter to her grandmother—pen and paper, she thought. Old-school, but it was important, felt important, to take the time, make the effort. In it she spoke of love, for her grandmother, her cousins, her friends. For Boyle, and the mistakes she’d made.
She spoke of finding herself, her place, her time, and what it meant to her to have come to Ireland. And to have become there.
She asked only one thing. If something happened, her grandmother would find the amulet, take it and Alastar, and pass them both to the next.
There would be a next if she failed. That, too, she believed absolutely.
However long it took, light would beat back the dark.
* * *
ON THE MORNING BEFORE THE SOLSTICE SHE WENT DOWN EARLY, the letter in her back pocket. She tried her hand at cooking a full breakfast fry, and though she thought she’d never be more than a half-decent cook, it didn’t mean not making the effort.
Connor walked in, sniffing the air.
“And what’s all this then?”
“We’ll be busy tomorrow, so I thought I’d take the opportunity to do it up right and spare Branna the time. She was up late again, wasn’t she?”
“Barely sleeping the past week or so, and no amount of cajoling or arguing changes it.”
“I hear her music, like last night, and it smooths me right out. She does it on purpose.”
“Claims she thinks clearer when the two of us aren’t thinking.” He snagged a sausage from the plate. “You’re worried.”
“I guess I am, now that it’s down to hours instead of days. Why aren’t you?”
“We’re meant to do what we’re doing. If something’s meant, what’s the point in worrying over it?”
For comfort, she leaned against him a moment. “You smooth me out as much as Branna’s music.”
“I have every faith. In you.” He wrapped an arm around her waist for a squeeze. “In Branna, in myself. And in all the others as well, and as much. We’ll do what’s meant, and do our best. And that’s all anyone can ever do.”
“You’re right, on all of it.” She eased away to pile a plate full for him. “I feel him lurking, don’t you? I feel him around the edges of my dreams trying to get in. He nearly does, and part of me realizes I’m allowing it. Then there’s Branna’s music, and the next I know it’s morning.”
Iona got down another plate, arranged about half as much on it as she had for Connor. “I’m going to leave this warming in the oven for Branna.”
When she turned around, Connor just wrapped his arms around her. He had, Iona thought, the most comforting way.
“There now, stop the fretting. He’s never faced the like of us three, or the three with us.”
“You’re right again. So let’s eat, then I’m going to drive to work, taking the long way for practice.”
“You’d be there in half the time if I walked you.”
“True, but I wouldn’t practice.” Or be able to stop off at the hotel, ask if they’d post her letter the next day.
She kept her eyes peeled for any trace of fog, of the black wolf, of anything that alarmed her instincts or senses. She made it to Ashford Castle without incident or accident. Really, she thought she handled the Mini, the roads, the left-hand drive very well, whatever Meara said to the contrary.
Just as she believed she handled the throbbing nerves of the waiting, of the silence, very well.
Maybe her pulse jittered every time she looked out a window of the cottage to scan forest, road, hills. Maybe she recognized the ache of stress in her back and shoulders every time she prepared to lead a group through the green shadows and thick woods.
But she continued to look from the window, continued to guide groups. And that, Iona told herself as she pulled up to the stables, counted most.
As she was the first to arrive, she opened the doors, shifted to flip on the lights.
And there in the center of the ring stood the wolf.
The doors slammed behind her; the lights flashed off. For one shocked moment, all she could see were three red glows. The wolf’s eyes, and its power stone.
They blurred when it charged.
She threw up a hand—a block, a shield. The wolf struck it with such force she felt the ground tremble. Just as she felt the cracks zig across her block like shattering glass.
She watched the shadow of its shape bunch to charge again.
She heard the cries of the horses, full of fear. And that decided her course.
As the wolf charged, she vanished the shield, jumped to the left. The momentum carried it through so it struck the doors with the force of a cannonball. When they burst open, it was Iona’s turn to charge.
She rushed out, threw the shield behind her this time. It wouldn’t get through, wouldn’t harm the horses. Bracing her feet, she prepared to protect even as the wolf circled back. Even as it rose up on two legs and became a man.