Authors: Nora Roberts
S
HADOWS
and shapes and murmuring voices. They swirled in her head, swelling, fading in a cycle of confusion.
Even when she opened her eyes, they were there. Revolving. What? was her only thought. What is it?
She was cold and wet, and every part of her was a separate ache. An accident. Of course, an accident. But…
What is it?
She focused and saw overhead, high overhead, a curved ceiling where plaster faeries danced among ribbons of flowers. Odd, she thought. How odd and lovely. Dazed, she lifted a hand to her brow, felt the damp. Thinking it blood, she let out a gasp, tried to sit up.
Her head spun like a carousel.
“Uh-oh.” Trembling now, she looked at her fingers and saw only clear rainwater.
And, turning her head, saw him.
First came the hard jolt of shock, like a vicious strike to the heart. She could feel panic gathering in her throat and fought to swallow it.
He was staring at her. Rudely, she would think later when fear had made room for annoyance. And there was anger in his eyes. Eyes as green as the rain-washed hills of Ireland. He was all in black. Perhaps that was why he looked so dangerous.
His face was violently handsome—“violent” was the word that kept ringing in her ears. Slashing cheekbones, lancing black brows, a fierce frown on a mouth that struck her as brutal. His hair was as dark as his clothing and fell in wild waves nearly to his shoulders.
Her heart pounded, a primal warning. Even as she shrank back, she gathered the courage to speak. “Excuse me. What is it?”
He said nothing. Had been unable to speak since he’d lifted her off the floor. A trick, a new torment? Was she, after all, only a dream within a dream?
But he’d felt her. The cold damp of her flesh, the weight and the shape of her. Her voice came clear to him now, as did the terror in her eyes.
Why should she be afraid? Why should she fear when she had unmanned him? Five hundred years of solitude hadn’t done so, but this woman had accomplished it with one quick stroke.
He stepped closer, his eyes never leaving her face. “You are come. Why?”
“I…I don’t understand. I’m sorry. Do you speak English?”
One of those arching brows rose. He’d spoken in Gaelic, for he most often thought in the language of his life. But five hundred years of alone had given him plenty of time for linguistics. He could certainly speak English, and half a dozen other languages besides.
“I asked why you have come.”
“I don’t know.” She wanted to sit up but was afraid to try it again. “I think there must have been an accident. I can’t quite remember.”
However much it might hurt to move, she couldn’t stay flat on her back looking up at him. It made her feel foolish and helpless. She set her teeth, pushed herself up slowly. Her stomach pitched, her head rang, but she managed to sit.
And sitting, glanced around the room.
An enormous room, she noted, and filled with the oddest conglomeration of furnishings. There was an old and beautiful refectory table that held dozens of candlesticks. Silver, wrought iron, pottery, crystal. Pikes were crossed on the wall, and near them was a dramatic painting of the Cliffs of Moher.
There were display cabinets from various eras. Charles II, James I. Neoclassic bumped up against Venetian, Chippendale against Louis XV. An enormous big-screen television stood near a priceless Victorian davenport.
Placed at random were Waterford bowls, T’ang horses, Dresden vases, and…several PEZ dispensers.
Despite discomfort, the eccentricity tickled her humor. “What an interesting room.” She glanced up at him again. He’d yet to stop staring. “Can you tell me how I got here?”
“You came.”
“Yes, apparently, but how? And…I seem to be very wet.”
“It’s raining.”
“Oh.” She blew out a breath. The fear had ebbed considerably. After all, the man collected Pez dispensers and Georgian silver. “I’m sorry, Mister…”
“I’m Flynn.”
“Mister Flynn.”
“Flynn,” he repeated.
“All right. I’m sorry, Flynn, I can’t seem to think very clearly.” She was shivering, violently now, and wrapped her arms around her chest. “I was going somewhere, but…I don’t know where I am.”
“Who does?” he murmured. “You’re cold.” And he’d done nothing to tend to her. He would see to her comfort, he decided, and then…He would simply see.
He scooped her off the couch, faintly irritated when she pushed a hand against his shoulder defensively.
“I’m sure I can walk.”
“I’m more sure I can. You need dry clothes,” he began as he carried her out of the room. “A warm brew and a hot fire.”
Oh, yes, she thought. It all sounded wonderful. Nearly as wonderful as being carried up a wide, sweeping staircase as if she weighed nothing.
But that was a romantic notion of the kind her mother lived on, the kind that had no place here. She kept that cautious hand pressed to a shoulder that felt like a sculpted curve of rock.
“Thank you for…” She trailed off. She’d turned her head just a fraction, and now her face was close to his, her eyes only inches from his eyes, her mouth a breath from his mouth. A sharp, unexpected thrill stabbed clean through her heart. The strike was followed by a hard jolt that was something like recognition.
“Do I know you?”
“Wouldn’t you have the answer to that?” He leaned in, just a little, breathed. “Your hair smells of rain.” Even as her eyes went wide, he skimmed his mouth from her jawline to her temple. “And your skin tastes of it.”
He’d learned to savor over the years. To sip even when he wished to gulp. Now he considered her mouth, imagined what flavors her lips would carry. He watched them tremble open.
Ah, yes.
He shifted her, drawing her ever so slightly closer. And she whimpered in pain.
He jerked back, looked down and saw the raw scrape just below her shoulder, and the tear in her sweater. “You’re injured. Why the bloody hell didn’t you say so before?”
Out of patience—not his strong suit in any case—he strode into the closest bedchamber, set her down on the side of the bed. In one brisk move he tugged the sweater over her head.
Shocked, she crossed her arms over her breasts. “Don’t you touch me!”
“How can I tend your wounds if I don’t touch you?” His brows had lowered, drawn together. She was wearing a bra. He knew they were called that, as he’d seen them worn on the television and in the thin books that were called magazines.
But it was the first time he had witnessed an actual female form so attired.
He liked it very much.
But such delights would have to wait until he saw what condition the woman was in. He leaned over, unhooked her trousers.
“Stop it!” She shoved, tried to scramble back and was hauled not so gently into place.
“Don’t be foolish. I’ve no patience for female flights. If I was after ravishing you, t’would already be done.” Since she continued to struggle, he heaved a breath and looked up.
It was fear he saw—not foolishness but raw fear. A maiden, he thought. For God’s sake, Flynn, have a care.
“Kayleen.” He spoke quietly now, his voice as soothing as balm on a burn. “I won’t harm you. I only want to see where you’re hurt.”
“Are you a doctor?”
“Certainly not.”
He seemed so insulted, she nearly laughed.
“I know of healing. Now be still. I ought to have gotten you out of your wet clothes before.” His eyes stayed on hers, seemed to grow brighter. And brighter still, until she could see nothing else. And she sighed. “Lie back now, there’s a lass.”
Mesmerized, she lay on the heaps of silk pillows and, docile as a child, let him undress her.
“Sweet Mary, you’ve legs that go to forever.” His distraction with them caused the simple spell to waver, and she stirred. “A man’s entitled to the view,” he muttered, then shook his head. “Look what you’ve done to yourself. Bruised and scraped one end to the other. Do you like pain, then?”
“No.” Her tongue felt thick. “Of course not.”
“Some do,” he murmured. He leaned over her again. “Look at me,” he demanded. “Look here. Stay.”
Her eyes drooped, half closed as she floated where he wanted, just above the aches. He wrapped her in the quilt, flicked his mind toward the hearth and set the fire roaring.
Then he left her to go to his workshop and gather his potions.
H
E
kept her in the light trance as he tended her. He wanted no maidenly fidgets when he touched her. God, it had been so long since he’d touched a woman, flesh against flesh.
In dreams he’d had her under him, her body eager. He’d laid his lips on her, and his mind had felt her give and arch, her rise, her fall. And so his body had hungered for her.
Now she was here, her lovely skin bruised and chilled.
Now she was here, and didn’t know why. Didn’t know him.
Despair and desire tangled him in knots.
“Lady, who are you?”
“Kayleen Brennan.”
“Where do you come from?”
“Boston.”
“That’s America?”
“Yes.” She smiled. “It is.”
“Why are you here?”
“I don’t know. Where is here?”
“Nowhere. Nowhere at all.”
She reached out, touched his cheek. “Why are you sad?”
“Kayleen.” Overcome, he gripped her hand, pressed his lips to her palm. “Do they send you to me so I might know joy again, only to lose it?”
“Who are ‘they’?”
He lifted his head, felt the fury burn. So he stepped away and turned to stare into the fire.
He could send her deeper, into the dreaming place. There she would remember what there was, would know what she knew. And would tell him. But if there was nothing in her, he wouldn’t survive it. Not sane.
He drew a breath. “I will have my week,” he vowed. “I will have her before it’s done. This I will not cast off. This I will not abjure. You cannot break me with this. Not even with her can you break Flynn.”
He turned back, steady and resolved again. “The seven days and seven nights are mine, and so is she. What remains here at the last stroke of the last night remains. That is the law. She’s mine now.”
Thunder blasted like cannon shot. Ignoring it, he walked to the bed. “Wake,” he said, and her eyes opened and cleared. As she pushed herself up, he strode to a massive carved armoire, threw the doors open, and selected a long robe of royal blue velvet.
“This will suit you. Dress, then come downstairs.” He tossed the robe on the foot of the bed. “You’ll want food.”
“Thank you, but—”
“We’ll talk when you’ve supped.”
“Yes, but I want—” She hissed in frustration as he walked out of the room and shut the door behind him with a nasty little slam.
Manners, she thought, weren’t high on the list around here. She dragged a hand through her hair, stunned to find it dry again. Impossible. It had been dripping wet when he’d brought her up here only moments before.
She combed her fingers through it again, frowning. Obviously she was mistaken. It must have been all but dry. The accident had shaken her up, confused her. That was why she wasn’t remembering things clearly.
She probably needed to go to a hospital, have X rays taken. Though a hospital seemed silly, really, when she felt fine. In fact, she felt wonderful.
She lifted her arms experimentally. No aches, no twinges. She poked gingerly at the scrape. Hadn’t it been longer and deeper along her elbow? It was barely tender now.
Well, she’d been lucky. And now, since she was starving, she’d take the eccentric Flynn up on a meal. After that, her mind was bound to be steadier, and she’d figure out what to do next.
Satisfied, she tossed the covers back. And let out a muffled squeal. She was stark naked.
My God, where were her clothes? She remembered, yes, she remembered the way he’d yanked her sweater off, and then he’d…Damn it. She pressed a trembling hand to her temple.
Why
couldn’t she remember? She’d been frightened, she’d shoved at him, and then…then she’d been wrapped in a blanket, in a room warmed by a blazing fire and he’d told her to get dressed and come down to dinner.
Well, if she was having blackouts, the hospital was definitely first on the agenda.
She snatched up the robe. Then simply rubbed the rich fabric over her cheek and moaned. It felt like something a princess would wear. Or a goddess. But certainly nothing that Kayleen Brennan of Boston would slip casually into for dinner.
This will suit you, he’d said. The idea of that made her laugh, but she slid her arms into it and let herself enjoy the lustrous warmth against her skin.
She turned, caught her own reflection in a cheval glass. Her hair was a tumble around the shoulders of the deep blue robe that swept down her body and ended in a shimmer of gold lace at the ankles.
I don’t look like me, she thought. I look like something out of a fairy tale. Because that made her feel foolish, she turned away.
The bed she’d lain in was covered with velvet as well and lushly canopied with more. On the bureau, and certainly that was a Charles II in perfect condition, sat a lady’s brush set of silver with inlays of lapis, antique perfume bottles of opal and of jade. Roses, fresh as morning and white as snow, stood regally in a cobalt vase.
A fairy tale of a room as well, she mused. One fashioned for candlelight and simmering fires. There was a Queen Anne desk in the corner, and tall windows draped in lace and velvet, pretty watercolors of hills and meadows on the walls, lovely faded rugs over the thick planked floors.
If she’d conjured the perfect room, this would have been it.
His manners might be lacking, but his taste was impeccable. Or his wife’s, she corrected. For obviously this was a woman’s room.
Because the idea should have relieved her, she ignored the little sinking sensation in her belly and satisfied her curiosity by opening the opal bottle.
Wasn’t that strange? she thought after a sniff. The bottle held her favorite perfume.
F
LYNN
had a stiff whiskey before he dealt with the food. It hit him like a hot fist.
Thank God there were still some things a man could count on.
He would feed his woman—for she was unquestionably his—and he would take some care with her. He would see to her comfort, as a man was meant to do, then he would let her know the way things were to be.
But first he would see that she was steadier on her feet.
The dining hall fireplace was lit. He had the table set with bone china, heavy silver, a pool of fragrant roses, the delicacy of slim white candles and the jewel sparkle of crystal.
Then closing his eyes, lifting his hands palms out, he began to lay the table with the foods that would please her most.
She was so lovely, his Kayleen. He wanted to put the bloom back in her cheeks. He wanted to hear her laugh.
He wanted her.
And so, that was the way things would be.
He stepped back, studied his work with cool satisfaction. Pleased with himself, Flynn went out again to wait at the base of the stairs.
And as she came down toward him, his heart staggered in his chest. “
Speirbhean
.”
Kayleen hesitated. “I’m sorry?”
“You’re beautiful. You should learn the Gaelic,” he said, taking her hand and leading her out of the hall. “I’ll teach you.”
“Well, thank you, but I really don’t think that’ll be necessary. I really want to thank you, too, for taking me in like this, and I wonder if I might use your phone.” A little detail, Kayleen thought, that had suddenly come to her.
“I have no telephone. Does the gown please you?”
“No phone? Well, perhaps one of your neighbors might have one I can use.”
“I have no neighbors.”
“In the closest village,” she said, as panic began to tickle her throat again.
“There is no village. Why are you fretting, Kayleen? You’re warm and dry and safe.”
“That may be, but…how do you know my name?”
“You told me.”
“I don’t remember telling you. I don’t remember how I—”
“You’ve no cause to worry. You’ll feel better when you’ve eaten.”
She was beginning to think she had plenty of cause to worry. The well-being she’d felt upstairs in that lovely room was eroding quickly. But when she stepped into the dining room, she felt nothing but shock.
The table was large enough to seat fifty, and spread over it was enough food to feed every one of them.
Bowls and platters and tureens and plates were jammed end to end down the long oak surface. Fruit, fish, meat, soups, a garden of vegetables, an ocean of pastas.
“Where—” Her voice rose, snapped, and had to be fought back under control. “Where did this come from?”
He sighed. He’d expected delight and instead was given shock. Another thing a man could count on, he thought. Women were forever a puzzle.
“Sit, please. Eat.”
Though she felt little flickers of panic, her voice was calm and firm. “I want to know where all this food came from. I want to know who else is here. Where’s your wife?”
“I have no wife.”
“Don’t give me that.” She spun to face him, steady enough now. And angry enough to stand and demand. “If you don’t have a wife, you certainly have a woman.”
“Aye. I have you.”
“Just…stay back.” She grabbed a knife from the table, aimed it at him. “Don’t come near me. I don’t know what’s going on here, and I’m not going to care. I’m going to walk out of this place and keep walking.”
“No.” He stepped forward and neatly plucked what was now a rose from her hand. “You’re going to sit down and eat.”
“I’m in a coma.” She stared at the white rose in his hand, at her own empty one. “I had an accident. I’ve hit my head. I’m hallucinating all of this.”
“All of this is real. No one knows better than I the line between what’s real and what isn’t. Sit down.” He gestured to a chair, swore when she didn’t move. “Have I said I wouldn’t harm you? Among my sins has never been a lie or the harm of a woman. Here.” He held out his hand, and now it held the knife. “Take this, and feel free to use it should I break my word to you.”
“You’re…” The knife was solid in her hand. A trick of the eye, she told herself. Just a trick of the eye. “You’re a magician.”
“I am.” His grin was like lightning, fast and bright. Whereas he had been handsome, now he was devastating. His pleasure shone. “That is what I am, exactly. Sit down, Kayleen, and break fast with me. For I’ve hungered a long time.”
She took one cautious step in retreat. “It’s too much.”
Thinking she meant the food, he frowned at the table. Considered. “Perhaps you’re right. I got a bit carried away with it all.” He scanned the selections, nodded, then sketched an arch with his hand.
Half the food vanished.
The knife dropped out of her numb fingers. Her eyes rolled straight back.
“Oh, Christ.” It was impatience as much as concern. At least this time he had the wit to catch her before she hit the floor. He sat her in a chair, gave her a little shake, then watched her eyes focus again.
“You didn’t understand after all.”
“Understand? Understand?”
“It’ll need to be explained, then.” He picked up a plate and began to fill it for her. “You need to eat or you’ll be ill. Your injuries will heal faster if you’re strong.”
He set the plate in front of her, began to fill one for himself. “What do you know of magic, Kayleen Brennan of Boston?”
“It’s fun to watch.”
“It can be.”
She would eat, she thought, because she did feel ill. “And it’s an illusion.”
“It can be.” He took the first bite—rare roast beef—and moaned in ecstasy at the taste. The first time he’d come to his week, he’d gorged himself so that he was sick a full day. And had counted it worth it. But now he’d learned to take his time, and appreciate.
“Do you remember now how you came here?”
“It was raining.”
“Yes, and is still.”
“I was going…”
“How were you going?”
“How?” She picked up her fork, sampled the fish without thinking. “I was driving…I was driving,” she repeated, on a rising note of excitement. “Of course. I was driving, and I was lost. The storm. I was coming from—” She stopped, struggling through the mists. “Dublin. I’d been in Dublin. I’m on vacation. Oh, that’s right, I’m on vacation and I was going to drive around the countryside. I got lost. Somehow. I was on one of the little roads through the forest, and it was storming. I could barely see. Then I…”
The relief in her eyes faded as they met his. “I saw you,” she whispered. “I saw you out in the storm.”
“Did you now?”
“You were out in the rain. You said my name. How could you have said my name before we met?”
She’d eaten little, but he thought a glass of wine might help her swallow what was to come. He poured it, handed it to her. “I’ve dreamed of you, Kayleen. Dreamed of you for longer than your life time. And dreaming of you I was when you were lost in my forest. And when I awoke, you’d come. Do you never dream of me, Kayleen?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. There was a storm. I was lost. Lightning hit very near, and there was a deer. A white deer in the road. I swerved to avoid it, and I crashed. I think I hit a tree. I probably have a concussion, and I’m imagining things.”
“A white hind.” The humor had gone from his face again. “You hit a tree with your car? They didn’t have to hurt you,” he muttered. “They had no
right
to hurt you.”
“Who are you talking about?”
“My jailers.” He shoved his plate aside. “The bloody Keepers.”
“I need to check on my car.” She spoke slowly, calmly. Not just eccentric, she decided. The man was unbalanced. “Thank you so much for helping me.”
“If you want to check on your car, then we will. In the morning. There’s hardly a point in going out in a storm in the middle of the night.” He laid his hand firmly on hers before she could rise. “You’re thinking, ‘This Flynn, he’s lost his mind somewhere along the way.’ Well, I haven’t, though it was a near thing a time or two. Look at me,
leannana
. Do I mean nothing to you?”
“I don’t know.” And that was what kept her from bolting. He could look at her, as he was now, and she felt tied to him. Not bound by force, but tied. By her own will. “I don’t understand what you mean, or what’s happening to me.”
“Then we’ll sit by the fire, and I’ll tell you what it all means.” He rose, held out his hand. Irritation washed over his face when she refused to take it. “Do you want the knife?”
She glanced down at it, back up at him. “Yes.”
“Then bring it along with you.”
He plucked up the wine, and the glasses, and led the way.
H
E
sat by the fire, propped his boots on the hearth, savored his wine and the scent of the woman who sat so warily beside him. “I was born in magic,” he began. “Some are. Others apprentice and can learn well enough. But to be born in it is more a matter of controlling the art than of learning it.”
“So your father was a magician.”
“No, he was a tailor. Magic doesn’t have to come down through the blood. It simply has to
be
in the blood.” He paused because he didn’t want to blunder again. He should know more of her, he decided, before he did. “What is it you are, back in your Boston?”
“I’m an antique dealer. That came through the blood. My uncles, my grandfather, and so on. Brennan’s of Boston has been doing business for nearly a century.”
“Nearly a century, is it?” he chuckled. “So very long.”
“I suppose it doesn’t seem so by European standards. But America’s a young country. You have some magnificent pieces in your home.”
“I collect what appeals to me.”
“Apparently a wide range appeals to you. I’ve never seen such a mix of styles and eras in one place before.”
He glanced around the room, considering. It wasn’t something he’d thought of, but he’d had only himself to please up until now. “You don’t like it?”
Because it seemed to matter to him, she worked up a smile. “No, I like it very much. In my business I see a lot of beautiful and interesting pieces, and I’ve always felt it was a shame more people don’t just toss them together and make their own style rather than sticking so rigidly to a pattern. No one can accuse you of sticking to a pattern.”
“No. That’s a certainty.”
She started to curl up her legs, caught herself. What in the world was wrong with her? She was relaxing into an easy conversation with what was very likely a madman. She cut her gaze toward the knife beside her, then back to him. And found him studying her contemplatively.
“I wonder if you could use it. There are two kinds of people in the world, don’t you think? Those who fight and those who flee. Which are you, Kayleen?”
“I’ve never been in the position where I had to do either.”
“That’s either fortunate or tedious. I’m not entirely sure which. I like a good fight myself,” he added with that quick grin. “Just one of my many flaws. Fact is, I miss going fist to fist with a man. I miss a great many things.”
“Why? Why do you have to miss anything?”
“That’s the point, isn’t it, of this fireside conversation. The why. Are you wondering,
mavourneen
, if I’m off in my head?”
“Yes,” she said, then immediately froze.
“I’m not, though perhaps it would’ve been easier if I’d gone a bit crazy along the way. They knew I had a strong mind—part of the problem, in their thinking, and part of the reason for the sentence weighed on me.”
“They?” Her fingers inched toward the handle of the knife. She could use it, she promised herself. She
would
use it if she had to, no matter how horribly sad and lonely he looked.
“The Keepers. The ancient and the revered who guard and who nurture magic. And have done so since the Waiting Time, when life was no more than the heavens taking their first breath.”
“Gods?” she said cautiously.
“In some ways of thinking.” He was brooding again, frowning into the flames. “I was born of magic, and when I was old enough I left my family to do the work. To heal and to help. Even to entertain. Some of us have more of a knack, you could say, for the fun of it.”
“Like, um, sawing a lady in half.”
He looked at her with a mixture of amusement and exasperation. “This is illusion, Kayleen.”
“Yes.”
“I speak of magic, not pretense. Some prophesy, some travel and study, for the sake of it. Others devote their art to healing body or soul. Some choose to make a living performing. Some might serve a worthy master, as Merlin did Arthur. There are as many choices as there are people. And while none may choose to harm or profit for the sake of it, all are real.”
He slipped a long chain from under his shirt, held the pendant with its milky stone out for her to see. “A moonstone,” he told her. “And the words around are my name, and my title.
Draiodoir
. Magician.”
“It’s beautiful.” Unable to resist, she curved her hand around the pendant. And felt a bolt of heat, like the rush of a comet, spurt from her fingertips to her toes. “God!”
Before she could snatch her hand away, Flynn closed his own over hers. “Power,” he murmured. “You feel it. Can all but taste it. A seductive thing. And inside, you can make yourself think there’s nothing impossible. Look at me, Kayleen.”
She already was, could do nothing else. Wanted nothing else. There you are, she thought again. There you are, at last.
“I could have you now. You would willingly lie with me now, as you have in dreams. Without fear. Without questions.”
“Yes.”
And his need was a desperate thing, leaping, snapping at the tether of control. “I want more.” His fingers tightened on hers. “What is it in you that makes me crave more, when I don’t know what more is? Well, we’ve time to find the answer. For now, I’ll tell you a story. A young magician left his family. He traveled and he studied. He helped and he healed. He had pride in his work, in himself. Some said too much pride.”
He paused now, thinking, for there had been times in this last dreaming that he’d wondered if that could be so.