Books by Maggie Shayne (305 page)

"Oh, Arianna." Raven enfolded her sister in her arms, and held her tight. ' 'Why is it you feel you have to try so hard not to love him?"

"Because he can never love me back. I thought... I

thought if there were no love, there could be no pain. No hurting and longing for what I could never have. But it was never a choice, really. I've always loved him."

Raven stroked her hair. "Things will work out. Have faith, sweetheart."

Arianna lowered her head to Raven's shoulder. But she was out of faith, and determined, at last, to right a very old wrong. She couldn't have Nicodimus's love, she knew that, had accepted it. But she could save his life, and she could give him back his mother. She could make up for the mistakes she'd made in the past. And she would. Even knowing full well that it might be the last thing she ever did.

Marten had left no sign. Duncan and I searched for hours, to no avail. We found no track, no path, no clue. I thought of Nidaba, of the horrors she must have suffered in the past, likely at Dearborne's hand, and of how she must be feeling right now ... a captive once more. Anxiety for her, and a deep fury against Marten, boiled in my belly.

"We might as well go back," Duncan said, a hand on my shoulder. "Maybe Arianna has remembered something more about all this by now."

"Arianna will not tell us any more than she wants us to know," I said wearily. "She's always been the most stubborn girl I..." I stopped speaking for a moment, and Duncan looked at me, waiting. ' 'I remember her stubbornness. The way she would sneak away from her mother's home by night to study the ways of magick with The Crones. Even knowing the danger such actions brought with them."

Tilting his head, Duncan studied my face. "The Crones?"

I nodded, Arianna's face clear in my mind now. The way she had looked then. I had followed her, spied on her to be sure she was safe. I'd seen her with the old women, her cheeks bathed in the glow of their balefire. "She looked the same ... but different somehow. Physically, she hasn't changed, except that she has cut off her hair. But there was an innocence in her eyes then. She seems ... hard now."

"Not so hard as you might think," Duncan offered. "With her sister, she's as soft as a breeze."

I nodded in agreement. "Her hardness is selective then. She dons it to protect her heart from the likes of me."

Duncan couldn't seem to think of a response to that. Instead he said, "Tell me about these old women who taught her their ways."

I nodded, searching for the memories, finding them where before there had been but shadows. "They were Witches, mortal ones. Even before she knew of her own nature, Arianna sensed her power. She was determined to learn about it, about what it meant, and why she possessed it when others did not. She sought out the knowledge in the only place she could find it. The Crones were outcasts, feared by the clan, but left alone for the most part."

"Still," Duncan mused, "it must have been risky for Arianna to spend time with them. Especially in those days."

A darkness settled in my brain, and a chill shivered up my spine. "It nearly got her killed," I said. Then I blinked and searched my mind some more.

"This is a new memory, isn't it, Nic?"

I nodded. ' 'It was the fire, I think, that brought all of this back to me. I recall... I was searching for Arianna, and could not find her. And... there was smoke, and noise coming from the edge of the woods where The Crones lived. I went there and..." I pressed my fingers to my forehead, as if to force the memory clear, and then I lifted my head, felt my eyes widen. "The clan murdered them. Hanged The Crones and burned their bodies. It was like a nightmare. Charred remains dangling from the limb of a mighty oak. The house in ruins. The entire clan, milling about, some bearing torches ..."

Duncan grimaced. "You're right. Seeing Arianna's little house burn tonight likely jarred some of this loose for you."

I didn't care what had caused the memory to return. I only needed to follow it, for I sensed its import. "Arianna was there. Gods, she was devastated, and furious. The

crowd turned its attention on her as she shouted accusations at them. Someone cried out that she had been seen with The Crones, that she was likely a Witch as well, and should suffer the same fate." I lowered my head as the breath rushed out of me, and felt again the sick-to-my-stomach fear that had assailed me then. "I remember her father, standing in front of her, ready to defend her against that murderous mob with no more than a fallen limb as a weapon. He'd have had no chance against them all. But I stepped in to protect her as well."

"How?" Duncan asked. His gaze riveted to mine, he seemed fascinated by the tale. "Two men against an entire clan? How did you defend her against that?"

I closed my eyes as the past rushed over me. "I was known as close kin to their chieftain. They wouldn't have dared defy me. But I knew Arianna would be in grave danger again the moment I was gone. I had to link her to me in a way so permanent and so real that she would be safe, even without me at her side."

Opening my eyes, I stared up at the stars, and saw the past unfolding in my mind. The dress she'd worn, the flowers in her hair. The excited uncertainty in her eyes. ' 'I married her," I whispered. "By the Gods, I married her. Arianna ... Arianna is
my wife.'"

I felt as if my legs would buckle beneath me, and suddenly Duncan was there, gripping my shoulders, and easing me downward until I sat on a partially rotted stump. The fragrance of the moist, decomposing wood and moss rose up to wrap around my senses, but my mind refused to stop whirling.

"Your wife? For the love of heaven. She never told us any of this." He shook his head in wonder. Then he eyed me again. "It's all just a bit too much to deal with in one night, isn't it, Nic? Discovering a mother and a wife, all at once? Are you okay?"

"I... Gods, why didn't she tell me?"

Duncan hunkered on the ground beside the stump. "I could hazard a guess. If you want me to?''

I looked at him and nodded hard.

"Arianna is... a proud woman. No, that's an understatement. It's more than pride. At any rate, if you only married her to keep the clan from murdering her, then she must have known it. Right? I mean, frankly, knowing her as I do, I'm surprised she even agreed to it."

I frowned fiercely, searching my mind. "She did not agree... not at first. But in the end she realized she had no choice. Her mother and father urged her to accept, and I pushed her as well. Her only other option would have been to run away. To leave all she knew and loved behind, and to try to exist on her own. In the world as it was then, she would have been in just as much danger that way as she had been that night at The Crones' execution."

Duncan nodded. "So she agreed ... knowing you didn't love her."

I blinked and met Duncan's eyes. "I was a fool. So determined to protect my heart from the touch of hers and the pain I believed that touch would bring. Gods, I set terms. Can you believe that?
I
laid out terms, expecting
Arianna
to agree to them."

' 'Might as well set terms for the wind as to how it should blow," Duncan remarked, shaking his head and smiling slightly at the very idea. "Arianna sets her own terms."

I nodded wryly. "Yes. She did then. She agreed to wed me, but informed me she would never be content with the rules I laid out: that she would be my wife in name only, that I would never be capable of loving her, or being her husband in the truest sense of the word. She said... she said she would make me love her. That my defenses would crumble beneath her slightest touch. That it was I who would surrender to
her
terms, and that I should be aware of it from the start."

Duncan smiled fully now. "You should have run for the hills, Nic. You never stood a chance, did you?"

"If I ever thought I did, I was fooling no one but myself," I admitted. "My pride ... it wasn't pride really. It was fear. My old wounds ran deep. I had lost my wife, my sons, my family. I had no wish to let her reopen those wounds, and I knew that she could. That she would if I let

her. But I could never admit that I was afraid of a young girl like Arianna."

"Don't feel too bad, Nic. I was scared to death of her sister." Duncan got to his feet again. "But I have a feeling you should be telling Arianna all of this, instead of spilling your guts to me. Don't you?"

"I suppose I should." I rose slowly, brushed the dust from my jeans. But there were more images making their way back to me as we walked toward the village. No clear memories, but a sense. A sense that Arianna had indeed conquered my heart, and that once she had held it in her small hands, she'd crushed it mercilessly. The old fear of her crept over me once more. The feeling that I must protect myself from her this time, or suffer complete destruction at her hand.

And yet, I had no desire to obey my mind's warnings. No desire at all. Let her trample my heart if she would. I would not resist her. Not this time.

I was shivering when we arrived back at the site of her burned house. A chill of foreboding ran all the way to my soul.

Arianna and Raven were waiting there, but looking far better than they had when we'd left them. They were clean and dressed in fresh clothing.

"Any luck?" Raven asked.

"No, none at all." Duncan touched the blouse she wore. "Very pretty."

"Some of the locals donated some fresh clothes to us. And Arianna and I have rooms waiting at a local inn for the night. There are clean clothes waiting for you both there, as well."

"And a hot shower, I hope," Duncan said.

Arianna had a hold on my eyes that wouldn't let go. I could not look away, and found I did not want to. She took my hand, and saying nothing, led me along the streets and through the town to the inn.

The inn was a large building, likely once a farmhouse, with brown slabwood siding, and a railed stairway leading up to solid doors, painted red. When we went inside, Raven led Duncan directly up the stairs, leaving Arianna and I alone below.

Arianna seemed nervous. Naturally, she would be, I reminded myself. She'd just lost her house to fire, and likely the sight of the flames had elicited the same memories in her mind as they had in mine.

Licking her lips, she led me to the foot of the stairs, then paused and looked up at me. The nervousness fled however, and her full lips quirked upward into a teasing smile. "You're still covered in soot," she said. "And your hair is practically gray with ash.''

I returned the smile, though still sick with worry for Ni-daba, and reeling with shock from the night's revelations. "You can see then what I would look like as an old man."

"You already are an old man."

I lifted my brows. "True enough. But you are an old woman, as well. I suppose I can no longer argue that you are too young for me, can I?"

Her smile faded, and she broke her gaze. "You remember that?"

"I have remembered a great deal tonight, Arianna." I reached out to stroke her hair, then paused, noting the dark smears of soot that coated my hand. "I will bathe first, and then ... we will talk."

"All right." She seemed to lift her chin a bit as she started up the stairs, and not meeting my eyes, she said, "Our room is this way."

Our room?
My mind leapt on those words. Did she mean ... could she want... but...

She was moving quickly away from me, and I hurried to catch up. Turning at the top of the stairs, she moved along a corridor, paused at a door, and inserted a key. Then she opened the door and stepped inside.

The room was a simple one. There was a large bed, a pair of overstuffed chairs, and a television like the wondrous one that had been in Arianna's house. She was already moving through, opening an adjoining door, calling over her shoulder, "The bathroom is right here." But I was focused again on the bed: one bed. Only one.

Shaking myself, I went to join her in the bathroom.

"No tub," she said. "Just a shower stall, but I showed you how to work that at home."

I nodded mutely.

"Your clothes are here." She patted the top of a folded stack of garments. "Towel is on the rack." With that she quickly backed out of the small bathroom, leaving me with a head full of questions, and not a single answer.

Sighing, I reached into the stall to turn on the water and adjust its temperature. I hurried through the process of bathing, though I did a thorough job of it. I was eager to speak with Arianna... with my wife. To find out just what she intended to do about tonight's sleeping arrangements. Perhaps there had been only the one room available, I thought as I scrubbed the soot from my body, and watched the dark water swirl down the drain. But surely if that were the case, she'd have spent the night with her sister, and sent Duncan to share this room with me. Unless Raven objected to that.

Then again, I did not think Raven the kind of woman who would deny her sister anything she asked.

I shampooed my hair, ridding it of the ashy residue, and was rinsing the lather away when there came a tap on the bathroom door.

"Are you almost done?" Arianna called.

"Yes."

"Can I come in?"

I went still, standing motionless beneath the spray. Soap bubbles trickled down my face, into my eyes, and still I could not move. "Yes," I finally managed.

The curtain of the shower was pulled closed, but I heard the bathroom door open, heard her small, soft footsteps as she came inside. And then closer. "I... got some more soot on me when we were back at the house," she said, her voice very soft now. Almost timid, which was so unlike her it made a shiver dance over my spine.

Bracing myself for her rejection—for it would certainly come—I spoke softly. My voice seemed incapable of anything louder just then. ' 'I would like nothing better than to wash it away for you, Arianna."

She did not answer. Reaching up to the curtain, I curled my hand around it, and drew it slowly open.

She stood there before me, not a stitch of clothing covering her beauty. Her cheeks were pink, her eyes wide and shining. My eyes devoured her, from her blush-stained face to her slender neck, and lower. Her breasts, round and peaked, and perfect. Her waist, narrow and tempting. The shadowy hollow of her navel, and the silken curls between her legs. Beautiful legs, slender and strong, and small bare feet, toes curling and relaxing over and over.

"I see no soot," I whispered.

She licked her lips. "I lied. There isn't any."

I clasped her waist in my hands and pulled her into the shower with me, turning her so that she stood directly beneath the spray. The water coursed over her, drenching her hair and running down her face. Her arms curled around my neck, and every part of my body seemed to tingle with new life, as she stood on tiptoe, and pressed her lips to

mine. Her mouth tasted sweet, her tongue, warm and moist as I stroked it with mine. Wet flesh pressed to the front of me, her breasts warm, nipples taut against my chest.

I slid my mouth from hers to drink the moisture from her jaw, and her neck. "My beautiful Arianna," I muttered. "My beautiful wife."

I heard her soft gasp, felt her body stiffen. "Then you remember that, as well."

"I remember that. How I ever forgot it, I will never know." I bent over her, capturing a breast in my mouth, tasting it, teasing its hard crest with my tongue while I held her tight to me. Her taste ... yes, I remembered this as well. And more. I fell to my knees before her, and as the water rained down upon us, I kissed the droplets away from her skin. Licked it away from her belly, her hips, her thighs. Then I pressed my mouth to her center, darting my tongue inside to sample die salty moisture there.

Moaning softly, she clenched her hands in my hair, and parted her thighs, opening to my gentle invasion. Inviting me to take more of her. I swelled and ached for her, wanted to devour every bit of her, and I drove my tongue deeper. The taste of her was maddening to me as I stroked her, sucked at her, used my lips and even my teeth to make her tremble and shake. She whispered my name, then cried it out loud when her pleasure reached its peak, and when she would have backed away I caught her buttocks in my hands and held her still, pressing my face tight to her and licking deep. Refusing to let her go, flushing her with my tongue until she was shaking so hard her knees buckled beneath her, and she would have collapsed had I not been holding her so tightly.

Gathering my shuddering lady into my arms, I carried her from the shower, reaching back to shut off the water. I took her to the bed, and lowered her to the mattress. Then I eased myself atop her, parting her thighs with my hands, pressing them wide for me. I slid inside her. She was warm, and wet, yes, but tight. Very tight, and still convulsing with the echoes of her climax. Slowly, I began to move deeper, and when I had filled her, I pulled back again. Very slowly.

In a moment, she was moving, too, her hips arching up as I thrust into her, pulling away as I drew back. Her legs wrapped themselves around me. Her arms imprisoned me. I bent to feed again at her mouth as I moved faster, drove harder. She reached the pinnacle again even as I felt my seed spilling into her, drawn from the depths of my soul, it seemed. Draining me dry.

I lay there inside her for several long moments, during which neither of us spoke. The very blood in my veins seemed to sing with joy, and my soul itself sighed in sweet release. Sweet union.

I moved to lie down beside her, and she curled into my arms, her head nestled upon my shoulder.

"Arianna," I whispered. "Sweet little cat, does this mean that you—"

Her fingertips came then to press softly to my lips. "No talk now, Nicodimus. Not now. I want to fall asleep in your arms. Let's save the talking for tomorrow."

I frowned, but agreed. There was nothing,
nothing,
I would not do for her. So if she wished to sleep in my arms, that was what she would do. And in the morning, I would convince her somehow that my love for her was true, and abiding, and too strong for any ghosts of the past to threaten.

Arianna slipped away before dawn. Doing so was far easier than she had expected it to be. She stood for a long moment beside the bed, in the darkness, just looking at him. Nicodimus lying there with his eyes gently closed, his magnificent chest rising and falling in the rhythm of slumber. That was the way she left him, and the image she would carry with her of him, in her mind. She found she didn't want to face Nicodimus when he woke, didn't want to see what might be in his eyes when he opened them. Not the misguided notion he had that he had ever cared for her... loved her. And not the memory that might very well have returned by then, and the hatred that would come with it. To see either of those things would hurt too much to bear. Both would tear at her heart and leave it bleeding. So when

she slipped away it was with a sense of relief.

And longing. Bittersweet longing for something that could never be. Something that
had
never
been.
She'd been foolish enough to hope for it once. But she was harder now, and wiser, and she knew the difference between fantasy and reality. And yes, it hurt, but the pain would be far worse if she let herself fall into that bottomless pit of hoping again. Her feet were firmly on the ground. She knew exactly where she stood with Nicodimus.

She also knew where to find Marten and Nidaba. The keep where Marten had taken her all those years ago—the place it had taken days to reach on horseback. Now it was only a couple of hours away by car. She could locate Ken-wick again, she was certain of that, although she had never tried to do so in the years since.

She exited the inn by a rear door, and stepped out into the dead silent, still streets of the sleeping village. A soft purple hue colored the sky, and the only sounds were the occasional cry of a nightbird, and the fluttering wings of insects swooping by. Morning was still a couple of hours off. It would give her all the time she needed.

She walked briskly back to the remains of her house, and thanked her stars that she never worried about such things as taking the keys from her car in this peaceful little place. Within a short while, she was heading south, along a road that hadn't even existed the last time she'd traveled this way. But the direction was right. Easy enough to keep the coast in view. Easy enough to recall the odd shape of the hills that surrounded that place.

And easy enough to wile away the time the journey took, reliving every moment of the night she had spent in Nicodimus' s arms. It had been so good. So beautiful. She had no regrets, not one. It had been right to make love to him. Right, and perfect, and wonderful.

By the time she reached her destination, the sun was up, brilliant and orange and fiery in the sky. It spilled like liquid fire over the rugged hilltops, and painted the lush grasses in shades of crimson and gold.

Arianna stopped the Jeep along the roadside and got out.

Shielding her eyes, she stared at the spot amid those craggy hills where centuries before, the dark, hulking form of Ken-wick had risen like a brooding giant pointing at the sky. Now there was nothing.

"Gods, what if I was wrong?" she whispered, squinting, straining to see. "What if this isn't what Marten meant at all? It doesn't look as if the keep is even standing after all this time."

Doubts crept in. If she had been wrong, it could cost Nidaba's life, and as much as the woman seemed to hate her, Arianna couldn't return the feelings. She remembered too well the woman Nidaba had been. The strength of her tempered by wisdom—strength a young rebel had admired to no end. Nidaba ... she'd been unaware of it, but Arianna had idolized her for a time. She'd tried to emulate her, wanted to be like her.

Nidaba was a broken woman now. Wounded so deeply she'd curled up inside herself and seemed unable to find her way out again. But she would. In time, and with Ni-codimus's help, she would. Arianna would at least make sure she had the chance to do just that.

She couldn't turn back now. Not until she made sure nothing remained of Kenwick.

Stiffening her spine, she struck out on foot across the land, plotting her course mentally as she went and aiming for the spot dead center of the surrounding hills, where that keep had once stood.

The terrain was rough and rocky as she climbed higher and the grass thinned. The chill morning breeze battled with the fiery sun, so she was alternately hot and cold as she pushed on. It took no real effort for Arianna though. In fact, she took it with ease, enjoying the stretch and flex of her muscles, and the increased flow of her blood. She had been cooped up too long in that cottage in Stonehaven. She had been inactive, playing nursemaid and housemother to her guests, and reining in her natural tendency to run wild.

She guessed she had been reining in a bit more than that, too. Her emotions had been imprisoned inside her since Nicodimus's return from the grave. Even now, they beat at

their prison bars in protest, straining to break free. But she knew better than to let them out. Not now. She needed all her focus now, all her attention for the battle ahead.

If she let her feelings reach the surface, she feared she would be useless in a fight. She would be kneeling on the stony ground, aching for a man she could never have. Moon-eyed with a love she had sentenced to death long ago. She'd been so blind. Her feelings for Nicodimus were just as alive as he was. They had been all along. Merely dormant, waiting. She had resurrected her own weakness, her only vulnerability, when she'd resurrected Nicodimus.

Arianna topped a rise, and peered downward into the basinlike clearing. Crumbling stone walls staggered below, some towering to a height of fifty feet, while others barely held themselves upright at three. Stone masonry littered the ground. What remained of the place seemed almost ready to crumble. Yet she spied the arching entryway, its wooden doors long gone. Dust by now. Beyond that opening, a yawning darkness seemed to beckon.