They continued sifting until she'd completely lost track of time, then boarded another passenger train.
Once on the train, he took a seat and pulled her down to sit between his legs, though maintaining space between their lower bodies. He drew her shoulders to his chest, wrapped his arms around her, and rested his jaw against her hair.
She was startled to realize he was shaking. It was almost imperceptible, but there was a deep tremor running through his powerful body.
"What's wrong, Adam?" she asked nervously. What could make Adam Black shake? Did she even want to know? Had she missed something? Were they still not safe yet, even after all their frenzied sifting?
"What's wrong?" he growled. "What's wrong? Bloody hell, I screwed up, that's what's wrong! Do you know how lucky we were that he let me see and hear him? If he hadn't, there's no telling what might have happened. Christ, I'm not used to this being-powerless shit; I'm no frigging good at it." A long pause, then a muffled oath. "I should never have stopped for the night, Gabrielle. I shouldn't have stopped until I had you in Scotland and knew you were safe. I was a bloody arrogant fool."
Arms snug around her, he lapsed into stony silence.
Gabby blinked and fell silent herself. Her heart did a dangerous little flip-flop inside her chest. I was a bloody arrogant fool, he'd said. Not words she'd ever expected to hear from your average imperious Fae.
But then, nothing about Adam was proving to be what she'd been raised to expect from the average imperious Fae.
And the line in her mind between man and fairy was getting ever more blurred.
Closing her eyes, she leaned back into him, telling herself to try to get some sleep while she could, because it was anyone's guess when or where she might get to sleep next.
She'd just begun to drift off into a light doze when he shook her gently; they disembarked and caught a shuttle to the airport.
"A flight's leaving now, ka-lyrra," he said, scanning departures. "There's no time for me to play with their computers and get you a ticket. You'll have to hold my hand. Come. We must hurry to catch it."
Scotland. They were going to Scotland. Right now.
Blinking, stupefied by what her life had become, she slipped her hand into his.
Invisible, they passed through security and made for the gate. She glanced up at his profile. His jaw was set, his eyes narrowed and focused straight ahead, and he was walking so fast that he was practically dragging her.
His pace didn't slow until they'd boarded the plane.
It was Monday, she thought with a kind of distant wonder as she sank into a window seat beside him, holding tightly to his hand.
She should be home, at work. She should be getting ready to make her stand with Jeff. She had dry cleaning to pick up, plants that needed to be watered, a dentist appointment this afternoon, and dinner plans with Elizabeth tonight.
Instead she was on a plane, cloaked by the féth fiada, temporarily noncorporeal, about to fly halfway across the world, being chased by otherworldly demons, and half-seduced by an otherworldly prince. Would have— if she had to be brutally honest with herself— probably been wholly seduced, if not for the interruption of said otherworldly demons, and wouldn't that have made a fine mess of the already fine mess in her head?
It was a measure of how surreal her existence had become that, in the midst of all she could be worrying about, indeed, should be worrying about, her most prevalent concern was that she really, really hoped everyone had already boarded, and they would just stay in their own seats and not sit in her.
You were firing questions at me today, trying to get inside my head.
You asked if I believe in God.
I told you of course I do— I've always had a strong sense of self.
Your house is quiet now, you're sleeping upstairs and I'm alone with this blasted, idiotic book that purports to tally the sum of my life, and the fact is, maybe I do.
But maybe, ka-lyrra, your God doesn't believe in me.
— FROM THE (GREATLY REVISED) BLACK EDITION OF THE O'CALLAGHAN Book of the Sin Siriche Du
16
Scotland. The Highlands.
In Adam's opinion, there was no finer place in all the world. He'd passed much of his existence spotting a human glamour amid her lush vales and rocky tors. He'd lived for a time, back in the seventh century, in the guise of a battle-scarred warrior, with a Highland clan called the McIllioch, eaten and "tooped" and fought beside them. And when one of their many battles had grown too fierce, he'd bequeathed a Fae gift upon the McIllioch males, saving their line from extinction.
He'd set up his smithy here and there, for a time at Dalkeith-Upon-the-Sea, for a time at Caithness, among too many other places to name. He'd infiltrated the Templars when they'd fallen, guiding them to Circenn at Dunnotar, to be used in battle by Robert the Bruce, and then to the Sinclair at Rosslyn, where to this day their fantastic legacy endured.