He wondered how the arrogant Keltar would like spending the next thousand years hung in a deep, dark cavern, flush to a stone wall. He’d only kept the mirror in his study for the amusement it had given, and because, on occasion, he’d needed his captive to perform some deed he’d not yet possessed the power to do himself. But once he had the Dark Book, he would never need the Druid again.
And then Cian MacKeltar was going to rot in the deepest, coldest, blackest hell Lucan could find for him.
* * *
24
Under ideal circumstances, Jessi might have spent days brooding. Weeks, even. When she was hurt, she preferred to hole up and lick her wounds alone.
But circumstances were far from ideal, and days were precisely what she didn’t have. As for weeks—she had two. Period. By the time she finished licking wounds, she would have a much bigger one to tend.
And then she would despise herself for time wasted.
Cian had either finished placing his wards, or the mirror had reclaimed him again. She knew because, a little while ago, she’d heard people out on the lawn, laughing and talking. She’d pushed aside the drapes to find diffident rays of late-afternoon sunlight trying to push through thick gray clouds and several castle maids standing about, hands on hips, eyes sparkling, flirting with a handful of well-muscled gardeners who were trimming hedges on the still-damp lawn.
She’d been startled to realize how late in the day it was. She’d passed most of it staring into space, trying to mull through thoughts hopelessly muddied by emotions, and decide if Cian was a callous bastard who’d just wanted to have sex before he [insert word she refused to say, even in her mind] or if he cared for her at all.
She could argue the case both ways.
You fit me here, woman, he’d said.
And when she remembered him saying those words, and the look on his face as he’d said them, she believed him.
Especially when she remembered it, coupled with the way he’d made love to her in front of the fire. And again later, in the shower. She could have sworn she’d felt a part of him bleeding into her through his hands, that he’d been cherishing every last cell of her being with his caresses.
Yet there was a cynical part of her that said a dying man after a millennia-old blood-vengeance might say just about anything to get: a) somewhere safe so he could have his vengeance; and b) hey, what about a little great sex along the way with the big-boobed babe?
Bottom line was, the big-boobed babe had finally realized that she wasn’t going to get anywhere sitting in her room alone, groping blindly through her thoughts.
So she decided to go find him, and grope blindly through his thoughts—assuming he would cooperate—and see what might come of it.
It ended up being far more than his thoughts she groped.
Cian stood in the library, near the fire, and finished plaiting the last of the braids into his hair.
He slipped the remaining tricolored bead around it, compressing the soft metal between his finger and thumb, molding it to the end. A sorcerer did not risk any other elements on his body when working dark alchemy. He gathered his arm cuffs from the mantel and refastened them around his wrists.
The warding was now complete, the castle grounds protected. There hadn’t been as many dead things in the soil as he’d expected, likely due to the lesser, ancient wards he’d discovered, and removed, before sowing his own.
Keltar soil was clean earth, strong and potent. His wards had intensified that potency to a nearly palpable degree. Indeed, as he’d walked over it, returning to the castle proper, he’d felt the power of his wards humming beneath his heels.
None of Lucan’s sorcery would be of any avail to him on the castle-proper portion of the estate now.
Upon completing his task, he’d washed up and hurried to the library to advise his descendants that the job was done. He’d found the twins and their wives cozied up to a crackling fire.
There was not a single place he could look in the book-lined room that did not bring to mind intoxicatingly sensual, carnal memories of his night with Jessica. Their bodies had come together with every bit of the explosive passion he’d known they would.
The entire time he’d been laying wards, he’d kept his thoughts tightly focused on the task at hand. But now they burst free of his tight rein and turned hungrily, desperately to his woman.
“How is she?” he asked.
It was Gwen who answered. “Furious. Hurt.”
“And hurt. And furious,” Chloe added.
“What did you expect?” Drustan said stiffly. “You seduce her and doona tell her you’re dying? Have you no honor, kinsman?”
Cian said nothing. He’d not explain himself to Drustan, nor to any man. Only one woman’s opinion of him mattered, and even that wouldn’t have stopped him. He’d done what he’d done and didn’t wish it undone. Undone, he’d not have gotten his night. And though Jessica may think him a thousand kinds of bastard, he would have another night with her, and another still.