Dark Enchantment (28 page)

Her heart skipped a beat, stuttered once, twice. And then was still. Her head dropped forward, her body limp.

Lifeless
.

Chapter Twenty-nine

A
s his form floated downward toward the earth Caleb felt no warmth of relief at having found Arianna. Neither felt he any sense of cold from the icy winds. Fully submerged within the Otherworld, he rotated the wooden post to face away from the cliff’s edge with merely a thought.

As he looked upon the lifeless form of the mere mortal, a frown marred the transcendental perfection of his glowing visage. Not a reaction to grief, but rather an acknowledgement of the lack of retribution the evil Conor had received due to the man’s accidental fall. For the
Sidhe
possessed a veritable treasure-trove of damnable faerie magic, the likes of which would have made the man’s skin crawl.

Standing in front of the dead woman, Caleb gave a mental push, releasing the leather straps binding her to the post. As she fell free of the restraints, he scooped her indifferently into his arms. Arms hanging limply at her side, her head fell against his chest.

Pain slammed into him like a jackhammer. Apparently, his apprehension over the permanent loss of his humanity had been groundless. For his mortal soul had quickened in an instant, at the first touch of her precious flesh to his. And, with the quickening, the floodgates of heaven had flown open wide, filling him with light and life…and an all-consuming, soul-devouring sense of loss.

“Too late.” He choked on the words. The sweet spirit that had been Arianna had departed its earthly tabernacle. Stricken to the depths of his soul, Caleb fell to his knees, her lifeless body cradled against his chest. Positioning her gently on the ground in front of him, he searched frantically for a pulse, the debilitating sense of dread like bands of iron closing around his chest. Rainwater streamed down his face, cascading onto her body, as he brushed a kiss across her soot-smudged brow.

“I’ll not let you go.” He whispered a vow embraced with all his heart.

Caleb pointed his right index finger skyward, so that his body might absorb the sizzling currents from the electrical storm. Much as he had done to protect Arianna from the minion—from Conor—that day on the coast. Aeromancy, the drawing down of an electrical charge from an existing thundercloud, was an act fraught with the possibility of disastrous repercussions. Using his body as a conductor, a kind of lightning rod, Caleb would direct the thunderbolt to be discharged into Arianna’s heart.

The likes of a cosmic defibrillator.

His grave dilemma? The fact that a lightning bolt could reach temperatures of 30,000 degrees centigrade—hot enough to fuse together individual grains of sand. Therefore, the task he faced was to siphon off the appropriate voltage of energy…

Or risk burning the wee thing to a crisp.

His teeth clenched, muscles trembled with the stress of the electromagnetic radiation building inside him. Bitterness was building as well, as he silently railed against the inequities of his existence. Of all the preternatural gifts bestowed upon the
de Danann
people…the gift of healings, of harnessing the weather, the gift of Innate Knowledge, mental telepathy, and mind control among them…that which he needed most desperately at this moment remained sadly out of his reach. For ‘twas an inexorable reality that his people held no authority over life and death, a power vested solely in the Creator.

His God, whom he petitioned now as heartily as ever any mere mortal man did. “Please, Lord. Please let her live….”

Electricity crackled over his body, lit his flesh with blue light much as the faerie magic had done earlier that evening. With one hand raised toward the sky, his eyes shot green fire as he placed his other hand over Arianna’s heart.

In a voice ringing with the authority of a host of angels, he commanded the lightning. “Into her chest.
Now
!”

The miniscule jolt of electricity he’d siphoned off and directed into the damaged organ caused it to tremble, then begin a sluggish beat beneath his hand. It was faint, laboring. And he knew it would cease in seconds if her lungs didn’t work in tandem, feeding her brain with life-giving oxygen.

“Breathe,
a stór.
Breathe,” he chanted in his native tongue as he cleared her airways and tipped her head back, his mouth making a seal over hers. Caleb worked feverishly, blowing tiny puffs of air into her seared lungs at measured, rhythmic intervals. Tirelessly he continued, for what seemed like hours, refusing to give up, unwilling to accept that her lungs may have been too damaged to recover.

So much time had passed before he heard a tiny wheeze that, at first, he thought his mind was playing tricks on him. But then she choked, gasped—a horrible, wonderful rasping sound.

Hissing out a long, slow breath, Caleb gathered her crumpled body against his chest. Enveloping her inside his jacket, against his warmth, he rested his cheek against the top of her head and cradled her, rocking her as one might an infant in arms. He whispered desperate promises in her ear, vows of sunshine on a rainy day and snowflakes in July…of her every heart’s desire in his power to grant…

If she would only ever just keep on breathing.

Although he had earlier caused the rain to cease, Caleb felt moisture sting his eyes, cloud his vision before a single drop of liquid traced a warm path down the curve of one cheek. Frowning, he caught the solitary drop on the tip of his finger and stared at it. Tasted it with his tongue.
Salty.

“Tears.” He marveled at the anomaly as another teardrop rolled down his face…and then another…until they were flowing freely as a soft spring rain. He was crying. His people had no experience with such a physical manifestation of emotion. Maybe he’d inherited the trait from his mere mortal mother. He considered the timing and thought it odd that the tears hadn’t begun to fall while he was grieving her loss, but now, once the crisis had passed.

Caleb rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. Arianna curled up tighter in his lap, in a fetal position against his chest. Helpless rage tore through him as he realized that she was naked beneath the torn and bloodied gown she wore. Only a remnant of translucent satin covered her nakedness, a garment now blackened with soot, splattered with mud, the hem scorched and tattered. Pain stabbed his chest at the sight of the angry red flesh, all wrinkled and blistered from the soles of her tiny feet to well past her calves.

At last,
he thought.
Something in my power to remedy.

Stretching out his hand, Caleb called upon the healing virtue. Directing its flow to those raw and swollen areas, he accelerated the natural healing process from weeks, or even months, to mere seconds. Though unconscious, she flinched and moaned at the barest caress of his fingertips. His heart squeezed in anguish and he pulled his hand away. “Ah,
mo chroi
, I’m so sorry,” he whispered into her hair.

Lips brushing her temple, he leaned down and found her mouth with his. Using that simple point of contact he eased her backward in time, took her to a place where there was no suffering, no pain. “All that I’m free to give, I offer you now,” he murmured. And together they revisited the day they’d sat wrapped in each other’s arms, watching the sun go down from his secret place above the sea.

His hands radiating with divine heat, he traced his palms lightly over her legs and feet. Skimming her body, he erased every bruise and burn, every injury that marred her tender flesh. He accomplished this, even as the gentle puffs of air he blew into her mouth completed the healing of her lungs, returning the moldering gray organs to a plump and healthy pink.

Only when she was physically restored, did he reluctantly draw her back to the present. To the harsh realities, he knew there could be no avoiding. Her pain relieved, her mind released her to float in and out of consciousness. But each time she surfaced, she clung to him desperately, stark terror in her unseeing eyes. Caleb regretted that he’d no power to heal the injuries to her psyche. Only time and the patient support of those who cared for her would see to that.

The loud drone of an engine drew his eyes skyward. An army helicopter was searching the island, its beacon light slicing a path through the darkness. Caleb had planned to contact Seamus telepathically to send help, but Arianna’s friends must have escaped and rung the gardai. The chopper hovered directly overhead now, its spotlight fixed on them.

As she began to thrash about, whimpering at the intrusive noise and the whipping wind, he held her close. “’Tis safe you are,
a ghrá.
No one’s going to harm you now…nor ever again,” he vowed.
Not if the fate of the whole world hangs in the balance.

Caleb would see to her protection. Somehow. Quite well, he knew that Conor’s death hadn’t put an end to the danger she was in. ‘Twas written in the sacred scrolls that when one possessed by the murderous spirit of a Minion died, another would rise up to take his place.

“Caleb,” Arianna breathed, her voice scratchy and raw.

“
Ciúnaigh, a ghrá.
Sshh, my love, I’m right here.” His lips brushed her forehead. “The ruckus you hear is only help arriving.”

She settled, nestling against him. “I love you, Caleb,” she sighed, and was gone again.

“And I love you,” he whispered into her hair, knowing she wouldn’t hear.

* * *

When Caleb had arrived at the hospital, he parked around back to avoid the journalistic feeding frenzy. The girls’ ordeal—a strange tale of three young women drugged and bound, with a bit of torture and even an attempted human sacrifice thrown in for good measure—was the kind of story the tabloids would be feasting on for days.

As Caleb and Arianna were exiting the building, they found a swarm of reporters buzzing around the Land Rover like bees around a honeycomb. With a murderous glint in his eyes, Caleb knocked away several mics that had been shoved into Arianna’s face.

“Aren’t you the one found her?” a voice called out. Ignoring the question, Caleb bundled his passenger into the vehicle’s passenger seat and went around to get in himself.

As he slammed his door shut, Arianna snorted. “Geez. All you need to qualify for your five minutes of fame is to be the main course at a weenie roast.” But when a haunted look flashed through Caleb’s eyes at her quip, she patted his hand. “I’m sorry, sweetie. But I’m fine now. And it’s helped to know that Conor was mentally ill—not evil.”

“I knew nothing of the cancer, or that he’d been dying of an inoperable brain tumor, until I told Granny he was gone.” Caleb related how she had wept a mother’s tears as she confessed how Conor had sworn her to secrecy about his terminal condition. “I grew up aware of his schizophrenia, o’course. And he’d possessed a bit of a mean streak as a lad. You know the type relishes plucking the wings off butterflies. But those tendencies disappeared decades ago along with an adjustment in his medications.”

“I feel so sorry for Granny.”

“’Tis hard on her, sure. She keeps saying she can’t believe her poor boy would do such a terrible thing. And that maybe ‘twas the new cancer drug he’d been given interacting badly with the medication for his psychotic episodes.”

“That could be the case. Either that, or maybe he dosed himself with whatever high-octane hallucinogen he gave to my friends and me.”

Caleb stilled. A muscle twitched just below his temple. “Hallucinogen?”

“Yeah, you wouldn’t believe the things I was seeing that night. My mother’s ghost rising out of the sea…and other stuff.” The man was arrogant enough, Arianna thought. He would be totally impossible were she to admit to seeing him soaring through the clouds like a frigging Faerie Prince.

Before turning onto the road leading to the castle, Caleb checked the rear-view mirror, probably making sure they had successfully ditched the press.

Arianna glanced at him. “Tara and Michaela are waiting for me at the cottage—”

“They’re not expecting you straight away. I told them I’d be bringing you home with me for a wee while first.” He reached out and captured her hand, brought it to his lips. “We’ve things to discuss, you and I. And I’ve something at the keep I want you to have, so we’ll speak there.” He drew in a long breath. His exhalation was audible. “Whatever happens,
mo chroí
, I want you to know I’d never consciously hurt you.”

Nothing good can come out of a conversation that begins like that, Arianna thought.

* * *

Their fingers interlaced, Caleb held his hand behind his back as he led Arianna around the circling stone steps to his apartments. In the family solar, they passed through the study, then went down a short corridor and entered his bedchamber through a thick mahogany door.

“With Granny staying here, do you really think it’s appropriate to be showing me your ‘etchings’ right now?” Arianna teased to lighten the tension she was feeling.

Her inauspicious stab at humor brought a fleeting smile. “She’s visiting a friend in town this afternoon, so she’ll be none the wiser.”

One look at the room and Arianna understood why a master bedroom in a castle was dubbed with the grander title “master chamber”. The space was a thousand square feet, if it was an inch. Large, mullioned windows graced the western end of the room, providing a breathtaking view of the sea. A monumentally huge fireplace, constructed from some kind of black granite, took up most of the southern wall. Antique rugs covered the varnished floorboards, adding warmth to the tastefully masculine décor. Heavy drapes encircling the imposing bed—the size of two kings raised on a dais—matched those at the windows and the duvet cover.

From her dreams, Arianna recognized the Celtic knot pattern in shades of brown, black, gray, navy and burgundy. The color combination complemented the highly polished, dark mahogany pieces of furniture, so massive only a room with these dimensions could have accommodated them.

Caleb led her to two over-stuffed armchairs set cozily in front of the blazing hearth. After she sat down, he crossed the room, going to one of the built-in, floor-to-ceiling bookcases flanking the fireplace. He plucked an aluminum slipcase off a top shelf.