The Immortal Highlander (15 page)

She was shocked, sometime later, to find they were back in the hotel room, where Adam grimly snatched up their luggage. She opened her mouth to ask what in the world was so important that he’d risked returning for it—really, clothes and toiletries were eminently replaceable—but he’d sifted place again and she’d learned her lesson about keeping her mouth shut while doing so. (Fortunately they encountered no lakes on their itinerary this time; she was grateful they weren’t near the coast, materializing in shark-infested waters would have been way worse than being dunked with tadpoles.)

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 sporting 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.

And the Keltar, well, he’d been fascinated by that Highland clan of Druids since the day they’d been chosen to negotiate and uphold The Compact with the Tuatha Dé, but he’d been especially fascinated by
the twin MacKeltars, Dageus and Drustan—dark, powerful, sometimes barbaric—sixteenth-century Highlanders who’d forsaken love, only to find it in the bleakest hours of their existence.

And now he was in human form, driving into those mountains at the side of a human woman, about to meet those very Keltar in the flesh.

What would they make of him? Would his reception be fair or foul? He was, after all, of the race that had made the Keltars’ lives so difficult; one of those responsible for generations uncounted of MacKeltar being feared, touted as “pagan” and “evil” for continuing to adhere to the Old Ways when Gaul abandoned their Druids first to the Romans and then to the equally tender mercies of Christianity.

Would they know of him? Would his reputation have preceded him? Would Dageus have any memory of Adam healing him? The mighty Highlander’s heart had stopped beating completely by the time Adam had knelt beside him on the Isle of Morar.

Would the Keltar, like Gabrielle, be reluctant to trust him? Reluctant to do what he needed them to do, or rather,
not
do?

Rubbing his jaw, he stared out the window of the rental car, forcing himself to put aside thoughts of whether those two would welcome or revile him—what mattered was that they’d crossed the queen’s wards several leagues back, and Gabrielle was now on protected ground—he’d deal with whatever else came to pass. He’d spent most of the time in transit over the ocean mentally kicking his own ass for what had happened in Atlanta: Because he’d been so selfishly intent on seducing her, on binding her to him, he’d imperiled her life.
Stupid, smug bastard; you’re not invincible anymore.

Rather than winning her, he could have lost his
Sidhe
-seer in that hotel room forever. Her fragile, precious life could have been snuffed out, freeing her soul to go places he could never follow, not even with all his powers restored. Merely thinking about it made his human body start knotting up all over again. Bad thing about being human and having so much muscle was that all that muscle could get tense. He’d gotten his first headache on the plane. He had no desire to get another one. Ever. Nor did he appreciate the sick feeling in his stomach no quantity of food had managed to assuage. Nothing but holding her tightly had seemed to help.

Exhaling slowly, he forced his attention outward, to the countryside, a vista of which he never tired.

At that moment, the car veered sharply to the left, then back just as sharply, and Adam bit back a smile, knowing she’d probably hit him if she saw it. Gabrielle had insisted on driving (if one could call it that) when they’d acquired the cramped, compact rental vehicle, arguing that the effects of the
féth fiada
enshrouding him might cause accidents were he to drive. Unaccustomed, however, to driving on the “wrong” side of the car, on the “wrong” side of the road, she was having a time of it.

For heaven’s sake, if the sheep would just stop catapulting themselves onto the road, I might have a chance!
she’d snapped the last time he’d laughed.
They come out of nowhere, like they’re dropping from the sky.

Poppycock. Sheep trundle. Slow as snails. If you’d quit rubbernecking, trying to look everywhere at once, you’d see them coming,
he’d teased. By Danu, he adored her fine-featured face, the expressions that flitted across it, her temperament. She had an inner fire that begged provoking, just for the pleasure of watching it burn.

Right. I’m supposed to drive past Loch Ness and not look at it? What if Nessie pops her head up and I miss it? You’ve been around for thousands of years. I’ve never been to Scotland. They should keep the damned sheep off the road. Put up fences. Why are there no fences in Scotland? Don’t they believe in protecting the tourists? And what’s wrong with two-lane roads? Have they never heard of two-lane roads?

If it’s not two lanes,
ka-lyrra,
how are you having such a hard time staying on your side of it?

She’d bared her teeth in a ferocious little scowl and he’d had to bite the inside of his mouth to keep from laughing. Or dragging her into his arms and kissing her, which would have certainly resulted in a wreck.

Okay, one and a half lanes,
she’d begrudged irritably.
I’m trying to stay on my three-quarters of a lane of it.

And with a haughty glare, she’d promptly gone back to trying to look everywhere, while avoiding sheep and driving wrong-sided twice-over, spending more time off the road than on.

And he was back to trying not to laugh.

He relished her reaction to the land he’d long loved best, far more than Ireland, perhaps more even than anyplace on all of Danu. He could give it no rhyme or reason, Scotland and her people just did something to him. Always had. If Gabrielle’s inability to keep her eyes (and the car) on the road was any indication, Scotland was exerting the same ineffable pull on her too.

And how could it not? Late summer was breathtaking in the Highlands, the hills dappled with the colors of the waning season: the deep reddish-purple of bell heather, the pale pink cross-leaved heath, the heart-shaped silver heads of sillar shakles. It would be a few weeks yet before ling and heather truly began to paint entire hillsides with their purple-pink haze, and he found himself hoping they’d still be there to see it.

He’d like to see Gabrielle running through a field of heather; he’d like to strip her naked and push her down in it and have his wicked way with her.

And he would, he promised himself. Soon. Now that she was safe.

It wouldn’t be long before they were at the Castle Keltar. The lights of Inverness were even now fading away in his side-view mirror.

Inverness.

Morganna.

It was near here that she’d lived so long ago, at Castle Brodie.

And suddenly, in that side-view mirror there were no roads, no hotels or shops, no diners or pubs, nothing but wide-open, unspoiled land stretching beneath a vast blue sky . . .

I love you,
he’d told her, astonished himself when the words had fallen from his tongue. But Circenn had just been born and was wrapped in blankets, cradled in her arms—his
son
. She’d been sweat-glistening, damp-haired, exhausted, and glowing with an innately female radiance. And something had come over him. He’d said it, and it had been too late to recant. And, bloody hell, how swiftly he’d wished to recant.

She’d torn her gaze reluctantly from the bairn and tipped her face up.

And she’d laughed.

If he’d had a soul, it would have sliced right through it.

Her laughter had been soft and wry, and all the more abrasive for it. For in it, there’d been a touch of pity.

Ye canna love, Fae. Ye have no soul.

So much for Adam Black’s words. Had any woman ever believed them? Or merely bowed to his irresistible sensual lure, fallen prey in body but never in heart? Once, he’d not cared. But time and contact with humans had done strange things to him, changed him, made him begin to wonder about things he’d never wondered about before—and sometimes he felt like he imagined Gabrielle must: straddling two worlds, one foot here, one foot there, no place that felt like home.

How do you know I can’t love?
he’d hissed. So casually she’d thrown the words back in his face, words he’d never said before. Words he’d never said again.
Define love, Morganna.

She’d been silent for a time, staring down at the tiny infant snuffling wetly in her arms.

Love means ye’d die for that person a thousand times o’er,
she’d finally said, gazing down at the newborn.
Ye’d give the verra last drop of all ye had to give to tarry at their side but one moment more, to behold them alive and hale and happy.

That’s not fair,
he’d countered.
You know I don’t have a soul. If I die, I cease to exist forever. If you die, you go on. To some other time, some other place, some other world. I become dust. Nothing more. You can’t hold me to the same criteria.

Ye wish to play at being like us but nae held to the same accounts? If ye truly love someone, Fae princeling, ye’d give the verra last drop of all ye had to give—whate’er it may be. And ye’d nae squabble o’er differences.

Maybe it’s
you
who can’t love, Morganna. Maybe when you love someone it means you’d be willing—not to die—but to give up your immortal soul for them. So maybe it’s
your
failing, not mine.

And so the argument had begun. The timeless, eternal, never-changing argument between them. Until the unique Tuatha Dé bond forged between a Fae male and human woman the instant a child was conceived had become more painful than pleasing. Until they’d both built walls to keep the other out.

By Danu, how many times had they had that fight? A hundred? A thousand?

Right up to the day she died. And he’d stood over her deathbed, trying to get her to take the damned elixir of life, as he’d been trying to get her to since she’d been seventeen; but like a fool, in a rare moment of abjectly stupid honesty all those years ago, he’d told the young Morganna of its unsavory side effect: that immortality and immortal souls could not coexist.

That once she took it, in a short number of years all trace of that by which she defined her humanity would be gone. That soft golden glow surrounding her would fade day by day, until nothing of it was left. Until she was as void of that divine inner flame as any Fae.

She would change, they always did.

But better a soulless Morganna than a dead one.

Never, Adam. Let me die.

He could have taken away her memory of his admission. He could have forced her to take the elixir. He could have made her believe anything he’d wanted her to believe.

But what he’d wanted her to believe was that he was worth it.

Would it be so bloody bad to be like me?
he’d thundered.
Am I such a foul being, then, without a soul, Morganna? Have I not been good to you? What is it you want from me I’ve not given you? What have I failed to do, be?

“Adam, there’s something I don’t get. Why didn’t Darroc just kill us?” Gabby asked abruptly, jarring him from his dark reverie. “He had the advantage of surprise. He could have shot you in the back, or hit you over the head or something.”

He blinked, rubbing a hand over his eyes. Christ, those memories had come suddenly and without warning, crashing over him so intensely that he’d forgotten where he was for a few moments. He’d been back there, hating her for dying. Hating her for looking down on him until the very end for lacking that with which she’d had the grace to be born.

Hating all humans, with their holier-than-thou souls, lumping all mortals together as one unilaterally vile species. And finally remembering that he was, after all, a demigod—so fuck them!—he had walked through the Highlands for a time as Death himself.

Jaw clenched, he shoved the whispers of times-gone-by back into that dark corner of his mind he never willingly visited. His
oubliette,
his place of forgetting. Layers upon layers of memories dropped into the pit and left there, stretching back thousands of years. To immerse in it would be to invite madness. Yet another lie he’d told Circenn was that learning too much too quickly caused madness among their kind, when the truth had been a subtle variation of that: It was not knowing when to forget that did.

“You don’t know Darroc,
ka-lyrra,
” he said. “He likes to play with his prey before he kills it. He wouldn’t take the risk while I was touching you because, if he didn’t knock me out or kill me instantly, I could sift us to safety. He didn’t bother to conceal himself and the Hunters this time with the
féth fiada,
because he wanted me to see him and hear him. He was trying to antagonize me, to get me to turn on him, to separate us. After what he saw, I’d wager he now wants you as much as he wants me.”

“Why?”

He glanced at her. She’d twisted her long hair up in one of those clips that she was so fond of, and there was a little spiky tail sticking straight up, poking the roof of the car, bobbing perkily as they bounced and careened over the rough road. She had on her soft suede jacket with the fleecy lining, the collar turned up, framing her slender neck. The early-evening sun was a fiery ball sliding down behind Ben Killan, gilding her dainty profile as she nibbled her lower lip.

And she was the bonniest damn thing in all the Highlands, far more than the blooming bens and sparkling burns.

She was funny and stubborn and sexy and smart and packed with human passion, and she did something to him he couldn’t explain. Kissing Gabrielle, he’d decided back in the suite, with his arms full of her lush softness, was as close to tasting heaven as a man without a soul could hope to get. She’d responded to him with all the explosive passion he’d sensed in her the moment he’d laid eyes on her, rising swiftly to the edge of climax. He could so easily have brought her to it after they’d been interrupted, could have been merciful and relieved the tension in her body while they’d sifted, or even later on the train or plane.