The Magic Knot (8 page)

“The portents are good.” Red flags of excitement blazed on Tristan’s cheeks. “I think Niall will bring the pisky here today.”

Nightshade examined his fingernails, contemplating how much of his nocturnal visit to the Elephant’s Nest he should reveal. He smiled in anticipation of the druid’s surprise. “I could have told you that.”

Tristan looked up, a length of small intestine dangling from his hand. “What’s that?”

Nightshade wandered across to the dirty window framed with rotten wood. He stared at the waves rolling across the English Channel toward France. Let the bastard wait.

“Tell me, stalker, or you’ll suffer.”

From the tone of Tristan’s voice, an empty threat— for now. Nightshade cocked a hip against the counter and examined Tristan’s frustrated expression with satisfaction. “I visited the Nest last night. She’s staying there.”

Tristan dumped the handful of entrails back on the plastic tray. “Bloody Niall. I should know better than to trust him.”

“He didn’t realize who she was.”

“How’s that possible? Niall would sense one of the Good People.”

“She is half human.” Nightshade watched carefully for Tristan’s reaction to the reminder that Rosenwyn was his daughter.

“So?” Tristan turned away, ripped off the gloves, and dumped them in the trash.

“She’s been living as a human for years. You’ never know she has mixed blood unless you were looking for it.”

“Sounds like you picked her out easily enough.”

“I remember her.”

“Ahh.” Tristan walked out to the terrace and stared at the sea.

Nightshade followed him, squinting in the sunlight. “Niall’s bringing her today. Will you ask her to stay?”

If Tristan persuaded Niall that Rosenwyn should stay, it would make Nightshade’s life easier. Then, with her under the same roof, it would be only a matter of time before he made her his own. He suppressed a growl at the thought of her warm blood flooding his mouth, and her sweet, healthy flesh beneath his teeth.

“She won’t be staying here,” Tristan announced.

Nightshade snapped back to reality with a jolt. “Why not? She’s your flesh and blood.”

“I know you want her. Forget the idea. You have me.”

Nightshade bit down on his retort. “Why do you want to see her then?”

“She has some things of mine. I intend to retrieve them.”

“What things?” Before the words faded, Nightshade answered his own question. “The Magic Knot paintings,” he whispered, queasy with horror at the thought of seeing the imprisoned bodies of the piskies.

Tristan faced him. In the brisk sea breeze, clumps of his hair flapped against his skull like bird’s wings. “You do have a brain in that magnificent head of yours after all.” He grasped Nightshade’s forearm, a glint of madness in his eyes. “I want to bring the pictures back here, let the piskies see I have their ancestral home. They’ll wish they’ been kinder to me when they had the chance.” Tristan’s fingernails bit into Nightshade’s arm. “If the girl was raised as human, she won’t realize the paintings are anything more than oil on canvas. I’ll persuade her to let me have them.”

He slapped Nightshade’s cheek, harder than an affectionate pat, but not hard enough to stir the need to retaliate. Nightshade curled his lip at the sting.

Tristan grinned darkly. “Revenge will at last be ours. I’ll force the troop to watch from their painted prisons while I sacrifice the last member of their royal line. Then they’ll know they’re trapped for all eternity.”

Tristan plans to kill Rosenwyn.

Only years of practice held Nightshade steady as the shock of Tristan’s words crashed through him, shattering his brittle new hopes. Thirty years ago he’d craved revenge on the piskies. He’d believed alliance with Tristan gave him a future. Instead, Tristan had destroyed everything that mattered to him. He wouldn’t let the druid kill Rosenwyn.

Rosenwyn is my queen.

The thought of watching Tristan slice open Rose’s belly as he had the rabbit’s weighed sickly in his gut.

Tristan gave him a searching look.

Nightshade smiled slowly, precisely, judging the exact stretch of lips and curve of mouth to indicate pleasure and acceptance. “Wonderful.”

“Come, let’s discuss our strategy for this meeting with my daughter.” Tristan ambled toward the house.

Nightshade stared after him. He already knew his strategy: bite Rosenwyn, bind her to him with blood-lust, then kill Tristan. And if the delicious Niall O’Connor got in the way, Nightshade would be only too happy to bite him as well.

Later that day, Rose drove her car along a narrow Cornish lane, following the arousing sight of Niall’s tight backside straddling his motorcycle.

He signaled and turned left between two massive granite pillars topped with statues of slender dancing figures. She slowed her car and glanced up at their frozen smiles with a hint of disquiet.

The drive ran for half a mile between rambling, unkempt banks of rhododendrons, crossed a bridge spanning a stream, and climbed a hill through stubby woodland buffeted by the sea winds.

As they emerged from the wood onto a drive circling a fountain, Trevelion Manor stood before her, a rambling old structure that looked as though it had grown out of the cliffs. The front of the building was wreathed in ropes of creeper bearing withered yellow leaves that fluttered in the sea breeze.

She shivered. Her father certainly liked his privacy. The Elephant’s Nest seemed isolated, but it was nothing compared to this place.

On climbing out of her car, she wrinkled her nose at the smelly, stagnant water and rotting leaves in the
fountain. Clumps of yellow and gray lichen clung to the nymph dancing above the bowl, turning what must have once been a pretty statue into a monster.

A tingle of familiarity ran along her nerves. She stared at the nymph’s face, imagined it clean, imagined water spraying jewel-like drops from the shell in its hand. Had she ever lived here? Her mother had been so secretive about her father, she’d never mentioned where they lived.

Niall came over to her as the front door opened. “Good luck,” he said softly, and they walked toward the house.

Nightshade stood in the doorway grinning. “Good afternoon, Rosenwyn. I knew you wouldn’t be able to keep away from me.”

“Hello, Nightshade.” Arrogant, conceited, and proud, she thought as she took in his silky hair trailing over rock-hard pecs. But, boy, could he carry it off.

“Half-breed.” Nightshade acknowledged Niall with a grin that verged on a leer.

Face blank, Niall made no response to the insult. “The lass’s here to see her father.”

“And her father is delighted to see her.” A slender, almost frail man stepped out and smiled at her.

Rose tried to smile back but her lips wouldn’t cooperate. With his waxy skin and obviously dyed black hair, he resembled a walking corpse who’d been prepared by the undertaker and then risen from the slab. She hadn’t taken after her mother, but God help her if she looked like her father.

“Hello, Mr. Jago.” Now that the time of the meeting was here, she had no idea what to say. She didn’t even know what to call him.

He stepped closer and extended his hand. “Welcome, my dear. Do come in out of the cold wind. November has brought winter at last.”

Up close, he smelled of musty fabric and chemicals. When she grasped his hand, a ripple of cold shot up her arm. Retrieving her hand, she rubbed life back into her fingers. Every instinct she possessed told her not to venture inside.

He inclined his head and indicated that she should precede him through the door. “Please do come in.”

Rose glanced at Niall for encouragement and met the blank wall of his unreadable gaze.

Damn.
She’d come this far….

With a quiver of trepidation, she stepped over the threshold into the dark hallway. The decorative wooden paneling and plasterwork inside had obviously once been grand but, like the outside of the house, had fallen into disrepair. Her father led her along the corridor to a large drawing room dominated by eerie stuffed animals. A bay window looked out over a large garden toward the sea. Although the house was in poor condition, the place must be worth a fortune.

Nightshade wandered across to the massive granite fireplace and spread his wings toward the heat. Niall entered last and positioned himself by the doorway. Reaching out mentally, Rose sensed Niall as if he were an anchor for her sanity. She released her breath, glad of the support.

“A drink, my dear.” Tristan held up a decanter of golden liquid.

“I don’t drink.”

“A cup of tea, perhaps.”

“No, thank you.” She looked around at the yellowing teeth and glassy eyes of the dead animals. The idea
of consuming anything in this place made her nauseated.

“I hope you don’t mind if I do.” He poured for himself and indicated a seat by the window. “Make yourself comfortable. We’ll talk. Catch up on the years we’ve missed.”

Rose sat stiffly facing her father, and noticed Nightshade and Niall eyeing each other like pit bulls.

“If you two boys are going to fight, please take it outside so I can talk to my daughter in peace. Otherwise sit down and behave,” Tristan said, his casual tone at odds with his words.

Niall dropped into a straight-backed chair by the door. Nightshade flopped across an easy chair, legs over one arm, wings over the other. Furniture was not designed for people with wings.

Tristan placed his glass on a side table and steepled his fingers. “Now, Rosenwyn, tell me about your mother.”

Her mother’s words echoed in her mind:
Never go to Cornwall. Never search for your father.
A flash of guilt stung her and lingered, a burning pain in her chest. Rose had always assumed her mother was just bitter and paranoid, but if she’d been a fairy, something terrible must have happened to drive her out alone into the human world.

“There isn’t much to tell. She died eleven months ago.”

“Was she happy?”

Rose stared out the window toward the sea. Had her mother been happy? For as long as she remembered, her mother had frantically tried to enjoy herself. The men. The drink and drugs. But her behavior had been a search for oblivion more than happiness.

If Rose had felt out of place, her mother must have been desperate—only she’d used a different method of escape.

Rose clenched her hands. She had always judged her mother harshly. Maybe she should have tried to understand. “In her own way, I’m sure she was happy.”

“But it wasn’t your way?”

Even if he were her biological father, discussing her mother with this stranger felt like a betrayal. He was nothing like the father she’d pictured in her dreams. She had no wish to reveal her hopes and worries to him.

“Mother was an artist. I’m an accountant.” Rose forced a smile. “And never the twain shall meet.”

Tristan Jago smiled back. “I have a knack for figures. You must get that from me.” His eyes lost focus. “Your mother was a free spirit. She and I didn’t see eye to eye on many things. It sounds to me as though you two had the same problem.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Rose noticed Nightshade watching her. She glanced over, expecting his arrogant grin, but he averted his gaze. Unease fluttered in her chest.

“Ailla painted much of the time when I knew her,” Tristan continued. “During the years we lived together here she painted the Magic Knot tarot paintings.” He smiled sadly. “Such wonderful paintings. I have a strong emotional attachment to those works. My dear Ailla left me when they were finished and took you with her.”

“How old was I when we left?”

“It’s so long ago, I’m not quite sure. Believe me when I tell you I searched for you and your mother. But it was not to be.”

Rose stared at Tristan and fished the depths of her
mind. A memory skittered back. Nightshade bending over her, tall and dark. She was frightened, screaming. He lifted her, cradled her in his arms. In her mind, she heard the echo of his deep voice, repeating her name, soothing her.

Rose gasped, clutched the arms of her chair, and jerked her head around to meet the nightstalker’s silver gaze. “You’re the only one I remember. You were…” She shook her head in frustration as the recollection faded.

Tristan cleared his throat. “That’s not surprising. He’s lived here for years. At one time, I think, he was even a little in love with your mother.”

Nightshade must be older than he looked, but that didn’t seem strange. Something else she already knew?

“Tell me, Rosenwyn,” Tristan said, “what ever happened to the Magic Knot collection? I would love to view the paintings again. They hold so many cherished memories for me.”

Rose glanced at Niall’s taut expression, tried to sense him, found nothing. She dragged her gaze back to Tristan. Why was he so interested in the wretched paintings? Blinking, Rose gathered her thoughts. “Mother had them put in storage.” Tristan’s eyes widened with alarm, and she added quickly, “It’s a specialized facility for fine art, with humidity and temperature controls. Mother left instructions in her will that the paintings were to be cared for.”

“Perhaps…if you have no use for them, you could return them to their original home. I’d love to hang them here.”

In the crowded drawing room, every spare patch of wall was decorated with a glass case containing a dead animal. “Are you planning to redecorate then?”

“This is a large house, my dear. I have many bare walls, and it would give me much pleasure to see them back where they belong.”

Tristan’s attempt to appear sentimental didn’t convince her for a moment. He had an ulterior motive for wanting the paintings. Considering the state of the decrepit manor house, his motive wasn’t hard to figure out. It was her stock-in-trade—money.

Rose shook her head. “I’m sorry, Mr. Jago; my hands are tied. Mother left instructions in her will that I mustn’t part with them.”

Tristan’s face tightened until his head resembled a polished skull. “Your hands are tied, are they?” He stood, faced the window, and knocked back the last of his drink. “I was hoping you’ make this easy, my dear. Now we’re going to have to do it the hard way.”

Alarmed by Tristan’s clipped tone, Rose glanced at Niall, who’d risen from his chair and taken a step forward. His flinty gaze flicked between Tristan and Nightshade.