Once Upon a Castle - Jill Gregory [20]
“Both. We’re proud of our dreamers here. I would show you Ireland, Calin. The bank where the columbine grows, the pub where a story is always waiting to be told, the narrow lane flanked close with hedges that bloom with red fuchsia. The simple Ireland.”
Tossing her hair back, she turned to him. “And more. I would show you more. The circle of stones where power sleeps, the quiet hillock where the faeries dance of an evening, the high cliff where a wizard once ruled. I would give it to you, if you’d take it.”
“And what would you take in return, Bryna?”
“That’s for you to say.” She felt the chill again. The warning. “Now I have something else to show you, Calin.” She glanced uneasily over her shoulder, toward the ruins. Shivered. “He’s close,” she whispered. “And watching. Come into the house.”
He held her back. He was beginning to see that he had run from a good many things in his life. Too many things. “Isn’t it better to face him now, be done with it?”
“You can’t choose the time. It’s already set.” She gripped his hand, pulled. “Please. Into the house.”
Reluctantly, Cal went with her. “Look, Bryna, it seems to me that a bully’s a bully whatever else he might be. The longer you duck a bully, the worse he gets. Believe me, I’ve dealt with my share.”
“Oh, aye, and had a fine bloody nose, as I remember, from one. The two of you, pounding on each other on the street corner. Like hoodlums.”
“Hey, he started it. He tried to shake me down once too often, so I…” Cal trailed off, blew out a long breath. “Whoa. Too weird. I haven’t thought about Henry Belinski in twenty years. Anyway, he may have bloodied my nose, but I broke his.”
“Oh, and you’re proud of that, are you now? Breaking the nose of an eight-year-old boy.”
“I was eight too.” He realized that she had maneuvered him neatly into the house, turned the subject, and gotten her own way. “Very clever, Bryna. I don’t see that you need magic when you can twist a conversation around like that.”
“Just a small talent.” She smiled and touched his cheek. “I was glad you broke his nose. I wanted to turn him into a toad—I had already started the charm when you dealt with it yourself.”
“A toad?” He couldn’t help it, the grin just popped out. “Really?”
“It would have been wrong. But I was only four, and such things are forgiven in the child.” Then her smile faded, and her eyes went dark. “Alasdair is no child, Calin. He wants more than to wound your pride, skin your knees. Don’t take him lightly.”
Then she stepped back, lifting both hands. I call the wind around my house to swirl. She twisted a wrist and brought the wind howling against the windows. Fists of fog against my windows curl. Deafen his ears and blind his eyes. Come aid me with this disguise. Help me guard what was trusted to me. As I will, so mote it be.
He’d stepped back from her, gaping. Fog crawled over the windows, the wind howled like wolves. The woman before him glowed like a candle, shimmering with a power he couldn’t understand. The fire she’d made out of air was nothing compared with this.
“How much am I supposed to believe? Accept?”
She lowered her hands slowly. “Only what you will. The choice will always be yours, Calin. Will you come with me and see what I would show you?”
“Fine.” He blew out a breath. “And after, if you don’t mind, I’d like a glass of that Irish of yours. Straight up.”
She managed a small smile. “Then you’ll have it. Come.” As she started toward the stairs, she chose her words carefully. “We have little time. He’ll work to break the spell. His pride will demand it, and my powers are more…limited than they were.”
“Why?”
“It’s part of it,” was all she would say. “And so is what I have to show you. It isn’t just me he wants, you see. He wants everything I have. And he wants the most precious treasure of the Castle of Secrets.”
She stopped in front of a door, thick with carving. There was no knob, no lock, just glossy wood and that ornate pattern on it that resembled ancient writing. “This room is barred to him by power greater than mine.” She passed a hand over the wood,