Anne Bishop - The Pillars of the World

Still there was that Fae Lord at the horse farm to consider. He might think to look beyond the borders of the Old Place.

Adolfo sighed. No, he couldn’t take the time required to soften the girl to the humility that was proper and becoming in a female. But she would give him the opportunity to work with the two younger Inquisitors and teach them how to refine their skills.

Dianna gave the dead mare in the meadow a wide berth. The shadow hounds sniffed the carcass, then backed away, growling softly. Lucian, in his other form, laid his ears back and galloped to the cottage. Dianna followed, feeling her heart thump against her chest when she noticed the open kitchen door.

Lucian reached the cottage, changed to his human form, and went inside before Dianna and her hounds crossed the meadow. By the time she stepped into the kitchen, he was striding out of the bedroom.

“She’s gone,” he said, his voice filled with fury and bitterness. “She’s already slunk away with that lout .”

Dianna looked at the soup kettle on the worktable and the biscuits beside it. She gingerly touched the kettle. Still a bit of warmth. And the biscuits were fresh.

“I don’t think she left with him,” Dianna said softly. She remembered what Morag had said about the Black Coats, and a chill went through her.

“What are you talking about?” Lucian snapped. “There’s signs of packing in every room.”

Dianna walked to the kitchen door, stared at the dead mare in the meadow, then turned back to her brother. “Oh, she intended to leave with him, but I don’t think that’s the reason she isn’t here.” When he started to argue, her own temper sharpened. “If she was leaving for good, she wouldn’t have left food out to spoil.”

“Someone else would have taken care of it,” Lucian said, pacing the main room. Then he stopped abruptly at the same time Dianna asked, “Who?”

They looked at each other.

Dianna licked her lips, which were suddenly, painfully dry. “Maybe she’s just gone to Ahern’s to ask what to do about the mare.”

“Maybe.” Lucian hesitated. “We’ll wait here a while. If she doesn’t return soon, I’ll go to Ahern’s to find out if he’s seen her.”

Relief flowed through Dianna. Whatever had happened to that mare looked bad, but it had nothing to do with Ari.

“While we’re waiting, we might as well have some of the soup,” she said. “There’s no sense letting it go to waste.”

As she dished out the soup, she suddenly wondered why Morag had returned to Tir Alainn in such a hurry.

“Was the mare dead when you left?” Morphia asked.

“No,” Morag replied. Hidden in the shadows of the woods, she studied the meadow—and shivered. There’s a storm coming .

She had been gone less than an hour. She had been gone far, far too long. I shouldn’t have left her. If I’d been thinking, I wouldn’t have left her .

“The Huntress is obviously here,” Morphia said, lifting her chin in the direction of the shadow hounds, who were gathered near the kitchen door. “Perhaps the Lightbringer as well. So at least we’ll have some help.”

Morag’s heart had gone numb. That was the only way to explain this odd sensation of her mind seeing things with painful clarity while she felt nothing. “No,” she said. “We’ll get no help from them.”

“But isn’t that why you came back to Tir Alainn?”

Morag shook her head slowly. “I went back to tell them about the witches, so that they would understand that Ari wasn’t someone to manipulate for the Fae’s pleasure. And to tell them why it was so important to protect her kind.”

“All the more reason for them to help us now.”

“Oh, they would help us protect Ari. But they’re also interested in eliminating Neall because she wants to marry him and leave Brightwood. So we’ll get help from someone who wants to protect both of them. We’ll go to Ahern.”

Something shivered through the air. Adolfo set his wineglass on the table, walked over to the window, and pulled the curtain aside. Nothing looked different, but something was different.

Maybe it was nothing. Even locked in the cellar, the witch made this whole place stink of magic. It wouldn’t feel right again until she was dead.

He turned to retrieve his wine, then stopped.

It was magic he was sensing, but there was too much of it to be coming from just her .

He opened the drawing room. The guard standing on duty immediately straightened.

“Get the horses saddled,” Adolfo said. “Then wait for further orders.” He closed the door, retrieved his wine, and drained the glass.

His hand shook. It hadn’t done that in a long, long time. He always feared the witches, never felt easy until they—and their magic—died. That fear was his mother’s legacy. Keeping them alive long enough to break them down was a test of his own strength.

This one was hardly more than a girl—and still his hands shook. Because of the Fae. Before now, he’d been able to dismiss them. They came and went, paying little attention to the human world beyond their immediate pleasures, and he’d never had to be concerned about them becoming adversaries. But there was the Gatherer to consider. She was already aware of the Inquisitors, already seemed to be taking an interest in the witches in this land. She could not be dismissed. Neither could the Fae Lord who had hidden his true nature from the people of this village for so many years.

There hadn’t been time to get the feel of this witch, to know which branches of the Mother were her strength. No matter. They would take her somewhere on the estate far enough away that the ladies of the house wouldn’t be distressed. And they would hang her from a tree and open up her belly. A crude method, but effective.

“I shall not suffer a witch to live,” he whispered. He would make sure nothing and no one spared this one.

He walked out of the room and gave his orders.

The dark horse slid to a stop, his hooves bare inches from Ahern’s boots.

“Where’s Ari?” Morag demanded.

Ahern crossed his arms and lifted his chin. “Gone by now. She and Neall. The Black Coats came here today. When she came a little later to bring the horses that had come with you, I told her she and the boy had to go.”

“Neall went with her?”

Ahern shook his head, his expression turning grim. “She ran back to make her peace with Brightwood. He followed as soon as he got the horses saddled. Couldn’t have been more than a quarter hour behind her, half at the most.”

Morag closed her eyes. “He didn’t reach her in time. The Black Coats must have her. If Neall isn’t careful, they’ll have him too.”

“How can you be so sure?” Ahern demanded.

Morag opened her eyes. “Death is whispering. Death is nearby.”

Ahern lowered his arms, clenched his fists. “They’ll have taken her to Baron Felston’s estate. That’s the only place the Black Coats could go to do . . . what you said they do.”

“How do I get there?”

“I’ll take you.” Ahern turned, summoned one of the men who had been lingering nearby. “Glenn. You remember what I told you? All of it?” He waited for the man to nod. “No matter what happens today, you do what I told you.”

“Yes, sir.”

A few moments later, Morag and Morphia followed a gray stallion over the fields, racing toward Baron Felston’s estate.

Neall rode close enough to the estate to see the house and stables. Too much activity. Why were so many horses being saddled?

“Best to leave us here,” the small man said. “We’ll make our own way to the house.” He paused. “Do you know where they’d likely be keeping the witch?”