Нора Робертс - Blood Magick

On a half laugh—just a touch of derision in it, he arched his eyebrows. “So now it’s all yours, is it?”

“The time, that choice, was mine, both of them. And both of them wrong. All my careful calculations, wrong. So more’s needed to be certain this time. This third time.”

“Third time’s the charm.”

Huffing out a breath, she smiled a little. “So it’s said. What we need may be there, for the taking, if we go back. So, will you go dreaming with me, Fin?”

To hell and back again, he thought.

“I will, but we’ll be sure of the dream spell first. Sure of it, and of the way back. I won’t have you lost beyond.”

“I won’t have either of us lost. We’ll be sure first, of the way there, and the way back. It’s Cabhan’s time, his origins—we agree on that?”

“We do.” So Fin sighed. “Which means you’ll be after bleeding me again.”

“Just a bit.” Now she lifted her eyebrows. “All this fuss over a bit of blood from a man who so recently claimed he’d die for me?”

“I’d rather not do it by the drop.”

“No,” she said when he started to pull off his sweater. “Not from the mark. His origins, Fin. He didn’t bear the mark at his beginning.”

“The blood from the mark’s more his.”

She did what she did rarely, stepped to him, laid a hand over the cursed mark. “Not from this. Yours from your hand, mine from mine, so our blood and dreams entwine.”

“You’ve written the spell already?”

“Just pieces of it—and in my head.” She smiled at him, forgetting herself enough to leave her hand on his arm. “I do considerable thinking when I clean.”

“Come to my house and think your fill, as your brother left the room he uses there a small disaster.”

“He’s the finest man I know, along with the sloppiest. He just doesn’t see the mess he makes. It’s a true skill, and one Meara will have to deal with for years to come.”

“He says they’re thinking the solstice—the summer—for the wedding, and having it in the field behind the cottage here.”

“They’re both ones for being out of doors as much as possible, so it suits them.” She turned away to fetch a bowl and her smallest cauldron.

“They suit each other.”

“Oh, sure they do, however much that surprised the pair of them. And with Boyle and Iona before them, we’ll have spring and summer weddings, new beginnings, and the gods willing, the rest far behind us.”

She got out the herbs she wanted, already dried and sealed, water she’d gathered from rain on the full moon, extract distilled from valerian.

Fin rose, got down a mortar and pestle. “I’ll do this,” he said, measuring herbs.

For a time they worked in easy silence.

“You never play music in here,” he commented.

“It distracts me, but you can bring in the iPod from the kitchen if you’re wanting some.”

“No, it’s fine. You played last night. Late in the night.”

Startled, she looked up from her work. “I did. How do you know?”

“I hear you. You often play at night, late in the night. Often sad and lovely songs. Not sad last night, but strong. And lovely all the same.”

“It shouldn’t carry to you.”

His gaze lifted, held hers. “Some bonds you can’t break, no matter how you might wish it, no matter how you might try. No matter how far I traveled, there were times I’d hear you play as if you stood beside me.”

It tugged and tore at her heart. “You never said.”

He merely shrugged. “Your music brought me home more than once. Maybe it was meant to. Bowl or cauldron?” he asked.

“What?”

“The herbs I’ve crushed. For the bowl or the cauldron?”

“Bowl. What brought you home this last time?”

“I saw Alastar, and knew he was needed. I bargained and bought him, arranged for him to be sent. But it wasn’t time for me. Then I saw Aine, and knew she was for Alastar, and . . . more. Her beauty, her spirit, called to me, and I thought, she must come home, but it wasn’t time for me. Then Iona came to Ireland, came to Mayo, walked by Sorcha’s clearing through the woods to you. In the rain, she walked in a pink coat, so full of excitement and hope and magicks yet untapped.”

Stunned, Branna stopped her work. “You saw her.”

“I saw she came home, and came to you, and knew so must I. He would see, and he would know. And he would come, and with the three I might finally end him.”

“How did you see Iona—even to her pink coat?” Flummoxed, Branna pushed her hands at her hair, loosened pins she had to fix in again. “She’s not your blood. Do you ask yourself how?”

“I ask myself many things, but don’t always answer.” He shrugged again. “Cabhan knew her for of the three, so it may be through him I saw, and I knew.”

“It should remind you, when you doubt, the blood you share makes our circle stronger.” She lit the candles, then the fire under the little cauldron. “Slow heat builds to a steady boil. We’ll let that simmer while we write the spell.”

When Connor came in he kept his silence, as magicks swam through the air. Branna and Fin stood, hands outstretched over the cauldron while smoke rose pale blue.

“Sleep to dream, dream to fly, fly to seek, seek to know.” She spoke the words three times, and Fin followed.

“Dream as one, as one to see, see the truth, truth to know.”

Stars flickered through the smoke.

“Starlight guide us through the night and safe return us to the light.” Branna lifted a hand, and with the other gestured toward a slim, clear bottle.

Liquid rose from the cauldron, blue as the smoke, shining with stars, and in one graceful flow, poured into the bottle. Fin capped it.

“That’s done it. We’ve done it.” She let out a breath.

“Another dreaming spell?” Now Connor crossed the room. “When do we go for him?”

“It’s not for that, not yet.” Branna shoved her hands through her hair again, muttered a curse at herself, and this time just pulled the pins out. “What time is it? Well, bloody hell, where did the day go?”

“Into that.” Fin pointed to the bottle. “She nearly ate my head when I was so bold as to suggest we take an hour and have lunch.”

“She’ll do that when she’s working,” Connor agreed, giving Fin a bolstering pat on the shoulder. “Still, there’s always supper.” He gave Branna a hopeful smile. “Isn’t there?”

“Men and their bellies.” She took the bottle to a cupboard so it could cure. “I’ll put something together as it’s best we all talk through what Fin and I worked out today. Get out of my house for a bit.”

“I’ve only just got into the house,” Connor objected.

“You’re after a hot meal and wanting me to make it, so get out of the house so I can have some space to figure on it.”

“I just want a beer before—”

Fin took his arm, grabbed his own coat. “I’ll stand you one down the pub as I could use the air and the walk. And the beer.”

“Well then, since you put it that way.”

When Kathel trotted to the door with them, Branna waved at the three of them. “He could use the walk himself. Don’t come back for an hour—and tell the others the same.”

Without waiting for an answer, she turned and walked through to her kitchen.

Spotless, she thought, and so beautifully quiet—a lovely thing after hours of work and conjuring. She would’ve enjoyed a glass of wine by the fire, and that hour without a single thing to do, so she had to remind herself she enjoyed the domestic tasks.

She put her hands on her hips, cleared her head of clutter.

All right then, she could sauté up some chicken breasts in herbs and wine, roast up some red potatoes in olive oil and rosemary, and she had green beans from the garden she’d blanched and frozen—she could do an almondine there. And since she hadn’t had time to bake more yeast bread, and the lot of them went through it like ants at a picnic, she’d just do a couple quick loaves of beer bread. And that was good enough for anyone.