Dark Rival (43 page)

Where was Moffat? He stood, searching for him, but instead of sensing evil, Ailios's great white power flowed over him, through him.

Royce jerked, stunned. His gaze and senses were drawn to the carriage, for she was within the vehicle. As he stood, the carriage crossed the drawbridge and he heard her laughter— and the squeal of a child, followed by more childish voices.

Amazement stunned him senseless.

The carriage was passing him now.

He strained to see within—and saw himself seated beside Ailios, three small children with them.

What did this mean?

But he knew, Ailios had given him those children, Ailios was his wife.

Remaining stunned, he turned to stare after the carriage as it vanished into the next gatehouse. And so much intense yearning consumed him.

Moffat materialized beside him, sword in hand. He grinned.

Royce didn't think, he leapt—and so did Moffat.

HE BECAME AWARE of fires raging, an inferno. He had leapt forward another one hundred and seventy years into a place called St. Petersburg. This time, the knives in his skull remained even as his powers returned, and in the hack of his mind, he knew his body was beginning to suffer from so many leaps. He realized a huge palace was in flames. A mob was besieging the walls, which were guarded by a very few frightened soldiers. The mob wielded pikes and logs, and had destroyed every carriage and vehicle in their path, while the soldiers wielded strange weapons with swords sticking from them. Loud bangs sounded. Men screamed in fury, in agony. As he stood, he saw the palace gates had been breached.

"You will die today," Moffat panted.

Royce still gripped his sword as he whirled to face the deamhan. “So ye lust for me, not Ailios, he hissed. He hurled his energy at him, but Moffat blocked it.

Moffat laughed, thrusting. "I will kill you for taking Kaz from me. Then Ailios will bend to me—in my bed—and she will heal for me as I choose."

Royce met the thrust, enraged. Moffat wanted revenge on him after all. Their blades rang. Did he have the holy Book of Healing?

“I have many pages from it," Moffat replied. “How else would I keep so many giants alive in these wars?"

Royce roared his answer and thrust many times, so swiftly that Moffat was driven backward, able only to defend himself. Royce laughed, feeling triumph at hand.

Moffat laughed back—and leapt.

Royce roared and followed.

HE CRASHED, no longer caring about the pain in his racked body. The knives had gone entirely though his brain, or so it seemed, and he howled from the pain. As he struggled to see past the shooting stars in his mind, searching for Moffat, he was dismayed—for he was at Carrick once more. Horseless carriages filled the courtyard. Laughter drifted from the open doors of the hall. He recognized Ailios’s voice and he had one coherent thought. She was still his wife.

He heard himself speaking, for a strong breeze was carrying sound that day.

"Die," Moffat panted.

Royce felt the blade caress his jugular, a whisper of razor-sharp steel. He leapt.

HE LEAPT FAR into the future, centuries farther than the date of his death. And this time, even before crashing, he searched for Moffat and felt him on his heels. He grunted as he landed again on his back. Somehow, he had kept a grasp of his sword. This time he wept from the torment of the leap. He wanted to faint from the agony and knew he must not. He was certain he could not withstand time travel many more times.

He heard Moffat gasping beside him. His head exploding, he managed to see a strange, starless sky. He tightened his grasp on his sword.

Above him were a thousand huge towers, all brilliantly lit from within. He was lying on a smooth, gleaming, ebony road, one that seemed to be made of seamless and endless black stone. There were no stars, no moon, just the light from the towers. He sat up. Silver horseless vehicles moved on the road, hovering just above it, filled with people whose faces he could see through the windows. Others flew high in the sky, like birds without any wings.

But he could not think about this strange world. Power had returned to his muscles, flowed in his veins. He stood. "A Ailios!"

Moffat sat, Royce seized him, so he could not leap. In that moment, he felt the deamhan's black power returning. He struck, intending to behead him this time.

And Moffat leapt anyway.

But Royce was ready. Anticipating the leap, he went with him, his blade cutting into his throat and jugular artery as they were hurled past the huge towers and into the void of timeless space.

Moffat howled in rage and pain.

Flying through the stars and moons, through meteors and rock, past suns, the force now threatening to tear him limb from limb. Royce finished the thrust, slicing through Moffat's neck.

For one more instant, their gazes remained locked.

Royce felt savage triumph. He released his sword and watched it spin away into infinity.

Moffat's gaze became incredulous, and then his head and body separated and were hurled away toward other galaxies.

Royce gave over to the leap with his body, and, suddenly exhausted, he willed a landing, any landing, anywhere….in any time.

WHERE WAS ROYCE?

Allie huddled in one of the two large chairs in Carriers hall sick with fear and despair. She'd arrived home in the late afternoon of the exact day she'd been seized by Moffat at Blackwood Hall. It was almost
midnight
. Royce had vanished into time, pursued by Moffat, over twelve hours ago, if she dared count the hours in a normal way.

Where was he? What was happening? Why hadn’t he returned to her?

Allie was so afraid, and no matter how Ceit and Peigi hovered, how kind they were, how attentive, the sick feeling in the pit of her stomach would not subside.

She felt power approaching and cried out but it was Aidan who strode into the hall, his face hard and grim.

Allie gasped, “Where is Royce?”

"I dinna ken," he said.

Allie shivered, a terrible cold stealing over her already chilled body. "What does that mean?"

He paused by her chair. “I followed them to a French city in the seventh century, but they leapt so quickly. I landed after them, I managed to chase them to the eighteenth century but they were long gone by then—an' I could not find their trail."

Allie choked on more fear. Moffat was hunting Royce through the centuries. "Try again!"

"I canna,” Aidan said fiercely. "Ye dinna think I wish to find the man I love as a friend, a brother and a father, all at once! They're gone, Allie, long gone, an' they could be anywhere, in any time."

She felt her tears finally falling. "It's been hours and hours. Oh God. What could be happening?”

Aidan did not answer, laying his large hand on her back.

"Have ye eaten? Have ye taken some wine? Ye need to do so an’ get rest."

"I am not resting" she flashed furiously, I am sitting right here, waiting for Royce to come home!"

His expression grave, he left her to go to the table, where he poured a mug of wine and began sipping it. Allie stared. She had never seen him so somber. In that moment, she knew he thought Royce dead.

She would never believe it.

But when
midnight
came and went, she curled up in her chair and wept.

FIVE DAYS LATER, Allie was standing on the ramparts of the southern walls, staring listlessly across the ravine and adjoining lands, wishing Royce would miraculously appear before her very eyes. She was so afraid he would not. As she stood there, one of his heavy plaids wrapped around her green velvet dress, she saw three riders approaching. Not a one was Royce, although they were Masters all, and she let the tears freely fall.

She wasn't going to believe he was dead. She would never believe it. But why didn't he come home?

She didn't move as the riders galloped closer, finally crossing the drawbridge. A moment later she turned and saw MacNeil, Seoc and another Master whom she did not know dismounting in the bailey below. MacNeil glanced up and raised his hand. Allie could not wave back.

She turned away, her back to the men. She prayed to her grandfather that MacNeil brought good news, but his expression had been severe.

Power approached. It was a power she had yet to feel, hot and impatient, battle ready. She turned and stared at a dark, blue-eyed man clad in thigh-high boots, a red and black plaid worn over his leine. In spite of his intense presence, his searching blue gaze was soft with sympathy.

Allie tensed.

He was reading her mind, because he smiled. "Aye, lady, I’m yer brother, Guy Macleod.”

Allie breathed hard. She looked at him, thinking about the fact that he was a powerful man she could depend on— her only family in this time. Aidan had stayed at Carrick, but she knew he was ready to go home to his small son. Guy was a stranger, but she needed him. "Thank you," she managed to say, realizing she might break down at any moment. “Thank you for coming."

He studied her for a moment. "Do ye wish for me to call ye Ailios or Allie?"

"Allie," she said, because there was only one person whom she wished to hear the name Ailios from. “I need Royce,” she heard herself say brokenly.

His slight smile vanished. "It has been five days since he was last seen outside Eoradh in the sixth century. T’is time to grieve."

"No! Is that why you came? To tell me to give up hope?"

"Yer my sister. I came to invite ye to Blayde. I have a wife an’ she can comfort ye."

"I am not leaving Carrick." Allie cried. Tears fell. "I appreciate your offer, I can't leave. ...not yet."

He said carefully. "If Royce could return, he would."

Allie began to cry.

Guy Macleod laid his large hand clumsily on her shoulder. "Ye need to come with me to Blayde" he said. "Yer my sister. T’is my duty to care for ye now."

Allie shook her head, backing away.

He became coaxing. "My wife is very kind. Ye’ll like her." He hesitated. "She's from yer time."

"I have to wait for Royce,” Allie tried desperately. "Then wait with me and Lady Tabitha at Blayde.” She shoot her head to clear it; she couldn't have heard him correctly. "I beg your pardon. You didn't say your wife's name is Tabitha?"

He seemed perplexed. "Aye, I did. Ye’d like her greatly— everyone likes Lady Tabitha," he said.

She was in disbelief. “Not Tabby….my Tabby.”

"I dinna ken."

"Is she dark blond and beautiful, a good hand taller than I am? Does she cast spells?" Allie cried. "Does she use Tarot! Did you find her in
New York
?"

Guy's eyes went wide. "Keep yer voice down. She’s no witch. But aye. I found her there in the year 2008.”

Allie simply stared, stunned.

ALLIE STOOD at the canopied entrance of her Park Avenue home.

The city hadn't changed. Park Avenue was bumper to bumper with yellow cabs and luxury black sedans. Horns blared. Pedestrians rushed up and down the sidewalks. The center of the street was abloom with flowers. No litter marred the clean, swept sidewalks.

It was September 21. She could have returned home at any time, but it had seemed appropriate to return two weeks after Royce had been murdered by Moffat at modern-day Carrick—because she'd been waiting in the fifteenth century for two weeks for him to return.

Royce’s Fate was engraved in stone. Moffat had been meant to murder him, and apparently, he had done just that in 1430.

It was hard to grasp the fact that Royce was dead. Worse, she was convinced she had caused his death a second time. If she hadn't gone back in time to save him, none of this would have happened, would it? And he would have lived another six hundred years.

Her heart shrieked at her in protest. Her heart would never believe him dead. Her heart would wait for him forever.

She was deeply depressed, grief-stricken. She had even considered going back to Ruari in the sixth century, but what if she caused his death then, too? It had become time to be sensible. He was dead, for there was no other explanation for his absence. She would mourn forever—but her place wasn't the fifteenth century. Of course it wasn't. Her place was the twenty-first century.

Her father and her brother, Alec, had to be sick with fear over her disappearance. But Allie just stood there, unable to move forward, staring at the glass doors of the entrance to her apartment building. Aidan touched her elbow. He had insisted on taking her home. "Maybe I should wait a moment," he said. “To make certain ye find yer family well."

"You don't have to wait," Allie said hoarsely. She suddenly turned and wrapped her arms around him in a bear hug, clutching the velvet dress Royce had given her in her arms. "If Royce comes back, you'll come for me?" And then she realized what she'd said. She needed a miracle, desperately.

His blue eyes flickered oddly. "O’ course."

Allie turned away. He had been grieving, too. She'd caught him weeping when he thought he was alone. He didn't think Royce was ever coming back to them.

Wiping her eyes, she marched up to the front door. She tried to smile at the doorman and failed. "Hi, Freddie."

He barred her way. "Hello " He was a flirt and he smiled at her. "Who are you here to see?”

Allie was bewildered. "Are you joking?" She started to go past him; he took her arm.

"Lady." His tone changed. “No one goes up unannounced. Who are you here to see?"

She gaped at him while he stared firmly at her. "Have I changed so much?" she finally asked. “This is where I live.”

Instantly she saw a wary look in his eyes—a look she was very familiar with, being a New Yorker. He thought her nuts. “If you won't tell me who you wish to see. I can't let you in. You have to he buzzed up."

This was insane. What was wrong with him? “I'm really tired and this isn't funny." Freddie never joked. "I live here."

"Unless you're a new tenant, you don't live here. And there are no new tenants—there haven't been in years."

He didn’t know her. "Buzz William Monroe—or Alec," she cried. She looked past him at Aidan, who was listening closely, his eyes wide and alert. What is this? she asked him silently.