The Queen of Swords: A Paranormal Tale of Undying Love (17 page)

The next two cards offered additional information to consider.
The Hanged Man and The Moon. More nebulous in their meaning, these called for deeper consideration. Chewing her lip, she took a few moments to study the images. The Hanged Man dangled upside down by one foot. The peaceful expression on his face and nimbus around his head suggested the pose was one of ponderance rather than punishment. The card, she strongly sensed, represented Graham’s spiritual limbo.

And he’d stay
The Hanged Man until he changed his beliefs.

The Moon
was more puzzling. The card showed a radiant full moon, its face in profile, between two towers. In the foreground, a dog and wolf howled while a lobster crawled out of a pond. The symbolism strongly suggested light and dark embattled—the part of the spiritual journey known as “the dark night of the soul.” But did it signify Graham’s dark night or hers? Or, would they face the darkness together as twin souls?

She heaved a sigh and shook her head.
Only time would tell, she supposed.

That brought her to the seventh and final card: the outcome. She reached for it with a trembling hand,
overturning it quickly. Her heart nearly stopped when she saw what it was.

Part
II: The Chase



And woman, lovely woman! thou,

My hope, my comforter, my all!

How cold must be my bosom now,

When
e'en thy smiles begin to pall!

Without a sigh would I resign

This busy scene of splendid woe,

To m
ake that calm contentment mine,

Which virtue know
s, or seems to know.

—George Gordon, Lord Byron

Chapter
13: Beautiful Dreamer

Why had she come back? The question had plagued him for a bloody century. Suddenly, it didn’t matter anymore. He’d finally found the courage to do the right thing. To walk away, as he should have done the minute he drew the Queen of Swords.

For a few heady days, he’d allowed himself to feel again, to hope again,
and to love again. And it had been the most glorious feeling in the world. But, at the same time, unspeakably selfish. What right did he have to take up with her, to corrupt her virtue, to endanger her life? He should’ve stayed up on that bloody tightrope where nothing could touch his heart.

Or break it.

Sighing jaggedly, he crossed to the mirrored wardrobe and pulled down the suitcase he’d only just put away. He carried it to the bed, set it atop the bedcovers, and laid it open. He’d leave at first light and drive rather than travel etherically. That way, he could take the dogs and a few other items that mattered to him, like his tarot cards and the portrait of Caitriona he’d demanded Branwen return.

Reaching to the nightstand, he picked up the miniature, marveling again at the uncanny resemblance. The thought of leaving, of losing her again, filled him with a harrowing emptiness.
With a lump in his throat, he fingered her rosy cheeks and Mona-Lisa smile. Just as in life, she looked as if she kept a very good secret.

He’d left the portrait behind when he fled to Edinburgh, having no other choice, and returned to find it stolen by looters.
Somewhere along the line, it wound up at the National Portrait Gallery. He’d seen it there in 1972 during an exhibition of Raeburn’s miniatures. He hadn’t stolen it; he’d merely restored it to its rightful owner.

After tucking
the portrait into a pocket of the suitcase, he turned toward the desk. If he planned to work on his book while in Scotland, he’d better take along some of his diaries too. But which ones? And what to do to keep those he left behind safe from Branwen’s prying eyes? Picking up one in particular, he cracked the cover. The must of aging paper pricked his nose as his gaze fell on the date: 1815. He thumbed through it until he found the entry he sought.

12th May. Visited Caitriona tonight for the first time since becoming a monster. She slept, unaware of my presence, & for a time, I was content simply to observe. As the hours passed, I began to wonder what might happen if she awoke to find me in her room. Would she think me a wraith? Would she think it a dream? Desiring to know, & to get closer, I sat down on the corner of the bed, alert for any stirrings. Seeing none, I crawled up the bed until I reached her side. Still she did not stir. Ever so carefully, I set my head upon the pillow next to hers. She slept on. Drinking in her scent, I felt contentment for the first time since fate & Fitzgerald tore us apart. I closed my eyes & must have drifted off, because next I knew, her arm fell across my chest. Startled awake, I found her blinking at me in disbelief.

I lay there, still as death, waiting for her to react. Her hand moved up my chest to my face. She dragged her fingers across my jaw, pressed them against my lips, touched the end of my nose, my eyebrows, my forehead. As she combed back my hair, she whispered: “This must be a dream. But
you feel so real, so alive. I don’t ken how such a thing is possible; nor do I care. I only pray I shall never awaken.”

I kept still. I could hear her heartbeat, smell her blood, but her blood was not what I craved. She set her head on my chest & started to sob.

“Am I dreaming?” she asked, soft & low.

“Aye.”

She raised herself up, came over me & pressed her mouth against mine.

“Can we make love in my dream?”

“Aye.”

When it was over, I collapsed beside her, feeling so elated, so profoundly moved, I very nearly wept.

She set her head against my chest. “Will you promise me something?”

“Anything,
m’aingael.
”

“
Always come to me like this in my dreams.”

With a woeful sigh, he set the diary in the suitcase and threw a glance toward the clock. It was after midnight. He’d best get some rest. He planned to leave just after sunrise and the drive to Druimdeurfait would be long and fatiguing. And then what? He shook his head, knowing the answer. He’d be alone again. Wandering the halls like a bloody wraith and missing her with every fiber of his being. Just like the last two times.

A knock at the bedroom door jerked him back to his bedchamber and started the dogs barking. The knock came again, louder this time, followed by Branwen’s voice, “Graham, if
you’re in there, please open the door.”

“I’m tired, Branwen.” He raised his voice both in annoyance and to project past the lump in his throat. “And in no mood for
company.”

“Ben tells me
you’re leaving tomorrow,” she said, ignoring his request to be left alone in typical fashion, “but he must be taking the piss for some reason. Because you’d never be that heartless.”

“Your brother spoke the truth.” He hurriedly packed his clothes over the diary. “I’ll be lea
ving for Scotland first thing.”

She looked wounded.
“It’s because of that human, isn’t it?”

He rolled his eyes. “Does the reason really matter? I’m going and that’s that.”

“When are you coming back?”

“I don’t know. Maybe soon, maybe never.”

“Never? You can’t be serious.”

And yet, he was. In fact, never coming back was starting to sound better and better. He might need to live without love, but at least he wouldn’t have to live with abuse.
Lighting another cigarette, he prayed she’d go away. Not that she’d ever been one for subtlety.

“Please, at least open the door so we can say a proper goodbye.”

Meaning what? A farewell shag? His jaw clenched. The door was unlocked, so even if he told her flat out to bugger off, she’d probably just barge in anyway.

“I’ll only open the door if
you promise no monkeyshines.”

She laughed. “Monkeyshines? Seriously? There’s one I haven’t heard in a while.”

“Promise, Branwen. Or you’ll be saying cheerio through the bloody door.”

“Why are
you always so cruel to me?” She sounded wounded, but so what?

“Gee, I don’t know
.” His voice oozed sarcasm. “Maybe it’s to do with how you try to humiliate me whenever you don’t get your way...or how you mess with me while I’m sleeping...or, how you’ve got the deluded idea there’s something between us because I was daft enough to bed you once or twice.”

“It was more than twice,” she corrected him.

That warranted another roll of the eyes. As usual, she’d missed the whole bloody point. Why did he waste his breath? Suddenly, he couldn’t wait to get out of there. If he never saw Shelob again, it would still be too soon.

Another long silence raised his hopes. Had she buggered off?
Returning to the desk, he began to leaf through his diaries. When he heard the door open, he spun around, gulping when he saw her standing there in nothing but a short satin robe and high heels.

H
is gaze narrowed and hardened. “I said no monkeyshines.”

“
You said no monkeyshines if you opened the door.” She drew nearer, devouring him with her eyes. “But you didn’t open the door, did you?”

She kept one hand behind her back, making him prickle with suspicion. He stepped back, dropped the diary, and willed himself gone. She moved toward him, bringing the hidden hand around front. Just as he saw the iron spike, she thrust it into his abdomen. Groaning, he collapsed in a heap. His dogs began to growl and bark. Branwen hurried to the nightstand where he kept their treats, shook the bag to get their attention, then tossed it into the hallway. When the Westies charged after it, she kicked one of them, making it yelp in pain, before slamming and locking the door. Returning to where
he lay, she looked down at him with scorn in her eyes.

“
You’re not going anywhere, you ungrateful Scottish bastard.”

He just lay there on his side, helplessly immobilized. She rolled him onto his back with her foot, dropped to her knees, unbuckled his kilt, and flung it open. She stood up, kicked his legs apart, knelt between them, and bent over his crotch.

“Well hello, Angus Og. Long time no see. Have you missed me?”

She took him in her hand and began to pull and squeeze.
Though he watched her ministering to his member, he could feel nothing apart from the searing iron in his gut. The hatred in his heart was just as scorching. And not just for what she was doing to him now. He’d warned her many times about mistreating his dogs, but she went right on doing as she pleased. She got up, grabbed his ankles, and dragged him—out the door, down the back stairs, his head banging on every step—through the kitchen, and down another jarring flight to the basement.

His scalp was bleeding and his brain half-scrambled by the time they reached the wine cellar. She pulled him to the middle of the limestone cavern, dropped his ankles, and locked the iron gate
s she’d just towed him through.

“
You can forget about Scotland. You’re not going anywhere, lover.”

Concern for Cat’s safety torched his heart, but he could do nothing but lay there like a useless doll, chastising himself for not leaving sooner and for underestimating
the toxicity of Shelob’s venom.

She kicked his legs apart, knelt in between, and dragged her nails across his scrotum h
ard enough to steal his breath.

“How about a little
tamakeri
, lover.”

Terror tightened his throat.
Tamakeri
was the Japanese term for ballbusting. She let out a wicked laugh as she clamped a hand around his bollocks. A searing bolt of pain ripped through his abdomen. His mouth opened in a silent scream. His body spasmed in protest. Dark blotches burst across his vision. He couldn’t move, couldn’t curl up, couldn’t do anything. She squeezed harder and harder, laughing and laughing. Did he hear someone else laughing too? Another woman? The pressure, the pain was agony. Just when he was sure his testes would rupture, darkness closed around him like sheltering arms.

* * *

Cat awoke exhausted, having tossed and turned the better part of the night, her angst careening from Graham to Avery to her dissertation to Maud Edenfield and back again. After washing up, she put on a pencil skirt, plain blouse, and her usual boring-but-comfortable pumps before making her way to the kitchen, where she had tea and toast before heading out. The weather was so lovely she decided to walk, despite fearing another encounter with the raven. She also felt like a zombie extra from
The Walking Dead
and hoped the exercise might help pump a bit of blood to her brain.

After sleepwalking her way through her morning lectures, she headed straight to Maud Edenfield’s office, relieved to find the
older witch inside.

“Might I have a word?” Cat asked, peeking around the half-open door.

Maud, who resembled Emma Thompson with dark hair, lifted her blue eyes from the book on her desk and smiled. “Of course.”

The desk was large
, stately, and cluttered. The shelves behind overflowed with books and assorted occult objects. Crystals, wands, chalices, figurines, tarot cards, and the like. As Cat approached, her gaze swept over the spines, taking in three seminal titles:
The Discoverie of Witchcraft
by Reginald Scot;
Daemonologie
by King James I; and
The Celtic Twilight: Faerie and Folklore
by W. B. Yeats. A pair of tufted leather wingback chairs much like those in Wicken Hall’s library stood between the door and the desk. The sight of them induced a sharp pang.

“Do sit down
.” Maud gestured toward the chair on the left. “And tell me how I can help.”

Cat took the offered chair and cleared her throat. “It’s to do with vampires.”

“In general? Or one in particular?”

Heat touched Cat’s cheeks.
“One in particular.”

“The ginger-haired Scot from the library?”

“Yes. But—”

Maud smiled
warmly. “I have eyes haven’t I? And a heart. What is it you wish to know?”

“Can his condition be reversed?”

“That will depend on what sort he is.”

“He’s of the Unseelie Fae. Something called a
dusios
.”

“I see
.” Maud steepled her fingers and tapped them against her chin. “And do I correctly assume his condition, as you call it, was imposed on him against his will?”

“Yes
. By a dark wizard named Gerard Fitzgerald.”

Maud leaned forward in her chair, her blue eyes gleaming with interest. “
Lord
Gerard Fitzgerald?”

Cat nodded. “Do
you know him?”