The Screaming Stone: The Otherworld Series Book 2 (7 page)

He gasped speechlessly stunned into silence.  This skeletal portend of death had plucked a thought from the steel barrier that surrounded his mind.  Although he knew it to be impossible she capped off her performance with a grizzly wink that only he seemed to be able to see.

“I is tired Robert,” she said with a supernatural yawn.  “Was dat all yer company needed from me?”

Whether out of fear or respect words, which usually flowed from his mouth in an unending stream, would not come to Robert now as all he seemed able to do was nod his head.

“Before I go ya all tank that fine Finn for me apples.”  And with the breath of her final words the candles extinguished themselves plunging the room into shadow only slightly illuminated by the false yellow light of man outside the window.

Chapter Six

Regression

When the circle was broken, the magick dissipated as it was drawn back into the universe to be recycled.  Griffin lingered along with Robert as together they took great care in ceremonially returning Sam to her resting place.  As soon as the magick had snapped back to its origins Annie was on her feet shakily stumbling out of the room.  The air in her tiny living space had grown claustrophobically heavy and suffocating.  She had never before witnessed anything like what had just taken place.  She was an infant, a newborn to the world of magick.  The power still left her feeling disorientated like an unwelcome host in her own body.  Part of her, the hidden secret part she continued to harbor, rose up threatening to break free in the presence of such pure old magick.  For years her skeptic consciousness had kept the goddess at bay, locking her tightly within the bonds of the mundane; now sensing her freedom had finally come she lashed out testing and beginning to break every restrictive chain that held her.  It was a battle Annie feared winning as much as losing.

              With the force of her will alone she propelled her legs into motion in an attempt to flee to the safety of her tiny garden.  It was the one place that seemed to soothe both the mortal and immortal.  Her wobbly limbs did their best to carry and support her as they raced for the freedom of the open sky and fresh air, but she was stopped, feet away, from her escape.  As she feebly tried to close the door behind her a great mass prevented her.  She shoved at the thin core door as a whimper of frustration escaped her.  She glanced quickly over her shoulder, down the short aging hallway at a destination that although was just a few steps away seemed beyond her reach.  With one last attempt she threw all of her weight at the door and was treated with the tiniest fraction of hope as the door looked like it would succumb to her will only to have it ripped away when it refused to close completely.  Unwilling to back down she spun around and tried to compel her shaky legs down the hallway and to the freedom of the open sky.

              Her eyes clenched shut as a firm grip wrapped itself around her wrist dragging her flight to an abrupt end.  “Was that you really tryin’?” Duncan asked with a cocky sense of humor she really did not appreciate at the moment.  She had no time for humor when she felt like vomiting a goddess.

              Annie squeezed her eyelids tighter together only wishing the rest of her senses could so easily tune out the rest of the being that went with that thick honeyed brogue.  Her ears recognized it first and her eyes called them traitors; they were torn between not wanting to hear him speak again and begging him too. The assault on her overloaded senses did not end with the tickling vibrations her ears felt as the rest of her senses were quickly overwhelmed by his presence.  Her lungs inhaled the deep earthy spices of his scent as the grasp of his hand shifted from physically to emotionally restraining.

She wanted nothing more than the ability to be immune to him and the deadly virus that he had contaminated her with.  He wasn’t even hers, not really.  He belonged to another place, another time and more importantly to another soul.  She wouldn’t, couldn’t and shouldn’t let that thin barrier she had erected between the two of them be so easily dismantled by a traitorously fickle emotion.  There was no trust.  Yes, that was it, she tried to convince herself.  She could not trust him and she certainly could not trust herself after all, how could she be sure the goddess was not in control now?

              Her voice, her will she needed to find it.  “I need-,” What?  What did she need?  She knew what she wanted, but what did she
need
?

              As if sensing the war that continuously rattled on without conviction inside her he pressed his advantage capitalizing on the surprise attack he had inadvertently created. Her eyes remained closed; she still refused to look and see what was or at least could be hers.  The light restraining grip disappeared and was quickly replaced by a different sort of imprisonment.  She felt his arms cage her in with her back to the wall and her front brushing almost intimately against him she was exposed and incapable of any sort of defense as she was forced to face what she had been trying to run away from.

              “What do you need?” he whispered his breath tickling the delicate nerves embedded in her lips.  Her last defense threatened to buckle under the gentle assault as her delicately shielded eyes threatened to open and surrender.

              Her lungs burned as she struggled to keep every muscle still, willing her physical body to disappear into the peeling wallpaper at her back.  They screamed in protest and succeeded in turning her eyes into a prize for her attacker.  She sucked in a deep breath, like a drowning victim who suddenly surfaces and all sense of emotion rises to behold the beauty of life.  Her eyes popped open, her heart began to beat rapidly, her ears began to listen and her hands began to feel.  Her voice struggled to be heard and finding no words settled on a sound somewhere between regret and want.

              His tortured exhaled breath signaled a truce as he slowly moved away from her and gave her a little room.  He was willing to lose as much as she wanted to win.  She seized upon the opportunity and found her voice to press the small advantage she had gained.  “I need to know what is
real
,” she finally replied.  Internally her eyes rolled at the husky needy sound of her own voice.  Damn if she wasn’t every weak-willed, overly hormonal woman who had ever found creative life in a cheesy romance novel.

              Slowly her mind began to overrule her heart as it sought to rationalize the irrational.  Her sight hardened as her eyes were drawn back to her side.  They bore into the beautiful face that hovered inches away from hers.   They looked past the full mouth that had parted in anticipation of delivering a killing kiss.  They looked past the flaring nostrils that threated to inhale the last remnant of sweet resistance and settled on to his most dangerous feature; those tortured stormy eyes.  In the otherworldly depths of those irises she saw he was struggling with the same demons, the same doubt.  The only difference was he fought it differently.

              A sarcastic laugh danced a joyous jig as it dribbled out of her.  “You see, even you don’t know,” she accused pushing him easily away from her.  She watched him fall stunned into the wall that barely held his massive form upright.

              “My own thoughts have been dark, even my dreams haunt me.  I’ll no’ claim ta have all the answers, but I know what’s real!”  The raw pained sound of his voice made Annie regret her decision to attack when she should have retreated.  The moment she realized her tactical mistake she tried to turn and run again, but he was much faster.  Years of battle sharpened reflexes sprang into action as his hand quickly seized her wrist preventing her from fleeing.  “Ye forget one thing princess, I know what it’s like ta be two beings stuffed into one casing.  I walked that line all these years for you.”

              “For her,” she spat back as she tried, without success, to pull free from his grasp.  She was outraged that he would claim that he had done everything he had done for her.  He fought, he still fought for his goddess, and he just refused to admit it.  He was terrified of her stepping on the screaming stone because it might cause Aine to disappear again, making him start his quest all over.  And just where did that leave her?  With a broken heart and shattered self-esteem because she lost the one guy she had ever really been interested in to a faerie princess.  Oh yeah, she was the pathetic anti-heroine in that cheesy romance novel.  The one everyone felt sorry for and the one who ended up having to put on a brave face for true love.

              “For you,” he repeated softer.  “If I were so eager ta toss ya away I’dve raised no objectin ta ya standing on that stone.”  He was upset, his brogue always got thicker and harder to understand when he was upset.  He was barely containing his anger as his hands had found their way to her shoulders and squeezed them tightly before giving her a slight shake for emphasis.  “Ya’ve been too close ta death too many times already; but none have ya physically ran towards,” he finished shaking her again as he tried to press home his point.  He exhaled, raised his head to the ceiling seemingly praying for divine guidance before letting his balled up hands drop back down to his sides.

              “I don’t want to be two people stuffed into one casing,” she replied throwing his words back at him as she cautiously took a slow step backwards towards the door.  “Sometimes I sound like her, hell I know sometimes I look like her,” with each step she made towards the door, towards her escape her words took on added strength.  “But damn it know this, I am Annie Locke.  I was born of this side of your veil; and I am just as real as your precious goddess.  I will step on that stone and forget all about the Fae as your princess retakes her throne and -,” she stopped herself from going any further as she felt tears well up in her eyes.

              She turned to make her escape in earnest but his last words halted her, hand hovering just above the screen door handle, she waited and listened.  “Tara scares me Annie.”  She refused to turn around, refused to look at him afraid of what she might see.  Somehow this seemed easier for both of them; he was free to talk and she was free to listen. “I’ve never been there.  I’ve never seen its hills that have eyes all over Ireland.  I’ve never seen the hedge rows that outline its borders.  I’ve never smelled the grass nor heard the sheep that graze in its shadow. 
But I’ve been there
,” he ground out.  “I’ve felt the power of that stone and it scares me.”

              She had gained her space, had won the freedom, had won her escape, and before any fickle emotion could draw her away she took her chance and ran away as fast as her new found strength would take her, leaving Duncan and his confession behind her.  Because what she could not say, what she would never admit to him was that that stone scared her too.

              Tears refused to blur her sight.  She should have felt some form of emotional angst but it would not surface.  The adrenaline and the quick run had bled any emotion out of her.  Her physical body had stopped moving the instant it felt the cool wet touch of the ocean.  Her shoes were stuck in the muddy shores of the Wharf.  Of all the places she could have run to this should have been the last.  Its grassy shores still retained the fresh screams of a battle barely won, but somehow she felt clean.  The salty Atlantic water had quickly and thoroughly cleansed her emotions leaving her clean, but empty.  The feeling allowed her to think more clearly and without the unwanted distraction of Duncan and the goddess that purred every time he was near.

Her eyes grazed across the darkened waters and imagined what lay beyond the sheltered harbor.  Somewhere this lapping ocean water had once touched the distant shores of the one place that held her past, present and future; the one place that truly held her freedom.  Only then could she be sure if she was really feeling what she was feeling.  Only then would she discover if she could escape this bizarre love triangle with her heart still in one piece.  Before the battle that had raged on these shores she had been told, convinced even, that she and the goddess were one and that any hope of separating them was just a dream.  Others wiser in such things had convinced her otherwise.  If there was a way, any way at all to separate herself from the goddess she had to take it.

              “It might not be there you now,” spoke a strangely soothing voice.  “Those answers that you’re looking for, they could be a lot closer to home.”

              She barely contained a chuckle in response.  “You were the last and strangely enough the first person I would want to chase after me,” she admitted.

              “For a moment I thought you might have run in the opposite direction.  But in the end I realized this place would always hold more power over you.  Maybe it holds a strange power over the both of us.”  Annie nodded slowly in agreement, her eyes refusing to tear their vision from her ultimate goal.  “Are you sure the answers are out there?”

              “Yes,” she answered quickly.  “I need to know where reality ends and begins.  I need to know if what I am feeling is coming from me or
her
.  Ireland has answers that I will not find here,” she responded trying to sound as cryptic as possible.