LITMIR.BIZ

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on this path he’s forged?”

      “You cannot believe... I never meant... It’s only that—”

      He kissed her quickly, shushing her sputtering objections. “You love me just as I love you, and that makes life a wee bit harrowing at times, yeah?” Then he turned away and started for the Elder’s Library. “Rest easy, wife. I will see this handled and return to you.”

      An idea struck her. “Promise me, Lachlan. Please.”

      He spun and walked backward. “I give you my word that I will see this handled and return to you, Lady Isibéal Cannavan.”

      With a nod, she turned and took a couple of steps forward before glancing back and finding that her husband had already passed through the library door.

      Perfect.

      She reached up to smooth her furrowed brow even as anxiety, weighted with irrefutable knowledge, settled over her. Lachlan was not meant to meddle in the gods’ arguments, be they petty or just. And while he might feel obligated to participate in this hearing, she held no such compulsion. Her first duty, now and always, was to look out for her husband and see him safely returned to her. It would have been so even had her heart’s mate been a shepherd and not the Assassin.

      She would do what needed to be done to ensure that she did not lose Lachlan in this, or any, lifetime.

      Bowing her head, Isibéal threw open her ties to the elements and the magicks they heralded. Threads of color whipped around her with dizzying speed, colors only she could see. The magicks were as bright as they were ethereal, raw power drawn into her hands and shaped to her will alone. Few witches had come before with more power than she wielded even now, decades before the zenith of her power was forecast to arrive.

      Lachlan’s parting words were still so new that the memory of them would be strong enough to cast and weave around, and she would do both, and more, if it meant tying his promise to her intent.

      With few movements and naught but whispered words, Isibéal created a sphere that raced across the deepening shadows of time that grew between his words and the present. The sphere reached back and retrieved the promise Lachlan had made her, captured the words and then sealed them inside the crystalline ball. Threads of color wound around the exterior at ever-increasing speeds until the motion was a blur. Colors fused in a bright flash of light that made her eyes water. Magick receded with very little in the way of a dramatic exit. Shimmering inside the orb was the essence of the words Lachlan had gifted her with.

      Isibéal cradled the sphere between her cupped palms, one above the globe and one below, the strength of her magick suspending it. Dipping her chin, she spoke over those harvested words—words that represented her future, her hope—and infused her voice with both her will and power. “Protect these words, heartfelt promise man to wife, keep the promise alive for me, that we might again share a life. His spirit shall not cross to its final resting place, but will remain in limbo, affected by neither time nor space. My soul shall serve as sacrifice, to bind us where we fall, only love’s inherent power will be enough to break the thrall. Hear me now and mark my plea, for wait I shall, across years or centuries.”

      The bespelled orb flared bright. A flash of heat passed into her hands and made her gasp, but she managed to hold on to it until the heat dissipated. Then, with a subtle glance around the stairwell, she tucked the living spell into the depths of her basket and bade it reduce in size until it was no larger than a small stone from the streambed.

      Peace warred with fear at what she’d done. It was unnatural to bind a single soul, let alone two, to this plane when their physical bodies died. Their souls could go on indefinitely, though whether madness would take their minds had yet to be seen. To be freed would have to be an act of love. Nothing else would suffice to bring the two souls back together. That didn’t bother her, though. Their relationship was, and always had been, ripe with love and heavily decorated with lust. If two souls were ever to find their way back to each other and reunite, their souls would.

      Gathering her basket of naturals, she resumed her trek up the broad staircase that would take her to the third-floor infirmary only to pause at the first landing, her hand on a newel. She could not let him go. Not without knowing him one last time.

      There was no shame in her request, no remorse or hesitation when she said, “Join me, Lachlan. Steal that wee bit of time we’ve tripped over, time alone to...” She looked down demurely only to glance up at him through lowered lashes. “There will be plenty of time to see to the intricacies of mediating under Thranewyn’s Law after I’ve had my way with you.”

      She started up the staircase again, swaying her hips back and forth suggestively.

      Booted footsteps closed the distance between them and sounded as if they took the stairs two at a time. Hard hands wrapped around her upper arms and pulled her back against an even harder chest. “The deepest prisons of the Shadow Realm couldn’t keep me away.”

      “Never in a thousand lifetimes will such keep me away from you, husband. Never.”

      He followed her up the stairs then, to her room, where he loved her as passionately as she loved him, and with almost as much manic fervor.

      Almost.

      For Isibéal knew what he did not. This would be the last time they would lie wrapped in each other, loose-limbed and sated.

      She stayed as long as she dared, watching the late-afternoon sun paint Lachlan’s skin in warm colors as he drifted into a deep, quiet sleep. Then she rose, wrapped her robe about herself and crossed the hall to her infirmary, where she set about gathering a basket full of fresh bandages, salves and healing ointments she’d made. They would be needed on the coming morn when mediation turned to war.

      Dressed and packed little more than an hour later, she tried to leave. Truly, she did. But she craved one last look at her husband’s face, peaceful in sleep, long lashes fanning over his cheeks. This was how she would remember him, always and forever.

      Emotion welled, filling her chest until she could not breathe.

      “From my very first breath until time ceases, you have been and will always be the heart of me. I love you, Lachlan Cannavan.”

      Isibéal shut the door and then headed down the stairs and toward the stables. Pausing at the keep’s huge front doors, she swung her traveling cloak about her shoulders and raised her hood against the misting rain.

      She had a long ride ahead if she were to die before the sun’s zenith as agreed.

Chapter 1

      Ethan Kemp forced himself to keep his pace slow as he made his way down the castle’s long, forever-chilled hallway. He’d been called a lot of things over his thirty-four years—warlock, physician’s assistant, American expat, friend, lover and, on occasion, fighter—but he’d never been called a coward. That was a moniker he refused to sport. So he would not allow himself to walk faster, speed up or, gods forbid, run. He would not curse. He would not look over his shoulder. Again, anyway. Why bother? He knew what would be there. What had been there for the last several months. Always following him. Always just out of reach, that shapeless smudge on the air. Nothing tangible. A mirage.

      Hand at his side, he held the dirk with apparent disregard. Looks could be deceiving. He was under no illusion the blade would help him fight something he couldn’t see, but the weight of the weapon was better than nothing.

      Besides, if the Assassin’s Arcanum—the biological outcome if 007 met Highlander and had unprotected sex with Practical Magic—found out he was running from shadows and tricks of light? Gods save him. He’d rather have his balls waxed than take the endless ribbing he’d receive from those five men.

      While the heart of Druidism centered on a high regard for life and peaceful existence, the Assassin’s Arcanum, protectors of the Druidic race, were an entirely different breed. The Arcanum was composed of men who did whatever was deemed necessary to ensure that their brethren could live

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