A footfall sounded behind her, and Clare jumped, whipping her head around.
“Hey, you okay?” Griffin asked. “I apologize for disrespecting you.”
“You left me sitting on the wall?” Clare asked. “I could have fallen.”
“Only into the safetynets. You were okay, but I wasn’t,” Griffin said. “You don’t know what was going through my mind. I had to leave before I did something wrong. Forgive me.”
“No, it was I who—”
He took her hand and got down on one knee. Bowing his head, he said, “I am unworthy of you, dear Brigid. I’ve lost your Heart to your enemy.”
“What do you mean?” Clare asked. “You—”
“No, hearme out. I know you’re an illusion, not flesh and blood, because you are still waiting for your heart. Instead of applying my every waking moment to searching, I took advantage of you and wished to ravish you. I was wrong.”
Clare’s mouth gaped, but she shut it and swallowed. She was the one who was wrong to take advantage of a man who’d lost his memory. The sooner she fessed up and gavehis gemstone back, the sooner she’d be done with this mess.
But how could she confess when he thought of her as his beloved Brigid? She couldn’t ruin the illusion, or he’d be sorely disappointed. It could send him back into another seizure. She’d saved him from one already, by rubbing his temples and singing an imagined fairy song. She hadn’t known it would work, but she couldn’t let himfly off into another unknown world when it looked like he’d already forgotten major events—if meeting her on the airplane was a major event.
“Don’t look so surprised,” Griffin said, mistaking her silence. “You are the loveliest creature who ever walked this planet. You are not a vessel for my use, but the woman I have always loved. Our reunion must wait for when I find your heart.”
“What happened to the heart?” The question slipped from between Clare’s lips. It would be useful to ascertain what Griffin thought happened.
“I don’t remember,” he said, looking down at his feet. “I’ve lived many lives, always looking for you. Some lives, we were fated to be apart, some lives, we were friends, but in one glorious life we had a family, children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren.It was destroyed when the Normans arrived on our fair shores.”
“Did you ever get her back? I mean, did I reappear?”
Griffin put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “You feel like real flesh and blood, but you could be a changeling. The real Brigid was imprisoned in a Norman castle back in the twelfth century. The annals don’t appear to say we’ve ever been together again.”
Clare shuddered at the charge that she was a changeling. That was what the abbess who adopted her believed, and to this day, some of the girls she grew up with called her a changeling.
“If she’s a changeling, how are you supposed to drive out the fairy and get the person back?”
He lifted a finger to make a point. “I can see how you’re disassociating yourself from Brigid. Veryclever, Changeling. Maybe I’ve told you too much.”
“One question.” Clare tipped her finger against his pointer finger, pressing him back. “Do you prefer a human Brigid who is mortal and will die, or a fairy queen Brigid who can bring Ireland back to its glory days? Since you’re a man who cannot stay dead, isn’t it better to live and love the fairy version of Brigid? Together, you two canreign forever.”
“The prophecy says I’m supposed to get a mortal Brigid.” Griffin’s voice wavered, and the wheels appeared to turn in his mind. “You have a point. The last note says the Queen of Ireland, Brigid the fairy queen, will resurrect and reward me with one life to live with a mortal Brigid.”
Fairies never died, unless they happened to be inhabiting a human as a changeling,and the underlying human being died. If so, Griffin’s quest could be a fool’s errand. Although death for a fairy was different than for a human. The essence of a fairy would be imprisoned in a magical object and only freed by strong emotion.
“Let me see if I have this correct,” Clare said, scratching her chin to appear like she was deep in thought. “Brigid was a goddess of the Tuatha DéDanann. She and you became eternally bound as lovers around a thousand years ago. This would coincide with the time of the Norsemen or Viking invasion. A few hundred years later, the Normans invaded Ireland, built castles, and set up dukedoms in the northern and eastern part. They captured Brigid and imprisoned her. If she was a changeling, then the body she inhabited might have been killed, andshe is now imprisoned in a magical object. I’m guessing it’s the item you’re looking for, the so-called Heart of Brigid. Once you find it and bring it to the place she is imprisoned, you’ll free her. She becomes a fairy queen, and instead of renewing your love story, she rewards you with a mortal Brigid.”
Griffin’s gaze on her was intense and focused, so much so that his eyes were likepools of black coal. His mouth was pressed into a harsh line, and the sheer masculinity of his body and soul should have frightened Clare. The atmosphere was charged, sparking with equal measures of attraction, lust, and temptation. But at the same time, he was wary, and it showed in the dip of his eyebrow.
“Who are you?” he demanded. “Are you a witch? A Morrigan disguising yourself asmy goddess of fire?”
“I shall not tell you, and if I did, would you believe me?” Clare hoped a black feather wouldn’t drop from the sky at that exact minute. “All you need to know is that I offered to help you.”
“What do you want in return?” His addictive lips curled into a sneer. “Nothing’s free when it comes to goddesses and the Fae.”
“Neither with human mortals,” Claresaid. “My wishes are easier to fulfill than yours. If I help you find the Heart of Brigid, you will allow me to write a screenplay of your story and help me produce it into a movie.”
“Why would a creature such as a Morrigan care about a movie?” Griffin raised a suspicious eyebrow. “You’re all about power and thwarting the will of powerful men. You’re bloodthirsty, and you love war. Mostof all, you thrive on the suffering of men. I doubt you’ll ever understand love, as you yourself have no heart.”
“You’re nuts,” Clare said. She whirled away from Griffin and headed for the staircase. “I’ve enjoyed visiting your castle, Mr. Gallagher.”
At that moment the butler appeared. Although elderly, he was a large, powerfully built man. He had the same intense look as a warriorking, and his eyes penetrated her skin more than an obedient butler should. He was clean-shaven, of course, dressed in a coat with tails, white shirt and cravat, white gloves, and a cap at an angle that was more jaunty than proper.
“Master Griffin and guest,” he said in a solemn and sonorously deep voice. “Lunch is ready. The table is set in the Butterfly Garden.”
Clare moved toswerve around him, but as smoothly as a dancing-master, the butler moved to block her way to the staircase without seeming like it.
He gave Griffin a pointed stare which drew chills down Clare’s spine.
What was going on? Was she in danger?
Before she could panic, a smile cleared the anger from Griffin’s handsome face.
“Allow me to escort you, dear Brigid,” he said,offering his arm. “We have barely scratched the surface of my castle. I’m sure you’ll be interested in its history, the many libraries and collections here, and of course, the world-class cuisine my staff concocts for our dining pleasure.”
