“Come back to me now, Emma. It is time ye returned so I can show ye more of our ways. Ye lack the experience and the control to tarry long among the pathways.” His voice grew louder, echoed deeper as though inhabiting every particle around her.
“I don’t know how to get back.”
“Think of the stones. The blessed stones ofTursachan Chalanaiswill always serve as your anchor.”
Emma visualized the circle of towering megaliths dotting the barren hillside. She remembered the sharpness of their rectangular outlines, dark and shining as they cut into the glowing horizon of the yellow-white rising moon.
“Now open your eyes,” he whispered, his lips brushing the side of her face and his arms tightening around her.
Emma opened her eyes. The pull of gravity, the weight of the physical world crashed into her with a rude, demanding force. Her knees folded and her lungs clenched with the sudden inrush of air as she clawed at Torin to keep from going down.
He scooped her up into his arms as she gasped and wheezed to catch her breath. “Breathe, Emma. Take slow deep breaths. Ye will be fine. Returning to the physical plane isna always pleasant.”
“You could’ve warned me.” She coughed and spewed, struggling to hang onto his muscular neck as she gasped in great gulps of air.
Torin chuckled, cradling her closer against his chest. “The spirit walk isna the sort of thing easily described.”
Chapter
Thirty-Six
The loosely stacked pile of jagged gray rocks sat undisturbed where Torin had placed them. Tiny white lines of quartz embedded in the smooth limestone sparkled beneath the sun. Emma spread her fingers wide until her outstretched arms shook, staring at the squatting rocky target as though it were about to sprout fangs and attack her.
Gritting her teeth, she slowly bent her arms at the elbow, then lunged forward and flung out her outstretched hands as though shoving an invisible barrier away from her body. The crystals in the boulders winked in the sunlight, completely undisturbed in the untouched pile of stones. The never-ending wind gusted a pile of dried grass between Emma and her intendedvictimas a passing seabird squawked overhead.
“Dammit!” She straightened, glaring at the stubborn rocks.
“Ye must use yer instincts. Stop thinking so hard about what ye must do. Feel the magic. Allow the natural flow of the energy to move through ye and gain strength until yer ready to release it.”
She shot a fiery glance back at Torin. “Stop using that tone of voice with me. I am not a child nor am I stupid. Maybe you were just wrong about me. Did that ever occur to you?” She droppedher arms and pressed her stiff outspread fingers tight against her jeans. Her lower lip quivered and the muscles of her jawline displayed her anger with an irregular tick.
Torin bit the inside of his cheek. Lore, he loved it when her temper flared. It turned her aura such a tempting shade of red. If only she could see the stubbornness of her expression. Emma reminded him of a beloved pouting child.
“Emma.” Torin drew in a slow deep breath. “If I was wrong, which I never am when it comes to a guardian, how do ye explain the spirit walk?”
The slightest rumble of an irritated growl sounded low in her throat as her mouth tightened into a frustrated sneer. Her brows knotted into a vicious scowl over her narrowed eyes.
Torin chewed down harder on the inside of his mouth. Perhaps it was a good thing she couldn’t quite focus her powers just yet. She surely wouldha singed his arse with the anger flashing in her eyes. “Take a deep breath and relax into the energies. Ye can do this. Now try it again.”
Emma scrubbed her face and raked her fingers back through her hair. Tightening her lopsided ponytail with a determined yank, she spun on one heel and turned back to frown at the unsuspecting pile of rocks.
“Now remember what I told ye—”
“Just be quiet and let me do it! I can’t do this if you keep fussing at me.”
Torin clamped his mouth shut, took a step back and folded his arms across his chest. Cupping his chin in his hand, he tapped the tip of his nose with his index finger. She would never do it, not until she relaxed and felt the energy coursing through her veins.
He sighed, dropped his hands to his waist and hooked his thumbs in the top of his kilt. This century had tainted her, taught her that everything must be explained away with purely logicalreasoning. As he watched her frustration grow, a sense of loss weighed heavy on his heart. Poor Emma. The lass had lost touch with the wondrous feel of believing in the impossible. He studied the frustration etching deep lines into her scowl. Why did she fight the defensive side of the energy? She had managed the spirit walk easily enough.
Emma stiffened her arms and aimed her tensed hands at the pile of rocks. Bending her knees and easing forward into a lunging crouch; she shook both of her stiffened hands at the boulders and roared. “Be gone!”
“Be gone?”
She straightened while tucking her arms back against her sides. “Well, what would you say if you wanted to make something disappear?”
Never taking his gaze from her face, he rendered the stones non-existent with a single flick of his wrist. “I wouldna say anything. I would just make it so.”
Emma stared open-mouthed at the bare patch of ground where the pile of rocks once stood. Spinning around to face him, she dismissed his accomplishment with a shrug. “Nobody likes a smart-ass.”
