Time Everlastin' Book 5 (19 page)

Drenched and shivering, he
peered over the wall. To his left, high on a hill, were the
standing stones. In the distance to his right, the inn.

I must return to the hotel
and call Lachlan, but I canna fly in this deluge.

His teeth chattered and he
hugged himself against the tremors racking his body.

Tha' mural! Yer thoughts be
daft,
he scolded himself.

The fierce dark eyes
materialized on his mindscreen. He shivered again, harder, rattling
his bones.

Get yer wind. Dash, but I
ache!

He tried to will the image
from his mind, escape those eyes, to no avail.

Did Taryn see the
mural?

What would she have gleaned
from it?

Certainly not the
impressions bombarding him!

The rain fell harder, its
iciness, painful.

"Och, MoNae! Deliver me from
this night!"

He knew the only deliverance
would come from himself.

Hours later, the rain
lessened to a mist. It was fast approaching dawn before he arrived
at the inn, shifting into human form behind a low hedge outside the
main entrance. He was wet and cold and more exhausted than he could
ever recall, his body so drained of energy, he tottered into the
small foyer like an old man racked with arthritis. The middle-aged,
thin man behind the reception counter lowered his newspaper and
eyed him suspiciously.

"Ou' in the rain, were
ye?"

Were Reith in a better frame
of mind, a witticism would be to his liking, but all he could
muster was a weak nod as he dragged his feet toward the staircase.
The suite Lachlan had retained was on the third floor. No elevator,
of course. By the second step, Reith wanted to curl into a ball and
weep like an abandoned babe.

A burgeoning sense of
urgency gave him the willpower to make it to his destined landing.
Stepping inside the living room of the suite, trembling, his teeth
chattering, he closed the door behind him, turned on the light
switch, and lumbered to the telephone on the desk.

He told himself he should
take a hot shower and change into warm clothes before making the
call. Instinct declared he not waste a moment.

His hands shook so, it took
three tries of dialing Winston's cell phone number before the
numbers were entered correctly. With the first ring, he eased onto
the couch arm and hunched his shoulders against the coldness that
had become a second skin.

"Hello?"

The voice confused Reith.
"Hello. Who be this?"

"Reith? This is Kahl. Where
are you?"

"I need to talk to Lachlan,
Kahl."

"You sound funny," the boy
said, and yawned. "You eating something?"

"Wha'?"

"Peanuts? It's too early for
‘em, don'tcha think?"

"Kahl, I must talk to
Lachlan, Roan or Winston!"

"Which one? You woke me up,
y'know."

"Kahl—"

"I didn't take the phone,
Reith. I found it in Alby's room and forgot—"

"Kahl, please!"

"—to return it. What you
doing, Reith?"

"I need to speak wi'
Lachlan, Kahl. Now!"

"Geez. You sound mad about
something. Are you?"

Reith managed a ragged
breath. "I be tired, lad. Can ye fetch Lachlan to the
phone?"

"Wouldn't it be easier if I
just took the phone to him?"

Reith blinked in perplexity.
"Aye. Aye, twould be, wouldna it."

"Yep. Adults don't think too
clear in the morning. Aunt Laura—"

"Kahl, m'lad, this is
important."

"Okay. Blue misses you,
y'know."

Reith gulped past an
obstruction forming in his throat. "Does she?"

"Yep. She's been fretting
about you staying away on your own." Kahl snickered loudly into the
mouth piece. "Women can't make up their minds, huh?"

"Lachlan, Kahl. Please,
lad."

"Come home soon, Reith. I
miss ya."

Despite his pain and misery,
Reith smiled. "As I do ye."

"About Blue," Kahl whispered
into the phone. "She still loves you, y'know."

"Tis a fine dream, lad,
but—"

"She wouldn't be so worried
if she didn't."

The statement gave Reith
pause. "Mayhaps, tis so."

"Hey, I may be a kid, but I
have eyeballs, y'know. Damn good eyeballs!"

"Ye’re cussin',
lad."

"You gonna tell?"

"No."

"You still want to talk to
Lachlan?"

"Desperately."

"Desperately, huh? You still
sound funny, Reith."

"I be cold and tired, lad,
is all. Can ye hurry to Lachlan wi' the phone?"

"Like run?"

"Aye...like run."

"But I always get yelled at
for running!"

Again, Reith felt on the
verge of succumbing to tears. "This once, laddie, I urge ye to run
like the wind. No' on the stairs, ye hear?"

"Best place to
run."

"Promise me,
laddie."

"Aw, hell—oops! You didn't
hear that, right?"

"Hear wha'?"

Kahl giggled. "Okay. I'm on
my way."

Reith sighed in relief and
rolled his eyes heavenward.

Kahl gave a detailed report
of his progress. Stair one. Stair two. Second landing. Stair one.
Oops, cut the cheese. Stair two. Oops, burped. Stair
three.

Lachlan's gruff voice was
finally heard in the background. Shortly, he said into the cell
phone, "Reith?"

"Lachlan!" Reith's heart
eased its frantic racing.

"Where are you?"

"At the hotel."

"Tis early." Reith heard a
door close through the ear piece. "I dinna want to wake Beth,"
Lachlan said. "As I said, tis early. Have you uncovered somethin'
abou' Taryn?"

"No' sure." Reith found it
difficult to breathe.

"Wha's wrong, laddie. You
dinna sound weel."

"I just got back from the
Isle o' Lewis."

"You returned there?
Why?"

"Lachlan—" A deep-chested
cough seized Reith.

"Laddie, what's
wrong!"

"Got a chill, be
all."

"Chill, you say?"

"Tis rainin' and I flew from
the isle."

"Fegs, mon!"

"Lachlan, ye must listen to
me!"

"Calm down, laddie. We've
been worried abou' you."

"I've been at the Astory
Inn, Lachlan."

Lachlan's voice dropped to a
harsh whisper. "Wha' for?"

"Do ye remember the
place?"

"O' course I do. I was also
there as a lad."

"Lachlan...wha' disturbed ye
abou' goin' to the standin' stones?"

"Why?"

"I need to know!"

A long pause, then, "I dinna
know, lad. Mention o' the place gave me the chillies."

"Lachlan, there be a room at
the inn, and a mural—"

Pain exploded in the back of
Reith's head and his world leapt into spiraling
blackness.

"Lad? Laddie? You there?
Reith? Reith!"

A beefy hand lowered the
black telephone onto its cradle, disconnecting the call.

"Wha' now?" asked Flan
MacLachlan, staring down at the crumpled form on the
floor.

His younger brother
shrugged, snorted, and swept back his wet hair. "Mavis wants him
back at the inn."

Flan's eyes rolled up to
glare at Dougie. "No duh, ye moron."

When Dougie grunted, Flan
puffed out his chest and pointed at Reith's prone form. "Didna I
say this one was the maist peculiar o' the trio? When are ye gonna
learn to listen to ma intuition?"

"Tis good luck to catch a
fairy," Dougie beamed.

"He's a leprechaun, ye
moron!" Flan blustered. "Now find somethin' to truss him
up."

"Like wha'?"

"Surprise me wi' yer
ingenuity."

"Wha' if he shrinks again
and flies off?" Dougie frowned. "I dinna think leprechauns have
wings."

From an inside pocket of his
raincoat, Flan withdrew a syringe in an unopened clear pack, and a
small vial filled with clear liquid. "Mavis thought o' his escapin'
us."

"Ye goin' to drug
him?"

"No, ye fool, I plan to give
him a vitamin!"

Dougie's beefy shoulders
lifted amicably. "Ah. Right ye are. We dinna need a sick
fairy—leprechaun—on our hands. Mavis thinks o'
everythin'."

Chapter 10

Nightmares bedeviled Taryn's
sleep. She woke with pain pulsing at her temples, her mind mired in
mucilaginous layers of lassitude.

Forcing tidbits to surface
tweaked her brain. She remembered the gargoyle had been part of the
convoluted dream. And the barbarian. Although she couldn't remember
the details, an aftermath of gloom mantled her. She wanted to cry,
and that was so unlike her. Cry when she was angry, maybe. It
happened occasionally. Rarely. But to cry for the sake
of—

What?

So, she was trapped below
the Callanish Standing Stones. Fodder for a helluva story when she
returned topside. Okay, so her host was a gargoyle. More fodder, if
anyone believed he existed outside of her imagination. And there
was the barbarian. Annoying, yes, but he did stave off her boredom.
And she detested being bored. So much so, she had fantasized about
him carrying her off and ravaging her.

Why hasn't he?
she wondered petulantly.

She splashed her face with
cold water from the stone basin, and patted her skin dry with a
frond half her size.

Any barbarian worth his salt
would have had his way with me by now. Seduced me between the
leaves....

A moan rattled in the
confines of her skull.

Desperation doesn't become
you, Taryn. You need to escape, not get laid.

Popping into her mouth two
of the fruit pods growing by the stone basin, she left the den and
headed toward the gargoyle's quarters. When she'd last seen him, he
slept peacefully, his color back to its variegated grays. The
crisis, it seemed, was over. She had fallen asleep questioning her
attachment to the creature. Never having had a pet, and someone who
had always thought animal lovers two screws short of supporting a
hinge, the grief-stricken panic she'd felt when she encountered him
on the floor, was profound.

Which didn't make
sense.

According to the barbarian,
the creature was responsible for her imprisonment down-under. His,
too, but she was loath to believe anything that rolled off his
over-worked tongue.

There was something in the
creature's eyes that tugged on her heartstrings. Intelligence and a
depth of understanding that often plagued her contemplations. He
wasn't merely an animal. Except for an occasional grunt and the
gurgle-growls and purrs she sometimes heard, he made no attempt to
communicate via audio means. He talked with his eyes...and through
his drawings.

"I don't feel threatened by
him," she said, eyeing the vivid blue glow in a pool to her left.
"It doesn't make sense he's the one holding me down here. El
Beard-o, on the other hand, doesn't have a trustworthy bone in his
body. He could have come down here to hide from the police. He's
probably a psycho who happened across the creature. But that fall
should have killed me. And I should have drowned in the pool.
Dammit, why can't I make sense out of this mess?"

She slowed to a stop several
feet beyond the threshold to the gargoyle's chamber. He wasn't on
the stone slab where she'd left him, and a quick survey of the
spacious room didn't locate him.

"Hello?" she sang out. "It's
me, Taryn."

A faint sound captured her
attention.

Rock scratching against
rock?

She edged toward the area
blocked by a twenty-foot standing stone riddled with scenes carved
into the otherwise smooth surface.

"Hello?
Gargoyle?"

She rounded the megalith and
crossed half the distance between the stone and a wall etched with
scenes. The golden glow from a small pool near the wall, afforded
adequate visibility. Despite this, she nearly walked into the
gargoyle before seeing his vibrant eyes looking down at her from
what seemed the wall across the way. His flesh tones served as
perfect camouflage. When he settled on his haunches, facing the
wall, she stepped to his side and watched him lift his right index
finger and continue his etching.

Rock scratching against
rock. Only it was a talon wearing down the hard surface as he
diligently concentrated on his current masterpiece.

Taryn lost track of how long
she observed him. Each stroke of the talon gradually formed
recognizable shapes. At one point, she realized he was depicting
his illness, sprawled out on his back, Taryn kneeling beside him.
His accuracy for detail left her in awe. The curls trailing down
her back and the one spiral lock that often dangled in her face.
Her long tapered fingers, in the scene, placed atop his chest. Even
her slightly turned up nose was as clear as a
photograph.