Time Everlastin' Book 5 (29 page)

The rain abruptly ended, and
a deathlike silence blanketed the site.

"No!" Taryn cried. She flung
herself into Broc's arms, her own cinching his middle. "Don't let
him send us back!" she pleaded of Lachlan and Roan. "He's held us
prisoner! Lachlan, send him away!"

Lachlan found himself
staring into the eyes of the creature, whose green gaze studied him
with uncanny attention. Then, to his and Roan's amazement, a rueful
smile appeared on the beast's mouth, and his gaze pinged between
Broc and Lachlan.

"She remains here wi' her
brither," Broc said stonily to the creature.

"No!" Taryn braced her back
against his chest and faced the gargoyle. "Karok, haven't you
punished him enough?"

In response, the beast threw
back its head and wailed. The sound made even Lachlan
shudder.

"He doesna want ye now,"
Broc told Taryn. When she looked up at him imploringly, his spine
stiffened. "I dinna want ye. Leave wi' yer brither and never
return."

"I-I won't leave you," Taryn
sobbed. "I-I'll stay down there with you! We can have a life in his
realm. I don't care, damn you, not as long as I'm with
you!"

"Taryn," Roan
rasped.

"Oh, Roan," she wept. "Don't
let Karok do this." She slapped her palms to Broc's chest. "I love
you!"

"Take her!" Broc commanded
Lachlan, and shoved her into Lachlan's arms. "Hold her fast till
the ground seals."

"Broc, no!" Taryn shrieked.
"You don't have to return below! He can't force you!"

Broc, who had been walking
toward the opening, stopped and cast her a withering look. "Nay, he
canna force me. I go because tis where I belong."

"I hate you!" she wailed,
and immediately clamped her hands over her mouth.

"Aye, as weel ye should for
lettin' me have ma way wi' ye," he said without mercy, and whistled
for the horse. When the animal arrived, he mounted. The gargoyle
spread its wings, lifted into the sky and whizzed about the site
with dizzying speed.

Lachlan and Roan discovered
holding Taryn back was more work than imaginable, for she fought
them with all her might. Broc descended into Karok’s world, the
gargoyle flying close behind him.

"Wha's the beast carryin'?"
Lachlan said.

"It took Dougie!" Katie
cried. "He stole Dougie!"

The ground shuddered as the
opening rapidly closed.

A thought struck Lachlan and
he glanced in the direction of the sacrificial slabs.

Blue and Reith were
gone.

Chapter 15

Roan passed Taryn a steaming
cup of tea and settled into a chair across from her. Despite the
golden glow from the blazing hearth, her features were wan,
emphasizing dark half circles beneath lifeless eyes.

"Lass—" Roan chewed on his
lower lip when she looked at him through a dazed expression. He
wanted to clasp her hands and reassure her that whatever she had
endured was now in the past. For nearly a day, she hadn't spoken,
only stared into nothingness, sometimes rocking to and fro, and
sometimes huddling in a chair as if wanting everything beyond the
confines of her mind to vanish. "You must eat somethin'. Least let
me fetch you—"

"Why?" she asked, her voice
a hoarse whisper.

Why?
He shrugged in perplexity and forced a smile. "To keep up yer
strength, Taryn."

She blinked and took a sip
of tea. The trembling in her hands caused the saucer and cup to
clatter, and she placed the plain white china on a small table next
to her chair. She shrank deep within the colorful quilt covering
her, leaving nothing but her face exposed.

"Taryn, wha' happened down
there?"

She stared into the
crackling flames, her chin quivering, her bleak expression tugging
on Roan's heartstrings.

"Let me help
you."

Her sole response was to
shift her gaze to his face.

"Taryn, ye're ma sister. I'm
here for you."

"You can say it," she said
tremulously. Sighing deeply, she closed her eyes a moment and
managed a weak smile. When she looked at him again, there was
something in her eyes he couldn't define. Something trying to
convey a message she was reluctant to word.

"Say wha', lass?"

"You love me."

"O' course I do."

To his bewilderment, she
broke down in sobs and buried her face in the quilt to muffle the
sound. "I thought you didn't try to find me!"

"Damn me, Taryn! Ye're ma
kid sister! Regardless o' wha' happened afore, I do love
you."

"Why?" she
sobbed.

Roan laughed with
frustration. "Why? Because we're kin. Because...ye're a part o' me
no one else can share."

He sagged with exhaustion,
and winced at a nagging pain in his wounded shoulder. Taryn peeked
over the quilt and he managed a smile. "We've lost a lot o' years,
haven’t we?" he said sadly. "Ma fault. Damn ma pride."

The quilt lowered. "No one's
fault," she said, her voice hitching with emotion. It's just...my
mind got messed up when you left us."

"I didn’t leave,
Taryn."

Tears coursed down her face.
"To a little girl, it was her big brother who left. I know it
doesn't make sense."

"Aye, it does," he said,
staring at his hands entwined on his lap.

"You took care of me when
Mom and Dad were off socializing, and read me to sleep every night.
You were my only anchor, Roan, and I adored you."

"You terrorized me," he said
with a mock shudder.

"Because you let me. No one
could replace you in the States. I pretended you were there,
though, sharing tea parties in my room, playing dress-up and
hide-and-go-seek. I was eleven when my imagination couldn't hold on
to you any longer, and I was alone, really alone for the first
time.

"I'm not proud of what I've
done trying to fill that emptiness, Roan. I can't change the past,
only my future."

"You don’t need to change at
all for me," he said, bracing his forearms on his thighs and
leaning forward. "I want to be a part o' yer future, Taryn. I need
you in ma life."

She swallowed convulsively.
"I'm so confused," she whimpered.

"Abou' us?"

She shook her head.
"Broc."

"Wha' did he do to
you?"

"It hurts," she said,
placing a hand over her heart. "His words...his actions...don't
make sense." She swallowed again, loudly, and sucked in a liquid
breath. "I can't believe he could make love like that unless his
heart was in it."

"Mair'n I wanted to know,"
Roan grumbled, heat suffusing his face.

A door slammed, startling
them. Before Roan could leave his chair, Lachlan stormed into the
room, drenched and pale, and went directly to the fireplace. Roan
stood and held out the sofa quilt, but Lachlan belligerently
flagged a hand and set to pacing like a caged animal behind Taryn's
chair.

"No luck?" Roan
asked.

Lachlan released a colorful
stream of Gaelic, his voice booming.

"I checked on our guests a
while ago. Lannie, we can’t keep them tied up in the cellar much
longer."

Lachlan dashed around the
chair and stood nose to nose with Roan. "Dinna you dare tell me
ye're concerned for those bloody bastards!"

"Ye're spittin' yer
drippin’s on me," Roan said, his calm tone incongruous to the blood
heating in his veins. "Look...Lannie...I'm as worried as you abou'
Blue and Reith, but I need to get Taryn away from here."

"No," she rasped.

Lachlan spared her a brief
glance before the burning dark coals of his eyes bored into Roan's.
"Then go. And take her wi' you!"

"Lannie—"

"Tis one matter to put her
own arse in harm's way," Lachlan snarled, "but this time she's gone
too far! You leave." He swept an arm in the direction of the door.
"I'm stayin' till I get ma friends away from tha'
monster!"

A choked sound rattled from
Taryn, eliciting the men's attention. Roan went down on a knee
beside her, while Lachlan remained rigidly in place.

"He won't hurt them," she
said in a small voice.

"The monster or yer latest
bed mate?" Lachlan asked scathingly.

Roan stood and confronted
him. "Watch wha' you say, old mon."

"Besides," Taryn said,
"they're fairies. They can escape—"

"They have no power in the
craiture's realm!" Lachlan snapped. He swept the soaked sleeve of
his shirt across his mouth, and looked down at Taryn. "Since you've
found yer tongue, how did you go beneath the ground?"

Her eyes downcast, she
lifted her shoulders in a feeble shrug.

With a howl of vexation,
Lachlan leapt to the mantel and swept down a broadsword cradled in
an oak wall rack. He flung the weapon, and jerked in astonishment
at his over-reaction when the gleaming blade penetrate the back of
the sofa.

"Lachlan!" Roan
barked.

"Bite ma wet breeks,"
Lachlan muttered. Sitting next to the sword, he removed it, stood
it on end, and rested his hand on the hilt, his brow atop his
hands. "I've tried everythin'," he said wearily. "I've shoveled
dozens o' holes and kept hittin' rock beds." He looked up. "You
should take yer sister and return to Baird House. I'll stay and
keep pokin' till I find a way through tha' bloody
ground."

"I can't leave you here
alone." Roan snatched up a second quilt from on the chair and
tossed it over Lachlan's head. "Have the mind, if you please, no'
ta catch yer daith." As an afterthought, he muttered,
"Again."

Lachlan leaned the sword
against the sofa and briskly rubbed himself with the quilt. "It
doesna make sense for you and Taryn to stay. Have you spoken to
Winston?"

"But a few
words."

"Deliah?"

"They have a son." A smile
tugged at Roan's mouth. "Born a few hours efter we left the
estate."

"Has he a name?"

Roan shook his head. "No'
when I spoke wi' him. I-ah, didna mention wha' was happenin'
here."

"For the best."

"I was sitting on a rock,"
Taryn said.

The men looked to see her
staring into the flames.

"When the ground opened?"
Lachlan asked.

She nodded.

"It just opened suddenly?"
Roan asked.

She nodded.

"This...Broc," Lachlan said,
as if a bitter taste had seized his tongue. "He's a
MacLachlan?"

She nodded and turned her
head to stare through Lachlan with glazed eyes. "You told me at
Baird House I would meet him."

"I knew you would meet
someone connected to the stones," Lachlan said begrudgingly.
"Certainly no someone under the bloody things."

"You said, and I quote:
‘There's a mon waitin' for you at the end o' yer destination. Dinna
provoke him.' Do you remember?"

"Aye."

Taryn sniffed. "Do you know
who he is?"

"A MacLachlan," he said
sourly. "Tis all I need to know at this point."

"I think he is the legend,"
she said, so softly they had to strain to hear.

"The original?" Lachlan
scoffed then slumped as if his life force had fled him.
"Ma
ancestor?" he asked
with a sneer.

"I'm pretty
sure."

"A descendant o' the legend,
you mean."

She rolled her eyes in
exasperation. "Lachlan, you've died twice and come back. What's so
damned unbelievable about this Broc being the original?"

A crude sound of disbelief
escaped Lachlan. "Tis a ruse," he said, getting to his feet. He
gripped the hilt of the sword and jabbed the tip of the blade at
the floor as he returned to the hearth. His back to the warmth, he
scowled at Taryn.

"He would be over two
centuries old! And I would know if he were the real
mon."

Crimson stole into Taryn's
cheeks. She slowly rose from the chair, standing an arm's length
from Lachlan.

"He and Karok—"

"Karok?" Lachlan said,
looking as though she had slugged him.

"The gargoyle."

"Tha' craiture is a
gargoyle?" Roan asked, dazed.

"Karok," Lachlan murmured,
and mindlessly rapped the sword tip on the rock hearth floor. "The
name carved in runes on ma dirk."

"You knew those faces were
gargoyles and not demons?"

"Demons?" he said with a
frown. "Aye, I knew they were gargoyles. But..."
Rap. Rap rap rap.
"...wha'
has ma dirk to do wi' tha' craiture?"

"I don't know," Taryn said.
"All I do know is, Karok's holding Broc prisoner until he gets some
key."

"Key?" asked
Roan.