“Are you telling me I’ll betray someone?”
She tried to remain calm. “Is there a way I can kill Jason so that he never returns to the land of the living?”
“What choice? Please. Help me with Jason. Let me do this to make up for my bad choices.”
Even as she asked the question the chanting and drums began to grow faint. She tried to follow them, but they were gone as suddenly as they had come.
Aisley opened her eyes and sighed. She wasn’t sure who the voices were, but the magic that had surrounded her didn’t feel evil. If felt pure.
She frowned as her thoughts turned to what their voices had told her. Jason was coming for her. Betrayal and death awaited her. And the only one who could help her escape Jason was Phelan.
It was the choice they spoke of that kept running through her mind. Were the voices telling Phelan she was
“Bugger. I hate cryptic messages,” she whispered.
Aisley looked down at her watch to see it was nearing four in the afternoon. She couldn’t believe she’d been gone almost eight hours. It was time to get back.
She gingerly stood on her injured ankle. There was only a twinge of pain that dissipated after a minute. With her shoulders squared, she turned in the direction she had come and started back.
Amazingly enough, she managed to reach Phelan’s cabin in an hour without any mishap. Which was a first for her since she had ran blindly into the forest.
She also thought she ran much farther. There was definitely something going on, she just wasn’t sure what.
When she reached the cabin, she paused before she stepped onto the porch. The door still stood wide open from when she’d flung it on her way out.
Aisley swallowed past the lump in her throat and walked into the house. Room by room she searched and found nothing. She ended up in the bedroom where the mist had come.
There, on the mirror hanging on the wall, written in what looked like a mix of blood and dirt was her name.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR
Despite his dismal day of searching for clues to Wallace’s whereabouts, Phelan was anxious to get home. He’d been away from Aisley all day. Normally that would have suited him just fine, but that wasn’t the case anymore.
He found he needed to know she was close, yearned to have her beside him. It wasn’t just that he wanted her in his bed. He simply wanted … her.
All of her. From her laughter to the way she left clothes all over the room. From the feel of her soft midnight hair running through his fingers to tripping over her shoes. From her amazing body to her awful cooking skills.
There wasn’t a part of her Phelan didn’t like, or a part of her he didn’t want to know better.
He pulled the bike into the shed, and found himself hurrying to the house. A wave of her magic washed over him like a warm, comforting blanket.
Phelan saw her on the porch leaning against the wooden pillar next to the steps. He stopped with one foot placed on the porch and wondered at the peculiar look she gave him.
“What is it?”
She shrugged. Aisley wasn’t exactly smiling, but she wasn’t frowning either.
Phelan thought back over the day and realized what he had done. “I should’ve told you I was leaving.”
Aisley gave a nod. “That would’ve been the courteous thing to do.”
“I’ve never had to answer to anyone before.”
“You don’t have to answer to me.”
“I didna think.” That bothered him. He should have thought of her. He’d been too upset over Fallon’s call, but that didn’t mean he should have forgotten Aisley.
“How did your patrol go?”
There was no anger in her fawn-colored eyes. Phelan wrapped a strand of black hair around his finger and marveled at the silky feel of it. “Unproductive. How was your day?”
“I took a walk in the woods.”
He opened his mouth to tell her that might not have been a good idea, when she continued talking.
“And before you tell me it might not be safe, let me remind you I’m a Druid.”
Phelan flattened his lips. “There are creatures out there your magic will draw. They’re called selmyr.”
“Selmyr.”
“Aye. Ancient creatures that have been locked away but were accidentally released.”
“By?” she asked.
Phelan tugged her into the cabin behind him. He shut the door when she faced him. “By Arran and Ronnie. It was an archeological dig site. The selmyr feed off magic.”
“Just magic?”
“Aye, but they’ll kill anything. I fought them recently. The more magic a Druid used, the more frenzied they became.”
Aisley walked to the couch and sank down on it. “Where are these selmyr now?”
“I doona know. They travel on the wind and look like man-sized tornadoes of dust before they appear. They move with lightning speed. And no amount of magic can kill them.”
“Do you know anything about how they were originally captured?”
“It was Druids from the Isle of Skye who managed it the first time, but I know nothing more than that.”
Her gaze looked away as she bit her lip.
“Aisley? Do you know any Druids from the isle?”
She gave a small nod. Slowly, she returned her gaze to him, her pallor now a shade of green. “Me.”
Phelan stood in stunned silence. “You?”
“Me,” she repeated. “My family dates back six generations from Skye. My great-grandparents moved to Glasgow for a job after they were newly married. I’ve never been to Skye.”
“Have you heard of the selmyr?” he asked as he sat beside her, his body angled to better see her.
“When I was a small girl, my grandfather used to tell me stories of a creature that could travel on the wind. He said it would come and get me if I wasn’t a good lass.”
Phelan rubbed his jaw. “Did he describe them?”
“He said they were vampires, except they were ash-colored and hideous to look at.”
“That’s the selmyr. Is your grandfather still around?”
She shook her head. “He died many years ago.”
Phelan got to his feet and began to pace. “These selmyr are a force we Warriors were barely able to contain. It was only with…” He trailed off, wondering how much to tell her.
The Dragon Kings stayed hidden throughout history because no one knew who they were. They showed themselves to the Warriors and Druids of MacLeod Castle because of Charon.
Phelan couldn’t tell Aisley about the Kings no matter how much he wanted to. Not without the Kings giving their approval.
“It’s all right,” Aisley said. “You don’t have to tell me more.”
“We had help. I can tell you that much.”
Aisley put her hand on her stomach. She was getting nauseated the longer she sat there listening to Phelan talk of the selmyr and the last battle.
She had been at the last battle. She now knew the name of the gray-skinned creatures who had killed Dale
