Spell of the Highlander Read online

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Preface

  First Prologue

  Second Prologue

  Part 1

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  Part 2

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  Dear Reader

  Sources

  About the Author

  Other Books by Karen Marie Moning

  Copyright Page

  This one’s for my husband, Neil Sequoyah Dover.

  Were not there you—I’d be not too.

  I love you.

  Synchronicity: 1. The simultaneous occurrence of two or more meaningfully but not causally connected events; 2. The coinciding or alignment of forces in the universe to create an event or circumstance; 3. A collision of possibles so incalculably improbable that it would appear to imply divine intervention.

  Dear Reader—

  When I am uncertain how to pronounce certain words in a book, it makes my brain stutter each time they occur in the text, jarring me from the immediacy of the moment. Toward that end, I have attached this brief key of significant names:

  Cian: Key-on, with a hard C.

  Dageus: Day-gis, with a hard G.

  Drustan: Drus-tin, U like drum.

  The Draghar: Druh-gar, U like drum, hard G.

  Tuatha Dé Danaan: Tua day dhanna

  Aoibheal: Ah-veel

  FIRST PROLOGUE

  Aoibheal, queen of the Fae stood in the catacombs beneath The Belthew Building, concealed by countless layers of illusion, a formless projection of herself, beyond any Sidhe-seer’s vision, beyond even her own race’s perception.

  In the dimly lit labyrinthine tombs, Adam Black was pacing furiously, holding his ears and cursing a wailing Chloe Zanders.

  But it was not Adam’s plight that concerned her now.

  It was her own.

  Tonight she’d wielded the formidable magic of the Queen of the Tuatha Dé Danaan to destroy the Druid sect of the Draghar.

  But it was not for that purpose alone she’d done it. As ever, she had motives within motives. Her use of the full power of the High Queen of the Seelie Court of the Light had caused a blackout of all mortal magic throughout Britain, part of Scotland and a fair portion of Wales.

  It had shattered wards humans believed unbreakable, voided protections spells, and temporarily leeched all sacred mortal relics of any power they possessed.

  Closing her eyes, Aoibheal turned her far-vision outward, analyzing the weft and weck of the fabric of her world. She’d pulled a thread here, tugged a thread there, and the infinitesimal changes she sought had begun.

  Somewhere in Tibet an ancient sorcerer was seeking the unholiest of Dark Hallows.

  Somewhere in London a thief was casing a wealthy residence reputed to contain unimaginable treasures within.

  Somewhere a Keltar was biding his time, waiting for a vengeance long overdue.

  Ah, yes, it had begun. . . .

  SECOND PROLOGUE

  Some men are born under a lucky star.

  Showered with female attention from the moment of his highly anticipated birth into a family of seven lovely wee Keltar lasses, but, alas, no sons—his da dead to a hunting accident a fortnight earlier—Cian MacKeltar came into the world, at ten pounds three ounces, already laird of the castle. Heady stuff for such a wee bairn.

  As he matured into a man, he inherited the typical Keltar looks: wide-shouldered and powerful, all rippling muscle, topped by the dark, savagely beautiful face of an avenging angel. His noble Celt bloodline, true to its aggressive warrior–aristocracy heritage, also bequeathed him a lion’s share of sexuality; a simmering, scarce-contained eroticism that shaped his very walk, underscored his every move.

  At a score and ten, Cian MacKeltar was The Sun, The Moon, and The Stars.

  And he knew it.

  He was a Druid, to boot.

  And unlike the vast majority of his broody, overly serious ancestors (not to mention the veritable plethora of broody ones yet to be born), he liked being a Druid.

  Liked everything about it.

  He liked the power that hummed so potently in his veins. He liked cozying up with a flask of whisky among the collection of ancient lore and artifacts in the underground chamber library of Castle Keltar, studying the arcane knowledge, combining a chancy spell with a risky potion, growing stronger and more powerful.

  He liked walking the heathery hills after a storm, saying the ancient words to heal the land and the wee beasties. He liked performing the rites of the seasons, chanting beneath a fat, orange harvest moon, with a fierce Highland wind tangling his long dark hair, and fanning his sacred fires into pillars of flame, knowing that the all-powerful Tuatha Dé Danaan depended upon him.

  He liked bedding the lasses, taking their sweet lushness beneath his hard body, using his Druid arts to give them such wild, mindless pleasure as—it was whispered—only an exotic Fae lover could bestow.

  He even liked the brush of fear with which much of his world regarded him, as a Keltar Druid and heir to the ancient, terrifying magic of the Old Ones.

  The laird responsible for the continuation of the sacred Keltar legacy in the late ninth century was devilishly charming, darkly seductive, and the most powerful Keltar Druid ever to live.

  None nay-sayed, none challenged, none ever bested Cian MacKeltar. Verily, the possibility that someone or something one day might, never even occurred to him.

  Until that cursed Samhain of his thirtieth year.

  Some men are born under a lucky star.

  Cian MacKeltar was not one of them.

  Shortly thereafter, the underground chamber library was sealed off, never to be mentioned again, and all record of Cian MacKeltar was stricken from the Keltar written annals.

  It is highly debated among surviving Keltar progeny whether or not this controversial ancestor ever even existed.

  And none know that now—some eleven hundred years later—Cian MacKeltar still lives.

  Sort of . . . in a hellish manner of speaking.

  PART 1

  CHICAGO

  1

  FRIDAY, OCTOBER 6TH

  The call that changed the entire course of Jessi St. James’s life came on an utterly unremarkable, dateless Friday night that differed in no particularly significant way from any other unremarkable, dateless Friday night in her all-too-predictable life, which—she was in no hurry to discuss—were a lot of Friday nights.

  She was sitting in the dark on the fire escape outside the kitchen window of her third-floor apartment at 222 Elizabeth Street, enjoying an unseasonably warm autumn evening. She was being a shameless voyeur, peeping around the corner of the brownstone to watch a crowd of people that, unlike her, had time to have a life, and were talking and laughing out on the sidewalk in front of the nightclub across the street.

  For the past few minutes she’d been riveted by a leggy redhead and her boyfriend—a dark-haired, sun-bronzed, muscled hottie in jeans and a white T-shirt. He kept backing his girlfriend up against the wall, stretching her hands above her head, and kissing her like there was no tomorrow, getting into it with his whole gorgeous, rippling body. (And would you just look at that hip action? The way he was gr
inding against her—they might as well be doing it right there in the street!)

  Jessi sucked in a sharp breath.

  God, had she ever been kissed like that? Like the man couldn’t wait to get inside her? Like he wanted to devour her, maybe crawl right inside her skin?

  The redhead’s hands slipped free, down to the hottie’s ass, fingers curving into his muscled butt, and Jessi’s hands curled into fists.

  When the hottie’s hands skimmed up the redhead’s breasts, his thumbs grazing her nipples, Jessi’s own went hard as little pearls. She could almost imagine she was the one he was kissing, that she was the one he was about to have hot, animalistic—

  Why can’t I have a life like that? she thought.

  You can, an inner voice reminded—after your PhD.

  The reminder wasn’t nearly as effective as it had been years ago as an undergrad. She was sick of being in school, sick of being broke, sick of constantly racing from her classes to her full-time job as Professor Keene’s assistant, then home to study, or if she was really lucky, snatching a whopping four or five hours of sleep before getting up to do it all over again.

  Her demanding, tightly organized schedule left no time for a social life. And lately she’d been feeling downright sulky about it. Everywhere she turned lately there were couples, and they were busy coupling and having a wonderfully couplelicious time of it.

  But not her. There was no time for coupling in her life. She wasn’t one of the lucky ones that had a free ride through school. She had to scrimp and save and make every moment and penny count. In addition to working full-time and taking a full load of classes, she taught classes too. It barely left her time to eat, shower, and sleep.

  On the infrequent occasions she’d tried to date, the guys had gotten so fed up with how seldom she could see them and how low on her list of priorities they seemed to be and how unwilling she was to fall right in bed with them (most college guys seemed to think if they didn’t score by the third date there was something wrong with the woman—puh-leeze), that they’d soon sought greener pastures.

  Still, it would all be worth it soon. Although some people didn’t seem to think being an archaeologist and playing with old, dusty, or, frequently, dead things for the rest of one’s life was a particularly exciting thing to do (like her mom, who hated Jessi’s choice of major and couldn’t understand why she wasn’t married and blissfully popping out babies like her sisters), Jessi couldn’t imagine a more thrilling career. It might not top other people’s lists of dreams, but it was hers.

  Dr. Jessica St. James. She was so close she could taste it. Another year and a half and she’d be done with her course work for her PhD.

  Then she might date like the Energizer Bunny, making up for lost time. But right now, she’d not worked so hard and gone into so much debt to go screwing everything up just because she seemed to be stuck in some kind of hormonal overdrive.

  In a few years, she consoled herself, staring down at the busy street, the people hanging out at that club would probably still be hanging out at that club, their lives completely unchanged, while she would be traveling to far-off places, digging up remnants of the past, and having grand adventures.

  And who knew, maybe Mr. Right would be waiting for her out there at some future dig site. Maybe her life just wasn’t scheduled to take off as fast as everyone else’s. Maybe she was just a late bloomer.

  Holy cow—the hottie was slipping his hand inside the redhead’s jeans. And her hand was on his—oh! Right there in front of God and everybody!

  Behind her, somewhere in the cramped and crowded apartment that desperately needed to be cleaned and have the trash taken out, the phone began to ring.

  Jessi rolled her eyes. The mundaneness of her existence always chose the most inconvenient moments to intrude.

  Ring! Ring!

  She gulped another fascinated look at the unabashed display of sex-on-the-sidewalk, then reluctantly boosted herself inside the kitchen window. She shook her head in a vain attempt to clear it, then pulled down the shade. What she couldn’t see, couldn’t torture her. At least not much, anyway.

  Riiiiing!

  Where was that blasted phone?

  She finally spied it on the sofa, nearly buried beneath pillows, candy wrappers, and a pizza box that contained—eew—something fuzzy and phosphorescent green. As she gingerly pushed aside the box, she hesitated, hand suspended in midair above the phone.

  For a moment—the briefest, most peculiar of interludes—she suffered the inexplicable, intense feeling that she shouldn’t pick it up.

  That she should just let it ring and ring.

  Maybe let it ring all weekend.

  Later, Jessi would recall that feeling.

  Time itself seemed to stand still for that odd, pregnant slice of time, and she had the weirdest sensation that the universe itself had stopped breathing and was waiting to see what she would do next.

  She wrinkled her nose at the ridiculous, egocentric thought.

  As if the universe ever even noticed Jessi St. James.

  She picked up the phone.

  Lucan Myrddin Trevayne paced before the fire.

  When employing a sorcerer’s spell to conceal his true appearance—which he did whenever he wasn’t completely alone—he was tall, in his early forties, handsome, powerfully built, his thick black hair dashed at the temples with silver. He was a man who turned women’s heads, and made men take an instinctive step back when he walked by. His mien said one thing: Power—I have it, you don’t. And if you think you do—try me. His features were Old World, his eyes cold gray as a loch beneath a stormy sky. His true appearance was far less appealing.

  He’d amassed tremendous wealth and power in his lifetime, which had been considerably longer than most. He held controlling interest in many and varied enterprises, from banks to media to oil. He kept residences in a dozen cities. He retained a select group of uniquely trained men and the occasional woman to handle his most private affairs.

  To his left, seated in a deep armchair, one of those men waited tensely.

  “This is absurd, Roman,” Lucan growled. “What the hell’s taking so long?”

  Roman shifted defensively in his chair. He was aptly named, his features as classically handsome as those on an ancient coin, his hair long and blond. “I’ve got men on it, Mr. Trevayne,” he said with the trace of a Russian accent. “The best men we’ve got. The problem is, they went in a dozen different directions. They were sold on the black market. No one has names. It’s going to take time—”

  “Time is the one thing I don’t have,” Lucan cut him off sharply. “Every hour, every moment that passes, makes it less likely they’ll be recovered. Those damned things must be found.”

  “Those damned things” were the Dark or “Unseelie” Hallows of the Tuatha Dé Danaan—artifacts of immense power created by an ancient civilization that had passed, centuries ago and quite erroneously, into Man’s history books as a mythical race: the Daoine Sidhe or the Fae.

  Lucan had believed there was no better place to safekeep his prized treasures than in his well-warded private residence in London.

  He’d been wrong.

  Critically wrong.

  He wasn’t certain what had happened a few months ago while he’d been out of the country pursuing a lead on the Dark Book, the final and most powerful of the four Unseelie Hallows, but something had transpired somewhere in London—its epicenter in the east side, he could feel the lingering traces of power—that had reverberated through all of England. An immense and ancient power had risen for a brief time, so strong that it had neutralized all other magic in Britain.

  Which he wouldn’t have cared about since whatever it was had departed as swiftly as it had come, except for the fact that its rising had shattered formidable, allegedly unbreakable wards that protected his most prized possessions. Protected them so well that he’d found the notion of a modern-day security system laughable.

  Not so laughable now.
/>   He’d had a state-of-the-art system installed, with cameras in every room, sweeping every angle, because while he’d been away, a thief had broken into his museum of a home and stolen artifacts that had belonged to him for centuries—including his irreplaceable Hallows: the box, amulet, and mirror.

  Fortunately the thief had been spotted by neighbors while hauling away his loot. Unfortunately, by the time Lucan’s select staff had managed to identify and track the bastard, he’d already sold the artifacts to the first in a series of elusive middlemen.

  Artifacts such as his, fabulous and utterly lacking provenance, inevitably ended up in one of two places: with the legal authorities of one country or another after being intercepted in transit, or sold for a fraction of their worth on the black market before disappearing, sometimes for hundreds of years before so much as a whispered rumor was heard of them again. They’d gotten few names—and those, obvious aliases—from the thief before he’d died. For months now, Lucan’s men had been chasing a deliberately and cunningly muddied trail. And time was growing critical.

  “. . . though we’ve recovered three of the manuscripts and one of the swords, we’ve learned nothing about the box or amulet. But it looks like we might have a solid lead on the mirror,” Roman was saying.

  Lucan stiffened. The mirror. The Dark Glass was the one Hallow he needed urgently. Of all the years it might have been stolen, it’d had to be this one, when the tithe was due! The other Dark Hallows could wait a bit longer, though not long; they were far too dangerous to have loose in the world. Each of the Hallows conferred a gift upon its possessor for a price, if the possessor had the knowledge and the power to use it. The mirror’s Dark Gift was immortality, so long as he met its conditions. He’d been meeting its conditions for over a thousand years now. He intended to continue.

  “A shipment rumored to fit the bill left England for the States via Ireland a few days ago. We believe it’s headed for some university in Chicago, to a—”

  “Then why the fuck are you still sitting here?” Lucan said coldly. “If you have a lead, any lead at all on the glass, I want you on it personally. Now.” It was imperative he recover the mirror before Samhain. Or else.