Borrowed Time (The Witches of Mingus Mountain #2)

1. Into the Fire

1

INTO THE FIRE

Seth McAllister

Flagstaff, 1884

If he hadn’t been holding Deborah’s limp form in his arms, Seth might have taken a step back.

Jeremiah Wilcox?

How was that even possible? As far as Seth could recall, the dreaded Wilcox primus had died years and years ago. Not, he had to admit, that he’d been paying much attention to those sorts of things when he was only a schoolboy. But there had been hushed murmurs that the Wilcox clan now had a new leader, Jeremiah’s son Jacob.

And yet this man appeared young and hale and hearty — or at least, in the prime of life, probably about ten years older than Seth, which was crazy…wasn’t it?

But then he looked past Jeremiah to the house on whose front porch he stood, which seemed almost brand-new, the paint fresh and no real sign of wear on the porch steps, even though the home had been built in a style popular nearly fifty years earlier.

And there had been that horse-drawn carriage….

None of that mattered right now, though. He would have to deal with the unpleasant ramifications of his current reality later, once he knew Deborah was out of danger.

“Can you help?” he blurted. Yes, some part of him knew that asking for assistance from the cruel warlock who stood a few feet away was probably an exercise in futility, but he didn’t know what else to do.

Jeremiah Wilcox didn’t even blink. “I personally? No,” he said, and Seth’s heart sank. However, the other man continued smoothly, “But my sister Emma is a healer, and she lives next door. Go inside and lay your friend down on the settee in the front parlor while I go fetch my sister.”

The relief that flooded Seth’s entire body was so intense, for a second or two, it felt as if he couldn’t quite get his shaky limbs to obey him. But then he managed to nod, and hurried up the porch steps even as Jeremiah stepped out of the way and headed down them, presumably so he could go to his sister Emma’s house and bring her back.

Immediately to Seth’s right was a handsome room that overlooked the street, with tall windows and ceilings, and shining furniture he knew must have been very expensive, even if it would have been somewhat out of date in the world where he’d grown up.

When he’d grown up, he corrected himself. He still had no idea how any of this had happened, but something about the connection he and Deborah had made when she pressed her lips against his in that final, despairing kiss had been powerful enough to hurl them across both time and space, landing them in Flagstaff during the years when Jeremiah Wilcox was still head of his clan.

Had Jeremiah been able to detect that he was a McAllister, lost behind enemy lines?

Very gently, Seth laid Deborah down on the settee. It had fancy dark green upholstery, possibly silk, and almost at once became smeared with blood. But Jeremiah had told him to put Deborah there, so it didn’t seem as if he was too concerned about the fate of his settee.

Well, if what Seth had heard about the Wilcox primus was true, it wasn’t as though the man couldn’t afford to buy another one — or ten, if the mood struck him.

Deborah let out the faintest rattling gasp as he placed her on the cushions. The sound was terrible, true, but at least it told him she was still alive.

She had to be. She had to survive this.

A rustle of silk skirts made him turn around. Jeremiah and a woman — equally black-haired and black-eyed, although her skin was strikingly pale — who must have been his sister Emma stood at the entrance to the parlor, although she hesitated for only a second or two before she hurried to Deborah’s side and laid a hand on her forehead.

“She has lost a great deal of blood,” the woman said, and Jeremiah frowned.

“Can you save her?”

“I believe so,” Emma replied, and again, relief so intense it wanted to weaken him passed through Seth’s body. “You two need to leave me to work, though.”

Jeremiah inclined his head. “Of course,” he said, and turned his attention to Seth. “Come with me.”

Although Seth would much rather have remained at Deborah’s side, he understood that every healer had their own way of doing things, and it was never a good idea to interfere. “Sure,” he said, and followed the older man out of the parlor and down the hallway, where they headed into a room that was clearly his office, with a big mahogany desk dominating the space and shelves of the same wood taking up one wall. Here, the color scheme appeared to be more wine color than green, but the furnishings had the same air of obvious luxury as those in the front parlor.

Jeremiah went to a small table near the bookcase, where a crystal decanter and several glasses waited. He picked up one and poured some caramel-colored liquid into it, then handed it to Seth.

“It looks as if you could use this.”

Instinct made Seth take the glass, although once he had his fingers wrapped around it, he couldn’t help giving its contents a dubious look. “What is it?”

A corner of Jeremiah’s mouth quirked. His lips were thin, but expressive for all that. “Brandy, my boy. Do they not have it where you come from?”

Although Seth wanted to bristle at the way Jeremiah had called him “boy” — a decade might have separated them, but he was still a grown man with a job and his own house — he knew that getting into an argument with the Wilcox warlock was certainly not the best way to handle the situation.

“We have it, I suppose,” he replied. “But it’s been illegal for years.”

Heavy black brows lifted. “Indeed? How peculiar.” Before Seth could comment, Jeremiah went on, “It is certainly not illegal here, and I think you might find it will steady your nerves.”

Nerve steadying was definitely what Seth needed right then. He couldn’t stop thinking of Deborah lying on that settee down the hall, of how pale she was, how the blood wouldn’t stop flowing from that awful wound in her stomach.

How that same blood stained the white linen shirt he wore now.

His hand lifted the glass to his lips almost of its own volition. A large swallow, oddly aromatic, and then the burn started as it hit the back of his throat and continued its way down to his stomach.

He coughed.

Another quirk of Jeremiah’s mouth. “I suppose brandy might be a bit much if you aren’t used to alcohol,” he observed.

That was one way of putting it. As unpleasant as the initial sensations had been, however, Seth realized the burning heat had somehow transformed into a welcome warmth in his belly, one that made him want to stand up a little taller.

“It’s…interesting,” he said.

“But welcome in a crisis, I believe.” Jeremiah paused there, and the hint of a smile that had been playing around his lips vanished as if it had never been. “So, do you want to tell me what happened to you and your friend? You are clearly a McAllister, but she….”

The words trailed off, and the other warlock raised his brows.

Was that a hint of confusion in his expression? Seth couldn’t say for sure; he’d just met the man, but he could already tell that Jeremiah Wilcox was not the sort of person who generally found himself puzzled by much of anything.

“Deborah isn’t from my clan,” Seth said. He’d allowed himself a moment of inner struggle, one where he’d debated how much he should say to the Wilcox primus, but he’d realized soon enough that trying to hide anything from the man would be an exercise in futility. Perhaps the stories about his powers and his ruthless control of magic had grown over the years to become the stuff of legends that had very little to do with reality…but Seth couldn’t ignore the way he’d been able to sense the enormous power that had emanated from the man when he first encountered him.

Lying to such a strong warlock didn’t seem like a very good idea.

“No,” Jeremiah responded. “She has a look to her that reminds me of someone…but surely that must be impossible.”

Seth wasn’t sure what to make of that remark. There was no way in the world Deborah’s path could have ever crossed Jeremiah’s, even if she’d come through Flagstaff on her way to Jerome.

The man standing before him would have been dead for more than a decade by that point.

“Her name is Deborah Rowe,” he said. “She told me she’s from the Winfield clan in Massachusetts.”

Those words made Jeremiah go utterly still. His black eyes might have been augers, boring through to Seth’s very soul.

“‘Rowe’?” he echoed.

“Yes,” Seth said, even as he wondered what it was about Deborah’s name that would have made the Wilcox primus react in such a way. “I don’t know much more than that, though. She only confessed to me the day before that she was a witch at all. Somehow, she’d been hiding it before then.”

Now comprehension flitted across Jeremiah’s face, and he nodded.

“That makes sense,” he said softly. “Her father had the same gift.”

“‘Her father’?” Seth repeated, knowing how incredulous he sounded. “You knew Deborah’s father?”

“I did,” Jeremiah said. “But,” he went on, “I believe that is a tale she should tell you when she awakes.”

His head fairly spun, although Seth couldn’t say for sure whether that was the effect of the swallow of brandy he’d consumed a moment earlier, or merely his reaction to such an astonishing revelation.

He didn’t know how or why, but Deborah’s father had once been in Flagstaff, had met Jeremiah Wilcox.

Did Mr. Rowe have the same talent for time travel that his daughter did?

“She told me she’d come to Jerome because she wanted to explore Arizona,” Seth said. “In her time, it sounds as if that’s something witches and warlocks can do — travel, I mean. But she never said anything about her father traveling to Flagstaff in the past.”

Jeremiah’s brows had pulled together at the phrase “in her time,” but then he gave the faintest of nods, as if acknowledging something to himself.

“No, I suppose she wouldn’t have. However, I believe the details of her past are something Deborah should tell you for herself.” He paused there, his gaze moving to the glass of brandy Seth held. “You should have some more of that, I think.”

For a moment, Seth wanted to refuse, to tell the other man he certainly had no intention of taking advice from the likes of a Wilcox primus.

On the other hand….

He allowed himself another swallow, a much more measured one this time, and then deliberately walked over to the table that held the decanter and placed his half-drunk glass of brandy there. This second dose didn’t burn quite as much, but he could tell that if he had any more, it was going to make him lightheaded. He assumed this was a condition sought after by the men who drank moonshine in the bars down on Main Street, and yet it didn’t seem like a very good idea to lose control when he was standing here in the heart of enemy territory.

“What year is it?” he asked, and while Jeremiah didn’t exactly smile, something in his expression still appeared amused.

“It is November sixth, in the year of our Lord 1884.”

Right then, Seth was glad of the brandy he’d drunk, if only because the faint swimminess it induced offered a sort of cushion between his brain and the terrible news Jeremiah Wilcox had just told him. Yes, he’d somehow known this couldn’t be 1926, not when the man standing a few paces away should have been dead for years, not when these Victorian mansions looked as if they’d been built within the last year or so and not decades earlier…not when he hadn’t seen a single motorized vehicle, only a horse and carriage.

“And your own time is…?” the primus prompted.

Seth couldn’t help grimacing. “Nineteen twenty-six. June,” he added, although he supposed the month didn’t matter so much when they’d apparently jumped back in time more than forty years.

“Interesting,” Jeremiah said. “Is that your gift? Time travel, I mean.”

“No,” Seth responded at once. Part of him didn’t want to reveal what his true magical talent was, but again, he had a feeling Jeremiah would find out soon enough, even if he didn’t volunteer the information. “My gift is traveling in space. Translocation, some of the people in my clan called it.”

For a moment, Jeremiah didn’t say anything. But then he nodded. “It is a powerful talent to have. My brother Samuel has the same gift.”

As he said the other man’s name, something in the primus’s face seemed to darken, although his voice had been neutral enough.

Bad blood between the two brothers?

Maybe. The Goddess only knew that Seth had his own set of problems with his brother Charles, a commonality he wasn’t sure he wanted to acknowledge right then.

Of course, thinking of Charles only made him wonder how on earth his brother had reacted when Seth and Deborah disappeared right before his eyes. True, Charles was used enough to Seth’s gift that he might not have been too startled, even if everyone had thought Seth didn’t have the power to move anyone except himself through magical means. All the same, it probably wasn’t too fantastic to believe that he might have summoned some extra strength during that moment of crisis.

But he hadn’t sent himself home, or to his cousin Helen’s house so she could tend to Deborah’s wounds. No, for some insane reason, he and Deborah had been brought here, to a place he hadn’t believed would ever offer them the sort of assistance they required.

At least he’d been wrong in that. She might have been a Wilcox, but there seemed to be something quietly efficient and calm about Jeremiah’s sister Emma, a quality that told Seth she was a very strong healer and would do everything in her power to make sure Deborah recovered from the wound she had suffered.

“I believe the ability to move through time is something Deborah Rowe must have inherited from her mother,” Jeremiah said then. “While it’s true that these gifts don’t always pass from generation to generation, I don’t have any other explanation for your presence here.”

From the way he spoke, it sure sounded to Seth as though Jeremiah Wilcox must have known both Deborah’s parents, not just her father.

How many secrets had she been hiding?

Far too many, and he knew he wouldn’t get any of the answers he needed until she awoke…whenever that was.

“My sister is a very skilled healer,” Jeremiah said quietly. “I have no doubt that she will be able to bring Miss Rowe back to us. In the meantime, though, we should make some plans in order to explain your presence here in Flagstaff. I trust Emma to keep her own counsel, but I feel it is probably better to hide your identities from my brothers. There was some…ill feeling… between them and Deborah’s father, and I do not think it advisable for them to know who either of you are.”

Just what the hell had happened here?

As much as Seth wanted to know, he also understood that Jeremiah wouldn’t budge on that point. It was Deborah’s story to tell, and he would just have to wait until she was well enough to relate it to him.

In a way, that felt all right, if only because it got him believing she really was going to survive that horrible gunshot wound.

And although he obviously had no idea what was happening now in 1926, he had to hope that Charles had decided to finish the job and had thrown Lionel Allenby right off that cliff to follow the revolver that had been tossed over the side only a few minutes earlier. The man deserved it after shooting an innocent woman. There would be inquiries, of course, but Seth knew it would be easy enough to steer any suspicion toward the bootleggers once the man’s nefarious dealings were brought to light.

“So, what do you propose?” he asked, and something about Jeremiah’s stance relaxed slightly, as though he hadn’t been sure whether his McAllister visitor would cooperate with his plan.

“During her time here in Flagstaff, Deborah’s mother claimed to be a member of the Landon clan from Missouri and called herself Eliza Prewitt,” the primus said. “I think it simplest to tell everyone you are also Landons, come in search of her. To that end, it would probably be best if you presented yourselves as ‘Eliza’s’ brother and sister. That way, no one will ask too many questions about your relationship.”

At those words, an immediate protest rose to Seth’s lips. There was no way in the world he wanted to pretend to be Deborah’s brother. His feelings toward her might have become much more complicated over the past couple of days, but he knew they were far from brotherly.

And why had her mother presented herself as a member of a clan not her own?

He shoved that question toward the back of his mind, since he knew Jeremiah wouldn’t answer it anyway. As much as he disliked the primus’s plan, he knew it had its merits. No one would have too many issues with a brother and sister traveling together, and although feature for feature, he and Deborah didn’t look at all alike, they at least had the superficial resemblance of medium brown hair and blue eyes. They’d probably pass…as long as no one looked too closely.

Even though he knew he probably wouldn’t get a straight answer, he went ahead and asked anyway.

“Where did Deborah’s parents go?”

“Home,” Jeremiah said briefly.

No mention of where exactly “home” was, which Seth assumed was nowhere near Missouri…or 1884.

“But enough of that,” the primus went on. “I will make sure to secure rooms for you at the Hotel San Francisco, since it would look very strange for me to host a couple of witches from the Landon clan here in my own home.”

Although Seth was certainly glad that he wouldn’t have to stay under Jeremiah’s roof for any longer than was necessary, he couldn’t quite hold back a thrill of alarm on Deborah’s behalf. “Will it be safe to move her?”

“We won’t do so until my sister lets me know she is sufficiently healed,” Jeremiah replied. “In the meantime, though, it can’t hurt to make the arrangements — and to make sure you’re properly outfitted. The clothes you’re wearing aren’t immediately anachronistic, but Deborah’s are another story.”

The man had a point there. Seth guessed that no one would probably give his band-collared shirt and suspenders and heavy canvas pants a second look, even though they probably weren’t quite what men in the 1880s might have had in their wardrobe, but that thin summer frock Deborah had on wouldn’t even be allowed as an undergarment in 1884, let alone something worn on the street.

“Will it be that easy to get us what we need?” he asked.

“We have quite a good general store here,” Jeremiah replied. “But Deborah’s parents also left their things behind when they departed, and I’m hopeful they’ll fit well enough to get you started.”

What in the world had gone on here? Had the couple disappeared into thin air, just like he and Deborah had?

Seth didn’t want to acknowledge the more frightening implications of all this — that Jeremiah obviously expected his and Deborah’s stay here to be one of some duration and that they needed to have both a good cover story and sufficient wardrobes to maintain their false identities. While he wished he could believe all would be remedied as soon as she awoke, he knew that was probably wishful thinking. Whatever force had sent them from their own time to Flagstaff in the 1880s, it had to be something that had happened spontaneously with no real thought. She’d been hanging onto consciousness and certainly in no shape to cast any kind of powerful enchantment.

Which meant that getting out of here was going to be tricky.

“All right,” Seth said, knowing he sounded far too resigned, “let’s see about those hotel rooms.”