Chapter 37
Elodie knew she had to wake up, but she resisted. She remembered everything now. All the horrific, sordid details of what she had done. She. Not her mother. Elodie couldn’t believe her sweet mum had allowed herself to be prosecuted and locked away for a crime she hadn’t committed.
Shame rocked Elodie. She had blamed her mother for everything when the culpability fell on her shoulders.
Elodie wrapped the darkness around her, shying away from the light that attempted to reach her.
Magic surrounded her, but she pushed it away, also.
She didn’t care whose it was. How would she ever face her mother again? Or Elias?
Or anyone.
What she had done was criminal. Worse, she had allowed her mother to be convicted and put away for it. Would her mother ever forgive her?
Then Elodie felt a familiar hand take hers.
Scott’s callused palm was comforting. His presence soothed her frayed nerves.
She could only run for so long, and she had done it for too many years to continue.
She had come to Skye to put the past to rest so she could have a future.
It was time to face that, as tragic and ghastly as it was—despite her fears and shame.
Magic swarmed her. She knew the feel of it. Her powers. It had been there all the time, waiting. Her eyes burned with tears. The sensation of her magic made her dizzy, and yet at the same time, it comforted her, reassured her.
Elodie squeezed Scott’s hand. He returned the gesture.
She didn’t know what would happen when she opened her eyes, but she would never know unless she did it.
Growing up, she had never been afraid of anything.
She missed that about herself. Yet it was within her grasp to change and be the person she had once been.
And she wanted to shake off the past fifteen years and remember the dreams and ambition she’d once held so fervently.
She took another breath. Then, she opened her eyes. She found herself on the floor with Rhona and two other women over her. Scott was on her right. When Elodie looked to the left, her gaze clashed with her mother’s.
“My sweet girl,” Emily said with tears running down her face.
Elodie sat up and embraced her mum as she wept. Emily held her tightly. Elodie needed to say so much, but she couldn’t get any words out. Not yet. But soon.
The room was quiet. She knew that Scott was there, watching. Others were, too, but she didn’t pay them any heed.
“I’m so sorry,” Elodie finally whispered to her mother.
Emily leaned back and gave her a watery smile. “Don’t be.”
“You confessed to something you didn’t do.”
“It was my fault that things went as far as they did with your father,” Emily argued.
“I knew what Edward was, but I loved him anyway. I told myself that as long as it was only me he abused, that I could handle it. When I found out about Elias, I ended it. It was the reason your father was in such a rage that morning.”
When Emily turned her head to the side, Elodie followed her gaze and found Elias. Elodie’s tears started again.
Her brother shot her a lopsided grin as he brushed away a tear. “It’s good to see you, too, sis.”
“I hate to break up the reunion,” a man said from behind her. “But could the drumbeat you Druids heard have been caused when Elodie walked into this room?”
Scott said, “No.”
Elodie turned to face him. Their gazes clashed. He knew everything now. Every wretched detail of her past. “He’s right,” she answered. “I felt the house shake and heard the drum before I opened the door.”
Scott got to his feet and held out a hand.
Elodie took it, allowing him to help her stand.
He linked their fingers. Things needed to be said between them, but right now, she wanted to feel him beside her.
She didn’t know what the future held. That seemed too distant to imagine with everything else going on.
Elias and Emily got to their feet. Elodie took the moment to look at the others in the room. She wasn’t surprised to see Balladyn and Filip, but she didn’t know the other two men. Both were handsome in their own right, but they didn’t compare to Scott in her mind.
Rhona made the introductions. Elodie was at a loss for words to discover a Dragon King and a Warrior in the cottage with their powerful Druid mates. She was about to ask what they were doing there when she noticed the blood on her brother. “What happened?” she asked Elias, nodding at his wound.
Elias tenderly touched the cut on his brow. “I was attacked as I drove over the bridge, headed onto Skye.”
“Attacked?” Balladyn asked, his eyes narrowed, and his body tense. “By whom?”
Her brother shrugged. “I can no’ say. All I saw was mist that slammed into my SUV. The vehicle’s in the sea.”
“It has to be the same mist that’s been after Elodie,” Scott stated.
Filip nodded as a shiver ran down Elodie’s spine.
“Why is it after Elodie?” Sonya asked.
Emily caught Elodie’s gaze. “I think I know.”
“You mean because of what I did to Da?” Elodie asked.
Rhona frowned as she shook her head. “Wait. Are we saying the mist wants to kill Elodie? Or take her?”
“I’m no’ sure we want to find out,” Filip said.
Neither did she, but Elodie suspected she wouldn’t have that option.
“I know it wanted me dead,” Elias said.
Scott nodded. “And me.”
“Two Druids on Skye have been killed in two days,” Balladyn said. “No one mentioned any mist, but no one was left alive to say anything.”
Rhona grabbed her phone and glanced at the screen. Her face tightened as she looked at Balladyn. “Make that four dead. Frasier just texted. A kid called the police. Said they didn’t feel well and went to wake their parents but found them dead. It’s a family of Druids.”
“The children were no’ harmed?” Broc asked.
Rhona shook her head. “According to the DI here, it was only the parents.”
“Were any other kids left alone?” Eilish asked.
Balladyn crossed his arms over his chest. “No children were at the previous crime scenes.”
“There’s a reason the children were left unscathed,” Ulrik stated.
Elodie’s stomach turned violently as she realized the answer. “Adults aren’t likely to change their views, while kids can be molded.”
“What about in Edinburgh?” Rhona asked Scott.
He and Filip exchanged a look. “Only adults were slain. No one mentioned anything about any bairns.”
Emily cleared her throat. “I wish I could stay and help, but I must get back.”
“No,” Elodie said as she grabbed her mother’s arm.
Elias said, “She’ll get out in a few months. She’s served her time.”
Ulrik stepped forward. “I’ll return Emily.”
“I love you,” Emily said as she hugged Elodie once more.
Elodie squeezed her eyes closed. “I’ll see you soon.”
Then, Emily was gone. Elodie felt a fresh wave of tears well, but she held them back. Now wasn’t the time to give in to that emotion.
“This is connected to the drumbeat,” Eilish stated. “It has to be.”
Sonya nodded in agreement. “A warning of some kind.”
“Can one of you ask the Ancients what they want?” Balladyn inquired.
Rhona grunted. “If only it were that easy.”
“It wasn’t the Ancients I heard, it was the trees,” Sonya said.
Broc glanced at Sonya as he nodded. “If there’s been trouble, the Ancients usually speak to one of the Druids at the castle.”
“Isla mostly,” Sonya added. “She has a strong connection to them.”
“Have the Ancients said anything?” Scott asked her.
Eilish shook her head as Ulrik returned. “Not to them, and not to anyone at Dreagan.”
Elodie looked at the window where the branch had smashed through the glass.
“What?” Elias asked her.
She hesitated before she said, “When I first arrived, there was a storm.”
“An unnatural storm,” Filip interjected.
Rhona added, “Created by magic.”
“A sizable limb came through this window,” Elodie continued and pointed. “Did someone want to hurt me? Because that limb could’ve struck any of the windows.”
Scott’s lips pressed into a line. “Or were they trying to get you to come inside?”
Elodie’s gaze met his. “Exactly.”
“And by doing so, revealing your memories as well as your magic,” Elias said.
Filip grunted as he crossed his arms over his chest. “Let’s no’ forget it was coated in drough magic.”
“Which would’ve hurt Elodie if not outright killed her,” Balladyn stated.
Sonya’s lips twisted. “Maybe someone wanted Elodie to walk into this room, and by using drough magic on the limb, ensure that she had to use her magic to get rid of it.”
“That’s a possibility,” Broc said.
Rhona blew out a breath. “I don’t like any of this happening on Skye. Whoever this is must be stopped.”
“Everywhere,” Filip added.
Balladyn slid his gaze to Filip. “That’s the plan.”
“How can we help?” Ulrik asked.
Before anyone could reply, Scott said, “We keep Elodie out of anyone’s grasp. Whether they want to harm her or use her.”
“Agreed,” Elias and Filip said at the same time.
Elodie felt everyone’s eyes on her. She thought about the last fifteen years.
Everything made sense now. She hadn’t been herself.
Her magic had been bound, and her memories wiped.
It should have given her freedom. Instead, it had trapped her.
She loathed what she had done, but she hated that her father had become someone she had no choice but to stop.
Yet she hadn’t needed to go to those extremes. She could’ve hindered him and fled with the rest of her family. It was a nice thought, but Elodie knew that the chances of any of that happening had been slim. He never would’ve let them go. Her young mind must have come to that conclusion, too.
Or, it was simply seeing her father with a knife, attempting to kill her mother after trying to strangle her that made the decision for her. He wouldn’t have stopped. He would’ve tried again. He might even have gone after Elias. Or her. Or Edie.
Edie. Her sister didn’t know anything. She’d been kept completely in the dark. It was no wonder Edie had gotten on with her life better than either her or Elias. Elodie’s gaze met her brother’s.
As if knowing where her thoughts were, he mouthed, “Later.”
Beside her, Scott stood strong and unyielding.
She had her magic now, just as he had sought.
His organization wanted to use her. Would she let them?
She wanted to hate him for what he had done, but she couldn’t.
She was hurt. Deeply. But the feelings he stirred within her weren’t so easily forgotten or dismissed.
She felt his warm gaze and turned to him. His deep blue eyes searched hers. He looked for forgiveness. Did she dare give it? Could she?
“I’m not going to make decisions for someone else,” Rhona said, returning Elodie’s attention to the present. “This is about Elodie. She gets to decide what she wants to do.”
Elodie looked at the spot where her magic had made her father disappear.
She thought about the intensity of the magic that had erupted from her, the anger and fear that had swept through her.
If put into a similar situation, would she react the same way?
She was older and wiser now. She knew how to better control her emotions instead of simply reacting.
She returned her attention to her brother.
Then she looked at Filip, and then finally at Scott.
She thought about her mother, Edie, and her sister’s children.
If any of them were in danger, if their lives were on the line, Elodie wouldn’t stand by and do nothing.
Would she kill? Maybe. It depended on the situation.
Perhaps that was why someone wanted to harm her. They might want to make sure a murderer who had escaped punishment received the justice they deserved.
Elodie looked at Rhona. “I’m not running or hiding anymore.”
Then she released Scott’s hand and walked away.