CHAPTER EIGHT #2
He sat down beside her on the bench. His voice as low, he said grimly, “The Deamhanain be nay the only ones descended from the goddess Faola. Every Master can claim her blood.”
She made a sound, almost a laugh. He was also descended from ancient gods. Of course he was. How could she have thought otherwise? She clasped her cheeks, which were hot. A nervous breakdown wasn’t going to help her now!
Staring at the bow, he said grimly, “Evil was born with Adam and Eve, as ye ken. Long ago, the Ancients saw the need fer a race o’ warriors t’ fight the evil, Claire. Faola was sent to many kings.”
Claire choked on shock and fear. Her determination to dismiss his beliefs had become frighteningly fragile.
She stared at him, trying to think clearly. Malcolm had powers that were becoming harder and harder to rationalize. And he was good. “So you’re half god and half human.”
“Nay. There be three generations between me an’ Faola, lass. I be her great-grandson.”
He might believe he was the great-grandson of a goddess, Claire told herself, but that didn’t make it true. Maybe there was a rational explanation out there, somewhere. “Did you suck the life out of that thing the way the Deamhanain do?”
He stood. “Canna a god take life an’ give it? A Master can take life, lass. And some, a very few, can give it, too.”
“Great! You can give life, too?” she cried, shaken all over again.
“Nay. I canna heal. But all Masters have the power t’ take life. Otherwise, we are nay chosen.”
Unfortunately, he had finally made sense. The power of life and death was the greatest power of all, a power belonging to God or the gods. This race of warriors, if given by the gods to fight evil, would obviously have such a power, too.
An odd calm began. Wasn’t it better that the Masters had the same immortal blood in their veins as the demons?
She breathed hard and bit her lip. “That…thing was a demon. You broke its neck.”
“Aye. The Deamhanain dinna feel pain the way we do.”
Claire searched his gaze. “You don’t feel pain the way we do, either, do you?”
“I be strong.” His gaze held hers, a question there.
Claire knew what he was asking. He wanted to know how she felt about him now. She didn’t have that answer. “Why did you let the other two demons live? Why are they on this galley?” They were up front in the bow, tied up.
“They be humans, Claire, that be possessed. The monks have spells an’ mayhap they can be freed.”
She started. “You mean the monks will try to exorcize them?”
He nodded. Then, hesitantly, he smiled at her. “I need t’ help the men.”
Claire saw that they were pushing up to a pair of wooden piers. She couldn’t quite smile back.
As Malcolm leaped from the galley to the first pier, two other Highlanders leaped out, as well.
Ropes were tossed at the pilings, the other four men remaining at the oars.
Claire finally turned her attention to Iona.
She’d come by ferry last time, so her vantage point was the same. Otherwise, nothing was the same at all.
Two walled enclosures were visible, and she knew they were the older, fortified monastery and the medieval abbey.
Both had been ruins in the present, and a newer cathedral existed in their place.
The famous Celtic Cross that stood before the present-day cathedral was gone.
The abbey was not far from the pier, clearly built recently.
The monastery was farther up the road and built in paler stone.
The galley dipped as Malcolm climbed back inside. He returned to Claire and held out his hand. “Lass.”
Claire met his penetrating gaze, wishing she could keep his world at bay. “I think I believe you,” she said harshly. “I don’t want to, but I think I do.”
“’Tis better if ye do.”
Claire stared at him and he regarded her steadily. And she wondered where that left them.
CLAIRE BECAME INTERESTED in her surroundings as they waited for the monastery’s paneled wood door to be unlocked.
She was about to enter an intact, working, fifteenth-century monastery.
Here, there might be answers from an abbot named MacNeil.
Her guidebooks had claimed that the monastery had been built centuries earlier than the abbey, although the original buildings, made of wood, would have been built by St. Columba in the sixth century.
No wood buildings remained now, she saw, glancing over the monastery’s walls.
The walls were too low for comfort. They could be so easily scaled.
Many religious houses had been fortified in this time period, but this one was not. There were no high, crenellated walls, no defensive towers, no gatehouse, no moat or barbican. “Malcolm, this is such a flimsy door.”
“No Deamhan enters a holy place, Claire,” he said.
“Why not?”
“They lose their powers an’ we can easily destroy them.”
Thank God for small favors, she thought. Claire heard a bolt being lifted and the heavy door opened.
Claire preceded Malcolm inside, glancing curiously around. The monastery was a small village, really, with a dotter and refectory where the monks slept and ate, cookhouses, breweries, a church and many other buildings, as well as gardens and orchards.
Then she looked at the man who had admitted them and her heart almost stopped.
It was like looking at Matthew McConaughey playing the part of a medieval Highland warrior.
He was dressed almost identically to Malcolm, except his brat was green and black, thinly striped with white and gold.
He was tall and powerfully built, with dark gold hair, bulging biceps and quads, and he wore gold cuffs on both arms. She quickly revised her opinion—he looked like a bigger, stronger, sexier version of Matthew McConaughey.
His very green, very intense gaze swept her from head to toe and then he smiled slightly at Malcolm. That was all it took for his dimples to be revealed. “Ye break so many rules, Calum.”
Malcolm did not smile back. “This be Lady Claire,” he said. “I ken ye have seen us on our voyage.”
This could not be the abbot, Claire thought, trying not to ogle his thighs and arms. Abbots were short, fat and old. Abbots were bald.
“I have expected ye,” Matthew said flatly. His gaze slid very sensually over Claire again. A slight smile began. “Welcome, Lady Camden.”
Claire tensed. Malcolm had not uttered her last name.
“Niall MacNeil, lass,” Malcolm said tersely. “Niall? I dinna care how great yer powers be, keep yer eyes where they belong—in the head upon yer shoulders.”
Niall MacNeil smiled, amused. “I dinna chase yer Innocent, Malcolm. An’ye can ease yerself. I ken ye’d come, an’ the Ancients have allowed it.” He sent another very seductive, very indolent smile at Claire, and she instantly decided that he enjoyed his blatant male sensuality far too much.
“You were expecting me, or Malcolm?” she asked, shaken.
“Both,” he said, gesturing for them to start walking up the path.
Claire didn’t like games, especially not now. “Did you mean that the Ancients don’t mind my being here?” What did the old gods want with her? If there were old gods!
“Aye, lassie. Odd as it may be, the Ancients dinna mind yer presence amongst the Brotherhood.”
Before she could respond, she started, glancing past both men. A pair of huge, armed hunks was leaving one of the adjacent buildings.
The red-haired man was dressed like a Highlander in brat and leine, the other, a swarthy dark-haired man, like an Englishman in dark hose, knee-high boots, jeweled spurs, and a doublet and short-skirted burgundy jacket, which barely covered his upper hips.
Claire had read all about codpieces but had never seen one—and she had never expected to see one on a six-foot-three-or four-inch walking billboard for manhood.
She stared at the bulging laced-up pouch of fabric attached to his hose, then knew she flushed. She turned away, but not before the Englishman gave her an inviting smile. That attire was shocking and indecent on a man built like that. Women in her time would go nuts for it and him—for all of them!
“So now ye like Englishmen?” Malcolm asked dangerously.
Was he jealous? She took one quick look at him and saw he was irate.
She remained too shaken from the morning to be even slightly pleased.
“This is a monastery?” She was entirely disbelieving.
Except now, the chapel bells were ringing and she saw actual monks leaving the refectory—normal men in robes, some thin, some fat—all utterly silent as they made their way to the church.
Then another gorgeous giant, also dressed as an Englishman, appeared from a smaller building and crossed over to the gardens behind the church.
And then she saw several other Highlanders coming toward them from another building, all huge, powerful and frigging gorgeous.
There was so much testosterone in the air now that she was dizzy.
She stared after the trio, her heart racing. Malcolm gave her a dark look.
She met his gaze, thinking that she was undoubtedly surrounded by the most gorgeous, sexy, virile men in the history of the world, but none of them compared to Malcolm of Dunroch.
“A small chapter o’ monks remain,” MacNeil said, lowering his incredibly thick lashes, “to keep the grounds holy. The monastery became our sanctuary long ago. Most of the monks have gone to other cloisters. ’Tis a secure haven fer us, when we choose to come.
” He suddenly grinned, dimples deep, his gaze direct.
“An’ sometimes they are summoned fer the orders I give them. ”
She swallowed and glanced at Malcolm, who was now royally pissed with his buddy. MacNeil was showing off by letting her know who the boss really was there. “I need the truth,” she said, aware of the desperation in her tone.
His gaze moved slowly to her mouth. “Ye have so many questions,” he exclaimed softly. “Malcolm has told ye the truth. ’Tis spinning in yer mind, like a top.”
“He is really the great-grandson of a goddess?” she cried.
“Aye.”