Chapter Nineteen #2
He pressed the blade against his wrist, feeling the sharp edge part his skin.
Then suddenly something grabbed him by the wrist, yanking away the hand holding the knife. A voice called from above, a voice that washed over him like a summer breeze.
“Cailean!”
The force around his wrist pulled, there was a surge of power, and suddenly he was being yanked upward. He lost his grip on his knife, and it went sinking out of reach. He broke the surface and gasped in a great, whooping breath.
It took a moment for him to get his bearings and when he did, he spotted a familiar figure standing on the headland, staring at him with wide, fear-filled eyes.
Rose.
The sight of her nearly stopped his heart. Something surged within him, a sensation that filled him from head to toe, a feeling that banished all the fear and doubt he’d been feeling and replaced it with a quiet joy.
Rose. His Rose.
But he let none of his feelings show in his voice.
“What are ye doing here?” he roared.
“What’s it bloody well look like?” she roared back. “Stopping you from doing something monumentally idiotic. Now get the hell over here!”
Cailean hesitated. He’d come here to seal the prison with his blood.
If he went to Rose now, he knew she’d stop him.
He could not allow that. He could not let anyone, even Rose MacFinnan, divert him from this path.
Yet what choice did he have? He’d dropped his knife and the rest of his weapons lay on the beach where he’d discarded them.
With a growl of frustrated exasperation, he began swimming towards her. He reached the rocks and clambered up. Rose grabbed his arm and helped to pull him the rest of the way.
He straightened and faced her. She looked disheveled, with her hair in disarray and her clothes spattered with mud. But even so, she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
But all he said was, “Ye shouldnae be here.”
Her eyebrows rose. “I shouldn’t be here? You shouldn’t have locked me up!”
He winced. “Aye, maybe not, but I couldnae think of any other way to stop ye from following me.”
“Damn right I would have followed you! Cailean, what the hell do you think you’re doing?
Were you really going to… going to…” She didn’t finish the sentence.
She pressed one hand over her mouth and blinked rapidly as though fighting back tears.
“Damn you,” she whispered. “How could you do that to me?”
Cailean’s heart broke at the sight of her anguish. The last thing he wanted to do was hurt her. But this was the only way he could see to save his daughter. Didn’t she, of all people, understand that?
“I’m sorry,” he replied softly. “I’m sorry it has to be this way. I wish it could be different. I wish I had more time to spend with ye. But I have to save my daughter. I have to save my people. If my blood is the way to doing that, then so be it.”
“Not your blood! Dear God, Cailean, not yours! What were you thinking? Don’t you know what it would do to Catriona and your people if they lost you? Don’t you know what it would do to me?”
Her eyes flashed and her fists clenched at her sides. “I can’t lose you, Cailean. I love you!”
*
Cailean’s eyes flared wide as Rose spoke those words. He went very still. Around them, the breeze plucked at Rose’s hair and clothing, and the sea hissed against the headland. The raucous cries of seabirds filled the air. But between them, all was still.
“What did ye say?” Cailean whispered.
She gazed up at him. “I love you, Cailean MacNeil. I need you. Which is why I won’t let you do this. I won’t lose you. I can’t.”
He blinked slowly, as if trying to figure out if this was real or just a dream. She placed her palms flat against his chest. “Now do you get it? Now do you see why I came after you?”
He cupped her cheek with one hand. “Is this real?” he whispered. “Never did I think… never did I dare to hope…” He swallowed thickly, his throat bobbing.
She shook her head. “I know it’s crazy. When Lir brought me here, she said I might find what I’ve been looking for. I didn’t know what she meant at the time, but I do now. It’s you, Cailean. You’re what I’ve been looking for.”
His eyes slid closed. He pressed his forehead against hers and she breathed deeply, breathing in the scent of him. He was here. He was alive. That’s all that mattered right now. They could figure out the rest from there.
“What are we going to do, lass?” he whispered.
And that was the question, wasn’t it? No matter what they felt for each other, they both still had their duty. She’d vowed to end the sickness that afflicted this island and Cailean, she knew, would do whatever it took to save his people and his daughter.
Frustrated rage welled up inside her. Was their love to be destroyed before it could even begin?
There has to be another way, she thought. There has to be.
She pushed away from Cailean. He watched her warily, his stance tense as though readying himself to stop her from doing anything stupid.
“What are ye thinking, love?” he asked softly.
“I’m going to speak to him.”
“No, ye are not!” he snapped. “Ye know what happened last time! He isnae to be trusted, Rose. He will try to snare ye!”
“I know that. And last time you were here to bring me back. You’ll just have to do the same again, won’t you?” She huffed out an exasperated breath. “I have to try. What else can I do?”
He stared at her and she read a hundred different emotions in his eyes. Longing. Desire. Helplessness. But most of all, fear. Fear for her. For his daughter. For what this might cost. But there was also a weary kind of resignation as well.
“All right,” he breathed. “I’ll be right beside ye.”
She leaned into him, breathing in his reassuring, sea-and-sky scent. “I know you will.”
Taking a deep breath, she lowered herself to her knees. She closed her eyes and sent her senses questing outwards. She felt the god immediately. His presence slammed into her like sledgehammer, battering at her senses. Rage. Frustration. All-consuming hatred.
Give him to me! The voice boomed through her head like thunder. Son of the betrayer’s line! I will tear him apart! I will bathe the waters with his blood! I will make them all pay for what they did to me!
It was so powerful it almost flattened her.
She pressed her fists against her head and screwed her eyes shut tight, battling against the raging torrent of the god’s power.
It was like standing in the path of a hurricane, like staring into the heart of a volcano.
She’d never felt such rage and grief. Such suffering.
You cannot have him, she said to the voice. He was not the one who trapped you. Your lover did that.
Because of the poison he and his kind poured into her ear! And now she is gone and I am alone! You think to seal me back in here, spellweaver? Ye dinna have the power! Ye are just an insect against my might. Ye willnae give me the MacNeil? Then I will take ye instead! Come to me! I will drown ye!
Something washed through Rose’s mind. Gone was the rage, the frustration, the hatred.
Instead, something soft and soothing filled her.
In her mind’s eye she saw cool dark caves washed by the gentle sigh of the waves.
She saw forests of kelp waving gently in the breeze, multicolored fish darting between their fronds.
She saw moonlight on a dark ocean as still as glass.
She saw tranquility. The peace of oblivion.
All she had to do was dive in and it would be hers. No more cares. No more worries.
She felt her will fading, all thought and desire being washed into the endless sighing of the waves. It would be so easy to give in. So easy to step forward, to dive into the deep, dark water and let it close over her head…
“No!” a voice spoke by her ear, and she felt a firm grip take hold of her arm. “Come back to me, Rose, come back.”
A face floated into her mind. A handsome, beloved face, and all of a sudden the god’s compulsion shattered.
“Cailean,” she whispered. She didn’t open her eyes but she reached out and grabbed him, placing her own hands over his where he held her firm. Then, using him to anchor her, using his presence to stop her from losing herself again, she sent her senses out towards the god once more.
His rage and frustration battered against her but this time she had Cailean’s presence to keep it at bay, had his love surrounding her like a cocoon.
The god tore at her, trying to find a way past her defenses, but could find no way in.
Instead, Rose grasped hold of his fury and followed it to its source, sending her senses questing down into the cracks in the seabed that marked where he was attempting to escape his prison.
The god quailed, trying to flee her now, but she would not let him go. She rode his fury, deeper, deeper, until she saw what lay beyond it. Loneliness. A deep, soul-crushing despair. He had been trapped for centuries, full of grief and sorrow for his lost love, believing that he was alone.
But he wasn’t.
A memory formed in Rose’s mind. It was an image of Cailean and Catriona.
They were in the courtyard at Dun Mallach, Catriona trying unsuccessfully to get Patch to do some tricks while the little dog kept dancing around in circles and pulling on the hem of Catriona’s dress.
Cailean watched, arms folded across his broad chest, an amused smile curling the corners of his mouth.
And in his eyes shone a deep, unadulterated joy. The love of a father for his daughter.
And suddenly Rose knew what she had to do.
With a gasp, she withdrew her senses, untangled her awareness from that of the god, and opened her eyes. Her outward senses came rushing back and she swayed on her knees. Cailean’s hands on her shoulders steadied her.
He crouched, his dark eyes intense as he studied her face. “Are ye all right, lass?”
She swallowed a few times before she could speak and then nodded. “I know what we have to do, Cailean. We have to let him out of his prison.”