Chapter 11
Tavis woke to darkness and immediately panicked. He was trapped inside the time vault. He clawed at the lid, and then remembered Anna had hidden him in the burial vault. She was gone. He shoved the lid, and it crashed to the floor.
A muffled voice sounded outside. Voltar must have found them and taken Anna. Tavis bounded out of the burial vault with a roar. The sunlight was blinding, but he could hear voices. Voltar and his demons. He knew he would die, but perhaps he could save Anna. Without waiting for his vision to adjust, he rushed toward the sounds. He didn’t get far. Someone grabbed him from behind, pinning his arms. Swords pressed against his neck and chest.
“Stop,” someone shouted. The bodies surrounding him backed away. A man knelt beside him and brushed the hair from his face. “Tavis. How can it be?”
He knew the voice and the face. A guttural cry rolled from his own throat as he looked at his brother. “Faelan.”
Behind him, several people watched in amazement, including the men who had held him back. Tavis paid no mind, focusing on his brother who looked just as he had one-hundred-fifty years ago. “Faelan, you’re alive.”
Faelan was staring at him in disbelief. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to find you.”
“But how? Who…”
“Ian locked me inside. We had to make sure you were safe.”
“Daft fool. I should have known you wouldn’t stay behind.” Faelan grabbed him in a hug. “It’s my brother,” Faelan said to the men who had stepped aside. He turned to the stunned crowd. “It’s Tavis.”
“The one we’re getting ready to bury?” a red-haired woman asked.
Faelan let out a whoop and hugged his brother again, so heartily that it pained Tavis’s healing injuries. But he didn’t care.
“Then who’s in the coffin?” someone asked.
“Quinn,” Tavis muttered.
“The Keeper?” Faelan asked.
A red-haired woman went and knelt beside the coffin. Another woman stepped next to Faelan. She had dark hair and eyes like emeralds. “Isabel?” Tavis asked, shocked. How could she be here? In this time?
“I’m Bree, Isabel’s great-great-granddaughter.” Her eyes filled with tears. “How did you get here?” She gave a soft gasp. “The time vault in the chapel. It’s yours.”
“Aye,” Tavis said.
“But Mother and Father, Ian and Alana...” Faelan shook his head. “You left everything behind.”
“There was no other way. We heard about Druan’s virus. We killed his sorcerer, but we knew it would only slow him down.”
“Druan’s dead,” Faelan said.
“Faelan destroyed him and his virus.” This came from a tall man with dark eyes that were nearly as intense as Faelan’s. Handsome in the way that made women swoon.
“We knew he would try to make another,” Tavis said.
“He didn’t just make it, he released it,” a red-haired man said. “But Faelan’s talisman ate it up like snakes swallowing mice.”
“How did you get out of the vault?” a pale-haired woman asked. She had the same green eyes as Isabel.
“We’ve all got a thousand questions, but he needs to come inside,” Isabel’s great-great-granddaughter said. “He looks like he might faint.”
“I don’t faint,” he muttered. They all crowded around and escorted him into the house, and stared at him like something on display in a museum.
Isabel’s great-great-granddaughter made introductions. “As I mentioned, I’m Bree. I’m your brother’s wife. You can see he’s a bit overwhelmed.” Indeed, Faelan’s eyes were bright with emotion.
Tavis was shocked that Faelan had found a wife. Here? She introduced everyone there: Ronan, the handsome one; Niall, who looked like a blond ox; Cody, an intense-looking man; and Shay, the pale-haired woman with green eyes. Brodie and Sorcha were the ones with red hair. “And this is Duncan. He’s a descendant of Ian’s, but he resembles you and Faelan,” Bree said.
“Duncan looks more like Tavis than the pictures I’ve seen of Ian,” the red-haired woman said, peering intently at Tavis’s face. “When you’re up to it, I have questions about Quinn.”
“He should see a doctor,” someone else said. “He looks like he’s gonna pass out.” He couldn’t see who spoke. He was trying to keep the room from spinning.
“Where’s Tomas?” another voice asked.
“I think he’s at the castle. I’ll call Sean.”
“Don’t worry,” Bree said. “Faelan went through this when he woke from his time vault. Sleeping and then eating everything in the house. You’ll feel better after a couple days of rest.”
He started to tell them that he had been out of the time vault for many days, but he felt too weak to explain. He had to save his words for what was important. “I can’t stay. I have to find Anna.”
Faelan looked confused. “How do you know Anna?”
The faces blurred into one large mass of flesh. “She hid me in the crypt.”
“Hid you from who?” someone asked.
“Voltar and Tristol.”
His consciousness gave way to a ring of curses.
* * *
“How did he run into Anna?”
“I guess we won’t know until he wakes.”
“I know you want to talk to him, but he needs sleep. Remember how you were.”
“Voltar and Tristol. We’re up the creek.”
The voices woke him, but he didn’t know who was speaking.
“He’s waking up.”
He opened his eyes. He was lying in a bed, surrounded by people staring at him. “Bloody hell,” he said, trying to sit.
“Lie down,” Faelan said. He sat next to the bed, and Isabel— Bree—stood beside him. Ronan stood at the foot of the bed. Two of him. Tavis shook his head.
“How are you feeling?” Bree asked.
“I’m seeing double.”
Bree leaned closer, examining him. “Concussion, probably. He’s obviously been beaten. How many fingers am I holding up?” she asked.
“Three,” Tavis said.
“Now?” She held up one.
“One.” Tavis looked back at the foot of the bed. “But there’s two of him.”
Bree looked around. “That’s Ronan and Declan. Twins.”
“Good. I’m not barmy.” His chest was bare. Someone had undressed him and bandaged his wounds.
Declan was introduced, as well as Shane, a long-haired, slender man standing quietly in the back of the room. Tavis vaguely remembered meeting the others.
“He needs food before we start grilling him, poor man,” Bree said, touching his hand. A tingle ran up his arm.
“Shay’s bringing it,” Ronan said. “Cody’s bringing water and bandages.”
The pale-haired woman appeared at the door with a tray. Ronan took it from her and carried it to the bed.
Tavis sat up. “I’m not an invalid.” He didn’t need all this fussing over. He needed to get out of here. “We need to look for Anna.”
“You can’t look for Anna without something to give you strength,” Shay said.
“I’ll eat later,” Tavis said.
“You might as well give up now, man,” Ronan said, putting the tray on Tavis’s lap. “You’re outmanned by those two.”
A disrespectful way to speak about lasses, Tavis thought.
Brodie nodded in agreement. “You’d have a better chance stopping a steamroller.”
Did they all speak so strange? But he’d slept for generations. Times had changed.
“But Anna’s injured.”
“We’re searching for her,” Faelan said. “You need rest. You look like a lion tried to chew a hole in your shoulder.”
“Tomas is on his way,” Duncan said. The one who looked enough like Faelan and Tavis to be a brother, making Tavis miss Ian all the more. His family. They were all gone. But he’d known going in that this would be the cost. They would have suffered as well. Ian carrying a burden no man should carry. Had he managed to live a good life? Marry his Bessie, have bairns?
And poor Alana, losing their father and two brothers so close together. And his mother. He hadn’t even said goodbye. She must have been sick with grief. Had Ian told her the truth? How had she managed? What would she think to see them together now? Two of her sons, alive and well after more than a century?
“Tomas is the medic.” Duncan laid a small black box on a table. He’d been holding it to his ear. He must have seen Tavis frowning. “This is a cellphone. You can talk to people on it.”
And he was the one with the addled brain, Tavis thought, and then decided Duncan must have been jesting. Poor time for frivolity.
A man entered the room and was introduced as Tomas. He had light hair and a kind smile.
“That was fast,” Ronan said. “Did you take the helicopter?”
“I was already on my way to the castle,” Tomas said. He checked Tavis over, the exposed parts anyway, while everyone watched. But after days on end alone, going out of his mind with loneliness, he didn’t mind the company. In fact, he wasn’t sure he ever wanted to be alone again. Anna’s face came to mind. Where are you?
Tomas gave him medicine for the pain and declared that he would heal nicely, but he needed rest and food. He’d slept so much in the dungeon he didn’t want to waste any more time sleeping. Not with Anna still out there.
“Do you want to rest?” Faelan asked. “Or are you up to talking? We all have questions.”
Tavis answered their questions, but his mind kept drifting to Anna. Was she hurt? He realized Faelan was speaking to him. “What did you ask?”
“Why is Quinn buried in a coffin where my time vault was?”
“Frederick and Isabel offered us the crypt and a grave for Father and Quinn. We couldn’t tell them you were already in the crypt, so we put Quinn in the hole where your time vault had been buried.”
“We found your dagger and thought it was your coffin. We were told you were buried at sea,” Faelan said.
“That was Ian’s idea, so no one would come looking for me and find you. We weren’t sure whom to trust.”
“But the clan already knew about the crypt,” Faelan said. “They just couldn’t find the key. Isabel and Frederick had it.”
“Ian must have decided the Council could be trusted if he told them where you were.”
A shadow crossed Faelan’s face. “Where is Father buried?” Faelan asked.
“In the graveyard. I’ll show you.”
Faelan nodded. “After you’ve rested.”
“We know how you got inside the time vault,” Brodie said. “But how did you get out?”
“A man. He said his name was Angus.”
Faelan’s jaw was tight, and the others looked similarly disturbed.
“He took me to a house. He said Druan was looking for me. He thought I was you. Where is Angus?”
“He’s dead. Druan had him killed.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t think I properly thanked him. He was brave.”
“He was,” Declan said. “Anna still hasn’t recovered from his death.”
Anna?
“She and Angus had a thing,” Brodie said.
A thing? What was a thing? Like lovers?
“How did you end up in the fortress?” Cody asked.
“Tristol must have followed Angus and me. I was still weak from the time vault when Tristol grabbed me. I woke up in the dungeon.”
“You must have been there since around the time Angus died,” Declan said.
“I don’t know. I was unconscious part of the time. Anna arrived two days ago, I think.”
“How did you escape?” Shane asked.
“There was another prisoner there. He showed us a way out of the fortress and helped us escape. We were attacked outside by wolves, but the creatures didn’t follow us through the veil.”
“The stone wolves?” Ronan asked.
“Stone?” Tavis shook his head. “These were real. Big, fierce things.”
“I ran into them too,” Ronan said. “They had me up a tree. Who was the other prisoner?”
“I don’t know. He was strong. He held Voltar off while Anna and I escaped.”
“Held off an ancient demon?” Brodie said.
“The guards called him a hybrid.” Tavis didn’t tell them he feared Anna had been forced to mate not just with him, but the hybrid as well.
“What kind of hybrid?” Faelan asked.
“They didn’t say, but I’ve never seen anyone move like him. Like a streak of light.”
“That’s how the vampires move,” Ronan said, his jaw tight.
“I don’t think we could have gotten out of there without him,” Tavis said. “He gave us our talismans. The guards had taken them.”
“Where did the vampires come from?” Bree asked.
“They seemed to belong there,” Tavis said. “Must have been there with Tristol. Voltar’s demons came in and slaughtered them.”
“So maybe the demons and vampires weren’t working together when we saw them in the Albany castle,” Ronan said. “The vampires must have been there to spy on Druan. But why? For Tristol? What does he want with vampires?”
“I didn’t even know vampires existed,” Tavis said. They must have hidden well.”
“No one did,” his brother said. “We thought Michael’s vampire hunters destroyed them ages ago. I guess they weren’t all wiped out.”
Ronan looked troubled. “I should have known.”
“No way you could have known,” Cody said, nudging Ronan’s shoulder.
“I should have.”
“Vampires killed his brother Cam two years ago,” Cody explained to Tavis. “The clan thought he was taken by demons.”
“Sounds like this hybrid is part vampire,” Sorcha said. “Wonder what the other part is. Maybe they were going to turn you into some kind of hybrid as well. Did they say what they were doing?”
Tavis felt his face growing hot with anger and shame. “They were going to use me for... breeding.”
“Breeding?” Ronan asked. “Breed you to what?”
“I don’t know. They didn’t get that far.”
“If Tristol and Voltar thought you were Faelan, then they really wanted Faelan,” Bree said. “Why?”
“The Mighty Faelan,” Niall said. “The most powerful warrior the clan’s known. Why not?”
“Oh my God,” Bree said. “I knew Faelan was in danger.”
“Don’t worry yourself.” Faelan patted Bree’s shoulder.
“Worry.” Bree’s face was flushed with anger. “I’m going to kill the bastards.”
Bollocks. She was just like Anna. Were all women like this now?
“You won’t touch Tristol or Voltar. I forbid it.” Faelan’s scowl was fierce, but it didn’t seem to affect his wife.
“I don’t think Voltar was involved in the um... breeding plan. He said he’d been waiting for me, and he wanted me dead. Tristol is the one who kept calling me Faelan.”
“He’s not getting his hands on either of you,” Bree said to her husband.
“Did he figure out that you’re not Faelan?” Ronan asked.
“I don’t know. A blond man—Anna said he was a vampire—he came in and saw me, said I wasn’t you, and ordered Tristol’s servant not to tell Tristol because he’d make all their lives hell.”
“A blond vampire.” Ronan’s voice was hard. “I think I know him.”
“Aye. Anna said she thought he was the one you were after.”
“He escaped,” Ronan said. “We had him in Scotland.”
Bree clasped her hand over her mouth. “Do you think Tristol was planning to use Anna too? She’s beautiful and strong. If they’re trying to breed...” She didn’t finish.
Tavis remembered Anna underneath him on the dungeon floor, her body soft but stiff, her fear as he fought to hold back his own pleasure. “I don’t know, but they took her away once. I think they...” He stopped. Revealing what he feared had happened to Anna felt like betraying her trust. She hadn’t even told him what had happened. She likely wouldn’t appreciate him talking about it.
“You think they what?” Faelan asked.
“I think they gave her to the hybrid.”
“Anna?” Ronan said. “God no.”
“At least she’s alive,” Sorcha said.
“She probably wishes she wasn’t,” Ronan said. “Her mother was raped. She kept the baby and then years later she killed herself.”
“Anna.” Bree made a soft sound of distress. “She was the baby.”
Ronan nodded. “She doesn’t talk about it much, but her childhood wasn’t good. I think her mother tried, but she never got past the fact that Anna was the product of rape.”
“No wonder she’s dead set against marriage and having a family,” Sorcha said. “I would be too.”
Ronan ran a finger over the collapsed sword at his side. “It didn’t help that Anna had a few bad experiences herself. Her mentor tried to abuse her.”
“Her mentor? Poor Anna. I hope someone killed the bastard,” Bree said.
Ronan shrugged. “Anna did.”
“She killed her mentor?” Brodie said. “Blimey.”
“I guess you’ll stop teasing her now,” Tomas said.
Tavis felt sick. My God, what had he done? Maybe Anna wasn’t coming back because she didn’t want to see him again. He heard Bree speaking over the rushing noise in his head.
“I think Tavis needs to rest,” Bree said.
“I need to wash up.” He’d cleaned off as best he could in the dungeon, but he needed a proper washing. And now he needed some privacy so he could decide what to do about the awful thing he’d done.
“He can use the Jacuzzi,” Bree said. “I’ll get it started.”
“You’ll enjoy this,” Faelan said. “We have bathrooms now, fancy things, far better than a privy or a water closet. Smell better too. They have big tubs with hot water coming out holes in the sides. Works wonders on sore muscles.”
“Sounds like the one at the house where Angus took me.” Almost everyone left, and Faelan and Duncan helped Tavis into the bathroom. It was a sight indeed, even better than the one he’d used before. A large tub was bubbling as steam rose from the water.
“Don’t stay in too long,” Bree said. “You don’t want to pass out and drown.” This made her blush, and Tavis thought again how bonny she was. Until Anna, he hadn’t been with a truly beautiful woman. Marna had been pleasant, but no beauty. And there had only been the one time. Her coaxing had worn him down, and they’d lain together right there in the hay. That had been over one-hundred-fifty years ago. No wonder he couldn’t stop thinking about bedding Anna.
“I’ll keep a check on him,” Faelan said.
Faelan sat on the edge of the big tub as Tavis slipped into the water. “Very nice,” Tavis said.
Faelan was quiet, and Tavis saw he was looking at his back. “I’ll kill him for this,” Faelan said. The look on his face was fierce, reminding Tavis that Faelan wasn’t just his brother. He was the Mighty Faelan.
“The guard’s the one who did it,” Tavis said. “He’s probably already dead. Tristol was angry with him. If he didn’t kill him, I’m sure Voltar did. I don’t think he intended to leave anyone in that fortress alive.” Was he after Anna now?
“Is there something between you and Anna?” Faelan asked, as if he’d read Tavis’s thoughts.
“What do you mean?”
“It’s been over a century, but I know you, brother. You get a strange look on your face every time her name is mentioned.”
“She’s a bonny woman.”
“You don’t like bonny women,” Faelan said.
“I’ve never met one as bonny as her.”
“That doesn’t explain the guilt.”
Tavis looked down at the bubbling water and rubbed his hands over his face. “I took her.”
“Took her where?”
“You know.” Tavis gestured to his groin.
Faelan’s jaw dropped. “You had sex with Anna?”
“The guard forced us.” Tavis cringed and rubbed his hand over his battle marks, which were tingling. “He said he’d do it if I didn’t, and then he’d kill us both. I didn’t want to, but she told me to. We tried to pretend, but the guard caught on. We had to do it.” The shame burned his face.
“Ah, brother.” Faelan put a hand on Tavis’s arm. “If she told you to, it wasn’t as if you forced her.”
“But I didn’t have to go as far as I did.”
“You mean…” Faelan raised his brows and then blew out a sigh.
“I don’t understand how my body could even do that.” Tavis stared at the bubbling water. “She was trying to be brave, but she was scared. Now I know why, after hearing Ronan’s story.”
Faelan looked thoughtful for a good minute. “It was just your body’s reaction, and I think you and Anna are—well, you’d been in the time vault a long time, and I can tell you from experience, it has a strange effect on the body.”
“Now you know why I have to find her. I owe her a debt. I have to protect her.”
“Anna might not want to be protected. She’s strong.”
“Aye. I’ve never seen anything like her. She fought like a man.” But she wasn’t a man. She was a woman, and he owed her not just a debt, he owed her his life. “I swore to myself that I would make this right.”
“We’ll find her,” Faelan said.
“What if she doesn’t want to be found?”
Faelan frowned. “You think she’s staying away on purpose?”
“She must hate me.”
“She put you in the crypt so Voltar wouldn’t get you. That doesn’t sound like hate to me.” Faelan ruffled Tavis’s hair like he had when they were young. “I’ll do anything I can to help you. I’ve learned a bit about the women of this time. I don’t like it, but it does have some benefits. In the bedroom they’re... sorry.”
“It’s good to see that you still put your foot in your mouth sometimes,” Tavis said, punching Faelan’s leg.
“Don’t forget, you’re still my little brother.” Faelan lifted his hand to punch Tavis in return, but he looked at Tavis’s wounds and he stopped. “When you’re done, will you show me Father’s grave?”
“Aye, I will.”
“I want to know everything that happened. I’m going to check in with Lachlan and Marcas. Don’t fall asleep and drown. Bree will kill me if you do.”
Tavis scrubbed himself, and then, wearing the robe Faelan had given him, he went back to the bedroom. His kilt and shirt were gone, but he found clothes lying on a chair near the bed. A tight, black thing that looked like short trousers. It must have been an undergarment. Was this what men wore now? He also found outer trousers and a shirt without buttons, like the men here had worn.
He put them on and left the room. He wanted a few moments alone before he took Faelan to the grave. He opened the door and slipped outside. After being locked in a dungeon for so many days, the daylight seemed unfamiliar. He stood for a moment trying to reacquaint himself with freedom. He was alive. Faelan was alive.
He had to find Anna, and then he could grieve for what he’d lost. But as he stood there looking at the place, memories rushed at him as fresh as if they’d happened yesterday. The horror of finding Faelan’s time vault. The heartbreaking task of burying him in the crypt. Finding their father and Quinn slaughtered. Another heartbreak on top of the first. Ian’s tears as he closed Tavis’s time vault. Now here he was, what felt like a moment later, reunited with his brother, who wasn’t injured but alive and well. Married to a bonny woman. His assigned demon dead.
Hell, Faelan hadn’t needed him after all. Tavis had walked away from his assignment for nothing. No. Michael might be upset with him, but Tavis had protected the Book of Battles as he’d sworn. The book. He couldn’t remember where he’d hidden it. Those first hours were only a blur.
Perhaps he’d hidden it in the chapel. Leaves crunched under his feet as he walked. The air was cool. Not as cold as it was in Tristol’s fortress, but crisp. It must be November. It was shocking to see how the chapel had changed. The pews were crumbling. In fact, the whole place was. He hurried up front to the secret door. It was open now, with stones scattered on the floor. It appeared to have been sealed at some time. Tavis’s throat tightened as he walked down the rough steps into the darkness of the cellar. He remembered his own fear, and Ian’s, his brother pleading that there must be another way.
The time vault was still there in the corner, where he’d summoned it over a century ago. He remembered it as if it had happened yesterday. If he could just remember where he’d hidden the Book of Battles. He put his hands on top of the time vault and closed his eyes. Slowly, he let the memories in.