The Sixth Labyrinth (The Child of the Erinyes Book 4) (99 page)

Ibby gasped. She covered her mouth, moaned, and burst into sobbing.

Curran didn’t realize he’d leaped to his feet until he was standing over Beatrice, staring down into her face, which was at first startled, then oddly triumphant. The glow in her watery blue eyes suggested satisfaction. Had she orchestrated this scene? Was it playing out as she wished? Her expression chilled him. She looked from him to Seaghan, smiling.

Curran seized her wrists, meaning to drag her out of the chair, but a hard shove sent him sprawling. Ibby’s scream bounced through his ears, so piercing it felt as though a pick had been shoved between his eyes. Her chair crashed against the mantel as she stumbled from it.

Seaghan had pushed him away and taken his place. The fisherman stood hunch-shouldered, his meaty hands reaching towards Beatrice’s throat.

“Come to me, Seaghan MacAnaugh,” she said, like a lover. Seaghan complied almost eagerly.

“No!” It was Diorbhail. She ran forward and tried to pull Seaghan away. “No, it’s what she wants!”

Curran jumped to his feet and barreled into his old friend, but the giant didn’t flinch. His eyes were locked on the woman’s, who returned his stare as her tongue protruded and she made horrible gagging sounds. Her breasts convulsed.

“You’re killing her!” Curran yanked on those massive arms, pried at the whitened fingers biting into Beatrice’s fleshy throat. He punched Seaghan in the cheekbone three times, but the man remained impervious. Nothing could reach him. Diorbhail had no better luck. Seaghan was like an immovable mountain.

The two were locked in a strange, macabre embrace. Beatrice’s eyes bulged. One of Seaghan’s legs was thrust between hers and her hands gripped his forearms, scrabbling to no avail.

Curran’s fists dropped to his sides as a greenish black cloud floated from her mouth. An awful stench made him gag. She must have lost hold of her bowels.

Seaghan released her. He stumbled away, groaning, gagging, coughing, but he’d achieved his goal. Freed at last of his hands, Beatrice slumped, her arms dropping over the arms of the rocking chair. Her eyes glared sightlessly, and purple splotches in the shape of her killer’s fingers marred her throat. Drool seeped from her gaping mouth.

Seaghan fell to his knees and vomited. Curran knelt beside him. “What can I do?” he asked.

The man was shuddering. His flesh dripped sweat. He heaved in one breath after another, then vomited again and collapsed.

Curran rose. “Ibby, can you fetch the brandy?”

She was shaking uncontrollably, but nodded. She went off and soon brought the decanter and a glass. Curran poured some and, lifting Seaghan’s head, helped him sip.

Diorbhail stood nearby, one hand on her throat, staring at Seaghan.

After he’d taken in a measure of spirits, Seaghan gave a weak, dismissive wave, and rose to his feet. His eyes opened and closed as though he was having a hard time remaining conscious. “Where am I?” He lifted his hands and stared at them. “It’s over,” he said, his voice barely discernable through the roar in Curran’s ears. “I’m a man, at least.”

He stared at Beatrice’s body. His eyes narrowed and he sneered. Before Curran or Ibby could intervene, he was standing above her again, unbuttoning his trousers. He pissed all over her, splattering her dress and face.

“Oh my God,” Ibby screamed. She retreated, stumbling, squeezing her eyes closed.

“Seaghan!” Curran pulled the fisherman from the corpse.

“He is not Seaghan,” Diorbhail said quietly, but Curran dismissed it as hysterics.

“I… I’m sorry.” Seaghan pushed his tadger back into his trousers. But he didn’t look sorry or embarrassed.

Curran let it go. The woman had brought it on herself, after all, with her merciless goading. “What have we done?” he said, half to himself. “We’ve murdered Morrigan’s aunt. Did she deserve it?” He knew he was rambling, making no sense. He rubbed his hands against his thighs, but as he’d fought to pry Seaghan’s fingers loose, spittle had flown from the dying woman’s mouth, spattering over him, and he couldn’t seem to rub it off.

Seaghan stood motionless, breathing hard. After a moment, he lifted his gaze and stared fixedly at Diorbhail, who stood her ground and returned his stare somewhat defiantly, Curran thought.

“It’s over,” Curran said. “Seaghan? D’you hear me?”

Seaghan bent and picked up a slip of paper that had fallen out of the diary. He read it, and handed it to Curran.

Nam chridhe gu bràth.
Once more. Tonight. Dùn Mhiughalaigh
.

Curran’s breath shortened, igniting into rage.
In my heart forever
. “We’ll see about that,” he said. It would seem Beatrice, the bloody bitch, had been telling the truth about one thing, at least. These were the words of a lover. He balled the paper in his fist and threw it into the fire.

Ibby stumbled closer. “Find Morrigan,” she cried. “Curran, she can’t be dead. And Olivia.” Her voice rose. “Bring them home, please, I beg you.” Her eyes closed as she crumpled. Seaghan caught her.

“I could come with you,” he said, grasping Ibby around the shoulders and waist.

“No.”
The worst is still to come
. “This is between me and him. It’s my fight.”

Seaghan nodded. “Aye,” he said. He guided Ibby towards the loveseat. “No matter what we think of Beatrice, I believe one thing she said. Aodhàn wants Morrigan, and he’ll kill anyone who stands between them.” He speared Curran with a grim stare. “I’d advise you to take a gun.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

SHE’LL JUMP INTO
the sea
,
and she’ll take your child with her
.

Curran’s soul swelled and strained. Without Morrigan, did anything matter? If she and Olivia died….

He couldn’t be too late. He couldn’t.

The revolver’s hard cold grip, shoved beneath his belt, reminded him that the fight he intended to wage would end in death.

She’d rather die his penniless whore than live in your fine manor house as your wife
.

Diorbhail stumbled out of the cottage, running after him and grabbing his elbow. “Master Curran.”

“Get away. I’ve no more time for talk.”

“Be careful. Something… something isn’t right. And, Master Curran….”

“What?”

“I’d swear on my life she was lying. Please, please, Master Curran!” This last was shouted as he stalked off.

“I know that,” he muttered. By the time he stood at the summit of
Càrnan
, the sky was dimming, but he could still make out the isle of Berneray to the east, the cliffs where the lighthouse stood resembling the open jawed mouth of a gigantic dragon, drinking its fill of the ocean, and the lighthouse itself a distant white pillar.

Images flickered one after the next, always returning to that moment after he’d kissed her. Everything was so clear on her face a baby could read it. She didn’t hate him. She was terrified. Her words, designed to convince him she didn’t care, were the opposite of what he saw. She cared too much, and feared drowning under the torrent.

He’d never been sure before; now he had no doubt. She loved him. Yet whatever triumph he might have felt at that knowledge a month ago was edged with black certainty that she would do almost anything to stop feeling that way.

Love, violence, hatred, and failure… they’re all the same for Morrigan. That’s all she knows
. Father Drummond had seen the truth far more quickly than Curran. How he missed the old priest and his wisdom.

Urgency sent his heels gouging into the springy peat.
What would you do with freedom?
he’d asked when he and Morrigan trekked the moor above Stranraer.

I’d be pagan. No man would own me
.

Why remember that now? Were his fears trying to prepare him for the worst?

Before anything else, he’d fallen in love with the half-hidden siren beneath that veneer of malleability, the inner Morrigan whose eyes flashed when the outer lass smiled. He’d wanted to draw that girl into the light and sun. “Don’t take her from me,” he said out loud, not knowing if he spoke prayer or premonition, to God or Aodhàn.

She’d given him a glimpse of her true self, long before they lay together. What sort of man would he be to carp now, when the thing became a challenge?

His wife was a labyrinth, with sharp corners and blind curves, long dark passages leading into an unknown future.

“Morrigan!” he shouted as he approached the promontory of Dùn Mhiughalaigh. There was no answer but the wash of the sea and the shrill cacophony of seabirds.

He cupped his hands around his mouth. “Morrigan!” A lone puffin swerved off warily after glancing at him.

Curran pulled the gun from his belt. He saw nothing, no matter which direction he looked, though there seemed no place to hide. It gave weight to Beatrice’s claim that the lovers would throw themselves into the ocean, and take Olivia with them.

No way of telling who the father is, not until the babe is born and we see the color of its hair
.

He stared at the empty promontory, shaking with fear and rage.

Tonight. Dùn Mhiughalaigh,
Mackinnon’s note said. But there was no one on Dùn Mhiughalaigh.

She’ll jump into the sea
.

“No,” he said roughly. Lifting his face to the sky’s dimming glow, he shouted, “Where are you?”

It was shocking to realize that Seaghan, not Douglas, was Morrigan’s father. But what difference did it make? He didn’t care if the Devil himself had fathered her. Beatrice’s evil intent had no power, and had brought her nothing but her own end.

And no matter what Aodhàn had done, knowing his awful past changed everything for Curran. No wonder he’d lost his memories. The only surprise was that he’d managed to go on living after they returned.

When Curran met Morrigan, he’d too easily assumed she was a typical country girl, experienced rather than innocent. He thought of how ethereal she’d looked in her wedding dress, how dark and enormous her eyes had been. He relived how close she’d come to dying after giving birth, and how she’d fought her way back. There had been that incredible insight at Torridon, and later in London, when Lily gushed over the Wagner opera.

Fulfillment through oblivion,
Lily had said.
Death granting bliss, since life condemned the lovers to be near, yet always separated
.

Morrigan had added something. What was it?
In life constant yearning, but in death the destruction of guilt. Death as the shadow of love
. She’d seemed almost in a trance.

The bloody damnable legend had reawakened, with him in the role of the gullible King Marc.

Curran shuddered. She might well convince herself that death would bring her the elusive peace she longed for.

“Damn it!” he shouted, as terror seared. “Damn you! Why can’t I get you out of my blood!”

Then, carried on the wind, he heard Morrigan’s echoing shout. “
No, Mackinnon!
”

His head jerked one way then the other. He couldn’t tell where the scream came from. It floated from the clouds, the ocean. “Morrigan!” he shouted again, but there was no answer. “Morrigan! Where are you?”

He floundered through a mocking landscape bent on impeding him, seeing nothing but impervious black granite and a hungry ocean. “I’ll find you,” he said, shoving away his fear. “You’re alive, and I’m going to find you.”

* * * *

When Aodhàn saw Morrigan climbing down to the cliffs, he smiled. He’d been working out what to say, how to convince her to run away with him. The fact that she was coming, after telling him she wouldn’t see him again, gave him hope. But his smile faded when he saw what she was carrying. The
infant
.

What was he supposed to do with that?

After she’d wandered some distance along the edge, he left the bothy and followed her. She sat at the crux where Dùn Mhiughalaigh met the main island, and played with her baby. He crept closer, unconcerned that she might hear his approach. How could she hear something as slight as footsteps over the continuous thunder of the sea against the cliffs and the shrieking of seabirds?

He listened to her sing, as enchanted as the child by the sound of her voice. The fading sun haloed her in gold and bronze light. He heard her say,
What should I do, Mama?
and wanted to weep at her grief and longing for a mother.

What if she won’t leave with me?

He had vowed he would kill her. He wouldn’t allow her to be slaughtered by outsiders again, and he feared it now that he’d told her the truth about Lilith. Athene might send Harpalycus after them. He could be on Mingulay right now, in any one of the villagers’ bodies, or on his way, plotting how to best cause torture and mayhem. Or she could do something else. There were ten thousand ways for an inventive goddess to destroy them.

I will pick the time and method of our death,
he thought defiantly.
Not you. Not again.

But what was he supposed to do with Olivia?

I’ll kill her too.

The idea was repellent. Maybe they could put the child in the heath somewhere. Someone would find it, surely.

She turned then and saw him, and he was gratified at the flash of happiness on her face. Even the baby smiled. But his sense of triumph didn’t last. She hadn’t come to meet him after all. It was mere coincidence, apparently, all due to a fight with Curran, who had inconveniently returned.

Understanding came in a crushing landslide so overwhelming he had to grit his teeth to keep from shouting at her. He would never convince Morrigan to run away. There were no words he could construct that would pull off such a trick. The instant she said
Olivia should not be here with us
, he knew.

That left only one other choice.

Fighting to hide his miserable jealousy, he coaxed her into handing him her child and walked to the edge of the precipice. He felt the tremble of earth beneath his feet as the heavy ocean swells crashed against it. He could easily toss the bothersome thing over. She would fall into the sea or be broken on the rocks, far, far below. He could kill Morrigan too. She would never remember. She would love him again in the next life.