Page 49 of Dark Seduction

Claire stared at the tawny Highlander. He just smiled at her. Then he said softly, never removing his gaze from her, “Calum, lad, I wish a few moments alone with the lass.”

Malcolm turned to Claire. She didn’t hesitate. “Please.”

He nodded grimly and strode off.

She was alone with the so-called abbot now. “So it’s all true. This is a world of good and evil, demons and Masters. The demons have superpowers, and so do you. You’re both descended from old gods. Malcolm is descended from that goddess, Faola. And this is a secret brotherhood.”

“Aye.”

Claire stared, finally accepting reality—or the ultimate nightmare. He stared back, patient but intent. It was so hard to bend her mind around the fact that Malcolm was the great-grandson of a deity. She finally said, with dread, “Is he immortal?”

MacNeil smiled. “None of us be immortal, lass. Brogan Mor died in battle from mortal wounds. He was two hundred and fifty-two.”

Claire had almost forgotten. “Can Malcolm die in a battle, too? The way his father did?” That thought made her even more distraught.

“O’ course he can. Any Master can die from the worst wounds, if no one heals him—or if he doesna heal himself.”

Claire had to know. “And if he isn’t hurt, how long will he live? Two hundred years? Five hundred years?”

“I dinna ken.”

“Take a guess!” she cried, trembling.

MacNeil sobered. “My guess would be hundreds of years.” His expression was searching now, as if he wished to understand the turmoil in her heart.

Claire turned to gaze at Malcolm. She wanted him to have a long life, but this was too much to bear. What if he lived a few hundred years? But it wasn’t as if they would be together. When she died at ninety or so, he wasn’t going to know about it—or even care.

I will care.

Malcolm’s voice sounded loud and clear in her mind, although he stood so far away she couldn’t hear him if he spoke to her. “This is really hard,” she heard herself say. She forced a smile that felt ghastly at MacNeil. “I wonder if I’ll wake up tomorrow in my bed in NewYork—in a sane world filled with criminals who are sociopaths and perverts, nothing more.”

Compassion flitted through MacNeil’s emerald-green eyes. “We both ken ye canna return yet.”

Claire thought about Sibylla and the demon on the road to Dunroch. She shivered. “I have a major question. Why haven’t you guys brought all kinds of modern inventions back to this time? Why are you fighting with swords and not guns? For that matter, why not just suck the life from each other?”

His smile flashed. “I can take yer life away, but not the life of a powerful Deamhan—he’d use his great power to thwart mine. But if I wound him badly, I can take his life very simply, for he’ll be too weak to stop me.”

Unfortunately, that made sense.

“It takes a great effort to take life, lass. ’Tis often easier to take a man’s head with a blade. Besides,” he added, “we’re Highlanders. Even though we can travel to yer time, we live here.”

“What about the rest?”

He became serious. “There be many rules, Claire. When we make our vows, we swear to obey the Code. There be debate to some meanings, but certain rules are clear. A Master shall not change history. A Master shall not corrupt the present people. A Master shall not defy fate. Bringing your guns here would do all o’ that.”

“And the demons? Surely those time-traveling twerps are into guns and gas.”

“We destroy them when they come, whether they bring the future with them or not. When they do, we destroy their weapons.” He added softly, “The Deamhanain do not take pleasure in using poison, gas or guns. They take pleasure in torture and pain inflicted with their own foul hands, in rape and then the murder o’ innocent life.”

“Got it,” Claire breathed. She turned away, sick to her stomach. Is that what Sibylla intended for her? Torture, rape and then death?

She touched her throat and walked toward a pair of fir trees, pausing in the shade. She gulped air. Her mind was ready to shut down. “What other powers do the demons have? What is the worst they can do?” What is the worst Sibylla can do?

MacNeil’s gaze darkened. “If there be a power, there be a demon, somewhere, who has it.” His mouth hardened. “But there be a Master, somewhere, who has it, too.”

She was swept with unpleasant chills. “Great. Something to look forward to. Invincible demons.” Claire sat down on a small, handsomely carved bench.

“I just told ye, there be a Master to vanquish them.” He continued, revealing that he was reading her mind, “Sibylla has been given great powers o’ evil. She truly enjoys torture, takin’ life.”