Forged in Dreams and Magick (Highland Legends #1)(54)
The serenity and warmth of the glade wrapped around me, calming me unexpectedly. My first visit to the place had been dark—dismal. Now it shone brightly, beaming its splendor. Unfortunately, the relaxed optimism of the outside environment had only a fleeting effect on my inner barometer—pressure rising.
Velloc dismounted and moved to my side. I slid off my horse into his waiting arms. He kissed the top of my head, lacing his fingers with mine as we walked together, settling the horses by a tree. Once he’d secured their reins, he turned, gazing into my eyes. Tears had welled up in those dark pools that had always held undefeatable confidence. He cupped my face and brushed his lips softly against mine before kissing me with more tenderness than ever.
I smiled against his lips, nipping them softly as I pulled away to look up at the man I loved. “Velloc, you won’t lose me.” With my wild history, I had no basis for the claim, but I felt it deep in my bones.
He sighed. “You are my world, Isobel. Know that.”
I nodded, glancing beyond his shoulder, searching for the words to explain my jumbled mess of emotions as I tried to hold it together. I gazed back into those loving eyes. “Velloc, you are everything to me too. In this world. I don’t know what I’m meant to be . . . or why I’m even here. The box’s magick has a hold on me. I’m bound to it—controlled by it in a way I don’t yet understand.”
His arms banded around me, crushing me into his chest. A painful lump burned at the base of my throat. My arms slid around his waist, and I clutched him tightly, not wanting to let go.
Indecision had never been a part of my makeup, but at that moment, I wanted to call the whole thing off and go home with the man who held me in a death grip as if he feared losing me forever. What if his worst thoughts were justified? The man holding me was something real and true, a certainty amid a thousand unknowns.
My confidence waned, his anxiety seeping into my skin. I closed my eyes, burying my face into his neck, inhaling his scent, memorizing everything about the man who’d become my rock in a turbulent sea.
I inhaled a shaky breath. “Velloc . . . I can’t imagine my life without you.”
As if an unseen force watched from afar, the pressure to move forward increased. The microscopic grains in the hourglass had collected to such a mass, the weight of time itself fell heavy on my shoulders, bearing down on my heart and soul. The urgent need to flip the timekeeper—to restart the clock—had become undeniable, even as I failed to understand why.
The purpose of my journey back to the box had become about more than merely my strong tether to Iain. Renewing my connection with the artifact seemed essential to my very survival. Regardless of my wishes, I had to make at least a perfunctory appearance—have my hearing before the unseen judge and jury—no matter the results, even if the consequences tore me away from the second love of my life. That potential outcome and a sinking gut feeling clenched my stomach.
Velloc pulled away, interrupting my inner lecture about obligations put upon me by others. His strong hands clasped my shoulders, and I looked up. Lines of strain etched into his forehead as his tear-filled gaze held mine. My breath caught in my throat.
His deep voice broke when he softly uttered, “The box isn’t from here. We stole it from another tribe when we heard it brought a woman—a mate—to their leader.” He cast his eyes downward. “I’d . . . lost . . . mine.”
Whoa. We had much more to discuss than my issues. “Velloc, I—”
His lips captured mine, silencing the instinct to comfort my man. I tightened my grip on him, providing everything I could to ease his pain without words.
Velloc’s answer to my unasked question loaded several rounds of ammunition into an already-jammed cartridge. Had the other leader’s mate been snatched from another time too? Had she unlocked its secrets? Were there others? Had they time jumped more than once?
I needed to think about the bigger picture before haphazardly firing into an interrogation. Every domino in the line affected all the others, but the more I tried to focus, the more my mind clouded. The pull of the box tugged at an inner string that connected me to the inanimate object, as if some unseen game officiator sought to eradicate any distraction from its goal.
Velloc inhaled deeply, dropping his forehead down, resting it on mine. “Today isn’t about me, Isobel. I . . . needed you to know.”
A deep ache burned in my heart. My head spun. Panic had set in, and I didn’t want to leave. Conflicting emotions threatened to overrule any sense of purpose I’d had since my entire odyssey began. To a wanderer of worlds, knowledge might’ve been power, but human connections had become everything. “Velloc, please . . . I—”
“No.” His stern tone surprised me. As the two of us struggled, he became the strong one. “You need to do this. For us to be anything, you have to finish what you started.”
A broken record replayed in my mind: there hadn’t been time . . .
Velloc clamped his arms around me, squeezing the air out of my lungs. Before I had a chance to inhale a full breath, he tugged me toward the cave, keeping our arms locked together as we walked.
The inevitable had come. Prolonging the agony would only kill us slowly. Blessedly, my mind went numb as we rounded a corner of solid rock, approaching the entrance.
Daylight spilled into the shallow cave. My gaze tracked to the cause of all my turmoil. There she stood, gleaming and proud on her pedestal of rock, waiting for her continuing role.