Blood Magick (The Cousins O'Dwyer Trilogy #3)(26)

Pretty things and order required time and effort, and she enjoyed the housewifely duties, the simple and ordinary routine of them. She appreciated the faint scent of orange peel once the furniture was polished with the solution she made for herself and the tang of grapefruit left behind once she’d scrubbed her bath.

Fluffed pillows offered welcome as a soft, pretty throw arranged just so offered comfort and eye appeal.

Once done she refreshed candles, watered plants, filled her old copper bucket with more peat for the fire.

Meara and Iona had set the kitchen to rights before they’d gone off to the stables, but . . . not quite right enough to suit her.

So while laundry chugged away in the machines, she fussed, making a mental list of what she wanted at the market, a secondary list of potential new products for her shop. Humming while she planned, she finished the last of the housework with mopping the kitchen floor.

And felt him.

Though her heart jumped she made herself turn slowly to where Fin stood in the doorway that led to her shop.

“A cheerful tune for scrubbing up.”

“I like scrubbing up.”

“A fact that’s always been a mystery to me. As is how you manage to look so fetching doing it. Am I wrong? Did we agree to work this morning?”

“You’re not wrong, just early.” Deliberately she went back to her mopping. “Go put the kettle on in the workshop. I’m nearly done.”

She’d had her morning, Branna reminded herself, her time alone to do as she pleased. Now it was time for duty. She’d work with Fin as it needed to be done. She accepted that, and had come to accept him as part of her circle.

Duty, she thought, couldn’t always be easy. Reaching a goal as vital as the one sought required sacrifice.

She put away her mop and bucket, put the rag she’d tucked in the waistband of her pants in the laundry. After taking just one more minute to gird herself for the next hours, went into her workshop.

He’d boosted the fire, and the warmth was welcome. It wasn’t as odd as it once had been to see him at her workshop stove, making tea.

He’d shed his coat, stood there in black pants and a sweater the color of forest shadows with the dog standing beside him.

“If you’re wanting a biscuit we’d best clear it with herself first,” he told the dog. “I’m not saying you didn’t earn one or a bit of a lie-down by the fire.” He stopped what he was doing, grinned down at the dog. “Afraid of her, am I? Well now, insulting me’s hardly the way to get yourself a biscuit, is it?”

It disconcerted her, as always, that he could read Kathel as easy as she.

And as she had with him in the kitchen, he sensed her, turned.

“He’s hoping for a biscuit.”

“So I gather. It’s early for that as well,” she said with a speaking look to her dog. “But he can have one, of course.”

“I know where they are.” Fin opened a cupboard as she crossed the room. Taking out the tin, he opened it. Before he could offer it, Kathel rose up, set his paws on Fin’s shoulders. He stared into Fin’s eyes for a moment, then gently licked Fin’s cheek.

“Sure you’re welcome,” Fin murmured when the dog lowered again, accepted the biscuit.

“He has a brave heart, and a kind one,” Branna said. “A fondness and a great tolerance for children. But he loves, truly loves a select few. You’re one of them.”

“He’d die for you, and knows I would as well.”

The truth of it shook her. “That being the case we’d best get to work so none of us dies.”

She got out her book.

Fin finished the tea, brought two mugs to the counter where she sat. “If you’re thinking of changing the potion we made to undo him, you’re wrong.”

“He’s not undone, is he?”

“It wasn’t the potion.”

“Then what?”

“If I knew for certain it would be done already. But I know it brought him terror, gave him pain, great pain. He burned, he bled.”

“And he got away from us. Don’t,” she continued before he could speak. “Don’t say to me you could have finished him if we’d let you go. It wasn’t an option then, and will never be.”

“Has it occurred to you that’s just how it needs to be done? For me, of his blood, for me, who bears his mark, to finish what your blood, what cursed me, to end him?”

“No, because it isn’t.”

“So sure, Branna.”

“On this I am. It’s written, it’s passed down, generation by generation. It’s Sorcha’s children who must end him. Who will. For all those who failed before us, we have something they lacked. And that’s you.”

She used all her will to keep her mind quiet as she spoke, to keep her words all reason.

“I believe you’re essential to this. Having one who came down from him working to end him, working with the three, this is new. Never written of before in any of the books. Our circle’s the stronger with you, that’s without question.”

“So sure of that as well?”

“Without question,” she repeated. “I didn’t want you in it, but that was my weakness, and a selfishness I’m sorry for. We’ve made our circle, and if broken . . . I think we’ll lose. You gave me your word.”