Dark Witch (The Cousins O'Dwyer Trilogy #1)(13)

She’d gambled, well, pretty much everything to come here, to find her roots, to—she hoped—connect with them. And most of all, to finally understand them.

Burnt bridges, left them smoldering behind her in the hopes of building new ones, stronger ones. Ones that led somewhere she wanted to go.

She’d left her mother mildly annoyed. But then her mother never rose to serious anger, or sorrow, or joy or passion. How difficult had it been to find herself saddled with a daughter who rode emotions like a wild stallion? Her father had just patted her head in his absent way, and wished her luck as casually as he might some passing acquaintance.

She suspected she’d never been any more than that to him. Her paternal grandparents considered the trip a grand adventure, and had given her the very welcome gift of a check.

She was grateful, even knowing they belonged to the out-of-sight-out-of-mind school and probably wouldn’t give her another thought.

But her maternal grandmother, her treasured Nan, had given her a gift with so many questions.

She was here in this lovely corner of Mayo, ringed by water, shadowed by ancient trees, to find the answers.

She should wait until tomorrow, settle in, take a nap, as she’d barely slept on the flight from Baltimore. At least she should unpack. She had a week in Ashford Castle, a foolish expense on the practical scale. But she wanted, so wanted that connection, that once-in-a-lifetime treat.

She opened her bags, began to take out clothes.

She was a woman who’d once wished she’d grow taller than her scant five three, and curvier than the slim, teenage boy body the fates had granted her. Then she’d stopped wishing and compensated by using bright colors in her wardrobe, and wearing high, high heels whenever she could manage it.

Illusion, Nan would say, was as good as reality.

She’d once wished she could be beautiful, like her mother, but worked with what she had—cute. The only time she’d seen her mother close to genuinely horrified had been just the week before when Iona had chopped off her long blond hair to a pixie cap.

Far from used to it herself, she raked her fingers through it. It suited her, didn’t it? Didn’t it bring out her cheekbones a little?

It didn’t matter if she regretted the impulse; she’d regretted others. Trying new things, taking new risks—those were her current goals. No more wait-and-see, the mantra of her parents as long as she could remember. Now was now.

And with that in mind, she thought, the hell with unpacking, the hell with waiting until tomorrow. What if she died in her sleep?

She dug out boots, a scarf, the new raincoat—candy pink—she’d bought for Ireland. She dragged a pink-and-white-striped cap over her hair, slung her oversized purse on cross-body.

Don’t think, just do, she told herself, and left her warm, pretty room.

She made a wrong turn almost immediately, but it only gave her time to wander the corridors. She’d asked for a room in the oldest section when she’d booked, and liked to imagine servants scurrying with fresh rushes, or ladies sitting at their spindles. Or warriors in bloody mail returning from battle.

She had days to explore the castle, the grounds, the nearby village of Cong, and she meant to make use of all of it.

But her primary goal remained to seek out and make contact with the Dark Witch.

When she stepped outside into the whistling wind and drenching rain, she told herself it was a perfect day for witches.

The little map Nan had drawn was in her bag, but she’d etched it on her memory. She turned away from the great stone walls, took the path toward the deep woods. Passed winter-quiet gardens, spreads of soaked green. Belatedly she remembered the umbrella in her bag, dragged it out, pushing her way forward into the evocative gloom of the rain-struck woods.

She hadn’t imagined the trees so big, with their wide, wide trunks, crazily gnarled branches. A storybook wood, she thought, thrilled with it even as the rain splashed over her boots.

Through its drumming she heard the wind sigh and moan, then the rumble of what must be the river.

Paths speared, forked, but she kept the map in her head.

She thought she heard something cry overhead, and for a moment imagined she saw the sweep of wings. Then despite the drumming, the rumbling, the sighs and the moans, everything suddenly seemed still. As the path narrowed, roughened, her heartbeat pounded in her ears, too quick, too loud.

To the right an upended tree exposed a base taller than a man, wider than her arm span. Vines thick as her wrist tangled together like a wall. She found herself drawn toward them, struck by the urge to pull at them, to fight her way through them to see what lay beyond. The concept of getting lost flitted through her mind, then out again.

She just wanted to see.

She took a step forward, then another. She smelled smoke and horses, and both pulled her closer to that tangled wall. Even as she reached out, something burst through. The massive black blur had her stumbling back. She thought, instinctively: Bear!

Since the umbrella had flown out of her hand, she looked around frantically for a weapon—a stick, a rock—then saw as it eyed her, the biggest dog ever to stand on four massive paws.

Not a bear, she thought, but as potentially deadly if he wasn’t somebody’s cheerful pet.

“Hello . . . doggie.”

He continued to watch her out of eyes more gold than brown. He stepped forward to sniff her, which she hoped wasn’t the prelude to taking a good, hard bite. Then let out two cannon-shot barks before loping away.