Dark Witch (The Cousins O'Dwyer Trilogy #1)(68)

“I should’ve come home sooner, instead of worrying you.”

Branna shrugged, then softened. “If I’d had a man willing to make me dinner and give me a good roll after a fright like that, I’d have taken it as well. I trust he did a good job with both.”

Iona grinned. “Exceptional.”

Heat rose up Boyle’s back like a fever. “Would you mind not batting around my sex life, at least while I’m sitting here?”

“We’ll bat it around when you’re not then.” Branna poured his tea, kissed the top of his head.

“Have you eaten?” Iona asked her.

“Not yet. I will once I hear what you have to say. From the start, Iona. And if she leaves anything out, Boyle, however slight, you fill it in.”

Iona began, trying to speak in full detail, and with calm.

Branna gripped her hand. “You’re saying you called a whirlwind? How did you know the way?”

“It’s in the books. I know it’s advanced, and it’s risky, but it was . . . I don’t know why or how, but I knew it was what I needed to do. I knew I could.”

“Why didn’t you call me, or Connor? Both?”

“It was so fast. When I play it back, it’s like it was hours, stage by stage, but it was so fast. I don’t think it was more than a couple minutes.”

“If that,” Boyle confirmed.

“All right, but it’s best if you call for me and Connor.”

“Or Fin,” Boyle put in.

“I’m not shutting him out.” Or only a little, Branna admitted. “But blood calls to blood, Boyle. We’ve the same blood, Connor, Iona, and I. And this is blood magicks at work. You weren’t so afraid. Connor would have sensed that, as he did before. You weren’t so afraid as before, in the woods alone.”

“A little, but no, not like before, maybe because I wasn’t alone. I could only think he’d hurt Boyle and the horses, to get to me. It helped me focus, I think.”

Branna nodded, but pushed at her hair. “I’m jumping you around. You said he didn’t bring the fog.”

“No.”

“More to catch you off guard than to rattle your nerves then. And it may be he pulls some power from the fog as well, and wasn’t as strong.”

“Didn’t think he’d need to be?” Boyle nodded. “He learned different. She turned a tree to toothpicks.”

“I had some trouble with control.”

“Calling a whirlwind with no practice? I’m not surprised, and it’s a wonder if a tree’s all the damage done.”

“All that I saw,” Boyle said. “Unless you count the bastard spinning around in the air.”

“If I could’ve held it, focused it better, I might have destroyed it.”

Branna dismissed that with a shrug. “If it was that easy, I’d have done it myself before this. You did well. Finish it out now.”

Listening, nodding, Branna didn’t interrupt again.

“Yes, you did well indeed. I’d tell you it was a big risk, but I can’t question your instincts. They told you this was the way, and you followed them. You’re safe and well. I think you took Cabhan off guard, and you cost him. It may be you hurt him a bit as well, if his power source—the jewel is that, I think—lessened. How did it feel?”

“Enormous. Like I could feel every cell in my body burning. Like nothing could stop me.”

At that, Branna’s brows drew together. “There’s the danger as true as the wolf.”

“I think I know. Part of feeling that invincibility was why I couldn’t control it, or started to lose it, and let it control me.”

“It’s a vital lesson learned. It’s that being engulfed by the power, the thirst for more of it that made Cabhan.”

Iona thought she understood how that could be, how the temptation, the seduction of such great power could overwhelm. “Boyle talked me down. He helped me hold it, calm it, and finally stop it.”

Now those eyebrows rose. “Is that the way of it? That’s no small feat, to rein in a witch who’s not only reaping a whirlwind but riding one. Otherwise, the pair of you would be roaming about Oz looking for ruby slippers.”

“But I’d be the good witch.”

“Hmm. I’m relieved you weren’t hurt, either of you. And I’m thinking we might have a space of time, before he makes another lunge at us, to smooth out more rough edges. I’m proud of you,” she added, then rose.

Simple words, simply spoken, but they poured into Iona like fine wine. “Thanks.”

“I’ve a thing or two to see to in the workshop now that my head’s clear,” Branna continued. “I’ll tell Connor all of this, and as he came at you when you were with Boyle, it’s best if we tell Meara the whole of it as well. And Fin,” she added before Boyle could. “We’ll meet again, would you say, in a day or two, once I’ve—once we’ve all had time to think it all through.”

“I think that’s the right thing,” Iona said. “We’re stronger together, right, than separately?”

“I’ll hope. See you at breakfast, Boyle,” Branna said with a wink, then left them.

“Oh well, I don’t know as I should—”