Haley O’Brian scowled at her idiot co-worker as she stood, arms crossed, hip propped against the counter. “You did what?”
“I tripped over one of the paving stones just outside the ring. It came loose and the pouch with the scrolls inside was right there beneath.” His hands came up defensively when he caught her facial expression. “Okay, so I know it’s not technically legal, but I found the scrolls. Is it a crime to want to know what they say? Come on, in the name of science! When I saw they were Ogham, I knew you’d be the best person to translate.”
“What is this, finders keepers? Are we in third grade now?” She exhaled violently.
“First of all, that site is cursed. I told you that when I translated the symbols on the standing stones. Second of all, the best person to look at them is the governmental liaison.
They’ve got their own scholars and they’ll let us in on this if we go through them. You can’t take antiquities from a site. It’s illegal. For fuck’s sake, Jerry, you know that.
You’re endangering the entire Foundation over this.”
She pushed away from the counter and kept her eyes averted from the pouch on the table. God how she wanted to get her hands on those scrolls! But if you took shortcuts in their profession, it got around and you didn’t get grants. No grants, no work. No work and she’d be using her shiny degree at Copy Cafeteria for minimum wage.
And anyway, despite her modern upbringing, her grandmother was a witch. Or something. Haley didn’t quite know what but it involved magic and she’d just gotten around to admitting she’d been too chicken to really ask.
Haley’s parents may have disdained what they said was her gran’s superstition but that ring of stones lay heavy with vengeful magic. The symbols were a curse to keep something in. It seemed wrong to break the law to read the scrolls on a lie, like giving in to whatever maliciousness the site was bound by. It wasn’t superstitious to be smart. No way. She was calling Conall and not because the very sight of him made her tingly in all the right places either. Uh uh.
“Haley, we might never get to see them if you tell the liaison,” Jerry whined.
She waved him away impatiently, annoyed at him over the scrolls and for interrupting the beginnings of a very salacious fantasy about the sexy Conall Shaunessey.
“Jerry, I’m not going to do it. And if I don’t you’re screwed because I’m the best you’ve got. Anyone else with my skills will turn your ass in. You signed the contract. I’m a board member and I say tell the damned liaison. You’re putting the scrolls back, right now. And then you’ll call him from the site.”
She saw the calculation on his face and wanted to groan aloud.
“I can’t believe you’re going to play goody-goody on this. But okay.” He held his hands up again hastily as she moved toward him, wanting to smack him upside his head.
“I’ll take it back. But you have to come with me. You make the call and go with Shaunessey when he comes to take the scrolls. That way you can push your way into the room when they’re translated.”
It wasn’t like she didn’t want to take a gander at the scrolls—she did. They called to her. She wanted to know what was on them. Having that pouch there within reach, knowing no one had read them in centuries ate away at her.
“Okay, let’s go. Maybe I can look at them at the site before the liaison gets there.”
He jumped up, grabbing the bag before heading out the door as she followed in his wake.
After a short walk through a prototypical sunny forest glade, the trees opened up and she saw the ring. The stones nearly sang in the sunlight shafting over their gray surface.
Cursed or not, it was a place thick with magic and Haley’s own responded in kind, surging through her as like recognized like.
As she stood there, a sense of expectancy hung in the air. Something big lay in the shadows of the future, coiled up and ready to spring. A shiver passed through Haley as she attempted to shake the feeling off.
Haley knew what she needed to do was to give in and go visit her grandmother and get some answers. She responded deeply to the space and it seemed foolhardy not to ask.
Nearly as stupid as the fight that drove her from her grandmother’s house six months prior.
She realized that Jerry had been babbling as they’d been walking. Given his predilection for haring off on wild schemes, she figured she should at least pay half attention or it could be disastrous.
The circle of stones stood there, cold and dangerous. They brought a feel of dread to the glade, which would have been a damp, but otherwise lovely spot but for those gray stones looming in their midst.
As they’d approached, all other sound died out. No birds, no flicker of the leaves dancing against each other in the breeze. The magic of the circle hung heavy and humid.
Even those without any magical gifts had eschewed the spot, no one had done any real investigation of the standing circle despite its age. Haley knew, given the samples they’d taken and the general state of the stones and carving, that it was roughly a thousand years old. Stunning really, to think of anything that old being avoided for so long. It made Haley glad she didn’t need to be on site most of the time.
“Here’s the spot where I found the pouch.” Jerry pointed to a very smooth stone right inside the northern edge of the circle of stones. She bent and looked, noted the small amount of wear from a prying tool and rolled her eyes up to glare at him.
Sheepishly, he handed her the pouch. The magic spilled through Haley, as dark as the magic in the stones themselves. But there was something else in the leather bag.
Something vibrant. The pouch wasn’t in the best shape and after she’d peeked and verified the scrolls did indeed have Ogham script on them, she’d decided not to take them out until they were in a lab. Jerry may have been an ass but she knew he’d have taken great care when he removed them. Still, best not to take chances and have the parchment fall apart.
Satisfied that he’d obeyed at least the spirit of her instructions, she placed the container holding the pouch near the spot where the stone had been dug up and pushed aside— yeah right he tripped over the rock and it just came up—and pulled out her cell phone to call Conall, the liaison the Irish government had assigned to the site.
Conall Shaunessey looked at the display screen on his phone and a whisper of a long forgotten emotion slid outside his reach. It was the American Irishwoman from the Foundation. Haley.
“Conall Shaunessey,” he answered.
“Hi, Conall, it’s Haley O’Brian from the Foundation. We’ve found something out here that I think you should take a look at.”
Finally, she’d found the bleeding scrolls. He shoved the thought down. “Well isn’t that interesting? What is it?”
“Scrolls. They’re in a leather pouch. I don’t want to pull them out though. The pouch looks to be centuries old. I’d prefer to get them in a better environment than out here. I don’t want the paper to disintegrate. I did take a peek, without removing them completely or unrolling them. Looks like Ogham.”
“Sounds like quite a find. I’ll be out with my team in an hour. Thank you, Haley.”
He’d known she’d call, knew she’d be honorable and not break the law. Another positive in his favor.
He hung up and arranged for photographers and other staff to get out there and log the site. Of course he knew the contents and geography of that damned ring like the back of his hand but he couldn’t forget his position. The find would need to be recorded for historical posterity.
An hour later, he strolled through the glade and tried not to glare at the stones. Inside him, there was a faint stirring but he focused on her instead.
He’d always known it would take the right person to find the scrolls. The right witch with that touch of Faerie magic to end the damnable curse and let his soul free. Each time he’d been born into a new body but as half a person, his soul firmly rooted in the cage of those stones. And each time he died as the scrolls went undiscovered, only to go through the same process over and over again.
But when Haley O’Brian had walked into his office, tall and lithe, red hair the color of the last gasp of the sunset, eyes a bright, curious mossy-green, he felt real hope. Or as close to feeling as he’d done in centuries. As well as a whisper of desire. Her skin was touchable, creamy and pale, a dash of freckles punctuated her nose and cheeks. So Irish he couldn’t help but grin at her. He felt her magic crackle around her and tasted the Fae in it. Her immediate fascination with the site was the last clue and he knew it was finally time. More than that, he knew she was his. Finding the patience to survive the last months waiting for her to find the ring and then the scrolls would have been torture but he supposed it was one time he could actually be thankful the curse robbed him of emotion. She was the one and the curse would be lifted.
As he came upon the stones, he saw her standing there, sketchbook in her hands, bottom lip caught between her teeth in concentration.
“Hoy!” he called out as he approached with his people. She looked up at him and as always, it was as if she saw right through him. That jolt of recognition shot to his toes.
And to other parts like his cock, which always stirred to life in her presence, not like he’d be able to do anything with it until after she broke the curse.
