Spellbinder (Moonshadow #2)

Tall windows let in copious amounts of light, and there was comfortable furniture grouped around a large fireplace—couches and chairs, and a table strewn with parchment paper, inkwells, and pens. There was a variety of musical instruments set on wooden stands—tall, stately floor harps, lap harps and lyres, flutes, dulcimers, and lutes.

Sid’s primary instrument was the violin. That was her performance instrument, her area of expertise, the one she knew she could always pick up and create a soaring crescendo of music. She was also quite comfortable playing a viola, a cello, a guitar, and she did a lot of her composing on a piano.

Her confidence had been built on a lifetime of study, practice, testing, and performance. It had been built from a very early age, when her mother had forced her to practice, whether she wanted to or not, and had stood over her to make sure it happened. Then she had discovered she loved music and practiced of her own accord, while her parents showered her with praise and encouragement.

It had never occurred to her to question her own proficiency, or what kinds of music the Light Fae Queen might prefer, because she had an entire library of music living in her head.

Aside from her own burgeoning body of original work, she knew whole concertos by Bach, Brahms, Saint-Sa?ns, Vivaldi, Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Paganini, and Mozart by heart. She also knew pop and jazz, and could make her violin weep when she played the blues.

But she had never once played any of the instruments sitting in Isabeau’s music hall.

Moving like a sleepwalker, she went to one of the couches, sat, and put her face in her hands as she breathed, “I am so fucked.”

*

After returning to the cottage to drop off the supplies, Morgan went on the hunt to find the source of the scent that by all rights shouldn’t have been at the night market and yet had been.

He knew that meant the scent would be elsewhere as well, its source delving into places it shouldn’t be, snooping and spying. Causing dangerous mischief without regard to consequences. Hurting innocent people.

He ignored the moon’s passage across the heavens and the approaching dawn. His sole focus was on catching his prey.

He caught the scent again two miles outside the city. The source had hidden its trail with a lavish array of cloaking spells and spells of aversion, but Morgan was the better sorcerer. He shredded those spells like they were so much tissue paper.

Finally he came upon a cold camp hidden in a dense thicket of trees and overgrown foliage. No fire ring or woodsmoke gave the location away. It was how Morgan would camp if he wanted to keep his presence a secret.

The camp appeared to be empty, but his sharp, inhuman gaze caught the subtle, stealthy slither of a snake slipping away in the underbrush.

Gathering himself into a lunge, he caught the snake by its tail. Hissing, it whipped around and would have bitten him, except he grabbed it by the throat. The snake’s body heaved and bucked in his hands, and changed, and suddenly he clutched a lion by the throat. It roared in his face and thrust its powerful body forward for the kill.

Twisting his whole body in a way that made the wound in his side flare with fresh fire, Morgan lifted the lion bodily in the air and slammed it on the ground. Magic flared, a quick, desperate spell of corrosion. Morgan jerked his head back and rapped out a dissipation spell, while the lion melted away underneath his hands, and in its place, he held an alligator with a long, wicked snout filled with razor teeth.

The alligator twisted to snap at his legs. With another whole-body twist, he flipped onto its back, wrapped an arm around its neck, and locked it in place with his other arm. As he began to squeeze, he gasped out a null spell.

Silence fell over the scene, punctuated by the alligator scrabbling at the earth, mouth gaping, while both bodies strained. “Give in before I snap your neck,” Morgan growled. “I’ll do it.”

As he spoke, he felt the null spell dissipate. Before his adversary could attack again with more spells, Morgan spun quick threads of Power around him, binding his adversary’s magic to himself.

Suddenly the alligator’s body collapsed and melted away, and in its place, Morgan held a slim, wiry body roughly the size of a teenage human boy’s, only this was no human teenager. It was something older and much more dangerous.

Letting out a wail filled with equal parts rage and despair, it gave up the struggle. Once again, Morgan had captured Robin the puck.





Chapter Ten





Panting, Morgan relaxed his hold, rolled off the puck’s back, and came stiffly to his feet. Fresh wetness seeped into the bandages covering the wound in his side. He’d broken it open again. He pressed the heel of one hand against it.

At this rate, he would never heal, and actually, he was okay with that. The longer he could go between stabbings, the longer he could stave off that final, inevitable choice, and the more time he might have to find a way to break free from Isabeau.

As his weight lifted, Robin curled into a ball, both fisted hands pressed against his head in impotent rage. With his magic bound, the puck was no physical match for Morgan. Morgan was faster and stronger. If the puck tried to run, Morgan would only catch him again.

He asked hoarsely, “What are you doing here? Are you suicidal? You do know the Queen has ordered me to find you and bring you back to her.”

Robin lifted his feral face. The glow from the waning moon lit his gaze as he hissed, “And you always do what your mistress wants, just like the dog you have become.”

The insult rolled off Morgan’s shoulders. He’d heard much worse. He considered binding the puck physically but was suddenly so fed up, he didn’t bother.

“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you and be done with it,” he snapped.

Robin’s thin, feral expression shifted. Suddenly he looked lost. “I can’t,” the puck keened. “I can’t give you one good reason. She’ll bind me with the burning rope again and make me do things I don’t want to do.”

In a burst of exasperation, Morgan bent down, grabbed the puck by his jacket, and hauled him to his feet. He roared, “Why her?”

“Tell me the Queen doesn’t want to kill my Sophie.” Robin’s face clenched. “Tell me that one thing, sorcerer, and make me believe it.”

A heartbeat went by, then another. Morgan could feel his pulse thudding in his clenched fists. “You know I can’t tell you that.”

Bitterness laced the puck’s voice. “And you would do it, wouldn’t you?”

“If she gives me a direct order to do so, yes, I will.”

“Yet you still wonder why I have done what I have done?” A touch of sly cunning flashed in Robin’s moonlit gaze. “The musician makes you want to disobey, doesn’t she? She may be the only thing that can. Isabeau will hurt her and hurt her, the way she hurt me, unless you stop it. Her fate is your choice, sorcerer.”

“You fool!” he spat. The impulse to violence took over, and he shook Robin. “You have no idea what you’ve done. You have no clue what is really going on.”