Nearly to the doors of the grand house, Esmeralda found that she was too late.
She came upon the newly-wedded pair outside the house, lying entwined under a copse of trees, the blood from their slit throats now fertilising the soil around them.
Esmeralda wanted to cry, to scream, to keen into the night all of her despair that their love had not been consummated. The glorious consummation of true love, the like of the love between Royce and Beatrice Morgan, would have protected them like a powerful shield.
The old witch, no matter how tired, was not yet done with magic that night.
She picked up the delicate hand of the fallen Beatrice and saw the flesh and blood beneath the girl’s fingernails. The same could be found under the nails of the once mighty knight.
Taking her dagger, she gouged the human particles from beneath the lovers’ nails and also collected a dagger blade full of the soil that had absorbed the couple’s mingled life blood. Lastly, she pierced the point of the dagger into her finger and squeezed her own blood into her powerful brew.
Working swiftly, the witch mixed the protection charm with a fierce shake. More of her conjuring was muttered, she opened her charm and sprinkled her potion around them.
Forever linking them.
Forever, through eternity, binding them together.
Until one day, many, many years in the future, the stars in the lovers’ eyes would uncross.
Esmeralda knew the black soul would hunt them but she prayed that her protection charm and the added power of violence, death and true love would protect them.
The witch knew one day, they would find each other again.
And that day, they would need her.
Chapter One
Reincarnated
Marian Byrne stood at the door of Lacybourne Manor smiling at the last tourists that left through the grand entry.
At seventy years old, she’d been a volunteer for The National Trust working at Lacybourne for seven years. She had no idea how long she would be able to continue, her feet were killing her.
Marian was tall, straight, thin as a rail and had the energy of a fifty year old (or, at the most, a fifty-five year old). Her hair was cut short, its curls died a peachy red that was not old lady peach but a colour she, personally, found very becoming.
She was under strict instructions to have all the tourists and their cars and the other flotsam and jetsam cleared from the area before the man of the house came home.
Colin Morgan had inherited Lacybourne just over a year before. His aunt and uncle left no heirs so upon their untimely death (he of cancer, she of a broken heart, the latter Marian believed although the doctors said differently), the man from London became owner of the grand house with its medieval core. The old owners were not nearly as demanding as Mr. Colin Morgan. They would often mingle with the tourists and even open some of the private chambers.
Not Colin.
He closed the house all days except Mondays and Tuesdays and allowed it open only one Saturday a month. It was available solely from February through June, which was quite a muddle for The National Trust as that cut out the height of the tourist season and school holidays. And he expected all of the tourists and The National Trust pamphlets and laminated leaflets that lay about the rooms to be locked out of sight by the time he came home.
This would have vastly annoyed Marian, if she hadn’t met Colin Morgan.
He was near as the spitting image of the man in the portrait that hung in the Great Hall.
For that reason alone, Marian knew she’d do whatever he required.
The day had turned gusty, the sky already dark with encroaching night. The clouds, long since rolled in, had begun to leak rain.
Marian began to push the heavy front doors closed when she heard a feminine voice in an American accent call, “Oh no! Am I too late?”
Marian peeked out the door just as thunder rent the air and lightning lit the sky, illuminating the woman who stood on the threshold.
Marian couldn’t stop herself; she gasped at the sight.
The woman was wearing a scarlet trench coat belted at the waist and her long, thick hair, the colour of sunshine liberally dosed with honey, was whipping about her face. She had lifted a hand to hold the tresses back but she wasn’t succeeding. The tendrils flew around her face wildly.