Through the Door (The Thin Veil) - By Jodi McIsaac Page 0,38

involve herself in our affairs.”

“Wait, she’s how old? Don’t your people…die?” Cedar asked, looking at Finn.

“We do,” he said. “But not of old age. We can be killed by violence. We don’t age, not physically, once we reach maturity. We stay that way forever.”

“But…” Cedar looked back at Felix, with his grizzled white beard and toothy grin.

He laughed, showing his gold teeth. “I’m a healer by nature, but I can also whip up a right nice aging brew for those of us who want to blend in. I’m actually as young and virile as yer man Finn, here, and twice as charming,” he said with wink.

Rohan interrupted. “Enough questions, I said. Finn, go ahead and call Brighid.”

“Speaking of charming,” Murdoch muttered.

Finn blushed and gave Murdoch a dirty look. “She was fond of me for a while,” he said to Cedar. “But nothing ever happened between us. She knew my heart belonged to someone else.” Their eyes met for a heartbeat before he looked back at the group. “I’ll give her a call. I’m sure she’ll be willing to help.”

Finn disappeared into the kitchen and they all sat in silence, waiting. A few minutes later, he came back out, looking nervous.

“Well?” Murdoch demanded.

“She says she’ll tell us what she knows about depictions of Tír na nÓg. She wouldn’t say more on the phone, but it sounds like one exists and she knows where it is.” He hesitated and looked at Cedar. “She wants me to go see her in New York. And she wants me to take Cedar with me.”

“Why me?” she asked.

Finn’s cheeks reddened, but he held her gaze. “She says she wants to meet the woman who nearly drove me mad.”

Blood streamed down Maeve’s arms and dripped off her elbows. She ran her hand through her hair distractedly, leaving red streaks in the disheveled gray. The butchered remains of a cat lay on the floor in front of her. She was in the small workshop in the front yard of her house in the country, just outside the tiny town of Chester. It was the home Cedar had grown up in, and though Maeve had an apartment in the city so she could be close to her daughter and granddaughter, she still kept the country home for weekend getaways—and for the memories it held.

Maeve picked at the entrails, moving them around the floor for the dozenth time, examining them as she consulted faded charts and diagrams stained with bloody fingerprints. She shuddered, not at the gruesome display in front of her, but at the thought that she might fail, that she might not find Eden in time. Like a lamb to the slaughter, she thought, looking into the cat’s sightless eyes. Then she shook her head sharply. She needed to stay calm, to think clearly. She breathed deeply, trying to push her fear down, but it clung to her like a desperate lover. Nothing she tried was working as it should. She shuddered again and rolled a strand of cat intestine between her fingers, wondering what on earth she could try next.

Cedar’s betrayal had cut her like a knife, but she had not been entirely surprised. Despite all Maeve’s warnings, Cedar had loved Finn with all her heart, and she loved him still. Maeve could see the anguish of it on her face whenever anyone said his name. Cedar had chosen him once, and now she was choosing his people over her own mother, even though she had only known them for a day.

“You’re not one of them, Cedar, and if you have to learn your lesson twice, so be it,” Maeve muttered. And maybe there would be a silver lining to all this. If Cedar was with them, she could keep Maeve informed about their movements, helping her stay one step ahead of them.

She looked at what remained of the cat and sighed. She had not used her skills as a druid for many years, and she had grown rusty. The Ogham sticks had told her nothing about Eden’s whereabouts, nor had the runes. She had spent the entire night in the woods surrounding her country house, communing with the earth and the trees, begging them to speak to her, to help her find the child. Silence had been the only response.

She cursed herself for not anticipating this, for not doing more to keep Cedar and Eden away from these people. Nevertheless, Cedar had made her choice, and now it was up to Maeve. She had to find