Page 48

“There are other forms of magic, brother,” Miranda said, looking up at Adam.

“Magic with the power to last beyond a lifetime, and that too, Damien, is a rare form of enchantment. Could I deny that to my children? To myself? I love Adam; I would walk on live coals for him or lay upon a bed of nails.”

Damien watched his sister carefully, recognizing that it was useless to press her any further.

“And you Brand, why would you want a woman who would risk her footwear or ruin your rest with silly parlor tricks that any nominally trained charlatan could perform?” he asked, the corner of his mouth rising by a fraction.

“I have already told you that I love her, Wodesby,” Adam said, simply.

“Enough to forsake her without asking a simple question, Brand,” Damien mocked. “Is your pride such that you would run away without my ‘yea’ or ‘nay’?”

“I believed myself certain of your answer,” Adam replied, confused by the Mage’s mercurial shifts between mockery and solemnity.

“I have learned of late that nothing is certain, milord,” Damien said with a look of chagrin that encompassed them all, “especially those things that we deem most immutable.”

“Ask him, Adam,” Miranda urged him. “Ask.”

“Here? With the entire family standing about,” Brand asked, puzzled. “That is not how it is commonly done, Miranda.”

Lady Wodesby laughed. “Lord Brand, you may have realized by now that the Wodesbys are not part of the common run. Ask, dear boy.”

Adam found to his consternation that his throat was suddenly dry. Acutely aware of his audience, he cleared his throat. “Lord Wodesby, I request the honor of your sister’s hand in marriage.”

“Well that took you long enough, Brand,” Damien said with an expression of exasperation. “May I suggest that you avoid taking your seat in Parliament. It would take the entire session for you to make your maiden speech!”

“Answer him, Damien Nostradamus!” Lady Wodesby demanded. “Give him his answer or I will?—"

“Turn me into a frog?” Damien asked.

“Far worse!” his mother threatened. “I will cook your dinner and make you eat it.”

“Yes, Brand! You may have my sister and my blessing,” Damien said with mock haste. “By the Merlin, Mama, you have no mercy. If you wish to see your first anniversary, Lawrence, keep this woman out of the kitchen.”

Miranda went to her brother and embraced him. “Thank you, Damien,” she said, kissing him on the cheek. “I know that this is not what you wanted for me.”

“I want you to be happy, ‘Randa,” Damien said, hugging her close. “I wanted someone who could protect you and be strong for you.”

“Your sister is strong, Wodesby,” Adam said, his voice filled with pride. “And if I am ever in need of protection, I could not want for better.”

Damien examined his sister’s demeanor with a critical eye.

The sad, shrinking little girl that he remembered had disappeared and in her place was a confident woman.

“Yes, but who will protect you from her, Brand?” he asked, stepping neatly aside to avoid a sisterly poke.

“If either of you gentlemen are in need of charms or talismans to shield you from the wiles of Wodesby women, let me know.”

“Shall we remove your son, Adrienne, before your daughter does him bodily injury?” Lawrence asked, taking Damien by the elbow.

“If you want something done, do it yourself, I always say.” Lady Wodesby took Damien’s other elbow.

“If you see a rather dashing looking frog hopping about later,” Damien called back over his shoulder, “don’t step on me.”

“I might even grow to like your brother eventually,” Adam said, as the door closed behind them.

“Hush!” Miranda said, putting a finger on his lips. “Damien is conceited enough as it is. However, I do think that he rather likes you. His taunts are something of a barometer of affection.”

“Then it would seem that he esteems me highly,” Adam said, clasping her hand and kissing it softly.

“He is right though, I was a coward. These past few days I’ve done nothing but think about you, envy that nameless man who your brother favored.

Poor devil. I almost pity him when he is told that you are promised to me. ”

Miranda reddened. “There is no one else.”

Adam shook his head. “But I thought . . .”

“That there was a man of my dreams?” Miranda smiled.

“Only you are in my dreams, Adam. And since it suited my brother that you believe me out of your touch, he did not enlighten you. I confess that there was someone who might have asked me to wed him, given sufficient coercion. And had I not met you, I might have made the mistake of marrying him, hoping that I could make him into something he was not or dream myself into believing that I was satisfied. I thought that I was worthy of nothing better than Martin. After all, I was no witch.”

“The man was a fool,” Adam murmured, his fingers reaching up to brush a lock of hair from her eyes, his caress lingering upon the lobe of her ear.

“As was I,” Miranda admitted. “I was afraid, afraid to seek for a happiness that I did not believe that I deserved.” She looked up at him, trying to make Adam understand what he had done for her.

“All my life, my family has judged me by what I lacked. Is it any wonder that I saw myself in their mirror?”

He cupped her chin in his hands. “Look into my eyes, Miranda, and see what I see. Everything that I have ever wanted in a woman, everything that I will ever want in a wife. Without spells or sorcery, my love, you are magic for me, always.”

“And you are mine,” Miranda whispered. “You called me back from the Light, Adam. It was your voice that I heard that night at Lady Pelton’s, drawing me home to myself. So you too, must have a magic all your own.”

“So now that we have concluded that we are both magical,” Adam said, “there is only one thing left to do. Shall we enchant each other?”

In answer, she pulled his mouth down to hers.

This was the sorcery that she had been seeking, the bliss of fulfillment in a spell stronger than any witch or mage might dare to weave.

His kiss transformed her with its gentle power, changing her into the woman that she had never dreamed that she could be. The woman that Adam loved.

“‘A sea-change,’” she murmured, her fingers wandering to smooth the hair from his brow. “‘Into something rich and strange.’”

Adam drew a sharp breath. “That was the phrase,” he whispered. “That was the quotation that my mother was supposed to convey from beyond the Veil. Before he died, my father said to listen for those words.”

“Perhaps your parents are giving us their blessing,” Miranda said, hesitantly.

Adam smiled. “Only two weeks ago, I would have called it coincidence. There was nothing beyond the scope of explanation in that well-ordered world of mine. But there was also no wonder and precious little joy.”

“And now?” she asked softly.

“Now I know that there is something beyond happenstance, beyond understanding. Call it what you will, fate or sorcery, but I know that it has changed me, changed my life. Perhaps that what my father was searching for, an assurance that there is something that lasts beyond this moment, this hour.” He shook his head in awe as the realization struck him.

She was his. “And now, I look at you, my love, and find that eternity does not frighten me. For I know that it is not emptiness, but a place where love abides,” Adam said, his hand brushing the hollow of her throat where her emerald gleamed bright.

“And magic,” Miranda whispered, knowing deep within that she would always feel this wondrous response to his touch.

“These feelings reach beyond this life into forever. Together, Adam, we are magic.” His lips met hers once more in the miraculous alchemy that only lovers share, the transformation of two disparate souls into one.

Thorpe gave a contented purr. Within seconds, the feline voyeur found himself lifted gently, but firmly, by the scruff of the neck and placed on the threshold.

“For a familiar, Thorpe, I find you decidedly too familiar,” Adam said, shutting the door behind him.

In the face of this obvious human ingratitude, there was little the tom could do but ruffle his fur indignantly, twitch his tail and stalk to the kitchen to seek his supper.

THE END