Blood In Fire (Celtic Elementals Book 2) Read Online Free PDF

despite all, he had listened when she called. From almost four thousand miles away he'd heeded her warning and returned home.
    Not for her, though.
    She wasn’t fool enough to believe that.
    For his precious friend , for the wolf who was a wolf no longer. For Ronan Fitzpatrick, one of the Mac Giolla Phadraig . Never for her.
    Was that irony…the great and mighty warrior Cúchulainn mocking her through his descendants? Having the last laugh after these years?
    She held no grudge for the Mac Giolla Phadraig anymore , the clan Fitzpatrick that had been born of her old nemesis. Recently she had even deigned to save Ronan’s lady, snatching her back from the claws of death.
    It wasn’t atonement, nothing so pure as that. Though she had wanted him to believe that—for Aidan to see that she could be kind and merciful. That maybe she had changed.
    He had barely looked her way. Hadn’t acknowledged her at all except for one sarcastic comment. In fact, Aidan O’Neill had left the caverns of Knockdoon as soon as he knew Ronan’s chit and Ronan were safe. He hadn’t thanked her. And he hadn’t looked back.
    Bav knew better than to expect it, but what she had of a heart ached. Sometimes she wondered if she had learned anything from Cúchulainn at all. Her lip curled and she threw her silken hood back.
    Masses of wild scarlet curls fell around her shoulders, the contrast of her red hair against the white silk vivid in the pale light of the moon. Bav contemplated the hill of Cooley, the scene of her greatest defeat with her head high. Her strong, white throat worked as she remembered him. Cúchulainn . The dark-haired, quiet boy who had willingly substituted himself for a dog as a child but who grew into a man so fiercely proud he had defied her entire army.
    Alone.
    She forced herself to remember what failure felt like, what it tasted like and who had undone her. She, who had toyed with men’s lives like a careless and vain child, had been undone by a man. Oh, she had her revenge in the end. Indeed, she had. But it had been far from satisfying. Cúchulainn hadn’t wanted her—to the very last he had refused her help— refused to bow that arrogant head to save his own life.
    So, he died. And she'd mourned. Oh, how she had mourned!
    Mourned the enemy, the lover and the friend. She thought she'd learned from that experience, learned to keep her distance. To tread lightly where mortals were concerned, or at least lighter.
    Then centuries later, Aidan had come into his own—the pride of the O’Neills and all of Uí Néill —and into his bright young life she had rushed, like a moth to a glorious flame.
    She hadn’t been able to resist him.
    They drew her so, these proud, strong men of Eire. And they burned the heart right out of her.
    Again she had brought shadows and death in her wake. The more she had tried to save him from the darkness, the more she'd mired them both hopelessly. Now Aidan was lost to her, just as Cúchulainn had been.
    For those thousand, thousand lifetimes and more.
    Or mayhap not.
    A small, knowing smile curved Bav’s full lips as she raised her emerald eyes to the sky…and the moon.
    “Favors owed, little one. I am coming to collect. The time is at hand.”
    The moon seemed to shiver in the sky, tattered grey clouds drawing over its face, as if it sought to hide itself from her gaze. Bav laughed softly, bowing her head and drawing up her robe.
    The column of white silk covering the goddess’s lush curves trembled once as if in a gentle breeze, then swirled to the ground like sand slipping through an invisible hourglass. Bav vanished. In the space where she had stood hovered a large crow, wings glinting black on black, beating the air with a sound like bellows at a forge.
    The crow blinked blood-red eyes and opened its sharp beak, loosing a screech that reverberated down the ancient hills of Ulster like a tormented scream. The bird soared upward into the light of the moon, a dark arrow seeking its