She’d flung herself wholly and without reservation into their intimacy. She loved to touch, indeed, she seemed to crave it. She was constantly slipping her wee hand into his, or burying them in his hair, grazing his scalp with her nails. Like a wild tomcat who’d had absolute freedom, but known no place to call home, he savored the gentle constancy of the familiar touch of familiar hands.

He’d been right in thinking that with her, lovemaking might yield some indefinable result he’d not before experienced. Sex had always calmed and soothed him, easing his muscles, relaxing his mental tension, but now, when he fell sated, holding Chloe close, his heart was also at ease.

But if his present was a vast and sunny blue sky, his future was filled with the ominous roll of crashing thunderheads.

And he dare not forget that.

He dragged his gaze away from Chloe and inhaled deeply, forcing his thoughts back to less savory matters.

In the past ten days, though he and Silvan had discovered a wealth of long-forgotten information about their clan in the chamber library, and learned more about their purpose as Druids than they’d ever known, they’d still found no mention of the thirteen and scant information concerning their benefactors. Silvan was hoping they might find some way to contact the Tuatha Dé in the old records, but Dageus didn’t share his da’s optimism on that score. He wasn’t convinced the ancient race was even still about. And if they were, why would they bother to appear to a Keltar who’d fallen from grace when they’d not bothered to appear to any other Keltar? He wouldn’t be surprised to learn they’d planted their traps in the in-between and gone away thousands of years ago, never to return.

The search was taking too long. In the twenty-first century there’d been a dearth of information, now there was too much, and sifting through it was an epic undertaking.

That wouldn’t have fashed him, except he’d recently noticed something that had made him realize time was critical: His eyes were no longer returning to gold, not even with their constant lovemaking. Nay, his eyes were now burnished copper, and darkening further each day.

Though he was using no magic, though he was tooping incessantly, though the ancient ones had not spoken again, the darkness inside him was changing him anyway, in the same manner that wine inevitably soaked into and permeated the cask that held it.