Celtic Stars (Celtic Steel Book 4) by Delaney Rhodes Read Free Book Online Page B

information, Jamie Burke sighed and tugged at his beard clasping his own hands in his lap.
    The Burke refugee camp had become a quasi-independent village within the O’Malley territory. For the most part, Jamie was left to independently oversee the Burke clans people with only minimal involvement of the O’Malley Lord, Patrick MacCahan-O’Malley.  It was. Nevertheless, Jamie Burke’s duty to hear all manners brought before him, by a Burkes-man, even if the petitioner was his own mother.
    The silence grew thick. He knew she would never speak first, and for a slip of time he reveled in the power he held over this woman. It was easy to hate her and pity her all at the same time. It was not her fault he had been taken from her at birth and sent off to foster elsewhere. Her father was a monster in his own right, and she had followed suit by practicing the black arts and making herself an enemy of their gracious hosts, the O’Malleys.  Her story, though, if true, was fantastical. There was some otherworldly creature holding her hostage and forcing her to perform all manner of cruelty over her own people. All of this was in an effort to find some ancient relic. A relic that would somehow return him, her ex-husband, Easal, who used to be Eaton, to whatever black hole in the universe from which he had come.
    He shook his head. It was too maddening to believe. But – the priest bought the story and sold it to Patrick as well. He sold it to the others, including Lucian, the clan scribe and druid priest, and his brother, Airard, from Patrick’s clan in the north, and even the lad, Braeden, rightful heir to the O’Malley lordship. They all believed her, but seeing was not believing for Jamie. Having been blind from birth, he saw people and things in different ways than the others, and he hadn’t yet made up his mind.
    Yes, her aura had changed. Either she was making real, significant progress or she had harnessed the power of her black arts to the point she was able to fool even him. He knew about her and Kurt, the former priest although he doubted anyone else knew yet.  He saw it in both of them whenever they were within ten feet of one another. They were drawn to each other like magnets like there was some invisible force bringing them to each other. He wondered if she had cast a spell or if their attraction spanned more than recent history. She had imprisoned the priest before, when she held the power in Burke lands. Back when Easal was still Easal, the captain of the Burke guards and Odetta’s betrothed. Not the empty shell of a person now possessed by Eaton, the evil, manipulative, monster she claimed he now was.
    “Well, let’s have it then,” he grumbled.
    “My Lord,” she began.
    “Jamie, ye may call me Jamie,” he curtly replied.
    “Jamie,” she sighed in relief, “please call me mam,” she attempted to say sweetly, but the concept was clearly lost on her. She struggled with her hands before her in such a way as to lose her balance, and nearly tip herself over.
    “Don’t hurt yerself,” he stated, smugly. “Odetta will suffice.”
    She nodded in submission, curtsied and stood upright, looking deep into his crystalline eyes, wondering what he really saw. Her aura changed to fear and hesitation and Jamie interjected.
    “No reason for fear, Odetta, ye’ve made it thus far. What is yer request?”
    “Well, Jamie, ’tis not so much a request as it is – advice.”
    “Advice? For me?” he chuckled.
    “Aye.”
    This piqued his interest. “Please, sit ye there,” he said motioning to a stool across from him at the table. “Please, do tell what advice ye have for me, milady.”
    “Well, as ye well know, Easal will not rest until the Island of Women is his and he has invaded and overtaken the O’Malleys, with our people here as well.”
    “I’ve heard tell,” he nodded.
    “Well, I have a way to defeat him. I have knowledge of certain – uh – circumstances that will come upon us and I believe