Spellbound & Seduced by Marguerite Kaye Read Free Book Online

ten times removed. She was burned at the stake on Christmas Day two hundred years ago exactly come this Christmas. Her daughter it was who gave evidence against her. She was married to the local laird’s son, and he and his father were by all accounts heartless men who thought a witch-burning would provide their guests with a memorable entertainment. They held a sham of a trial, and they burned her, and as they set alight the bonfire, Lillias cursed them.’
    Jura paused to draw breath, shaking her head at Lawrence when he made to speak, anxious now that she was started not to lose momentum. ‘The daughter’s husband died, just as Lillias said he would, a year to the day on which they were wed, and so it has been, down through the female line—for we seem to bear only females. We are each of us witches, and all of us widows. Every one of us for two hundred years, Lawrence,” she said, her voice cracking. ‘My own father died before I ever knew him. I am determined to put an end to it. No man will die for loving me, and since I would wed none I did not love—for you and I have that in common—I have cast a spell upon myself to make sure that I can’t. Fall in love, I mean. So when the snow is over and you go to your castle, you need not fear that I shall be wanting more from you, because I expect by then the spell will have taken effect and I shall be just as pleased for you to go as—as you will be to leave,’ she concluded, trying very hard to look pleased at this rather awful prospect.
    Lawrence was quite at a loss for words. At pains as he usually was to make it plain at the start of any relationship that it could have only a limited future, it had not for a second occurred to him to say anything of the sort to Jura. Finding himself on the receiving end of her brush-off, no matter how original… Except it wasn’t a brush-off. Her anguish was quite obvious in those big expressive eyes of hers, and he was willing to bet that her hands would be clasped tight under her apron. She meant it—the spell, the curse, the whole lot. ‘Does this mean it was one of my ancestors who was responsible for burning your ancestor?’ he asked, not the most relevant question, but an appalling notion.
    â€˜No, no. I came here to Dunswaird a few years ago when my mother died. I hoped to make a fresh start.’
    â€˜And have you succeeded?’
    â€˜My powers will always isolate me, even where none know of my history, but they have no fey wife, no other healer. I can do good here, that is enough.’
    â€˜And if you say that another thousand times, you might convince yourself,’ Lawrence said, touched by her bravado. ‘I can’t quite believe what you’re telling me. If I’d heard it from anyone else—if I hadn’t seen for myself that you really do have powers—to live under such a cloud your whole life, it’s some horrible fairy tale. Surely this Lillias must have made some provision to revoke her curse? Isn’t there always such a thing?’
    â€˜She said that only a true and perfect love could break the cycle, but in two hundred years, the cycle has not been broken. Maybe we witches are not capable of a true and perfect love—my mother’s love, I know, was stronger for me than it was for her husband. Or maybe those who claim to love us do not love us enough. I don’t know, but I do know that I can make sure I am the last of us.’
    â€˜It seems to me an enormous sacrifice, to be alone always like this without the comfort of a husband or children.’
    â€˜I am not so different from you, Lawrence. You will not take a wife, and so will not have a child.’
    â€˜Yes, but…’ Lawrence frowned. When she put it like that, he was conscious of the tiniest niggle of doubt. Did he really want to be alone for the rest of his life? He brushed this question aside impatiently. ‘The point is that I