The Wild Sight by Loucinda McGary Read Free Book Online

sudden support or the easy way she
     uttered his name. Realizing his mouth was open, he snapped it shut and nodded in agreement, then quickly gulped some tea.
    McRory looked ready to protest, but Rylie spoke again before he could. “I’d like to see your dig site though, if that’s all
     right.” She took a sip from her cup then added, “And I’m afraid I don’t really know what a fen is.”
    Donovan suspected her of being disingenuous, but the ploy worked. He could see McRory switch into professorial mode.
    “Most people will tell you that a fen is nothing but a patch of marshy ground, but that’s not entirely true. Point of fact
     is that Irish fens are unique.”
    A ruckus from outside interrupted the lecture. Someone shouted for McRory and a moment later, a young man burst into the cottage.
    “Professor!” His breathless cry halted upon seeing the four of them. “So sorry, but—you—we—”
    “Slow down, Johnny, and catch your breath,” McRory admonished. He rose to his feet and hurried to the young man’s side. “’Tis
     an emergency?”
    “No . . . ” Resting his hands on his thighs, the lad Johnny took a deep breath. “Well, maybe yes. The thing is, we’ve found
     a body . . . in the fens.”
    “A bog body?” Sybil gasped in excitement, while Rylie gasped in alarm.
    Johnny shook his head. “He’s been dead awhile, but he’s twenty-first century, or twentieth at least. I could tell by his shoes.”
    “Are you sure it’s a man?” Donovan demanded, a terrible fear gripping him.
    Giving him a quizzical look, Johnny nodded then turned to McRory. “Please, Professor, will you come take a look?”
    “Straight away,” McRory answered, face grim. “Syb, you’d best call the authorities.” He stepped over the threshold and pulled
     on his rubber boots.
    Donovan plunked his cup into the sink. “I’d better come with you.”
    “Me too,” Rylie quickly chimed in.
    With a firm expression, McRory shook his head. “’Til we see what’s out there, you ladies need to stay here.”
    Sybil, who stood with her mobile phone in hand, gave a humph of dissatisfaction and turned away.
    Rylie glared but muttered, “Fine,” between her teeth.
    Not pausing for further discussion, they left the two unhappy women behind in the cottage. Donovan strode rapidly across the
     yard while McRory and Johnny kept pace with him.
    “We were taking the top layer off the new trench when Michael’s spade struck something,” Johnny babbled as they approached
     the canopied area where work tables and benches were set up. “’Twas a boot, but when he called me over to help unearth it,
     we saw ’twas a pair of boots, and the feet still in ’em!”
    Two men stood murmuring over one of the tables, but McRory waved them away when they moved to join the trio. Donovan was glad
     to give the work area a wide berth, in case there might be an artifact or something to trigger one of his visions.
    Tuning out Johnny’s nervous chatter, Donovan recalled how he stumbled upon the original dig site over two months ago. He’d
     been clearing dried grass and brush in the corner of the yard when he thought he heard a dog barking. He searched, but hadn’t
     found the source of the elusive sound. Frustrated, he whacked at a dead bush and when he uprooted the thing, beneath the shallow
     root system lay a purposefully constructed pit. Seeing the carefully arranged bones had triggered the first vision Donovan
     had experienced in over fifteen years.
    Amid the painful buzzing in his ears, he’d watched a Druid sacrifice the dog and place its body along with the foreleg bones
     of a horse into the pit to appease their gods Though the images had faded quickly, Donovan felt sick and frightened in their
     aftermath. His worst fear had come to pass. Coming back to his boyhood home had precipitated the return of the “gift” he’d
     never been able to control.
    When he was a young child, he saw and heard things that no one else did.