Laura Navarre - [The Magick Trilogy 02] Read online

  Midsummer Magick

  By Laura Navarre

  Tudor England, 1559

  The Virgin Queen’s Court whispers about shy scholar Lady Linnet Norwood, who spent a year and a day trapped in the Faerie realm and returned as a ruined woman. Linnet, however, is not yet free of magick. Otherworldly forces plot to use her to incite a bloody uprising that will twist the fates of mortal and Faerie realms alike.

  Exiled angel Zamiel wavers on the edge of accepting an offer from his fallen father to become Prince of Hell. Lucifer knows Lady Linnet’s significance, and urges his son to pursue and protect her for sinister ends.

  As Linnet flees those who would make her a pawn, Zamiel follows, tempting her trust and her passion. But the more he employs his killing rage on her behalf, the more he dreams of laying it aside in favor of peace.

  If the two can find faith together, they might sunder the unholy alliance that threatens the dawn of the Golden Age of England.

  Book two of The Magick Trilogy.

  99,000 words

  Dear Reader,

  I feel as though every month I start my letter the same, gushing over our month of releases and telling you how amazing and fantastic they are. This month, I’m going to change things up and start by telling you that they’re all quite awful. Okay, not really. Poor authors, I wonder how many of them reading this just had a mini heart attack? Of course you should be excited about this lineup of releases, because it’s another wonderful and diverse month.

  In the new-and-unique category, this month we have our first ever decide-your-own-erotic-adventure. Christine d’Abo’s Choose Your Shot is an interactive erotic adventure that not only lets the reader choose who the heroine ends up with, but what kinky fun the characters get up to along the way.

  We’re thrilled to welcome Karina Cooper to Carina Press. She’s moving her steampunk series, The St. Croix Chronicles, to Carina Press—starting with a prequel novella, The Mysterious Case of Mr. Strangeway, in which a young Cherry St. Croix takes on her first bounty, only to find her efforts challenged by a collector whose motives run deeper than a hefty purse. Look for book three in The St. Croix Chronicles, Corroded, releasing in September 2013.

  We have a strong lineup of contemporary romances this month. Fiona Lowe returns with her next Wedding Fever book, Picture Perfect Wedding. Tamara Morgan brings us The Derby Girl, in which a roller-derby girl lives up to her “bad girl” image to woo an unattainable plastic surgeon, only to discover that he’s the one man trained to see past the surface. In the humorous contemporary romance category, Stacy Gail’s Ugly Ducklings Finish First will be a hit with fans of high-school reunion romances, and with those who like their romance on the more lighthearted side.

  I’m also thrilled to welcome three debut authors to Carina Press this month, all with contemporary romances. In Kelsey Browning’s Personal Assets, book one of the Texas Nights series, a recovering good girl needs the right man to help her find her inner bad girl—which is easier said than done in a small Texas town. Next, when the bank refuses Emma the loan she needs to save her family home, she must turn to her neighbor Mitch McKenna, a sexy real-estate investor whose reputation she’s spent the past six months pulverizing into sand, in Unexpectedly You by Lily Santana. And last, but certainly not least, Knowing the Score by Kat Latham features a smokin’ hot rugby player with a scandalous past who gives up his vow of celibacy to help a virgin overcome her fear of intimacy. Three debut authors offer up three terrific contemporary romance novels—make sure to give them each a try!

  This month we also have three fantastic male/male romances. Kim Knox kicks off a fun-filled science-fiction historical trilogy. As described by the author, Agamemnon Frost and the House of Death is Sherlock Holmes meets The Scarlet Pimpernel. With aliens. Check out further Agamemnon Frost stories in September and October 2013.

  John Tristan joins Carina Press with his male/male fantasy romance, The Adorned. A beautiful young man indentures himself to a tattooist and becomes a living canvas for the artist and his inhuman patrons. And for those who like their male/male romance in the contemporary genre, Libby Drew’s Bending the Iron is sure to hit the mark as she builds a brand for emotional, wonderful male/male romance.

  Following book one of her Magick Trilogy, Magick by Moonrise, Laura Navarre takes us back into her historical paranormal world. When the Angel of Death falls in love with life, will a secret Tudor princess pay the ultimate price? Tudor England and the celestial realm collide in Midsummer Magick.

  Last, Love Letters Volume 4: Travel to Temptation continues the collection of A to Z erotic short-story romances penned by Ginny Glass, Christina Thacher, Emily Cale and Maggie Wells. Volumes 1 through 3 are now available. Look for volumes 5 and 6, Exposed and Cowboy’s Command, on sale in September and October 2013.

  As always, we have a significant backlist of books that I hope you’ll browse and take a look at, in genres from horror to mystery to fantasy to female/female and across the ranges of romance. There’s an adventure waiting for every reader!

  We love to hear from readers, and you can email us your thoughts, comments and questions to [email protected]. You can also interact with Carina Press staff and authors on our blog, Twitter stream and Facebook fan page.

  Happy reading!

  ~Angela James

  Executive Editor, Carina Press

  www.carinapress.com

  www.twitter.com/carinapress

  www.facebook.com/carinapress

  Dedication

  Once upon a time, there was a little girl who loved to read about fairies and romance and King Arthur’s court. Her parents nurtured that love by making sure her bookcase was always stuffed with magical reads.

  This one’s for my parents, Pam & Glen, still amazing after all these years. And for my sister Vikki, who still loves to call me Bookface.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  London

  January 1559

  The coronation of Elizabeth Tudor should have been Lady Linnet Norwood’s greatest hour. Only forty of the finest ladies in England had been chosen to accompany the new Queen from the Tower of London to Westminster Abbey in her time of triumph.

  Yet, as she rode bravely through the riotous streets on her shy bay mare, the new Countess of Glencross had never been more miserable.

  Beneath her, the poor beast flinched at every boom of cannon fire, every explosion of cheers as the citizens roared their support for their proud young Queen. On every side, a jostling wall of onlookers in bright holiday finery hemmed her in. Hundreds more spilled from the windows of the whitewashed, dark-beamed inns and shops that lined Gracechurch Street.

  To country-bred Linnet, the bewildering array of buildings seemed to blot out the sky. They leaned over the narrow cobblestone street until she feared the crowded structures would topple and crush them all like insects.

  Sweet Jesus, she was as jumpy as the mare, her skin taut and twitching with nerves under her fur-lined court gown of crimson velvet.

/>   Part of it was guilt. Her cloth-of-gold sleeves alone could have fed her modest household in their drafty castle on the Scottish march for a year.

  Part of it was agonized worry over her accursed clumsiness. Blessed St. Bride, let the horse not startle, or she’d go pitching heels over head in her fine regalia from this gilded deathtrap of a sidesaddle.

  But the worst part was fear.

  Fearful as a witless sparrow. Ye’d start at yer own shadow! Jasper’s old taunt rang in her ears. Aye, it was true, and none knew the reason better than he.

  Her brother was long dead, his bones scattered on unconsecrated ground somewhere in the ravine below Glencross. But his unquiet spirit would haunt her memory to the Judgment Day.

  “Begone, ye wee demon,” she whispered to banish the thought.

  She would have crossed herself, but drawing attention to her faith in this newly Protestant court was the last thing she wished for. She was a not-so-secret Catholic in a realm that despised them, her proud and ancient faith now stained with heretic blood by sad Mary Tudor—a devout Catholic—and the cruel Inquisition her Spanish King had brought to England as a bridal gift.

  She whispered a prayer for the dead Queen and those poor doomed souls. But the roaring crowd swallowed up her voice, burying her secrets under the joyful discord of happy England.

  Unheard as usual.

  Raising her chin, Linnet reined her prancing mare into line. Before her marched the crimson ranks of Queen Elizabeth’s Gentlemen Pensioners, bristling with ceremonial pikes, behind a canopied litter draped in white satin and gold. Within, the redheaded young Queen waved and beamed at her adoring populace.

  “No man in England would dare trouble ye here, ye wee bampot!” Impatient with her own timidity, Linnet chided herself, breath exploding white in the frosty air. “Ye’re one of the queen’s own ladies now, ye cloth-heid.”

  On either side, the proud beauties who served as the Queen’s Maids of Honor slanted her dubious glances. One haughty young blonde edged her mare away. They’d done their level best to ignore her since the master of ceremonies—the Queen’s favorite, Lord Robert Dudley—had waved her carelessly into place, his dark gypsy eyes already turning to more important matters, dismissing her soft-spoken thanks.

  Well, no matter. She hadn’t come all this weary way to London in the dead of winter to curry favor.

  Amid the billowing sea of her crimson skirts, Linnet clutched her scrap of parchment—the missive thrust into her hand by a ragged boy who stank of the tanner’s trade, lost in the throng before she could question him. That scrawled note whose brief words had set her heart hammering, hard and fearful, and drained the cold sting of color from her cheeks.

  If you truly wish to find the truth you seek, come alone to the Maid and Minion after the Rose Pageant on Gracechurch Street.

  No doubt it was a cruel jest, one more mockery from the Protestant court that scorned her.

  The Papist, the orphan, the mouse.

  The bastard.

  Now a galliard’s sprightly strains lilted over the cheering throng—another tableau to honor their new Queen. Was it the Rose Pageant? Beneath her tight-laced stomacher, her belly fluttered with nerves.

  She would go where bidden, as she’d always done, but steel herself not to be disappointed by the outcome. Very likely the note was but a hoax, for God knew the question of her parentage had been bruited about since she’d come to court. Her cold-eyed father and his deathbed pronouncement had seen to that. Why shouldn’t they whisper, when her own father repudiated her?

  Too bad for Edward Norwood that his sons were dead by violence or mischance, all three of them, and his slip of a daughter the only living heir Glencross had left.

  Besides, she ought not to mind being branded a bastard. Forsooth, she preferred it to the other rumors, the ones that called her mad—the poor girl who’d vanished for two long years and reappeared from nowhere, raving she’d been kidnapped by Faeries.

  Half-Scottish, half-mad, and now a bastard to boot. Three marks against her, each worse than the last.

  Enough.

  Firmly Linnet silenced the whispers of doubt, straightened her shoulders and gripped her reins in fingers growing numb from cold. Ahead, the Queen’s litter swayed to a halt for the Rose Pageant.

  Here, before the stands where the guildsmen watched in their fur-lined gowns, costumed players re-enacted key scenes from the Tudor dynasty. Now the imposing frame of King Henry VIII and his long-dead consort Anne Boleyn, supported by Unity and Concord, proclaimed a redheaded girl with a crown and scepter their new Queen.

  Linnet was too distant to hear the generous words of praise the Queen must bestow upon this pleasing spectacle. She’d been speechless with astonishment to be given any place at all.

  Still, her mounted post afforded some vantage, over a bobbing sea of hats and hoods, of the painted sign that swung from a high gable—a buxom maid linking hands with a ragged urchin.

  The Maid and Minion.

  Her heart bumped, hard and anxious, against the whalebone cage of her corset. With her destination in sight—a possible answer to the doubts that plagued her—her mouth went dry. Suddenly the cup of warm ale she’d sipped to break her fast seemed long ago and distant, like her half-remembered dreams of Faerie. She’d never been fearful in the Summer Lands, the Faerie realm that hovered like a mirage alongside Tudor England, separated from the mortal world by a fragile curtain of mist that grew thinner each year.

  But nay, that was the world she’d imagined while she wandered, lost and witless, on the Scottish moor.

  Carefully, Linnet edged her mare through the ranks. The shy bay balked at passing so close to the others, a reticence her rider shared. Still, there was no help for it.

  “Come, Moibeal, ye bonny sweet lass. Don’t fash.” Gently she coaxed the little mare. “They’re a noisy bunch, aye, but we’ve naught to fear from them.”

  Her movement jostled the elegant blonde at her side, who shot Linnet a disdainful look. “God’s Body, where do you fancy you’re going? Lord Robert directed us most expressly not to stray from the line.”

  “Aye, and I beg yer pardon.” Linnet offered an apologetic smile. “My throat’s that dry, Lady Catherine. I’ll just step down for a drop of sweet wine at the inn yonder, and be back in a twinkling. Wouldn’t ye like me to fetch ye some?”

  “Drink swill from that filthy inn?” The blonde made a moue of distaste. “Oh, ’tis good enough for the common sort, no doubt.”

  By reflex, Linnet ducked her head at the slur, prepared to hide behind her hood as she’d always done. Then, recalling her new rank, she lifted her chin and kneed Moibeal past.

  If she wished to be treated with the courtesy due a countess, she must bear herself accordingly. A fearful demeanor only invited others to abuse her.

  Jasper had taught her that.

  As she edged through the solid press of footmen holding back the eager throng, her anxiety mounted. The note had been most precise. If she failed to appear when bidden, her mysterious correspondent might conclude she wasn’t coming. She would have missed her chance to learn the truth she’d journeyed all the way to London to find.

  Biting her lip, she took her bearings from the painted sign, then slipped from the saddle. At once the crowd swallowed her up, a wall of bodies well wrapped and buffered against the biting cold. Patiently coaxing Moibeal to follow, Linnet threaded her way past flushed goodwives and good-natured merchants, all too intent on the spectacle to heed a wayward girl. She gave a wide berth to a band of young journeymen, rowdy with drink.

  She’d feared her splendid gown would excite notice, but she should have known better. Even clad in crimson velvet and cloth-of-gold, with her fire-streaked riot of mahogany curls piled high, she was still the mouse who crept along the floorboards.

  Invisible.

  Hundreds of England’s highest nobility, from the Lord Mayor of London to the Duke of Norfolk himself, paraded through the streets beside her, arrayed in pride and
glittering finery. Among them, Lady Linnet Norwood was the same insignificant little nobody she’d always been.

  By the time she reached the Maid and Minion, she was bruised and breathless. Thankfully she reached for the door—only to find it sealed and bolted, shutters nailed tight over the street-side windows. A pang of dismay stabbed through her.

  A ragged parchment nailed to the boards, months old, informed her the inn was closed and its master seized by the Crown for heresy. One of the last heretics, the poor wretch, to burn for his faith under the last regime.

  “Sweet mercy!” she exclaimed. “Is it all for naught, then?”

  Having steeled herself for some outcome, whether good or bad, she found the acrid taste of disappointment hard to swallow. She’d come south for no other reason than this, to piece together the summer her mother had spent in London twenty-three years ago—the summer Linnet was conceived.

  How much longer must she live beneath this stigma of bastardy she could neither confirm nor refute? How much longer must she flounder like an insect trapped in amber before the court’s unfriendly eyes—neither usurper nor madwoman, just the dutiful Catholic lady she’d always striven to be? How much longer must she wait, unable to secure the strong husband she’d reluctantly concluded her troubled lands must have? No respectable man would take her with the double stigma of bastardy and lunacy overshadowing her prospects.

  To say nothing of her faith.

  Tears of frustration blurred her vision. Impatient with her own weakness, she dashed them away.

  “Ye mustn’t lose hope so easy,” she muttered, indulging her childhood habit of talking to herself, since there was never anyone to listen. “Pretend ye’re a knight on crusade, a Knight of the Round Table, like Lancelot...”

  Nay, not him. Not Lancelot. Ansgar the divine spear, they called him in the Summer Lands. The land of Faerie.

  Her mind veered away from that dangerous terrain. She’d pretend to be Sir Galahad, one of King Arthur’s knights from the Faerie tales she’d read to her brother Colin, the ones the wee lad had loved so much.

  Aye, she was Sir Galahad, on a quest for the Holy Grail, and not to be thwarted so easily. No doubt she’d find another entrance in back.