The Witch's Hunger (The Fay Morgan Chronicles Book 3) by Katherine Sparrow Page B

his sleep. The spelled stone still sat on her forehead. I plucked it off and then lay down quickly beside him, nuzzling into his side moments before his eyes blinked open.
    “I had a dream you were gone,” he said blurrily.
    Paranoia fizzed through me as I smiled and kissed the tip of his nose. Did he know? No one must know. Anyone who did would want my Grail. Even Merlin.
    “But then I woke and here you are,” he said and kissed my cheek.
    I kissed his mouth. “I’m always here, love.”
    “Always … for now,” he said and rubbed his pointer finger over the forgetting spell wrapped around my arm. Blue light shone through from where the spell was slowly breaking.
    I hated looking at it. I hated knowing that I had worn the damned spell for over a thousand years, and had only discovered it four months ago when it began to break and I realized that the man who seemed so familiar to me was actually Merlin. My ancient foe, who had then been my true love, and then, for reasons I did not yet know, I’d erased all memories of him from my life. It had made me forget the Grail, too. Somehow, someway, I had put a spell on myself to forget them both, but why? I had no answers, and would have broken the forgetting spell all the way were it not such a massive spell that it might drive me mad. So I lay beside Merlin, wanting to promise him eternity, but I couldn’t. “Breakfast? Smoothies and scones and then another swim with our shark friends?” I said.
    “The perfect day with the perfect lass.” Merlin stretched his arm upward and grinned just as my phone rang.
    Few had the number. It was Lila calling. I’d asked her to call me every couple of days to check in about how my store was faring, but we had spoken yesterday.
    “Has something happened? Are you all right?” I asked as I answered the phone and stood up. I turned from Merlin and pulled on a long silk robe.
    “Good morning,” she said. “I really don’t mean to bug you, Morgan. I shouldn’t be bugging you. It’s only there’s this woman here and she kind of reminds me of you? I mean she’s mean. I mean, not that you are. And she’s bossy. And—”
    “Hand me the phone,” someone said sharply. A moment later, a voice spoke crisply into the phone. “If you are behind this, Morgan, I will skin you alive.”
    I scowled at the phone and had no idea who was speaking, or what she meant. Then a memory pulsed out of my forgetting spell. It hit me lightly and though it made my head ache, I didn’t pass out as I remembered this woman. It was Cleopatra.
    Not Queen Cleopatra—this was Cleopatra the great alchemist. A commoner with no relation to the Queen of gold and asps, born hundreds of years after the first one. This woman was Egyptian too, and had taken the Queen’s name as a pseudonym back when she had first started alchemy and needed to hide her true identity. She was older than me by a good six hundred years. “Why might you take my skin, Cleopatra?” I asked coldly.
    “Don’t you play dumb with me, Morgan le Fay. If you are not behind this, then tell me what you know.”
    I rubbed my forehead, but no more memories rose up to inform me about what she could possibly be talking about.
    “Speak or I will roast your organs,” she hissed.
    “My skin and my organs? Threaten me again, Cleopatra. Please. That will go well for you. Or perhaps you could instead tell me what in five red hells you are talking about. I live far from any gossip circuit. On purpose. And I’ve been on—” Vacation. For nine weeks. After centuries away from my love, and with an undetermined future, I thought we both deserved that. Not that I needed or wanted to explain any of that to this alchemist. “On leave. Doing research.”
    “Research in Belize? Are you investigating margaritas and flexible men?”
    Damn. Lila had told her where I was. Lila. Cleopatra wouldn’t hurt her, would she? Likely not, but if I was wrong?
    I turned from Merlin and grabbed my bag. I touched my