MacAlister's Hope (12 page)

Fia pulled it from the pouch she had yet to tie back on her belt and placed it in Elena’s palm. Elena held the stone out for a puzzled Symon to take from her.

“Hold it in your palm and tell them what you told me,” Elena said to him

Symon looked from the stone to his wife and back, then shrugged. “I told her Kieron loves you very much, Fia, enough to keep his promises to you even when faced with the Devil of Kilmartin. I told her I believed he was a man worthy of you.” A milky, but distinctly pink, ribbon of light filled the stone.

Fia had not heard that name in many years, an epithet used by many until Elena came among them. Now it made her smile as she reached for Kieron’s hand.

“Kieron is brave beyond measure,” she said, looking up at the man she loved with all her heart.

Symon chuckled. “He also told me that he wants to wed with you. Do you feel the same?”

“Aye, but—“

“No buts, sprite. You’ve said enough.” Elena held her hand out and Symon poured the stone into it. Elena held it up for all to see.

“Symon and I would be very happy to see the two of you wed.”

The stone turned a brilliant pink, with a shimmering deep blue weaving through it.

Fia stared at the stone. “What does that mean?”

“I do not ken, love,” Kieron answered her.

“I think it means happiness,” Elena said, “for I am abidingly happy today. I think a month is long enough to wait, do you not?” she said to Fia and Kieron.

“Wait?” Fia asked.

“To be wed,” Symon said. “Elena and Mairi need you here until my love is recovered fully. ’Twill give you a little time to train Mairi some more, too, though I think we should be able to spare her now and again so she can visit you at Kilglashan when she is ready to learn more.”

“I would like to see the daughter-of-my-heart married where I was,” Elena said, “in the stone circle where first I saw my Symon. In the stone circle where we were wed.”

Fia was unable to speak around the emotions that raced through her. Symon cleared his throat and threw a pointed look at Kieron who suddenly pulled Fia to face him.

“Fia, you are my love, my destiny, my hope.” He took her face in his hands and kissed her lightly. “Will you be my wife?”

She looked back at the couple who she owed so much to. “You are sure?” she asked them.

“Dinna keep the lad waiting, imp. ’Tis cruel.”

She turned back to the man she loved with all her heart. “I will!”

Kieron whooped, startling the bairns from their sleep.

Epilog

Kilglashan Village, 1323

“’Tis a perfect tincture, Mairi!” Fia placed the small glass bottle on the shelf above the workbench in her stillroom. “I do not think there is aught else I can teach you of herbs.”

Mairi grinned. “Mum says the same for the Lamont healing gift.”

“I do indeed,” Elena said as she walked through the wide open door, bringing the scent of spring inside with her. We’ve brought someone to see you,” she said as she shooed the toddling twins, Fia and Ranald, into the chamber on the ground floor of the hallhouse. Upon Fia’s marriage to Kieron, the MacAlister chief had insisted she take the space for her stillroom.

“Who?” Fia asked, trying to look around Elena to see out the door, though the sound of a fussy bairn gave away the answer.

“The wee princess, of course,” Kieron said as he stepped around Elena and her weans, his crying daughter on his hip. “Hope is hungry and only her mother will do,” he said as he handed their nine month old daughter into Fia’s arms.

Warmth filled Fia’s heart as she held her bairn. Kieron beamed at the two of them, as proud a da as she had ever seen, and her eyes filled with tears.

“What is it, sprite?” Elena asked quietly.

Kieron just smiled and pulled Fia close with an arm around her shoulders. “She is happy,” he said, laying a sweet kiss upon the crown of her head.

Elena looked skeptical, so Fia smiled and leaned into her husband’s embrace. “I cannot help it. I am so happy the tears just come.” Hope let out a cry of frustration as she nuzzled at her mother’s breast, stymied by her mother’s gown. “Patience, little one,” Fia said, moving to the chair she kept in the stillroom for just this reason. She quickly settled the bairn to her meal.

“’Twould make a good name for our next one,” Kieron said as he settled onto the stone floor. Ranald and the new wee Fia immediately clambered over their uncle.

“What would?” Fia asked.

“Patience,” he said, a twinkle in his eye.

“Nay, ‘twould be too confusing since that is what I say to both of you all the time.”

“But patience is difficult for us MacAlisters,” he said, and she could tell he was trying his best to keep their secret. All at once the love she felt for him and the bairn they had made filled her heart to overflowing.

“You can tell them,” she said, laughing at the look of glee that swept over his beloved face.

Elena and Mairi were looking from one of them to the other. “Well?” Elena asked.

“We are having another bairn,” Fia and Kieron said together.

Elena and Mairi whooped so loud they startled the twins and the baby. Fia calmed Hope. Elena and Mairi each scooped up a twin, bouncing them on their hips to stop their crying. Kieron rose from the floor and kissed his wife, and his bairn, and the joyful tears that seemed a constant in Fia’s life of late once more trembled on her lashes. Fia could not imagine a better life, a better husband, or a better family, old and new, than she had.

“I think if ’tis a girl,” Fia said to them all once the weans were quieted, “we should name her Joy.”

The Devil of Kilmartin

Excerpt

Southwestern Highlands, Scotland

Spring 1307

Madness clawed at Symon MacLachlan's soul. He battled it back with every breath his burning lungs could steal. The skirl of a wounded animal burst from his parched lips. His horse broke into a gallop. Pain pounded through Symon’s skull in time with the beat of the animal's hooves. His stomach lurched and dipped, threatening to empty itself. Purging, purifying wind battered his disloyal body and desperate mind.

Symon slowed the horse as he tried to grasp where he was. He glanced about at the moonlit forest searching for some clue as to why he was here. All of a sudden the trees around him bowed, as if in deference to his passing. His stomach roiled. He closed his eyes and willed the grove to right itself, willed the madness away. He swayed in the saddle and a low, feral, growl escaped him.

He would not let this blasted madness win!

Symon concentrated on the things he could feel — the warm, sweat-covered hide of the tired beast beneath him, the familiar texture of his plaid, bunched at his shoulder and about his waist, the chill wash of an early spring breeze against his fevered skin. He gathered his senses and slowly opened his eyes.

Blessedly, the trees were upright, their leaves rustling above where they belonged, silhouetted against the moon-bright sky.

It was a bloody awful way to live, never knowing when the madness would crash over him.

The horse stopped suddenly, nearly unseating him. It moved neither forward nor back, but rather danced nervously in place, shifting from one foot to another as if unsure which way to go. Symon nudged it forward, but it halted once more after only a few unwilling steps. Standing directly in their path was the dark outline of an ancient stone circle. His mount shied, snorting and shaking its head, as if denying the sight.

Symon calmed the animal, sharing its dislike for the silent, pensive circle, hunkered here at the edge of the glen. He wished to deny the sight as well. But that was impossible. He knew this cursed place. He knew the madness had led him back here.

The stones stood silently in their primeval ring as if standing in judgment of him. All the ills that had befallen his clan these past six months, even his own hated reputation, had started here, in this circle, on that fateful day of his father's death. Symon clenched his shaking hands. The past could not be changed.

But it could be faced.

It was madness to enter the circle again, but madness was his near-constant companion. What more harm could come from this place than the death of his father and the torment his life had become these past months? Symon would not let his weakness get in his way. Something had brought him here, and he was determined to face his fate. Perhaps then he would find a way free of his curse. If he did not, he would lose all that he had ever worked for in life: his position, his honor. It had already stolen his self-respect.

Symon slid from the horse. As he tied it to a tree, a hound bayed in the distance and was quickly answered by another, adding to the horse's already nervous shifting. It pulled at its lead, eyes wide, breath coming hard and fast.

"Shh," Symon said, grateful that his voice obeyed him. He scratched the horse’s cheek for a moment, quieting the animal and himself.

Finally Symon took a deep breath and moved toward the accursed rocks, drawn by the circle as a lodestone draws iron. The hounds bayed again, the sound echoing off the stones, warning him away. The hair at the base of his neck prickled in response.

"'Tis only a ring of mighty rocks." The sound of his own voice, though gravelly as always after the madness, calmed him.

Determined to meet his fate, he strode between two of the tall rocky sentries and into the circle.

A bare pace within, he stopped.

Gone was the clear air of spring, nor was the remembered blood-stink of battle present in the circle. It was like walking into warm, thick water. Sounds were muffled and the smells of a moment ago, damp, boggy earth and sharp, dusty rock, were muted here, more like the memory of a smell than the actual smell itself.

Mist began to rise about his feet, swirling up from the ground, reaching out and embracing the huge moss- and lichen-clad stones. Damp wisps of reflected moonlight filled the gaps between them with a transparent wall of white moonglow.

Hounds bayed once again, closer, accompanied now by a long wailing cry. The stallion stamped the ground.

Symon remembered to breathe.

It was only a trick of the wind, that wailing. It was only the remnants of madness that made that wail sound human.

Symon rolled his shoulders, noting the weight of his claymore high against his back, and the lesser weight of his dudgeon dagger tucked at his belt. At least his affliction did not extend to leaving himself weaponless.

A branch cracked. Symon whirled in the direction of the noise. Something hurtled from the mist and threw itself at him, hitting hard enough to force the breath from him. He staggered and his arms encircled the all-too-solid form of a woman.

Long-fingered hands gripped his tunic. Leaf-tangled hair caught in the stubble on his chin even as a peacefulness he no longer believed possible washed over him. Calm, like a healing salve on weather-raw skin, pushed the lingering confusion and pain from him. He felt clear-headed, balanced, and strong as he hadn't since the madness had first come over him in this very place.

Hounds bayed just beyond the mist, and the stallion snorted its misgivings. The unearthly wailing sounded again, this time from just under his chin. The woman pushed away from him, stumbling when he released her.

Peace deserted him.

He reached for her again, grabbing a bony wrist. Peace stole up his arm and briefly fluttered in his chest. She tried to stumble backward, her eyes fixed over his shoulder.

"Help me, I beg of you!" Desperation at odds with the peace he felt colored her low voice.

His decision was made in an instant. He drew his dagger and spun in one smooth, practiced motion to face the direction she had come from.

Huge, gray wolfhounds strained at the edge of the mist-shrouded circle, slavering like the hounds of hell, but they did not enter. Symon heard scrabbling as the woman moved to the far side of the circle. There she could easily slip into the mist and away from the hounds while Symon held their attention.

The easiest thing would be to let the hounds continue their hunt, but Symon had never been one to take the easy road.

So he would dispatch the dogs, and the keeper he was sure followed them. He would dispatch them by word or by blade, it mattered not, and retrieve the woman himself. Then he would regain that momentary peace. A peace he was suddenly determined to have.

He sheathed his dagger and drew forth his claymore, feeling calmer with the massive sword in his hands. Any reprieve from his own private hell was worth a fight. Even a fight in this circle. Especially a fight in this circle.

He planted his feet, balancing his stance, his claymore at the ready. A muttered curse came out of the mist, quieting the dogs, and sending them skirting the edge of the circle. A shaggy-haired man stepped between the stones, his dagger glinting in the moonlight, his heavily bearded face cast in shadows.

"Where is she?" the stranger demanded.

The voice was almost familiar, teasing his memory as if he should know it.

Symon said nothing as he moved slowly toward the man.

"'Twas a lass ran this way. I will have her back."

Still Symon did not answer. Something about the rumble, the thick burr, not entirely of these parts, picked at him, but he couldn't call the memory forward.

"I saw her come this way." The other man's voice grew threatening. "The hounds tracked her. I'll have her back!"

Symon took in the man's stance, the way he shifted slightly foot to foot, his dagger hand swaying back and forth as if he was unsure which way Symon would come at him.

"Just point the way she went," the man said, "and I'll leave you be."

Symon took another step toward him. The stranger stepped back deeper into the shadows.

"I'm after the lass."

"You are on MacLachlan land. If you do not leave now, you will die on MacLachlan land."

"Where I die is between the devil and myself, you bloody bastard."

"As you wish," Symon said.