“I didn’t think so.” James folded his arms, trying to look stern. “It wouldn’t be yon mist-” He broke off when she wriggled her fingers and the glittering mass shimmied and spun away over the edge of the corrie. Only a few twirling sparkles remained and then they, too, winked out, leaving no trace of the luminous fog.
James cleared his throat, frowning. “I would have preferred-”
“Pah!” Grizel set her hands on her hips. “What, then? Would you rather have tromped up here on your own, with two broken toes?”
“My toes aren’t broken.” James was sure they were.
“Say you.” Grizel wasn’t fooled.
It was also clear that she’d used her craft to do more than whisk him into her midst. A glance showed that the spill of rock that had blocked the corrie, no longer proved an obstacle. Now there was narrow gap where the ravine ended, a dark passage through stone, just large enough for a man.
Beyond that the heather-rich ground swept away and upwards, widening into a rolling moor of finest grazing, bounded by the daunting heights of some of the most steep-sided, jagged peaks in the land.
This was the heart of the Glen of Many Legends.
And – James knew well – no mortal man could call this stirring place his own.
A light touch to his elbow made that clear. “Are you for having me rid you of those aching toes now, or” – she darted a glance across the moor to a low, white-walled cottage tucked snugly between a tangle of boulders at the base of a particularly steep cliff – “will you be wanting a wee bit of nourishment before-”
“I’ll be keeping my toes and the pain.” James was sure she didn’t mean she might banish his digits, but he didn’t want to take any chances.
Wise women such as Grizel sometimes took a visitor’s wishes too earnestly and – he swallowed – worked spells that wrought all sorts of havoc.
So it paid to speak plainly.
It was also in his best interest not to set foot inside the home she shared with her partner, Gorm. Known as Tigh-na-Craig – House on the Rock – the earthy-sweet peat smoke that permeated the thatched cottage was said to be so soothing it could lull susceptible visitors into a doze that could last a thousand years.
Longer if a soul was unlucky.
James tried not to shudder.
Grizel stepped closer. “This day has seen me busy.” Her gaze flitted again to the cottage. “I’ve set out some fine cheese, made from the milk of my best hinds and” – she laid a knotty-knuckled hand on his arm, the glint in her eyes showing that she’d read his thoughts – “fresh-baked oatcakes, hot off the toasting stone.
“There’s even a thick meat broth bubbling over the fire.” She peered up at him, her voice crooning. “A fat capon, well larded and savory-”
“Nae.” James broke away before her words could spell him to her cottage with its softly glowing peat fire and tantalizing smell of food. “I’m no’ hungry,” he lied, his stomach rumbling loudly.
“Och! I do be sorry to hear that, I am.” She didn’t sound grieved at all.
But her voice did come from at least twenty paces behind him.
James froze, balling his fists.
He’d been marching through knee-high heather and grass, making for Tigh-na-Craig, as had undoubtedly been Grizel’s nefarious plan.
He swung around to glare at her. “You tricked me.”
“And if I did?” She glanced at his foot. “Be you still in pain?”
He wasn’t.
James pressed his lips together, not wanting to admit that his toes felt good as new.
“I see you aren’t!” She had the cheek to look mightily pleased.
James frowned, stubborn.
Grizel didn’t seem affronted. “I’ve been healing worse than broken toes since before the first sprig o’ heather bloomed in these hills.” She came forward to poke him with a slightly-crooked finger. “That be long enough to know that some men would sooner choke to death than admit they’ve got a bone in their throat.”
“Ah, well….” James pulled a hand over his chin. “The pain has gone, aye. And” – he glanced at the deer herd, now nibbling grass along the edge of a black-watered lochan – “I do thank you.”
“It was Rannoch what told me you were in need.” Grizel sent an affectionate glance to the white stag. He stood apart from the other beasts, his proud head held high and his uncanny gaze fixed on them.
“Did he tell you my foot was aching?” James felt foolish discussing a deer with such capabilities. But he knew better than to doubt the cailleach. “Or did he- … Rannoch, reveal the true reason I came to see you?”
He just hoped she and Gorm would give him the answer he sought without too much ceremony.
She might have cured his throbbing toes, and he did feel obliged to her, but it was late. He’d hoped to be back at Castle Haven by noon. Now – he could scarce believe how swiftly the day had vanished - the gloaming was slipping across the land, darkening the moor.
“She’s a great beauty, eh?” Grizel was eyeing him, looking purposeful.
“Who?” James felt the back of neck heat.
“Why” – She didn’t even blink – “she who you saw this day.”
“What makes you think I saw a woman?”
“Hah!” Grizel gave a cackle that would have curled the hair of a lesser man. “She cares for you, that one. I do be speaking of the maid with the shining tresses.”
“Humph.” James felt a spurt of irritation.
Grizel was baiting him. Catriona and Scandia both had shining tresses. But he knew from experience that it’d be pointless to try and prise a more direct explanation from the crone.
She enjoyed riddles.
James couldn’t abide them.
“Is Gorm in his cave?” He looked past Grizel to a cleft in one of the hills. It was there that Gorm spent his days, peering into a smooth-surfaced pool in the floor of the cave. Said to be bottomless, the pool reflected every thought and deed in the world since time beginning. And some claimed, beyond earth’s end.
Every evening before sundown, Gorm gathered handfuls of these truths and formed them into dreams. These he took with him to the front of the cave, releasing them to the night wind which bore them to those deserving.
James shuddered.
He knew the old man carried his tidings in both hands, his right hand clutching the good and true dreams, while he used the left one to deliver nightmares and false omens meant only to deceive.
The bards swore Gorm never erred.
His credo was simple.
Those pure of heart needn’t fear him. Others….
James swallowed, his every sin flashing across his mind. He was especially aware of how he could still feel Catriona’s warm supple body pressed to his side. How he’d burned with desire for her. He did now, fevering to taste the soft, ripeness of her lips. Need rode him hard, making him ache to drink in her sweetness. He drew a tight breath, certain his lust stood all over him, blazing like a beacon.
And now that he was here, so close to Gorm and his Pool of Truth, he was no longer sure he wanted to hear what the ancient might tell him.
“Gorm is there, aye.” Grizel spoke at last, sounding a bit miffed. “There be no day what passes when he isn’t up at thon cave.”
She leaned close, eyeing him sharply. “You’ve no need to see him. There’s naught he can say that I don’t know myself, mayhap better.”
“To be sure, and I respect your wisdom.” James kept his voice firm. “But I’ll no’ be offending Gorm by leaving here without conferring with him as well. Therefore” – he held Grizel’s bright gaze – “I will be making the journey up to his cave.”
“So be it.” She turned then and struck out across the moor, taking a narrow path that had suddenly opened between the windblown grass and heather. “But keep close for the way there changes more swiftly than the climb to the Bowing Stone and its corrie.”
Moving swiftly, she led him toward the steep rise where t
he cave’s black-jawed opening grew more ominous the closer they came. Jagged rocks guarded either side of the entrance and any moment he expected the boulders to rear up as scaly-backed, fire-breathing dreagans.
But as they neared the cave, it was only Gorm who stepped from the darkness to greet them.
A small, slightly bent man with a whirr of iron-gray hair and a particularly fine beard that reached to his knees, he hobbled forward on short bandy legs, his elfin face lit with a smile.
“It’s yourself, young James!” He beamed welcome from warm, intelligent eyes. “I know why you’re here and can put your mind to rest.”
Relief flooded James. “Clan Cameron will be victorious? The King will honor-”
“The King will be just, sure as I’m standing here. But….” Gorm closed his eyes, drawing a long breath. “You know fine I cannot tell you more. To do so would break faith with the Old Ones who’ve asked me to guard this sacred place.
“Truth to tell” – he opened his eyes and James saw a flicker a sadness in the clear blue depths – “they’d poison the waters of the Pool of Truth and cause it to overflow, flooding this high moor and, belike, the whole of the glen. The deluge would be unending, not stopping until a vast loch covered every stone and no living creature, man or beast, could ever call this land home again.”
“Pah!” Grizel kicked a pebble with her tiny black-shod foot.
Gorm gave her a look, undaunted.
James felt the blood rush in his ears, a dull roar that crushed his hopes. His gut twisted and a scalding heat filled his chest, making it hard to breathe. When he then noticed Gorm’s hands – both clasped loosely before him – he knew real dread.
Whatever truth the Maker of Dreams had seen, it held both good and evil.
Through Gorm’s fingers, James could see tiny bursts of brilliant blue-white flames and dark, pulsing shadows, blacker than the coldest night.
“Is the answer there?” He couldn’t look away from Gorm’s joined hands.
“So it is, aye.” The ancient nodded. “I have seen a truth that belongs to many men. You and your warriors will not stand alone on the field that day. Others will be there, too. Champions who fight and” – his eyes met James, piercing – “those who simply watch.
“I have seen into the hearts of all these souls.” He paused, flinging up his hands so that the swirls of light and darkness were caught by the wind and swept away. “It is your mingled fates, and the outcome you share, that I brought from the cave.”
“And that you’ve now released.” James couldn’t keep the bitterness from his voice.
“I could do naught else.” Gorm took a step toward him, his beard fluttering in the wind. “Such is the truth I’ve seen and no power on earth, not even my own, can change the events about to unfold.”
James cocked a brow. “Yet you say my mind should be eased?”
“I’ve been given a message to lighten your heart.” Gorm’s ancient voice rang deep, bold and powerful. “Men cannot alter their destiny, but they can choose how they master what comes. The words I have for you are ones the gods allow me to share. No more, no less. If you are wise, their portent should please you.”
“Then tell him.” Grizel jabbed him with a bony elbow.
Gorm kept his dignity. “I have seen” – he stepped aside to make room for Rannoch when he clattered up to the cave, joining them – “that peace will be had when innocents pay the price of blood and gold covers the glen.”
James stared at him. “That’s a riddle. It makes no sense.”
“It is what will be.”
“And if I ignore it?”
“You can, to be sure.” Gorm took a slow breath. “But doing so will not change the prophecy.”
“It’s a prophecy?” James felt as if icy mists were swirling around him, dark and terrible.
“It is the truth.” Gorm’s words came from far away, an echo beneath the rushing wind.
James frowned and clutched his plaid, the wind buffeting him. He struggled, staggering against the lashing gale and furious because he wanted to tell Gorm – and Grizel and their nosy white stag – that he didn’t care for their truths, by any name.
But when the wind died, he was no longer with the ancients at their cave. He was back at the corrie, his arm braced against the outcrop that – his eyes rounded – was no longer the shining, rune-carved Bowing Stone, but a jumble of towering, weathered stone.
And the end of the ravine once again tailed away into nothingness. The gap he’d passed through, was no more.
Not that it mattered.
He knew where he’d been and what he’d heard.
He just didn’t like it.
And he’d be damned if he was going to accept a fate that didn’t please him. So he squared his shoulders, set his jaw, and started down the hill.
He had much to do.
Chapter 6
“Lady – you’ll catch your death in that draught.”
Maili, Blackshore’s laundress and Catriona’s friend, swept up to the window in a cloud of musky perfume and swirled a shawl around Catriona’s shoulders. In a flash, two small dogs flew off Catriona’s bed and sped across the room, barking madly. They leapt at Maili, hurling themselves against her legs as if she had something dire in mind rather than seeing to her mistress’s comfort.
“Birkie, Beadle” – Catriona spoke sharply to the yapping dogs – “be still. Maili isn’t hurting me.”
“That be true.” Maili stood back and yanked her skirts aside, away from the jumping beasties. She was a plump maid with bouncing dark curls, a generous bosom, and merry brown eyes. “But they’re only trying to protect you, as am I. The wind is cold and-”
“Brisk air is good for the lungs.” Catriona smoothed the shawl in place all the same. “And I’m not in need of protection. It’s our men who are in danger.”
“Men have swords.” Maili flounced onto one of the window embrasure’s cushioned benches. “Two kinds, praise God. And most of them” – she crossed her legs, swinging one foot - “wield both weapons with mastery.”
“Pah.” Catriona’s gaze went to the black clouds racing in from the sea, then back to Maili. “If they knew what they were about, the King’s men wouldn’t be in the glen, fouling good Highland air.”
She ignored the rest of her friend’s comment.
Maili couldn’t breathe without swooning over men’s amatory skills. Catriona understood – especially since she’d felt the hard press of James’ powerful body against hers when he’d hurried her through the glen, how he’d almost kissed her on the boat strand, his breath teasing her skin and the heat in his eyes making her tingle – but unlike Maili, she lacked experience in such delights.
And she was only interested in one man.
Her heart beat for James Cameron alone, even if her position as Lady of Blackshore made him the least suitable contender for her affections.
Her feelings for him were a plague she’d always managed to suppress until their fiery encounter in the wood. Now tinder had been thrown onto the flames and she feared she’d never be the same again.
She did lean down to scratch Birkie and Beadle behind the ears, and then straightened when they dashed across the room and leaped back onto the bed.
As soon as they settled, she turned again to the window. She liked the cold rain just beginning to spit down from the heavens and the lashing wind suited her mood. If James wasn’t going to turn back and darken Blackshore’s gate, she wouldn’t mind him receiving a drenching on his journey back to Castle Haven.
A dousing from above to match the wet and soggy feet he’d earned when he’d stomped across Blackshore’s causeway as the tide raced in.
Had he returned as any sensible man would’ve done, given the wild and roiling skies, he could’ve spent the evening in a chair by the hearth, his belly full, sipping ale, and – she was quite sure – proving to her that his kisses were hotter than dreagan fire.
As it was….
He’d pref
erred to stalk off into the gloaming.
She bristled, his ability to ignore her twisting like a knife in her gut. Her worry about him – there wasn’t a MacDonald born who wasn’t a wizard with a sword, after all – tightened her chest, almost suffocating her.
The intensity of her concern was galling.
She should hate him.
Instead just the thought of him made her pulse quicken and her heart pound as whirls of deliciously heated prickles spilled through her until she was left wanting him more badly than ever before.
If he fell at the trial by combat, she’d never recover.
There had to be something she could do. Indeed, she would do something if only Alasdair wasn’t treating her as if she’d lost her wits.
She glanced at Maili, bristling. “The men should be locked in their bedchambers, not me.”
“But you aren’t, my lady.” Maili’s dark eyes met hers. “You’re free to roam anywhere-”
“Anywhere within Blackshore’s walls which is the same as being trapped in my room.” Catriona fumed inwardly, a wild and wicked part of her rebelling against her brother’s foolery. “I’d wager my toes that James Cameron hasn’t forbid his sister from leaving Castle Haven.”
“Lady Isobel isn’t you.” Maili tucked her feet up under her on the window bench. “Word is she’s quiet and biddable. She’s not one to stir trouble.”
Catriona turned back to the window. A thick wall of mist was beginning to slide across the loch, blanketing the far shore and the hills beyond. “I don’t stir trouble.”
“Mischief, then.”
“That neither.”
“There are some who’d argue that you do.”
“Then they aren’t harangued by overprotective brothers who sometimes can’t be suffered without a touch of trickery.” Catriona took a deep breath, remembering Alasdair’s most recent sampling of good intentions. He’d proposed she wed a deep-pursed, generously landed laird who – for once – been only a few years older than herself, but whose face had been marred by bulging, fish-like eyes.
Sins of a Highland Devil: Highland Warriors Book 1 Page 9