Temptation of a Highland Scoundrel

by Sue-Ellen Welfonder

  Suchlike did happen now and then.

  And perhaps it was vanity, or maybe just wistful longing for his old life, but he didn’t like being reminded that he no longer “was.”

  He was still here, after all.

  Leastways, he was after a fashion.

  So Daire—the proudest of all Mackintoshes—swelled his chest a bit and made sure his mail shone brightly as he held his position a few inches above the damp, needle-covered entrance to the woodland path.

  Truly not a boastful man—certainly not in his long-ago mortal existence—he did bend tradition by allowing himself the title of “proudest.”

  He figured the style was well-earned.

  Unlike others of his name, the weight of centuries gave him ample time to ponder his clan’s greatness. He understood the glory of Nought. The heart-stopping splendor of sheer cliffs and dark mists, the rock-strewn vale of dreagans, so sacred and dear to him. He also knew the strength, pride, and fearlessness of the men who, all down the ages, had called his beloved home their own.

  Now, much to his sorrow and annoyance, he had to look on as Kendrew, the present chieftain, narrowed the clan’s notable traits to pride.

  That, and—Daire squared his shoulders, trying to hover a bit straighter—the most irksome abomination of all: stubborn foolhardiness.

  The young chieftain needed to learn that little good comes of strutting about like a vaunting peacock.

  Sooner or later, someone salts your tail.

  Or the day arrives when you meet someone whose sword is longer and faster than your own. In a blink, you face an enemy whose ax blade is sharper and more deadly than the one in your hand.

  Daire knew the feeling well.

  In his day, he’d failed to win everlasting peace in the glen by kitting the perfect love matches he’d planned so carefully. He’d had a knack for the like. Rodan the traitor had seen to the end of those hopes and aspirations when he’d shown his true face, bringing hordes of callous mercenaries and slaughtering men and dreagans alike. Darkness descended as they ravaged Nought, ripping apart the cairns, searching for silver and gold they’d never find.

  Nought’s treasure was the strength of its high, noble peaks, the freshness of pure mountain air, the goodness of cold, rushing rivers, and the endless maze of jumbled rock that so often deterred invaders. Wealth could also be found in the richness of Nought’s upland grazing, hidden places dressed in lush, sweet grass that made Mackintosh cattle the finest in all the Highlands.

  But the greatest prize was the people who called Nought home.

  Proud men and women who loved their land so fiercely that even the price of death wasn’t too dear if it meant holding on to the beloved glen that held their history and blood, the promise of distant days yet to come. So long as a Mackintosh held Nought, the world was good.

  Daire meant for things to stay that way.

  When he walked—rather than floating—he’d done a fair job. Now, insubstantial as he was, he could only observe and, at times, use his ghostly skills to lend a few helpful nudges. Like the day he’d kept pushing the top stones off Slag’s Mound so that Kendrew would be forced to deliver them to Castle Haven for the memorial cairn.

  Still…

  He couldn’t fight flesh-and-blood men.

  Those days were past.

  Yet war bands roamed the glen. And—Daire shuddered—they were bold men well able to come close to Kendrew and his warriors in an affray. For sure, they’d wash the lower reaches of the glen, Cameron and MacDonald territory, with bright, fast-running blood. And they’d laugh the while, enjoying their horrible deeds and caring for no one.

  Once, Daire, Slag, and the other dreagan masters and their beasts could’ve banished such dastards in the blink of an eye. Even the most fearsome fighter ran when a blast of dreagan fire melted his sword.

  But those days were gone.

  Daire’s might held all the substance of a curl of mist. And even if Slag had fared better in the Otherworld and still retained his former strength, Daire had no idea where the beast was.

  They couldn’t confront the cravens prowling the glen. Men who lived for mayhem and slaughter and only wished to leave the Glen of Many Legends in smoking ruin.

  Stopping the fiends fell to Kendrew.

  Yet Kendrew believed himself as invincible, as untouchable, as Daire was now.

  Daire would give anything to touch again. To once more rest his hand on the shoulder of the big, stony-scaled friend he missed more with each passing century.

  Time didn’t heal wounds.

  It sharpened the ache.

  Kendrew should enjoy the chance to revel and laugh with new friends. Good men who would make fine allies, strong fighters at his back. Fearless champions at his side, men unafraid to stand in a shield wall. Above all, he should admit he’d lost his heart to the raven-haired Cameron lass.

  She would be good for him, Daire knew.

  She had the soul of a Norsewoman. And no female could be finer than that.

  Regrettably, Daire’s means of persuading the lad to embrace rather than repel such bounty were limited.

  He’d already done what he could.

  Just now he drifted a bit away from the wood, his gaze seeking the big, hard-faced warrior called Grim and the Cameron beauty, Lady Isobel. They’d moved deeper into the walled kitchen garden, standing in deep converse in the shadows of the gardener’s tool shed.

  Watching them gave Daire hope.

  The warrior Grim had a good heart. He could tell the maid truths that would help her turn Kendrew from his foolish, destructive path.

  Thinking it prudent to give Grim a few nudges in that direction—only if need be, of course—Daire smoothed a hand down over his mail shirt and prepared to float up and over the circle of whirling dancers, then into the tiny, stone-walled garden.

  But before he’d flittered more than a few paces, a loud crashing noise reached him from somewhere in the piney woods behind him.

  Daire stopped at once, hovering in place.

  Something large, heavy, and awkward was trundling through the trees, cracking branches and trampling underbrush, making an unholy din.

  It was an unmistakable racket.

  A furor only those in his realm would hear, and—his pulse quickened—the kind of noisy passage no entirely whole dreagan would make.

  Drago the three-legged dreagan was near.

  Excited, Daire ceased listening in on Grim and Isobel in favor of trying to catch Drago before the proud beast could lumber away.

  It was a pursuit Daire often attempted to no avail.

  Drago’s pride went deeper than ambling about just to prove he could.

  He was also a one-man dreagan.

  He answered only to his own master, a man long dead, and one who must sleep peaceably, because unlike Daire, he no longer roamed the glen.

  Drago walked alone, coming to no man.

  Except—Daire freely admitted—Grim, who gave the creature food. It scarce mattered that Drago didn’t actually eat the offerings. The glen’s magic was such that the same treats appeared on Daire’s and Drago’s sides of the veil that separated the worlds.

  So the three-legged dreagan loved Grim.

  And, Daire hoped, perhaps some of this day’s blessing would soften Drago’s heart and he’d answer when Daire called to him. If so, a most troubling riddle might be solved. Daire might learn something that would bring him closer to finding his long-lost friend.

  Drago was the last soul to see Slag alive.

  So Daire hurried on, pumping his wispy legs though he knew fine that doing so wouldn’t make him float any faster.

  He owed it to his friend to try.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Isobel looked at the huge Mackintosh warrior with his full-bearded, battle-hardened face and felt her heart splitting. “Is it true?” She glanced to the side, over the kitchen garden wall, but didn’t see Kendrew in the throng. “Kendrew goes to Rannoch Moor to visit his mother’s grave?”<
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  “So he does.” Grim’s eyes held only truth.

  Deep gray and compassionate, they were the same color as the rain clouds just beginning to blow in from the west. And in addition to honesty, they held a look that told Isobel he was someone who’d walk over jagged, razor-sharp knife blades for a man he called friend.

  Isobel regarded him, his words echoing in her head.

  “I thought he went to see…” She brushed at her sleeve, uncomfortable finishing the sentence. “I didn’t realize he’d have other reasons.”

  To her surprise, a wash of color spread across the big man’s face.

  “Och, he kens the ladies there well enough. All men hereabouts do.” The tops of his ears were turning red. “But he pays them little mind. He spends his time on Rannoch at Lady Aileen’s cairn. He cuts back the heather and bracken to keep the stones from being covered. And”—he hesitated—“he leaves sprigs of meadowsweet.”

  “Meadowsweet?” Isobel’s brow creased. The common strewing herb wasn’t known as something to be left at graves.

  But Grim nodded. “Nought’s seneschals have aye mixed meadowsweet with the floor rushes,” he explained. “Lady Aileen liked the herb’s freshening qualities. Sadly, the meadowsweet was the only thing she did like at Nought. Kendrew remembers that, so—”

  “He leaves the herb for her now.” Isobel had to remind herself to breathe.

  Seeing her struggle—her chest felt so tight—Grim’s eyes clouded with concern. His sympathy let her heart squeeze all the more.

  “So it is, my lady.” His words made it worse. “He has surely carried more meadowsweet to Rannoch Moor than would fill this glen.”

  Isobel swallowed against the thickness in her throat. “He must’ve loved her very much.”

  “He hardly knew her.” Grim glanced at the neatly laid rows of lettuce near where they stood. When he looked back at her, he studied her face for a long moment, as if deciding if he should say more.

  Above them, a cloud slipped over the sun, darkening the little garden around them. The smell of rich, loamy earth, onions, garlic, and herbs grew stronger, the pungency heavy in the air.

  A sharp wind swept down from the hills, chill, damp, and heralding rain. Isobel shivered, gooseflesh rising on her arms as Grim’s meaning dawned.

  “You’re saying he was very young.” She made the words a statement, knowing.

  Grim’s nod confirmed her guess.

  “He was a wee lad when she died.” He held her gaze as he spoke. “But he never forgot her fondness for meadowsweet. And, aye, he did love Lady Aileen. He still does, though I suspect part of the reason he visits her so often is guilt. He feels responsible for her death.”

  Isobel blinked. “What?”

  Surely she’d misheard him.

  “It is true, my lady.” Grim glanced at the lettuce again, and then at a tidy cluster of rosemary. He was large and solid as an ox, and his shoulders were broad enough to blot her view of the revelry on the field behind them. Silver rings glinted in his beard, adding to his air of fierceness. But in that moment—as he studied the ground—he appeared weighted by a burden he couldn’t shake.

  A deep sorrow, Isobel sensed, that frustrated him because he couldn’t besiege it.

  “Kendrew believes his mother wouldn’t have died if he hadn’t been born.” Grim looked up then, his tone proving she’d guessed rightly.

  He wasn’t a warrior who lost a battle gladly.

  Yet this with Kendrew—whom he clearly loved—wasn’t a skirmish fought with steel and strength. It went deeper, to a place Grim couldn’t go.

  “I’m sorry…” Isobel touched the ambers at her neck, confused. “I don’t understand. He was only a child, a very young one at that. How can he blame himself for a parent’s passing?

  “Sad though it is”—she had to say it—“such sorrows aren’t infrequent in these hills. Life is hard. Winters cold, our larders often lacking, and no one will deny clan feuding claims a great toll.”

  “To be sure, that is so, my lady.” Grim agreed easily. “Kendrew wouldn’t argue any of that. He knows the harshness of our lands better than most. He feels as he does because his mother died while trying to take him and Marjory away from Nought.”

  He frowned a little, pausing. “She didn’t want her children raised there and left Kendrew’s father. She was taking them to her family in Glasgow, but—”

  “She died on the journey?”

  “She did, aye. Flooding rains struck when they were only halfway across the bog. Lady Aileen and her escort were trapped there for days.” Grim looked down, nudging the path’s gravel with his boot. “Kendrew’s mother caught a fever. The ladies of Rannoch saw their fire and went to help. They took Lady Aileen into their care, doing what they could. But—”

  “She didn’t make it.” Isobel tightened her fingers on the ambers.

  “She was lost, aye. Most regrettably, she passed the morning Kendrew’s father arrived at the Rannoch ladies’ encampment, searching for her.” Grim glanced up from the gravel. “Lady Aileen died in his arms, with Kendrew and Marjory looking on.”

  “Dear God.” Isobel dashed a hand across her cheek.

  Now she knew why the Rannoch light-skirts were so welcome at Nought.

  Shame at her resentment of the women swept her, twisting her insides. She pressed her hand to her breast and closed her eyes, breathing deep. Pain, sharp and lancing, stabbed the deepest part of her. Images of Kendrew and Marjory as wide-eyed, terrified children burned across her mind. She also imagined a large, stern-faced man, broken and on his knees, tears damping his cheeks as he clutched his wife to his chest, unable to revive her.

  It was too much.

  The images were ghastly, more heartbreaking than she could bear.

  “It was long ago, my lady.” Grim looked a little embarrassed, as if he regretted telling her. He shuffled his feet, fingering one of the silver rings braided into his large black beard. “Kendrew will no’ have wanted me to—”

  “I am glad to know this.” Isobel tried to put him at ease.

  She glanced at the darkening sky, not surprised that the afternoon light was fading. Rising wind lashed the trees, tossing branches as the air turned chillier and the low, angry clouds swept ever closer. Soon, the heavens would break, rain chasing the celebrants from the field into Castle Haven’s great hall.

  Secretly, Isobel wished for a downpour.

  Truth was she’d always loved rain.

  And just now…

  If the storm raged powerfully enough, Kendrew would be forced to abandon his wish to return to Nought. He might do so if Marjory wasn’t along. But she was. And Isobel knew he’d not subject his sister to riding through teeming rain and cold, howling wind.

  But there were still things she didn’t know. And they were nagging questions that needed answers. She wouldn’t have any peace without prodding.

  Blessedly, she doubted Grim would mind.

  “Why”—she turned back to him—“did Kendrew’s father need days to track his wife?” Isobel puzzled over this, her heart lurching at the whole tale. “Surely he knew Rannoch Moor as well as anyone in these parts? And if she’d set out for Glasgow, he could’ve easily followed her, knowing the route she’d have to take.”

  “Aye, and that would’ve been the way of it.” Grim didn’t hesitate. “Sadly, Kendrew’s father didn’t know she’d headed south. Lady Aileen knew he’d come after her and so she told him she wished to visit a cousin who’d married into Clan MacKenzie, up Kintail way.”

  “I see.” Isobel looked at him, beginning to understand.

  He continued. “She tricked him, aye. It wasn’t until a passing minstrel begged a night’s lodging at Nought and mentioned having seen her and her party crossing Rannoch that Kendrew’s father realized what she’d done.” He paused as the strutting pipers marched past the garden gate, waiting until they moved on. “He set off at once, at great speed, but by then days had passed, and—”

  “It was too lat
e.” Isobel spoke softly.

  “That it was, aye.” Grim’s tone matched his name.

  “What a tragedy.” Isobel blinked against the stinging heat pricking the backs of her eyes. “And so…” She took a deep breath, trying to find the right words. “Why did Lady Aileen dislike Nought so much? Did she also not care for her husband then?”

  Grim shrugged. “Who can say? I was but a bairn in those days. Clan graybeards tell that she loved Kendrew’s father dearly. But she despised his home. She feared the wildness, hated the cold, and saw Nought as a stony province beyond the rim of civilization.”

  Isobel frowned. “I’ve never heard of a Highlander who didn’t love wild places.”

  “She wasn’t a Highlander.” He said that as if it explained everything. “She was Glaswegian, used to the bustle of Glasgow and all the comforts and luxuries found there. Her father was a wealthy merchant and arranged the marriage so she would have a title to go with her genteel ways. Lady Aileen was a great lady, she was.

  “So say all who knew her.” His voice was low, his tone respectful. “The pity is her ladylike delicacy brought her doom. She didn’t have the heart or backbone to love Nought as true Mackintoshes do. What we see as stirring, she viewed as desolate and barren, even threatening. The cold, dark mists carried doom, and falling rock from a landslide could strike her children.

  “So…” Grim spread his hands. “Her fear for Kendrew and Marjory drove her away, turning them into orphans when she meant to save them.”

  “Yet they didn’t need rescuing.”

  “Nae, my lady.” He looked at her intently, seeming pleased by her words. “Nought land loves us as much as we revere each dark curl of mist and every inch of the rocky, broken ground, the deep, black lochans, and the sheer precipices of our cliffs. To us, such wildness is beauty and as much a part of us as if our own breath and blood pulsed through every stone.

  “Alas”—he glanced over the garden wall at the sweeping green of the battle site, the thick pines edging the field’s length—“even some Highlanders cannae appreciate the starkness that is Nought. For Lady Aileen, such a savage place felt hostile, seeming like hell.”