Christmas Present

by Lauren Wood

  “I believe that we should bury him here in the very place that he died. I know where to find his wife. I think that she should know that he’s not coming back. I hope that I can count on you to stand by me during the difficult time of relaying this ugly news to her.” Ian dug into the soft earth with his hands, not stopping, until the hole was big enough that Finn would fit in there nicely. He was happy to see that Caitlin had joined him and both of them were now covered in dirt from head to toe. They buried him and then they waded back into the water.

  They came back out and there was no denying that the chemistry between them was off the charts. They kissed with their mouths telling each other that this was not going to be two ships passing in the night. “I shouldn’t have to say this, but I’m going to. You belong to me. If I have to fight for the right to be with you, then you’re going to see a different side of me. I don’t want to have blood on my hands.” “He is the one that I’m supposed to be with and I will not let anybody stand in the way of our happiness together. I already knew that I was with child. It was a mother’s instinct telling me that his father hood was imminent. I’m not going to tell him, until he gives me some kind of commitment.”

  “I’m going to have to disappoint Kathleen. It would’ve been glorious for our two clans to join forces, but maybe the clans that need to be together are yours and mine.” They planted a cross with Finn’s name scratched across the surface. They left there hand in hand, carving a new life for themselves and for the life of the little one that was going to come into this world months down the word.

  THE END

  SEDUCED BY HIGHLANDER

  Colleen McDoon sat looking in the mirror of the Lady Sylvia. Colleen had been a servant for the lady for month’s years now. She would rather live her old life, but she couldn’t dare. Her family had been methodically killed off, and she had to be careful.

  The only reason she wasn’t noticed as a McDoon as of yet was because of her looks. While the rest of her family had blonde hair and blue eyes that had made them stand out in the Highlands. Colleen had come out with a dark black hair.

  It was the only reason she had come wearing rags to this ladies house some several months ago at the young age of 17. She had escaped her house. Colleen had witnessed the deaths of her family. Thankfully the men who had come to the castle had only killed the rest of the family.

  A servant had taken her and hid her behind a cabinet. She had peaked through the hole she could see through. It had made her weep as she watched them beheaded. Colleen knew that her clothes would make her stand out, so she had switched clothing with one of their dead staff.

  That was the night she had created a new life for herself. It would be one that made her work hard; she didn’t feel she had a bad life though. Lady Sylvia had always been so kind to her. Colleen wasn’t sure if the Lady knew who she was or not. But the fact that she was still alive had her feeling a bit safe.

  Lady Sylvia had taken her in and told her she would pay her food to do work for her. Colleen had agreed quickly, she didn’t mind the work. That seemed like a lifetime ago now. Somehow she had managed to stay hidden. Though she knew that eventually her identity would be discovered. There would be writings at her family’s castle that would be discovered. In those writings Colleen knew she would be listed as one of the children.

  The new Queen wasn’t a dumb woman. She would realize that there was an extra person, a body that wasn’t located. Colleen’s mom had always been a person who loved to write down things. She knew that in those writings her mother would include great detail of many things. That would include Colleen and her secret would be out her eye color.

  That was the one thing about Colleen that stood out. Her brilliant green eyes, they would spot her by the way her mother had described them she was sure.

  She smiled thinking back to hearing her mother describe Colleen’s eyes. “They glow in the dark sweetheart. You know how you love cats, I swear you are one. Those eyes of yours are quite hypnotic to look into. Her nerves were frayed with worried. It had been too many months now, they had to know.

  The search would surely come to Lady Sylvia’s front door soon. Colleen had to be gone before that day came, but she didn’t know when it would be. Any hesitation on Colleen’s side could mean the difference between life and death.

  “I have to go soon. Where will I go though? I don’t know how to protect myself? I have a lot of things to learn.” Colleen watched as the tears rolled down her face. She didn’t want to put Lady Sylvia in harm’s way either.

  Again she wasn’t sure that the Lady didn’t know she was the true heiress to the kingdom. But as far as she knows her family is dead. She doesn’t realize that she has plenty of people in the kingdom who would stick up for her, heck fight to the death even. If she had been a boy she would know how to protect herself. She got upset at her circumstances once again. It was that anger inside of her that Colleen knew would help keep her alive.

  Colleen heard Lady Sylvia come in from behind her, she hurried back to work.

  “Colleen, I need you to listen to me now.” Colleen heard the Lady speak from behind her.

  Her heart sped up; perhaps while she was dreaming about her past life, they had come. Colleen knew she had been listening to what was going on around her. She had been too focused on her recent losses.

  She turned around trying to put a smile on her face. “Yes Lady, what can I do for you?” Colleen said a smile on her face. It was hard to hold that smile, but somehow she was managing it.

  “You must go, take the black horse tied up in the barn. Here is a map; I’ve drawn it as well as I can. Get to Kaiden Sahmes, tell him who you are, he will protect you.” Lady Sylvia handed her a map.

  Colleen looked down at the map, trying to read it as well as she could. Right now she really wished she had paid more attention when her father and brothers had tried to teach her things.

  “You must not worry, we have a large enough head start you should be just fine. But no hesitation, and don’t stop until you get there. You’ll be tired but you must keep going on, it will be a long ride. But it will be the only way you will survive. The Queen has called for your head and is offering a reward. While many will still protect you here, many will not. They need the money; the Queen has raised prices on everything and lowered what they are paying the workers and farmers. Life isn’t easy right now, and after 3 months of this, they are desperate.” Lady Sylvia explained.

  “Okay, why didn’t you say anything before? Why didn’t you tell me you knew who I was?” Colleen asked.

  “I could never be too sure when one of the other servants wasn’t around. I told them they could go home today and get paid full pay. They gladly left, so now we can talk. Perhaps I should have done this before now. But I didn’t want you to be nervous that I knew either. Listen Colleen, we can never be too careful who we trust.” Lady Sylvia stated.

  Colleen saw the seriousness of her face. “How do you know you can trust this man I’m going too?” She asked the obvious question.

  “He is a good man; he will make sure you are safe.” Lady Sylvia said.

  She waited to see if there was more to be said, but the Lady didn’t say more. Colleen knew or at least felt she could trust the Lady. If she said she trusted him that would have to be good enough. It just gave her a chill the words that she had just uttered to Colleen. The words echoed in her ears again, “we can never be too careful who we trust.”

  Colleen finally figured it was her one and only chance. “Thank you very much.” She turned and walked out of the house. Her running beginning already, she had only hoped for a few more days rest. Then she chided herself, “You’ve had a four month rest, your family is dead, at least you’re alive.” Colleen knew it was all true.

  Kaiden Sahmes sat looking out the window of his cabin. His life had been turned upside down overnight. He hadn’t known he was as dangerous as he had been that night. But he now paid for that night over and over again.

  He co
uldn’t go back home. He was stuck here in the woods. What kind of life could he have now? They were all afraid of him when they saw him. No one would buy or sell to him, unless they felt threatened. But Kaiden wasn’t the type of man who would threaten a person.

  Maybe that was why his magical unleashing and the death of many had scared them so much? It would make sense. Up until that night he had been the fun loving nice knight that just about everyone had loved.

  If that group of robbers hadn’t invaded their home that night none of this would be happening to him right now. He thought back one more time, like so many others, about that night and how it had happened.

  He had been sleeping when he heard his little sister yelling out it had made him sit straight up in bed.

  “Anna what’s wrong?” He ran out of the room. No real thought of danger on his mind. Nothing like this had ever happened in the past, why would it now? He came around the corner as his mother’s throat was being sliced open.

  “Tell us where you keep your jewels.” A man had hit Kaiden’s father hard in the face.

  “We don’t have any jewels.” Kaiden’s father had answered, it had been the truth. But the robbers didn’t believe him.

  A man drew a knife over his sister’s throat; he saw the blood begin to flow and watched the life go out of her eyes.

  “Stop it.” He had yelled. The noise had been ear shattering. His fury was immense. He had now seen two of his family killed his mother and the sister he loved very much. It had been too much for him.

  “Who the hell are you?” One of the robbers said as another grabbed at him.

  “I’m the person whose family you should never have messed with.” Kaiden said his eyes steaming.

  He unleashed the lightning bolts from his fingers. But before he could save him, his father was dead; the other robbers had no chance at that point. He killed them instantly, taking great relish in their loss of life. What he hadn’t realized was that there were other people who had witnessed the event.

  They had run to the town and spread the gossip quickly. Kaiden had gone into town to get help to bury his family, to mourn his loss. He had been told that he wasn’t welcomed; they didn’t know who he was.

  “You know my family has magical powers, why are you turning me away?” He had asked one of the people who closed his shop doors to Kaiden.

  “Aye, we know your family. But we have never heard of such demon power coming from them. They always helped us; I don’t think your parents would have killed anyone.” The man had said.

  “But they killed my family? What am I supposed to do, let them go?” Kaiden had argued.

  The man had shaken his head and shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. But I don’t want to be the only one to let you in his shop.” The man had closed the door.

  He had gathered what he could from his family home and made his way to this cabin. It had been one his family had visited before in the past. But as far as Kaiden knew it wasn’t something that many knew about.

  Right now all he wanted was to go back to his old life though. It was hard to not think about his family and be sad. He knew he had been different from his parents though. Where they had always been so caring and nice to people, Kaiden had seen mistrust.

  Now he understood where that feeling had come from in the past. Even the townspeople had thought Kaiden was different then, how long had they felt this way? He wondered as he looked out in the woods.

  At least he had a nice view and it was so far away from anyone. Kaiden knew it would be best for him to stay here the rest of his life.

  He saw a horse approaching from the side of the house. On the back of it was a hooded rider. It was clearly someone who was female, or perhaps a smaller boy. With the hood he couldn’t tell, but he didn’t feel a threat in the air. He had worked on his skills of being in tuned with nature since he’d been here the past few months.

  Though he felt no threat he still watched the rider approach cautiously, Kaiden stayed on guard his skills ready to be used if needed. She slowed as she came closer to the cabin. He could now clearly see that the figure was a female.

  He saw the long black hair as it flowed over her shoulders. She looked at him finally and he saw her green emerald eyes. He couldn’t take his eyes off of them right away. They were astonishing he found them to be amazingly startlingly too. Kaiden felt a mixture of apprehension and fear coming off of the girl’s body.

  “Are you Kaiden Sahmes?” She asked him.

  “Yes I am. Who are you?” Kaiden asked her.

  He saw the girl take a deep breath of relief. “Lady Sylvia McCloud sent me. I am Colleen McDoon.” She told him.

  Two thoughts crossed his mind at that moment. The first was why would Lady McCloud trust him this much? Did she support his truth? Could he possibly go back to town, with her support? The second was everyone knew about the McDoon’s. “Don’t be silly everyone knows that the McDoon family was slain. Why would Lady McCloud send you to me?” He asked.

  Kaiden’s eyes were half way shut trying to recognizing any of the feelings of nervousness at being caught in a lie. He couldn’t quite read her completely. It was those eyes of hers; they kept attracting his attention away from what he was trying to do.

  Colleen heard his questions, but the one that worried her the most was “why would Lady McCloud said you to me?” She heard it as if it was being shouted directly into her brain. Along with that question she was hearing Lady Sylvia as she said “We can never be too careful who we trust.”

  There was a warning bell going off in her mind. But still she stood in front of this man. There was something else about him that seemed to pull her in, to keep her in this spot.

  She looked at him once again to study him. He was tall, around 6’ 1” tall, a bit taller than her, she stood 5’ 8” tall. She looked at his hair it was a dark brown, and there were a few silver hairs coming in on the sides. He was obviously older than her 18 years.

  There was an odd feeling of kindness that surrounded him too. His eyes were brown, but they looked as if there were small sparks of yellow in them. It made her look closer at his eyes once more. The harder she starred the more yellow seemed to appear in between the brown.

  She shook her head again, realizing she hadn’t answered his questions yet. “I’m the middle child, the one who didn’t look like any of them. According the Lady Sylvia though, the Queen has put a bounty out on my head. She doesn’t want me to build up and opposition and throw her off the crown.” Colleen explained. She wasn’t sure why she was sharing so much. But she had to admit she had felt safe since she first saw him. Except for those few moments of fear where she wondered why he didn’t know Lady Sylvia trusted him.

  He shook his head but didn’t say anything right away. Colleen didn’t trust the silence much yet. It made her mind think about what this man was like in other ways. He made her feel so many odd things in such a short amount of time, Colleen wondered if he was one of those male witches.

  She had heard about them from her older brother. He had warned her since she was close to turning 18 and would soon be dating. “You know father will want you to marry well, so you’ll be meeting a lot of princes.” Her brother had told her.

  Colleen realized that she was lucky that hadn’t taken place yet. If it had, the men who had killed the rest of her family would know all about Colleen. They would have found her in the caste sooner or later, unless she lucked out and got out. Even then they would have been on her trail a lot sooner, and she stood out among the people. She knew this. Sometimes it was hard to think of the good things that came out of her families deaths. But this had been one of the best things, timing. Had they waited until now and her family was still alive, everyone would have known about Colleen.

  “Lady Sylvia told me you were a good man, she said she trusted you.” Colleen finally told him.

  She had to admit she was quite nervous about having told him who she was; however, again there was a feeling of being safe at the same tim
e. Colleen thought maybe she was delirious from the long ride to get here.

  But here she stood in front of him as he studied her more. She took the time to look at him more. Wondering how old he must be? What was his story? Why had Lady Sylvia picked this man to help her out? “How do you know Lady Sylvia?” She finally asked.

  Colleen watched his face for a reaction. “Well it seems like she might be one of the only people who trust me in the area. Maybe she is more of an ally then I’ve realized in the past?” He said.

  The answer didn’t really give her anything, she looked at him. She waited for him to continue, again looking at his eyes and seeing the yellow flecks in them. As she looked at him she suddenly realized what her mother had meant by eyes that entice you. His eyes were something that kept her wanting more.

  “She was a friend of our families.” He finally said.

  “But I don’t know of you? Why not, surely if you’ve lived in the same area as me for so long I would know you.” Colleen asked. She studied his face to try and place him. But then she realized she didn’t really go out much. Her family had been afraid of being attacked for the past several years. The last time Colleen had been out from behind the castle walls was well over 10 years ago.

  “I don’t know why but I’ve never seen you either? So with that being said, who is lying and who is telling the truth?” He questioned her as well. She saw his eyes narrow once more as if seemed to scan over her.