Dangerous Highlander ds-1

by Donna Grant

  He leaned against the door frame and watched Cara sleep. In her hand she clutched something against her, as if she was afraid to let it go. She shivered when the wind howled through the window.

  Lucan walked to the bed and covered her with another blanket. He wasn’t sure if it was fear or the wind that made her shake. It could be a little of both, especially after what she had seen that night.

  Unable to stop himself, he ran a finger down the side of her face to her jawline. Petal-soft skin met his touch and made him burn. Though he knew he should keep his distance, he found himself sitting on the bed, her body curved around him. His blood heated, his heart pounded. God’s bones, how he wanted to taste her, to run his tongue over her plump lips and mold soft curves against him.

  His hand moved to the end of her braid. With a flick of his fingers, he unbound her hair. He lifted a strand to his face and inhaled her fragrance of heather.

  He closed his eyes, letting her scent move through him. His body throbbed with need, with a longing that only grew the longer Cara was near.

  When he opened his eyes, he found her watching him. Her mahogany gaze held a hint of caution, but he also saw courage that warmed his heart. He waited for her to speak. She had questions, and he would answer them.

  “Is the village really gone?”

  He nodded. “Aye. The attack was on the village first.”

  “Is anyone alive? There could be those who need care.”

  Lucan glanced away from her face. “None were left alive.”

  “Oh, God.” She put her hand over her mouth and squeezed her eyes shut.

  He understood her pain. He had experienced much the same emotions upon seeing his clan gone.

  She wiped the tears from her face and opened her eyes. “The children?”

  He shook his head, unable to find the words.

  Her tears came faster, her lips trembling. “What happened here tonight? What were those things?”

  Lucan took a deep breath. “I wish it were easy to explain, but it isna. Those beings, those creatures you saw dead in the great hall, were made from evil and Druid magic. They are called wyrran.”

  She sat up and leaned her back against the headboard, her knees to her chest. “Magic? There is no such thing as magic.”

  Lucan didn’t know whether to believe her or not. Her dark gaze was open and honest, and he couldn’t deny that his gut told him she believed she spoke the truth. How could she have magic and not know it?

  “Magic is real. Look at what you saw tonight. Those were very real,” he said.

  “There are those who say the Druids were good people.”

  “Just like with anything, there is a good side and an evil side.”

  She licked her lips and wiped away the last of her tears. Lucan clenched his jaw to stop a moan when he imagined tasting her mouth with his own, sweeping his tongue between her lips, and drinking the intoxicating flavor of her.

  Lucan forced his breathing to remain calm, to remember Cara was frightened and in need of protecting, not ravishing. Yet he knew she would fit him perfectly, that their lovemaking would be earth-shattering.

  No woman had ever inspired such need, such yearning. Such hunger. He couldn’t turn away from Cara any more than he could turn out the god inside him.

  “I need to know what is going on, Lucan.” Her voice was stronger, the determined glint of her eyes telling him she wouldn’t give up until she knew the truth.

  If Deirdre was after her, Cara deserved to know the reality. All of it. No matter how painful it was for him to tell it.

  “Long ago, in another age, the Romans tried to take control of Britain.”

  She nodded. “Britain, but never the Highlands.”

  “The Romans wanted the Highlands, but the Celts never gave up fighting. Many generations saw the Romans grow in numbers, their territory increasing with each year. The Celtic tribes fought the Romans as best they could.”

  “But they weren’t able to beat them back because they didn’t align together,” she said.

  Lucan grinned, impressed by her knowledge. “The clans turned to the Druids for aid. The good Druids, or mie, were the ones the tribes sought for counsel and healing. They knew what the Celts needed was beyond their abilities. The mie looked to nature for their magic.

  “It was the other Druids the Celts needed. Those Druids, the drough, were ones who used human sacrifices and dark magic and forgot their true Druid ways. The drough knew to defeat the Romans the Celts were going to need special assistance.”

  Cara leaned her chin on her knees. “What kind of help?”

  Lucan shrugged. “At the time, I’m sure the Celts, desperate to have their land returned, would have done anything to get the Romans out of Britain.”

  “So,” Cara urged. “What happened?”

  “The drough used their black magic and forbidden spells to call up ancient gods long buried in Hell. These gods took the strongest warrior from each clan, possessing him.”

  Cara swallowed. “How many gods were called up?”

  “No one knows.”

  “And the gods? How ancient?”

  Lucan glanced at the fire. “So ancient that their names were lost over time.”

  “I see. Go on.”

  “With the gods now inside the warriors, they easily defeated the Romans, beating them back again and again until Rome finally left Britain, never to return.”

  “Then it worked,” she said, the corners of her mouth tilting up.

  “It worked, but when the Druids tried to call the gods back to Hell, they refused to leave the warriors. With no one else to fight, the warriors turned on each other.”

  She scooted closer to him. Her brow was furrowed, her concentration steady. “I cannot imagine that’s what anyone thought would happen.”

  “Nay. It took both sets of Druids to find a spell that would bind the gods inside the Warriors, since the gods wouldn’t release them. As long as a god is free in his Warrior, the man is immortal, with immeasurable strength and other abilities. With the gods bound, the Warriors returned to their mortal selves.

  “The Celts continued life as if nothing had happened. The possessed Warriors and what they had done was lost to legend over time. Forgotten except for the families of those Warriors. Others said the tale to be nothing more than something to frighten people.”

  “But it wasn’t,” Cara whispered.

  “Many, many years later it is said that a Druid priestess of the old, dark ways came upon a scroll with the story. Somehow, she discovered how to unbind the gods within the Warriors.”

  Cara frowned. “Why would she want to do that?”

  “She wanted—wants—to control the Warriors, to lead an army unlike any other over Britain. She wants control of Britain, and the world.”

  “You’re one of those Warriors, aren’t you?”

  Lucan blew out a breath and rose to walk to the hearth. He leaned his hands upon the stones and let his gaze drown in the red-orange flames.

  “Three hundred years ago, I was the middle son of the laird of the MacLeods. Quinn was already married, with a young son of his own. Fallon’s bride had been chosen and was on her way to the castle. The three of us, with twenty MacLeod men, set out to meet her and her guards.”

  Lucan swallowed. He had never spoken of that day to anyone, not even his brothers. By unspoken agreement, they had kept their thoughts to themselves.

  “Everything went according to plan,” he continued. “We got Fallon’s bride and started toward home. We were leagues away when we saw the smoke. We left the girl with our men, and Fallon, Quinn, and I rode toward the castle.”

  He paused, reliving the scene in his mind. The stench of death, the eerie silence, and the crows that feasted on the dead. Yet none of it compared to seeing the once lively and bustling castle in flames or the ground littered with their clan. So many bodies, men and women, young and old. Bile rose in his throat when he recalled seeing an infant still in its mother’s arms lying de
ad with her.

  “Lucan, you don’t have to,” Cara said.

  He held up his hand to silence her. He needed to speak of it. He hadn’t realized it until then, but once he had begun, he couldn’t stop.

  “When we saw the castle on fire, we knew something awful had happened. Yet we heard no shouts from our father or other men, as there should have been if they tried to put the fire out. It wasn’t until we reached the castle that we saw what had happened.”

  He straightened and turned to face Cara. Her dark gaze was steady and held so much sorrow that it nearly broke him.

  “They must have attacked as soon as we left, because the crows were already there, feasting. They killed every man, woman, and child. Not a horse, sheep, or chicken was left alive. Everything was dead. And burning.”

  He closed his eyes and swallowed past the nausea that overcame him each time he thought of the reek of the deceased. “Death hung in the air, infusing everything. We had no idea who had attacked or why. All too soon, Fallon’s bride and the other men reached the castle.

  “The woman took one look at what had happened and had her men return her to her family. It was for the best. With our father’s death, Fallon became laird to a clan that didn’t exist. He didn’t know what to do. None of us did.”

  “Did you try to discover who had done it?” Cara asked.

  He nodded. “There were too many to bury, so we burned the bodies and turned our attention to vengeance. The twenty men we had with us we sent off in different directions to spread the word about what had happened to see if we could gather any information. Fallon wanted me and Quinn to stay at the castle with him until the others returned. He said a laird had to remain in case some of the clan got free and tried to return.”

  “None returned, did they?”

  Lucan walked to the bed and lowered himself on it. “Nay. No one returned. Months went by with no news from our men. It wasn’t until years later that we learned they had been killed by Deirdre’s wyrran.”

  Cara cocked her head to the side. “Who is this Deirdre?”

  “An evil woman who I hope you never meet. She is the start of all of this, the Druid priestess who found the template to unbind the gods.”

  “By the saints,” Cara murmured, and crossed herself.

  Lucan snorted. “If we had known the day we received her missive what would happen to us, we would never have gone.”

  Cara’s eyes widened in disbelief. “You went to see Deirdre?”

  “We had no idea who she was. She told us she had information on the massacre of our clan. Even Fallon refused to stay behind for that. We made the trek deep into the mountains to see her. Once we were there, she told us of her plan to rule Britain and how she needed our help.

  “Too late we realized she had been the one to murder our clan, but she shackled us before we could escape. Her magic is strong, but then most black magic is.”

  “The talk of magic is hard for me to believe.”

  “After everything you saw tonight, you think I’m lying?”

  She shook her head and looked at her hands. “I never said that. I simply said it’s difficult to believe.”

  Lucan wished he had that problem. “We saw firsthand what Deirdre’s magic had brought forth. The pale, small beings were the first she called to her, fashioned from black magic, anger, and power. Next, she set about finding the clans who had the gods inside them.”

  “What did she do to you?”

  “She unbound the god.”

  Cara shrugged. “I don’t understand.”

  “When the Druids bound the gods, they passed from generation to generation, always possessing the strongest warriors. Sometimes the god would only pass into one warrior, with others like me and my brothers, the god would separate. Alone, Quinn is a force to be reckoned with, but when the three of us fight together, we are nigh unstoppable.”

  “What happened next?” Cara asked when he paused.

  Lucan scratched his chin, wondering if he should continue. Then he realized he might as well. “Once our god was released, it gave us the power to break out of her shackles, magic or not. We left the mountain, but we raged at what she had done. The angrier we became, the stronger the god grew. We dinna know how to control the powers we suddenly had. Decades passed as we hid in the mountains learning what we had become. We fought each other constantly, each blaming the others for what had happened.”

  “None of you were to blame,” Cara said.

  “Maybe. Fallon tried again and again to bind our god, to no avail. He learned first that if he drowned himself in wine, it dulled the god. Once he discovered that, there was always a bottle in his hand. For Quinn, it was much worse. He lost his wife and his son in the slaughter. He held himself responsible for their deaths, since it was his job to protect them. In his eyes he failed, since he lived and they did not.”

  “And you?”

  “With Quinn unable, and unwilling, to control his rage, and Fallon drunk, someone had to take care of them.”

  “So it fell to you.”

  He shrugged. “That duty led me to learn how to control the god inside me, to learn how to use the powers to my advantage without letting the god free.”

  “So you turn into the thing that attacked me tonight?”

  “Not exactly,” Lucan answered. “As I said, each clan had a different god. Each god had certain powers, or abilities.”

  She reached out and touched his hand, her fingers moving over his nails. “And the god inside you?”

  “Apodatoo, the god of revenge. I have enhanced hearing and quick speed added to my strength. I can also control darkness and shadows.”

  “Control them?”

  “Aye. I can move the shadows to my will, and the darkness I can use to my advantage.”

  “At any time?”

  “Nay. Only when I release the god do I have full control of that power. The rest I have all the time.”

  She bit her lip. “The man that tried to take me was ash colored.”

  “I fought one that was royal blue. When the god is released and in control, the man transforms and becomes what the god was.”

  She glanced at his hands again.

  Lucan curled his hands into fists. “Aye, Cara. I also turn. You saw Quinn partially turn, though I don’t think you realize it.”

  “His eyes turned black.”

  “Aye. Our skin, our eyes, and our claws turn black. Each god has a color that gets transformed to us when we release him.”

  Lucan stilled as she moved closer and touched his face. “Do you forget who you are when the god takes over?”

  “Nay, though I can hear him. I always hear him whether he is unleashed or not. But I don’t forget who I am, or who I am protecting.”

  “If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I would find your story impossible to believe. You were the one who caught me when I fell, weren’t you?”

  “Aye.” Lucan licked his lips. It was time to ask her. “Do you have magic?”

  Her brow furrowed and her eyes became distant for a moment. “I . . . I don’t think so.”

  “Do you know why the Warriors were after you?”

  “Nay,” she said with a shake of her head.

  He’d expected that. “Do you know what a Demon’s Kiss is?”

  After a moment’s hesitation, she pulled something free from her gown and held out the necklace with a vial at the end of it. “I think this is what they want.”

  Lucan looked at the small elongated silver vial with Celtic knot work surrounding it. It was held about her neck by a thin strip of leather. Could something so small be what Deirdre was after? “What is it?”

  “My mother’s blood.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  Cara waited while Lucan stared at the vial. He leaned close, but he never touched it. She wasn’t sure if what the ash-colored Warrior had called the Demon’s Kiss was the vial around her neck, but a nagging memory she couldn’t bring into focus told her it was.

  She
swallowed and tried to think past his question of whether she had magic. She didn’t know what magic was, so how could she know if she had it?

  What about when the vial warms?

  There was the possibility the vial was magic. She had been so young when her parents were murdered, but she never heard her parents speak of magic. She would have remembered that.

  Yet . . . there was something about Lucan’s question that made her remember the tingling in her fingers and the sprouts in the cell that hadn’t been there before she’d placed her hands on the dirt.

  It was enough to give her pause.

  “What is so important about your mother’s blood?” Lucan asked.

  She shrugged, jerking her attention back to Lucan. “I wish I knew.”

  His gaze narrowed as he leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. “Tell me of your parents, Cara. Where are they?”

  “Dead.” She dropped the vial, the weight of it landing against her chest with a soft thud.

  “Were they MacClures?”

  She hesitated. She had never told anyone she recalled her surname, but Lucan had been honest with her. “Nay. My parents were Sinclairs. The nuns found me wandering the forest and brought me back with them to the nunnery where they raised me.”

  Lucan shifted and turned toward her on the bed. He tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear, then laid his hands on her shoulders. “I’m going to keep you safe, Cara. I vow it to you. But I need to know about your parents and the vial. The more I know, the better I can protect you.”

  “I understand.” And she did, but the thought of opening up the memories of her parents’ deaths left her shaking with dread. She wrapped her arms around herself to try to remain calm.

  “They’re just memories, Cara. They can’t hurt you.”

  She swallowed and looked into Lucan’s sea green eyes. There was such warmth and compassion in them. He had shared his story with her. The least she could do was share hers. “I was only five summers. I remember always being happy, my mother always laughing. I can’t recall her or my da’s face anymore, but I do remember the laughter. And her smile.”