by Brenda Joyce
“My lady!” he cried, clearly relieved to see her. “Is Macleod with ye?”
Her heart lurched with more fear. “No, he’s not. Rob, how long has it been since he returned Coinneach to Melvaig?”
“’Tis been two days.” Rob’s blue eyes blazed and his face was grim. “I have heard Coinneach is arousing his allies an’ plans war on us now, an’ his mother is usin’ her magic to help him.”
Tabby went still. Criosaidh was still alive. Of course she was—she wouldn’t die until June 1, 1550, if Tabby had changed history. Now it seemed as if they would be rivals for the next two-and-a-half centuries. She shivered. She was a Rose. If she had to fight that witch for two-hundred-and-fifty more years, she would do so and she’d win.
“The MacDougalls are always plottin’ against us,” Rob added quickly, as if to reassure her. He then said, low, “He told me he would leap into the future to save ye in another time. I dinna realize he finally had his powers. I begged him not to go. What has happened to him? Why hasn’t he come back to us?”
“I don’t know what has happened. But I know he’s coming back—I am sure of it.”
Rob looked at her with worry but Tabby couldn’t reassure him. She kept seeing Macleod in that forest, and evil was stalking him. Where was he?
She reminded herself that he survived. She knew it because she’d just been in his arms.
It’s all right, she told him silently. I’m here and I’m waiting for you.
She couldn’t imagine defending Blayde for the next two-hundred-and-fifty years without him. Tabby felt sick. She held her stomach, thinking about how Fate—and history—could be changed. Maybe the gods were angry with her for what she’d just done at An Tùir-Tara. Now, she began to really worry. She’d just been with him on June 1, 1550, but he’d gone to Melvaig on June 19, 1550. If he was meddling at An Tùir-Tara and being punished for it after she’d been with him in the sixteenth century, their entire life could be destroyed.
A terrible headache began. She refused to think about being at Blayde for the rest of her life without him. Being able to leap into the past at any point in time meant that if someone made one slip, history could be undone and rewritten. But the Book of Roses stated emphatically that history would only change if it had been miswritten.
“He’ll return.” Rob was adamant, but his expression remained worried.
The day passed endlessly. Tabby found herself on the ramparts, waiting for him to return, as if he was traveling by horseback. At dusk she gave that up, because he wasn’t a mortal and he would return by leaping time. She paced the hall, unable to eat, until Peigi insisted.
She fell asleep in his great chair before the fire, his wolf-hounds at her feet.
And she dreamed about him. In her dreams, he was somewhere in the night, always walking, his face grim and set, his feet bloody and blistered. In her dreams, there were demons and wolves, and his sword dripped their blood. Sometimes she saw him wandering through the forests as the fourteen-year-old boy. When she awoke, he hadn’t returned, and she was even sicker with fear for him.
Something terrible had happened to him, she thought uneasily.
The sense she’d had before, that he was lost, escalated.
The hounds whined.
Tabby couldn’t even pet them. “C’mon,” she said hoarsely, feeling as if she hadn’t slept at all that night. She crossed the hall, the hounds racing her to the front doors, tails wagging. They began to bark in excitement.
Tabby opened the doors, the bright morning sunlight almost blinding her. Macleod was crossing the bailey.
He had come home. Tabby cried out in joy, flooded with relief. Then he stepped out of the shadows cast by the walls and her happiness vanished. She was stunned by his appearance.
His clothing had been reduced to rags and it hung from his body in tatters, revealing the fact that he had become terribly thin and far too emaciated for his large frame. He no longer looked like a knight or a bodybuilder—he looked like a marathon runner, and a sick one at that! He was long and lean now, all muscle and bone. Disbelieving, she realized his face was hollow and gaunt, too.
She started to cry and ran into his arms. He wrapped his arms around her in return, as if afraid to ever let her go again. Tabby clung desperately, so overjoyed that he was alive, and apparently unhurt—and that he was home. But what had happened to him?
In his hard, equally desperate embrace, she felt and understood the depth of his love for her.
“What happened?” she cried, looking up.
And the moment their gazes met, she realized what was wrong. He had no power.
She should have sensed his vast white power, because the hot waves always cloaked and cocooned her. It was gone.
But he smiled at her, his eyes shining with moisture and love. “Tabitha,” he murmured. “I’m afraid ye’re a dream.”
Tabby hesitated, frantic to comprehend what had happened, and in that single moment, she felt something else, too. Macleod’s power had always been tinged with a dark weight. Now, his presence was buoyant and light—like the look in his eyes.
The burden of guilt and grief was gone.
“I’m not a dream. Thank God you’re home!” She looked into his eyes and saw so much light—she saw joy and love. “You’ve healed,” she managed, shocked.
His mouth curved and even his smile was different. “I’ve forgiven myself, Tabitha,” he said simply.
She clasped his face. “I’m so happy for you.”
“An’ I learned I canna live without ye—but I have lived without ye fer many months now,” he said hoarsely. “So let me kiss ye, woman.”
He pulled her close and kissed her. Tabby gave in, clinging, crying with sheer joy. He was home and nothing else mattered.
When he tightened his grasp on her, his body telling her he was about to heave her over his shoulder and carry her upstairs, Tabby finally pushed away, wiping her damp face. “What happened?” She reached for his face and held it in her hands again. He was still beautiful. He was her hero, more so now than ever, no matter what they had done to him.
“The gods dinna want me now, Tabitha. I went too far—I defied them one time too many. I’ve been banished from the brethren. There’ll be no vows.” He was grim. “But I will fight fer mankind anyway.”
She realized he had been banished from the Brotherhood by the gods for what he’d done at An Tùir-Tara, and with that punishment, he had been stripped of all his powers, every single one. He was a mortal now, unlike the Master she’d met in the sixteenth century. He was frustrated but resigned. “I don’t care that you’re mortal. I love you just the way you are. But it is wrong, Macleod, wrong that you are denied your Destiny.”
“Can ye read my mind now?” he asked.
It was such a terrible irony. Tabby slipped into his mind and she saw that he had walked across the Highlands, fighting evil with his sword and his bare hands, in order to get back to her. She realized the extent of his ordeal—how he’d been hunted by evil daily, how he’d had to hide in order to survive. His companion had been his memories of the time spent with her and his tragic childhood. And he had worked through his repressed grief and guilt.
She stroked his jaw. “I can read your mind now.” She started—he believed she would die at An Tùir-Tara!
MacNeil had made him watch her go up in flames four times! And she had thought the stocks a cruel punishment! She started to cry. “I thought MacNeil was your friend!”
He cradled her in his arms. “Dinna cry fer me. I am home now, with ye, Tabitha, where I will always be. An’ I am happy.”
“I hate what they did to you,” she cried, her face wet with tears. “And I don’t die in the fire, Macleod! I hide in the fire! It’s Criosaidh who dies there.”
He gasped, and it was the first time she had ever seen him shocked. Then he tilted up her chin and his eyes blazed. “MacNeil was furious with me because I dinna trust in Fate. Now I ken why. O’ course the gods would let ye live. Ye’re ev
erythin’ fine an’ good in this world, Tabitha. An’ what of her deamhan ghost? Has it come back?”
She tried to stop crying and trembled, breathing hard. “I vanquished Criosaidh on June first, not June nineteenth, in 1550. And I destroyed the ghost when I destroyed Criosaidh. It imploded, Macleod.”
He was thoughtful. “But what if her deamhan ghost was born another time?”
Tabby nodded. “I think it likely her ghost is a part of history. One was destroyed, the other created, on June first. And if Criosaidh’s ghost was just born, I believe it will still go to early December 2008, seeking revenge on me there, before you take me into the past.”
“So she’ll hunt you in New York an’ then follow ye to Blayde, till ye go to 1550 to destroy both the ghost an’ the witch, a few days later.” He smiled, satisfied.
“I think the ghost is trapped in that triangle of time,” Tabby whispered, chilled. “She is created in June of 1550, she goes to December 2008 and follows me to June of 1298. Then I go to An Tùir-Tara and the cycle starts all over again. The dates might change a little, but it’s all really the same—it’s the history the Ancients wrote.”
“Good.” He was fierce. “Let the puny ghost suffer eternally in that triangle of time! I am proud of ye, Tabitha.”
She was surprised. “Really?”
His smile revealed one small dimple. “Ye dinna ken how much I admire ye—even with yer independent nature?”
Tabby bit her lip, but she was thrilled. “It’s mutual, Macleod. I admire you, too, more than you can possibly know!”
“But I’m medieval…barbarian…a savage,” he murmured, pulling her back into his arms.
She laughed. “You are so medieval, and you know what? I think I like it.”
He was pressing with some urgency against her now, and he said softly, his eyes gleaming, “Ye think ye like it?”
Desire reared up and hollowed her. “It’s been too long,” Tabby whispered.
His hands slid low. “I may be mortal now,” he said softly, “but ye’ll never notice.”
She inhaled. “I have no doubt.”
“Let me prove it,” he said. His mouth tightened, and he turned her around.
“Prove it,” Tabby ordered as her backside hit the edge of the trestle table.
His mouth curved. “Shrew,” he whispered.
Tabby felt her own mouth turn upward, while her body exploded with feverish excitement. “Barbarian,” she managed to say.
He reached for her leg and hooked it around his hip. He slid her gown up her calf, her knee, her thigh…her hip. “I’d cross a thousand Highlands fer ye, Tabitha,” he said. “A thousand more times.”
And she realized he would fight his way back to her time and again if he had to. “I love you, Guy.”
He started—she’d never called him by his name before. His gaze unwavering and fierce on her face, he slid his massive length into her, and a moment later they were joined. Tabby held on to him, crying. Nothing could ever feel as right as being in his arms, except for becoming one.
“I’m home now,” he said. “’Tis our home, Tabitha.”
She somehow nodded. She would never leave him. She’d figure out how to be a modern woman in medieval times, with a medieval Highlander as her soul mate. He made love to her on the table, and although mortal now, Tabby broke into more ecstasy than ever before, maybe because she loved him more than ever and finally understood him. When they were both breathing hard and almost sated, the light coming inside from the open doors was the soft faded hues of an approaching dusk.
He kissed her neck and moved off her, helping her up as she rearranged her clothes. Then he held out his arm and Tabby went to stand against his side. “Will ye stay with me?”
He couldn’t read her mind anymore. “Of course I will. But I need to see my sister—and I need to get the Book of Roses, too.”
“Ruari can help us.” He suddenly tensed. Tabby was confused, as well. She sensed so much white power, rapidly growing, and it was familiar—but that was impossible!
“Guy?”
“Tabitha,” he whispered, his blue eyes wide. “I can hear yer every thought.” He stopped. He flexed his hand. He gave her a look and pointed at the bench. Silver blazed; the bench exploded into tiny shards and pieces.
Tabby cried out. “You have your power back!”
Macleod stared in disbelief. Then he breathed hard and said, “I can leap if I wish to—I can feel it!”
Tabby seized his hand. “They’re giving you back your power!”
But Macleod jerked toward the hearth—as did Tabby. MacNeil materialized in a cloud of shimmering golden air, his majesty unmistakable.
Tabby thought about what he’d done to Macleod and she was so angry she inhaled, clenching her fists.
Fully present, he smiled a little at her, as if expecting her wrath and dreading it. “I dinna have any choice. The gods were done with him.”
“There is always a choice!” she cried. “You tortured him!”
Macleod took her hand, silencing her. Tabby blinked, realizing she’d been the one to lose her temper, not him. She realized he wasn’t angry. “Let’s hear what he has come to say.”
MacNeil smiled, approaching, and to Tabby’s amazement, he pulled Macleod into a bearlike embrace. “I’m proud of ye, lad,” he then said, releasing him. “The gods decided yer punishment. ’Twas harsh, I agree, but they gave ye one last chance to redeem yerself. Ye have triumphed over every deamhan sent to stop ye. Ye forgave the gods, even though ye thought Tabitha dead. An’ ye learned the truth about yer life—that yer reason to live is to defend God’s creatures, all o’ them, as long as they are Innocent.”
Macleod was flushed, probably from MacNeil’s warm hug. Tabby was amazed. “You forgave the gods?”
He nodded grimly. “An’ I am sorry, verra much so, that it has taken me so long to learn the truth.”
MacNeil clasped his shoulder, and Tabby saw that he was overjoyed and close to tears. “I saw Lady Tabitha in yer Destiny, Guy. The gods decided long ago she would be yer better half, an’ that she would guide ye to the truth. I will admit I became afraid she would fail. Ye can be the most stubborn of men! But I can see now that I shouldna have ever feared fer ye.” He turned to Tabby. “Thank ye, Lady Tabitha, fer all ye have done.”
Tabby nodded, tearing up. “You’re welcome. He’s sort of hard to resist.”
MacNeil grinned. “They like to make a man mad with desire, when it helps their cause.”
Tabby realized it was all Fate, and that was fine with her.
“Ye’ll come to Iona tomorrow.” MacNeil smiled and vanished.
Tabby rushed over to Macleod. “You are redeemed,” she whispered unsteadily, taking his hands. “You are forgiven. Tomorrow you take your vows!”
He inhaled, clearly shaken. “Tabitha,” he whispered. “Those vows mean everythin’ to me now.”
THE BEACHES WERE the color of pearls. The morning sunlight was bright and warm, the sky azure, without a single cloud, and the sea was the color of lapis. Not a bird chirped, not a leaf stirred—the morning was absolutely silent. Macleod stood before Iona’s holiest shrine, making his vows upon the ancient Book of Wisdom, which MacNeil held. The Abbot was cloaked in red and gold robes, while Macleod wore a leine so richly dyed that it was gold. The neckline and hem were lavishly embroidered, and his red-and-black brat was pinned across his right shoulder with his father’s lion brooch. The huge, gilded and bejeweled ceremonial sword he held dated back to the first days of the Brotherhood—two centuries before Christ was born. As he spoke, his voice resonated powerfully in the otherwise silent morning.
Tabby was overcome.
They were not alone. Fifty or so Masters were present, most of them bare-legged Highlanders in leines and brats. But a few of them were Lowlanders, Englishmen and Norsemen. Tabby was the only woman there.
The monastery, which was a sanctuary for the Brotherhood, reeked of warrior power and testosterone—it was highly cha
rged and solidly male.
But there was more. Behind the brethren, she could almost see the Ancients in their robes and gowns, shimmering in the morning light, fiercely pleased now. Clearly they would celebrate later, too. Their splendor and majesty was inspiring, and she had never felt so small, so insignificant and so humble.
Macleod went down on one knee.
She knew he felt it all, too.
Because this was his Destiny—serving the gods, keeping Faith and protecting the Innocent. And he was her Destiny. Tabby thrilled.
MacNeil laid both his hands on his shoulders, speaking softly now.
Tabby’s heart turned over, bursting with pride. If only Sam were present.
Then she felt a caress upon her shoulder.
She turned and Grandma Sara smiled at her.
For one impossible moment, Tabby saw her grandmother standing there, but not as a wrinkled old woman. She saw a young, beautiful woman, in ancient robes. Then the morning sunlight washed over Sara, and she was gone.
Tabby trembled, even more undone. She had not a doubt her grandmother had just come to join her in the most important moment of her new life. And if her suspicions were correct, Grandma was no stranger to the world of the Masters—just the opposite was true.
Tabby pinched herself. She was incredibly proud of Macleod, deliriously happy as never before, and wildly in love. Macleod was her Destiny and she was his. She had been meant to go back in time to set him free from his past, so he could take his vows. And while Criosaidh was her arch enemy, and they would war for a few centuries more until she was vanquished, so what? Her powers were growing and so were Macleod’s. She already knew the kind of Master he would become, and she was confident about her own powers, too. There would be other forces of evil to battle and fight—it was the law of the universe.
They were about to embark on a lifetime that would encompass centuries. They would fight evil, protect Innocence, make love, argue a bit—and make babies. Eventually she would have at least three strapping sons, not to mention a few magically talented daughters—or so she hoped. And while she missed Sam, she would see her again. Of that, she had no doubt.