Lost Touch Series
Page 24
It is unbelievable enough to find herself in medieval Scotland. It is beyond comprehension to find herself abruptly married to a stranger. A stranger, moreover, who unlocks a passion and sensuality within her Cat never suspected she harbored. And Roderic, who has vowed to never lose his heart, finds himself falling for the mysterious, flame-haired bride he has taken to his bed. A bride some say is mad… and others claim is an imposter…
ISBN# 1-932815-00-7 • Amethyst Imprint •
Paranormal Romance • November 2005
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PAST PRAISE FOR “A LOST TOUCH OF BLISS”
“Magical, sensuous, funny and touching—a sparkling gem of a book by a superb new author.”
—Mary Lennox, author of THE MOON RUNNERS
“Readers of paranormal romances will find a new author for their reading lists in Amy Tolnich.”
—Enchanted in Romance
“A LOST TOUCH OF BLISS has everything I could want in a romance, great characterization, a conflicted and heartfelt romance that keeps me reading, a few small mysteries, a bit of sizzle, and really good secondary characters.”
—The Romance Studio
“A tale of star-crossed lovers, tragic pasts, lost loves, and love once again found, makes this book a gem of a story that all paranormal romance readers will love. Ms. Tolnitch is sure to gain many fans, no doubt eagerly looking for her next book. A don’t miss!”
—A Romance Review
“A LOST TOUCH OF BLISS grips readers from page one! Amy Tolnitch mesmerizes readers with strong elements of the paranormal, the heartbreaking loss of a powerful love, and the breathless anticipation that a second chance hovers on the brink of forgiveness.”
—Romance Junkies
Outstanding!
“A LOST TOUCH OF BLISS is a rare treasure. Being a paranormal romance set in 1196, this engaging tale is one I truly loved and hated to see end. Reminiscent of Jude Deveraux’s early historical’s, Ms. Tolnitch’s writing will have you wanting to read more. For readers that enjoy a truly wonderful tale of finding love when it seems all is lost, then you need to add A LOST TOUCH OF BLISS to your ‘to buy’ list!”
—K. Ahlers, Independent Reviewer
“Fans of historical and those of otherworldly will appreciate this second chance at love in which the present (that is twelfth century present) and the deceased share so much in common.”
—H. Klausner, Independent Reviewer
“A TOUCH OF BLISS had everything I could want in any romance, great characterization, a conflicted and heartfelt romance that kept me reading, a few small mysteries, a bit of sizzle, and really good secondary characters.”
—The Romance Studio
“Ms. Tolnitch writes with much passion and wit as you read A LOST TOUCH OF BLISS and highly entertains the reader with her debut novel! This is truly an author to keep your eye on in the coming years as she delivers a heart stirring stories told with a passion that weaves a web around the reader and leaves you wanting more. Run to grab A LOST TOUCH OF BLISS and be carried away with a tender romance that delivers all the right touches and hits you on every level.”
—Love Romances
DEDICATION:
In memory of my beloved father, who always told
me I could do anything if I worked hard enough.
Published 2006 by Medallion Press, Inc.
The MEDALLION PRESS LOGO is a registered tradmark of Medallion Press, Inc.
If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment from this “stripped book.”
Copyright © 2006 by Amy Tolnitch
Cover Illustration by Adam Mock
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission of the publisher, except where permitted by law.
Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Typeset in Times New Roman PS MT
Printed in the United States of America
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First Edition
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
Many thanks to Helen Rosburg, Leslie Burbank, Wendy Burbank, and the rest of the Medallion folks for being such a pleasure to work with and for coming up with the idea that The MacKeir deserved his own book. I also want to thank my biggest fan, my daughter, who contributed such wonderful ideas for this story. As always, thanks to my relentlessly supportive husband, my agent, and my talented critique partner for their invaluable aid.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter
I
Toraig Village, The Highlands 1195
Iosobal stared down at the flames licking her heels in disbelief. She looked out over the crowd of villagers. A sea of angry, fearful faces glared back at her.
“Burn her!” a grim-faced man yelled.
Next to him, an apple-cheeked, young woman’s face twisted in hate. “Be gone, spawn of the devil,” she shouted.
“I did nothing wrong,” Iosobal hollered over the crackling of the flames beneath her. The villagers had tied her hands behind her around a stout branch. Her feet rested atop a mountain of kindling.
A man walked toward her, his eyes burning with condemnation. “You are a witch.”
“I healed the child. I helped him.” By Saint Brigid, why were they doing this to her? She had only sought to help the poor boy, his leg crushed by an uncontrollable horse.
In one moment, the boy’s mother offered thanks, and in the next the villagers dragged her to this pyre.
Behind her accuser, she spied the boy. His face held the same disbelief she felt. His mother tugged at him, but he dug in his heels, his horror-struck gaze fastened to hers.
“Through sorcery,” the man spat. “Evil sorcery.”
“Not evil,” Iosobal insisted, though with sick dread, she realized she wasted her breath. It was just as her mother had warned her. These people of the mainland would not understand someone like her, and feared what they could not comprehend. She should never have come here, never have let her curiosity lead her from their hidden island.
“She is just a child,” the boy’s mother called out.
The man did not even look at her. “A child of the devil. ’Tis best to kill her now, afore she grows old enough to spawn more like her.”
“I did nothing wrong,” Iosobal yelled.
“Your very existence is wrong. And for that, you shall burn,” he said to Iosobal. His expression was jubilant as he picked up a fiery piece of kindling and set it to the wood at the top of the pile.
The villagers chanted, “Burn the witch, burn the witch!”
The pyre erupted in flame. As heat washed over her body, Iosobal closed her eyes and envisioned Parraba Island. “Take me home,” she whispered.
Tunvegan Castle, Scotland
Fifteen Years Late
r
LUGH MACKEIR, LAIRD OF TUNVEGAN, AND MASTER of all within his personal realm, stared down at his dying daughter and felt as helpless as a newborn babe.
Four months Ailie had been ill.
Ill with the same sickness that had taken his beloved wife, Agatha, three years ago. Taken her within six months.
He turned toward the latest in a long succession of healers, and stamped down the urge to cleave the man’s head from his shoulders.
The man backed up a step. “I tried, Laird.” His throat worked. “I am sorry. There is nothing to be done.”
“You are no healer.” Useless fools, he cursed to himself. He’d lost count of the numbers of so-called healers who’d seen Ailie. And failed. Failed to do a single thing to ease her suffering. Just as they’d failed with Agatha.
His daughter slid her small hand in his, and gazed up at him as if he could conquer anything. “Help me, Father,” she whispered. “I do not want to die. I do not want to leave you.”
By the saints, his eyes were wet again. Even as he told himself a laird did not shed tears, he felt one slowly slide down his cheek. Dear Lord, she is only seven years of age, he silently prayed. Do not take her from me.
As he gazed into Ailie’s watery, aquamarine eyes, his resolve hardened. “I will help you, my heart.” Somehow, he added silently.
Suddenly, the answer came. The only course left to him. “Be gone from here,” he ordered the healer. “Today.”
The man sidled out the door.
Over the years, Lugh had heard dire warnings of a mysterious isle ruled by a sorceress, an isle no one could reach. It was only the whisper of a legend; a story told in hushed tones in the late evening after many mugs of ale had been drunk. A legend of a woman, a witch—who knew? Yet … a powerful healer.
He feared no man. Or woman. And any reasoned man knew that magic was but a superstitious fable.
He gripped his daughter’s hand tight. “We face this together, my heart.”
“And the Laird of Tunvegan is always victorious, right Father?”
“Always.” Lugh could barely see her through the veil of tears in his eyes. By God, he would find a way to save her. No matter what it took. He knelt down beside the bed and stroked damp strands of hair from her pinched face, hair the same flaxen color as her mother’s. Looking into her eyes was like looking into his own green ones, with a splash of blue added. She is mine, he swore to himself. And I shall keep her such. “On the morrow, we shall leave Tunvegan.”
Her brows drew together in puzzlement. “Why?”
“To find the person who shall heal you.”
She smiled. “Good.” As she closed her eyes, Lugh patted her hand, rose and nodded to the maid who sat in the corner. “Pack her things. We leave at first light.”
“But,” the maid hesitated, “to where, Laird? She is so weak, she—”
“Cease. I will save my daughter.” With that, he turned and strode out of the chamber. He had much to do.
IOSOBAL STOOD ON THE MOUNTAINSIDE AND KICKED AT a loose stone with the toe of her shoe. The two most stalwart men on her island wrestled with one of the massive rocks that blocked her cave. Unfortunately, since many of the men left Parraba, there was not an abundance from which to choose. The level of grunts and curses told her these two were having no more success than any other.
One of the men glanced up, and pushed a lock of red hair from his gleaming forehead. He averted his gaze from hers. “I am sorry, my lady. ’Tis just too heavy.”
Though she seethed with frustration, Iosobal made herself give them a light smile, concealing her heartache over the fact that an essential part of her remained beyond reach. “Thank you for trying. If you would care to stop at the palace, Niamh shall fetch you food and drink before you return to the village.”
The men exchanged what Iosobal privately referred to as The Look. A look that said there was no way in Heaven or on Earth that they would dare to set foot in the Lady of the Isle’s fortress. Over the years, she had heard many of the villagers’ stories, usually by accident. According to some, she lured men inside, and turned them into her slaves. In others, to cross the threshold meant you would never be seen again. The rest were too ludicrous or grisly to think about.
“Uh, my thanks, my lady, but we’d best be getting back to work.”
Iosobal nodded and they hastened away.
She glared at the stones, and held out her hands. “Move,” she commanded.
Nothing happened. Tears stung the backs of her eyes. She knew even Niamh, her maid, cook, and housekeeper, thought her foolish to care so much about a simple cave. But Niamh did not understand. Iosobal doubted she could. Niamh was a simple soul, happy to provide service in exchange for refuge.
No, there was no one else alive who knew that the cave was her sanctuary, her history, the place she connected with the spirits of her ancestors. It was the hallowed place she had buried her mother.
And because of her carelessness, it now held the one object she treasured above all others—the moonstone necklace her mother gave her long ago. With the necklace, she could see the true heart of a person. Without it, she felt exposed, weakened.
She tilted her head toward the cloudless sky. “Am I being punished? Is that why I cannot move the stones? Why?”
No answer came to her, and she slumped in defeat. For some reason, the wary look on the men’s faces came to mind. Neither would look her in the eye. She knew the reason. With her long, dark hair and pale violet eyes, she very much looked like the magical being she was.
She squared her shoulders and pushed the moment of loneliness away.
Slowly, she picked her way down the grassy hillside until she reached the sea. Above her, the pink walls of her home gleamed in the sun. As always, the clear blue water soothed her. She waded into the warm water and gazed at the empty horizon.
“Aid me, Lord. Send me the way.”
THE NEXT MORNING, LUGH STOOD IN THE BAILEY OF Tunvegan, issuing orders and readying his horse for travel. He had already dispatched a man to hire a boat for them at the coast.
People rushed back and forth with supplies, blankets, food, and drink, all loaded in several bags attached to the packhorses. Lugh had his weapons and his horse. He needed naught else, but he would see to Ailie’s comfort as best he could. He felt the doubtful stares of his people, and heard the whispers, but he ignored it all. Many thought his actions would seal his daughter’s fate, but he could not stay and do nothing. He knew with a certainty Ailie would not survive that. Out of the corner of his eye, he spied one of his men, Branor, approach.
Branor strode quickly and came to a stop close to Lugh. His brown-eyed gaze fixed on Lugh with what Lugh called his “scholarly look.”
“Have you lost your wits?” he asked. “Laird?”
“Mayhap, but ’tis all I can think to do.” Lugh tightened the girth on his saddle and his stallion shifted his feet.
“’Tis only a legend, Lugh. No one knows if any of it is true. No one has ever found this isle.”
Lugh narrowed his gaze. “Then I shall be the first.”
Branor muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like, “Reckless fool.”
“I will not stay here and watch my daughter die, Branor.”
“I know how much losing Agatha wounded you, but—”
“This is not about Agatha. It is about my only child.” Damn, but his eyes were near to leaking again. He shook his head and sucked in a breath.
“Very well. I shall go with you.” Branor’s weathered face was solemn.
“’Tis too dangerous. I cannot ask that of you.”
“You are not asking. And you may need a man at your back.”
Lugh stared at him for a moment, considering his offer. Branor was nearly as big as he, and well skilled with a blade. He was also Lugh’s most loyal man, despite the unfortunate fact he was not a Scot by birth and much of his past remained a mystery. Lugh slowly reached out and clasped Branor’s hand. “Than
k you, my friend.”
Branor nodded and headed off toward the stable.
After his departure, the hum of activity in the bailey quieted, and Lugh turned. An older man emerged from the massive stone keep, cradling a small bundle in his arms. Lugh’s heart swelled with pride as he watched them approach.
Ailie’s face was pale as bone, but she wore a sunny smile and waved to people as she passed, calling out greetings. By the saints, the lass knew the names of everyone at Tunvegan, Lugh realized. His were not the only eyes to have leakage problems, he noted.
“Einar,” Lugh said as they neared him. “Thank you.”
Einar nodded. “Is all in readiness?”
“Aye.” Lugh leapt atop his horse. “Branor accompanies me.”
“Ah. Good.” He handed Ailie up to Lugh. “God be with you on your quest.”
“See to the safety of Tunvegan,” Lugh charged. He lifted his head, and shouted, “Einar acts with my authority as laird.” As he passed his gaze over his people, he briefly paused on Lachlann, who stared back at him with a hard took. Lachlann, who had acted strangely for some time now. Lugh inwardly shrugged. He would have to see to the man when they returned. Naught mattered now but Ailie.
“Take care of our wee lass,” Einar said.
Lugh nodded. “That I shall,” he said. He handed Einar a sealed letter. “Have this delivered to Falcon’s Craig. I would let Agatha’s family know what befalls us.”
“I shall see to it, Laird.”
Lugh gathered Ailie close and rode out of the gate without a backward glance.
AILIE POINTED WITH A SHRIEK OF EXCITEMENT. “LOOK, Father, a dolphin.”