“She dinna share that with us,” his mother answered.
“I thought as much,” he said, tightening his grip on Isa’s hand. “But now you ken the truth of it and you’ll look after her, aye?”
“You can look after her yerself, lad, as soon as you’ve healed.” His mother busied her hands, stopping at his Guardian Mark, tracing her forefinger over it.
“I’m no up to an argument, Ma. And you’ll see to the boy’s welfare, too. His injury looks to be infected.” Robbie weakly tried to push himself up to one elbow, but his mother held him down.
“We’ll see to him. Dinna fash yerself so, Robbie. Now let me finish with removing this bandage.” Margery lifted the last of the wrapping from his chest, her fingers faltering as she exposed the wound. “Holy Mother,” she whispered, her composure rattled for the first time.
The jagged wound centered between his ribs, a wide dark stripe, moist and puckered, as if the skin could barely hold itself together over the mark.
Isa struggled to find some sign of improvement. “Esther’s poultice has taken the swelling down.”
Robbie made a noise somewhere between a chuckle and a cough, and shook his head. “It’s no her poultice. It’s regressing to where it was when it first happened.”
“Oh crap.” Leah pushed in front of Margery. “Let me see that. This is the big one? The one Cate took you back for? This is exactly what she and Mairi were afraid of, isn’t it?”
“Leah!” The warning in Robbie’s tone was clear, though what he warned his daughter of Isa had no idea.
“Fine,” she answered, her irritation clear. “Well? Is it?”
“It is. I ken you’ve renounced what you are, lass. Still, I’ve no choice but to ask for yer help, though I’ll understand if you refuse.”
Leah crossed her arms under her breasts and paced away from the bed, a stain of red mottling her neck and face.
“Dammit, Robert. After what you did for me? How on earth could I refuse? You wouldn’t be like this if it weren’t for me. Okay. Everybody out. If I’m doing this, I need some peace and quiet to work in.”
Isa sat on the cold floor in the hallway outside Robbie’s bedchamber, her head leaned back against the stone. Jamie curled in her lap, his skin hot and fevered to her touch.
There was so much she didn’t understand, not the least of which had to do with Robbie’s relationship with his daughter. The girl even called him by his given name rather than Father.
Margery approached, pacing up and down the hallway as she’d done since Leah had shuffled them all from the room what felt like hours ago.
“I canna imagine what in the name of all that’s holy can be taking the lass so long to—”
The chamber door opened, interrupting Margery’s rant.
Leah leaned against the doorframe, her face damp with perspiration. “It’s no good. Whatever magic has hold of him, it’s stronger than anything I can do. Isa, he wants you with him.”
Isa lifted the groggy child in her lap to his feet, and Margery took hold of the boy’s shoulders as Isa stood and hurried to Robbie’s side.
One touch of his forehead told her the fever burned in him, and she wrung out a cloth from the basin next to the bed, gently placing it over his skin. His eyes opened and he gave her a weak smile.
“It’s as I feared. The Fae Magic will have its way with me, but as soon as Leah has rested, she’s promised, she’ll see to Jamie.”
Fae Magic?
“What do you speak of?”
His eyes had closed and his breathing slowed. He slept again, so she wouldn’t wake him now, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t insist on an answer when he did awaken.
What reason could the Fae possibly have for doing something like this to him? It was much more likely that in his fevered state he had mixed the stories of her involvement with the Fae into what he suffered.
The very idea wracked her with guilt.
A muffled scream from behind her drew her to her feet in an instant.
Jamie lay prone on the floor with Leah’s body draped over him. His body shook with spasms as if he were possessed of some horrible demon trying to shake his limbs from his trunk.
Leah’s body shook as well, but her hands were held tightly affixed to either side of the boy’s face.
“Let him go!” Isa yelled, throwing herself at Leah, trying to pull the girl’s hands from Jamie, to no avail.
When she tried to shove Leah away, the girl’s head lolled to one side and her eyes rolled up. Clearly she no longer had any control over her actions.
In the next moment, right before Isa’s eyes, the side of Leah’s face began to redden and pucker, the skin bubbling and crawling, forming itself into a hideous parody of Jamie’s scars.
“We have to stop this,” Margery cried breathlessly, falling to her knees next to them, digging at Leah’s fingers as she tried to break the horrible writhing connection between the two.
A high-pitched hum whined around Isa’s head, and a pressure pounded at her as if the room were too full of air. The hum grew in both volume and power, and Isa could feel the sound rumbling and vibrating in her chest. She could swear a shaft of green light pierced Leah’s hands where they joined Jamie’s head, and then the light shattered into a million shards.
As the light shattered, both she and Margery were thrown across the room like rag dolls, landing several feet away.
Isa lay on her back, gasping for air.
Jamie! She had to get to the child to protect him.
She fought down a wave of nausea before rolling to her hands and knees. Another moment to gain her balance, and she slowly crawled back toward the crumpled pair in front of the fireplace.
The silence surrounding them now was almost more painful than the noise had been earlier, and she fought the urge to cover her ears against the roar of the silence.
Isa pulled Leah’s limp body off the child’s, pausing only long enough to see that though the girl’s face and neck were as scarred and disfigured as Jamie’s, she still breathed.
Too frightened to cry, she grabbed Jamie’s arms and dragged him into her lap, clutching him to her before leaning away to check his breathing. His small face was so peaceful, his lips barely open, and just as she had when holding little Sean the day before, she turned her cheek to him. The soft, sweet breaths pulsed over her face and then, knowing he’d survived whatever had just happened in that room, she felt the tears prickling at her eyes.
“He’s alive,” she said aloud, to no one in particular, her fingers trembling as she pushed the tangled hair from his perspiration-slicked face to see if he’d suffered further damage to his injuries. Only then did she fully realize what Leah had done.
Jamie’s face was perfect. All of it. The skin as smooth and soft and pink as little Sean’s. Not a scrape, not a mark, not a single trace of the scars from the fire that had ravaged the boy’s body.
Like a madwoman, she dug at his clothing, freeing his little chest and his legs. Annie had told her long ago that the entire side of Jamie’s body bore the same scars as his face. It was the cause of his limp.
But now, the whole of him was smooth and perfect, as if he’d never suffered a single injury in his life.
Disbelief held her captive. Amazement kept her stroking his beautiful unmarred cheeks. How long she stared at Jamie’s face she had no idea, but gradually she accepted that he was unhurt in any way and merely slept, albeit a deep sleep. As carefully as possible, she laid him back on the rug and moved to kneel beside Leah.
The marks on Leah’s face looked like fresh, puckered blisters, the outline of the damage still vibrantly visible. It was as if she had taken on the damage that had been Jamie’s only moments before. As Isa watched, the scars morphed and twisted, then amazingly began to fade, as if Leah healed right before her eyes.
The girl groaned as Isa touched her skin, but she didn’t open her eyes.
“The lad?” Margery pulled herself up to stand.
“Sleeping.�
�� Isa answered. “Completely healed and sleeping. Leah, too.”
Margery nodded, touching her fingers to a large bump on her forehead. “Well, that was an experience, was it no? If you’ll wait here with our charges, I’ll have someone come take them both to their rooms so they can rest in comfort.”
Isa nodded, not moving from her spot on the floor as Margery bustled out of the room.
Though she had no idea exactly what it was they’d just experienced, she had not a single doubt it entirely involved the magic of the Fae.
Even now she could smell its familiar scent in the air.
One thing had become absolutely clear to her in the past few minutes. She wasn’t the only one in this keep with Faerie ties.
Chapter 30
Isa lifted the compress from Robbie’s head and doused it back in the water, her spirits spiking up. His forehead had cooled and the fever seemed to be gone, though she had a concern that his face seemed paler than before.
Perhaps it was only the candles that made it seem so. Margery had been in earlier to light them, one on either side of the bed. Fine creamy beeswax candles, not those made of tallow, so there was no bitter smell in the room.
Leaning back over him, she fussed with his covers, checking the bandage to see if the spot on it had grown any larger. A few hours earlier, blood had begun to ooze from the wound—not much to be sure, but blood nonetheless.
She touched her lips to his forehead, breathing in the scent of him as she did so.
“Sweet dreams, dearling,” she whispered, surprised to find him watching her when she drew back. “Yer awake.”
“I’d never sleep through my own wife’s gentle kiss.”
A pain lanced through her heart with his words. Now was the time for her to tell him. To confess to having wed Malcolm MacDowylt. But coward that she was, she couldn’t make herself say the words. Instead she touched her lips to his.
His eyes fluttered shut and he dozed again, so she settled herself back on the stool next to his bed, his hand cradled between her own two.
A light touch on her shoulder and she nearly jumped from her seat.
“Sorry.” Leah dropped to the floor next to her. “Is the little guy okay?”
Little guy?
“Oh, Jamie? Yes, he’s magnificent. I dinna ken a way to thank you for what you’ve done for him.”
“I’m really glad he’s okay. I only wanted to help with the infection in his cheek, but I was so tired after trying to heal Robert, I lost control and the Magic took over.”
“And you’ve recovered as well?”
Leah’s face seemed to glow tonight, shining with radiant health as if this morning’s events had never happened.
“I’m fine now. What about him?” She pointed to Robbie. “How’s he doing?”
How is Robbie doing? He’s dying.
She might allow the traitorous thought to ramble around in her mind, but she’d never give voice to the words. Especially not to his daughter. She needed to be strong for Leah. In spite of the years that had passed, she remembered all too vividly how it felt to lose a father.
“Yer father’s fever seems to be gone, but now it seems the wound is beginning to bleed.” In spite of her resolve, her voice cracked as she spoke, and she covered her mouth with one hand as if she could hold the hurt inside.
“You love him, don’t you?” Leah put her hand up on Isa’s lap, patting her leg. “I’m so very sorry I couldn’t help him. I honestly tried, but I’m just not strong enough to turn back the Faerie Magic that has him in its grip.”
“What Faerie Magic?” This was the second time she’d heard that term, and this time it was no fever-sick man who voiced the words.
Instead of an answer, Leah posed a question in return. “You know about the Faerie, don’t you?” She ran her finger over the back of Isa’s hand as she spoke, tracing the mark that had formed there.
Isa found no point in denying it. “I’m told my mother was Fae. She left us before I was old enough to remember her.”
“Yeah,” Leah agreed, her voice sad. “Whatever else those Faeries might be, they’re especially good at deserting their families, that’s for sure.”
“What does this have to do with the magic you say has stricken Robbie . . . yer father?”
“Okay. I’m going to be totally honest with you here, but you have to promise me you won’t freak out or anything. Promise?”
“Freak out,” Isa repeated slowly, having no earthly idea what the girl meant. “I will try not to do this thing.”
“First off, Robert isn’t my father. He brought me here to protect me from some really bad guys.” Here she stopped and shook her head, tears shining in her dark eyes. “Really bad Faeries, as a matter of fact. The father/daughter thing is just the cover story he came up with. But his parents have been so great to me. They’ve accepted me as their granddaughter, and for that I love them to pieces.”
Isa stared at the girl, concentrating to follow Leah’s strange pattern of words, trying her best to follow the girl’s story.
“Here’s the thing. About nine years ago in actual time, and don’t even ask about that yet because it will all make sense in a minute or two, Robert got in this god-awful battle to save a friend, and he ended up getting a sword between his ribs for his effort. That friend used Faerie Magic to take Robert into the future, to a time where doctors had the tools to patch him up and save his life, because if he’d stayed here, he’d have been a goner. So—flash forward there he is in the future, doing fine until he agrees to bring me back here, back to his time, to save my butt. Only problem is, he isn’t supposed to be alive in this time, and it looks like the Faerie Magic is determined to set things straight.” The girl finally paused her nonstop rant to take a breath. “Make sense?”
Isa shook her head. Sense? Not at all. “Yer from this future Robbie was taken to?” she asked at last, her voice sounding hesitant to her own ears.
“Yes. And even though he knew this might happen, he decided to act as my Guardian to bring me back here because, way back when, he’d promised a dying friend he’d look after this guy’s little girl, but first those guys almost killed him, and then the whole time thing got totally messed up, and now you’re not a little girl anymore. In fact”—she smiled sadly—“you’re his wife now. And he’s . . .” Her words trailed off and she squeezed Isa’s hand.
Leah’s story boggled her mind. If not for the things she knew to be true, the things she’d experienced in her own life, she wouldn’t have believed a word of it. Not even the words she could understand.
But she did believe, and knowing the truth of his story made so many things he’d said and done so much easier to understand. Still, honesty deserved honesty.
“I have something I must tell you as well. As yer no his daughter, I am no his wife.” Isa kept her voice low, hoping to control the emotion buffeting her in waves. “No that I wouldna give all that I am to be such. Thinking to secure our release from the man who’d captured us, I spoke my vows to him in front of my clan. I’m no free to be Robbie’s wife. No ever.”
Leah rose up on her knees and put her arms around Isa, hugging her. “Don’t cry, Isabella. You are his wife as far as he’s concerned. That’s all that matters right now.”
All that matters? Hardly. If she understood Leah’s story correctly, the man she loved lay dying before her very eyes and it was as much her fault as anyone’s!
“He came back because of a promise to look after me.” She drew on Leah’s earlier words to help it all make sense.
“Uh-huh,” Leah confirmed, sitting back down on the floor.
“Came back though he knew it might cost his life.”
The girl nodded her agreement to that statement.
“Came back from a future time where he was perfectly healthy.”
“Yes.”
Isa felt as if there was something important just waiting to be plucked from the line of logic she’d followed, but it eluded her. Her tired mind struggled
to find the missing piece, and then the pieces snapped together like the foreign puzzle box in her grandfather’s solar.
She tried it one more time.
“If he can travel through time, and he’s no in any danger in the future . . .” she began, pausing as she considered the implausibility of what she was getting ready to say.
“We should send him back to that future where the Faerie Magic wants him to be.” Margery finished her line of reasoning from the shadows by the door.
“How long have you been standing there?” Isa stood and turned to face Robbie’s mother.
“Long enough to recognize what you say as truth. An excellent plan, my dear. Leah? How do we make it happen?”
Leah had risen to her feet as well, one hand supporting her against the chair. “I’m not one hundred percent sure. I only know that the women who sent us told us we had to think about the place we wanted to be. So I guess you have to think about where you’re going.”
“It takes those of the Faerie blood to invoke the magic.”
Isa jumped at the sound of Robbie’s voice and hurried to his side. One look at the growing red splotch on his bandage and she knew they had little time left.
“I am of Faerie blood. Only tell me what to do, Robbie.” Anything. She’d do anything to save his life.
He held out his hand to her. “Come sit beside me. I’ll tell you about my home and we’ll imagine ourselves there.”
Isa carefully climbed up onto the bed, cursing her clumsiness when she noted the flinch of pain on his face. “Tell me. Help me to see it with you.”
“My home sits in a lovely valley in the mountains. It’s a big ranch, with plenty of room for . . .” He paused, panting for breath, obviously in pain. “Room for little Jamie and all the children you’ll give me.”
Isa tried to envision his words, but his dream was too much fantasy even for her, despite how much she wanted what he described to come to pass.
“It’s no working. There’s nothing,” she muttered, her frustration and fear growing by the second.
A Highlander’s Homecoming Page 23