Courage of a Highlander

by Katy Baker

  It was good advice. Anybody with half a brain would realize that this was a fool’s errand. Anybody with half an ounce of common sense would give this up as a bad job and go write that gossip column about the local vegetable competition instead.

  Not Kara. She’d come to realize that common sense didn’t really enter her vocabulary much these days.

  She checked the address scrawled on the bit of paper for the hundredth time. Yes, this was definitely the place. Pausing in the shadow of one of the buildings, she looked around. She’d arrived in a part of town she’d never visited. Around her lay an abandoned industrial unit that looked as though it hadn’t seen activity in decades. The roads were pitted and cracked, the windows smashed, the buildings seeming empty and forlorn.

  She gulped. Yes, this was definitely a bad idea. For all she knew Irene MacAskill might be a plant sent by Devereux and this was a set-up designed to make Kara look like an idiot. If that was so, it was working.

  But she couldn’t leave now, no matter how much her common sense was telling her to. That fire in her belly wouldn’t let her rest. Her instincts were screaming at her that there was something here, something important, and she could no more have ignored them than she could have stopped breathing.

  Kara stuck her head out and looked around. It was getting dark now and she saw no sign of anyone. From across the street a stray cat arched its back and hissed before scampering away.

  Kara steeled her resolve and moved. Above her reared a huge warehouse. On first glance it appeared as abandoned as the others but there were fresh tire tracks indicating somebody had been here recently. A tall fence surrounded it.

  Carefully, Kara crept round the back. She hoped to find a gap in the fence or an open gate or anything that would let her get closer to the building for a good look. She didn’t find a hole but around the back of the building she found an old garbage can leaning against the fence. She paused, glanced around, then climbed up onto the garbage can and used the extra height to boost herself onto the fence and over the other side.

  She paused as she hit the ground, heart hammering. She had no idea who owned this building and although it seemed abandoned, the fence around it suggested otherwise. She was probably trespassing and had probably committed several felonies just by vaulting that fence. Nothing for it now, she thought. She had to go on.

  Moving quickly, she crept across a wide tarmacked area and soon found herself in a jumble of yards separated by crumbling walls. Kara guessed that these must once have been storage areas. She kept moving, searching for a door into the warehouse, heart thumping so loud she felt sure anyone in the vicinity would hear it. Finally, she spotted a door. It was small and battered, probably used for taking deliveries. She hurried over to it and set her ear against the rotting wood. Nothing. All was eerily quiet.

  Then, just as she was about to put her hand on the door handle, an explosion of barking sounded behind her. She whirled in terror. A huge black and tan dog came hurtling towards her, its claws making a skittering noise on the tarmac.

  Panic surged through Kara. She ran, pelting deeper into the warren of storage yards. She didn’t need to look behind her to know the dog was hot on her tail—she could hear it panting as it bore down on her, could almost feel its hot breath on the back of her legs.

  With a surge of panic she saw that the yard she’d entered had no exit. It was surrounded by tall walls. Kara didn’t slow: she leapt, arms outstretched at the wall. For a heartbeat her fingers brushed the top but then she was falling, to land on her back on the hard ground with enough force to knock the breath from her lungs. Gasping, she flipped onto her belly and then backed up, pressing her back against the wall.

  The dog skittered to a halt not three feet away, head hanging low, lips pulled back in a snarl. It bunched its muscles to spring and Kara threw a hand across her face, a scream forming in her throat.

  Then everything seemed to happen at once.

  The dog leapt at her, jaws snapping for her throat. But suddenly a man appeared, putting himself between her and the slavering beast. The dog slammed into him but he crouched down on one knee, drove his shoulder into its chest and the dog went tumbling away. It landed on its side and scrabbled to its feet, shaking its head as if dazed.

  “Hurry!” the man snapped. He held out his hand and hauled Kara unceremoniously to her feet.

  He grabbed her around the waist and suddenly she was being lifted onto the wall. She clutched at the stone to steady herself and then dropped down the other side. The man boosted himself after her, clearing the wall just as the dog made a leap at his feet. Kara collapsed onto her knees, panting in terror, and the man dropped down beside her.

  “It’s all right, lass,” he said in a deep voice. “He canna get in here.”

  Kara squeezed her eyes shut, concentrating on calming her racing heart. For a moment her head swam and she feared she might faint so she curled her hands into fists, digging her fingernails into her palms to steady her. Finally her heart rate began to calm and she opened her eyes, fixing her bleary gaze on her savior.

  He knelt next to her, regarding her with a concerned expression on his face. He was tall and broad-shouldered. Jet-black hair fell in lazy tangles onto his shoulders, framing a face of high cheekbones and a strong chin laced with stubble. Stormy blue eyes watched her steadily.

  “Thanks,” she gasped. “I owe you one.”

  “Ye are welcome, my lady.”

  He spoke with a lilting Scottish accent and now that she noticed it, he seemed to be wearing traditional Scottish dress. He wore a long plaid over a simple linen shirt. The plaid came to his knees below which he wore knee-high leather boots. A sash crossed his chest which bore an insignia she didn’t recognize. And was Kara imagining it or was that a sword strapped to his side? Well I shouldn’t be surprised, she thought. It’s no crazier than anything else that’s happened today.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  She eyed him. Giving her name seemed like a dumb thing to do. What if he was a security guard? But lying wouldn’t get her anywhere either. “Kara,” she muttered. “My name’s Kara. And you are?”

  “My name is Aiden. Aiden Harris.”

  “Right. Do you work here?” And are you going to call the police? she wondered silently.

  “Nay, lass. I’m...looking for something. Something I hope might be found here.” He regarded her with an inquisitive expression, his deep blue eyes full of questions. “Tell me, what would a lass like ye be doing in an abandoned place like this?”

  Kara lifted her chin. “Same as you. Looking for something.”

  “Really? And what would that be?”

  Kara bit back an angry retort. What did it have to do with him? But he had saved her from that dog and deserved a bit of common courtesy. “Answers. Answers to questions I don’t know how to ask.”

  She glanced at their surroundings. They were in another small yard. To the left rose the wall of the warehouse with two large windows looking out that were mostly broken. A high fence circled the yard, with a locked gate sealing them in. There was no sign of Devereux. Why had Irene sent her here? More and more she was beginning to think this was some elaborate trick of Devereux’s. An attempt to teach her a lesson for sticking her nose into his business.

  “If I ever see Irene MacAskill again, I’m going to give her the rough side of my tongue,” she muttered.

  Aiden’s head came up at that. He fixed her with a stare. “What did ye say?”

  “Nothing. It doesn’t matter.”

  “Did ye say Irene MacAskill?”

  Kara watched him warily. “Yes. What of it?”

  Aiden looked equally wary. “It was Irene MacAskill who sent me here.”

  Kara barked a sardonic laugh. “You too? Seems we’ve both been had. I think we’ve been sent on some wild goose chase.”

  “Ye dinna understand,” Aiden replied, shaking his head. “She sent me to protect the Iuchair—the Key of Ages. Why would she send ye as well? Ye are no
warrior. It doesnae make any sense.”

  “You’ve got it right there,” Kara replied. “None of this makes any damned sense.” She climbed to her feet. Iuchair? Key of Ages? What the hell was he talking about? She suddenly felt uneasy, as though she’d lost control of this situation. There was something going on here, something she was missing. Aiden knew Irene MacAskill. Did he know Michael Devereux as well? How was he caught up in all of this?

  “Listen, I—” she began but Aiden suddenly put his hand up for silence.

  He rose to his feet in one fluid motion and stood still, head cocked as if listening. Kara froze as well and then she heard it—the unmistakable sound of a car engine. Aiden crept over to the locked gate, signaling for her to stay put. Kara ignored him and followed, crouching by the gate and peering through the tiny gap between gate and fence post.

  A car pulled to a halt on the other side and four men got out. Kara gasped as she recognized Devereux. He held a small metal lock-box.

  “Hurry!” he snapped to his men. “Open the door.”

  His men hurried over to a large set of double doors that were chained and padlocked. One of them took out a bunch of keys. The doors squealed as he pushed them open, the sound setting Kara’s teeth on edge. With one last look around at the deserted landscape, Devereux went inside.

  Aiden let out a string of curses under his breath, his eyes tracking every movement of Devereux and his men. Then he stood and looked at Kara.

  “Ye should leave, lass. Those are dangerous men if ever I saw them. It isnae safe for ye here.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  He glanced at her as if deciding how much he could tell her then drew in a breath. “I came to get the Iuchair. Those men must have it or else why would Irene MacAskill send me to this place? I’m going to get it from them. I willnae leave without it.”

  “But there are lots of them and only one of you!”

  He shrugged as though this detail was unimportant. “I made a vow. I’ll nay break it.”

  Kara stood and squared her shoulders. “Then I’m coming with you.”

  “Nay, lass,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s too dangerous.”

  Indignation welled up inside Kara. “I’ve been investigating that man for months! This is my chance to find out just what the hell he’s up to!”

  Anger flashed in his deep blue eyes. “If ye enter that building, I canna guarantee I can keep ye safe.”

  “I’m not asking you to!” She crossed her arms and tapped her foot, glaring at him. “Listen. I’m going into that warehouse whether you like it or not. Now I think we’ve got a better chance if we work together but if I have to go alone, I will. You’ll not stop me short of tying me up.”

  “Dinna tempt me,” Aiden growled. Then he sighed. “Fine. We’ll need to sneak inside and get a look before we make a plan of action. This way.”

  He led the way over to the warehouse wall, pressing themselves flat against it. Aiden cautiously peered through one of the broken windows then ducked down next to Kara.

  “I canna see them. They must be in another part of the building. It’s clear within. Come on.”

  He moved silently to the doors and peered through the crack, hand resting on his sword-hilt.

  After a few tense moments Aiden relaxed, taking his hand from his sword and nodding to indicate they should go inside. Kara swallowed, a strange mix of near-panic and excitement swirling in her stomach. The rational part of her screamed that this was crazy. She was breaking into a building with a stranger she’d only just met on the off chance she’d be able to find out what Devereux was up to. But the other part of her, that part that had always followed her instincts, churned with excitement. Without knowing how, she felt sure she was on the right path. Tonight she would discover the truth. One way or another.

  She followed Aiden Harris as he led the way inside the warehouse.

  Kara couldn’t have said what this place used to be but there were bits of rusted machinery scattered about the floor. A thin layer of dust covered everything, disturbed only by the footprints of rodents.

  She and Aiden moved carefully, quietly into the room. Aiden’s eyes scanned everywhere, alert for danger, and everything about his posture suggested he was tense, ready to spring in any direction. He made not a sound as he slowly padded across the room to a door on the other side. Kara felt clumsy in comparison. Although she tried to move as quietly as he did, she failed miserably and her footsteps sounded as loud as gunshots to her ears.

  Aiden paused by the door and pressed his ear against it. Kara hunkered down next to him.

  “What is it?”

  “There are voices on the other side.”

  Kara pressed her ear to the thick wood. Sure enough, she could hear muted voices although she couldn’t make out the words.

  “What do we do?” she asked.

  Aiden looked around and his eyes alighted on a metal gantry that ran around the perimeter of the room. “This way.”

  They hurried over to a metal staircase that led up to the gantry. It was rickety, had clearly seen better days and rocked alarmingly when Kara set her foot on the first step.

  “I will go first,” Aiden said. “Come up only when I signal.”

  Kara nodded and Aiden set his foot on the first step. Although it creaked, the metal held as he climbed and stepped out onto the gantry. He nodded at Kara who gritted her teeth and began to climb. As the steps shook under her weight she cursed herself for a fool for the hundredth time tonight. What the hell was she doing? She could very well fall to her death in the pursuit of her stupid story!

  But she reached the gantry without mishap. From up there she could see what had caught Aiden’s attention. The top half of the wall was taken up by windows and there was a big metal box at the far end that seemed to straddle the wall between this room and the one beyond where the voices were coming from. The metal box had windows just like the wall as well as a door on this side. Kara guessed it had been a foreman’s office, situated where he could keep one eye on the workers in both rooms below.

  They hurried along the gantry and through the open door into the foreman’s office. It smelled musty with disuse and a rodent had made a nest in one corner. Kara followed Aiden inside.

  They crouched low then crawled over to the window. Kara got a great view of the room below. It was larger than the first and rows of workbenches had been pushed to the sides, leaving a clear space in the middle. This space was taken up by a structure that looked wholly out of place in this industrial setting.

  A set of ancient standing stones.

  Two large upright stones sat in the middle of a circle inscribed with chalk. They looked to be gray basalt and were taller than Kara, probably taller than Aiden. Across the top of these lay a third stone, forming a rudimentary gateway. This odd location with its lifting equipment dangling from the ceiling above suddenly made sense. Moving those stones would take a mammoth effort. But that still didn’t explain why the hell Devereux had constructed this thing in the first place. She shook her head, trying to make sense of what she was seeing.

  The chalk circle around the stones was inscribed with words but in a language that Kara couldn’t read. Devereux’s men stood at equidistant points on the circle and Devereux himself knelt on the edge closest to Kara and Aiden, fiddling with the strongbox he’d been carrying.

  “What is that?” Kara whispered, nodding at the standing stones.

  Aiden’s eyes, fixed on the scene below, flickered with unease. “An arch through time,” he muttered.

  A what? She opened her mouth to ask Aiden what he was talking about when a sudden gasp from him drew her eyes back to Devereux. He’d opened the strong-box and held a strange object up to the light.

  To Kara’s un-expert eye it looked like some kind of Celtic decorative piece. Made of beaten and flattened gold, it was about the size of her two palms together and was three-pronged, each of its prongs fashioned into swirling knot-work. From the way Devereux held
it up reverently, it clearly had some importance.

  Beside her Aiden tensed, letting out a long, slow breath. He leaned forward, the expression on his face tense and wary. “That’s it,” he muttered.

  Devereux suddenly laughed, a harsh sound that cut through the air like a whip crack. “Ha!” he barked. “Finally! I knew that old bitch McQueen would give me what I wanted! All these years she had this in her possession and she never even knew what she had!”

  “So that’s what he was after from the McQueen estate,” Kara breathed. “What is it?”

  Aiden didn’t look at her. His attention was still fixed on Devereux. “The Iuchair,” he breathed. “The Key of Ages. The reason Irene MacAskill sent me here.”

  Key of Ages? Arch through time? What on Earth was he talking about?

  “I don’t understand,” she began. “None of this is making any sense. I—”

  She cut off suddenly as Devereux stepped up to the stone archway. Now that she looked closer she realized that one of the uprights had a depression carved into it, a depression that was exactly the same shape as the artifact in his hand.

  “Aiden, I think he’s going to—” Kara began then stopped as she realized that Aiden was no longer crouching by her side.

  “Stop,” his voice suddenly rang out from below. He stepped out from the bottom of the stairs. Kara cursed under her breath. Damn the man! He moved so quietly that she hadn’t even heard him leave.

  Devereux spun at the sound of Aiden’s voice. His eyes fixed on Aiden for a second before he looked around, checking if Aiden was alone. Kara ducked low as Devereux’s gaze flicked over the foreman’s office.

  “Who the hell are you?” Devereux demanded.

  Aiden stepped further into the room. “Who I am doesnae matter. What I’m here for is what’s important.”

  Devereux raised an eyebrow. “Oh? And what is that?”

  “To return the Iuchair to its rightful owner.”

  “I am its rightful owner!” Devereux growled. “Have the McQueen family sent you here? Stupid of them. And stupid of you thinking you could walk in here—and walk back out again in one piece.”