Hope Everlastin' Book 4

by Mickee Madden

  Taryn had shivered at first glance, but then became fascinated by the possibility that Ciarda could have been a witch. Everything ever written about Lachlan Baird was contained within the books. The only mention of the history of the dirk was that it had been handed down for generations on a particular side of the MacLachlan clan.

  When Taryn questioned where the dirk had originated from, Collin had shrugged and stated, "From Broc MacLachlan in the seventeen hundreds. Ciarda, tha' one was reluctant to talk much abou' her ancestry in tha' respect. All she would say was he was a hero and had vanished on the isle. Her family had located there to honor his memory. Lies, if you ask me. Wha' better place to conduct the devil's work than at those evil stones?"

  "What stones?" Taryn had asked.

  He had looked at her as if she'd grown two heads. "The Callanish Standing Stones! Surely you've heard o' them, lass!"

  Taryn hadn't.

  "Weel, I'll tell you this much, Miss Ingliss. Tha' dirk's a key to the gate o' Hell. One night, ma great great-grandfaither, Gavin, overheard his mither talkin’ to Lachlan while he slept. Och, Lachlan was young, nine or ten, I think, and had been down wi' a fever for several days. Ciarda was sittin’ wi' him, talkin’ o' this Broc MacLachlan, and wha' due the clan owed him. But wha' shook up ma dear Gavin was her tellin’ Lachlan she had figured ou' the secret. Aye, she had, and it was the dirk. The dirk was the key to the mystery and the lost souls who couldna leave till—" He made quotation marks with his fingers. "—the dirk was returned to the stones.

  "Aye, Gavin told his children and their children, and they their own and so on, o' how she told the sleepin’ Lachlan she could no' return the dirk for fear she would be lost there, too, or her son demanded in payment o' Broc's sin. And she asked for her son's forgiveness."

  Collin had leaned toward Taryn then, his eyes reflecting the maniacal workings of his mind. "Now you tell me, does it no' all reek o' witchcraft and the devil, himself?"

  Taryn hadn't responded, but thanked him for his time and returned to her hotel room.

  The next morning, with the sketch she'd stolen of the dirk tucked away in her purse, she took a train to Inverness. The following day, she flew to Stornaway, where she'd rented a car. With the directions she'd gotten from the man at the rental office, she drove to the MacLachlans' inn. The three-story building had been formerly called the Sgeul Inn, but was translated into the Astory Inn at the turn of the century.

  It was there she discovered she could learn no more about the dirk's history, and that the remaining eleven family members of the original clan were as tight-lipped as clams. During her five-day stay they watched her when she ate in the dining room, and when she walked around the grounds. She could almost swear they even watched her when she was in her room. If she struck up a conversation with one of the guests, one of them always seemed to be around, listening in. To say they had deemed her a threat from the moment she had signed the register might sound paranoid, but she was convinced it was true.

  A threat to whom or what?

  On the first floor, there had been a room dedicated to Broc MacLachlan. A shrine. It had given Taryn the willies, made her sick to her stomach every time she tried to cross the threshold. Directly across from the doorway was a massive portrait of a man in the MacLachlan red and blue tartan, his black hair a wild mane falling nearly to his waist. Although the figure stood larger than life, Taryn couldn't focus on his features, only his black eyes, which gave her the distinct impression they were boring into her with a silent accusation. Accusing her of what, she didn't know.

  Taryn had left the inn without having viewed anything stored inside the shrine. She visited the standing stones, a cruciform setting of megaliths that had filled her with such dread, she couldn't stop shaking. Twenty yards from the nearest stone, she couldn't force herself to go closer. It was as if an invisible hand had slapped against her chest and remained there to ward her off.

  From Stornaway she flew to Inverness, then to Glasgow that evening. She stayed overnight at the Holiday Inn on Argyle Street, rented a Volkswagen the next morning, and drove to Edinburgh. For the next three weeks she met with various professors at the university, showing them the sketch and asking their opinions of its origin. Although intrigued, they all claimed they had never seen anything quite like it. The last professor suggested she talk to Michael Stoughton, a retired archaeologist and renowned collector of ancient weapons.

  It took ten days before Stoughton responded to the messages she'd left at his home and office. He invited her to his home, a two-story, red brick house with white trim. She had expected him to be an affluent man—a collector of ancient weapons, after all—but in fact the house was moderately furnished. He was a man in his sixties with salt and pepper hair, deep-set hazel eyes, a charming smile, and only a hint of an English accent. Over tea, Taryn showed him the sketch.

  "The MacLachlan dirk," he said, a tremor in his tone. His shrewd gaze lifted to regard Taryn. "What's your interest in this?"

  At first, Taryn had considered lying to him, but there was something in his eyes that told her he would see through her if she tried. So, she told him about the connections between the Baird and Ingliss clans, and how Ciarda's father had given the dirk to Lachlan. All the while she spoke, she was keenly observant of the way his repeatedly ran his thumbs over the depiction of the dirk's handle.

  "I remember reading about his murder when the story was released last year on the current happenings at the estate," he murmured. "This sketch is supposedly of the dirk that killed him?"

  Taryn had nodded. He paled and shivered. After several moments, he gestured for Taryn to follow him. He led her to a large room behind pocket doors. The contents had taken her breath away. Not only did Stoughton collect ancient weapons, but armor and small artifacts as well. There was so much to see that she couldn't look at everything as she followed him across the room. At one point, he commented that this part of the collection was composed of reproductions, which answered her unspoken question as to how he could have these items in a home with no apparent security.

  She was wrenched from her preoccupation when she realized he had somehow engaged a hidden wall to open. He led her down a staircase, the end of which opened into an enormous room. Here, he had said, was his true collection.

  Taryn had felt as though she had stepped into another world. She couldn't even begin to imagine the value of the pieces. Each weapon was enclosed in glass with soft showcase lights. She didn't dare ask him why they weren't in a museum, for fear she would offend his sensibilities.

  Stoughton escorted her to a polished maple desk and instructed her to sit in the only chair in the room. He left her there and returned about a minute later with something in his hand. Sitting on the edge of the desk, he positioned a lighted magnifying glass, mounted to the side of the desk, in front of her and handed her what appeared to be a gold spearhead approximately four inches long and an inch and a half wide at the base. The tip was sharp, and Stoughton cautioned her not to touch it. At this point, Taryn regarded it without the aid of the magnifying glass.

  Stoughton smoothed out the sketch on the desk, the handle pointed downward. "You can't see them with the naked eye," he'd said, indicating the spearhead. "Use the glass."

  "Is this really gold?"

  He nodded.

  Taryn adjusted the magnifying glass and held the artifact beneath it. It had taken her a moment to find just the right position to make clear the details along the edge of the spearhead, and she jerked back in surprise.

  "Gargoyle faces," Stoughton told her, "not demons."

  Taryn couldn't bring herself to look at the spearhead for several seconds, during which her heart seemed lodged in her throat. Then, hesitantly, her hands trembling a bit, she again placed it beneath the glass and forced herself to concentrate on the engravings. Yes, they were faces, each slightly different. Twenty-six, thirteen on each side, and to the naked eye smaller than the head of a pin. Magnified, each face was eerily detailed. Brows a
nd cheekbones differed. The set of the eyes. The mouths. Down the center of both sides of the spearhead were symbols.

  As if divining her thoughts, Stoughton stated, "Runes. Each side translates to ‘Family of Karok'."

  "What?"

  "That's what it says."

  "Where did you get this?"

  "It was wedged in a side seam of a trunk my nephew purchased at an estate sale."

  Taryn had numbly stared at the sketch of the dirk, specifically at the drawn strip of symbols on the blade. "Are these runes, too?"

  "Yes. It translates to 'Passage Key Karok'."

  "What does it mean?"

  "I have no idea." Stoughton frowned. "When I first translated the spearhead, I searched through every book I could find on myths of gods and demigods. Nothing. Not even a king or prince who used the gargoyle as a symbol.

  "Gargoyles originated in Greece and Rome as water spouts," he went on, as if lecturing a class. "The word descends from the Middle English word gargule and the French word gargouille, meaning throat, and refers to the gargling sound of water through a spout."

  "So gargoyles were never worshiped?"

  He shook his head grimly. "Not to my knowledge, which is why finding them engraved on a gold piece is so unusual. "What are the odds, Miss Ingliss," he'd gone on, his voice monotone, a faraway look in his eyes, "of you and I coming together with two very unique pieces involving gargoyles and runes?"

  She had shrugged and shaken her head in bewilderment.

  Stoughton picked up the sketch and studied it for a time. "I would like to see what's on the other side of this dirk. Do you know where it is?"

  Unwilling to tell him any more than she had, she again shook her head.

  "Pity, because I believe something is trying to call both items home."

  A chill had clamped onto Taryn's spine. "Home?"

  He'd smiled ruefully, and his eyes had taken on a disconcerting look of foreboding. "Why else would our paths have crossed?

  "Passage key," he murmured. "Most curious. A passage into what, I wonder."

  Stoughton's last words continued to haunt Taryn. She'd left his home unshakably convinced of two facts: the dirk was a key, and the secret it held had something to do with the Callanish Standing Stones. Never had an obsession with a story been more deeply rooted in her gut. Whatever it took, she would return to the stones, with the dirk, and learn the secret Ciarda had feared.

  As she rummaged through the trunks in the attic, the ache in her back made it feel as though she'd already spent hours bent over them, when in fact not even a half hour had gone by. She kept herself focused and worked as fast as she could move her hands. After the ninth trunk she began to lose heart, and slowed her search until she came across one with the brass initials CM.

  Now her heart began to race again. A rush of adrenaline restored her energy.

  The trunk was locked, but that didn't concern her. Removing one of the bobby pins from her hair, she bit off the cushioning tip and deftly inserted the blunt metal end into the keyhole. Three seconds was all it took for the tumblers to click.

  Taryn opened the trunk and positioned the flashlight on the left rear corner, at the crook of the top and bottom. Like a child cut loose in a candy store, she fished through tablecloths and doilies, lace handkerchiefs with CM embroidered in red and blue thread, books and papers. There was a large jewelry box with a stunning collection of necklaces, rings, and bracelets with various precious stones. The pieces were old, in gold or silver, all detailed with Celtic designs, but none of them interested her. She closed the lid and replaced the box inside the trunk, then started glancing through the papers.

  Receipts and letters from family and friends. Again, nothing that caught her interest. Most of the books were poetry collections, one was titled Plato's Notes, and one she discovered was a Bible. She skimmed through the pages of each, saving the Bible for last.

  It was a thick and very old book, the thin leather binding hand-sewn with cords of darker leather, and the contents written in Gaelic. Getting more discouraged by the moment, she carelessly flipped through the pages until she glimpsed a glint of metal in the corner of her right eye. She placed the Bible next to her on the floor and reached into the trunk. Between the folds of one of the handkerchiefs was a gold chain with a locket. The front border was intricately carved with a circle of Celt knots. In the center was CM in Old English letters.

  Taryn gingerly ran a thumb over the surface then opened the locket. Inside were two tiny oval portraits, one of a boy of about three-years-old, the other of possibly the same boy at about age ten.

  "Lachlan," she murmured, then tilted his images into the light for a better look. "You were a cute devil, even then." She chuckled. "What secret was your mother hiding, huh? Come on, Lachlan, you can tell me."

  With a resigned sigh she peered into the trunk. She placed the locket in her left hand, using the right to prod and squeeze the various other fabric items. Finally, in the front right corner at the bottom, her fingers came across a semi-stiff article. She pulled out a pouch no larger than her palm and closely inspected it.

  An icy sensation began in the pit of her stomach and spread through her veins. She couldn't be sure, but the texture felt like coarse hair, black and masterfully woven, the knotted tie cord made from the same material. There was something inside the pouch, but she couldn't bring herself to open it right away. An abysmal sense of foreboding cloaked her, a feeling similar to what she'd experienced when seeing the gargoylian faces on the spearhead, beneath Stoughton's magnifying glass.

  Her lips tightly compressed and breathing sparingly through her nostrils, she opened the pouch. She leveled her left palm and tipped the pouch over atop it. A necklace fell out. It wasn't like anything in the jewelry box or anything she'd seen, with two exceptions. The knotted cord was made from what appeared to be the same hair as the pouch, and was attached to the loop of a tear-shaped pendant made of cobalt blue stone. The second similarity was in the tiny carvings in the rock. She didn't need a magnifying glass this time. Gargoyle faces and runes.

  A violent shiver coursed through her. She told herself to replace the necklace in the pouch, toss it in the trunk, and forget she had ever seen it. But it was a vital part of the mystery, and she could no more let it go than she could join a convent. Both went against her nature.

  Hastily, she crammed the pouch into one cup of her bra, wincing at the feel of the coarse weave against her skin. She righted her V-neck sweater, patted and smoothed the area concealing the pouch to make sure it wouldn't stand out if she encountered someone on her way back to her room, then picked up the Bible and tossed it inside the trunk. She took the flashlight in hand and was about to close the lid when she noticed a corner of paper sticking out from between the front pages of the Bible.

  Anticipation quivered through her. She nervously moistened her lower lip by sucking it in, and angled the full beam of light on the intriguing piece. The scalloped edges told her it wasn't one of the pages that had come loose. This was something someone had tucked inside the book.

  A letter? From Ciarda? To Lachlan?

  She eased the paper from between the pages. It was folded in half with such care, the edges were perfectly aligned. She tucked the flashlight between her legs, beam upward, and gingerly unfolded the letter. The handwriting was small and graceful, but to her dismay, the words were in Gaelic.

  "Dammit," Taryn muttered. "Fine, I'll just-ah, find someone to translate it after I leave. Shit. Gaelic. Good ol' English beneath you, Ciarda? Oh, but don't worry your pretty little skeletal head. It'll take far more than a damn language to discourage me."

  Taryn closed the trunk and stood. Again placing the flashlight between her thighs, she carefully tucked the letter into the front of her tailored, brown tweed slacks and took the light into a hand.

  She went rigid at the sound of footsteps on the stairs. Then she heard Roan call, "Taryn, you in the attic?"

  Sucking in a deep breath, she went to the top of t
he staircase and saw him paused halfway up, a questioning eyebrow cocked in her direction. She forced a smile and said lightheartedly, "It's cool up here. Have you ever gone through any of the trunks or boxes?"

  "You didn’t get into any o' tha' stuff, did you?"

  "I peeked in a couple of the trunks," she said merrily, and started down the stairs. He descended ahead of her and waited in the hall. While he closed the door, she looked down at her clothing and jerked in surprise. "That has to be the cleanest attic I've ever been in. Do you have a housekeeper?"

  He issued her an impatient look before shaking his head.

  She laughed mockingly. "Don't tell me you do housework!"

  "The house takes care o' itself."

  A blank expression fell over Taryn's face. "You're kidding."

  "No. The stuff in the attic belongs to Lannie."

  "Okay." She gave an airy shrug. "There's two trunks with some great old clothes up there."

  "Aye. Some o' it belonged to his mither."

  "What about the rest?"

  "Tessa and Robert's children were only allowed to remove their personal belongin’s when they moved ou'. Everythin’ else remained, includin’ their parents' things."

  "What right did Lachlan have to keep their stuff?" she asked with a hint of bitterness.

  "By right tha' it was his money they lived on. He could have prevented their children from takin’ anythin’ but wha' they had on their backs, but he didn’t, did he?"

  "Magnanimous sonofabitch, isn't he," she said flippantly.

  "He's tha' and mair. I would appreciate it if you spoke o' him wi' the respect due him, especially when in his home."

  His scolding brought a crimson color to her cheeks, and she couldn't stop her immediate response. "Why don't you just sacrifice a frigging lamb to him! Jeee-sus, better yet, one of those goddamn peacocks!"

  "I'll see you in the morn," he said stiffly. "Good night."

  She glanced at her watch. "It's not even nine o'clock."

  "Everyone else has turned in."