Tara shook her head. “Not yet. You are right, Colin. I don’t know how long I can stay in this form. I already feel exhausted just from that brief flight.” She nodded slowly. “I will practice on the way to your mother’s castle an’ write Adam a letter tellin’ him to be prepared. Although I hope to God nothin’ happens in the meantime. Does your mother have men ready for battle, just in case the worst happens?”
Colin stared at her. “Only a few… But whether they are ready to battle with an evil witch and an English army armed to the teeth…” He shook his head. “I know not. Is that why you went to Haddington, then? To Rhona? Was it to figure out how to use your magic against your mother?”
Tara nodded. “Aye, it was.”
Baldric was tugging impatiently at her skirts. “Tara, can you teach me how to do that?” he asked hopefully. “I want to change into a frog.”
Tara couldn’t help but smile at him. “Well, Baldric, I’m not quite sure you are able to do that.” Well, he can change into a selkie, but I don’t think Colin wants me to mention that so casually to him, Tara thought. “But you can use your imagination. Sometimes, the imagination can be much more effective than magic.”
“All right, I’ll try,” he said.
“You can try tomorrow, Baldric,” Colin told him. “It’s time for bed.”
Baldric’s shoulders slumped. “Fine,” he said dolefully.
Despite having been in his arms earlier, Tara still kept her distance from Colin that night, making her makeshift bed on the other side of the fire. The shifting had worn her out, and she fell asleep quickly without bothering to take off her breacan and use it as a blanket. As her mind drifted to sleep, she vaguely remembered shivering, but she was much too weary to do anything about it.
Later, she awoke to find herself warm, with something heavy over her body. She lifted her head and realized that Colin’s cloak was wrapped tightly around her. At some point in the night he must’ve came over and placed it over her body. It smelled nice, like wood smoke, as well as a scent that belonged only to him. She snuggled down deeper into the cloak and slept on for the rest of the night.
It was late in the morning when she awoke. She pushed her hair out of her face and sat up, blinking her eyes against the bright light of the sun.
“How did you sleep?” Colin asked, poking a stick of meat into the crackling fire.
“Well,” she replied, “Verra well, actually. I suppose I needed that. I’m sorry to keep you both waitin’. I didn’t mean to sleep so much.”
“We don’t mind,” Colin grinned. “I managed to catch a hare with my dagger. It’s a pretty useful skill, I must say.”
“Impressive! I didn’t know you’ve been practicin’!”
“Well, I’m not quite as skilled as you. It took me a few times to finally hit one,” he admitted sheepishly. “I’d given up if it hadn’t been for Baldric pointing one out by the campsite on our way back.” He turned the skewer over to start cooking the other side. “I’m looking forward to having something other than hare. Who would’ve thought I’d eat so much of it on this trip? I guess that’s our lot for traveling in the dead of winter.” He took the stick out of the fire, inspected it, and stuck it back in. “Thankfully, my mother is somewhat of a gourmand and has hired only the best cooks to make her meals. They use spices from all around the world.”
His mother sounded like a well-to-do lady. “Well, I look forward to that,” Tara said, licking her lips at the prospect. Once the meat was finished cooking, he held the skewer out to her. She took a piece of the meat and handed the stick to Baldric. “An’ what of your father?”
“My father died many years ago. My mother was remarried to her Scottish butler who had lived in Wymond Castle, where my brother lives now,” Colin explained. “She comes from money and cared not that her butler was penniless. They fell in love a few years after my father passed on, and then she decided to move.”
“What is your mother’s family name?” Tara asked, curious if she had heard of them before. Her own mother taught her the names of the influential families of Scotia. She later realized her mother was only telling her the names of the lairds she wanted to seduce.
“McDougal,” Colin told her.
“Ah, yes, the McDougals,” Tara said, smiling ironically. Una did not fail to tell her what an influential family the McDougals were. “It’s Cedric McDougal who is one of the richest lairds in Scotia, if I recall correctly.”
“Aye, that is my uncle,” Colin said. “We are distantly related to the Stewarts on my mother’s side and to the king of England on my father’s side, which, in turn, makes Aengus Castle a bit of a neutral site for the warring parties. That is why I am not too worried about a battle taking place at my mother’s castle. Both families know her and respect her.”
Tara didn’t know how she felt sitting around someone whose family only had a trifle less money than the king of Scotia. But here Colin was, sitting in the dirt, sharing a skewed hare with her. “How do you feel, then? Who do you owe your allegiance to?”
“My brother is strictly on King Edward’s side,” Colin said. He took a bite out of the meat and chewed it thoughtfully before continuing. “Outwardly, I support King Edward. It would be a death sentence to say otherwise, being born and raised in England. But between you and me, I care not for the man. Not that I care much for the Stewarts, nor King David. I just want to live a peaceful life without the threat of power-hungry men to disrupt it.”
Or women, for that matter, Tara thought. “Here, here,” she said to him, raising an invisible tankard as a salute. “I look forward to the day when we can say what we want about the royals without fear of execution for treason.”
“Hopefully, that day comes sooner rather than later,” he said.
After they finished eating, they continued north. Baldric was sitting with Colin when Tara decided to practice on her shifting a little bit more. She waved at the boy to get his attention. “Baldric, watch,” she whispered to him. In a blink of an eye, she was sitting on top of her horse as a cat. She licked her paws idly as Baldric laughed and clapped.
She didn’t know how Colin reacted to her magic, whether it was with apprehension or just curiosity. He looked at her now in her feline form, his eyebrows furrowed together. “Don’t fall off,” he warned.
“Cats land on their feet,” she tried saying to him, but it only came out as a long, drawling meow. She arched her back in a delicious stretch and transformed back into human form.
“Impressive,” Colin said laconically.
“That’s all you have to say?” Tara teased.
Colin laughed and spread out his hands, palms up, in a surrendering gesture. “I don’t know what to say without it sounding as though I’m praising a court jester or a traveling bard. I don’t want to offend you, Tara.”
But Tara only laughed. “I suppose it does seem that way, doesn’t it? Well, we do need some entertainment durin’ these long, borin’ stretches of land. Do you have any requests?” she asked Baldric.
Baldric’s eyes lit up with delight. “How about… a fox!”
Tara nodded. If she could change into a cat, how difficult would it be to change into a fox? “Aye, one fox for the young lad. Here we go!” She closed her eyes and concentrated.
She felt her body change into the furry form of the animal, but she wasn’t prepared with how large a fox actually was. She lost her balance on the horse and, without thinking, dug her claws into the horse’s flank for purchase. The horse reared with painful surprise and kicked her off. Tara squealed as a hoof met the side of her body, and she flew ungracefully into a prickly bush. The panicking horse ran off into the trees.
“Tara!” she heard Colin yell. She blinked up at him as he stood over her fox form. He lifted her body into his arms and laid her down carefully onto the grass. “Please tell me you are not hurt.”
She could only whimper pathetically. Ach, she hurt. She hurt all over.
“Change back into a human, please,” C
olin coaxed. “I cannot understand you while you are like this.”
She tried. Lord knows she tried changing back, but the process made her entire body shudder with pain. She whined sadly up at him and closed her eyes.
Am I to stay a fox forever, then? she wondered deliriously.
Colin cursed under his breath and pressed his hands against her small form. “Stay with me, Tara,” he said.
She forced her eyes back open to gaze at him. She didn’t like the worried expression on his face. How poorly did she look?
“Let me know where it hurts,” he said. He pressed his fingers gently against her body and when he reached her shoulder, she cried out, almost nipping his hand with her sharp teeth.
He recoiled from the bite. “Easy,” he said, as though he were actually talking to a wild animal. “Is it your shoulder, then, Tara?”
Tara whined, hoping he would take that as an affirmative answer.
“Is Tara going to live?” She heard a worried whisper from somewhere behind Colin.
“Yes, she’ll live. She just took a nasty fall when her horse kicked her.”
Of course I’ll live, Tara thought furiously. I can’t die now. If I die now, there will be nothin’ to stop my mother from murderin’ my family! She made to get up but then collapsed once again onto the grass.
“Well, that’s enough of that,” Colin muttered, watching her struggle. He gathered her up again in his arms and, for the final time, she attempted to change back into a human. To her surprise, she succeeded, and Colin almost lost his footing and stumbled backwards. His back hit solidly against the trunk of a tree.
“Tara!” Baldric shouted happily.
“Ugh…” she groaned in response. “Aye, ‘tis my shoulder that hurts so.” She tried to move her arm, but it only sent a shockwave of pain down the right side of her body.
Colin put her back down on the ground and palpated around the injured shoulder. “It looks as though the bone has gone out of its socket,” he observed. “But to my limited knowledge, it doesn’t look broken. I can set it back in place, but it’s going to hurt like the devil.”
“Well, I don’t have much of a choice, do I?” Tara muttered through gritted teeth.
“Unless you’re content with a painful, useless arm, I’m afraid you don’t.”
Tara leaned her head back against the tree trunk. “Let’s get it over with, then.”
“Here.” Colin undid his leather belt from around his waist and folded it in half. “Open your mouth and put this between your teeth. Bite down hard. There’s a good girl.”
He grabbed hold of her arm and her shoulder. “Take a deep breath,” he said. And just as she did, a shooting pain ripped up her arm and all the way down her back. She screamed through the belt, tears pricking the corners of her eyes. The world went black, like someone had drawn a curtain. And the world around her, with Colin and sweet little Baldric, was gone.
Instead, she saw her mother.
No!
Tara didn’t want to see her. She didn’t want her to know where she was. She tried to turn away, but her mother looked directly at her and she saw. She saw her, and she saw where Tara was going. Una had been heading west from the Lowlands, but now she would make her journey northward.
Una’s thoughts were now Tara’s thoughts. Aye, the north. That was where all of the Seelie fairies lived, with their fancy courts and uppity attitude. She would burn their land, too, and become Queen of both the fairies and the humans. Forget Queen Phillipa. She would get rid of the wench and be King Edward’s new consort, ruling alongside him.
“Finally,” Una told Tara, “I can get what I have wanted for all of these years.”
Tara then saw herself, dressed in an expensive gown made of silk. She was looking in a mirror and what looked back was a face she hardly recognized. A diadem graced the crown of her head, one that contained an emerald jewel winking in the light of an ornate room decorated in exotic paintings and sculptures. Her dress was the color of a twilight sky, purple and blue, and shimmered when she moved her hips left and right. On her feet were slippers that were encrusted with so many jewels she wondered how she’d be able to walk.
In her reflection, she saw behind her a group of handsome men, princes by the look of their fancy garb. Three of them walked up to her. One man stopped just behind her and lowered his head to her ear. Her body shivered as his breath tickled her neck. The other man wrapped an arm around her waist and the third walked in front of her, blocking her reflection, and leaned forward to kiss her on her lips.
“And daughter,” Una told her through her vision. “You can have all of this, too. You can have any man you desire.”
“NO!”
Tara shot upright. Sweat drenched her body, and her heart beat erratically. Colin’s cloak was once again tucked around her, and she pulled it off, relishing the cold air that graced her skin. She was lying in the same spot as before, but Colin and Baldric were seated away from her, hovering over a fire. Both were awake. She rubbed her eyes wearily, realizing it was well past morning. The sun hung heavy in the sky.
“How long was I asleep?” she asked.
“For most of the afternoon.” Colin told her. “It’s fine. King Edward’s men don’t seem to be interested in coming up this way, so we seem to be safe for the time being.”
Tara shook her head. “No. No, it is not fine.” She stood up on wobbly legs, then fell back down.
“Take it slow,” Colin warned, coming up to her with a flask of water. “Drink this.” She drank gratefully, not realizing how thirsty she was. “Now tell me why you are in such a state of panic.”
“I dreamed of my mother,” she told him, wiping her mouth with the sleeve of her dress. She noticed the confused look in his eyes. “Don’t tell me how I know, but I saw my mother. She’s… she’s now headin’ this way. She’s comin’ for us. We can’t go to Aengus Castle. It’s too dangerous.”
Colin shook his head. “We’ll be fine, Tara.”
“You don’t believe me.” She knew she was starting to sound hysterical. Would Colin think he was traveling with a mad woman? “It’s not fine. She’s comin’. She’ll burn your mother’s castle to the ground, just like she did Haddington. Just like she will do with Dunaid an’ Murdag once she is done with Aengus.”
“Relax. I think we’ll be fine. Besides, my mother’s castle is heavily fortified.”
He didn’t understand the direness of the situation. “I can’t persuade you to not go, can I?” she asked despairingly.
“I’m afraid not.”
Well, she couldn’t just leave him and Baldric alone either. If her mother was coming to Aengus, then Tara must be there to defend Colin and his family at all costs.
She just hoped that she would be able to stop Una before that even happened.
Tara tested out her shoulder, rolling it forward and back slowly. It was still painful and sore, but she could move it, which was an improvement from before. “Thank you for helpin’ me out earlier,” she told Colin.
He gave her a wry smile. “Promise me you won’t spook your horse again by changing into random animals. It took me the better part of the day to get her to calm back down.”
“Aye, that was a foolish mistake on my part,” she said, her face flooding red with embarrassment. “But at least now I know I can turn into a fox, for whatever good that would do.”
“The only good a fox would do is to be a noisy pest in the city, nosing around where it doesn’t belong.”
“It might prove useful.” She shrugged and gave him a smile. “I could be a spy.”
Colin laughed. “Perhaps that is your calling in life.” He then fished around in his bag for a shirt and tore the material in half. “It would be best if we made a sling for your arm so that you won’t injure it again from moving about.”
“I do like to fidget,” she said. She held still as he tied the cloth around her arm and shoulder with delicate hands. She relished being so close to him and knew she was only torturing
herself by feeling that way.
Nothin’ is going to come of this, Tara, she told herself firmly. There will only be heartbreak in the long run.
“It seems like this isn’t your first time dealin’ with this sort of thing,” she observed.
“Nay, it is not,” he revealed. After finishing the last knot with a tight pull, he looked off in the distance and smiled, yet there was a hint of sadness in his expression. “Back when we were lads, my brother and I got ourselves in a whole bit of trouble climbing trees and being precarious. I ended up falling from a tree and had the same sort of injury as you. My brother helped me up, told me to stop crying, and then proceeded to put my arm bone back into place before I had a chance to tell him not to. He took the shirt from off his back to make a sling for me and walked with me all the way back to Wymond Castle, to the healer. His kindness was something I’d always remember, and it will forever be dear to my heart.”
Tara shook her head, knowing that this was the same brother who wanted to kill both him and Baldric. “I’m sorry,” she told him, not knowing what else to say.
Colin nodded. “Yes, me too. I’m sorry that he changed into some sort of monster. If there was some way that I could’ve foreseen this to happen, perhaps I could have changed him. Perhaps I could have helped him out in some way.”
“I don’t believe the way he is actin’ is your fault at all,” Tara said.
And what about her? The destruction of Lothian, the impending danger to Aengus and Dunaid… Was all of this her doing? Was all of this her fault?
Nay, it wasn’t.
“It’s not my fault, either,” Tara said out loud. She let the words out like she had been holding her breath for a very long time. She began to laugh.
Colin blinked at her. “What do you mean?”
“Here I am sayin’ that it’s not your fault that your family member has turned into an evil person, and I’m just realizin’ how dishonest I’ve been to myself. For so long, I’ve blamed myself for my mother’s actions, an’ now, I’m finally understandin’ that it’s not my fault. How would I know she would escape from the Unseelie Court? How would I know that she would raze Lothian? It’s not my fault, Colin.” She was almost hysterical with relief. She found herself in Colin’s arms, embracing him. “Thank you for helping me to realize that.”
Charming the Highlander Laird Page 11