by Nina Mason
Regret bubbled up inside her. This was not how things were supposed to turn out. She was supposed to be waking up after her wedding night with soreness between her legs and a husband by her side.
She was not supposed to be alone, single, and still a virgin.
Expelling a sigh, she sat up and looked around. The cottage was small, but cozy. Across from the sage-green couch stood a pair of chintz-covered wingbacks on either side of a stone fireplace. A weathered leather chair and ottoman were nestled in one corner beside a table with a lamp—a perfect nook for reading, something she’d be doing a lot of over the next two weeks. Anticipating as much, she’d brought plenty of books along—mostly bucket-list classics she’d bought from the fundraising sales at the university library, where she’d worked the past three years as a student librarian.
But, first things, first.
Sighting her purse on a table by the door, she went over and fished out her mobile. Her heart sank when she saw the battery was only at five percent. Buggering hell. Tired as she was, she should have had the good sense to put it on the charger when she got in last night.
There was a telephone on a small cabinet under the stairs. In the top drawer, she found a local directory. Opening to the back, she skimmed the business listings for a convenient mechanic. There were two nearby. Keeping her finger on the number of the first, she looked around for a clock. She found one on the wall of the tiny kitchen behind her. It was a few minutes past seven. Would a garage be open so early? There was only one way to find out.
Lifting the receiver, she dialed the number above her finger. When a recording informed her the shop was closed until eight, she hung up and tried the second number.
The line rang twice before a thickly accented male Scottish voice growled, “MacGregor’s Auto Repair.”
“Oh, good. You’re open. I was afraid you might not be.”
“Aye, we open at seven sharp. What can I do you for?”
Jenna took a moment to work out how best to describe her situation. “I’m having engine trouble. Er, had engine trouble. Last night, while driving up here from Edinburgh, my car broke down. I parked it on the shoulder and need someone to have a look—or maybe tow it to a garage.”
“What sort of car is it, lass?”
“A Cooper Mini. Do you work on that sort?”
“Aye, lass. Where exactly did you leave it?”
“On the road leading into town—a mile or so south of Faery Glen.”
“As luck would have it, I’ve got a wee open window of time this morning. Can you meet me there in fifteen minutes? I’ll bring the tow truck—on the off chance I can’t get it started.”
“I’ll be there. Thank you so much, Mr. MacGregor.”
She hung up and went in search of the loo. Not until she was standing before the mirror over the sink did she remember she’d left her toiletries in the car. There was a hairbrush in her purse, but she’d left everything else—toothbrush, antiperspirant, and make-up bag—in the boot of her Mini.
Bugger.
Doing her best to make herself presentable, she ran the brush through her hair, washed her face with the tiny bar of soap provided, and used her fingers to clean the morning film off her teeth.
With five minutes to spare, she grabbed her purse and headed out the door. Her gut tightened as she entered the glen—the only route she knew back to her car. She wended her way along the footpath, keeping an eye out for the man she’d spied the night before. There was no sign of him, which produced in her an overall heaviness punctuated by contradictory surges of relief and disappointment. As much as she hoped not to run into him, she also wanted to know who he was and why he’d been bathing outdoors under the full moon. In the sober light of day, she was more inclined to believe he was a Pagan performing some sort of ritual than a homeless man.
A druid she could handle. Far better than someone who might have drug or mental problems. Not that she didn’t have compassion for people in need; she did. A lorry load of it. Back in Edinburgh, she frequently gave money to the panhandlers she passed on the street, even though, as a struggling student, she really couldn’t afford to be charitable.
She made her way to the road and, at her car, found the tow truck waiting with the engine running. Mr. MacGregor, a middle-aged man with thinning ginger hair and a pronounced belly, jumped out as she approached.
“Pop the bonnet,” he said, “and I’ll just have a look to see if I can pinpoint the problem.”
Climbing into the Mini, she did as he asked. After he’d had an extended gander and tinkered a bit, he asked her to turn the key. The engine sputtered and shimmied, but didn’t turn over.
“It’s not the alternator.” He drew nearer the half-lowered driver’s window as he wiped the grease from his hands on a rag. “But it could be the fuel line, the carburetor, or even the diode trio.”
Jenna blinked at him. “What’s a diode trio?”
“A little gizmo to do with the electrical system.”
Worry tightened her stomach. Having no job and very little savings, she couldn’t afford a major car repair. “Is it expensive to replace?”
“It’s not cheap—and I’ll have to order the part from my supplier in Glasgow, so it could take a few days. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, eh? I can’t say for sure what the problem is till I run some diagnostics—and to do that, I’ll need to get her up on the rack.”
The hope she’d been floating that he might fix the car right away crashed to the ground. Suddenly, coming all this way on her own seemed like the worst idea ever. She’d have nothing to do, no way to get around, and no one to turn to if anything else went wrong. Until now, she’d always had someone looking out for her. Her father, until he died, and then William.
They might have been high handed, hyper-critical, and controlling, but at least they were there. Now, she had no one. The cold, hard realization she was all alone and unprotected in the world chilled her to the marrow.
Mr. MacGregor must have picked up on her despair because he gave her a smile and said, “Dinnae fash yourself, lassie. I’ll have her running again by the end of the week. In the meanwhile, you can drive my old Volvo. It’s a bit of a clunker, but should get you around well enough.”
As Mr. MacGregor, who seemed nice, hooked up the car, she thought again about the man from last night. When they climbed into the cab of the truck afterward, she said, “Can I ask you something?”
He arched a wooly red eyebrow in her direction. “About cars?”
“No, about Faery Glen.”
His brows drew together, forming a ruddy divot between his eyes. “What would you like to know?”
She cleared her throat, unsure how to phrase her question. “Last night, after my engine quit, I cut through the glen to get to the cottage I’m renting. I was supposed to get married yesterday, but—well, never mind that. Why I’m here doesn’t matter. What matters is what I saw once I got here.”
Something flashed behind his heavy-lidded hazel eyes—something that made her suspect he knew what she’d seen. Face and voice pinched, he said, “Oh, aye? And what is it you think you saw?”
“A naked man washing himself in the waterfall.” She was in no state of mind to beat about the bush.
His gaze slid toward her. “Did he see you?”
“I don’t think so.”
He started the engine and pulled off the shoulder into the road. As the truck rumbled toward town with her Mini in tow, she waited for him to say more. When he didn’t, she prodded him. “Who is the man in the glen?”
“Do you know, by any chance, the old ballad of Tam Lin?”
The name seemed vaguely familiar. Perhaps her mother had told her the story once upon a time. If so, she couldn’t seem to resurrect the details. “I might have, but don’t recall the particulars.”
“Tam Lin was a knight taken by the faeries way back when. He lived in the lowlands, in a forest called Carterhaugh, which he guarded for the faery queen who’d made him her capti
ve. When any human happened to trespass upon his territory, he charged them a toll.”
“A toll? What sort of toll?”
“Aye, well…” He cleared his throat and seemed suddenly ill-at ease. “In the case of lads, Tam took coins, watches, dirks, or anything else of value they might be carrying on their persons. From the lasses, he took…something else of value.”
Jenna’s mouth fell open. “He raped them?”
“Not technically, no. Rather than force them, he persuaded them to give themselves to him.”
Doubtful, she squinted at him. “Persuaded them how?”
“Though, I can’t say for certain, I can venture a good guess. In case you don’t know, faeries are very…well, let’s just say seductive creatures.” He licked his lips. “Anyway, getting back to the story, a lass named Janet wandered into Carterhaugh one day and met up with young Tam Lin. Later, when she discovered he’d gotten her with child, she returned to the forest for an herb to get rid of the bairn. Tam appeared again and, realizing her intent, promised to marry her and be a proper Da to the bairn if she helped free him from his bonds.”
They were in Rosemarkie now, driving along the high street. The garage could not be far. If she didn’t get her answer before they got there, she might never learn the identity of the stranger in the glen. “As fascinating as all of this is, what does it have to do with the man I saw last night?”
“Did he have a beard and long hair?”
“Yes. He had both.”
“The man you saw wasn’t a man, lassie. Not technically speaking, leastwise. He was Sir Axel Lochlann, the guardian of the glen—Rosemarkie’s own Tam Lin.”
Her jaw dropped as shock impaled her heart. “Are you telling me he’s an honest-to-goodness…faery?”
“That he is—and you should count yourself lucky he didn’t catch you in the glen after nightfall.”
Jenna was taken aback. “Because he’d hurt me?”
Mr. MacGregor pitched a sidelong glance in her direction. “Because, from what I hear, he’s irresistible to the lasses—especially bonny redheads such as yourself.”
Despite her avid interest in what he’d told her, Jenna let the subject drop. At the garage, Mr. MacGregor parked the tow truck around back and helped her transfer her luggage—including a duffle bag filled with archery equipment—from the Mini to the Volvo. He hadn’t exaggerated the car’s dilapidated condition. It was a faded shade of pale green, at least fifty years old, and riddled with dings and rust. It nevertheless exuded a certain vintage charm.
Even though she asked no more about the man in the glen, she thought about little else. If she had any sense, she’d grab some groceries, head back to the cottage, and read a book while waiting for Mr. MacGregor to call with the prognosis on her engine trouble. Reading was a safe pursuit. Safe, relaxing, and sensible. Venturing into the faery knight’s territory again was the opposite. So, why did she want to do just that?
She pulled out of the driveway at MacGregor’s Auto Repair and into the carpark of the little grocery store they’d passed along the way. As she filled her cart with provisions, she boiled down her possible motives to two. Either she simply wanted another glimpse of Sir Axel now that she knew what he was—because, honestly, one didn’t get the chance to see a genuine faery every day of the week—or, somewhere in the depths of her subconscious mind, she believed he was the man she was destined to meet.
Except that he wasn’t a man, lived in the wild, and was bound to a faery queen—none of which made him all that appealing as a romantic prospect. And none of which would stop her if he was, in fact, the man she was destined to be with.
The right man is out there, waiting for you to find him. But it will never be if you bind yourself to a man you don’t love.
There was an unspoken insinuation in the prophecy: the right man, she would love.
She did not, could not, love William. Wanting his approval, she’d come to see on the long drive to Rosemarkie, was not the same as wanting him. She respected and admired him for his piety and self-control, but she could not call what she felt love.
Love was more exciting, more explosive. Love was a fireworks display. What she felt for William was closer to a candle in the rain.
She’d accepted his proposal to please her father, thinking she could always get out of it later. Then, she went away to university and hardly saw William. Having an absentee fiancé made it easier to focus on her studies and work. She was a good girl, a pastor’s daughter, and a virgin. Cheating wasn’t in her, however much she might regret her choice of partners.
Now, she was free of William. Free to find a man who would love and accept her for who she was.
Even if he wasn’t strictly a man.
On the way home from the market, the Volvo seemed to steer itself into the carpark at Faery Glen. To her disappointment, the lot was full of vehicles, including a monstrous dark-green tour bus. Since it seemed unlikely Sir Axel would show himself with so many people around, she headed back to the cottage, resolving to wait until dark and try again.
* * * *
Axel roused from his torpor when Queen Morgan pulled him back toward her. He had only been half asleep. The hours seemed to drip, sticky and thick, like sap from a wounded tree. As they made love again, the resin coated his limbs, making him feel like an insect encased in hardening amber. When finally he fell back, pleasure-drunk and drained dry, he could not close his eyes.
Avalon was even more silent than the glen. No chirping insects, no tweeting birds. Only the sigh of the sea and the murmuring breeze whispered behind the backlit draperies. The sun might not set in Avalon, but nightfall was still discernible by the descending quietude.
Staring up at the canopy with burning eyeballs, he contemplated what the queen had asked him to do. He did not relish killing Sir Leith’s wife and unborn child. All too well did he know the torture of witnessing such barbarism. Over the centuries, he had seen many of his own children murdered by the heartless creature who now slept peacefully beside him. All of his sons and the many daughters who would have surpassed their mother in beauty, crushed like bothersome midges. Sorrow’s blade twisted in his heart. Though he had grieved for his murdered children, he was powerless to protect them.
“An rud a thig gu dona falbhaidh e leis a ghaoith,” as his father used to say. What cannot be helped must be put up with.
Words Axel still lived by.
Aside from the queen’s order to kill Lady MacQuill, he welcomed the mission—and not merely to escape the prison of enslavement, though that was certainly part of the appeal.
Of more importance was the chance to embark on a quest—the ultimate test of a spiritual warrior’s substance.
Chapter 4
As Jenna stepped out the front door of the cottage at twilight, the screech of a bird drew her gaze skyward. There, circling the glen, was a large white raptor. Squinting for a better look, she studied the noble creature, trying to work out what breed it might be. She’d always taken an interest in wildlife and bird watching, but she’d never seen anything like this magnificent specimen, whose snowy feathers shone as bright as the moon against the iridescent violet sky. Was it a white owl? She didn’t believe so. But neither could she think what other kind of winged predator hunted after sundown.
She watched the bird wheel on the cool, gentle wind. It seemed to edge closer, to know she was there, to observe her as she observed it—with a mixture of curiosity and fascination. Then, she got the oddest sensation. As if energy were flowing between them. When prickling goose pimples erupted down her arms, she tore her gaze from the sky and shook the feeling off.
You’re imagining things, Jenna. It’s just a bloody bird.
Or, maybe it wasn’t.
Making a mental note to ask Mr. McGregor more about Sir Axel’s habits when he called about her car, she switched on her torch and headed into the glen.
She’d passed the afternoon trying not to obsess about what she would say to Sir Axel if they met. Try
ing, but failing miserably. What would he say? What would he do? Would he be kind or stony? Would he persuade her to have sex with him?
Would he need to?
All the times she imagined her wedding night, she’d pictured William on top of her, coldly thrusting away. And still she wanted it, wanted the intimacy, wanted to be desired as a woman even if she didn’t enjoy the sex. William’s physical aloofness had destroyed her self-esteem. Not that she had much left after her father had gotten through with her.
Never once had either one of them told her they loved her. Never once had they shown the least consideration for her feelings. As a woman, she wasn’t their equal. According to The Bible, as both men frequently reminded her, women were put on this Earth to bear children, cook and clean, and look after their fathers and husbands.
Jenna bristled at the neanderthalic notion, even though a small part of her had been brainwashed into believing it. Was it any wonder her mother took her own life? Or so the police suspected. There was no other way to explain why her car made no skid marks before leaving the road.
“Put that wild idea right out of your head,” her father told the detective who’d come to their house. “Because my Claire was a good Christian woman who would never interfere with the will of the Lord. Especially in the horrible, selfish, and sinful way you’re suggesting.”
Jenna didn’t share her father’s confidence. He had been as cold to his wife as he’d been to his daughter. On the few occasions her mother had tried to kiss or embrace her husband, he pushed her away—a sight that always broke Jenna’s heart.
Just as it did when William treated her with similar coldness.
Only someone who’d been under the thumb of such a person could understand the power they held. They wore their partners down, eroded their spirits, their sense of self, until there was nothing left but a void. A black hole of dependency and need that craved approval more than it yearned for escape.