The lass glowered up at him and pushed herself to her feet. Her cloak fell over her body once more, masking her shape. Not that it mattered. Her face made up for what was hidden. Her high, elegant cheekbones were like the statues in his extensive gardens with smooth, creamy skin that seemed to glow in the sunlight. Her straight hair was black as a raven’s wing. Her dark brows arched boldly over large gray eyes which cut into him with a blade of irritation.
“What are ye staring at?” she demanded.
Was he staring? He couldn’t help it. She was beautiful. And she was a woman. A woman!
He wanted to speak, but his tongue wouldn’t cooperate. And, aye, he was staring. It was impossible not to. A beam of sunlight shone over her naked forearm where she’d propped her hand on her hip, as if beckoning him to stroke the exposed flesh. How he wanted to. His palm tingled with the desire to skim over her warmth.
“Is this yer tree?” She gestured at the rowan. “Yer castle?”
Her lips wrapped her words, making them somehow sensual.
When he’d been a lad, before his curse, he would have been able to charm her out of her clothing in only a matter of minutes. But now…
His heart crushed.
He was a shell of a man. His life had slipped away with naught but Gillespie’s enchantments and nagging for company. Duncan was a man cursed. A man humbled.
“Is this yers?” she asked again, dragging out each word slowly and loudly.
She thought him deaf. The idea snapped him from his daze. He hadn’t offered her an apology, or an invitation inside. It was his first time in over fourteen years seeing a woman and he’d done little more than gape.
“Will ye come inside?” he asked.
Her attention shifted to the castle and returned to him. “What’s in there?”
Her question took him aback. He answered with the first thing that came to his mind. “Furniture.”
She surprised him by smiling and giving a laugh. She had a pleasant laugh, soft and breathy. She had nice teeth too, strong and white.
“Food?” she asked, her mouth still slightly curled up at the corners.
He nodded. “Aye, food.”
“Verra well,” she said. “I’ll come inside.”
And with that, Duncan had his first guest in the castle in over fourteen years - and a woman no less.
CHAPTER 2
IF EVINA WASN’T VERITABLY invincible, she would not have accepted the man’s offer to go inside. But with the hunger snarling insistently and the aroma of roasting meat close enough that she could practically hear the fat drippings sizzle in the fire, she couldn’t decline. A hot meal would be heaven. A hot anything would be divine with the white-walled snow violently blasting the border around the tree.
The man continued to observe her with rapid flicks of his dark gaze, evidently unaware of his lack of discretion. Pity for him to be addled when he was so handsome. And he was handsome. Taller than any other man she’d seen or battled before, his hair dark, his gaze equally as black and beautifully fathomless, his jaw sharp and shadowed with several days’ worth of growth. He wore a simple léine with a pair of leather trews, which gave her plenty of a view to admire.
How she’d have enjoyed those brawny arms curling around her waist and that strong, grizzled jaw scraping over the sensitive bit of her—
“I’m sorry I hit ye.” He said it churlishly in a manner seeming not at all apologetic.
“It’s nothing I canna take.” She grinned at him in an effort to soothe his concern, but he gave her an odd look.
“Why should ye be able to take a hit?”
“I’m a warrior.” She gestured to the sword at her hip, and the bow slung over her shoulder. She left the other weapons unspoken of in their unmentionable places. One never wanted to ruin a good surprise if one might need them later. “I’m a mercenary. Got any impending battles you require assistance in winning?”
He stopped and narrowed his eyes at her. “But ye’re a woman.”
“And ye’re an idiot,” she stated bluntly. “Yet we both appear to get by in life, aye?”
He frowned at her. “An idiot?”
Guilt nipped at her. She’d lived with the crudeness of soldiers too long. She softened and reached out to pat his arm. He was like warm stone beneath the thin léine. “I shouldna have been unkind about it. I’m sure it’s no’ been easy for ye.”
“I’m no’ an idiot.” He regarded her as if she were mad.
Her nerves rankled at his contradiction. She dropped her hand from him and folded her arms. “Ye canna stop gawking at me and ye can hardly speak.”
He stared at her. She gestured to him. “See?”
His strong jaw clenched and a breath hissed from between his teeth. “I’ve been in the castle a verra long time.” He spoke slowly, as if he were stretching his patience with his words. “I’ve no’ been around anyone but Gillespie for nigh on fifteen years. It’s been that amount of time since I’ve seen a woman.” He glanced at her and looked away.
The color rose on his cheeks and she surmised his admission had made him blush.
Apparently he wasn’t an idiot—he was simply a man. One meeting a woman for the first time in a decade and a half. She was lucky he was able to speak at all.
A surge of anticipation warmed within her. Not only was the man not daft as she’s assumed, she was the first offering he’d had in far too long. Her body tingled with promise. By the end of the night, those enormous hands would be running over her naked body, brushing her sensitive nipples, dipping inside her center…
“In that case, I promise I dinna bite.” She meant it as a jest, a bit of flirtation.
The widening of his eyes indicated he didn’t take it as either. He gestured to the castle and silently led her to the wooden door at the base of the tower stretching above them. The entire path had been bathed in sunlight. A wonderful convenience as Evina was in no rush to face the snow again. Especially when the numbness of her toes was beginning to tingle painfully to life.
“Welcome to Duart Castle, my lady.” The man motioned for her to enter.
“Not my lady.” She smirked. “Just Evina.”
“Then ye can call me just Duncan.”
“Why, thank ye, just Duncan.” She stepped over the threshold into the castle and stopped short. It was not merely full of furniture, it was full of treasures beyond even her wildest dreams. Ornate fixtures gilded with precious gold, countless paintings larger than the people who posed for them, velvet-lined furniture carved of rich wood. This was no mere castle, it was a palace.
“My mother was a collector of fine things.” Duncan offered the statement more in apology than explanation. “It is…extravagant.”
It was, indeed, but beautifully so, and left Evina suspecting more than simply the rowan tree possessed an enchantment.
A tall, thin man strode in carrying a large silver tray between his long hands. “Laird, I—” He choked, and the tray crashed to the floor. Wooden cups rolled away amid the powdery shards of broken porcelain.
“Gillespie, please,” Duncan said. “I dinna want to frighten our guest.”
The man called Gillespie remained transfixed on Evina with wide eyes, even as he bent to retrieve several large pieces of broken pottery. He swallowed and the bump in his slender throat bobbed perceptively. “D…d…do ye require anything?” His narrow lips parted into an impossibly large, toothy grin.
“I havena eaten yet today,” Evina said. It was a lie. She hadn’t eaten in three days. As with physical harm, the lack of food did not affect her as it did others. But it didn’t mean the juicy, roasting meat flavoring the air did not make her mouth water with hope for a good meal.
Gillespie straightened. “We have a side of venison cooking which ought to be ready shortly. I’ll fix some for ye.” He spoke in a quick, rapid tone.
Evina smiled. “Aye, that’d be fine, thank ye.” She glanced to Duncan, who had continued to regard her during the exchange. Based off his servant�
��s reaction of her, Duncan’s words appeared to hold truth. There had been no women in the castle for some time.
“We can eat in the great hall.” Duncan strolled in the opposite direction of the broken pottery Gillespie had abandoned in search of food for her.
Evina observed the mess once more before following Duncan from the grand room into one far finer, with tapestries as large at the walls. Images of gods and goddesses decorated the large surfaces and glittered with gilded thread.
There was a mystical element to the entire castle, from the rowan tree to the castle itself and the men within. She wondered at the accident of having found Duart in the midst of such a storm. How much of the discovery had been her mysterious luck, and how much might possibly have been fate?
DUNCAN ATTEMPTED to quell his attention from wandering toward Evina. The task was made all the more difficult by the removal of her cloak, or rather, by the reveal of her shapely body. She wore a leather gambeson, fitted against the curves, accentuating her breasts and slender waist. Below, her well-formed legs were encased in a pair of leather trews.
Women did not dress like that fifteen years prior. He suspected women did not dress thus now either.
She quirked an eyebrow, and smirked. “I canna fight in a dress.”
“Why do ye fight?” He studied her openly, genuine in his curiosity.
She fell unceremoniously into the seat beside him. “For coin.”
“Are ye part of a battle near here? Is that how ye ended up at Duart?”
She glanced to the open doorway in expectation of Gillespie and the food, no doubt. She had said she hadn’t yet eaten, and it was well past when most would have had their first meal.
“Aye, I was in a battle,” she replied. “It is long since over, but it’s no’ nearby. More than a sennight’s walk away.”
A sennight. That meant she had walked to the castle for days, most likely having slept on frozen earth and eaten the reserves she’d had.
“Do ye have anyone traveling with ye?”
Her gaze trained on the doorway once more. “They died in the battle.”
Gillespie ambled in with a large trencher of venison. The simple act of setting the meat to the table made it fall from the bone and emit tendrils of steam.
“Ach, I forgot the whisky.” Gillespie bowed and left as swiftly as he’d arrived.
Evina took a large helping of the meat as well as another of the stewed vegetables and a fist sized hunk of bread.
Duncan had not known hunger. But then he’d never had to walk over land instead of riding a fine horse, nor had he ever had to sleep on the frozen ground in place of a grand home. He’d lived without want of coin or any other necessity in life.
It wasn’t until he caught the tremble of Evina’s hands, the starved manner in which she swallowed before bringing the first bite of food to her lips, that Duncan gathered she had most likely experienced all those things. That she would doubtless continue to until she had a place to stay, a benefactor to ensure she was provided for.
Evina ate carefully, as if she meant to savor every bite, relishing the morsel of food in her mouth more than Duncan had enjoyed any one thing in the entirety of his life.
“Ye could stay here,” he said abruptly.
She regarded him for a long moment while still chewing her food. The great banging clatter came from somewhere within the castle, small at first, before crashing louder and ending with a humming reverberation.
They both stared in the direction Gillespie had left.
“Think on it.” Duncan rose quickly and made his way to the noise where he found Gillespie sitting amid a pile of pots.
The servant put his hands up. “I’m fine. I’m fine.” He shook his head. “I shouldna have grabbed that one.” He eyed the smallest pot with hostility before fixing his attention on Duncan. “Do ye wager she’s a daughter of Morrigan?”
Duncan had dreaded the suggestion, even as he’d anticipated it. Telling Gillespie it wasn’t possible was not the issue-it was saying the words aloud. Admitting it to himself. The lass had arrived starving, with naught to her name but a simple bow and a serviceable sword. He’d caught sight of the sword when they’d made their way inside. It jutted two inches higher than the scabbard, noticeably not made as a pair. The hilt was flat and unadorned, the blade nicked along its sides.
It was obviously not a weapon belonging to a goddess’s daughter. Certes, not one belonging to the goddess of war and death.
Duncan shook his head. “She’s no’ a daughter of Morrigan.”
The skin around Gillespie’s eyes tightened. “Ye’re sure?”
Duncan bent to retrieve a large pot, one too large for the older man’s slender arms to lift, and set it into place along the shelf. “I canna say it’s arisen in conversation.”
Gillespie snapped his long fingers. “Then ye dinna know.”
“She’s a peasant.” Duncan lowered his voice. “It’s been more than a day since she ate. She has no home, no coin. I’ve no’ ever heard of a goddess’s child so poorly cared for if she is one.”
Gillespie moved about the kitchen, deftly retrieving pots to return to the shelf. “I’ll prepare the bed for her regardless. We ought to summon servants.”
Duncan shook his head. He’d had his fill of enchantments in his life, and Gillespie’s claims to be a druid’s grandson were little more than tales from Gillespie’s whimsical mother. In hindsight, Duncan never should have given the man the crumbling tome from the witch’s effects.
“Laird, we canna have a guest in our home, a woman who might be the one, without having her properly seen to. Allow me to make the attempt.” Gillespie’s face went red with excitement, his eyes bright. “Please.”
Long ago, Duncan would have been able to deny the old man without remorse. However, with Gillespie as his sole companion, the only one who had stayed as everyone left, Duncan found he did not have the spirit to deny the aging man this request. For when Duncan died, there would be no one to care for his most loyal servant.
“Ach, fine. But mind ye dinna disturb—”
“Aye, I’ll no’ disturb the rowan tree.” Gillespie bobbed his head emphatically. “Ye know I’d no’ ever touch it.”
Duncan sighed. “Verra well.” He hesitated, almost afraid to say the next order, and in doing so, allow himself to fall into the light of optimism radiating from Gillespie. “Prepare the chamber.”
The chamber had been set aside early on, outfitted to fit the needs of a princess, with the finest of furnishings and coverlets. Most importantly, at its center was a four-poster bed rising high enough to accommodate twelve stacked mattresses.
Gillespie lifted his thin shoulders and rubbed his hands together.
“And have a care ye dinna get yer hopes too lofty.” Duncan said it to Gillespie, but he meant it for both of them. Even as he spoke the words, his pulse came faster and his breath hitched.
Try as he might, he could not stop the desperate welling inside the despair of his soul.
For what if Evina was absolutely the daughter of Morrigan, and what if she ultimately might save him? The prospect left his body prickling with excitement, with a sensation he hadn’t possessed in the fourteen years of his curse - hope.
CHAPTER 3
EVINA HAD SLEPT in unusual places through the course of her life. In stables among hay and beasts, on the floor of an employer’s castle with their servants. Once she’d been so tired after battle, she’d fallen to the bog and slept there among the reeds and soggy peat. She’d been invited to several estates and provided a well-appointed chamber, but nothing – nothing - was as grand as what lay sprawled before her.
Fine tapestries and furnishings adorned a room large enough for three families to live in. Marble statues stood like sentries on either side of a fireplace yawning so wide, it could easily swallow a bed. Well, mayhap any bed but the one in this chamber. The magnificent four-poster bed rose to the painted ceiling and was complete with a series of stairs to access the ma
ttresses stacked not five or even ten, but… She ticked off the numbers in her head as her eyes lifted from the bottom mattress to the top. Twelve.
Twelve mattresses.
“I hope ye find it to yer liking, my lady.” Gillespie gave a quick, awkward bow, his long limbs akimbo. “I’ll send in a maid to assist ye with yer bath.”
At once the servant disappeared and a large tub sat before the hearth. Had it been there before? She was sure it had not.
But then, she wasn’t one to argue. Not when a bath awaited. A warm one, at that! She dropped her bag to the floor where it landed with an ungainly clunk.
Steam curled up from the mirrored surface of the bathing tub. Innocent and alarmingly normal. She moved closer and noted the delicate perfume of roses emanating from the water. Heat from the nearby fireplace warmed the chill from her bones.
It had been a shamefully long time since she’d done much more than a hasty scrub with a cloth. The idea of sinking into the scented water and letting it wash over her like silk almost made her moan.
“My lady, are ye ready for me to assist ye?”
Evina spun about to find a woman with a fair complexion and white blonde hair waiting. The door hadn’t opened. Evina was certain she hadn’t heard it open.
She may be invincible, but the hair on the back of her neck stood on end.
“I was told there were no women here,” Evina said.
The woman approached. She was lovely in a peculiar way with a small mouth, round black eyes and a high, smooth forehead. Her neck was extraordinarily long, giving her an odd and somehow graceful appearance.
The maid bowed her head. “I’ve only been brought in today to care for ye during yer stay, my lady. Ye may call me Ala.”
Evina eyed the young woman with growing skepticism. “Where did ye come from?”
Ala lifted her head and met Evina’s gaze with eyes so dark, the pupils weren’t visible. Confusion furrowed at her slender pale brows. “The village, my lady.” She said it with such innocent certainty, Evina immediately felt foolish for asking, for questioning.
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