Mara reached for his hand and covered it with hers. “How terrible to lose her that way.”
He felt connected to Mara again; she was no longer a million miles away. “She didn’t die, but we all lost her anyway, or we lost the person she would have been. Andrew’s right. Fiona was all spirit and sass, and he and Iain loved her as much as I did. Her burns were serious, and for a while no one knew if she’d recover. I remember my parents fighting constantly for those weeks. My mother wanted to fly Fiona to America to a burn center there, as soon as she was stabilized, but my father wanted her to stay at the hospital in Glasgow. Finally my mother got her way. She was an American citizen, so there was no red tape. She and Fiona and I flew back to the States, and the two of them have never returned to Scotland. My father insisted that I come back for a month each summer, and my mother allowed him that small victory. But Fiona’s never been back, not even for my father’s funeral. He left her half the hotel, but she refuses to make any decisions about it. She’s put me in charge.”
“And where is she now?”
“She still lives in New York with my mother.” He debated how much more to say. He had already bored her with the story of his marriage. But Mara seemed genuinely concerned, and Fiona’s story seemed to have taken her mind off her own problems.
“She’s never really grown up,” he said. “She went through terrible pain, skin grafts and treatments all the years of her childhood. I’m sure that changed her, but the worst part was my mother. She smothered Fiona until there was almost nothing left of the little girl we’d all known. Mother felt so guilty about what had happened that she devoted her entire life to making things easy and safe. Now Fiona doesn’t seem to be able to function without her.”
“That’s very sad.”
“You want to hear the real irony? Fiona’s writing children’s books. She’s been successful, because she’s still a little girl at heart, a little girl who may never grow up.”
Mara was silent for a while. “Did you ever think,” she asked at last, “that what happened to Fiona might explain a bit about why you did no’ interfere with the way that Lisa was raising April? Were you afraid you might turn out to be as overprotective and smothering as your mum?”
He hadn’t thought about it. He had never thought about it, even though it seemed perfectly clear to him now. But he couldn’t absolve himself of guilt that easily. “Even if it were true, it would hardly be an excuse, would it?”
“We’re too old to need excuses, Duncan. But perhaps, if it is true, it might help explain something that obviously bothers you.”
A month ago he would have been angry; a month ago he had been angry when he’d believed she was trying to analyze him. Now he leaned over and kissed her lightly on the lips. “You’re always trying to get me off the hook, aren’t you? You’re determined to make me feel good about myself as a father.”
“Is that so bad?”
She really wanted to know. He read her own questions in her eyes, questions deep inside her, formed by the life she’d been forced to live. “Nothing you could do would be bad, Mara.” He was all too aware of a green filled to capacity with gossiping villagers, of her reputation and his, of customs and superstitions and centuries of Sinclair men who had probably sat at one time or another in this very spot with the women they loved. “Nothing.”
He kissed her again, aware of everything, but most especially, of her.
* * *
She didn’t know what would happen or to whom. She’d had no clear visions, no glimpses of the future. She just knew that something was going to happen, and soon.
Mara watched Duncan cheering for Andrew in the caber toss. The caber, nearly eighteen feet long and weighing more than a hundred pounds, was to be lifted and tossed so that it lay across the ground in front of the competitor like the hands of a clock at midnight. The crowd hushed in anticipation and Andrew hoisted it, ran the required steps and heaved it into a nearly perfect position.
The crowd roared. Duncan, who had swung April to his shoulders for a better look, strode over to congratulate his old friend. Mara saw a cluster of young women eyeing Andrew with longing. Andrew liked the ladies, and in turn they liked him twice as well.
Her vision swam for a moment, as it had on and off since midmorning. She felt suddenly clammy, and her head began to pound. The scene before her vanished; transposed over it was another that was much the same. She saw the village green and the people thronging it. The sun still shone—although it was lower in the sky—but even as she felt its rays warm her skin, she heard the roar of thunder. Horror gripped her. She struggled to move, but her limbs were weak and uncoordinated. She struggled—
“Mara?”
She felt a hand on her shoulder. She swallowed, then gasped for air. The vision dimmed, then disappeared. Duncan was beside her, and it was his hand she felt.
Heat flooded back into her body, but her head pounded harder.
“Mara, are you all right?”
She shook her head. She couldn’t speak.
Duncan swung April off his shoulders and pointed her toward Sally, who was standing in a line at a nearby stand. “Sally’s buying currant buns for you and the girls. Better go help, or little Fanny will eat them all before you get yours.”
“Is Mara going to be all right?”
“Sure. She’s just not used to the sunshine.”
April patted Mara’s hand, then she skipped off to find Sally.
“It’s not the sun, is it?” Duncan asked when they were alone.
She shook her head.
“Do you want to tell me what’s going on?”
“You would no’ ken.”
“You could try me.”
She tried to focus on his face. Little by little her vision cleared until she could see every nuance of his expression.
And she realized she couldn’t tell him. He was wary, already suspicious that her behavior had something to do with the second sight he didn’t believe in. She could share herself with this man, share her feelings, even the story of her life before Druidheachd, but she couldn’t share her visions. Because the visions would stand between them.
“I’ve a bad headache,” she said.
“And I wouldn’t understand that? I’ve never had one myself?”
“Duncan, dinna push me. I can only tell you what I can.”
“Maybe you ought to go home. I’ll drive you if you don’t feel well enough. Or better yet, let’s go back to the hotel. I’ll put you to bed in my room. You can sleep this off, then we can have a nice supper together.”
“No.”
“No?”
“I have to stay here.”
His tone grew sharper. “Why? You didn’t even want to come in the first place.”
She left him standing there with his questions and his suspicions. She started back toward the hotel stand, paying just the minimum attention to her surroundings. Somehow she had fooled herself into believing that she could keep her visions separate from her relationship with Duncan. She had almost believed that she could allow him into her life and her heart.
But they could not be separate.
“Mara!” She felt a hand on her arm, and she was jerked unceremoniously out of the path of a sturdy chestnut mare.
“Iain.” She put her hand to her throat. Her pulse beat wildly beneath her own fingers.
“You were about to get trampled. You certainly weren’t watching where you were going. Are you all right?”
“I seem to have all my body parts intact. Thank you.”
He was dressed much as Andrew except that he wore a white shirt with his black-and-red kilt and a black velvet jacket instead of a plaid across his shoulder. He grimaced as she surveyed him. “It’s expected,” he said. “The laird of Druidheachd always shows up in his kilt.”
“And you dinna like it?” She certainly liked what she saw, and she knew that the other women at the fair would, too.
“I don’t mind the kilt. I mind being the laird wh
o has to show up.”
He walked beside her, still holding her arm. Two more horses trotted by. She saw them clearly now, and she stayed out of their way. “You were deep in thought,” he said.
“Aye.”
“Trouble, Mara?”
“I came here to find peace, Iain, but there’s no peace to be found.”
“There might be a message in that.”
“What do you mean?”
“Maybe peace isn’t what you need.” He squeezed her arm before he dropped his hand. With a wave he disappeared into the crowd gathering to watch the horse race.
She was torn about what to do. She had only rarely felt this lost. She wanted to go home, to her mountain and her cottage. She wanted the solace of a peat fire and Guiser lying contentedly at her feet. But she had to stay.
She felt warm arms come around her. She knew they belonged to Duncan. She shut her eyes and leaned against him. And despite everything else she felt, she no longer felt lost.
“Don’t run away from me again, Mara,” he murmured close to her ear. “Maybe I don’t understand everything, and maybe I don’t even want to. But don’t run away. Let’s see if we can find some compromises.”
She covered his hands with hers in answer.
“Come on. Let’s go watch the race.”
She let him lead her to the edge of the crowd. The oval where the horses were to race was large enough that there were enough places along their route so that everyone could see. Posts had been set up and ropes marked the boundary so that no one would stray onto the course. The horses waited at a makeshift gateway. There were only three of them, the chestnut that had nearly trampled her, a heavyset white gelding that looked as if it belonged behind a plow, and a bay that danced nervously from side to side each time a bugler summoned the crowd to the race.
“I’ve got a pound on the chestnut,” Duncan said. “Iain wants the white and Andrew the bay. What’ll you take?”
“I’ve no talent for this,” she said too sharply.
He ignored her tone and its implications. “Well, which one looks like a winner to you?”
“I’ll take the chestnut, too.”
“Good girl. You can pick a winner.”
She tried to smile, but her face felt frozen. The pain in her head was nearly unendurable; she knew that worse was coming.
She could hear Duncan making soothing conversation; she could hear her own polite responses. The bugler finished and the horses came through the gateway to line up beside each other.
“They go around five times, I think,” Duncan said. “I’ll bet the white doesn’t even go four.”
Someone fired a shot into the air and the horses were off. They streaked by, their hooves pounding the earth just in front of her. Mara closed her eyes, but she could still see them. The chestnut was out in front, the white in second, and the bay, who was tightly reined in by its rider, was a close third. The rider would keep the horse in check until nearly the end of the race. Until…
The horses thundered by again, but Mara barely heard them. She opened her eyes but it wasn’t the present she saw. She saw the fifth and final lap, and as she watched, the bay’s rider gave the horse its head. But instead of surging forward, the horse jerked to one side, and before its rider could compensate, the horse plunged into the crowd.
Exactly into the spot fifty yards from where Mara stood. The spot where two little boys stood beside their mother, who was holding high a chubby, laughing toddler, so that she could see the race.
She jerked away from Duncan and began to push her way through the crowd. The horses were on their fourth lap now, at least she thought they were. Time was confused and confusing. It stood still and sped forward in the same instant. There was no time. She was alone in a timeless void, and she had to reach the children.
She pushed harder, ignoring the disgruntled noises of those she trampled. The crowd was dense here, too dense to easily pass through. She made a path for herself with both hands, concentrating only on what lay ahead.
She could hear the horses rounding the bend, although she didn’t have time to spare a glance. She was only ten yards from her goal, ten impossible yards.
“Please, let me through!” She pushed, and at last the crowd parted. She launched herself forward. The children were almost within reach. She could see their faces, eyes huge and glowing with the excitement of the race.
She saw those same eyes, sightless eyes staring from a wooden kist in the old stone kirk across the green. “Let me through!”
She made a final push and grabbed the closest boy by his collar, flinging him with nearly superhuman strength into the crowd behind her. The second boy screamed in protest as she grabbed him and flung him after his brother. Their mother whirled, shock, then fury written across every feature. She lunged at Mara, and Mara circled her with her arms. She could feel the baby between them, still safely cocooned against her mother. She launched herself backward, taking them both with her. Pain shot through her arm as she fell, and her head exploded into a million shards of light as it hit the ground.
She blacked out just as the bay broke through the ring and charged into the empty space where a mother and three small children had just been standing.
CHAPTER 10
There was a moment as Mara fell when she cried out silently against fate. She felt no regret for trying to save the children, but she knew as she heard the thunder of horses’ hooves closing in on her that her vision had come too late. She had not been warned in time. She had not thrown the boys completely clear and she had not protected their mother and the baby. She had been taunted with their fate, but she had not been given the strength or time to prevent it.
How much better not to have known.
As fireworks exploded in her head, then darkness closed around her, she felt an agony that surpassed physical pain. She had battled fate and lost, and in the process she had lost Duncan, too.
“Mara.”
Pain shattered the darkness, and she tried to retreat, but a man’s voice called her name once more. “Mara. Wake up. Mara, can you hear me?”
She tried to retreat further. She lay very still and willed the voice to go away.
“What I dinna understand is how she knew the horse would bolt,” a different voice said.
“Why does that matter now?” the first replied.
“It does no’ matter, it’s just a subject of some interest in the village.”
“Damn it, Angus, the only thing I’m interested in right now is if she’s going to be all right!”
“You’re a man who will no’ take telling, are you no’? I’ve told you she’s going to be fine. I’ve told you more than once. It’s a nasty bump, but I’ve seen nastier.”
“We’re talking about a brain here. She hit the ground hard, and it’s been over an hour. She still hasn’t come to!”
“She’s waking up now. After nearly fifty years I know the signs. Her head will ache for days, and she may be a wee disoriented. But her arm will give her more trouble than her head. She’ll be in a sling for weeks at the very least. She’ll no’ be milking cows or doing chores.”
“I don’t care about her cows! Her cows can be damned. It’s Mara I’m worried about.”
“Listen to me, Duncan Sinclair, Jeanne whacked your wee bottom nearly thirty years ago in this very room, and now I’ll do it myself if I must. Stand back and give the lass room. She’ll no’ come round a’ tall with you breathing all her air.”
Putting the men’s words together in some sort of logical order made Mara’s head hurt worse, but she struggled to make sense of their conversation.
A woman’s voice sounded from faraway. “Angus, the lads are all patched and ready. The bittiest one’s climbing the walls, and I can nae contain him any longer.”
“Let me check them over again, Jeanne. Then they can go.”
“And nae a moment too soon!”
Mara felt someone take her hand. “I’ll call you if she wakes up, or if there’s any c
hange.”
“Then you’ll be calling me soon. She’s awake now. She just does no’ want to be.” Mara heard a door slam.
“Mara, is that true? If you’re awake, will you please open your eyes and let me see for myself? For God’s sake, I can’t tell if this old quack knows what he’s talking about or not.”
Everything was clearer now. Mara willed it to be even clearer. She opened her eyes and saw gray. Gray stone, gray light, the grayish pallor of Duncan Sinclair’s face. Her eyes closed.
“Mara.” Duncan’s voice was close to her ear. She could feel the warmth of his breath against her cheek. “Do you know where you are? You’re at the hospital in Druidheachd. You’ve been here about an hour.”
“The…children?”
“They’re fine. A few scratches, that’s all. Their mother’s all right, too. You got her out of the way just in time. The horse was so close it caught the heel of her shoe when it plunged past, but she wasn’t touched. The baby just had the wind knocked out of her when all of you fell.”
Mara didn’t know if she dared to believe him. Then, from somewhere in the distance, she could hear the whooping of children’s voices, and she knew he was telling the truth. She began to cry.
“Don’t cry. Mara, don’t. Please. For God’s sake, don’t cry.”
She cried anyway. She could feel his fingers stroking away her tears. They trembled against her cheek. “I thought…” She couldn’t form the words.
“You thought you were too late? You weren’t. You got there just in time.”
“So I was right. She’s awake.” The door slammed once more.
Mara opened her eyes again. Old Dr. Sutherland swam into view. “Aye.”
“Well, it’s no’ every day I treat a heroine, lass. I’m honored to have the good fortune today.” He came over to stand beside the bed. He lifted her wrist and felt for her pulse. “You had a bad bashing, and your head will ache for a while yet. But it’s your arm that’ll give you the most trouble.”
Their earlier conversation was beginning to make sense to her now. “Arm?”
“Your right arm. You did no’ break it, but it’s a nasty sprain. We’ll have to keep it immobilized for a while. You can no’ do a thing except have the good grace to accept it.”
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