by Laurin Wittig - Guardians Of The Targe 02 - Highlander Avenged
And if it was the Targe choosing her . . .
She dared not look at Malcolm. If she was Guardian, then she was once more tied to Dunlairig, to her clan, and he was destined to be chief of his. Tears filled her eyes at the implications. He was hers but she could not let him abandon his destiny just because hers had once more changed. She would have to tell him.
But not until she was sure.
“We must get back to the caves,” she said, still not looking at him, for she did not want him to see the sadness that swamped her at the mere thought of being parted from him. “I must tell Rowan of this place and what has happened here immediately.”
“We cannot keep it our secret?” he said, wrapping his arm around her waist and tucking her against him as they gazed over the pool in the dim light.
She leaned back into his embrace. “Some, aye, some is just for us, but the rest—I cannot keep that secret. I would if I could.” She laid her head against his shoulder and stared at the darker spot in the pool where the stone lay hidden just beneath the icy water. “I would if I could.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
ONCE MALCOLM AND Jeanette had made their way down the steepest part of the trail from the grotto, the rain that had threatened all afternoon poured down upon them in cold, heavy sheets. Malcolm looked for shelter as he walked behind her, following close enough so he could reach out and steady her when she stumbled. And she was stumbling more and more. But he saw nothing more than trees to shelter under, and the rain was hard enough that even the thick canopy of leaves did not stop it.
They had no choice but to get back to the caves as quickly as they could. When the trail widened, Malcolm drew even with Jeanette and took her icy hand. She did not need to be drenched in icy water twice in one day without ever properly warming up in between. Worry lodged in his gut and knotted in his throat. She had been so glassy-eyed just before they left the grotto and he had not been able to decide if it was unshed tears or the onset of fever. The temperature of her skin said ’twas not fever, but then if it was tears, he did not understand why. She had been so happy until she’d seen that stone, so passionate and alive in his arms. And he had been alive in hers, something he had not felt in longer than he could remember.
Was she afraid of the visions? Had she seen something that disturbed her that she had not shared with him?
Jeanette stumbled, then slipped on a muddy patch, Malcolm’s hold on her hand the only thing keeping her upright.
“We can slow down, love,” he said, pulling her close enough to wrap his arm around her, simultaneously pulling her nearer and holding her up more firmly, though she did not slow her pace. The need to protect her, to take care of her, was so fierce it shook him.
“Nay.” She wiped the rain from her face but did not look at him. “The rain is getting harder. If we slow down, the entire trail may be impassable. We need to get back to the caves and then I need to go to Rowan at first light.”
“If the rain has stopped and the trail is passable.”
“Even if those conditions still exist.” She trudged on, almost dragging him with her.
He could not help but admire her determination even as he struggled not to tell her what she could and could not do. He needed her to be safe, to be well, but he also understood the importance to her clan of what she had discovered today. The question was how to honor her need to share the news of her gift with her cousin, and to keep Jeanette safely at the caves until he was sure she was not falling ill from so many drenchings. He could go himself at first light, though he did not know these bens well, and had no idea where the camp of warriors was now, since they moved it every day.
There were plenty of lads at the caves now who were old enough to be well acquainted with the bens and trails in this area. Perhaps he could ask Peigi which one of them he could send to fetch Rowan and Nicholas. At worst he would send his messenger near the castle, as he and Jeanette had done, to find someone who could take him to the camp. He wished Jeanette’s da, Kenneth, would return from his trip to gather their allies. He had a question for the man that he needed to have answered before he sent for his family to attend his wedding to Jeanette. As much as Jeanette needed to get word to Rowan as fast as possible, he felt the same about speaking to Kenneth so that he could claim Jeanette openly as his, and she could claim him as hers, in front of all her kin.
A chill that had nothing to do with the torrential rain ate inward to settle in his bones as he recalled Jeanette’s glassy eyes. Had she seen something that would keep them apart?
Nay, he would not let that happen, no matter what she had seen. He sped their pace as the trail leveled off and he knew they were now very close to the cave site. He needed to get Jeanette settled and dry, and then he would speak with Peigi.
Moments later they were at the edge of the clearing around the caves and for a moment he feared something had happened, for the place looked as if it had been abandoned abruptly, but then he saw a movement at the mouth of the large cave—Aileas, one of Peigi’s sisters, waved them in out of the rain.
“We were worried for you two,” she said as they stepped out of the downpour and into the dank but relatively dry cave. “Peigi! They are here!”
Peigi came from the back of the cave at a much brisker pace than he’d expect from a woman her age. She had toweling over her arm and was leaving a trail of commands for dry clothes, hot food, and blankets in her wake.
“Ye tarried too long,” she said, shaking her head at the two of them, and it was only then that Malcolm realized he still held Jeanette close against him like the lovers they were. “I hope ’twas worth it.” And with that remark she patted his cheek as if he were indeed a laddie. She barely suppressed a grin while she extricated a now shivering Jeanette from his hold and guided her to sit near the fire at the mouth of the cave, just out of reach of the rain.
“You are a troublemaker, Peigi,” Jeanette said.
“Aye, that I am.” She handed each of them one of the lengths of toweling, but she was looking at Jeanette, who looked even paler than usual, her beautiful blue eyes gone big in her face. “Let us get you both out of those wet clothes,” Peigi said, “afore you catch your deaths.” But she was no longer laughing and teasing as she helped Jeanette get her sopping arisaid off. “Turn your backs, lads,” she commanded as she unlaced Jeanette’s gown. “Betty, where’s a dry kirtle, and we need a plaid or two. She’s cold right through to her bones if I’m any judge.”
Jeanette smiled a little and nodded her head. “Right through to my bones.”
Malcolm turned around, though there was no need for it after this day, but he did anyway, dropping his own dripping plaid to the ground and doing his best to dry his hair. When he was allowed to turn back, Jeanette was sitting near the fire once more, swaddled in a dark plaid with thin yellow and red stripes running through it, her hair spread over her back, while Peigi combed the tangles out of it as if Jeanette were a wee lass. A feeling he was not familiar with warmed him and he decided it was gratitude. He was grateful that Peigi was taking care of his angel when he did not yet have that right. He let the homey image of the two women sink into him, and then he took that opportunity to find his own belongings and change into a dry tunic. He snagged the plaid he’d been sleeping on and wrapped it around him.
“Peigi bade me gather your wet things and hang them to dry,” said a woman he’d seen now and again about the camp.
“I thank you, mistress . . .”
“I am Helen,” she said, picking up the wet tunic he had dropped to the ground. “Thank you for getting Jeanette safely back.” She shook out the tunic. “There has been so much heartache for this clan of late, I don’t know what we would do if something happened to any of the lassies.”
“The lassies?”
She smiled. “Aye, that is what we call them, though they are all grown women now, or almost grown. Jeanette, Scotia, and Rowan. The
lassies. The three of them have always held the hearts of the clan as if they belonged to all of us.”
He started to say Jeanette was his now, but he stopped, wondering if his own clan felt the same about him and his sisters. Wondering what this clan would do when he took her to live in the MacKenzie stronghold, when he took her to be his wife. Wondering how Kenneth would react when he asked for his daughter’s hand and took her from the clan.
Helen laid a hand softly on his forearm. “Dinna fash yourself. She will be fine as soon as she gets warm. Jeanette is much stronger than she looks, as are all three of the lassies.” She looked about the ground then. “Where is your plaid?”
He motioned back toward the mouth of the cave, where he had left it in a pile.
Helen nodded. “I’ll just get these things drying then.”
Malcolm followed her back to the fire, only to find Jeanette sound asleep, leaning against the hard stone wall of the cave.
“We should get her to her bed,” he said quietly to Peigi, who sat next to her.
“Not now. She sleeps soundly and I expect that is just what the lass needs.” She picked up a wooden bowl that sat almost in the embers of the fire and handed it to him, along with several bannocks. “Eat. I expect that is what you need.”
Malcolm’s stomach rumbled, answering her better than words could. He lowered himself to sit next to Peigi, enjoying the warmth of the fire and the oat-thickened stew. When the bowl was empty, and the bannocks gone, Peigi looked about her, then leaned toward him.
“Are you not going to tell me what happened this day?” There was no teasing in her tone, indeed, she was more serious than he had ever seen her. “Bedding a lad and getting drenched in the rain does not make a lass that pale, or that worried looking.”
Malcolm did not think ’twas possible, but the woman made him blush.
“You did bed her, aye?” she asked, a hint of teasing lightening her voice now.
“ ’Tis none of your business, Peigi.”
“True enough, but an auld woman gets little attention from the lads anymore”—she elbowed him in the ribs—“so I have to live that part of my life through others now.”
“I have never met a woman like you before, Peigi.”
“Nor one like Jeanette, I wager.”
“Never one like Jeanette.” He looked over at his angel where she slept awkwardly against the wall. He moved to sit near her, his back to the wall, his legs stretched out in front of him, his feet almost in the fire, then he carefully lowered her from the wall to pillow her head on his leg so her neck would not afflict her when she woke. He smoothed her rapidly drying hair back from her cheek, noted the warmth of her skin now, and watched her simply breathe for long moments. A calmness warmed him from the inside out. A rightness settled into him.
“What else happened, Malcolm?” Peigi said, just loud enough for him to hear but not loud enough for her voice to carry beyond them.
“ ’Tis not my place to say, but we need to send someone to fetch Rowan, for Jeanette needs to speak with her and she will insist upon traveling to the warriors’ camp at first light tomorrow if we do not fetch her cousin.”
“And Nicholas, the chief, will need to come.”
“—And Nicholas, of course.”
Peigi nodded but said nothing.
“Have you had any word of when Jeanette’s da will return?”
“Nay. You wish to ask Kenneth for his daughter’s hand?” Now she slanted him a look that dared him to say otherwise.
“I do.”
“Does she wish to wed you, too?”
He sighed and smiled, remembering when they had claimed each other as their own in the grotto. “She does.”
Peigi let out a cackling laugh and slapped her thighs. “I kent it! I kent you were the one for her and she for you. You will treat her well, lad.”
“I will, Peigi, of course I will.” He looked down at the sleeping lass. “I love her.”
“As do we all,” she said, then added with a sly grin, “Well, perhaps we do not love her exactly as you do.” With a wink she was off to send a lad to fetch Rowan and Nicholas.
JEANETTE FOLLOWED THE deer with the bent antler through familiar wood, past the heather bank where she and Malcolm had trysted, past the shielings, and on down the ben toward Dunlairig Castle. She tried to look about her, for she could not remember how she came to be in the wood, nor even what time of day it was, but everything around her—except the deer and the trees immediately around him—were oddly grey. A thick fog separated her from her surroundings, leaving her with an odd floating sensation, as if she rested in the loch, or among the clouds.
Time had no meaning to her so she knew not how long she followed the deer. When he turned, she followed, understanding that he was taking her somewhere, as he had taken her and Malcolm to the grotto. Warmth infused her entire body at the thought of Malcolm and the memory of what they had shared there.
The stag stopped, looked back at her, and gave that odd bark of the roe deer, as if to chastise her for letting her mind wander from whatever his mission was. She heard shouts in the distance and, at the same moment, the deer took off with a giant bound into the thick forest. He took great leaps through the wood, moving so swiftly and so effortlessly that Jeanette could not keep up, but neither could she make her voice work, though she tried to call out to him to wait for her.
The shouts grew louder now, and the unmistakable sound of swords sliding free of their scabbards sliced through the air, sending unseen birds flapping and squawking from their perches all around her. She ran until she saw the stag, standing still just within the wood at the edge of a small clearing.
In the open area stood a dozen English men-at-arms in a circle, their backs to each other, swords drawn and a look of fear and anger on their faces. Two large, freshly toppled trees, judging by the vibrant green of their leaves, hemmed them in on two sides.
Across the clearing, Rowan stood just within the shelter of the trees, her coppery hair glinting in the shifting sunlight filtering through the leafy canopy. The white ermine sack that held the Highland Targe was clutched in her upraised hands and Jeanette could see her cousin’s lips moving, though she could not hear her voice. A crackling came from Jeanette’s right, like a thousand ropes snapping, one after the other, and then she watched as a massive pine tree tipped toward the clearing, gathering speed as its roots separated from the ground around them and its branches pulled free of its neighbors. With a boom that almost knocked Jeanette from her feet, it landed across the other downed trees, closing a tight triangle about the English.
Before the last tree had even settled, the English soldiers began streaming over the downed tree nearest Jeanette, scrambling away from the clearing shouting, “Witch! She’s a witch!”
Jeanette froze, not knowing where to go to avoid being overrun by the English when one of them passed right through her.
Jeanette woke with a start and a gasp, her heart pounding. She swallowed and tried to remember how she’d gotten from that clearing to . . .
She was in the main cave, the night’s fire gone cold in front of her and the day fully dawned outside. She pushed herself upright trying to meld what she had seen—the English soldier passing through her without knocking her over, nor any pain—with her waking up here in the cave.
She remembered coming back to the caves in the rain, and Peigi helping her dry her hair . . . and then nothing until she’d followed the deer again.
A vision. And if it was true, then Rowan was still the Guardian, for she had called upon the power of the stone to guide her gift and fell those trees. Which meant Jeanette, with her newfound gift of second sight, was what? Another Guardian? Was it really possible that there were two Guardians at the same time?
She stood and shook out her skirt, then headed to the back of the cave where the Guardians’ chronicles were safely hi
dden. She hadn’t gotten more than a few steps when she heard her name called, and a hand landed lightly on her shoulder.
“You’re awake at last, ye slugabed,” Malcolm said, turning her to face him. The smile that lit his eyes dimmed as he looked at her. “What is amiss, angel?”
“Another vision. The roebuck again.” She stepped into the comfort of his arms and laid her head on his chest where the quiet, even thumping of his heart calmed her. “I saw Rowan and at least a dozen English soldiers in the forest.”
She could feel Malcolm holding his breath.
“She will be fine, at least she was when I woke up. It seems she has learned to protect herself and her people without my help after all.”
“She was alone?”
Jeanette thought about it for long moments, running through everything she remembered, until at last she said, “I do not think so, but I saw only her and the soldiers. One of the soldiers ran right through me, Malcolm, as if I were a ghost watching them.”
“ ’Twas a vision. Perhaps they could not see you, though you saw them.”
“It did seem they could not. What does it mean? Do you think Rowan, and whoever was with her, really did meet up with the English in the forest?”
“The roebuck has not steered us wrong yet, so it would seem he is trustworthy, which means aye, I do think so, or they will, if you are seeing the future.”
Jeanette pushed back so she could look up at Malcolm. “We must go to her, tell her what I’ve seen. We might even be able to stop her from venturing into the forest and meeting up with those soldiers if it has not happened yet.”
“Nay, we do not need to go to her. She should be on her way here by now with Nicholas at the very least. Peigi sent a lad off as soon as the rain stopped last night, to fetch them here. If what you saw was her on her way, then ’tis too late to stop the meeting, and if ’tis in the future, then there is naught to gain by traipsing into the forest where we may run into the same Sassenachs.”