’Twas true enough that Morgaine touched Alasdair as no other woman ever had. He recalled too well his gran’s conviction that there was but a single true love to each man and woman on this earth, and he could not help but wonder.
Was Morgaine the woman he was destined to love? Could it be that theirs was a match fated to be, and one that not even time could stand against?
’Twas a heady thought. Alasdair tried to hide his response to the appealing idea – not that either woman was paying attention – by indulging in another biscuit. He felt his ears heat and his gaze dropped to Morgaine’s legs.
Was it truly so bad to be lost in this time? Angus must have grown to manhood, married, and had bairns of his own. Gran must have finally passed away, after many years of health and happiness. Would it be so foul to know that they had lived the fullness of their lives, even as he had a rare opportunity to win a woman’s heart?
There was naught else to draw Alasdair home, beyond concern for his loved ones and his own sense that he had erred in leaving Angus alone. Could news from these records set his mind at ease?
Could Morgaine’s compassion soothe his doubts?
For Alasdair knew that if he stayed in this time, he would bend his every effort to win the love of his Morgaine. He would make her forget this Matthew James Reilly who had treated her so poorly. He would pledge himself to her and prove himself worthy of her affections.
Alasdair would make Morgaine happy if ’twas the last thing he did.
He crunched another biscuit with resolve. Aye, Blake would not have to send his buggering advocate after Alasdair.
*
The light was fading when Morgaine gave a crow of delight. She emerged from deep stacks of record boxes with an ancient bound book and a smudge of dust across the bridge of her nose. “I think this is it!”
“Oh, that’s one of those books the monks created, when they transcribed all of the old records that were crumbling away,” Frances said. She glanced at Alasdair. “The monks of Newcombe Abbey.”
“Aye, I know them well.” These were the monks who had shown Alasdair their fine books and first tempted him to learn to write.
But Frances blinked. “Know them?” She wrinkled her nose. “The abbey closed during the Reformation. It’s been gone for centuries.”
“He means he knows of them,” Morgaine interjected quickly. She flushed slightly at her lie, even without looking at Alasdair and he wondered whether Frances truly believed her.
The woman could not lie to save her very soul, he thought with mingled affection and amusement.
Frances shook her head, adjusted her glasses, and leaned over Morgaine’s shoulder to examine the book. “Well, what does it say?”
Morgaine ran a finger along the text. “It talks about Olaf the Black, King of Man and the Isles.”
“Aye. My forebear.” Alasdair nodded approval.
“And of them coming to settle on the west of Lewis. Then there’s a list of names.”
“My goodness, where to start?” Frances murmured.
“Look for Ismay of Mull,” Alasdair instructed. “She wed Ranald MacAulay and bore him a son, Angus Morgan.” Frances looked up in surprise, but Alasdair continued undeterred. “That man then wed Fiona Campbell, who bore him a son…”
“Named Alasdair.” Morgaine’s gaze sought Alasdair’s and held his for a long moment. He saw that she knew full well who this Alasdair was.
Finally, she moistened her lips and looked back to the text. “He married Fenella Macdonald in 1307, and she bore him a son in 1308 named Angus.”
Alasdair could not make a sound, there was such a lump in his throat.
Morgaine swallowed visibly. “Fenella died in 1308, Alasdair in the storming of Edinburgh castle in 1314 while he was following Robert the Bruce.”
So, they thought him dead.
“And what of that son, Angus?” Frances demanded cheerfully, evidently unaware of the tension in the room. “He must have had children that led to your strain of the family.”
Morgaine ran her fingertip across the page as though she would change what the script said. When she looked up at Alasdair, her expression heavy with sympathy, he had a sudden sense that he did not want to know the truth.
“He died,” she said softly, and Alasdair prayed his son had lived long. The sorrow in Morgaine’s eyes made him fear otherwise. “In 1315.”
Alasdair blinked, but Morgaine’s expression did not change. Angus had died, at seven years of age? Impossible!
But Morgaine’s eyes did not lie.
Nor did the book she held.
A hot tide rushed through Alasdair. His son had not even grown to manhood! He shoved one hand through his hair, hating that such a fate should have befallen his only child.
Aye, he had failed the boy sorely.
“Well, then, that must be the wrong family line,” Frances interjected crisply, turning back to the books. “Why, you can’t be descended from people who didn’t have family, now, could you? Let’s look a little further…”
Angus had died too young.
The fault for it lay squarely in Alasdair’s own camp for he had abandoned the boy. Somehow, in some way, he had to make it right. He did not know where he was going or what he was going to do when he got there, but he was seized by the imperative to move.
To do something immediately. His gut churned with the knowing. ’twas his responsibility to make all come right for his child, and ’twas a duty Alasdair had left undone too long.
And clearly, whatever needed doing could not be accomplished in Frances Fergusson’s cluttered abode. Alasdair could not bear to remain in its cozy comfort while wrestling with the stark reality of his failure.
He had to fix the oversight now.
Alasdair put down the plate of biscuits with less than his usual grace. The women looked up, and he tried to excuse himself in a civilized manner. When the words would not come, he simply bolted out of Frances’s home, his pulse thundering in his ears.
He barely heard Morgaine running after him.
*
Morgan couldn’t keep up with Alasdair, let alone catch him. “Alasdair!” she cried when she stumbled on Frances’s gravel path, not expecting him even to acknowledge her shout.
He looked back, and Morgan’s heart twisted at his anguished expression.
But he did not stop.
And Morgan would never be able to close the yawning gap between them. She halted and watched Alasdair make quick progress across the peat, his figure growing rapidly smaller.
Alasdair must have known that Angus would be dead – it had been seven hundred years, after all – but she couldn’t blame him for being shocked that the boy had died so very young. Angus had died so soon after Alasdair leapt through time that Morgan couldn’t help wondering whether there was a connection.
And she guessed that Alasdair was wondering the same thing.
Alasdair’s only son, his only touchstone to remind him of his beloved Fenella, had died young, perhaps because Alasdair had been away. Alasdair probably believed he had failed the memory of his gorgeous wife.
Or maybe it just troubled him that her presence had been wiped away so quickly. Morgan wished heartily that the record had included some notation of how Angus had died.
It might have set Alasdair’s mind at ease.
“Well, I must say I’ve never seen such a strong reaction to finding a record,” Frances commented behind Morgan.
Morgan deliberately turned away from the highlander’s fleeing figure and forced a smile. “It was a bit of a surprise for him.”
“Hmm.” The older woman’s expression was skeptical, as though she sensed that there was more to this story than she was hearing. “I suppose his family must descend from another line,” she confined herself to saying. “No doubt he’ll discover some other helpful details from those at home and be back.”
Morgan guessed where Alasdair might have gone. He could have gone home, where at least in his mind, he could be
with Fenella and their son. It was the closest he could come to fixing what he thought he had done wrong.
But Morgan could do one better. The ideal solution for Alasdair would be for him to go back in time. Maybe then he could help his son. Maybe then he could set history to rights again.
She had the crystal that had somehow tumbled out of the Scottish regalia when Alasdair had appeared. She didn’t know how everything was connected, but the fact remained that Alasdair had traveled through time once. That could only mean that he could do it again. Morgan resolved in that moment that she would figure out how.
The blue Micra came puttering around the corner with perfect timing, and Frances glanced at her watch. “My goodness, we were occupied for quite some time.”
“Yes, well, thanks for your help.” Morgan retrieved her bag from the foyer, exchanged a few more pleasantries, then hopped into the waiting car. Blake had come alone, and Morgan barely noticed that his shirt was uncharacteristically untucked.
“Can we hurry?” she asked as she got into the car. “Alasdair decided to walk.”
Only then did Morgan notice that Blake didn’t need much encouragement to put the pedal to the floor.
Morgan waved to Frances, then stared out the passenger window as though she were fascinated by the dusk falling over Lewis. She hoped that Blake wouldn’t notice she was upset.
Morgan knew that Alasdair would never be hers, no matter how much she loved him. Still she had to try to make him happy, simply because she did love him.
Which meant that she had to send him away.
Forever.
Auntie Gillian had always said that life had no interest in playing fair, but that one had to make the bets of it. Morgan bit her lip, blinked back her tears, and determined to make the best of this. She would do whatever she could to give Alasdair his one desire.
She would help him solve this, even if it meant spending the rest of her own life with an aching heart.
*
But Alasdair wasn’t at the bed-and-breakfast.
Morgan paced up and down the porch for a good two hours, purportedly watching the sun set, but he didn’t show. She finally concluded that this place was too resonant of the present for Alasdair to escape to the past here.
After all, there was a bed-and-breakfast built virtually on the site of his home.
She remembered how Alasdair had pointed to the standing stones, the first thing he had seen that was precisely as he recalled it.
With that recollection, Morgan knew exactly where to find him. He would have sought out familiarity – she knew it.
Morgan raced back inside, startling Justine and Blake from the whispers they were exchanging over their after-dinner coffees.
“I need the car!” It wasn’t much of a greeting, but it got their attention.
Blake frowned. ‘You’re sure you can handle driving on the wrong side and all that?”
“No,” Morgan conceded. “But it hardly matters. There’s not much traffic here. It’s a good place to practice.”
“Uh huh.” Blake clearly didn’t share her optimism.
“At night?” Justine demanded. “Where are you going?”
“To get Alasdair. I think I know where he’s gone.”
Blake and Justine exchanged a glance, then Blake got to his feet. “Look, I can take you there.”
Morgan’s tone was firm. “No. I need to go alone.”
She knew this as surely as she knew her own name. Justine and Blake understood her determination because they conceded the point immediately.
“All right. But let me show you a few things,” Blake said. Morgan turned to hurry to the car.
“And be careful!” Justine shouted after them.
*
All Morgan could think about was getting to Alasdair, so she felt that Blake was determined to teach her every nuance of the car’s operation. She was impatient with his thorough tutorial, resenting every passing moment, but she soon regretted that.
She particularly regretted not paying much attention to what Blake had said about using the manual choke.
Morgan did well enough on the paved road – and thankfully, divine intervention ensured that very few of the residents of Lewis were subjected to her habitual drift to the right side of the road.
She repeatedly corrected her course in the glare of oncoming headlights.
Fortunately, she didn’t have that far to go.
Soon, Morgan saw the standing stones rise ahead and sighed with relief. The Micra skipped along the gravel road littered with a jarring quantity of potholes.
Even worse, it was hard to anticipate them. Morgan was jostled and bounced in the driver’s seat. She ground the gears more than once. The little temperature gauge nudged upward as she kept her foot hard on the gas pedal.
The Micra bottomed out twice with a jolting grin, then lurched into a spectacularly deep hole. Morgan miscalculated whatever she should have done and stalled the car.
She couldn’t get it started again. The Micra was apparently not interested in enduring another round of torture. Morgan cranked the ignition over and over again, gave it a good shot of gas, and heard the engine choke to oblivion.
She had flooded it.
She supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised. She looked around herself, becoming aware for the first time how completely dark and silent it was here. Night had fallen with incredible speed, a night that was blacker on this island than anywhere else she had ever been.
But Alasdair was out there alone. He needed her help, whether he realized it or not. Morgan gathered up her bag, then turned on the headlights to give herself at least an idea of where the road went.
A dark shape lurched across the road. Morgan’s heart missed a beat and she flicked on the high beams.
Just to find a tall, golden highlander striding toward her.
Morgan collapsed against the seat in relief as Alasdair hauled open the door. He bent to duck his head inside, bracing his hands on either side of the door. Though he smiled, his gaze was somber and Morgan knew he hadn’t missed her moment of fright.
“You cannot be surprised to see me, my lady,” he mused, despite the opposing evidence before his very eyes. “Only this wee chariot could make such a riot of snorting and farting. They likely have heard you all the way to Edinburgh.”
Morgan took a deep breath. “I came to find you.”
“Aye,” Alasdair said, his voice low and silky. Morgan was painfully aware of how very close he was, and her desire for his touch hummed to life.
“I came to help you go home,” she said quickly hurrying over the words before she could think about them too much. “You came forward in time, so it only makes sense that you can go back. We just have to figure out how.” Morgan looked up to find Alasdair’s gaze intent. “You just have to tell me exactly how you did it before.”
“’Twas the witch as done it,” he acknowledged slowly. “And ’twould seem clear that you are indeed no sorceress.”
There was no censure in his tone and Morgan smiled tentatively. “No. Just an illustrator.”
Alasdair’s smile flashed in the darkness. “There is no ‘just’ about it, my lady. Your talent is rare in its power.”
Morgan was dismayed that she blushed so easily in his presence. “You don’t have to call me ‘my lady,’ you know. I’m just an ordinary person, not nobility or anything.”
“There is naught ordinary about you, Morgan Lafayette.” Alasdair said her name deliberately, as though schooling himself to address her correctly. “And never believe anyone who tells you otherwise.”
Before Morgan could absorb his words, Alasdair extended a hand to her. “Come, my lady. ’Tis time enough that you saw the standing stones that so intrigue you. The moon will rise full this night, and my gran oft said ’twas then that magic happened within the circle of stones.”
Morgan looked at his proffered hand, strong and broad, and knew there was nowhere else she would rather be than with Alasdair beneath the
stars.
Even if she was destined to lose him in the end.
*
The night sky was filled with a bewildering array of stars. Morgan was amazed that once she stepped out of the car, her eyes adjusted quickly to the darkness. There were no houses nearby and no lights other than the starlight.
Which was surprisingly bright. In fact, Morgan had never seen so many stars. Alasdair caught her elbow with a chuckle when she tripped because her gaze was so fixed on the heavens above.
His touch recalled her to what she had to do. “So, what happened? What is your last memory of your own time?”
Alasdair’s thumb began a slow caress of Morgan’s elbow and he frowned as he walked. “Robert the Bruce had granted us the task of winning Edinburgh keep from the English. ’Twas one of two they yet held, the other being Stirling. We heard tell of a way up the outside wall and climbed it, under cover of darkness.”
“I remember the guide talking about that!” Morgan declared excitedly. “But then, once you and I met, no one remembered it.”
Alasdair slanted a considering glance her way. “We had taken the guards by surprise and easily won the keep. We had been long at camp, and the English had ample stores of both food and whisky. We indulged ourselves, then explored the keep.”
“That’s why you were drunk.”
“Aye, fou as a puggie we were when we met the wee witch. She claimed we would interrupt the slumber of Morgaine le Fee, of whom we all had heard ample tales. It has long been said that her cavern lies beneath Edinburgh keep and that her pet dragon, a most ferocious beast, is doubly fearsome if awakened to defend his mistress.” Alasdair grimaced. “The witch dared us to meet her mistress unflinchingly.”
“And you took the dare,” Morgan guessed.
“Aye. In truth, I believed it to be whimsy. I feared she knew another way into the keep, or that she was one of the English aiming only to frighten us away.”
Time Travel Romances Boxed Set Page 62