A Scot's Pledge (The MacLomain Series: End of an Era, #1)

by Purington, Sky

  “Och, nay, this was not against your will, lad.” Grant looked from Julie to Aidan. “This was with aid from Julie’s inner Guardian Witch, trying to bridge the gap betwixt you and your Broun.”

  “Chloe, then?” Julie said.

  “Aye, I would say so.” Grant grinned at Aidan. “I’ve seen her in my travels, you know. She’s a verra fetching lass.”

  Aidan crossed his arms over his chest as though fending off a possible romance but nodded graciously because he would always put duty to clan and country first.

  “You’ll see,” Grant assured. “She’ll likely keep you on your toes, too. Which will eventually appeal to the strict moral boundaries you’ve created for your heart and soul.”

  “I didnae do that.” Aidan cocked his head, perplexed. “And if I did, why would such a lass appeal to me?”

  “’Tis always exciting to be freed of your boundaries, lad,” Grant scoffed before he waved it away and focused on more pressing matters. He looked at Julie and Tiernan. “Tell me, when you traveled back to the era when these stones were resurrected and witnessed the Guardian Witch ceremony, would you say that the sun setting on the solstice was the initial source of power? That which led to the creation of the ring?”

  “Undoubtedly,” they confirmed at the same time.

  “Aye, then,” Grant replied. “’Tis important that.”

  “Why?”

  “Because ‘tis a doorway directly linked to your magic, Julie,” he revealed. “One that can be opened and closed by you.” He looked to where Tiernan’s tattoo was located, clearly aware it was there. “And mayhap he who you protect.” He gave them a telling look. “I believe you have the power to seal the enemy’s magic out of at least these stones. This Stonehenge.” His gaze flickered over where they had been lying on the grass before his amused eyes returned to them. “In fact, I’d hazard to say you’ve already started the process.”

  Julie’s mouth fell open then snapped shut before she spoke into Tiernan’s mind. “Please tell me he’s not referring to us having sex.”

  “Aye, ‘twas the intimacy.” Grant grinned, catching their internal conversation. “And ‘tis bloody good I caught that thought.” He looked between the men. “That means that though ‘tis only a wee bit right now, MacLomain magic is starting to stabilize.”

  “I think mine is beginning to return,” Tiernan informed. “’Tis not one hundred percent but far better.” He looked at her ring. “Not to mention the stone is starting to shine.”

  “A stone that originally came from this verra Stonehenge.” Grant nodded, pleased. “I must be off to confer with Adlin about this.” His gaze went from the ring to Tiernan’s tattoo then he looked to the sky though he could not see the ley-lines. “Keep an eye to the things that guide your way.”

  “Wait,” Tiernan said before Grant could whisk away. “What were you going to say about the solstice? How are Julie and I supposed to close the gateway? When we do, will it end whatever’s affecting everyone’s magic? Mayhap cripple the Disinherited?”

  “Och, nay, if only it were that simple.” Grant sighed. “From what I’m sensing, ‘twill simply seal this particular Stonehenge, which in turn will help you against the threat rising up.” He looked between the three of them with a grave expression. “Make no mistake, this is but the beginning of us defeating monsters that have been around as long as Guardian Witches if not longer.”

  “Who are they?” Tiernan asked.

  “I havenae figured that out yet,” Grant replied. “But Julie is right about them being called the Disinherited. Because whatever injustice they felt they suffered aligns with the noblemen determined to own Scotland one way or another.” When he shook his head, his body caught on the wind for a moment before it straightened again. “Whoever they are, they siphoned the magic of the Guardian Witches’ power in this place, then morphed and twisted it with their own magic. That is why they can use the ley-lines.”

  He looked into the distance as though seeing another Stonehenge though it was halfway across Scotland. “Their magic is attached to all the Stonehenges I mentioned and in turn, not just Julie, but he who she protects. A MacLomain. Then through him, his kin.” He looked southwest as though gazing across the Atlantic itself. “Through them, the Brouns and their Stonehenge.”

  “My God,” Julie exclaimed. “My friends are really vulnerable then.” She shook her head. “I’ve got to find a way back, seeing how the ley-lines don’t seem to be getting me there.”

  “They may not be getting you there in an obvious way,” Grant replied. “But understand this, lass. Dark magic might have taken advantage of Guardian Witch magic, but it works in reverse too. In a way, especially as you grow stronger, your magic protecting the MacLomains protects their true loves as well.” He gave her a compassionate look. “I know this is difficult for you to grasp and frustrating because you cannae control it yet, or even ever entirely, but ‘tis magic not necessarily meant to be completely controlled. Not by your mind anyway.”

  “Then, by what?”

  “Your heart,” he said softly, looking between them. “Don’t you see? The more you accept what you feel is yours and always has been, the more love you provide your magic. That, in turn, will start a chain that follows your magic and ley-lines. Then it will help spark that very love in others.” His knowing gaze drifted to Aidan. “Dormant love just waiting to connect with its other half.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “I GUESS IT’S a good thing I love you.” She grinned at Tiernan. “Or all this might’ve gone to hell.”

  “It still might,” Aidan reminded. “If we dinnae get back to the wee king.”

  “Very true.” She shook her head. “Grant might have shared all sorts of new things, yet I feel like he left us with more questions than answers.”

  “Aye.” Tiernan sighed. “Like da, that tends to be his way. Especially when he’s unraveling a mystical puzzle.”

  Grant had poofed away a few minutes ago, his departing words only that they best be off in the direction meant for them.

  “Why didn’t he just say back to David?”

  “Because he’s taken on Adlin’s cryptic tendencies,” Aidan muttered, studying the stone he had appeared in front of.

  “Or mayhap he's quite literal.” Tiernan looked to the ley-lines he could evidently see again no doubt because they’d been intimate. “’Tis your magic we must follow, lass.” He shrugged a shoulder. “Mayhap ‘tis not supposed to bring us back to the king quite yet.”

  “Our magic,” she corrected then considered the lines too. “How am I supposed to sense where to go if I have no idea where that might be other than back to David?”

  “I think if you keep in mind that you need to protect the king,” he replied, “then it will take us where we are supposed to go. ‘Twill show us the next leg of our journey. One that will ultimately keep him safe.”

  “Sounds reasonable.” She sighed and mulled over her surroundings. “And exactly how do I do that again?”

  Tiernan pulled her into his arms. “For starters, your magic seems at its best when we’re close.” He tilted her chin up and brushed his lips across hers. “When you’re not giving things too much thought but giving yourself over to something else.”

  “Something else?” she mused. “Don’t you mean someone else?”

  “Aye,” he murmured. “Me.”

  He kissed her again, this time more passionately, and proved he was right.

  Bright light flashed, and they found themselves...right where they had started.

  “’Tis daytime now,” Aidan said, pointing out the obvious, clearly glad to be along. “Yet, we didnae travel.”

  “Not from our location,” Tiernan agreed. “But mayhap to a different era.”

  “The stones look the same,” she pointed out. “So it wasn’t way back in time again, at least.”

  “Nay.” Aidan’s gaze narrowed on the horizon. “So, what’s next?”

  “I have no idea.” She frowned
and looked around. Her ring wasn’t shining, so no help there. Then she remembered what Grant had said and looked at Tiernan’s shoulder. Evidently of the same mind, he was already pulling up his sleeve.

  “Whoa,” she whispered when he revealed it. “Do you see that?”

  “Aye,” he said. “’Tis a bluish-green line running from the center to the outer edge.”

  “A ley-line,” she whispered. “It’s not pointing at one of the four stones in the tattoo but sort of in between.”

  Aidan joined them and peered at it before he looked in the direction the line was pointing. “Mayhap ‘tis telling you where we need to go next.”

  They looked at him, surprised.

  “You can see it too?” Julie asked.

  “Aye,” Aidan replied.

  She looked up. “What about lines in the sky?”

  He shook his head. “Nay.”

  “Interesting.” She met Tiernan’s eyes. “What do you make of that?”

  “I dinnae know, but I’d say Aidan seeing the line on my tattoo is a step in the right direction.” He eyed the line then looked where it led. “You’re right about it pointing out which way we should go, Aidan. I’m sure of it.”

  She perked her brows at Tiernan. “So essentially your tat’s a magical compass?”

  “I’d say so.” He kept looking in that direction. “We willnae know for sure though until we head that way and see if it leads us where we’re meant to go.”

  “Very true.”

  So they headed in that direction only for everything to transform the moment they stepped beyond the stones.

  “What the...” She spun only to find the Stonehenge vanished and the landscape entirely different. “What happened? Where are we?”

  Tiernan’s gaze swept over their surroundings before he looked at Aidan. “We’re near the east coast now, aye? It looks like an area north of East Lothian.”

  “Aye, ‘tis,” Aidan confirmed. “We’ve been shifted clear across Scotland.” His gaze turned west. “And we’re not alone.”

  “Och,” Tiernan muttered, pulling her after him. “Those are Sassenach soldiers. We need to find woodland and hide until we know what’s going on.”

  Thankfully, the forest wasn’t too far off, and they made it undetected.

  “There are caves in this direction.” Tiernan led them deeper into the forest. Late day sun cut through the trees, and a blustery wind blew. “’Twill keep us out of sight until we figure out our next move.”

  “What time period do you think this is?” she asked. “Yours, maybe?”

  “’Tis impossible to know,” Tiernan said. “Though ‘twas spring there and ‘tis clearly summer here.”

  He was right. The season had changed. But that didn’t mean the year had.

  “In here.” He led them into a small cave behind a thick wall of shrubbery. “We’ll give it a wee bit o’ time, then I’ll scout.”

  “Nay, I’ll scout,” Aidan said. “’Tis best you stay with Julie and protect her.”

  She looked at Tiernan’s shoulder. “Is the line still on your tat?”

  When he lifted his sleeve, it was gone.

  “It’ll be back,” she murmured, convinced of it as she ran her fingers around the circle. “I just know it.”

  He nodded in agreement, clearly sensing the same.

  Aidan ended up waiting an hour to confirm they hadn’t been followed before he left, and Tiernan felt it safe enough to start a fire. It might be summer, but the wind was chilly and the cave even chillier.

  Once the fire was crackling, he sat on a rock and plunked her down on his lap. It seemed English soldiers had swiftly become the last thing on his mind, which suited her just fine.

  She grinned. “I can just as easily sit on my own rock.”

  “I am your rock.” He fingered a curl affectionately and met her eyes. “Do you know how many times I envisioned pulling you onto my lap? Talking to you this way rather than you sitting elsewhere?”

  “No,” she murmured.

  He slowly wrapped the curl around his finger. “And you cannae imagine how many times I wanted to play with these curls, and run my fingers through them.”

  “Not always the easiest thing to do with my hair.” She traced the tip of her finger along his strong jaw. “And I wanted to do this.” She touched the corner of his mouth. “Sometimes, I wanted to pretend you had food on the corner of your mouth so I could touch here.”

  “I wish you had,” he murmured and kissed her finger. “I wish we had just done the things we wanted to do.”

  “But we couldn’t,” she whispered. “Not then.”

  “Nay, not then, but we can now.” He traced his fingers over her shoulder blade and brushed back her unruly curls. “I wanted to do this when we sat beneath the old oak, not just so I could touch your hair but feel the warmth of your skin through your shirt. So I could see the way the sun speckled your neck on a warm summer day.”

  She tugged gently at his shirt. “And God knows, I wanted you to finally take your damn shirt off on a warm summer day.”

  He grinned and pulled it off now. In turn, she lowered the corner of her dress, giving him full access to her shoulder.

  “Och, if I’d seen this then,” he kissed it softly, “I would have wanted to do that.”

  Just the feel of his warm lips brushing her skin made her breath catch and her nerve endings come alive. “If you’d done that, I would have wanted to do this.” She cupped his cheek. “Touching you like this while looking into your eyes.” It was hard to find her voice as emotions bubbled up, so she whispered, “I always loved your eyes. Especially when they looked my way.”

  “And they always did,” he murmured, reminding her of how his magic first sparked. “From the verra beginning.”

  As she gazed into his eyes, remembering all the times, all the ages, that moment came rushing back. When his magic first flared.

  “I saw it then,” she whispered, startled, her magic evidently unlocking a memory. “For just a flicker of a moment.”

  “What, lass?”

  “This.” She brushed her fingers over his tattoo. “For a split second, it was there before your magic flared...or maybe it was within your magic.” She shook her head. “How could I have forgotten I saw that shape? It almost seemed forged within your very magic...part of it somehow.”

  “Because this represents the stones at the root of your magic,” he said softly, referring to the tattoo. “And I am the one you are meant to protect.” He touched her Claddagh ring. “As I am meant to protect you.”

  Before she could respond, his lips were on hers, and she was more than ready. They had a lot of lost time to make up for. Especially him considering he had lived far more life since they met.

  He dug his fingers into her hair as the kiss deepened.

  “Yet another thing I wanted to do,” he murmured into her mind. “As you can imagine, I was often in a verra difficult state by the time I left you.”

  “I wasn’t much better off.” She rubbed herself back and forth along his erection, so turned on it hurt. “I used to imagine what it would’ve been like if you showed up in the shower...or maybe when I was doing something naughty to myself.”

  He growled into her mouth and hoisted her until she straddled him.

  “What are you doing,” she half gasped, half groaned. “Aidan could return at any second...or an English soldier could show up!”

  “I will know if anyone's close.” He adjusted her clothing until the throbbing flesh between her thighs was against him, yet her skirt covered everything else.

  “But is your magic a sure thing right now?” she murmured, her voice raspy with desire, her concern over being caught by his cousin or discovered by the enemy fading fast.

  “Aye, my magic is sure enough.” He freed himself and grabbed her ass over her skirt, steering her where he wanted her. “If not, I’ll hear them coming.”

  “They might be light on their feet,” was all she got out before he drove
himself deep inside.

  “I cannae tell ye how many times I wanted to do that, lass,” he groaned, his brogue as thick as the masterpiece between his legs.

  “Tell me more,” she half whispered, half whimpered, liking where this was going in more ways than one. “Tell me what you wanted to do to me.”

  “We would have been sitting on that old swing hanging from the oak in front of the colonial in New Hampshire,” he said, not moving, driving her crazy with anticipation.

  “That would’ve been a trick,” she managed. Taking the initiative, she rolled her hips, enjoying the way his muscles tensed, and his pupils flared with pent up desire.

  “I have excellent balance.” He wrapped his hand in her hair again and held tight to her ass with the other. “And strength that would have kept ye right where I wanted ye.” He steered her up his shaft so slowly she about came undone. “Ye would have enjoyed the ride from the verra start.”

  “I bet I would’ve,” she began only to release a strangled cry when he pulled her back down sharply. Sparks of near painful pleasure raced from her womb to every last corner of her body.

  “Hell,” she gasped, gripping his shoulders when he did it again, and again, over and over. Sometimes torturously slow, other times fast, and hard.

  Thankfully, she felt his magic ignite around them so they wouldn’t be heard because he definitely made her scream. Something she’d never had a problem with before but couldn’t stop now. Not when every move he made, everywhere he touched, made her moan or wail with pleasure.

  By the time things got really hot and heavy, she might have even been sobbing it felt so good. When he grabbed her backside with both hands, and she wrapped her arms around him, holding on for dear life, they soared toward a pinnacle that blew her mind when it hit.

  He released a strangled groan of pleasure as he thrust deep one last time, held her in place, and exploded inside her. Both trembled, breathing heavily as he held her that way for a time. Eventually, he wrapped his arms around her and held her as tightly as she held him. She could stay in this moment forever it felt so perfect. So meant to be.

  Unfortunately, as it turned out, forever would have to wait.