Domnall (Immortal Highlander, Clan Mag Raith Book 1): A Scottish Time Travel Romance

by Hazel Hunter

  Domnall

  Immortal Highlander, Clan Mag Raith Book 1

  Hazel Hunter

  Contents

  HH ONLINE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Sneak Peek

  MORE BOOKS BY HH

  Glossary

  Pronunciation Guide

  Copyright

  HH ONLINE

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  Chapter One

  A drop of rain plopped on Jenna Cameron’s face, rousing her from a sleep so deep she felt muddled. She saw trees, sky, clouds. Huge trees. Dark sky. Gloomy clouds. As she regarded her surroundings shivers sprinted over her wet, chilled skin. Nothing looked familiar, and yet she felt a tremendous relief pouring through her. She had done something. She had reached something. Her thoughts felt remarkably peaceful, as if she hadn’t a care in the world now.

  She never wanted to move again.

  Wind came rushing through the trees, fluttering the leaves and creaking the branches. Pine and rain scented the damp air moving over her face. Everything around her felt soaked, from the wide, hard rough thing pressing against her back to the mound of things under her cheek.

  Not things, leaves.

  She felt her heartbeat speeding up as she tried to understand what was happening to her. All she knew was her name: Jenna Cameron. She didn’t know where she was, how she got here, or who had done this to her. She took in a quick breath and tried to recall anything else, but her mind felt wrong. A sharp, tight cord of pain began to twang slowly between her temples. Had she taken a blow to the head? She couldn’t remember.

  All she knew about herself was her name. How was that even possible?

  “’Twill be well, lass.”

  Those four words drew her gaze to the mountain of a man standing over her. Jenna wasn’t afraid of him. It simply confused her to discover him there. From his expression, as he crouched down in front of her, he seemed just as bewildered.

  Jenna liked his eyes. A beautiful shade of green, they tilted up at the corners, giving him a slightly feline look. Gold tipped his dark lashes, and caught the sunlight as it sifted through his long brown hair. He had very striking features, broad and bold and intensely masculine. Under his dark cloak he wore a rough, oddly-made shirt, wool trousers, and fur-topped boots.

  “Domnall mag Raith,” he said, his deep voice colored by a heavy accent she didn’t recognize.

  It took her a moment to understand that he was telling her his name. “I’m Jenna Cameron. Where am I?”

  “Scotland.”

  That wasn’t very specific, but at least it put a name to his accent. She eyed his heavy belt and the sheath that hung from it. He had his left hand curled loosely around the hilt of what had to be a sword. When he saw her staring, he let it go.

  “I’ll no’ harm you,” Domnall said, as he took off his cloak and covered her with it.

  Until he did that Jenna hadn’t realized she was naked. The warmth of his cloak felt so good she wanted to burrow under it and never come out.

  They went on looking at each other, in a cautious, startled way that made her think of two accident victims who had just climbed out of their wrecked cars. Was this his fault, or hers? Jenna had no idea.

  At last he asked, “How came you here?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Worry invaded her comfort and started issuing demands for information. How long had she been out here in the woods? Had Domnall brought her? Hit her over the head? Was that why she couldn’t remember anything? Why was she in Scotland, of all places?

  The wet, cold ground felt as uncomfortable as all those questions she couldn’t answer. She needed to get to her feet.

  Domnall saw what she meant to do and took gentle hold of her arms, helping her up. As they both stood Jenna saw just how much he towered over her. Her head barely reached the middle of his chest. She glanced down at her feet as he wrapped his cloak more securely around her. She wasn’t that short. He was simply huge: broad shoulders, big arms, long legs, and bulging muscles everywhere. His hands covered most of her upper arms. If he wanted to hurt her, she was a goner. Right now, she should get busy with screaming, crying or shouting for help.

  Why aren’t I afraid of him?

  “Jenna Cameron.” He said her name slowly, as if it belonged to a language he was trying out for the first time. “’Tis a Scottish name, but your voice.”

  “American.” She said it without thinking, and then smiled. “I’m from America.” There was something else, too, something important hovering just behind that. It made her head hurt to reach for it, but finally she dragged it out of her dark memory. “I’m an architect.”

  Phantom sensations came over her as the fact brought with it fragments of memory. Water lapping over the toes of dirty boots. A groaning, cracking rumble roaring overhead. Then terror, bright and piercing, running and falling, being struck over and over by huge, heavy blows. Agony, despair, and then in that terrible darkness, light from above. Cold, glaring white light, and snowflakes falling on her face…

  Jenna pressed one hand to her head, gasping as her headache swelled. Just as suddenly it vanished, and the terrifying memory bits went with it.

  “I’m in trouble,” she told Domnall. “I think someone tried to hurt me. Maybe kill me.” She clutched his cloak, trying to draw it tighter around her shivering body. “They must have left me here.”

  Jenna glanced around them, and that was when she saw the marks on the huge tree trunk just behind her. She turned around slowly, her stomach clenching as she took in the long row of marks that had been burned into the tree’s bark. She couldn’t read the primitive glyphs but they looked very familiar. They also made every muscle she owned tense, as if readying her for a fight.

  “Do you ken what they mean?” Domnall asked.

  “I’ve seen them before, but no.”

  She reached out to touch the marks, and at the last minute snatched back her fingers. That made his cloak slip from her shoulders and drop to the ground.

  “Be still, lass,” he said when she bent to retrieve it.

  Jenna felt his hand on her back, and then her eyes closed as pleasure spread from the stroke of his fingers along her spine. “What are you doing?”

  “You’ve skinwork here from your neck to your waist.” He traced the pattern f
or another few seconds before he picked up the cloak and wrapped her up again. “By the Gods. ’Tis the same.”

  “As the tree?” she asked as she turned around, but the big man shook his head.

  He hesitated before he pulled up his left sleeve, revealing his hard-muscled arm. A long tattoo of the glyphs in black ink ran from under the fabric to his elbow.

  “’Tis the same as my own.”

  Finding a naked, unconscious female in the very spot where he had awoken twelve centuries past gave Domnall mag Raith much to think on. Seeing she had been inked with the same glyphs as he bore on his arm added to the mystery. That Jenna Cameron could no more remember what had happened to her than he had upon his awakening suggested she’d also escaped the grove of stars. Yet she offered no more answers than he had when Galan Aedth had brought Domnall and his men out of darkness.

  ’Tis naught more to be done.

  Only the druids knew of the grove of stars and its ways. Domnall had to take the lass back to the settlement. Behind his back he signaled to the four other defenders watching them from their positions around the ash grove, and faint shuffling sounds answered him as his men retreated.

  To Jenna he said, “I must take you to our headman, Galan Aedth. He’s a powerful dru-wid, and may aid you in remembering.”

  “Okay.” She glanced down at her bare feet. “Did you see my shoes?”

  She’d come to the enchanted forest as naked as the Mag Raith had, and he doubted she could walk in his boots. Domnall didn’t want her pretty feet torn by the rough trek they’d have to make, so he scooped her up into his arms.

  Jenna made a surprised sound, and curled her hands around his neck. “You don’t have to carry me.”

  “Aye, but I think I must, lass.” He’d be hard-pressed to put her down again, too.

  As he carried her out of the grove Domnall thought of his cottage, hidden deep in the woods, and the wide, comfortable new bed he’d made himself last spring. The tribe’s goose tender had saved him enough feathers to line the straw ticking. He imagined her in it, wrapped in one of his blankets, waiting for him. Her slight weight and soft skin pleased him as much as the scent of her, like a rose blooming under the stars. It had been too long since he’d taken a lover, but the sweet, gentle tribeswomen who offered him and his men comfort in truth preferred their own kind.

  What would Jenna offer him?

  Naught. Why such a thought had come into his head, Domnall couldn’t fathom. She’s in need of help, ’tis all.

  Her fine skin and delicate features made him wonder if she might be a dru-widess. He’d never heard of magic folk dwelling in America. Where could such a strangely named place lay? In Britannia or Francia? He knew so little of Scotland beyond the Moss Dapple’s boundaries it might be a newly-named land within the old borders. The only thing that seemed familiar was her very dark hair, similar to that of the Cornovii tribes to the south—if they still flourished. Doubtless much had changed since the days when he and his men had freely roamed the highlands.

  He’d never seen such eyes. They looked blue in the sunlight and violet in the shadows. The color reminded him of the panay flowers that bloomed near springs and streams.

  “You should stop and rest if you get tired,” she said, her bright gaze shifting over his face with open curiosity.

  She spoke as if she were an ox and he a stripling. “I dinnae grow tired, lass.”

  Carrying her to the settlement required Domnall to skirt some traps he and his men had set for a wild boar that had grown troublesome of late. It also gave him some time to ponder how he would approach Galan. Since his great falling out with the headman, Domnall had kept his distance to avoid another skirmish. He’d never felt any particular liking for the dru-wid, but he and the other hunters owed Galan their lives. Serving the headman and his people as their defenders allowed them to repay the old debt as well as give them purpose.

  Some of the Moss Dapple’s bairns came running to stare at Domnall as he brought Jenna into the center of their settlement. Because they had isolated themselves from the rest of the world, the tribe lived simply but happily in their forest. It provided for all their needs, and they in turn nurtured it to sustain their tribe. Though none of the Mag Raith could remember how they had come here, Domnall and his men had been mostly content among the Moss Dapple.

  Yet the Mag Raith were not dru-wid kind, and never would they be.

  “Domnall,” Jenna said, drawing his attention from his thoughts. She sounded wary now. “Please put me down.”

  Carefully he placed her on her feet, and adjusted his cloak so that it better covered her bare body. When she had awoken in the forest, he’d averted his gaze from her nakedness. Before her pretty eyes had opened, however, he’d looked his fill. She had beautiful skin, as creamy as churn milk and as smooth and unmarked as a newborn’s. She possessed the flat belly and boyish hips of a young lass, but her full, high breasts assured him she’d left childhood behind her. He never imposed himself on any female, but keeping his hands from touching her had proven a surprising struggle. The possessiveness of her, to which he had no right, refused to leave him.

  Now that he’d held her and carried her Domnall regretted bringing her to the settlement. He might have hidden her in his forest cottage for a time. There he could have talked with her, and gleaned any memories she might have of the grove of stars. Jenna might even remember how she’d arrived there, and shed light on some of the darkness in his past.

  “Overseer,” a low, tight voice said.

  Domnall’s remorse doubled as Galan Aedth approached him and Jenna. Taller and broader than most dru-wids, the headman wore richly-worked green robes adorned with the tribe’s forest symbols. The sight of them stirred his anger, for his storm-gray eyes had darkened to match the flat blackness of his hair. His temper, of late uncertain, would surely burn high again if the severity of his expression was an indication. As Galan was the most powerful dru-wid among the Moss Dapple, that promised nothing good.

  “Headman,” Domnall replied. He inclined his head as a show of the respect he no longer felt for the man, and took a discreet step closer to the lass. “I found this lady in the ash grove. She’s called Jenna Cameron.”

  “Indeed.” Galan’s eyes narrowed as they shifted to the lass’s face for a moment, then he regarded Domnall. “Why dinnae you wear your armor, or carry your axe?”

  The dru-wid would have him sleep in his defender garb if he could.

  “The men and I went to set snares for that boar plaguing the gardeners.” To draw Galan’s attention from yet another contentious matter between them, he gestured behind the lass’s back, indicating the length of her skinwork. “Jenna’s marked as we were, and hasnae memory of her ordeal.”

  Galan’s upper lip curled. “Or so she’s told you. You’ve no reason to place your trust in this wench. Likely she was sent to distract you while her scheming masters plot to siege our lands.”

  A low laugh came from Jenna, who shook her head. “I’m sorry. Scheming masters? You can’t be serious.”

  “Dinnae speak to me, outsider.” Galan’s jaw tightened as he glared at Domnall. “Take her to the cider house and confine her there. I shall consult with the Gods as to what ’tis to be done.”

  Chapter Two

  As Jenna walked through the settlement with Domnall she saw sympathy in the eyes of every person she passed. She also noted how different they looked compared to Domnall. None seemed especially tall or muscular. Their narrow faces, gentle eyes and delicate builds made them seem almost fragile compared to the overseer. They certainly didn’t make her feel as unsettled as Domnall did.

  She also couldn’t understand why a bully like Galan had become their leader. To have such an angry man in charge of a peaceful village seemed like a terrible match, not to mention his bizarre talk of scheming masters and their plots.

  Past the outskirts of the village they took a trail that led to a wide, low wooden structure constructed of heavy logs with saddle-notched
corners. The cider house appeared well-maintained, and the sharply-peaked roof looked as if it had been newly-thatched. Looking at it brought a sense of seeing something incredibly old, like some rare artifact. Nothing about it invoked any memories of her home or the buildings in it. Neither had any of the tribe brought back a recollection of her own people.

  Only Domnall seemed familiar, although she couldn’t put her finger on why. Nothing about him prompted any associations at all. His clothing seemed strange to her, and the sword he carried almost bizarre, as if she’d never seen one, which seemed unlikely. She’d also swear she’d never seen him before in her life. Yet the inexplicable sense of knowing him wouldn’t leave her.

  “You don’t belong to this tribe, do you?” she asked, still studying the structure.

  “No. My men and I awoke here, as you did, in the ash grove. We were hunters before we came here.” He stopped and glanced back over his shoulder, shaking his head once before he regarded her. “I must leave you now.”

  He didn’t sound happy about that, Jenna thought, any more than she was. An aching hollow expanded in her chest. “Do you have to lock me up? I promise I won’t hurt anyone or run away.”

  “The Moss Dapple dinnae permit outsiders on their lands. You shouldnae be here.” At the door he turned a latching bar and eased it open. “I’ll speak to Galan again.”