Isobel saw adventure.
And - she hoped – the love of a lifetime.
* * *
About the same time, but in the dread place of rock and shadow that Isobel and her friend had just been discussing, Kendrew Mackintosh stood in the middle of Castle Nought’s cavernous great hall and stared at his sister, Marjory. Fondly known as Lady Norn for her striking Nordic beauty and Valkyrie-ish temperament, she lifted her chin, meeting his gaze with her wintriest smile. She also had the cheek to think that planting herself in front of the door would keep him from leaving the hall.
“You’ll no’ be stopping me from enjoying the night’s revels.” Kendrew folded his arms, incredulous as ever at her flashing-eyed boldness.
Then he grinned, unable to help himself.
“By Thor,” he boomed, “you should have been born a man. If you wielded a sword as sharp as your blazing eyes, no enemy would be safe.”
Marjory set her hands on her hips, her chilly mien not warming a whit. “You’ll be spared my wrath as soon as you read James Cameron’s missive.” Sending a pointed glance at the parchment scroll resting atop a nearby long table, she began tapping her foot. “It’s no great task. Break the seal and give him the courtesy of-”
“Odin’s balls, I will!” Kendrew glared at her, his grin faded. “Breaking thon seal and reading his foolery will only sour my mood. I already ken what he’s after. This new letter will hold the same twaddle as his previous ones and I’m having none of it.”
“He only wants a few stones for the memorial cairn.” Marjory bent another icy look right back at him. The little brown and white dog sitting beside her skirts eyed him with equal animosity.
Marjory glanced at her pet, and then back at Kendrew as if the teeny beast’s opinion supported hers. “Send James the rocks and” – she curved her lips in an annoyingly superior smile – “he’ll leave you be.”
“Aye, he will.” Kendrew swelled his chest. “But no’ because I do his bidding, I say you.”
Jaw set, he shot a glance at the hall’s high, narrow-slit windows, his irritation increasing to see that the twilight was already sliding into night. The sky still shone with the fine luminosity of highest summer, but the hour was advancing.
The celebrations at the dreagan stones would be well underway.
“You did agree to send stones.” Marjory proved she could be the most vexatious female he knew. “I heard you when we were at Castle Haven to discuss the cairn just a few months past. Everyone heard you.”
Kendrew cut the air with a hand, ignoring her argument.
“I’d rather send Blood Drinker arcing into James’ Cameron’s skull.” He grinned again, liking the notion.
Blood Drinker, his beloved, well-used and storied war ax, hadn’t quenched her thirst of late. Giving her finely-tooled blade a nice long drink of Cameron blood would do the weapon good.
“The bastard is a bane.” He relished the shock on his sister’s face. “He’ll no’ be getting a single Nought stone for his cairn. Every rock here, even the smallest pebble, belongs where it is.
“Cuiridh mi clach ‘ad charn.” Kendrew waited for her reaction. “Have you forgotten that those words mean so much more than ‘I will place a stone on your cairn?’ Has it slipped your mind” – he stepped closer, frowning down at her – “that the old wisdom has little to do with carrying a rock to a man’s final resting place and everything to do with vowing never to forget that man?”
When she flushed, Kendrew pounced. “Every stone on our land, be it on a cairn or in the bottom of a burn, recalls a long-past clansman. I’ll no’ disgrace their memories by seeing even a grain of Nought sand added to a memorial that glorifies our enemies.”
Satisfied that Marjory couldn’t argue, Kendrew folded his arms.
She recovered swiftly. “Word is Alasdair MacDonald sent enough stones to build a small house.” Straightening to her full height, she tossed back her bright, sun-gold hair and raised her chin, defiant. “He-”
Kendrew snorted. “MacDonald is a worse snake than Cameron. With his sister now married to James, the bastard had no choice than to send Blackshore rocks. I do have a choice and Cameron knows what it is.”
“He can’t. You’re ignoring his requests.”
“That’s my answer.”
“The memorial cairn is to mark the battle site,” Marjory persisted. Her dog stood, a cagey look entering his eyes as he started toward Kendrew. A wee creature she’d illogically named Hercules, the dog was clearly bent on performing a favorite irritating trick.
“Call him off, Norn.” Kendrew glared at the dog, his manly dignity keeping him from leaping out of Hercules’ leg-lifting range.
“Hercules, come here.” Marjory used her sweetest tone.
The dog barred his teeth and growled at Kendrew, but then trotted dutifully back to Marjory where he once again took his place beside her.
“He’s annoyed by your grumblings.” Marjory excused her pet. “And I’m disappointed by your stubbornness.” She took a breath, all cold, northern ice again. Kendrew could almost feel the chill winds swirling around him. “You’re deliberately undermining the peace in this glen. You know there’s to be a friendship ceremony at Castle Haven in two months. If you refuse to send stones, the cairn can’t be completed.”
“Could be I’m for forgetting that slaughter ever happened.” Kendrew grabbed his bearskin off the bench where he’d thrown it earlier and swirled it around his shoulders. “If I think about it, I just want to be there again. Only” – he strode right up to his sister, towering over her – “then I’d finish the fight, leaving no’ a miserable Cameron or MacDonald on the bloody field.”
“The king ordered peace.” Marjory didn’t back down.
Hercules growled again.
“Robert Stewart has his royal will.” Kendrew stepped around them both and threw open the hall door. “And I” – he glanced over his shoulder at her – “am off to Slag’s Mound to enjoy what peace is left to me.
“A pity you’ll no’ be coming along.” At the moment, he was secretly relieved.
In such a mood, she’d ruin the festivities.
“Hercules was ailing this morn.” She bent and scooped the wee dog into her arms, coddling him. “I’ll not be leaving him alone tonight.”
“As you wish.” Kendrew shrugged, certain Hercules looked triumphant.
He knew a trickster when he saw one.
He was a master scoundrel himself, after all.
Glad of it – and proud, truth be told – he pulled the hall door shut behind him and stepped out into the glistening, silver-shot night.
Marjory needn’t know he had other reasons for being so thrawn about the stones.
His stubbornness was Cameron’s own fault.
The last time he’d visited Castle Haven, he’d told James of seeing several armed strangers. Thick-bearded men in helms and mail, they’d lurked about on a ledge overlooking the waterfall behind the Cameron stronghold.
James claimed his lookouts would’ve spotted any trespassers. He did send men to the falls. No strangers were found. James’s tone upon reporting his guards’ findings implied that Kendrew had mistaken water spray for the glint of mailed coats.
Kendrew said no more.
But he hadn’t forgotten the slight.
Pushing his foe from his mind, he stepped deeper onto the broad landing.
Splendor greeted him, making his heart thud fast in his chest. Castle Nought’s thick, impregnable walls rose seamlessly from the cliffs at the northernmost end of the Glen of Many Legends. And here, in the stone-cut arch of the lofty gatehouse, the whole sweep of his territory could be admired. But he knew that many short-sighted fools didn’t appreciate the windy, steep-sided vista of rock and mist stretching beneath him. Those misguided souls thought of his home a dark and benighted place, full of cold and menace.
Kendrew knew better.
True men thrived in such wildness.
Soft living created weak men. Th
ose who cowered in gentler climes, weren’t worthy of their bollocks.
Knowing he was worthy of his and more, Kendrew reached for the heavy gold Thor’s hammer at his throat and kissed the well-loved amulet.
The gods did well settling him and those who’d gone before him as the guardians of this rugged, mist-drenched corner of the Highlands. Tonight he and his people – and a few lusty, well-made lasses drawn to the raucousness from the surrounding hills and moors - would honor those gods, thanking them for their bounty.
Already, the bonfires were lit in celebration, flames leaping high against the sides of the high peaks hemming Nought land. The fires threw a pulsing, golden cast across the windswept ridges and the narrow, rockfilled vale, the contrast with the glistening silver of the night sky almost too beautiful to behold.
But Kendrew did, fierce pride coursing in his veins.
He loved Nought.
And he waited all year for Midsummer Eve.
It was a night of magic.
A time when – he was sure – even the dreagans sleeping beneath their stony cairns, stirred and yearned for the days of yore.
Kendrew understood such longing.
And when he let his gaze sweep the great mounds of jumbled rocks so many glen folk still feared, he knew he’d sooner take his last breath than call any other place home. He closed his eyes and breathed deep, reveling in the heady smell of cold air and damp stone, the tantalizing trace of roasting meat and woodsmoke drifting on the wind.
Joy filled him.
It was time to forget any fools who didn’t appreciate Nought and let his own passions run free. Eager to be on his way, he bounded down the bluff’s narrow stone steps and made straight for the jumbled outcroppings dotting his land, the heart of the dreagan stones.
This Midsummer Eve would be like no other.
He felt it in his bones.
Chapter 2
Isobel’s daring held until the Rodan Stone loomed before her.
She stared at the monolith, its sudden appearance through the mist both startling and unsettlingly ominous. She hadn’t faltered once since leaving Cameron territory and although she’d imagined eyes watching her once or twice, the feeling had been fleeting. If anyone had seen her slip away, she’d have surely been followed. But she’d only heard the rustle of her own passage as she’d hurried through the thick pine forest she knew so well.
Now…
The succor of Haven’s woodsy-scented pines, rich, damp earth, and clean, cold-rushing streams lay far behind her. And Kendrew’s Nought was living up to its fierce reputation as a grim place choked by rock and battered by wind. Little more than a few tussocks of stunted heather and ghostly-looking birches grew here.
Worst of all…
She’d almost swear the Rodan Stone was glaring at her.
Set deep into the wild sweep of rock, scrub, and jagged peaks that defined Mackintosh country, the monolith seemed to warn that the fates weren’t kind to those who dared trespass beyond this point. The brooding heart of this bleak, mist-shrouded corner of the glen stood near. And anyone venturing onward should take heed.
Isobel did pause. But she refused to let the hoary monument sway her.
Even so, her insides went a little cold as she eyed the stone.
Tall, eerily manlike, and more than a little menacing, the standing stone would’ve speared heavenward if it didn’t lean at an odd angle. But the towering stone did tilt forward, giving credence to the tales that the monolith was actually a once-living man who’d been flash-frozen in the act of fleeing from the dreagans.
Rodan, the storytellers called that man. They claimed he’d been a long-ago Mackintosh warrior. One of the clan’s revered dreagan masters, until the hungry beasts rebelled at the instigation of his greatest rival, another master of dreagans who went by the name of Daire. That clan traitor - supposedly turned by greed - is said to have used darkest magic to spell the dreagans into attacking Rodan when he revealed that Daire was lightening Nought’s impressive stores of silver and gold, and even lining his purse with the sale of Mackintosh cattle and grain.
Daire’s nefarious deeds were paid in his blood.
Rodan was a clan hero.
And his stone had become a place of reverence for all Mackintoshes.
It also served as a boundary marker for dreagan stone territory, or so Isobel had always heard.
Just now, she was more concerned with what she felt. In keeping with the legends of Nought, thick mist rolled across the broken ground and the cold air held more than the sharp brittleness of a chill night. Something stirred in the swirling mist.
This time, she was certain.
She felt someone – something – staring at her as surely as the morrow.
And whatever it was, it was angry.
“Rodan…” Isobel whispered the stone’s name, hoping to placate the long-dead dreagan master if it was his ill will prickling her nape.
She looked about, studying the lichen-grown boulders and sheer cliffs. Mist wraiths slid past granite outcrops and through the scattered birches of a nearby wood. It was easy to imagine a tall, dark shape hovering there, frowning at her from the shelter of the trees.
Little fantasy was needed to see a thick-bearded spearman, his mail coat shining through the whirling mist – until the mist shifted, revealing the warrior had only been the silver-gleaming trunk of a birch. His shield, moments before blazing brighter than the sun, proved nothing more than the silvery flash of a rushing stream.
Isobel shivered, all the same.
She knew from her family history that ghosts existed.
Clan Cameron had their own Scandia, once known as the Doom of the Camerons until they’d learned the truth of her tragic demise. A gray lady, Scandia most often appeared when tragedy struck the family, but she wasn’t the cause of those disasters as the clan had always believed. She only sought to warn the clan of impending danger.
And perhaps – or so Isobel personally believed – Scandia simply wished to enjoy the ambiance of Castle Haven and the good cheer of men and women she’d once walked among and still viewed as her own.
Someone’s mortal passing didn’t mean the snuffing out of his soul.
Isobel was certain of that.
So she couldn’t ignore the possibility that Rodan lurked near his stone and might see her, a Cameron woman, as a threat to his people.
“Rodan…” She stood straighter, speaking louder this time. “I know you’re a clan hero.” She touched her amber necklace, taking strength in the gemstones’ smooth coolness. “I honor your bravery and-”
A whoosh of icy wind whipped past her, tearing at her cloak and then circling the stone before speeding off into the deeper shadows.
“Ack!” She brushed at her cloak and patted her hair, annoyed that the wind had loosened her braids. She’d taken care to twine blue silk ribbons through the strands and now one of the ribbons was coming undone.
“I mean no harm.” She lifted her chin, hoping her voice sounded more firm than it did to her.
She also curled her fingers around her ambers, waiting for the enchanted stones to spring to life, lending their protection as she’d been told to expect of them. Catriona had sworn the ambers quiver and heat whenever a threat loomed near.
The necklace was still.
Forcing herself to be brave, she went to the Rodan Stone and flattened her hand against the monolith’s icy, age-pitted surface. “I’ve made a pact, see you? An oath sworn on sacred white heather and with two friends to ensure this glen is never sundered again.
“I haven’t had much luck upholding my part of our plan.” She chose her words carefully, keeping her hand pressed to the stone so the gods who ruled Midsummer Eve would hear her. “I’m hoping this night’s magic will aid me. I mean no harm. I only want to see Kendrew.” It wasn’t the whole truth – she wanted his kisses, perhaps even more.
But she felt rather silly speaking to a stone.
“Once I see him, I’ll leave.” She ho
ped he’d see her and demand that she stay.
She’d accoutered herself to tempt him.
She wasn’t here as an enemy.
And if legends were true and the storied stone – or Rodan himself – was guarding the entry to the dreagan stones, she wished the monolith and its spirit would note how carefully she’d readied herself to come here. She’d brushed her hair so many strokes that the long raven tresses gleamed like blue-black satin. And she’d not just bathed, albeit quickly, but had smoothed her body with rich, scented oils. She’d chosen a low-cut gown of sheerest silk, its deep sapphire color dark enough for modesty, though the soft fall of its clinging folds left little to the imagination.
She meant to leave her cloak at the edge of the dreagan stones.
Then…
She shivered and closed her eyes, refusing the notion that some fierce power here might prevent her from continuing to the heart of Nought territory. She could hear the revelry. Joyous shouts and laughter filled the air, raucous singing, and the roar of bonfires. Pipes screamed and drums rolled, the familiar music blending with the more primordial beat of what could only be scores of spear ends knocking on the stony ground.
She took a deep breath, her own wildness awakening, roused by urges older than time.
The chill wind blasted her again, its urgency making her heart beat fast in her chest. She could almost feel a rush of emotion beneath the freezing gusts, a powerful force seeking to prove its fury.
She gripped the stone harder, the wind nearly knocking her off her feet.
“See here…” She delved deep inside her, summoning strength.
She’d come so far. And she wasn’t leaving just because Rodan and his stone apparently disliked her.
She meant to be triumphant.
But the cold wind mocked her, howling so that its scream blotted the din from the revels. For a moment, she imagined she again caught a movement in the birch wood, this time nearer to the edge of the trees. As before, it was the fleeting image of a tall, dark shape – the figure of a man – and with a furious glint in his eyes.
Temptation of a Highland Scoundrel: Highland Warriors Book 2 Page 3
