by Donna Grant
“Never, beauty. Just remembering how you told me you were a Druid, and that I shouldna worry over you.”
“Well, I’m giving you permission to worry. I’m not exactly an experienced climber.”
“Good thing I am.”
She adjusted the backpack. “Of course you are. Is there anything you aren’t good at?”
“Relationships?”
Aisley liked how he could admit something so personal. “You phrased it as a question.”
“It is. I’m asking you.”
She elbowed him. “I think you’re doing pretty good for a guy who claims he’s not had a relationship before.”
“I’ve a good teacher.”
That made her grin falter. “Phelan, you shouldn’t take my word for everything. My relationships were disasters. I don’t even know if I understand what constitutes a real relationship.”
“You know,” he said as if his declaring it were true.
They walked in silence for several minutes, taking in the scenery. The closer to the mountains they got, the more dramatic the landscape. It was no wonder people flocked to Skye, she mused.
Aisley couldn’t help but wonder what her life would have been like had she grown up here.
“You have family somewhere on this isle,” Phelan said.
“How do you always know what I’m thinking?”
He winked and sidestepped a rock. “I know you.”
“And yes, I know I’ve family here.”
“Do you want to find them?”
“No. I remember when I was about five that I met an aunt and uncle who lived here, but I don’t remember their names.”
His hand reached out and quickly steadied her when her feet slipped on the damp grass. “I thought mortals kept in touch with their families.”
“Some do. Some don’t. My mother was an only child and didn’t know her relatives. My father was the second out of five. All his siblings but one moved away from Skye. I suppose everyone lost touch.”
Phelan stopped when they reached the crest of a small foothill to the mountains. “You know you have family. I doona think you should pass up getting to see them again, beauty.”
He didn’t try to hide the longing in his voice. Aisley reached for his hand. “If I could, I’d take you back in time and let you see your family.”
He gently squeezed her hand.
They started walking again, this time hand in hand. Aisley surreptitiously glanced at their hands. It seemed so natural and felt so right, that for a second she’d forgotten that the only other time she had held a guy’s hand was when she was still in school.
It was a simple gesture, but one that meant so much to her. Phelan had no idea that with every word, every move she was falling deeper and deeper in love with him.
When she was with him he gave her the courage to think what life could be if she sided with the MacLeods and stood against Jason.
Then she would recall she was a drough. The death she wanted was being pushed further and further away. Phelan was doing that to her. His kisses, his smiles.
But it was temporary, however much she might want it to be permanent. She needed to remember that. It was becoming more and more difficult though. Phelan had changed everything without even meaning to.
Never far from her thoughts was Jason. He would come for her. She knew it as she knew the sun would rise in the east. Jason killed with merely a thought.
What he had in store for her would be a hundred times worse. Not just because she had left him, but she was blood. He’d been suspicious of her long before the last battle.
How many times had he told her she was expendable? He had no qualms about killing her, regardless that she was family. How she hated him. That deep, true hatred that burned in her gut.
The weather suddenly shifted as the wind began to howl around them. Aisley was glad she had ahold of Phelan. He kept her anchored in more ways than one.
After an hour of walking against the wind, it halted as quickly as it had begun. None of it fazed Phelan. He kept walking, moving them closer and closer to the Cuillins.
Fifteen minutes later he stopped and reached into his pack for a bottle of water that he handed to her. Aisley eagerly accepted it while she sat on a boulder and he leaned against another.
The weather was cool, but she was sweating from her exertion. The layers of clothes Phelan had bought were definitely coming in handy. Nothing she’d had in her duffle would have sufficed.
“Each mountain in the black hills has a name,” Phelan said as his gaze fastened on them.
“What are they?”
“Am Bastier, which means ‘the Executioner.’”
“Oh, that makes me feel safe.”
He chuckled and took a drink of his water. “There’s Sgurr a Ghreadaich.”
“And that one translates to?”
“The Peak of Torment.”
Aisley’s brows lifted. “Wow. They keep getting better and better. Is that all?”
“Then there’s Ah Garbh-choire.”
She held up her hand when he started to talk. “Let me guess. It means ‘Doorway to Hell.’”
Phelan tossed back his head and laughed. “Nice try, beauty. It translates to ‘the Wild Cauldron.’”
“That’s so tame compared to the others.”
“Names can be deceiving,” he warned.
Aisley looked at the mountains. “You think we’ll find answers there to the selmyr. What if we find more?”
“That’s what I’m hoping for.”
“More isn’t always good.”
Phelan’s blue-gray eyes scanned the surrounding area. “Throughout my long years, I’ve learned there is verra little that ever turns out to be good.”
Aisley inwardly cringed. She was going to turn out to be one of those things. And that saddened her as nothing else had since losing her daughter.
* * *
It was almost time. He had taken form. It had been but for a moment, but it had happened.
Aisley.
She drew him. He’d felt her presence. It was his hatred that guided him to her time and again. It’s what would lead him to her once more.
He stretched out his mind, searching for her through time and space. There was someone else he wanted to look for, but her name kept slipping from his mind. When he found Aisley, she’d tell him all he wanted to know.
Where he was, time didn’t exist. He simply … was. With no form, he wasn’t sure how his magic stayed with him. Instead of questioning it, he gathered his magic close.
The words of a spell he’d learned … he wasn’t sure when he’d learned it. The words were just there. They fell through his mind like raindrops on a loch. His magic rippled through time until he found Aisley.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-NINE
Phelan wasn’t astonished to find Aisley could climb better than she’d said. They reached the first slope of the Cuillins an hour ago. The climb was steep and slippery in places. He stayed behind her in case she fell, but he let her choose the best path for her.
The Druids he’d felt in Portree were near. They were getting closer to them, he knew. Aisley’s apprehension of meeting them gave him an uneasy feeling—about all of it.
Phelan realized that giving Aisley the room she needed to trust him could well turn against him. What he had learned of her past were things she hadn’t shared with anyone else.
It was the rest of her past that concerned him. Like who she was running from. And who in her family had told her about being a Druid and magic as well as Warriors but hadn’t told her the story of Deirdre.
He braced a hand on Aisley’s hip when she reached a steep part of the mountain that required her to get a firm handhold to pull herself up. Only when she had gotten past the roughest section did he use the strength his god gave him and jump to stand beside her.
Her lips twisted. “I’m thinking I should just hop on your back and you do that all the way up the mountain.”
“
I can,” he said with a grin. “Then you’d miss some great views. And we could miss the Druids.”
“This is a long shot we’re taking. The Druids that bound the selmyr are probably long gone. You said yourself Druids are becoming scarcer and scarcer. Do you really believe the ones here will know what to do?”
He turned her to unzip her pack and take out the jacket he’d packed for her. After he zipped her pack back up, he pulled it off her and handed her the jacket. “You’re going to want to put this on.”
Aisley looked from him to the sky. Without a word she got it on and zipped it as the first drops of rain started. Phelan then handed her a fleece beanie.
“Thank you,” she murmured as she slid the beanie over her head, making sure it covered her ears.
“The rain is going to make the climbing that much more difficult.”
She shrugged. “I’ll be all right.”
“Aye, but I willna be worrying about you. There’s a place a few hundred yards up that will give us protection.”
Aisley’s flattened lips told him she hated being coddled, but he couldn’t help it. He wouldn’t chance her life just to get a little farther.
Not to mention the rain could last all day. He hadn’t mentioned spending the night on the mountain, but he had come prepared for it.
Phelan pointed her in the direction they needed to go. As if on cue, the rain quickly turned from a drizzle to a downpour. It could last as little as a few minutes or as long as an hour. The weather on Skye adhered to its own rules.
The slope evened out as they neared the hollowed part of the mountain. But it also grew narrow. Phelan was opening his mouth to tell Aisley to be careful when her foot slipped on a loose rock.
His instincts and quick reflexes grabbed her before she could go over the side. Phelan tightened his hold on her wrist before he pulled her up beside him.
Aisley was visibly shaken as she looked over the side to where she would have fallen had he not caught her. He couldn’t even think about it.
“Slowly,” he cautioned.
She nodded and started forward with one hand on the mountain. Phelan watched every move she made like a hawk. It was an eternity later that they reached the hollow.
As soon as they were inside he pushed her up against the wall and kissed her long and hard. It was meant to distract them both, but her answering moan turned his blood to molten lava.
He angled his head, deepening the kiss. His hands delved into her wet hair, feeling the coolness of it. Instantly it was like cold water doused on him.
Phelan ended the kiss and looked down at her. “Are you cold? You feel cold.”
“I am a little.”
“You need a fire,” he said and looked outside hoping to find something to burn.
There was a loud sigh behind him. “What I need is for you to calm down,” she shouted over the rain.
Phelan turned his head and glared. “You’re cold.”
“And so is your skin. It’s raining and the temperature dropped. I’ve been in colder weather than this, and I survived.”
He was handling the situation all wrong, but how could he explain to her the terror that gripped him? She was mortal. It took the smallest thing to end her life. He’d witnessed it through the centuries, and the idea of it happening to Aisley left him feeling as if the iron grip on his chest would never let up.
“Besides, there isn’t room for a fire,” Aisley said. “There’s barely enough room for both of us to sit.”
Phelan ran a hand down his face and shook the water from his hair. “Do you have the magic to heal yourself?”
The silence that followed made the fist around his chest tighten until he couldn’t breathe.
“No,” she replied in a soft whisper.
He turned to her. “You’re strong. You willna get sick.”
“I won’t get sick,” she repeated, a small smile tilting up the corners of her mouth.
Phelan dropped his pack to the ground and smoothed his hair away from his face. He couldn’t take his gaze off Aisley. She slowly set her pack down before she removed her jacket.
With her gaze locked with his, she held her hands out with her palms facing down. Her magic, warm, elegant, and provocative engulfed him.
Claws lengthened from his fingers that he buried in the granite of the mountain. If he went to Aisley, if he neared her he’d take her savagely, brutally. His hunger was that great.
Fire erupted between them. Phelan tore his gaze from hers to look at the red and orange flames. Heat instantly filled the small space.
“I might not be able to heal myself, but I can do other things.”
Phelan swallowed hard. “You really have no idea what your magic does to me, do you?”
“If you mean, can I see that your eyes are flashing from blue-gray to gold, yes, I can tell.”
“Does it frighten you?”
“Only if you don’t come here so I can kiss you.”
Phelan was in front of her the next second.
MacLeod Castle
Larena stood on the shore with her arms wrapped around her. The wind battered her while the waves rolled toward her, landing in foam upon the rocks at her feet.
For centuries she had been a part of this land. She’d given blood, sweat, tears, and her soul to protect it—to protect those within the castle walls.
The woman she was when she first met Fallon had been shaped by years of fighting droughs and the love of the one man in all the world who was meant to be hers.
Yet, she was changing. She could feel it inside. The things that used to matter—family, laughter, love—were things she had to work to remember.
She held out a hand and called up her goddess. Her skin shimmered as it turned iridescent and long, sharp claws extended from her fingers. She ran her tongue along her fangs.
Her goddess, Lelomai, called for death.
Larena struggled to take in each breath. Lelomai was taking control. Bit by bit Larena was losing the battle she’d won hundreds of years ago.
Lelomai’s call to let go was tempting. Larena was tired of fighting, tired of giving up everything for the safety of mortals who didn’t know she existed.
All she had to do was relinquish the last grip of her control. It would all be over quickly.
Hands, firm and strong, spun her around. She found herself looking into the dark green eyes of her husband. Fallon’s long, dark locks were dancing about his head in the wind, and the stricken look on his face told her he knew exactly what she’d been about to do.
“Doona go where I can no’ follow,” he begged.
She placed a hand over his heart after she tamped down her goddess. He’d had his own demons to fight when she first met him. She had helped him fight his addiction to alcohol, but she wasn’t sure he could help her. “It’s getting too hard to fight my goddess.”
“You’ve had control for five centuries, my love. The only way Lelomai gets to rule you is if you let her.”
“If I let go, all of this craziness inside me will cease.”
“If you let go, I’ll lose you.”
Anguish, sharp and true, rang clear in his deep green eyes. She had loved this man through centuries. How could she think of giving up on that? They had shared laughter, heartache, battles, long nights of steamy lovemaking, and a bond that couldn’t be reversed.
Larena closed her eyes and gave a vicious shake of her head to clear it. When she looked at Fallon again, whatever had taken hold of her was gone.
“I’m fading,” she told him. “I can feel it. One day you’ll come to me and I won’t know who you are.”
He pulled her into his arms and held her tightly. “We’ll always know each other, Larena. Our love is solid and formidable. Evil isna strong enough or brave enough to try and touch us.”
“It’s not safe for me to walk freely in the castle. You need to lock me in the dungeon.”
“Never.”
She lifted her head and traced his lips with her finger.
“Always so stubborn.”
“I’m protecting you.”
“Then let the Druids spell me into a deep sleep.”
He shook his head. “Nay. I wouldna be able to reach you then. You must stay with me. You have to fight this. I’ll be here. You know I’ll help you, but you have to do this, Larena.”
He didn’t finish. But there wasn’t a need. She knew if she didn’t fight she was already lost to him.
She looked out across the turbulent sea. Engaging whatever was inside her was going to be the most difficult battle of her life. How could she refuse Fallon, though? She couldn’t. It seemed a daunting trial before her, but with Fallon beside her, she could get through anything.
Larena faced her husband and smiled. “Then let’s fight this thing.”
Relief flooded his eyes. He held out his hand, and together, they jumped to the top of the cliffs to walk back to the castle.
CHAPTER
THIRTY
It was after lunch before the rain stopped. Kissing Aisley had been a mistake. It took everything Phelan had not to make love to her right then and there.
He settled for heated kisses and having her straddle his lap as he sat on the ground. She drew his attention away from everything, which he couldn’t allow right then.
Phelan sensed not just the mies but something else as well. Danger was in the air. It crackled around him, putting him on instant alert. Whether the danger was for him or Aisley, he wasn’t sure yet.
And until he was, he didn’t want Aisley to know anything.
He looked out over the land. The sun was already breaking through the dense clouds, shining beacons of light over the rugged terrain of Skye. The rain coating the mountains sparkled like diamonds in the sunlight. It didn’t seem to matter what weather was on Skye, the place was truly enchanted.
“That was good,” Aisley said as she swallowed the last bite of her sandwich and reached for her water.
Phelan swiveled his head to her. “I think we should wait for the sun to dry the rocks before we proceed.”
“We could be here for an eternity. Do you think I didn’t grow up with the damp Scottish weather and don’t know how to keep my footing?”
