The Princess and the Laird

by C. A. Szarek

  The tiny window high above his head on the wall of his cell didn’t provide enough light that he didn’t have to strain his vision, but he struggled to read the words anyway.

  He scanned the short note three or four times, his eyes and his heart clinging to, ‘I love you’ written in her neat script.

  Without that, he would’ve gone mad months ago.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Alana frowned.

  Was that some kind of noise right outside her room?

  Before she could react, the door to her prison flew open and smashed into the wall with a loud bang. She shot to her feet from her seat on the giant bed.

  The petite figure that rushed inside held a full tray, complete with a steaming bowl, and was wearing the normal kitchen maid’s uniform of a brown hooded robe, but Alana’s evening meal had already been brought.

  The remnants of it were on a trencher by the door that’d just been—forced?—open.

  The maid appeared to scan the room, and her gaze landed on Alana. She tossed the food and didn’t pause as it hit the stone floor, splashing stew and mead everywhere. The small loaf of bread bounced before it bumped the hearth and stopped.

  She dashed to her, shoving off the hood, and Alana met a pair of wide leaf-green eyes. The lass was young and had fair hair, a blonde hue only slightly darker than Alana’s own. She was also a bit too short to be Fae—probably within an inch or two of Alana, who’d always been considered small.

  “What—”

  “I’m Claire. Let’s go.” She grabbed her arm and tugged.

  “Wait!” Alana shouted as the woman attempted to drag her across the tower room.

  Who’s Claire?

  “We don’t have time!” she yelled before Alana could voice her question.

  She told herself to go with it, because ‘Claire’ was obviously a part of her escape. Xander had said he’d get them out soon, but he hadn’t been specific.

  “I packed a bag. Been waiting for my cousin to make his move,” she said, then pulled free of the lass’ grip and snapped her fingers.

  Her purple day-dress poofed into lavender trews, a dark purple bodice and soft white leine beneath it. The fabric settled over her body and fastened itself where necessary. Her magic satchel found the appropriate place on her arm. The bag looked small, but the interior was spelled to hold an almost infinite amount of items.

  She wasn’t trying to be vain, but there were a few gowns she wanted to bring with her to the Human Realm. Since her father hadn’t kept her from her normal attire, she didn’t want to part with it, either.

  “Handy,” Claire whispered.

  She flashed a grin. “Now we can go. Where’s Xander?”

  “Dealing with your guard.” The lass thumbed over her shoulder, toward the rounded corridor.

  “Good. Where’s Alex?”

  “My husband—Duncan—is getting him.” Her fair brows drew together, as if she was worried, but Alana focused on what she’d said.

  “Husband?” She reared back. From what Alex had always told her of his brother, Duncan MacLeod was a bit of a scoundrel with the lasses and wasn’t likely to marry.

  Her son adored his uncle, and Duncan was always friendly to her, so she hadn’t given it more thought. Her visits to the Human Realm were always focused on Alex and Angus, so she’d not actually spent much time with his family, or other MacLeods.

  That was about to change.

  She’d finally be free to be with her love and her lad and the rest of their clan.

  “Aye.” Claire nodded. “Long story. We need to go.”

  Despite the familiar word, the lass’ inflection was off. She wasn’t Scottish. With the raised voices and excitement of finally getting away, it hadn’t dawned on Alana until then. Something about the woman was off… She had to remind herself that staring was rude.

  Xander’s large frame filled her prison’s doorway, snatching her attention from her new sister-by-marriage. He gestured. “Claire, cousin. Come.” His voice was more urgent with every word.

  He didn’t have to tell her twice.

  Alana was sick of being locked away.

  Her bodyguard kicked the door to the other room at the top of the tower open.

  Alana’s eyes darted to the oversized Fae man-at-arms slumped against the wall. He was one of the regular guards, but she’d never gotten his name. For months she’d missed Rannick; he’d not been assigned to keep watch on her in the tower.

  The guard’s neck was at an odd angle, but she didn’t think her cousin had killed him. He had a magical aura floating over him, so he’d likely been put to sleep with a spell. It wouldn’t last long, so they needed to move.

  Xander urged her to enter in front of him, and Claire stayed close, too. There was no one inside, but its level of grandeur mirrored the other room.

  Alana snapped her fingers said a spellword silently. The multicolored pane of glass in the window disappeared. Sunlight flowed into the now open space.

  “I gotta learn how to do that. What else can you do?” Claire stared.

  She opened her mouth to answer, but her cousin was faster.

  “We can discuss magic later. We must go.” He wrapped his arms around them and lifted to the air with two great pumps of his wings.

  “I’m going to put my arm around your waist,” she told the lass as Xander flew straight for the window.

  “Okay,” Claire said and Alana moved closer.

  She’d never heard the odd word before, but since her new sister-by-marriage had also nodded, she took it as an affirmative. Although, her unusual accent really jumped out.

  Her cousin muttered a spell that would increase his speed and make them invisible.

  Claire gasped and clutched at her as Xander abruptly changed direction.

  “Worry not,” Alana said in the vicinity of her ear. “He’s made us invisible. He won’t drop us, either.”

  Again, the lass nodded, and her body softened against Alana’s. “So, can you read minds?”

  The query shook, and her magic tingled with Claire’s nerves.

  “Nay, but I can speak mentally. Among other things.” She offered a slight smile. She didn’t know Duncan’s wife, but she wanted to make her feel better.

  “Alana has much magic,” her cousin murmured.

  “I can blink, as well, although my father had the tower spelled so I could not do so to leave.”

  “Blink?” Claire’s pretty green eyes went wide again.

  “Oh, blinking is a form of travel, I suppose. I think about where I’d like to be, then appear there. I can’t jump between realms, but I don’t have to due to the Faery Stones. It’s a rare trait, but my lad can as well.”

  “Angus?”

  Alana nodded and beamed. She couldn’t wait to see her son again. Hold him, and kiss him, although he was getting to old for that. He’d protested last time she’d done so. Not that she’d been over-bothered, and had told him so.

  “You’re not wrong about that, Claire,” Xander said. “That is a part of her magic as well. My cousin has empathic magic. Sometimes she projects what she feels.”

  “Geesh, stay out of my head.”

  Alana smirked.

  Her cousin didn’t answer, but he hovered over a clearing in the forest. He landed gently and released her and Duncan’s lass.

  She assumed they were waiting for Alex and his brother, but the long blue grasses were undisturbed. In her peripheral vision, she caught Claire and Xander scanning the area while they waited and she did the same.

  They waited.

  The passing moments made her heart skip and she didn’t like the look on her cousin’s face.

  Where were her husband and his brother?

  Had they failed to get free?

  Alex, my love, we wait for you. Please hurry. She pictured the clearing in her mind and tried to project it to him.

  Xander’s mouth was set in a hard line. He drew his sword. The swishing sound it made as it cleared shot up her nerves
.

  Alana forced a breath, than another.

  Claire was just as worried, and her emotions spiked, washing over her magic and making her stomach jump. The lass stood next to her, fists clenched to her sides, and her pretty face contorted with concern.

  They both needed to calm.

  Alana paced. Her forehead was bathed with sweat, but the same appeared to be happening to her companions.

  “Where’re Duncan and Alex?” Claire’s voice trembled.

  * * * *

  His twin growled as yet another key failed to open Alex’s cell.

  “Duncan, ye’ve ta hurry.” He grabbed the crystal bars with white knuckles, but released his hold before they could sting him. He couldn’t let nerves allow him an injury that might delay them when their time was already limited.

  “Yammerin’ like a lass dinna help, brother,” Duncan muttered.

  Alex managed a smirk. “Aye, I missed ye, too.”

  His brother glared up from the rattling ring of keys and met his gaze. “Ye think somethin’ ‘tis amusin’?” he snapped.

  “Laughin’ is better than despairin’.”

  “Just a moment ago, ye were orderin’ me ta free ye.”

  He sighed. “That dinna change. Get me outta here, will ye? They’ll know somethin’s wrong. Alana has been freed by her cousin—and a lass claimin’ to be yer wife? From the future, my wife says?”

  “Aye. My wife.” His twin grunted. “I wed, what of it? And how do ye know about yer wife?”

  Alex snapped his mouth shut when to keep it from hanging open. Duncan had married? He almost wanted to demand if his brother had been the victim of a changeling. “What do ye mean, ‘what of it?’ Ye? Wed?”

  “Are ye hard a’ hearin’? I already said aye. I’m goin’ ta strangle ye as soon as I free ye.”

  He laughed; couldn’t help it. “I’d rather ye no’. I’d like to see my wife and my lad again.”

  “I came fer ye, dinna I?”

  “Alana says they’re ta tha clearing. Brother, please hurry. Tha royal guard will be alerted tha magic on tha tower locks were tampered with. We’ve run outta time.”

  Duncan rattled the keys again. “They all look tha same!” His voice was little more than a frustrated growl. “I’ve lost track a’ which I tried. An’ how do ye know where they are?”

  “Alana can speak inta my mind. Limited by distance, a’ course.” He took a breath. “Duncan.”

  His twin met his gaze. “What?”

  “‘Tis magic. Ye must concentrate ta see past it. The key glows blue. Concentrate, little brother.” He’d seen it a dozen times when the guards had come to get him for his daily dose of torture.

  It’d gotten so they’d stopped asking questions and would just beat him, then have a healer come put him back together. Healing magic had fascinated him at first, would be handy to have at home, but with every broken bone and gash knitted, the angrier he got.

  The guards had never noticed how he watched when they thought he was unconscious each time they reopened his cell to allow the healer in.

  The woman had never said a word to him as she worked, but she had very kind eyes.

  His brother took a breath. When he looked back down at the giant ring of keys, Duncan stared. Waiting.

  Alex too, watched. Waiting for the blue glow.

  Finally the pale sky-like aura radiated in his twin’s grip.

  “I have it!”

  “‘Tis a trick ta it. I’ve watched tha guards. Ye must turn it ta tha right, then tha left, an’ rotate it completely. If ye fail in tha’ order, alarms will sound.”

  Duncan followed the instructions, and turned the key so slowly it felt like an eternity. Finally, finally, Alex heard the lock pop. His brother pulled the door open, flashing a grin.

  He was hauled into a tight embrace, and Alex hugged him back, slapping his shoulder. “Thank ye. Captivity was tiresome.”

  Duncan shook his head, snorting. “Took me six months ta find ye, I’m sorry, brother.” His blue eyes reflected regret, but then his gaze went keen, and he wore a frown.

  It wasn’t a mystery what he was looking at.

  They were no longer identical.

  Alex had lost too much weight and muscle, his frame was no longer one with his brother’s. His plaid was in irreparable scraps, and his leine was so packed with filth it was arguable if it’d ever been anything but black and grimy.

  His face was crowded with a thick beard, unlike Duncan’s clean-shaven cheeks. He didn’t feel weak, but he didn’t want to see distress in the eyes that matched his own, either. “Dinna look a’ me wit’ pity, Duncan MacLeod. I’m as braw as ever. Let us hie ta our wives.” He patted his arm and urged him out of the dungeon.

  They were almost out of the maze-like place when a shout went up from behind, the voice echoing in the cavernous corridor.

  “Halt!” The word was close enough to Scottish Gaelic to be recognizable.

  Duncan unsheathed his claymore and ordered Alex behind him.

  The rush of feet was too close, so he couldn’t argue. He had no weapon, so even if it grated, he’d have to let his brother protect him. He just hoped the problem was dispatched before they gained more attention; he was intimately familiar with the sheer number of Fae men-at-arms.

  When the guard came into view, Alex let loose a chuckle.

  He was as naked as a new bairn, and he didn’t have a weapon.

  Duncan yelled the MacLeod battle cry and rushed the guard.

  His pale blue eyes went wide as his brother knocked him over, and brought the hilt of his sword down on his head.

  The Fae man slumped to the stone floor, blood tricking down his forehead.

  “Ye dinna kill him.” Alex arched an eyebrow. After what the bloodthirsty lot had put him through over the past six months, he wouldn’t mind seeing every last one of his torturers dead and buried. Or burned. They’d done things to him he’d never speak of.

  “I canna kill an unarmed, naked man, even a Fae guard.”

  He smirked. “Marriage has made ye soft.”

  His brother frowned, then whipped the guard’s armor up and off his body, draping it over the unconscious Fae man. “Let us go ta our wives, as ye say.”

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Claire’s yell had Alana’s eyes locking onto what the lass had seen first. Two men—their men—had broken through the line of thick Acana trees.

  Her peripheral vision told her their movements were mirrored; Duncan pulled his wife into his arms at the same time Alex’s embrace encircled Alana.

  Then there was only her laird.

  She whimpered but kissed her husband back with all her might, caring not that his face was rough with a thick beard against hers, his clothes were soiled shadows of what they’d once been, and he needed a bath. She remembered how he always smelled of sandalwood and leather, and clung to him.

  “Alex, oh, Alex,” Alana chanted into his mouth as the hair there tickled her cheeks. She grinned when they parted and tugged on the black fuzz. “This needs to go, my love.”

  He flashed a fatigued smile and she frowned at how his leine and plaid hung from a much-too-lean frame.

  She couldn’t weep for what the king had ordered done to him yet—they were free from their prisons, but not from the Fae Realm. She didn’t protest when he pinned her to his side and glanced at his brother.

  The other couple was still kissing. Holding onto each other with passion and love that would’ve been obvious even without her empathic magic.

  “Weel, weel. My little brother chose a fine wife,” Alex said, and at least his amusement was genuine. His lopsided grin didn’t seem so tired.

  It had her smiling.

  The lass looked from Duncan to Alex and back, reddened and gasped. “Twins?”

  Alana’s smile slid to a grin. Claire’s confusion and wonder washed over her magic and made her arms tingle.

  “You never thought to mention your brother wasn’t only your brother, but your twin? Y
ou said he was older than you.”

  Her inflection was so obviously foreign Alana should’ve known she was not only not Scottish, but from a different century right away, but Claire had confessed such as they’d waited for their husbands. She was from what she’d called, America.

  Duncan slid his arm around her shoulders, but shrugged. “Alex is my older brother. We shared a womb, aye. He was born first.”

  When she rolled her eyes, Alana giggled.

  Alex and Duncan side-by-side made a striking pair. Even if her husband’s prowess was diminished—temporarily until they could get food and rest in him—the MacLeod twins were the handsomest men she’d ever seen, even though the Fae as a race were beautiful. No Fae man held a candle to Alex and his brother. She and Claire were lucky to have married them.

  “We must get to the Faery Stones,” Xander urged. “The longer we linger here, the more chance our magic will be discovered.”

  “I can take one person if I blink,” she said. Alana glanced up at her husband.

  “Go with tha princess, mò gradh.” Duncan cupped his wife’s cheeks.

  The lass’ panic was obvious as she blanched. “No. I want to stay with you.”

  “Alex an’ I will go wit’ Xander, join ye shortly.”

  “Blinking is fast and undetectable. You’ll be safe with me.” Alana kept her voice soft, reassuring, but her magic told her she hadn’t convinced her new sister-by-marriage.

  “I’ll see ye in moments, Claire-lass,” Duncan said.

  Alex tugged Alana to him and covered her mouth with his again.

  She kissed him back and held on tight as their tongues mingled. She told herself they weren’t saying goodbye, so she didn’t have to crush his now-leaner waist.

  He put his forehead to hers and squeezed her against him. “As my brother said, I shall see ye in moments, mò chridhe. Tha gaol agam ort.” His voice was a whisper for her ears only.

  The Gaelic words weren’t so different than Fae. She smiled. “I love you, too.” Alana took a breath and reluctantly stepped away from him. She caught her new sister’s green eyes. “Take my hand and hold on tight.”