The Ravenscraig Legacy Collection: A World of Magical Highland Romance

by Allie Mackay

  As if he guessed, Tavish glanced into the festive hall, then back at him. “You truly mean to leave us? Nothing will change your mind?”

  “My decision was made when I found that parchment.” He still felt how his blood had chilled, the shock hitting him like a kick to the gut. “It was no empty threat, but penned with true venom.”

  “Then I shall go with you.” Tavish clapped a hand on his shoulder, looking quite taken by the notion. “I wouldn’t mind seeing those flying machines and tour buses.”

  “Nae, you must stay here to laird in my place.” Aidan reached up to press his friend’s hand. “The clan will follow you well. Our friends and allies respect you. Equally important, our foes know not to cross you.”

  “There are others. Good and worthy men-”

  “It will ease my mind to know Wrath is in your hands. Yours and no one else’s.” Aidan paused, needing to swallow. His damnable throat was closing again. “I’ll have your word, Tavish. Only so can I go in peace.”

  Tavish scowled and turned away. When he swung back around, he grabbed Aidan by the arms, dragging him into a swift, crushing embrace. “Sakes, but I shall miss you!”

  “Ach, chances are we’ll be rejoining you in the hall, back before the sweet courses are served.” Aidan almost wished that would be the way of it. “We cannae be sure anything will happen. It is a chance, nothing else.”

  “Nae, it is more. You will be sent forward to Kira’s time.” Tavish pressed a hand to his heart. “I feel it here.”

  “We shall see,” Aidan said, trying to make light of the possibility.

  In truth, he felt it, too.

  Almost as if the air around him was already shifting and the cold afternoon mist beginning to drift across the bailey was lying in wait, silent and watching. Anticipating just the right moment to thicken, swirl, and speed him away.

  A chill tripping down his spine, he grabbed his friend’s shoulders, pulling him close one last time. “I must see to Kira,” he said, releasing him. “I’ve returned her old clothes and she may need help hiding them beneath proper raiments for the feast.”

  Tavish nodded. “How long will you remain with us? Before you go?”

  “Not long.” Aidan glanced back into the hall. It was more crowded now, and louder, some of his men already carousing. “Perhaps you can help by making sure the ale flows a bit faster than usual?”

  Again Tavish nodded. “As you will.”

  “So be it, my friend.” Aidan turned away, suddenly needing to be gone. “Live well.”

  But before he’d gone three paces, Tavish halted him with a hand to his arm.

  “There might be one unexpected difficulty.” Tavish glanced about, lowering his voice despite the cacophony that surged around them. He looked pained. “Something neither us reckoned would happen.”

  Aidan waited. Something told him he wasn’t going to like whatever his friend had to say.

  “Well?” He looked at him. “What is it?”

  “Not it, her.”

  “Kee-rah?”

  “Nae.” Tavish shook his head. “The MacLeod widow. She-”

  “Fenella MacLeod?” Aidan’s brows lifted. He hadn’t heard word of the she-devil since he’d spurned her attentions some long while ago. “What of her?”

  “She is here and will surely expect a welcome at the feast.”

  “How can she be here?” Aidan rubbed the back of his neck, the thought of the predatory widow making his flesh crawl. “The MacLeod holding is on the other side of Skye. I didn’t send her word about tonight’s celebrations.”

  “Be that as it may, she is here.” Tavish looked miserable. “She’s down on the landing beach with one of her galleys. She sent a messenger a short while ago. The man claimed her ship has sprung a leak. I was coming to tell you when I saw you standing here, looking into the hall.”

  Aidan snorted. “MacLeod galleys ne’er spring leaks. Their fleet is almost as well-kept as our own.”

  “My thoughts exactly,” Tavish agreed. “The woman is curious, and perhaps envious. She’s heard of Kira and wants to see her.”

  “Ah, well.” Aidan considered. “There we have your first duty as Wrath’s new laird.”

  Tavish blinked. “My first duty?”

  Aidan nodded.

  “You must keep the MacLeod woman occupied tonight. By fair means or foul.”

  ***

  Hours later, Kira sat beside Aidan at the high table in Wrath’s crowded great hall, worrying about what might or might not happen when they finally managed to sneak away from the feast and out into the bailey. Beyond that, only a few other things really concerned her.

  How wonderful it was to finally have good-fitting, comfortable shoes on her feet again.

  That the panties she’d missed so much now felt constricting. And that wearing her medieval garb over her regular clothes made her look fat.

  She also decided that if the big-breasted, raven-haired siren sitting with Tavish at the other end of the table didn’t stop sending slow, knowing smiles Aidan’s way, she and Aidan would be leaving well before he intended.

  A departure she’d truly regret because if everything went as planned, she’d likely never again have the chance to experience this kind of medieval pageantry.

  Not for real, anyway.

  She knew without having ever attended one, that a twenty-first century medieval banquet dinner theatre couldn’t hold a candle to Aidan’s feast. No matter how flashy and fancy, how expensive, or how many supposedly hunky male models they engaged to play at being knights.

  “Aidan.” The siren’s low, husky voice slid around the name like a caress. “You didn’t tell us your good news,” she purred, leaning forward just enough to display the generous swell of her breasts. “How proud you must be, an heir for Wrath at last.”

  Kira’s face flamed.

  Aidan, man that he was, fell for the ploy.

  He blinked, his gaze flitting to Kira, then back at the woman. “Heir?”

  The woman’s gaze dipped pointedly to the bulge at Kira’s middle. She said nothing, her red lips simply curving in another slow, intimate smile.

  A nasty, catty smile that lasted only until Maili materialized beside her, a huge tray of stewed oysters and cooked herring balanced on one hand - a hand that flicked just enough to the side to send the tray’s wet, steaming delicacies spilling into the beauty’s lap.

  “Ohhh!” The woman leapt to her feet, her eyes snapping with fury. “You careless chit!” she cried, swiping at her ruined skirts, her scoldings and jigging drawing all eyes.

  Then, before Kira knew what was happening, two strong hands were lifting her to her feet, releasing her almost as quickly to thwack Aidan roughly on the back, then give him a great shove toward the deep shadows at the far end of the dais.

  Tavish, she saw, barely catching her breath before he yanked aside a tapestry and swept open a door she’d not known existed. “Fair means or foul,” he said, practically pushing them through it, into the cold, sleety dark of the bailey.

  True to the last, he’d created a diversion for their escape.

  Then the door slammed behind them and they were alone, running hand in hand across the deserted courtyard, the swirling night mist so thick around them, Castle Wrath and its sturdy walls already seemed little more than a long-ago dream.

  Somewhere, muffled and distant, a dog whined and howled, but otherwise the night was eerily quiet. Great rolling curtains of mist damped all sound, even the pounding of their feet on the bailey’s dark, rain-slick cobbles. Hurrying, they soon reached the gatehouse, for once emptied and silent, its heavy oaken doors closed and barred, the iron portcullis lowered to keep out unexpected intruders. Not that any were likely on such a still, fog-drenched night. Even the dog’s howls faded away, dwindling until not the faintest echo remained.

  What did remain was a ladder, tucked into the deepest shadows in the concealing lee of the curtain wall and giving access to the top of the gatehouse arch.

&nbs
p; Looking at it, so real and waiting, Kira felt her mouth go dry. She began to tremble.

  “Aidan….” She pulled him back when he grabbed hold of the ladder, his foot already on the first rung. “I know you ordered men to take turns on the battlements.” She looked up, scanning the wall-walk but seeing only swirling mist and thin curtains of fine, slanting rain. “What if one of them sees us?”

  “They won’t.” He kept his hands on the ladder, already ascending. “My guards know to keep their eyes trained on the cliffs and the sea. No’ on the empty bailey and the gatehouse arch behind them.”

  Still, Kira cast a last glance at the top of the curtained walling, so difficult to see in all the thick, whirling mist. And even if she could make out the battlements, somehow she doubted she’d see any men there.

  Not now.

  The queasy feeling in her stomach and the prickles at the back of her neck told her it was already too late.

  Aidan’s men were gone.

  Blessedly, he was still there. On top of the arch now, and reaching down for her, encouraging her. “Come, Kee-rah, give me your hand and I will pull you up.”

  Kira blinked. She hadn’t realized she’d scrambled nearly all the way up the ladder. Her heart pounding, she felt his hand grasp hers even as the ladder rung seemed to vanish from beneath her feet.

  “Oh, God!” Her breath caught as she hovered just a split second in thin, empty air. But Aidan’s arm swept around her like a band of steel, his strong hand heaving her up onto the arch-top with him. “I think it’s happening already,” she gasped, clutching at him. “The ladder disappeared beneath me.”

  “Aye, lass, I know.” He kept his arms locked around her, holding her so tight against him she could hardly breathe. “I cannae see much through all this mist, but I think more has disappeared than the ladder.”

  Kira wrapped her own arms around him, clinging to him just as fiercely. She pressed her head against his chest and closed her eyes, not really wanting to see whatever it was he’d meant had disappeared.

  It couldn’t be helped that they’d find Wrath in ruin if indeed they returned to her time. But she’d come to love the real Wrath and didn’t want to watch it dissolve before her eyes. It would be difficult enough to see Aidan’s face when he saw what had become of his proud home.

  She winced.

  That was something she should have thought about before. Something she might not have to worry about now because nothing was happening.

  Nothing at all.

  Even the light patter of the fine, misty rain was no more. Total silence swelled around them, almost like the proverbial quiet before the storm. The thought made her shudder, then cry out when her foot slipped on the slick stone surface of the arch-top.

  “Hold, lass!” Aidan’s arms tightened around her, righting her before she lost her balance. “Try no’ to move, Kee-rah. Just hold on to me.”

  “I will-Iieeeee….” Her foot slipped again, this time plunging knee-deep into a mossy, fern-lined crack in the arch’s stonework.

  Crumbling, ancient stonework, grass-grown and riddled with cracks, just as she remembered.

  Equally amazing, her tartan picnic rug and her backpack were wedged into a clump of ferns near her ankle.

  “Aidan!” She pulled her foot from the gap, her heart thundering. “We’re here! My things, too!”

  Her entire body shaking, she reached into the crevice, her fingers closing around a strap on her backpack just when all hell broke loose. An earsplitting boom shattered the quiet, knocking the breath from her as wave after wave of brilliant white light flashed across the arch-top, ripping away the mist and darkness until every tiny age line and lichen pattern stood out in bold relief on the ruined stone.

  Then the world went black.

  Total darkness.

  Even the cold was gone. The fine, sleety rain. She felt and heard nothing.

  Until a great blaring blast pierced her ears and she slammed down onto the stone again, this time landing on her buttocks with a hard, bone-jarring thunk.

  “Bluidy hell, woman! Have ye gone daft?”

  Kira jerked, a man’s angry voice ringing in her ears.

  An angry Scottish voice, burred and all, but so unpleasantly startling it took her a moment and a few mad eye-blinks to realize that the owner of the voice was standing beside the open driver door of a bright red car.

  “Damned tourists, anyway!” He glared at her, tapping his temple with a forefinger. “I could’ve hit you! Flying across the car park like there was no tomorrow!” he huffed, jumping back in his car and roaring off.

  Car park?

  Kira blinked again, only now fully grasping that she was in a car park and not on Wrath’s gatehouse arch. Far from it, she was sitting right smack in the middle of a large paved and graveled car park crammed full with cars, square-shaped recreational vehicles, and tightly packed rows of coach tour buses.

  Her stomach beginning to do funny things, she recognized the place as the Spean Bridge Mill, a popular tourist trap on the scenic A-82, just north of Fort William and not far from the turn-off road to Skye.

  This was definitely her time, but something had gone wrong.

  They weren’t supposed to return here.

  Nor was it autumn anymore, but late spring or early summer. She’d lost six or seven months. Her palms starting to dampen, she hoped she hadn’t lost more.

  Aidan was gone.

  Trying not to panic, she pushed to her feet and looked around, searching for him. Her backpack was still clutched in her hands and her tartan picnic rug lay a few feet away, unharmed. But her medieval clothes were gone, as was he.

  “Aidan!” She shouted for him, the blood roaring in her ears, panic sweeping her.

  A family of four turned to give her weird looks. She scowled at them, not caring what they thought. “Aidan!” she called again, her mouth going dry now, her heart starting to hammer wildly.

  There was no sign of Aidan anywhere.

  Only other people.

  Lots and lots of other people. Mostly American and English tourists from the looks of them. They streamed in and out of the mill-and-tea shop, weaving through the parked cars, and crowding the pretty arbored walkways. An especially noisy bunch blocked the entrance to the mill’s busy public restrooms.

  Separated from the main gift shop by a flower-lined walkway and a series of dark-wooded pergolas, they were the cleanest and finest public restrooms along the entire A-82. An insider tip for those in the know, complete with a lovely view of the Spean River’s rushing, tumbling rapids.

  They were also where she needed to go. Now.

  Not for the usual reason, but because panic and dread were making her ill. Gorge was rising in her throat, hot, bitter, and scary. Worse, she was finding it increasingly difficult to breathe.

  She needed to splash cold water on her face and calm down.

  She needed to think.

  Plan a way to find Aidan, wherever he’d landed. Or get back to him if he was still standing on his gateway arch-top, possibly just as panicked and looking for her.

  Moving fast now, she headed straight for the restrooms. If need be, she’d use her elbows, or even swing her backpack, to plow a way through the tight knot of tourists blocking the entrance.

  She needed a clear head more than they needed to use the facilities.

  But when she neared them, she saw that the tourists weren’t waiting to get into the fancy restrooms at all. They were taking pictures. Snapping away like mad, oooh’ing and ahhh’ing over something she couldn’t see.

  Then several of them moved and she did see.

  They were photographing Aidan!

  He stood ramrod straight between two wooden barrels of spring flowers, Invincible raised threateningly, and such a fierce glower on his face he would have scared her if she hadn’t known him. Unmoving and unblinking, he could have been a life-size statue. The tourists apparently mistook him for a reenactor, posing for their benefit.

  A little old lad
y on the edge of the crowd gave Kira a gentle tap on the arm. “He’s been standing there like that for at least ten minutes,” she gushed, aiming her diggy camera at him. “My granddaughters back in Ohio will swoon when they see his picture. He’s just the kind of wild Highlander they’re always dreaming about.”

  Don’t I know it, Kira almost said.

  Instead, she gave the woman a tight smile and pushed her way forward. “Aidan! There you are. Come, we’re late.” She laid on her most businesslike tone. “Your appearance at the Loch Ness Medieval Festival is in an hour.” She grabbed his arm, his muscles hard and tense and ready for battle. She flashed an apologetic glance at the crowd as she pulled him away. “We’ll just make it if we hurry.”

  “Wait!” A family father with three little kids hurried after her. “There’s a medieval festival at Loch Ness today?”

  Kira nodded. “All day,” she improvised, praying Aidan wouldn’t contradict her.

  Not that he looked keen on saying much of anything.

  His mouth was set in a firm, hard line, and he’d clamped his jaw so tight she wouldn’t be surprised if he never got it open again.

  He also refused to let her pull him farther than a few yards from where he’d been standing. His scowl darkening, he sheathed Invincible with such force, the English family father and the rest of the crowd scattered at once, leaving them alone on the walkway.

  Others, those just now exiting the gift shop, made a wide circle around them.

  “Wise souls.” Aidan spoke at last, eyeing them as they scuttled past.

  Planting his legs apart and folding his arms, he assumed his most lairdly mien. A posture that lasted until one of the monstrous things he assumed was a coach tour bus rumbled past them, only to come to a shuddering, smoke-belching halt, then disgorge a small throng of chattering, oddly-garbed people who looked very much like the ones who’d cornered him the moment he’d landed in this horrid, dreadful place.

  One such soul turned to gape at him – a female, and not unattractive, all things considered – but when she paused and aimed one of those little silvery objects at him, he smiled wickedly and whipped Invincible a foot or two out of its sheath.

  It was enough.