The Winter Stone: One Legend, Three Enchanting Novellas

by Crosby, Tanya Anne

  “Perhaps you should have taken him to Elena.” Annis’s quiet voice filled the otherwise silent room.

  Kieron glared at the girl who seemed unaware of how much her doubt-filled words could undermine Fia’s confidence. Annis reminded him vividly of his younger days when Tavish’s more pointed efforts to undermine his confidence had done their job.

  “You need to leave,” Kieron said to her, unwilling to let anyone weave doubt about Fia’s ability to heal the chief in Fia or in Tavish.

  “But I am here to help,” Annis said, with a childish pout.

  He took a moment to calm himself, then stepped in front of both Annis and Tavish, blocking Fia from her “helper” and from Tavish’s piercing stare.

  “Then be helpful,” he said, softening his voice as if he spoke to a wean. “Fetch your things and Fia’s from the horses and have one of the women show you where you will be sleeping.” He glanced over his shoulder at Fia, who was still standing perfectly still, staring at the chief’s ravaged body. “Tavish, she is just deciding what to do first, ’tis all, I am sure of it. There will be things that need your attention—other than your da—now that we are back. I will stay and make sure she has everything she needs.”

  Tavish actually growled but that no longer bothered Kieron. For all that Tavish was a skilled warrior, experience had taught Kieron his cousin was more bluster than bite, most of the time.

  “Go,” Tavish said to Annis, much to the lass’s apparent surprise.

  “But—”

  Tavish cut her off with a quick slant of his eyes in her direction. She spun without another word and left without bothering to close the door behind her.

  “You, as well,” Kieron said, and was relieved when his cousin gave a sharp nod. He paused before he closed the chamber door. “Make sure she heals him, Kier. She is here because you believed her and Lady Elena.”

  Kieron nodded, knowing that both women believed Fia had sufficient skill, but even he was having a hard time believing that was true, in spite of the evidence of the Winter Stone, now that he could see Fia’s doubts. He turned back to Fia and started to speak, but realized her lips were moving, as if she were speaking to herself, though he could not hear her voice. Her eyes were darting from the chief’s torso, to his face, now badly ravaged by the strange welts, and back, all the while her lips moved. She laid a hand upon the chief’s brow. She closed her eyes, her lips still whispering. Her brow furrowed deeper and deeper until suddenly her eyes popped open.

  “I need—” She looked up and glanced past Kieron. “Where is Annis?”

  “I sent both her and Tavish away. She was annoying me and you made Tavish very nervous when you did not respond to his demand that you heal the chief.”

  “His dema— Nay, he did not demand such a thing, did he?”

  Kieron smiled at her. She hadn’t been hesitating over treating the chief, she’d been figuring out what to do. Her concentration reminded him of his grandmother. “Aye, he did. Tell me what you need and I shall see it fetched immediately.”

  Fia turned her attention back to the chief. Even Kieron could tell that though he slept, his pinched, grey face spoke clearly that he was in great pain.

  “I need more of whatever sleeping draught the women have given him for what I need to do will cause more pain before it begins to help. I need warm water and rags to clean him, oats— enough to fill a large pot, but not cooked—a mortar and pestle, a kettle of hot water, and my bag.”

  Kieron pointed at the end of the bed where he had laid her saddlebag, then went to the door, relaying Fia’s requirements to the women who had been tending the chief.

  “Can she help him?” one of them asked.

  “I believe she can,” he answered, then closed the door again, sending up a prayer that he was right.

  Three days later and all Fia had accomplished was to help the chief sleep a bit with the soothing of her oatmeal poultice. His eye was so swollen the lid could not open and he complained of the pain of it even when the blisters on his torso were bearable. A willow bark brew did little to help with either the fever or the pain. She’d even had Annis make a brew of birch, and they had tried a poultice of balsam, but neither had done more to ease the man’s pain than the willow and oatmeal.

  Fia paced the chief’s chamber, exhaustion pulling at her feet, but the need to find some solution to this affliction kept her from resting. The door opened quietly and Fia tensed. Kieron came in, followed closely by Annis with the fresh kettle of willow and birch infused with garlic she’d been sent to make more than an hour ago. Thank heaven Tavish wasn’t with them. Fia did not think she could take another confrontation with that one, though she knew he would be by before much longer to push her out into the corridor and rail at her for not healing his father.

  But not while Kieron was here, she realized. Tavish never berated her when Kieron was about. She took a deep breath, letting the tension of the anticipated confrontation ease out of her—for now.

  “Pour a cup, Annis,” she said quietly, “and set it on the table to cool. I do not want to wake him if I do not have to. ’Tis the only reprieve from the pain we can give him right now.”

  Annis nodded and did as she was told, another miracle created by the presence of Kieron. She did not ken why Annis was wary of Kieron, but she was grateful for it. “Will you fetch some fresh bed linens?” she asked the woman.

  When Annis turned to face Fia, her mouth was set in a disgruntled line but she did not complain that she was being sent on yet another errand. The truth was, Fia could not stand the sly cuts of Annis’s conversation and glances anymore. The constant doubt Annis sowed wore on Fia and she was sure she would not be able to keep a civil tongue much longer, so she kept the woman busy and away from the chamber as much as possible.

  “You should let her sit with the chief,” Kieron said when the door was closed.

  “I do not trust her attention enough to do that.” Speaking those words lifted a weight from her she had not realized she carried.

  “Then let me. Tell me what to do if he wakes. You can rest on the pallet over there that has yet to be used.”

  She worried her lower lip, weighing her fatigue against the needs of the chief. Kieron held out a hand to her and she only hesitated a moment before reaching out and settling her palm against his. When he gently pulled her close she did not resist. He enfolded her in his embrace and laid his cheek against the top of her head. For a moment she froze, surprised to find his embrace so welcome.

  “You are too tired, Fia.” He ran his big hand up and down her back, as if he soothed a bairn, and she allowed herself to relax, to rest her cheek against his broad chest, to let him hold her. “A little sleep will clear your mind and perhaps then you can discover another way to help the chief.”

  Fia closed her eyes. The scent of him—the sharp scent of evergreen, the cool scent of fresh Highland air, and a spicy scent she could not name but that was his all alone—surrounded her, soothing her better than any herbal brew she might take. The slow beat of his heart against her cheek, and the comfort of his strong arms around her, revived her more than sleep could. Here was a welcome shelter from the storm of doubt and worry that she had weathered from the moment she agreed to come to Kilglashan.

  “I know you can help him,” he whispered into her hair.

  “Do you really?” Fia asked looking up into his brilliant green eyes. She was captured by both the care and the desire that lit them, like sun sparkling through new leaves.

  “Aye, I do.”

  “Why?”

  Kieron stared into her eyes for a long moment, then cupped her face in his hands and kissed her, lightly, but the touch of his lips to hers lit a need inside her so fierce it took her by surprise. She rose up on her toes, laid her hands against his scratchy cheeks, and pressed her lips to his, letting all thought and all care fall away as she lost herself in the softness of his mouth. He let out a low growl and pulled her hard against him, even as she swept her tongue along the lin
e of his lips. She did not know why she did that, but followed her instincts and was rewarded when he deepened the kiss, sweeping his tongue over hers. Jolts of desire raced through her, focusing her every fiber on this moment, this man, this kiss.

  A short rap on the door had them leaping apart just as Annis swung it open, her arms filled with fresh bedding. Kieron turned away, shoving his hair back from his face as he moved to a small window and peered out toward the village. Fia hoped Annis could not tell what she had interrupted, but the knowing smirk on the woman’s face dashed her optimism.

  Annis used her hip to close the door with a bang, startling the chief awake. Fia wiped her sweat-damp hands on her skirt and turned her attention back to where it should be—on her patient—chiding herself for allowing her attention to be drawn away so easily.

  “How are you feeling?” She asked him as she lifted a rag from the bowl of cool water on the table and wrung it out, then smoothed it against the man’s forehead and the side of his face unaffected by the blisters.

  “Thirsty.”

  “I have a brew for you. This one is stronger so it should help with the pain.”

  The chief merely grunted as he tried to shift in his bed. A grimace, combined with a moan he tried to swallow, told her the pain still rode him. Kieron came to the bedside and helped the chief as Fia held the light sheet of the finest linen away from him so it would not pull across his skin as he moved, for even that light weight was unbearable.

  “Annis, prepare another oatmeal poultice,” she said without looking at her assistant. She did not want to see the woman calculating how she could use the indiscretion she had walked in on to her best advantage. Fia put the rag down and reached for the cup. Habit had her lifting it to her nose to check the strength. She was about to help the chief drink it when she stopped and sniffed it again.

  Something wasn’t right. She sipped it, let it lie on her tongue for a moment, then swallowed.

  “Annis,” she turned to find the woman staring at her. “What did you put in this?”

  “Only what you told me,” she answered, her lip quivering and her eyes not quite meeting Fia’s.

  “Nay, you did not.” Fia poured a little of the contents of the cup into her hand, examining the color. “It looks right, but the scent is off, as if you did not use enough birch, and there is no willow in here, either, for it does not tighten the tongue.”

  “I made it just as you taught me, nothing more, nothing less,” Annis said, but Fia could tell the girl lied, though she could not fathom why she would endanger the chief’s health.

  “Do you wish the chief to remain ill, to be in pain?” Fia snapped quietly, not wanting the chief to hear, though even in his waking moments he seemed unaware of most of what went on around him. She stepped closer to her assistant. All her doubt, frustration, and fatigue gathered, making her words harsh and erasing any ease she had found in Kieron’s arms. “For that is what you consign him to with this!” She dumped the liquid from her hand onto the floor and the contents of the cup with it.

  A lone tear trickled down Annis’s cheek, as she turned beseeching eyes to Kieron who had joined them. “I did not—”

  “Surely she would not seek to hurt the chief on purpose, Fia,” he said his voice full of concern and for a moment Fia felt abandoned by her one ally here, until he gave her a quick wink. It was only then that Fia noticed he once more had the palm-sized, perfectly round milky stone in his hand, as he had the day he had come to take her away from Kilmartin. He closed the distance between himself and Annis.

  “I did not want to do this, for to do so will weaken the power of this magic stone, but it seems the time has come,” he said. He balanced the stone in his palm in front of her. “Take it,” he commanded, and Annis plucked it from his hand, holding it between her thumb and forefinger as if she did not like the touch of it.

  “If you place this in a bowl of water fresh from a fast-running burn just as the sun peeks over the horizon,” he continued, “and let it sit in the sun until sunset, watching over it every minute lest any animal or person drink from it, or any leaf or bug fall into it, the water will ease his pain.”

  Fia started to ask why he did not use this magical stone before now, but she remembered the wink. Kieron was not abandoning her, he was aiding her in discovering the truth, though not in the way most people would go about it.

  “But there is no sun today,” Annis whined, holding the stone out for Kieron to take, but he let her hold it there between them.

  “Then you must make the brew again and I will let you use the stone when there is sun. Can you make it correctly this time?”

  It took all of Fia’s will not to speak against this, but she was intrigued by Kieron’s approach and let him finish with Annis.

  “I made it correctly this time!” Annis said, but now she did not meet the eyes of either of them.

  Fia gasped, but covered it with a cough. The stone, milky when Kieron had handed it to Annis, now had faint dark ribbons running through it, as if it had been colored by the refuse of the privies.

  Kieron shook his head. “She lies.”

  “Nay, I do not,” Annis said, holding the still darkly ribboned stone out and shaking it as if that would force Kieron to take it. Fia looked at the stone, then at Kieron, then back at the stone. Brown, almost black, and he said she lied as if he knew it for a truth.

  “Did you use exactly what I told you, and in the exact amounts?” Fia asked, testing her theory.

  “Aye,” Annis replied, holding out the still dark hued stone to Kieron who made no move to take it from her.

  “Annis, you did not,” Fia said, still not sure that what she saw in the stone reflected what she thought it did. “Why?”

  Annis closed her eyes for a moment, then sighed. “I spilled the willow in the fire. ’Twas all burned up before I could think what to do.” Annis scrunched up her nose, as if she smelled something rotten, clearly displeased that her lie had been uncovered.

  The stone shone a faint pink now, but still a thread of brown woven through it. Pink, like when Elena and she had held it before…truth? But with a lie still woven into it?

  “Why did you not get more from my supply?” Fia asked, determined to find the whole truth.

  The lass swallowed hard and laced her fingers together so fiercely her knuckles turned white. “I was pouring it directly from the bag when it spilled, though I ken well ’tis not the way you like it done. I sneezed and the entire bag emptied into the fire. There is no more.”

  Still pink with a thread of brown.

  Fia narrowed her eyes at the girl, trying to figure out where the lie still lay. She considered the chief, and how he seemed in more pain the last few hours than he had been before. She had thought it only that his condition worsened, for it clearly had not improved, but perhaps…

  “When did you burn up the willow supply?” she asked, sure now that she had found the heart of the lie.

  Annis looked at her feet and spoke so softly Fia almost couldn’t hear her. “When I went to make the brew in the middle of the night.”

  Pink. Clear pink.

  Kieron plucked the stone from Annis’s fingers and it was once more milky. “Did she cause the chief harm?” he asked Fia as he tucked the stone into the pouch at his belt.

  “I do not think so. More pain, aye, but ’tis my fault for not checking her brews more carefully. I know better. I am sorry, Kieron.”

  “You are not the one to be sorry. If she had told you the truth, there would be no need to check.”

  “Still, I must take some of the blame. I will not let it happen again.”

  “Nor will I,” he said. “Would you mind terribly if I had her kept under watch in the cottage you have yet to use?”

  “Will she be punished?” she asked.

  “If Tavish discovers her perfidy? Aye, but I think ‘twould be more fitting to return her to Kilmartin and let Lady Elena mete out her punishment, do you not?

  “She will not belie
ve either of you,” Annis said, sidling toward the door.

  Kieron did not turn around. “If you so much as touch that door I shall break your hand. Fia, what do you think? Turn her over to Tavish who is not known for holding his temper, or give her to Elena for judgment?”

  Fia weighed her options far longer than necessary, enjoying watching Annis quake for real for a change. But she could not let the woman be harmed by Tavish, no matter how much she deserved it. “Confine her to the cottage. She shall return with me to Kilmartin and Elena will decide her punishment.”

  Kieron smiled at her for a moment. “’Tis more consideration than she deserves, but I am not surprised by that.” He turned to Annis. “You are lucky. Fia is more forgiving than I, but even her sentence would not hold with me if you had caused more harm to my chief than prolonging his pain, which is already more harm than the man deserves. If you had, I would happily give you over to Tavish’s temper.” He grabbed her none too gently by the upper arm and dragged her to the door. The pouch that held the milky stone bounced against his leg and caught Fia’s attention.

  “Wait.” She knew the stone had turned vaguely pink when she and Elena had held it, and now it turned a sickly dark brown when Annis spoke. Kieron said she lied, and she had verified that for herself. The stone told him. A murky brown for lies. Pink for truth. She suddenly realized it was after he saw the stone turn pink, not only in her own hand, but also in Elena’s, that he had assured Tavish that she could heal the MacAlister chief, as if he knew it for a truth.

  Truth. If the stone knew when someone spoke the truth…

  “Kieron, can you have someone else take her away?” Excitement coursed through her, dissolving all fatigue in its wake. “I need to discuss something with you.”

  He glared at Annis. “Aye, lass. Give me a moment to hand her off and I shall send someone to fetch more willow for you. I know my grandmum has a supply. Shall I summon someone I trust to sit with the chief so you can prepare the brew yourself?”

  “Not yet,” she said, turning her attention fully to her patient. “Not yet.”