Highland Games Through Time

by Nancy Lee Badger

  “Don’t interfere, Bull.”

  “Easy, Jake. If he’s her brother, you shouldn’t be attacking him. Skye won’t like it.”

  Bull was right. Skye wouldn’t approve. The last time, when Kirk thought he was Haven’s former lover, he nearly lost his head when Kirk came at him with a sword. What would Kirk do if he knew Jake was seducing his little sister?

  “I can hear the wheels turning in that hard head of yours. Calm down, friend.”

  Bull was right. Besides, he couldn’t hit him while he held Skye to his chest. Bull tugged his shirt, pulling him from the great hall. As they approached the doors leading back out to the bailey, a woman stood with hands on her hips. She glared at him, as one foot tapped the stone floor in apparent exasperation. She’d piled her black hair on top of her head in a loose bun. Familiar black spikes protruded from the sexy mess of curls, and her pale green eyes flashed.

  “Haven,” Jake whispered.

  “ ‘Tis Lady Haven to ye, blacksmith,” Kirk roared.

  Jake’s first impulse was to march up to Kirk and punch him in the face again. Instead, he threw his arms around his friend.

  “Are you okay?” Jake asked her, smoothing a loose strand of hair behind her ear.

  Haven nodded, with an expression that assured he’d made the right choice to back down. Jake tamped down the urge to talk more with the friend he’d missed for five years. An acute need flared to life, a deep-seated yearning to find out more about Haven and Iona’s lives.

  Glancing at Kirkwall Gunn, he headed toward the bailey. He grabbed a fresh tankard of ale from a passing servant. Chugging the contents, he strode away.

  “What are we doing here?” Bull asked. Pacing across the large bedchamber gave him little comfort, but he needed to keep moving. His head was spinning. Like a fish out of water, he couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t think. He wanted to go home. “Answer me, Jake.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Not an answer.” Why was Jake clamming up now? Their friendship was fairly new, but they’d shared secrets over a couple of beers. “Funny how not a word of traveling back in time ever came up.”

  “I thought you’d call me crazy.”

  In the back of his mind, he believed Jake. Crazy talk, indeed. If he hadn’t experienced time travel personally, he wouldn’t have believed him. A smart man would have kept his mouth shut.

  Jake was a smart man.

  “Skye needs me,” Jake said.

  Jake wouldn’t face him, which told Bull more than words could. Jake had feelings for little miss Highlander. Feelings he tried to suppress.

  “Why? She has Marcus, Lady Fia, and her huge brother. No one can harm her here.”

  “You’re wrong, Bull. Haven was kidnapped from a bedroom like this one. The sorcerer popped in, stole her away, and nearly killed my friend Iona in the process.”

  “This happened the last time you were here?”

  “Yes. I wanted to help get her back.”

  “Why didn’t you?” Bull stopped pacing and crept near the door. He sensed movement beyond, yet Jake continued talking.

  “Bull, you have no idea what Skye forced me into. Surrounded by sixteenth-century warriors, with my worry for Haven weighing me down, I made the mistake of saying something stupid in Skye’s presence. She took offense, and sent me home.”

  Getting Jake to open up was working. However, the only way to figure out the next step in this instance, was to get Jake to open up all the way.

  “Listen. I’ve been in your shoes. I know how lust or love can screw with a man—”

  “Wait just a minute—”

  “No. You listen. You’re hooked on her, I can see that. Let’s help Skye and her friends, then get our asses back to the future. Although the opportunity to research these people and this time period is tempting, we could die here.”

  Jake sighed, staring out the small window in the stone wall of the bedroom. He crossed his arms over his chest in a defensive move, which wasn’t lost on Bull. He wanted to help Jake get through whatever the problem was, then get home.

  “When you’re right, you’re right. Sorry I got you involved.”

  “Not your fault. If I hadn’t jumped on Balfour and followed you two, I would be back at your apartment house trying to catch Jenny’s attention.”

  “Jenny? I forgot about her. What will she do when old Balfour shows up at the barn without a rider?”

  “I wouldn’t worry. That won’t happen for about four-hundred years,” Bull said.

  Jake smiled, but he continued to stare out the window.

  “So, tell me more about little Lady Skye. She’s quite the handful. When we were on the horse together, I felt every soft curve—”

  Jake’s fist slammed into Bull’s stomach. He crumpled, and decided to stay down.

  “Guess I…,” he coughed, “struck a nerve.” Bull was surprised how fast Jake had crossed the room and toppled onto the bed, while he fought for breath.

  Jake’s hands were fisted at his sides, and his cheeks burned red with rage. “Keep your mouth shut. Skye’s body is not up for discussion.”

  “I agree,” boomed a voice from the doorway. Kirk stood with feet spread, and a hand on the dirk at his side. He’d removed his long sword from the scabbard at his back and had left it elsewhere, but he was still a formidable man.

  “Hey, Laird…uh…Kirk,” Bull said.

  “Stay away from my sister. Both of ye.”

  By the time Bull scrambled to his feet, the massive Highlander was gone.

  Jake stared at the empty doorway, then hung his head. “Best get some sleep. We’ll talk tomorrow. I promise.”

  Bull nodded and left Jake’s room to find his own. He closed Jake’s door, and breathed deep. The castle was quiet.

  After about an hour in his room, Bull stoked the fire in the corner brazier, and polished his boots. The day’s travails made him antsy. He couldn’t sleep.

  Stepping back into his borrowed boots, he wrapped his plaid around him and fastened it with the wide belt. Bull trudged down the stairs, and into the great hall. He stepped over several men asleep on the floor and headed for the huge hearth, but the fire had gone cold. He spun on his heels, walking through the front hall, and out the door into the bailey. Bull pulled his shirt closed at the neck. The ancient kilt he wore was warm and dry, and he was thankful someone thought of him, as he had stood dripping and tattered beside Dara.

  How quickly his plans had changed.

  One minute he planned to invite Skye out for breakfast. A trip to the local pancake restaurant never had a chance. The night air was crisp with the scent of hay and smoke.

  Smoke?

  An animal’s scream split the night.

  “The barn’s on fire!”

  CHAPTER 20

  Skye wrestled with the urge to move. Something bound her hands, and pain slashed across her hip. The sorcerer had captured her! She woke with her hands tangled in her nightdress, and the scent of the sea wafting through the window slit.

  No, ‘tis only a bad dream.

  The day that the sorcerer had kidnapped her, she had kept her fear at bay long enough to plan her escape. She had freed herself with a long-forgotten spell, and a frightening plunge into the sea.

  Her eyes fluttered open, and she stared at a dark wooden ceiling. She slid her gaze to dry walls of cut reddish stone, unlike a dungeon’s damp walls. Window slits, partially covered with heavy curtains, billowed in a strange breeze without a barred door in sight.

  Taking a deep breath, she struggled to wrench a hand free of the bedclothes. Were her horrifying dreams memories she had failed to purge?

  Kicking free of the heavy blankets, she swung her feet to the cold floor. Shivering in the thin cotton nightdress, the urge to see the ocean had her moving to the window.

  The dream hung there on the edge of consciousness, and refused to release her. The salty tang of the ocean gave way to the comforting odor of dirt and vegetation, smells she enjoyed whenever she toiled
in her herb garden.

  As if in a dream, the image of the garden in her childhood village brought tears to her eyes. Years ago, in far away Keldurunach, her life had consisted of nothing more than the adoration of her brother, and the freedom to practice her craft.

  At her husband’s castle, north of Castle Ruadh, she had planned to live a normal life. She wanted children, and people to serve. Her healing poultices helped save lives.

  Yet, I failed to save my husband.

  When the other hunters had returned his body to their home, he was long dead.

  Skye rubbed her palms together to warm her fingers. As she stepped into a simple gown of un-dyed homespun wool, a vision rose.

  As if she was a butterfly looking down from above, she watched herself toiling in a garden. She could smell the herbs as she crushed them between her fingers. The tang of mint filled the air, but black smoke and cinders suddenly overpowered her, and she could no longer breathe.

  Her eyesight wavered, and her stomach turned inside out. A lightning bolt of pain sliced down upon the garden so fast, it left her image on the ground, and her borrowed dress in tatters. Pain and fire slashed across an image just out of reach.

  What she saw and felt, was much different from the day the sorcerer attacked her and Alec in the garden. Could this be a vision of an attack to come?

  Since she was no longer dreaming, she ought to make herself useful. Haven had not had more than a few precious moments to talk with her, because Kirk had whisked his wife to their bedchamber. Skye wanted to know everything there was to know about Jake Jamison, and would seek out her sister-in-law this morning.

  She had no idea where Alec was. Possibly, a nurse had him somewhere safe inside the castle. Her older brother had married a young witch from the future, and Skye loved her from the moment they met. Haven was smart, though a novice in witchery spells. Her knowledge of herbs and flowers was formidable. How lucky for them that they had found each other. The whisper of time could not keep them apart.

  Unlike Jake and I.

  Time was not the problem keeping her from giving up her mission, and loving Jake. The problem was, Jake Jamison was not human.

  Skye smoothed the front of her dress, and slipped her chilly feet into a pair of borrowed doeskin slippers. They reminded her of the shoes her husband removed from her trembling feet, before he took her to bed on their wedding night.

  Before she had married Lethan, she filled the days with gathering herbs such as yarrow, ragwort, and blackberry leaves in the meadow outside the Gunn tower. Many days she walked through the forest along the bank of the river, and collected apple buds and willow bark. The image of a sword, as it flashed close to Jake’s head, made her stumble.

  “Snap out of it, ye nervous Nellie,” she said.

  She sighed, and walked closer to the window to see if daybreak was near. She was at Castle Ruadh. She was safe. Was Jake safe? The threat was real, and the sorcerer would die, but today she wanted to live.

  Skye had set aside her witchery, until her husband’s untimely death. She practiced her spells ever since. She had failed to save her husband, though she had protected her young nephew.

  Rubbing her arms, she crossed her bed chamber and recalled how she had jumped in front of the boy, pushed him behind a water barrel, even as the sorcerer’s bolt hit her.

  Skye shook away the memory. She had escaped the villain. Angered at the loss of his intended victim, he had stolen her—the laird’s sister—and used his magic to send her to her husband’s castle.

  Without Alec.

  Alec is fine. Kirk assured me.

  Skye would do everything in her power to keep her brother, and every man, woman, and child in their clan, safe. She had used spells and the magical properties of her moonstone pendant to return to New Hampshire. The gem nestled in a silver setting, its power formed from the elements. She had returned to find Jake.

  He had been less than happy to see me.

  Haven had explained the modern games to her. Skye recalled her first trip to the future, when she sought the help of old Dorcas. She had dressed in a plain gown, and had hidden several small knives beneath her skirt. She had to alter her plans when she spied the nearly naked back of a handsome blacksmith.

  She could remember the eerie song of bagpipes echoing off the surrounding mountains. Pretty dancers high-stepped on a make-shift wooden stage. The tasty smell of flaky pastries filled with spiced meat, and the sweetness of the shortbread biscuit she had nibbled, made her mouth water.

  She wished she could have strayed nearer the fields where kilted men strained beneath the weight of stones and hammers, but Jake had caught her eye.

  I used him, as was his destiny.

  Shaking away the cobwebs of her thoughts, she tied her hair in one long plait. But, the dream, or sense of doom, grew stronger. Since she did not possess the sight, she ought to ask Iona for help.

  Premonitions were Iona’s claim to fame.

  Why else would she awaken confused and alone? A sudden urge to float out the window and dive into the ocean pushed her back a few steps, then filled her with dread. The acrid smell of brimstone and Hellfire filled her nose and mouth.

  Looking down at her hands, red streaks flickered across her skin.

  Is that blood on my hands?

  Dread surrounded her, and she ran. Something ominous was trying to tell her to act, and act now. Skye threw open her chamber door, and screamed when a shadowy form blocked her path.

  “Skye? Slow down. I won’t hurt you. I came to warn you.” He hoped his body blocked her scream. No one was in the hall, but several people talked in the great room, below the stairs.

  “Praise the Mother, Jake. Ye nearly scared me to death! Why are ye in my bedchamber?”

  “Sorry.” He pushed the door shut behind him, then paced toward the bed, then to the fireplace. When he turned toward her, she saw his hesitation.

  “I know yer secret. ‘Tis safe with me. Ye are safe here,” she whispered.

  Jake turned back toward the cold brazier, sucking in a deep breath. He released eons of frustration, and shot fire from his mouth. The supernatural flames brought the dead coals back to life. He crouched, adding two more bricks of peat, then rose to his feet.

  He sighed, and smoothed the front of his borrowed kilt.

  “You used that knowledge against me five years ago.” Ever since they met, on a perfect autumn afternoon in New England, the secret weighed him down. He always considered his magical ability as no more than a curse.

  “I say now what I told ye then…embrace yer true nature.”

  He heard the words, and glanced at her expression. Was that kindness or pity in her eyes? She looked awful.

  “Weren’t you able to sleep either?”

  She hesitated. Shoulders sagging, she stepped closer and ran her fingers down his forearm. The urge to have her touch him even lower, shocked him back to the here and now.

  “Nay, the dreams persist. I feared I was back in the dungeon, my wrists bound, at the sorcerer’s mercy.”

  An image of her naked body splayed across his bed, her powerful hands bound, stirred fire in his groin.

  When had she grown into a lush, sensual beauty? He hadn’t listened to the girlish witch. She had admonished him in secret.

  “Use it while ye hide it from others. Creating fire is a verra’ useful ability,” she had told him.

  “Enough of dreams. Jake, ye are safe with me. What is wrong?”

  His sharp laugh echoed throughout the bedchamber. He could not look at her, so he stared into the flames.

  Flames he had created.

  “I meant to ask you, the day we met. Why aren’t you surprised at my ability?”

  “I had heard of such magic, but only in the context of Scottish myths and folk tales. Will ye tell me how ye came to be a firebreather?”

  “Is that what it’s called?”

  Her eyes shied from his gaze, and she appeared to think before answering.

  “Please,
Skye. Talk to me.”

  “Ye really doona’ know? Yer gift is rare.”

  “My gift? I call it an aberration. A curse.”

  “Nay, ‘tis powerful magic. Ye must be descended of dragons.”

  “Dragons! Are you nuts?” Jake kicked an unruly cinder back into the fire. His shoulders sagged. Her hand still rested on his forearm, so his outburst hadn’t frightened her. He roughly brushed it off, and stepped away from the heat of her and the hearth. “Keep away from me. I might hurt you.”

  “Ye would never harm me, Jake.” She stood by his side, but didn’t try to touch him. The sweet familiar scent of her, radiated off her body. The swelling in his groin turned hotter than the fire in the nearby hearth, and a growl rumbled in his throat.

  He glanced down at her.

  She smiled up at him. Surprised she hadn’t turned and run from the room, he watched her eyes widen. Small lines crinkled in the corners, and her skin bore dozens of tiny freckles.

  Had they been there before?

  “You should run. Run far from me, Skye. Something has happened to me.”

  “I have fears, but ye be not one of them. Besides, the room has filled with the scent of wood smoke, and yer manly musk. I am happy ye came to me.”

  “Skye, don’t go there. Your brother—”

  “Kirk is not happy with any man unless he chooses him for me. His mind is elsewhere. The sorcerer and his evil threats have taken precedence.”

  Her eyes reflected the flames he created, but sadness was evident in her lowered chin and drooping eyelashes.

  “Ye do not frighten me.”

  He hadn’t tried to frighten her. He only wanted to make sure they were on the same page. He had never let people witness his ability, but Skye had somehow stumbled on him using it.

  If Skye had never spied on him five years earlier, then she could not have blackmailed him into traveling back in time. Somehow, her recent appearance at the Highland games caused another trip back.

  “This is your fault. I shouldn’t be here.”

  “Nay. Yer help is necessary. Besides, I am glad yer here to scare away the nightmares,” she whispered.