by Mia Marlowe
“I told ye, milord.” Callum Farquhar stumbled after Adam, his face as sorrowful as a whipped pup. “No weapon of metal will prosper against the sorcerer whilst magic flows round that mirror.”
Morgan raised an appraising brow at the small man. “Very astute, Farquhar. Ye may have more understanding of these doings than I thought.” Then he glared at Adam, who’d been frozen in place since his sword was ripped from him. “And now for you, milord.”
Morgan made mystic symbols in the air before him again, and Adam backed inexorably toward Cait and the mirror.
“Flee, Adam. Save yourself,” Cait urged. Misery nearly choked her. “Dinna stay for me.”
When he kept backing toward her, she realized that he had no control over where he was sent. His muscles bunched and tensed as he strained to reach the sorcerer, but he couldn’t break the spell’s hold. Finally Adam came to rest before her, forming a shield for her with his own body.
“Oh, Adam. Why did ye come?”
“My heart is here with ye. My body had to follow. And even if I could leave ye, lass,” he whispered, “I wouldna.”
“Isn’t that precious?” Morgan said with a sneer. “Mark it well, Farquhar. ‘Flesh of my flesh’ is no’ just words to the laird and his lady. They’re warp and woof of the same plaid. Bound together—bone to bone. These two share one heart. When one stops, they’ll both drop.”
Standing just outside the gouged circle around the mirror, Farquhar looked sorrowfully at Cait and hung his head. If she had suspected him of being the religious sort, she’d have guessed he was praying.
Then Morgan began to chant in Latin again, but it was no liturgy Cait recognized. She peered around Adam as the sorcerer lifted his blade to the four corners of the room and then began to advance toward the magical circle. Murder blazed in his eyes.
“We havena much time,” she whispered furiously, “but I want ye to know, Adam Cameron, that I do love ye. I didna mean to, but I couldna help it. I should have loved ye better, but with all that I am, I count myself blessed to have loved ye at all, even for this short time.”
“Love is stronger than death, lass.” His voice rumbled through her and she realized he was trying to give her the last gift he could offer—courage. “We’ve naught to fear, you and me. Whatever happens in the next few moments, I’ll see ye after, aye?”
Cait pressed her cheek against his strong back and swallowed back a sob. She’d try to be brave for him. She could face anything so long as this man was beside her.
Then Morgan stopped chanting. She peered around her husband in time to see the sorcerer cock back the arm that bore the iron blade. Adam’s chest was bared. Morgan couldn’t miss from this distance.
He threw the athame.
Time contracted and expanded around them. Cait seemed to see every glint of candlelight on the dark blade as it sped toward her husband. She perceived the very air bending around the athame, curling around the knife in feathery wisps. Her vision narrowed until all she could see was the lethal tip hurtling toward them.
Then out of nowhere, someone broke the circle and leaped in front of Adam. It was Farquhar.
Suddenly Cait regained control of her limbs. Her dirk, Mr. Shaw’s larger blade, and Adam’s claymore all clattered from the mirror’s frame to the sandstone floor. Adam snatched up his sword and, roaring like a feral beast, he swung the long blade in a glittering arc toward the sorcerer.
It ought to have cleaved Morgan MacRath in two, but instead, when the claymore struck him, his whole body disintegrated into little black dots, like a swarm of midges. The dots seemed to try to coalesce back into a shape, but only managed a tangled mass. They floated up and flowed like a black river across the soot-covered beams above. Then a burst of light flashed from inside the long looking glass and the black dots scattered. They raced toward one of the cells and trickled through the iron bars to escape the light. The door to the cell banged shut of its own accord, and the bars flared white-hot for a few heartbeats before settling to pulse softly. The collection of dots shivered in the darkest corner.
“Weel, that’s the end of Morgan MacRath, I’ll warrant,” came Farquhar’s rasping voice. “He didna reckon on the mirror. It bent his own curse back on him. O’ course, your claymore had a mite to do with it too, Lord Bonniebroch.”
“Mr. Farquhar, you’re . . .” Cait knelt beside him. The hilt of the athame protruded from his chest.
Adam started to pull it out, but Farquhar stopped him with a hand to his arm. “Nae need, man. Let it lie. It can do no more harm.”
Cait positioned herself so she could cradle the older man’s head in her lap. A sob escaped her lips. “This is all my fault.”
“Hush. In the end, ye were willing to give your life in exchange for your husband. Dinna be surprised that someone else was willing to do the same for you. Though to be honest, I’d hoped MacRath hadna such a good aim.”
“No, no, no,” she chanted in misery. “You have to live, Farquhar.”
“Wish I could oblige ye, milady,” he said, gulping air between his words, “but I fear I’m after doing what we all must one day.”
“Stow that talk,” Adam said gruffly as he took one of Farquhar’s hands. “I’m without a steward here at Bonniebroch. I was planning to offer ye the position.”
“I’ll take it,” Farquhar said with a half-smile twitching his mouth. “Though I fear it’ll be the shortest stewardship on record.”
Cait didn’t try to stop her tears. They streamed down her cheeks and fell onto the old man’s broad forehead.
Farquhar’s smile faded. “Dinna weep for me, lady. I’d no’ have ordered this different.” He grasped both their hands and joined them together. “Ye two have been given a gift that few folk receive even if they live together for a lifetime. Ye both ken ye’d die for each other, and that’s no small thing.”
Adam squeezed her hand and she gave him a tremulous smile. If only love were enough to heal all wounds, Farquhar would be on his feet doing a reel from the depth of emotion that radiated between Cait and her husband.
“But there was treachery afoot here in Bonniebroch, so someone’s blood was meant to spill this night.” Farquhar’s voice fell to a whisper. “I’m satisfied for it to have been mine.”
His eyes closed. “My life hasna been my own since the day ye shielded me at the pillory, milady. Now, my debt is settled, my vow fulfilled. The long dark holds . . . no terror . . . for me.”
Then his chest fell for the final time and he was gone.
Epilogue
Before Callum Farquhar was buried, the lady of Bonniebroch had a gold ring made for his ear and saw to it that he was dressed in one of the laird’s own plaids. The sky wept on the day his body was interred with all honor in the wall of the castle chapel in a niche near the vestry.
That night Cait wept afresh as well. She’d dismissed Grizel and the two chatterbox maids and sat before the mirror in the laird’s chamber brushing out her own hair. Finally she set the brush aside, laid her head on the dressing table, and cried as if her heart would break.
“Still weeping for a selkie lover?” Adam said from behind her. He must have slipped into the room without her hearing him. For a big man, he was silent as a cat when he wished to be. She sat upright and swiped her eyes. “Dinna think it’ll work. Ye’re a fair distance from the sea, Cait.”
She met his eyes in the mirror and offered him a brave smile. “Why would I need a selkie lover when I have ye, Adam?” Then her chin began to tremble and she dropped her gaze.
He came up behind her and leaned down to plant a kiss on her neck. “I ken how ye’re feeling, love. I grieve for him too.”
She turned and swiveled in the chair. He knelt beside her and gathered her in a snug embrace.
“But Farquhar wouldna want ye to make yourself sick with grief.”
“But I feel so guilty.”
“He didna blame ye and neither do I.”
“No, I dinna mean about the bargain with MacRath.
I feel guilty because I’m so very happy with ye. And so very sad about Farquhar at the same time. ’Tis as if there are two of me trapped in one body.” She clutched him in a desperate hug. “How can such deep joy and deep sorrow live in the same heart?”
Adam kissed her with tenderness that made the tears start again. “I dinna ken.” He dropped a peck on the tip of her red nose. “But if there were two of ye, I’d love them both.”
She laughed, despite her tears, and kissed him again. In the face of death, the living always turned to riotous life and Adam made her feel more gloriously alive than anything.
“Ahem.”
“Did ye say something?” Adam asked between kisses.
“No, I—” A flicker of movement caught the tail of her eye and she glanced back at the mirror. Cait gasped. “Farquhar!”
There between her reflection and Adam’s stood the little old man who’d come to mean so much to them both. She looked behind them, but he wasn’t in their room.
“Nae, milady. Ye’ll no’ find me in your chamber. I’m behind the glass.”
She and Adam both turned back to the mirror. Farquhar stepped in front of their reflections instead of peering from between them and gave his dipping little bow.
“Ye’re no’ seeing things. ’Tis I, no’ exactly in the flesh, ye ken, but here all the same.”
“Farquhar, ye’re a . . . a . . .”
“A spirit. A ghost, if ye will. I suspect either term will suffice. I bear ye a message.”
Cait’s eyes grew round. “From my mother?”
“Nae, I havena been in this realm long enough to have made her acquaintance and in any case I suspect she’s in a higher plane than I, but news tends to travel quicker when one isna hampered by a body. I’ll let ye know if I should hear from her. No, the word I have for ye the now is of your father.”
Cait’s hand went involuntarily to her throat. She’d sworn by her blood. Her father had sworn by his head. “Is he . . . ?”
“He’s fine. Better than fine. Word about Grant Castle is that at the hour of MacRath’s defeat, scales fell from your father’s eyes and he saw the world clear for the first time in years.” Farquhar turned to look at Adam. “Expect a message in a fortnight from Wallace Grant asking after your health and pledging his support of Albany as King James’s regent.”
“Thank you, Farquhar,” Adam said solemnly. “That is good news indeed.”
“Then I hope ye’ll think the next bit of information is good, too. I stand ready to assume my duties as the steward of Bonniebroch.”
“But ye’re a . . .”
“A ghost,” Farquhar supplied helpfully. “Aye, we’ve established that. Are ye no’ attending? At the risk of seeming impudent, I believe ye’ve gone a bit soft in the head, milord.”
Adam crossed his arms over his chest. “Have ye considered how the folk of the castle might take to a steward who’s . . . disembodied? It’s one thing for ye to show up in our mirror, Farquhar. If ye pulled the same stunt for Cook, I warrant she’d have a fit of apoplexy on the spot.”
Farquhar waved a dismissive hand. “Dinna fret, your lordship. No’ everyone can discern my presence. But I’ve already appeared to Mr. Lyttle, your butler. He’s got a steady head on his shoulders and, more importantly, he can both see and hear me. With your permission, I’ll simply relay my orders through him.”
Adam snorted. “You seem to have thought of everything.”
“One does one’s best.”
“Very well. Ye’ve been appointed the new steward of Bonniebroch. At least I won’t have to worry about ye pillorying people in my absence.”
“No indeed.” Farquhar chuckled. “In fact, first thing tomorrow, Mr. Lyttle will relay my order for the pillory to be torn down. But now I have more serious news from the realm of the spirit. This time for both of ye.”
Cait grasped Adam’s hand. “What is it?”
“When you defeated Morgan MacRath, he was in the middle of casting a curse on the castle and everyone in it. Ye stopped the worst of it, but part of the curse remains.”
“What sort of curse?” Adam asked.
“I’m still trying to sort that out, but the good news is that it doesna touch the pair of ye.”
“How can ye tell?” Cait squeezed Adam’s hand.
“Because everyone else in the castle is casting a white aura, whilst ye two look the same to me. I dinna ken yet what it means, and the castle folk appear to have taken no immediate harm but they’re all changed somehow. Now because the curse was incomplete, there’s a chance that it can be undone,” Farquhar said. “But I warn ye, it willna be an easy thing.”
“What’s required to break the curse?” Adam wanted to know.
“Time. Lots of it. The curse will last three hundred years, long past your life’s end. But there will come a future laird of Bonniebroch who will be tried by the prophecy and found either worthy or wanting.”
Cait leaned toward the mirror. “What prophecy?”
Farquhar smiled sheepishly. “The one I’ll write once I figure out the extent of the curse and how to break it, o’ course.” Farquhar squared his shoulders and straightened to his full, but inconsiderable, height. “But that’s as no matter the now. All I see for ye and his lordship is a long, happy life together.”
“And in all your seeing, Farquhar, have ye a notion what I’d like to see from ye?” Adam asked.
Farquhar blinked in surprise. “Why, no, milord. How may I serve ye?”
“By serving up a little privacy for me and my wife. We’re no’ long marrit ye ken.”
“Och, o’ course, yer lordship. I’ll see ye on the morrow then.” He began bowing and his image faded. In a few blinks, the only reflections Cait could see in the mirror were hers and Adam’s.
“Shall we cover the looking glass, do ye think?” she asked. “In case he comes back?”
“Nae need. Farquhar has more sense than that.” Adam blew out the single candle, plunging the room into fire-lit dimness. “Besides, I doubt ghosts are especially keen-eyed in the dark.”
He tugged her to her feet and pulled her into a deep embrace. The place in her heart that stored all the hurts of her young life—the loss of her mother, the negligent indifference of her father—was swept clean now. Adam’s kisses filled it with acceptance and worth and love.
“And how about you, milord?” She nuzzled his neck and then gave his earlobe a quick nip. “Are ye especially keen-eyed in the dark?”
“I dinna need to be so long as I keep ye close, lass.” Adam scooped her up and carried her to the waiting bed. “And believe me, Cait, I mean to keep ye close all my life.”
And as her husband covered her body with his, Cait smiled into the dark. Callum Farquhar, ye saved my man, and he saved me. Thank ye, wherever ye are.
Somewhere in Bonniebroch Castle, the spirit of the new steward smiled back.
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Alexander’s curiosity, along with other parts of him, was thoroughly piqued about what it might take to have her.
“I’m fair peeved with ye now, milord, what with ye no’ wantin’ to wed me.” Lucinda leaned toward him. “I think it would take considerable skill on your part for ye to convince me to allow ye a kiss.”
A smile tugged his lips. Nothing could be simpler. “What stakes will you wager?”
“How about me brooch?” She fingered the ivory cameo at her shoulder.
“You rate yourself too cheaply. That’s not nearly enough for your first kiss.” He eyed her mouth and was reminded again of a ripe peach. He’d bet it was as sweet as one too. How had she gone unkissed this long?
“What would ye consider a fair penalty should I lose then?”
“Actually,” he said, an idea for finding her an alternate bridegroom taking root in his mind, “I’d hate to think we’ll be wed without you having anyone with which to compa
re me. If I win this little wager, I expect you to kiss two, no, three other men between now and our wedding day.”
All he’d have to do was make sure she was caught kissing someone else by a busybody tongue-wagger and the ensuing scandal would break the engagement for him. Lucinda MacOwen would be shuffled off to the preacher with the other man she’d kissed quicker than she could say “Bonnie Prince Charlie.”
Her lips quirked. “A most original penalty. I accept. And if I dinna allow ye to kiss me, what should ye forfeit?”
“How about ownership of that prize Blackface ram?”
“Done,” she said in a businesslike tone. “A princely wager, sir. Grand Champion Black Watch Farrell Loromer has been the making of the MacOwen herd. My father once turned down two hundred pounds for him. Now, after offering me such a rich inducement not to succumb, how do ye propose to convince me to allow ye a kiss?”
Damn. He’d never considered that a sheep would be worth so much.
“You’re thinking about this all wrong,” he said. “A kiss isn’t a prize for a man’s enjoyment only. A woman well-kissed is a thoroughly contented creature.”
“Oh, aye?”
“Aye, I mean, yes.” He was an Englishman, dammit. It shouldn’t be so easy for his Scottish roots to pop out. “A kiss is more than the mere touch of two pairs of lips. It’s sharing a breath. It’s holding each other’s souls.”
Her lips parted softly. “Ye make it sound almost a sacrament.”
“If it’s done right, it almost is.” He moved closer to her on the bench, one arm slung casually over the granite back.
“And I suppose ye know how to do it right.”
“So I’ve been told.” He leaned toward her.
She leaned toward him too, till their faces were a hand’s breadth apart. Then she pulled back. “That’s still no’ enough for me to allow it.”
“The question of who allows a kiss isn’t really relevant. Both parties have to want it, need it, for a kiss to be truly magical. There’s no allowing. A real kiss just happens.”
