The long wand gleamed bright silvery-blue as the ancient raised his voice, chanting out his protection.
Sorley saw him, too, and laughed.
“Dare needs more than an old man’s mumblings,” he sneered, his blade stabbing. “Only your blood will cleanse it!”
Ronan grunted and fought off the other’s furious slashes. The ringing of steel and his own blood roared in his ears, blotting out all else.
His ribs blazed with unbearable heat, the muscles in his arms and shoulders on fire. The pain in his left foot slowed him, making it ever more difficult to hold his own against the guardsman’s attack.
Somewhere a woman screamed — Gelis? — and the terror in her cry gave him a burst of strength.
“Cuidich N’ Righ!” he yelled her war slogan, his blade clanking and scraping against Sorley’s.
With renewed zeal, he claimed the assault, yelling and slashing and driving the other back. They circled and feinted, then circled again, swords thrusting and clashing, their gazes locked and heated, both panting with exertion.
Sweat dripped into Ronan’s eyes, stinging and blinding him, but he didn’t dare blink. Instead, he leaped backward and then spun around, raising his blade high for a deadly, two-handed swing.
But Sorley whirled as well, a bright splash of red streaking around his middle even as Ronan’s sword sank deep into his shoulder, sliding against bone.
Sorley’s eyes bulged and his own blade fell from his hand. He clutched his stomach, the blood gushing there spilling over his hands and onto the rushes.
“A Highlander ne’er betrays his own,” Ronan panted, sickened by the sight of his own steel plunged deep into a kinsman’s breast.
He stared at his erstwhile friend, some detached part of his mind wondering why a shoulder cut bloomed so fatally red around the guardsman’s waist.
And then Sorley toppled face-first onto the rushes and he saw.
Gelis’ s — nae, Hector’ s — sgian dubh raged hilt-deep from the guardsman’s back.
The boy stood at the edge of the throng, staring round-eyed at the little blade’s horn handle.
“He j-jumped onto it,” he spluttered, shaking his head. “I was only holding it and h-he leaped backward and then whirled round. I didn’t mean —”
“To be sure, and you didn’t.”
Gelis.
Her face pale, but her eyes shining, she was suddenly at the lad’s side. She pulled him against her, stroking his hair and crooning. Shielding his eyes as Ronan did what he must, flipping his kinsman onto his back and then bracing his foot against the dead man’s chest to free his blade.
He tossed the sword aside and dropped to his knees, reaching to shut Sorley’s eyes, but before he could Gelis cried out and slumped to the rushes.
Ronan jumped back up, scooping her into his arms and clutching her against him, but she fell anyway, twirling and tumbling through icy darkness.
Down and down she fell, the loud buzzing in her ears blending with her scream and the distant sound of a man calling her name.
Then — as before — she slammed to a halt, this time landing on something hard and cold.
Stone, or tight-packed earth, it cradled rather than hurt her. But the darkness was suffocating. Impenetrable and cloying, it swirled around her like a great black shroud, pressing ever closer until she was sure her lungs would burst from lack of air.
Gelis.
The man called her name again, his voice deep and much louder now.
Then suddenly the blackness lightened and receded a bit, but she still found herself in a small, cramped place, airless and cold.
She shivered and drew up her knees, chilled by the spinning gray mist and the surety that this was a place forsaken and damned. Sculpted of stone and silent as the ages, its emptiness reached for her, clinging tight and grasping, as if she was its sole salvation.
Then he was there.
Kneeling as he’d been just before her fall, though — as before — his gold neck torque was missing, and his well-loved features seemed just a bit different — not quite those she knew so well, yet still achingly familiar.
The streaming raven hair was the same, thick, glossy, and skimming his shoulders, just as his eyes blazed with an inner heat, though she knew instinctively that the passion burning there was not for her.
This man wasn’t the Raven.
And his needs, though passionate, were . . . others.
A burning desire that went deeper than this world, calling to her from a great, great distance even though he knelt on bended knee before her, his outstretched arms so close she could have grasped his hands.
If she could have moved her own.
But she could only stare, her heart thumping wildly, and the icy gray mist holding her firmly in place, not letting her move or even cry out.
He loomed closer then, kneeling directly before her, so close she could smell the cold, damp must of ancient earth and stone that clung to him.
Again, she shivered, his chill sweeping her, seeping deep into her bones.
His stare pierced her, seeming to search her soul as a large stone appeared in his hands. Gray, round, and absolutely ordinary, it nevertheless managed to glow and pulse, its heat singeing her.
“I beg you . . .” His voice rang in her ears.
No longer kneeling, he bent over her, his stone cradled against his chest. “Free the raven,” he pleaded, the words seeming to catapult her into the air, sending her spinning upward and away from him.
Free the raven . . .
She heard the plea again and again, the three words accompanying her as she spiraled ever higher until, at last, she began falling again, once more hurtling through darkness, but this time landing on something soft and warm.
Her eyes snapped open and he was still there.
He leaned over her, looming close, just as he had a moment before, but his stone was gone and the bright glint of gold shone at his neck.
They were no longer in the tight and musty confines of a cold stone-lined room. Now she lay secure in the enclosed silk-and-furred safety of her own dark oaken four-poster.
But her breath hitched and through the gap in the bed’s brocaded curtains she spied at least a dozen fine wax candles flickering in iron wall brackets.
The Raven’s bedchamber, she’d bet her life, though she searched the shadows, needing to be sure.
Familiar wall tapestries and her husband’s own bearskin rugs greeted her, not to mention the untidy pile of her well-packed MacKenzie strongboxes.
On the far side of the room, a birch-and-peat fire blazed on the hearth and Buckie sprawled in its glow. At ease, though still wholly alert, he’d rested his head on his paws and was staring at the bed, his rheumy gaze unblinking.
Gelis’s heart squeezed seeing him there, some memory she couldn’t quite place making her eyes water and burn.
But the man bending over her and stroking her hair so lovingly was the true reason a tear spilled free to track down her cheek.
He was caressing her lovingly.
And the look in his eyes said everything.
“Ronan.” Her voice cracked on his name. “I thought you were going to die.”
“And I feared you had!” He drew a great breath, his eyes dark. “Sakes, lass, but you scared me.”
He shoved a hand through his hair then and glanced over his shoulder at Buckie, his own voice a bit huskier than usual. “You frightened us both.”
His ears perking on the words, the old dog pushed to his feet and hinked across the room to join them, his hips swaying and his claws clicking wherever the floor rushes proved a bit thin.
“I’ve ne’er seen Buckie enter this room.” Ronan looked down when the dog bumped against him.
He dropped a hand to rub Buckie’s ears, but the dog took no heed. Pressing closer to the bed, the beast thrust his head past the curtaining to nudge Gelis’s arm with his nose.
Ronan stepped aside when Buckie’s tail began to swish enthusiastically.<
br />
Gelis smiled, certain the world was melting.
The Raven grunted and — she was sure — tried to appear unmoved.
“He hasn’t left your side since you fell to the rushes in the hall,” he said then, speaking above the popping of the fire’s birch logs. “If you’d hear the right of it, he prowled back and forth in front of the bed until his legs wouldn’t carry him anymore and then he went to rest before the fire.”
“He . . . ach, fie on me!” Gelis lifted a hand to swipe the dampness from her face. “MacKenzies never cry!”
“Neither do MacRuaris, but you brought me close.” He looked at her, his expression dark, almost desperate. “ I — damnation, lass! Whate’er have you done to me!”
With a groan, he flung back the bed drapes and grabbed her by the shoulders, pulling her hard against him. He kissed her roughly, digging his fingers into her flesh and squeezing tight, holding fast as if he feared she’d slip from his arms any moment, disappearing into nothingness.
“Dinna e’er do that again.” He drew back to breathe the words against her lips, his heart pounding so fast, she could feel its furious beat through his plaid.
She appeared to be naked.
Something she only now became aware of, with his arms tightening around her and the slightly scratchy wool of his plaid rubbing against her nipples.
They peaked and tingled and a distinct molten dampness touched her inner thighs, that part of her, too, reacting to his embrace. The way he kissed and nipped along her jawline, then dipped his head to nuzzle her neck.
“You undressed me.” She shivered on the words.
“Sweet lass — I had to.” He sat beside her on the bed and pulled her even closer, one hand now smoothing circles up and down her bared back. “For all I knew, there could have been more than one blackheart in the hall. I had to make certain you were unharmed.”
“I am . . . well.” She leaned into him, sure her heart would burst any moment.
“Was it your gift, then?” He kissed her brow, rubbed his face against her hair. “Just tell me that whate’er befell you wasn’t something you ate or drank in the hall.”
He looked at her, his gaze earnest. “That was Sorley’s plan, see you. He —”
“It had naught to do with him.” She closed her eyes, not wanting to think about the scene in the hall.
How frightened she’d been and, aye, how certain that Ronan was doomed.
After all, she’d seen his death foretold when her taibhsearachd had shown her the blackness slowly engulfing him.
Or so she’d believed.
Now she knew better.
And her relief watered her knees.
“It was my second sight, aye.” She touched a finger to his golden neck torque. “One of several taibhs I’ve had in recent times. I thought they were all of you. Though” — she took a deep breath — “now I know they were not, leastways not the last two.”
He sat back at once, his jaw hardening. “You have visions of other men?”
Gelis scooted away from him and scrambled off the bed, heedless of her nakedness.
In truth, she felt like whirling and jigging, so greatly did his jealousy thrill her.
But the soul who’d appeared to her deserved and needed her help.
Whirling and jigging could wait.
So she took another deep breath and tossed back her hair.
“Not other men,” she said, setting her hands on her hips. “But one who looked very much like you. I believe he was your forebear, Maldred the Dire.”
The Raven shot to his feet. “That’s no’ possible. He’s been dead since pagan times . . . since before these great hills were young.”
He frowned. “Nae, it canna be. He —”
Gelis tilted her head. “Will you deny the kisses we’ve shared in the mists of my visions?”
She let her gaze slide down the front of him. “Our passion?”
“That’s different.” He shook his head, clearly caught off guard. “Aye, that was very, very . . . other.”
“How so?” She stepped up to him, twined her fingers in his hair. “If you can hold and kiss me in such a place, why can’t Maldred appear to me there as well?”
“Because I am alive.”
“That proves naught.” She smiled, flashing her triumph. “Save that we were meant to be.”
His face went all stony.
He looked anything but convinced.
She let go of his hair and slid her fingers over his neck torque. “Know this, then.” She laid on her smoothest tone. “It is a great and difficult feat for a living soul to appear to another in such a way. A soul —”
He huffed, cutting her off.
“A soul,” she went on regardless, “one already dwelling in the saoghal thall — the Yonder World — can achieve the like much easier.”
Stepping back, she placed her hands on her hips again. “That is the way of it.”
“I still dinna like the idea.” He crossed his arms. “And why would Maldred appear to you?”
“Perhaps because he knows everyone else wants nothing to do with him.” She lifted her chin, sure of it. “He needs me and knows I will help him.”
The Raven snorted.
“The saintliest saint couldn’t help that one,” he said, frowning again.
“He could not appear to me or any other soul, if the Old Ones wished to deny him.”
Ronan harrumphed again.
Crossing the room, he snatched a folded plaid off a chair and returned to swirl it around her.
“I’ll no’ have you standing naked when we’re speaking of the man,” he groused, knotting the plaid at her shoulder. “He was said to have been irresistible to women.”
Once again Gelis felt a ridiculous urge to dance and jig.
Instead, she stood still while the Raven fussed and straightened the plaid, smoothing and tucking in its folds for her.
She clenched her fists, not quite ready for him to see that each brush of his fingers against her skin sent tingly firelicks of heat rippling across her nerves.
Sweet tingly heat that set her belly all a-quiver and lit a fire in the secret place low by her thighs.
Then he stepped back, looking satisfied.
“That’s better.” He dusted his hands and glanced around the candlelit room almost as if he expected to see his ancestor leap out of the shadows at him.
“No need to tempt the old marauder — if he is about!”
“He isn’t concerned with women.” She tried to reassure him, his words reminding her of the spirit’s sadness.
The piercing stare Maldred had fixed on her.
“He needs us to help him and” — she drew a breath to present her coup de grâce — “he wants to help us.”
The Raven’s eyes widened. “Howe’er can he help us?”
“ ’Tis simple.” Gelis smiled. “I am quite sure he showed me where the Raven Stone is hidden.”
Chapter Sixteen
His tomb?”
Ronan nearly choked on his surprise. “Then, sweet lass, your gift has lied to you. “Or” — he waved away her protest — “you’ve falsely interpreted what you saw.”
His lady huffed and set her own hand to slashing the air.
“I do know what the inside of a tomb looks like,” she minded him, her tone fringing on indignant.
High color stained her cheeks and, as so oft, her braid had come undone. Her hair tumbled to her hips in a welter of red-gold curls, each glossy strand gilded by fire glow and tempting him beyond reason.
There were things a man could do with such tresses.
Things that had scarce little to do with long-dead ancestors and their hoary resting places.
Ronan shoved a hand through his hair and bit back a groan. He didn’t want to talk about old bones and burial grounds. Not with her looking so fetching in his plaid that he couldn’t think straight.
She, however, seemed determined.
And she’d definitely taken up Maldred�
��s torch.
Her sparking eyes and the jut of her chin proved it.
“I once crept inside the family tomb at Eilean Creag.” She started walking around the room, her steps making her breasts bounce. “I was young, and — and I wanted to see bogles. They hid from me, as ghosts are known to do, but I did get a good look at the tomb.”
Ronan folded his arms. “That changes naught. Maldred wasn’t buried in a tomb. He —”
“I know what I saw.” She halted in front of him. “He was in a small stone chamber, dark, cold, and airless,” she said, emphasizing each word with a finger-jab in his chest. “It could only have been his tomb.”
Ronan drew in a great breath and let it out slowly. “You’ve seen the man’s grave, lass. ’Tis a table grave in the family’s oldest burial ground. All that remains to mark where Maldred lies is a broken stone slab. It ne’er was a tomb.”
“He’s in one all the same,” she insisted. “And his Raven Stone is there with him. That, too, I saw. He held it out to me and told me to ‘free the raven.’ ”
“He what?” Ronan’s heart stopped.
He’d never told her the full tradition of the stone.
And he could tell she didn’t know.
If she did, her triumph couldn’t be contained.
“He told me to ‘free the raven,’ ” she repeated, pacing again. “I think he was assuring me that by loving you, I will free you of the curse you think you carry. That Dare will then be —”
“He didn’t mean me, sweetness.”
Ronan turned to the nearest window, hoping the chill night air seeping through the shutter slats would restore the color to his cheeks.
He was sure all the blood had drained from his face.
He’d felt it happen.
Just as he could no longer deny his lady had truly seen Maldred, wherever the knave held himself.
Even more alarming was the soul-piercing possibility that the maligned old goat wasn’t quite the malefactor everyone thought.
At the very least, if his bogle did exist, the centuries might have made him a bit repentant.
There seemed no other explanation.
Seducing a Scottish Bride Page 25
