Beyond the Highland Myst

by Highlander 01-08

"Regardless of how you perceive what happened, you still have a family here, and a clan who needs its laird. If you can't do the job, then step aside for someone who can!"

  "Who the hell put you in charge of me?" Hawk roared.

  Tavis's own burr thickened as his temper mounted. "Your mother, you bletherin' idiot! And even if she hadna asked me, I would have come after you myself! You may be killing yourself, lad, but I'll no' be having you torturing Lydia while you're doing it!"

  "All I'm doing, old man, is having a wee bit of a drink," Hawk protested.

  "You've been having a 'wee bit of a drink' for over a month now. I, for one, am tired of watching you guzzle yourself to death. If you canna put down the bottle, then just get the hell out. Go piss the night away in a snowdrift where the people who love you are no' forced to watch."

  Tavis kicked open the doors and tossed the stumbling Hawk face-first into the snow.

  "And doona be coming back in until you can be nice to your mother! When you're ready to be laird again, and you've given up the bottle, you can return. But not until then!" Tavis roared as the Hawk struggled to pull his head out of a drift.

  When Hawk finally managed to struggle upright, he snorted disbelievingly when he saw the man he'd thought of as a mild-mannered tanner send the Hawk's own guards to stand wide-legged in front of the door, crossed arms clearly barring him entrance into his own castle.

  "Just stay out!" Tavis bellowed with such volume that Hawk heard him through the castle's heavy wooden doors.

  * * * * *

  Adrienne hadn't realized how thoroughly she hated winter.

  The pale face of the clock above the mantel chimed once, twice, then lapsed into silence. Two o'clock in the morning; a time when being awake could make a person feel like the only living creature left in the world. And Adrienne did feel that way, until Marie silently entered the library. Adrienne glanced up and opened her mouth to say good night, but instead a deluge of words flooded out despite the dam she'd so painstakingly erected.

  Marie tucked herself into an armchair and smoothed an afghan across her lap.

  Adrienne poked at the fire and opened a bottle of sweet port while she told Marie a story she'd never told anyone. The story of the orphan girl who thought she'd fallen in love with a prince, only to discover that Eberhard Darrow Garrett had been a prince of organized crime and that he'd been sending her on vacations to get drugs across the border in her luggage, her car, sewn into her clothing. And how, since she had always been packed and unpacked by his attendants, she hadn't known. She'd simply enjoyed wearing his incredible ten-carat diamond engagement ring, riding in his limos, and thumbing her nose at the Franciscan nuns in the old orphanage on First Street. How she hadn't known that the FBI had been drawing its net around him ever tighter. She'd seen that a wealthy, undeniably attractive man was showering her with love, or so she'd thought at the time. She'd had no idea she was a last-ditch effort to get a series of shipments out of the country. She'd never suspected that she was less than nothing to him—a beautiful, innocent young woman no one would ever suspect. His perfect pigeon.

  Until the day she'd overheard a terrible conversation she'd never been meant to hear.

  She told Marie in a hushed voice how she'd turned state's evidence and bought her own freedom. And then how Eberhard, whom the FBI had managed to miss after all, had come after her in earnest.

  Marie sipped her port and listened.

  She told Marie how when she'd finally been trapped by him in an old abandoned warehouse, sick of running and hiding and being afraid, she'd done the only thing she could do when he'd raised his gun.

  She'd killed him before he could kill her.

  * * * * *

  At that point Marie waved an impatient hand. "Eees not real story. Why you tell me this?" she asked, accusingly.

  Adrienne blinked. She'd just told the woman what she'd been afraid to tell anyone. That she'd killed a man. She'd done it in self-defense, granted, but she'd killed a man. She told Marie things she'd never trusted to anyone before, and the woman waved it away. Pretty much accused her of wasting her time. "What do you mean, Marie? It was real," she said defensively. "It happened. I was there."

  Marie rummaged through her small reticule of English to find the right words. "Yes yes, senorita. May be ees real, but ees not important. Ees over and forgotten. And ees not why you weep like world ees ending. Tell me real story. Who cares where you come from, or I? Today matters. Yesterday ees skin on a snake, to be shed many times."

  Adrienne sat very still for a long moment as a chill worked its way down her spine and into her belly. The hall clock chimed the quarter hour and Adrienne gazed at Marie with new appreciation.

  Drawing a deep breath, Adrienne told her of Dalkeith-Upon-the-Sea. Of Lydia. And of Sidheach. Marie's brown eyes lit with a sparkle, and Adrienne was treated to a rare sight she'd bet few people had ever seen. The tiny olive-skinned woman laughed and clapped her small hands to hear of her love and of her time with the Hawk. She latched on to details, oohing over the nursery, glaring at her for saying Adam's name too many times, ahhing over their time together in Uster, sighing over the wedding that should have been.

  "Ah… finally… this ees real story." Marie nodded.

  * * * * *

  In 1514, the Hawk was trying desperately to sleep. He'd heard a man could freeze to death if he fell asleep in the snow. But either it was too damned cold in that drift or he wasn't quite drunk enough. He could remedy that. Shivering, he pulled his tartan closer against the bitter, howling wind. Stumbling to his feet, he teetered unevenly up the exterior stairs to the rooftop, knowing the guards often kept a few bottles up there to keep them warm while they stood watch.

  No such luck. No bottles and no guards. How could he have forgotten? The guards were all inside, where it was warm. He was the only one outside. He kicked aimlessly at the snow on the roof, then stiffened when a shadow shifted, black against the gleaming snow. He squinted and peered through the wet swirling flakes. "What the hell are you doing up here, Grimm?"

  Grimm reluctantly abandoned his persistent survey of the falling dusk. He was about to explain when he saw the Hawk's face and kept his silence instead.

  "I said, what are you doing up here, Grimm? They tell me you practically live on my roof now."

  Suddenly furious, Grimm retorted, "Well, they tell me you practically live in a bottle of whisky now!"

  Hawk stiffened and rubbed his unshaven jaw. "Don't yell at me, you son of a bitch! You're the one who lied to me about my—" He couldn't say the word. Couldn't even think it. His wife, about whom Grimm had been right. His wife, who had left him for Adam.

  "You are so unbelievably dense you can't even see the truth when it's right in front of you, can you?" Grimm snapped.

  The Hawk swayed drunkenly, God, where had he heard those words before? Why did they make his heart lurch inside his chest? "What are you doing up here, Grimm?" he repeated stubbornly, clutching at the parapet to steady himself.

  "Waiting for a blasted falling star so I can wish her back, you drunken fool."

  "I don't want her back," Hawk snarled.

  Grimm snorted. "I may have mucked it up once, but I'm not the only one who let his emotions interfere. If you would just get past your foolish pride and anger, you'd realize that the lass would never have left you willingly for that blasted smithy!"

  Hawk flinched and rubbed his face. "What say you, man?"

  Grimm shrugged and turned away, his dark eyes searching the sky intently. "When I thought she was breaking your heart, I tried to keep the two of you apart. 'Twas a damn fool thing for me to do, I know that now, but I did what I thought was best at the time. How the hell was I supposed to know you two were falling in love? I've had no such experience. It seemed like a bloody battle to me! But now, thinking back on it, I'm fair certain she loved you from the very beginning. Would that we all could see forward with such clarity. If you'd pull your head out of that bottle and your own stubborn ass long enough,
you might develop keen vision as well."

  "She-said-she-loved-the-smithy," Hawk spit each word out carefully.

  "She said, if you'll recall, that she loved him like Ever-hard. Tell me Hawk, how did she love her Ever-hard?"

  "I don't know," Hawk snarled.

  "Try to imagine. You told me yourself that he broke her heart. That she talked of him while you held her—

  "Shut up, Grimm!" the Hawk roared as he stalked away.

  * * * * *

  Hawk wandered the snow-covered gardens with his hands pressed over his ears to stem the flood of voices. He removed his hands from his ears only long enough to take another swig from the bottle he'd pilfered from the stable boy. But oblivion never came and the voices didn't stop—they just grew louder and clearer.

  I love you, Sidheach. Trust you, with all my heart and further then.

  None of my falcons have ever flown my hand without returning, he had warned her at the beginning of that magic summer.

  You were right about your falcons, Sidheach, she'd said when she left with Adam. He'd wondered many a night why she'd said those words; they'd made no sense to him at all. But now a hint of understanding penetrated his stupor.

  Right about his falcons…

  Had his own jealousy and insecurity about the smithy so muddled his vision?

  None of my falcons have flown my hand…

  Hawk lurched to his feet as a terrible thought occurred to him.

  The day of their wedding she'd been gone from his side for more than two hours. He hadn't been able to find her. Then she'd walked hurriedly out of the broch. He'd wanted to take her back into the sweet coolness to make love to her and she'd carefully and determinedly steered him away. They'd gone to the stable instead.

  What had she been doing in the broch on their wedding day?

  He sped through the frosty garden and leapt the low stone wall, racing through the lower bailey. He threw open the door of the broch and stood, gasping great breaths into his lungs. It was too dark with night falling. He went back outside and drew open the shutters. Not much light, but maybe it would be enough.

  Hawk stood in the center of the round tower, memories tumbling around him. Eventually his eyes adjusted to the gloom. What were you trying to tell me, lass?

  His mind whirled while his eyes searched the floor, the ceiling, the walls…

  There.

  He crossed to the wall by the door and there it was in tiny letters. Printed on the dark wall with chalky white limestone.

  None of your falcons have flown you willingly, my love. Always yours! A.D.S.D.

  A tiny leak sprang in the dam that had held back his anguish, releasing a trickle of pain that went on and on. She'd tried to tell him. He uses no coercion against me, she'd said. But coercion the smithy had obviously used against someone or something that Adrienne cared about more than she'd cared for her own happiness.

  How could he have not figured it out before? That his cherished wife would have sacrificed everything to keep Dalkeith safe, just as he would. That hers was a love so deep, so unselfish, she would have walked through hell and back again to protect what she loved.

  Hawk groaned aloud as memories tumbled through his mind. Adrienne bathing with him in a cool spring on their return from Uster, and the simple reverence in her eyes as she surveyed the untamed landscape that was Scotia. Adrienne's eyes glowing every time she gazed up at Dalkeith's stone walls. Adrienne's tenderness and gentle heart hidden carefully behind her aloof facade.

  The bastard smithy must have found her in the broch, or perhaps he'd been trailing her. Adam had obviously threat ened to use his strange powers to destroy Dalkeith, and Adrienne had done whatever he'd asked to prevent that. Or was it he, the Hawk, Adam had threatened to destroy? That thought sent him into an even bleaker rage. So, his wife had given herself up to protect him and left him a loving message to let him know what she couldn't risk telling him. That she would always love him. Her strange words had been carefully selected to make him wonder why she'd said them. To make him go to the falcon broch and look around. She hadn't been able to risk being any more explicit tor fear Adam would catch on.

  She must have written the words only moments before he'd found her the day of the wedding. Knowing that she had to leave him to keep him safe, she had wanted one last thing—for him to hold fast to his belief in her.

  But he hadn't. He'd raged like a wounded animal, quickly believing the worst.

  He swallowed the bitter bile of shame. She'd never stopped loving him. She'd never left him willingly. Small comfort now.

  How could he ever have doubted her for even a minute?

  The bottle dropped from his hands with a thump. Sidheach James Lyon Douglas, most beautiful man and renowned lover of three continents, man the very Fae might have envied, sank to the ground and sat very still. So still that the tears almost froze on his cheeks before slipping to the ground.

  * * * * *

  Hours later, Hawk made the slow, sober journey back up to the rooftop and sat heavily beside Grimm. As if their earlier conversation had never been interrupted he said, "Ever-hard… She said he used her for a fool, and she cried."

  Grimm looked at his best friend and almost shouted with relief. The wild black eyes were mostly sane again. The jagged, brittle pieces of his heart no longer dangled from his sleeve. There was just a glimmer of the old Hawk's determination and strength in his face, but a glimmer was a good start. "Hawk, my friend, there is not a man, woman, or child at Dalkeith who believes she left you willingly. Either I can stay up here and freeze my ladycrackers of trying to find a falling star, or you can do something about it yourself. I—and my freezing nether regions—would thank you most assuredly. As would all of Dalkeith. Do something, man."

  Hawk closed his eyes and took a deep, shuddering breath. "Like what? You saw them vanish into thin air. I don't even know where to look."

  Grimm pointed to the smoky crest of Brahir Mount in silence, and the Hawk nodded slowly.

  "Aye. The Rom."

  Grimm and the Hawk passed a moment staring silently into the swirling gray mists.

  "Hawk?"

  "Hmmm?"

  "We'll get her back," Grimm promised.

  * * *

  CHAPTER 33

  it took more than a month of frustrated searching to find the Rom. They'd moved on to warmer climes for the winter. It was Grimm who finally tracked them down and brought Rushka back to Dalkeith. Unknown to the Hawk, recovering Adrienne had become Grimm's personal penance, and finding the Rom had been but a minor step along the way.

  "Who is Adam Black, really?" Hawk asked.

  Everyone gathered in the Great Hall had wondered that same question at some point during the strange smithy's stay, and they all leaned closer to hear the answer.

  "You Highlanders call his people the daoine sith. Adam is the fairy fool. The jester at the Fairy Queen's court." Rushka sighed and ran worried hands through his silver hair.

  "Fairies," Grimm echoed carefully.

  "Oh, don't go getting spooked on me, Grimm Roderick."

  Rushka snapped. "You heard the banshee yourself the night your people were killed. You saw the bean nighe, the washerwoman, scrubbing the bloody gown of your mother before she died. Just makes me wonder what else you've witnessed of which you speak naught." Rushka broke off abruptly and shook his head. "But that's neither here nor there. The simple fact is that the Fairy inhabit these islands. They have since long before we came, and they probably will continue to do so long after we're gone."

  "I've always believed," Lydia said softly.

  Hawk shifted uneasily by the fire. He had been raised on legends of the Fairy, and the fairy fool—the sin siriche du—was the most dangerous of the lot. "Tell me how to beat him, Rushka. Tell me everything there is to know."

  Keeping track of the past was an astonishing feat of memory, and not all of the Rom could maintain such exhaustive records in their heads. But Rushka was one of the finest lorekeepers, and he was
revered for being able to recite the ancient tales word for word—his father's words, and those of his father's father before him—back fifty generations.

  "It was told to me as follows." Rushka took a deep breath and began.

  "There are two ways to be certain one is safe from the Fae. One is to exact the Queen's oath upon the pact of the Tuatha De Danaan. That is nearly impossible to obtain for she rarely bothers herself with the doings of mortals. The other is to secure the true name of the fairy with whom one is dealing. One must then pronounce the name correctly, in the being's own tongue, while looking directly into the fairy's eyes, and issue one command. This command must be explicit and complete, for it will be obeyed precisely and only to the letter. There is no limit on the length of the com mand but that it must be spoken unbroken, conjoined, never-ending. One may pause, but one may never finish a sentence until the entire command is complete. If the command is broken to resume conversation with anyone, the extent of obedience summarily ends." Rushka paused a moment studying the fire. "So you see, our histories say that if you look directly into his eyes while calling his true name, he is yours to command." Rushka paced uneasily before the fire in the Greathall.

  "What is his true name?"

  Rushka smiled faintly and sketched several symbols in the ash of the hearth. "We do not speak it aloud. But he is the black one, the bringer of oblivion. He has many other names, but'tis only this one that concerns you."

  Hawk was incredulous. If he had only spoken Adam's name in Gaelic, he would have had it. "That simple, Rushka? You mean to tell me he was so smug and sure of himself that he called himself Adam Black?" Amadan Dubh. Hawk echoed the name in the privacy of his mind. Literally translated it meant Adam Black.

  "Aye. But there's still a catch, Hawk. You have to find him first. He can only be compelled if he is present and you utter his name while looking directly into his eyes. And they say his eyes can send a man swiftly into madness."

  "Been there already," Hawk murmured absently. "Why didn't you tell me this when he was still here? Before he took Adrienne back?"