Beyond the Highland Myst

by Highlander 01-08

  Then she'd met this capable, mighty warrior, and in his shadow the real Jack Stone had come into sharper focus. As had her real feelings about him.

  She was angry at her father. Angry at his irresponsibility: his failure to have cars serviced, to take out life insurance, to carry adequate auto coverage, to plan for a future that might stretch beyond his present. In so many ways her father had been an overgrown child, no matter how charming he was. But Circenn Brodie would always plan for his family's future. If he wed, he would keep his wife and children safe, no matter the cost to himself. Circenn Brodie took precautions, controlled his environment, and built an impenetrable fortress for those he called his own.

  "Talk to me, lass."

  Lisa dragged herself from her bitter thoughts.

  "If you tell me why you seek so desperately to return, I will bring you the flask. Is it a man?" he asked warily. "I thought you told me there had been no one."

  The tension that had quickened in her veins while she'd sat in the doorway, clutching the knife and waiting for him, dissipated suddenly. She chided herself for her foolishness: She should have foreseen that force wouldn't work with this man.

  The primary reason she'd refused to discuss Catherine with him was that she hadn't wanted to make a fool of herself, to start talking and end up weeping openly before the impassive warrior. But her emotions were no longer under her control, and the need to talk consumed her, the need to have someone to trust, to confide in. Her defenses slipped further, leaving her raw and exposed. She sank to the floor. "No. It's nothing like that. It's my mother," she whispered.

  "Your mother what?" he pushed gently, sinking down beside her.

  "She's d-dying," she said. She dropped her head forward, creating a curtain with her hair.

  "Dying?"

  "Yes." She drew a deep breath. "I'm all she has left, Circenn. She's ill and won't live much longer. I was taking care of her, feeding her, working to support us. Now she is completely alone." Once the words had started coming, they tumbled forth more easily. Maybe he did care enough to help her. Maybe if she told him all of it, he would find a way to return her.

  "She was in a car wreck five years ago. We all were. My daddy died in it." She stroked the baseball cap lovingly. "He bought me this a week before the wreck." A bittersweet smile crossed her face at the memory. "The Reds won that day, and we went to dinner afterward with Mom, and that's the last time I remember us all being together except for the day of the wreck. It's my last good memory. After that, all I see are the crushed, jagged pieces of a blue Mercedes covered with blood and…"

  Circenn winced. Placing a finger beneath her chin, he forced her to look at him. "Och, lass," he whispered. He traced her tears with his thumb, his eyes mirroring her grief.

  Lisa was soothed by his compassion. She'd never spoken aloud of this, even to Ruby, although her best friend had tried many times to get her to talk about it. She was discovering that it wasn't as hard to confide in him as she'd feared. "Mom was crippled in the car wreck—

  "Car wreck?" he asked softly.

  She struggled to explain. "Machines. The Mercedes was a car. In my time we don't ride horses, we have metal"—she searched for a word to which he might relate—"carriages that carry us. Fast, sometimes too fast. The tire… er, wheel of the carriage came apart and we crashed into other machines. Daddy was crushed behind the steering wheel and died instantly." Lisa blew out a breath and paused for a moment. "When they released me from the hospital, I found a job as quickly as I could, and a second one to take care of me and Mom and pay the bills. We lost everything," she whispered. "It was horrible. We couldn't pay the lawsuits, so they took our home and everything we had. And I'd accepted it—I had—I'd accepted that was how my life would be, until you took me away in the middle of something that I have to finish. My mother has cancer and only a short time to live. No one is there to feed her, pay the bills, or hold her hand."

  Circenn swallowed. He could not interpret much of what Lisa had said, but he understood that her mother was dying and she had been trying to take care of everything for quite some time. "She is entirely alone? There is no other of your clan left alive?"

  Lisa shook her head. "Families aren't like yours in my time. My father's parents died long ago, and my mother was adopted. Now there's only Mom, and I'm stuck here."

  "Och, lass." He drew her into his arms.

  "Don't try to comfort me," she cried, pushing against his chest. "It's my fault. I'm the one who had to work in a museum. I'm the one who had to touch that damned flask. I'm the selfish one."

  Circenn dropped his hands and expelled a frustrated breath. There was not one selfish bone in her body, yet she was lambasting herself, carrying the blame for everything. He watched helplessly as she rocked back and forth, her arms wrapped around herself—a posture of deep grieving he'd seen far too many times in his life. "No one has ever been there to comfort you, have they?" he asked grimly.

  "You carried the weight of it all alone. This is untenable. This is what a husband is for," he muttered.

  "I don't have one."

  "Well, you do now," he said. "Let me be strong enough for both of us. I can, you know."

  She wiped angrily at her tears with the back of her hand. "I can't. Now do you see why I must return? For God's sake, will you please give me the flask? You promised when we were at Dunnottar that if there was a way for me to return, you would help me. Was that something you said merely to placate me? Must I beg? Is that what you want?"

  "Nay, lass," he said violently. "I never want that from you. I will give you the flask, but I must collect it. It is in a safe place. Will you trust me? Will you go to your chambers and await me there?"

  Lisa searched his face frantically. "Will you really bring it?" she whispered.

  "Aye. Lisa, I'd bring you the stars if it would cease your tears. I did not know. I knew none of this. You did not tell me."

  "You never asked."

  Circenn scowled as he mentally kicked himself. She was right. He hadn't. Not once had he said, Excuse me, lass, but were you doing something when I snatched you out of time with my curse? Were you wed? Did you have children? A dying mother who relied upon you, perhaps? He helped her to her feet, but the moment she had her balance she tugged her arm from his hand.

  "How long will it take you to retrieve it?"

  "A short time, a quarter hour, no more."

  "If you don't come to me, I will return with a bigger knife."

  "You won't need a knife, lass," he assured her. "I will bring it."

  She left silently, carrying part of his heart out the door with her.

  * * *

  Circenn opened his secret chamber and grimly retrieved the flask from the hidden compartment in the stone floor. It had never occurred to him that she'd had a full life in her time; he'd been so selfish that he'd never once asked her what he'd taken her away from. He had seen her only as proud, tenacious, sensual Lisa, as if she'd lived nowhere before she had come to him, but now he understood clearly. She had sacrificed most of her adult years caring for her mother, carrying burdens a laird would stagger beneath, nurturing the only clan she had left. It explained much: her resistance to adaptation, her continued attempts to search his castle, her illogical unwillingness to give up on the flask as a way to return home. He knew Lisa was an intelligent woman, and he suspected that deep down she realized that the flask wouldn't return her, but if she formally gave up on the flask, she would have no hope. People often clung to irrational hopes to avoid despair.

  His heart wept for her, because he knew that the only man who could return her would see her dead first. For the first time in his life he was furious with himself for refusing to learn the things Adam had so often offered to teach him.

  Come train with my kind, Adam had coaxed on numerous occasions. Let me teach you the fae arts. Let me show you the worlds you might explore.

  Never, Circenn had replied scornfully. I will never become like you.

  But the m
agic is inside you—

  I will never accept it.

  Yet now he would have given anything for the art of sifting time. Anything Adam wanted at all. He straightened his shoulders, closed the hidden chamber, and moved to the door. How could he have been so blind as not to realize that she'd had a life and lost it? How could he have ever thought she was duplicitous? The image of her huge green eyes, shimmering with tears as she'd gazed up at him, refusing his solace because she'd obviously never been given comfort and didn't know how to accept it, would burn forever in his mind.

  He had a difficult path to walk with her now. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, bracing himself for her discovery that she was truly trapped. With a deep sigh, he left his chambers.

  "Lass," he said softly.

  Lisa glanced up as he entered the room. She was huddled in the center of her bed, her pale face stained with tears. He fished about in his sporran and moved slowly to her side, making a journey he was reluctant to complete.

  "Stand up, lass," he said quietly.

  Lisa rose swiftly.

  He held out the flask.

  "You brought it," she whispered.

  "I told you I would. I should have done so before now. I knew you wanted it. I saw the look on your face when we were riding from Dunnottar and you glimpsed it in my pack."

  "You can read me so easily?"

  "Not always. Sometimes I can't read you at all, but that night I could. You'd been crying—"

  "I was not. I almost never cry. I only cried now because I'm so frustrated."

  "My apologies—it had been raining," he corrected swiftly, protecting her pride. His heart was touched: She was embarrassed by her tears. There was no shame in weeping. He'd seen her cheeks wet with tears several nights on their journey, but they'd been quiet tears, and he'd assumed it was part of her acceptance of her transition, never suspecting she was grieving over her mother. He was amazed that she hadn't wept openly before now. But she was resilient and tough, and that gave him hope that she would recover in time.

  "That night it was raining," she agreed. "Go on."

  "You glimpsed the flask as I removed an extra plaid. To protect you from the rain," he teased, hoping to lighten her grim mood.

  She arched a brow, but her eyes were sad, filled with unshed tears.

  He sighed and continued. "And I saw the hope in your eyes—a hope that centered upon my flask. I knew it couldn't return you, so I dismissed the thought, but I should have realized that you would need to prove to yourself that it wouldn't work," he said gently.

  "Give it to me," she demanded.

  He dreaded this, dreaded the moment when he would see in her lovely green eyes stark certainty that she could never return. He proffered the shimmering silver flask in silence.

  She reached for it. "How does it work?" she whispered.

  "It doesn't," he whispered back. "You only think it does."

  Her fingers closed on the flask. He watched as she wrapped her hand reverently around it. Wrapped both hands around it, did something funny with her feet, and closed her eyes. She muttered softly.

  "What are you saying?"

  "There's no place like home." The words were half mumbled but painfully clear to his ears. He winced. Aye, there was no place like home, he agreed silently, and he would do his best to make this feel like home to her, since he was the one who'd uprooted her with his thoughtless curse. "I am verra sorry, lass," he said softly, his brogue thickened by emotion.

  She didn't open her eyes, refused to move. Finally she crossed to the bed and lowered herself on it, tightly holding the flask. She looked as if she was mentally reciting every prayer or rhyme she'd ever learned. After a long time, she rose and stood by the fire.

  She stood like that, frozen, clutching the flask, for so long he finally sank into a chair beside her. How much time passed, he had no idea, but he would not move an inch until she accepted it, and then he would be there to wrap her in the shelter of his body.

  Full night had descended when she finally stirred, the dinner hour long past. Her hair shimmered in the firelight, her face was ashen, and her lashes were dark fans against her pale skin. He cursed when a tear slipped down her cheek.

  When she finally opened her eyes he saw pain in the brilliant green depths. Denial and acceptance warred on her expressive features—acceptance the brutal victor. She had held the flask, she had performed whatever ritual she believed in, and she had experienced incontestable defeat.

  "It didn't work," she said in a small voice.

  "Och, lass," he said with a sigh, helpless to alleviate her suffering.

  She began to fiddle with the stopper on the flask.

  "What are you doing?" he thundered, half rising from the chair, ready to rip the flask from her hand.

  "Perhaps if I drink this?" she said hesitantly.

  "Never, lass," he said, his olive complexion paling. "Trust me, you doona wish to do something so foolish."

  "What's in it?" she gasped, clearly stricken by his reaction.

  "Lisa, what is in that flask would not only fail to return you to your home, it would be the purest glimpse of hell for you. I would not lie to you. It is a poison of the vilest origin."

  He didn't need to say more to convince her. He could see her acceptance that not only wouldn't it take her home, it might kill her—or make her wish she were dead. He understood that Lisa, as sensible as she was, had now acknowledged that she'd been clinging to an impossible hope and would not do so again. If he said it wouldn't work, that was enough. By trusting her, he had gained her trust.

  She sniffed and, to her apparent chagrin, another tear slipped out. She dropped her head forward to hide behind her hair in the way he'd noticed she did when she was uncomfortable or embarrassed.

  Circenn moved swiftly, intending to catch the tear upon his finger, kiss it away, then kiss away all her pain and fear, and assure her that he would permit no harm to touch her and would spend his life making things up to her; but she dropped the flask onto the table and turned swiftly.

  "Please, leave me alone," she said and turned away from him.

  "Let me comfort you, Lisa," he entreated.

  "Leave me alone."

  For the first time in his life, Circenn felt utterly helpless. Let her grieve, his heart instructed. She would need to grieve, for discovering that the flask didn't work was tantamount to lowering her mother into a solitary grave. She would grieve her mother as if she'd in truth died that very day. May God forgive me, he prayed. I did not know what I was doing when I cursed that flask. He snatched the flask from the table, tucked it into his sporran, and left the room.

  * * *

  And that was that, Lisa admitted, curling up on the bed and pulling the curtains tight. In her cozy nest all she lacked was her stuffed Tigger and her mother's shoulder to cry on, but such comforts would never again be hers. As long as she hadn't tried the flask, she'd been able to pin all her hopes on it. She'd been astonished by Circenn's reaction to her confession—she'd glimpsed a kindred moisture in his eyes.

  You're falling, Lisa, her heart said softly, for more than a country.

  Good thing, she told her heart acerbically, because it looks like he's all I've got, for now and forever.

  She glanced around the curtained bed and snuggled deeper into the covers. The fire made her chamber toasty, and there was a flask of cider wine in a cubbyhole in the headboard. As she took a deep swallow, savoring the spicy, fruity taste, she gave in to her grief. Her mother would die alone and there was nothing Lisa could do to prevent it. She drank and cried until she was too exhausted to do more than roll onto her side and slip into the gentle, wine-induced oblivion of sleep.

  All I wanted was to hold her hand when she died was her last thought before dreaming.

  * * *

  Circenn Brodie stood beside the bed and watched Lisa sleep. He parted the filmy bed curtains and stepped close, dropping his hand to lightly touch her hair. Curled on her side, she'd folded both hands beneat
h one cheek, like a child. The faded red bill of her bonnet—base ball cap, he reminded himself—was crushed between her hands and a plaid she'd bunched up into a pillow of sorts. She had clearly cried herself to sleep, and it looked as if she had fought a losing battle with her covers. Gently, he eased the plaid away from her neck so she wouldn't strangle herself with it, then straightened the fabric twisted about her legs. She sighed and snuggled deeper into the soft mattress. Removing the wineskin from where it was nestled close to her side, he winced when he discovered it was empty, although he understood what had driven her to drink it.

  She had been seeking oblivion, a quest he'd embarked upon a time or two himself.

  She was lost. Torn from her home. Stranded in the middle of a century she couldn't possibly understand.

  And it was his fault.

  He would marry her, help her adjust, protect her from discovery—and most of all, protect her from Adam Black. One way or another, he promised himself firmly, he would make her smile again and win her heart. She was everything Brude and more. His mother would have loved this woman.

  "Sleep with the angels, my Brude queen," he said softly. But come back. This devil needs you like he's never needed anything before.

  As he turned to leave he spared a last glance over his shoulder. A faint smile curved his lips as he recalled her fascination with whipped cream. He hoped one day she would trust him, desire him enough to allow him to take his spoonful of whipped cream, trail it across her lovely body, and remove the sweet confection with his tongue.

  He would heal her. With his love.

  And he would never die on her—that he could promise.

  * * *

  "What's wrong?" Galan asked, taking one look at Circenn's grim expression as he entered the Greathall.

  The laird dropped himself heavily into a chair and picked up a flask of cider wine, absently turning it in his hands.