[Druids Bidding 02.0] RenFaire Druids: Dunskey Castle Prequels

by Jane Stain

  It seemed Siobhan wouldn’t be as much help as Emily had assumed. Why had she interrupted? Would she even answer if Emily called or texted?

  Emily’s curiosity demanded to know as much as it could uncover about the mysterious and alluring man.

  Her heart agreed.

  Her common sense told her to relax and just enjoy the few hours she had left with Dall.

  Shut up, she told it.

  “What else have you studied, besides Gaelic?”

  Dall took a moment to think this time before he answered. “English, French, Norwegian, Swedish, and a little Dutch.”

  Emily felt her jaw dropping. Only the nobility could read and write back then, let alone study other languages. A thousand more questions formed in her mind, but before she could ask even one, a smattering of applause broke out in the streets.

  Everyone around her stood.

  Dall extended his arm to her, and with quite a clamor, all two hundred of them quickly exited the roped-off clan meeting area.

  Emily was dying to ask Dall to stay in touch, and at the same time she didn’t dare for fear of shortening what little time she had with him. Clinging to his arm as if it were a life preserver and she couldn’t swim, Emily tried her best not to cry as the entire clan paraded down the street. The sun was getting low in the sky, and the air was going chill. None of the stages had anything going on anymore.

  No one tried to get her to buy their wares. Most of the fairgoers were crowded around the ale stands now, or busy shopping for souvenirs at the now crowded booths. The streets were empty of play and singing and laughter.

  Emily figured that those actors who earlier had been in the streets pretending to sell hot cross buns and playing small tricks on the tourists were likely all backstage now, winding down from their day together.

  She wanted to ask Dall to take her back there, as a way to sort of sneak in and be part of that, a faire insider. And she would have if she weren’t certain that Siobhan would tell Dall no, grab him, and pull him away from her forever.

  Very soon, Emily would be in Vange’s car, speeding away from the faire until next year. So she clung to Dall’s arm, miserable in her head even while her heart soared at being near him.

  Emily’s mood soon brightened, though.

  Out in the street with Vange, Ian, and Siobhan nearby, Dall took both of Emily’s hands and twinkled his eyes at her.

  “Emily, I had great pleasure in oor day togither. I dinna want it tae end. Would ye and yer best lass like tae come back for the run o’ the faire?”

  Finally.

  She had the urge to hug the man, but…

  She willed him to make a way to come see her, once he knew her plight.

  “Oh Dall, we would love to, but we spent all our extra money for the whole month getting into the faire today and buying these costumes.”

  Unexpectedly this made him smile. “’Tis good that ye did, lass.”

  “Huh?” Too late, Emily remembered not to scrunch her forehead up. Her mother always said that would give her wrinkles.

  Dall calmed her a bit by squeezing her hands. “Yer costumes—and meeting us—mean ye can come back for free, as faire people on the gate list.”

  “Really?” This was everything Emily had dared to hope for. Not only would she keep seeing Dall, but she and Vange would be faire insiders. They would find out if all the rumors of wild night shows and late night parties were true. And she would have more chances to find out where Dall really came from. But she had to admit, the best part was she could keep seeing Dall…

  Afraid to get her hopes up and have them dashed away, Emily looked at Ian and Siobhan’s faces to see if they thought this was possible.

  They seemed to agree that it was.

  They were nodding and smiling at her and Vange.

  “Aye, lass,” Dall said with his hands warm and real in hers. “Yer costumes are English, sae ye canna be part o’ the clan, but Ian has found ye other places, if ye want?” His face was hopeful and showed such … longing for her.

  Emily looked at Vange for her reaction.

  But her friend was already nodding. “What will we be doing?”

  Dall looked to Emily for her answer.

  She nodded an emphatic yes.

  “Let us hae Ian show ye,” Dall said, raising the burlap wall to create a gateway to the backstage area.

  2 Highlander

  Ian took them to a booth that sold handmade boots. Some of them were ordinary brown, but most were multicolored pictures made of leather: Celtic patterns, birds, animals, trees, flowers…

  A sign said “Custom orders welcome.”

  Emily looked at the prices.

  Yikes.

  The least expensive pair—plain brown leather shoes—were $200. The fancy decorated boots that went up to the knee were $1,000.

  Vange slowly turned in the middle of the booth, taking it all in.

  “Wow, someone is a master cobbler.”

  “Five generations of someones, actually,” said a smiling grey-haired man.

  “These are the two lovely ladies I told you about, Simon,” said Ian.

  “Well met, lovely ladies.”

  Vange Laughed.

  “This is Emily, and I’m Evangeline. We both love your booth. Ian says you can get us on some sort of gate list where we can get into the renaissance faire for free. What type of help do you want in exchange?”

  Simon gazed at their new English peasant costumes and then looked pointedly at Vange’s sneakers, and then over at Emily’s.

  “Ian is a good friend,” he said. “I’ll gate-list you both just as a favor to him. But I offer you each your choice of a pair of boots—and gas money—if you’ll hawk for me just two hours a day for the run of the faire, which is the next ten weekends.”

  “What’s ‘hawk for me’ mean?” Emily said.

  “Deal.” Vange shouted at the same time, without even finding out what that meant.

  Sometimes Emily worried that her friend’s second-graders were going to walk all over her, once the two of them were done with graduate school.

  Simon pointed to a man and woman out in the faire street.

  The woman was proudly displaying her colorful leather boots for passersby, and the man was calling attention to her. Both of them were directing people into the booth.

  “That looks like something I could do,” Emily said, studying the woman’s sales technique and remembering a play where she’d been a shoe salesperson. She had spent every weekend for a month at Macy’s, observing the shoe salespeople there and learning their mannerisms and techniques.

  “Can you spare the ladies for the rest of today Ian, so I can get their gate-listing squared away and show them the ropes—and so they can pick out which boots they want?”

  “I suppose so,” Ian said, looking at Dall.

  Dall turned to Emily, and they shared a smile.

  Taking in the magnificent sight of her kilted admirer, Emily kind of forgot where she was for a minute.

  Dall said, “Is that agreeable tae ye, lass?”

  Oh, right, working at the boot booth.

  Looking around, Emily noticed that Ian wore boots from this booth. She vaguely thought Siobhan and all the other Scots at the faire might, too.

  But Dall didn’t.

  Trying her hardest not to get lost again in the vision of manliness in front of her, Emily took a good look at Dall’s boots.

  They were plain brown leather, of course, but they looked warmer and sturdier than Ian’s. Unlike any others she saw here, Dall’s boots were stained by rain and snow. The souls were thicker than on the boots at the booth, and the buttons were made of some type of shell rather than metal. And they had subtle dagger sheaths built into them, which he wasn’t using at the time, but which Emily could see might be very useful indeed when concealed by her two long skirts.

  She smiled at Dall to let him know he would have his answer soon.

  He smiled back.

  She was pretty s
ure his smile said that he realized she was going to negotiate—and that he was impressed. But that could have been her imagination.

  Emily was forcing herself to negotiate. It was a skill she would need when she ran her own high school drama department. Well, she had other reasons, too. For one, she was broke.

  “Simon?”

  “Yes, Emily?”

  “I want my boots made the same way as Dall’s.”

  Simon came over and studied Dall’s boots.

  “Would you mind taking one off, Dall?”

  Dall was looking at her with realization in his eyes. He wasn’t panicking, though, and that was a good sign. Maybe he would take her into his confidence and she could confirm what she thought was going on here: that he had time traveled from the Scotland of the 1500s. She tried to put reassurance in her own eyes as she gazed back at him. That seemed to work. He gave her his comfortable smile again before turning to answer Simon.

  “I dinna mind,” he said, unbuttoning his boot and handing it to the cobbler with a friendly smile before he turned back to Emily and included her in his smile.

  Simon took Dall’s boot over to his workbench and made various measurements. Emily noticed he was taking notes with a pad and pencil that he kept hidden behind the workbench because they weren’t ‘period’ for this faire—‘not period’ was drama slang for an anachronism.

  When he brought Dall back his boot, Simon held it reverently. He also held a colorful pair of shoes under his arm.

  “I won’t be able to have your custom boots ready tomorrow, Emily, but I will by Friday. They won’t be typical of my work, though, so I’d like for you to wear these shoes when you hawk for me.” He handed Dall back his boot and handed the shoes to Emily.

  Ian put his hand on Dall’s shoulder, and Dall turned to him, still buttoning his boot.

  “We have ring-out today.”

  Dall turned to Simon to say something.

  Simon had his hand up.

  “Leave the ladies with me. I’ll get them passes in time.”

  Dall stretched out his sword hand to Simon, but instead of shaking hands, he grasped Simon’s forearm and waited for the cobbler to do the same before they shook.

  Emily had a brief moment of panic, as if Dall were leaving to his own time right now and she would never see him again. What was this about getting passes, and in time for what?

  But before he left, Dall turned to Emily. “Will ye take the evening meal with me, lass?”

  “Yes.” She tried to make her smile one of joy and not one of relief.

  Dall took her hands and squeezed them again, then gently swung her back and forth as the two of them stared into each other’s eyes.

  Emily tried to use her stare to communicate just how much she enjoyed Dall’s company. She thought his stare was saying the same about her.

  Ian spoke in a sotto voice meant only for their group and not for the audience walking by in the street.

  “I hope you’ll stay for dinner too, Evangeline.”

  “You betcha,” Vange told him with a rascally wink.

  “OK,” Ian said to both women, “we have to go help close the faire. Go with Simon and get your passes, and we’ll meet you back here in about an hour. Dinner will be more sandwiches from Dall’s cooler, just so you know.”

  Emily squeezed Dall’s hands again before she let them go.

  Simon’s pick of shoes fit Emily perfectly and matched her costume. They were cute, too, with pointy curled toes like elf shoes, and the soft leather was more comfortable than sneakers.

  Simon told her, “Wear them while you work here and then keep them, with my compliments. And like I said, I’ll have your boots ready for you on Friday.”

  Emily started to say, “Two pair is too much—”

  But Simon cut her off.

  “No, a deal’s a deal. I offered you boots of your choice, and I must say, you made a wise choice. I just need to shop for the shell buttons, or I could make your boots tonight. It’s nothing to worry about.”

  He looked inside a small pouch. He must have had a time piece hidden in there, because he got antsy.

  “Except we really do need to get over to the gate and put you on the list before they close. Evangeline, you can pick your boots out when we get back, OK?”

  Vange nodded yes.

  “Emily, you can stow your sneakers inside this bench seat.” He opened it and waited while she stowed them. “Tom, you’ve got the booth.”

  “I’ve got the booth, Simon,” said a younger man who looked like Simon.

  The three of them all but ran to the front gate. It was where Emily and Vange had entered the faire seven and a half hours before. Good thing it wasn’t far. The area near the front gate was crowded with merchants selling souvenirs out of handcarts and customers clamoring to buy them.

  The inside of the gate booth was almost like the driver licensing office, including the line. Two dozen people were already there, trying to get passes at the last minute. When the three of them came in, the faire administrator called out:

  “OK Chuck. Block the door. These three are the last ones for today.”

  “Whew,” Simon said, giving Emily a nervous smile.

  She smiled back, trying her best to give the impression she understood why he felt so relieved.

  The faire administrator took the women’s pictures and looked at their IDs, Simon signed something, and then Emily and Evangeline both had gate passes for the duration of the faire. This, Emily understood: she was coming back all ten weekends of faire for free.

  “Let’s get back to the booth where we have good seats, ladies. You won’t want to miss the Scots’ ring-out, trust me.”

  Simon introduced Emily and Evangeline to everyone at his booth, most of whom were part of his family. They had brought out lawn chairs from backstage and were all seated facing the street, leaving empty chairs for the three of them. Emily became aware of the bagpipes while Simon was reminding them they could stow things inside the wooden bench seat, where she had already stowed her sneakers.

  “Let’s take our seats, ladies. The show is almost here.”

  Shrugging at each other, Emily and Vange sat down.

  Just in time, too, because around the corner came all the highlanders, marching in kilts. Oh my, they were a wonderful sight. But it got better. Every twenty feet, the three dozen kilted men would stop, turn to face the audience on the sides of the street, and do their non-period but oh-so-wonderful can-can dance again. The drummers made sure it was lively.

  And this time, Vange and Emily were in front of the guys and able to see the show:

  Kilts.

  Hairy legs.

  Big smiles.

  Neon yellow swim shorts.

  Both women had their phones out in seconds and were taking video.

  Before the guys passed them by, Vange pushed Emily up, saying in her ear over the bagpipes, “Go hug him, Em, and I’ll get a picture.”

  Vange got up too, so she could run and get a better angle.

  Emily had to time it just right, between can-can dances. When she saw her chance, she ran to Dall, grabbed him, and turned him so she could hug him while Vange got a good picture.

  Only, Dall must have misinterpreted her intention. It really seemed like the idea of posing for pictures was foreign to him.

  When she grabbed Dall and turned him, Emily expected him to look for the camera, pose for it, and smile. That was what any normal guy would do. It was almost a ritual, here in the 21st century.

  Instead, Dall pulled Emily close and kissed her.

  During their first kiss, she figured out that the French must have taught the other Europeans how to kiss long before the 1500s. It was a long wet kiss. In the back of her mind, she knew Vange was laughing her head off and taking a dozen pictures of this kiss. On Instagram.

  Emily didn’t care.

  Not even a tiny bit.

  Too soon, Dall was being pulled away from Emily by the other highlanders so that they could
do their next dance twenty feet down the street.

  “I’ll be back for you soon, lass.” he called out as they dragged him away, smiling.

  “I’ll be here.” she yelled back as she waved at him, smiling.

  When the bagpipes were far enough away that you could hear singing—which took a while—the Scots women paraded by, arms around each other and singing a song that Emily realized was meant to let all the customers know it was time to go home:

  You’ve drunk your ale.

  You’ve drunk your wine.

  Your noses are quite rose-I-ed.

  Way, all the way, go all the way home.

  It’s getting late.

  Head for the gate.

  The faire it now be close-I-ed.

  Way, all the way, go all the way home.

  Last but not least came a line of security guards carrying radios and wearing red sashes. And checking everyone for gate passes. Those who didn’t have them were herded toward the front gate. Finally understanding what the big rush to get their passes had been about, Emily and Evangeline proudly showed them with big grins and were allowed to stay.

  While they waited for Ian and Dall to come escort them to Dall’s tent for dinner, Evangeline picked out her boots.

  It didn’t surprise Emily at all when her best friend picked the most colorful non-period pair they had—purple leather with red and green and yellow jewel patterns on them. They’d be hidden by her skirts most of the time, and they suited Vange.

  Emily got anxious again while she waited for Dall and Ian to come back for her and Vange. The sun was setting. The fear had crept into her mind again, fear that Dall would be sent back to his own time and disappear out of her life before she ever saw him again.

  As if the fear weren’t enough to deal with, her common sense reminded her she had only known this man for eight hours—that he was a stranger and she should guard her heart.

  Simon and his family were nice. They gave Emily and Vange gas money ahead of time, showed them around the booth, and told them some tidbits they could share with the customers they directed to it. After Simon arranged their hawking schedule with them, he even invited them to have dinner with him and his family.