Authors: Susan Sizemore
And here she was with the most quiet man in the Highlands. She strongly suspected that he had something totally different than verbal communication in mind.
Something more tactile was probably in Rowan’s plan for the evening. Was sex a form of communication? She didn’t know. She wasn’t sure she was ready to find out.
She wasn’t prepared to remain in isolation even with a companion across the fire from her. When she looked back at him, she found him watching her. She didn’t know if the warmth in his eyes came from some emotion or the glow of the fire.
He has nice
eyes
, she thought. When she looked into his eyes, it was easy to forget that he looked like Toby Coltrane. The odd thing was, she was forgetting what Toby looked like. That made no sense, she supposed, or was some sort of paradox. It was just that Rowan was so distinctly himself, despite the superficial resemblance to another man she wasn’t even sure she loved anymore. If she didn’t love Toby—
Fortunately Rowan chose to break his silence and into her confused thoughts.
“Come here.”
Maddie jumped. “I am here.”
He patted the ground beside him then held up the bag of provisions he’d brought.
“If you want your supper, lass, you’ll eat it by my side.”
She disliked the reminder of just how dependent she was. She also wanted to eat.
“How do you know I won’t march out and hunt up some nice wild vegetables to eat?”
“Will you?” He looked at her intently. “Can you?”
Maddie glanced out the door. There was nothing but night and rain and wild things out there. “Maybe I’m willing to try.”
He laughed. “If the answer to a question is no, say so.” He patted the ground again.
Maddie did consider fleeing. “Are there still wolves in the Highlands in this century?” She’d already seen a bear or something. “What was that thing you killed anyway? Something that went extinct before my time?”
“If you want answers, do as I tell you.” He glanced inside the bag. “There’s bannocks and a bit of a honeycomb in here.”
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She had a weakness for honey and she did want answers. Maddie moved around the fire to sit next to Rowan, close enough that their thighs touched. She felt the warmth of his bare skin through the layers of linen and wool she wore. The surprising thing was that she wasn’t tempted to scoot away from the contact. She told herself it was because the damp night was chilly despite the fire, that she needed all the shared heat she could get.
“Well, I’m here,” she said, and held out a hand. “You said something about honey?”
Maddie reflected that her simple words might have sounded like a provocative invitation to another man. Not Rowan. He gave a nod and unpacked their dinner. She sighed with relief, but at the same time felt a small bit of disappointment that he hadn’t taken her words wrong. She tried to bury her confusion as she ate her meal and stared into the small fire.
“What’s the matter?” his question interrupted her thoughts after a few minutes.
“With what?” Maddie glanced sideways at Rowan as she licked honey off her fingers.
“You’ve got a frown as dark as you accuse me of having marring your face. Is the meal not to your liking? Or is it the company?”
He sounded glum. Now this was not a rare occurrence, but for the first time she thought her answer might cheer him up and it mattered to her. Why it mattered to her, she couldn’t say.
“It’s not you,” she said, with more conviction than she felt. “Or the food. It’s me.”
“What’s wrong with you?”
“I don’t know.” She gestured toward the door and the downpour beyond. “Maybe it’s the weather.”
She didn’t expect for her comment to draw the reaction it got. Rowan drew closer and settled an arm around her shoulders. “I’m here to keep you warm.”
“I’ve got the fire for that,” she said, but she didn’t try to scoot away. There was a certain comfort factor in the arm that circled her.
“That won’t last long and I’ll still be here.” He spoke softly, his lips close to her ear.
For a moment Maddie found it difficult to breathe. She stared at the flames and was very aware of Rowan’s presence. “Do you want your questions answered yet?” His breath brushed her cheek as he spoke.
“Questions? Wh-what questions?”
“About wolves and the beastie?”
She’d forgotten the queries she made about the local wildlife before she got involved in thinking about her own weird emotions. Now she recalled the odd animal, its size and smell and the strange eyes like no mammal should have. She shuddered at the memory and knew he noticed because his embrace tightened. She craned her head to look into his face. “Does the beastie have a name?”
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“The Questing Beast. The fairies send them to hunt special prey.”
“That’s folklore. What was it really? Don’t you know?”
“I know exactly what it was. I’ve killed them before and I’ll no doubt kill them again. Perhaps that’s what’s plaguing the shepherds who sent for me, though no one’s seen the thing for certain.”
She had to admit that it made sense for a primitive people to attach supernatural attributes to something they didn’t understand. She just didn’t like thinking of Rowan and his clever relatives as being so ignorant. All right, so this was the thirteenth century, that didn’t mean the natives had to remain superstitious.
“The Loch Ness Monster doesn’t exist you know.”
“That’s no affair of mine,” he replied. “Loch Ness is a good ways from my holding.
Besides, what does the Urquhart clan’s curse have to do with the Murrays? We’re plagued enough by fair folk of our own.”
“That wasn’t my point.”
Rowan wasn’t much interested in debating the woman’s strange beliefs with her.
“It’s not wise to talk about the fair folk,” he warned. “It draws their attention.”
Her answer was a deep sigh, he felt it all along the length of his body. He liked holding her near, communicating without the medium of words. Words were malleable things, hard to grasp, harder to let go. Actions had true honesty, the language of the body didn’t lie. He could feel her tension, her frustration, perhaps a bit of growing trust from the way her head rested in the crook of his arm.
He liked the way she felt, a warm, soft bundle of female curves. He had thought he was attracted to a more delicate sort of woman, but found that he liked Maddie’s robust figure just fine. There was more of her to hold onto than some little fragile thing. He rubbed his cheek against the springy thickness of her hair and drank in the scent of her.
She smelled of rainwater and heather soap, of smoke and of herself. If he kissed her, she would taste of honey.
He didn’t want to talk. He wanted to have her on her back and have sex with her.
Then he wanted them to bundle up together in his plaid and her cloak and get a good night’s sleep for there was a hard quarry to pursue tomorrow. He’d brought Maddie with him for the express purpose of finally making her his wife in more than name. The problem was how to begin. He couldn’t just force his will on her. She’d just find something to hit him over the head with if he tried, he was firmly convinced of that.
Besides, he didn’t want her unwilling.
Rosemary had said to court her. He’d decided that it wasn’t such a bad notion. He granted that she deserved more than gruff orders. She was growing on him, was his handfasted wife. He liked her fire and her looks, and even her stubbornness. He liked being with her and wanted her to like being with him. She deserved more than he could give her but he would try to open up as much as his guarded heart could bear. He wanted to give her more, to give in to the urge to properly love her. He sighed and set about doing the best he could with what little he had to offer.
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A Kind of Magic
Maddie liked words. Rowan thought it would be easier to try to impress her with gifts of silk and dainty sweetmeats than to give her the conversation she seemed to crave, even though he was a poor man. Earlier in the day it had not seemed so hard to talk to her. She had drawn words out of him of curiosity and of anger, Maddie had a gift for making him feel both. Right now he wanted to fill the darkness with kisses, to hear no sound but mutual sighs of pleasure. Before that could happen he would have to try to set his tongue free as he had a few hours before.
She helped him when she said, “Dung’s not a bad idea.”
“What?”
“Dung,” she repeated. “As a fuel source. I’ve been thinking about alternate fuel sources.”
“What are those? No, I think I take your meaning,” he went on before she could.
“Alternate fuel source—things that burn besides firewood.”
The proud grin she gave him at his answer warmed him. It made him want to coax more from her, to see her looking at him with pride and joy, curiosity and concern. It made him want her to want to take an interest in
him.
He knew he felt an interest in her, not just in the way a man should be interested in a woman, but an interest in the great knowledge she’d brought with her from her world.
“Bingo,” she said to his interpretation of her words. “I mean, aye. Fuel for the new fireplaces and the forge and the pottery kiln and a greenhouse if I can figure out a way to build one.”
“What kiln? What’s a greenhouse?”
“And we need a grain mill,” she went on without answering his questions. “Do you know that those stone querns the women use to make flour are far too inefficient for the amount of food they produce? And that coarse flour might be high fiber but it’s terrible on peoples’ teeth.” She looked at him, earnest expression illuminated by the firelight.
“All this stuff is fixable, doable, but I don’t want to cut down every tree on the mountain to improve the quality of life for a few people. We have to share this ecosystem, you know.”
“I wouldna let you cut down my forest even if you wanted to,” he told her.
She smiled. It brightened the whole room. Or at least it dazzled him. This was a new experience and he wanted her to keep looking at him like that for days and days.
Instead she said, “It would be nice if we had a few more pigs.”
Curiosity changed the spell her smile had started but didn’t dissipate it. “Pigs?
Why?”
“Actually there are coal deposits not that far from here but I refuse to be responsible for introducing fossil fuels to the world even if I do work for a petroleum company in my own time.” She stroked a hand across her jaw. “If I’m going to start the Industrial Revolution, I’m going to do it right.”
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Rowan grasped her hand with his free one. “Maddie, love,” he urged patiently.
“Why do you want more pigs?”
Rowan Murray was stroking her fingers and he had just called her love. These facts were not lost on Maddie. She chose to try to ignore them and gave the man a simple explanation about synthesizing methane from animal waste, those of pigs in particular, and how it could be used for fuel.
When she was done, he said, “I see.” He also kept touching her. He’d touched her the whole time she’d been talking, her fingers, stroked her temple, touched her throat. It had been very distracting but she’d managed to remain lucid. He also seemed to understand what she was talking about. It was so nice to have someone understand what she was talking about. Even better, he seemed genuinely interested.
Rowan was fascinated. “This is a fine magic,” he told her.
“It’s chemistry.”
“Call it what you will, it’s the best use for magic I’ve ever heard.”
He considered the implications of the things Maddie spoke of for a few silent moments. He liked that she was eager to teach what she knew, to be up and doing.
Taking pig waste and making it into something useful seemed as practical as taking a piece of iron and turning it into a sword. Rowan liked being presented with practical strategies and solutions. Lord knew, he’d had his fill of frivolous magic and moonlit illusion that faded in the light of day.
He kissed her temple. The gentle, brief, touch of his lips sent an electric current all through her. She’d never felt anything like it before.
Chemistry in action?
she wondered.
She was distracted from this new sensation when Rowan asked, “Are pigs all we need?”
“That’s one thing we can use,” she answered. She gazed thoughtfully into the glowing embers of the fire. Rowan’s presence surrounded her, the rain lulled her. She relaxed against him. “With a little work there’s plenty of accessible energy.”
He shifted position so that she leaned back against his chest with his arms around her waist, supporting and enfolding her. She could feel the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed. That too was soothing.
“What sort of energy?” he asked.
She yawned then answered. “If there’s one thing Scotland’s full of, it’s weather. We could use water and wind for power.”
“Windmills and water wheels?”
“You’ve heard of them?”
“Oh aye. My great uncle went on crusade. He came back with many tales of devices used in foreign parts. Drew pictures of them to show how they were built.”
“He never built any?”
Rowan shook his head. “My grandfather wanted nothing to do with Sassenach ways. My father—”
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It was painful to hear the way his voice trailed off with angry resentment at the mention of his father. It was enough to make her want to hold him and comfort him.
She didn’t know what the elder Murray had done, but she was certain Rowan didn’t need to live with the pain that obviously haunted him. She’d never wanted to comfort anyone before but the urge to help Rowan was very strong. She didn’t know how, she didn’t know if he’d accept compassion or interpret it as pity. She wondered if it was wise to talk to him about it. She also knew wisdom had nothing to do with breaching emotional distance.
She cleared her throat then said, “Was your father—mean to you?”
Rowan couldn’t stop the low, bitter laugh. “No. He was a good man. Everyone loved him.”
She hesitated but couldn’t keep from asking, “Everyone except you? Or do you think he didn’t love you?”