Authors: The Last Highlander
Alasdair took his seat with unexpected grace for one so out of scale with his surroundings. Morgan immediately realized there was absolutely no way to avoid having his arm brush against hers. His leg was planted firmly alongside her own and she swore she could feel the tickle of his hair through her leggings.
She could certainly feel the warmth emanating from his skin.
“Well, good morning!” Justine said smoothly, as though nothing had transpired. Morgan studied the bad drawings of the local attractions printed on her place mat, as though they were fascinating, and pretended not to notice the warm scent of the man almost pressing her against the wall.
That damn tingle was humming in her belly again – and it had a companion tingle quite a bit lower. Morgan tried to ignore them both and failed.
Alasdair took a deep breath, and to Morgan’s surprise, when he spoke, his tone was hearty and cheerful. “And a fine morning ’tis indeed,” he agreed.
He glanced to bowls of cold cereal before Justine and Blake, and Morgan caught a glimpse of his dismay. Morgan smothered a smile and studied the drawings some more.
“Is the fare good in this hall?” he asked, his voice sounding strained.
“Well, you can’t eat eggs and sausages every morning,” Justine declared.
“You cannot?”
Blake grimaced and indicated his wife. ‘I could if she let me.” He winked at Alasdair. “A man needs a hot breakfast, right?”
“It’s not good for you to eat so much saturated fat, “ Justine stated with her usual assurance about matters of nutrition.
Blake leaned forward with gleaming eyes. “What about kippers, Alasdair?” He pushed up his glasses. “Don’t real Scotsmen eat kippers?”
“Aye, that they do! A plate of kippers with eggs and sausages, bread and ale would be most welcome indeed.”
Morgan peeked through her lashes to find Alasdair looking much more enthusiastic. Maggie was hailed and was easily persuaded to provide two kipper breakfasts for the men, but she wouldn’t go for the ale. Morgan supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised that Alasdair got what he wanted – mostly.
Morgan had bran flakes.
At least, she tried to have bran flakes. The little boxes of cereal that Maggie provided were sealed far more securely than Morgan remembered. She cut along the perforated lines but couldn’t get the box all the way open. Oblivious to the fact that her three companions were watching her warily, Morgan put aside her knife and wrestled with the little box.
Now she remembered why she’d hated camp.
Morgan gave the cardboard a determined tug and it tore unexpectedly. She saw that the wax paper lining was ripped just as bran flakes flew all over the table. They cascaded everywhere, oblivious of coffee, cream or anything else.
Fortunately, her family was used to this kind of thing. And the last container with which Morgan had lost a battle had been an econo-size jar of mustard.
Now, that had been a real mess.
Blake philosophically picked a few bran flakes out of his coffee, and Justine swept up little piles on the tablecloth. Morgan tried to get some of the cereal actually into her bowl before Maggie could chide her. Even retrieving the bran flakes from every relatively clean surface left Morgan with only half a bowlful.
She would have to open another one. Morgan gritted her teeth and reached for another box. She caught Alasdair’s eye in time to see his dumbfounded expression.
“You would go to such trouble for wood shavings?” he demanded.
“It’s cereal,” Morgan retorted. She waved the box at him. “And besides, I’m not talking to you.”
“Aye?” Alasdair picked up a flake from his table quadrant, put it in his mouth and chewed for only an instant before he made a face. “’Tis wood shavings and naught else.” He took the wet flake out of his mouth and fastidiously set it on the side of a saucer.
Morgan ran a finger under the type and read aloud: “Bran flakes. Eight essential vitamins. Part of a balanced breakfast.”
Alasdair looked unimpressed.
Determined to do a better job of opening this one, Morgan turned her knife on the box. But before she could really do any damage, Alasdair scooped package and knife out of her grasp with a low sound of exasperation.
“I can do it.”
He flicked a wry glance her way. “Aye, I have seen how well you do.” Morgan flushed as he made short work of the box, his gestures economical and easy.
He added the cereal to the remnants of the previous box in her bowl, then looked her square in the eye. “If indeed you must insist upon eating wood shavings, at least do not compel the rest of us to wear them.”
There was nothing Morgan could say to that. She tried to look indifferent to him as she poured milk on her cereal, but Justine’s smug smile told her she hadn’t succeeded.
But she knew one thing that would wipe the smile off her sister’s face.
“I told Alasdair we’d take him home,” she informed them brightly. Justine and Blake looked delighted, but before they could say anything, Morgan continued. “He lives on Lewis in the Hebrides. Near Callanish.”
Both faces fell with comic speed.
“But that’s all the way across the country!” Blake protested.
Justine dug her elbow hard into her spouse’s ribs. “Well, we’ll be delighted to have such a tour, won’t we,
dear
?”
Blake blinked, looked from one sister to the other, then shook his head. “All right. All right. We’ll take Alasdair home.” He dove for his guidebook. “Lewis!” he muttered to himself and started to scan his maps.
It served them right, Morgan thought. If they didn’t know by now that Alasdair was Mr. Wrong, they would by the time they reached his home.
“We can still go to Scone,” Justine said, her tone conciliatory.
Blake didn’t even look up.
“Where Robert the Bruce was crowned King of Scots,” Alasdair added.
Blake looked up at that. “As though that matters. Crowning that troublemaker would have tainted the place forever if the English hadn’t already taken away the Stone of Scone.”
Morgan put down her spoon. Why didn’t anyone remember that Robert the Bruce was a hero?
Alasdair’s hands landed heavily on the table, and his voice was low with outrage. “Robert the Bruce is no troublemaker!”
Blake set down his map. “Look, my own forebear Angus Og was fooled by him, so I can’t blame you for thinking this Robert the Bruce guy was all right. But he caused a lot of trouble and cost my family a lot of land, so I’d rather we just didn’t talk about him anymore.”
Alasdair sat back with a dissatisfied thump. Morgan saw that his hands had tightened into fists in his lap.
And why not? He was right.
Always ready to leap in and set a wrong to rights, Morgan tapped the edge of her bowl with her spoon. “But you said on the way here that Angus Og
won
a lot of land for supporting Bruce. When Bruce was victorious at Bannockburn...”
“Morgan!” Justine interjected. “The Scots
lost
at Bannockburn.”
But they didn’t and Morgan knew it.
Maggie brought breakfast at that point, laying it before the men with a proud flourish. Alasdair recovered himself enough to thank her politely for the meal, but Morgan heard his growled words as he tucked in.
“Robert the Bruce is a hero and the King of Scots. Naught that anyone tells me will persuade me to forget the truth.”
Why was it that only Alasdair remembered the same details about Scottish history as Morgan did?
And how could Alasdair have changed Blake and Justine’s
memories
?
Morgan thought about the Polaroid of Alasdair with no one in it.
And the guard who swore she’d never seen the crystal before. A little shiver danced down Morgan’s spine that had nothing to do with the temperature in the room.
Morgan suddenly wondered whether this really was a con job – because it would have to be an awfully good one – or there was something Truly Weird going on.
Either way, the only one who knew the answer to that was Alasdair. Who was he? Where had he come from? And what was he up to? Morgan watched him out of the corner of her eye and wondered how she could find out the truth.
“I am begging your pardon for zis interruption of your meal.” The German man at the next table leaned toward them with a broad smile. He turned his attention to Alasdair and fingered a fancy camera, his r’s rolling almost as much as Alasdair’s. “But would you be minding if I take your picture? My vife, she zinks you are a
real
highlander.”
* * *
Having conquered not only the unfamiliarity of driving on the left side of the road and shifting gears with the left hand, a North American tourist might consider himself an accomplished UK driver.
At least until he encountered the humbling experience of the roundabout.
Supposedly, this alternative to traffic lights is intended to make driving from point A to point B less of an ordeal – but to the uninitiated, the reality is a nail-biting contradiction.
The roundabout – as might be expected from its name – is a circular intersection, the converging roads radiating from the center like spokes of a wheel. A given car enters at one spoke, merges with the traffic already on the roundabout, travels clockwise around the circle, then exits at the destined spoke to continue on its way.
The equation is complicated by the structure of the roundabout itself. There are usually at least two lanes: the outer one for traffic exiting at the next outgoing road, the inner one for vehicles traveling further around. Incoming cars must take advantage of any break in the traffic and lunge into the appropriate lane.
Just to add to the sport of it all, the round format reduces visibility, as do the frequently adverse climatic conditions. Add to the mix that drivers familiar with the intersection tend to travel through the roundabout at high speed and you have one intimidating obstacle for the novice.
With far too many opportunities for practice, to many tourists’ minds. Morgan found it easy to believe that there must be some drivers circling the same busy roundabout for years, desperately trying to escape at their desired exit.
Blake was determined to conquer not only the basics of negotiating the roundabout itself but also the fine points of merging and signaling protocol. A perfectionist in every phase of his life, he could be no less behind the wheel of a Nissan Micra with right-hand drive.
Sadly, Blake was not as familiar with a manual transmission as might have simplified matters. After all, he had graduated from his Honda Civic to a sleek silver Mercedes – with an automatic transmission – a long, long time before.
And shifting with his left hand was a new art.
Alasdair, however, understood little of these modern technicalities. He knew only that they were going to Scone, where Robert the Bruce had been crowned King of Scots and from whence the British had stolen the Stone of Scone. It was a destination that suited him well, as Alasdair knew that in the mortal world, Scone was on the way from Edinburgh to Lewis.
It seemed that Morgaine intended to keep her word. The only question was when they would pass through the veil between the worlds.
Such lofty expectations were tempered when it became clear that they were to ride within a strange blue chariot. Alasdair was astonished by the vivid blue of what they called the Micra.
And he was even further amazed by the advisors’ expectation that he would clamber into the tiny rear seat.
Beside Morgaine.
But Alasdair could not risk their irritation now. He managed to pack himself into the small space, though he was far from comfortable.
Clearly the Micra was yet another implement of torment designed by the malicious Morgaine. That she endured its cramped conditions herself, apparently willingly, was a puzzle Alasdair could not resolve.
The threesome shielded their eyes with obsidian that shone in the sunlight, leaving Alasdair wondering what damage this chariot would do to his own eyes for he had no such armor.
’Twas all so very strange.
Once they were all inside the chariot, Blake made a mysterious gesture. He muttered an incantation under his breath, repeated the gesture, and the Micro began a disconcerting humming. Alasdair surreptitiously looked for the flock of angry bees, but to no avail.
When the Micra slid away from the walk and moved along the road with no sign of a horse, Alasdair inhaled so sharply that his nostrils pinched shut.
Any discomfort was forgotten with his mistrust of this conveyance. The Micra vibrated like a country cart but moved markedly faster.
What powerful sorcery Morgaine granted to her minions!
The Micra darted down the curved streets with disconcerting speed, and Alasdair wondered fleetingly whether Morgaine intended to return him home in a shroud.
He glanced at his companions and was startled to find that they all clearly took this wizardry in stride. Alasdair strove to appear nonchalant but was certain that he failed. He stared out eh window and watched the streets hasten past.
No doubt this was some part of the magic necessary to move between Morgaine’s domain and the mortal world. He gathered that they intended to be in Scone before midday. Indeed, he might be home sooner than he’d thought.
In one way or another.
* * *
By the time the humming Micra met its first major roundabout, Alasdair had only just managed to find a way to sit without doing any of his vulnerable parts serious injury.
“Shit!” Blake declared from the front seat. “This one has
eight
roads going into it!”
Alasdair glanced through the space between the front seats and had to close his eyes at the dizzying rate their little chariot chewed up the road.
This was definitely not in the world of mortals - though he would endure even this wild ride to see his home island again. Alasdair was beginning to have very affectionate feelings for his humble cottage.
He was even thinking fondly of his sharp-tongued gran.