There'd been at least a dozen such incidents in the last week, but Mara refused to think about them.
Leastways not tonight, on the eve of the memorial cairn's unveiling ceremony.
A traditional Highland
ceilidh
with all the bells and whistles.
And, she hoped, no unexpected surprises.
A hope that lasted until the evening's entertainments of music, singing, and storytelling were in full swing and she spied her father's teeny tartan-swathed wife heading her way. High color stained Euphemia's usually pallid cheeks and her thin lips were pursed so tightly that she looked like she'd just bit into a persimmon.
Even worse, a likewise tartan-sashed Prudentia sailed along in her wake.
Neither Mara's dad, nor Alex, nor even Murdoch was anywhere close by. Much to her dismay, all three men were presently making
gentlemanly
across the vastness of the jam-packed great hall. Resplendent in their dress kilts and silver-buttoned Prince Charlie jackets, they stood before the hearth fire, sipping drams and having a blether. And, from the looks of it, eating her dad's brought-along soft pretzels.
And the shrew was bearing down on her.
Mara straightened and put back her shoulders, waiting.
It didn't take long.
"I can't spend a night beneath this roof," Euphemia announced, drawing up in front of her. "Everything smells musty and old and—"
"Ravenscraig is old." Mara took a sip of her own single malt, Royal Brackla, then placed the dram glass on a plaid-covered trestle table. "And there are some here who might be offended if you call the place musty."
She looked at Prudentia. "Wouldn't you say Ailsa and Agnes do an excellent job keeping up the castle?"
The cook had the grace to look chagrined, but she recovered as quickly.
"She means the dog smell," she said, sending a pointed look to where Dottie, Scottie, and Ben were making hopeful rounds, begging tidbits and savories from guests. "That, and all the ornate ancestral portraits everywhere."
Euphemia nodded. "They're downright creepy." She glanced at a particularly large one hanging above the great hall's enormous hearth. "I'm certain I saw one that had a nasty-looking chieftain in it whose eyes followed me when I walked past."
Mara folded her arms. "If you did, I imagine the painting was done by a highly talented artist."
The shrew sniffed. "You won't change my mind. Your father and I will not be staying here. And"—she paused to glance at Prudentia—"
she
told me the place is riddled with ghosts."
"
Ghosts
?" Alex slid a black-jacketed arm around Mara's waist, dropped a kiss onto the top of her head. "What's this about bogles? Has someone seen one?"
Prudentia turned to him. "Anyplace where time has stood still is a place where sensitive souls can feel the past."
Alex took Mara's hand, lacing their fingers. "And are you such a sensitive?"
The cook narrowed her eyes. "I always ken when a spook is about," she said, looking superior. "The very air in a room changes, giving you a chill that goes right to the marrow."
"Indeed?" Alex arched a brow. He was sorely tempted to conjure an icicle from behind his back and offer it to her like a rose.
"And you, fair lady?" He gave the small, sour-faced woman his most dazzling smile. "You do not wish to spend the night here? In the castle?"
"Most definitely not," she snapped, apparently unimpressed by medieval Highland charm. "I, too, can sense ghosts. I feel them everywhere here."
"Well, then—"
He broke off, his words drowned by the sudden skirl of pipes as Erchy, another of Alex's
special
friends, strutted into the hall, blowing his pipes with red-cheeked gusto. A piper of some renown from the days of the '45, he marched right past them, drawing nary a flicker of alarm from either of the spirit-seeing women.
"Well, then," Alex continued when Erchy and his screaming pipes reached the far end of the hall, "if you are concerned about sleeping where you suspect ghosts are underfoot, perhaps you'd prefer one of Mara's cottages down at One Cairn Village."
"You mean out near the memorial cairn?" Euphemia worried her lip. "I don't know. It's pretty isolated out there, isn't it?"
"To be sure." Alex smiled at her. "But the cottages are newly built and modern even if they look old and quaint on the outside. And"—he discreetly stepped on Mara's toe—"many of my reenactment friends are housed in the cottages or they camp nearby. They'd surely come to your aid if you needed them."
"Well…" She looked hesitant.
"They're all here just now, celebrating." Alex waved a hand, indicating the milling Highlanders, corporeal and otherwise. "Braw lads, as you can see. I can guarantee you nary a one of them is afraid of ghosts."
Mara almost choked.
She did turn aside, unable to watch and listen.
Stepping up to the plaid-draped trestle table, she helped herself to a piece of saltwater taffy and waited until the shrew hurried off to inform her husband that they'd be sleeping elsewhere.
"I can't believe you did that." Mara whirled around, not at all surprised to find Alex wearing a self-satisfied grin. "My dad was looking forward to sleeping in a castle."
"That wee besom wouldn't have given him a moment's peace no matter what room you might have given them."
Ben joined them then, pressing against them and nudging their hands with his cold, wet nose until Hottie Scottie reached down to fondle his scruffy head.
"Even so, the empty cottage isn't very inviting," Mara said, taking another piece of taffy. "It'll be cold. Someone will have to go down there and ready it for them."
"We'll do it." A mischievous twinkle lit Alex's eyes. "You, me, and Ben. We'll slip away now and no one will be the wiser."
"Us?" Mara blinked. "But the dancing is about to start. Didn't you see the fiddlers setting up? Or your friends helping to clear away the trestle tables?"
"Och, aye, I saw." He looked down, the light gone from his eyes. " 'Tis a reason I'd rather be off with you now, before such merriment begins."
"You don't like dancing?" she asked, sounding so disappointed he bent his head and kissed her.
"Och, sweetness." He rested his hands on her shoulders, gave her another quick kiss, this time on her brow. "On my soul, I would dance with you all night and ne'er have enough. But—"
Her eyes widened. "Are you fading again?"
"Not that, either." He shook his head. "But my lightning bolt scars are troubling me more than usual this e'en, and while I'd gladly suffer the discomfort to dance with you, I've no wish to whirl around the hall with the other women here tonight. If we stay, Highland courtesy demands I do just that."
"Oh." Color flared on her cheeks. "I didn't think. And I'd forgotten about the scars. You just seem so—"
He pressed his fingers to her lips. "Precious lass, for the two of us, I
am
real," he vowed, willing it. "So real as this fool MacDougall sporran I donned just for you."
"
MacDougall sporran
?" Her gaze flew to the thing, her jaw dropping as astonishment washed her lovely face. "You are wearing a clan sporran," she gasped, looking back up at him. "Why? I m-mean… wherever did you get it?"
"Why?" He cocked a brow at her. "Can you not guess? I wear it to honor the day. And my lady."
Mara swallowed, unable to speak.
She couldn't stop staring at the proud MacDougall clan crest on the sporran's gleaming silver cantle. A fine dress sporran, it looked to be of best-quality leather and fur with tasseled diamond-cut chains.
Then the beautiful sporran swam before her eyes and Alex's arms were reaching for her, dragging her against his warm, blessedly solid chest.
"Y-you don't know what it means to me to see you wearing that," she said, the words choked. "But w-where did you get it?"
"Och, lass," he soothed, rubbing her back as he held her. "I fashioned it by will. The same way I conjure my plaid or sword or anything else I desire."
He set her from him then, the light back in his eyes. "I conjured a duplicate for your da. He's wearing it now. 'Tis why we spent so much time having a good
craik
o'er by the hearth. I thought such a gift might please him, and increase my chances when I ask him for your hand."
Mara stared at him, her jaw slipping again. And then the world disappeared for a heartbeat only to reappear in bold and thrilling colors.
Everything looked freshly washed and bright.
New and wonderful.
She swallowed, dashed at her tears. "You mean to ask for my hand?" she asked, glancing across the hall at her father.
Sure enough, he was wearing an identical sporran.
Beaming, he appeared to be showing it to anyone whose eye he could catch.
She looked back at Alex, her throat so thick she could scarce speak. "Does this mean what I think it means?"
He grabbed her hand, started pulling her toward the door. "That I wish to marry you?" He slanted a glance at her as they paused on the threshold, waiting for Ben. "Of course, that's my intention. If—"
"Oh, Alex!" She flung her arms around his neck, kissed him hard and deep. "I never thought—"
"Dinna let your heart swell too quickly," he cautioned, breaking the kiss. "I meant to say I wish for us to marry if e'er we can find a way to enjoy a more normal union than the present circumstances allow."
"Oh." Mara's elation vanished like a pricked soap bubble.
"No frowning." Alex captured her face in his hands, dropped a quick kiss to her down-tilting lips. "We have much to relish together even if we can ne'er truly be man and wife. For the now, a pleasant walk through the
simmer dim
to One Cairn Village."
He opened the castle's main entry door, led her out into the luminous, silver-washed night. "And," he added, as they made their way along the gravel path toward the distant line of woods, "a fine four-legged companion to accompany us. Such joys are worth much. Let us be glad for them."
He looked down at the old dog trotting so happily beside them. "I ne'er told you, but it pleases me greatly to have won Ben's affection," he said, his own heart catching this time. "He reminds me of Rory. A dog I had… er… shall we say, a very long time ago?"
"We shall," Mara agreed, smiling as Ben bolted off across the grass.
When he disappeared into a thicket of rhododendrons, she turned to Alex, throwing her arms around him again and hugging him until her breasts hurt from being crushed against him.
She reached down between them, slipping her hand beneath his MacDougall sporran, then smiled when she felt the thick, hard ridge of his desire.
"O-o-oh, Alex, I want and need you so!" she cried, curling her fingers around him, squeezing. "And I love you so much I can't breathe without feeling you somehow. Holding your hand, kissing you, just… touching you. So long as we touch I am alive."
"And if we do much more such touching, you'll have me lifting my kilt right here on the garden path—in clear view of all our guests."
"Oh!" Mara said for the third time that night. "I forgot some of the hall's windows look out onto the lawn."
"Then come, let us be away to ready that cottage for your da and his wee spitfire of a wife." He offered her his arm, smiling when she took it. "Who knows what pleasures the night may yet bring?"
A good hour later, in the very heart of One Cairn Village, Mara closed the door of her dad and the shrew's soon-to-be love nest and gave a great sigh. She glanced at Alex, her heart dipping at how handsome he looked in the soft silver-blue light of the late summer's evening.
A quiet evening.
A night full of beauty with a slender moon shining in the heavens and a gentle wind stirring the hushed air.
Not a sound from the
ceilidh
could be heard this far from the castle, and with all of One Cairn Village's current occupants enjoying the revelry, the silence felt thick and heavy. And just a touch eerie.
Almost otherworldly.
Shivering, she pushed the thought from her mind and looked back at the quaint little cottage with its bright blue door and low, romantic lights gleaming through the thick-silled windows. Not real candlelight, but electric lamps fashioned to look and burn like candles, they cast the same flickering golden light.
"Oh, Alex. Do you think they'll be pleased?"
"The besom?" He scratched his chin. "That one, to be sure. But, snug as the cottage is, I suspect your da would've preferred the tower room you'd selected for them. Which one was it? The Islesman?"
Mara nodded. "Yes, that was it."
"Aye, he would have liked that one," Alex agreed, winking at her. "It would've reminded him of Bran of Barra. Your da seems quite taken with him."
Mara laughed. "Dad would have appreciated the views from the room, too. But he'll like being right across from the memorial cairn."
She glanced at it then and frowned.
A great blue cloth had been swirled round the cairn's base, covering the stone and the large brass memorial plaque. Much to her horror, Ben had an edge of the cloth clamped between his teeth and was pulling on it.
"Ben, no!" Mara cried, running toward him across the little village square. "Stop that!"
But Ben only tugged harder, his tail swishing wildly when the cloth ripped. He froze for a moment, looking stunned by his own triumph, a good-sized piece of the blue sheeting dangling from his jaws.
And then, almost smiling, he streaked off into the heather, the blue cloth whipping behind him like a knight's banner.
"I didn't know he could run that fast." Mara threw a startled glance at Alex.
"Looks like he's headed to that scrub-grown knoll again," Alex said. "I'd wager there's a rabbit or some other wee creature that makes its home in that cluster of rocks he was snuffling at the other day."
He slung his arm around Mara's shoulders, gave her a squeeze. "Come, let's go fetch him," he said, leading her toward Innes's soap-and-candle craft shop and the thicket of gorse and whins just beyond it. "He's clearly caught the scent of something."