Reunited (Book 2 of Lost Highlander series) (25 page)

Pietro watched her as she petulantly raised her chin and waved her hands in his direction while Quinn stared ahead, trying to ignore her.

That was the woman he was fated to be with. Bratty, conniving, beautiful. Obviously, if all went according to history, they’d have at least one child together.

Uncertainty snaked up his spine. Had he made the right decision? Was there even a decision to be made? The very thought of leaving her wiped away the doubts that kept creeping into his mind.

As she twisted in the saddle to reach for her canteen, he admired her petite, lithe curves and felt a tightening in both his chest and loins as her long, glossy hair fell in waves over her shoulder.

Maybe if he could manage to get her alone somehow tonight, he could show her all they had in common. Show her that a future with him didn’t have to be bleak. Maybe she would be more positive about a life together when he reminded her how passionate she could be with him.

Another stab of pain exploded behind his eyes, blurring his vision and almost making him retch. He grabbed the pommel to keep from tipping over and held on until it passed.

He looked wistfully at Bella as more pain ratcheted through his skull. Maybe not.

They rode hard, only stopping in the darkest part of the night to get a few hours of rest. As the sky slowly brightened the next morning, she thought the scenery looked different from what she remembered and asked Lachlan if they’d taken a different road.

“Aye, I took us a bit of a scenic route to avoid Castle Glen. Yer people are verra upset with me at the moment and t’would be best if no one from there were to see us.”

“Is it really that bad?” she asked.

She could feel him tensing behind her and turned to see his face was etched with lines of worry.

He nodded and sighed. “I’m surprised they didna chase after us, and I wouldna be shocked if they didna change their minds and send men to my land spoiling for a fight. Bella’s father didna want me to take her away.”

“Wait, what? Did you kidnap her?” She pictured Pietro and Quinn being ambushed on their way home, torn to shreds by her vengeful kin while beastly Bella egged them on.

Lachlan made a rumbling noise of contempt. “No, Piper. She is my wife, for all intents and purposes. They have no right to stop me takin’ her where I will. They dinna like it is all.”

Piper didn’t like any part of what he’d just told her. She hated being reminded for the one millionth time that Lachlan was married to someone else, no matter that it was name only and her own ancestor. And she really didn’t like the thought of Bella being treated like chattel. Her heart railed at the injustice of it. She didn’t like the little cow one bit, but she hated the poor girl’s complete lack of choices even more.

“Dinna go feeling sorry for the lass,” Lachlan said, seeming to have sensed the discontent in her silence. “She’s with the one she’s supposed to be with. ‘Tis a miracle, no? That the man we sought was from yer own time?”

“It’s bizarre. I just wish we could figure out how he got sent back in the first place.”

Piper leaned back against Lachlan’s chest and he wrapped his strong arms around her.

Through the trees she thought she saw a glimpse of Agnes’ house and relaxed, trying to remember all the questions she wanted to ask the herb woman about all the confusing twists and turns of time travel magic.

She missed her little suede covered notebook she carried with her to jot down ideas and make lists. Finding a scrap of paper to make a list in this time had turned out to be impossible and she would have to rely on her memory.

He kissed the top of her head and urged the horse into a fast trot, clearly as anxious as she was to see Agnes, then be on their way home.

They came upon the little cottage from the back and Piper noticed the goat was still tied to its post, angrily butting its head. The chickens were nowhere to be seen, and Piper guiltily hoped there might be soup waiting for them.

Lachlan jumped off the horse and helped her to dismount, looking around the small yard with a frown. A gust of wind blew past them and Piper shivered.

Lachlan led the horse to the fence rail, looking around the yard with the same worried frown on his face.

“Here,” she said, taking the reins from his hand. “Go tell her we’re here, I’ll take care of this.”

She knew how eager Lachlan was to see Agnes again. As for herself, she wanted to get her nerves under control and sort all her questions in her mind.

She was half considering spilling all her secrets and admitting the addictive allure Daria’s old grimoire held for her, but was afraid of their reactions. She wound the reins around the rail, making a clumsy knot. A lump settled in her stomach at the thought of their looks of disgust if she told them how she wanted to explore other spells from the book, not just the one that allowed them to jump through time.

The goat bleated loud enough to make her jump from her troubled thoughts and she noticed the trough was empty. She looked around for a pump or well, not really sure of water delivery technology in this day and age.

“No wonder you’re so grumpy,” she said to the goat.

 She leaned over to get a better look at it, and even in her agricultural ignorance could see that the poor thing was in dire need of milking. Standing up straight, she turned in a circle, looking all around, but not sure what she was looking for. Dread seemed to wind its way up from the cold ground, wrapping around her and clenching her insides.

Something was wrong. Never had anything, least of all an unmilked goat, caused the hackles to stand up on the back of her neck, and goosebumps to spring out up and down her arms. A twig snapped behind her, loud as a gunshot.

Stifling a scream, she turned to see Lachlan standing in the yard, his hands bloody, a blank look of shock and grief on his face.

She ran to him and grabbed his wrists, holding out his arms and turning his hands to look for the source of the blood. She felt his side and found his bandage to be in place, and there was no blood on his shirt. She looked up at him, trying to get him to see her.

“She’s dead,” he said, then shook his head and winced.

Piper could see he’d only just realized it when he said it out loud and she pulled him over to a wooden bench near the wall of the cottage. She managed to get him to sit.

“Are you sure?” she asked.

She gripped his shoulders when he didn’t answer her, then started toward the house. He grabbed her by the wrist, then groaned when he saw the smear of blood he left on her sleeve.

“Piper, I’m sure. Ye mustn’t go in there.”

He stood up and strode to the well, and with a few turns, pulled up a bucket of water. He splashed some over his hands then set about watering the goat. Piper watched in dismay as he found a little stool and sat down to milk the goat, absently letting a good deal of the milk splash onto the ground. His face was stony with suppressed rage.

“Lachlan?” she said when the milk stopped flowing.

He patted the goat and turned around, looking broken. And, she was alarmed to see, truly afraid. She started shaking and he stood up to steady her.

From a fold of his kilt he took out a scrap of parchment and held it out for her to see. She reached for it but he pulled it out of her grasp.

“I think ye must no’ touch it,” he said. “Can ye understand it?”

Heart pounding, she leaned over to inspect the blotchy ink spattered piece of paper. There were some scrolly lines and then a scrawl of words in an eerily familiar hand. She couldn’t understand them, not to read them, but knew if she placed the tip of her finger on the paper, she would be flooded with their meaning.

Unable to breathe, she looked up at Lachlan and knew as well as he did who had left it there. Vision closing in on her and a thunderous roaring in her ears, she reached for him. He helped her to the stool, first pulling it away from the curious goat.

“Daria,” she gasped. She took a heaving breath to keep from vomiting. “It’s a spell.”

He nodded and crumpled it in his fist. “The witch is alive,” he said. “I dinna know if she used these wicked words to overpower Agnes, or if it was something after ... she - she killed her with an axe.” Lachlan’s voice gave out and he dropped his head into his hands.

She sat in stunned silence, unable to let his disjointed words fully absorb. She struggled to keep them at a distance, but they jabbed at her, sharp as needles. Axe, kill, wicked. Had she known, had any inkling from the beginning that Daria might still be alive? Bile rose in her throat.

A muscle in his jaw worked as he took her by the arm and pulled her up from the stool. He led her around to the front of the house, out to the low wooden fence that surrounded it. She kept her eyes on the ground as he pulled her along, horrified to see they were following a spotty trail of blood.

On the other side of the fence, he pointed to a small cleared area in the grass. Knowing and not wanting to know, she shook free of his hand and marched up to it. In the cleared circle there were bones. Eleven of them, stained with blood.

With a surge of panic, she threw herself at Lachlan. “Where did she go?” she screamed. “Where is she?”

He tried to get her to be still, but she jerked free of him, wanting his arms around her and at the same time, feeling suffocated by her fear and needing space.

“The barn fire,” she said, counting back how many days ago that had been. “My sheep.”

Had the insane witch gutted her sheep? She started to cry and sat down on the ground. Appalled at how close she was to the finger bones she scrambled away from them.

Lachlan dropped to the ground and pulled her to him, ignoring her feeble struggles. She collapsed against his chest and buried her face in the rough wool of his plaid, not wanting to accept what was in front of her.

With a jolt of fresh fear, she thought of Evie and Sam. Thinking they were safe and sound in the present, they were probably worried about her and Lachlan in the scary past. And now had the scary past come to them?

Her frazzled nerves solidified with the need to act. She pulled away and stood up, hurrying over to the bones. They were bloody and bits of flesh and sinew still clung to a few of them. She coughed, trying not to gag or let her mind take off.

Pushing aside her revulsion, she gathered them up, wrapping them in the pretty scarf she’d been using to cover her hair. The thought of that evil hag being in her house, on her land, near her friends, made her blood boil with a rage she’d never before known.

“She went back,” she said with utter certainty. Lachlan was looking at her warily and she put the bone bundle on the ground and tried to at least appear calm. “She killed my sheep, and tried to burn down my barn.”

She stopped and looked at Lachlan, feeling the terror brimming over to near hysteria. “Do you think it was her who sent Pietro back?” She began to pace back in forth in front of Lachlan. “When do you think Agnes ...?” she asked.

He rubbed his face and pushed the hair off his forehead. “Perhaps right after we left,” he said.

With a shudder, she imagined a gruesome scene in the cottage. Could Daria have been here when they were? Watching them from behind the trees? If she hadn’t been so eager to set off for the village, might they have kept Agnes safe? She shook off the futile thought. It wouldn’t help them with a plan of action. It wouldn’t bring her back.

“You said you didn’t think anyone ever got pulled into your spell, your way of travelling.” She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to piece it all together. “Maybe you were right. Pietro could have been brought back when Daria did her spell.”

Trying to muddle through when things might have happened helped to calm her for a second, but then she started thinking about when and where Daria might be now. Forcing herself not to cry anymore, she reached out wildly.

Lachlan grabbed her hands and held them, looking into her eyes.

“We dinna know any of this for fact,” he said soothingly. “She took Agnes’ books. She may have just wanted to keep the knowledge for herself.”

“Why kill her?” she wailed.

Agnes was an old woman. She could have easily been subdued. Daria could have waited for her to go to the village and just taken the books. She knew without hearing Lachlan’s answer that Daria was just that cruel and bloodthirsty.

He shook his head, and dark anger flashed in his eyes. “Madness. Grief. She must have seen that Brian was killed when she made it out of the fire. She knew she couldna return to her family for fear they learned what she was.”

 “Do you think Evie and Sam are safe? It’s them she knows. She’ll blame them for Brian’s death.”

At that, Lachlan’s eyes flickered with shock. She could tell he hadn’t even thought of them until that moment, and was now afraid for them, too. That was all it took for her to make her decision. She reached down for the bones.

“We have to go,” she said, voice rising as the hysteria she’d been fighting began to bubble up. “We have to go now.”

The spellbook was in the saddle bag, and she stalked away to get it. After she retrieved her things, she untied their horse and swatted it in the direction of the village, knowing it would find its way to the stable there. She untied the goat next and watched with tear blurred vision as it meandered off after the horse. Lachlan didn’t stop her, but merely followed her to the back, found a shovel and began to dig.