Snow Swept Moors: A Highland Winter Collection, page 64
She could have sworn by the Tuatha de Dannan—the ancient Celtic Gods—that the animal smiled at her. So she smiled back.
Most lowlanders worshipped the new and were slowly forgetting the old, as were the Highlanders, who had once held fast to the legends and traditions of the past, believing, as Esmé and Caelia and Rory did, that these thing were the heart and soul of Scotland—what made it great and rooted so deeply in the soul.
Esmé looked around at her garden of starflowers and daisies struggling through the chilly soil, though it was nearly June. The winter simply would not let go. Still, the branches of rose bushes spread and tangled their way up the uneven stone walls with tiny pink and red buds that fell off the vine before they bloomed. Moss and ferns grew along both sides of the tiny burn her grandfather Rory had dug for her, then guided the large burn outside to split off and supply her garden with peat-brown water running over stones. In spite of herself, Breda the brat came out, crouching for hours beside the stream, placing rocks of various sizes to create a pond and a tiny waterfall, a burn that rippled over smooth, round stones.
This small walled garden was the only place where Esmé ventured to visit the outdoors, because she was safe here; here she had control, though she never forgot her fear and guilt. They all had lost so much that night. That’s why she had studied with Eachan, the healer who had saved her father, learning all she could about herbs and poultices and teas. She never wanted to feel so helpless a second time.
“Ye have that look on your face again,” her father said, coming up behind her.
Startled but not distressed, she crossed her legs and sat on the ground that she kept soft, by turning it over and over, despite the chilly weather. Outside her enclosure there was snow and frigid wind, but not inside. She and Connall Fraser had made sure of that. “Ye shouldn’t creep up on me, Da. Ye know how fragile I am.” For once, her tone was light-hearted.
“Oh, aye?” Connall shook his head, though she was fragile in some ways; in others, she was incredibly strong. He wished, as he had so often, that he understood her better. “I’ll try to stomp louder from now on.” He pointed to the rabbit. “Have ye been doing your healing again?” He barely kept himself from emphasizing ‘healing’ with a tiny bit of sarcasm. Her healing frightened him sometimes, so he often responded with skepticism or anger.
“Aye, he’s free of infection; I felt it.”
Connall Fraser stiffened as anger flashed, stifling the fear. “Ye can hear things in the beat of his heart, no doubt, but I doubt ye can ‘feel’ what he feels. Tis just no’ the same, Esmé, lass.”
Sighing, she put the rabbit in the clever cage her father had built, which gave him air and light and even grass, but kept him safe from the other animals. “I forgot we can no’ discuss such things, Da. We agreed, did we no’? Ye believe what gives ye comfort and I’ll do the same.” Her hazel eyes, more silver than grey, begged him to leave it at that.
“So we did, and so we shall.” He glanced around at the tall walls he had built for her, with occasional windows to let in more light. They had worked together on designing the cages, with Grandfather Rory suggesting a few clever touches. Grandmother Caelia had helped the girl lay out and plant the herbs she needed for her healing, and even the reluctant Breda had helped—in her own way.
Connall felt he owed this sanctuary to his daughter, because of the guilt she carried on her slender shoulders. He would rather have removed that guilt entirely, but he did not begin to know how. So he did what he could for Esmé, his multi-talented, sensitive daughter. She made him ache sometimes, such as now, simply by smiling.
“Thank ye, Da.”
He was not certain to what she was referring, but her gratitude warmed his heart regardless. “I came out to tell ye your grandmother is bringing ye some food, since ye missed breakfast with us. Are ye well, my lassie?”
Esmé hesitated. “I’m well,” she said, though she was not certain that was true. “Tis just a dream I had.”
Her father clenched his fists. “A nightmare? Are they back?”
Throwing her arms around him, Esmé cried, “No, Da! Tis nothing like that. Don’t worry about me so much. It was magic, she wanted to cry; I feel it in every bone in my body. But good magic or bad? Her blood sang, ye know tis good. Tis frightening. Tis beautiful! But she did not say those things. They were her secret.
“Ah, here Caelia is now with Geordie trailing behind her.”
Geordie was the youngest Fraser child. The result of a brief blissful year when Sorcha Fraser had stayed home for a while, temporarily happy in the bosom of her family. She had gone soon enough when the hard work of raising a screaming baby began, though strangely, after she left, Geordie became a laughing, playful infant very quickly.
Connall Fraser—the only man brave enough to marry Esmé’s mother—was handsome. He would have had to be, to catch Sorcha MacGregor and make her fall in love with him. But he’d made a mistake; he wanted a family and a secure life. He wanted to know what was going to happen tomorrow.
Esmé and Breda’s mother had never really wanted a family. Instead, Caelia and Rory’s only daughter had roamed the world, going from man to man after she left Connall. Esmé was grateful every day that Sorcha’d had the good sense to leave her family at the Hill of the Hounds. It had saved them all.
Connall kissed his daughter on the forehead, nodded to his mother-in-law and started back inside.
He was nearly knocked off his feet by little Geordie hurling himself at Esmé and grabbing her around the knees. “I missed you, Esmé. You weren’t at breakfast.”
The girl laughed and swung him around in her arms. “I missed ye too, laddie. But everyone else was there, surely.” She tousled his tawny hair.
“Aye, but the grown-ups were all busy, and Breda was frowning. Besides, she’s never as funny as ye.”
Their father’s lips twitched while he tried to swallow his laughter. Connall lifted his son and kissed the top of his head. “Just don’t tell Breda ye said that, lad. She’d choke on it for certain.
In the act of hugging his father, Geordie paused, looking confused. “Tis only words, Da. How could she choke? I didn’t mean to kill her. I’ll never say it again.”
For a second time, Connall’s lips twitched, along with Esmé’s and Grandmam Caelia’s. “That would probably be wise,” Caelia said quite seriously, in order to keep her laughter inside.
“Weel, I’ve work to do,” Connall said, hurrying away, shoulders shaking.
“Be a good lad, mo-run, and go play with your garden toys while I sit and talk with your sister.”
Geordie nodded good-naturedly, gave Esmé one more ferocious hug and went off to dig out his ‘tools’ and wooden worms, carved and lacquered birds and small animals his Grandad Rory had carved for him to play with while he pretended to plant a garden like Esmé’s. He adored Esmé and wanted to be exactly like her. He knew with certainty that she would never leave him.
“I brought ye something in case you’re hungry.” Caelia Rose MacGregor sat on the edge of the chair her son-in-law had built for her comfort when she visited Esmé in the garden, which was often.
“Thank ye, Grandmam. I guess I’m just no’ hungry.”
Caelia balanced a tray of bannocks and crowdie and pears on one wide, flat arm of the chair. Normally the girl would have at least stopped by the kitchen long enough to bring her food out to share among her menagerie of animals on the mend, those who’d chosen to stay after they’d healed, and some who came and went when they pleased. This late May day was cold, so the garden was more crowded than usual, and the pens and ingenious boxes where she kept the injured and sick were full to bursting.
Examining Esmé closely, Caelia observed, “Ye have a distant look in your eyes, Esmé Rose, as if you’re no’ quite with us.”
Rose was her middle name, but also Caelia’s maiden name. The girl loved the sound of her two names together, and clung to all things Rose. She loved the crest, which had a harp—an old-fashioned hand harp, or clarsach—instead of the animals of prey others had chosen long ago. Besides, music enchanted her, so it was perfect. Birds stood on either side of the clarsach, as opposed to the bucks or wolves that appeared on other crests. And the Rose motto warmed her heart: Constant and True.
Inexplicably, the girl blushed and looked away. The added color in her cheeks emphasized her comeliness, but also her fragility. She was tall, yet delicate looking in every other sense, but her grandmother was not fooled by Esmé’s looks. Caelia knew her to be a very strong woman for her 18 years. Her tightly braided blonde hair was pulled back from her heart-shaped face and fell down her back, brushing the soil. Caelia had long ago given up trying to keep her favorite granddaughter clean. Sometimes she wondered if the dirt was a form of unconscious protection.
“You’ve been dreaming again, haven’t ye?”
Unable to control herself, the girl blushed a second time. “Have ye been talking to Da?”
“About your dreams? Certainly not. That subject will always remain between us. Ye must trust me on that, dear lass.”
“I do.” Esmé looked up when she felt the blush fade, though she knew Caelia had seen it. Her grandmother missed nothing. Sometimes she wondered if Caelia could read her mind. She certainly hoped not. The sensuous feelings came rushing back, and she dug her nails into the soil, hoping the memories would go underground, though her whole body trembled. Her grandmother was a seer, and though she told the girl time and again she could only ‘see’ through her paintings, Esmé was fanciful and could not help but wonder. “But I promise ye, these were new dreams not old nightmares. New visions and songs. New...” she hesitated, touching the medallion in her pocket, then added, “promises.”
Caelia felt a special ache in her heart for this young woman, who had gone through so much when she was only nine, and without a mother to help her through it.
Esmé could not hold back a poignant smile. She knew her grandmother was thinking of The Night of the Bear as they all referred to it, because it had changed so much. Everyone had suffered many hard weeks after Esmé and her father had stumbled in the night of the attack. The healer Eachan had come quickly with his herbs and poultices. Still, her da had burned with fever for a full week, and then been ill for two more. It had taken him even longer to strengthen his arm again, for some of the muscles had been damaged. He had managed many of the required duties as Keeper of the Manor, and Rory helped him with others, but it had been well over a year before Esmé heard Connall confess to his in-laws: “I finally feel like a man again.”
I and I alone took that feeling from him, she berated herself.
Meanwhile the men of Glen Affric had set out to search for Ewan, who had gotten lost in the woods when he followed Esmé. He had become very ill with a raging fever and congestion of the lungs, and though Eachan had treated him as vigilantly as her father, her young brother had only lasted a month. Too weak to fight anymore, he had finally given in. Esmé had been inconsolable. I did this too! I should have taken care of my brother. I knew how he depended on me. For excitement, for a reckless moment, I brought disaster upon everyone.
Weighed down with guilt and fear of losing more of the ones she loved, she had huddled inside the manor house at Hill of the Hounds—or Fairies Haven, as some still called it—never once setting foot outside from that night forward, except for this small fenced area along the western side of the house. She had managed, over these many years, to push her guilt down deep inside, because it would have consumed her else.
They never discovered the injured bear.
For years she had been plagued by nightmares, and then dreamless sleep.
“Promises, is it?” her grandmother asked, pleased, for she could not resist Esmé’s radiant face and smile. Her chest tightened with tenderness and tears pricked her eyes at the sight of her granddaughter’s elation. “Weel then, tis time and not before time.”
Esmé did not need to speak; the answer was in her shining eyes.
Chapter Four
Magnus glowered at his brothers and father, holding steady, though it felt as if the ground was shifting like sand beneath his feet. Much as they often annoyed him, they were the only family he had left, and he cared for them profoundly.
He stared at them then as if he did not know them, had never known the two tall soldiers and the proud man, grizzled and weak, whose eyes flashed with resolve.
“Ye’d take away the lairdship?” he repeated in shock, feeling ill.
Diarmid nodded without a word.
“Ye are aware that I never wanted the title to begin with?” That was true; he’d had to fight a battle in his soul to even accept it, which was why he was stunned at how much this little plot to remove him from his birthright hurt.
Graeme sniggered. “Tis what ye say now to save yourself embarrassment, but we all know how much ye covet being laird for the power it gives ye over us, the clan and the money. Weel, now ye must pay for that power with a war.”
His brown eyes seemed to pierce Magnus’s defensive wall, and he realized his brother was smarter than he’d believed. Clever and greedy—for blood and violence, not money—that was a dangerous combination.
Pounding on the table with such force it rattled the plates and saucers, Hugh demanded, “Give us your answer. Is it to be war or no?”
His voice reverberated through the large room that should have held linen cabinets and several fine sideboards to display the china and silver and special pieces his family had cherished for generations. The table should have been of fine mahogany, and 20 feet long at least, with gilt cushioned chairs arranged along each side. Massive rugs should lie at both ends, woven in Brussels or the Far East, and the plain stone walls, cracked in some places, should have been covered with skilled and vibrant tapestries to give the huge room life and color. But as Magnus looked around at the new wooden floor—plain because that was all the MacLeods could afford—the six-foot oak table and newly upholstered eight matching chairs, he saw the dining room as a stranger would: bare and hollow and ludicrously empty.
The illness in his gut increased, and as it did, he knew what he must do. “I must consider it carefully.” He looked directly at his father. “One cannot, after all, decide to go to war in the time it takes to miss breakfast. Julia MacDonnell has certainly destroyed her own honor, and that of her father, and laid a shadow across ours. You’re right, the three of you. It cannot be allowed to stand.”
That was not what they had expected. Did they think I would capitulate while I stood with my stomach growling even through my shock and anger? Of course they did. They not only had no faith in his judgment; they also had no faith in his strength, because he didn’t wear it in a scabbard perpetually at his side. “But soon they’ll find out how wrong they are,” he said in a tone of voice neither his brothers nor his father would have recognized. He was fairly certain they had forgotten the subtlety of the MacLeod clan motto: “I shine, not burn.” If, that is, they had ever understood it. He was certain Julia, his betrothed did not; she had not even bothered to learn it.
~ * ~
Magnus stopped briefly in his room to eat some cheese, bread and wine he’d had not had time to finish the night before. When it was gone, he was itching to get out and away from the castle. The sun had barely risen, but he knew others would be up and about. He reached the stairs from the Auld Keep to the town with great relief, more blind than open-eyed, thinking far too hard. He paused for a moment at the landing. Glancing down, he froze.
Arise! The whole of the world awaits ye! The Voice had said. And so it did.
The townspeople and half the island dwellers were gathered in one great jagged clump of humanity at the foot of the stairs and along the castle walls, all staring up at him expectantly. It was the end of May, but most of them stood in snow up to mid-calf, and the stones they were leaning on must be nearly as cold as the broken ice from the puddles in the muddy road. Winter lingered in patches on the thatched and wooden roofs, covering the ground beyond the crumbling city walls, half of which had collapsed years ago. The sea brushed the rocky shore lethargically, too thick and cold to rush. Water drip, drip, dripped from the corners of cottages, wooden shacks and a few newer buildings. It was 1820 on that day in late May, and the last hotel had been raised in 1750; the last bank in 1755. The keep behind him—called the Auld Keep, perhaps because it had been built in 1126—had fallen into to total disrepair in parts, but Magnus was only slowly bringing it back.
He enjoyed his other passions much more: he was the island healer, a benefactor to the people of his clan, and a scientist of sorts. At least he liked to think so. He was also a hunter and expert fisherman. He had tried to find ways to increase grain growth so the people didn’t starve.
Magnus narrowed his bright blue eyes, running his fingers absently through his hair, waiting. I’ve no’ had my breakfast yet, so no doubt they want something done at once, he thought cynically. He was not always so cynical, he told himself. Or was he?
“You’re needed, Magnus the Broken!” several people cried out, both men and women.
He had once smashed two of his toes, and it irked him that everyone since had called him Magnus the Broken. It might not have come to that if there hadn’t been two other Magnuses in town. One was an old man who had been very ill, but against everyone’s expectations, had survived. He was known as Magnus the Cured. The third was called just plain Magnus. “And a lucky man he is,” Magnus the Broken murmured under his breath.
“What is the meaning of this?” he hollered down to the faces turned toward him. He did not really intend to be rude; it was just one of the hazards of being a MacLeod—but especially of being a Magnus. Besides, they all knew his gruff exterior was not the real Magnus; that was the Magnus he reserved for his family. And sometimes, of late, for memories of Julia MacDonnell. Particularly since Julia had left him—he cut the thought off ruthlessly. I will not think about her. I have work to do.
