“W hat is that feckin’ thing?” Grant asked Mairwen when he reached her. The wind picked up, and more dark clouds rolled in, as though summoned to join the war and blot out the sun.
“It is not a what .” Mairwen kept her focus locked on the sky while flexing her long, bony fingers. “It is a verra dangerous who .”
“Now is not the time to dance with words, witch.” A flicker of movement to his right made him turn. He nearly choked with an overwhelming surge of rage, fear, and panic. “Get inside, woman! I’ll not have ye out here. ’Tis too dangerous.”
Green eyes flashing like brilliant emeralds, Jessa pointed at the cloud and shouted, “I spotted it first. It’s mine.”
“And I’m helping her,” Emily said, squinting against the stinging whip of the wind.
“No!” he roared above the howling furor of the rising storm.
Jessa ignored him, infuriating him even more as she shoved her way in front of him and ridiculously tried to shield him with her outspread arms.
He picked her up and set her behind him, then bared his teeth at Mairwen. “Get her out of this! Take her back to her time!”
“I cannot,” Mairwen said. “It is too dangerous during an attack.”
Lightning splintered the sky into a thousand dancing pieces, and deafening thunder shook the earth.
“My goddess!” Screeching like a banshee, Griselda, the laundress, hobbled toward them as quickly as her bent body allowed, dragging along an armload of wooden paddles with her. Her small dog raced ahead and took a protective stance in front of Jessa, staring up at the roiling storm with its hackles raised and teeth bared.
If the danger were not so great, Grant would laugh at this army of women and the newly healed dog. Then he went still, remembering how Jessa had made the dog strong and healthy, even though she had denied it. If she possessed the power to heal, might she also possess other powers? “Mairwen—Jessa healed that dog. Made it whole again. Do ye ken she can do more? Could she repel that thing?”
“I did not heal the dog!” Jessa shouted over the wind, but her denial lacked conviction.
Mairwen shook her head, curling away against the gale and shielding her face with her arms. “The Morrigan is too powerful for any of ye. Go inside. The dark one and I have old scores to settle. I shall deal with her myself.”
Grant’s blood ran cold. “The Morrigan?” Fear rooted deep in his heart, not for himself, his clan, or his keep, but a heart-clenching terror for his precious Jessa. He caught her wrist and pulled her close. “Ye must go inside. I beg ye.”
With her teeth clenched in a fierce scowl, she stared up at him as if about to refuse. Then she lunged forward and pulled him down for a kiss, clinging to him with a fury. Nothing else mattered. If they died this day, at least they died together. He dropped his sword and crushed her to him, tangling his fingers in her hair and delving ever deeper into the wondrous taste of her. A force as powerful as lightning crackled through him. When he lifted his head, he lost himself in her eyes.
“I need ye safe,” he rasped, “because I have discovered I love ye just as much as I loved ye in all our past lives.”
She defiantly jutted her chin higher. “And because I love you, I will not leave you here to die alone.”
An ear-splitting wail whipped around them, unleashing the storm’s anger and stinging them with torrential rain and debris.
Grant didn’t care. He had his beloved in his arms, and she had not only admitted she loved him but sworn she would not leave. Filled with joyous defiance, he caught her closer and locked his glare with hers. “So, ye’ll be marrying me then, aye?” When she didn’t answer, he jostled her. “Aye?”
Blinking through the blinding rain, she gave him a curt nod. “Yes.”
He threw back his head and unleashed a victorious roar.
Lightning splintered the world again and struck the courtyard with a powerful explosion that burnt the air and sent the cobblestones flying. All went deadly quiet. Even the rain disappeared like morning mist burned away by a blazing sun.
“Is it over?” Emily whispered through the eerily heavy silence.
“No,” Mairwen answered. “It has only just begun. The dark one is merely taking a deep breath before she shows us her displeasure that Jessa and Grant have discovered their bond.”
An unholy roar rumbled from deep below their feet as if the earth was about to open its great maw and swallow them whole. The ground trembled and rolled, making them stagger. An eerie groan came from the keep, dust shaking free of its stones and rolling down its sides. The watchtowers jutting up from the corners of the skirting wall swayed like trees in the wind.
“ Tenete !” Mairwen shouted, dropping to her knees and digging her fingers into the ground.
Emily ran toward the open kitchen windows, screaming, “Don’t come out! It’s an earthquake. Take cover under something sturdy.”
“The puppies!” Jessa tore out of Grant’s arms and dashed for the laundress’s lean-to.
“No,” he bellowed, charging after her. “Jessa!” As he dove into the shack to drag her back out, the earth shuddered harder, making the ramshackle structure shake with a deathly rattle. “Damn ye, woman! Listen to me!”
“I am not leaving those puppies to die.”
In the choking dustiness of the darkness lit only by the hot coals beneath the wash cauldrons, Grant barely made out Jessa crawling toward the dog’s nest of rags and hay, searching for the wee mongrels.
“I can’t find them.” Panic filled her voice, and he knew without even seeing her that tears streamed down her face.
Her sorrow killed him, forcing him to drop to his knees beside her and run his hands along the ground. “The wee ones are afraid and hiding.”
The timbers above them popped and crackled, warning of what was to come. They had to find the pups before everything collapsed and caught fire in the cauldrons’ coals.
“They’re here! All three.” She gathered the tiny things into a fold in her skirt and went to stand, but the roof gave way, knocking her into his arms.
Just as he had feared, the coals got a taste of the wood, burst into flames, and crackled and popped with a greedy hunger, eating up the wreckage and trapping them with a blazing wall that would not yield.
Dust and smoke choked them. The heat threatened to sear their lungs. Coughing, Jessa sidled along the wall, moving as far from the flames as possible. “This way,” she called out, shouting above the roar of the fire.
“Jessa!” He caught her arm and shook his head while pointing. “We canna escape that way because of the skirting wall.” Lor a’mighty, if they didn’t escape soon, the thick air would take them before the fire could.
In the smoky darkness of the fiery hell, her panic reached out to him. Her desperation screamed for him to save them, her and those damn pups she loved like they were her bairns. That thought strengthened him. They would live through this and fill the keep with so many sons and daughters that their laughter would shake the foundation stones to dust.
“Hold tight to the wee dogs,” he shouted into her face, “up close to yer chest.”
“Why?”
“Just do it. There’s nay time to explain.”
She gathered the folds of her skirts around the puppies and curled herself around them.
He had to save them. No matter what. Jessa had to be safe. He shook out the extra length of his great kilt over her head to shield her, then swept her up into his arms. Ducking, he charged into the wall of fire, aiming for a patch of lightness that he prayed was the sun fighting against the clouds. The acrid stench of burning hair filled his nostrils along with its hissing crackle filling his ears. His flesh sizzled, but he didn’t care. He would save his Jessa. As he lowered his shoulder to break through a blazing timber, another one snapped and caught him across the back, then raked its fiery shards across his ribs, nearly causing him to drop his precious bundle.
“Grant!”
“I have ye, lass, I have ye.” Excruciating pain thrummed through him, but he refused to yield. All he had to do was make it into the clear. He only had to hold fast that long. As he stumbled free of the last of the raging fire, Emily and Mairwen rushed to him.
Erratic flashes of light and dark blurred his vision, then blinded him completely. He dropped to his knees and ever so gently lowered Jessa to the ground. Wheezing in agonizing breaths, he collapsed forward but caught himself on his forearms to keep from going face first into the mud.
“Take care of her,” he said, the raw growl burning his throat. “Keep her safe.” He couldn’t see, nor could he tell if the roaring in his ears was the continued raging of the storm or his own blood bellowing for relief. “Take care of her,” he repeated.
A soft touch to his face turned his head. Something softer still brushed against his ear. The sweetness of his dear one’s mouth, perhaps? That notion granted him what little ease there was to be had. “I am safe, Grant. I am safe.”
“Aye,” he whispered. Or he thought he did. With his head swimming and the demons raking their talons across his body, ’twas difficult to be certain of anything. “Safe. My love is safe.”
“Don’t you dare die on me!”
That made him smile. She sounded so far away that he feared his soul had already started its journey to the next place.
“Bind yerself to him, lass,” another voice said. “Rejoin yer soul to his. Lend him yer strength.”
The witch, maybe? He tried to blink his eyes open wider, but it did no good. Only darkness filled his vision, and the wind howled louder in his ears.
“Bind myself to him? I don’t understand.”
Ah, now he knew that voice, and he heard it as if she were within his mind rather than beside him. It was his precious Jessa. He reached for her, but the demons flexed their talons in his flesh and made him roar with the pain instead.
“Ye must say the words to him. Say them as I tell ye. Quickly now, afore the Morrigan returns and carries him off to the land of the dead. Bind him to ye and hold tight to his spirit so she canna rip him away.”
He fought to push himself upright. If the Morrigan was returning, he had to rise, had to protect his Jessa.
Then a sweetness of roses wafted into his awareness, chasing away the stench of burnt flesh, smoke, and singed hair. A velvety soft mouth kissed him, and in his mind, clear as the bell ringing in the kirk’s tower, he heard his dear one say the words:
Heart of my heart,
Soul of my soul,
We reunite,
To never let go.
Blood of my blood,
Bone of my bone,
We two are now one,
Our halves are now whole.
For the good of all,
With harm to none,
So let it be spoken,
So let it be done,
So mote it be.
“So mote it be,” he whispered, breathing easier as a familiar warmth, a comforting serenity washed across him like a soothing balm. Darkness and the suffocating pain no longer blinded him. Instead, a golden glow of ethereal light buoyed him, filling his awareness. “I love ye, my Jessa, my precious wee fox.”
“I love you, too,” she said and gave him another tender kiss. “Heaven help us both.”
* * *
Jessa was about to shatter into a hysterical mess. Maybe if she kept whispering, So mote it be , Grant would be all right. The oath had calmed him, and with any luck, it would send that dark monster straight to the deepest pit in hell. An earsplitting boom made her jump and clutch him tighter, sheltering him as best she could with his head in her lap. She struggled to keep him on his uninjured side. The last thing his ragged, bloody back needed was a roll in the mud. He had to live. She couldn’t bear it if he died because he had followed her into that fiery death trap.
A hiccuping sob escaped her as she gently rocked with her cheek pressed against his charred, matted hair. His thick, dark mane, once shoulder-length, had burned off in jagged patches, leaving him raggedly shorn and smoldering with faint wisps of smoke still rising from the longer sections. The wound on his cheek was even angrier than before, encrusted with blisters as though his raw flesh had boiled in the heat.
“I am so very sorry,” she whispered against his closed eyes before looking up at Mairwen. “Can we not take him to the twenty-first century to heal and then bring him back?”
“I am sorry, lass.” The elder shook her head. “That is not how it works. The Veil would allow ye to pass since ye are a woman, but being a male, it is doubtful he would survive it. Especially in his condition.”
“Can we not go back, get some medicine, maybe even a doctor, and bring it all here?” Emily asked.
“No. We dare not overly muddle history. We trouble it enough by our very presence.” Mairwen tipped a nod at those emerging from the keep to join them. “Ye are their mistress now, Jessa. Tell them what ye wish done.”
“What I wish done?” Had the meddling old woman lost her mind? Jessa stared at the men, women, and children. All of them stared back at her with expectant expressions. What was she supposed to tell them? She didn’t know what they needed to do. “I have no idea what to say.” Too much had just happened—and Grant, the man she had finally admitted she loved—was dying because of her.
“A good leader reassures the people and assigns them tasks so they not only feel useful but keep their minds occupied with beneficial thoughts rather than worries.” Mairwen knelt beside her and nodded at Grant. “What do ye believe he would say to them?”
Before Jessa could reply, three men she hadn’t yet met pushed free of the crowd and knelt in front of her.
“Mrs. Robeson has gone to her apothecary for healing poultices,” the largest of the trio said, before thumping his fist to his chest and bowing his head. “Forgive me, mistress. I be Henry Skelper. Close as a brother to the laird, I am.”
“I am Jessa,” she told the red-haired giant, then eyed the other two men.
“I be Lachie,” said the muscular blond who could pass for a battle-scarred Viking. “Close as a brother to him, as well.”
The last of the three, short and wiry, and somehow reminiscent of a ferret, offered her a gallant bow. “I be Gordon. If ye need a lock picked or some gold pinched, I be yer man. I can get whatever Himself might need. Daren’t ye worry about that.”
Henry shook his head. “I feel sure the mistress finds comfort in yer adeptness at thievery at a time such as this.” He bowed to her again. “We can carry him to the bedchamber, m’lady. If’n ye wish it done. What would ye have us do?”
Jessa couldn’t bear the thought of letting go of Grant, but she supposed he’d be better off in his bed instead of here in the mud. She shuddered at the thought of what needed to be done to the torn flesh on his back to keep the infection at bay. “I guess that would be best. But be careful. Try not to hurt him any more than has already been done. He saved me. We have to save him.”
“Aye, mistress,” Lachie said with a calmness that told her no matter how careful they were, the journey to the bedroom would cause Grant hellacious pain.
Lachie and Henry placed themselves on either side of their unconscious laird, hooked their arms under his, and lifted.
“Nay!” Grant came to life, growling and thrashing like an enraged beast. He knotted his fists in her skirts and yanked her closer. “I’ll not let ye take her! Never!”
“Let him go.” Jessa swatted them away, then hugged Grant and resumed her gentle rocking. “Shh…I am here. No one is taking me anywhere. I will never leave you. I promise.”
Distant thunder rumbled sorrowfully in the distance, and a respectfully shushing rain pattered in the mud, gradually increasing to a steady downpour.
“M’lady—” Henry shuffled with uneasiness. “Ye must let us move him. ’Tis for the best.”
She glared up at the man and decided that now was the time to set the tone for how they would treat her. Never again would she just go along and settle when she knew it wasn’t what was best for her or those she cared about. She deserved better. She deserved respect. “Leave us for a while. Let me get him calm while you see if anyone else is hurt or needs rescuing. Others could be trapped if anything else collapsed. You know he would want them seen to first. I’ll take care of Grant.” She swiped the rain off his face and kissed his forehead. She would sit here in the mud with him for eternity if need be. Something deep inside told her he did not need to be moved. Keeping her cheek against him, she said, “Make them go away, Mairwen, because I am not moving him. It would be wrong. I feel it. He needs me to hold him until he is ready.”
Before Mairwen could respond, Griselda spoke up, raising her shrill voice for all to hear. “Her be the goddess. Do as she says for the good of our laird.”
“The goddess?” Henry repeated, his tone equal parts awe and horror. “Forgive us, divine one.” He dropped to his knees and bowed his head. Lachie and Gordon did the same.
Griselda’s dog moved to Jessa’s side, threw back her head, and howled as if singing her goddess’s praises.
“Help the others,” Jessa told them through clenched teeth, grateful for the rain because it hid her tears. She’d clear up the confusion about the goddess thing later. If it made them listen to her now, she would use it to her advantage. She didn’t want Grant moved. It just felt wrong.
As everyone except Mairwen, Griselda, and Emily moved away to assess the damages and help anyone who might be injured, Grant relaxed, slumping against her. Alarmed, she pressed her lips to his temple and concentrated on detecting the faint tapping of his heart. To make sure she hadn’t imagined it, she worked her fingers under what was left of his neckcloth and pressed them to his throat. A slow, faint pulse barely tapped against her touch.
“You cannot die,” she said in a desperate whisper, then closed her eyes and pressed her cheek tighter against him, envisioning the healthy, sexy grump who had thrown her back onto the bed the first time she had tried to escape him. The coolness of his skin and his slower breathing both terrified and enraged her. “You will not die. I will not allow it!”
The unexplainable, loving heat that had surged through her when she had healed Griselda’s dog returned, lifting her heart and filling her with hope. Fearing she would scare the feeling away, she closed her eyes tighter and added the memory of the breathtaking fire of their first kiss to the vision of his healthiness. The soothing flow of the eerie tingling hummed through her even stronger. On impulse, she gently flattened her hands on his wounds, instinctively spreading her fingers as wide as she could. Eyes closed, she pressed her mouth to his temple and held the kiss, willing the loving energy to flow out of her and into him. Even if it didn’t heal him, at least he would know she loved him.
“Believe,” Mairwen quietly ordered, as she laid a hand on Jessa’s shoulder and squeezed. “Believe, child, and it will be so.”
“You are capable of anything you set your mind to,” Emily told her as she laid both hands on her other shoulder. “Anything is possible, Jess. Absolutely anything.”
Their touch steadied her. Their words gave her strength and clarity. “You are healed,” she whispered against Grant’s forehead, concentrating on believing every word. “You are whole.” Intuition from the very depths of her soul nudged her to add, “So mote it be.”
He shuddered with a sudden, deep intake of air, then turned and pulled her down for a kiss. He tasted of hope, of happiness, but most of all, he tasted of life. She sobbed and clutched him tighter. An overload of joy hurtled through her, exploding her senses.
“Lore a’mighty, woman,” he whispered between rapid fire kisses. “Ye’ve made me as strong and mighty as a Highland stag.”
She cradled his face between her hands and smiled. “I was so afraid you were going to die.”
He reached up and brushed his thumb across her tear-soaked cheek. “I just needed a wee rest to catch my breath, and yer loving touch to awaken me.”
“Thank you.”
The bewilderment in his eyes made her smile.
“For what are ye thanking me, love?”
“For being you.” She didn’t know how to explain it. They had only just met, and yet, now that she had fully embraced all the magical intricacies of the Highland Veil, fated mates, and whatever Mairwen and the people of Seven Cairns were, it was as though a fog had lifted. She finally saw everything clearly and remembered it as though she had known it all her life. And it was as though she knew Grant almost as well as she knew herself. She shrugged. “Thank you for being you.”
With a smugness that somehow made him endearing rather than infuriating, he pushed himself up to his feet and helped her stand. “And where are yer wee pups, m’lady?”
“Pups?” He’d just escaped death’s door and was asking her about the puppies? “I-I don’t know,” she stammered with a shake of her head. “I was worried about you.”
“With their mama,” Emily said, pointing out the dog sitting beside a basket, washing her babies. “And they’re all fine. Mama dog is grateful to both of you.”
“Are you really all right?” Jessa touched his cheek. The angry wound was gone, replaced by a silvery thread of a scar that made him even more handsome.
He caught her close and held her as if fearing she might disappear. “I am better than all right, my love, and I am grateful, as well.” His embrace tightened around her. “My spirit tried to leave here, but ye held fast, and then ye healed me.”
Emily cleared her throat. “Mairwen and Griselda, is there not someplace else we can be? Like helping with cleanup or something?”
“We need to hie ourselves to the kitchens and set some water to boiling,” Griselda said. “Himself and the goddess be wanting a fine hot bath, I’m thinking.”
Even though a bath sounded wonderful, especially one with Grant, Jessa felt guilty about even thinking of such a luxury while everyone else was busy putting everything back together. “Everyone has enough to do right now. A bath is too much to worry with. All we need is a pitcher or two of hot water and a basin.”
“It shall be done,” Griselda said, “and I shall settle the pups and Brownie-dog in a corner of the pantry if that be all right with ye, my goddess?”
“That’s fine, Griselda. Thank you.” Jessa heaved a great sigh at the woman’s insistence on addressing her as a divine being, but didn’t correct her. She’d been called worse, and now that Grant was alive and well, a bone-aching weariness had settled over her.
Grant pulled her arm through his and tucked her to his side. “Come, m’love. Let us survey the Morrigan’s destruction whilst Griselda tends to our water. She’ll send Mrs. Robeson or Molly to find us once it’s ready.”
Jessa paused long enough to wave at Emily. “We’ll talk later. Okay?”
Emily gave her a smile that settled heavily on her heart. Soon, she would never see dear Em again—or at least—not for a while. Not until the goddesses granted Mairwen’s request. If they granted it. She tried not to think about it. Head suddenly swimming, she stumbled to one side and caught hold of Grant to keep from falling.
“Jessa?” He caught her by the shoulders. “Are ye injured? Ye healed me, but what about yerself?”
“I’m just really tired. My adrenaline must be bottoming out.” She pulled in a deep breath and looped her arm through his once more. “I’m fine. Come on. Let’s make sure no one else is hurt and see how badly the keep was damaged. Has anything like that ever happened before?”
“No. But I am worried about ye. Ye’ve gone peely-wally.”
“I was accused of that in Glasgow. What exactly does that mean?”
“Sickly. Pale.”
An apt description because she felt sickly and pale but wasn’t about to admit it. It had to be the drop in adrenaline after so much terror. Inhaling all that smoke probably hadn’t helped either, but if she kept busy and powered through, everything would reset, and she would be fine. “We’ll check the kitchen first. A lot of heavy stuff could’ve fallen from the rafters.”
He glared at her in a growly yet protective way that sent a surge of contentment through her. She patted his arm and laughed, her weariness already lifting.
“Ye laugh when I look at ye with a sternness that means ye should do as I ask?”
“You make me happy when you look at me that way. It makes me feel loved.”
His sternness melted away, replaced with a soulfulness that stole the air from her lungs. “As long as my soul exists,” he said softly, “I will love ye with a fury that burns hotter than any fire that exists in this world or any other.”
She threw herself into his arms, hugging him tightly while burying her face in his chest. “I love you so much it almost hurts,” she whispered. “I never knew it could be like this.”
He held her right there in the middle of the outside kitchens as if no one else in the world existed. His heartbeat thumped a strong, reassuring beat beneath her cheek. “We are going upstairs,” he said with quiet firmness, then bellowed, “Sawny!”
She cringed and pulled back, unable to resist scolding him. “I am now deaf in one ear.”
“Forgive me, but I nay wished to miss the lad when I saw him pass by.”
Jessa tried not to smile as Sawny slowly approached, his eyes wide and his mouth hanging open. Apparently, word about the laird being at death’s door had already spread through the keep.
The boy dropped to one knee and bowed his head. “My laird—’tis glad I am to see ye so braw and filled with life.”
“Thank ye. Now, I need ye to find Henry and Lachie. Tell them to care for the clan jointly, using their best judgment until my lady and I have recovered from our ordeal. They can update me on any damages at that time. Not before. Have Mrs. Robeson send food and drink to my chambers. Griselda is seeing to the hot water for our wash. It needs to be delivered to us as well. Can ye remember all that, lad? Can I trust ye to see those things carried out with no issue?”
Sawny lifted his head and nodded, reverence in his eyes. “Aye, my laird.”
“Off wi’ ye, then.”
As Jessa watched the boy go, a niggling worry, a concern that refused to be ignored, gnawed at her. “What are your people going to think about today? About your healing? About Griselda calling me a goddess? When word spreads, there is bound to be trouble. Don’t you think?”
He scooped her up into his arms and carried her like a babe. “I think those are worries for another time. Now is our time for thankfulness, joy, and love.”