Page 18 of Her Scot of Bygones (MacLeod Dragons #2)

–Lucas–

NOTHING WAS STRANGER than loathing Evan when we found him waiting for us in the woodland, then slowly feeling my rage melt away. The sensation was much like it had been when Hazel and I first remembered each other in our lair. As if a veil were pulled back, my distrust waned.

At least until he pushed up his sleeve and revealed the last thing I wanted to see.

“Nay,”

I groused, shaking my head when I saw the same tattoo of a winged sword with a gem at the center on him that had also appeared on Hazel, meaning they could be fated mates.

“’Tis impossible.”

“We can only hope,”

Evan agreed, not fighting me but looking at the two of us with compassion.

“Though I was eager to see ye both again once I started remembering our past, this tattoo was the main reason I took the risk of coming here, because ‘tis a risk right now. Laird Dugal and Elspet are watching everyone’s comings and goings closely because another mark has not appeared on Dugal.”

The pact claimed it could be any Sutherland male, and naturally, Dugal wanted to be the one. It would give him more power than he already possessed, not to mention a new mistress, who was half dragon, giving him exceptionally powerful offspring. As it were, his wife, Hazel’s half sister, Lilias, hadn’t inherited their father’s dragon blood and was only a witch.

“Yet you did take the risk of seeking us out, and we’re grateful,”

Hazel replied to Evan, troubled.

“So is it safe to say they don’t know you wear the mark yet?”

“Nay, but I suspect ‘twill only be a matter of time.”

He eyed the sky and trees swaying as the winds grew gustier, then gestured at a cozy cave near the hazel tree.

“Why dinnae we all sit and talk, as decisions will have to be made and the weather will turn again soon.”

“Sounds good.”

Hazel looked at me, slipped her hand into mine again, and squeezed.

“Whatever happens, I’ll always be yours and don’t doubt Evan understands that.”

While Evan nodded in agreement and gave me a look of reassurance that I knew well because I had once trusted him with my life, we all knew what the ultimate outcome of this pact was, and by no means was it just peace for the sake of king and country. It was about birthing a new generation of dragons born of the Sutherland’s ancient sorcerer bloodline. So if Hazel shifted for the first time and there was a purple gem over her dragon’s heart, that meant she and Evan were fated mates and would have to breed.

“Come.”

Hazel pulled me along when I hesitated, wanting to get her as far from Evan as I could because friends or not, he was a threat.

“Let’s sit, catch up, and figure out what comes next.”

Speaking of.

“’Twas bold of ye to have that letter delivered to MacLeod Castle, Evan,”

I said, finally relenting and joining them.

He frowned at me in confusion as we sat around a fire.

“What letter?”

“It claimed if Hazel saw her tree and I went to retrieve her, then she had found her way back to us.”

Yet even as I reminded him, I not only saw but sensed he had no idea what I was talking about.

“That I had to let her dragon guide us down the path we needed to travel to find out which one of us she’s destined for.”

I narrowed my eyes.

“You threatened if I didnae, ‘twould be war betwixt us.”

“Which strongly implied you remembered our past,”

Hazel said softly, eyeing Evan.

“Yet you didn’t, did you? Not until recently.”

She shook her head.

“Any more than you delivered that letter.”

“’Twas not me,”

Evan confirmed, seeming just as troubled.

“And nay, I didnae remember what we three shared until just last night.”

He cocked his head and narrowed his eyes, issuing Hazel a small smile.

“’Twas truly odd. I was enjoying a dessert made by our cook who doesnae excel at such things, but she’s a kindly old lass, so I assured her ‘twas verra good, only for the next bite to be delicious indeed. ‘Twas so good it jogged a memory then another, and ye came rushing back to me, Hazel, as ‘twas mine and Lucas’s favorite cake ye had made for us when we were young.”

“A sweet far better than any we’d ever had,”

I murmured, unable to stop a small smile, too, when I remembered her making it for the first time. She had found what she needed in the woodland, cooked it in a cauldron over this very firepit, and won our hearts instantly.

“I remember now,”

she said softly, whimsically, seeing us all as children.

“You two were out fighting with swords you’d fashioned out of sticks, and I was in here with my basket of herbs.”

Her gaze rose to the ceiling where she had once dried those very herbs, and she smiled.

“And I was in here experimenting in a frilly apron I had fashioned out of anything I could get my hands on, determined to find the perfect recipe.”

“’Twas when ye first used yer magic,”

Evan reminded, still smiling.

“’Twas something to behold even if it didnae quite go yer way.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle, remembering her calling us in to eat and informing us it just needed one finishing touch, and that would be a bit of dragon fire if we could spare it.

“Yet when you gestured at the pot—”

I couldn’t help but chuckle.

“we learned you had a wee bit o’ dragon in you as well because what you were making caught on fire.”

Hazel chuckled too and looked at me not just with fondness at the memory but with unmistakable love.

“Always wanting to impress me, you gallantly put it out with a bit of your own dragon magic, and I’ll swear to this day that was the key.”

She slipped her hand into mine again.

“One I’m sure was part of why I was able to make that cake again last night, and for it to reveal everything we had forgotten.”

Her soft smile turned to Evan.

“Us, because I loved you guys so much, and I still do. You were my best friends. Much-needed friends when things were difficult at home.”

I remembered now. All of it. Everything she’d shared with us. Everything we’d shared with her. We knew so much about each other, and truly were the best of friends. When I met Evan’s eyes, I knew he was thinking the same thing, and it saddened me that we had lost so much time.

“Why did we lose time, though?”

I wondered aloud.

“I cannae for the life of me recall.”

I shook my head and frowned at Evan.

“To my mind ‘twas Lilias who came betwixt us, yet I cannae recall how it ended, and it seems I never told my kin.”

“Nor I, but then I never trusted most of mine.”

Evan’s eyes softened with undeniable affection, settling on the fire as the skies darkened once more and thunder rumbled in the distance.

“I was only ever in love with Lilias. I trusted her completely...even trusted her with my heart.”

“I’m so sorry,”

Hazel said, her words soothing as only they could be, and the pain in her eyes for him genuine.

“So you finally told her how you felt? Because the last I remember, you hadn’t.”

“Aye, I told her, but by then ‘twas too late.”

Evan sighed, the heartbreak in his words palpable as his eyes remained on the fire.

“Dugal had become chieftain, and he wanted her as his bride, so she was lost to me before we ever stood a chance.”

“Yet she still loves you,”

Hazel said, sounding certain if not nostalgic.

“I remember the few times she joined us, mostly in her early teens, and I recall how she looked at you.”

She glanced from me back to Evan.

“Just like I looked at Lucas.”

“Aye,”

Evan agreed, his gaze fond if not a little lost now.

“’Twas all there in the one kiss we shared before Dugal made her his—”

his tone turned bitter.

“not out of love but because she was the daughter of his father’s rival. It didnae matter that Malcolm Sutherland was gone by then. He wanted all that belonged to yer father to belong to him just as his da before him.”

“That’s despicable,”

Hazel said, her gaze as wounded as Evan’s words.

“The years since then must have been difficult for you both, seeing each other yet knowing you could never be together.”

“It has not been easy.”

Evan ground his jaw, and his dragon eyes flared.

“Made harder when Dugal bred with her undoubtedly against her will and with no love betwixt them.”

His gaze softened once more.

“But then, I suppose we would not have her wee precious bairn, Marjorie, otherwise.”

“I can’t believe I have another sister, let alone a niece,”

Hazel marveled, seeming to understand what Evan needed right now because she chanted wooden mugs all around, then a cauldron over the fire, a basket of herbs, and various other things here and there.

“Tell me all about her, Evan. Spare no details.”

She chanted on an all-too-familiar frilly apron and started tossing things into the pot, encouraging him with a warm smile.

“Tell me all about my beautiful, precious niece.”

“She is verra bonnie,”

Evan conceded, clearly finding comfort in the line of conversation and, like me, the sight of Hazel bustling around.

“Come to think of it, she looks a lot like ye, Hazel, with the same striking red locks and big green eyes.”

“Tell us more.”

She kept smiling as she tossed various things in the pot, and icy rain mixed with random snowflakes outside.

“What is she like?”

“Curious to be sure, much like her Aunt Hazel,”

he began, grunting with approval at the whisky she provided before his smile widened.

“She’s a wee bit o’ a daredevil with a fierce love of adventure, longing to fly with the dragons.”

“It sounds like she is a wee bit like all her aunts.”

Hazel cocked her head and frowned.

“So she’s not half dragon?”

“Nay.”

Evan shook his head.

“Like Lilias, she didnae inherit the gene.”

He eyed her curiously.

“Why do ye sound so surprised?”

“I don’t know.”

She shrugged and shook her head.

“I guess it sounded wrong somehow, but it obviously happens, so I’m not sure why it struck me as strange.”

Having added everything she wanted, Hazel stirred her concoction and encouraged him to go on.

“Tell us more about Majorie, and about your life now.”

She smiled from me to Evan.

“Let’s catch up while we eat like we used to and see if we can’t cobble together how we ended up forgetting each other.”

So we did, and as the afternoon turned into night, we enjoyed Hazel’s delicious cooking, some good whisky, and got caught up. Sometimes the conversation was serious, and sometimes full of laughter, as we took a walk down memory lane, as Hazel put it.

Mysteries remained, however.

None of us could recall when Hazel had first arrived, only our initial contact with her on a snowy night when we had been out hunting. And none of us could remember how it ended, and we were left believing something untrue, if not downright forgetting things altogether. That is, until heavy snowflakes replaced rain and we finally witnessed where it all began.

Better still, who it all began with.