Mael: Immortal Highlander, Clan Mag Raith Book 2 Page 2

  She had so much wayward, curly hair that it hung down to her hips, and gleamed in his torch’s light like scrolls of frost. His tunic hung on her tall frame like an over-large sack, but that only emphasized the graceful lines of her long limbs. She had dark gold brows, rosy lips, and a slightly squared chin that balanced the oval of her refined features. Her stature was such that her eyes, of the same silvery gray as dove feathers, looked into his with but a slight tip of her chin.

  By the Gods, he’d never seen such a female. She might have been one of the old Eceni’s war goddesses, fallen to earth.

  “It seems that I am exceptionally long, as you are,” Rosealise said, pursing her lips as she eyed her bare feet. She seemed dismayed now. “Happily, far leaner, or your shirt would…well, it’s the best we may do.”

  “I’d give you my trews, but I’ve naught under… ah…” He looked around them until he saw his tartan flung against the base of a hedge. “Here, lass.”

  Rosealise watched him shake out the plaid and then stepped back as he held it out to her. “I cannot take your cloak, Mr. Mag Raith. You must be thoroughly chilled by now.”

  “’Tis hardly cooler than a summer morn, and I’m no’ a maister. My name ’tis Mael.” As he wrapped the violet and black tartan around her shoulders, he breathed in the crisp, clean scent of her, like that of snowfall on a still November morning. As soon as he felt her shiver, he took his hands away. He’d frightened her, likely by telling her too much about the Sluath and her escape. Then he wondered if instead he caused her fright. “You’ve no more to fear, my lady.”

  A soft chuckle escaped her. “I am no lady, sir…Mael. I work. I work as… I am…” She frowned and pressed her fingers to her temple. “The headache regrettably prevents my calling to mind my work at present.” She squinted at him. “Might we go now?”

  That meant walking out of the maze, and be facked if Mael could remember how he’d gotten into it. Dimly he recalled pushing through the outer hedge, and picked up his torch to examine the nearest walls—walls which now had begun sprouting long wooden branches covered in sharp metal thorns.

  “Mayhap I spoke too soon.” Mael turned his head until he spied the top of Dun Chaill’s only intact tower, and then took hold of Rosealise’s arm. “This way with me, lass.”

  “Oh, blazes.” She held out her other hand, across which he saw a long, thin scratch oozing blood. “You have exceedingly unpleasant shrubbery here, sir, in dire need of trimming. You should give your gardener the sack.”

  “I shall burn the place on the morrow,” he promised as he hurried her along with him. Ahead of them more of the thorned branches appeared, and began spreading into the gap between the two hedge walls. “Lass, forgive me.”

  “Forgive you for—oh, my.” She flung her arms around his neck a moment after he snatched her up. “Sir, this is most unseemly.”

  “Aye.” He shifted sideways and back again to avoid the stabbing branches, and then spotted his own tracks. “Hold tight now, lass.”

  Mael looked ahead with his eyes far-seeing and at last spotted the opening in the hedge. It had been somehow hacked out of the juniper, as if he’d done so with his sword, which as he recalled remained inside the great hall where he’d left it.

  “May I have that torch a moment?” Rosealise asked, and when he handed it to her, she waved the flames at the branches, which shrank back into the hedges. “Beware now. I see a very large hole in the ground there, by that gap in the greenery. I daresay we shall fall into it should we attempt to leave by that route, sir.”

  “Mael. Mayhap.” He shifted her so that her chest and hips pressed against his. “Put your legs around my waist.”

  “I’ve no notion of what you mean.” Rosealise made a shrill sound as he hoisted her thighs around him. “Mael, I cannot believe I’m accustomed to such behavior.”

  He glanced over his shoulder to see the space behind them filling up with thorny branches. “’Tis a run now, lass, or we shall be skewered.”

  “As I see. Well, then.” She sighed and clutched him tightly. “Onward, my dear sir, onward.”

  Mael backed up a few steps, hissing as thorns prodded his bare back. He then ran at the gap, waiting until the last possible moment before he jumped. His powerful legs projected them both over the pit-trap and through the juniper, and when he landed, he promptly fell face-down atop Rosealise.

  He propped himself on his elbows and looked down at her dazed expression. “So, ’twas like this for you with me, then?”

  She closed her eyes for a moment, and he saw the gleam of a tear clinging to her pale lashes. When he used his thumb to brush it away, she took in a deep breath and smiled up at him.

  “Thank you, sir. You’ve saved my life twice now.”

  It had been so long since Mael had been so close to a female that he didn’t want to move. No, ’tis her. Only and ever her. That ridiculous thought made him push himself up and off her.

  Rosealise swiped her fingers over her cheeks, sniffing as she rose. She then quickly tugged down the edge of his tunic, as if trying to cover as much of her legs as possible.

  “If I may be so unmannerly to inquire, what do those marks on your arm signify?”

  His jaw tightened as he glanced down at his Sluath tattoo. He hated the strange inked glyphs, but to remove them he’d have to skin himself.

  “’Tis a brand, I reckon.”

  “I’m also marked.” She touched her leg. “Mine appear to be the reverse of yours.”

  Mael thought of Jenna’s skinwork, which matched Domnall’s. “Mayhap the same fiend marked us both. We’re as cattle to the demons.”

  “Ah, yes. The demons.” She turned toward the wall of the outer ward. “Blazes. Is this a castle?”

  Mael nodded. “’Tis Dun Chaill, home now to the Mag Raith. Much in ruins, yet we mean to rebuild it.”

  “An admirable goal.” For a moment sadness flickered across Rosealise’s face. “Where in it might we find your chieftain?”

  Chapter Three

  BEING ROUSED FROM his bed to greet a strange, half-dressed female had Domnall wondering if he yet dreamed. Jenna, who woke with him, obviously recognized the towering lass as one of the females who escaped the Sluath with them. She said nothing as Mael introduced Rosealise Dashlock, and then ushered her into their chamber.

  “I regret I must disturb you both at this wretched hour,” Rosealise said. “But Mael has related a tale of my escaping an underworld that seems quite, ah, fantastic.”

  The sound of her voice echoed through Domnall’s thoughts, familiar and warming, as if a pleasing song. From that recollection came a single word, uttered in his own voice: Dash.

  “I’ll explain to Miss Dashlock what’s happened,” Jenna said. “You two should go build up the fires and put on a brew.” She handed Mael one of her mate’s tunics. When neither of them moved she added, “The lady needs to dress, guys.”

  On their way to the great hall Mael related the details of his encounter with Rosealise in the maze. That she had plummeted out of the sky and retained no memory of her past life made it obvious that she had been a Sluath slave. Jenna had found her way to them in the same manner.

  “I told her more than I should, Chieftain,” his tracker admitted as they retrieved some logs from the woodpile the men had stacked in the corner of the hall. “’Twas unnerving, to see her there in my tunic, looking the goddess with her hair loose about her. ’Twas so addling I forgot to guard my tongue. Now she reckons me crazed.”

  “Jenna shall assure her you’re no’.” He watched Mael struggle into his tunic. “The goddess fell naked from the sky, then.”

  “Aye. I thought you larger.” He rolled his shoulders against the too-tight seams before he caught Domnall’s gaze. “Dinnae smirk at me. ’Twas no’ as if I summoned a female in the scud to drop on my head.”

  “Never should I reckon different.” But he heard the softer shift in Mael’s tone whenever he spoke of Rosealise, and the new worry in his eyes. “Ken yo
u the lady from our time in the underworld?”

  “I recall naught of her or that,” Mael admitted. He looked as if he might say more, and then rubbed his brow. “I’ll go see to a brew.”

  Jenna came to the hall with Rosealise a short time later, and smiled at Domnall as she led the woman to sit by the now blazing hearth. It amused him to see his spare tunic, trews and boots fit the tall blonde’s length, if not her much-thinner frame and smaller feet.

  “I daresay I’ve never donned pantaloons or bloomers,” Rosealise said as she sat down and regarded his trews. “Quite comfortable and practical. Doubtless why men never allow us to wear them.” She looked up at Domnall. “As soon as I may secure more suitable attire, Chieftain, I will launder and return yours.”

  “’Tis of no concern.” He walked over to stand beside the heavy wood mantle so that he faced both women. “My wife spoke to you of how and why we came here?”

  “She did explain, most thoroughly,” Rosealise said, her expression shifting to remorse. “I regret that I briefly regarded Mael as a lunatic.” She looked around them. “I should like very much to apologize to him for my mistake.”

  The softness in her tone suggested she wanted to do more than that, which pleased Domnall. Of all his hunters, Mael had been unwavering in his loyalty to the Mag Raith. As a man devoted to his family, he’d also suffered the most from the loss of their tribe and their solitary, outcast existence among the druids. A tall, strong lady like Rosealise might make him the perfect mate.

  “Mael is preparing a brew, something like tea,” Jenna said to her, and then met his gaze. “I do remember saying goodbye to Miss Dashlock in the underworld, and she has a Sluath tattoo, so she was definitely imprisoned there with us. The reason she sounds different from me is that she’s English.” His wife glanced at the other woman. “You have a vaccination scar on your arm. Do you know when you got that?”

  “Horrid sickness, small pox. I…oh.” Rosealise uttered a small sound of dismay and rubbed the back of her neck. “Do you know, I suffer the most dreadful ache in my head whenever I try to recollect even the smallest detail of my life?”

  “It’s the same for me,” Jenna said. “Unlike us, Domnall and his men remember their past without any difficulty. They were hunters before the Sluath captured them.”

  Domnall guessed why his wife was choosing her words so carefully. She had not yet informed Rosealise that she had travelled through time, or that Jenna and the Mag Raith were immortals.

  “Now we’re become builders, and Jenna our architect,” Mael said, his tone deliberately hearty as he emerged from the kitchens with a tray of steaming mugs, oatcakes and fruit. “If you’ll take charge of this, my lady?” he said to Jenna as he handed her the tray.

  Domnall went to help him set up the trestle table, watching his gaze as it kept straying back to Rosealise. “What think you?”

  “She’s an iron wildflower,” Mael promptly answered. “Such beauty, and yet so sure and strong.” He looked intently into Domnall’s face and glowered in return. “I but admire her courage, as I’ve done Jenna’s.”

  “You’ve never looked at my wife thus,” he told him, “or I’d have put you on your arse.”

  Dawn arrived soon as they assembled the table, and the other Mag Raith emerged from their chambers. Each stopped to stare at Rosealise before moving to join Domnall and Mael. In a low voice the chieftain quickly related what had happened before asking the ladies to come to the table.

  After introductions to the other men Rosealise sat beside Jenna and inspected them openly, earning a smile from Edane and a narrow look from Kiaran. Broden seemed to be looking anywhere but at the Englishwoman.

  “You chaps seem a quite capable lot,” Rosealise said, her tone briskly pleasant. “I’ve no doubt you’re the reason we ladies escaped the underworld. For my part I do thank you. Have any of you written to your families to make them aware of your adventures?”

  Before anyone spoke Broden said, “We cannae write, and we’ve no living kin. ’Tis just the five of us, and our chieftain’s wife.” He seemed oblivious to Mael’s glower, his rasping voice grew soft as he asked, “Ken you any of us, my lady?”

  Rosealise took a moment to carefully study each face again before she sighed. “I’m afraid I don’t recognize anyone, sir, although Mael seems somewhat familiar to me. Jenna tells me in time my memories may return, so if we were acquainted, I pray my ignorance of it only temporary.” She eyed the tracker for a moment, and her lips curved.

  Broden nodded, but Domnall had the odd sense that he was angry.

  “What shall you do now, my lady?” Kiaran asked.

  “You’ve all been exceedingly kind to me, and I’m so grateful,” the Englishwoman said briskly. “Yet I feel I should seek lodging elsewhere until I may regain some inkling of my personal situation. Perhaps there is an inn in a nearby village?” Before someone answered she touched her brow. “I forget, I have no money to pay for rooms, or memory of family or friends who might assist me. It seems I must trespass on your hospitality a little longer, Chieftain.”

  “Think naught of it,” Domnall told her. He had no intention of allowing her to leave Dun Chaill, but if she thought that her own idea, all the better.

  “Well, then that’s settled.” Rosealise glanced at one of the tree trunks supporting the boughs and thatch they’d installed as a roof over the hall. “This is admirable work you’ve done here. I’m quite impressed by the clever manner by which you’ve preserved nature’s additions to this room. Do you imagine the trees will continue to grow?”

  As Jenna described how the men had first topped the trees and stripped their branches before building the roof, Broden rose from his seat. He caught Domnall’s eye and gave a tilt of his head before he retreated into the kitchen. The chieftain followed, and found his trapper adding water to the brew pot.

  “We shallnae frighten her, if ’tis your worry,” he told Broden, and watched him toss a handful of herbs and spice to the water. “As we learned with Jenna, ’tis better to measure out truth in small portions.”

  “’Tis no’ that.” The trapper glanced out into the hall before he said in a lower voice, “Since we came here, I’ve been dreaming of a lass. I cannae recall her features, but her long, pale hair, aye. ’Twas the same as the lady’s. ’Twere no such females among our tribe, so I ken I met her in the underworld.”

  Domnall frowned. “Why didnae you say?”

  “In my dreams the lass shares my bed.” His jaw tightened. “Naked, as we kiss and touch. Although I ken no more than that, doubtless we facked.”

  “Jenna said ’twere other females who escaped with us.” He thought of Mael’s besotted looks at the Englishwoman and rubbed his brow. “You cannae tell her, Brother.”

  “Think you I would?” Broden rose and bunched his fists. “I ken that I’m slave-born, and lower than swine. You neednae remind me.”

  Before Domnall could explain his meaning the trapper stalked out.

  Chapter Four

  IN THE FIRST light of dawn Galan Aedth sat in the center of a midland glen and silently fumed. The last of his channeling crystals sat on the stele before him, flickering like a rushlight in a breeze. His chilled hands felt none of its power as he tried again to draw from it. To see the faint glimmer of magic wink out confirmed his suspicions.

  Useless.

  Galan rose from the spell circle, leaving behind the crystal and the stele as he made his way through the tall grass to his mount. Despite his efforts to conserve his power it had slowly drained away over the last weeks. The charms he carried would maintain his protective body ward for only a few more hours. Without more power to recharge them he was as useless as a mortal.

  For this quest Galan had sacrificed much. Thanks to the Mag Raith and Jenna Cameron he’d lost his position as headman of the Moss Dapple, and had been banished from his tribe. He had no wish to return to the enchanted forest, even to dwell among his own kind, so that was of little consequence. What burned in him wa
s the need for vengeance against the Pritani and their hoor. His pursuit of them had forced him to bargain with the Sluath. The soul-stealing demons had proven even more terrifying than the old legends had claimed. Yet they had also promised him in return for the Mag Raith the one dream denied him for centuries.

  Fiana, his dead mortal wife, would be returned to him, unless he failed to give the demons what they wanted.

  He stopped and crouched to remove the horse’s hobble when another disagreeable thought occurred to him. The gods saw to it that druid kind could return to the mortal realm from the well of stars. When Galan died his next death, he would not reincarnate again.

  He straightened, and gripped the carved shell pendant hanging from his neck. In hopes of gaining the secret of immortality he had deceived the Mag Raith into serving him for twelve centuries. He’d wanted eternal life so that he might have time to discover how his mortal wife might reincarnate as druids did. By abandoning him, the wretched Pritani had condemned Galan to the same fate as his beloved Fiana.

  If I fail, I shall die and like her be lost forever.

  Galan knew he had set himself upon the dark path ever since learning that the Sluath were more than superstitious legends. All the warnings he’d ignored over his many lifetimes now would come true. He’d squandered his power and his soul for a love he’d never again know, and an existence ever denied his kind. Another druid might have felt regret and shame.

  His rage fed on the humiliation to burn ever higher.

  A shadow blocked the rising sun, and Galan saw the fringe of the dark gray clouds racing toward him. Strange flashes of light within the fast-moving storm made him force his legs to walk toward it. The lightning that sliced down to strike the glen made clots of dirt and grass fly into the air as he stood and watched. The light flashes spread, grew brighter, and took on form.

  Winged men, godlike and arresting in beauty, flew down to land before him. Each had a beguiling form, and the vision they presented seemed that of a celestial gift being bestowed. Their immense wings flared out before folding and disappearing into their backs. Magic shimmered over them, transforming the demons into seemingly ordinary mortal men. Only one did not change, but strode up to Galan in all his white-gold glory.