“They keep this here downstairs,” she said in awe. “Can you believe it?”
He looked at the hunting scene depicted there, then shrugged. “I suppose when you have all this history collected, you have to hang it somewhere.”
She smiled at him and he felt it a bit like a fist in the gut. He didn’t know her, which made it absolutely ridiculous to continue to have the feeling that he’d met her before.
He was going to have to get some control over his life before the utter improbability of it overwhelmed him.
“I think we’re getting a tour of the tree now,” she said reverently.
He frowned. “The tree?”
“The hawthorn, which I’ve just learned isn’t so much a hawthorn as it is a holly tree. They built the castle around it. Cool, isn’t it?”
He agreed it was and allowed himself to be collected right along with her by their guide, who was as full of as much hearty trivia as he could have wished for. A Scottish historian in her element? There wasn’t much he appreciated more.
He walked with Emma down more stairs and into what might have been mistaken for a cellar in times past. In the midst of the floor, surrounded by a railing, was a tree.
“The donkey lay down beneath this very tree,” the guide was saying, “and that was enough to assure the Thane he had fulfilled the inspiration of his dream.”
Nathaniel realized he’d been gaping at the tree in much the same way Emma had been at that tapestry. It also occurred to him that he had missed quite a bit of the tale the guide had been telling them. He looked at her in consternation.
“Dream?”
She smiled. “The first Thane of Cawdor was looking for a spot to build a new home. Legend has it that he strapped a chest of gold to a donkey, the donkey wandered to this tree and lay down, and the perfect spot was thus selected.”
Emma looked at her in surprise. “But this tree isn’t still alive, is it?”
“Sadly, no. Building the castle around it, I believe, was too much for it. I’m not sure we can say with accuracy how long it lived, but they have run tests to verify when they think it was planted.”
“Really?” Emma said. “When was that?”
“I believe the carbon dating puts it about 1372.”
Nathaniel took a breath.
He let that breath out.
Then he felt his world cleave in two.
He clutched the railing, because his alternative was to fall into the pit surrounding that dead tree. He almost went downto his knees, truth be told. It was nothing but sheer willpower that kept him on his feet. That and Emma suddenly standing next to him with her arm around his waist.
He realized the tour guide was peering into his face, but he couldn’t find the words to tell her to stop.
“Are you unwell, sir? Is he unwell, miss?”
“I’m fine,” he rasped, heartily alarmed by how difficult it was to get the words out. “Fine.”
He thought he might be ill. Those numbers weren’t his usual ones, to be sure; those numbers were a thousand times worse. It was as if the whole world had shuddered.
“I’ll go find you some water,” the guide said. “Miss, if you want to come and sit on these stairs with him, he might be more comfortable.”
“Nay, we should go,” Nathaniel ground out. It was honestly all he could do not to fling himself over the railing and hope he knocked himself unconscious. It would have been the kindest thing he could have done for himself.
“I’ll run fetch help, then,” the woman said, sounding profoundly alarmed. “Sir, you look very unwell.”
He felt very unwell. He simply closed his eyes, because he didn’t have the energy to argue with her. He put his hand over his eyes as well and left it there until he thought he could pull it away without the faint lights in the cellar blinding him.
That took substantially longer than he thought it might.
