With a clap of her hands to summon the chambermaids, she gifted Ciara with a welcoming smile. “If ye will follow me, I will have ye settled in and your things put away as befits the lady of Clan MacKay.”
ChapterFour
Bright and cheerful rooms surprised Ciara when Sorcha led her through the door of her chambers. She’d expected the usual gloomy interior found in most keeps of the Highlands. However, Faolan’s suite of rooms was a complete antithesis of the dark, brooding man himself. Unusual scenes of heather-covered hillsides woven into tapestries decorated the whitewashed stone of the walls. Ciara heartily approved. Deer and dogs or bloody hunting scenes usually decorated most keeps.
The vibrant hues of the threads matched the chill-stopping weaves hanging at the narrow windows. Hand-carved benches beckoned with pillows of rich burgundy and royal blue, with silky coverlets to match. Ciara found the craftsmanship of the substantial furniture impressive and heartwarming. She had spent so much time in the plastic and metallic world of the twenty-first century, she realized just how much she had missed the seduction of a satiny hand-finished wood.
At the sight of furs scattered across the stone floor, she couldn’t help but frown. At one with the earth and all its creatures, Ciara felt more akin to the animals roaming the world than she did to the mortals inhabiting this realm. She noticed a door adjoining her rooms to the laird’s private chambers. Anticipation stirred the heat between her thighs. Good. The doorway would make the seduction easier.
One sparse trunk had arrived from the stables when the Sinclair troop unloaded their horses. Gordon Sinclair hadn’t deemed it necessary to provide his daughter with anything but the barest of trousseaus. No matter. Ciara could manifest anything she desired.
A muffled caw and a frantic pecking at a tapestry-covered window drew her attention from perusing the room. As she pulled aside the cover, Alec hopped inside, his feathers puffed against the chill of the night. “Brrr…I should’ve changed into a wee mousie and stayed inside your dress.”
He fluttered to alight upon the back of the chair closest to the roaring fire. As he stretched his frost laced wings, Alec almost purred as he basked in the warmth of the flames. “How did it go? Did the laird like ye? Do ye think ye’ll have any trouble luring him to your bed?”
Ciara backed up to the fire with a shrug as she lifted her skirts to let the warmth caress her legs. “I think my fine laird is going to be a bit hard-headed when it comes to warming my bed. You should’ve seen his face when he accidently used his magic and looked upon my aura.”
“He saw your aura?” Alec squawked as he hopped over to check out a plate filled with bits of cheese and bread. “If he saw your aura, he’ll know ye for sure to be an immortal. Only immortals can power so many prisms of light.”
Ciara turned to roast the front of her legs, stretching to study the heavy wooden mantel mounted above the hearth. Bundled sprays of lavender and heather were draped across the entire shelf. Thick stumps of candles on iron pillars sat snuggled in between the bundles of the aromatic herbs. As they warmed, the herbs released a calming scent to float around the room.
“I don’t think Faolan knows about such things. He’s turned his back on his mystical studies. He’s not tried his powers in years. From what I can find out, he blames two things for all the problems in his life. He thinks magic and love are the basis of every evil in the world.”
Alec picked up a crust of bread in his beak, tossed it in the air, and downed it with a stretching gulp. Hopping over to the pitcher sitting beside the platter, he cocked his head to one side and peeped inside the vessel.
“All the problems in his life?” Alec’s squawk echoed as he stuck his head down into the jar. He pulled it back out, raised his beak in the air and let the liquid gurgle loudly down his gullet.
Ciara nodded as she stretched out on the bench beside the fire and hid a yawn behind her hand. “The housekeeper, Sorcha, has proven to be a wealth of information. We had quite a nice chat while I settled in.”
As she unlaced the soft doeskin slippers on her feet, Ciara wiggled her toes as she continued, “Faolan blames love and magic for causing his parents’ deaths, one brother to be cursed, the other brother to disappear at sea, and his sister to be sent to parts unknown. From what Sorcha told me, his father died while protecting his mother from some sort of witch-hunt. His mother didn’t feel life worth living without his father, so with her husband dead, she jumped from the cliffs onto the rocks below. One of his brothers was cursed by a jealous sorceress. The glass crystal in which she entrapped his soul is guarded somewhere within this keep. The other brother and his wife and both their daughters have been lost at sea for nearly a year. Faolan blames a jealous sea goddess for leading them astray and possibly destroying them.”
Finger tapping her chin, Ciara paused as she tried to remember everything Sorcha’s memories had told her. It still amazed her that Sorcha’s aging mind had been able to give her such a complete rundown in such a short amount of time. Even though Sorcha was getting on in years, her mind was quite the analytical file. Ciara had been able to sort through all her memories for almost immediate retrieval.
Her eyes widened and Ciara nodded as she continued, “Oh, and his sister, Aveline, was sent from this realm since it was discovered she was born an immortal. She was forced to be mated to the sea god Mannanan when she dabbled with the tapestry of time to find Faolan’s brother Ronan a wife.”
Alec paused with a chunk of cheese clenched in his beak, cocked his head to the side, and mumbled around the bit of food. “You found out all that in the short time it took the housekeeper to set ye up in your room?”
Ciara wiggled a mischievous brow and folded her hands behind her head. “You know how people always open up to me. All I have to do islisten.”
Gobbling down the cheese, Alec hopped closer to the fire as he chortled with a knowing croak. “Ye mean ye read the woman’s mind while she was hanging your dresses upon the pegs in the cabinet.”
Ciara sat up to remove the tray from Alec’s reach and smoothed the sleek feathers glistening upon his head. “You know me too well, my trusted raven. I might have cheated just a tiny bit and popped into her mind to sort through some of what she told me. I had to…she kept close guard over her words. I could barely sort through what she said.”
As she rose from her seat, Ciara walked over to the bed, and ran her hand across the woven coverlet. “Mistress Sorcha is very open and friendly but she’s also very protective of her laird. She seemed eager for me to understand him and his ways but was very selective of her words. I had to be certain everything she told me was the truth.”
Beckoning to Alec with a wave of her hand, Ciara turned her back to him as he lit upon the bed. “I had the poor woman so flustered by the time she left, she forgot to send a maid in to undo my gown. Be a dear, will you?”
Standing still, her head bent, she stared at the floor as Alec unlaced the intricately woven gown. “I suppose I could always think it away, but I’ve got to be careful just how much I manifest things in and out of thin air. I don’t want to draw any more suspicion than I already have. It was obvious when I arrived, Faolan MacKay expected a childlike lass. Apparently, he planned on using his faux wife to silence his advisors’ bidding that he must marry. Now that he’s been publicly tied to a woman who’s obviously not a simplistic child, it may be a bit more difficult to draw him into my snare.”
Ciara felt the tug as Alec yanked at the ribbon clenched in his beak. “If ye ask me, I feel sorry for the lad. I got a peek at his aura as he headed out toward the skirting wall. I’ve never seen such a melancholy shade of blue.”
Stepping out of her gown, Ciara bent and picked it up from the floor. She shivered and moved closer to the fire as she shook out the gown. “He’s a gloomy one all right. He looks at everything from the darker side. But his heart is pure. Perhaps when he has a son to bond with, it will make him better. Maybe we can help him while we’re here, Alec. I’ll have to think about that.”
Ciara hung the gown on a peg and closed the door to the lavender-scented cabinet. Turning back to the inviting overstuffed bed, she sighed as she pushed aside the velvety bed curtain. As she slid naked between the cool, crisp sheets, Ciara shivered in delight as she snuggled deep into the pillowed nest.
Alec hopped to the head of the bed and bent down to peer into her smiling face. “Ladies of this time dinna sleep naked in their beds unless they’ve just finished lying with their husbands or they are whores who have just been paid. Where is your night dress?”
Pushing the raven out of her face, Ciara snuggled even deeper under the covers. “I’ll conjure one tomorrow morning before the maid comes in to wake me. Now go away and let me go to sleep. I love the feel of these sheets against my skin.”
