At least they had placed his shelf so he had a decent view of the streets. Latharn’s humorless laugh echoed off the glass walls of his prison. His shelf. After six hundred years, he’d reduced himself to referring to his prison as though he were a child’s bauble in the nursery.
“Brodie, my love, what did ye do with the crate of hand painted-dishes Moira brought round yesterday eve?” Fiona MacKay’s voice lilted from the stockroom at the back of the store.
Latharn heaved a bored sigh as he leaned up against the clear, curved wall. This century’s guardians—his descendants, Brodie and his wife, Fiona—were decent enough, but he failed to see their interest in this little shop they’d decided to set up in Balnakiel. Fiona should be home having babies and Brodie should be caring for the MacKay estate while they waited for Nessa’s arrival in Scotland. Yet there the man stood in the corner with a dust rag in his hand as though he were some sort of chambermaid. And if Brodie bent over one more time and gave Latharn a clear view of his arse in that kilt, Latharn was going to pelt him with an object from the other side of the shop. His distant cousin’s hairy backside was not the view he preferred in all of Scotland.
“I’ve already brought them in here, my love. I thought they’d best be displayed on the shelves in this bay window facing the street.” Brodie ran his cleaning rag around the edges of the newly installed windows. He’d polished the panes clean and clear in the dawning light of the day.
“They’d be better displayed in the garbage bin.” Latharn snorted as he leaned closer to the walls of his cell. “Those things are hideous. I wouldn’t use them to feed the swine.”
Fiona emerged from the chaos of the stockroom, pushing her damp hair back from her face. She nodded at Brodie’s results with the sparkling panes. She shoved up her sleeves and bent to pull the plates from their bubble wrap and stack them on the shelves. She paused with a plate held in midair as a flickering purple light cast a haze across her apron.
“Did ye notice your cousin over there appears to be more active these days since we’ve placed him in the shop?” Fiona nodded toward Latharn on the high shelf behind the counter, where he stood inside the glowing glass sphere perched on a hand-carved wooden stand.
A surge of pride swelled through Latharn’s chest. Ah yes, there was a job well done indeed. It had taken him quite a while to guide Brodie to Fiona. The hardest part was getting the hardheaded fool to propose. A few subconscious suggestions here and there and now the lad had finally settled down. Little did Brodie know that Latharn had scared away all his other girlfriends. Latharn didn’t like those modern girls. Brodie needed a woman who loved tradition and would watch over him. Fiona was all of that. Latharn had watched her. He had chosen her for his descendent. Everyone needed a little guidance now and then.
Tossing the rag on the counter, Brodie studied the pulsating globe. “Aye, I’ve noticed. I wonder if we’ll be the generation to see Cousin Latharn released from his wee crystal tomb.”
Latharn tensed at Brodie’s words. There would be no wondering about this subject. Nessa was on her way to Scotland right now. He had brought her this close. Latharn would not consider the fact that Nessa would draw this close to him and then fail to break the curse.
Fiona stretched and lifted the violet ball from the shelf. She eased it to the counter between them for its daily polishing.
“Can ye imagine being imprisoned for nearly six hundred years inside a witch’s ball?”
“Ye could never imagine,” Latharn whispered hoarsely as he turned away from the swirling rag upon the glass.
Brodie leaned closer to the globe as he spoke, squinting as he peered into the prison. “I wonder if he’s gone mad in there? Latharn MacKay’s been imprisoned for all those years; he’s watched all the people he knew and loved grow old and pass away. He’s witnessed them all pass from this life to the next, leaving him behind. The stories say that even though we canna see within, there’s nothing to keep him from seeing outside of his curved glass walls into the world beyond.”
Latharn covered his ears, squeezing his eyes shut, trying to block their words as well as six hundred years of memories. All their faces, all their laughter, it all tormented him—and he remembered each and every one.
Fiona polished the ancient stand, where for centuries the MacKay generations had rested the globe. “At least his mother discovered how to break the curse before she jumped to her death.”
Brodie scowled as he helped Fiona clean the stand. “Aye, Rachel MacKay found how to break the curse. But I still don’t understand how it will ever come about. If the one woman Latharn MacKay could ever love is supposed to whisper the breaking of the curse…, wouldn’t she have existed back in his time? Wouldn’t she have lived in 1410? The legends said he wouldn’t give his heart to any of the women he’d ever met. But how’s he to meet this one woman he’s supposed to love if he’s imprisoned within the globe?”
Latharn waved his hand to seal his words within the sphere. Pacing back and forth within the globe, Latharn roared at them from his side of the walls. “I have already met her! It will happen, Brodie. She comes to us as we speak.” The time wasn’t right to communicate with his descendants even though his frustration level neared explosion. In the past, when he’d spoken to his guardians, they’d sometimes had difficulty trusting their sanity. He had to wait until the proper moment. For now, it was better they think of him as the family legend, the bauble on the shelf requiring a daily dusting.
Fiona shrugged as she returned the orb to its shelf. “I don’t understand it either, Brodie. I’ve heard the stories ever since I was a lass toddling along beside my grandmam’s skirts. She told me how a chosen member of the clan must guard the globe until Latharn found his release. But I never understood how he was supposed to find the love of his life if he was imprisoned inside a tiny crystal cell.”
Latharn nodded his approval. Fiona was a traditional girl; her lullabies had been the family legends. She would understand in time.
Brodie dusted the countertop as he mused on his ancient cousin’s fate. “They say he was a powerful sorcerer, trained by his gifted mother and the clan druid. They say he’d only begun to discover just how powerful he was when the darkbana-buidhseachentrapped him within the ball. They say Cousin Latharn scorned the woman after taking her to his bed.”
“That is not what happened at all.” Latharn groaned. “Why can they never get it right? Every century it gets worse with the telling. At least this century, they got the part about the sorcery right.” Three hundred years ago, they had said that he was some sort of mythical ogre.
Fiona tucked her arms around her husband’s waist and rested her cheek upon his back. “Well, if Cousin Latharn was as good a lover as a certain MacKay lad I know, then I can understand how the woman could be upset and determined for a bit of revenge.”
With a nod toward the back room, Brodie waggled a suggestive brow. “Ye know, we’ve yet to hang the open sign on the door just yet. And there is a bench in the back room that looks verra promising by the way it is designed.”
As a pang of loneliness tore through his chest. Latharn heaved a weary sigh. This was the part he hated the most, the utter seclusion. The isolation tormented him. Down through the centuries, he had agonized while watching his guardians with their loved ones. The solitude was the gaping wound that never healed. He wanted his life back. He wanted his Nessa. Dammit. He wanted to live.
Fiona smiled, easing her way toward the back room. With a toss of her head, she beckoned for Brodie to follow. “Why, Brodie MacKay. That bench is for sale as an authentic midwife’s labor chair. I canna believe ye would suggest such a thing. Ye should be ashamed of yourself.”
As they turned in unison toward the back room, the bell above the outer door jangled. Someone had chosen that inopportune moment to enter the main room of the shop.
Latharn stared across the room, flattening his hands against the frigid walls of his prison. It was her. She had arrived at last. His Nessa stood in Scotland, sharing the same room as the accursed globe. She was beautiful. The sight of her stole the breath from his lungs. He clawed his fingers against the glass, itching to touch the silk of her hair. He yearned to caress her, to take her into his arms. She was so close. She was almost within his reach.
“Nessa,” he whispered.
“Excuse me. I was wondering if you could give us some directions? I must’ve gotten an out-of-date map at the airport.”
