Letting her see the shadows blackening his soul.
Then, just as he drew so near that Gelis thrust out a shaking hand to touch him, he vanished, disappearing as if he’d never been.
Leaving her alone on the surf-washed little strand, the high peaks of Kintail and the shining waters of Loch Duich the only witnesses to all that had transpired.
“ Oh- dear-saints,” Gelis breathed, lowering herself onto a damp-chilled boulder. Scarce aware of what she was doing, she dashed her tangled hair from her brow and turned her face into the stinging blast of the wind, letting its chill cool her burning cheeks, the hot tears now spilling free.
Tears she wasn’t about to check, regardless of her proud name.
The blood-and-iron strength of her indomitable lineage. A heritage that apparently held much more than she’d ever suspected.
More than she or anyone in her family would ever have guessed.
Still trembling, she tipped back her head to stare up at the brilliance of the blue autumn sky. To be sure, the raven was nowhere to be seen, and the day, nearing noontide now, stretched all around her as lovely as every other late October day in the heart of Kintail.
But this day had turned into a day like no other.
And she now knew two things she hadn’t known upon rising.
Her heart full of wonder, she accepted the truth. She was ataibhsearlike her mother, inheriting more than Linnet MacKenzie’s flame-colored tresses, but also hertaibhsearachd.
The gift of second sight.
A talent that had slumbered until this startling morn, only to swoop down upon her with a vengeance, making itself known and revealing the face of her beloved.
Her future husband and one true love.
There could be no doubt, she decided, getting slowly to her feet and shaking out her skirts, adjusting her cloak against the still-racing wind.
“I was wrong,” she whispered, thinking of the scrying bowl as she turned back toward Eilean Creag and the postern gate. The magic hadn’t disappeared.
It’d only gone silent.
Waiting to return in a most wondrous manner.
A totally unexpected manner, she owned, slipping back into the now-bustling bailey. She possessed her mother’s gift, and knowing how accurate such magic was, she need only bide her time until her raven came to claim her.
Then true bliss would be hers.
Of that she was certain.
About the same time, but in one of Eilean Creag Castle’s uppermost tower chambers, Duncan MacKenzie, the redoubtable Black Stag of Kintail, stood at an unshuttered window, hands fisted at his sides, the twitch at his left eye threatening to madden him. Scowling as only he could, he clenched his jaw so tightly he wondered he didn’t crack his teeth.
He did feel the weight of his years. They bore down on him as ne’er before.
Their burden and his outrage.
His scowl deepened and he glared at the sparkling waters of Loch Duich, the fair hills of his cherished Kintail, and the eye-gouging clarity of the cloudless autumn sky. The lofty cliffs and headlands on the far side of the loch earned his especial disfavor. Too impassive was their stare, too uncaring, the soaring rock that should have been weeping.
He wouldn’t weep either. As one of the Highlands’ fiercest and most powerful chieftains, such a weakness fell beneath his dignity.
But he was mightily grieved.
“Saints, Maria, and Joseph,” he swore, curling his fingers around his sword hilt, then releasing it as quickly. His trusty brand wouldn’t help him in this pass. Truth be told, he dare not even consider the like. He did allow himself another glower at the wild mountain territory he called his own, great and boundless hills that had the gall to appear at such peace, so calm and untroubled.
He could scarce breathe for vexation.
Never in all his days had he felt so cornered, so well and truly trapped.
