9
The look on Tavish’s face told Lindsey everything she needed to know. He was clearly a tough man who had lived a hard life. His gruff exterior hid a depth she hadn’t expected.
When she’d first met him he seemed rude and abrupt but that was just on the surface. Underneath was something she hadn’t expected.
The miscarriage of justice had almost crushed him but somehow he’d found the strength to keep going, to keep living even when everyone else had given up on him. Behind the pain, there was a boy who’d loved his mother, who’d loved the place where he’d grown up. A boy like any other.
She’d seen the look when he was giving her the tour of his house, but she hadn’t understood it then. She saw it again when he fell into his chair after discovering her carving.
She hadn’t whittled the statue for him to find. She’d done it because it seemed like a fitting tribute to his mother and to a village vanished forever. She had no idea who’d lived there but she knew about the plague. Those who died did so in pain and fear.
The bluebell wreath and the carving represented everyone who’d gone, her tiny little tribute to a place and time she would soon be leaving forever. In a way, it was also her thanks to whatever force had brought her back through time, a way of showing her gratitude for what had happened.
She was grateful. Despite nearly drowning and initially thinking a brutish Highlander might kill her, despite the fact she was going to try and sneak into a castle and become a thief for the first time in her life. She was glad it had happened.
She had come back and would be able to do at least one good thing while she was in the Middle Ages in Scotland.
When he’d walked in after finding the carving, she was terrified of him. He no longer looked like the man she’d gotten to know over the last couple of days. He looked like a wild animal.
It took a moment to see past it. When she did, she was able to regain control of herself. She saw the tremble in his lip, the way his eye glistened as he sank into the chair. It wasn’t anger, it was something much deeper that was powering him.
Then the truth came out and they had held hands. Although she didn’t say it out loud, that was the moment she realized the true reason she was doing this.
It was the same reason why she’d decided to collect the bluebells she saw on the shore of the loch. A small patch of them under an ash tree, no other flowers anywhere to be seen. She looked at them whilst shivering from the effects of cleaning herself in the icy cold water. They spoke to her.
Kneeling down to collect the bluebells, she spotted a lump of wood next to them. It was out of place, looking like a freshly cut log rather than a fallen branch. It was the perfect size for her to carve.
She gathered it up while thinking of working on the Celtic design she’d seen inside Tavish’s house. It was while carrying the bluebells into the village that the idea came to her to carve something very different.
She had no idea what Tavish’s mother looked like. And yet when she heard a woman’s voice in his room the previous night, she could picture her perfectly.
Flaming red hair, tall, ethereal like an elf queen out of a Tolkien novel. The knife had moved in her hand with little conscious effort of her own, the figure emerging from the wood simply and without any effort.
She left the bluebells with the figure, her little memorial to all that had happened in the past.
She hadn’t planned for what would happen if he saw it. She had no clue he would return and end up holding her hand, showing her a softness hidden inside him. The look in his face as his warmth spread into her fingers was everything.
“I brought something with me,” she said when they’d finished breakfast, making a decision to share something she never thought she would. “From my time, I mean. Would you like to see?”
He nodded without saying anything, sitting bolt upright in his chair.
She reached into the folds of her cloak and brought out the photos. The water from her near-drowning had damaged them but she had still kept them, fearing they might be her only link to the present if she was unable to get back.
Although the colors had shifted and the images blurred it was still possible to make out the contents. She handed them to Tavish.
“What are these?” he asked, examining them closely. “Is this…is this ma hoose?”
She nodded. “We took them on a Polaroid camera when mom first got the place. Look, that’s her with the key.”
He stared in shock at the photos, touching the paper as if he thought they might come to life. He smiled. “She’s laughing. Why is she laughing?”
“Because she was given a key but there’s no front door left.”
He looked closer at the picture. “You look like her.”
“Do you think so?”
“Aye. I never knew what my mother looked like.” He handed the photos back, his fingers lingering on hers for a moment. “Ah could only wish for something such as that. How do you create a drawing so lifelike? It’s like witchcraft.”
