“From me, lass,” the voice responded. Seconds later, a tall Scotsman appeared. His ethereal form sporadically caught on the wind. “My name is Grant.” He looked fondly from Aidan to her. “Aidan’s great-granda.”
Things just got stranger by the moment around here, didn’t they? If she didn’t believe in ghosts before, she certainly did now.
“Nice to meet you, Grant.” The family resemblance between him and Aidan was remarkable. “I’m Chloe.”
“Aye, I know.” He smiled at her. “’Tis good to finally meet you.”
Finallymeet her? As if he knew she was coming? She eyed him curiously. “So, you expected me?”
“But of course.” Before she could ask more questions, his attention turned to Aidan, his focus on other things. It seemed he followed them well enough whether or not he was here. “You’ve already had a run-in with a Disinherited, aye?”
“Aye.” Aidan shared what had happened to him and Chloe while in a dreamlike state earlier. “How did you know?”
“Because something happened when Julie and Tiernan visited the Stonehenge in Ireland,” he started to explain but stopped short. As if sensing something, he peered at Chloe with sudden interest. “You’ve come across something new in all this, aye, lass?”
“New?” She frowned and shook her head. “What do you mean?”
“I dinnae quite know,” he murmured, eyeing her curiously. “’Tis not from the afterlife but...Ah!” His gaze widened. “’Twas of the gods!”
What? When? “The gods?”
“Aye, a goddess by the feel of the energy still around you.” He cocked his head, considering her. “Of the Celtic variety, I’d say and ‘twas quite recently.”
“Sorry, but if I was around a goddess, I think I would've noticed.” Or would she have? What exactly did a goddess look like? How would she have presented herself? She imagined a glowing, glorious entity with her arms outstretched, radiating peace and light.
Like warm sunshine.
“Noway.” She rounded her eyes at Aidan, recalling the sunlight streaming through the window at Edinburgh Castle. The mysterious voice and faery Godmother gown. “You don’t think...my dress...”
“’Twas a lovely dress,” Grant mentioned absently, thinking things over. He nodded once and grinned as if his question had just been answered by some unknown source. “Aye, ‘twas most definitely a gift from a goddess.” Curiosity lit his eyes. “Tell me more, Chloe. What did she say?”
When had he seen her dress? She supposed it didn’t much matter. His confirmation that she had been contacted by a goddess was more important. So she told him about the exchange. How the voice had claimed to be a friend and seemed supportive of her being a witch.
“Why do you suppose she claimed to be a friend?” she asked Grant, all the while aware of Aidan’s growing discontent. She frowned at him. “And why do you look so upset?”
His expression smoothed. “I am nae upset.”
“Yes, you are.”
“Nay—” he began only for Grant to cut him off.
“He’s upset because he didnae continue asking about your dress, and just assumed your magic had manifested it,” Grant revealed. “More than that, he's frustrated that his magic has waned so much that he didnae sense a goddess had reached out to you.” He looked at Aidan with compassion. “But he need not feel that way for two reasons. Not only do I hail from the afterlife, a place one step closer to the land of the gods, making it easier for me to sense them,” his gaze flickered to her Claddagh ring, “but Aidan has not harnessed the power of his one true love yet, which would allow him to sense them, too.”
When Aidan nearly replied, “My one true love is dead,” but bit his tongue instead, she did her best not to respond to his thought. It was private, and she had no right.
Grant, however, had no such issue.
“Mayhap, my lad, ‘tis time for you to reevaluate a good many things.” His pointed but compassionate gaze went from her to his great-grandson. “If not for your kin and country, then for yourself, ‘tis time to come to terms with the fact that mayhap true love can happen more than once.”
His inner defiance obvious, Aidan straightened a little but offered no response. Meanwhile, Cray kicked in with his own two cents. Compassion for her flashed in his eyes so quickly she nearly didn't catch it.
“We learned well enough that love can happen twice, Cousin,” Cray reminded, sounding more convinced of that than he looked.
“Aye, it can,” Grant agreed. Yet the way he gazed at her ring told a slightly different story. While true lovecouldhappen twice, the particular brand of love found via the Claddagh ring was one of a kind.
“So what happened at the Irish Stonehenge?” Aidan asked, plainly ready to change the subject. “Why have Tiernan and Julie not joined us yet?”
“They will soon enough,” Grant assured, suddenly distracted. As though something else had caught his attention. “Right now, ‘tis best you get some rest and be mindful of your dreams.” He looked from her to Aidan, his ethereal form fading almost as if he had no control over it. “Stay close together when dreaming for you are...”
Before he could finish, he was gone, an ethereal wisp on the wind vanishing into the darkness, his last words left unsaid. If that weren’t enough, he’d never gotten around to telling them what had happened at the Irish Stonehenge.
The very reason he’d been here to begin with.
