Fiona held up her hands. “It seems to me that Molly has proven herself more than capable of handling herself in a crisis, dinna ye think?”
“Conall,” Molly said, laying her hand on his arm. “If I can help stop those men from hurting anyone else like they hurt the people of Lanwick, I want to do it. I have to do it. You said things happen for a reason. That I’m here for a reason. What if this is it?”
Conall held her gaze for a long time and Molly refused to back down or look away. Shewasgoing with him whether he liked it or not.
At last, he sighed. “Fine. But ye must do as I say, when I say it. Agreed?”
She gave him a salute. “Aye, captain.” Then she frowned. “Where was it you said we were going?”
“The north,” he said, his eyes straying in that direction. “To a place I’d hoped never to see again.”
Chapter 12
Conall finally reachedthe top of the cliff and leaned over with his hands on his knees as he tried to get his breath back. From the trail below he heard puffing and muttered curses. A few moments later, Molly’s head appeared over the top and he held his hand out to help her up. She took it and he hauled her up the last few steps.
She collapsed onto her back, staring up at the sky and panting, arms out to either side and hair spread out around her like a halo. “Bloody hell,” she muttered between breaths. “That was steep.”
Aye, it was. From here a view of the sea spread out in an unending blanket and Conall could just make out theMermaiddwindling into the distance. Fiona had wasted no time in organizing the villagers, getting them onto theMermaidin time to catch the tide. He and Molly had stood on the beach and watched them go, each laden down with a heavy pack of supplies.
Molly scrambled up and came to stand beside him, the wind whipping back her wild tangle of hair as she shaded her eyes and stared out at the boat diminishing in the distance. She was a time-traveler. Whenever he was reminded of that fact, he couldn’t quite believe it was real. How was it even possible? How could she have come here from the twenty-first century?
And yet, he didn’t question for a minute that it was true. Something inside him, some deep instinct he couldn’t quite explain, told him that it was. And besides, through his long association with the Order of the Osprey and their alliance with the Seelie Fae, he’d come to realize that things were seldom as they seemed in this world and that magic was all too real.
Irene MacAskill’s words rang through his head.Ye canna move forward while looking back. Ye must face yer past if ye want to find yer future. And I believe the one who will help ye do that is on their way.
Could Molly have something to do with what she’d said to him? Surely not. And yet, the thought kept nagging at him, like an itch he couldn’t quite scratch. Perhaps that’s why he’d agreed to let her come along on this trip even though common sense should have dictated that she remain behind in Lanwick.
Or perhaps the reason was even simpler than that. Perhaps it was simply that he enjoyed her company and even though he’d known her for so short a time, the thought of leaving her behind had tied his stomach into a knot.
Molly hefted her pack, getting the weight more comfortable on her shoulders and turned to look inland, her gaze skipping over the forbidding moorland that stretched as far as the eye could see.
“Well,” she said. “I hope it’s not as bleak as it looks or we are in for a rough time of it.”
“Apologies, lass, but it is every bit as bleak as it looks. There is very little between here and our destination. If ye thought Lanwick remote, it has naught on where we are going.”
“Lovely,” she muttered. She glanced at the sky. “Well at least it isn’t raining. We should be grateful for small mercies.”
