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Marjorie scoffed. “I should have ken ye’d just trick me.”
“I didna trick ye. I dinna like this height one bit. What happened?” Isbeil covered her hand with her dry and warm one. “Is it that time traveler?”
Marjorie’s face fell. “Time traveler? Ye dinna believe him, do ye?”
Isbeil cocked her head to one side and raised her chin to look behind the merlon. “I went to the ruins, lass, to look for the rock he mentioned.” She looked sharply at Marjorie. “‘Tis there. Flat, large, and with a handprint. A handprint in a rock as though it used to be clay and someone laid a hand in it.”
Marjorie let go of Isbeil’s hand. “That dinna mean he traveled in time.”
Isbeil sighed and pressed her fists against her hips. “Nae that alone. But I felt it—the faerie magic. Aye, that place is saturated with it. ‘Tis like the scent of lavender. And when I touched the rock… It shifted the air as though a great many invisible butterflies were flapping their wings around the rock. And although I didna see the faerie herself, I kent she was there, mayhap watching me from behind a tree.”
A chill went through Marjorie. Was the old healer finally mad? Marjorie didn’t know how old Isbeil was, but she’d been wrinkled and aged for as long as Marjorie could remember. As small children, Marjorie, Craig, Owen, Domhnall, and Lena had huddled together by the brazier in the great hall, listening to Isbeil telling her Highland stories. Her small black eyes reflected the orange flames, her mouth dark against the leather-like skin. The children had been afraid to go near the loch for at least a year, afraid that a kelpie would come out of the water and take them.
“Are ye thinking the aul’ Isbeil’s lost her mind?” Isbeil said with a sad smile.
Marjorie didn’t reply. Isbeil was family. Her whole life, Marjorie knew she could trust the woman like she could trust herself. And although she didn’t believe in the legends and stories of faeries and ancient heroes, she’d been raised on them, drinking them in like her mother’s milk, alongside the stories from the Bible.
Something within her knew that if Isbeil told her Konnor was a time traveler, he was, no matter how mad it sounded. Together with the strangeness of Konnor’s speech, his clothes, the words he used, his manners, even his hair, it all suddenly came into a complete picture, and she knew.
“Nae, Isbeil,” she said. “I believe ye.”
He had traveled in time. He told the truth. And somehow, the wild mixture of hope and dread in her soul tilted to the side of hope. And Konnor entered the very secure and guarded circle of people she could trust within her soul.
Only that fact meant that sooner rather than later, Konnor would need to return to his time and disappear from Marjorie’s life forever.
Chapter 17
Marjorie’s pulse jumped as someone came into the great hall. She glanced over her cup of ale, hoping to see a certain head of brown hair and a pair of broad shoulders that made her mouth go dry. Instead, it was Alpin, one of the warriors.
Damn it.
She hadn’t seen Konnor since their sword training. Where was he? It was evening meal time, and almost everyone was here in the great hall, filling it with the hum of voices. Her great chair was hard and smooth under her fingers, and the warm air was filled with the scents of food and stuffy from the amount of people.
Everyone looked exhausted, but unlike yesterday and the days before, the atmosphere was cheerful. As though after a hard day of work, they’d seen some progress. Eyes were brighter, shoulders straighter, chins higher. There was even the occasional laughter here and there.
It was more than Marjorie could have asked from them, given that many of them could die defending the castle very soon.
A tall man came in. No crutch.
Konnor.
He was tall and so handsome her stomach squeezed, and her knees went weak. He glanced at her, nodded curtly, and went to sit at one of the tables with other warriors. Without talking to anyone, he rounded his shoulders over a bowl of stew and ate. Marjorie gestured to Muir, who always kept an eye on her.
“Aye, mistress?”
“Please tell Konnor to come eat with me.”
His eyes hardened, but he didn’t protest. “Aye.”
Marjorie’s heart fluttered like a bird in her chest as Muir came to Konnor and leaned to speak into his ear. Konnor glanced at Marjorie, his mouth set in a line, but he nodded and stood up with his bowl and hobbled to her.
Muir watched him approach, and he wasn’t the only one. It felt like every pair of eyes in the hall were on Konnor and her.
Konnor took the seat next to Marjorie’s and looked at her expectantly, his impossibly blue eyes hard.
“You wanted me?” he said.
Oh, she did. She craved his presence near her like the warmth of a fire in the freezing, dark depths of winter. The intensity of it both scared and excited her. She’d never wanted to be near someone like she wanted to be near him. In the few days she’d known him, she’d become more attached to him than she’d ever been to anyone. How could she have grown to care so much for someone in only a few days? And what did this all mean?
