She could not take it in, and yet it fit. It was as if her whole life had merely been a path she was to follow that would lead her to this specific point, to this specific place, to this specific man.
“I will not kill you. I could not.”
“Not directly, perhaps.”
She moved out of his grasp. Something uncontrollable happened whenever he touched her.
“You can’t leave,” he said.
“I most certainly can.” She ran toward the gate, not caring if she was half stumbling in her haste.
“Are you willing to go against your vision? Your destiny? How am I to guide you if you leave?”
He would guide her straight to hell. It would be a carnal journey, a sinful path of decadent exploration and erotic discovery. A wave of pleasure coursed through her. She cursed under her breath.
“You had a reason for coming here, too, Cailean. You won’t be able to fulfill it if you leave.”
She blew out a breath. “What do you want from me?”
“I want you to come with me.”
“Stonelachen.”
Her heart skipped a beat. “Stonelachen? But it’s—”
“Very hard to find.”
“Lachlan searched for it.”
“He didn’t know where to look.”
“If there is a castle, or even a ruin of one back in those rocks, one that has been there for three hun—” Her voice broke as the enormity of what was happening to her, of just who she was talking to, assailed her.
He was right. She could not walk away from him, his past, her past … or their future. Not as a scientist, not as a woman, and most of all, not as a Claren. She gripped the gate for support. “Three hundred years is a long time for something to remain hidden.”
Rory shrugged. “The MacKinnons were a crafty lot. Stonelachen was impregnable for good reason. The MacKinnons lost down here, on this land, not up there.” He gestured to the stone edifices that rose above them, beyond the boundaries of the cemetery. “The blood of battle was never spilled within the sanctity of Stonelachen.”
“But the Clarens took ownership of it when they defeated your clan.”
His expression darkened. “Aye, they did. And they lost it as well, to the MacDonalds. It was abandoned shortly after that. Stonelachen only gave her secrets to those born to her. It is useless to anyone else. She has been empty ever since.”
“Except for you. How long …?” She couldn’t even phrase the entire question. It was too fantastical, despite the living proof standing before her.
“I’ve been here for several years, as I told you. I’ve been here before. Many times. This is the first time I have stayed. And now I know why.”
“I don’t—”
He raised his hand. “Enough. I’ll talk no more of it here.” He walked toward the back of the cemetery.
“Where are you going?”
“Follow me and find out.”
“But—” She sighed in frustration. A mixture of fear and dread balled up inside her. Along with excitement. This was a once in a lifetime chance, she told herself. An incredible find. He was living history.
With a quick glance at her car, she snatched up her backpack and shoved her notebook inside, then hurried to catch up. And she knew that no matter what she told herself, it wasn’t the scientist that followed the man. It was the woman. The Claren woman.
Cailean had always considered herself to be in good physical shape. But there was no denying that every muscle in her body ached … and it had nothing to do with sexual urges. In fact, as she glowered at Rory’s back as they traversed yet another impossibly rugged slope, she couldn’t believe he’d made her feel anything other than pain.
She wanted to ask how much further, but she’d cut her own tongue out first. There had been no talk since they’d begun the ascent and she wasn’t going to be the one to break the silence. It was almost full dark. And very cold. Certainly they had to reach Stonelachen soon. She diverted attention from her screaming muscles by imagining what the castle would look like. Abandoned as it had been for centuries now, certainly it had to be more ruin than functional building. Secrets, he’d said. What secrets could a castle contain? Secrets that had held civilization at bay for three centuries?
They topped the narrow ridge, and she held what breath she had in anticipation, only to be met with sheer rock. “No.” The word, a wail, came out without permission.
Rory stopped and turned. “Yes.”
“How?” It was all she could manage.
“You’ll see.” He turned and began to climb toward the towering wall of stone.
She could do nothing but follow, muttering several choice imprecations under her breath as she did. Even when they were less than twenty yards away, she could see no way up or around it.
Then Rory disappeared into the rock wall.
She stopped dead. “Okay.” She ran a hand across her forehead. In the last week or so, she’d met a three-hundred-year-old ghost and now his three-hundred-plus-year-old brother. A brother who made her feel things …
“And I’m dealing with that pretty damn well, considering,” she said aloud. “But I draw the line at a man who can walk through walls.”
Rory reappeared as suddenly as he’d vanished. “Are you coming? It’s getting cold out here.”
“Sure. Fine. Just teach me that walking through walls trick and I’ll be right there.” She sounded more like Maggie with her sarcastic tone than her usual serious self.
A pang tugged at her heart as she thought of her cousin. For the first time in her life, she’d have appreciated the companionship and comfort of family. And a friend. Maggie was literally the only one who would understand. Cailean hoped she was okay.
And then it hit her. Duncan. Brothers.
She looked up at Rory, who stared down at her, hands on his hips. She’d have to tell him about Duncan.
“Come on. I willna harm ye.”
Her heart tripped at the soft sounding burr. It occurred to her now that back in the cemetery, he’d spoken with the clarity of the King’s English, almost chillingly so.
She’d reacted to his perfectly modulated commands with a depth of feeling she’d never experienced before, as if there had been no choice but to follow him down the darkly sensual path he was creating. And yet, the gentle rolling of his brogue affected her much more. She felt comforted, protected. It made no sense, but if he’d slipped into the patterns of speech of his early life, who knows what she might have done with him on that stone bench.
“Cailean.”
“Okay.” She carefully picked her way up the last stretch of scrabbling slope. She looked over the wall behind him, but still saw nothing. “I may have visions, but I can’t move through stone. Sorry.”
A small hint of a smile played at the corners of his mouth. He lifted his hand out to her.
Cailean studied the broad palm and long fingers as if the devil himself had offered her a treat. She looked back to his eyes, eyes that were glittering despite the lack of light.
She slowly lifted her hand, pausing slightly, then placed it in his. He didn’t react in any visible way, but when his fingers closed over hers, she felt an energy flow between them that was so primal she couldn’t deny the connection. She had truly committed herself now.
“Follow me.”
As if she’d ever had a choice.
He turned and stepped into the stone, or so it appeared. What looked to be a rough edge was actually a slice in the rock. Straight on it appeared like a wrinkle in the stone, forged from the crushing pressure of the ice floes that had created the Trotternish eons ago. She turned sideways and slithered into the tight space. There was a grinding sound and for several heart-stopping seconds she thought she would be crushed. Then the stone in front of Rory shifted and she was freed. She stumbled behind him into an open area the size of a small courtyard. It was mostly a rock tumble, with towering stone walls all around.
She looked up to find the night sky twinkling above her, the moon had risen, bathing them in blue-white light, casting long shadows from the rocky spears above. She turned slowly. “This is amazing.” She turned in time to catch a brief flash of pride cross his face.
“This is only the beginning.”
He dropped her hand and stepped behind her, reaching into the passage. Seconds later there was the same grinding sound. Cailean’s eyes widened as the boulder in front of her shifted and rolled, as if being pushed by some unseen hand. It stopped directly in front of the passage.
“An auld trick my ancestors learned from the Druids. Interesting lot, that.”
He took her hand again, the combination of his smile and his strong hand in hers stilling any words she might have uttered. He stopped long enough to light a small torch, then led her through the open area through another hidden passage in a tumble of rocks directly across from their entrance. No moving stones this time, not that it mattered. She was quickly lost in the maze-like warren of passages Rory drew her through.
In the flickering shadows she saw other passages not taken and some others that had caved in. Occasionally they wandered briefly through an open moonlit area, only to quickly descend back into the stone passageways.
“It’s no wonder no one found this,” she said in hushed tones. She felt like she was entering a sort of sacred ground. Other than Rory, she was very likely the first person to enter this part of Scotland in several centuries.
Rory nodded toward the next passageway. “As I said, Stonelachen only gives her secrets to those born to her.”
“When did you leave, originally?”
He paused at the entrance to another tunnel and looked back at her. The torchlight cast his face in harsh relief. “Right after the last MacKinnon fell. I wasna going tae be a conquest of no bluidy Claren.”
He turned away and headed off to their left. Cailean stood for several seconds, unable to follow, unable to do much more than breathe. There had been hatred in his voice, and worse, in his eyes. Three hundred years was an awfully long time to nurse a grudge.
For the first time she questioned her safety. Would he drag her all the way in here to exact some sort of revenge? She hadn’t thought so. Hadn’t felt that. Her vision had said the harm he’d bring to her wouldn’t be physical. In fact the only physical thing he’d wrought on her was pleasure—hot, sweet, dizzying pleasure.
She stared down the passageway, his frame cast in shadow from the flame held above his shoulder. “Tell me what happened,” she said, suddenly needing to know before she went another step. “What happened that day, Rory?”
“I fought beside them. Calum was one of the first to die.”
She drew in her breath.
“I was their Laird, then. They fought for me, Cailean, for the memory of my father. They gave their lives for me. But the Clarens—they kept coming … and coming. I was but one man. I couldna kill them all.” His voice grew hoarse with emotion. “But God himself knows tha’ I tried.”
Vivid images of the battlefield that day blazoned bright and bloody in her mind’s eye. She felt her stomach pitch and roll as she saw him, an immortal warrior filled with rage against his mortal enemies, and yet unable to claim victory against them.
“Rory—” She stopped as her voice broke.
He reclaimed the distance between them. “No. You will know it all now, Cailean, before we go one step further. I didna believe her, you know. I didna believe she could cast the curse of immortality upon me. She was possessed of the sight, as her older sister had been before her, but she also claimed she’d held forth with the sithiche and shared in their faery druidheachd, their sorcery.”
“But—”
“She sent word that she wanted to meet me the night before we were to be wed. She wanted to tell me what had really happened between my brother Alexander and Edwyna. That we could not wed until I understood.”
“Edwyna was dead by then,” Cailean murmured.
“They blamed the MacKinnons but we did not slay her. Though there were many who would gladly have done it.”
“What did Kaithren say?”
“She claimed Edwyna had given her heart to Alexander. She said Edwyna had seen his future and that whatever she had done, was done to save him from a far more horrible fate. She claimed she wanted to make sure the same horrible fate would not befall us.” Rory scowled. “There was no love between us, but there was lust. She wanted us to commit our hearts to one another and I told her what she wanted to hear.”
“She didn’t believe you?”
“I didna think it mattered what she believed. She knew I did no’ trust her. The loss of my brothers was a festering wound inside me and in my clansmen. I would have her commitment tae me, whatever it took.”
“So you made love to her?”
“It was what she sought and I wanted to make sure the wedding took place. The future of my clan depended on it. Her talk of hearts bound and love meant nothing to me.”
“She thought otherwise.”
“Aye.”
Cailean began to tremble, as she recalled his words to her when he held her in thrall. This time I will be the conqueror.
“I was deep inside of her when she put her curse upon me.”
“Oh, Rory.”
“It was revenge. For Edwyna and Mairi’s deaths.”
Rory’s face was a mask of pain and rage, made more fearful by the rigid control he was exerting over both. “I did no’ believe her faery spells and I demanded the wedding take place. She had to marry me now, her virginity was lost. She could have had a MacKinnon bairn already growing inside her. I thought I would have the final victory.”
“You would still marry her, when you knew she hated you to the point of putting a curse on you?” While you were still inside her? Cailean could not fathom such manipulation.
His voice shook. “I would see our clan survive no matter what. Our union was our last hope.” His control began to crumble. “She renounced me on the altar, claimed I’d raped her to avenge my brothers’ deaths, even held up the bloody sheet we’d lain on. She cursed our union to eternal hell and called her clansmen to arms. They were prepared. They had been forewarned of her intentions.”
“My God. What happened to her?”
“She died in battle.”
“By your sword?”
He shook his head. “I dinna know which of my clansmen cut her down, but I saw her face as she fell.” He began to shake. “She knew I understood her true power then. As men fell all around me and I remained standing, she knew I’d realized the curse was real. She smiled as her last breath escaped her.”
The horrific images flooded her mind. Without realizing it she found herself reaching to stroke his face.
He caught her hand before she touched him. “I didn’t believe and I have paid the price.” He looked into her eyes. “I won’t make that mistake again, Cailean.”
“But I don’t—”
“No.” The word, sharp and commanding, rang against the stone walls, echoing until it faded into silence. She saw him clearly now as Laird of his clan, commanding men twice his age into battle, commanding them to their deaths.
“Understand this,” he said softly. “I have no love for the Clarens. Hatred burns in me for what she did, for what her sisters did. But you are not here to pay for the sins of your ancestors. I want only for you to free me, so that I may join my clan, my father and my brothers. So that I may be finally free of this cursed earth.”
He stepped closer and held her hand between them. “You will give this to me and I will use any means necessary to achieve my goal. I will not be thwarted nor tricked this time.”
He turned abruptly and pulled her behind him. He wasn’t hurting her, but his grip was firm.
They moved along at a swift pace that kept her almost at a trot. Then he turned into a tunnel lined with torches. He slowed and lit each one as they passed until he came to a stone wall. He reached for a sliver in the rock to his right. The sound of stone grinding on stone came again and the wall facing them shifted to the right. A gaping blackness lay beyond. The torchlight penetrated no more than a foot of it.
He turned to her, blocking the entrance. “We’re here.”
She tried to quell the trembling of fear and anticipation. “How do you remember all those twists and turns?”
“I grew up in them. Of course, we took the scenic route.”
Cailean wasn’t surprised. He would take no chances with her. He would do whatever was necessary to maintain full control of what would pass between them. She understood why, even if she didn’t like it.
“Well, let’s not stand here all night,” she said at length.
“As you wish.” He leaned in to light torches on either side of the portal.
Cailean stepped inside and her mouth opened in amazement. Rory moved along the walls, lighting torches as he went.
They were in a great hall of massive proportions. One wall was lined with huge inset fireplaces, big enough to roast an ox. Or two. And they likely had. The opposite end of the room was raised up several levels higher. Broad stone stairs, each the width of a man, led up to that area. There was no furniture of any kind, only piles of rubble and rock where parts of the ceiling and walls had caved in over time. All in all, it was amazingly well preserved.
She turned, gaping. The walls were bare, but she imagined them as they once must have been, hung with tapestries and shields, armaments perhaps. She looked up. The ceiling was so far overhead, it faded into darkness.
Rory came to stand several yards away from her.
“How far beneath the ground are we?”
“Not as far as you’d think.”
The depth of this hall alone put them a fair distance below the earth’s surface. “How did you—your clan—carve this room out of stone?”
“These caves and caverns were mostly formed naturally, by the melting ice floes that created the Trotternish. There are other stories, of course, some legend, much of them myth, but even I don’t know the full truth of the origins of Stonelachen.”
“How far back do you know for certain this existed?”
“Is this Cailean the scientist asking?”
His question startled her, because she hadn’t been thinking at all about the scientific import of this. She’d been thinking of the man in front of her, that this was his heritage and that she could well understand to what lengths he would have gone to save it.
She stood here and for the first time in her life she wasn’t an awed observer. She felt connected this time. Personally connected. To something larger, something more important than the sum total of her own short life. It filled her with an entirely different sort of awe, and with a pride that stunned her. “No. I’m asking because this is my heritage too.”
She’d expected the fury and she wasn’t disappointed. She spoke before the rage in his eyes could spew forth. “I’m not my ancestors, Rory. I didn’t betray you or slay your men. But like it or not, my heritage is mixed up with yours. My people—” Her voice broke on that word and she had to pause as the wonder of that truth washed over her. “My people were here too, even if their time of occupation was brief. Even if their occupation was ill-achieved.”
He looked away and shrugged. “I hear what you say, Cailean Claren, but you will have to forgive me if I dinna like it much.”
“I’m not asking you to like it. Neither of us is particularly thrilled with our current circumstances,” she said pointedly.
He took her face in his hand and held her chin tilted up. She could have pulled from his grasp, but she did not. Her breath had deserted her like a traitor at his touch and she found she had no will to break the connection.
“Your heart beats faster when I touch you. Your pupils dilate and your skin warms.” He moved closer to her and she vainly tried to moisten her throat. “You say you are not thrilled, yet you thrill easily and swiftly to me. Isn’t that true, Cailean?
“The past between Claren and MacKinnon blood has been brutal and ugly. It doesna have to be that way this time.”
His touch on her skin, the way the burr slipped in and out of his speech, his commanding presence … and the fact that she wanted more of all of it, combined to leave her trembling.
He stepped in closer, reaching over her head and shoving the torch he held into a stone sconce on the wall behind her. He leaned in to her, trapping her in the space between the cold stone and his very warm body. “Do ye tremble in fear, lass, or anticipation?”
“It won’t matter,” she managed.
“It will end badly,” she said, her voice a whisper. “Unions of any sort between a Claren and MacKinnon always have.”
“Ah yes, Lachlan and his legendary curse.” He lifted his head, but did not step away.
Cailean was torn between the need to move away from his overwhelming presence and the desire to step forward and curl into the warmth and protection he could certainly offer her.
Protection? She blinked at the idea. How insane was it to want protection from the only man she’d ever needed protection from?
“How can you question it after what you told me of Kaithren?” Her head began to throb now, and she looked down, away from the light as she pressed her eyelids shut. “The curse on you is real, as is the curse on our clans. It all began back then—with Kaithren, with Edwyna, we may never know. But it exists.”
He gently lifted her chin up to him. “All the more reason for us to find the answer, to end it once and for all. And I don’t speak only of the curse on our clans. Do you not wish to end your curse as well?”
As the Key, she was an integral part to it all. She reached up a shaky hand and covered his as he caressed her cheek. He would guide her to the end of the curse; his, the clans’, and hers. He would guide her to the solution.
“Maybe I will be the death of you after all, John Roderick MacKinnon.”