Page 61 of Laird of Twilight
“Come away!” A hand touched his arm. James turned to see Elspeth, who pulled on his sleeve. “James, please.”
He reached out, drew her close so that she could peer through the window. “Look. What is going on? How is he doing that?”
“Hush,” she whispered. He looked down, and the silk of her hair, loosely braided for the night, caressed his chin as she pressed close. He drew her aside, away from the window.
“Why are you out here? You must have been sleeping,” he said, noticing that she wore a dark plaid shawl over a night rail, the fabric pale in the moonlight. “Did the infernal noise of his weaving wake you?”
“I woke suddenly and knew you were out here. So I came.”
“Woke and just knew,” he said.
“Just knew. I feel you, in a way,” she whispered. “Sometimes I just know where you are, as if you were...part of me.” She touched his arm.
Part of her. Somehow he knew what she meant. He felt it too. He and his twin had a tie between them, and this was strangely similar. But how—he stopped. Was it possible to feel a bond with someone so quickly, trust so completely, love so immediately? And how, at this moment, was Donal MacArthur doing that unearthly weaving? His mind whirled.
“Come away,” Elspeth said softly. “We should not be here.”
“Wait.” He bent his head, mouth beside her ear. He felt her catch her breath. “I want to sort this out, whatever this is. I want to understand what is happening.” In the weaving cottage, he thought—and in his own heart.
“You must not watch my grandfather. Come away,” she insisted.
“He works the loom like the devil himself. Why?”
“It is a secret of the Kilcrennan weavers. Grandda’s own secret to guard. We must not look. Please, come away with me.” She tugged at his arm.
“That inhuman pace—how does he keep it up?” He glanced through the window. In a whirlwind of the weaving, Donal never looked up, snatching the roll of tartan from the loom and setting the frame again, absorbed in his work, all at a steady and astonishing speed. “I saw you today at the loom—such skill and grace. But what he is doing in there is unearthly.”
“It is not of this earth, what he does.”
A chill slid down his spine. “Please explain.”
She looked up at him, so beautiful in the moonlight, so solemn. “It is the fairy gift upon him. I should not tell you—but listen, now. Years ago, Donal MacArthur was given the fairy gift of weaving a month of work in an evening.”
“Fairy gift?”
“An ability bestowed on him by the fairies. A kind of spell.”
“Away wi’ you,” James murmured gently. “I did not have that much whisky.”
She was sincere, eyes wide and earnest. “It is due to the fairy whisky that you are able to see his pace tonight.”
“I am nae fou—well, nae that fou,” he jested softly. She shook her head.
“They say the fairy brew allows some, only certain people, to see the fairy magic at work. Without sipping the brew, you would see only a man at his weaving.”
He frowned, remembering that her grandfather had hinted something similar. “Donal mentioned the gift of the fairies. I thought he meant the Highland Sight.”
“That as well is a gift. Some are blessed by the fairies at birth.”
“You truly believe this?” Everything in him wanted to deny what she was telling him.
She shrugged, then nodded. “I have grown up with these beliefs and tales. Some I wonder about—others I do believe are true. There is no other explanation unless we are all truly mad.”
The small hairs lifted on his arms, his neck. He felt a strange and dreadful sense growing—what if fairies were real? “How do you explain Donal’s weaving ability? Can you always see it, or only with the whisky?”
“I see it,” she said simply. “I am a fast weaver, and I can make a good length of tartan in a few days. When the magic comes over my grandfather like this, he can weave dozens of plaids over a single long night,” she said.
“I—do not know what to say,” he breathed, glancing back toward the window, where the light spilled, and the wild clacking of the loom sounded.
