Page 57 of A Rogue in Twilight
James sipped again. “Because it is delicate as well as powerful?”
“And because it is made from dew according to a recipe from the Fey.”
“The Fey, is it.” The whisky warmed like fire yet soothed his throat and his spirit too, relaxing him. “Your cousin would be a wealthy man if he could sell this outright.”
“Tcha!The taxes would be too high to bother. There would be no profit left. My cousin does well enough exporting his other whiskies, and we shall say little of that to protect him, hey. For this brew, he respects his responsibility to theDaoine Sìth, and will not profit from their recipe. Fairy dew makes his fairy brew.” He winked.
“Dow-in shee.”James attempted the Gaelic. “My sister has a knack for the Gaelic, learned from our nanny. I did not pick up much of it myself.”
“You had a Highland nanny in Edinburgh?”
“I was born in the Perthshire hills and spent years in the Highlands before I came south to live with relatives.”
“Then you are a Highland man at heart, for all that.”
“I suppose I am. Mr. MacArthur, do you believe in this fairy business?”
“Oh, I do,” was the firm answer. Then the man took a long swallow.
“My grandmother mentions you in her manuscript. She was impressed with your knowledge of fairy lore. She devoted pages to your stories.”
“Did she?” Donal MacArthur carried the bottle and sat in a threadbare brocade chair, indicating the other for James. “I amflattered. We were good acquaintances, and I am pleased to be in her wee book.” He raised his glass. “To Lady Struan, a friend to the Kilcrennan weaver and a friend to the fairies too.”
“She also mentioned Niall MacArthur.”
“My son. Elspeth’s father.”
“So I understand. His painting hangs in the library at Struan House.”
“The fairy grove, aye. He painted that just before he disappeared.”
“Disappeared?” James raised his brows.
MacArthur refilled his glass and poured another dram for James. “He was lured by the charms of a fairy lass.”
“Some lasses have a way of enchanting a fellow.”
“Some, aye. And some are of the fairy ilk.” MacArthur sighed. “Niall roamed the hills to make his drawings—he was gifted, that lad—and he worked at the weaving too. One day he went out with his drawing box, and never came back. He met a fairy lass and went over to the fairies with her.”
Unsure how to respond to that, James sipped. Perhaps the man embellished the account to hide the shame of a young man running off and leaving a small daughter and presumably a wife. “What a tragedy to lose him. I am sorry,” he said carefully.
“Sad for us, but he enjoys life where he is. One loses all sense of time and responsibility in the fairy realm. A day there is like a year here. A week is seven years. I know this myself.”
“Oh?” James tipped his head, skeptical, trying to remember something his grandmother had written, but he thought best to move the subject along. “So Miss MacArthur did not know her father?”
“Never saw him except in her dreams. She has a gift, you know. The Highland Sight.” He tapped his forehead.
“So I have seen.” That was undeniable and inexplicable.
“It can be a gift from the fairies.” The old man sighed. “Mrs. Graham and I have raised her to be a proper lass, even took her to Edinburgh for her debut with her Graham cousins. But she prefers to be here, and she is a brilliant weaver, I will say. But I must be honest, sir.” MacArthur leaned forward. “I want to see her married, and happy—and far away from here.”
“She seems determined to stay.”
“Do not give up your suit, sir,” Donal said.
“I cannot force her to agree. She is very stubborn.”
“Soon she will turn twenty-one, and then—well.” MacArthur stopped. “They have won, what’s done is done.”
