Page 84 of A Rogue in Twilight
Then he wondered if Elspeth had told her grandfather about their engagement. For now, it was best kept a secret among just a few.
He turned the agate again in the light. At its heart was a cluster of tiny clear crystals in a toothy formation that reminded him whimsically of a miniature landscape of hills and castle turrets. Extracting the loupe from his bag of tools, he adjusted the double lenses for magnification and tilted it over the stone.
Under the lenses, the outer casing of granite formed a thick husk around the exquisite blue striations and crystals in a stone of excellent clarity. He angled it, and the crystalline cavity suddenly looked like a tiny cavern.
“What the devil,” he murmured. Reminded of something he had seen recently, he carried the stone into the library and wentstraight to the painting over the mantel to compare the agate perched in his fingers to the landscape.
Aye, he thought. The cave rendered in the painting, under the profile of hills, looked identical in shape to the crystalline center of the stone. An odd coincidence, he told himself. Had the stone inspired Donal MacArthur’s son, or was there an eerie, almost magical, reason for the similarity?
Or had Elspeth and Donal influenced his own opinion of this fairy business?
The hour was late, and he had work to do. He reached for his grandmother’s manuscript again, remembering that his grandmother had mentioned an artist without naming Niall MacArthur. Where was that—flipping pages, he found it and sat back.
A young artist went into the hills to sketch from nature,Lady Struan had written.Tired later, he lay down to rest on a hill at twilight. A shepherd saw him in passing, and the man’s family said later it was the last that the artist was ever seen, for he never returned home. His father searched for his son, and one evening, as the father, a weaver, sat at his loom, the son appeared in a mist, and said that he had been lured inside the hill by a beautiful fairy woman. He loved her and wanted to stay with her. Begging his father to meet him in the hills in seven days, the son promised to give him a precious gift.
Was that the stone? Astonished, James read on.
When the weaver arrived at the agreed time and place, he met the fairy queen, a gorgeous creature he had loved in his own youth. And he saw his son and the fairy lass who had won his heart. The gift they presented to him was their infant daughter.
They made a bargain between them that the weaver would raise the girl until the fairies called her back to them on her twenty-first birthday. She was given the gift of the Sight so that she might see what cannot be seen and know what cannot be known.
The girl must return to her fairy kin to live in their realm forever. Only if she falls in love with a man who understands and respects the fairy ilk can she stay in the earthly realm. But her grandfather must forfeit his gifts for her happiness.
Clutching the page, James read it again, heart pounding. Either his grandmother had a vivid imagination, or she knew more about the MacArthurs of Kilcrennan than James could imagine. He turned the page.
The Fey posed another wicked bargain—all spells would break if the weaver could find and return a treasure stolen from the fairy ilk long ago and hidden in the wild hills. But, said the man who reported this tale, it may never be found.
James set down the manuscript and sat staring at the blue agate.
Chapter Twenty
“Look at theHighland natives!” Lady Rankin pointed as the open carriage rumbled along. Beside her, Elspeth saw two Highland men and a boy walking along the ridge of a hill, dressed in plaids. As the coach passed, they waved and doffed their caps.
“Please do not call them natives, Aunt,” Fiona said.
“Well, they look like Hottentots,” Lady Rankin said. “My gracious, your coachman drives fast!” She grabbed a strap by the half-door as MacKimmie took the carriage at a stiff pace up a curving slope in the road.
“Some coaches fly very fast through here,” Elspeth said. “Grandda says you could set a tea-table on their coattails, flying out so straight.” James and Fiona laughed.
“Is the Brig o’ Turk mentioned in Sir Walter’s poem the one in your glen, James?” Lady Rankin asked, pointing toward a stone bridge.
“That is another bridge, I believe. Ours was damaged in the recent rains,” James answered.
“I enjoyed the passage you read to us fromThe Lady of the Lakethis morning, Aunt,” Fiona said. “Perhaps we will see other sights from the poem.”
Elspeth smiled, remembering how the lady had droned on imperiously that morning as the group set out. She tugged at her gray bonnet and folded her gloved hands demurely in her lap, hoping her gray gown, green spencer, and plaid shawlwere acceptable in this company, as she wanted to please James’s family. Certainly her leather boots were well suited to hillwalking, and she was ready for an outing in cool autumn weather. She thought of Charlotte Sinclair, a vision in a pale blue walking dress and long pelisse with matching bonnet. Glancing at James, she was glad that Charlotte was riding in the second coach with Patrick, Sir Philip, and Donal MacArthur. Her grandfather would have scant patience with Charlotte’s selfish ways.
As the countryside flew by with MacKimmie in command, Elspeth enjoyed the comfort of the open landau pulled by two sturdy horses. Lady Rankin had complained that a coach and four would be more comfortable until Angus MacKimmie had pointed out the larger vehicle would be a hindrance on Highland roads. “We will be lucky to even come near Loch Katrine in this carriage,” he had said. “The ground is verra rocky.”
Fiona sat close to James, discussing geology. Elspeth smiled, watching them, grateful to have found a friend in James’s twin. Their engagement would be kept secret for a while, even from Grandda and Peggy. She trusted Fiona and Patrick, too, to keep the news to themselves. That they were pleased was enough for now, though she was eager to tell Grandda as soon as James agreed it was time.
“There is Loch Achray,” she said, pointing as the coach rolled onward.
Lady Rankin consulted a small guidebook. “It looks scarcely more than a pool. How disappointing.”
“It is a small one—a lochan. It is in a beautiful setting.” Gold and russet trees, oak and birch, covered the hillsides, with clusters of evergreens.
Fiona consulted a page where she had written some notes for the tour. “I look forward to seeing the impressive Trossach Mountains, said to be the fringe of great Highland fastnesses,wildish and remote, to the north.” She looked up. “It is noble and picturesque scenery. No wonder it is so popular, not just because of Sir Walter’s poetry, but for its spectacular beauty.”
