Page 77 of A Rogue in Moonlight
“I see. It is a potent drink, more so than the usual whisky.” She set a hand to her head. A high blush colored her cheeks, and her throat was pink at the open neck of the dressing gown. “I do feel it. Oh, my.”
“Sit down,” he said, though she did not. “Word about Kinloch fairy whisky got out eventually, over generations. It is known to be extraordinarily good stuff. We gift it here and there. My cousin Donal, for one.” He smiled ruefully. “If it was better known, there could be a clamor for it, and we cannot make it in quantity. And if word got about and brought tourists here, it would make a spectacle of our glen. We do not want that.”
She sighed. “Highland romantic legends are very popular now.”
“I intend to keep my beautiful glen from becoming an attraction.”
“You are right to be careful. This glen would no longer be a remote and private place. People would come to explore, and would want fairy whisky.”
He nodded. “They already come in droves to Loch Katrine, wanting to experience the Highlands of the Bard of the North, as they call Scott.”
“Although,” she ventured, “your glen might be rescued from poverty if tourists were allowed here, and paid a fee to visit and stay at an inn, and so on.”
“I refuse to encourage the traffic of strangers in the glen. But I will tolerate one Lowland teacher.” He smiled, slight but sincerely, hinting at more than he dared tell her.
“Will you now,” she said wryly. “I thought you were anxious to be rid of her.”
“I am reconsidering.” He settled back against the table. “Tell me about your family legend. Sit, Miss MacCarran,” he urged, seeing her sway and set her hand to the chair.
She did, demurely adjusting the overlarge robe around her lithe and slender form. “I have heard there is an old family seat at Duncrieff, and inside the castle there is a cup. A band of gold set with jewels encircles the cup, engraved with a motto. It was gifted to an ancestor long ago, and tradition claims the MacCarrans of Duncrieff are obliged to follow that decree. If we do not—” Her blush deepened. “You will think it very silly.”
“I make whisky according to an old fairy recipe. Nothing you could say would seem foolish after that, lass. Who was this special and wise ancestor?”
“An ancestress, actually. A fairy. So they say,” she added quickly.
“Ah. Fairy blood somewhere in you, then. Go on.”
“The jeweled cup was the gift of a fairy bride who married a MacCarran long ago.”
“And she proclaimed a motto that you are all obliged to follow? Is it secret?”
“Not secret,” she said. “Love makes its own magic, the cup says.”
He caught his breath, then nodded. “Nothing silly about that. What is the obligation? Be kind to others? You do well in that regard, I think.”
“We are obliged to honor her gift by finding true love,” she said quietly. “It does not always happen.”
“Not an easy thing to find. What is the consequence of not finding true love?”
“Poor luck for the family. And we have surely had some.”
“That is often the way of it, with fairies. They bless and curse freely, without thinking about the effects of their ultimatums.”
“Sometimes, so the tradition says, members of our line must marry those with fairy blood. If we can find someone to meet that condition!”
“Difficult, that.” He looked at her steadily, marveling at her family’s tradition, understanding completely, for his kinfolk had met conditions for generations. “Even to me it seems impossible, and at the least would not help generations continue.”
“Indeed.” She stared up at him, her graceful fingers folded together, her beautiful eyes gray blue in the shadows. “Very hard to manage.”
“It might interest you to know,” he murmured, heart pounding, “that I have a bit of fairy blood.”
“Do you?” She blushed deeply. He watched it flow into her cheeks.
“So they say.”
“Not surprising, though.” She cleared her throat.
“My guess is you have more than a trace of fairy blood, lass, judging by the way the fairy whisky took you.”
