Mariette And The Cowboy (Western Night Series 2) (47 page)

              He had heard that they were beautiful, but her beauty was such that it almost seemed rotten, her dewy skin looked almost as though it could split in his hands like overripe fruit, and he rose to his feet to fight her.

              “None of that,” the baobhansith said as though he were acting silly. “Just dance with me!”

              She reached her arms out to him, and he felt a little weak in the knees at the thought of it. He knew that he maintained some resistance to her charms, but not all, and he could swear he heard some sort of music in the air.

              “No!” He heard Fiona cry, and suddenly he was in the arms of the creature, feeling her impossibly sharp nails digging into his arms. They were sharp enough to slit the belly of a bull, and he was sure that they had.

              “Fiona!” Another voice cried, and there was Artair, standing in the light of the fire, his face red with running.
No!
Callum thought, as the creature turned her eyes to him. Artair’s face immediately grew slack, and he held out his arms to her.

              “Artair!” Fiona cried. She gripped her pack in her hands, before a realization came to her face. She dug through her thing, and removed the skein of milk.

              Stepping forward, she held the skein before her. “See? My offering. I offer this to you.”

              The baobhansith turned head like a serpent, her eyes growing wide at the offering of milk.
Of course
, Callum thought.
It’s best to make an offering of water so they do not want your blood, and milk would be the next best thing
.

              The creature seized the skein of milk held it to her lips, drinking and mewling thirstily, as Artair stood dazed, a small pool of blood already draining at his feet.

              Callum drew his sword and stepped quickly, driving it into the creature from behind. She screamed and yowled, but the runes carved into his blade glowed faintly, and then were still. Fiona finished lacing her bodice as the creature died and her brother came back to reality, and she moved to him to see if he was alright. Callum knew that he would be, she had not held him in her deathly embrace for very long.

              Fiona moved to Callum side, embracing him.

              “I forgot to tell you,” he said to her after she had finally let him go.

              “What is it now?” she asked with a little laugh. He reached into his bag and removed a small sprig of white heather. Her eyes grew wide, and with trembling fingers she took the flowers from his hand.

              “It seems like I had gotten a little distracted before I was able to properly give this to you,” he said with a little laugh. “But here it is. The choice is your now.”

              She looked into his strange golden eyes, this man who could turn into a wolf, and knew precisely what her answer would be.

Epilogue: Two Weeks Later

              Fiona braided white heather into her hair in preparation for the wedding. She had never been more sure, than she was at that very moment, she knew that now, and as she adjusted the tartan of Clan MacCaig as a sash across her simple white dress, she understood finally what Ole Bonnie had meant.

              The old woman watched with a smile as Fiona breathlessly prepared. She had done well, knew she had, but such was her wont, being what she was. Fiona had spent her entire life wishing to see a faerie, but had failed to see the one who had been before her all along. This thrilled Ole Bonnie, because as kindly as she was, she still loved a good trick or two.

              With Artair’s witness account, and the pile of bones that the baohbansith had become, Fiona and Callum were easily believed by the people of the village. They had looked upon the situation with wonder, and perhaps a little fear. Ole Bonnie liked that, a little fear was good when dealing with faeries.

              With Fiona’s approval, the wedding plans had begun immediately.

              “Look at me, Ole Bonnie!’ she cried with happiness, spinning around to show off her dress.

              “You’re the most beautiful bride in the highlands,” Ole Bonnie said, and she meant it too.

              In spite of Fiona’s protests, the old woman had insisted on watching the ceremony from afar. Her old bones, she said, she couldn’t go walking up hills anymore. It did not matter, for as soon as Fiona lay eyes on her groom her face lit up with joy and she thought of little else, not even about Ole Bonnie. But that was just as well.

              She watched from afar as Fiona kissed her happy groom, and she granted a wish that Fiona had not even known she had made.

              They would live happily ever after, that would be Ole Bonnie’s gift. She bowed her head and began to walk away, returning back to wherever it was that she had come from, disappearing from the minds of the villagers….all except one.

THE END

Trapped With A Highlander

Highlander Romance

By: Bonnie Adamson

Trapped With AHighLander

Prologue

For as long as Marnie  Mackenzie could remember, she had been told the same thing.

              “Stay away from those Campbell kids.”

              “The Campbell clan is nothing but trouble.”

              “They’re cursed, you see? It’s tragic I guess...but considering the fact that it’s them…”

              For her entire life, Marnie  heard this sort of thing over and over. Don’t trust the Campbells, we don’t like the Campbells, after all of this, it came as a great surprise to her that her best friend actually belonged to Clan Campbell.

              She hadn’t planned on it, of course not. She was a good loyal member of Clan Mackenzie just like all of her ancestors had been. But as the years had gone by, she had begun to wonder just what was so
bad
about the Campbells? So she had snuck out of the village to go see. What she found was surprising enough… only in the fact that they were
normal
. They weren’t trouble, at least not any more trouble than any other clan is, and more importantly, they were
nice
.

              Of course, when Marnie  met Bridget, the poor girl had no idea that Marnie  was a Mackenzie. She hesitated to really say anything for fear that Bridget would hate her just on principle, but when Marnie  finally came out with it, Bridget had laughed it off. It was definitely a comfort to her.

              That was how Marnie  and Bridget began to meet almost every day at their favorite grassy knoll. For two clans who hated each other so much, the Campbells and the Mackenzies lived very close, which made it easy for the two friends to meet each other. This went on from the age of twelve until the age of sixteen, when Marnie  accidentally discovered the secret of the Campbell clan.

              It had been Bridget’s birthday, and Marnie  had baked a small cake for her to share with her friend. That day Bridget was nowhere to be found, and Marnie  grew bolder and bolder in an attempt to find her friend. Turned out that the main reason why Bridget had been nowhere to be seen was because she had been spending the entire day turning into a wolf.

              For some reason Marnie  had not been afraid, in fact she had been jealous, and that feeling had been compounded the next day when Bridget came to visit her and explained everything.

              “Didn’t you know?” she had said. “It’s the reasons why our clans hate each other, your clan cursed ours centuries ago to turn into wolves.”

              To be honest, Marnie had never really known why the Mackenzies disliked the Campbells so much, she had originally thought that it had been a dispute over land, since the clans lived so close together, or perhaps a quarrel over some marriage that never came to be, or one that did. It had never occurred to her that it had something to do with a curse, and she could almost guarantee that it hadn’t occurred to many members of Clan Mackenzie that this might be the case. Part of her was a little shocked, but a bigger part of her felt envy.

              “But how is that a curse?” Marnie  asked, and she meant it. How could it be terrible to run free in the forests, over the hills of the highlands? How free must Bridget feel every day? She was walking in magic, magic that the Mackenzies no longer possessed, how incredible must that be?

              Instead her friend made a face and shook her head. “You think it’s fun, but it’s not. It hurts for one thing.”

              “The entire time?”Marnie  asked. Bridget shook her head.

              “Only for about the first five minutes.”

              The first five minutes could work for Marnie .

              “It doesn’t seem fair,” she told her friend one day as they lay about the heather meadow in between their two villages. “Centuries ago my clan was full of witches and magic, look at us now!”

              It was true, the Mackenzie clan was now a far cry from the magical druids they had been in the past, and while they weren’t necessarily the most close minded of the clans, they certainly weren’t the most magical. That went to the Campbells, and Marnie ’s clan had
made
them that way.

              That had been two years ago, and now at eighteen Marnie  was beginning to wonder how long her friendship with Bridget could be sustained. Soon she would have to look into marriage, and would a husband allow her to sneak off to spend time with her best friend? Would they care about how much she cared about this person? What if she had children? The thought was dizzying to Marnie , although she knew that one day it would very much be a possibility.

              Then, of course, there was Neil.

              Neil was a Campbell, but the kind of Campbell she simply couldn’t stand. Every time she saw them at the market, or while out riding, there he was with his wild red curls and blue eyes, there he was with that stupid smile that told her that he knew a secret that she was keeping, although she had a feeling if he
really
knew, she would have gotten into trouble by now. Instead he was always there, greeting her with that terrible smile of his and making fun of her knobby knees. She couldn’t stand him, and what made matters worse was the fact that he was Bridget’s brother.

              It didn’t make sense to Marnie , since Bridget was kind and sweet and Neil was a complete waste. That’s how it seemed to go with the Campbells, good ones and bad ones abound. His ability to turn into a wolf could not even make him more interesting, and how terrible is that? All in all, he was a complete wash.

              Or at least he was… until the day they all went to see the witch.

Chapter 1

              Neil actually loved becoming a wolf, who wouldn’t? There was something incredibly powerful about shedding your human skin and growing fur, in running around all all fours and howling at the moon. Sure, the beginning of the transformation was painful with the crunching of bones and stretching of limbs, but wasn’t it worth it to see through the eyes of a wolf? Wasn’t it worth it to experience magic?

              He often forgot that his opinion wasn’t shared by everyone. Often it wouldn’t do to mention the curse in a positive way at all. It was only really talked about when another person in the village was turning sixteen, and even then it was spoken of in hushed, scandalized tones. He wished things weren’t that way, but what could he do? It was a centuries old curse!

              Of course, there were aspects about the way things were that Neil loved to embrace. This mostly consisted of the cool hatred towards the Mackenzies. Most of them were decent sorts of people, in spite of the curse, but the Mackenzie he loved to hate above all of them was Marnie .

              There was simply something about her that he couldn’t put a finger on. Was it her thick dark hair, or her mournful green eyes? Was it the freckles that sprinkled on the bridge of her nose what he couldn’t stand? He didn’t know, but he had loved to hate her for years.

              It was a complete disappointment that Bridget had decided to break the rules by befriending
her
. Sometimes Neil flirted with the idea of telling their parents about the secret friendship, but something always kept him from doing it.

              Which was why he was so shocked when his parents found out anyway.

              “What have we always told you?” Neil and Bridget’s father boomed, his face turning red to match his hair. “You can’t trust a Mackenzie, and yet here you are, having picnics with one!”

              Bridget stood her ground, and Neil was impressed by that. She stood in the doorway clenching her hands into fists and stubbornly standing her ground.

              “Marnie  isn’t like what you said! She’s trustworthy and nice and has been my best friend for a long time!”

              Their father’s facial expression darkened. “We try to keep our affairs to ourselves, so you know that friendships with other clans are strictly regulated, but you chose a
Mackenzie
!? What’s next, are you going to marry one!?”

              Bridget frowned but shook her head. “I should be able to marry whomever I choose, father!”

              She might as well have told him that she had committed murder, and Neil watched as a little bit of resolve slipped from her face. He gave a great, deep sigh and looked over to their mother who up until that point had been too speechless to say anything. Their mother did not have the curse due to being born outside the clan, but she had given birth to two children cursed enough, so she had been considered just as much of a part of the situation than any of them. Neil knew that Bridget was jealous of their mother, wishing that she could have somehow in some way not received the Campbell curse. Neil thought that was ridiculous, and often told her so. Why give up such an amazing ability? People just didn’t understand him.

              “Addie, I think you know what we should do.”

              Neil and Bridget’s mother bowed her head and Neil’s heart sank. He didn’t actually think that his parents were going to do anything but warn her, but as he watched his mother think.

              “Bridget, my darling daughter, I just don’t know what else to do…” Their mother stood up and moved to her daughter’s side. “My original clan know all about the secret curse of the Campbells...and I think that it would be best if we sent you there to live with my sister until this all blows over.”

              It didn’t hit Bridget immediately, but once it did Neil could see her entire face crumpling under the weight of the decision. Part of her looked like she wanted to run, but instead she merely closed her eyes and breathed deeply. Darkness covered Neil’s heart, and he thought for the first time in the conversation that he should say something.

              “Do you think that’s wise?” he asked. His voice sounded so small under the weight of what was happening. Bridget looked to him as though she were drowning and he was reaching out a hand to save her. He wanted to help, but he didn’t know how well he could.

              His father glanced at him as though suddenly realizing that he was there. Neil’s father was not fond of the fact that he had embraced the wolf within, and was terrible at ignoring that fact. His lip curled in annoyance, and once again Neil felt shame. There was nothing that he could do for Bridget now, Neil realized. At least not like this.

              “Don’t interfere,” his father said. That was that.

              “My entire
life
is here!” Bridget cried, and Neil could tell that she was milliseconds away from bolting out the door, bolting out of the life she was trying so hard to protect. Their mother looked mournful at the girl’s dismay, but knew that she couldn’t do anything either.

              “Your
life
is putting all of us in danger!” her father cried. “Don’t you see that? If other found out about us we would be hunted!”

              “So?” Neil mumbled under his breath. “We become hunters.”

              “Not now, Neil,” his father warned. Neil knew that it was best not to speak again at that moment.

              “So what if they found out? Marnie  knows about it and she doesn’t care. She thinks it’s fascinating! She thinks just like Neil does!”

              Silence swept over the room like ice water, and even Neil’s eyes grew wide at the revelation. Marnie  Mackenzie
knew
about the wolf curse? Of course it had been many generations since the Mackenzies put the curse on them to begin with, but the Campbells had tried for a very long time to dismiss the truth of it as merely a legend behind the cool animosity. Neil himself had always assumed that the Mackenzies had their own story behind it, but what if that wasn’t the case? Suddenly the idea that he would not have to hide anymore had given him a sliver of hope. Maybe this wouldn’t be for nothing after all.

              That sort of hope was lost on his father, and instead a great tide of rage rose within him. Neil wanted to run himself, not knowing what was going to happen.

              “You told someone outside of this clan the truth!?”

              Bridget kept her head raised, her eyes clear, although Neil knew that she wanted desperately to cry.

              “She found out on her own, and yet we are still friends. The feud should have stopped
ages
ago.”             

              Their father seemed to collapse in on himself, muttering about what to tell the elders about this. Their mother seemed equally horrified, and turned to their father to lay a gentle hand on his shoulder.

              “I will go with her for the first few weeks...introduce herself to that side of the family…”

              “No!” Bridget burst out, before turning on her heel and finally running out the door. Neil jumped to his feet and put a hand out to his father who seemed ready to bolt right after her.

              “Wait, I’ll go get her.”

              “Will you?” his father asked, untrusting. Neil knew better than to take umbrage with his father’s lack of trust and simply nodded.