Kissing the Countess (22 page)

"Morag sings like a frog, so I could never teach her my fairy songs," Flora said, once they were back inside the cozy croft. Morag gaped at her in protest as Flora went on. "I have always wanted a pupil worthy of the music. Your voice is pure, Catriona Mhor, and now I know you understand the old songs, why they are beautiful and why they are valuable."

"I do, Mother Flora. I love the old songs," Catriona said.

"But you are Countess of Kildonan. This is not good. However, I liked your mother." The old woman frowned.

"Catriona Mhor is worthy of your songs," Morag insisted. "She wants to protect and save them. Put aside your resentment of Kildonan and give her your teachings."

"But her husband cannot be trusted," Flora said. "How could my songs be safe in his house? The outlanders and holiday climbers would ask his wife to sing her pretty songs. Bah, that is not the way. These are beautiful, powerful songs. Their magic must be appreciated, and the new earl will not understand that—just like his father."

"Evan is not like his father," Catriona said. "He is a good man, and he will love these songs for what they are. You misjudge him." Suddenly she felt fiercely protective.

"He is a beautiful man, too," Morag said. "If you would ever come down off this mountain, Mother Flora, you would see him for yourself. Such a man!"

"Ach, there was no man finer than my husband," Flora said. "I will set you a test, tall one. Did your mother teach you any of my songs?"

"She knew many songs, but only one of your fairy songs."

"Sing it for me now."

Catriona closed her eyes to remember. Tilting back her head and sitting tall, she began the beautiful air that her mother had sung years ago to lull her children to sleep.

My joy and my heart

My laughter and my tears

My child, my little child

Hill o hu ro

Hill o hu ro, hiri o...

As Catriona trilled the last notes, beautiful mouth music rather than true words, the melody seemed to chime and fade.

"Ah, nicely done," Flora said.

"Is that the test? Then she passed," Morag said.

"Of course it's not her test. That is the fairy song my own great-grandmother heard from the fairies themselves, when they came to peek at her child in the cradle. So you want to know the rest of what I know, eh?"

"I do," Catriona said.

"You have the fairy's own gift of singing. That is good. But we must know if the fairies approve. Hmm..." Flora looked around the room thoughtfully. Then she stood and went to the window to take something from its place on the wooden sill. "I want you to bring me a crystal stone." She held out her palm, in which was a smoky crystal a few inches in length.

"That's a Cairngorm stone," Catriona said. She knew that the quartz rocks, which occurred in translucent shades of brown, could be found on Highland mountain slopes and were named for the mountains to the east. Catriona had sometimes found them while walking the hills. "I would be happy to get one for you."

Flora set the crystal in the windowsill, where it winked, whisky colored, in the light. "Bah, that sort is easy to find. I want one that is far more rare. I want a fairy wand."

"A what? There is no such thing," Morag said.

"They exist, but they are not easy to find," Flora said. "They shine with their own magic light. If you can find one and bring it to me, I will teach you my songs."

"Fairy wands—the stones they also call fairy crystals?" Catriona nodded. "I've heard of them in the old tales, but I don't know of anyone who has ever seen one. I would not know where to find one or what it might look like."

"They exist only at the top of Beinn Sitheach." Flora pointed upward at the ceiling to indicate the great mountain that shadowed her house.

Catriona blinked. "But no one has ever gone all the way up there. They say it is impossible to climb that peak." She knew that well enough—Evan had fallen in his attempt, and her own brother had died on those rocky slopes years ago.

"It is not easy, but it can be done. If you want my songs, girl, you must find the will and the heart to do this. They say the mountain peak sparkles because the fairy crystals grow so thick up there. But what I want is the most special kind—the one that shines in moonlight."

"Moonlight?" Morag said. "There's no such stone. Mother Flora, you cannot send the girl up there in the darkness!"

"Hush, you. It is her choice," Flora said. "The most precious of the fairy wands hold magic light, and will show themselves in darkness and moonlight. If you want the songs, tall girl—then go up there. The fairies themselves will help you get up there, and show you where the stone is, and get you safely down again. So it is not so hard as you think—if the fairy kind agree that you should have the fairy wand, and the songs."

"Ach, she's lived with her crazy dreams for too long," Morag muttered to Catriona. "Mother Flora, this is the Countess of Kildonan and a new bride, not some girl to send on a magic quest like in one of the old tales!"

"How do you think I got the fairy songs myself?" Flora asked. "They are not granted to just anyone. An old singer set me a task long ago, too."

"What was it? Flying over the mountains on a broomstick?" Morag asked.

"If you must know, crabby girl, I was to win handsome Rory MacLeod's heart and make him my own," Flora said. "And I did it. And winning that man was a harder task than climbing that mountain could be, I tell you. Ah, but it was worth any price." She smiled and looked at Catriona. "What say you?"

Catriona frowned thoughtfully. All her life she had wanted to learn the old, legendary fairy songs, for those exquisite melodies held a special magic of their own. And her dearest dream was to learn and then preserve the old Gaelic songs, to keep them safe in case the Celtic culture that birthed them truly faded away.

More than any others, the rare and beautiful fairy songs lured and drew her—and no one knew them as well as Old Flora. Without the fairy songs, the work of Catriona's heart would never be complete.

She must find a way to do this, she told herself. Just last night, Evan had talked about risks, wanting her to take a chance on their marriage—but she clung to what felt safe to her.

Now she would have to find the courage to climb that mountain peak, go higher than anyone, higher than her brother or Evan had gone. She would find the fairy crystal that Flora wanted—or her life's work would never be finished.

"I will do it," she said, lifting her chin.

"Good. But hurry," Flora said. "I'm a very old woman."

* * *

Returning to Kildonan Castle alone, Catriona came back by way of the old bridge that she had crossed a thousand times before, leaping the gap as she had always done. A little while later, she met Evan when their paths intersected on the rolling moorland near to the castle, where the long grass was autumn gold and the wind cut cold and damp.

He did not ask about the bridge, and they strolled back to Kildonan chatting politely about their afternoon. She told him about walking with Morag and going to visit an old woman who knew the old songs, and he nodded.

"They are important to you, the ancient Gaelic songs."

"Very much," she agreed, without elaborating. "Did you walk the hills with your friend Mr. Fitzgibbon today, or go hunting?"

"No—I've been spending time with the estate's account books, and then went to the stables, where I met Mr. Gillie, and we talked about horses and sheep, the livestock and the living the land gives us, and so on." He shrugged. "A long day, and there is more of it ahead. But it is well past time I devoted my days to Kildonan and the glen."

He shrugged, as if he felt some kind of regret over it. Catriona glanced at him, frowning. He seemed tired, she thought, and pensive. Her own thoughts were focused on her meeting and her mission, which she did not want to discuss in detail with him or anyone, beyond the two or three who knew.

"Did you learn a new song today? Would you sing it?"

Surprised, she nodded, and paused to begin the fairy tune that her mother had taught her long ago. Evan listened, quiet and attentive, closing his eyes, tilting his head.

When she finished, he opened his eyes and touched her shoulder, a simple caress that sent a wonderful thrill through her. When he murmured thanks, she felt the affection in it as warmly as if he had kissed her.

Then he resumed their stroll, Catriona beside him, walking toward the graveled drive in the castle forecourt.

Inside the foyer, they parted politely, Evan saying he must meet Arthur in the library, while Catriona murmured that she wanted to go upstairs to change.

"I'll have Mrs. Gillie send tea up to your room," he said.

After solitary and peaceful tea while she read a little, she dozed in the chair, waking to twilight, and the sound of knocking on the door as Lady Jean called her name.

Feeling foggy, Catriona let her into the room. "Sorry, I was asleep," she said, blushing.

"Even is sleeping too," Jean said, smiling. "I've told him, and the others, that neither one of you should be expected down for dinner. Trays for each of you. I've pleaded fatigue for both of you, and so you should not feel pressed to appear."

"Thank you," Catriona said, surprised and touched.

"Both of you survived quite an ordeal in that awful storm on the mountain," Jean said, "and then the rushed wedding and all the challenges of arriving in a new home. All of it has happened so quickly." She smiled again, patted Catriona's shoulder. "You and Evan need rest, just as Mr. Grant advised."

At the mention of Kenneth Grant, Catriona suppressed a shudder and nodded in silence. She stood by then while Jean took charge like a brisk wind, running her bath herself without calling for a maid, drawing the draperies closed, even building up the fire in the hearth.

"Relax. I will have supper sent up, and ask that you not be disturbed. You or Evan," Jean said, and left, a finger to her lips in a hushing gesture as she shut the door.

After she had bathed, emerging warmed and refreshed, she dressed in a simple nightgown, pulling around her the generous folds of a woolen shawl. Then she heard a tap on the door, and Deirdre entered with a tray that held a covered bowl of hot, thick soup, a plate of bread and cheese, a pot of very hot tea.

Eating a little, sated and drowsy, Catriona settled in the bed, leaning back on its abundance of pillows and quilts. Taking up the book, she did not stay with it for long, slipping quickly into sleep again.

In the dark of the night, she woke, and after a while, got up to use her private water closet. Then, pausing by the door to the sitting room, she felt a pang of temptation—and padded through the little room to stand at Evan's door. The urge to knock was strong, but she only rested her hand on the door.

Footsteps. She heard creaking, the rhythmic fall of steps on carpeting. He was pacing. Something bothered his sleep.

The steps paused just at the door, and Catriona felt as if he was just there, keen and present on the other side of the door. Leaning her brow against the wood, she breathed slowly.

But she did not knock. She closed her eyes, thought of slow, tender, heated kisses, of passion, of need. All she had to do was knock, go into his arms—and the marriage he had described would be made. All or nothing, he had said.

But she wanted more than marital compatibility and fulfilling of duties. She wanted love, deep and real, and all that went with it. A fancy, a dream, perhaps. But she would not give up on it just yet.

She turned away, slipped back to her room, sliding under the covers to bury herself in soft, snowy linens and loneliness.

Laying there, she thought she could still hear his pacing, sense his thinking, his presence. She did not have to be alone tonight. All she need do was open the door.

What she wanted was finer, stronger, yet just out of reach.

Chapter 16

Glad to be outside in sun and wind, Evan was glad to have such a physically demanding chore that morning. He worked alone on the broken bridge, fetching and carrying rocks from among those scattered on the hillside. Wedging each one between the broken stones that edged the gash in the bridge, he did his best to shore up the loose stones.