macdougall's darling
by
emily richards

For Linda and Brace Beebe, who made it easy to go to Scoff and, and
for Emily Jarvis, who made it easy to be there.

Prologue

There were few stars visible.  Those that were streaked through the
inky night sky each time Terence MacDougall narrowed his eyes and
tilted his head to peer at them.

"Fallir~g to the earth, they are!  All the stars in the bloody sky
falling to the earth, and no' a thing to be done about it!"

With the last word he stumbled over a stone and sprawled facedown,
sinking inches into the peaty sod before he could determine exactly
what had happened.  With a supreme effort he rolled to his back and
faced the sky again.  When his head was cradled securely the stars no
longer blazed across the sky.

They danced a flirty Highland fling, winking their wee starry eyes and
twitching their wee starry bottoms.  He crooned a tone in
encouragement.

"O' the Highland lass will love all day and niver ask yet pardon.  But
the Lowland lass niver loves fit all She'd rather be yet warden .... "
Terence could keep a pub full of brawny Highlanders thralled with his
fine tenor voice and colorful lyrics.  But he

wasn't at his best sprawling fifteen yards from Loch Ceo's shore
without an audience.  He cleared his throat to try again, but no tunes
came to mind.  He stared at the sky, and the stars rearranged
themselves again, spelling out a message like a glittering theater
marquee in far-off Edinburgh.  He pointed his index finger and read the
words out loud.

"Terence MacDougall, Esquire, requests the pleasure of yer attendance
at the christening of his firstborn son..."

His voice trailed off.  He couldn't remember what Jane planned to name
the hairn.  He would have no say in the matter at all, of course.  Jane
was a strong-willed woman, given to fits of stubbornness and red-haired
fury.

Had it been his fault that she'd gone into labor a week ahead of
schedule so he hadn't been home to help?  Had it been his fault that
Jane's own granny, who had agreed to assist with the deliver, had
fallen sound asleep and couldn't be wakened when the pains got
sharper?

No, nothing was Terence's fault, except planting the braw laddie inside
Jane, of course.  And hadn't it turned out all right, anyway?  Jane had
found her way to the wee cottage hospital and borne their new son in
one of its sterile rooms.

And she'd had plenty of company.

Plenty of company.

He crooned a new tune.  "0' the laird and lady came to town in shoes of
Spanish leather.  Old MacDougall came to town arrayed in heath and
heather " Aye, his son, Terence MacDougall's own son, had been born at
the same moment as the laird's.  Right beside him.  or nearly so.  Old
Dr.  Sutherland had caught the laird's heir, while Jane had delivered
Terence's by herself in the next room.

And there was the wee matter of the other babe, the third male hairn
who had been born at exactly the same moment in the bed beside Lady
Ross's.  The son of the innkeeper, Donald Sinclair, caught just in the
nick of time by Dr.

Sutherland's nurse, Jeanne.

Three laddies, born exactly at midnight on Hallowe'en.  And no one who
had been in the hospital that night could testify which had come first
or last.

Emilie Richards Gingerly Terence sat up.  The effects of a night of
whisky were beginning to weigh on him.  He had promised Jane that once
she'd given him a son, he would stop his drinking and look for a steady
job.  He had every intention of keeping his word, but even Jane
couldn't expect him to stay sober before the lad came home from the
hospital.  He was a father now.  There was much to consider.

He stood on wobbly legs and squinted into the darkness.  Just ahead,
the silver gleam of the loch beckoned to him.  He lived on the loch,
just around the bend, but he had chosen this place on the shore for its
unobstructed view and isolation.

No one was about.

He stumbled forward and thought not a whit about the other stones that
were conspiring to trip him.  The loch belonged to Terence.  Loch Ceo's
waters run through his veins; her waves beat against the shore in the
precise rhythms of his heart.  He was as shallow as her shoals and as
profound as her uncharted depths.  He was wed to her in a way that he
would never be wed to Jane.

"I've a son now," he shouted when at last the icy water lapped at his
shoeless feet.  He had lost his shoes somewhere on the journey here
from the village--it was not the first pair.  He waded deeper, ignoring
the shock.

"I've a son, darling!  A wee laddie with hair as red as his mum's and
eyes like autumn heather.  Did you hear me, darling?"

The waves picked up, as if in answer.  But it was not the loch to whom
Terence spoke.

"I dinna know what we'll call him.  Fergus, perhaps.  Or Geddes. Geddes
MacDougall.  Do you like that, darling?

Does that suit you?  "

His words echoed back to him in spurts and wisps.  He knew immediately
that neither name suited.  He tried again to remember what Jane had
wanted to name the hairn if it was a lad.

He regretted for an instant that he hadn't listened harder.  Jane was a
good lass.  She clese~ed better than he gave her.

Was it her fault that his loyalty, his deepest love, was reserved for
another?

"Andrew I" The name came to him in a flash.  Aye, he and Jane had
discussed names one night before he wandered into the village for his
nightly rounds at the hotel pub.  Now it

popped into his whisky-sodden brain.

"Andrew Do you like that, darling?  Does that suit you better?"

There was no movement on the loch, but he knew that Andrew would suit,
and well.

"There were two others born this night," he shouted.

"But our lad was the brawniest, darling.

There's some who are saying already that the births are an omen, it
being Hallowe'en night and all.  That the three laddies' destinies are
entwined.  Do you think so?  "

The picture of the three infants formed in Terence's head.  When he had
arrived at the hospital, they had already been laid out side by side in
three wee cradles, and even the laird had not dared to make a fuss.  In
the presence of the others, each babe had quieted, as if the laddies
belonged together and knew it somehow.  They were uncommonly handsome
weans, not a puny one among them.

He didn't know he was weeping until the tears frosted against his
cheeks.  Only then did he realize that his feet were numb and the
numbness was creeping toward his knees.

"Show yerself, darling," he crooned.

"Show me ye're happy, too."

A large part of Terence's life had been spent staring at the loch.

Had he pursued his studies with half as much concentrated zeal, he
would possess a university degree.  Had he spent his energies on a job,
he would possess a country estate and a braw house somewhere north of
Princes Street in Edinburgh.

"Show yerself, and let me see how happy ye are for me!"  He stood
motionless and waited on legs that had lost all feeling.  A cloud
crossed over the crescent moon, and the loch was a shrouded mirror.
Then, as the cloud passed, the loch shone clearly again, an undisturbed
stretch of water that passed seamlessly into the horizon, undisturbed
except for a large ripple in the center, widening and dipping and
lapping its way toward the shore.

"Darling," Terence breathed.

"My very own darling."  He shaded his eyes, although there was no
glare.  He wished for field glasses, for the crystal clear vision of
his youth, for a head unclouded by the pub's best whisky.  A

11 shape appeared, a silhouette as graceful, as proud as abeautiful
woman.

"Mercy."  But he needed no mercy, no rescue, no explanation.

"Mercy, darling.  At last!  And what a night ye're chosen."  He stared
for what seemed like forever, until the loch was once again as still as
the moment before dawn.  His legs were numb clear to his hips when he
finally turned away.  He stumbled, but he had expected to, and he
caught himself as he fell.

The icy waters washing his hips and chest chilled him to the core, but
they were no match for the warmth blazing inside him.

He was Terence MacDougall, husband of Jane, and now, father of Andrew.
He was a failure in all the ways that the world counted success.  He
was a drunken fisherman and tour boat guide, a worthless storyteller
and composer of bawdy songs.

He was the man who had just witnessed a miracle.  He clawed his way to
the shore and slapped and rubbed his legs until feeling began to
return.  Then he stood gingerly and headed around the bend in the
direction of the loch side cottage that had always been his home.  At
the precise point where his view would become obscured by trees, he
turned.  His voice was choked with emotion.

"Farewell, darling."

There was no answer, but Terence hadn't expected one.  Miracles neither
spoke nor showed themselves twice.  He would live the rest of his life
on the strength of this one.  He would teach his son about miracles.

"Farewell, darling.  And remember the lad's name is An- drew.  Just
so's ye'll know when you meet him.  He'll be a fine laddie, our Andrew.
I promise.  A fine, fine lad."  There was no answering ripple, but
Terence knew his darling had heard.  He had lost his hat along with his
shoes, but he tipped it anyway before he disappeared into the trees.

Chapter

Not too far away, in a lake so deep that its waters lap at the very
center of the earth, there lived a young water dragon named Stardust.
Perhaps that seems like an odd name for a dragon, but even on nights
when the stars shine their brightest over Serenity Lake, they are only
twinkling, shifting specks of dust to the creatures who live beneath
the surface.  On such a night, Stardust was born.

Fiona Sinclair looked down at the hint of green peeking through an
eternity of cotton candy clouds.  To anyone gazing skyward from that
lush landscape, the plane on which she traveled would be a tiny speck,
a silver daylight star.  She had gazed at the skies often enough in her
twenty-five years, gazed and dreamed and made a wish on every pass' rag
plane that she would be on the next one.

It was a cliche, but too true, anyway.  She should have been more
careful about what she wished for.

"Do you have a little girl?"

Fiona turned her gaze to the dark-haired child seated at the end of the
opposite aisle.  She hadn't realf~ noticed her before.  Fiona hadn't
noticed much of anything since boarding the plane except the fear
generating and regenerating inside her.  Now she summoned a'-Smile.

"No."

"Then who's that for?"

The little girl, dressed in a red skirt, red tights and a red T-shirt
swirling with silver and gold pinwheels, pointed to the book in Fiona's
lap.

"My niece.  Her name's April, and she's almost eight.  How old are
you?"

"Oh, much older," the little girl said with a world-weary sigh.

"Nearly ten."

Fiona nodded gravely.

"Then I suppose you're too old for picture books."

"Definitely.  But I read the Stardust books.  When I was a kid."

Yesterday, Fiona translated silently.

"And what did you think of them.9 Did I make a good choice?"

"She'll probably like it okay.  Is that a new one?"  High, high
praise.

Fiona surprised herself with a genuine smile--the kind she thought
she'd left somewhere back on the ground.

"Yes.  The newest."  As a matter of fact, the book wasn't even in the
stores yet.  Fiona was the author, and her advance copies had come as
she was gathering her luggage for the trip to the airport.

The little girl leaned across the aisle and squinted at the cover.

"It looks like Stardust has a new friend."

"I think she finally decides she has to swim to the other side of the
lake and look for another family of water drag OILS

"But she was scared to leave her cove.  She was scared to go anywhere
else."

Fiona silently handed the book across the aisle.  The little girl took
it with naked enthusiasm.  She was halfway through the first page when
she looked up.  She struggled to look bored again.  I'll just read it
and tell you how it is, in case it's no good.  "

"I know you'll be honest."  Fiona sat back and closed her eyes.

There were so many routes to those dragons across the lake, and so many
ways to get there.  Swimming was only one.

She heard a giggle across the aisle, and the rustle of a page.  She
wondered--as she had every minute of every day since she had begun to
plan her own escape--if she would survive this taste of the world
beyond her own cove.

It was not Andrew's fault that his clothes smelled of smoke and his
fingernails were imbedded with ashes.  Nor was it his fault that his
hands weren't quite steady.  He had scrubbed them repeatedly, blistered
skin and all, at a cottage near the scene of the accident, scrubbed
them with soap designed to dissolve everything it touched, including a
layer or more of skin.  But the ashes and the blisters would remain for
a long time still.

So would the memories.

He was not a man to be easily shaken.  He had worked on North Sea oil
rigs since the day he graduated from university, and he had seen his
fair share of disasters.  In his days as a diver he had discovered the
body of a comrade wedged between two pieces of pipe, deep in Davy
Jones' locker.  As a drilling engineer on a control platform he had
watched a ninety-knot wind sweep a pair of Norwegian roughnecks to
Valhalla.  He had volunteered for rescue missions on land and sea and
never flinched when called upon.

But the tragedy he'd witnessed this afternoon was enough to make him
wish he could pull over to the side of the road and have a good cry.

He couldn't pull over.  He was already late, despite his promise to
Duncan Sinclair that he would not leave Duncan's sister Fiona waiting
at Prestwiek Airport.  He had been entrusted with Fiona's safety,
fragile, frightened Fiona, who had rarely been away from her home in
New York.  Fiona, who at twenty-five was beginning a journey that might
lead straight back home if Andrew didn't g~t to the airport soon.  For
a man in a hurry, his driving was nothing short of pitiful.  In the
past hour he hadn't come close to the speed limit, Each time his foot
pressed the accelerator, he saw twisted metal and clouds of poisonous,
choking smoke.  And he heard the cries of a child.

The surrounding traffic slowed to his speed as he neared Prestwick.

Now there was nothing he could do except pull

15 into line at the motorway exit and follow the stream of cars to the
airport car park.  It was an hour beyond Fiona's arrival time when he
locked his door and started toward the terminal.

Prestwick was a maze of airline counters and waiting areas.  He scanned
computer monitors, but he was so late that Fiona's flight was no longer
listed.  He stood in an interminable line to find out where her plane
had landed, then jogged toward the appropriate gate, weaving his way
through crowds colorfully dressed in saris and turbans, Savile Row
business suits and skimpy resort wear.  He asked for directions from a
teenager whose pale green hair clashed with a plaid kilt worn above
knee-high cowboy boots.  But only when the young man pointed at the
gate just behind him did he spot the woman sitting in a remote corner.
Andrew stood abgolutely still as he gazed at her.  Fiona had been three
at their last meeting.  He had been eight.  She was the wee sister he'd
never had, the sister torn from him by tragedy and the manipulation of
unfeeling adults.  In the years s'nice, he had tried more than once to
imagine her growing up.  Through Duncan's eyes he had followed her
progress, even gazed at rare photographs.  But nothing had

Nothing.

Fiona looked up, and her eyes met his.  He was not a man to wax poetic.
Gold was gold, and brown was brown.  But as he walked toward her, he
could see that Fiona's eyes were a glorious combination, butterscotch
sunshine, molasses moonlight, vibrant, courageous beacons in a face
fast giving way to terror.

"Andrew?"

"Aye."  He approached her slowly, carefully, as he would approach a
wild creature.

"Aye, I'm Andrew.  And it's glad I am you're still here, Fiona."

Her lips curved into a forced smile.  Her words emerged one at a time,
as if each took great fortitude.

"Where would I have gone?"

Gingerly he took the seat beside her.  They were the only people at the
gate.  A sign explained that the next flight scheduled to use this area
wasn't due to arrive for another

two hours.

"I was afraid you might turn around and go home."

She looked away, presenting him with a snubnosed profile and clouds of
pale red-gold hair.

"Well, I thought about it.  But it's a very long trip."

"I left in plenty of time this morning.  I truly did.  It's just that
there was an accident .... " He didn't want to go on.

Curls whirled in disarray as she faced him.

"Oh, I'm so sorry.  Are you all right?  You weren't hurt?"

"No, I came along afterward."

"Then the road was blocked?"

That had been the least of it.

"Aye."

"Do you know... ?  Was anyone... ?"

"It was a bad crash."  He looked down at his blistered hands, still red
from their scrubbing, still imbedded with ashes.  He clasped them
behind him so that he wouldn't have to look at them and remember.

"So, tell me about your flight.  Was it comfortable?  Did they feed you
well?"

"I didn't eat."

"And why was that?"

"My heart took up all the room in my throat."  He surprised himself
with a laugh.  If he'd thought about it, he wouldn't have dared.  He
knew Fiona was deadly serious, that the flight here had probably cost
her every ounce of courage she'd ever hoarded.  But at his laughter,
she smiled again.

And this time the smile--a Mona Lisa beauty--was almost genuine.

"I know it sounds funny."  She made a wry face, and soft ginger-colored
freckles danced along her nose and cheeks.

"I'm afraid you're about to find out what a barrel of laughs I am."

"Never."  He sobered.

"Have I told you how glad I am to see you?"

"Are you?"

"You've changed a bit.  Grown a foot or three, but you're still our
Fiona."

"Am I?"  She shrugged, and the movement sent the collar of her
long-sleeved blouse sliding up her neck before it settled against her
throat again.  Only then did he notice the scars that her hair and
collar had hidden.

His gaze wandered with studied casualness back to her face.

"Aye.

Welcome home, darling.  It's been far too long.  "

Color washed her cheeks, a pale apricot hue that warmed her fair
skin.

"Maybe not long enough."

He reached for her hand.  Like his father before him, he was a man who
touched easily.  For all Terence MacDougall's faults, he had taught his
only son there was no shame in touching.

Andrew wove his thick, ash-darkened fingers through Fiona's slender
ones, ignoring her when she tried to pull away.  Her hand was as soft
as he had expected against the raw skin of his.  He felt it tremble.

"Far too long," he said again.

"This is where you belong, Fiona.  It always will be.  You have more
family here than just Duncan, Mara and April.  You've lain and me, too,
and lain's wife, Billie.  There's nowt that any of us would no' do for
you."

"That's very kind, but" -- He squeezed her hand before he withdrew
his.

"Now we'll get you a bite to eat before we're on our way back to
Druidheachd.  Have you talked to Duncan?"

"I phoned him.  He told me that two different inspectors had shown up
at the hotel unexpectedly last night, and both insisted on his
undivided attention today.  He said that you had volunteered to come
here instead, and that you're a man of your word."  She looked up at
him through gold-tipped lashes.

"If a bit slow about it."

He laughed.

"Well, he's right, for all that.  Let's find some food, then I'll ring
him and explain."

She made a soft sound of protest, but he ignored it.  He stood.

"What about your bags?"

"A man from the airlines promised to store them for me at the baggage
claim.  I gave him my tickets."

"Then we'll eat first."

She stood, too.

"I can easily wait, Andrew."

"Then you've more self-control than I do."  He took her elbow as if he
had been guiding her through crowds all his life.  The gesture seemed
to surprise her, but she didn't pull away.

"I saw a cafe with sandwiches and coffee no' too far away.  Will that
be good enough?"

"Plenty good enough."

He walked slowly, purposely shortening his long stride.  Duncan had
told him once that Fiona limped.  He noted now that there was an
artfully feminine swish of her hips each time she stepped forward with
her right foot, but nothing like he had expected.  It did slow her pace
a little, and he compensated easily.

He made conversation as much to put her at ease as to put the accident
out of his mind.

"Did you get any sleep on the plane?"

"Not a bit."

"I know your heart was in your throat, but what kept your eyes from
closing?"

"I propped!  them open with my fingers so I wouldn't be sleeping when
we crashed."

He groaned.

"I was the same way the first time I flew."

"I don't believe it."

"It's true.  But I was in a helicopter flying out to my first job as a
diver off an oil platform, and I was supposed to be fearless.  My job
depended on it.  So I whistled as loud as I could until the gent beside
me threatened to loosen a few of my teeth."

"Not good for whistling."

He was already charmed by the sweetly serious way that she joked.  She
wasn't a bit sure of herself, but she wasn't so shy or retiring that he
had to work to draw her out.  From everything he had been told, he'd
expected a woman who wouldn't meet his eyes.  A floor watcher. Instead,
the woman beside him was gazing avidly at everything and everyone that
passed.  She stayed close beside him, as if she were glad for his sheer
masculine bulk, but as they walked, her eyes drank in every airport
detail.

"Here we go."  He abandoned her elbow and grabbed a door instead.

"It's casual and quiet inside, You can eat and rest a few minutes
before we start back."

There was an empty table near the door, and he took it, seating her
where she could gaze through the glass partition at the passing crowds.
She sank inw her chaff as if she had found a permanent home.  Her eyes
were grateful, but her lips were drawn in a thin, tight line.  For the
first time he

clearly saw what her decision to come back to Scotland had cost her.

"You'll feel fit and ready for anything after you've had a bit to eat."
He signaled a gray-haired woman in a white apron lounging against the
front counter, and after she had uncurled herself one millimeter at a
time, she ambled their way.  Fast service was obviously not the motto
here.  An- drew wondered how many flights had been missed while
passengers waited for a cup of coffee.

"Do you know what you'd like?.

It looks as if you'll have plenty of time to decide.  "

"Soup, if they have it."

They settled on two bowls of beef and barley soup and a pot of hot tea.
Andrew planned to sneak six lumps of sugar and half a liter of cream
into Fiona's cup.  He wished he could lace it with whisky, as well.

She spoke after their server ambled away.

"Andrew, do you know that your hand is bleeding?"

He looked down.  His hands throbbed, but that was no surprise.  He had
ignored the pain, even welcomed it as his due, an easily borne,
infinitesimal particle of the human misery he had witnessed earlier.
Now he saw that the skin along the heel of his right hand was cracked
and swollen.  And there was blood.

"I'm sorry.  Did I get it on your shirt?"

"I don't know.  That's hardly the issue, is it?"  She took her napkin
and dipped it in the ice water that had been set before her.  Then she
dabbed it against Andrew's hand.  Gently.  More gently than anyone had
ever touched him.

He had been fine until that simple kindness.  He had been fine, but
now, suddenly, he wasn't.  He got to his feet, but he couldn't think of
an explanation he wanted her to hear.

"I'm going to ring Duncan now.

Will you be all right?  "

"Of course.  Go ahead."  She looked as if she wanted to say more, but
thankfully, she didn't.

He had to exit the restaurant and walk a distance to locate a
telephone, but he wasn't sorry.  Fiona didn't need to hear what he had
to tell Duncan.  As he waited to be con- neeted, he stood with his back
to the passing foot traffic and

his hand cupped over his ear.  When Duncan came on the line, he wasted
no time on formalities.

"I'm here, Dune.  Fiona's fine, and we'll be on our way soon.  We're
just having something to eat first."

He waited  for Duncan's anger to blow itself out before he spoke
again.

He registered but didn't really hear the scorching lecture on the other
end.  When Duncan fell silent, Andrew spoke.

"There was a three-car pileup on A82.

I was the first car on the scene.  One of the ears ignited, Dune.

There were people inside.  "

Suddenly he couldn't say anything else.  Until the moment Fiona had
sponged his hand he had successfully pushed the worst of the accident
out of his mind.  Now, safely away from her, he relived it, in all its
horror.  He swallowed once.  Twice.  He still couldn't speak.

"Jeez, Andrew.  I'm sorry."  Duncan's tone was tortured with guilt.

"Why didn't you tell me that right away?  I should have known you'd
have a good reason for keeping Fiona waiting."

"I would no' have come at all, if it was anyone but Fiona here waiting
for me."

"Did you tell her?"

"None of the details.  God, no.  What could I say?  It was a wee girl
in the ear, Duncan, and her parents.  I was able to get the hairn out,
but not her mum and dad.  They're ... no' with us anymore."

"Is the little girl going to be all right?"

"No."  Andrew ran his hand through his hair.

"They were taking her to Glasgow, to a hospital with a special burn
unit, the same one where Fiona was taken .... " Duncan was silent,
too.

"What could I say to Fiona?"  Andrew asked.

"What could I possibly tell her?"

He felt a hand on his shoulder, the faint pressure of a woman's
fingers.  He turned and saw Fiona gazing at him.

"You could have told Fiona the truth," she said.  Her eyes gleamed with
reproach.

"Exactly the way you just told it to her brother."

Chapter 2

"I did no' want to upset you," Andrew said, when he and Fiona were on
the motorway to Druidheachd.

"I did no' want your first day back in Scotland to remind you of your
own days in hospital."

"There's nothing you could say or not say that would make me forget
them.  I grew up in hospitals."  Or maybe she hadn't grown up.
Sometimes Fiona wasn't sure.

"Pretending I was never hospitalized doesn't help me.  Tiptoeing around
the truth doesn't help, either."

"Do you want to hear all of it, then?"

Gazing at Andrew's profile as the motorway flashed by outside the
window, Fiona considered.  Neither of them had felt like eating after
he'd finished his phone call with Dun- can.

They had gathered her luggage and started toward Druidheachd.  But
until now, they hadn't really talked.  Her memories of Andrew were hazy
and childish.  Fireengine red hair.  Being lifted to sit on shoulders
that were sturdier than Duncan's and considerably lower to the ground
than her own father's.  A loud laugh.  A bright smile.  And stories
coming so thick and fast that she could hardly savor one before another
had begun.

That boy, the hero of her early childhood, was now a man.  And what a
man he was.  The sturdy youthful shoulders were as broad as an oxen
yoke.  The hair had ripened to a darker shade, a rich shining auburn
that fell in a thick shock across his forehead.  His hands--now she
understood why they were sore and bleeding--were a giant's hands.

Andrew was everything she wasn't--brash, strong, fearless.  He was
exactly the kind of man who had always frightened her the most.

She stared ahead of her.

"I think you should tell me.  yes."

He began, but his reluctance was obvious.

"I left my house early this morning.  I did no' want you to be forced
to wait for me.  I knew..."

She saved him from further explanation.  He had 'understood how
frightened she might be of coming to Scotland, frightened of the things
that everyone else took for granted.

"Thanks for that."

He continued.

"It's been so long since you've been here.  I'm certain you can no'
remember the roads near the village.

They've changed hardly at all since you were a wee lass.  They're as
narrow, as curved and treacherous, as they were in our grandparents'
time.  In their grandparents' time.  "

"And if drivers take them half as fast as you take this motorway, then
there's bound to be trouble."

He tapped the brake immediately.

"I normally travel at twice this speed."

"Maybe it seems fast to me because you insist on driving on the wrong
side of the road."  He glanced at her, and she forced a smile.

"There were few cars on the road at that hour."  His hands gripped the
wheel.

"I was planning what I would do when I got to the airport.  How I would
spend the time before your flight.  I calculated that I'd have to wait
at least an hour.  So I decided to take the longer way there.  It's a
bit more scenic, and it seemed a fair way to waste time.  I was between
two-villages, on a stretch in the mountains, when I saw smoke rising
from somewhere beyond.  I thought perhaps someone was burning strips of
moorland.  It's done to

23 encourage certain types of undergrowth for game birds, and this is
the proper time of year.  I thought it might be interesting to watch.
"

"I wish it had been that innocent."  Fiona could see from Andrew's
expression that he wished the same.

"When I got on a straight bit of road, the smoke thickened.  I could
see cars ahead of me.  For a moment I thought they had stopped to watch
the fire, too.  Then I realized they were the fire, that there had been
an accident, a pileup.  I still dinna know how it happened.  Who was
going in which direction, or why they collided.  The road was steep.
Perhaps brakes failed.  Someone panicked.  But the three cars were at
angles across the road, two of them folded together as if they'd come
off a line just that way.  I got as close as I dared--there was more
and more smoke every moment.  I was afraid of an explosion.  I pulled
off the road and began to run " Fiona sat quietly, her hands clenched
together.  He was much too good a storyteller.  She could see the
accident unfolding before her.  She didn't prod him to continue.  She
heard him fighting his emotions, trying to tame them to spare her his
misery.

But they would not be tamed.  He spoke faster, as if to finish
sooner.

"There was a man in a business suit slumped over the steering wheel of
the car that was closest to me.  His car seemed to be the least
damaged, and when I started toward him, he waved me on and opened his
door.  He managed to get himself out and away from the fire.  There was
an old woman collapsed against the door of the next car.  The door was
hardly that anymore.  There was no way to open it, but I was able to
reach her from the other side and drag her free.  I carried her away
from the crash.  She revived as I carried her, and I laid her on the
side of the road beside the man from the first car."

"You probably saved her life."

Andrew didn't acknowledge Fiona's statement, as if it were too
insignificant to comment on.

"Another car had arrived and stopped by then, full of haft-grown lads.
One of them ran with me back to the wreck.  The smoke was thicker, and
I could see flames licking at the interior of the first car.

I knew there was no one else inside, and we went straight to the
third.  There was a man at the wheel--or what had been the wheel--and a
woman beside him.  They were already dead.  " He slammed his palm
against the steering wheel.

"I

hope to God they were already dead, Fiona.  "

She rested her hand on his shoulder for a moment.  She didn't know what
else to do.  Her eyes filled with tears, which were infinitely
preferable to the vision that filled his.

"The flames were fast growing thicker.  I knew it would only be seconds
at best before the petrol blew.  I shouted to the lad to get away, and
I started to back away, too.  Then I heard a child screaming.  I
shielded my face and leaned forward, and I saw what I'd missed.  Right
in the midst of the smoke and flames there was a child strapped into
the back seat.  And she was..."

"Don't!"  She took a deep breath.  For a moment the world grew dark.

She took another, and another, until the darkness receded.

"I'm sorry.  I..."

"You dinna need to apologize."

Minutes passed before she spoke again.

"You got her out?"

"Aye.  And the tank blew just after."

"Oh, Andrew."

"A crofter had seen the flames, and it was no' long before assistance
arrived.  We did what we could for the wee lass until they took her
away.  But she was badly injured."  She heard the truth in his voice,
not his words.  He didn't repeat the child to survive.

"There've been so many advances, so many new ways to care for ...
burned children.  It may not be as terrible as you think."

"I dinna even know her name.  If I ring them, they'll tell me that I've
no right to know her condition."

Fiona was silent.  She replayed his words in her head.  She measured
her own fears, a lifetime of living as a recluse, the insecurities that
had kept her a child for twenty-five years.  ~When she spoke, her voice
was firm.  Confidence that she didn't feel buoyed it.

"Then we'll go to the hospital, and we'll insist that they tell us."

"I'll no' drag you there, Fiona.  If I go, I'll go alone.  Later,
when"

"We'll go now, Andrew.  Right now.  And we'll make them tell us how she
is.  Because you won't sleep tonight, and you won't think about
anything else until you know.  And neither will I."

Andrew's doubts were as thick as the smoke at the scene of the
accident.  What odd hand of fate had drawn Fiona into this tragedy in
her first hours on Scottish soil in more than twenty years?  For all
her brave talk, she looked as if a breeze would send her spinning.  She
had neither eaten nor slept since leaving New York.  Even if he
discounted how difficult it had been for her to come to Scotland at
all, the picture was still of a woman using up her last reserves of
strength.

He still had time to skirt Glasgow and continue toward Druidheachd.

There was still time to alter their plan.

"You're certain you want to do this?"  he asked.

"There's no shame in changing your mind."

"I would like to see how she is."

"I should no' have burdened you with any of this."  She was silent for
so long that he thought she wasn't going to answer.

"I've spent a lifetime not being burdened," she said at last.

"I've been protected and sheltered until I'm not sure who or what I am.
I had hoped it might be different here."

He had been chastised.  There was no doubt.

"It's just that" -- "It's just that I was burned as a child myself, and
I was taken to the very same hospital.  And because you're a kind man,
you want to spare me those memories.  Nothing can spare me, Andrew.  I
haven't forgotten any of it.  I won't suddenly remember the horror of
it when I walk through the door.  It's with me always.  I can face
this."

There was nothing else he could say.

He knew Glasgow well.  Almost no one would say it was Scotland's most
picturesque city, although it was the large at But there was an energy
here that he found satisfying, a spirit of renewal that had transformed
some of the city's worst defects.  He came to Glasgow when he wanted to
lose himself in her theaters or pubs, or just in her exuberant

bustle.  But today there was no joy in his drive through the city.  He
pointed out no landmarks or monuments.  And when he finally parked his
car in front of an imposing XSctorian era building, he still couldn't
find anything to say.

"We'll go in together," Fiona said.  She didn't look at him.

"Aye."

"Andrew, whatever has happened to her, you did your best.  How many men
would have risked their life the way you did?"

"If I had found her first, she would no' have been so badly burned."

He heard her quick intake of breath.  Misely filled him.  He had not
meant to admit that.

"You rescued the survivors as you came to them!  Anyone would have done
the same.  If you'd taken the time to survey the scene and make choices
about who to rescue first, you might not have had the time to rescue
anyone."

"I almost missed her completely.  I panicked.  I overlooked her at
first.  If I'd been more careful..."

"How can you be so hard on yourself?"

He got out of the car and came around to open her door.

"It should never have happened."

"Now you're making sense.  It shouldn't have."  She stood to face
him.

"But unfortunately, nobody consulted you or me.  And all we can do now
is make the best of it."  Her chin was raised so high he almost didn't
notice the slight wobble.  Shame filled him.  He was leaning on her,
burdening her with his own misery.  He had been sent to take care of
her.  Duncan had trusted him to take care of Fiona, and she was taking
care of him.

"I'm sorry.  I dinna know what's wrong with me.  You're right.  I'm no'
God.  I know that.  It's just that..."

"You wish it could be different.  I know.  I understand that."

Andrew studied her face.  She wasn't pretty.  He decided that now.  Her
face was too sharp, too intense for so predictable a word.  With her
pale curly-colored hair, her ginger freckles and thin, turned-up nose,
she might have been merely adorable--if her life had been different.
But so much was written on Fiona's face, so much pain and longing and

27 hope--especially hope--that no one would think her adorable again.
Her amber eyes devoured everything in her path; they smoked with
emotion.  Her mouth was soft and vulnerable.

And expressive.  She was so obviously a woman who' had never learned
the art of letting any moment pass without wringing something from it
or without letting her reaction show.

"Let's go," she said.

"Thank you."

"What are friends for?"

Not for what he wanted from Fiona.  The realization came as an
unwelcome surprise.  Andrew thought of himself as a simple man.  His
taste in women had always been simple, too.  He appreciated laughter,
energy, buoyant good humor.

He had looked for women who didn't take life seriously, and, most
especially, who didn't take him seriously.

Fiona was none of those things.  She was a rare butterfly, slowly, so
slowly, emerging from a dark, cramped cocoon.

She could so easily be frightened away or, worse, injured.  She was not
for Andrew MacDougall, nor should he even want her to be.

And yet already he felt a pull toward her that went beyond anything as
ordinary as friendship.

"We will no' stay long.  I promise."  He started toward the hospital
entrance.  He didn't want to think about his feelings anymore.  He'd
never thought of himself as a man who was capable of so many confusing
emotions.

She fell into step beside him, and he slowed to accommodate her.  They
didn't speak again, not even when they were inside.  They wound their
way through the hospital maze, through nurses and desks and
explanations of why no one could tell them anything.  They moved
steadily onward, but as they conquered each new hurdle, Andrew watched
Fiona's skin grow paler and her step less confident.

"I want you to sit here and wait," he said at last, pointing to chairs
outside the swinging doors that led to the sixth floor burn unit.  It
was the last place they could try, and a sympathetic nurse had
suggested they come up and attempt to speak directly to someone on the
floor.

"There's nowt to be gained by going inside."  When she started to
protest, he

held up his hand.

"We might have better luck if I go by myself, Fiona.  They might be
less intimidated and more roe lined to give me information."

She appeared to consider, then she nodded.

"I'll wait."  He watched until she was seated before he pushed open the
doors to continue his search for information.  The unit was a long
narrow hallway with a dozen rooms on either side and corridors leading
in both directions.  Personnel scurried from room to room, buI no one
was on duty at the central desk to help him.  He knew better than to
stop the nurses and doctors in the midst of their activity.  Life and
death were precariously balanced in this ward, and he remained out of
the way, impatiently waiting until an older man in a white uniform
stopped to ask if he needed help.  He explained as succinctly as he
could.

"I can no' get her face from my mind," he said, after he'd told his
story.

"I have to know if she made it, if she's going to be all right."

The man patted his shoulder.

"I just came on duty.  I'll check the records and see what I can
find."

Andrew felt such a rash of gratitude, he couldn't speak.  He nodded.

"Wait outside," the man said.

"I'll get back to you as soon as I can."

Andrew went to wait with Fiona.  He was encouraged for the first
time.

He strode out to tell her that they would know something soon, but
Fiona wasn't there.

"She's so tiny.  You're sure this is the right child?"  The nurse
standing beside Fiona nodded solemnly.  She was a young woman, not much
older than Fiona, with a plain, sturdy face dominated by compassionate
blue eyes.

"Aye.  This is the one that was brought in from the accident your
friend described.  We think she's not more than three."

Fiona stared through the glass at the dark hair spread across the white
pillowcase, the pale heart-shaped face.

There were tubes and machines and monitors.  A nurse bent over the bed
and adjusted the IV.

"What are her chances?"

"Fair, I think.  The moment she's out of recovery they'll take her up
to the unit where you were waiting.  She survived the surgery, and the
burns aren't as extensive as your

29 friend feared.  Sometimes these injuries appear to be worse than
they are.  "

"And sometimes they're worse than they appear."

"Her name is Hume, we think.  The car was registered to a Robert Hume
in Woodstock, England.  The police are trying to trace her relatives
now."

"The poor baby."

The nurse was silent for a moment.

"I've seen far worse eases walk out of here and go on to lead normal
lives."

"I was one of the ones who didn't walk out of here," Fiona said.

"Pardon?"

"I was a patient in this hospital when I was three.  In the burn
unit.

And it was a long time before I walked.  "

"I'm sorry.  I had no idea.  Actually, I thought you were an
American.

From the accent.  "

"I was born in Scotland.  After I was burned, I went to the States for
rehabilitation.  My mother was an American, and she insisted.  I... I
haven't been back until now."

"Then I'd say you have a natural bond with Miss Hume."

"I guess I do."  Fiona wished she could go to the sleeping child and
comfort her.  She would need much comfort in the days to follow, and
the people who could have offered it were dead.

"We have to go now.  I really shouldn't have brought you up here.  It's
against all the rules."

Fiona summoned her dwindling resources to smile her appreciation.  The
nurse was the same one who had recommended that she and Andrew go
directly to the burn unit for information.  She had found Fiona there
and reported that the child was in recovery after emergency surgery.
She had offered to take Fiona to peek through the window in the door,
but only if they went immediately.  There had been no time to wait for
Andrew to return.

Now they walked down the hall together and waited for the elevator that
would take Fiona back upstairs to find Andrew.

"Will they let us visit her, do you think?  When she's able to have
visitors?  We're not family, but Andrew saved her life, and I..."

"I'll speak to her doctor.  I'll tell him you were here and ask him to
make a note in her chart."

The elevator door opened, and Fiona stepped inside.

"You've been so kind."

"I feel so sorry for her, the poor wee dearie.  If those were her
parents in the car, then she'll be so alone through this.

It seemed that since you were so concerned.  "

"I appreciate it.

Andrew will, too.  " She waved goodbye as the elevator closed its
doors.

Andrew was pacing the sixth floor waiting room when she arrived.

"Are you all right?"  He pushed his hair off his forehead, a useless
gesture that was completely endearing.

"I'm just fine, and I think your friend is going to be, too."

"What do you mean?"

"I just saw her.  I'm sorry you weren't with us, but there wasn't time
to find you."  She explained what had happened.

"She's in fair condition?"

"I think that was an educated guess.  I'm not sure they're issuing any
evaluations yet.  But the nurse felt she has a good chance.  She's
burned over thirty to forty percent of her body, not all third degree.
There was some internal bleeding.

They had to do surgery, but it turned out to be relatively minor.  The
nurse couldn't be more specific than that.

It was a miracle she told me that much.  " Andrew sat down and rested
his head in his hands.  Fiona sat beside him.  She focused on his
hands, which looked swollen now, which they hadn't earlier.

"Andrew, we're going to stop by the emergency room, or whatever you
call it here, and get them to He at your hands.  You're risking
infeetion ."  "You think she's going to be all right?"

"I think so.  And she's being well cared for.  They're searching for
relatives now.  They've trac~l the car to a Robert Hume in England."

He looked up.

"There was a moment, just after I got her out, when I wondered if I'd
done the right thing to try and save her.  Did I do the right thing,
Fiona?  Now, with every 31 thing she has to go through, all the pain
and sadness, did I do the right thing?"

She knew why he asked her.  The answer was a gift that only she, or
someone who had gone through the same terrible experiences could give
him.  She had survived a fire, too.  Had she wished sometimes that she
hadn't?  Did she wish it now, when she looked back at everything that
was behind her?

"You did the right thing."  She took a deep breath.  She had said the
words because they were the ones he most needed to hear.  But they were
true.  She realized it with a new and profound relief.

"You did the right thing, Andrew.  And someday she'll be as happy as I
am to be alive and to have a full life ahead of her."

His eyes glistened.  He nodded.

Her heart turned over slowly.  In that moment he was as vulnerable as
she had been all the days of her life.  She guessed that much of what
he'd felt today was new to him.  He was a strong man, a good man.  But
today he had needed strength.  Her strength.

"Thanks," he said.  His voice was husky.

"I think I'm ready to face Druidheachd."

"I think you're more than ready."  He leaned over and kissed her cheek.
His lips were warm, and the intimacy, the rare feeling of being
cherished and accepted, was a streak of sunshine through her exhausted
body.

"Let's go home, Andrew," she said, when he moved away.

"Aye, Fiona.  Let's go home."

Chapter3

The old gray stone building was not a prison.  It was the first home
Fiona had known as a child, the village hotel and pub that had been run
for generations by her ancestors.  The Sinclair Hotel was the rink
where she had skated in wool socks across slate floors, the sanctuary
where she had been wrapped snugly in the love of her family.

Until the night when the fires of hell had nearly consumed her.

"You were so young, no more than a wee girlie.  Does it seem
familiar?"

Fiona stared at the hotel from the passenger seat of An- drew's car.

"I don't know what I remember or just what I've been told over the
years."

"You were happy here.  Always smiling, laughing.  And dancing.  I would
sing, and you would dance."

"You remember that?  You were only a little boy your- serf."

"Aye, I remember."

She switched her gaze to Andrew.

"Did you carry me on your shoulders?"

"Aye.  Have you been told that?"

"No."

A smile peeked through the layers of exhaustion on his face.  The smile
seemed natural; the haggard lines of fatigue did not.

"You would kick, and I would tell you to stop.  Then you would pat my
hair and tell me you were sorry.  Just when I believed you'd learned
your lesson, the exact moment I relaxed, you would kick me again."

'"It seems a little late for an apology."  She smiled, too.

"Let's go inside.  Duncan and Mara will be waiting."

"You'll come, too?"

"Aye.  There's nowt you can do to stop me."  He opened his door and
came around to open hers.

Fiona wasn't sure that she wanted Andrew to stay.  He needed rest.  The
strain of the accident and its aftermath was clear, and she knew that
his hands throbbed, although he hadn't complained.  He had submitted to
having his hands dressed and bandaged at the hospital, but he hadn't
taken the painkillers issued to him, because he had needed a clear head
to drive the rest of the way home.  She wondered, too, if on some dark,
unconscious level he welcomed the pain as his punishment for not
rescuing the Hume child sooner.  There was a selfish reason for wanting
him to leave, as well as one for wanting him to stay.  Fiona was filled
with pride, if not with courage, and she did not want Andrew to witness
how difficult it would be for her to walk through the hotel's front
door for the first time in twenty-two years.

Then there was the part of her that wanted to lean on him, the part
that yearned to have him beside her.  The part that was willing to
sacrifice all her considerable pride for the strength and comfort of
his presence.

He opened her door, and she knew the moment had come.  He held out his
hand.  She took it gently, and her own hand was swallowed and
cradled.

"Duncan and Mara have made changes in the place," he said.

"Mara appreciates everything old, and Dune wants all the old swept away
and replaced.

Between them, they've struck a balance.  It's cleaner, brighter.  More
welcoming.  But it's still the same hotel.  "

Old.  Auld.  Something wept inside Fiona.  Andrew's accent, thicker and
more musical even than Mara's, connected with wisps of memory inside
her.  It was the sound of

home, denied to her for twenty-two years.  The sound of love and
acceptance and the life that had been cruelly taken from her.  She
stood and looked up at him.  Her throat was tight, and her heart
swelled against her rib cage until it had no room to beat.

"You have only to walk through the front door," he said.

"And it will be better."

She nodded.  Denying her fear was futile.  The blood had drained from
her cheeks, and the hand enclosed in his was shaking.

They walked up a cobblestone path, past shrubs just on the verge of
bloom.  A sweet fragrance teased the air, and she saw rows of purple
hyacinths outlining the border that circled the hotel.

"Aunt Fiona!"  The door flew open, a massive wooden door that had
creaked and groaned for centuries, and a child flew toward them.

"Aunt Fiona!"

Andrew droplxxl her hand just in time for Fibna to fling open her arms.
April fell into them.

"Aunt Fiona!"

Fiona clasped her niece and held on for dear life.

"You've grown.  I can't believe it.  You,re grown again, and I just saw
you."

"It's been months!"

"Too long."

"Welcome home, Fiona."

Fiona looked up and saw her brother standing in the doorway.  For a
moment there were only the two of them.

I'm back, Duncan, but I don't want to be here.  I know you don't,
Fiona.  I didn't expect you ever to find the courage to come home, but
I'm glad you did.  She responded to the welcome he'd issued out loud.

"Thank you," she said.  She wanted to say more, but the words wouldn't
come.  His serious gray eyes didn't change as he smiled at her.

"Fiona."  Mara pushed past her husband.  Her blond hair fanned out
behind her as she descended the steps.  She seemed to float, as if she
somehow had transcended the earth at her feet.  Mara and Duncan had
been married at Christmas time.  Fiona had liked her new sister-in-law
on

Emilie Richards 35 sight.  Mara was a large part of the reason she had
come back to Scotland.

Fiona held out her arms, and they enveloped each other in warm hugs.

Then Duncan was beside her, hugging her, too.  She rested in the arc of
his arms for a moment, Dun~ can, who had been the only true constant in
a childhood gone berserk.

"Come on up to our apartment," he said.

"We'll skip a tour for now.

Mara will put on the kettle, and you can put your feet up.  Then we'll
have supper.  I made linguine with clam sauce.  Your favorite.  "

"You were always the best cook in our family."

"Andrew?"  Duncan said.

"We're expecting you, too.

We've set a place for you.  "

"I dinna think so.  I've" -- "Andrew, please come," Fiona said.  She
took a step toward him.  Just one uncertain step.  She extended her
hand.

"It will do you good.  Please?"

He seemed torn and suddenly--terribly--alone.  She took another step
toward him.

"Duncan really can cook.  I He smiled at her.

"Aye, I'll come."

"Goody!"  April said.  She flung herself at Andrew, and he caught her
and swung her to his shoulders.

Fiona saw him grow paler, as if the little girl was the weight of the
world.  She knew the hands that had caught April must throb unrner
ifully, but when April was settled, he patted her legs.

"Let's go, Springtime.  You tell me where."

"~e,l,!  Uncle An~ to take you straight to our apart- ~'n~,o~l.  " D~,
can said.

"He's in no shape for a gallop through Fiona watched Andrew duck as he
carried April through the doorway.

She frowned and followed close behind, worried that he had taken on too
much.  She could almost feel the torment in his hands, the strain of
every screaming muscle.

She was inside the hotel, walking beside Duncan and Mara through the
reception area, before she realized that she was home.  Finally and
irrevocably home again.

The linguine was perfect, the sauce pungent with Mara's own herbs and
mushrooms coaxed from the woods near the mountain cottage she had built
with her own hands.  April had made dessert, an apple cake studded with
walnuts and raisins and topped with fresh, sweet cream.  Duncan and
Mara's apartment was comfortable and homey, an airy, contemporary space
carved from eighteenth century stone.  The walls were cream-colored,
the furniture light oak and beech.  Muted abstract art adorned the
walls, and tulips in hand-thrown pottery adorned the tables and
shelves.  April's toys nestled in corners and peeked from colorful
chests.  There was no attempt to hide the fact that a child lived here
and was very much loved.

"You'll have more, Andrew?"  Mara asked, as she passed the platter of
apple cake in his direction.  Fiona watched Andrew from under her
lashes.  He had eaten little and spoken less.  Her contribution to the
dinner conversation had been even slighter.  Duncan and Mara had
covered their silences, and April had filled in cheerfully when no one
else could think of anything to say.

"I could no' eat another bite, even though it is the best cake in the
world," Andrew said, looking straight at April.

"Then you'll have some coffee?"

"I think I'd better be getting home to my dog."  Andrew set his napkin
on the table.

"I left Poppy with a neighbor, and Mrs.  Kent'll be ready to feed him
to my darling if I dinna get home soon."

"You can't go," Duncan said.

"lain and Billie are on their way.  At least stay until you've seen
them."

"Your darling?"  Fiona looked up at him.

"Have I missed something, Andrew?  Has the last man of midnight
fallen?"

"Fallen?"

She had noticed his eyes before--she couldn't imagine how anyone would
fail to notice them.  They were a changeable hazel, nearly brown at
times, but the green of a tropical sea when his emotions were aroused.
Now they sparkled like sunlight on calm water, filled with the humor
that she imagined was usually just under the surface.

"Yes, fallen," she repeateit.

"Married.  Have you gotten married, too, Andrew?"

"Oh aye.  I've been married since I was old enough to sit beside the
loch and stare o'er the horizon."

Fiona had seldom been teased.  Her life had been a serious bus' mess

Now she found that Andrew's teasing left a warm tingle inside her, as
well as a trail of confusion.

"I'm obviously the only person here who doesn't know what you mean."

"Andrew's darling is our resident loch monster," Dun- can said.

"I

don't know why he's dragging this out.  "

She faced her brother and saw that his eyes weren't sparkling at all.

He was staring at his childhood friend, the man who was closer to him
than a brother, and Duncan's eyes were even more serious than usual.

"Fiona can take a bit of teasing," Andrew said.

"I suspect that Fiona's had a very rough day."

"Fiona is sitting right here and can speak for herself."  Fiona said
the words with girl.  " a forced smile.

"Fiona's a very big She turned back to Andrew.

"Tell me about this darling of yours."

"I dinna see why.  You know the stories.  I told you all about my
darling when you were a hairn."

Not so far away, in a lake so deep.  "You were the one."  She breathed
the words.  She leaned toward him.

"You were the one who told me the stories about the water dragon?"

"I dinna know if I was the only one."

"All these years... I've wondered."

"It was the only way to keep you quiet.  You were fair troublesome,
Fiona, as apt to skreich as to tug at my hair."

"I

didn't use the same stories, did I?  The Stardust stories aren't the
same"

He shook his head decisively.

"No' at all the same.  I'm afraid my darling lives alone.  I only wish
she had so many friends."

"You've seen... your darling?"

He grinned.

"No' a bit of her.  No' a peek.  No' a fin."

"But he will," April said.  She got up from the table and circled it to
climb up in Andrew's lap.  He lifted her and set

her in place as naturally as if she were his own child.

"Uncle Andrew will see his darling," she continued.

"Just once.

That's all anybody's allowed.  Right?  "

"That's correct.  One peek to a customer."

"Andrew has an imagination to rival yours, Fiona," Duncan said.

"And he's not at all shy about sharing it with

"And you, my beloved husband, are in need of an imagination
transplant."  Mara kissed Duncan affectionately on the top of his head
as she stood to heg'm clearing the table.

"If there was such a thing, Druidheachd would surely he the center
where the transplants were performed.  Never has there been a place
with so many fanciful, impressionable, suggestible people!"

April wriggled down to help Mara, and Andrew leaned back/n his chair,
hands behind his head.  He was obviously enjoying himself.

"Dune, correct me if I've my facts twisted, but do you no' make your
living using what wee imagination you've been given to convince your
fellow men and women to purchase what they never knew they needed?"

"Imagination's a completely different matter when it's used in the
practice of free enterprise."  Duncan allowed himself a smile.

Duncan had owned a successful advertising agency in Pasadena before his
divorce from his first wife, but he had sold it, and the money had gone
to her in exchange for custody of April.  Fiona knew that her brother
still missed the faster pace of the business world, despite his
satisfaction with life in Dmidheachd.

"Duncan, have you started another agency?"  she asked.

Duncan shrugged.

"I'm doing some consulting.  I commute twice a week and do the rest of
the work from home."

"That's terrific."

"He'll no' he content until Glasgow is the Los Angeles of Great
Britsin," Andrew said.

"And we are all awash in consumer values and valuables."

"I'm working with a tourist board, as well as several companies that
export Scottish products," Duncan said.

"And, as usual, Andrew is exaggerating."

"No' a bit of it.  I'm telling the truth as I know it.  You've plans to
put your mark on Scotland.  Before you know it, we'll he trading our
shortbread and haggis for Save the Rain Forest ice cream and green
algae sausages."

"I'll take the algae over haggis any day," Duncan said.

"Haggis?"

Fiona asked.

"The intestines of sheep, stuffed like sausages.  The intestines are
the best part of it.  It's downhill from there," Duncan said.

"You've truly a way with images, Dune.  I'm fain to see what you'll do
to Scotland once you've had the opportu " Are the two of you at it
again?  Shall I stand between you or let you slug it out?  " The words
sounded from the doorway.

Fiona turned and saw a dark-haired man standing there.  He was tall,
almost regal, and at his side was a slender woman with brown hair and
eyes that rivaled Andrew's for sparkle.

"Billie.  lain."  Mara went to the doorway and kissed lain's cheek.  He
embraced her before he passed her on to his wife.

Fiona watched with something like dread.  She was exhausted.  Jet lag
and a wealth of new experiences and emotions had drained her of all
reserves.  Her life had been at best contemplative, at worst
stultifying.  But for a moment she wished for the peace of the
familiar, for the boredom of seclusion.

Then she was swallowed in lain Ross's arms, strong, confident arms
holding her against a hard chest.

"Ah, Fions," he said.

"You're every bit as lovely as I rem em She was at a loss for words.
She was not lovely, nor would she ever he.  She had been marked by
fire, scarred by experiences that had made her a recluse for most of
her life.  Yet lain told the truth as he saw it.  She was beautiful to
him.  She was Duncan's sister, and for too short a time, she had
practically been his.

She found herself embracing him, too.  When he stepped back, she smiled
up at him.

"You're taller than I remember, lain.  But then, so am I."

His blue eyes were understanding, yet at the same time assessing.  She
had the strangest feeling that he completely comprehended what the day
had done to her.

"Come here, Billie, and meet the guest of honor," he said, without
taking his eyes off Fiona.

Fiona found herself in another set of arms.  Billie was wiry, and
energy seemed to pulse in waves from her.  Fiona guessed that lain's
wife was everything Fiona herself was not, lively, impulsive,
courageous to a fault.  Despite their differences, Fiona was drawn to
her immediately.

"We've all been on pins and needles waiting for you," Billie said.

"I wish you could have come for the wedding."

"I do, too."  Fiona murmured the expected polite response before she
realized that she really meant it.  Billie and lain had been married
just three weeks ago.  Fiona had been invited to the ceremony at
Fearnshader, the manor home that had been in lain's family for
centuries, but she hadn't believed she was strong enough to make the
trip.  She had been told repeatedly that she wasn't.

Yet now she was here.

"Billie was the bonniest of brides," Andrew said.

"The single lasses from six villages wept as she walked up the
aisle."

Everyone laughed, except lain, who narrowed his eyes.

"And who are you to talk, Andrew?  Is there a single woman in the north
of Scotland who doesn't have you at the top of her list?"

"I suspect there are a few," Billle said dryly.

"Though contrary to the utterly male perspective being expressed in
this room, most women have better things to do than lay snares for
recalcitrant bachelors or even to bother themselves with lists."

"Is that how you caught lain, Billie?"  Duncan asked.

"You ignored him until he couldn't resist such a novel approach?"

"No, she nearly drowned herself right in front of me."  lain slung his
arm over Billie's shoulder.

"That caught my eye."

"Think what you will," Billie said, eyes shining.

"But in my version of the story, you caught me."

Fiona was entranced by the interplay.  The three men had been friends
since infancy.  They had been born together at the stroke of midnight
on Hallowe'en in the tiny hospital that served the village of
Druidheachd.  The odd coincidence had been proclaimed an omen, and the
babies had been raised to be as close as brothers.  No parent,
including the highly educated Malcolm Ross, tenth laird of Druidheachd,
had dared to object.

Now two of the three men of midnight--as they were known in the
village--were married, and their wives had been absorbed into the close
circle of friends.  Only Andrew~ained alone.  Fiona wondered why he had
never taken the plunge.

She followed the stream of conversation, answering when spoken to but
primarily enjoying the role of observer.  Andrew gave a truncated
version of the accident that morning and their visit to the hospital in
Glasgow.  Sympathy was expressed, but more important, it was apparent
on the faces of everyone present.

They took coffee in the living room, and the talk turned to life at
Fearnshader.

"Billie's having all the furnishings appraised and dated," lain said.

"Then we'll decide what to keep, what to donate to museums, and what to
sell at auction."

"No one has thrown out anything at Fearnshader for centuries," Billie
said.

"It's less a home than a warehouse.

If a piece isn't sturdy or useful enough to stand the rigors of real
life, then I don't want it.  "

"I can see it now."  Duncan held out his hands in the facsimile of a
picture frame.

"Fearnshader decked out in California contemporary."

"No chance of that," Billie said.

"Just a Fearnshader you can walk through and furniture you can sit on.
We'll keep the best pieces and the real heirlooms, the rest is
history."  Her smile was infectious.

"Literally."

"As soon as you've settled in, 15iona," lain.  said, "we'll have you
for a visit."

Fiona smiled her thanks.

"We could use a visitor or two," Billie said.

"There's been a noticeable lack of them since the wedding."

"Well, I've been there twice," Mara said.

"And I know Duncan and Andrew have stopped by."

"I think what Billie's trying to say is that we've noticed a..."  lain
shrugged.

"A change?  I don't know how else to put it, exactly, except that
there's a new reserve in the way people in the village are treating
us."

"Perhaps they're just keeping their distance for a time.  They know
that newlyweds have better things to do than entertain," Mara said.

"I'd like to think that's it."  lain didn't look convinced.

"I've wondered if it was me," Billie said.

"If the fact that I'm from America, even though my family came from
here originally, has upset people.  But I was warmly welcomed when I
first arrived, and even at the wedding, people seemed genuinely happy
that lain and I had found each other."

"It's only been a matter of weeks," Mara said.

"Perhaps they're just adjusting to the change in your status.  It's a
wee village, and change comes slowly.  It took more than a little time
for me to be accepted."

lain lifted one expressive hand.

"Last week we decided to hire new staff to assist the gardener.  We
want to restore my mother's gardens."

"Lady Mary would be pleased," Duncan said.

"I asked the gardener to find helpers he would like to work with.  I
knew his judgment could be trusted.  He came to me a few days later and
told me that none of the village lads would come.  He's had to go
farther afield."

Mara frowned and turned to her husband.

"Duncan, that sounds familiar."

"We've had a similar experience here," Duncan admitted.

"I've had to advertise as far away as Fort William for new maids and a
server for the dining room.  And no one can explain why suddenly
there's no help to be had in Druidbeachd."

"It's most certainly just a coincidence," Andrew said.

"Do you think so?"  lain turned to him.

"Have you no riced anything odd yourself?"

"No' a thing.  Duncan, has business dropped off at the hotel?  The
pub?"

"The daily receipts have been less at the pub, but not so much that I'd
call it a trend.  Business dips and soars on a regular basis, depending
on the weather, the season .... "

"Have either of you asked around?  Have you questioned anyone?"  Andrew
asked.

"It's difficult to ask outright," lain said.

"But I'm keeping my eyes open."

"As am I," Duncan admitted.

"And I'm listening."

"I think you'll find that it's nowt," Andrew said.

"Just winter ending and the locals staying home and readying themselves
for the occasional glimmer of bonny weather.

The winter was worse than we've had in years.  Perhaps our young people
are all looking for positions in a better climate.  "

The talk drifted to other things.  As if they were afraid they might
wear out Fiona, lain and Billie made excuses a few minutes later and
left.  Duncan went to help April get ready for bed, and Mara offered to
help Fiona settle into her suite, which was just down the hall from
their apartment.  Andrew stood as Fiona did.

"I'll be saying goodnight now."

Fiona didn't want Andrew to go.  It was his strength that had gotten
her so far today, and she didn't want to lose it.

But there was more, an awareness of him that had sustained her, too.

She had watched him throughout the evening, cataloging his responses,
savoring his wit, basking in the warmth of his gaze when his eyes
settled on her.  She had a cloistered nun's experience with men, but
she didn't need experience to know just how special Andrew was.

She held out her hand.

"Good night, Andrew, and thank you for everything."

He took her haxid in his bandaged one and held it for a moment.  His
hazel eyes glinted in the lamplight.

"I'll see you soon, Fiona."  He turned to Mara and kissed her cheek,
then he was gone.

"The room always seems a bit dimmer when he leaves it, does it no'?"

Mara put her arm around Fiona's shoulders.

"Let's get you settled."

The suite Duncan and Mara had chosen for Fiona was huge, with a stove
and refrigerator in one corner of the main

room and a wide day bed table and chairs along the other side.  There
were two multi parted windows that looked over the main street.  The
small connected sitting room had already been furnished with a magn'.
fficent old desk and a drawing table, and Mara told her that in the
daylight the window there looked over an enclosed courtyard with neatly
clipped boxwoods and beds of blooming bulbs.

"You know, of course, that any rooms in the hotel are yours for the
taking," Mara said.

"But I chose this for your first days here.  It's close to us, but
you'll have privacy, too.

And it's one of the larger accommodations.  Most of all, I thought you
might like the views as much as I do.  "

"It's lovely.  Perfect.  I'm sure I'll be happy here."

"Will you?"  Mara rested her hands on Fiona's shoulders.

"That's all we want, Fiona.  At any time ... if there's anything we
might do..."

"You've done enough just to let me come."

"This is your home."

There was nothing Fiona could say to that.  She was about to be left
alone with her ghosts, and she could feel them wrestling inside her
already.  Was home the place where you felt as if you were about to be
torn to bits?

Fiona turned back to the windows after Mara had gone.  Dark had settled
in, along with a light rain, and only the occasional sloshing of a car
on High Street was visible in the faded lamplight.  Tomorrow the
village green would be a bright emerald set amidst the gray stone of
Dmidheachd, but tonight there was only glistening cobblestone and the
haze of drifting rain.

She sighed and turned away.  Her suitcases had been unpacked by one of
the hotel's maids and all her mile tries laid neatly in place.  She
could bathe and go to bed, as everyone

Or she could not.

She stood, paralyzed.  She was not used to being torn by indecision.

There had been so few decisions to make in her life that choices had
seemed exotic, heady things.  Now she must choose between courage and
cowardice.

Until now that choice wouldn't even have presented itself.  Her life
had been a study in cowardice.  But she had altered that when she
boarded the 747 to Prestwick.

The hotel had quieted considerably by the time she step pea outside her
door.  The old building seemed to settle as she listened.  It stirred
vague memories inside her.  Had she really lain awake as a small child
and listened to the hotel sigh softly as it readied itself for the
stillness of night?  It seemed so now.  The sounds were so familiar
and, best of all, calming.

She started down the corridor.  She wasn't exactly certain of her
destination.  She thought the room she sought was on this floor
somewhere, but she hadn't wanted to ask.  Dun- can might have persuaded
her not to go there tonight, and if he had failed, he would have
insisted on taking her there himself.

She hadn't wanted company.

The room might be occupied tonight.  She knew that was possible.  If it
wasn't occupied, the door would surely be closed and locked.  It was
foolishness to be wandering the halls of a hotel she hadn't lived in
for twenty-two years, looking for memories that Were best locked away.
But even as she told herself to go back, she moved forward.

At the head of the stairs she turned and started up another hallway.

With each step she grew more reluctant.  Too many years had passed. She
had been so young.  Time guaranteed change.

Even if she remembered the correct hallway, all vestiges of the fire
would have been wiped away.  She stopped in front of the fourth door on
the left and knew deep inside her that she had found her childhood
room.  Some memories were too powerful to be dissolved by time or will.
She stood quietly and listened.  There were no sounds from within.

No sounds.

She lifted her hand to knock softly.  The woman whose knuckles rapped
against dark wood seemed a stranger to her.  What would she say if
someone answered?  She steeled herself and knocked again, this time
louder.

When no one answered, she turned the handle slowly, cautiously.  The
door swung open, and even from the hail'.

way she could see two freshly made beds waiting for guests who
obviously would not be arriving that night.

She stepped inside before the voices in her head could stop her.  Her
~in was ~ and her hands shook.  Four steps inside she leaned wall hands
behind her.  and ~tred a~

"Good-night my dearie dearest.  You'll be snug and safe here tonight,
all warm in your wee bed.  Nowt can harm you as long as we're next
door.  Your mum will come and tuck you in soon, and before you know it,
it will be tomorrow and Duncan will be home again."

She closed her eyes, but the room was still before her.  Her father's
lean figure loomed above her.  He bent to kiss her forehead, and she
breathed in the faint scent of lime and pipe tobacco.  She wrapped her
arms around him, but already sleep weighted her eyelids.

The memories were as real as her own heartbeat.  She had been nearly
asleep when the door opened again.  , "Fiona, you little rascal.  Did
you think I wouldn t find that picture you drew on the kitchen wall?
What am I going to do with.  you?  Never was there such a little girl."
The voice was female and, despite the scolding, indulgent.

The scent this time was light and floral, the lips every bit as warm
against Fiona's forehead.

' ~Are you cold, "s~veetheart?  Would you like me to plug in your
little heater?

Her eyes flew open.  There was no space heater in the room now, of
course.  Nothing in the room was the same as it had been twenty-two
years ago.  Fire had gutted everything along half the corridor dot even
the plastered walls.  Had the building been anything but solid stone,
it would not be standing now.

"I was afraid I'd find you here."

For a moment Fiona didn't know if the voice she heard was real or
imagined.  She turned her head toward the doorway and found Andrew
standing there.

"I thought you might no' sleep until you'd faced this."  He moved
slowly toward her.

"Were I you, I could no' have."

"It's madness."  She turned away from him and stated out at the room
again.

"I found it.  After all these years, I still knew exactly where to
come.

"My bed was there, I think, and Duncan's over there.  I was mad at him
that night because he'd gone to spend the night with you and lain.  He
always seemed to be gone, or you and lain always seemed to be here.  I
didn't like being left out."

"Have you seen enough?"

Her eyelids drifted shut, and a moan, one helpless, futile moan,
sounded from somewhere deep inside her.

"I've seen it so often.  In all of my dreams."

Strong arms came around her.  She let him pull her against his chest.

She could no more have resisted than run away.

She wanted his arms around her.  The soft cotton of his shirt brushed
her cheek, but it was the only thing soft about Andraw.  His chest was
stone, as secure and solid as the hotel walls.

His hand stroked her hair.  His fingers were trapped by a curl, then
released.

"You remember more?"

"I remember it all."

"Do you want to... tell me?"

She shook her head.  She had no desire to share these memories out
loud.  She had learned long ago that no one could bear to listen.

"Then I'll tell you what I remember."

She lifted her head.  The Right was dim.  Only a distant street lamp
shadowed his face.

"But you weren't here."

"No' that night.  I came the next day, after I'd been told what had
happened.  You were in Glasgow, by then, of course.  Your whol~ family
was there with you.  I'd been told no' to come to the hotel.  Ordered,
really.  But as soon as my da's head was turned, I came anyway.  It was
a dark day, as if the sun had no interest in shining after what had
occurred the night before.  I walked the distance, because I was afraid
my bicycle would make a fair bit of noise, and I did no' want to be
caught.  When I first glimpsed the hotel, I thought that I'd been lied
to.  Nowt seemed different.  I expected to see you come bobbing through
the front door."  Her face was so close to his that she could almost.
see his memories in his eyes.

"I'm sorry you weren't right."

"Once I was inside, I knew it had no' been a lie at all.

There were crews of men carrying out charred wood and water-soaked
furniture.  They passed close to me, carrying something long and narrow
that still appeared to be smoking.  i could no' tell what it was at
first.  Then I realized that ~t was your bed.  "

They were both silent for a moment.  Fiona shuddered.  Andrew drew his
arms tighter around her.

"And so I know," he said, "at least a bit.  I know what you suffered

that night, and I know how much of a miracle it was that you survived
to come back here this night.  "

"There were times when I wished I hadn't survived.  I was too Young to
think of it that way, of course.  I just knew that.

I wished it would all disappear, the pain, t, he skin grafts aria
surgeries.  I would think of the pictures I d seen of heaven, pictures
m storybooks, and I wish I was there.  "

"But it's different now?"

She thought of the little girl he had rescued and the ~r~e~ a~
dnhteh~Yr ~t~ ~fb~ ~r~ts' ~Ys~Se' ~a'c~i it fl~ffern;t~'-' ~ee.

fore her.  It was a room, and there were no sinister presences here. It
was simply a room.

"She told him something she'd never told anyone..  _Tl~" e fire was
caused by a space heater.  When I began to think I d need a passport, I
.  went looking through some old papers to find m~, birth certificate. 
I came across me insurance report.

I 11 never know why my mother kept it.  Maybe she thought that destroy
ins it.  would compound hilt some.  ;

how.  But the report stud that tlae heater was oetecuve ano lr
overheated.  The cord shorted out and set fire to the rug beside my
bed. Neither Duncan nor I was ever told that.  The cause of the fire
was supposed to be a mystery.  "

"Her guilt, Fiona?"

"My mother believes she's responsible for... everything that
happened."

"I've never heard Duncan say so."

"Duncan doesn't know, and I don't plan to tell ,h~_,.  Mother's kept it
a secret all these years .ixyause slE.  could~l~e~ bear for us to know
the truth.  She was the one wno~u the heater from the closet and turned
it on.  She was me one who left it on that night."

"Fiona, how can you know that?"  .

"I ~aiiember."  She waited for him to dispute it.  It seemed impossible
that a child of three would know or that a woman of twenty-five would
still remember.  But he didn't dispUte it.

' " you blame her?

"For'that?  No, of course not.  She despised Scofiand's climate.  To
her the hotel was always damp and_ cold, and s~_ didn't want me to be
uncomfortable.  I can only guess, Out I think she probably intended to
come in a little later and turn

off the heater.  Instead she probably fell asleep or just forgot turned
again to face him.  " But her guilt, Andrew, her c~silt was more
dangerous than any fire.  Her guilt almost troyed me.  "

He didn't ask how.  He seemed to sense it, as if he could envision all
the years since the fire when Melissa Sinclair had struggled to make
life perfect--and out of reach--for her daughter.

From guilt as much as from love.

Fiona didn't know why she had told Andrew all this.  She had learned
long ago to keep her thoughts and feelings silent inside her.  She
offered him a tremulous smile in apology.

"It's the same room, but I'm not the same, am I?  I had to come in here
and walk out again on my own two legs.  Time stopped for me after my
father kissed me and put me to bed that night.  And now I have to start
it ticking again."  He rested his hands on her shoulders, bandaged
hands that throbbed from another child's tragedy.  He leaned toward
her, and her eyelids drifted closed.  He had kissed her cheek this
morning.  She expected, yearned, for the same, for the warmth of his
lips, the cherished safety of his affection.

But his.  lips brushing hers were a surprise.  They were warm and
moist, and pleasure spiraled through her, entwined with surprise.  He
lingered, deepening the pressure until.  there was no mi.  ~taking the
kiss for comfort.  Her breath eaugat; her lips parted.  A world of
enchanted sensuality and black velvet nights seemed to hover within her
reach.  ~he opened her eyes, and he lifted his head.

"Time did no quite stop, Fiona.  You were a child then.  Now you're a
woman.  And you have the rest of your life before you."  He touched her
cheek with his fingertips, but he didn't smile.  He left without
another word, left her there to walk out of the room on her own.

He had been gone for a long time when she walked out into the hallway
and closed the door quietly behind her.

Chapter 4

"It's enchanted."  Fiona stepped over the ridge leading down to Mara's
croft and stood staring at the view before her.

"I can't believe you could bear to leave all this to live at the
hotel."

"Your brother was an enticement," Mara said.

"Duncan?"  Fiona raised a brow.

"The same Duncan who plays rock music at top volume and never refolds a
newspaper in the right direction?"

"I'd be the first to admit he's no' perfect.  But he has a way about
him you might no' ken, being his sister."

Billie crossed over the ridge to join them and the conversation.

"I'm afraid she's right, Fiona.  Every one of the men of midnight is
irresistible."

It was a conversation Fiona might have enjoyed pursuing, except that
she didn't know how to, exactly.  The only man of midnight who had so
far resisted his own irresistibility had been on an oil rig in the
North Sea for the past two weeks as she slowly adjusted to living in
Druidheachd.  Andrew had dropped completely out of her life, and she
missed him.

Mara put her arm around Fiona's shoulders.

"Shall we explore?"

"I can't wait."

"You're certain you feel up to it?"

"I could walk a hundred miles."  Fiona smiled.

"Over the next year or so."

They took the gentle slope slowly, stopping to admire the thatched
stone cottage that Mara had built with her own hands.  Surrounded by
the last stands of fading daffodils, sheep grazed behind a fence,
several with lambs frolicking at their sides.

"Once I bred all my ewes," Mara said, "but now I breed only as many as
I'll need for my own spinning.

I could no' bear to sell the young ones off each summer.  Their mothers
mourn them so.  "

Fiona had already seen the gorgeous yarn that Mara spun and dyed from
the wool of her sheep.  Mara had woven her a shawl for Christmas that
was one of her most prized possessions.  Now Mara had become the owner
of a small shop in the village where she displayed her crafts and those
of the other local artisans who staffed it.  Mara was a woman of many
talents.

"Will you teach me to spin?"  Fiona asked.

"Aye, and you'll be wonderful at it.  Your fingers are nimble and your
patience unending."

"Oh, it ends more often and a lot more abruptly than you might
think."

"Billie, now..."  Mara shook her head sadly, but her eyes danced.

"Billie will never be a spinner.  But I can see our Billie tramping the
countryside, searching for plants to help me make my dyes."

"That's me, all right," Billie agreed.

"Explorer and threat to all she surveys."

They petted and played with Guiser, Mara's border collie, as well as
one of the sturdiest of the lambs.  Fiona held the soft wiggling body
against her own and was loath to give it up when it was time to put it
back with its mother.

"We'll go have some tea now, if you're ready," Mara said.

"I'm anxious to show you the cottage."

The cottage was charming from the outside, a fairy-tale residence.

Fiona was awed as Mara explained how she had carried the stones for the
cottage herself and set them in place in two parallel rows.  The space
between was packed with dirt for insulation.  The roof was.  thatched
with dried

sedge in picturesque rippling whorls and webbed with wire mesh.

"In the old days," Mare said, "we would have held the thatch in place
with hand-tied ropes made from straw or heath and weighted with stones.
But I deviated a bit, like the lazy city dweller I am."

"The whole project definitely reeks of laziness," Billie said.

"If you had even an ounce of ambition, you'd have built a whole
settlement here."

"Ah, that comes next, and soon, I hope."

"What are you planning?"  Fiona asked as she followed Mara and Billie
inside.

The interior of the cottage was every bit as quaint and intriguing as
the exterior.  The rectangular space was divided by a bed raised off
the stone floor on a platform.  Fireplaces adorned each end of the
room, one with iron kettles hanging from sturdy hooks and chains inside
it.  Rafters as thick as a ship's mast supported the roof above, as
well as the dried flowers and herbs hung in colorful clusters below.
Mare gestured Fiona to a chair beside a gleaming walnut table.

"I've no' told you my plans for the croft?"

"I don't think so."  Fiona settled herself.  The view out the small
window just in front of her was more glorious than any artist's
landscape.

Mare removed a kettle from the hearth and held it out to Billie.

"Will you do the honors?"

Billie tucked the kettle under her arm and started for the door.

"I

think I've got the hang of your pump by now.  I'll be back in a jiffy.
"

Mare struck matches to light a neatly laid pile of kin- riling.  When
it was blazing, she carefully introduced several small blocks of peat.
By then Billie had returned, and Mara lowered a chain to set the kettle
over the fire to heat.

All three of the women wore sweaters and jeans, but Fiona was glad when
the fire began to slowly warm the room.

Mare set out a teapot with delicate china cups.  A tin of shortbread
was next, followed by bannock and blackberry jam.

"Well, I've plans to turn the croft into a school," she said, w!  ~m
she had completed preparations and joined them at the table.

"It's been my dream for a time now.  It will be

Fanilie Richards 53 a place for children to come and learn the skill. ~
of their ancestors.

We'll construct more cottages like this one, raise animals and a garden
together.  I'll teach them to spin and dye and weave on hand looms.  "
She till~l her head, as if she could see the entire picture.

"For a week or two at a time, of course.  I've no plans for it to be
large or important.  Just a place to pass on the traditions and history
of our Highlands."

"It's a wonderful idea.  When do you plan to start?"

"After Duncan and I have built our house."

This, too, was a surprise.

"A house?  Here?"  I'll show you the site after tea.  We've designed it
already.

And if it's done on time, then we can begin the school with a few
children next summer.  "

"You'll live here and not at the hotel?"

"I think we'll live in both places, most likely.  Here in the summer
and the village in the winter.  But we can be flexible.

As much as I like the hotel, I savor the privacy we have here, and I'm
inclined to want to hole up in the country from time to time, even
after winter's come.  " Fiona had already noticed that Mara retreated
frequently to her apartment, particularly when the hotel was most
crowded.

"You like the quiet, don't you?"

Mara didn't say anything for a moment, and Billie toyed with her cup.

Finally Mara spoke.

"Fiona, there's something you ought to know about me.  I've no' told
you before this because it seems so... unlikely."

"Unlikely?"

"I sometimes see the future."

Fiona frowned, unsure what Mara meant.

"Sometimes?"  Billie said.

"Sometimes?"

'"All right, then.  Often."  Mara smiled as Billie shook her head.

"Very well, Billie.  Fair often.  Is that better?"

"She sees the future as often as the rest of us remember yesterday,"
Billie said.

"And have you no' had your own brushes with things the rest of us can
no' see?"  Mara chided Billie.

"Am I the only one whose sight has been extended?"

"I've never seen the future.  Just... other things."

"Other things from eight hundred years ago, to be exact.  Other
lives."

"Wait a minute."  Fiona leaned forward.  Her head was whirling.

"Are you telling me that both of you have had, umm... psychic
experiences?"  She couldn't think of a better term, although that one
seemed inordinately clinical.

"Put bluntly?  Aye," Mara said.

"And I know you must think we're both a wee bit gyte, at best."

"It does sound a bit... gyte, whatever that is."

"Daft... crazy.  I've always seen bits of the future.  I can no'
explain it, nor do I want to particularly.  But all too often I can
sense what's going to happen to someone I meet.

It's a fact of my life that I've learned to live with.  And when it
gets to be too daunting, I come here.  I've never yet seen the fate of
a sheep or songbird.  I can rest here.  "

"And you, Billie?"

Fiona said.

"Oh, nothing so exotic," Billie said.

"Just a little brush with an ancestral curse.  But it's all over
now."

Fiona sat back and stared at them both.

"Well."  She didn't know what else to say.

"I felt I had to warn you," Mara said.

"It seemed only right."

"Does this mean that when you look at me... ?"

"No.  It's rare that I can see the future of those I love."

Fiona felt warmth radiate through her.

"Thank you."  Mara got up to pour the water into the teapot, and Billie
began to butter the bannock.

"But I do have feelings about your future," Mara said.

"No' predictions, mind you.  But feelings."

"And?"  Fiona asked.

"Billie and I have both put our pasts to rest since coming here.  I
think you will, too."

Fiona considered that.  She had so often thought of herself as someone
apart.  Now, and as naturally as if it had always been so, she had been
embraced and included in the friendship of two women she already
admired immensely.

Two strong women, secure in themselves, despite the trials they'd
endured.

"Well, that's why I came," she said at last.

"Then you came to the right place," Billie said, covering her hand.

"And we're glad you're here."

Andrew stepped through the doorway of the hotel pub and paused to let
his eyes adjust.  He needed a wee taste and a bit of company before
going home to sleep for a day and a night.

Andrew worked a fortnight at a time, and the work was constant and
draining.  He would work two more shifts before summer's onset; then he
would be off until autumn.  He had stipulated the odd schedule at the
beginning of his employment, and although there were still grumbles
from management when summer approached, there was never a threat of
losing his job.  He was talented at what he did and a hard worker with
years of valuable experience If his employers privately thought he was
daft for trading his generous salary for the headaches of a tour boat,
they kept their opinions to themselves.

The night was still early, and the pub was half-empty.  As he stepped
over the dog stretched across the threshold--a dog remarkably similar
to the one waiting at a neighbor's house for him--he greeted men he had
known all his life.

Safely across he squatted and scratched Primrose behind his bedraggled
ears until the dog rolled to his back, tongue lolling in total ecstasy.
Primrose was April's dog, the brother of Andrew's, but at night, when
April was in bed, Primrose appoint~l himself guardian of the pub
doorway.  Andrew turned away and stood to find a hand stretched toward
him, offering whisky.

"Could you use this?"

"That I could."

Andrew took the drink from Duncan's hand and held it out in the
traditional Gaelic toast.

"Slainte mhah."

Then he downed it in a single swallow.

"A bit dry, are we?"

"I dinoa drink when I'm at work."

"Come over to the bar and I'll have Brian pour you another."

"And to what do we owe your generosity?  Have you gone and sold
Scotland to France while I was at work, Dune?"

"Nothing quite so lucrative.  I just want to talk to you."  Andrew had
come for a few slaps on the back and the la teat village gossip, not
for anything serious.  He thought longingly of his bed and the peace of
the cottage where he

had lived all his life.  He lived there alone now.  His father had
been dead for more than a decade, and his mother had moved to life soon
after, to rid herself of memories.

"Can we keep the conversation short, I hope?  I've had just the barest
wink of sleep in the past forty-eight hours."

"It won't take long, then you can go home and sleep straight through
until your next shift if you want."

"I might well."

At the bar they both waited for a dram of the pub's finest, then took
it to a table in the corner.  Andrew leaned his chair back on two legs
and watched his friend.  Duncan seemed to be mentally sifting through
openings, which was unusual.  He had always been a blunt man who said
exactly what he was thinking without preamble.

"It's about Fiona," Duncan said at last.

Andrew felt a thread of alarm.

"Has something happened?  She's no' gone back to America, has she?"

"No, nothing like that."  Duncan sipped his whisky.  Now that the
opening was out of the way, he appeared to be planning what to say
next.

Andrew was a patient man, but not tonight.

"Would you get on with it, Dune?  It will be time for my next shift
before you've made a start."

"Fiona's vulnerable, Andrew."  Duncan cupped his glass in his hands and
leaned forward so they were eye to eye.

"I

don't know what persuaded her to come back here after all these years.
You know she never saw my father again after the fire, don't you?  She
never came to Scotland for visits, even when the doctors said she
could.  For a long time she wouldn't go anywhere, not even school.  She
was tutored at home for most of her childhood, then she went to a
small, private academy for high school, and later, a local college.
She'd leave in the morning and come back in the afternoon at exactly
the same time every day.  She wasn't involved in any activities.  She
didn't even have friends she spent time with.  "

"What has this to do with me?"

"I don't know what's made the change in Fiona.  I never expected to see
her here, but I can't tell you how glad I am that she's come.  And I
don't want anything to scare her

57 away.  She's still a three' year-old child emotionally, and
anything, just about anything, could shove her straight back into her
shell.  "

Andrew picked up his glass and sipped, but he watched Duncan over the
rim as he did.  He took his time, although until this moment he had
been the one to hurry the conversation along.

When he was finished, he carefully set down the glass.

"And you think," he said, just as carefully, "that I might scare her,
Dune?  You think that I might drive her all the way back to America?"

"To my knowledge, she's had no experience with men at all.  Not one
bit.  And she doesn't know or understand you."

"What is there to understand?"

"Andrew, you're a man who likes women, really, genuinely likes them.

Not all men do, and not all men understand women or even care to.  But
you do, and you're warm and affectionate toward every one you
encounter, from Sheila MacClaskey's youngest baby girl to old Flora
Clan "What you're saying is that I'm indiscriminate?"  Duncan's eyes
narrowed.

"Fiona doesn't know you.  She may not understand that you treat
everyone the same way, and that even when you single someone out for
special attention, it doesn't last."

"Indiscriminate and inconstant?"

"I'll put it right on the table.  I watched you with Fiona the day she
arrived, and I watched her reaction.  She may expect more from you than
you're willing to give.  And I don't want her to get hurt again.  I
don't ever want her to be hurt again."

"Then I'd recommend you wrap her in some of Mara's thickest fleeces,
for protection.  Lock her in a room with no ~sharp objects, in a
country with no threat of fire, flood or d. Make certain she has no
visitors, because visitors ight bring disease or, worse, excitement
into her life.  And at might no' he good for her heart" -- Duncan
thumped his glass on the table.

"Cut it out!"  Andrew set all four legs of his chair on the floor.
Quietly, carefully.

"She is no' a three-year-old child, Dune.  She's a woman.

And she's made that dear by coming here.  I will

no' ignore her to please or comfort you.  I will no' do what the rest
of you have done all her days.  I will no' protect her from life.  But
you know, or you should, that I would no' hurt her, either.  I can only
imagine what turmoil you must be undergoing to suggest that I might!  "
Duncan's jaw was rigid and his eyes the color of steel.

"I'm not suggesting you'd do it on purpose."

"Then what are you suggesting?  That I'm too clumsy or tactless to
watch myself?  That you're the only one in the village with her best
interests in mind?  Fiona's led the life of a nun--no, that's no' even
true.  A nun is surrounded by her sisters.

Fiona's had only your mum, and from what I can tell, she sheltered and
stffied her until Fiona had to run to the other side of the word to be
free.  Let her be free, Dune.

let her make mistakes.  let her grow in all the ways she needs to.  And
give me credit for a wee bit of sense.  "

Duncan was silent for a long time.  When he spoke again, he only
sounded weary.

"Do you know how badly she was burned, Andrew?"

"Do I have the medical report?  No.  Do I have the gist of it?  Aye."

"She came this close to dying."  Duncan held up his thumb and
forefinger.  There wasn't enough space between them to pass a piece of
paper.

"There's a lot that can be done now with plastic surgery, but there are
things that still can't he.  Sometimes there just isn't enough skin to
go around'."

Andrew didn't wince.

"And?"

"Her face was spared, her hands, most of one leg... But her scars are
extensive."

"And if you dinna stop protecting her, there will be more scars inside
than out."

"I love you like a brother, Andrew, but Fiona/s my sis Andrew got to
his feet.

"Then I hope you'll no' he called upon to choose between us."

Outside, the cool nip of a Scottish spring day had thickened into the
chill of night, but Andrew hardly noticed.  He paused just beyond the
howl door and ran a hand through his hair.  He no longer felt like
sleeping.  Adrenaline pumped

59 through him, and he knew it would he hours before he could put his
head to a pillow.

"Andrew, is that you?"

He recognized Fiona's voice immediately, but he wasn't sure from which
direction it came.

"Fiona?"

He gazed across the street to the village green, a rectangular slice of
land shaded by ancient trees.  He saw a woman's slender body
silhouetted against gray sky, and he started toward her.  Duncan's
words rang in his head.

/ They were face-to-face before she spoke again.

"I didn't know you were back."  She smiled, and her eyes searched his
face.

"You look tired.  Have you had any sleep since I saw you?"

"A bit here and there.  What are you doing?"

"Just taking a walk.  The air fee is so luscious, I couldn't resist.
It's so heavy, so soft, it almost feels like hands stroking my face."

The image did something odd to him.  He felt it deep and warm inside
him.  But Fiona didn't seem to notice how sensuous her observation had
been.

"I like the way everything smells this lime of evening," she said.

"There's peat smoke, but there's also a hint of flowers on the breeze.
Winter and spring at war."  --Here in the Highlands we're never that
certain which is winning.  "

"There are the sounds, too.  Tires on slick cobblestone, now that's a
wonderful sound.  Night birds and children laughing.  Music drifting
from houses.  I'm sure behind their curtains, people are dancing,
slowly .... " She laughed at hell, ll elf

"My imagination knows no bounds."

"Nor should it."

'"

"Don't you think so?"  She made a wry face.

"Some~ I think it's supremely overdeveloped, but where would I I~
without it?"

He wondered if she was referring exclusively to her sue- O~ with the
Stardust books, or to something more.  Had her imagination become a
substitute for real life, and did she to experience what she had only
dreamed?

"Your are wonderful, Fiona.  Glorious.  I have them all."

"Do you?"  She seemed surprised.

"Really?"

"Shall I quote?"

"No!"  She laughed.

"Offering's good enough.  I'm glad you like them."

"Would you enjoy some company?  I think I need a walk, too."

"I'd love it.  Usually April walks with me, but she's off with her
friend Lolly tonight."

"Where shah we go?"

"I've found a favorite place.  Do you want me to show you ?  " Aye. "

She led him through the green, around a stone fountain that hadn't
worked since his childhood and down a path still littered by winter's
refuse.

"Did you have a good two weeks?"  she asked.

"Neither good nor bad.  Busy.  It still confounds me what a fuss and a
mess we make to retrieve and sell the leaves and ferns of another
age."

"Leaves and ferns?  Oh, you're talking about oil.  You think there's
too much fuss?"

"When I was just out of university I found life on the platform
exciting.  Now it seems pointless.  Man will wait until all the oil's
finally gone before he looks for ways to live without it.  We'd be
better by far if we started looking harder now."

"I couldn't agree more."

"No?"

"I was at Mara's cottage today.  And even though I'm not exactly
equipped or ready to live that simply, it made me think how much we
have that we don't really need."

"Are you certain you're Duncan's sister?"

She laughed.

"I know you're teasing, but you're too hard on Duncan.

It's not selling things that he enjoys particularly.

It's the chance to exercise his creativity.  And he's always found ways
to take on projects he believes in.  He'd never admit it, but he's
really an idealist.  Like you.  "

"Aren't you?"

"It sounds bloody self-important and virtuous.  And I've never stirred
myself to be either."

"No, I think idealism just comes naturally to you.  I think you live by
your values."

"And how do you know so much about me?"

"I'm a great observer.  When I was little, I learned how to judge
people and what they said."  She smiled up at him, and the rising moon
caressed her cheeks and forehead with silver.

He was moved by the expression in her eyes.

"What exactly did you learn?"

"When you're small, no one wants to tell you anything.  They talk to
each other, never to you.  So I found out what I wanted to know by
reading expressions and putting together all the things that adults
didn't say to me."

"And now you think you know me?"

"I wouldn't go that far.  I think I know some things about you."

"That I'm an idealist.  What else?"

"That you're kind down to the bone.  That you give everyone the benefit
of the doubt and try not to judge.  That you have a stubborn streak
that gets you through the worst times in your life, but it probably
also gets you in trouble."

He thought that her brother would certainly agree with the last.

"I'm no' kind to the bone, Fiona.  And there are people I dinna like,
sometimes at first glance.  And if I'm ~abborn, it's often more for a
lack of insight than idea lima Let's no' have any false ideas about who
I am.  I'm just aman like any other."

"Andrew, I never thought you were anything but a man."  She didn't
sound hurt or dismayed.  She sounded ass taxi

"Well, you dinna sound disappointed."  ~"You're a good man.  If you
weren't, then I'd be disap stopped beneath a tree.  He rested his hand
against c.

"Why?  What difference would it have made?"

I told you I have an overdeveloped imagination,

"Well, I've imagined you all these years, and you're very much the way
I imagined you.  So I would have been disappointed if you'd turned out
to be a scoundrel."

"Fiona, why would you imagine me at all?  You were so young when... you
left Scotland."

"It's simple, really.  I held on to everything I did res nero- her."

That, almost more than anything she'd ever said to him, made his heart
turn over.  She wasn't looking for sympathy.

She had no idea how lonely she'd been, so lonely that she'd held on to
the memories of a toddler.  Loneliness seemed a natural state to her.

He thought about Duncan's warning.  Andrew believed all his own logic,
all his own replies, but he was struck with the basic truth behind
everything his friend had said.  Fiona could be hurt, and badly.

The first time he'd seen her he had noticed what beautiful hair she
had.  Now the wind bounced curls against her cheeks and neck as she
stood looking up at him, and they were reminders of sunshine on a
moonlit night.  He remembered how her hair had felt the last time
they'd been together.  He had wanted to comfort her, but he had been
struck then by how good it felt to touch her, to feel the ~ilken,
lively mass of her hair against his fingertips, the length of her body
against his.  Tonight he had denied his own power to hurt Fiona.  Now
he faced the fact that the possibility was there.

"Come on, I'll show you that special spot I was talking about."  Before
he could speak, she turned away from him and started away.

He wanted to call her back, to tell her that exhaustion had claimed him
and he'd changed his mind about the walk, but it was too late.  He
followed behind her, crossing the road at the most secluded end of the
green.  They were heading for the loch.

She paused so he would catch up, then continued.

"I'm sure this is a place you've been a million times, but I found it a
few nights ago and fell in love."

"You give your heart easily."

"Not easily or often.  But Loch Ceo is special."

"Aye.  I've always thought so."

"I know.  You take tourists out on the loch in the summer, don't
you?"

"As many or few as want to go.  We're no competition for Loch Ness
here, and my darling's no public relations part.  She shows herself
rarely.  She's a shy lass and careful to whom she reveals a glimpse."

"Then it's not a thriving business?"

"No, for which I'm thankful.  We're a wee clachan, off the tourist
path, and we have just enough commerce to sustain us.  Loch Coo could
no' handle a hundred tour boats with sonar and underwater cameras, and
Drnidheachd could no' handle an influx of tourists with cash to spend.
Change comes slowly here, and we can incorporate new ideas and new ways
of doing things if we have the time to plan for tlx~.  But I would hate
to see what would happen if changes ever had to be made quickly."

"I like it the way it is."

"Aye, so do I."

Fiona parted overgrown shrubs and stepped through them, and Andrew
followed.  He took her arm when he realized where they were.  There was
a moderate grade dipping toward the shore, and he wanted to be sure
that she didn't slip.  he released her.  The shore around the entire
loch was narrow, but the spot where they stood was so.  A flat rock
jutted into the water, and Fiona climbed up on it and beckoned for him
to join her.  A cold wind came sweeping over the water, and he was
immediately chilled.  From the rock above him she didn't even seem
"Look at this, Andrew.  Have you ever seen anything so gorgeous?  You
can hardly see a house from this angle.  I could almost believe we just
discovered the loch ourselves and no one else has ever been here
before."  i / There were a hundred views that were just as beautiful,
to show her every one.  He climbed beside her.

"The moon loves the loch.  She silvers every ~"I've always liked
moonlight the best.  It's... forgiving."

"Forgiving?"

"Moonlight softens and blends.  It highlights only what it chooses.

Sunlight exposes everything it touches.  "

like fire.  Andrew gazed over the water.

"I saw Sara Hume today, Fiona."

"I drove to Glasgow when my shift ended.  Ordinarily I would have been
back home this morning."

"I knew that they had verified her identity.  I've called every day,
but they wouldn't tell me much on the telephone except her name.  Tell
me how she is."

"Unbelievably tiny."  And quiet.

Far too quiet.

"Did she have anyone with her?"

"She has a granny who's come up from England to be with her.  She's a
kind woman, a very modern granny who watches everything carefully and
has taken on as much of Sara's care as she's allowed.  She insisted
that they let me visit.  We'll no' have trouble getting in to see Sara
again."

"How is she really, Andrew?"

"They say she's responding well to treatment.  But her spirits are low.
She has an aunt who'll take her home when she's discharged, a young
woman with two children of her own.  She and Sara's mum were close, and
she and her husband want Sara very much.  But she can no' come to
Glasgow for more than short visits, because she has her own children to
care for.  I think she needs more visitors, people who aren't there to
hurt her--because that's the way she must view the doctors and
nurses."

"That's exactly the way she views them.  I remember hating everyone who
walked through the door of my hospital room because inevitably they
were going to cause me more pain.  And I was too young to understand
why."

"She responded to me.  She listened to me talk.  She even said a few
words.  Her granny said that Sara had been close to her father .... "
"You'll he going to see her often, won't you?"

"Aye."

"May I come?"

He thought of everything that Duncan had said and all the things he
himself had replied--and believed--in return.

"Aye," he said, after a hesitation.

"If you want to come, Fiona, you're welcome."

She turned back to the loch.

"I'll bring her my books.  I know they're careful about most toys on
the unit, because of germs, but they should let her have books."

"I planned to go day after tomorrow."

"I'll be ready."

Fiona was ready for everything.  Ready to help, ready to embrace life,
ready.  Andrew put an end to that line of thought.

"Are you ready to go back now?"

She opened her arms as if she wanted to take the loch back with her.

"Do you suppo~ if I sat here and stared, didn't even blink, for a whole
nigat, I'd see your darling?"

"She's been known to reward great patience."

"I'm not sure I have great patience anymore."  She turned back to
him.

"Once that was about all I had."

Now her eyes were hungry for more.  He could see that clearly, despite
nothing except moonlight illuminating them.

He wondered if she understood all that she hungered for, or if in the
weeks to come, as her world expanded, she would begin to understand
more clearly.

As they started back toward the village, he wondered if he would have
the strength or clear judgment to walk the line between giving her the
things she wanted and denying her those that would cause her more
pain.

Chapter 5

Serenity Lake was a clear turquoise lake, with tall trees rising from
its bank to shade the water from the eyes of curious creatures who
lived on the land.  Stardust loved the tree shadows as well as the spar
Ming sun-kissed water at the center of the lake.  She loved the way
water droplets showered the lake's still surface when she dipped low
and flipped her slender tail.  Best of all, she loved the reeds and
rushes at the water's edge and the thick grasses along the lake's
bottom, because she could nibble on them all day and never grow hungry.
But as Stardust nibbled, she grew and grew and grew.  Until one day she
realized that she would not be just like all the other creatures in
Serenity Lake.  She would be much larger.  So much larger that someday
she might frighten her friends the fish, who now so cheerfully kept her
company.

~ ~ She's asleep," Pamela Brownleigh whispered.

"You've put her straight to sleep, Fiona.  It's nothing short of a
miracle."

Fiona closed her book quietly.  She wasn't sure how miraculous it was
to put a child to sleep with a book she'd written herself, but she was
delighted for Sara's sake.  She remembered too well how blessed sleep
had been when she had been a patient here.

She stood and moved away from the bed.  Sara was a tiny shape under a
clear plastic tent and a heartbreaking array of dressings, but until
she had fallen asleep, her dark eyes had followed Fiona everywhere.
There were other children in the room, children who had been critically
injured, too.  Fiona had steeled herself for this, steeled herself for
horror and the return of terrible memories.  But all she had felt upon
walking into the room was compassion and a desire to help.

"Did her mother read to her?"  she asked softly as she gave the book to
Pamela, Sara's grandmother, who was an attractive older woman with hair
that was just beginning to gray.

Fiona watched her tuck the book away in the drawer that held the few
other toys the little girl was allowed to have.

"Yes, Penny was quite a reader.  Sara could listen for hour so " I'll
come as often as I can.  "

"It will help.  She has so little to look forward to."  Pamela
expression was matter-of-fact.  Whatever tears she past.  Now her
mission was to get her grandchild well enough to resume as normal a
life as possible.  k'She'H have a good life.  You'll see.  She has a
wonderful grandmother to help her.  "

_"And friends."  Pamela allowed herself a rare smile.

"I'm grateful to both you and Andrew."  She looked up at the man who
stood at the other side of Sara's bed, watching the little girl
sleep.

"There's little enough I can say to Andrew," t 9 , " ~la there.  If ~t
weren t for him... " He thinks that anybody would have done what he
did.  "

"He's wrong, you know."

"Yes, I know."

"I can only be grateful that it was Andrew who came along that day."

~: Andrew came to join them.

"I suppose we'd better go Pamela.  But we'll be back."

"With more of your magic act?"  Pamela asked.

"I'll make sure he practices," Fiona promised.

"It's a ween of blethers when a three-year-old child can see straight
through every trick I do."

"A ween of what?"  Fiona asked.

"A ween of blethers.  It's nonsense, ridiculous."  He shook his head.

"You need educating, Fiona."

"It's nothing short of amazing I can understand you at all," she said,
winking at Pamela as she spoke.

"When the r's are really rolling, I feel like I'm at the start-up of
the Indy 500."

"His accent is music to my ears," Pamela said.

"And will continue to be so forever."

In the hall, Fiona and Andrew ~eraoved the hospital gowns and masks
they had been required to wear inside the ward and left them in a bin
beside the door.  Then they started down the corridor.  Fiona watched
more than one nurse--and a lovely young doctor--follow Andrew with
their eyes after he'd nodded and spoken to them.  Andrew had a way of
making everyone his friend immediately, as well as attracting more than
his share of feminine attention.

And h~ was such a vital, healthy presence on a ward where robust good
health was a cherished dream.

"I'm hungry," he said when they'd reached the lobby.

"How about you?"

It was well past lunchtime, but until that moment, Fiona hadn't thought
about eat' rag She had been so engrossed in the unfolding drama
upstairs.

"Starved."  And she was.  She wondered how she had managed to suppress
it for so long.

"We could go back to Prestwick and see if the soup we ordered the
afternoon that I flew in is ready by now."

Andrew looked at his watch.

"No, it's still too soon.  It'll be another week yet, at least.  We'll
have to take our chance on something here."

"Here?"  She grimaced.  She had been fine on the ward, but now she
wanted to put the hospital and everything it stood for behimd her.

"Hva~ in Glasgow.  No' here in hospital.  I know a place close by.
Shall we walk?"

She was already exhausted, and her hip and leg ached from standing for
so long.  But she didn't want to call attention to that.  She nodded.

"Sure, let's."

Four blocks from the hospital, she was sorry that she had been so
agreeable.  Andrew had shortened his stride for her, but his pace was
still faster than she could comfortably walk.  But again, she didn't
want to admit that she had troubleeeping up.

"It's just at the end of this street," Andrew said, pointing to a
stretch of several blocks.  He hadn't spoken since leaving the
hospital.  Fiona knew that he was thinking of Sara and the other
children in the ward.  He had visited every one of them, told
ridiculous jokes and spoken words of encouragement.

His output of energy had been tremendous.

Now be needed to readjust.

She kept pace with him at great effort.  The street was completely
ordinary, with small businesses interspersed with brick residences
sporting small, perfectly tended gardens and neatly painted trim.  They
passed a tailor, a shop selling greeting cards and cheap souvenirs, a
butcher with strings of rubber sausages looped in the window.  She
concentrated on everything except the growing agony in her leg and hip.
At the end of the street Andrew gestured to a narrow doorway.  The
acrid odor of smoking oil wafted from avail- and crevices.  Through the
window Fiona could ~ several unadorned laminated plastic tables and a
counter the width of the room.

"Best fish and chips in Glasgow."  Andrew opened the door and the smoke
no longer wafted, it poured out to~y embrace the car exhaust that
already perfumed the

Fiona preceded him.  There was a menu of sorts posted ~bove the
counter.  Fish and chips.  Fish without chips.  Chips ~fithout fish.

"This is going to be a tough choice."  ~ He looked at her for what she
thought was the first time the hospital.

"I did no' even think.  Would you to go somewhere with a bit more
variety?"

My mouth is watering.  " And it was.  she couldn't remember ever
smelling anything more Eating had always been something she was re70

quired to do.  For years she had been forced to consume calories as
part of her rehabilitation.  Everything she ate or drank had been
carefully weighed and charted.  By the time that regimen had been
lifted, her interest in food had evaporated.

She ate to survive.

Today she was going to eat for pleasure alone.  The thought of that was
almost pleasure enough.

"What kind of fish should I order?"

Andrew examined the menu.

"I prefer the haddock."

"Good, I'll try it.

And chips, too.  "

"Find a table and I'll wait for the food."

She didn't argue.  She could hardly wait to get off her feet.  Finding
a table was a matter of choosing the best view out the grease-speckled
windows.  Only one table was occupied, and the couple sitting there
sipping soft drinks looked as if they were about to take their final
slurps.

She chose a booth in the corner and slid along the bench.  It had been
molded with the human form in mind, but the curves did nothing to ease
the pain in her hip.  She turned at an angle and propped her thigh
along the bench's edge.  The pain receded a little.

Andrew returned with drinks in tall paper cups.  I'll bet there's a
country somewhere in the world without Coke on its menu," she said, as
he set her drink in front of her.

"No' if Duncan and his kind have their way."

"Poor Duncan.  You're never going to let up on him, are you?"

"Never."  He slid into the seat across from her.  Fiona thought Andrew
looked particularly charming today.

He was wearing a hand-knit sweater of heath cry gold, but as the day
warmed, he had pushed up the sleeves to reveal wide, muscular forearms
brushed with auburn hair.  Casual clothing suited his wide-shouldered
frame, but she could imagine him in something as formal as a tux, too.
Handsome was too cultivated a word to describe him.  But rugged or
appealing were not.

She took a sip of her drink and hoped that the sugar and caffeine would
restore some of her energy.

"You were terrific with Sara.  And with the other kids, too.  You never
let on how frightening they look.  From your reaction, no one

71 would ever have known they were any different from nor real
children.  "

"Theyare normal children."

She shook her head.

"It doesn't do any good to pretend.  They aren't normal.  Not after
what they've been through.

They'll always he different, even if a miracle occurs and their bodies
are perfectly restored.  Every one of those kids has been to hell and
back.  "

He didn't argue, which surprised her, because most people liked to keep
up a pretense, if only to themselves.

"I tell myself they're children, just like any others.  I suppose
that's just what I do to get through it."

"They have all the needs of other children.  They need to be loved and
accepted.  You do a wonderful job of that."

"Sara may be discharged as early as next month."

"I know.  Pamela told me.  The sooner the better.  As soon as she's out
of danger she'll recover more quickly at home."

"How soon did you go home, Fiona?"

"I was in one hospital or another for most of five months.  Then,
later, there were other stays, for one problem or another.

I used to think if I ever had a place of my own I'd decorate it in
antiseptic white or insipid green and install loudspeakers in the
hallway so I'd feel at home.  " One side of his mouth turned up.

"I was only in hospital : once myself, just for a few days to have my
appendix out.  ~ They swore I was the worst patient ever to darken
their

"Come on, I bet the nurses adored you."

The other side of his mouth turned up, too.

"Do you think so?  Now that I ponder it, I received more back rubs
pregnant mother of triplets."

She lauEhed.

"I'll just bet."  She sobered a little and spoke she thought.

"You know, that's the thing I missed I still remember just how terrible
it was never to have touch me.  No one could give me a back rub, of
They couldn't do anything except hold my hand But even after I was out
of the hospital..."  She "I'm sorry.  This is erring maudlin, isn't
it?"  -~ '~"No.  What about after the hospital?"

"I guess people were still afraid they'd hurt me.  And they were
probably right.  But I think it would have been worth it."

His eyes blazed with emotion.  His voice deepened.

"No one touched you?"

"That sounds crazy, doesn't it?  They must have.  I probably just don't
remember very well."  She said the lie with conviction and looked him
straight in the eye as she did.  The clerk behind the counter gave a
sharp whistle, and Andrew slid across his bench.

"I'll be back."  She used his absence to stretch her leg out farther.
It still throbbed, and she dreaded the onset of a serious cramp.  She
knew the signs, having experienced them for as long as she could
remember.  There was no real hope she would ever be without them.  The
last doctor she had complained to had simply said that she was lucky
she had enough undamaged muscle to cramp at all.

Andrew returned with two gigantic bundles wrapped in white butcher's
paper.

"The portions are smaller than some, but the cooking's good enough to
warrant eating here."  He set one bundle in front of her, and she
unwrapped it to find enough golden brown fish and french fries to feed
the multitudes-without a noticeable miracle.

"I can't eat all thi~q!"  She leaned forward and inhaled, then closed
her eyes in bliss.

"But I'm sure going to try."

He unwrapped his and doused the contents indiscriminately with the
bottle of vinegar at the table's edge.  Then he sprinkled everything
with salt and pepper.  She was three delicate bites into hers before he
started.  He was done with his first piece before she'd fini.  qhed
half of hers.  She watched his strong, white teeth tearing into the
second piece.

"I can see why you were worried about the portions."

His eyes sparkled.

"Have you never seen a man eat before?"

"Not with such a shameful lack of enthusiasm."

"A~ you telling me that my manners need improving?"

"Your manners are perfect.  It's your appetite that's exu " "Is a man
no' supposed to have an exuberant appetite?"

Unaccountably, she wondered about his appetite for other things.  The
night he kissed her came to mind.  The kiss had been merely to comfort
her.  She knew that.  He had not been moved to kiss her for any other
reason.  Yet now she wondered what it would be like to be kissed
without reserve, to be stroked by his broad, rough haft ds to be
touched by the tips of his long, sturdy fingers.  Would his lovemaking
be as exuberant, as uninhibited?  As soundly relished?

She looked down at her fish, hiding her thoughts.  This was dangerous
ground, forbidden to her.  Her developing relationship with Andrew was
a source of delight.  She could destroy it by wishing it was more than
friendship.  She, of all people, knew how futile and destructive
wishing could be.  A vicious pain stabbed through her leg and drove all
other thoughts from her mind.  She had been warned, but again, she had
wished for the impossible.  Her fish fell to the table, and she grabbed
her thigh.

"Fiona?"

She couldn't speak.  She was too proud to writhe in agony, but not
disciplined enough to prevent a tortured gasp.

She turned to the side and stretched her leg along the seat.  Then she
leaned forward and began to massage her calf.

Long years of experience had taught her that this was the for reJid.

pushed hers aside.

"Let me."  Andrew slid seat and propped her foot on his lap.

"I can reach

'~No, it's all right, I"-- She gasped again.  The pain was squeezing
and squeezing .... put his palm again.~t the thin sole of her shoe and
the ball of her foot gently toward her knee.

"Is that Si~e'shook her head.

He continued to hold her leg in position with one hand, other probed
her calf through the soft corduroy of When he seemed satisfied he had
found the right began to knead it with his thumb and fingertips.

the pain eased, she realized what he was doing and what he would learn
from it.  There was nothing

shapely about her leg.  It was thin and underdeveloped, and it was
rigid with scar tissue.

Humiliation filled her.  She wanted to order him to stop, but as his
hand eased over her knee and up toward her thigh, she knew she had no
prayer of uttering the words.  It felt so wonderful, so miraculous, to
have him soothe away the cramp.  He moved so slowly and carefully, with
single- minded determination to end her suffering.  She had never
gotten control of the agony this quickly on her own.  She leaned
against the wall, and her eyes closed against her will.  Now the warmth
of Andrew's hands, the gentle probing of his fingers, was more notable
than the pain.

"How far does it extend?"  he asked.

"You've done enough.  Thank you."

"I asked you how far it goes."

She opened her eyes.  His were implacable.

"To my hip," she whispered.

"Ah, Fiona, why did you let it get this bad?  Itwas all the walking,
was it no'?"

She nodded.

"Why did you no' tell me?"

"All my life people have been forced to make allowances for me.  I'm
tired of it."

"People who care about each other make allowances.  Every one of us can
use a hand from time to time.~' His hands moved higher, as if to prove
the point.  Her legs were turning to liquid, but of more interest was
the liquid heat building inside her.  Through pain and embarrassment,
she was still responding to his touch.  She tensed, ashamed of her own
reaction, and the tension reignited the cramp.  As if he could feel the
newest spasm, he pressed harder, and it quickly eased.

He lifted his hands, and she felt he reft She was afraid to look at
him.

"Thanks.  That helped a lot."

He slid closer, stretching her thigh over his knees.  Before she could
stop him, one hand grasped the tender flesh at the inside of her leg
and the other settled opposite it.  He began to knead.

"The muscle here's like stone.  It will take a bit of working to make
it better."

She was afraid to speak, sure that only a moan would escape her lips.

She was swimming in waves of feeling, drowning in shame and resurfacing
in desire.  She had often yearned to be touched, but never had she
guessed how powerful a thing it could be.

When he was satisfied, he pressed against the rounded curve of her hip
with the heel of his hand.  Once, then again.

Miraculously, the pain there eased, then disappeared.  At her
involuntary sigh, he pressed harder.  When he finally re, leased her,
her leg felt completely relaxed.

"Wiggle your toes," he ordered.

"Andrew, I'm fine."  Her voice sounded exactly as she had feared it
would.  Dreamy.  Tentative.  Affected.

"Wiggle... your... toes.  " "You a tyrant, aren't you?"  She wiggled,
then bent her foot back and forth.

"Any more pain?"

"Not a bit."  She managed to look him in the eye.  There was something
in the gaze he returned besides concern and delermination.  Something
warmer flickered there.  Or was that her imagination, too?

"Do you want to try walking on it?"  he asked.

"No.  I can't thank you enough, but go eat your fish.  It's probably
cold."  it could be.  There was hardly time.  "

Hadn't there been?  It seemed to her that he had lingered ~ l~r for
years.  Decades.

She struggled to sound normal.

"Where did you learn to do that?"

H~ gently lifted her leg and slid from beneath it.  Then he to his own
side of the booth.

"I've had leg cramps I used to climb, and once I got a cramp while I
was from the bald face of a mountain.  I had to scram and all, or die
trying."

"That's terrible."

I've learned what to do.  "

gazed directly at her, and the warmth she'd thought seen was still
present in his eyes.

"Luck's a relative Fiona.  It might be that I was the lucky one."

Jamie Gordon hadn't drunk quite as much as his older brother Peter,
and he'd been luckier for it.  Just one short year ago he had decided
to ease up on whisky and tighten up on his purse strings.  In a moment
of supreme self knowledge he had seen the dead end on the road he was
traveling, and he had decided to make something of his life.

All because of a ghost.

"Peter, would ye wake up, man?"  Jamie leaned forward carefully and
grabbed the toe of his brother's boot.

"For God's sake, Peter, would ye please wake up?"

"Hand yer wheesht!"

Peter kicked sharply, and Jamie sat back to avoid him.

Jamie didn't shut up, as requested.  He knew if he did, Peter would go
directly back to sleep.

"We're out in the boat, Peter.  Dinna make such a fuss, or the
monster'll be having us for tea."

"Huh?"  Peter opened his eyes.  Slowly.  Carefully, as if he were
uncertain exactly what he might see.

"Out in the boat," Jamie repeated slowly.

"On the loch.  Together."

Peter stretched, but his eyes were still blank.  Jamie sighed.  He was
just nineteen and Peter all of twenty-one.  Peter was taller by' two
inches, and better at soccer, shinty and rug get There was nothing his
brother couldn't do, in fact, except think.  Thinking was Jamie job.

I caught a fish or two while ye were sieepmg, he _s~d.  He pulled his
stringer out of the water and held it aloft.  'two brown trout and an
eel wriggled there.

"Mum'll be glad, I ken, that one of us could remain sober."

"Maybe she'll give ye an extra biscuit or twa, hairn, for being such a
good wee laddie.

"Maybe I ought to stand up and pitch ye' out of the boat."  Jamie's
eyes narrowed.

"That'd sober ye.

Peter didn't stir.

"Maybe ye ought to stop start the engine, Jamie-hairn."  He tipped his
face to "It's about to rain."

"Maybe that'd sober ye."  But Jamie had to agree time to leave.  The
skies above Loch Ceo, perfectly clear hour ago, were now fast clouding
over.

"I dinna like the rain," Peter said.

Jamie knew why.  A year before, Peter had nearly drowned in a freak
storm.  Of course, he had been warned.

Jamie himself had warned his brother that the burn that trickled
through Druidheachd was rising and should not be crossed.

A ghost had warned Jamie.

"Poor old Peter," he said as he pulled the cord on the engine.

"Who'd have guessed such a swankie would be fair terrified o' getting
wet?"

Peter made a pretense of lunging toward him, but with his coordination
dulled by too much whisky, his own momentum carried him forward too
fast, and he couldn't stop.  He fell straight into Jamie's lap.  Jamie
tumbled sideways, and the cord went with him, snapping free from the
engine.  As Jamie watched in horror the cord sailed across the water to
vani.  ~h under the rippling surface.

"Now look what ye've done, ye idjit!"  Jamie shoved the ~prawling Peter
away and leaned over the side.

"It's gone.

No' a sign of it!  "

"What dye mean, no' a sign?"  Peter peered over the side With bleary
eyes.

"It's in there somewhere."

"Do ye want to go looking for it?  I'll gladly help ye in."  back.  The
sky already seemed darker, and they a long way from shore.  To make
matters worse, there other boats in sight.

we something else to use as a replacement?  " Pc- hands and knees and
began to search the It didn't take long.  The boat was short and
narrow, neither man was neat, the boat was in space for clutter.  He
climbed awkwardly back Nowt ."  could have told ye.  Nae rope, nae
string.  " stringer, Jamie?  How about that?"

stiff.  But we could plait our fishing lines.  do it.  Cut them off in
lengths and plait them.  "

grabbed for their fishing rods at the same mo- got to his first and
triumphantly whipped it directly in the path of Jamie's jaw.  The sting
of the his throat sent Jamie reeling backward, arms

flailing.  On impact from Jamie's elbow, Peter's rod went flying over
the side.  Peter wildly threw himself forward to retrieve it, and the
boat tilted precariously.  In the effort to grab his brother and keep
him from sending both of them to the bottom of the loch, Jamie tossed
his own rod in the general direction of the boat's floor.

"Sit still, damn ye, Peter!  Ye're got nae sense today.  No' a bit of
it!"  He held Peter tight until the boat had stopped the worst of its
rocking.

"I've got to get me rod, Jamie."  Peter peered into the water.  He made
a sound of despair.

"And it looks as if ye'd better think about getting yers."

Jamie loosened his grip on Peter's collar and stared into the loch.

"Bloody hell."  He had missed the boat entirely.

His rod floated an arm's length from his brother's, and because of the
turmoil the rocking boat had created, neither was in reach.  Weighted
heavily to take the lines deep into the water below, they would not
float for long.  Even as he watched they began to sink.

"Double bloody hell!"

"We'll have to row for them.  Quick!"

"We have nae oars, ye idjit!  Ye made me take them out.  Do ye mind
doing that?

"Jamie," " he mimicked in a high voice, '" we'll have nae need of them,
and they'll jist take up room!  "" "I dinna mind saying anything of the
sort!"  They glared at each other, but lesson learned, neither moved a
muscle.

"So, what is it yer thinking we should do?"  Peter asked at last.

Jamie peered skyward again.

"I'm thinking we'd hettcr be prepared to empty the boat of water when~
there ,:_ " As if in warning, one large rainorop splasneo to ms'
comes.

" II" forehead and trickled down his nose.  Triple bloody he .

He sounded resigned.

"Michty!  I dinna like the rain, Jamie.  Ye mind what happened
before?"

"There are nae ghosts out here.  And what's there us of, Peter?  What
good would it do now?"  Lightning flashed across the sky, and, as if on
cue,

boat began to rock.  Wind swept over the loch,

79 new gust, the boat rocked harder.

"If we're lucky," Jamie shouted over the thunder, "it'll be a wee storm
and quickly over.

Just sit tight--and bail when ye must.  " He felt along the bottom of
the boat for the tin he'd used for bait, emptied it over the side and
handed it to his brother.  He had to content himself with a smaller tin
that stank of long dead herring.

Darkness descended with the storm, a nearly total dark- heSS despite
the fact that the sun should still be just above the horizon.  The wind
howled along the loch's surface, sending sprays of water into the boat.
Jamie pulled his collar around his neck, but it was little protection.
He was quickly chilled, and from the expression on his brother's face,
Peter was every bit as miserable.

The little boat rode the increasingly turbulent waves as if it had been
constructed for exactly that purpose.  But Jamie knew that if the storm
grew too violent, they would be swamped.  And no one who went down in
Loch Ceo lived to tell the story.  The temperature was too frigid. Fear
rose inside him.

What had been an irritation was now far more.  Had he offended someone
on high or, worse, something, some hideous, hellish creature, down
below?

Had he gone back one too many times on the vows he had made a year ago?
He'd been to the village kirk more than , beside the rising burn. He'd
been so of- em that the minister had learned his name.  Surely that was
for any man.

"Look!  There!"  Peter leaned over and rattled Jamie's Imee.

"Look off in the distance.  Someone's coming for us!"

Was it because he still drank whisky?  He rarely drank too much.  The
barman at the hotel had nearly forgotten his

; Jamie, have ye nae ears?  There's a boat coming!  A Stoatie looked up
and saw his brother's arm extended over water.  He was pointing into
the darkness.  Jamie but he couldn't see anything.  He leaned forward,
glimpse of the promised miracle.  shape rose from the water, just
meters away.  It I. a slender head with huge amber oval eyes that
glinted

fiercely under the glare of the next crack of lightning.  Its neck was
as long as the mast of a schooner.  As he stared in horror, a tail
arced out of the water thirty or more meters behind it and viciously
slapped the waves.

Jamie screamed at exactly the same moment as Peter.  It was one of the
few times in their lives that they had agreed on anything.

Chapter 6

Fiona loved pretty clothes.  As a child she had been relegated to
wearing neutral colors and simple, unadorned styles because her mother
had believed it was best not to draw at- lent ion to a body so laced
with scars.  She had grown up in oxford cloth shirts and cotton slacks
that hid of her leg but didn't rub, as fashionably tight might have.
After she had been questioned relent- in high school about the scars on
her neck, she had to wearing turtlenecks under her shirts to hide even
this $ign that she had been a burn victim.

She was in college before she began to question her mother's judgment.
She had been burned, but she had surWas there an unwritten code that,
as a memorial to she should dress the part of a corpse?  Her first in
purchase had been a coral angora sweater with a neckline that nestled
just under her chin.  She had a coral-and-brown plaid skirt to wear
with it, and boots of butter soft leather that stopped where the
mother's tight-lipped assessment hadn't made the but Fiona had
persevered until she now

possessed a wardrobe of pretty, feminine clothes that still hid the
basic truth.

The basic truth, the reality of scars and damaged muscles and joints
that would never work perfectly again, must have been apparent to
Andrew today.  Fiona knew what he had learned when he massaged her calf
and thigh.  The miracle was that he hadn't seemed to think it mattered.
He hadn't pitied her, and he hadn't hesitated to help.

And his eyes had glowed warmly afterward, as if touching her had been a
pleasure and not an act of compassion.

She carried that glow with her on their trip back to Druidheachd.

Through a sudden storm that made driving slow and treacherous, she let
that glow warm her.  When they stopped in front of the hotel, she
turned to say goodbye.

Rain still fell, and the sky had grown dark, but she could see Andrew's
face in the softly muted glow of the street lamps and floodlights
illuminating the walkway.

"I'm glad we went.  Thanks for taking me with you.  And the fish and
chips were great.  Every bit as good as you promised."

"I plan to see Sara again next week.  Would you like to go with me?"

"If it's not any trouble."  She started to get out, but he put his hand
on her arm and kept it there.

"Why would it be?"

She frowned at him.  There was evidently more to this exchange than
polite cliches.

"Just that if it's out of your way to bring me, or if I slow you down
too much..."

"Fiona."  He shook his head.  There was both exasperation and
understanding in his voice.

"Is that how you think of yourself?.

Someone who slows down the rest of us?  Is that why you did no' tell me
to slow down today when I was walking too fast?  You'd prefer to
suffer?  "

"I'm not a masochist, Andrew."

"Did I say you were?"

"I have never preferred suffering to not suffering.  Just the
opposite."

"Then why did you no' tell me to slow down?"  She was embarrassed, but
she knew she owed him a real explanation.  He had been too good a
friend for less.

"I

Emilie Richards 83 guess I don't want anybody to think of me as
different.  " She smiled ruefully.  " /f I'm going to be different, I
guess I'd like to be silently different.  "

o'If you we, re ,p.  ~r?  arm.  g a list of words that described y
urselt, womo different ~e at the top, do you think?  "

She was caught off guard.  She didn't know how to answer.

"Do you remember earlier, when you told me that the children on the
burn unit are no' normal children?"  He didn't wait for a reply.

"I think you're correct.  They've come through something the rest of us
might no' be able to understand completely.  I can no' minimize that.
But I can tell you this, as well.  None of us is normal.  All of us are
different in some way.  And we owe it to each other to respect that.

But I can no' respect you and you can no' r~spect me if we hide from
each other.  "

"Is that what I was trying to do?"

"I'll make allowances for you if you make them for me."

"What could I possibly have to overlook about you?"

"I suspect you'll find all sorts of things if you look closely
enough."

She found that hard to believe.  Even this conversation was an example
of his bone-deep warmth and compassion.

I'll be honest with you from now on.  Besides, I got a taste happens
when I'm not.  "

He leaned forward.  Her breath caught, but she didn't close her eyes.

"Good," he said.  He kissed the tip of her nose, a little-s~ster k/ss,
but still strangely moving.

"And I'll be honest, too."

"That means if you ever feel like I'm a burden, you won't ask me to
come along out of a sense of duty?"

"A burden?"  He shook his head.

"Is that on the list, too?"

"Good Lord, pop psych with a Scots accent!"  be a _urden.  O ite the
opposite' oae ng~Xl the sound of that more than she should.  got out of
the car and watched him drive away, wipers slapping in random bursts
and tires streams of water in his wake.  HIS car had alisaprod went

The day had been long and tiring, and her first thought was of a warm
bath followed by something simple for supper.

She had warned Duncan and Mara that she probably wouldn't be back until
late, so she knew they wouldn't expect her to eat with them.  She had
planned to rest before seeing them at all, but Duncan was in the lobby
when she walked in.

"Back at last, huh?"

"Umm .... " She lifted her shoulders in a stretch.

"And tLted.  It's a long trip back and forth.  But productive.  We got
to visit Sara, and I read to her.  Andrew did the most ridiculous magic
tricks.  He needs lessons, but the kids ate it up."

"You were gone longer than I thought."

"We went out for lunch.  I guess we stayed longer than we'd planned."

"Come have a drink with me.  I want to talk to you."

"Has something happened?"  She thought of her mother, completely alone
in New York now that her only two children were in Scotland.

"Nothing like that.  I just want to talk to you."  She raised a brow.

"That's the voice you use with April, Duncan.  Is it going to be one of
those conversations?"

"No.  April's a little young for' this conversation."

"It's sounding worse all the time."

"Then let's get it over with."

She wanted to beg off, but she followed him toward the pub like a
dutiful younger sister.  Duncan had been her best friend for too long
to defy him now.

The pub was almost empty, an unusual event even for such an early hour.
Duncan motioned her to a seat in the corner, where they were less
likely to be disturbed.  She had loved the hotel pub on sight, despite
its resemblance to an ancient mausoleum.  With its thick stone walls
and slate floors, it should have been gloomy, but she only found it
remarkably old, and, like Mara, history appealed to her.

"You know, I never thought of this, but I think I like old things
because anything that can survive for such a long time amazes me."  She
took her seat and smiled up at Duncan.

"This building will be here when you and I are dust.  They'll be
serving beer and whisky here into eternity."

He looked down at her without smiling, and she knew what he was
thinking.  Survival amazed her because she almost hadn't survived.  She
shrugged.

"It's a good thought, not a bad one, Duncan.  Some things endure.  I
like that."

"Have you had anything to eat?  Are you hungry?"  There were always a
few meals prepared in the pub, simple fare for regular patrons.  She
wasn't particularly hungry, but she realized that if she ate now, she
Would have one less thing to do later.

"Do I smell steak and kidney pie?"

"Probably."

"I'll have a little, if it's ready."

He went behind the bar and filled two glasses with beer.  She had
learned to drink it warm, as the locals did, and she was just as glad
tonight that it was, since the pub was always chilly.

She rubbed her arms to warm them.  Poor circulation was a problem she
would have into eternity.  Like the pub, some things endured.

He returned.

"What are you smiling about?"

"I'm beginning to develop a sense of humor about my'Oh?"  He set her
glass in front of her and pulled up a chair across the table.

"Your pie will be out in a moment."

"Did you eat already?"

She took a sip, then set her glass down.

"Fire away, Duncan."

"Well, I just wondered how things are going."  She thought about
that.

"Fine.  Are we finished?"

His smile was reluctant.

"I'm coming on too strong, aren't I?"

"I think I'd rather be your friend than your heavenly assignment."

"Heavenly assignment?"

"You've always felt like you had to take care of me.  You know, Duncan,
the fire wasn't your fault, and even if you'd been at home that night,
you might not have been able to do anything to help me.  You might have
been burned, even killed, yourself."

His eyes widened.  Had he not been such a restrained man, she thought
his jaw might have dropped.

"What are you talking about?"

"You know darn well."  She lifted her glass to him.

"So, have we reduced all my feelings for you to guilt?"

"I know you love me."

"I'm glad you haven't lost sight of it."

"But you can love me and still not feel that I'm your responsibility.

I have to learn to be respons~le for myself.  I should have started
years ago.  "

He sat back, but his fingers tapped a steady rhythm on the table.

"You've had a lot to cope with."

"Very little of which I was allowed to cope with.  Mother coped for me.
You know she did, even when I wanted desperately to try coping myself.
Eventually I just let her have her way.  She was one obstacle I just
couldn't seem to find the energy to overcome."

"How did you find the energy to come here and get away from her?"

"I'm not sure.  But at least some of it was cowardice."  He frowned.

"I

don't understand.  "

Brian, the barman, came to their table and set a bowl in front of her.
The inevitable chips joined it.  She thanked him, and he smiled a
gap-toothed salute before heading back to the bar.

"What did you mean about cowardice?"  Duncan asked.  She cut open the
puff pastry that sealed the bowl, and steam poured out.  For the second
time that day her mouth watered.

"Do you know how popular the Stardust books have become?"

"I know they're selling well.  I'm thrilled for you."

"My agent's been busy with subsidiary rights.  Now there's a Saturday
morning cartoon show in the works.  Then come commercial tie-ins.
They're talking about vitamins, lunch boxes, notebooks and pencils.
You're the one who's a whiz in advertis'rag, and I'm the one who's
going to make a million off of it."

"That's incredible, Fiona!  Why haven't you said anything before
this?"

"Because that's what drove me here."  She looked up from the pie.

"That's what finally got me on the plane.

Success.  Because publicity comes with it, Duncan, and I don't want it.
"

"Publicity?"

"My publisher released a story about me, telling all about how I was
burned as a child in Scotland and how I made up these stories during
the years I was recovering.  It was great press.

I got so many offers for interviews.  " She shook her head.

"Can you imagine that?"

He didn't respond.  She suspected he could imagine her reaction only
too well.  He knew her better than anyone.

"I tried saying no.  I explained that I valued my privacy above
everything else, but that's like waving a red flag in front of a bull.
I got more calls.  Finally I just panicked.  And here I am."

"Well."

"Right.  Well."  She started on her pie.  It tasted even better than it
looked.

"I'm glad you came, no matter what the reason."

"So am I."  She looked up.

"I really am.  I was so seared.

Getting on that plane was the hardest thing I've ever done.  But it was
the right thing to do.  "

"Are you still scared?"

"Sometimes.  I'm so used to having other people make my decisions, the
smallest thing can throw me.  But I'm learning.

Do you mind having me here?  "

"Are you kidding?"

"You're a newlywed."

"And you're tactful to a fault.  We hardly know you're around."
"Good."

"The hotel is half yours."

"I never wanted it.  It was a reminder..."  ~"And now?"

"I wish I'd come back sooner.  While our father was still alive."  "He
wasn't an easy man."

Fiona knew that Duncan and their father Donald Sin- clair had never
gotten along.  Duncan had been forced to

visit him each summer, but the visits had never brought them closer.

"I Wouldn't know what kind of man he was," she said.

"I wasn't invited here, and he never came to see me in New York."

"I think Mother discouraged him."

"Ma be" But Fidrid knew the bitter truth.  There was just y no point in
telling Duncan.

She was halfway through her pie when D~,__n'c~n spoke again.

"Look, I want to bring up some ming e~s~.

"I figured you did."

"I want to talk about Andrew."

She had suspected as much, but she still felt an unpleasant shock.

"Oo on."

"Fiona, you don't know Andrew as well as I do."

"That's certainly true.  I've hardly had the chance to know him at
all."

"He and lain are my closest friends.  I'd go to hell and back for
either of them."

"I doubt that will ever be required."  She looked up from her _dinner,
which had suddenly lost its appeal.

"What are you trying to say?"

"Andrew likes women."

"That's hardly an indictment."

"He and lain both have reputauons--a~ least, lain used to have one
before Billie.  His is a thing of the past now..  But Andrew's utation
isn't.  I don't t_Think there s a single woman in ~ Highlands whose
heart doesn't beat a little faster when Andrew comes around."

She laid her fork carefully on her place mat.  "

"Oh?"

"Andrew gen ely ray.om : He enjoys pany, admits their best qua mes. he
... ow.s woman like herself in return, and I t!~ink that s a huge part
of his appeal."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I don't want you to get hurt."  "And how could he hurt me?

You've !  us~ told me that Andrew likes women, and that he's good to
them and for them.  He doesn't sound dangerous to my safety or
wellbeing.  "

"Are you trying to misundexstandg"

She rested her forearms on-the table and leaned forward.  Her gaze
locked with his.

"Are you trying to pussyfoot around what you really want to say?"

"All right.  Andrew's almost thirty, and he's never been married.  He
likes women, but he likes them too much to settle down with one. There,
is that blunt enough?"

"No.  Because I think you're trying to tell me something else.  Two
things, actually."

"And what are they?"

"One, that I could never hold Andrew's interest because I'm not enough
of a woman for him.  And two, you think I'm too immature and innocent
to be.  able to draw my own conclusions and make my own decisions.
You're taking up where Mother left off.  You've appointed yourself my
guardian!"

Duncan sat back.  It was so unlike him to withdraw from any conflict
that she knew immediately that she'd scored a point.

"It never occurred to me that you weren't enough of a woman for any
man," he said.

"I'm your baby sister.  You still think of me that way.  And when you
look at me, you remember the little gift who lay in a hospital bed for
months and months trying to grow new skin."

He winced, but she pushed on.

"That's only a small' part of who I am.

I'm a lot more than that.  And I'm old enough to find out about the
rest of me.  " They were brave words.  She wasn't even sure just how
true they were.  She just knew that they had to be said.

"Is there something wrong with my not wanting you to get hurt?"

"yes."

Her brother was a stubborn man.  Stubbornness had got- lea Duncan
through a difficult childhood as well as a difficult f~t marriage.
Fiona was surprised to learn that she had a streak of stubbornness
herself, but the discovery was sra ying.

"Back off," she said.

"I have no reason to think that Andrew and I will ever be anything
except friends.  But if else develops with any man, I'll be the one
to

judge how far it goes.  I'm a consenting adult.  And you're my
brother, not my keeper.  "

Her courage played out, she sat quietly and watched him think, because
that was the only brave thing that she could still manage.

He sighed.

"Damn."

"Damn Andrew?  Damn me?"  Her voice cracked on the latter.

"No, damn myself.  I'm sorry, Fiona."

Her eyes widened.

"That's it?  You're sorry?"

"I don't know what else to say."

"No!  I mean, that's plenty.  Great, in fact."  Her smile was
high-voltage.  She had steeled herself for his anger, and instead she
had gotten an apology.  The aftermath was heady.

"Andrew told me as much."

She sobered.

"You spoke to Andrew about me?  I can't believe you did that."

"I didn't want to talk to you.  I guess I thought I could avoid it that
way."

"arno, a~a " you say to him That your sister was so in- sge might }all
at his feet if he smiled at her?  "

"Give me credit for a little sense."

She narrowed her eyes.

"Why?"

This time he smiled.

"If it makes you feel any better, Andrew essentially gave me the same
lecture you did."

"It takes you a while to catch on, doesn't it?"  His smile tightened
into something more serious.

"Just be careful, Fiona.  I know it's past time you made your own
mistakes" -- he held up his hand before she could interrupt "--and your
own successes.  Just be careful.  I don't think I can stand to watch
you suffer again."

"That's what it's all about, isn't it?"

"I can probably be forgiven ,~,.  for.  ~at, " can't I?  " She reached
for his hand.  Probamy.

Duncan could be forgiven for not wanting her to suffer.  But despite
his denial, Fiona wondered if he was worried because he didn't believe
she could hold any man's interest.  She completely lacked a repertoire
of feminine wiles.  Her

91 fund of small talk teetered on the verge of bankruptcy, and her life
experience could be summed up in an incomplete phrase.  And she
certainly didn't have a perfect body to throw into the equation.

-Long after her discussion with Duncan, she stood at the window of her
suite and watched the last raindrops falling on High Street.  With true
Highland courtesy, an eerie mist seemed to rise from the earth to meet
the rain halfway.  She was exhausted, but too morose to do anything
about it.  She imagined Andrew's reaction to Duncan's brotherly chat,
and she wondered how she could face him again.

"Fiona, are you still up?"  A light knock preceded the softly spoken
question.

Fiona recognized Andrew's voice, even at a whisper.  It looked as if
she were going to face him again immediately.

She cracked the door and stared out into the hallway.

"I thought you were going home to get some sleep."

"I went home.  May I come in, or is it too late?"

"I haven't even changed for bed."  She opened the door wider to let him
through.  His hair was plastered to his head, and his clothes were
soaked.

"Have you been out in the rain ever since you left?"

"Aye.  I have.  That's what I've come about."

"You don't have towels at home?"

He laughed.

"I've towels aplenty.  I just have no' had the opportunity to use
them."

"Where have you been?"

His hazel eyes were dancing.

"Rescuing a pair of yobs from the loch."

"Yobs?"

"Two good-for-nowt lads.  Brothers.  Peter and Jamie Gordon.  Have you
met our Peter and Jamie, yet?"

"I don't think so."

"Just as well.  Between them they've caused more trouble in the village
than the rest of our lads put together."

"Maybe you should have thought twice about rescuing them."  She went
into her bathroom and retrieved a fluffy white towel.  She handed it to
Andrew.

"I'm going to make some tea.

I'd offer you whisky if I had any up here, but afraid tea will have to
do.  Have a seat.  "

"I'm too wet.!"

"Sit on the towel, then, and I'll get you another as soon as I put the
kettle on."  She did just that.  When she re, turned with another towel
in tow, he was already drying himself .  She watched him ruffle his
hair, then stretch his head back to rub his neck.  Such a simple act,
but it spoke of intimacy.  He passed the towel over his skin roughly
but with obvious enjoyment.  She had already guessed he was a man who
enjoyed sensations of all kind, the feel of wind and water on his skin,
the ache of tired muscles after a hard day at work, the pumping of his
heart and the tingling of his flesh after a long run or the ascent of a
mountain.  Her flesh tingled as she watched him.

He rubbed his shoulders, and the fabric of his shirt slid along his
muscular arms.

"I can only get the worst of it.  I should get home, but I just had to
tell you something first."  She perched in a-chair.  Andrew was still
standing, and now he was dabbing at his chest.  The square,
well-defined muscles were clearly outlined by the clinging fabric, and
she was hopelessly mesmerized as he pulled the shirt even fighter with
each stroke of the towel.  As she continued to stare, he unfastened the
top three buttons to expose his skin to the towel.

Rain-darkened hair gleamed with drops of moisture.

She couldn't seem to turn her head or speak.

He stopped and stared pointedly at her.

"Have you no curiosity?"

She found words somewhere.  Her mouth had gone dry.

"Was the rescue successful?  Did you find your yobs?"

He grinned triumphantly.

"Aye, that we did!  And a blethering pair of idiots they were.  They
had taken their launch out to the middle of the loch to do some
fishing, but they took half a bottle of whisky and twice as much
beer.

From what I can tell, Jamie fished and drank, and Peter drank.  If they
caught any fish, they had disappeared by the time we arrived.  "

"Were they too drunk to come in out of the rain?"

"In a manner of spe~king.  They could no' start their motor.  All they
could think to do was ride out the storm.  I suppose they knew that
eventually their mum would send someone to look for them.  Which is
what happened, of

Emilie Richards 93 course.  When.  I drove up to my house, there were
men launching a rescue boat, and they asked me to come.  " He was
drying his arms now, but his mind was definitely on the events of the
evening.

She forced her mind to those events, too.

"And the Got- dons were all right when you found them?"

"Now, that's relative, Fiona.  They were unharmed, it's true.  But were
they all right?"  He shrugged and tried to look serious, but his eyes
were dancing again.

"You're such a born storyteller.  You know how to drag out a good
thing, then drag it out some more."

"They saw my darling."

"What?"  She got to her feet.

"They saw my darling!  In the worst part of the storm she came up right
next to their boat.  Shilpit laddies that they are, they nearly
perished from fear on the spot."

"You're kidding."

"No' a bit of it.  They saw her.  Jamie even told us what color her
eyes were.  Amber, like yours, Fiona."

No one had ever told her that her eyes were amber.  An- drew's
assessment left a warm place inside her.  "what else did they see?"

"A long neck, and a long body, too.  Jamie says that her tail slapped
the water several boat lengths behind.  He was fair certain she would
turn over their boat, but of course, she did no'."

"Of court?"

"She's a shy lassie, and she does no' often show herself, but when she
does, she means no harm."

I'm not so sure I d count on that to protect me if I were in their
shoes.  "

"Jamie says that she looked straight at them before she plunged back
into the depths.  He claims that the waves she made as she vanished
nearly upset the boat.  He had to re- noStr,ain, Peter from jumping
into the water in a panic.  Peter is much of a thinker."

'"It doesn't sound like Jamie's ever going to win any prizes
himself."

"They're good lads, if a wee bit blate.  I dinna think either of them
will be drinkin for a good while."

The kettle whistled, and she crossed to pour the boiling water into a
teapot.  Since Andrew dearly hadn't had dinner, she rummaged in her
refrigerator.

"I have the makings of a sandwich in here," she reported.

"Interested?"

"No.  I'll just have the tea and be going.  I should be at home now,
but I wanted you to hear the story from me."

She closed the door and turned to face him.

"Andrew, do you believe that they really saw... something?"

He stared at her.

"Believe?  Of course I believe.  She's there, and they saw her.  What
room can there be for doubt?"

"Well, you said yourself they'd been drinking.  And the storm was
pretty fierce for a while.  They were probably seared to death to be
out on the water like that, with all the light ming and thunder, and
the waves getting higher and higher .... " "They saw her.  I know what
you're thinking, Fiona, but they saw her.

I saw the fright she gave them.  " He shook his head.

"Silly laddies, as if she'd try to harm them."  She approached him
slowly.  He was still dripping on her carpet, but he lowered the towel
to watch as she came closer.

"You really believe, don't you?"  She shook her head, amazed.

"You really believe that a creature lives in Loch Ceo.  It's not just a
wonderful story to you."

"I believe she's there.  Aye.  In the same way I believe that the sun
will rise tomorrow--somewhere, at least, if no' in Scotland."  He
smiled, and his expression heckoned her closer.

"I didn't know."

"And now you do."  He dropped the towel at his feet and reached out to
slide his hands down her arms.  He took her hands in his and pulled her
closer.

"I believe she's shy, so very shy that she only comes out when she
t~ink.~ that no one will be watching.  I suspect she was more surprised
to see the Gordon brothers than they were to see her.  I believe she
waits until no one is there before she rises high above the waves and
glides along thdr ridges.  She has a need to see the world around
her--even, perhaps, to experience it a bit.  But she's so frightened of
what might happen to her .... "

"I can understand that.  The world wouldn't accept her.  She probably
knows that.  She would frighten everyone who saw her."

"No' everyone.  Those who love her would find her 'beautiful."

She was hopelessly mesmerized again, but this time by the spark
kindling in his hazel eyes.

"Would they?"  she whispered.

"Aye."  He sighed as he pulled her closer.

"Aye.  Very beautiful."  His arms closed around her.

Fiona lifted her face to his.  She wasn't surprised that he was going
to kiss her.  His happiness was unrestrained and undeniable.  She could
almost taste his joy and feel his exuherance in the way that he held
her.  The wet folds of his clothing clung to her as he drew her still
closer, but the warmth of his body seemed to seep into her own.

His hands traveled slowly up her back, along her spine and shoulders to
the nape of her neck.  There were scars there, hidden from the eye, but
he brushed past them to bury his hands in her hair.  He tilted her head
and lowered his mouth to hers.  There was nothing comforting about this
kiss, and nothing brotherly.  His lips were demanding, and hers opened
like the petals of a flower at too ming first She clung to him, too
astonished and too suffused with emotion to examine what was happening.
His tongue teased her lips, tracing, moistening, dancing with soft
velvet strokes.  She responded with more hesitation than confidence.
His hands dove deeper into her hair, as if the feel of it gave him
pleasure.  She sighed, and immediately she could feel his smile against
her lips.  He delved deeper, and his tongue explored with gentle,
constant pressure.  Her legs seemed to grow weaker in proportion to the
strength of her response.  She clutched his shirt with trembling hands
and held it like a lifeline.  Desire bloomed inside her, a persistent,
flowering yearning that swamped all other sensations.  She wanted to
touch him, to explore him with her hands, to feel the hard breadth of
his chest, the of his shoulders.

As if he knew, he lifted his head, and his eyes promised that he would
not draw away if she did touch him.  But her courage was gone by then,
used up in the heat of that one, breathtaking, staggering kiss..  With
his gaze still fixed on her face, he swept his nauch over her back and
finally slid them to her hips to rest there while his thumbs gently
massaged her abdomen.  H,e leaned forward again and kissed her once on
each sloe of her mouth, swift, sweet kisses.  He kissed her nose, as he
had in his car, and then her eyelids.

"There are some people who, if they knew.  my d.a.r,l?,_g, would find
her the most beautiful creature in the worm, he said softly.

He covered her hands and brought them to his lips to kiss each palm and
seal her fingers over the kiss.  Then he was gone, and the only sound
in Fiona's apartment was the beating of her own heart.

Chapter 7

Feamshader, lain's family home, was a child's most cherished dream or
terrifying nightmare--depending on the strength and direction of the
child's imagination.  Gar- c~run.  gOyles loomed from parapets, and the
castellated towers the corners held delicious promises of vampire bats
[ hideous cloaked phantoms.

The drive to Feamshader from Druidheachd was pastoral and pleasant,
along a rambling Scottish wynd that bordered Loch Ceo.  Only when the
hulking remains of ancient Ceo Castle came into view did the mood
change and the turbulent history of the Highlands assert itself.  Just
off the loch road and past the castle, Fearnshader lent its gloomy
presence to the landscape.

"Fearnshader means 'place of alders," " Duncan told Fiona as he parked
the hotel minibus beside a gatehouse at the edge of Fearnshader's vast
front garden.

"The alder ~x~ve between here and Ceo Castle is probably as old as the
itself, much older than the house--which has to be than any structure
in the state of New York."

~ From the back seat Fiona looked out the window, con- for the moment
just to take in the sight of the huge home.

"So I came here as a little girl?"

"You came here with me at least once.  Lady Mary, lain's mother, was
fascinated with you.  She made me bring you, and you and she had a tea
party."

"I don't remember her at all, but I still have a doll that she sent me
when I was in the hospital in New York, a very old and valuable doll. I
think it was hers as a child."  Fiona continued to stare out at
Fearnshader.

"That wasn't long before she died, I guess.  Everything changed so
quickly, didn't it?"

"Everything except Fearnshader.  And Billie's changing that now."

Mara, who was sitting beside her husband, clucked her disapproval.

"Billie is just refining what's already there.  If Lady Mary was alive,
she would be delighted that someone loved the house again and wanted to
make it a home."

"Are you chastising me?"  Duncan leaned over and kissed her.

"I'm sure I'll love what Billie's doing.  Just as soon as I get used to
it."

"Your brother believes he's a thoroughly modern man.  But he has no
tolerance for any change that affects his boyhood memories," Mara told
Fiona with a wink.  Duncan defended himself.

"I've told lain more than once that he needed to throw out half of what
was here.  And if I recall, you're the one who wouldn't let me paint
the hotel

"Duncan, you wouldn't have!"  Fiona was shocked.

"No, he would no' have," Mara agreed, because it would have been the
end of our marriage.  But he threatened it all through the winter.  "

"There was no light for months.  I came very close to painting the
whole place egg yolk yellow with murals of palm trees and flamingos."
Duncan got out of the car and came around to open doors.

Fiona was enchanted by the walkway.  peonies poked their scarlet spears
through the newly cultivated earth that bordered the cobblestones, and
shrub roses sporting spring's verdant first growth preened in the
translucent light of a Scottish gloaming.  She took her time, lingering
to admire everything.

"In another month or so, the walk to the door will be a sensory feast,"
Duncan said.

"The earliest roses will be blooming, and the peonies are nearly as
fragrant.  Billie promises that this is one thing she'll never
change."

Billie was waiting for them at the front door.  She had insisted that
she was going to do the cooking for her first din her party herself,
and she had obviously stuck to her word.  She balanced a bunch of fresh
basil and three garlic bulbs in one hand and held the door wide with
the other.

"I'm so glad you're here.  Somebody needs to entertain Andrew.  He
insists on helping in the kitchen, and the man's a menace."

"Do you need help?"  Mara asked.

"Yours, sure.  His?"  She shook her head, and her short dark hair
fanned out in spikes.

"He claims to cook by taste alone.  He's eating more than he's cooking.
There'll be nothing left to serve if we don't get him out of there."

"Where's Lord lain during all this?"  Duncan asked.

"Fixing a pipe in the master bath.  I know it's un lordly or something.
He's supposed to be posing by the fireplace in very old tweeds, but if
he doesn't stop the leak, the dining room ceiling might cave in during
dinner.  I'd hate to do that to you.

Most of the staff is off on holiday, so there's no one to lend a hand.
"

"Duncan can help him, and I'll help you."  Mara turned to Fiona.

"Can you entertain Andrew?"

Fiona hadn't seen Andrew in a week, not since the day his darling had
been spotted in the loch.  She looked at Duncan, whose eyes were
shuttered, but he didn't attempt to object.

Whatever his feelings, he was trying not to be overprotective.

"I suppose I can.  If he's had enough to eat to hold him until
dinner."

"The man has devoured half the contents of my cupboards," Billie
said.

"That might no' do it," Mara said, "but you'd better give it a try,
Fiona."

Fiona and Mara followed Billie through the expansive i hallways, while
Duncan took the stairs to find lain.  Fiona was fascinated by every
room they passed.

"This is inc red- Could I have a tour sometime?"

Billie shot her a grin.

"That's a terrific idea.  Get Andrew to give you one.  Just don't let
him show you the kitchen."

"You wouldn't mind if we prowled around?"

"Mind?  You're family, aren't you?  Besides, Andrew knows as much or
more about the house than I do.  He practically grew up here.  And he
won't be likely to start moving furniture at every stop."

"How is the renovation going?"  Mara asked.

"It's great fun.  I make a pile of things that I think we need to get
rid of, lain comes along and gives me a history of every piece and what
it means to him, and eventually we're right back where we started."

"Slowly, in other words."

"Slowly and carefully.  But we're moving in the right direction.  Some
of the rooms are actually comfortable.  I'd say by summer's end, the
parts of the house that we use will be really livable."

Fiona was lost already.  They had only made two turns, but she was
sorry she hadn't dropped bread crumbs behind her.  They made one more,
to a short hallway that led through an imposing wooden door temporarily
propped open by a crate filled with canned goods.

"Andrew, real help's arrived.  You're banished until dinnertime,"
Billie said.

Andrew turned.  His gaze went directly to Fiona.  He greeted her, then
Mara, but he didn't move toward them.

"You're certain?  I've only begun chopping the tomatoes."

"Good, then some should still be left for the table."  Billie
cheerfully shooed him toward Fiona.

"I've promised Fiona you'll show her the house.  That should take an
hour or two.  Maybe that will give lain time to figure out how to turn
off the water.  Duncan's on his way up there."

"I told you I could help him."

"When you arrived he was still playing Master of All He Surveys, and he
would have been furious if I had sent you up.  By now he should be
ready for reinforcements.  Desperate, in fact."

"You have a poor opinion of men."

She kissed his cheek.

"I have a realistic opinion of my husband's strengths and weaknesses.
Go have fun."

As he passed, he hugged Mara's shoulders and asked about April.  Then
he faced Fiona.

"There's still enough light to see the gardens.  Would you like to
start there?"  A week had passed, and she had spent too much of it
wondering exactly why Andrew had kissed her.  In her imagination she
had conjured a reunion scene filled with intimacy and subtle innuendo.
Instead Andrew was looking at her as if she were a stranger.

She told herself that she should have expected this.  The kiss had been
exuberance, an adrenaline high, and afterward he had obviously
regretted it.  Now it would be her job to be pleasant while pretending
the kiss hadn't meant anything to her, either.  She steeled herself and
found a sin' de

"Sure.  I've already admired the gardens in the front."

He ushered her back through the doorway and into the hall.  In silence
they took a different set of turns until they were on a wide stone
terrace that overlooked acres of what had obviously once been formal
gardens.

"It was very different when we were lads," Andrew said.

"These were Lady Mary's pride and joy.  She had a large staff of
gardeners, but she did much of the work herself and all the
supervision."  ; ~Fiona walked to the terrace edge and leaned against
the sculpted railing.  The night was surprisingly warm, and a breeze
caressed her cheeks.

"There were roses."

"Aye.  Did Duncan tell you that?"

"I don't think so.  I think I remember them."

"You were far too wee to remember."

"You're right, I was.  But I remember them anyway.  That must have been
where we had our tea party."

"Tea party?"

"Duncan tells me Lady Mary invited me for a tea party.  I don't
remember that.  But I remember this view, I think.

And roses.  Not along the walkway out front.  Dozens of bushes.

Hundreds, maybe.  "

~ "Hundreds, aye.  Behind the boxwoods to the left.

"They ~ her passion.  lain intends to restore the rose garden in Some
of the roses are still there.  The old ones an survive neglect.

But the hybrids are all gone.  They'll to be replaced.  " He joined her
at the railing, but he several feet away.

"You can see the overall design

from here if you use your imagination.  The boxwoods outline the
different areas.  There's a wee reflecting pool and fountain beyond
that stand of birches.  That was the silent garden, and we were only
allowed there if we agreed to be silent, which was seldom.  "

Fiona turned so that she could see him.  The view was exceptional.  He
wore a dark tweed jacket and faded jeans that had long ago molded
themselves perfectly to his long legs.

"I can imagine the three of you playing here, romping in and out of the
boxwoods.  Climbing trees, trampling flower beds."

"Lord Ross planted a maze for us just beyond the roses.  A very
intricate and complicated one.  I think he rather hoped we would never
find' our way out."

She laughed.

"Obviously you did."

"Boxwoods grow slowly, and only now are they above eye level.  I
suppose it was really a maze meant for our chilI bet April loves it."

"Aye.  And Mara and Duncan will have more children.  lain and Billie
will have their own, as well."

"And you, of course.  You'll certainly be a father someday."

"I've no thought of settling down."

She heard his message loudly, although he hadn't raised his voice.

"Well, you would have to settle down to be a father," she said
lightly.

"I suppose that's going to make it tough."

"I can no' imagine having the life of a child in my hands, having to
shape and mold it."  He shook his head.

"I have none of the qualities a man needs for that."

"You'd be a fantastic father.  The very best kind."

"You dinna really know me, Fiona."

There was little she could say to that.  From the tone of his voice she
guessed that she wasn't going to be allowed to get to know him any
better, either.

"Maybe I don't know everything," she said at last, "but I've watched
you with April and Sara."

"It's easy to love a child, and the most difficult task in the world to
be a good parent."  He moved away from the rail

and turned to her.8

"If there was enough light we could walk along the pathways, and I
could show you what's left of the gardens and what lain intends to do
with the remainder.  But that will have to wait.  We'll have a look at
the inside instead."

He was standing close to her, but he was a thousand miles away.

Fiona'had hoped that if she was determinedly casual, Andrew would
realize that she hadn't overreacted to his kiss.  Now she saw that
something more overt was going to be required.

"Andrew."  She put her hand on his arm to stop him from moving away.

"You don't have to show me anything, you know.  And you have nothing to
be embarrassed about, either."  She was completely unused to expressing
her feelings out loud.  She could feel her cheeks heating from the
effort.

"Fxnbarrassed?"

She dropped her hand.

"I know you regret what happened the last time you saw me.  Please,
don't worry about it.  I understand why you kissed me.  You were
excited cause your darling had been spotted.  I know it had very little
to do with me."

He stared at her for a moment.

"Well, at least you did no' say it had nowt to do with you.  At least
you give yourself credit for having the tiniest bit to do with it."
Anger flashed through her, and she hardly recognized it.

She had seldom been angry.  What could anger have changed?

"Look, we aren't discussing my self-esteem.  We're discussing you.  But
if your feelings are off-limits..."  She turned and started toward the
house.

"Fiona."  This time he stopped her.

"I am no' embarrassed.  Can you really believe I am?"

~ "You're acting like a stranger, which is your perfect right, of
course.  I just thought you might regret kissing me

"I did no' regret it!"

: She faced him.

"Good."

It was no' a good idea!  "

"Then let's forget it and get on with being friends."

"Fiona, it was no'-a good idea because I want to do it

She was stunned.  She had expected anything except this.

"Why?  It's not an addiction.  If you do it again, you're in no real
danger of becoming hooked."

"Dinna you think so?"  He stepped closer.

"I doubt I

' u h" have the power to resist anything I want badly cno g .  She was
mesmerized by the seductive flicker in his eyes.

"Let's just assume that's true.  Exactly why would you have to resist?"
Her voice sounded shaky and unfamiliar to her

OWn ears.

The door to the terrace opened, and lain poked his head through it.

"Bloody hell, Andrew.  I've got water gushing faster than I can mop it
up.  Can you lend a hand?  Duncan has no more idea what to do with the
bloody blasted pipe than I do."

"Of course," Andrew said without taking his eyes off Fiona.

"I'm sorry, Fiona," lain apologized.

"I promise I'll give you a tour myself another time.  Unless it's all
under water."

"Go ahead," Fiona told Andrew.  For just a moment his expression was a
mixture of relief and regret.  Or maybe she only imagined there was
anything there at all.  Just as she had imagined that she saw desire in
his eyes when he talked about kissing her again.

Dinner was poached salmon with a sauce of fresh herbs from
Fearushader's conservatory and a salad from the same source.  There had
been enough spectacular side dishes to have everyone groaning with
pleasure well before Billie served a dark chocolate torte.  The groans
grew louder, but no one turned down a generous slice.

Andrew had hardly looked at Fiona throughout the extended meal, but he
had been completely aware of every movement she made--or didn't.

Most often she didn't move.  Fiona, once a spirited, active child, had
developed tranquility to an art form.  Her movements were spare and
infinitely more graceful because of it.  She leaned slightly forward as
the talk swirled around her, as if to 'immerse herself in it without
being forced to participate.  Her eyes were like depthless pools.  Deep
as the

105 loch, he supposed, hinting at great mystery and an ageless
serenity.  They changed with the timbre of the conversation, reflecting
and absorbing the emotions that others expressed.

"Andrew,.  you've had little to say tonight," lain said, when they
moved into the comfortably casual sitting room for coffee laced with
Drambuie.

He'd had little to say because he had been so busy not watching Fiona.
He had carefully not watched the way she smiled--a smile that barely
disturbed the composure of her face but was nevertheless warm and
genuine.  He had carefully not watched the way her turquoise sweater
softly outlined the contours of her breasts or the way her long fingers
stroked the fine linen tablecloth and savored the whorls of the
intricate family crest on the silverware.

He hadn't watched her lift a bright tropical blossom from the floral
arrangement to brush its soft petals against her cheek and learn its
exotic scent.

"I think Andrew's fnentally out on the loch looking for his darling,"
Duncan said.

"Along with half of Druidheachd."  ~ "Only the half with boats."
Restless, Andrew got up to pour himself more coffee.

"Boats and the time to make a quid from our visitors."

"The hotel's been full, too," Duncan said.

"But I expect it to die down soon."

"Has activity on the loch increased that much?"  Fiona asked.

Andrew was aware this was the first remark she'd addressed to him since
their discussion on the terrace.  He faced her.

"Aye.  I've had my hands full, as has everyone with a boat.

There've been no sightings on Loch Ness for sometime.

We're taking up the slack.  "

"Then you think it will be temporary?"

"I suppose that depends on Nessie and my darling.  They'll have to work
it out between them."

"I'm sure they're in constant touch," Duncan said wryly.  Fiona hadn't
turned her gaze from Andrew.

"I would imagine that a lot of the people who come just want to be

out on the loch.  I bet they don't care if they see anything out of
the ordinary.  The ordinary is magnificent enough.  "

"Then you've been out on the water?"

"Oh, no.  I've imagined it, though.  It's so beautiful from the
shore.

It's easy to see it would be that much more beautiful gliding through
the waves.  "

"It's particularly lovely on a clear night like this one.  You should
come for a cruise."  Andrew realized he had excluded everyone else.

"All of you," he amended.

"It's rare to have a night this lovely so early in the season."

"I can't," Ia'm said.

"There's still work to be done upstairs or there'll be permanent damage
to the ceding."

"I'd better stay and help lain," Billie said, "or there'll he no living
with him."

"We have to get back to April," Duncan said.

"Or I do.  Mara and Fiona can certainly go."

"I have to pass, as well," Mara said.

"I have to be at the croft early tomorrow to help with shearing."

No regret showed on Fiona's face, but Andrew saw it in her eyes, deep
where anyone who wasn't searching would miss it.

"It looks like we'll have to wait," she said.

"Another time, Andrew?"

Andrew could feel Duncan watching him.  He had only to say aye, that
they would go another time.  He could make the offer again when the
others weren't busy.  There was nothing in Fiona's manner to indicate
that she expected anything else.

But it wasn't a matter of her expectations.

"Do you have a reason no' to go tonight?"  he asked.  She tilted her
head.  Like all her movements, this one was slight, and more effective
because of it.

"No, but I don't want to leave out the" -- "They've all been in my
boat.  You have no'."

"Aren't you tired?

You've been taking people out all.

week.  "

He stared at her.  The room seemed unusually still to him, as if
everyone had ceased breathing.

"Aye, but you're no' just people, are you?"  He set down his coffee and
held out his hand to her.

She didn't look around, but her cheeks delicately flushed with color.

For a moment he thought she would refuse.  For another, he almost
wished she would.  Then she stood and took his hand.

"It sounds like something I'd better not Andrew turned to Duncan.

"I'll bring her home afterward."

Duncan gave a curt nod.  Andrew wanted to reassure him.  He wanted to
promise his friend that there was nothing to worry about.  But even if
he'd had the freedom to speak, there was nothing he could have
promised.  Nothing.

"Billie, lain," he said, turning to his hosts.

"I would no' abandon you so quickly, but I know you have work ahead.

Is there anything else I can do before we leave?  "

"Abs91utely not.

Shutting off the water was enough.  Go and have fun," Billie said.

Andrew bent to kiss her cheek, but he held tightly to Fiona's hand' so
she wouldn't slip away.

"Thank you for everything.  It was the finest meal I've h~d in years ~'
Billie--kissed him in return, and the kiss landed very near his ear. It
was followed by a whisper.

"I don't care if she's Duncan's sister, Andrew.  Don't you dare treat
Fiona like anything less than a woman tonight."

Chapter 8

Stardust yearned to be something she was not.  She yearned to be tiny,
with shining, rainbow scales, like the trout who had once been her
friends.  She yearned to be slender, with a supple body that twirled
and coiled in the water like the eels who now refused to swim with her.
But she was not small or slender.  The lake seemed to rise as she grew,
as if the weight and size of her body pushed the water higher up the
beach.  Now she had no one to play with except Lockjaw, the snapping
turtle who preferred to sun his ancient body on a log. Lockjaw was not
afraid of Stardust.  He talked to her whenever she swam close enough. 
It was Lockjaw who told her that she was a water dragon and would never
grow smaller.  And it was Lockjaw who told her that far across Serenity
Lake there were other dragons just like her.

Andrew's boat was neither large nor flashy.  It was a cabin cruiser
with comfortable seating for six.  Obviously MacDougall's Darling had
spent a long life exploring the loch and was now approaching
retirement, but Andrew had kept

her in such perfect condition that under the soft glow of moonlight her
dark wood trim gleamed like a prized antique and her white hull was an
unblemished beacon.

"She has none of the luxuries of a more modern craft.  But there's no'
a boat on the loch in better condition."

"And I'm sure there's not a guide who tells better stories."  Fiona
took Andrew's hand and let him help her aboard.  The boat rocked gently
under her feet.

"You'll get your sea legs before long."  He didn't drop her hand.

"Are you warm enough?"

"I'm fine."

"I could run inside and get you a coat."

Fiona looked beyond him to the frame cottage sitting back from the
shore.  was anchored at the end of a short stone pier jutting out from
Andrew's own property.  They hadn't gone inside.  She'd only glimpsed
the exterior, but what she'd glimpsed was charming.

"I'm fine.

Really.  "

A high-pitched yapping carved a rift in the evening's dark tranquilli~.
Andrew shook his head.

"I'm afraid Poppy's discovered I'm home."

Fiona already knew the story of how Duncan and Mara had rescued three
breathtakingly ugly puppies wagging their tails' at the gates of puppy
heaven.  She knew that after naming them all, April had kept Primrose,
then presented Primrose's brother to Andrew.  lain had been gifted with
the third look-alike, Hollyhock.  The fact that the two men had never
had the heart to change the dogs' names said volumes about their love
for April.

"I've seen the others.  Don't I get to judge this one, too?"  she
asked.

"He's every bit as ugly as the rest and twice as ill- mannered," Andrew
warned.

"Go on and get him.  Bring him along and I'll see what I think."

Andrew leapt back to the pier and disappeared into the darkness.

Fiona wandered the boat, stroking the sleek vinyl.

cushions and the flawless woodwork.  Everything was mmtly in place and
sparkling clean.  She was peeking below the spartan sleeping quarters
when the boat began to

rock.  She turned just in time to brace herself before Poppy sprang.

"Down!  Get down, Poppy!"  Andrew leapt on board and.  rushed over to
grab the dog who, if possible, was larger and uglier than both Primrose
and Hollyhock.

"It's all right."  Fiona wrapped her arms around the dog's neck and
stroked his mottled fur.  Poppy's eyes said "love me," while his
drooling canine smile added "please?"

Hooked, she murmured reassurances, which was no hardship, since his
ears were at lip level.

"Get down!"  Andrew pulled Poppy off Fiona and back down to all
fours.

"I'm sorry, Fiona.  He's never been quite so poorly behaved.  You would
think he'd never seen a woman."

"And just how many has he seen?"  She squatted to continue the
dog-woman communion.  Poppy was wiggling and slobbering with abandon.

"No' as many as you've probably been led to believe."

"Really?  I've been told your fame extends through the Highlands."

"Fame?  For what, exactly?"

Fiona looked up.  Andrew's arms were crossed, and his eyes sparkled.

She knew he expected her to back down, but she wasn't quite the
blushing virgin he believed her to be.  She shrugged carelessly.

"I don't know.  Every time I ask for details, the women in question
just smile."

"Ah, that.  They refer to my prowess at tossing the ca her ."  "The
caber?"

"A long pole, thick and heavy."  He made a circle with both hands.  She
whistled softly in appreciation.

"Slippery, too," he continued, "when a man's tensed to put all he has
into the throw.  You lift it like this."  He demonstrated, bending
slowly, then raising his cupped hands until they stopped just at his
groin.

"Then you heave it as far and as hard as you're able.  I've competed
throughout Scotland."

He smiled seductively.

"I've been declared a champion more than once."

She lifted a brow.

"Now that I think about it, they all said you were a champion, although
who knows how many ca 111 her tosses they've seen?  But the description
of... the caber certainly fits."

"A man could have his head turned with such praise."

"And I bet a man could lose his head tossing his caber in the presence
of the wrong woman."

"Oh, I'm canny whenever the occasion arises."

"And I suppose it... arises... often?"

"No' as often as you've probably been led to believe."  This time she
smiled.

"Isn't that where we began?"

He squatted beside her, weight resting easily on his heels.

"What do you think of my Poppy?"  "I think he's spectacular."

"I will no' question that too closely."  Andrew ruffled Poppy's ears,
but the dog didn't turn from Fiona.

"He seems to have taken a liking to you."

"He's a discriminating mutt."

"Shall we take him along, then?"

"We shall."  She looked up and realized how close An- drew's face was
to hers.  Moonlight defined the rugged slash of his cheekbones, the
square strength of his jaw, the slope of his nose.  His was a Celtic
face, equal parts warrior, pagan and mystic.  He smiled and joked so
often and easily that she suspected few saw the passion and the mystery
deeply etched in his hazel eyes.

"I'm glad you came," he said.  The teasing had ended.  He was close
enough to read her thoughts and too close to hide his own.

"Me too."  "I did no' think you would."

"Neither did I."

"I acted badly tonight."

"You have nothing to apologize for."

"Your brother warned me away from you."  Her heart began to beat
faster.

"I know.  Is this about Duncan?"

"No.  It's about my being afraid that I'll hurt you."

"You can only hurt me if I let you."  Her breathing felt uneven, as if
there weren't enough air in Scoffand to completely fill her lungs.

He didn't speak or move.  His gaze flicked to her lips, then back to
her eyes.  She saw caution melt into longing until there was no point
where one ended and the other began.  Desire was an unbroken continuum,
a magnetic compulsion that held them motionless, even as both of them
resisted its pull.

At last he stood.

"I'll cast off."

The voice that emerged from her lips was husky and breathless, not her
own.

"Do you need a crew?  I can do whatever you tell me."

"No' this time.  I want you to sit and enjoy.  It's special, when you
see it the first time, our loch.  Watch carefully as we pull away and
you might see my darling.  She's always nearby."

Fiona didn't ask how he knew or if he was teasing, since she doubted he
had an answer for either question--and there were already enough
unanswered questions between them.  She settled herself in one of the
comfortable seats at the stern and gazed out at the loch, shifting
positions as the subtle purr of the engine added rhythm to the night
and the boat pulled away from the pier.

Poppy jumped up on the seat to her left.  Fiona kept her eyes on the
water, although she wanted more than anything to watch and admire the
way Andrew handled the boat.  As the wind ruffled her hair she stroked
the dog's velvet ears and searched the horizon for the proud lift of a
water dragon's head.

Lights defined the loch's shoreline, intermittent and indistinct.  She
knew there vc ere no commercial developments here except for a small,
homey settlement of tourist cottages on the opposite shore that were
rented each year by the same Lowland families that had rented them for
decades.  Fiona had explored the loch's circumference with Billie in
search of an old woman who was said to tell richly embroidered stories
about sea-dwelling gel pies who assumed human form--and all the poor
women who had been fooled by them.  B'filie was working on a
dissertation on local folklore, and Fiona had accompanied her on other
trips into the country,- as well.

"What do you see?"

The boat had slowed, but it was still moving.  She hadn't exIx~ed
Andrew to come up beside her.  She tilted her chin to look up at him.

"Everything and nothing.  It's even more beautiful than I imagined."

"This is my favorite time.  There's rarely anyone out here at night
except the most intrepid fishermen."

"You never grow tired of it, do you?"

He lowered himself to the seat to her right so that Poppy wouldn't be
displaced.

"Never.  Some men travel to see new sights.  I come here for them."

"Then you're not a traveler?"

"I've seen the corners of the world, but I've found nowt I like better2
I suppose that makes me dull and unimagina'If you were making a list to
describe yourself, would those adjectives be at the top?"

' "A dull, unimaginative person would no' think of making a list."  ~
"Who's steering the boat, Andrew?"

He leaned back.  She knows her own way.  "

Fiona knew better than to worry.  The loch was his home, and she was
perfectly safe.  She leaned back, too, and turned enough to admire his
profile.

"Do you remember your first time out on the loch?"

"I Was a babe in nappies.  My father had no regular job.  He was a tour
guide, and he fished and sold what fish he could when no one in
authority was about.  He often took me with him.

lain and Duncan had their first ride on the loch in his boat.  "

"Those must be wonderful memories."

His voice dropped, as if her casual response had charted new depths in
the conversation.

"Some of them, aye.  My da was a storyteller beyond compare.  And he
had the voice of an angel.

We Scots are no' a weepy people, but when my da sang the old songs late
at night at the pub, there was no' a strong man there who could stop
himself from shedding a ~ar.  He would si~"g, and they would buy him
whisky so that

There was more here, but she knew better than to pry.  She searched
for something safer.

"Did your mother love the loch, too?"

"She hates it still.  She says that Loch Ceo stole her husband."

Fiona sat forward.

"Andrew, did your father drown?  Is that what she meant?"

"My father died in hospital from too many dreams and too many drams."

She was at a loss for comforting words.

"He was a man no' meant to be a husband or father.  A good man,
nonetheless."  Andrew stood and crossed to the wheel, as much, Fiona
guessed, to end this portion of their conversation as to change the
boat's direction.  Poppy turned his head to watch, but the dog stayed
where he was.  The boat picked up speed, then slowed once more.  Fiona
looked out at the water and watched the lights on the opposite shore
grow brighter.  Andrew took his seat again and pointed to the bow of
the boat.

"We're heading for a bonny cove where my darling was twice sighted last
century, once by a doctor in Druidheachd on holiday, then again twelve
years later by a wee lad and his sister.  They claimed until the day
they died an old man and woman that their story was true and no'
combined imaginatian."

"How many sightings have there been?"

"Three this century that I know of.  It's entirely possible there've
been more, but no' everyone is willing to admit what they've seen.  My
father was one who did admit it.  He saw my darling just hours after I
was born, on his way home from the hospital."

"Wasn't your birth odd enough as it was?"  ~ "The villagers think so.

They still believe that when Duncan, lain and I are together we have a
certain power .  " Fiona remember that Billie had once said something
similar, but she hadn't understood.

"Power?  What kind?"

"There's no attempt to define it.  lain graciously accepts it as
superstition, while Dune goes quietly mad."

"And you?"

"I think there's something to it."

"Do you?  What?"  :

"I think that three men with a single purpose are more powerful than
three hundred divided."

"Purpose?"

He leaned forward, hands on his knees; then he stood.  He started
around the helm to the bow, walking as skillfully on the bobbing deck
as on land.  "

He was staring at something in the distance.  She rose to follow him
with Poppy at her heels and wondered if he thought he had glimpsed his
darling.  She didn't speak until she was beside him.  There was nothing
to block the wind here at the bow, and cold spray splattered her
cheeks.  She shivered and wished she had taken his offer of a coat.

"Do you see something?"

"Aye.  Over there at Gerston's Cottages.  It looks as if they're lea
ring down the piers.  It's an odd thing to do so late in the evening.
There was no one working there forenoon or after."

~ "Maybe the owner hired men who can only work at night."

"Perhaps.  Or perhaps she does no' want anyone to know what she's
doing."  Andrew turned to Fiona.

"Or perhaps Kaye Gerston has nowt to do with this at all."  He moved
past her to the helm again.  She followed him again and him take the
wheel.

"We'll have our look at the cove, I promise, but I think I'll
investigate first.  Do you mind?"

She was disappointed that the revelations about his childhood were
over, but he had already given her much to ponder.  She spoke as she
braced herself for a faster ride.

"Nope.  I thrive on mysteries."

Loch Ceo was both long and wide, a small loch in comparison to Ness or
Lomond, but large enough to make it impossible to view one side from
the other.  As they drew al~r, Fiona could see what had intrigued
Andrew.  There ~ three narrow piers extending a short distance into the
water, or at least there had been three narrow piers earlier day.  Now
two of them looked like the bones of filleted nothing but skeletal
posts and crossbeams, and those fast giving Way, too.

Andrew pulled the boat up to the end of the pier that held a lone
workman.

"Harry Dutton, is that you?"

A blond-haired man who was kneeling at the middle of the pier ripping
out boards looked up with no surprise on his face.  Fiona suspected he
had seen them coming.

"Evening, Andrew."

"Looks like you'll soon make short work of that."

"That's what I'm being paid to do."

"Kaye's going to put some money into better piers, is she?"

"No' Kaye, I shouldn't ~Think.  It's no' her property anymore."

"Is that so?"

"Sold it, she did."

"I had no' heard."

Harry stood.  Fiona saw that he was a huge man, a side of beef on thick
elephant legs.

"It's all going," he said.  He swept his hand behind him.

"Cottages and all."

"And why is that?"

Harry shrugged.

"I should think to make way for something new."

"Do you know what?"  "

" Can't say I do.  "

"Is Kaye still on premises?  Or has she left already?"

"Oh, she's here.  Should be for a while.  She's a lifetime of memories
to pack."

"Aye."  Andrew stood with his hands in his pockets.  He had taken on
the attitude of a man smoking a pipe, vigilance overlaid by endless
patience.  He didn't even look around, but Fiona knew he was aware of
everything, the other men too far away to speak with, the darkness
beyond the piers where the doomed cottages lay, the mellow light
spilling from the windows of a small frame house near ex the water.

He moved at last, just a shift of weight from the balls of his feet to
his heels, but she found she had been holding her breath.

"Do you know who the new owner might be, Harry?"  he asked.

"There's two of them.  From London.  That's all I know."

"Two, you say?"

"I only saw one, a fat, bald chap pie Never heard his name."  "Martin
Carlton Jones

"Someone you know, then?"

Fiona saw that Andrew's face had grown grim.

"No," he said.

"Someone I never plan to."

"I have no favorite spot on the loch, but this is one of my favorites."
With practiced ease, Andrew dropped anchor i~

the middle of a deserted co~ve.  The boat lurched a bit, then settled
for lazily riding the gentle waves.

Fiona stood at his side.

"One of how many?"

"A hundred."  He recalculated.

"Two at most."

"It's all so perfect."

He leaned against the railing and crossed his arms.

Moonlight had turned her hair a soft wheat gold and her ey~ the color
of expensive aged whisky.

"I've always been glad they could no' develop here.  The shore's too
steep and the land too rugged."

22Someone determined enough could ~f_i~, d a way.  " No one has been
that determined.  No yet.  Perhaps the time is coming."

"It does seems odd to me that so much beauty has gone ?apped in a
country with limited resources.  It's almost as if Druidheachd was left
off the map."

"It has been left off many.  Until now we've been too wee,

too off the beaten path, to bother with.  "

"Until now?"

I~ had no desire to burden her.  Not yet, and certainly not

Druidheachd can no' resist the march of prog ~ forever.  The day will
come when we have our own s in the center of town.  "

"~11, maybe McDonald himself originated here.  Did think of that?
Fergus MacDonald of Druidheachd, a immigrant lad, east away on the
streets of New York in his pockets but a recipe for his old granny's
beef sandwiches."

you're right, of course.  We should build him a

"I can see it now."  She framed it with her hands.

"Golden arches.

Two of them intersecting.  "

He laughed and reached for her hand "I've nothing against progress.  I
only cam when it steals what's dear to

Her hand was cold inside his, and she looked away shyly as he eased it
under the hem of his jacket.

"Doesn't every kind of progress rob us of something?  Before television
people spent more time visiting and talking.  Now they sit in their own
houses and communicate with the world, but it's completely one-sided.
Something was lost at the same time something was gained."

He placed her palm against his waist.  He could feel each separate
finger through his shirt.

"I like the old ways.  I dinna own a telly.  There's poor reception on
the loch to be.  gin with, but I'm afraid if I had one, I'd watch
it."

"That would be the point."  She turned more fully toward him, and then
she shivered.

"What do you do instead?"

"You're cold."  He shook his head.

"I should have fetched you a coat after all."  He tugged her closer.

"Come here."

She came with just a hint of resistance.  He tucked her under his arm
and against his side.

"You'll warm up in a moment ."  "Tell me what you do instead of
television."  There was a persistence to the question that intrigued
him.

He guessed it was at least partially a demand that the conversation
continue just as it had, despite the fact that she was now intimately
snuggled against him.  The other part was intriguing, too.  She seemed
genuinely interested in how he spent his hours, as if she wanted to be
able to visualize a portion' of his life.  Her life had been so
sheltered and circumscribed.  How often had she imagined the daily
activities of others and expanded her horizons through them?

He answered without admit flag that in the last weeks at least some
part of every day had been spent thinking of her:

"I walk and I climb.  I've no real passion for golf, but I play when I
can.  I practice my pipes more than anyone who's heard me might
think."

"Pipes?"

"Bagpipes.  Has DUncan no' complained to you of my playing?"

"Not a word."

"It's what I do when I need to think."

She looked up at him, cheeks kissed by the moonlight, lips soft and
vulnerable.

"Oh, I want to hear you play.  I'd like nothing better."

"You might no' say so after you've heard me."

"I'll take my chances."

Her eyes were shining with anticipation.  His heart constricted
painfully in his chest before it began to speed faster.

He knew better than this.  He knew who and what he was,

and he knew what she needed.  She was the princess in the tower, badly
in need of rescuing.  But he was no knight.  He was the son of a
drunken fisherman, a Highlander with no aspirations to be anything but
exactly what he was.

And what was he at that moment except a man who wanted to hold Fiona in
his arms?

His own hand seemed to stray against his will, to steal up her arm to
her shoulders, her neck, her hair, to burrow into

~ ~!  dst of the unruly strands until her face was turned to ms thumb
caressed her cheek.  His thumb was callused and ~ skin as soft and
undefiled as snrino's first wi~a flowers.  He touched, tentatively,
patiently," ~l~c~rner of ~

mouth.  He heard her breath catch and felt her body tense.

~ "What chances... will you take?"  he asked.

"I don't know."  Her eyes widened.

"This terrifies me."

"Does it?"  He stroked his thumb over her bottom lip,

glowly, tenderly.

"Is that all that it does, Fiona?"

can I offer you?  " She put her hand on his cheek ~op him from shaking
his head.

"It's more than a lack or false modesty.  You only see a part of me,

There is more.  "

the parts of himself that no one saw.  The when he sat alone and stared
into the darkness.  The he moved faster and faster to rid himself of
black and bottomless doubts.

"Have I asked you to be

"So am I."

"Are you trying to misunderstand?"

I understand exactly.  Do you?  He leaned forward and kissed the place
he had touched at the corner of her lips.  Her mouth was ripe and ready
for harvest, as enticing as forbidden fruit.

He touched her bottom lip with his tongue, following the path of his
thumb.  He could feel the warmth of her breath as she sighed, but she
didn't pull away.  He enclosed her in his arms, a safe, warm harbor,
and took her lips fully, slanting his against them.  There was such
sweetness such innocent seduction, in the way that she yielded, a sigh,
a gradual melting of her body into his, slowly, ever so slowly, He had
never been one to play games with women, to pressure or even to woo. 
Women had come to him, women with no thoughts of commitment or
ownership.  Women who liked his warm smile and the touch of his strong,
wide hands.  Women who had remained friends when they were no longer
lovers.

Women so different from the one he held in his arms: She was new to
being kissed, and the teaching of it was more arousing than he could
have imagined.  He felt the tentative forays of her tongue in places
she barely touched, places he wanted her to explore.  Wanted badly. 
Her sweater skimmed his jacket, and as he tightened his arms around
her, her breasts sank slowly against his chest.  Slowly.  Carefully. 
As if she were afraid he would find something there to disappoint
him.

"Fiona," he whispered against her mouth, and once more against her
cheek.  From the night that he'd kissed her in the more where she had
almost died, he'd had some vague idea that he could help her step over
the brink into womanhood, that he could make her see that she was worth
a man's attention and that any man would be luckier for it.  "

Now he saw how dangerous the most honorable intentions could he.  But
somehow, despite burgeoning fears of his own, he couldn't stop kissing
her.

She stroked his cheek with her palm, then skimmed it lightly down his
neck and along his shoulder.  Each separate an on his He

could feel each hesitant flutter of her hand as she continued her
explorations.  He was adrift in the scent of her hair, the silk of her
skin, the pillow soft give of her breasts.  Her hips nestled against
his, intimately, then more intimately still.  If she was frightened by
what she found in return, she didn't pull away.  He wondered if she
understood exactly what his own arousal meant, and what proof it was of
her feminine powers.

He settled his hands at her waist and urged her closer.  Her sweater
drifted over his hands as his thumbs traced the waistband of her skirt.
At the precise moment that he touched the bare skin of her back, the
sensuous spell ended.

"No."  She stepped back so swiftly that she might have fallen if he
hadn't had his arms around her.

His breath was erratic, but not as erratic as his heartbeat.  Hands
that were usually rock steady trembled badly.

He had gone from control to a nearly total lack of it in mere moments.
He stood very still as reality filtered through the erotic veil that
had shrouded his common sense.

"Fiona, are you afraid I'll make you do something you do no' want to
do?"  he asked when he was certain that the voice that emerged would
sound like his.

She didn't answer for a moment.  She turned away from him, and he let
her go.  She walked to the railing and looked the cove.

"What are we doing, Andrew?  This can't go anywhere.  You've made that
clear, and I knew it, any Of all people I should know better than to
play with Is that what we were doing?"

She faced him at last.

"You wouldn't have liked what you if you'd continued touching me."

"I know you have scars," he said bluntly.

"I am scars.  There are places where that's all I am.  It's It's worse
than that.  There's no way a man could feel anything except..." waited,
but his gaze stayed connected with hers.  He silently demanding that
she finish.  she said at last.

"Or compassion, which ~ more enlightened version of the same.  And t
want your pity.  Not yours.  I couldn't stand it."

"Thenyou'll no' have it."

"And horror?  Can you really tell me that you wouldn't find the
evidence of what happened to me horrifying?"

"What happened to you was horrifying."  He steeled himself to add
more.

"What's happened to you since is more SO."  Her eyes widened, and she
stepped back against the rail as if he'd struck her.

He pushed on.

"You've determined that a man will find nowt about you to love, that no
man is clever or caring enough to see past scar tissue to the woman
herself.  You've decided that because you're no' perfect, a man could
no' be aroused by anything else about you, the softness of your breasts
or the curve of your hips.  Your lovely smile, the way your hair dances
in the wind."  He turned up his palms hopelessly.

"You had the evidence pressed up against you, and you simply ignored
it."

"You don't know.  You can't."

"I dinna know it all, perhaps.  But I know that there's nowt about you
that could horrify me and much I desire."

"Have I become a mission to you?"  There was no anger in her voice.  If
there had been, he would have walked back to the helm and started the
engine.  But beneath the starkness of her words he heard the cry for
comfort and reassurance.

"You have become a complication," he said honestly.

"I've loved you forever, Fiona.  But you no longer feel like my wee
sister.  Perhaps once I wanted to give you confidence.  Now I want to
give you myself, and that could be dangerous for us both."

He knew that she didn't, couldn't, really understand what he meant.

But he couldn't have explained it any better.

Her eyes glistened with unshed tears.

"This is going to end badly, isn't it?  You're Duncan's best friend,
and lain's, too.  I Ct~uld destroy that."

"Aye, if we let it come to that.  But we have the power to be certain
that it does no'."

"Then we ought to stay away from each other."  ~ "That would be the
coward's way out.  Is that what you:, want?"

"What do you want?"

"More than I should."

"Do you have to speak in riddles?"

"All right, then.  Judging from the state of my body, I want you in my
bed.  Scars and all, Fiona.  But when you climb out of it, I want you
to leave without a backward glance.  I know who and what I am, and what
I can offer.

And I can no' offer a life you would want.  " You know that already.

You know w~thout giving me a chance to decide?  Are you going to make
my decisions for me, too?  "

"I know who I am."

"We're a pretty pair, aren't we?"

He felt the tension that had held them in its grip crack wide open.

He smiled, and suddenly the night was warm and the breeze a genre
caress.

"Maybe we were put on God's thgr~n earth to be a trial to each other.
Did you think of at?"

Her body softened; her shoulders slumped, and she shook her head.  You
work hard at pretending you're a s~mple

He moved forward and cupped her chin in his hand.  inexorably, he
turned her face to his.

"Oh, I'm no' at all And you're nO' the sweet c~t ~, ......~ .

run .  ~. ,~".- lucre's a woman inside you clawing her way But, Fiona.
And one day soon, she will have her way."

Chapter 9

Kaye G~rston could drink a man under the table, ~ help him home to bed,
tuck him in with a jovial flourish and leave him with the imprint of a
huge smacking kiss in the center of his forehead.  She was a tall woman
with large bones and belly, who stood on wee Cinderella feet--which
were her only vanity.  Her age was indeterminate; she had always dyed
her hair a flaming red, and her face had been as weather-beaten and
lined during Andrew's childhood as it was now.

Kaye's face had always been open, too, as easy.  to read as a screaming
tabloid headline, but today it was as mcompre, heusible as a Turkish
daily.

"Do I owe you an explanation, Andrew?"  she asked.

"Have I given you the impression at one time or the other that I have a
duty to explain myself to you?"  Andrew was an engineer, not a
psychologist, but he understood guilt and fear and the ways in which
they manifested themselves.  Days had passed since his discovery that
Kaye had sold her land, but she had avoided his phone calls and
pretended not to be home when he had visited once go?

fore.

He refused to back down.

"And have I given you the impression that I'm demanding something of
you?  I've asked for information and nowt more.  Friend to friend and
neighbor to neighbor."

Andrew stood just outside the door of Kaye's house and waited for an
answer.  She hadn't asked him in, which was unusual, too.  Kaye had
been a close friend of his mother, and she had always been partial to
Andrew.  She herself had given birth to nothing but girls, slight,
fairy like creatures with graceful manners and delicate features.  They
might as well have been fairies, for all she'd understood them.  But
ahe had understood and appreciated Andrew, and she had always been
there to cuff him soundly on the ears if he misbehaved or--more
rarely--to clap him on the back if he didn't.

~. My mum asks about you often," he offered at last, :. ~en she still
hadn't answered,~"She moved aside with an audible sigh and gestured him
~ nm " You may or may no' find a place to sit, she said.

~:lea up to you to look for one.  I'm far too busy to do it for stepped
past her into the hallway, now a laby- of cartons and furniture piled
into eccentric seulp'So it's true, you are moving.  " and glad I am of
it."

successfully.  Kaye's house had with decorative touches, not until her
had died and the girls had grown old enough to their collective Way.

But it had always been scrupuwith mismatchedfuruiture lined up against
the precision.  Now all was chaos.

to offer you," she said bluntly when they had their way into a
cluttered sitting room.

"The cofsomewhere in the kitchen, and you know how I feel More's the
pity it's too early for whisky, even for come for refreshment."  her
arms, engulfed by a man's shirt, and sandaled, glamorously pedicured
feet.

"So why say goodbye?  You could have saved a trip.

I want no goodbyes I'll be leaving soon, and that will be that.  "

"Is it that easy, then?  You've lived here all your life.  Your
family's had this property for how long?  Three generations?

Fourg" " It matters no' at all how long they had it.  Someone else has
it now.  "

"Martin Carlton-lones and Nigel Surrey."

Kaye narrowed her eyes.

"And who were your sources for that wee slip of information?"

He touched his forehead with his forefinger.

"Mr.  Carlton-lones said that lain Ross might cause a fuss, but he
neglected to mention you," she said.

"So he told you that lain would be unhappy?"

"And what care I?"

Andrew was sorry to be correct.  Even though he had suspected the
worst, he had hoped for better.  Martin Carlton Jones and Nigel Surrey
were developers who specialized in hob day communities for the British
upper class.  For almost a year now they had made no secret of their
opinion that Dmidheachg could be a cozy Highlands retreat for the rich
and famous.  lain had already called their hand once, but it seemed
that now they were back and more insidioUS

than ever.

The room where he stood was small and simple in de~ sign.  There was a
narrow window on each of three identical walls and a blackened stone
fixe place on the other.  The draperies had been removed, and the
fireplace mantel was clear of everything but the ingrained soot of
centuries.  An- drew lifted a book from the carton nearest him and
examined the title.

"You always loved a good mystery.  I still have several yo/a've loaned
me."

She batted the air disdainfully.

"Keep them.  I dinna need another thing to move."

"We share that, you and I. I love a good mysl~, I sense a real one
here.  Why would a woman who loch as you do sell her inheritance to
strangers, take the and move to a place she does no' love?"

"Och, it's no' so difficult, Andrew.  There's no need summon Hercule
Poirot or Jane Marple.  My girls

want this place.  One's in London, one in Paris, one in Aberdeen. I've
grown too old to care for the cottages alone, and why should I? So that
when I die, my girls can reap the profits?  No, I've sold it myself. 
I'm moving to Spain or Portugal, I've no' decided which.  I'll sit
outside in the sunshine all day if I like.  And when I die, there'll
still be plenty of money to divide between them.  No' that any of them
need it.  "

He was silent.  He understood everything that she'd said, but he also
understood the things she hadn't.  She had been forced into a corner,
with too little capital to make needed improvements and too little
strength to go on as she had.

She had convinced herself that unlimited sunshine would make up for the
loss of lifelong friends and a proud heritage.

Sympathy filled him, but he knew that Kaye would hate sympathy as much
as pity.

And there was still a mystery.

"Fine, then.  Let's say there was no other way to do things.  You woke
up one morning and determined that you had to sell.  Why Carlton-Jones
and Surrey?  lain's made it plain to everyone that he'll buy property
on the loch and beyond if it has to be sold.  He's warned of strangers
coming here to quietly buy up what they can until Druidheachd any
longer but a summer resort."

Your friend lain has his own reasons for wanting my would those be? "

; wants it all, does he no'?  It's no' enough that he's most of the
countryside.  Now he wants it all, vii loch .  And what are his
reasons, do you suppose?  " forced himself to speak slowly, without
passion.

"I

is to protect a village he loves and a way needs to change slowly and
carefully.  "

your Lord Ross!  That's why he wants it held himself in check.  He had
known this woman "Carlton-Jones and Surrey offered you more t was
worth, did they no', Kaye?  More than Did you no' see that this was the
way they

plan to make their start?  They offer more than your property worth,
and they'll offer more to the next man or woman, too.  Then, when
things have changed so profoundly that no one wants to live here,
they'll snap up what's left at a half or a third what it's worth.  "
She sniffed.

"They paid more than I ever thought I could get!  But no' because of a
plan such as the one you've outlined.  They're no' that crafty, Andrew.
They offered it because of the sighting.  Do you no' see? They've an
idea that this will be the next Loch Ness.  They dinna know our
creature.

They dinna understand that she shows herself rarely.  And by the time
they do understand and the tourists are all gone again, I'll be gone,
too.  With their money.  " He heard a plea for understanding and
acceptance.  He could only shake his head.

"They are no' fools.  They are the very men that lain warned you about.
My darling has nowt to do with their hunger for our land."

"Have you become like your friends, Andrew?  Duncan Sinclair owns the
only hotel in the village, and lain Ross owns most of the property
outside it.  Have you become greedy, too?  Do the three of you want to
control all that happens here?  Is that what this is about?"

For a moment he couldn't speak.  Anger flared so fiercely that it
threatened to consume his good judgment.  Then he calmed, a millimeter
at a time.

"Kaye," be said at last, "you.  have two choices, I think.  You can
look into your heart aria remember who Duncan, lain and I truly are.
You can remember that you've known us since the night we were born,
that as weans you bounced us on your knee and dinged our wee bottoms
when it was needed.  Or you can forget what you know and believe the
lies of two men with nowt to gain from telling the truth."

He didn't, couldn't, wait for her response.  He picked his way across
the floor and brushed past her without another word.  Spring sunshine
had brightned the sky when he first entered the house.  He noted that,
as he left it, dark clouds were forming.

As a young man just old enough to take his first drink, Andrew had
refused, to the dismay and ridicule of his

friends.  He had been solidly in his twenties before he tried beer and
older still before he turned to whisky.  Even now he monitored his own
response like a diabetic checking insulin levels.  He knew exactly how
much he could drink and still maintain his wits.  He made certain that
periodically he stopped drinking entirely, just to be sure that he
still could.  And daily he told himself that if the moment ever arrived
when he badly craved a drink, he would never take another.

Today, after his confrontation with Kaye Getston, he ordered whisky
with his supper at the hotel pub, savoring the roar as it plunged to
his empty stomach and echoed through his body.

He would have liked a repeat, but instead he took his meal, cold lamb
and colcannon--a puree of potatoes and turnips combined with chopped
cooked cabbage--to a table in the corner.  Frances Gunn, the hotel
cook, made the finest colcannon in the Highlands, but today Andrew ate
without tasting it.

Days had passed since he had seen Fiona.  He had thought it wise to
give both of them time to distance themselves from the events on his
boat.  Instead he had spent all his time remere bering how she had felt
in his arms.

He wanted to see her tonight, but he hadn't come to the hotel to find
her.  He knew that she wasn't upstairs, that this morning she had gone
to Glasgow with Duncan.  Several weeks before she had begun to make the
journey with Duncan whenever he went in for meetings.  Fiona visited
Sara in the hospital while Duncan worked.  Andrew suspected it wasn't
easy for her, that each lime she stepped in to the burn unit she was
assaulted by memories.  But she went anyway, because it did Sara and
Pamela good to have her there.

"Two can stare at the wall same as one."  lain lowered himself into the
chair beside Andrew and set an identical plate on the table.

Andrew hadn't heard lain approach.  He adjusted his chair so that he
could see his friend.  Marriage had been good to lain.  Like a fetal
cat who had been adopted and domesticated, he still retained his
watchful demeanor and quick reflexes.  But lain was more content than
Andrew had

ever hoped to see him, a far more optimistic version of the man he
once had been.

"Thanks for coming," Andrew said.

"I did no' really expect you to get away."

"Billie's off in the country somewhere with Mara, and it's not often I
get to sample Frances Gunn's cooking these days."

"Billie's every bit as good a cook."

"Absolutely true.  But she doesn't cook this."  lain pointed his fork
at his plate.

"Or kedgeree, or boiled beef and hodgils."

"My mum made kedgeree every time you came to eat with us, you liked it
so well.  She always said that if you grew tall and strong, it would be
her kedgeree that did it."

"How is she, Andrew?  I haven't spoken to her s'nice I told her about
the wedding.  Have you persuaded her yet to come back for a visit?"

"She will no' come, and I know better than to expect it.  I visit her
whenever I'm able.  She's made friends in life, and she has a job she
enjoys in a shop there.  I think she's fair satisfied with her life."

"I plan to take Billie to meet her one day soon."

"She'd like that.

She always asks about you and Duncan.  She was so happy to meet Mara
and April in the autumn.  "

lain began slicing his meat.

"You didn't ask me here to discuss old times, did you?"

Andrew considered how to begin.  He had always been a direct man, never
the least confused about what to say and when to say it.  But his
relationship wi/h Fiona seemed to have changed all that.  Now there was
much he questioned and even more that he doubted.  And most of all he
doubted himself and his own ability to make things right.

"Kaye Gerston has sold her property on the loch to Carlo ton-Jones and
Surrey," he said, when nothing better than the blunt truth occurred to
him.  lain took his first bite and didn't speak.

"Aye, it was a shock for me, too," Andrew acknowledged.  He knew his
old friend too well to be fooled.

"So, they've made a foothold at last."

Andrew pushed his own plate to one side and tilted back his chair to
see lain better.

"I spoke to Kayc this morning.  I spent the remainder of the day
speaking to everyone who would speak in return."

"And?"

"There are several more who are considering offers.  John Warren, Nancy
Reed, the Coopers, who own most of the western shore and my favorite
cove."

"I've spoken to each of them in the past and promised to buy their land
at fair market value if they ever wanted to

"Aye, each of them mentioned as much."  Andrew reached for his spoon
and began to drum idly on the table.

"When you do that, I know things must be worse than.  you've said."

"Have you done anything, lain, that might have angered the
villagers?"

"Are they angry?"

"Aye.  And all had the same defense.  You have more than you should.

You want more than you should.  Duncan is a greedy American and you're
an arrogant laird.  They've nowt bad to say about me.  No' yet.  But I
felt a Chill in the air as we spoke.  I'm one of the men of midnight,
for all that.  "

lain carefully laid his fork on his plate.  It was the equivalent of
another man pounding the table with his fist.

"I've been nothing less than fair to anyone here.  I lease land at a
rate far under that of other landlords, and I do whatever upkeep is
necessary.  My standards are high, my relationships with my tenants are
superior--or at least they have been until now.  I've sold property
when I've been asked, and donated land and money whenever the cause has
been just.  I certainly have more than any man de~xves, but I was born
with it.  And I've rectified that whenever I was able."

"Who is it you're trying to convince?  I know who you are and the way
you manage what's yours.  And I know why you want to keep Carlton-Jones
and Surrey from Druid- heachd."

"They're vampires.  They'll suck the blood from Druid- heachd so
quickly not even a transfusion will help.  They'll

take it-all.  Every last rock and grain of sand for miles around, and
they won't rest until they've gotten what they want.  It's a matter of
honor now, because I threatened them.  Months ago I told Martin I would
use my influence, as well as all the information I have about the ways
in which they've acquired land in other places, to keep them away from
Druidheachd.  I wasn't foolish enough to believe that I could stop
them, but I expected to slow them down, perhaps enough to rethink their
ambitions.  Apparently even that was foolish.  "

"What can be done about it?"

"Does it matter what I can prove?  Will anyone listen now?  Martin and
Nigel have obviously taken me at my word.  I said that I would use my
influence, and they've gun to erode that."  There was nothing humorous
in lain's smile.

"That's the part I didn't foresee."

"And the part that hurts?"

"Aye."

The two men stared morosely at each other until a third voice
interrupted.

"The two of you are looking pretty sober.

Shall I get Brian over here with a bottle of our best?  " Andrew gazed
up at Duncan.  He was glad to see his friend, despite the strain that
had developed between them since Fiona had come to Druidheachd.  He
silenced the internal voice that pointed out that Fiona must be hack
now.

"Have a seat, Duncan.  This concerns you, too."

Duncan grabbed a chair from another table, which wasn't difficult.

The tables nearest them were suddenly vacant, which inevitably happened
when the three men of midnight sat down together.

"Everyone's moved away," Duncan said.

"Did you see that?  No one left in shouting distance."

"You make too much of it, as always," Andrew said.

"Someday I'm going to rig the lights.  Then when I come over to join
you, I'll have Brian shove a switch somewhere and the whole place will
explode in bursts of lightning."

"And never more will another patron walk through that door."

"It might be worth it."  Duncan leaned hack in his chair like both of
the others.

"So what's going on?"

Andrew filled him in as succinctly as he could.  Duncan listened, and
nodded when appropriate.

"Well, that explains why it's been so hard to get anyone to work for me
or you, lain."

"I've been thinking about it all day.  The beauty of the scheme is
this," Andrew said.

"The villagers believe that Cadton-Jones and Surrey'only want their
land because of my darling.

But the villagers also know her habits well.  They believe that when
time passes and she's no' sighted again, the land will no longer have
value.  So they want to sell while they can.  Carlton-Jones and Surrey
have reinforced their view.  Both men are very adept at looking like
fools.  "

"When you were making your rounds this morning, did you ask those who
are considering a sale what would happen if your daring was sighted
again?  Wouldn't that increase the value of their land further?
Shouldn't they wait to sell?"  lain asked.

"Aye, I thought of that.  They responded that if my darling is sighted
again, it will bring more tourists, and they're fair tired of the ones
who are here already.  At that point, they would want to sell
anyway."

"A truly neat trap," lain said.

"Our credibility is quesrioned, our options narrowed.  I'll do what I
can to expose Martin and Nigel, but by the time I can make my ca~, it
may be too late.  If too many sell, there will be little incentive for
the others to hold on."  He stood and looked at his watch.

"I have to get home.  Billie should be back soon.

Let's talk some more tomorrow.  "

The other men nodded.  They were silent until lain had left the pub.

"Did you have a good day in Glasgow, Duncan?"

Andrew asked.  He couldn't resist the next question.

"And did Fiona see Sara?"

Duncan didn't look at him, which was unusual.  He looked just over
Andrew's shoulder at nothing.

"Andrew, she's still there."

For a moment Andrew was confused.

Sara?  "" Fiona I'm afraid Sara's taken a turn for the worse.  One of
those infections that can complicate things in an instant.

Fiona phoned while I was in a meeting.  She plans to wait

there all night if she has to, but she refused to leave until she got
some news.  "

"You left her there?"

Their gazes connected.  Duncan's eyes narrowed.

"She gave me no choice.  Weren't you the one who pointed out that I
have to let her live her own life?"

Andrew pictured Fiona in the' antiseptic waiting room at the end of the
ward.  He pictured tiny Sara, flushed with fever or shivering in the
grip of chills.  He shook his head.

"Would you have told me, Duncan, if I had no' asked?"

"I called your house the moment I got home.  When you didn't answer, I
came down here to see if anyone knew where you might be."

Andrew stood.

"I'll go.  I'll wait with her."  ]-Ie paused, expecting Duncan to
protest.

Duncan just nodded.

"I'd feel better if you did."

For most of her life Fiona had cultivated the art of sitting still.

She had learned to wait patiently, to accept what she was given and not
to expect miracles.  She had woven stories in her head to pass the
long, lonely hours, and when she was old enough, she had transferred
them to paper.  Although she had studied art in coil Re Fiona had never
thought herself much of an artist.  No matter how hard she tried for
precision, her drawings and paintings were softly focused impressions,
moody visual collages that suggested a universe of emotion She had
never actually been privy to.

Her profess oh had been encouraging, but more aggre~I've students had
garnered most of the awards and praise.

A senior class on illustration had changed that.  Fiona had thrown
herself into the final class projeet--illustrating a child's picture
book--with a fervor she hadn't even known she was capable of.  Instead
of the required folk or fairy tale, she had illustrated one of her own
stories, the birth of the water dragon Starddst in far-off Sep~ity
Lake.  Instead of the required dummy made up of preliminary pencil
sketches, she had submitted exacting pen and ink drawings washed with
dreamy watercolors.  Her instructor had been captivated, and so had the
children's book publisher who years before had been the instructor's
lover.

The result had been a contract for Fiona.  The patience she had spent a
lifetime refining hadn't even been required.

Without stamping an envelope, her career had been established.

Fiona knew how fortunate she was, and she guarded that fortune
jealously.  She had never expected another lucky break.  She had worked
tirelessly to bring that first book to fruition, and each subsequent
book, too.  She was a perfectionist who threw out one hundred drawings
for each one that she kept.  She haunted aquariums and zoos to capture
the sleek, supple movements of aquatic creatures, and she sat for hours
beside ponds just to understand the way that reeds rustled in the
breeze and sunlight reflected off gentle waves.

She seldom went anywhere without a sketchbook.  She had one with her
tonight because she had brought it to entertain the children in Sara's
ward.  It was a trick she had discovered several weeks ago.  When she
had sensed that the children were tired of hearing her stories, she had
asked them to write their own.  She faithfully recorded their ideas;

then, as they watched from their beds, she sketched their characters
for them, listening attentively to their suggestions and incorporating
them always.

There were more pictures today.  She had steeled herself to return to
the ward, even when she had discovered that Sara had been moved to a
room by herself.  She had forced herself to ignore the empty bed where
Sara should have been and to interact with the remaining children.  She
had tried to be cheerful, but the children themselves were more somber
than usual.  Sara was a favorite, the youngest child on the ward, and
everyone knew how sick she was.

Now Fiona flipped through today's sketches, as she had a dozen times
already that evening.  One boy's fantasy was a two-story fire-eating
monster who, with one indrawn breath, could extinguish any blaze.  She
stared blindly at that drawing.  Children were direct and
uncomplicated.  Had such a monster existed, the little boy wouldn't be
lying in the burn ward.

Tears filled her eyes, and anger filled her heart.  She closed the pad
and clutched it to her chest.  Long ago she had

learned the futility of questioning fate.  Now she simply railed
against it.

"Fiona?"

For one wild instant she thought she had imagined An- drew's voice.

Then she looked up and saw him standing in the doorway.  She dropped
the sketchbook to the seat beside her and brushed away her tears with
the back of one hand.

"When did you get here?"

Andrew ignored her question, walked straight over to her, lifted her
from her chair and took her in his arms.  She had spent days reliving
the feel of his body against hers, but now she discovered that the
reality was an alternate universe, so superior to fantasy that there
was no resemblance.

"Is she worse?"  he asked.

The words fell against her hair; his breath warmed her scalp.  She
clung to him, and the tears fell faster.

"No, but she's not any better, either," she said on a sob.

"If she's no' worse, then that's good."

"I'm so tired of sorting through things and pretending that the bad
ones are good because they could be worse."

She forced a humorless laugh that sounded more like a plea.

"Shh .... " He held her tighter.

"I know."

"She was getting better!"

"We both knew this could happen.  We'd been warned.  Pamela warned me
herself."

"Why didn't they protect her?  They shouldn't let any visitors on that
ward.  People bring germs with them.  They shouldn't have let us
visit."

"The hospital does its best.  I've never seen such attention to
detail.

And they allow us to visit because the children's spirits need healing,
too.  "

She was sobbing harder now.  He stroked her hair with steady, soothing
hands.  The more she tried to control herself, the more she cried.
Andrew continued to hold her, to stroke her hair, and sway gently back
and forth.  Finally, little by little, the tears began to dry.

He pulled a huge white handkerchief from his trouser pocket and slipped
it into her hand.

"Now wipe your eyes."

She did.  She could feel Andrew withdraw, not suddenly, but as if he
were weaning her from his support.

"I'm sorry,"

Emilie Richards 137 she murmured, swallowing the last of her tears.

Embarrassment wormed its way through her sorrow.  She felt worse with
each passing second.

"Fiona."  He lifted her chin so that she was gazing at him with
reddened eyes.

"Dinna you dare apologize.  I'd like newt better than to cry myself."

"Then why don't you?"

"I suppose I've forgotten how.  You'll have to cry for u~ both."  He
took her hand, then he sat on one of the sofas and pulled her down to
sit beside him.

"Tell me everything you know."

She had leaned against him enough.  She held herself away from him,
although he didn't drop her hand.

"She started running a fever this morning.  That's not unusual, but it
spiraled higher and higher as the morning went on.  By noon they'd
isolated her and started her on some heavy-duty medications."

"Is Pamela with her?"

"Yes.  But she's not allowed in the room.  She can watch through a
glass partition, but that's all."  She glanced down at her watch.

"Pamela came back about an hour ago to tell me that nothing had
changed.  They hope to see some improvement by midnight, but it's touch
and go."

"Did Pamela say that?"

"No.  She's trying to be brave.  But I know what I know."  He didn't
question that.

"Have you had supper?"

"No."

"Then we'll go downstairs together.  You'll eat whatever you can, then
we'll come back up here and settle in until we've heard good news."

"I'm not hungry."

"Did I ask if you were?"  He didn't smile.

"You'll eat anyway, and when we've gotten the news we came for, we'll
go back to the hotel" -- "What?"

"I'll reserve rooms at a hotel while you eat.  We'll no' be driving
back to Druidheachd after this.  It's far too late."

She contemplated that.  She'd had no plan at all, except to wait.  Now
she had a plan.  She'd had no hope of comfort.

"Now comfort sat beside her.

She'd had no hope at all.  But Andrew had enough hope for all of
them.

Until we've heard good news.

"don't know what to say" She searched his face.  For a moment his
resolve melted into vulnerabfiity.  Some unprotected emotion shone in
his eyeS.

"That's just as well."  "You didn't have to come."

"Aye.  I know."

She couldn't leave it at that, although it was safer.

"I'm glad you did."

"I know that, too."  He drew one finger along her cheekbone, as if
collecting teardrops.

"We'll always be glad to see each other, Fiona.  No matter how much we
deny it.  No matter how many mistakes we make with each other.  It's a
blessing and a curse, and still it does no' matter.  We'll always be
glad to see each other, no matter what sorrow it brings."

Chapter 10

Fiona was dozing on Andrew's shoulder when Pamela arrived to tell them
that Sara seemed to be responding to treatment.  She had stabilized,
which was the best anyone had expected so early in the crisis, and
there was every hope that by tomorrow morning her fever would begin to
inch back toward normal.  In the meantime, the little girl was
sleeping, and Pamela insisted that Fiona and Andrew do the same.  She
intended to use a hospital bed to get some sleep herself.

Fiona and Andrew were already heading toward the closest hotel before
they exchanged more than a few words.  She noted the way his strong,
wide hands tensely gripped the wheel, as if he were afraid he might
fall asleep if he relaxed.

"You don't think they're just telling us she's better so that we'll get
some sleep, do you?"  she asked.

"Could they just be putting a positive spin on it?"

"They could be, but I doubt it.  What need have they to spare our
feelings?  They're far too busy to be worried about

US.  "

"I guess you're right."

"There's nowt we can do tonight, Fiona.  We'll ring first thing in the
morning."

She fell silent again.  Rain had fallen throughout the evening, and
under the graduated glow of their headlights the street glistened like
gushing oil.  Just ahead a cat darted between shrubs lining the curb,
but there was no other movement.

Glasgow, Scotland's jittery, glittery diamond in the rough, was
sleeping soundly.

Andrew pulled into a space in front of a solid and monumentally plain
building.  Fiona had to squint to find the sign that designated it as a
hotel.

"It looks like the kind of place that caters to long-term residents."

"It does, but there was room for us.  I've a key to the side door."

"I imagine they'll think it odd that we're arriving without
suitcases."

"I explained."

She followed him inside, up a set of stairs covered in an endearingly
old-fashioned maroon carpet, past doors with cut glass knobs and wails
adorned with framed lithographs of the river Clyde.  He stopped in
front of the last door at the end of the hall and used an ornate key in
what was obviously a nineteenth century keyhole.

He ushered her inside.  The room was tiny, the carpet worn.  A musty
smell greeted them, as if the room had been closed up for months.  She
ran a finger idly along the wainscoting and found it dust free.

"It doesn't matter what it looks like.  It has a bed."

"I thought you'd he pleased to see that."

The bed was large enough for two, visibly sagging and smothered by a
chenille spread with a tartan blanket folded neatly at the foot.  It
gave her an odd sensation to stand there and look at it with Andrew
beside her.

"Where's your room?"

"At the opposite end of the hall.  Will you be all right?"  She had
expected to be, but something about the room gave her pause.  Her skin
tingled, one step from unwelcome goose bumps.  She couldn't put her
finger on the reason why, but she didn't feel comfortable here.  She
met his eyes anyway.  How could she complain when he'd worked so hard
to set this up?

"I'm probably going to be-asleep before I pull down the covers."

He handed her a small paper bag.  He'd already told her that after
picking up the keys he'd stopped at the chemist to buy them each a few
toilet ties They would be clean tomorrow even if them clothes
weren't.

"Loo's down the hall," he said.

"On the right.  I think there's a sign."

"Thank you.  For everything, Andrew.  I'd be spending the night at the
hospital if it weren't for you, and taking a bus home tomorrow."  ~ As
he handed her the key, he gave her a weary smile.

"I'll see you in the morning, then.  Shall I come for you about
eight?"

"As soon as you get up."  She realized she sounded like someone who was
already anxious to leave.

"I don't want to hold you up any longer than necessary."  Her smile was
a paler version of his.

He didn't touch her or even smile again.  He closed the door behind him
and left her standing alone in the room.

Fiona resigned herself to a long night and went down the hall to
prepare for it as best she could.

Back in the room she left the door ajar as she did another visual tour.
There was absolutely nothing to be frightened of here.  The room was
shabby but scrupulously clean; in fact, it wasn't too different from
the smaller rooms at the Sinclair Hotel.  The layout was nearly
identical, and the double-hung window that faced the street rattled
with a familiar buzz.  She told herself she was being silly.  At the
window she gazed below.  She could just see Andrew's car and,
surprisingly, Andrew.  She guessed he was getting something he needed
for the night.  Despite a chill wind brought by the rain, she unlocked
the window and tried to lift it.  She preferred the wind to the musty
smell, but she quickly discovered that the window wouldn t budge.  It
had been varnished shut.

Aware that if Andrew looked up, he would see her, she went to lock the
door and turn off the light.  When she returned to the window, he was
nowhere in sight.  She spread the draperies to let in the glow of the
street lamps before she turned down the covers.  She stripped off
everything except her panties, then slipped back into the long-sleeved
T-shirt she had been wearing.  Under the covers she watched light

play across the ceiling until her eyelids finally closed from their
own weary weight.

There Was an international conference in Glasgow that week, and not a
hotel for miles around had possessed a vacant room.  Andrew had snagged
Fiona's through sheer good fortune.  The old hotel nearest the hospital
seldom had rooms to rent for the night, and therefore wasn't on lists
for potential conference space.  There had been just one room, rarely
used and badly in need of refurbishing, that the proprietor had
begrudgingly rented.

"Dinna go expecting Gleddoch House or the Cop- thorne," he'd said in
his spiralling Glaswegian accent.

"And if you decide to share it with her, that'll be five quid more."

"I

will no' be sharing it.  " Andrew paid the modest price.

"And where will you go?"

"I'll sleep in my car.  It's no' a hardship.  I've done it before."

"You'll wish you'd driven home.  Cold i'll be tonight.  The rain always
brings it."

"I've blankets in the boot."  Andrew held out his hand for Fiona's
key.

The proprietor shook his head, reached under the counter and came up
with a key and a bottle.  He handed over both.

"You'll be needing this more than me, I ken.  And I've charged you
enough for the room to make up for it."

Andrew grinned and took both.

Now Andrew looked at the bottle.  It was by no means full, but it held
the promise of a warmer night.  He had made himself as comfortable as
possible in the back seat of his sedan.  The bench seat tilted up, so
no matter how hard he tried, he was wedged against the backrest.  His
legs were too long to stretch out, even at an angle, and he had to make
do with pulling his knees to his chest.

Propped in that position, he twisl~l off the bottle cap and took a
swig.  The whisky wasn't Scotland's finest, but it did the trick.  Heat
rushed through him, tingling through his limbs and warming his
fingertips and toes.  The prospect of the night ahead began to look
less bleak.

Leaving Fiona alone in the room had been absurdly difficult.  She
hadn't wanted to be there by herself.  She had attempted to be
cheerful, but the truth had shone in her eyes.  For the briefest moment
he had considered telling her the truth, but in the end he had rejected
it.  He might have stayed if asked, and his intentions would have been
the best.  But he was fast learning that even the best of intentions
had little effect where Fiona was concerned.

He could see her window at the building's corner.  Her light had gone
out some time ago, and he wondered if she was asleep yet.  He wondered
how she slept, on which side and how soundly.  He doubted that she
sprawled.  She had too little confidence for that.  She had spent so
much time in hospital, immobilized and tortured.  He doubted that she
had ever learned to enjoy her body, to fling it about and claim the bed
as her own.

Yet inside that body was a woman yearning to be free.  She was a
sensuous woman, one who loved color and images, who drank them in, then
spilled them across paper in tumultuous bursts of emotion.  He had been
entranced years before when Duncan had shown him Fiona's first book. He
had sensed the woman behind the illustrations, her loneliness, her
dreams.

He still sensed her loneliness, eVen when they were together.  But
Fiona's dreams were even clearer to him, if not to anyone else.  She
had been imprisoned in a tormented body that longed now for solace.
What had once known agony could know pleasure, as well.  Yet pleasure
sometimes brought greater pain, and she had endured enough of that for
a lifetime.

He could not be the one to cause her more.

He unscrewed the cap from the bottle again and took another, longer
drink.  It wasn't a night for arbitrary limits.  He was alone, in a
freezing car when he could be in a warm bed beside Fiona.  He imagined
what it would feel like to hold her in his arms under the tartan
blanket.  She had such doubts about herself as a woman.  She was sure
that her scars would kill a man's desire.  She had no idea how little
they would matter to him.  She had no idea how he dreamed

of the swell of her breasts, the delicious narrowing of her tiny
waist, the flair of her womanly hips.

What difference did scars make when it was the woman inside the body
that he wanted?

He closed his eyes and tried to let the whisk-y carry him off to sleep.
He was a large man and should have had a large man's tolerance for
drink, but the moment his eyes closed, he knew he'd had too much.  The
darkness moved, shifting in waves inside his head.  The car was parked
beside the curb, yet it seemed to race beneath him.  He clutched the
blanket he'd taken from the boot and kneaded it with his fingertips.
Finally he opened his eyes and sat up.

His head cleared almost immediately.  Rain had begun again, and he
listened to the soft splatter on his roof and windows.  He liked rain,
and like any good Scotsman had learned to ignore it when it was
inconvenient.  Now it emphasized the barriers between him and Fiona. As
the rain fell harder, it seemed to shrink the metal frame of the car
and imprison him.  He was used to solitude.  No matter how lively, how
outgoing, he was with others, he was most comfortable alone.  But he
wasn't comfortable tonight.  Tonight it seemed that none of the truths
or the lies that he regularly told himself could make any difference.
There wasn't much left in the bottle now.  He unscrewed the top once
mon~ and held it at eye level.  In the glow of the rain-shrouded street
lamps he could see the dim, distorted reflection of his own face.  At
no moment of his life had the resemblance to his father been clearer.

At first the smell of smoke was comforting.  There were bonfires in the
autumn in the field beside the hotel, and on the night of the Johnsmas
fair fires were built on the hillsides.  Her father held her on his
shoUlders so that she coUld peek over the crowd" and watch the flames
lick at the mists of evening.  Her father had broad shoUlders, and he
never complained if she forgot to sit still.  Her father was a strong
man.

He never grew tired when she sat on his shoulders, and he never scolded
her.

The smoke grew stronger, and she began to cough.  Just a little, at
first.  Not enough to wake her completely.  She lay

Emilie Richards 145 with her thumb in her mouth, sucking greedily on it
after each coughing spasm.  She wanted nothing more than to .  sleep.

The smoke thickened, and the coughing grew worse.  Each indrawn breath
tore at her lungs.  She burrowed deeper under the covers, but even they
couldn't filter the smoke.  At last she opened her eyes, but the covers
were pUlled over her face, and only darkness greeted her.

She was awake enough to be frightened, now.  She didn't like the
dark.

She didn't like the smoke.

"Duncan?"

She coughed again.  Duncan didn't answer.

"Duncan?"  She swatted the covers away, arms flailing faster and
faster.  She struggled to sit up.  The room wasn't dark.  There was a
strange and terrible glow, a bonfire on the floor beside her bed.  As
she watched, the flames licked higher and the smoke thickened.

And then her blanket began to smoke, too.

Fiona bolted upright, the tartan blanket clutched tightly to her chest.
A scream tore at her throat, but she smothered it with clamped lips.
Only a moan escaped, a pitiful, horrifying moan that started deep
inside her and went on and on.

She hadn't had the nightmare in years.  She'd thought she had outgrown
it, that the doctors who had encouraged her to talk about it had
finally put the nightmare to rest.  Soft lamplight spilled through the
windows, and she could see, as she forced herself to survey the room,
that nothing was wrong.  She sniffed, but she was greeted only by the
smell of old, worn carpets and stale air.  There was no smoke.

No smoke.

She was trembling.  Sleep had fled, and she knew it wouldn't be back
again that night.  She rose on legs so weak they threatened not to hold
her, turned on the bedside lamp and went to stand at the window.

The panes of hand-blown glass were so familiar, and so was the layout
of the room.  Even the musty smell touched a chord deep inside her. Now
she knew why she hadn't felt safe here from the beginning, and why the
nightmare had

come back.  She was alone in a room much like the one she had shared
with Duncan as a child.  There had been another bed, his, in the
corner, and a door connecting the room to her parents'.  But the room
had smelled exactly like this one.

Her mother had retrieved the heater and turned it on that night to
drive away the chill and the smell.

She leaned a pale cheek against the glass.  The street below was not
the high street of Druidheachd.  This was Glasgow, and she was safe.
Andrew was just down the hall.  Andrew.  She longed for him in that
moment as she had never longed for anyone.  She was no longer a child.
She was a woman, but still she longed to be enclosed in his arms.  Just
until the trembling stopped.  Just until she could remember exactly who
and what she was.

She didn't know his room number.  She couldn't knock on doors until she
found him.  She and Andrew would both be put out on the street, and
rightfully so.  She couldn't ask him to hold her, or to take her back
to Druidheachd.  She had to wait until morning when he came for her.

She had to wait and not fall asleep again.

She tried to focus on the street below, washed gently by rain as it had
been earlier.  Tears filled her eyes and dropped to her cheeks.  She
seldom cried.  She had learned too early that tears were little help.
Tears hadn't stopped the pain that had torn at her day and night for
months after the fire.  They hadn't stopped the relentless duties of
doctors rand nurses who hurt her terribly every time they touched her.
They hadn't softened the hearts of the child~n who had turned away from
her in horror when they glimpsed her scars.  But she had cried tonight
for Sara, and now she cried for herself.

There had been no fire in this room.  She was not imprisoned by walls
of flame.  She was imprisoned by her own memories, and by a nightmare
that hadn't disappeared, after all.  And calling to her from somewhere
over the prison walls was a man who claimed he wanted her, even as he
claimed that he didn't want to hurt her.

There was movement on the street.  She brushed aside her tears and
turned her head.  The door to Andrew's car opened, and Andrew emerged.
He looked up at the win Emilie Richards 147 dow, then, head bared to
the rain, he started toward the side door.

Confusion filled her, but only for a moment.  The situation wasn't
difficult to grasp.  Andrew had only been able to find one vacant room,
and he had given it to her.  He hadn't told her the truth because he
hadn't wanted her to worry.

He hadn't told her the truth because he couldn't imagine spending the
night in the same bed with her.

She told herself that the latter couldn't be true.  She was vulnerable
tonight, still immersed in the darkness of her dream.  Andrew wasn't
disgusted by her.  He treated her like a woman, not like a sideshow
freak.  And he hadn't seen what the fire had done to her.  He could not
be repulsed by what he only imagined.  When he held her in his arms,
there was no sign that he found her anything except desirable.  But he
had begun to discover what she really was.

She remembered the day he had massaged her leg.  Despite the fabric
covering it, he must have noticed how extensive the scars were, how
they bulged and twisted .  And he had touched her back.  His fingertips
had probed the skin there, skin laced so tightly with scars that there
was no skin, not skin like other women had, at least.  Her back was a
patchwork quilt of scar tissue, of skin grafts that didn't have the
resilience or appearance of normal skin, and sites where what skin had
survived the fire had been harvested for grafts on her leg and feet.

There was a knock at her door, and nothing tentative about it.  She
realized that she was wearing a T-shirt and lit He more.  She ran to
the bed, scooped her pants off the floor and sat to pull them on.  He
knocked again, louder this time.  She nearly flew to the door to let
him in.  A brief look down the hallway assured her that no one had been
awakened.

"What are you doing here?"  she whispered.

He slipped inside and pulled the door closed behind him.

"I saw you at the window."

"Yes.

I can see how you might have, considering that you were sleeping in
your car.  "

"There was only one room."

"I figured that out."

"Why are you up, Fiona?"

"Why did you lie?"  She stepped back to put more space between them.

"What point was there in giving you more to worry about?  There was
nowt to be done about it.  There's no' another room available in the
city.  I was lucky to find this."

"It's a large bed.  We could have shared it."

He didn't move, and he didn't speak.  Then he turned away.

"Why are you up?"  He went to the window, as if checking his car.

"I just am."

He glanced at her over his shoulder.

"I could no' see your face, but I had the feeling you'd been crying.  I
can see I was right."

Denial was absurd.  She knew her eyes were red, and her cheeks were
probably flushed.

"I had a bad dream.  That's all."

"All?"  He faced her, leaning against the sill.

"Do you l~ave them often?"

"No.  It was the room.  It smells like..."  She didn't want to say
it.

"It smells like a room in an old hotel.  Your room?"  She shrugged.

"Duncan and Mara make sure that all the rooms in the Sinclair Hotel are
clean.  And they air them constantly."

"But it was no' always so.  They've brightened things considerably."

"All right, Andrew.  This room smells like the room I had as a child.

And I guess that triggered my nightmare.  Because I was"-- She could no
longer be matter-of-fact.  She swallowed.

"Back there."  Her voice dipped dangerously.

She looked away.

"Fiona."  He reached her in three steps and pulled her close.  His arms
tightened around her.

He smelled like whisky, as well as the good clean scent of rain.  She
struggled to separate herself from him, but he held her tighter.

"I'm fine.  You're always comforting me, and you don't need to.  I'm a
grown woman now."

"Since when does a grown woman no' need comfort?"

"I'm not your sister."  She succeeded in pulling away.  His eyes
glittered strangely, almost as if he saw more than a delicately boned
woman with tear-stained cheeks.

"You've nowt to fear there.

I've no' thought of you as a sister since the day you stepped back on
Scotland's soil.  "

"Then how do you think of me?  Am I too pitiful to share a bed with?
Did the thought of sleeping beside me upset you too much to risk it?"
The words hadn't passed her lips before she regretted them.  They were
her worst fears, and only a tiny part of her believed them.  But she
was ruled by that tiny part, tossed and manipulated and horrified that
it might be true.  She had thought of herself as pitiful for so long
that even though she had made a fragile peace with her body, she was
not convinced that others ever could.

"Pitiful?"  His hand shot out and cupped her chin before she could move
away.  He held it tight and turned her face up to his.  His right hand
clamped hard on her shoulder.  She was immobilized.

"What have I done to make you think such a thing?"

"Let go of me, Andrew."

"Tell me what I've done!"

"You've slept'in your car rather than sleep in the same bed as me!"

"I slept in my car because I was afraid of what might happen if I slept
with you.  Shall I explain?"

Shame filled her.  She had bullied him into claiming to be attracted to
her.  She had exposed her deelx~t fears and humiliated herself.  And
for what?  How could she ever know how much truth there was in what
he'd said?  Andrew would never hurt her.  That was the one thing she
knew for certain.

"You diana believe me."  Anger sparkled in his eyes, and his mouth was
a grim line.

"You force me to prove myself."

"I'm not forcing you to do anything."  She grabbed his wrist and pushed
it away.

"Look, I'll help you make a bed on the floor.  Then neither of us has
to worry about anything."

"You're a far different woman when you're angry."  He held her by both
arms so that she couldn't turn away.

"There are signs that the wee lassie who kicked my shoulders and
pulled my hair is still inside you?"

"I'm a grown Woman!"

"Aye, that you are, Fiona.  That you are."  He tugged her closer.

"And I'm a grown man, no' a saint."

Before she could respond, he was kissing her.  He neither ravished nor
punished her lips.  He took them as if they belonged to him, as if she
belonged to him and always had.  He tasted like whisky and desire. She
could hardly breathe, but somehow it no longer mattered.  When his arms
encircled her they were not a prison but a boundary within which she
was nothing less than whole.

"Fiona."  His voice was ragged, and his breath was warm against her
cheek.

"I want you.  Can you doubt it?"

As if to prove his words, he pulled her hips to his.  He was aroused;

even a woman with no experience couldn't misunderstand.

Her doubts began to dissolve.  His lips were warm against her jaw, and
warmer as they searched for the hollow of her throat.  Her head fell
back, and she moaned.  He urged her hips closer, and she longed for the
brush of his naked flesh against hers.  Her mind filled with flashing
images, forbidden and erotic, of what it would be like to take him
inside her body, to merge with him, to swallow him so completely that
Andrew became a part of her fox ever

The images melted into reality, his hand kneading the fabric of her
T-shirt, then settling against her breast.  HIS thumb brushing slowly,
achingly, over the erect nipple.  She was flooded with heat, with
sensations long repressed.  She had abandoned hope that she would ever
respond to a man this way.  She had convinced herself that she had
nothing.  to give, and that in return a man wouldn't waste his time
giving her pleasure.  Now she understood that what gave her pleasure
also pleasured Andrew.  And that when she kissed him, touched him, his
satisfaction was as great as her own.

Even as she thought of touching him, she did.  The top button of his
shirt came free as she twisted the fabric in her hands.  The hair on
his chest was like silk against her palms and his skin was warm enough
to singe her fingertips.  He gave a guttural moan, an eruption from
deep inside him, and jerked her closer.  The shirt fell open as she
slid her

hands lower; buttons separated from buttonholes, and the fabric swung
free.

His chest was rock hard and ridged with muscle.  How could his skin, as
firm as steel, be so sensitive to her touch?

He buried his face in her hair and clenched her hips tighter.  There
were layers of cloth between them, but the heat of his arousal sought
the moist heat inside her as surely as if they were naked.

He groaned again as she explored with hands that fluttered over him,
learning the way the thick mat of hair' tapered toward his belt buckle,
the way that her touch dampened his skin with sweat.  She could feel a
tremor begin somewhere deep inside him.  She had done this.  She had
done this.

He kissed her again, a deep, dark kiss that reached all the way into
her soul.  There was nothing held back, no attempt to initiate her
slowly into passion.  He kissed her as if something had burst inside
him, something uncontrollable and new.  She shuddered with pleasure.
Heat and sensation spiraled through her.  She had done this.  She had
destroyed his caution.  She was no longer a burn victim but a woman.

"Fiona."  He filled his hands with her hair, tilting her head for
greater access to her mouth.  Then his hands traveled down her back,
kneading and stroking.  She was dizzy with the joy of it, dizzy and
throbbing.  When he lifted her shirt and touched her bare skin, she was
too caught up in her own desires to realize what he was doing.

At the end of the kiss her head fell forward against his shoulder.  He
was touching her breast now, not through the T-shirt but flesh to
flesh.  She had never experienced anything like it.  She bit back a
moan of pleasure and squeezed her eyes shut.

And just before they closed, she glimpsed her own bare feet.

She stiffened.  She tried to pull away from him, but he was beyond
explanation.  He murmured against her neck, her neck where a fine web
of scars was hidden by her hair.  He kissed her jaw, her chin and,
finally, her mouth.  His hand glided to her other breast.

She was torn in two.  Half of her wanted to beg him to continue, and
half of her wanted to cry.  She splayed her

hands against his bare chest and tried to push, but it only seemed to
excite him.

"Fiona, come to bed."  His voice was a deep rasp, a dark masculine
sigh.

' Fear began to fill the places where desire had been.

"An- d~v.  Stop."

He didn't respond to her command.  He hardly seemed to hear her
voice.

"How could you think I did no, want you?

You have dreams of the fire, and I have dreams of you Tears sprang to
her eyes, and for a moment she forgot to be afraid.  He dreamed of her.
He wanted her, despite what he knew of her injuries.  She would not
disappoint Andrew.

Then she looked down again and saw the horror that was her feet, feet
that had been seared by fire, feet that surgical teams had almost
despaired of saving.  Feet that for many years could not hold her
weight.  ~They served he_r proudly now, these battle-weary feet with
their scars and their perfect form, but they were a symbol of all she
had endured, and all she was not.

"NOV' She succeeded in backing away this time, sue- ceeded in breaking
free of his arms.

"Stop it, Andrew."

He was breathing hard.  His arms shot out again, and he reached for
her, pulling her back to him.

"You diuna mean it."  He didn't give her a chance to answer.  He kissed
her again, as if he would find his answer there.

She was afraid, but not of him.  She was afraid that he would stop
kissing her when he saw what she was, that he would push her away and
pity--or worse, revulsion--would finally cloud his eyes.  He'dhad too
much to drink.  She knew that now.  She saw it in his loss of control.
She saw it in the way he refused to listen.

He scooped her up as if she were nothing, a dust mote or dandelion
down.  He strode to the old bed and lowered them both to it with a
flourish of masculine strength.  Then he stretched out half over her.
She splayed her palms against his bare chest to ,kc~_ him away, but his
mouth ~. ,_es~_.  _n'd~e~_ hungrily to hers.  Dinna think about
anything but this, he moulded against her lips.

"Just this and nowt more."  He covered her hands with his own and
stretched them over her head.  His chest brushed against her breasts.
He pushed the knit fabric of her shirt higher until it was her skin~
her naked breasts, that lay against him.

"No!"  She twisted in panic to get away from him, twisted and fought
against the strength of the hand holding hers.

"You dinna mean no."  He freed her hands, but now both of his played
over her skin.

"You want me, and I want you.

There's no shame in this, Fiona.  "

"No!"  She twisted away, shoving him hard with her hands and her knees.
She sat up, then stood on shaking legs and backed away from him.

"Does no mean something different here than it does in America,
Andrew?"

He didn't answer.  He sat up slowly, almost as if he were in a dream;

then he turned his bael~ to her.  She watched him lower his head to his
hands.

She crumpled to the other side of the bed and did the same.

Time passed, although she couldn't have said how much.  When the
tension between them had stretched to a silent, shattering scream,
Andrew spoke.

"Are you all right?"

She hadn't expected his first words to be a question about her
well-being.  She had expected fury.  She deserved nothing less.  She
was a virgin, but she was not an adolescent drowning in her own budding
sexuality.  She was a woman, and she understood what it meant to lead a
man on.  She had asked Andrew for more than she'd allowed him to give
her.

There were terrible names for what she had done.

"Are you all right?"

she asked.

"No.  I dinna think I am."

She didn't know what to say.  An apology seemed useless, a thing so
slight that it would evaporate in the air be "I would no' have forced
you," he said.

"I know!  Andrew, I know yOU wouldn't have.  It's just that" -- "It's
just that I lost control."

She turned a little, but she could see only the back of his head.  He
ran his hands through his hair, but his head was still bent.

"If you ever needed proof that I'm not worth your trouble, this was
it," she said.

"If you ever needed proof that I'm not enough woman for any man..."

"The only thing we proved tonight was that neither of us knows what we
want.  At least, no' deep inside, where it matters most."

"I wanted you."  She heard a sob in her own voice.

"No' enough,."  He stood.

"And why should you have?"

"Andrew-" I would drive us home now, but I'm no' in any shap~ to drive.
Sleep if you can.  I'll be back for you in the morningo" " Where are
you going?  I'm not going to let you sleep in that car.  "

He turned at the door.  His eyes were bleak, and he shook his head.

"Dinna worry yourself, Fiona.  I dinna think I'll be sleeping at
all."

Chapter 11

The Honourable David Gow had a useless title and a penchant for hub lie
young women of good family.  The former had only become useless after
he had indulged his addiction to the latter once too often.  He had
been banished from London, fired from a prestigious position at the
Times and dispatched by his irate father to the backwaters of
Scotland--where a dowager aunt kept note of his every movement.

Despite his dark good looks and clever wit, there were few hub lie
young women of good family available to David now.

Between his aunt's eagle eye and his markedly reduced circumstances, he
had settled into a life of boredom so extreme that even the harsh
Scottish winter had seemed a diversion.  He had learned the subtle
differences between snow and more snow.  He had developed a reluctant
fondness for coal smoking on a soot-blackened hearth.  Even his
housekeeper Xrtolet, an old woman with more cheek than teeth, had
become a source of inspiration and intellectual stimulation.

Violet was the first to tell David of the creature that inhabited Loch
Ceo in Druidheachd, a village so remote that few had ever heard of it.
Violet had a sister who still lived in

Druidheachd, and she went there often to visit.  He had paid little
attention to Violet's story at first, since every loch in Scotland
seemed to have a dreadful monster with glowing eyes and reptilian
scales.

But when Violet told him of the most recent sighting, David's curiosity
had been aroused.  Time had passed since his exile, and he could assess
his future.  He wondered if perhaps he hadn't landed on both feet after
his long fall from grace.  His father was beginning to relent; David
had even been invited to return to London for a short visit.  Now he
needed a story, a dashing, gripping story that combined scholarly
insight with tabloid titillation.

One good story speeding over the international wire services could be
the ticket back to his former life.  The creature in Loch Ceo could buy
him that ticket.  David arrived in Druidheachd on a clear,.  warm
afternoon.

He had avoided the Highlands until now, convinced that if the rest of
Scotland was parochial, the Highlands were at best medieval.  Despite
himself, he had been charmed by the landscape and immediately caught up
in its spell.

There were no mountains anywhere in Europe that were quite like these.
The jagged peaks seemed to rip holes in the present and send time
spiraling out of sequence.  He would have to remember that line for his
article.

The high street of the village was anything but busy.  There were more
people on foot than in cars.  Neighbors chatted in front gardens of
blue delphiniums and yellow primroses.  An old woman who could have
been Violet's twin strolled toward a low-slung building with a willow
basket draped over her arm.  He followed her trail, scenting gossip and
information ahead.

Two hours later he was out on the loch in the launch of the very lad
who had sighted the creature weeks ago.  By this time David had heard
the story in more detail than he, the demanding, ever-thorough
journalist, had ever wished for.

"Right here it was," Jamie Gordon said.  He was a pleasant looking
young man, a bit gormless, but enthusiastic and open, nonetheless.

"A creature so fearsome ye'd have frozen in yer tracks, too.  Of
course, there were nae tracks to freeze in that day.  I'm thinking the
creature did no' know we

Emilie Richards 157 were there.  She had nae reason to think anyone
would be so gyte as to be out on the loch in a beastly storm.  "

"She?"  David asked.

"Aye.  She."

"You, umm... saw identifying markings?"

Jamie looked blank.

"You saw proof it was female?"

"Proof?  Like tits and such?"

David kept his composure.

"Yes."

"No.  Nowt of the sort.  But she's a lady.  Andrew MacDougall calls her
his darling."

"Andrew MacDougall?"

"Aye, MacDougalls have always lived on this loch.  An- drew's da saw
her once, ye know.  The night that Andrew and the other men of midnight
were born.  Did ye nae hear that story?"

"Men of midnight?"

"Aye.  Did ye no' say ye were a reporter?"  Jamie asked suspiciously.

Clearly he wondered how practiced David's skills could be.

"Tell me about these men of midnight."

Jamie did so, with relish.  David filed the story away in his mind.  It
was mildly interesting, but not of the scale he was looking for.

"Can you describe the creature again, Jamie?  Amber eyes, you say?"

"Aye, the color of aged whisky.  I'm no' a drinking man now, but
someone could show ye--if ye've never had the chance to see good malt
whisky in England."  He winked.

"And her neck was as long as a Scotsman's... legs, under his kilt."  He
winked again.

David gave the lad points for wit.

"You say you were frightened.  Was it only because you weren't
expecting to see the creature?  Or did she threaten you?"

"Threaten?  Our creature?  I think no'!"

"Then she's harmless?"

"Och, she's that and more.  She's as shy as a virgin.  She was as
surprised to see us as we were to see her.  She vanished immediately,
ye know.  Vanished so swiftly that if Peter had no' seen her, too, I'd
have wondered about my own sanity."

Evening was creeping their way.  The launch rocked gently beneath them
in sunset-hued waves.  Soon it would be time to go back to shore. David
had already taken a room in the picturesque hotel at the center of the
village.  He planned to stay on tomorrow, but he was already beginning
to feel frustrated.

So far he had not heard or seen anything that qualified as news.

There was no more to the story than had been reported--at least,
nothing more that he had uncovered.  There had been nearly a dozen
boats on the loch when he and Jamie came out.  He suspected that in the
weeks since the creature's sighting, a fair number of those boats had
been populated by reporters.  Unless there was another sighting, the
boats would dwindle, the story would be filed on the back pages of
village weeklies, and he would have to find another ticket back to his
town house in Kensington.

Unless there was another sighting.

"Do you suppose that your creature only comes out in a storm?"  David
asked.

"Nae.  She comes out when she thinks that nae one is there to see
her."

"That's always been the case, then?"

"Andrew MacI)ougall could tell ye.  He knows every story there is ."

David looked out over the water.  The loch was a large one.  From their
vantage point near the middle, all shapes on the horizon were
indistinct.  And as night fell, his view would be obscured even more.

"What do you say, Jamie.  Let's stay out tonight and see if we can see
your creature again."

"Stay out in the dark?  Michty!  I think no'.  I've seen her my one
time, but I'm no' one to challenge fate, Mr.  Gow.  I'd as soon be
slee~ing in my bed where there are nae creatures to be seen at all.
More's the pity," he added with still another wink.

"What will you take for the boat, then?  I'll take it out myself and
return it as good as new in the morning."

"My boat?  Oeh, nae.  I could no' let you have it.  It belongs to my
brother, too, and" -- "Fifty quid," David said in his most
authoritative voice.

"Ye say ye'll return it in good condition?"

"That's what I said."

"Seventy-five, then, and a deposit of the same.  I'll return the
deposit in good condition if the boat's come to nae harm."

"Done," David said.

Jamie looked pleased with himself, but he shook his head in sympathy.

"It'll be a long, cold night, Mr.  Gow."

David stared at the horizon.  The shore seemed to grow blurrier by the
second.

"I expect it to be, Jamie.  But some prices have to be paid.  And I'm
afraid I've had enough of Scotland's winters."

At first Stardust was afraid to venture into the middle of Serenity
Lake.  Although her fish friends still avoided her because they were
frightened by her size, it took no courage to stay close to the shore
where she had been born.  She was lonely, of course, and longed for a
companion.

Sometimes she imagined another dragon just like her, one with a neck
that rose from the water like a castle's tallest tower and a body that
made waves so high they gobbled up the golden sand on the farthest
beach.  For many months, imagining such a companion was pleasure
enough.

Then one day Stardust awoke from her bed in the reeds at the lake's
bottom, and she could no longer imagine another water dragon at all.
She tried all that day and into the evening.  But no matter how hard
she concentrated, no pictures would form in her mind.  Her imagination
was gone.  She had used it all.  Stardust knew, as she fell asleep
again that night, that at last she must cross the lake and find a real
companion.

Sara was better.  In the two weeks since the crisis she had grown
stronger, until her doctors were encouraged enough to continue' the
program of skin grafts and therapy they had temporarily put on hold.
She was back in the ward with the other children now.  Fiona had seca
her twice.  She hadn't seen Andrew at all.

"Andrew should be back before too long, should he no'?"  Mara asked one
morning.  She was peering over

Fiona's shoulder at a pen and ink drawing that Fiona was adapting from
one of her sketches.

"Should be."  Fiona really didn't know when Andrew would be back from
his final shift of the season.  On the morning following their
encounter at the old hotel, she and Andrew had lingered in Glasgow just
long enough to hear news of Sara's recovery, then they had made the
long trip back to Drnidheachd in near silence.  Without really looking
at her, he had asked if she was all right, and she had said "of
course."  She had tried to apologize; he had asked her not to.  And
very little else had been said.

"It seems a shame that he's no' here for all the excitement."

Mara didn't have to elaborate.  The excitement in question was the
newest sighting of Andrew's darling, several days before.  A reporter
from a tiny village in West Lothian had spent the night in a boat on
the loch, and just before dawn his journalistic patience had been
rewarded.

"I'm not sure Andrew would want to be here," Fiona said.

"This place is a three-ring circus."

"Would you enjoy having Andrew to supper when he comes back?  I always
enjoy see' rag him."

"I don't think so."  Fiona searched for an excuse.  Nothing occurred to
her.

"Do you feel that we're throwing you together?  Is that the problem?"

Fiona clutched at that.

"Andrew's very kind, but I don't want him to feel he has to make
something more of our friendship."

Mara touched her shoulder.

"He's very kind, it's true.  But never dishonest.  And he's as stubborn
as any Scotsman.  He's nearly as stubborn as Duncan, for that matter.
If Andrew felt he was being pushed, he would dig in his heels like my
prize tup on shearing day."

Fiona capped her pen and faced her sister-in-law.

"It's not Andrew, it's me."

Mara wailed for her to go on, but Fiona couldn't.

"Are you finished for the morning?"  Mara asked at last.

"Or shall I leave you alone to get on with it?"

"I'm done.  It's not turning out the way I wanted it to, anyway.  I
think I need the break."

"What's this book about, or is it bad luck to ask?"

"Stardust falls in love."

"Does she now?"

Fiona made a face.

"I haven't done one drawing that I like.  One water dragon per page is
plenty.  Two complicates things immensely."

"How true to life," Mara said wryly.

Fiona stood and stretched.  She had been at her drawing board most of
the morning.  She had spent hours here every day since returning from
the ill-fated night in Glasgow.  She had hoped that hard work would put
the encounter with Andrew from her mind, but she had failed.

"What are your plans for the day?"

"I'm going to start on the attic.  I thought you might want to help.

Billie's inspired me.  We've a miniature 'version of Fearnshader up
there.  Antiques and mementos from centuries.  I want to get to it
before it all crumbles to dust.  It's your family history, after all.
Yours and Duncan's, and April's, too.

No' to mention my own children's.  "

"Are you trying to tell me something?"

Mara's laugh was like quicksilver.

"I'm trying to tell you that we're trying, I suppose.  For that matter,
Billie and lain are, too."

Fiona's happiness at the news was tempered by poignancy, as so much was
these days.  She had never dared to dream she might have children of
her own, but now that fact seemed inexpressibly sad.

"I'm glad I've had a chance to practice this aunt thing," she said.

"I'd say you have it mastered.  April adores you."  They continued to
chat on their way to the attic.  Fiona couldn't remember ever having
been there.  It wasn't the sort of place where children would be
allowed to play.  Even with the lights on it was dark, and cobwebs
surrounded boxes and discarded furniture like ghostly shrouds.

"It's a fire hazard," Fiona said.

"I'm glad we're doing this."

"It is a wee bit of a mess.  And it will take more than a day or two,
I'm afraid."

"I've got time if you do."

They started with a tour, categorizing piles and scanning furniture.

"If we're unclear about anything, Billie can tell us what's Worth
keeping," Mara said.

Fiona tried to summon enthusiasm.  She needed a project of this scope
to help her regain her equilibrium.

"I think we should have some of the better furniture taken downstairs,
to that room off the kitchen, maybe.  There's nothing in there right
now except a few shelves.  We can get a better look at it and decide
what to do."

"Let's decide what we want to have carried down."  They settled on a
pair of round wooden tables, assorted chairs that had probably once
graced the dining room, a love seat upholstered in tattered green
velvet, and a pine cabinet that Fiona hoped to put beside her drawing
table to hold art supplies.

"That's a start," Mara said.  They had dragged everything except the
love seat to the top of the stairwell, and both women were panting. Now
Mara lowered herself to the love seat.

"There are so many stories here."

Fiona looked up from a book she had found on a tall pile of volumes.

It was a cookbook from the turn of the century, with hints on the
proper deportment of young ladies.  From the inscription she already
knew that it had been a birthday gift to one of her unfortunate
ancestors, a young lady named Glenda.

"Stories?"

"Aye.  Hundreds of them.  Can you feel them, Fiona?"  Fiona imagined
she held one of those stories in her hands.

"Isuppose.  If I ever need inspiration, I'd only have to come up here
and turn my imagination loose."

"The book in your hands..."  Mara nodded toward it.

"It belonged to a young woman with hair the color of yours.

She did no' live long enough to see her hair turn gray.  " Fiona stared
at her.  Mara shrugged sadly.

"I'm sorry."

"Sorry she died, or sorry you told me?"  Fiona waited, and when Mara
didn't answer she nodded.

"Sorry you know."  She was becoming used to Mara's strange ability to
know things others couldn't, and she was aware what a tremendous
handicap it sometimes was.

"It's as if I were born in a world with no walls.  Time seems to have
no barriers."  There was no self-pity in Mara's tone.

"Can you see everything as clearly as Glenda's death?"

"No, and I'm grateful for that.  I only know that Glenda died young,
not how or why.  I dinna see the past as clearly as the future.  I'm
only given glimpses.  This seat, for instance."

Mara stroked her hand over the worn velvet.

"Lovers once sat here and plotted to run away together."

She smiled.

"I can no' tell you when.  But they made their plans right here, and
executed them successfully, for all that.

I'm thinking they had a long and happy marriage.  "

"I like that story better."

Mara stood and began to wander.  The attic was huge.  They had barely
skimmed the surface today.

"There's something of you here, Fiona."

"Something of me?"  Fiona followed her.

"Aye."

"What do you mean, exactly?"

Mara turned.

"Most of the time I'm frustrated that I can see so much.

Just occasionally I'm frustrated that I can see SO little.  "

"There's something of me here, but you don't know what?"

"I'm afraid that's so."

"Maybe some of my childhood mementos are stored here."  "Perhaps." Mara
shook her head.

"No, that's no' it.  Although that may be true, as well.  But I sense
something " She shook her head again in frustration.

"Now, if I were no' so close to you, if I did no' love you so
well..."

Fiona was filled with a warm glow.

"I prefer the love to the clairvoyance."

Mara's smile was equally as warm.

"And so do I."  They ended up in a corner piled high with boxes that
looked newer than most of the others.  Fiona dug at the tape binding
the top one until she had loosened a corner, then she pulled it free.
She unfolded the flap to look inside.

"Look at this."

She lifted out a pipe and handed it to Mara.  A

quick inspection showed that there was an entire collection of them,
each wrapped in soft flannel.

"Some of these look to be quite old," Mara said.

"But no' all of them, though I'm no expert."

"My father had a collection of pipes.  I remember Dun- can telling me
about them when he came back from a trip here one summer.  He and
Andrew borrowed a pipe to smoke some old tobacco that they'd found, and
my father was furious."

"Perhaps these were his."

Fiona cradled the pipe against her chest, although she wasn't aware of
doing so.

"I'm sure they must be.  And these other boxes must be his things, too.
After he died, did Duncan pack all this and carry it up here?"

"I would doubt it.  Perhaps it was done for him, before he came back to
stay.  But he must know that it's all here."

"He and my father weren't close.  Maybe Duncan just didn't have any
interest in going through his things."

"Then you should," Mara said.

Fiona looked up.  She was torn by emotions and memories.  She
remembered the young father who had doted on her, as well as the absent
father who had cut her from his life.

"Do you think so?"

"Aye.  You wanted to help.  This would be the place to begin."  Mara
turned away before Fiona could read her expression or respond.

"It's late.  Perhaps I should see if I can get Duncan or someone to
start carrying down the furniture."

Fiona glanced at her watch.

"You're right.  But I think I'll stay here a little longer.  Just to
see what I've got ahead of me."  "Will we see you downstairs for
supper?"

"I think I'll eat in tonight.  But I'll come say goodnight to April
later, if that's all right."

"When has it no' been all right?"  Mara paused at the stairwell.

"I'll be nearby if you need me."

Fiona went through the pipes, one by one.  They were beautiful examples
of craftsmanship, each unusual and unique.  She wondered if her father
had inherited a collection, then added to it through the years.  She
knew almost

nothing about Donald Sinclair, except that after the fire he had ceased
to be a father to her at all.

And she knew the reason why.

On impulse she decided to take the box downstairs.  She suspected that
eventually she would find a display cab' met or shelf among her
father's belongings, because she couldn't imagine that he had kept the
pipes out of sight.  She was too much the artist to allow such finely
wrought objects to stay packed away.  If Duncan didn't want them, she
would find them a home elsewhere.

Halfway to the stairwell she heard the door open below.  Obviously Mara
had been successful in finding someone to haul down the furniture.  At
the top of the stairwell, she discovered whom.

With one foot on the attic floor and the other on the top step, Andrew
crossed his arms and blocked her path.

"Do you need help with that?"

Her hands had been perfectly steady.  Now they weren't.  She shook her
head "Thank.% but it's not hea " He didn't move to let her pass.

"You're looking bonny, Fiona ."  He was looking bonny, too.  He wore an
ivory sweater with zigzagging cables that emphasized the breadth of his
chest.  His jeans were faded, his shoes shined.  His hair, always a bit
shaggy, was boyishly rumpled by the same wind that had whipped color
into his cheeks.  But in the midst of that picture of good health and
cheer, his hazel eyes were unutterably sad.

She wished she had changed into something more flattering than leggings
and an oversize man's shirt.  She tried to smile.

"I think I'm just looking dusty."

"Then it becomes you."

There were a thousand things to say, and none of them could find their
way past her lips.  She settled for gossip over silence.

"Did you hear about the newest sighting of your darling?"

"Aye.  I heard.  The Honourable David Gow, alone in Jamie Gordon's wee
boat."

"There's been quite a stir.  Druidheachd is the newest mecca for
reporters and fans of the supernatural.  Every

room in the hotel is taken.  The Wongs over at the chips shop doubled
their prices, but they're still busy until midnight.  "

"I stopped by my house to get Poppy before I came here.  There were
three families from Edinburgh camping in my garden."

"Then you just got home?"

Her voice fell.

"And you came here first thing?"

He had come to see her.  Two weeks of doubts and fears rose up to greet
Fiona, but regret was loudest of all.

"An " You dinna have to say a thing.  "

"I think I do."  She forced herself to meet his eyes.

"I'm not worth your trouble, Andrew.  I'm insecure, and I haven't lived
enough to know how to make good decisions.  But the one thing I'm not
is stupid.  And I know that throwing away our friendship because of one
night when we were both unhinged is stupid."

"Our friendship is stronger than that."

"Can you forgive me?"

"I told you, Fiona, you've done nowt that merits forgiveness."

"I may be unsophisticated, but I do know what a tease

"And I knew your fears.  Perhaps we're both guilty.  You for issuing an
invitation you did no' mean.  Me for drinking too much and listening
too little."

If he had scoffed it off, she knew that their friendship would not have
survived.

"I did mean it," she said softly.

"I wanted you.  I still do.  But I'm not woman enough for you,
Andrew."

His reply came after a telling pause.

"Aye.  So you think."  He reached for her hand and brought it to his
lips.  He kissed her knuckles and held them against his cheek for a
moment.  Then he let her hand drop.

"The games are over, Fiona.  I'll no' ask you for anything again.  But
if you come- asking, be absolutely certain you intend to take yes for
an answer."

She didn't know what to say, and then it didn't matter anyway, because
Duncan was standing on the bottom step looking up at them.  Fiona
wondered how much he had heard.

He spoke, and from the tone of his voice she knew he had heard it
all.

"Kaye Gemon called the desk, looking for you, Andrew.  She wants to see
you tonight, at her place."  Andrew didn't look at him.  His gaze was
still on Fiona.

"I half expected Kaye to be gone by now.  Did she say what it's
about?"

"Nancy at the front desk took the call.  That's all she said."

"Here's the furniture that has to go down."  Fiona gestured toward the
grouping to her right.

"It's a good start toward getting this place cleaned up."

Andrew reached for two chairs.  She stepped out of his way, and Duncan
did the same when Andrew reached the bottom of the steps.  In a moment
he was gone.

"Are you going to help, too, Duncan, or are you going to stand there?"
She started down the stairs toward him.

"Don't take out your anger at Andrew on me."

"I'm not angry at Andrew or you."  She stopped on the step just above
him.

"Then what was that about, or maybe I Shouldn't ask."

"You shouldn't," she said firmly.  There was nothing his imagination
could conjure that was worse than the truth.

"Then just tell me this much.  Are you okay?"

She hadn't been.  She realized that now.  For two weeks she definitely
had not been okay.  But now she was, because Andrew was hack, and that
revelation was frightening enough to erupt as anger.

"If you really want to know, none of this is easy!  I feel like
Sleeping Beauty.  I've been asleep for years while the rest of the
world went on with its business."

' "You weren't as isolated as all that."

"I might as well have been asleep for all I learned."  He didn't answer
directly, but his stern mouth relaxed.

"I

talked to Mother this morning.  "

Fiona had studiously avoided conversations with their mother since her
arrival.  She had studiously avoided con168 MacDougall' sDarling
versations about their mother.

"I.  hope she's well," she said stiffly.

"She is, but she's convinced you aren't.  She's threatening to come and
see for herself."

"Mother on Scottish soil again?  I don't think so."

"Talk to her, Fiona.  Reassure her."  He smiled sadly.

"Keep her away."

They were eye to eye now.  Equals, thanks to the steps.  She saw the
concern in his eyes and sighed.  I'll call her.  "

He didn't move aside.

"Just tell me one more thing, will you?  If you're Sleeping Beauty, who
is Andrew, exactly?"

Fiona knew this could no longer he avoided.  There was no room for
secrets among the three of them.

"I'm afraid that Andrew's the prince who's convinced he's not up to his
role.  And I'm the princess who isn't sure whether she should sleep
another hundred years or awake from her spell."  He put his hand on her
shoulder.  One gentle hand.

"You always took fairy tales too seriously."

"I have a feeling that until I take this one seriously, Dun- can, the
words happily ever after are never going to have any meaning for me
again."

Chapter 12

Now that Midsummer Day was just around the corner, sunlight was a
friend to be counted on.  There were still hours of it remaining when
Andrew readied MacDougall's Darling for the journey to Kaye Gerston's.
He'd made himself an early supper and eaten it on his pier, where he
could watch the shabby parade of boats on Loch Ceo.  Rubbish floated
toward him on the gentle waves, discarded soft drink cans and food
wrappers.  The air was perfumed with exhaust, and a stone's throw from
the pier's end, a rainbow- hued film of petrol from someone's poorly
maintained motor glazed the water.  In the rush to profit from the
sightings, the villagers fortunate enough to have boats had pressed
them into service, and weekend sailors from nearby towns had busied
themselves at the public launch.

Andrew climbed onto the bow and slid to the edge to check a mooring
rope.  It seemed sound when he tugged, but he untied it anyway, then
knotted it once more to be certain, checking for defects as he did.

"I dinna know what they think they'll see," he said, gazing out at the
water.

"You're no' going to show yourself again, are you, darling?  I suppose
this means I wffi no' have my chance at you, either.  But I'd as soon
you stayed hid170 MacDougall s Darling den now, even from me.  Who
knows what this mob will do if you shoW yourself again?"

"Hello!"

Andrew looked up but couldn't immediately locate the pleasant
baritone.

"I say, over here."

Andrew spotted the man, tall and fine-boned, on the pier just behind
the stern.

"Just a moment.  I'll be with you directly."

Andrew tightened the knot to his satisfaction, tugged it three times to
test it, then slid back across the bow to the deck.  He vaulted over
the side to the pier and faced his visitor.

"I'm surprised my dog did no' announce you."  Andrew held out his hand
as he introduced himself.

The man took it in a firm handshake.  He was dark-haired with a
particularly winning smile.

"I made friends with him, I'm afraid.  He won't do as a watchdog, will
he?  Not if prowlers know to scratch his ears.  I'm David Gow."

"So you're the one who claims to have seen my darling."

"I did see her.  Quite a sight, your darling."

"So I've been told."

"Then you've never seen her yourself?"

"Just in my dreams."

David's expression didn't change, but Andrew had the feeling that he
was being examined thoroughly.

"I've a favor to ask you, Mr.  MacDougall."

"Andrew."

"Andrew, then.  I'd like a tour of the loch in your boat."

"Have you no' already seen what you came for?"

"I suppose it might seem so.  But it was a bit like putting the cart
before the horse.  I saw the creature before I'd had a chance to hear
all the stories about her.  And I'm told you tell all the best
stories."

Andrew didn't respond to the flattery.

"And what will you do with whatever I tell you?"

"I'm writing a series about my experiences here.  I hope to include
whatever I learn from you."

"And if I dinna agree?"

David Gow seemed taken aback.

"I'll pay handsomely.  I only want a few hours of your time."

"It's no' the money, Mr.  Cow.  No' all of us are willing to sell
ourselves."

"It's David."

Andrew reluctantly admired the way Gow stood his ground.

"What if I say no?"

"Then I may get some of my facts wrong.  I doubt either of us would
like that."  There was no threat in Gow's tone, but he was clearly a
man who was used to getting his way.  Andrew hadn't intended to take
anyone out in his boat for a few days.  He was weary from too little
sleep, and his throat was raw from long hours on a windswept oil
platform in the North Sea.  He had planned to rest and recover.

"When?"

"Tomorrow, if you're willing.  I've just been waiting for you to
return."

"Then tomorrow it is.  Shall we say noon?"

"Splendid.  Thank you."

David paused.

"Oh, one more thing ... Andrew.  My housekeeper came up yesterday to
visit her sister.

Would it be too much trouble if they came, too?

It would please Violet, I know.  "

Andrew wanted to dislike David Gow.  He didn't believe that Gow had
seen his darling any more than he believed that Martin Carlton-Jones
and Nigel Surrey had the best interests of Druidheachd in mind as they
sought to destroy its way of life.  But this man was not exactly what
Andrew had expected.

"Bring them," he said gruffly.

He stepped back, turned and whistled for Poppy.  The dog appeared,
slinking low to the ground, as if he knew that he'd failed a major
watchdog examination.  Andrew motioned him into the boat; then he
walked toward the bow to untie the mooring rope.  Without being asked,
Cow untied the one at the stern.  Andrew stepped on board, and Gow
tossed him the rope.

"Tomorrow," he said.

Andrew grudgingly lifted a hand in farewell.

"If you see your darling, Andrew, tell her I send my greetings."

I'll tell her you hope to make her acquaintance one day.  " Andrew
started the motor.  If David responded, the words were lost in the
resulting roar.

There were no workmen at Kaye's when Andrew cut the motor and drifted
the remainder of the way to the one pier still left standing.  Little
had been done since he had been here last, and that surprised him.  He
had steeled himself to see the cottages gone, the old hazel and beech
trees toppled to the ground.  Instead, everything was much as it had
been, except that there was no sign of life, not even a light in Kaye's
house.

He tied the boat and went in search of her.  She wasn't in her house,
as he had guessed.  He found her digging in the perennial border that
snaked along the drive leading to the cottages.

He watched as she pounded a spade into the midst of a clump of greenery
with her foot and pried her prize from the earth.  She laid the
contents of the spade on the grass at the border's edge; then she
lifted her hand and wiped her brow.

She looked tired.  For the first time Kaye Getston truly looked old.

Andrew cleared his throat, wishing as he did that he'd chosen another
method to announce himself.  His throat clenched painfully, and he
coughed in protest.

"Lord love us!  What did ye plan to do next, Andrew?

Jump up and down and skreich?  " Kaye faced him.

"I'm sorry.  I suppose I've picked up something I should no' have," he
said hoarsely.

"Then stay away from me.  I've enough problems without yours, too." She
sighed.

"Come inside, lad, and I'll make you something for the cough."

He followed her meekly.  He'd had every intention of he- ing forceful,
and now he wanted only to sit and rest in her warm kitchen.

Kaye had no more opened the door than he realiTed that something was
amiss.  There were still boxes in the foyer, but many fewer.  In the
sitting room, books were neatly in place on shelves once more, and the
mantel was lined with mementos.

Furniture stood in disciplined rank~ against the walls as it had in the
days before Kaye's dainty daughters had arranged it in intimate
groupings.

"I expected to see the house empty," he said.

"Then you expected wrong, did you no'?"

"I've been wrong a time or two before."  He followed her into the
kitchen and took the chair that she designated with a wave.

As he watched, she plugged in her kettle, then, as the water heated,
she retrieved a bottle of Scotland's finest and liberally baptized an
oversize cup with the contents.  When the water boiled, she topped the
cup and added a squeeze of lemon and a spoon of honey.

"Drink it.  Every bit," she commanded.

He didn't need to be told twice.

"Sometimes you remind me of Terence," she said.

"He sat in this very kitchen more times than I can remember, sipping my
whisky and telling me stories.  You're his image."  He immediately
sipped slower.

"He was a good man, your da."

Andrew was tired, and even the warmth of Kaye's toddy did little for
his aching throat.  He wanted to be charitable toward his father.  He
nearly always managed charity, if not love.  But tonight he couldn't
find either within him.

"My father was a boozer," he said.

"And if you fed him whisky, you must have seen him here often.  He
would take whisky wherever he could get it.  Toward the end, he would
take anything with alcohol in it."

"You sound bitter, lad.  I've never heard you sound bitter."  "I know
what he was."

"I think perhaps you may no'."

He looked up at her.  Her brows were knit in a scowl.

"I lived with the man, Kaye.  If I dinna know, then who does?"

"Did you know that when we were in school, your da took all the
prizes?"  After he shook his head, she went on.

"There was no one brighter than our Terence.  No one who could take an
ordinary day and turn it into a story that had everyone gasping for
breath.  And his smile..."  She smiled herself.

"He turned the heads of all the lasses in the village with that smile.
Mine included.  But he had no eyes for me or anyone but your mum.  And
Jane loved him equally as well.  That's why she never left him, Andrew.
Och, she had reason to.

We both know she did.  But when he was no'

drinking, he was an angel come to earth, with a sweetness, a clarity
of thought, a vision of a world the rest of us could no' see .  "
Andrew felt as if someone had wrapped their fingers around his throat
and was squeezing hard.

"I look in the mirror sometimes, and I see him staring back at me."

"And well you should.  Because you're like him, Andrew.  You're what he
could have been if the drink had no' got hold of him?"

"He got hold of the drink.  And the rest of us watched him drown in
it."

"He loved you very much.  He tried to stop drinking for you and for
your mum.  In the end he could no' stop for anyone.  And he was afraid
that you'd be bitter."  Andrew was silent as he finished his drink.  It
was the odd eat of nights.  He rarely discussed his father, and now the
fingers on his throat were squeezing harder.

"I suppose you're wondering what's happened to make me ask you here,"
Kaye said, changing the subject.

"It's occurred to me to wonder."

"I have no' signed the final papers for the sale of this property."

"Have you no'?"  he asked, with no change of expression, although his
pulse sped up a beat.

"I just said so, did I no'?"

He nodded.

Kaye sighed and crossed her arms.  In the light of the kitchen, Andrew
could see that her red hair was turning white, one inch at a time.  He
wondered if that was the reason she suddenly looked so old, or if she
had decided not to dye it anymore because she really was old and knew
she could no longer fool herself.

"I'm dying, Andrew."

He set his cup on the table.

"What do you mean?"

"I've leas than a year to live.  I've known for some time.

I suppose I thought that if I left here I could change it somehow.

Change homes, change fate.  " She shook her head as if she couldn't
believe she'd been so foolish.

"But I know better.

My decision caught up with me.  You're responsible, if you must know.
You and your defease of lain and Dun 175 can.  I wanted to believe
differently, because it suited me.  But I know those lads nearly as
well as I know you, and I could no' fool myself forever.  And when I
began to question.  "

"They're good men."

"Aye.  So I've talked this over with my girls.  They want me to stay
here, where I'll be most comfortable, and for once they're right.
They'll each he coming home in the next months to spend time and say
goodbye."

"Are you certain you're dying?"

"Of course I'm certain!  Do you think I'd be wrong about something as
important as that?"  She softened her words with a reluctant smile.

"Ah Andrew, lad, you dinna want to believe it, that's all.  I suppose
I'm glad."

This time his voice was hoarse from more than encroaching illness.

"I'll miss you."

For a moment, just the briefest moment, she looked sad, too.  Then she
shook her head.

"We'll have none of that, Andrew.  I'll be here a while yet.  And we
have to make plans."

"Do we?"

"Aye, because I've decided to leave you this land when I die."

For a moment he thought he'd heard her wrong.

"Me?  But why?"

"You're the only one who will no' turn it into a blasphemy."

"Your girls deserve to inherit this, Kaye."

"My girls dinna want it.

And they've done well by themselves.

There was more of me in each of them than I ever believed.  They've
good professions and strong marriages.

No' a one of them needs what the sale of the land would bring.  I've
made a wee bonny investment or two over the years.  They'll each get a
good bit to ~eraember me by.  "

"Is it really possible to back out at this late date?  There's been
work done on the property already, work ordered by Carlton-Jones, as I
understand it."

"The piers had to be replaced in any case.  I'll pay the men for their
labor myself.  But I've checked carefully, Andrew.

The property is still mine until I sign the final document, and I can
change my mind, like any good lass.  "

"Carlton-Jones and Surrey will no' sit idly by.  They'll
threaten..."

He stopped.

"Have they threatened?  Have you told them?"

She smiled slyly.  For a moment she looked younger, and as healthy as
ever.  He understood why when she spoke.

"No.  i've no' said a word.  They're staying in Fort William for the
night, and they're expecting me to deliver the final papers there in
the morning.  Telling them will be your task,

Fiona sat in the hotel dining room, at a window overlooking the green,
where preparations were under way for the annual Johnstoas Fair.  She'
had intended to have supper with Mara, but early in the afternoon Mara
had been called away to her shop because one of her helpers was ill.
Duncan had gone to Inverness on overnight business, and April was
staying with a friend.  Fiona had agreed to troubleshoot if it was
needed while Mara and Duncan were away, but so far--thankfully--the
hotel had run smoothly.  She had spent much of her life alone, and
she'd developed a fondness for solitude.  Now, after just six weeks in
Scot- land, she was sorry to be sitting by herself.  She had discow
ered she was a social creature at heart, happiest when she was with the
people she loved.

Happiest of all when she was with Andrew.

"Miss Sinclair, one of the guests is unhappy with his room, and he
wants to speak with you."

Fiona had been so immersed in her thoughts that she hadn't heard Nancy
approach.  She was a young woman with a sweet face and congenial manner
who tended the desk with the same love and care with which she tended
her two young children.  She was also experienced in handling difficult
guests and rarely needed anyone to run interferenee for her.

"What's the problem?"  Fiona asked.

"It's the pounding."  Nancy gestured toward the window.

"He says that he can no' work with the noise from the green.  He's a
journalist for some paper or tother.  He's the one who saw the
creature, you know."

"Can't you give him a room on the other side of the hotel?"

"There's no' another room to be had.  We've guests sharing as 'tis who
hardly know each other."

Fiona resigned herself to a confrontation, she who had once been too
shy to start a conversation.

"I'll talk to him."

"I was hoping you would."  The man's voice came from behind Fiona, and
she turned.

"I'm the guest in question," he said.

"David Gow, recently from London.  And you sound like an American."

"Really, Mr.  Gow."  Nancy said, "I expected you to wait for Miss
Sinclair in the lobby."

"Fiona Sinclair."  Fiona held out her hand.

"It's okay," she told Nancy.  She started to get up, but David waved
her down.

"I don't want to interrupt your supper.  I just want to join you," he
said, with a smile that could recharge a battery.

She liked him immediately.

"Most irregular, Mr.  Gow," she said in her best imitation of an
upper-class English dowager.  She lifted one brow with an elegant
quirk.

"I'm afraid I am most unconventional.  My family despairs of me."

She gestured to the chair in front of her.

"If I offer you a seat, will you agree to stop complaining about the
noise?"

"Entirely possible."  He took the chair and pulled it close to the
table.  Muttering under her breath, Nancy left them alone.

"It was all a ploy to meet you, you know," he said with another
high-voltage smile.

"Although now that I have, I wonder, have we met before?  Your name
seems familiar, although I'm certain I'd have remembered the face."

"We haven't met," she assured him.

"I've seen you around and inquired a bit."

"A detective in our midst.  Why did you want to meet me?  Are you doing
a piece on hotels for your paper?"

"Only a very intimate piece on beautiful hotel owners."  She saw he was
serious--as serious as an obvious philanderer like David Gow could ever
be.  Six weeks ago his admiration might have puzzled her.  It certainly
would have

dismayed her.  Now she was simply intrigued.

"What do you find beautiful about me?"  she asked.

He cocked his head, like a portrait artist assessing his newest model.
The server arrived with Fiona's tat ties and mash, and David ordered a
drink.  He waited until they were alone again before he answered.

"Some women are beautiful because of a feature or two.  Lush, kissable
lips, startling eyes."  He shrugged.

"Some have no outstanding features, but their face is a perfect blend,
a designer masterpiece.  And some women, like you, Fiona, aren't
technically beautiful.  No lips or eyes to build a temple to, no
boring, vacuous symmetry of features.  Just a strength of character and
a feminine grace that transcends the ordinary."

"You are very good at this."  David's words had given Fiona a warm
glow.  As practiced as they obviously were, they seemed to have been
recited with sincerity.

"Better than almost anyone."  He lifted his drink to her.

She leaned forward.

"Am I supposed to crumple at your feet now, or much later down the
road?"  She really wanted to know.

"It would save us both a great deal of time if you crumpled
immediately."

"I'm afraid I've never crumpled.  I warn you, I might get it wrong."

His eyes sparkled seductively.

"I would be pleased to assist in every way."

She laughed.  She would never have believed that flirting with a man
could be such fun.  David Gow was handsome and charming, a lethal
combination for a woman with no confidence.

But Fiona had grown beyond that woman.  She had unfurled her feminine
wings, and even if she wasn't confident enough to fly, she could
flutter her wings provocatively.

"You're not taking this at all seriously, are you?"  he

"Not one bit.  But you're a terrific ego boost."

"I'm pleased to be of service.  Any service."

"Fiona."

Fiona turned at the sound of another voice.  She watched Andrew
approach from the rear of the dining room.  The warm glow inside her
ignited into something more exotic.

"Well, hi.

What are you doing here?  "

He nodded curtly at David, as if they had already met.

"I'm looking for Duncan."

"He went to Inverness this afternoon, and he won't be back until
tomorrow."  She searched Andrew's face.  He looked tired, more tired
than she had ever seen him.  His hair was rumpled, and stubble carpeted
his cheeks.  Concern filled her, replacing the excitement she had felt
at his arrival.

"Are you all right?"

He brushed off the question with a wave of his hand.

"I'll he going, then."  He nodded toward David and started out of the
dining room.

"Would you excuse me?"  she asked David.  She tossed her napkin on the
table, and before he could answer, she started after Andrew.

She caught up with him in the lobby.

"Andrew!"  She put her hand on his arm.

"What's going on?"

"I dinna want to interrupt your supper, Fiona."  There was no smile to
soften the words.

Despite the curtness of his tone she didn't drop her hand.

"It doesn't matter.  Is something wrong?"

"I wanted to see Duncan, that's all."

"Well, I'm in charge until he gets back.  Can I help?"  He looked more
exhausted by the second.  When his voice emerged, it was one decibel
stronger than a rasp.

"It's been a night for good news and bad.  And I wanted Duncan to help
me deliver some of it."

She nodded, as if she understood, even though she didn't.  She felt
emboldened by her concern and by the sheer pleasure of being in his
presence again.

"Well, will I do instead?"

He opened his mouth as if to refuse.  Then he clamped it shut.  He
stared at her for a moment.

"You've left Gow sitting in the dining room."

She shrugged.  She had already forgotten about David Gow.

"I'll apologize.  No doubt he'll attach himself to someone."  '

"What about your supper?"

"You look' like you could use some company.  I'll take it back to the
kitchen and have Frances save it for me.  I'm not even hungry."

"It's a long drive."

She laughed.  He was making excuses for her, but she was in no mood to
accept them.

"Good grief!  I'll take an apple."

He seemed torn.  She touched his stubbly cheek.  She tried to make her
fingertips convey what her lips could only hint at.

"It would give me the greatest pleasure to be able to do something for
you for a change.  May I do this?"

"What about the hotel?"

"Mara's due back any moment.  It will be fine."

"Come on, then," he said, turning away from her.

"I'll wait for you in my car."

His task to break the neWs to Carlton-Jones and Surrey.  And his task
to spend the evening with Fiona beside him.

There was an incomparable sweetness to each, particularly the latter.

Fiona sat in the seat next to his, her hair the same brash gold as the
twilight horizon, and Andrew felt as if the sun had come to bide awhile
beside him, He had been unaccnuntably upset to find her talking to Gow.
He had nowt against the man--except that he was an obvious liar--but he
wondered if Fiona realized that men like Gow devoured women for the
sheer pleasure of it.  She was a hairn when it came to men.  She had no
idea how voracious, how self-indulgent, they could be.

Despite repeated evidence, she had no idea how much Andrew ached to
indulge him.  qeff at her expense.

"I haven't been to Fort William before."  It was Fiona's fourth try at
conversation.  Unsure what to say and confused by his own feelings, he
had hardly responded to the other three.  She seemed undaunted.

"I've nowt against Fort William.  It's pleasant enough."

"But?"

"There was no 'but."  "

" You don't sound enthused.  Andrew, are you ill?  "

He probably was.  Andrew was beginning to realize that his throat was
not just raw from exposure.  He had to struggle to make himself
heard.

"I suppose my mind's on what I'm about to do."

Fiona turned to watch him.  He didn't have to see to know.  He could
feel the subtle shifting of her body, hear the rustle of her clothing.
The soft swish of fabric against upholstery, the soft whisper of one
leg rubbing against the other.

"Why don't you tell me what's happening?"  she said.  He did, because
it was easier than just sitting beside her, imagining each breath she
took, each move she made.  He planned just to give her the briefest
overvieW, but she asked questions, and he elaborated.  When he got to
the part about Kaye's intentions to will him her property, Fiona
whistled softly.

"Andrew, what an incredible gift."

"I still dinna understand."  He was surprised to find he had relaxed
considerably.  Just the sound of Fiona's voice was healing.

"What don't you understand?  She wants you to have it.  She knows that
you won't put up condos or build a shopping mall.  It's her way of
preserving something that's meant the world to her."

"But lain would have bought the property from her at a fair price, and
he would no' have abused it."

"She wanted you to have it.  Let's face it, lain owns most of the
countryside.  And Duncan has the largest and most valuable piece of the
village proper."

"Duncan and you."

"The loch belongs to you, Andrew, and Kaye understands that.  It's your
home and your heart."

He was silent, mulling over the things she had said.

"Odd, is it no', that the three of us" -- He allowed himself one
careful glance.

"The infamous men of midnight," she said with a grin.  That grin, so
unabashed and exuberant, touched something deep inside him.

"Aye.  The three of us, the ridiculous men of midnight, have so much of
the village and beyond in our possession now."

"But not a one of you feels you really own it.  It's almost a sacred
trust to each of you.  Even Duncan.  I know he had a chance to sell the
hotel last year, but he held on to it, even though he swore he would
never live in Scotland.  It's crazy, but it's as if it was meant to
happen this way."

"What about you, Fiona?"

"Me?"

"What are your plans?  It seems as if Duncan will be staying here
now.

He and Mara are going to build a home.

She has plans for her school .  " She was silent for a long time.

"I like it here," she said at last.

His breath rasped painfully in his chest.  He let it out slowly.

"Do you?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

She seemed genuinely puzzled and perhaps a little hurt.  He couldn't
answer.  He couldn't ask her if she planned to stay awhile, a decade,
forever.  The answer mattered too much.

She snuggled down in her seat and closed her eyes.  He felt that, too,
as if the air in the car had changed somehow, as if molecules had been
permanently rearranged.  He swore he could hear her breathing slow, and
in his mind's eye he could see her breasts rise and fall in a deeper
cadence.  To distract his thoughts, he turned on a tape of Celtic folk
songs and they passed the rest of the trip in silence.  It was only
much later when he finally pulled up in front of the luxurious old
hotel where Martin Carlton-Jones and Nigel Surrey were staying that she
opened her eyes.

"We're here?"

"Aye."  He did what he had forbidden himself to do earlier.  He turned
to watch her.  Her cheeks were ivory, as if sleep had robbed them of
color, but as she stirred, they deepened to a pale apricot.  He could
not have prevented his next movement, not with the thought and planning
of centuries.  He touched her hair, which was a paler gold in the
moonlight.  Her eyes were slumberous cat's eyes.  She was still not
quite awake but far from asleep.

"Why do we always deny ourselves the things we want most, Andrew?"

His heart missed a beat.

"Do we?"

"Yes.  I think so.  We spend all our lives learning to live without
what we cherish most, and we call it self-discipline or moderation in
all things."

"Exactly what are you referring to?"

"I was thinking of the property you're going to inherit.  You don't
feel worthy of such a large grit, but you want it.

I know you do.  "

He leaned closer.

"Is that all you meant?"  She didn't answer for a moment.  He could see
her come more fully awake.  He wondered what it would be like to hold
her tightly against him in the mornings as her eyes slowly opened.  To
listen to the soft sound of her breathing and feel her body respond
without inhibition to his.

"No, that's not all I meant," she said softly.

"What have you denied yourself, Fiona?"

"I waited too long to fly.  I've never wanted anything more than to be
a normal woman with a normal life.  But I let fear strangle me."

"And now?"

She smiled, a sleepy, wanton smile as old as woman.

"Maybe someday I'll find the courage to pursue what I most cherish."

He wanted to kiss her.  Her mouth was soft and ripe for kissing.  He
had only to lean closer and take her lips with his.

But he forced himself to turn instead to open his door.

"Do you want to wait in the lobby?  Or do you want to come with me?  A
bonny scene it will no' be.  Carlton-Jones and Surrey are no' used to
being thwarted."

"Oh, I want to be there.  I wouldn't miss this for the world ."  Her
answer surprised him.

"You're certain?"

"Absolutely.

Carlton-Jones and Surrey are greedy through and through.  They don't
cherish Mrs.  Gerston's land, they merely desire it.  You cherish it,
Andrew.  The days are gone when Highland men defended what was theirs
with dirk and claymore.  I'll have to be content with this.  "

He turned back to her and gazed on what he cherished most.  She
believed in him in a way he didn't believe in himself.

And he believed in her.  They were held captive by their

own bonds,.  yet they strained toward each other, yearn He knew better
than to kiss Fiona again, but when had a MacDougall put reality before
his dreams?  He gave a harsh sigh and bent his head.  She wove her
fingers in his hair as his mouth sought hers.  Her thumb traced his
cheekbone.  Her lips were eager and pliant, and she gave him everything
he asked for.

When he finally lifted his head, her eyes were shining.

"And with that, I send you into battle," she whisl~_ red.

"May the best man win, my brave Highland warrior."

Chapter 13

Fiona got up just after dawn, did the exercises she was required to do
every day, then dressed for a breakfast picnic beside the loch.  She
brought her sketchbook and two of Frances Gunifs famous scones, along
with a jug of' hot tea flavored with thick, fresh cream.  She needed
inspiration for a drawing, and now that the loch had been "discoveaxxt"
it was only quiet during the morning's earliest hours.  She wanted to
capture the way that water bugs skimmed the shallows and gulls spread
their wings before they dove to feast on minnows.

She was discouraged by her lack of progress on the next Stardust book.
Her editor was nudging her to submit what she had finished, but Fiona
wasn't satisfied enough with her work to submit anything yet.  Images
eluded her, images of two water dragons dancing in the water together.
The book was for children, yet she knew that she couldn't tell the
story properly without conveying the water dragons' joy, even
exuberance, at finding each other.  Until she could, she had no book.

Primrose 'followed Fiona to her favorite cove.  He was disgruntled that
April had left him for the night, and he needed coddling and
reassurance.  She gave both dutifully,

and after she'd spread her blanket on the ground, he spread his long
body along one end and closed his eyes, satisfied.

Fiona stared out at the water.  She was still staring an hour later, no
closer to putting pencil to paper than she had been before coming.  But
the loch had changed in that time.  There were boats now, just a few,
but a harbinger of things to come as the day progressed.  It seemed
that everyone in the British Isles planned to come and search for
Andrew's darling.

On the way back from Fort William last night she and Andrew had passed
a farm not far from the village.  Overnight it had become a caravan
site.  Tents and caravans now lined fields that should have been
planted with oats or wheat.  The wily farmer had found a more lucrative
crop.  Kaye Getston had decided not to sell, and now that prime piece
of property on the loch would be Andrew's someday.  But who else would
succumb to the offers of Martin Carlton Jones and Nigel Surrey or men
just like them?  How long before Druidheachd became a place to visit
instead of a place to live?

Fiona turned her head in the direction of Anch~-w's house.  She
couldn't see the little cottage from here, but she thought she could
make out the end of his pier.  It had been late when they'd left Fort
William, and neither of them had said much on the long trip home.  The
meeting with Carlton-Jones and Surrey had been a different matter.
Plenty had been said there.  She had disliked the two men on sight and
would have disliked them even if she hadn't known what they were up
to.

Martin Carlton-Jones was overweight and bald.  Nigel Surrey was only
bald.  He had come down to the lobby dressed in a shiny polyester
warm-up suit, ~ if Fiona and, Andrew had interrupted his hopeless quest
~or physical perfection.  Both men had been affable at first, as if
there were no reason to be on guard against two inconsequential
Druidheachd msidehts.

"You have Kaye Gerston's final papers?"  Nigel had asked, mopping
hard-earned sweat off his forehead as he spoke.

"That's why you're here?"

"No.  There will be no final papers.  Mrs.  Gerston's changed her
mind.

She'll no' be selling to you or anyone.  "

Martin stepped forward.  He seemed perplexed.

"What do you mean?"

"She's decided to keep the property."

"But she can't do that."

"Can she no'?"  Andrew's smile was lethal.

"That will surprise her, since her solicitor has assured her she's
perfectly within the law."

Martin's expression changed.  It was a subtle change, as if he wanted
to continue to appear a bit dim-witted.  But Fiona suspected that his
mind was working at Concorde speed.

"Why are you here, MacDougall?"  he asked.

"As a favor to Mrs.  Gerston.  She's not well.  You've preyed on an
old, sick woman, and I'm here to be certain it will no' happen
again."

"You made the trip all this way just to tell us she changed her mind,
when she could have had her solicitor call?  There must have been
something in it for you," Nigel said.

"Aye.  The greatest satisfaction in the world."  Andrew took a step
closer.  He towered over both men in every way.

"And I have my own message to deliver.  You'll no' find it easy to buy
up our village, our loch or our countryside.  You've already had
dealings with Duncan Sinclair and lain Ross.  Now you'll have to deal
with me, too.  We'll stand together, with everyone else who feels as we
do, and we'll protect what's ours.  I'd tell you to look elsewhere for
your land and your village, but I would no' wish you or your kind on
any community.  Go back where you came from and be content with what
you have.  Because you will never have what's ours."

Martin Carlton-Jones, obviously taken back, turned to Fiona, as if
hoping to find a victim to make him feel better.

"I'll be standing beside them," she said, before he could address
her.

"And so will every woman in the village who values what she has.  I'll
be sure of it."  Afterward Andrew had dropped her back at.  the hotel
with a fleeting smile and a squeeze of her hand.  He had thanked her
for going with him, but now she wondered if her presence had really
made any difference to him.  She felt immature and foolish.  A man like
Andrew neexied someone who could stand at his side in every instance
and in

every way.  She was nothing but a poor substitute.  Her fantasies of a
full and satisfying life were persistent but absurd.

She hadn't even been courageous enough to give him one night of
pleasure.

And perhaps, even if she had found the courage, he would have found no
pleasure anyway.

Resigned to another unproductive morning, she started to pack up.

There was no inspiration to be found here, only black thoughts and the
remnants of dreams.  Routed from comfort, Primrose wandered down to the
water while she folded the blanket.  Then he began to bark.  She looked
out over the water again and saw a boat coming closer.  Shading her
eyes, she stared into the glare of the sun and saw that the boat was
with Andrew at the helm.  He drew closer until he was drifting toward
the shore.

She waved, determined not to flaunt her self-doubts.

"Ahoy, Captain!"

He nosed the boat forward until the bow was touching the bank where the
water was deep enough to keep from scraping bottom.  He motioned for
her to come on board.  She was dubious, but he stepped out on the bow
and held a hand toward her.  She crawled on to the bow and took his
hand.  In a moment she was on the deck beside him.

"Out for a morning sail?"  she asked.

"Aye."  The voice that emerged was more nearly a croak.

"Andrew?  Are you all right?"

He shook his head.  His forehead was furrowed in a frown so fierce that
his eyebrows were nearly a straight line.

"You can't talk?"

That was now perfectly evident.

"You poor thing."  She felt his cheeks.  They were cool, and so was his
forehead.

"Is anything hurting?"

He shook his head.  He didn't mention his pride, but she suspected it
was gravely wounded.

"Your throat's not sore?  Chest?  Head?"  She watched him shake his
head in answer to each question.

"Woke feeling fit, then went to call Poppy," he croaked.

"Lord, don't talk anymore.  You'll lose what little voice you have
left."

"Going to hotel.  Got to tell Gow can no' take him out."  Fiona knew
that Andrew had agreed to take David Gow out for the afternoon, along
with his housekeeper Violet Higgins and her sister Muriel.  Last night
she had sensed Andrew's lack of enthusiasm, but now she sensed no
satisfaction at canceling the trip.

"You didn't really want to take him out anyway, did you?"

"Want to get rid of the man."

She laughed.  He scowled.

"Then why don't you take him?  You can croak a story or two and take
his money.  You might feel better about everything after that."

"You've no sympathy."  The croak was fast becoming a whisper.

She laughed again.  "Andrew..."  She rose on tiptoe to kiss his
cheek.

"I've got sympathy coming out my pores.  But you're not sick, you know.
You're just losing your voice."  She rested a finger against his
lips.

"Shh... It'll be completely gone if you say much more."

He took her hands in his and clasped them to his chest, but he didn't
speak.

"This is kind of fun," she said.

"You can't argue with me.  A woman could get used to this."  She
laughed as he narrowed his eyes.

"Look, I've got an idea.  Why don't you take me with you this
afternoon?"  She ignored the savage shake of his head.

"I'm serious.  I'll tell all the stories David Gow could ever digest.
Maybe they won't be the same ones you'd tell, but I do remember some of
your stories, you know.

And I can make up what I don't remember.  I'm pretty good at that,
after all.  "

He shook his head again, but she ignored it once more.

"Why?  Are you afraid I'm a better storylellex than you are?

Or is it just that you don't want me on the same boat with David Gow?

The man does have a way about him, doesn't he?  "

He didn't try to answer; he tried to stare her down.  She would not be
thwarted.

"Come on, Andrew.  You've been

such a good friend to me, and it will be days before your voice is
back to normal.  Let me do this for you.  Then we can kiss David Gow
goodbye.  " She smiled as his eyes blazed.

"Not literally, of course."

He sighed.  That, at least, was clear.  Finally he gave a gruff nod.

"Good.  We'll meet you at the public launch then?"  He managed a final
croak.

"Noon."

He'd drank a gallon of hot tea with lemon and honey, and swallowed
eVery medication in his house that related to throats.  And still his
voice emerged only with the most vicious prodding.  Andrew watched
Fiona charm his guests, both female and male alike, and
wondered--grudgingly--if some good might come from his illness after
all.  This was one more thing that Fiona was proving she could do.

"Our creature's said to live 'at the very bottom of the loch," Fiona
told the guests, "in a cave so well hidden that eVen if the loch were
dry, she couldn't be found."

"Once there was talk of draining the loch," Violet said.

"When my mum was a wee girlie.  A scientist from Edinburgh nearly
prodded the village into it.  Wanted to find the creature, he did,
wanted it so badly he did no' mind killing her.  And where would they
have put all that water, I'm thinking?"

"There was talk once, when we were lassies, of dragging the loch with
nets," Muriel said, peering over the side.

"I

believe it was tried.  "

"It was," Fiona said.

"With no luck, of course.  The loch is so deep in places--deeper than
Loch Nee, s, in fact--that there's no hope of a net long or large
enough.  There was also talk of poisoning the water with quick lime and
of charging it with electricity, to see what died and floated to the
top.  Luckily neither w~as eVer tried."

Violet straightened with difficulty.  She was younger than her sister,
who looked to be nearly seventy, but the two women were much alike in
appearance, with lively blue eyes just visible under gray Prince
Valiant bangs.

"Where were you when you saw the creature?"  she asked Gow.

"Over there."  Gow pointed in the direction they were heading.

"Now that's unusual," Fiona said.

"Most of the sightings haven't been on that side of the loch.  I wonder
why you were so favored?"

He smiled the engaging smile that set Andrew's teeth on edge.

"I've never had a problem with the ladies."

Violet snorted.

"You've had your share of problems, I'm thinking.  Is that no' why
you're in Scotland, lad?"

Gow laughed.

"Tell us about the sightings, Fiona."  Fiona launched into one of the
most preposterous stories that Andrew had eVer heard.

"Once there was a young man named Alan MacDougall," she said, in her
musical voice, "and he was the very first to see the creature.  It
happened so long ago that we've lost track of the date, of course. Some
think it was more than five centuries ago, but still the story lives
on."

"I'm riveted to the spot," Gow said.

"Tell us more."

"Well, poor Alan was dying for love.  His sweetheart was betrothed to
another, and as far as she was concerned, Alan didn't even exist.  He
was a scrawny lad.  The dashing, brawny MacDougalls came much later."
She flashed Andrew a smile.

"Poor Alan was always getting beaten when the village lads took sides
again.~t each other.  He was small, and his eyesight was poor.  He was
pockmarked, and one arm was too short.  They even say he walked like a
turkey.  Fiona!"

Andrew croaked.

She raised one brow.

"Wasn't I supposed to tell them that part?"  She shrugged.

"I'm son~.  Like every MacDougall to come along since, he walked like a
man twice his s'~e.  Is that better?"

Andrew glared at her.

"Anyway, one day Alan saw the woman he loved--her name was Verity--on
the road to her castle.  Did I mention that she was the daughter of a
rich man?  Well, Verity turned her head when he passed, and after that
he heard her giggling with her maids.  Alan realized at last that
Verity only saw him as an object of ridicule.  So he decided that he
would drown himself that night in the loch.  He waited until

dark so he wouldn't get caught, then he stole a boat that was tied up
on the shore and rowed it out to the middle.  I'm afraid he wasn't a
very brave young man.  The stalwart, courageous MacDougalls came much
later.  " This time she winked at Andrew.

"Was this Alan really one of your ancestors, Andrew?"  Gow asked.

Andrew tried to imagine David Gow with his legs where his arms normally
hung.  The picture so delighted him that a grin came naturally.

Gow turned back to Fiona.

"Well?"

"Alan stole the boat instead of merely jumping off a bank.  He was
afraid he'd chicken out once he was in the water and climb right back
on shore.  The problem is that our Alan wasn't very strong."

"The strong MacDougalls came much later," Gow said.

"You've heard this before?"  Fiona asked with a straight face.

"I'm beginning to think I'll never hear it all."

"Well, because Alan wasn't very strong, it took him most of the night
to row the boat to the middle of the loch.  I believe I forgot to
mention that he had no sense of direction, didn't I?"

"The MacDougalts with a sense of direction came much later," Muriel
said with a cackling laugh.

"No, I don't believe 'they ever did.  Did they Andrew?"  Andrew wanted
to haul her below deck and kiss the impudent smile off her soft, sweet
lips.  She was transforming herself before his eyes again.  He knew
that he was seeing the Fiona she had been destined to become before the
fire that had robbed her of her courage.

"Anyway, Alan finally made it to the middle, but by then it was almost
dawn.  He'd hoped to rest a bit before he killed himselfmalthough I
find it hard to imagine why.  But because the sky was growing lighter
and the sun was about to appear, he realized he was going to have to
make a quick job of it, tired or not.  So he stood up, pinched his
nostrils together--although I find that hard to imagine, too--and
jumped overboard."

"I thought this story was about the loch monster," Gow said.

"Ah, it is.  You see, just at the moment that Alan jumped, the creature
rose from the depths of the loch, and Alan landed on her back."

Gow groaned.  So did Andrew, although less obtrusively.  Fiona
continued.

"So there he was, riding the back of a terrible water creature like a
medieval rodeo cowboy.  Now, drowning had appealed to poor Alan.  He'd
imagined his own bloated body washing up on the shore to the weeping
and wailing of the village women.  He'd even thought that perhaps he'd
look better bloated a bit, and that maybe Verity might feel a little
remorse for the way that she'd treated him.  But he couldn't imagine
that even he would look any better if he was chewed into a million
teensy pieces.  In fact, he doubted that anyone would take the time to
put his remains back together again and identify him.  So Alan did the
only thing he knew to do.  He screamed."

"And well he should have," Violet said With a sniff.  " is a very
gentle creature.  She wouldn't hurt anyone, of course.  She feeds on
the reeds and rushes at the loch bottom, and even the fish are her
friends.

But Alan, being the first MacDougall to see her, didn't know this.

The smart MacDougalls"-- " Came much later," the three guests thor used
in unison.

"Exactly.  So meanwhile, poor Alan screamed out his puny lungs.  The
creature, frightened herself now, gave a mighty buck.

Alan soared through the air and landed smack dab in the middle of the
boat.  At first, of course, he was dazed.  He couldn't believe he'd
been so lucky.  Then the creature rose from the water and put her face
right up against his " " And?  " Gow prompted.

"And Alan realized that the creature was far more lovely, far kinder
and more charming than Verity had ever been.

Right that minute, Alan fell madly in love with her.  And although she
descended into the water and he never saw her again, he adored her
until the day he died.  "

"The MacDougalls with good taste came much later?"

Gow asked.

"Oh no, Alan was the first MacDougall with good taste.  And all the
Others who've come after Alan have loved her, too.  Unreservedly."

"Is any of this true, Andrew?"  Gow asked.  Andrew looked straight at
Fiona.

"Every bit," he said.

"Although some of us have loved a woman just as well."  His voice
emerged as a whisper, but he knew she had heard him.  Her expression
softened like honeycomb in the sun.

"That truly was a ludicrous saga," David told Fiona.

"I've never heard such a succession of outrageous stories.

Tall tales, isn't that what you Americans call them?  " Fiona stretched
lazily in the warmth of the afternoon sun.

was cruising back toward shore after-an extended tour.  Muriel and
Violet were at the helm getting a boating lesson from Andrew, and David
had just come back to join her.

"Exactly what did you expect?"

"Nothing quite so colorful.  You're quite good at this.  I'd almost
think you'd had practice."

Fiona heard more than casual praise in his voice.

"Oh?"

"In fact, I'd say you are very nearly a professional."

"I'm honored."

"You're famous."

She turned in her chair so that she could see his face.

"Famous?"

"I have a niece.  I buy her storybooks."

"Oh, I see."

"I thought your name was familiar when we were introduced.  I think I
said as much."

"Writers can generally escape into obscurity, particularly writers of
children's books."

"And that's what you wanted to do?"

Fiona suspected that was now an impossibility.

"That's what I hoped to do."

"And well you might have, if you hadn't made up those absurd stories
today.  Tell me, is Loch Ceo the Serenity Lake in your books?  And is
Stardust its creature?"

"You not only buy my books, you read them?"

"They are lovely stories.  Brilliant.  I feel I know them by heart.

They're the only books my niece will let me read her.  "

"She's a very discriminating young lady."

"Is Loch Ceo Serenity Lake?"

Fiona considered what to tell him.  David was a reporter, and she
wasn't foolish enough to believe that this would not ix: mentioned in
his next missive from Druidheachd.

"I was born here, and I heard stories about the creature as a little
girl.  But I left Scotland when I was only three."

"Then it's just a coincidence?"

She couldn't deny the place of those stories in her life.

"No.  I remembered them, even though I was very young.  I had a lot of
time to think and imagine as a child.  My fantasies were more palatable
than reality."  She saw the question in his eyes.

"I was badly burned as a little girl, and I was in and out of hospitals
for much of my childhood.  It was my way of escaping."

H He didn't expr'c~" pity.  He certainly didn't seem revolted.  e just
nodded.

"It's odd, isn't it, how one's worst misfortune can become a ~ mark
able gift to the world?"

"What a lovely way to put it."

"So you remembered the stories you'd heard, and you changed and
embroidered them and they became the Stardust books."

"David, I came back to Scotland because I wanted to avoid publicity."

"I'm afraid this is a elichq.  But there is no corner of the world so
remote that we can run away from who we are."

"You're going to write about this, aren't you?"

"Not if you forbid me."

"You would agree not to?"

"Yes, I think I might.  But I hope I won't have to."  Fiona realized
that this moment had become a crossroads.

She could continue to hide, as she had hidden all her life.  Or she
could come forward now and tell the world a little.  abo~ut herself.
Surely there were other people like her,p~opic WhO had been scarred by
fire or by other tragedies, WhO would draw courage from her story.  A
picture of tiny Sara flashed through her mind, Sara, who, as she grew,
WT~erenld have to cope with the same sorrows that Fiona had.  was so
little she could do for Sara or the other children on the burn ward. If
someday Sara and others like her could draw courage from her
experiences.  "I won't ask you not to," she said.

"You'll be fair and kind.  I trust You, David."

"Never, ever think that I can be trusted, Fiona."  He leaned forward
and kissed her.  He was smiling when he withdrew.

"I believe that at this moment your Andrew would like to throw me to
his darling.  The MacDougalls who aren't possessive of their women have
yet to be created, I'm afraid."

He stood and strolled to the side.

Fiona glanced toward Andrew, but he turned away.  Whatever was in his
eyes was lost to her.

At last they docked, and she stood beside Andrew as he gravely shook
hands with their passengers.

"We'll talk again," David said, as he took her hand.

"We'll have to go over details."

"You'll be around for a while, then?"

"For a bit.  Circulation at the paper has increased noticeably since my
stories of the creature have been running.  I'd be hard-pressed to
leave now."

"Before you saw my darling, did it occur to you that circulation might
increase?"  Andrew croaked.

"It certainly did," David.  said.

"Surprising how things work out, isn't it?"  He stepped on to the pier
and held out his hand to Violet, then Muriel.  With a wave they were
gone.

"Well, it went well, don't you think?"  Fiona asked Andrew.

"You certainly seemed to enjoy yourself."

"Wasn't I supposed to?"

He ignored her and started back to the helm.  She followed at his
heels.

"Andrew, David knows about my books.

He figured it out.  "

He shrugged.

"He's going to write about me.  I guess I can't hide forever."

"Why should you?"

She suspected that the gruffness of his voice wasn't due to laryngitis
alone.

"Why are you angry at me?"

"I'm no' angry."

"You sound angry.  And I don't think I've done anything."

"i'm no' an

She watched him polish the controls with a soft rag and tidy the
immaculate helm.  She wondered if his house was the same and guessed it
wouldn't be.  She suspected that the boat was Andrew's real home.

"I told David how I remembered stories about your darling when I went
to America."  He grunted, and she went on.

"It's funny, isn't it?  A seed is planted, then it grows in the
strangest ways.  I remembered stories about the loch.  Some of them
were probably yours.  But some of them were my father's.  Now people
will read and remember my stories.  I wonder what my father thought
about that?  I wonder if he even knew about the Stardust books before
he died?"

Andrew looked up.

"He never said?"

"No."

"He was no' an easy man."

"So I've been told.  I wouldn't know, myself."  He looked puzzled.

She wished she hadn't started this.  She didn't know how the
conversation had led to this point so quickly.

"Look, you shouldn't be talking.  I'm sorry.  I should go- and leave
you alone."

He took her arm as she turned to go.

"Donald Sinclair was a hard man, but he loved you," he rasped.

"Do you no' believe it?"

"Loved me?"  She stared at him.

"Oh, I think not, An- drew.  He never called me or wrote me, not once
after the accident.  And he never came to America to see me."

"You never came here, either.  You refused to come."

"Do you think that was the way I wanted it?"  She shook her head.  His
hand fell to his side, and she turned to leave again.

"Was it no'?"  he asked.

"No."

"Then why did you stay away?"

"It doesn't matter now."

"It does."

She realized he wasn't going to drop this.

"I wrote my father when I was ten.  I asked him if I could come with
Duncan to Druidheachd that summer.  I didn't tell my mother.  I was
afraid she would forbid me to come if I did.  I thought she was the one
who was keeping my father away."

She stared out at the loch and didn't face him.  Her father's
rejection was so old that she hadn't expected it to hurt anymore.  Now
she found it still did.

"He never answered my letter, and Duncan went off to Scotland without
me.  My mother found me crying one day, and she finally persuaded me to
tell her what I'd done.  And then she told me why my father never wrote
or called, and why he refused to see me."

She turned back to him.

"He couldn't stand the sight of me, Andrew.  Oh, Mother didn't put it
quite that way.  She tried to protect me by telling me that it was just
the way he was, that he had always expected everything and everyone to
be perfect, and that it wasn't my fault that I wasn't perfect anymore.
But I knew what she really meant.  I wasn't just imperfect.  I was
ugly.  Hideous.  And my father couldn't ever stand to look at me
again."

"Fiona..."

She managed a smile.

"You know what?  It was his loss."

His eyes said everything his battered voice couldn't.

She looked away, because compassion was the gateway to tears, and she
didn't want to cry.

"I don't know why I told you this."  But the moment she said the words
she didkn ,ow.

She had told him because he deserved an explanation for why she was so
frightened to let him see her scars.  He deserved to know where her
worst fears about herself had come from.

"I dinna believe it."

"You don't believe what I've told you?"

"I dinna believe your father stopped loving you."

"There are twenty-two years of silence to prove it."

"A dead man can no' defend himself, Fiona."

She touched his hand.  Her gaze followed because she still couldn't
look him in the eye.

"Yes, he's dead, but you're alive.  Can a hvmg man for8 1ve a woman.
who's afraid that he'll find her as imperfect- as her own father did?

He wove his fingers through hers.

"Aye, he can, if the woman someday stops hiding behind her fears."

Chapter 14

Duncan and lain were already waiting when Andrew arrived at the pub.

After docking the boat he had napped well into the evening, and on
waking, his voice, although not completely restored, was strong enough
for conversation.

He didn't have to be forceful with his old friends.  He merely needed
to be heard.

Andrew greeted them and took his chair.  Duncan signaled Brian, and a
generous dram was placed in front of him.  There was no need to shout
over the rowdy good cheer of the crowd.  As soon as he had joined his
friends, the closest tables mysteriously emptied.  As always, the men
of midnight Were given wide berth.

"You sound god-awful," Duncan said.

"Are you all right?"

'. "Nowt wrong that this will no' cure."  Andrew held up what was now
an empty glass.

"I'm hearing rumors about Gerston's Cottages," lain said.

Andrew quickly filled them in while Brian came back and filled his
glass again.

Duncan gave a long, low whistle.

"So the lines are drawn for all to see."

Andrew gestured to the patrons on the other side of the pub.

"Carlton-Jones and Surrey have lost their foothold, but they may well
gain another.  There's an air of discontent in the village and beyond.
Some residents talk of selling to escape the tourists pouring in to
look for my darling.  Some talk of selling because the time is
right--they think they'll no' have a chance to sell at this price
again."

"Do you remember Margaret Henley's predictions when we were born?" lain
asked.  Margaret Henley, long since passed on, had been the village
seer, a woman gifted with extraordinary second sight.

"Aye.  We were no' to be separated.  We were to grow up in each other's
shadows, to strengthen the bonds that began at our birth," Andrew
said.

Duncan finished the prediction.

"Because a black cloud would descend over the village someday, and the
three of us would have to stand together against it."

Andrew sat forward.

"Surely you dinna think this is what old Margaret meant?"

"Were you expecting something more spectacular?  A war?  Famine?

Plague?  " lain asked.

"Greed is far more insidious.

If Carlton-Jones and Surrey or men like them move into Druidheachd, the
village will exist no longer.  There'll be nothing left but a name and
a fading history, and few who care about either.  "

"I feel more equipped for full-scale war," Andrew said.

"Greed is invisible, an enemy without form or substance."

"As difficult to pin down as a black cloud," lain said.  They fell
silent.  Andrew finished his second whisky, but he felt no better.  He
signaled for a third.

"I feel helpless," lain said.

"I overplayed my hand with Martin and Nigel months ago, and now they've
effectively neutraliTed me.  Because of all I have, when I speak out
against greed, I'm perceived as greedy myself."

"And I'm the American interloper," Duncan said.

"More than a few people think I object to Druidheachd expanding its
tourist base because more hotels will be built and I'll have
competition."

"At least there are no fingers pointing at me," Andrew said, holding up
his glass for Brian to refill.

"Then perhaps you'll have to be the one to finish the battle," lain
said.

Andrew considered that.  He had never thought of himself as the
guardian of all that was good in Druidheachd or anywhere.  He was
simply Andrew MacDougall, every- body's friend, the peasant in the odd
play that had cast lain as the lord and Duncan as the clever
merchant.

"What can I do?"

"I think it's time to make our fears publiC," lain said.

"I think we have to call a meeting and bring all of this out in the
open."

"At the kirk," Duncan said.

"I can talk to the minister and ask for use of it."

"And who's to run this meeting?"  Andrew asked.  Both men looked
squarely at him.  He shook his head, but their expressions didn't
change.

"We'll be there," lain said.

"But we've come to the final act in this drama, Andrew, and I'm afraid
you're destined to be the star."

"Surely you dinna believe that this is what we were born for?  You've
become as superstitious as the villagers who once believed that Mara
was a ghost or a fairy."

"Sometimes I'm not completely convinced that they were wrong."  Duncan
didn't smile.

"There are things that happen here..."

"Aye," lain said.

"That there are."

Andrew stared at the two men who were closer to him than brothers.

Their lives had been entwined since birth, yet he wondered if he had
ever seen them this clearly before.  He had been content all his days
to let his friends be the things he was not.  lain was the undisputed
leader.  Born to privilege-as well as tragedy--he had easily mastered
the world he had been bequeathed, ordering his personal life and the
lives of those who were dependent on him with aristocratic compassion
and precision.

Duncan had been the most aggressive of the three.  He had charged into
the world at the earliest opportunity and carved out his own personal
kingdom with skill and intelligence.  Even now, when his roles as
husband and father were more important to him than financial success,
he was still effectively setting the hotel on its financial feet and
launching a new business on the side.

Andrew had always known exactly who he was.  He was Terence
MacDougall's son,.  with an abundance of charm and good nature to see
him through his life.  Yet he realized now that even with all their own
strengths, lain and Duncan had always seen more in him than he had seen
in himself.

As if he had read Andrew's mind, Duncan spoke.

"You might have fooled the rest of the world, but you never fooled us.
We know exactly what you're capable of, Andrew.  lain and I have done
all we can.  I stood up to Martin and Nigel when they tried to buy the
hotel.  lain stood up to them when they wanted his land.  Now it's time
for you to step forward.

You have the confidence of the villagers in a way we never will.  "

Andrew stared at his empty glass.  Three whiskies and he wanted
another.  Did he want it because he hoped to silence the voice inside
him whispering that his friends were wrong?  Did he want it because he
had always known that at heart he was no different from his father and
that someday he would end up exactly like him?  Or did he want yet
another mind' deadening dram because deep inside he was afraid to take
his rightful place beside lain and Duncan, to be someone more than he
had ever believed he could be?  Just like Fiona.

For the first time he truly understood Fiona's fears.  For the first
time he realized how insidious his own had become.

"A week from Sunday, at seven, if we can get the kirk," he said at
last.

"Post a notice in the lobby, Duncan, and one here.  I'll put up
something at Cameron's, and I'll speak with the old men and women who
have nowt better to do than gossip.  That way we'll be certain that
everyone will know."  He stood and looked down at his friends.

"I suppose that it does no' matter if this is what we were born for or
just an obstacle that's been put in our paths.  We'll see this through,
and I'll be thankful you're standing beside me."  For a moment his
voice seemed to fail him once more.  It fell to a lower octave.

"There are no finer friends anywhere in the universe," he said
gruffly.

He had always been the most sentimental of the three men.  But lain and
Duncan rose to their feet as if they were one body and flung their arms
around his shoulders in fierce, male hugs.

The lights in the pub flickered and died.  For a long moment complete,
astonished silence reigned.

Then Andrew began to laugh.

Fiona had been watching dark clouds roll in over the village all
evening, so the power outage didn't surprise her.

Somewhere in the far distance, where the storm was raging, a line was
probably down.

She sat at one of the windows in her suite and gazed over the green.

The street lamps were dark, and not a glimmer could be seen from any
building.  She'd been given candles for such an event, but she
preferred not to light them.  She wasn't afraid of the dark, but later,
the smell of lingering smoke might trigger another nightmare.

When the knock sounded on her door, she felt her way across the room to
answer it.  She expected Mara, but it was Andrew who was standing
there.  Andrew, smelling of whisky, who was nothing more than a dark,
imposing outline of a man.  Before she could speak he put his hands on
her shoulders.

"You're all right, Fiona?"

"Sure.  Why shouldn't I be?"

"I thought you might be frightened."

"No.  Darkness has never bothered me."

"I nearly killed myself climbing the stairs."

"Then I think you'd better come in and make yourself at home until the
lights come back on.  Climbing down the stairs might he even worse."
She stood aside to let him enter.

When she had closed the door, she groped for his hand.  I'll lead you
across the room.  Take it slow.  "

Safely across the room they fell on her sofa together.

"You sound a lot better," she said.

"Your powers of recovery are amazing."

"I think no'."

"Then you're still feeling bad?"

He was silent.  He had dropped her hand upon reaching the sofa, and it
was too dark here to see him.  Still, she experienced his presence in
the oddest way, as if there were a space in her life that was filled
now, when before it had been empty.

"I'm well, Fiona," he said finally.

"But I'm only just beginning to understand how little I've
recovered."

"I don't understand."

"Neither did I until tonight."

She waited for him to go on, but the silence fell again.  When he did
speak, she thought he had changed the subject.

"Do you member my father, Fiona?"

"Not at all."

"Did you know he was enchanted with you?  Whenever he encountered you
in the village he treated you like a bonny dolly.  For your third
birthday he carved you a wee walking stick with a dragon head, and you
used it to bash my legs whenever I refused to do what you wanted."

She laughed.

"Really, I don't know why you still speak to me."  "There was another
side to my father."

She turned so that she was facing in his direction.  She could just
make out his shape against the white wall.

"Was there?"

"He was an alcoholic."

She had never heard him use that word.

"Yes, I know."

"On my climb up the stairs, I remembered a night much like this one.
When I was a lad we were often without power, most often because my da
had no money to pay our bill.  We were less often without food,
although that happened from time to time.  My mother had a large
vegetable garden, and when my da was sober he fished.  At the end of
winter, when there was no food left in our cupboard, my granny was
there to help."

Fiona hadn't realized that AndreW's childhood had been so bleak.  He
was not a man to complain.

"What happened that night?"

"That night there was nether power nor food.  Our telephone had been
disconnected, and our car had no' run for

205 weeks.  It was too cold to walk to my granny's, and by the end of
the evening, we had run out of peat.  My mother gave me a piece of
bread with honey she had scraped from the bottom of a jar, then she put
me to bed, under a thick layer of blankets.  But I was still too cold
and hungry to fall sleep.

I lay there and listened to my parents fighting.  "

"And you remember it still?"

"Aye.  I remember hearing my da cry, then my mother cry, too.  He told
her that he had no choice, you see.  He was exaetly the man God had
made him, a weak and foolish man at that.  He wanted to be different,
but he could no' be anything but what he was.  That was his excuse for
all his failings, and I suppose it was a way of denying all his
strengths, too.  Because ifhe was just as God made him and had no
control over his life, then nowt he did, no' good or bad, was his to
claim.  That's how he lived his life, a puppet to any force that pulled
his strings."

Fiona's heart ached for Andrew, but considerably less so for the man
who had fathered him, Terence MacDougall, who had allowed his own child
to go hungry.

"Did you believe him?  Did you believe it wasn't his fault?"

"I was only a wee laddie.  My choice was to call my own father a liar
or to believe that he truly had no choice, that he could no' help what
he was.  So for years, that's what I told myself."

"And now?"

Andrew was silent.  Fiona wanted to touch him, to reassure him somehow,
but she didn't know what to say.  She still didn't understand exactly
why he had told her this, although she was more than touched that he
had.

The silence extended.  Outside she could hear the storm approaching,
the light sprinkle of rain at its border tapping against the old slate
roof.  On the street below there was a scurry of feet and a shout as
someone ran for shelter.  She felt and heard Andrew stand.  She stood,
too, and she was in his arms.

He didn't kiss her; he just held her against him and stroked her hair.
He lifted one curl and brushed it against his cheek; then he stepped
away.

"There's something I must do," he said.

"Would you like me to come with you?"

"No.  I'll do this alone."

"Be careful Outside.  There's thunder in the distance."

"Aye."

Fiona heard his footsteps.  She yearned to call him back, to offer
herself as solace, but her devils were as relentless as his.  The door
opened, then closed again, and she was alone.

The full bottle of whisky that Andrew had bought from Brian felt almost
warm under his anorak, mostly, he supposed, because it was dry and
nothing else that was touching his skin was.  The heavens had opened,
and it was difficult to tell where the rain ended and the loch began.
Beneath his feet cruised slowly forward.  Her lights swept the water,
but nothing except mist and rain was illuminated.  Only a fool would be
out on the water tonight, a fool or a man who had experienced an
epiphany.

The rain had long since washed away the whisky he'd had at the pub,
completely sobering him.  Some whispering voice deep inside him begged
for more, for something to dull the pain of his revelations, for
something to persuade him that the course he had set for himself could
be altered.  But the bottle stayed again.  ~t his skin and his hands
stayed steady on the wheel.  He was piloting the boat by feel, sensing
both his location and destination.

He knew exactly where he wanted to go.  lain had traveled this.  path
before him.  lain, too, had been haunted by his past and his destiny.
Months ago he had drowned both in the deepest part of the loch, and it
was to that spot that Andrew headed now.

Lightning split the sky, and he thought about the night he had rescued
Jamie and Peter Gordon.  It would be like his daring to show herself
tonight, but he wasn't here to find her.

He was here to find himself.

Minutes passed, and the rain fell harder.  He reduced his speed once,
then again, until he was barely moving.  The boat rocked harder under
his feet, and he grasped the wheel until his knuckles turned white.
Satisfied at last, he switched

207 off the engine, and then, holding fast to the railing, he felt his
way toward the stern.

Drenching rain sluiced over his brow and down his neck.  Water sloshed
over his shoes, and icy waves crashed over the sides.  Once he nearly
lost his balance, but he clung stubbornly to the railing, afraid that
if be fell the bottle would shatter.

He reached the stern at last and wedged himself between a seat and the
side.  He knew the danger of being swept overboard.  Almost no one
bathed in frigid Loch Ceo and lived to tell about it.

Safe for the moment, he unzipped his anorak and pulled out the bottle.
It was Briaffs recommendation, the pub's finest whisky.

Andrew had wanted nothing but the best.

Rain streaked the glass almost immediately, and the bottle slid through
his hands.  He was cold, and his fingers weren't steady.  It took him
nearly a minute to get a good grip and unscrew the cap.  It gave with a
reassuring sigh, almost as if the whi~ky had a mind or a life of its
own.  That seemed entirely appropriate to him.

"A life for a life," he said.

Unaccountably, he thought of a night much like this one when Terence
had taken him fishing.  He had been an adolescent, both vulnerable and
hostile, and above all certain of his own immortality, as only a boy
that age can be.  But there had been whisky on that cruise, too, and
they had very nearly not made it home alive.  By the time Andrew had
fought the boat in to shore with his father passed out on the deck, his
mother, waiting on the pier, had been as pale as a corpse.  She had
clasped his struggling adolescent body against hers, and she had made
him promise that he would never go out in the boat with his father
again.  Terence had died six months later.

But Andrew did not have to die young.  He did not have to wonder the
rest of his days if in this, too, he would someday be like his father.
Like Terence, he was exactly the man God had created him to be.  And
that man, like all men everywhere, had been given choices.

He unscrew eel the cap all the way, then he leaned forward.  The boat
bobbed dangerously beneath him, but he hardly noticed.  He turned over
the bottle and watched as the pub's most expensive whisky poured into
the water.

He was not an alcoholic.  Not yet, and perhaps, even if he continued to
drink, not ever.  But now he would never have to face that possibility.
He would never have to wonder if someday, like his father, he would
wall too far along the whisky road to ever find his way back.

He had been given a choice.  He had made his.

He thought then of Fiona.  From the beginning he had thought himself
unworthy of her.  He had never believed he had the potential to be a
loving husband and responsible father.  He had seen the best and the
worst in Terence, and he had believed himself to be the same.

He was not.

He stood drenched and shivering, staring at the water.  Eventually the
storm blew over, the waves calmed, the last raindrops fell.  Still he
stood there.

At last Andrew went down to the cabin, but he wasn't ready to leave.

Instead he pulled out his bagpipe, stowed in the safest, driest place
on board because he often played for his guests.  He breathed air into
the bag through the blowpipe, tuned the drones to the chanter and blew
a short passage.  When he was satisfied be went to the stern and lifted
the blowpipe to his lips again.

And he began to play.

Chapter 15

Even though more than a week had passed since the night of the storm,
the haunting wail of a lone bagpipe still seemed to drift through
Fiona's window.  She didn't know what trick of the wind had carded the
music straight to her room that night, or even why she was so certain
that An- drew had been the piper.  She only knew that she had never
heard anything so poignant or wrenching, and that if she lived to be a
hundred, she never would again.

Now she stood at the window and gazed at the darkening sky.  Even after
the pipes had grown silent, the music had played on in her mind, like a
background score for the unfolding events of her life.

"Fiona?"  Mara pushed open the door, which Fiona had left ajar.

"Am I disturbing you?I brought you some soup.

It's Frances's cock-a-leekie.  I know you like it.  "

"You're so thoughtful.  " "Fiona crossed the room and took the small
tureen from Mara's hands.

"I was just about to make a sandwich."

"Soup's perfect on a night like this one."  Mara followed Fiona
inside.

"It may be summer, but the air's far too damp and cold for my taste.
And another storm's brewing."

The past.  week had seen nothing but storms.  Dark clouds had hovered
over the village, spilling rain at regular intervals and never quite
dissipating.  Fiona still hadn't grown used to the persistent chill.

"Will you share some soup with me?"  she asked.

"I ate earlier with April, when you were out.  Andrew stopped by, and
we fed him, as well."

"I'm surprised there's anything left for me."  Fiona kept her voice
light, although trying to fool Main was futile.  Not only was Mara
gifted with second sight, she was one of the most astute people Fiona
had ever met.

"He asked about you."

"He's a considerate man.  I suspect he also wanted to know how April
was doing in school, how your yarn is selling at the shop, and whether
you've broken ground for your new house."

"Aye, but no' with the same amount of interest.  I told him you'd gone
with Duncan to visit Sara."

Fiona jumped on the new subject.

"It's hard to believe Sara's on her way home to England right now."
That morning, just hours before the little girl's discharge from the
hospital, Fiona had visited one final time.  She had mi.  qsed not
having Andrew at the hospital with her, but he had made the trip
earlier in the week to say his own goodbyes.

The far~v64t had b~a t~a'y bit as hard as Fiona had expected.  She had
presented Sara with an original watercolor of Stardust, framed and
ready to put on the wall of her new bedroom.

Then, as the little girl blew kisses, Fiona had stripped off her
hospital mask and gown and gone downstairs to meet Duncan for the ride
back to Druidheachd.

"You'll miss her," Main said.  It wasn't a question.  Mara had little
need to check out her observations.

"A lot."  After the goodbyes Fiona had been filled with sharply
contrasting emotions.  She was glad that Sara was finally well enough
to leave the hospital, but she wasn't glad that she wouldn't be seeing
her regularly.

She set down the tureen and toyed with the lid.

"You know, on the way home it occurred to me that there are still ways
I can help her.  She's going to have questions as she grows up,
questions that only another burn survivor can really answer.  I think
I'll visit once she settles in and keep in

211 touch after that.  Her grandmother invited me, and I think her aunt
and uncle will be grateful for help.  "

"It's only just beginning to occur to you that you're needed, isn't
it?"

Fiona looked up and smiled a little.

"I'll be going back to the burn unit, too, as a volunteer.  The sister
in charge asked if I would.  She says that the children ask for me when
I'm not there.

And do you know why?  Not because of my stories or my drawings,
although they like those well enough.  But because I tell them that I
was burned, too.  When they see me, they start to believe that maybe
someday they'll be whole again, like me.  "

"Are the children right, Fiona?  Are you whole?"  It was a strange
question, but Fiona understood perfectly.

"Almost."

"You have things to face, yet.  But you've come so far, so fast."

Fiona thought of Andrew.  All roads led back to him.  In the past week
she had seen him from a distance twice, and once he had stopped her in
the lobby for a casual conversation.  But there had been no further
moments of intimacy.

At an early age she had adapted herself to solitude; now she was
discovering all over again what it meant to be lonely.

"One thing I have to face is the fact that this book may never be
finished," she said, guiding the subject in a less personal
direction.

"I wish my editor was better at math.  If she calls once more in the
middle of the night because she can't master the time change, I may
blurt out the truth."

"And the truth is?"

"I've done over a hundred sketches for the last part of the book, and
not one of them is right."

"It will come."  Mara took Fiona's hand and squeezed it.

"Have some soup now.  You have tomorrow to try again."

She crossed the room, and the door closed soundlessly behind her.

As she dished up and ate the soup, Fiona thought about Mara's news.

Andrew had been at the hotel tonight.  She wondered if he had known
that she was in Glasgow.  Perhaps he had chosen a time to visit when he
was sure he wouldn't have to confront her.

Or perhaps he hadn't given any thought to her at, all.  More likely
his mind had been on other tmngs.  taste naa oeen extraordinarily
busy.

The village buzzed with news of the upcoming meeting to discuss the
future of Druidheachd.  Andrew had worked nonstop to be certain that
everyone in the village intended to come.

After the confrontation in Fort William, Carlton Jones and Surre had be
un to twist the arms of property g .  t owners who ha~ showed interest
m their offers.  Their atempts to collect signatures on the dotted line
had met with dubious success.  ~there was a d .  e~.  seated d~strust m
the Highlands of undue haste and bullies.  So although several owners
of small cottages had succumbed, those with larger properties had dug
in their heels to wait.

So much rode on Sunday night.

She finished the soup and cleaned up, then she began to restlessly
wander the room.  She had just finished a book, and television held no
interest.  Fiona had learned her housekeeping skills from a mother
determined to keep all germs away, so her rooms were already spotless.
Only one thing was out of l~lace.

The last box sfie had brought down from the attic sat m, the corner
beside the door.  Since the day that Mara had enqUired h~r, interest,
Fiona had spent hours sorting through father s belongings.  Most had
gone straight to charity.  Others she and Duncan had divided between
them.  The collection of pipes now resided in Duncan's office, a sign,
she supposed, that Duncan still had so.  me feeling for.  the man w~o
had sired him, no matter how mad equate their relationship had been
while Donald Sinclair was still alive.

The box was filled with papers.  S. h,e~ had already sorts!  " through
the top third, and so far she d only found miscellaneous bills of sale
and receipts from years before.  She had started a pile for Duncan to
check over, although she suspected that everything was.  too old.to_be
relevant: Donald S'melair had been organized to a fault.  Duncan n,aO
to, lO her that the files in the hotel office had been compmsive~y
current.

Now, with nothing better to do, she lifted a new stack of tPiapers from
the box and settled herself on the sofa to connue her work.  As she had
expected, she found more outdated documents.

She could almost visualize her father

213 filing bills and forms until they were no longer useful, then
carefully storing them in boxes for that one chance in a million that
they might be needed again, She pictured a man with an obsessive need
to maintain order.

A man who demanded perfection in everything and everyone.

She scanned the next neatly typed paper, which looked like a budget or
a list of expenses from two decades ago.  She started to stack it with
the others, when her own name caught her eye.

She was the sixth item on the list.

"Miscellaneous medical expenses for Fiona."  There was a notation in
pen beside it.

"Question Melissa."

Her hands faltered, and what was left of the pile drifted to her lap.

From the beginning she had hoped to find some clue to her own past
inner father's things, the tiniest scrap of evidence that he hadn't
forsaken his imperfect daughter.

But until this moment there hadn't been even a mention of her name.

Now she understood why.  Twenty years ago or more she had been reduced
to an annoying expense fn Donald Sinclair's budget.  She had been put
from his sight as coldly and meticulously as the outdated hotel
records.  Somewhere in this box or another there was undoubtedly a file
folder containing every bill he'd been forced to pay for her care.

She pictured the words on the file guide.  Sinclair, Fiona.  Formerly
beloved daughter.

The tone of her inner voice was as bitter as that image.  Anger burst
into flames inside her, and for a moment she w. ~ so filled with it
that it screened out everything else.  Un- t!  l the day her father
died, she had held fast to a secret hope that he would come to her and
beg for forgiveness.  Even after his death, she still had searched
relentlessly for proof that she'd mattered even a little.  Now the
fantasy was over.  Since childhood she had convinced herself that she
needed her father's approval and love.  With Donald Sinclair's
[~uidance she might step out into the world, instead of hiding in the
safe, stultifying prison that her mother had created to shelter her.

It had all been a lie.  Just as her mother had told her, Donald
Sinclair had abandoned his daughter because she was no longer a perfect
child.

But she had told herself an even worse lie.  She had believed that she
needed him to become whole and perfect again.

She did not.

The question Mara had asked earlier came back to her.  Are the children
right, Fiona?  Are you whole?

And she had answered: Almost.

Almost, but not quite.

Now Fiona realized that all her life she had used her own imperfections
and her father's abandonment as a shield to keep the world away.  She
was not at fault for his desertion.  She was only at fault for letting
it matter so much.

Through the years, one decision at a time, she had let cowardice become
a way of life.  But there were no excuses now.

Almost.

She had never needed her parents' approval or even their strength to
become the woman she was meant to be.  They had been far from perfect,
too.  Yet despite everything, she realized that she loved them still.
And if she could fondly remember the young father who had carried his
little girl so contentedly on his shoulders, despite the rejection that
had come after, then she was living proof.  Perfection was not the key
to love or freedom.

She had yearned to be free all her life, when all she'd ever had to do
was spread her wings and fly.  She had learned that in her weeks in
Dmidheachd.  She'd learned that she had everything she needed inside
her.  She always had.

She got to her feet, and the papers fluttered to the floor.  She
stooped to scoop them up, but her mind was somewhere else.  She carried
the papers to the corner and set them on the carpet beside the box. She
would have to go through them again, since they were out of order. But
that could wait for another time.  There was already too much to think
about.

She straightened and started to turn, but a letter on the top caught
her eye.  She frowned and leaned closer; then she dropped to her knees
and held it at arm's length.

"Fiona dearest..."

And once again her world spun out of orbit.

He was a Scotsman, bred to ignore the weather, a Highlander who took
storms and fog and chilling winds in his stride.

He was heartily sick of evil black clouds, of days that resembled
night, and nights so damp that the fire on his.  hearth spuaerea in a
perpetual death throe.

Andrew threw another stick on the impotent flames and turned away.  He
had lived in this cottage all his life; he had nearly been b. from.
here.  The cottage had never seemed so small or smothering, and he had
never wanted more to leave it.  decB.  U. t where could he go?  Until
he was utterly secure in his ~smn_not to drink again, he did not need
the enticements, of the pub.  He didn't yearn for his old ways, but he
new better man to tempt rate.

He would be welcome in Duncan or lain's homes, but he was loath to
inflict himself on his friends or their wives.

These days he wasn't good company.  The man who could retreat easily
behind wit and a broad smile was a man he no longer knew.  He was only
just beginning to know the real Andrew

He could go to Fiona.

Andrew had considered that often enough over the past week.  Once he
had driven halfway to the hotel before he turned back home.  He had
yearned to share his discover~, his revelations, with her.  But what
would he have gained?

Until she could share with him, until she could give herselY,

there were barriers between them that made true communication
impossible.

Poppy rose from his place in front of the fire and cocked his head.

Then he sprang forward, hurtling toward the door like a greyhound on
his final lap.  At the last poss~le moment he slid to a stop, rammed
his head against the door and an to bark.

Andrew crossed the room, pushed the dotg to one side and opened the
door to peer out into the evening gloom.  Rain had, begunagain, cold,
penetrating rain, and at first he saw nothing.  'len a woman in a long
mackintosh materialized in the snaaows of the beech trees that lined
his walk.

"Fiona?"  He shouted a few stern words to Poppy, who was yapping
joyfully.

She came to a stop under the shelter of his entryway.

"I

wasn't sure you'd be home.  "

"Come in.  You'll catch your death of cold out in this."

She stepped inside but refused to stand by the fire until she had taken
off her coat.  He hung it on a peg, then turned back to examine her.

"It's no' a night for a walk."

"It was the right night for this one."

He saw that she was clutching something to her chest.  In the ~cker of
,h.  is fire, he read strange motions on her face

but be couldn t identify them.  What do you have there?

"My past."  She held her bundle tighter.

"Did you come to share it?  " he .ask~ g?ntly;~"

Yes.  I. Andrew, do you want me to reave.

He had never wanted anything as much as her presence.

But he only shook his head.

"No."

"I should have called.  Only, I thou_.gh, t, if I did, you might say
no.  And I couldn't have stood that.

"I would have said yes and come to get you."

"I've never been inside your house."

"There's little to it.  You've missed nowt."  Her hair was wet, a mass
of corkscrew curls dangling over her forehead and neck.  Raindrops
sparkled on her lashes, and color suffused her cheeks.  He thought she
had never looked bonnier.

"I think it's the coziest house in the world."  She made her way into
the center of the room, her dark denim skirt swirling around her calves
as she moved.  He watched as she drank in every detail.  The wide plank
floors that glowed like miser's gold {n the firelight.  The fireplace
he had built himself from stones carried from Being Domham, the
mountain where Mara had her croft.

He found himself telling her about it.

"I built the fireplace two years ago.  There was a wee worthless one
there when I was young."

' "It's wonderful."  Still clutching the bundle to her chest,

she ran one fingertip alonIg the edge of the mantel.  It was'a beam of
solid cherry, pains.  raising igly' c .  h~seed and.  sand.  edi then
rubbed with six coats of oil during the long wmmr his oast "You've put
so much love into it."

Love?  Andrew wasn't certain of that.  He thought of all the hours he'd
spent here throughout the years, lonely hours when his worst fears had
hovered unseen in this loch side

217 monument to his childhood.  He had changed things slowly and
carefully, built a new fireplace to replace the old one-- which far too
often during his boyhood had been as cold and empty as the worst winter
night.  He had sanded and varnished floors where his father had often
sprawled, too dizzy some nights to make his way to bed.  He'd painted
walls and replaced furniture, built shelves and partitions to change
the cottage into something new.

When all he had ever needed to do was change himself.

"You're smiling."  Fiona smiled, too.

"Did I say something funny?"

He shook his head.

"The very funniest stories are the ones that take the longest to
understand."

She tilted her head in question.

"I'm glad you like my cottage.  I like it, as well.  There are only
good memories here now."

She moved closer, in the same manner that she always did.  A step at a
time, with long pauses punctuating each movement, as if she weren't
certain she had any right to propel herself through space.

"I brought something to show you," she said, when she was so close that
he could read the subtle nuances in her whisky-colo}ext eyes.

He wondered if whisky eyes were an addiction he would be forced to
forsake, too.  She held out her bundle.  As he watched, she unwrapped a
layer of plastic, then another of brown paper.  She had taken no
chances on the rain.

"Take them," she said.

He took what appeared to be a stack of old letters.

"Do you mind if I sit?"

"Please."

He moved to the settee that was closest and made himself comfortable.

She sat on the far end, perched as if for flight.

Andrew snapped on the reading lamp.

He was halfway through the first letter before he began to understand.
He looked up.  Fiona was watching him intently, but he couldn't read
her expression.

"Finish them all before you say anything," she said.

He read on, although it wasn't an easy thing to do.  Somewhere, halfway
through the pile or beyond, his eyes began to blur.

He felt Fiona sit forward, waiting for him to finish.  Gamely he
finished the letters, although by then, there was no need to read them
all.

"He loved me," Fiona said, when he had finished.  Her simple statement
summed up everything.  More than twenty years of pain and guilt.  A
father's confessions to a daughter he had never been able to face.  The
pathetic withdrawal of a man who had once been filled with life and
love.

"He believed the fire was his fault," she said.  There were tears in
her voice as well as her eyes.  Andrew saw them through his own.

He cleared his throat.

"So he was the one who placed the heater in the closet."

"Yes.  Apparently he'd noticed that the cord was frayed, and he'd
planned to take it to be repaired.  I remember Duncan saying once that
our father wasn't a man to throw away anything.  So he put the heater
away, but he forgot to tell my mother.  The hotel was full that week,
and he was busier than usual.  He didn't think of it again.  Until it
was too late."

"He never forgave himself."

Fiona shook her head.

"That's the hardest part.  He wrote me these letters, Andrew, one on
each of my birthdays.  He didn't mi~ a year.  And they're all the same.
I think his guilt grew worse as time passed.  He loved me.  He's made
that part so clear.  But he was terrified to face me, to see what his
own carelessness had caused.  So he poured out his heart on paper once
a year, and the rest of the time he grew sterner and stiffer, until
even his son couldn't love him anymore.  I think that was the way he
felt it should be.  He was so ashamed that he couldn't even allow
Duncan to love him."

"And he never mailed the letters."

"No.  Don't you see?  If he had mailed them, I might have forgiven
him.

And he was sure that he didn't deserve forgiveness.

He punished himself until he died.  "

"He was a poor, sad man."

"My mother was right about him, Andrew.  That's the most terrible thing
of all.  He was exactly what she said, a man who couldn't tolerate
imperfections.  But it was never my imperfections that made him abandon
me.  It was his own ."  '

He placed the letters on the lamp table.  She was still at the end of
the settee, too far away to touch or comfort.  As he watched, she moved
closer.  He didn't reach out for her, only sat very still.  HIS breath
burned in his chest, but he was afraid to release it.

"I'm very much like him," she said softly.

"I despise the parts of myself that are less than perfect.  I use them
as excuses to wall myself away from the things I want most."  She was
beside him now.  One heartlfeat away.  He lifted his hand and captured
a teardrop at the side of her nose.  HIS hand wasn't quite steady.

"And what is it that you want, Fiona?"

"I don't know.  I'm still afraid."

His hand fell to his side.

"To be held by you," she said, even more softly.

"I want to be held by you."

"Do you?  And the things that come after holding?  Do you want them,
too?"

"I want to feel.  I want to feel you."

He knew better than to take her like this.  She was at her most
vulnerable and still unsure of what she had to give.  She needed time
to assimilate all that she'd learned.  But even as he opened his mouth
to tell her so, he knew that he wouldn't find the words.

She needed him tonight, and, God help him, he needed her just as
much.

Despite everything he still might have found the strength to move away
if she hadn't cupped his face in her hands.

"I

want to feel you inside me, Andrew.  "

He groaned and pulled her closer.  His fingers threaded through her wet
curls, and he brought her lips to his.  She tasted like raindrops and
leafs, like the dark sweetness of twilight and the bright sunrise of
hope.  The kiss was a shared joy, an exchange.  Perhaps she wanl~xl to
be held, but she wanted to hold, as well.  Her hands moved along his
neck and shoulders as they kissed, exploring and giving pleasure.  He
kissed the corner of her mouth, brushed his lips along her jawline and
moved lower to find the racing jolt of S~ moaned, a soft, womanly purr
that resonated through his body.  He captured the sound against his
lips.

"Ah, Fiona, do that again."

She sighed, and the sound was just as sensuous.  His lips moved still
lower, to the hollow of her throat.  He heard her breath catch as he
kissed her there.  One hand crept to her waist, and he anchored his
thumb in the waistband of her skirt, splaying his fingers over her
denim-clad hips.  His lips captured hers once more, and hers parted
instinctively.

This time the moan was his.  He was lost in the pleasure of her
surrender.  The kiss deepened, and her arms circled him tighter, almost
as if she were afraid he would leave her.

He lay back against the cushions and brought her to rest against him.
He could feel the soft give of her breasts against his chest and the
curve of her hip against his thigh.

One leg lay between his, a sorceress's weapon of torture.  Each time
she moved he could feel his body's transfiguration.

They were only moments into their lovemaking, and he was moving toward
fulfillment.

Both hands were at her waist now.  He felt a button against his
fingertips and made short work of it.  He tugged her blouse away from
the waistband and rested his palms against her bare skin.  Her breath
caught, just for a moment, but she didn't protest.  Her flesh was warm
and not entirely smooth.

His heart beat faster at the intimacy of this contact.  His fingertips
sought and found the bottom edge of her bra, tracing the line of
elastic back and forth as he kissed her.

She didn't protest when he moved to her sides.  The skin there wasn't
perfectly smooth, either, but the small flaws took nothing away from
the experience of caressing her.  This was Fiona, warm and sweet and
aching to be touched.

His Fiona, who was so much more than the sum of her scars.

She murmured something when he unsnapped her bra.  He kissed her again,
lingering over her lips as his hands lingered at her back.  Then
gently, more gently than he knew he could, he stroked the sides of her
breasts with his thumbs.

"You feel like velvet," he whispered against her cheek.

"Like everything that's soft and new.  And you're so very warm."

"Do I really please you?"

He took the time to prove it to her, although he was reluctant to
abandon the provocative pleasure of her breasts.

He found her hand and guided it to his lap, to the place

221 where pretense could never flourish.  He groaned as her fingers
curled around him.

"There's no finer barometer of my pleasure or lack of it."

"Andrew..."  She stroked him, inexpertly, innocently, and with such
success that he had to cover her hand and lock his fingers tightly with
hers.

"Do more of that, and the night will end before it's begun."

"It's begun," she whispered.

"It's more than begun, Andrew ."  She was right, and they were still
before the fire.  The evening had begun here, but clearly it needed to
end elsewhere.

He grasped her hips and moved her away; then, he- fore she could ask
why, he stood and pulled her to her feet.

He swung her up into his arms, laughing roughly as she gasped.

"You're a wee bitty thing, Fiona.  An armful and no more."

Her face was just inches from his.  Her eyes gleamed in the
firelight.

"I intend to be more than an armful."

The cottage was small, his room only a few strides away.  His bed
loomed in the corner, lit only by the dubious cloud covered moon and
the lamp glowing faintly in the sitting room.  He lowered her to the
floor.  There was no laughter now.  He was suddenly aware of the
commitment they both had made.

"I

could no' live with myself if I hurt you.  " He cupped her chin and
tilted her head so that she was gazing at him, although it was too dark
to read what was in laer eyes.

"It's no' too late to say no."

"And still early enough to say yes."

He wanted to tell her all that he was feeling, who he was and who he
intended to be for the remainder of his life.  He wanted to offer her
everything inside him, his past and his future, the memories of the man
he had been and the hopes of the man he had become.

But despite her brave words, he knew she was frightened.  She wanted
him, but she was still so afraid to reveal all that she was.  He could
not overwhelm her.  She had come to him tonight.

And that had to be enough.

He'touched the top button of her blouse.

"I've dreamed of this."

She stood very still.

"Have you?"

He pulled the button through its hole.  He traced the deeper opening
with one finger.

"Aye.  Shall I tell you what I dreamed?"

"I think so.  Yes."

"I dreamed that we were together, just this way.  And that when I
undressed you, you became a swallow and soared high in the sky above
me."

"That's a sad d~.am, Andrew."

He unbuttoned the second button, and the third.  His thumb dipped
deeper, lightly brushing her flesh.  Back and forth, as gently as a
whisper.

"Then, just as I had given you up and bowed my head to mourn, you came
back to earth and lighted on my shoulder.  And when I looked down at
you, you were a woman again.  My woman."

He spread open her blouse.  Her bra was a strip of gleaming white, but
the darkness hid her well.  He pushed the blouse from her shoulders,
and it floated to the floor he- hind her.

"Dinna fly away from me, Fiona."

"And if I do, will you wait for me?"

He felt the question deep inside him" and he feared that she wasn, t
ready for thisl'BB'u,t he couldn t _m,a, he himself st.of?

He didn t know how.  I II wait always.  He forced his hands to his
sides, but he couldn't force himself to move away.

She nodded.  He could see the outline of her head against his window.

Then she reached Up and touched her bra, and when she lowered her hand,
the bra came with it.

He could just see a beautifully feminine outline, the ripe curves of
her breasts, the narrow nip of her waist.  He moved forward, and she
stood her ground.  He touched her breast, and he was lost.  She was as
soft as he had imagined.  What scars his fingers could discover had
stretched and thinned as she'd grown until they were only spiderwebs
crisscrossing the sweetly rounded flesh.

"You're all I dreamed."

"I'm no one's dream, Andrew."  Her voice trembled.

"But tonight I'm your reality, if you'll have me."  He showed her that
he would.  He scooped her closer and discovered the reality of a back
that was textured with both smooth and coarse Skin.  He felt her hold
her breath as he explored her, as if she were waiting for him to push
her away.  He murmured reassurances and kissed her chin, her

223 cheeks and finally her lips.  She melted against him, and he felt
the age-old thrill of conquest.  Nothing he had discovered had lessened
his desire.  She was Fiona, and the rest was immaterial.

He found the strength and self-control to undress her slowly and then
to let her undress him.  They had the night, and he found the patience.
Her skirt pooled at her feet, then her slip.  For a woman so convinced
she could never seduce a man, her underthings were a revelation.  He
felt silk so fine that it must have been transparent, and the tant aliT
ingly delicate froth of lace.  She wore a satin garter belt to hold up
her stockings, a sensuous and welcome surprise that was easily smoothed
over her hips.  He silently vowed to undress her again someday in
brightest sunlight, and the thought made it harder, and yet more
rewarding, to be patient.  When it was his turn to submit, her hands,
sometimes tentative but more often eager, were almost his undoing, but
he didn't rush her.  When she faltered, he helped.  When she didn't
falter, he stood in quiet, blissful agony.  The room was cold, and he
felt her shiver as she leaned against him to slide down his trousers.
Only then did he take matters into his own hands, kicking off his shoes
and making quick work of the remainder of his clothes.  He drew back
the covers, but she stood beside the bed.  He couldn't read her
expression, but he could read her thoughts.

"It's no' too late," he said.  His voice protested, cracking strangely
on the last word.

She sat on the bed and extended her hand, and he was lost again.

Beside her and under the covers, stretched leg to leg, hip to hip, he
thought he would go mad.  Her scent was everywhere.

Her hair brushed his cheeks; her breasts brushed his chest.  He could
feel her moist heat drawing him closer.  He knew how slow he must go,
how careful he must he.  He forced his hands to linger, his lips to
seduce, not plunder.  He had never lost himself so quickly, had never
been forced to fight for even a semblance of control.

Her flesh seemed to soften against his, and she sighed her pleasure as
he kissed the crook of her shoulder, the nape of her neck.  She moaned
as he sucked at her earlobe, and when his thumb stroked her nipple, she
shuddered against him.

He knew what it was to give a woman pleasure.  Now he discovered what
it was to give his woman, the one woman in the universe who had been
created for him, pleasure and more.

Because Andrew knew as he touched her skin, the precious, scarred skin
that had defeated the hungers of a raging fire, that he was helping her
defeat the doubts that had been with her for so many years.

And how could she doubt herself now?  How could she have any doubts
when his body was taut with desire and her hands were caressing the
evidence?

At last he shifted her beneath him, slowly, carefully.  He already knew
she was ready for him.  His own caresses had grown intimate, and he
knew she was moist, that he wouldn't hurt her any more than necessary
if he made love to her now.  He had taken a moment to prepare himself,
because pregnancy was unthinkable when so much was unsettled between
them.  But now the thought of hurting her deterred him again.

He hesitated.

In that moment, she was more courageous than he.  She drew him closer
and instinctively lifted herself to him.  He felt her stretch slowly to
accommodate him.  He was a large man, and she was a small woman, but
that barrier could not defeat them.

Time moved as slowly as he did.  It seemed a new day when he lifted her
in his arms and rested against her.

"Fiona?"

"I love you, Andrew."

His throat tightened, and blood roared in his ears.

"Fiona.  Darling."

He began to move again, carefully as before, but never so slowly again.
She gasped and began to move with him.  All thoughts of patience, of
teaching her about love, vanished.

She was teaching him.

The sounds she made deep in her throat were the sweetest he had ever
heard.  She arched against him, and any semblance of sanity fled.  He
held her tighter and thrust harder.  She moved with him, warm as
sunshine and velvet soft.  He could only see the outline of her head on
the pillow ease but he thought he saw the gleam of tears in her eyes.

He called her name as she gasped his.

And in that moment, time stood still.

The first thing Fiona felt as she awoke was wonder.  Wonder that her
body could feel so replete, wonder that she had slept so soundly,
wonder that a bed could feel so warm and comfortable.

And then she remembered.

Andrew.

In a flood of sensation she recalled what had happened last night.

She had come to Andrew's home, and he had rUlently and expertly taken
her virginity.  He had wanted Andrew had wanted her.

She could feel a smile on her lips as she relived what she could of
those moments.  He had been tender and passionate, an unlikely,
stunning combination that had carried her to some place well outside
herself.  And Andrew had been there to guide her back.

She opened her eyes and saw her arm, then her hand, with long, relaxed
fingers curled around the edge of a cream colored duvet.  light
fillexed in from a window not far away, highlighting the contrast
between the pale purity of the fabric and the patchwork cjuilt of skin
once touched by fire.  She always slept in shirts that covered her to
her wrists.  For a moment the sight of her own arm was as shocking as a
woman's first glimpse of a naked man.

And then her smile died.

It was morning, and the sky was growing lighter.  An- drew was sleeping
soundly beside her, the warmth of his breath gently tickling the nape
of her neck.  His arm lay across her waist, and his hand rested
possessively against her abdomen.

And soon he would awaken, too.

"She did her best to stem the tide, but panic flooded her.  Her gaze
was fixed on her arm, on the only part of her body ~at she could see.
Andrew would see it, too, see what he had touched in darkness, see what
he had so gently, thoroughly loved.

She told herself to be calm.  She told herself that love was not about
perfection in form or spirit.  She had never, never in her wildest
imagination, believed that lovemaking could be as powerful, as
exquisite, as what had passed between them last night.  She had
prepared herself for pain, for shy s Darling ness and whatever residue
of pleasure could seep through those formidable barriers.  She had
expected that residue to be enough.

She had expected so little and gotten so much.  Andrew shifted
slightly, and she went stiff with apprehension.

She imagined the pity in his eyes when he saw her body for the first
time.  He could not have discovered by touch alone just how damaged she
was.  Last night had been heaven, but this morning would be hell.

And suddenly, she knew she couldn't submit to it.  The sky was growing
lighter, although it appeared to be another gloomy day.  Had the sun
been shining, the room would be flooded with light, and she would be
completely visible when she stood.  As it was, if she moved now, she
could dress quickly.  Even if Andrew woke up as she did, the light was
dim enough to provide protection.

She didn't have time to question her decision.  She moved on impulse,
on information learned as a child and later as an adolescent.  Every
taunt, every whispered word of pity, was loud in her ears.  She
couldn't bear to taint the memory of last night with that.

She couldn't bear for Andrew to know how scarred she was still.  Both
outside and in.

He mumbled something as she inched out from under his arm, but when she
dared a glance at him, his eyes were still closed.  She sat up
carefully, praying he wouldn't awaken.  The room seemed- to grow
lighter by the moment.  She eased herself off the bed and wished she
could wrap herself in a sheet, but there was only the duvet, far too
heavy, and covering him, as well.  If she tried to remove that, he
would know.

As she moved across the wood floor her bare feet sounded like gunshots,
despite the care she took to step quietly.  She couldn't remember
exactly where Andrew had undressed her.  The memory of the way he had,
with such tender care and something almost like awe, was crystal clear.
For a moment she paused, filled with the achingiy sweet memory.

There had been nothing of pity in the way he had made love to her last
night.  He had wanted her; he had wanted to give her pleasure.

She wanted to crawl back into bed with him and forget her own
superficial pride.

But she couldn't.

She found her clothes on the floor at the foot of the bed.  Her hands
were trembling by then, and she fumbled with each piece, making long
work of something that should have been easy.

She didn't dare glance at Andrew.  Once begun, her mission was best
accomplished in haste.  And she didn't want to stop dress' rag halfway
through.  She didn't want him to see her like this.  Not the naked body
or the naked fears.  She finished at last, pulling her dark stockings
high and snapping them into place.  She wondered what Andrew had
thought of the absurdly feminine underwear, if he had found it an odd
choice for someone with so little feminine appeal.

She turned, as if to find the answer on his slumbering face.

And she saw that he was watching her.

For a moment she stood completely still.  She wondered how long he had
been staring at her, and exactly what he had seen.

"Very little," he said, as if he had read her mind.  He didn't smile.

"You've hidden yourself well, Fiona."

She considered lying.  She could tell him that she had to get back to
the hotel right away because she was afraid Duncan or Mara would look
for her this morning and be, come concerned.  She could say that she
had wanted to make him breakfast, and the cottage was too cold for
naked flesh.  But this was Andrew, and he deserved better.  She said
nothing.

"Did last night mean nowt?"  He sat up.  The duvet lay carelessly over
his lap, but his chest was broader and more powerful than her hands had
told her.  He was magnificent.

"Last night meant everything," she said.

"I think no'."  He shook his head, and his eyes were sad.

"Who was it that I made love to last night?  I remember the feel of
her.  She was soft and pliable, as womanly as a man's fondest dream.
But today she's gone, as surely as if she were that dream, and a dream
only."

"Come back to bed.  Take off your clothes and come back to bed."

She yearned to do it.  She yearned to believe that it would change
nothing, that he would be as eager to love her once

he'd seen her as he had been last night in the darkness.  Her hand
went to the top button of her blouse And froze.

He didn't make it easier.  His gaze was steady and unblinking.

"Until you trust me," he said, "until you trust me to know who it is
you really are, then we've nowt to say to each other."

For a moment she couldn't believe she'd heard him right.  He had always
understood her fears.  Andrew, more than anyone in the world, had
understood.

"I understand, but I will no' accept this from you," he said, as if,
once again, he had read her thoughts.

Anger erupted somewhere deep inside her, like lava spewing from a
long-dormant volcano.

"And who are you to decide what I will and will not do!"  He stared at
her until the silence had a sound of its own.

Then he sDoke.

"I'm the man who will love you, Fiona.  The moment that you truly begin
to love_ yourself '

Chapter 16

On a warm summer morning Stardust began her journey to.  the other side
of Serenity Lake.  She said goodbye to Lockjaw, who wished her a safe
trip.  The ~out w. ere too fn_'ghtened to say farewell, but they Imppea
their fins from a safe distance.  The eels spelled out Good Luck with
their nimble bodies.  Stardust uickly reached the drop off where the
water grew eeper.  She had never come this far before, and for a moment
she almost turned back.  Then she thought about how lonely she was.
Even her imagination failed her.  Stardust knew that she had to cross
the lake, even if Lockjaw was wrong and there were no other water
dragons waiting for her.  The water was deep and dark, but she had to
try.

"It's a nice little church, but I'm in danger of becoming a sun
worsmper.  If the sun ever shines again."  Duncan strolled down the
center aisle of the village kirk with lain at his side.

Andrew was already at the front, arranging the lecteru that would be
used for the meetin He hadn t felt comfortable using the and the a
man

who was concerned about the fate of his parishioners, had brought in a
Simple wooden stand from his own study.

"No sermons, Andrew?"  lain nodded at the old walnut pulpit looming in
the corner.

"And I'd so looked forward to hearing you preach."

"I suspect before the night is finished you'll hear more preaching than
you'd ever wished."  Andrew joined them just in front of the first
pew.

"Do you think we'll have a good turnout?"  lain asked.

"I think everyone who matters will come.  Those who plan to sell and
those who are on the fence.  Those who have no stake in it will stay at
home."

"Then everyone should be here," Duncan said.

"Everyone has a stake."

lain set the papers he'd been carrying on the lectern.

"Have you prepared a speech?"  he asked Andrew.

"I think that would be unwise.  If I'm too formal, they'll feel I'm
trying to manipulate them.  I'm just going to state my concerns.
They'll have the papers you've prepared that show what Carlton-Jones
and Surrey have done in other places and what's happened as a result.
But in the long run, it will no' be what I say or what they read that
matters.  It will be how determined they are to help each other.  If
each thinks only of himself, we'll be lost.  But if they're willing to
act for the greater good..."

The other two men were silent.  All of them knew how difficult this was
going to be.

"Kaye Gemton was planning to come and s. ,p~;a" k out," Andrew said, "
but she's in hospital in Inverness.

"Since when?"  Duncan asked.

"Yesterday."  Andrew had driven her tiaere himself, just hours after
Fiona had walked out of his life, perhaps forever.

It looked as if Kaye would recover enough to be released early tomorrow
morning.  He wasn't sure that he would recover at all.

"She would have been a powerful influence," lain said.

"Aye, but there will be others who'll speak out for what's right."

"It looks like people are beginning to arrive," Duncan said.

"It would be best if we didn't sit together."

"Is Mara coming?"  Andrew hesitated.

"And Fiona?"

"Yes.  One of the local teenagers is watching April, but I think
there'll be a number of children here.  For their sake, you're going to
have to douse any fireworks before they go off."

Andrew watched his friends take seats in different aisles.  The church
was old, and it carried the musty smell of centuries of prayer and
worship.  It's architects had carefully eschewed the sentimental or
emotional, preferring stern gray stone and a design as rigid as a
Calvinist's spine.  But the emotion and sentiment were hidden here.
They were impregnated in the air, worn into pews' that h~d held both
the newborn and the dying.  Centuries of men and women had mourned in
this place, even if they had managed it with Scottish stoicism and
dispatch.  Young people had committed themselves to each other and to
God on the very place where he stood.

And now Andrew was asking for a different kind of commitment.  He was
not a particularly religious man and not a superstitious one.  But he
was glad that they had chosen the kirk as their meeting place.  It
seemed only right.

The villagers filed in slowly at first; then the lempo picked up, until
people were sliding to the center of the pews to make room for
newcomers.  There was an air of suppressed excitement.

Children, scrubbed with io an inch of their lives, bounced on pews and
signaled each other across the room.  Old women leaning on canes and
old men moved slowly down the aisles to find seats.  He tried to greet
them all and thank them for coming, but the task grew too large as the
time neared to start.

Andrew glanced at his watch.  It was almost seven.  Mara still hadn't
arrived, although Billie had come in to sit beside lain.

Fiona was nowhere to be seen.

Andrew wondered what he would do when she did arrive.  He hadn't seen
her since she'd left his house' two mornings ago.  He didn't know what
she'd thought or felt.  He had been harsh, so harsh that his own words
still rang in his head.  But he couldn't take them back, because they
were true.

Until Fiona believed in him and in herself, they had no future
together.

All too well he understood self-doubt and the terrible price is
exacted.

He looked toward the door, but it wasn't Fiona who strolled into the
kirk.  David Gow, looking as if he belonged in a glossy magazine
advertisement, took a seat halfway into the room.

Andrew had no doubt why Gow was here.  Next week this meeting would be
portrayed in Gow's newsl~aper as a quaint attempt by the village of
Druidheachd to ~ progress at bay.  Gow was a brother in spirit to men
like Carlton Jones and Surrey.  He used whatever was at his disposal to
better his own lot.

The question now was how many of the villagers were like him?

Andrew shook another hand or two, then started toward the front.  The
room grew quiet.  He w. as undisputably the moderator.  The meeting was
about to I~gin.  Normally he wore his kilt for formal occasions, but he
hadn't wanted to be accused of even' a hint of drama tonight.  Instead
he was wearing a suit pulled from the back.  o. f his closet.  The suit
was a dark tweed prison and the.  tie a silk han/~man's noose.  But he
was willing to endure the worst punkshment to set the right tone.  _ _
.

, At the front he resisted yanking at his starched white coLlar.  He
waited until the room fell silent.  Then be stepped over to the
lectern.

At that precise moment, Mara and Fiona walked in.  He didn't begin, as
if, like a good host, he was waiting for his newest guests to be
seated.  But the truth was that he couldn't speak.  HIS mouth was as
dry as a stale scone, and his throat felt as if the scone was lodged
there.  He had ex- aad ted to feel some sense of detachment, some sense
that he been right to risk their relationship in order to make his
point clearly and finally.  Instead, all he felt was fear.  Because as
he faced Fiona in the crowded church, he ~alized llUSt.  how much he
loved her and what his life would be worth f she turned away from him
forever.

She was seated now, a pale-faced waif with her chin held absurdly high.
He wanted to lope down the aisle, toss her over his shoulder and flee
Druidheachd forever.  He wanted to forget what was right and settle for
what was safe.

Instead, he cleared-his throat and began.

"FOr those of you who dinna know, my name is Andrew MacDougall, and
with the support of the minister of this

233 kirk, I've called this meeting to discuss the events of the past
months.  "

At first he spoke slowly and carefully, searching for the right words.
These were not people who would be convinced easily.  Many of them were
the descendants of stubborn men and women who, in the early nineteenth
century, had avoided the Wholesaleexile of Highlanders known as the
Clearances.

The people sitting in this kirk were wary as well as astute.  They made
decisions with the same skill and care with which they made their
livings.  Scots had an international reputation for parsimony, but
Andrew knew the truth about that.

Scotlandwas a harsh land, and throughout history it had been a poor
one.  For centuries the Highlands had been poorest of all.  After the
Clearances, those who had remained had not survived through luck. They
had learned to husband their resources, trade on their own unique
talents and make careful, considered decisions.  The old ways were
maportant in Druidheachd, because the old ways had stood the test of
time.

He tried to present his concerns without emotion, but .  when he spoke
about what the village and the land meant to him, the emotion crept in.
He had tried not to glance at Fiona, but against his will, his eyes
sought her then.  Her eyes were luminous, and despite everything else
that was be_tween them, he knew she supported him in this.

Just as he had expected, the debate began the moment he finished.  A
stranger, a man in a cos fly gray suit, rose to his feet.

"I would like to speak, if I may.  I represent Mr.  Carlton Jones and
Mr.  Surrey.  And I would like to address this."

He held aloft the sheet of facts and figures that each person had
received at the door.

lain had prepared the document carefully.  There was nothing in it that
couldn't be verified.  It was an indictment of the business practices
of the men in question and an unvoiced prediction of what would happen
to Druidheachd if enough villagers sold their property

lain stood, too, and Andrew held up his hand to silence the man in
gray.

"You'll be welcome to speak in due time," he said.

"But this is a meeting for the citizens of this village and the
surrounding countryside, and until they've had a chance to be heard,
I'll have to ask you to be seated."

The man protested.  Andrew stood his ground.  A murmur swept the room,
but no one spoke in defense of the man's rights.

"lain," Andrew said, "have you something to say?"  lain came to the
front.  The murmur grew louder, then died.

"There are many ways for a man to attain what he most wants," lain
said.

"One of them is to spread rumors that belittle anyone who stands in his
way."  He let his words sink in before he continued.

"I could do that as well as any man, but I've chosen instead to fight
this issue with facts.  You have those facts before you.  Now, if you
have any questions for me, I'll answer every one of them."  There were
questions, and some of them were overtly hostile.  Andrew had expected
as much.  lain handled them all with aplomb.  He explained in clear
language what had happened to the towns that had fallen prey to
developments such as the one Carlton-Jones and Surrey enwsioned.

With figures and examples he backed up his claims that Carlton-Jones
and Surrey's developmenls were among the most destructive.

"It comes down to the simplest of values," he said at last, when there
were no more questions.

"Each of you must separate what is _._t~l, ,y, important from what, in
the long run, is inconsequential.

"Easy for you to say, isn't it, lain Ross?"  A matronly, woman in the
second row lumbered to her feet.  Andrew recognized her as Darla Mac
Bride a local busybody with the tongue of a viper and the disposition
of a hedgehog.

Compared to others sitting in the windows, Darla's family was
relatively new to the village.  Only two generations of Mac Brides
resided in the kirk yard

"None of this has been easy for me to say, Mrs.  Mae- Bride," lain said
evenly.

"I'm deeply concerned about what's happening here."

"And why is that?  Is it because those English gentlemen can pay more
for our land than you can?  Everybody here knows that you want it for
yourself!"

"Everybody here doesn't know that," said another female voice.  "lain
Ross and his father before him have managed their land wisely and well.
He's a fair and intelligent landlord, and I'll not have you malign him
this way!"

Darla sat down, making disgusted noises that carried to the last pew.

"I have no wish to own so much as one more blade of grass," lain
said.

"In fact this is as good a time as any to announce that I've just
donated Ceo Castle and the land surrounding it to Historic Scotland, to
be managed as a national historical site."

"Couldn't pay the taxes, I suppose," Darla said.

"If I couldn't pay the taxes on property that's belonged to my family
for centuries, why would I try to buy property in the village?  Have I
need of it for another home, perhaps?"

There was no response from Darla, but another rumble of voices
ensued.

lain took his seat.  Andrew waited for the next speakers to emerge.

They did, in fast succession.  One woman's voice trembled audibly as
she tried to explain why she had just sold her family's property to
Carlton-Jones and Surrey.  A man stood up to announce that he hadn't
sold and didn't intend to.

The debate raged on.

Andrew lost his patience in the midst of a particularly virulent speech
by a man he'd often drunk with at the pub.

The man was defending his right to do anything he bloody well
pleased.

"Of course you've the right," Andrew said.

"You've also the right to bray like a blethering jackass any time you
choose!  Just pardon the rest of us for no' going along with you.  Some
of us are more interested in what happens to our friends and neighbors
than whether we'll have enough quid to bet on the soccer matches!"

Had anyone been foolish enough to drop a pin, it would have sounded
like a bomb.  Andrew's eyes swept to Fiona again.  He expected to see
censure.  Instead, her eyes were dancing.

She lifted her hands and began to applaud.  Fully half the room joined
in.

Duncan was the eighth speaker.  Mara leaned over to whisper in Fiona's
ear as he strolled to the front.  The stroll was high drama.  Except
for lain, everyone else had spoken from their seats.

"Does he no' look.  bonny tonight, our Duncan?"

"You think he looks bonny all the time, Mara."

"Aye, I suppose.  And will his son be as bonny, do you think?"

Fiona turned and searched Mara's face.  Despite the serious nature of
this meeting, she looked completely serene.

"Are you pregnant?  Is that what you're telling me?"

"Aye.  Duncan does no' know, of course.  I knew better than to tell him
while the clouds hung heavy over Druid- heachd."

"Mara, that's great!"  But even in the midst of her congratulations,
Fiona pondered Mara's last statement;

"You know more than you're saying, don't you?  Every- thing's going to
turn out right, isn't it?"

"That depends.  In a moment the men of midnight will have done all they
can, just as it was predicted they would.

But there's one here who's yet to speak.  One whose destiny is tied up
in the village now that her past has been resolved.

One who needs to explain to these g,o~, d people exactly what
Druidheachd is, and what it means.

"You can't mean me!"

"Aye.  And you've known you must speak since you walked through the
door.  For my son and.  _f_o_r t'be daughter Billie carries.  And for
your own weans, Fiona.  Duncan began, and Mara turned away to watch
him.

Fiona hardly heard a word he said as she sorted wildly through Mara's
revelations.  A son for the Sinclair and a daughter for the Rosses. She
wondered if Mara was sure.  She wondered if Billie knew.

And then there was her part in this.  Her own part, and one she was
terrified to play out.

She had ached to speak almost from the first.  No one had talked about
the mysterious, mystical appeal of Druidheachd, of its history, its
secrets.  No one had painted pictures of the mist-shrouded peaks of
Being Domhain, of Cumhann Moor with its eerie landscape and its, ghosts
of lovers long dead.  No one had spoken of Andrew, s darling, not even
Andrew.  They had talked of taxes ano property values, of duties to
neighbors.

But no one had talked of the things that set this one tiny village
apart from hundreds of other Highland clachans.

There was a spattering of applause, and she realized that Duncan had
finished.  But before he could be seated, Darla

Mac Bride began to s~out.

"You're not even one of us, Duncan Sinclair!

You were raised in America.  You've no right to speak here.  "

Duncan began a response, but he stopped when Fiona stood and started
down the center aisle.

"Fiona?"

She was halfway to the front before she knew she was on her feet.

Anger had carried her forward, as well as the knowledge that, for once,
she knew her own destiny as well as Mara did.

"I'd like to answer Mrs.  Mac Bride if I may."  She reached Duncan's
side.  He didn't sit down.  He nodded curtly, but he stayed beside her
as if he expected her to collapse.  She turned to him.

"I'm all right.  Go on."

He looked apprehensive.  She touched his hand.

"Go on," she said.  He shrugged and star~!  down the aisle.  Only when
he was seated did she turn to face the audience.  There were so many of
them.  For a moment she faltered.

"She's got no right to speak here, either," Darla Mac- Bride said
loudly.

It was all the courage Fiona needed.

"Don't you think so?"  She forced herself to look out over the audience
again, and her fear evaporaled.  She was shaking with anger, yet for
all their faults, these people were hers.  She had grown up without
them, but they belonged to her and she belonged to them in a way that
she would never belong to anyone else.

She moved slowly toward the first pew.  The room had grown still again.
Even the babies had quieted, and the little children watched her with
their mouths open.  She lifted a hand and touched the opposite cuff of
her blouse, a cuff that neatly hid the truth about what she had
endured.

She fingered the double thickness of fabric, and strangely, it gave her
courage.  She had endured.  Like this wonderful old village, she had
endured.  And the fire and its aftermath had given her a clearer vision
of Druidheachd's future than she might have had without it.  She, of
all people, knew what it meant to lose roots, family, history.

"Duncan was born here.  I was born here," she said.  Her voice was
clear and strong.  She was sure it had reached the back pews.

"So what if you were," Darla said.

"That means nowt to me!"

For the first time since she'd walked to the front, Fiona looked at
Andrew.  He wanted her to sit down; she knew he did.  He didn't want
her to suffer, not for this, not for him.  But he couldn't know that
she wasn't suffering.

She was never going to suffer again.

She turned her gaze to Darla.

"I almost died here, Mrs.  Mac Bride And that matters, don't you think?
That gives me the right to speak as one of you.  I was meant to grow up
here, but I wasn't given that chance.  This village and everyone in it
was erased from my life, just as it's about to be erased from yours.
Well, I'm back, and now I know exactly why I am.  To tell you exactly
what you'll lose if you continue this madness."

Even Darla Mac Bride fell silent.  "

Fiona began to paint the picture she saw in her mind, but with words.

She described what it had been like to leave as a small child and come
home as an adult.  She talked about her first glimpse of Being Domhain,
her first ride on the loch.

She talked about the majesty of the old buildings, the music of the
tiny burn, the way that the clouds met the earth and cleansed
everything in their path.

"There's magic here," she said.  She walked over to stand directly in
front of Darla.

"Magic that not everyone can see.

The measure of whether someone deserves to speak at this meeting is not
how long they've lived here but how much of that magic they've touched.
"

Darla drew an audible breath.

Fiona turned away from her and smiled at Mara.

"There am ghosts here, and fairies.  There's a mysterious creature in
our loch who far too rarely blesses us with her presence.  But there's
something even more important.  There's tradition, and kindness and a
wealth of memories.  And there's his- Wry that will be destroyed if we
let Druidheachd change too quickly."

She was almost finished.  She had only one thing left to say.  She
gazed around the room.

"Whatever you decide, someday you'll have to explain your position to
your children and grandchildren, your nieces and nephews.  Will you
tell them that magic died one summer, and you sold the remnants for a
few pieces of silver?  Or will you tell them that the magic is still
here, and that they have only to reach out their hands to find it?"

Her cheeks were flushed; she could feel their heat.  But she had never
felt better or slxonger.  She hadn't intended to look at Andrew again,
but her traitorous eyes sought his for one quick glance.

His expression was inscrutable, but his hazel eyes blazed fiercely with
pride.

Chapter 17

No sunshine in the world was more beautiful than Scot- land's.  From
the moment the sun rose on Monday morning the village was bathed in a
golden glow that gilded the gray stone houses and plucked rainbow hues
from the lovingly tended cottage gardens.  Hollyhocks swayed in the
sun- warmed breeze, and roses cascaded over austere iron fences, as if
to point out that there was nothing in life that couldn't be changed
with enough love and care.

Nothing that couldn't he changed.

In the late afternoon Billie strolled through the hotel attic with
Fiona and Mara at her side, lifting dusty items and scrutinizing them
carefully.  In less than a minute she had discarded three lamps and a
radio that Fiona had hoped was an antique.

Billie picked up a stack of crocheted doilies that were crumbling from
age and neglect.  She shook her head and relegated them to the discard
pile.

"I think there are enough people who'll stand firm to keep
Carlton-Jones and Surrey from having what they want."

Last night's meeting had been the topic of discussion since Billie's
arrival.

"I want to believe you're right," Fiona said.

"She is."  Mara lifted a chipped crystal bowl from the top of a
cardboard carton and handed it to Billie.

"Worth a repair?"

Billie held it up to the light.

"Nope.  But Martha Stewart would use it for flowers.  She'd put sweet
peas or drooping ferns over the chipped part."

"What did you mean, Billie's right?"  Fiona asked Mara.

"Do you know so,m, ething we don't?"

Billie grimaced.  She always knows something we don't.  "

"Do I know exactly what the result of last night's meet ins will be?"
Mara shrugged.

"No.  Do I know that we'll raise our children here, and that life will
be good?"  She smiled.

"Does that mean yes?"

"It's never as clear as all that.  But I felt the black clouds drifting
away last night, and when I awoke this morning, the village was ablaze
in sunshine."

Billie lifted an old cribbage board from a box and ran her thumb over
the holes.

"Speaking of children..."

Fiona exchanged glances with Mara.

"I'm pregnant," Billie said.

"At least, I think I am."  She looked up, and her eyes narrowed.

"Darn, you're no fun at all.  You already knew, didn't you?"

"I had a wee suspicion."  Mara embraced her.

"So am I."  Billie hugged her back, the cribbage board temporarily
forgotten in one hand.

"Does Duncan know?"

"Aye.  I told him last night.  But I told Fiona first."  Mara stretched
out her arm to include Fiona in their embrace.

"And it's largely due to her, I think, that I could tell Duncan today.
I think we owe the future of the village to our Fiona."

Fiona tried to protest, but Billie shushed her.

"You were magnificent," she said, hugging Fiona hard.

"If Carlton Jones and Surrey abandon their plans, it will be as much
because of what you said as anything else."

"The men of midnight had a bit to do with it," Fiona said.

"Aye, a bit," Mara said.

"But they needed you, Fiona.  We all did~ And we always will."

Fiona thought about what she planned to do in a few minutes.  She had
left the meeting last night without speaking to Andrew, who had been
surrounded by people.  She

hadn't seen him today, either, but she knew from Duncan that Andrew
had driven into Inverness early in the morning to bring Kaye Gerston
home from the hospital.

He should be home soon.

"Can the two of you finish this without me?"  She backhanded the air
ineffectually.

"You go on.  Andrew needs you more than we do," Mara said.

Fiona met her eyes.

"What else do you know?"

"If you go to him now, you'll find out for yourself."

"I thought you couldn't see the destiny of people you loved?"

"She doesn't need second sight to know what's between you and Andrew,"
Billie said.

"Plain old eyesight is plenty good enough."

Andrew crossed the pub threshold but was blocked immediately by friends
who wanted to have a word with him about last night.  He had turned
down half a dozen drams by the time he arrived at the bar, and he shook
his head as Brian raised a bottle high.

"Just water."

"Am I hearing you right?

Water?  "

"You are, and that's all I'll be having from now on," Andrew said.

"Even if I have to pay for it, I will."

"Water, Andrew?"

Andrew looked up to find lain beside him.

"That's what I'm drinking, aye."

"Well, I've heard it said the stuff's not so bad.  Make mine water,
too, Brian."

Brian grumbled under his breath.

Andrew turned and leaned against the bar.

"You can drink whatever you choose, lain.  I'll no' grab the glass from
your hand."

lain lifted the water that Brian put down in front of him.

"Slainte tn hah To your health, Andrew.  To the best of health
forever."

Andrew lifted his own in response.  He hadn't looked forward to
explaining his decision to stop drinking to his friends, but he should
have known that lain wouldn't need an explanation.

"Give me whatever you gave them," Duncan said, crossing the room to
join them.

"It will no' be to your liking," Brian grumbled.  He slid Duncan a
glass of water from a full ten feet away.

Duncan looked at his water, then he looked at Andrew.  He gave one of
his rare smiles.  '~I like it fine.  "

"We're alone again," Andrew said, and it was true As always, the other
patrons had taken tables in the far corners of the room.

"I thought after last night the villagers might have determined that
we're only men.  With no special power among us."

"Did you think that would be the result?"  lain asked.

"Then you weren't at the same meeting I attended.  There was enough
power in that room to light up Druidheachd for years."

fe rent from any of them.  They've given us a name, and a reputation,
but we're only.  men.  "

Duncan had given similar speeches more times than An- drew could count.
Now he shook his head.

"I think you're wrong."

"Do you?"

"I think there's a special si .g~ificance to be' rag born at
midnight.

It.  "s neither day nor night, one day or the next.  It's a moment that
h.o.,v~s alone in time, poised on the brink of change.

And that s exactly where Druidheachd has been.

Poised at midnight, waiting for the next part of its history to begin.
And I think that next part began last night.  I just ho'p~ it unfolds
the way we know it should.  " Fiona is no' the only one in the Sinclair
family capable ofj~oetry."

Duncan watched Andrew thoughtfully.

"I think Fiona turned the tide of the meeting last night."

Andrew couldn't even thlnir about what Fiona had done wi~out, feeling
his throat tighten.

"Aye."

She's always been my little sister.  It's been my job from the
beginning to protect her.  "

"I know."  "I guess she proved last night that she doesn't need my
protection ."

'

"That she did."

"I'm sorrY," Duncan said gruffly.

Andrew didn't have to ask what Duncan was apologizing for.  He was
giving Andrew a clear go, ahead Andrew just didn't know how to tell his
friend he had no idea how he should proceed with Fiona.  He cleared his
throat.

"I dinna know why we were born at the same moment.  I've no notion if
it was fate or coincidence or someone's idea of a joke.

I'm just glad that it happened that way.  " Duncan clapped him on the
back.

"And do you suppose that now, since we may verY well have served out
our cosmic purpose, life will settle down for all of us?  We'll move
into middle age worrying about mortgages and high blood pressure and
where to take our next vacation, instead of curses and ghosts and
creatures in the loch?"  They gazed thoughtfully at each other.

"Not bloody likely," lain said with a wry smile.  And as one, the three
men lifted their water glasses in silent toast.

"Fiona?"

Four feet from the hotel's front door, Fiona recognized David Gow's
cultured accent.  Reluctantly she turned to wait for him to cross the
lobby and join her.

"I'm afraid I'm on my way out," she apologized.

"If it's another problem with your room, you'd do better to speak with
Nancy."

"It's not a problem at all.  I'm leaving town in a few minutes, and I
wanted to say goodbye."

"Well, we'll miss you."  She extended her hand.

"I hope you found your stay... enlightening?"

"Quite so."  He favored her with one of his thousand-watt smiles, along
with the handshake.

"I have something for you."  He extended a file folder.

She took it and held it to her chest.

"No, go on and look at it now.  Please."

She was on her way to Andrew's, and she really didn't want a delay, but
her curiosity got the better of her.  She opened the folder and found a
neatly ~typed article, probably his submission for the next issue of
paper.  She looked up.

"If you'd take a moment and read it, I'd be grateful."

She nodded reluctantly.  She scanned the article at first, then she
found herself backing up to read every word.  When she had finished,
she didn't know what to say.

"David..."

"My farewell present."

"You've as much as admitted that you didn't really see our creature,
that it was a trick of the waves and light."

"Not quite.  I've said that it could have been."  The article was
beautifully written.  Despite herself, Fiona was enormously impressed
with his abilities.  She had never read a more moving testament to the
powers of myth and legend and one man's desire to believe in both.  No
one could fault David for what he had claimed, but neither would anyone
with an ounce of skepticism believe that a creature really existed in
Loch Ceo.  Feona could almost hear the village's tourist revenue
trickling away.

"You've gotten yourself off the hook nicely."  She looked up.

"And you've defused the tourist bomb here.  Now maybe Druidheachd has a
chance of getting back to normal."

"More than a chance.  I'm a better reporter than you might think, with
better sources."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I know for a fact that the gent who was representing
Carlton-Jones and Surrey at the meeting last night has recommended that
they abandon this project.  He doesn't think the company has a prayer
of getting all the land they need.  He indicated to me that they've
reluctantly agreed."

"You're sure?"  He smiled again.

"As sure as I am that the royal family will have another crisis in the
next six months."

"That's as good as it gets."  She handed him the folder, and he tucked
it under his arm.

He reached for her hand and held it for a moment.

"You were wonderful last night, Fiona.  I'm planning to do an article
on you and the Stardust books when the rest of this dies down.  I hope
you'll agree."

"On one condition."

"You tell me right here and now that you never saw Andrew's darling."

"I think I'm looking at Andrew's darling."

"David..."

He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it.  Then he released it.

"I

can't tell you that.  "

"Are you afraid I'll tell someone?  I won't.  You've done more than
anyone could have expected to make things right."

"I can't tell you I never saw her, Fiona, because it's not true.  I had
every intention of lying when I set out that night.

I made myself as comfortable as I could and settled in to get some
asleep.  And in the hour just before dawn, I woke up and saw Andrew's
darling no more than twenty feet away, stretching her ma~tmificent neck
toward the stars.  She turned and saw me, and for a moment she did
nothing at all.  Then she flipped her tail and arched her back and dove
gracefully back into the water.  "

Fiona was silent, imagining that sight.

"Do you believe me?"  he asked.

She nodded.

"I won't say it changed my life."  His smile belied his words.

"Thank you for telling me."

"You can tell Andrew, although I doubt he'll believe it."

"I don't know.  Of all people, Andrew believes in miraclcs."

"I'll be in touch in a month or so."  David opened the door for her and
lifted his hand in farewell.

Outside the sun was still shining brightly, although it was past six
o'clock.  Fiona crossed the village green and wound her way toward the
loch.  Andrew's house was a good distance by foot, but she knew better
than to hurry.  She couldn't risk a cramp, and she didn't want to be
exhausted when she arrived.

The air smelled of summer, of wild dog roses and freshly mowed grass.

The loch had its own distinct smell, a clean, elemental fragrance, like
the moments just before a rain- storm.  She stopped more than once to
gaze out over it when the road took her close enough for a good view.
Finally she turned off on the narrow wynd that led to Andrew's cottage
and the ones much farther beyond.  She hadn't called, because she
hadn't wanted to risk a rejection.

Now she hoped that the long walk hadn't been for nothing.

She was relieved to see Andrew's sedan parked beside a cluster of larch
trees.  His lights were on, and his windows were thrown o__I~?  _, to
the fresh breeze.  From inside the house she.

heard Poppy s yapping, then, more faintly, Andrew's VOIce.

"No, you'll no' be going out with me this time, lad.  I'm in no mood
for your company tonight."

Fiona didn't have to calculate where Andrew might be going.  He was
going where he always did when he needed to think and plan.  He was
going out on the loch to commune with his darling.

And she was going with him.

~

She was waiting when he stepped aboard minutes later, waiting at the
miser's starboard side and gazing out over the water.  She turned when
she knew he had seen her.

"Hello, Andrew."

"Fiona..."

"Isn't it a wonderful evening?  It's still so light."

"A~ e."

"I ~card you talking to Poppy.  I knew you'd be coming out.  May I come
with you?"

He answered by turning aside to cast off.  She settled herself at the
stern, and as she did, she remembered the night he had brought her out
on the loch for the first time.  He had told her then that there was a
woman inside her, clawing her way free.

He had been right.

The motor rumbled, and the boat began to move away from the pier.  He
guided it with skill until they were free of the shore and past the
only other boat in sight.  Then he open eel the throttle and started
across the water.

She had expected him to come and sit with her, as he had that first
time.  Since they were virtually alone on the loch, she doubted it was
necessary to stand fig idly at the helm, but that was what he did.

She contented herself with admiring the view.  The sun was sinking
slowly, and the light was growing softer.  Sunset was still an hour or
more away, and even then, the sky would stay light for a time.  Winter
days were cruelly brief and summer days unending, but nothing in Scoff
and was mundane or ordinary.  It was a land given to excesses, a land
she would be happy to live in forever.

Time ceased to have any meaning.  Tonight the loch was a blue so dark
it seemed to dispense with color entirely.  Except for the wake of the
boat, the surface was still.  She imagined Andrew's darling somewhere
far below them.

e motor purred a softer cadence, and the boat began to slow.  Fiona
realized they were approaching the sheltered cove where Andrew had
brought her the first time.  They were completely alone when he turned
off the motor.

For a moment the silence was as loud as a roar.  She got to her
fee~t.

Andrew hadn't moved toward her, so she covered the space between them
instead.

"I'm glad you chose this place.  It has nice memories connected to
it."

"Aye."

"I don't think anyone will be developing this cove for a long time."

"We can hope that's the case."

"I think it will be."  She told him what David had said about
Carlton-Jones and Surrey.

"Druidheachd is bound to change, but it looks as if maybe it will
change slowly.  And now that everyone's been alerted to what could
happen, maybe there'll be more safeguards established.  That s the next
thing we have to work on."

"We, Fiona?  Do you plan to stay here, then?"

"I'm not going anywhere.

This is my home now.  "

"Fiona..."  She saw anguish in his eyes and something very close to
guilt.  She stepped forward and put a finger to his lips.

"You have nothing to apologize for, Andrew.  You were right about me. I
was hiding from you.  I guess I've been a little like your darling in
that way.  I've been more afraid of exposure than anything.  I've only
risked a glance or two at the real world when I was sure that no one
was there to see me."  He took her hand.

"I had no right to try to force you to be something you're no'."

"You didn't force me.  You told me the truth about myself, and you told
me what it was doing to you."

He tightened his grip.

"You've no need to let me off so easily.  I've regretted what I did
every moment since.  I want you any way I can have you."

"You can have me the way I am, Andrew.  The scars, the fears, the
insecurities.  And you can have the rest, too.  The better parts of me,
and the best."  She stepped back, and she

249 smiled as she unfastened the top button of her blouse.

"I

love you, Andrew.  "

He covered her hands.

"You dinna have to do this."

"I want you to see who I am.  It's taken me too many years to realize
that this is a body to be proud of.  I survived a fire, and every scar
I have is a miracle.  Maybe the scars aren't pretty, but I'm alive
because of them.  And I'm very, very glad I am."

He gathered her hands to his chest.

"Then let's go down to the cabin," he said hoarsely.

o. I want you to see me here, where the light is stronger.  " She
pulled away from him.  She was determined, and she was just discovering
that she could be every bit as stubborn as her beloved Scotsman.

She had dressed carefully for this moment, and undressing posed no
difficulties.  She neither sped through it nor lingered.  She undressed
with the same lack of fanfare that she did each night before bed.  When
she was finished, she stood before Him, her clothes spread out at her
feet.  She knew what he saw.  And she knew the love that filtered his
gaze.  She was not perfect, but neither was he.

"This is who I am," she said.

He clasped her close; then he lifted her into his arms.  She didn't
protest as he took the few stairs to the cabin.  There was light here,
too, enough to let her feast her eyes as he stripped off his shirt and
pants and joined her on the narrow This time there was no fear and no
shame as he explored her body.  She offered herself proudly, and in
return she took everything he offered her with the same fierce pride. 
When they were one at last, she held him close, basking in his desire
for her.

"I love you," he said gruffly.

"You know it, do you no'?"

And you 11 marry me, and have my children?  "

"Aye," she said again.

"God willing, we'll do it in that order."  He laughed and clasped her
closer.  And then there was no laughter, only unfiaggmg joy.

He was seeping soundly when she finally could bear to part from h~m.

The tiny cabin had filled with glorious tinted

light, and she knew the sun was setting.  She wanted to see it, but
she couldn't wake Andrew.  He looked entirely too happy to disturb.

She pulled on his shirt, which fell nearly to her knees, and climbed
the steps, checking at the top to be sure they were still alone.  Then
she strolled out on deck, gathering her clothes as she went.

The sky was ablaze with colors she never could have duplicated in a
thousand years.  She felt as if they were inside her, too.  They were
the colors of hope and of dreams come true.  She stood at the side and
looked over the glistening water.  When she drew the final
illustrations for her book, she would try to capture this moment.

"It's our loch," Andrew said from behind her.  His arms came around
her, and she leaned against him.  She could feel his belt buckle press
against her back, but his arms were bare.

"I never want to miss a sunset again," she said.

"Then we will no'."

They stood quietly and watched ~he loch absorb the colors of the sky.

Orange and mauve painted the surface, and lavender washed in from the
farthest shore.  Fiona felt Andrew shift behind her, and then his arm
lift~i and he was pointing to their left.  She followed his finger with
her gaze.

A ripple disturbed the water not more than ~, n'feet away, a ripple
that grew steadily wider as she watch co nine arew a breath that seemed
to go on and on, and just as she was sure her lungs would burst, a head
rose, a narrow, magnificent head with oval amber eyes.

Fiona's eyes filled.  She couldn't move or exhale.  She stood
transfixed.

Another head broke the surface, with a neck that was longer and
thicker.  The first swung around, and for a moment the two water
dragons stared at each other.  Then their heads began to sway.

The water dragons danced, gliding through the water together, as if
they had been lovers, always.

They descended under the water at last.  When there was no sign they
had ever been there, Fiona slumped against Andrew and his arms .
tightened like metal bands.  She turned and lifted her face to his.

"They knew we were here."

"We'll send our children to this cove someday to see them."

She tasted the salt of tears when he kissed her.  And she didn't know
whose tears they were.