For a Heart Come Home (Ancient Songs #5)

Prologue

In the hall of a western chief deep in the Scottish Highlands, a bard sings and plays upon his harp, telling ancient tales of his host’s ancestors. Four tales he has told this night, holding his listeners in thrall.

But now the hour grows late. The ale has flowed, the feast is finished, and Finlay the bard judges that his listeners will soon require their beds.

A long evening of entertainment it has been, during which those gathered have heard of a long-ago, valiant warrior.

A third son sent to perform an impossible task.

A princess of ancient times with a bold heart.

A Viking maiden strong in spirit. Courage and endurance and love so impossible, it can do nothing but exist.

He coaxes from the strings of his harp one last, bright, glittering cascade of notes and sets the instrument aside. The magic that holds the room wavers but does not break. His listeners still watch him with wide eyes.

It matters little what his audience thinks, or even the noble chief. Finlay has told each and every tale this night for the benefit of but one listener—the tall young woman with the ashen-blonde hair who even now blinks and tries to shrug her way from what she has heard.

Can she so free herself? He can only hope not, for the story is not done. The rest of the tale cannot be sung but must be lived out here and now, in present time.

Those of whom he has spoken tonight are not gone.

They live on, if in other guises. He is still here, as he has always been, and pledged to one woman alone.

If she does not see him and know him for who he is, then no song he ever sings will serve to complete the magic.

The wheel of the years will continue to spin, but he fears his heart will never come home.