Epilogue
Hogmanay
The MacBean house blazed with lights on New Year’s Eve, every window glowing gold against the winter darkness. Forbes stood in the kitchen watching Lilith arrange shortbread on a platter while Alan explained the finer points of first-footing to a rapt audience of Salem witches.
“The first person tae cross yer threshold after midnight determines yer luck for the year,” Alan was saying, his accent thicker than usual with the approach of Hogmanay. “Traditionally, a tall, dark-haired man—which is why Forbes here will be doing the honors tonight.”
“What does he bring?” Sydney asked, leaning against the counter with obvious interest.
“Coal for warmth, salt for flavor, shortbread for plenty, and whisky for good cheer.” Alan grinned. “And he cannae speak until he’s set them down and wished the household prosperity.”
“So Forbes has to go outside right before midnight and then come back in?” Gwen looked at him with amusement dancing in her eyes. “In December. In Massachusetts.”
“Tradition is tradition, mo chridhe.” Forbes pulled her close, pressing a kiss to her temple. “Besides, I’ve survived Scottish winters. This is practically balmy.”
She laughed against his shoulder, and Forbes felt the now-familiar swell of gratitude that this—she—was his everyday reality.
Two months since Samhain. Two months of mornings at the MacBean kitchen table with Gwen—coffee in hand, smile waiting. Two months of being engaged to the woman he loved.
“Can I steal ye for a moment?” Forbes murmured against Gwen’s ear. “Before the chaos truly begins?”
He led her through the back hallway to Alan’s study—quiet enough that the party noise faded to a comfortable murmur. Forbes closed the door and pulled a small leather journal from his jacket, clearly old, the pages yellowed with age.
Gwen frowned at the unfamiliar handwriting on the cover. “What is this?”
“Open it.”
She did—and her breath stopped.
Protection wards. Bishop protection wards. But more complete than anything she’d ever seen, more detailed than the fragments her grandmother had passed down.
“Forbes,” she whispered. “Is this—”
“Mercy Bishop’s original protection ward.
The complete version, including the component that was lost when yer family split.
” He moved closer, looking over her shoulder.
“Ye mentioned yer grandmother always said there was something missing. So I started searching. Found it misfiled in Edinburgh under ‘Highland herbalism.’”
Her hands were shaking. “All this time? You’ve been looking since we met?”
“Alan’s been teaching me the Gaelic annotations.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Apparently, I sound like I time-traveled from 1746.”
A laugh broke through her tears. “Forbes, this is the most thoughtful thing anyone has ever done for me.”
“Yer magic was never broken, mo chridhe.” His hand came up to cup her cheek. “It was just waiting for the right key.”
She set the journal on Alan’s desk and threw her arms around him. He held her while she cried—not polite tears, but the deep sobs of someone finally receiving something they’d needed their whole life.
“I love you,” she said when she could speak.
“I love ye too.” He pressed a kiss to the top of her head.
She pulled back, wiping her eyes, and touched his chest—right over his heart. “The key to my magic. It was you.”
Forbes’s expression cracked open—that raw vulnerability he usually hid beneath wit and competence. He pulled her close again, his face pressed against her hair.
“Ye were my key too,” he said finally, his voice rough. “Ye unlocked everything.”
They held on for a long moment. Then Forbes kissed her forehead, her nose, her lips.
“There’s more at midnight.”
“More? Forbes, this is already—”
“Ye’ll see.” He smiled, that crooked expression that still made her breath catch. “Come on. Before Alan sends a search party.”
“Ten minutes to midnight!” Sinclair announced, bouncing with three-year-old excitement. “Mr. Forbes has to go outside soon!”
“Aye, I do.” Forbes stood, pulling on his coat. “Right then. Who’s timing this?”
“I’ve got it,” Kinloch said seriously, brandishing his mother’s phone like a sacred object. “I’ll text you at 11:59 so you’re ready.”
Forbes crouched down to eye level with the boy. “What would the sparkly ones say about tonight?”
Kinloch’s grey eyes went distant for a moment, seeing what Forbes couldn’t. Then he smiled. “They say you found your way home. They say the year that’s coming will be good.”
Something fierce and grateful lodged in Forbes’s throat. He pulled the boy into a brief hug, then straightened to find Gwen watching him with that expression that still stole his breath.
“Walk me out?” he asked.
“Obviously.”
They slipped outside into the cold December night, their breath clouding in the air. The garden was quiet, the protection wards humming with gentle magic, the fairy lights casting everything in soft gold.
Forbes pulled her fully into his arms. “Every Hogmanay I can remember in Scotland was beautiful—traditional, proper, full of history. But also cold. Distant. I was always documenting it rather than living it.”
His voice softened.
“Tonight, I’m no’ observing. I’m home.”
Forbes’s phone buzzed. One minute! Get ready!
“That’s my cue.” But he didn’t move yet. Instead, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a small velvet box.
Gwen went very still, glancing at the sapphire already on her finger. “Forbes—another gift?”
“It’s no’ a ring.” He opened the box, revealing a silver brooch in the shape of two intertwined hearts, crowned and wrapped in Celtic knotwork. “This is a luckenbooth. A traditional Scottish love token.”
Gwen stared at it, one hand coming up to cover her mouth.
“The journal was my research serving yer family’s magic,” Forbes said quietly. “But this is different. This is my heritage. My tradition.” He lifted the brooch from its velvet nest. “I wanted ye tae have something of where I come from tae go with the future we’re building.”
“Forbes,” Gwen whispered.
“The two hearts are for us—intertwined because we’ve chosen each other. The crown is for loyalty. And the Celtic knot...” He smiled slightly. “That’s forever. No beginning, no end. Just us, choosing each other, every day.”
His phone buzzed again. 30 seconds!!!
“I have tae go. But when I come back through that door—when I’m yer first foot of the new year—I’m bringing coal and salt and shortbread and whisky. And I’m bringing myself. All of me. For as long as ye’ll have me.”
“Forever,” Gwen choked out. “I’ll have you forever, you impossible Scottish man.”
Forbes kissed her—deep and sure and full of promise—then forced himself to step back.
“Put it on. Please. I want tae see ye wearing it when I come back.”
Gwen pinned it to her sweater with shaking hands, the silver hearts resting just over her own.
“Happy Hogmanay, Forbes MacLeod.”
“Happy Hogmanay, mo chridhe.”
He walked backward toward the street, unable to stop looking at her.
Inside, the countdown started.
“Ten! Nine! Eight!”
Forbes reached the sidewalk, arms full of symbolic gifts—coal and salt wrapped in cloth, shortbread in its tin, a bottle of Talisker whisky from Alan’s private stock.
“Seven! Six! Five!”
Gwen stood on the porch, one hand touching the luckenbooth, her smile radiant even through tears.
“Four! Three! Two!”
Forbes took a breath and thought: Thank ye. For this. For her. For everything.
“ONE! HAPPY NEW YEAR!”
The door burst open. Alan appeared, grinning, and Forbes stepped forward across the threshold.
He set down the coal for warmth. The salt for flavor. The shortbread for plenty. The whisky for good cheer.
Then he straightened and said, voice carrying to every corner: “Lang may yer lum reek. May yer chimney always smoke—may ye always have warmth and prosperity in this house.”
“Welcome, welcome!” Alan clapped him on the shoulder. “First foot of the year, and a good one!”
But Forbes’s eyes were only for Gwen, who’d moved to the front of the crowd, the luckenbooth gleaming silver against her dark sweater.
“Welcome home,” she said softly, and he heard everything she meant.
Forbes pulled her close and kissed her while the house erupted in cheers.
Around them, Salem’s magical community celebrated—witches and Highlanders, families and friends, old traditions and new ones being born.
Outside, midnight bells rang through Salem.
Inside, Forbes held Gwen close.
And somewhere—in the space between worlds—the Highland warriors who’d found their own second chances smiled.
Because the man who’d honored their stories had finally written his own.