Chapter Twenty-One
“Okay, ready?” Elise said. “Pick a card, but don’t tell me what it is.”
Catriona, sitting cross-legged in front of Elise, nodded and then pulled a card from the deck, glancing at it before she pressed it against her chest.
“Right, put it back and I bet I can guess which one yours is.”
Obediently, Catriona put the card back in the deck. Elise proceeded to shuffle them and then lay them out in a pattern on the rug between the two of them. She picked up a card and held it out.
“Was this your card?” It was the four of hearts.
Catriona’s eyes went wide. “Aye, it was! How did ye do that?”
Elise waved her fingers dramatically. “Magic.”
Jenna, who was sitting in the window seat, rolled her eyes. “Don’t listen to her, Cat. That wasn’t magic at all, just sleight of hand. Anyone could do it.”
“So ye could teach me?” Catriona asked, excitement in her voice.
Rose smiled to herself as she sat at the dressing table while Mable fussed with her hair.
It felt so good to have her sister and niece here.
She wasn’t sure she would have been able to do this without them.
Lir kept her promise and dutifully brought Elise through time so she could be present today and brought Jenna over from the neighboring island of Skye where she lived with her husband, Arran MacLeod.
To say that they were both surprised by her story was an understatement.
As Elise had pulled herself out of the tidal pool that Lir had used as a portal, it was probably the only time Rose had seen her younger sister speechless.
Jenna too had been shocked that her rule-following, risk-avoidant aunt had agreed to travel to the fifteenth century.
And not only that, now she’d decided to stay.
Mable stepped back. “All done. I hope ye like it.”
Rose squeezed the maid’s hand in thanks then turned to the others. “Well? How do I look?”
“Awesome!” Catriona cried. “My papa willnae know what’s hit him!”
Rose couldn’t help but smile. Catriona was already picking up Jenna and Elise’s turns of phrase. She just hoped the pair didn’t teach her any swear words. She wasn’t sure how she’d explain that one away to Cailean.
“I think Trouble has got it just about right,” Elise said, using the nickname she’d given Catriona. “You look awesome, sis.”
“Like a proper fifteenth-century lady!” Jenna added. She gave Elise a mischievous smile. “Sure you don’t want to come and join us, Elise? I can really picture you in one of my dresses.”
Elise scowled. “No, thank you. There is no way you’re getting me living in this time. It’s bad enough that I have to come here if I want to visit the pair of you. No internet? No coffee shops? No indoor plumbing? Not a chance.” She shivered at this horrifying thought.
Jenna laughed. “You get used to it. You’d be surprised what you can get used to when the trade-off is finding your soulmate.”
A disgusted look crossed Elise’s face. “Ugh. You sound like a Disney movie.”
Rose chuckled at their banter. Oh, how she’d missed it. She perhaps hadn’t realized quite how much until now.
There was a knock on the door. Mable went over to answer it, revealing Drew MacRae standing there, looking dapper in his tartan plaid and with his hair and beard freshly combed.
It was strange to think this was the same man who’d been at death’s door when she first arrived.
Now he looked whole and hale and years younger than his sixty years.
He cleared his throat. “Erm… I’ve been sent to tell ye… that is, I’ve been sent to ask… if ye are ready, the ceremony is ready to begin.”
Rose felt a thrill go through her. She wasn’t sure if it was nerves or excitement or both. She rose to her feet. “Thank you, Drew. We’re on our way.” She said it calmly, even though her stomach was suddenly tying itself in knots.
“Well,” Elise said, climbing to her feet and pulling Catriona up after her. “Let’s get this show on the road, shall we?”
“Ready?” Jenna asked, laying a hand on Rose’s shoulder.
Rose took a deep breath. Oh God. She was really doing this. It was really happening.
“Ready.”
She’d asked Elise to give her away. Unconventional, maybe, but nobody in Dun Mallach had batted an eyelid.
After all, she was a MacFinnan spellweaver, and eccentricity went with the title.
Elise gave her a wink and came to stand beside her.
Jenna and Catriona took up their places behind, carrying bouquets, while Mable took hold of Patch.
The little dog had been put on a leash, and he was not happy about it. But the last thing Rose needed was him deciding now was a great time to play chase-the-hem while she was in her wedding dress. He pulled and yapped, excited at all the commotion.
“Patch, behave yerself!” Catriona scolded and, for a wonder, he calmed a little. Catriona bent and hung a wreath of flowers around his neck.
“Brides-dog indeed,” Rose said with a laugh.
They stepped out of the room and made their way through the corridors of the castle.
As they walked, Rose thought of how strange this had all seemed when she’d first come here.
It had felt alien, far removed from everything she knew.
But now, as her eyes skimmed across the tapestries on the walls, the beams across the ceilings, the plaid runners that covered the flagstones, it didn’t feel strange any more at all.
It felt like home.
They reached the doors to the great hall and paused. Drew was waiting there to announce them, and as she reached him, he turned and announced their arrival to the guests waiting within. Music sprang up from the quartet that Cailean had recruited, and Rose felt her heart skip a beat.
This was it. The moment she’d been dreaming of for the past few weeks as preparations were made. She could hardly believe it had finally arrived.
Stepping inside, she saw that the great hall was crowded with people, some of whom she recognized, some of whom she didn’t.
Maggie and Beatrice were there, grinning like a couple of excited schoolgirls, along with Old Seamus, his daughter Brina, and a huge gaggle of grandchildren.
Others she didn’t know, as many had come in from other islands to mark the wedding of the laird of Barra.
As she and Elise took the first step down the aisle, her gaze immediately sprang to Cailean.
He was waiting for her in the place where the high table normally sat but which had now been cleared away and replaced by a woven arch covered in late-blooming flowers.
His eyes found hers across the intervening distance, and her breath caught in her throat.
Decked out in the MacNeil plaid, with his dark hair framing his face, he was enough to take her breath away.
She found herself grinning every bit as stupidly as Maggie and Beatrice had been, and he gave her an answering grin, boyish and full of joy.
“Who is that?” Elise murmured as they began walking down the aisle.
Rose tore her gaze away from Cailean to see that Elise was eyeing the man standing at Cailean’s side.
He was younger than Cailean with wavy blond hair so pale it was almost white.
He wore clothes even finer than Cailean’s and had a bearing that spoke of easy confidence.
She’d met the man yesterday, when he’d arrived from Islay to stand as Cailean’s best man.
“That’s Jamie Donald,” Rose said. “They call him the Lord of the Isles. He’s Cailean’s liege lord.”
“Is he now?” Elise said in a musing tone. “So what’s that? Some sort of king?”
“I don’t think it quite works like that. I think it’s more that he’s first among equals.”
Elise said nothing more, but Rose could see her glancing in Jamie Donald’s direction as they walked. Oh dear. She recognized that look in her sister’s eyes. The poor man didn’t know what he was in for.
But all such considerations were pushed from her mind as they reached the end of the aisle. Elise eyed Cailean as she held out Rose’s hand towards him.
“You take good care of her, you hear?”
Cailean’s eyes shone. “Oh, I will. On that ye have my word.”
Elise gave a tight nod and stepped back, shooting Jamie Donald a curious look as she went to stand next to him.
Cailean took Rose’s hand and squeezed. “Rose,” he breathed. “Ye look stunning.”
“You don’t scrub up too badly yourself,” she replied, squeezing his hand and giving him a smile. God, she couldn’t seem to stop smiling.
“Ready, love?”
“Ready.”
Together, they turned to face the person who was to marry them.
This was to be a handfasting, a traditional Scottish wedding rather than a Christian one—to Beatrice’s disgust and Maggie’s delight.
So rather than a priest, they had asked for the most experienced person on Barra in such matters, one who had one foot in the old religion and one foot in the new.
It just so happened that they both knew her.
“My, look at ye two,” Agnes of Hemkirk sighed. “A more suited couple I dinna think I’ve ever seen.” Her eyes almost disappeared into their nests of wrinkles as she smiled. “Let’s begin.”
She raised her arms above her head and called in a voice louder than anyone would expect from so diminutive a woman, “Ye all know why we are here, aye? We are here to handfast the laird and the spellweaver, aye?”
“Aye!” came the roar from the guests, followed by a loud bout of cheering.
Agnes stepped forward, a length of red and green tartan, the colors of Clan MacNeil, in her hands.
“Ye come before us in love, in trust, and in hope for the days ahead,” she said. “Do ye offer yourselves freely, without fear or force?”
Cailean looked at Rose, his thumb brushing across her knuckles. “Aye,” he said. “With all that I am.”
Rose smiled, heart fluttering. “Yes,” she whispered. “With all that I have.”
Agnes nodded, eyes bright, and began to wrap the tartan around their joined hands, binding left to left, heart to heart.