Chapter 1 #2
“Do ye not remember his reaction the last time ye showed him yer phone?” Mairwen touched the rim of the scrying bowl.
“Sometimes, simple is best, Keeva, even though it may seem archaic.” She turned her attention back to the image on the divination waters.
The lass was lovely enough; of that, there was no doubt.
But her pain and weariness were undeniable—and at the age of nine and thirty, children from the union with her fated mate would be doubtful.
Especially since she was a mere mortal rather than a shifter.
“Acceptance by his people will be difficult for her.”
“Fated mates have faced such prejudices before,” Keeva said. “Calia Wiles is a fighter. She has overcome much.”
“Calia Wiles,” Mairwen repeated, still studying the image of the dark-haired lass with the soulful eyes.
“The name suits her.” But fighter or not, the mortal woman from the twenty-first century would still be faced with suspending her belief in everything she had ever known.
Of course, all fated mate matches required that of one or the other of the souls.
For some inexplicable reason, Mairwen sensed this particular pairing might prove more difficult than usual.
She pushed up from the table. “Let us prepare for the grand chieftain’s arrival, and hope the two of ye succeeded in solving his terrible riddle.”
* * *
Dressed in his usual long, black coat and kilt, Grand Chieftain Mathison Shadowmist’s mood matched his somber clothing.
As he passed between the magical wards that bordered Seven Cairns of seventeenth century Scotland’s Ninth Realm, the sting of their protective energy rippled across him and raked his wolf’s senses.
He rolled his shoulders to dispel the annoyance he and his inner being had felt so many times before.
His mount’s steps clattered on the cobblestone streets of the village of immortal beings, who were his only hope of regaining his life and, hopefully, a relationship with his sons.
A ragged sigh left him. It had been so long.
That feckin’ witch had poured every ounce of her magical strength into the curse that had robbed him of everything.
He shook his head. Never had he imagined that Bansys of the Silvercord Clan could ever be so powerful.
The bone-chilling drizzle intensified into a downpour just as he reached the meeting hall, which resembled a stone fortress more than a gathering place for the villagers.
All the other buildings along the thoroughfare were simple enough structures, some with thatched roofs, others with slate or clay tiles, and almost all with whitewashed walls.
But the meeting hall, with its watchtowers and formidable defensive parapets, would make intruders think twice about trying to seize it.
As he dismounted, he turned and spied one of the Weaver’s watchers.
To the untrained eye, the watchers appeared as lifeless stone statues of gnomes, various mythical creatures, or animals, but Mathison knew better.
The watchers missed nothing that happened in Seven Cairns, and they reported everything to the Weavers.
This particular watcher was an almost life-sized statue of a wulver—a good-natured, helpful creature with the head of a wolf and the body of a man.
Mathison placed his reins in the outstretched hand of the sculpted figure. “Take him to the dry. I dinna ken how long I will be.”
The wulver didn’t respond, but Mathison felt certain his request would be obeyed. “Dinna harm him,” he told his horse before walking away.
Horse rumbled a grudging acknowledgement of the request. Known for his foul temper and preference to serve only one master, the great black beast often had to be reminded to behave.
Mathison paused just beyond the reach of the pair of magical wards placed on either side of the main entrance to the hall.
The sting of their magic was a great deal more unpleasant and filled with warning than the wards guarding the village’s borders.
None of the wards would affect mortals who possessed little or no magic, but as a shifter—as the ruler of all the shifters of the Ninth Realm—the wards didn’t hesitate to make it known that he could only pass when the old one, the all powerful Mairwen, deemed it permissible.
Usually, once the border wards announced his arrival, she disarmed this pair at the entrance to the hall.
But knowing their power from personal experience, Mathison preferred not to chance it.
“Mairwen,” he called out. “I bid ye grant me entry.”
The door opened, and the immortal he’d visited for centuries to seek relief from his current existence smiled up at him. The silvery-haired matron stepped back while waving him inside. “Welcome, honored chieftain. Come, dry yerself by the fire while Keeva pours ye a wee dram to warm yer soul.”
Mathison shoved back the hood of his riding coat and fought the urge to shake off the water. ’Twould be a rude thing indeed to behave like a common mongrel in the presence of the one rumored to be a daughter of the mother goddesses. “I thank ye for yer hospitality.”
He moved to stand in front of the huge hearth that took up one end of the long meeting room.
Fresh wood popped and crackled in the glowing bed of coals, revealing that someone had recently fed the blaze.
Mairwen’s assistant, the wee lass known as Keeva, hurried over with a tankard, which he accepted with a nod.
That youngling always set him on edge. She flitted around too much for his liking, always reminding him of a flighty moth or an annoying midge.
She smiled more than usual today, and a different sort of energy filled the air with an excitement that caused his hackles to rise.
Hazarding a sip of the whisky she’d given him, he widened his stance and waited.
Something was most definitely different this time.
He sniffed the air, taking in the scents surrounding him.
The stench of disappointment that had fouled all his earlier visits was gone, replaced by a new aroma—a layer of leeriness and something else.
Even though he both feared and dreaded the answer, he had to ask, “Ye have found her?”
The old one didn’t smile, but neither did she bow her head with regret. She merely studied him as if weighing the sins of his weary soul.
“Answer me, Mairwen.”
“We feel we have found her.”
“But?”
“Uniting the two of ye will not be easy.”
He snorted a bitter laugh. “Nothing about my life has ever been easy.”
Mairwen directed him to the large stone bowl that sat in the center of the table. “Come. See who we think may be the one we have searched for so verra long.”
At least the bowl seemed harmless enough.
Not like those strange things that the young apprentice of Mairwen had shown him on his prior visits.
Still, a bit of cautiousness seemed prudent.
He approached with the wariness of a beastie ready for a trap to spring at any moment.
Then, he locked eyes with the image captured atop the waters in the bowl and forgot all else.
Even Dubh, his inner wolf, perked to attention and growled, “She is ours. She is our one.”
Preferring to proceed with caution, Mathison maintained a detached, calm demeanor. “Who is she?”
“Calia Wiles.” Mairwen moved to stand beside him. “A twenty-first century American seeking isolation in the Scottish Highlands in the hopes of escaping her troubled past.”
While something in the woman’s lovely hazel eyes pulled him in, the silvery-white stripe in her dark hair gave him pause. “She is in the future, ye say?”
“Aye.”
Something was not right. He felt it. “What realm…exactly?”
“She is mortal, grand chieftain.”
His heart sank to the pit of his stomach. “A mortal.”
“Aye.”
He turned away from the compelling image and started toward the door.
“My fated mate canna be a mortal who will die in a handful of years and shriek in terror whenever she sees me shift into my wolf. And look at her hair. She is no springtime lass who might be willing to change. That one will be set in her ways.”
“Wait, mighty one.” Mairwen’s order possessed the power to halt him just as he reached the door.
“Once the two of ye are bound and settled in the Ninth Realm, her lifespan will match yers just as the Highland Veil blesses each fated mate reunited to strengthen it. She is naught but nine and thirty mortal years of age.”
“And yet, I notice ye dinna address my other concern. Ye know as well as I the prejudices a mortal would face in the Ninth Realm.” He shook his head, taking care to keep his back to the image, fearing that if he looked at her once more, the woman on the waters would somehow coax him into returning and tossing caution to the winds.
“Because of this curse, I am known as the Wraith, the restless spirit that wanders through the Ninth Realm. No one recognizes me. None of my kith nor kin. No one. When I tell them of our times together in an attempt to stir their memories, they canna see me at all and claim I disappear before their verra eyes.” He flicked his hand at the bowl on the table.
“Yet ye bring me a mortal with half her life gone and expect me to be grateful even though my pain will only grow once we are joined? Ye expect me to believe this is the woman foretold to break the curse?”
“Tell me how yer pain will grow?” Her eerily bright eyes flashing, Mairwen charged toward him with her colorful skirts swishing in time with the jangle of her silver bracelets.
“Ye will have yer fated mate. The curse will be broken, and her lifespan will be matched with yers. As a Defender, a protector of the Highland Veil, ye know as well as I that the Veil always keeps its oath to ye.”
“And when I resume my rule, and my people reject her—what then?”
“Are ye that great a coward?”