Page 34 of To Win a Highlander’s Heart

On the top of the chest of drawers she’d found a brush and comb that she’d put to use, as well as a small miniature of a woman with dark hair and soulful grey eyes. The woman looked very much like Rowena, except years older. Her mother perhaps?

Aria’s own mother’s hair had been red, her skin fair, and she’d had eyes that were as blue as the sea on a summer’s day, which made sense since her mother’s magic could control water and all manner of water fairies and selkies. As a half-fae Aria only had magic over freshwater brooks and rivers, but nothing to do with the sea or saltwater.

Aria continued her appraisal of the bedchamber while she waited for those who were still about to settle. She’d yet to find a likeness of her father. Perhaps there were none, and she’d always be left to wonder what kind of man abandoned his own child? Or, had it been her mother who had failed her by returning to Fairyland before she’d been born where she’d been forced to live in a world where she only half-belonged?

Leaving her thoughts behind, Aria opened the door and peered into the hallway once more. This time the corridor was empty. Her stomach gave another growl of protest as she stepped outside the bedchamber and silently crept to the stairs. She had successfully made her way to the second floor, when an unearthly chill came over her and a mist curled across the floor, swirling and consolidating until something not quite human and not quite ghost appeared in front of her.

Why are you here?

Aria’s heart leapt in her chest at the sight of the woman from the miniature in her borrowed bedchamber. “Who are you?” The woman’s piercing grey eyes raked her, assessed her. The ghost’s gaze narrowed on her face, and a flash of recognition flared, then vanished.

Are you here to harm my children? I will never allow that.

Aria bristled. “I helped them today. I did not harm them.”

You were the one who invited the enemy inside these walls.

“I did not know what would happen. From my observations, it appeared to me as if the MacLeods have led ideal lives. Who would have guessed they would have so many enemies?” She’d always imagined the MacLeods as invincible.

You think my children have led ideal lives, that they are invincible? In that you couldn’t be more wrong. All of us have suffered in some way because we are MacLeods.

“You can hear my thoughts?” Aria frowned. She would have to be more careful in the future. She straightened as her stomach grumbled again. A ghost wasn’t going to stop her from her quest for food. With a quick intake of breath, Aria stepped right through the image of the woman before her and continued down the stairs. And then froze in her tracks.

The ghost’s icy form enveloped her. She tried to take a step, but found she could not. “What do you want from me?”

I want you to leave this place. I know who you are, Aria. You were here once before when you came to Dunvegan with your mother.

Aria swallowed to ease the tightness in her throat. “How could you know that?”

An anxious frown formed a wrinkle between the woman’s other-worldly brows. I was a mortal woman then, known to you and your mother as Janet MacLeod. I tried to help you, but my efforts instead led to my own death and the disappearance of my son, Keiran. Would you know anything about that?

Her voice was almost inaudible, but it caused fear to cascade through Aria, making her light-headed. This was the child’s mother? “That is why I am here—to tell your kin about Keiran.”

The apparition held ominously still as grief distorted her features. Tell me, is he still alive?

“He is. Though my grandfather used magic on him to accelerate his age. He is now twenty in human years.”

The apparition staggered back, releasing Aria from her frozen prison. For years I have wondered . . . I wanted to search for him, but I was trapped here in this form.

“You cannot leave Dunvegan?”

Nay. But you must. Her voice was vibrant with urgency. You must leave or swear to me you will cause my family no further harm. We have suffered enough already because of you.

Aria felt a cold chill ripple down her spine. “I mean your children no harm, I promise.”

The apparition’s shoulders sagged as though relieved by her answer. Is there a way to bring him home?

“There is a way. That is what I have come to discuss with your sons.”

Then why are you hiding in the bedchamber?

“I needed time to consider how to tell them. I also wanted to make certain they would believe me. And I needed to measure their nature to see if they would accept me as their kin.”

The daughter of Iain Cair.

“The child your husband, the laird, refused to take in,” Aria said bitterly as the memories flooded back.

Sympathy reflected in the woman’s soulful eyes. My husband used to be a gentle man but he changed. He became brutal and suspicious after he sustained an injury to his head in battle. Had you and your mother arrived a few months earlier the outcome might have been different for both of us.