Page 3 of A Little Highland Magic

Chapter One

Dunvegan Castle, Isle of Skye, Scotland

Wednesday, March 27th, 1743

Aria’s gaze shifted from the gates inside Dunvegan Castle as the memory of her mother and her visit nine years ago faded from her thoughts. Much had changed over the years. She was now a member of the MacLeod clan. With a keen eye, Aria surveyed the front courtyard, searching for anything she might have overlooked as the clan waited for visitors to arrive. She was not in charge of the castle’s defence, but she took her task as a defender of the MacLeods very seriously.

Twenty men were in place at the portcullis and around the courtyard. Their weapons were at hand if they needed them. Even so, she scowled. There was a time when she wanted nothing more than to attack the MacLeods for what they had done to her and her mother. Yet time and the current inhabitants of Dunvegan had changed her heart. Norman MacLeod had died before she had made her way back to the human realm for a third time five months ago.

The sins of the father are not the sins of the sons. Her mother’s words, spoken while they had waited for Oberon to draw them back to Fairyland after Pearl had been injured, had been a sharp rebuke to Aria’s claim that she would someday take revenge against her human relatives. Ignoring her mother’s advice, she trained harder than any other warrior in the fairy realm, until no one was her equal.

When the veil between the human and fairy worlds thinned on All Hallows’ Eve last year, she had entered the human realm, intending to take the revenge that had driven her for the past nine years. Her plans did not account for Norman MacLeod’s death. In short order, her need for revenge fell away, replaced by a renewed longing for family. The new laird, Alastair MacLeod, and his family had accepted her, treated her as a vital member of their household. For not refusing her a third time, she would protect them until death.

“Is everything ready for the arrival of our guests?” Graeme Duff, the captain of the guard at Dunvegan Castle, asked with the voice of authority as he came to join Aria in the courtyard, jolting her out of her thoughts.

Aria rounded on Graeme, studying him, measuring, and appraising. An air of barely suppressed danger surrounded him. She saw it in the taut line of his shoulders and the grim line of his mouth. In the past few months since she had come to live with the MacLeods, Graeme always looked as if he were ready for battle. Yet today, he was allowing an enemy of the MacLeods into the keep.

“Aria, is everything ready?” he repeated.

Aria narrowed her gaze. The feeling that something terrible was about to happen had been making her feel on edge for the past few weeks. Inviting their long-established enemy to supper was a very bad idea, yet no one else in the MacLeod clan seemed troubled by that fact. “How does one prepare for their enemy to arrive on their doorstep?”

Graeme’s eyes widened at her unexpected anger. “There will be no battles today. The MacDonalds are no longer our enemy since Rowena and Marcus married.”

Unable to leash her displeasure, Aria stepped closer to the man who refused to see what was right in front of him. Something about this whole situation was wrong. Terribly, horribly wrong. “How does one marriage between a MacLeod and a MacDonald erase centuries of fighting between your two clans? Did you forget that a MacDonald kidnapped Gwendolyn and her siblings and held them hostage for five years? Or that a MacDonald killed Fiona’s father? How can you be so absurdly optimistic about this visit?”

The dark-haired captain of the guard gazed at Aria with a calm, unnerving stare. “How can you be so negative about the possibility of change?”

Aria blanched at the bite in his words, but she held her ground. “When you have suffered what I have, you tend to be suspicious of everyone and everything.”

“What have you suffered?” Graeme’s brow furled. “You are a fairy. An ethereal being who lived in an ideal place until recently.”

“I am half fae, and you know nothing about Fairyland.” She turned away, but he caught her arm, forcing her to turn back to him.

“You have never talked about Fairyland. Is it not the ideal place myth and legend make it out to be?” Before she could answer, his eyes widened, and suspicion registered in his steel-blue eyes. “What does that mean for Keiran? He is not a fairy at all, but a MacLeod stolen by the fae as a babe. Has he been in danger all this time and you are just now telling us of this?”

Aria’s gut twisted. There was so much more to the story of Keiran’s abduction than the MacLeods knew. And if they learned the truth, they would all despise her. She swallowed roughly. “Your precious Keiran is safe. He has the honour of being a favourite of the king. No one would harm him, or they would suffer the wrath of the fairy king.”

Graeme’s features relaxed then shifted, searching her face again with an intensity she had not witnessed in this man before. “The way you say that makes me believe you have suffered such wrath. Is that why you see danger at every turn and isolate yourself from the rest of us?”

She moved away. “Please, I do not wish to discuss the matter any further. We have dangerous visitors arriving at any moment. Do your part and be ready to greet them. I will be in the background watching for any signs of foul play.” She hurried off, forcing away the reminder of her life before coming to the MacLeods. She curled her hands at her sides, almost hoping the MacDonalds were here for nefarious reasons so that she could fight them and burn away the feelings she tried so hard not to feel.

“Aria, wait . . .” Graeme called after her.

She kept walking until she was inside the castle and out of earshot, then headed for the tower. There she could strike the enemy with her arrows if they indeed came to Dunvegan under false pretences.

Taking the stairs two at a time did not tamp down the memories that clawed at the back of her mind. When she reached the door to the tower she moved to the crenellations and peered down over the edge at the sound of hoofbeats. A small party of perhaps a dozen men dressed in red and green tartan approached the gate. The MacDonalds had arrived.

As the portcullis opened, Aria palmed her bow, which she always kept close, and drew an arrow from the quiver at her back. She held her breath and strained to hear what Laird Alexander MacDonald said as he dismounted his horse and entered the courtyard on foot. The men behind him did the same, turning their horses over to the waiting groomsmen. As the MacDonald laird came forward, his hand moved to the hilt of his sword.

At the possibility of aggression, Aria set her arrow against the string, placing one finger above and two below. She pulled the string towards her until it touched her lips, keeping her arm straight, but not stiff. Her focus sharpened on the grey-haired man who was the clan leader. The others who came with the MacDonald would follow his lead—to peace or war. If he drew his weapon, all she had to do was relax her string hand and the arrow would pierce the man’s neck. He would die before he even knew he was under attack.

Before she could loosen her fingers, Graeme came forward and offered the MacDonald laird a bow. Aria was too far away to hear their conversation clearly, but it seemed cordial now. Marcus and Rowena MacDonald stepped from the keep and hurried towards Graeme and the MacDonald laird, no doubt offering a greeting.

The MacDonald’s hand shifted from his weapon as he pulled first Marcus then Rowena into an embrace. The MacDonalds in the laird’s company stood down.

Aria lessened the tension on her string and lowered her weapon. She returned her arrow to her quiver and her fingers trembled, something they had not done for years. When it came to battle, she was always so sure of herself and her abilities. But today she had been wrong, suspecting the MacDonalds were up to no good as they entered the MacLeod stronghold. She swallowed hard as she turned away from the scene below and pressed her back against the cold stone of the tower wall.

Despair coiled in her stomach. In Fairyland, she had never been wrong about the intentions of others. Had finally being accepted by her clan somehow lessened her instincts? Aria pushed away from the wall, and leaving her bow behind, drew her sword. She began to spar with an imaginary partner as the need to fight welled inside her. Over the last nine years, battle had come to be the only thing that calmed her nerves. The motions silenced her memories as her focus turned to the demanding routine she forced her body to endure. Her movements were tightly controlled as she wove her way through the timeless dance of a warrior.