The Highlander's Stronghold (Searching for a Highlander Book 1) Read online

  My first instinct was to run around the base of the mound and locate someone, Dylan, anyone, to shout out my find, but I dared not leave the artifact. How could I? What if it disappeared? What if one of the many seagulls flying overhead snatched it up and carried it off? The opportunistic birds had made off with someone’s backpack only the day before.

  The dagger looked heavy, and I doubted whether a bird could carry it in its beak, but still I couldn’t bring myself to leave it and run for guidance. Given that I was a bit loopy from the excitement and the blood pounding in my ears, I did what I thought was right. I removed both pairs of gloves and picked up the dirk to take it to Dylan.

  On contact, the metal seemed to flare, and yet it didn’t burn. I eyed it wildly, almost tempted to drop it, but I held on. The sky darkened, or so I thought. Perhaps it was just my vision. Flashing lights blinded me, and I shook my head. Suspecting that I must have held my breath too long and was about to faint, I tried to drag in a deep breath, but it didn’t help. I clutched the dagger by its hilt and slipped into a dizzying whirlpool of unconsciousness.

  Chapter Two

  “Lass, what ails ye?” a voice asked me.

  “Dylan?” I whispered. My eyes seemed to be glued shut, and I rubbed at them with one hand. Finally, one of my eyelids popped open, and I looked up into the very tanned and angular face of a golden-haired and bearded man. Not Dylan. The man who peered at me had azure eyes, and his long hair fell about his face.

  “Who are you?” I whispered. I tried to push myself upright, but the man squatting beside me and dressed in what appeared to be a voluminous kilt pushed me back.

  “I dinna think ye are well enough to stand just yet. I will thank ye to return my dagger. I acquired that from a French merchant, and it cost me dearly. The man said it was several centuries auld. I dinna ken if he spoke the truth, but it is a sturdy piece and has served me well.”

  I looked down at the metal in my hand. Bright and untarnished as it had not been when I found it, sunlight gleamed on the silver surface. In a daze, I loosened my white-knuckled grip on the handle, and the stranger took the dagger from me, stowing it into a slender sheath hanging from the wide belt at his waist.

  “That’s an artifact,” I said dully. Was he planning on stealing it? No, I wasn’t going to allow that.

  My heart continued to pound in my ears, as it had before I fainted, and I breathed deeply through my nose in an effort to regulate my breathing so that I didn’t pass out again. Rather than raise my eyes to the man’s face, I studied his tartan once again. Of a muted scarlet shade, the plaid pattern was large, mostly gray and black, with blocks of hunter green. But it was the size of the garment that took me aback, that and the fact that the stranger didn’t seem concerned that bent on one knee, he exposed himself.

  I blinked and looked away to study the kilt. Consisting of what must have been yards of material, it was unhemmed, belted at the waist, and dropped to the ground as if it hung lower in back than in front.

  A padded dark-blue sleeveless vest fitted with a single row of pewter-colored metal buttons covered most of what appeared to be a loose, long-sleeved white linen shirt. A grayish neckcloth ended just below his dark-blond beard. The belt now holding the dagger rested on his waist. Dark dusty boots covered the lower half of his legs.

  I felt like I’d been studying the man for hours, but when he moved to drop both knees to the ground, I realized it had only been a matter of seconds.

  “Where’s Dylan? Who are you?”

  “I dinna ken this Dylan, but I do ken who I am. Who are ye, mistress? Who brought ye here?”

  “Dylan. Dylan brought me here,” I said. The man’s eyes mesmerized me. The azure blue reflected the color of the sea surrounding the island. Small silvery flecks in the irises could almost match the whitecaps.

  “Your eyes,” I murmured.

  The man blinked. What I could see of his cheeks above the beard reddened.

  “Again, I dinna ken Dylan. Ye could no have passed through the gate without being seen unless someone smuggled ye through. Ye surely didna bring a boat over from the mainland by yerself. Which of the lads brought ye? Dinna fear repercussions for yerself, lass. I will send ye back across with no harm done. Yer man, though, I will have to deal with him.”

  “I don’t have a man,” I mumbled stupidly. I’d actually been giving that particular issue a lot of thought for the past year. I’d spent so much time in school studying for my master’s degree, and when not in class, working to make ends meet, that I hadn’t had time for a man. Lately, I’d been wondering how to go about getting a man, or if I really had the time for a relationship.

  “Are ye saying that one of the women brought ye over? No, I dinna think that likely. They dinna saunter back and forth at low tide without their husbands, nor can they manage one of the boats.”

  “What?” I asked, my head obviously still foggy. “Boats? No, I came with Dylan, you know? Professor MacElroy? From the University of Glasgow? He drove. We walked over. Here I am. Where is he? And who on earth are you? You can’t keep the dagger. It’s a historical artifact.”

  I pushed myself to rise again, but the stranger laid a restraining hand on my shoulder. I had been stunned and bewildered. Now, I was scared.

  “Take your hands off me,” I said. I looked over his shoulder. Two men, dressed similarly to the big blond kneeling beside me, stood by, watching us.

  The stranger followed my eyes and looked over his shoulder.

  “Gie away, ye two. This does no concern ye.”

  One young, one middle aged, they grinned and moved away, stepping into a doorway on the ground floor of the keep.

  The keep! My eyes widened as I tilted my head back to eye the tower. Of stacked rock, the rectangular building appeared to be about fourteen feet tall with openings on all visible sides, windows without glass. The movement made my head swim even more. I closed my eyes against the sight of the tower. It couldn’t possibly be there.

  An arm slipped under my shoulders, and I opened my eyes again to see a golden-blond beard almost touching my face as blue eyes peered into mine.

  “Lass, I can see ye are no well.” All of a sudden, I was lifted into the air and settled across the man’s chest. The tower still loomed over me, impossibly. I thought about struggling in his arms, but I sensed that he meant me no harm, and something about the strength of his hold made me feel completely secure. He could have been Superman carrying my Lois Lane off into space.

  He carried me into the open doorway of the tower, and I eyed the thick, heavy wooden door with awe. The interior of the keep was dim but not so dark that I couldn’t see the stacked stones comprising the walls. A narrow stone staircase circumnavigated the perpendicular walls of the tower, ending at landings on two corners before disappearing near the top. Daylight filtered in through small windows in the upper recesses.

  The stranger carried me into a tiny room and settled me onto a narrow bed. I should have been worrying at that point, but I wasn’t. I felt I had only to scream out and someone would come running. Dylan, for sure, wherever he was.

  Dylan. The tower? The excavation. No, something was seriously wrong. Was I dreaming? If so, it was actually quite interesting. I had certainly picked an extremely dramatic character to feature in my dream.

  “What’s your name?” I asked as the stranger straightened to stare down at me. He seemed extraordinarily tall in the low-ceilinged room. Feeling somewhat small and vulnerable, I pushed myself into a sitting position at the head of the bed, drawing my legs to my chest. He watched my movements with an expression I couldn’t really decipher. His furrowed brow and narrowed eyes suggested something more than mere curiosity. Astonishment?

  “John Morrison,” he said. “And yers?”

  “Ann Borodell.”

  “Borodell. I am no familiar with this name. Is it Norman? Ye are no from the Western Isles, are ye?”

  I shook my head. “No, I think it’s English, a variation of Borrowdale, I read onc
e.”

  “English!” he said with a quirk of one dark-blond eyebrow. “How did ye come to Dun Eistean, Mistress Borodell?”

  Mistress Borodell? What an eccentric man. Even the MacIvers, the family I boarded with, living as remote as they did on the tip of the Isle of Lewis, didn’t speak in such unusual ways. Their accent was indeed thick, but not as heavily accented as John’s.

  Before I had a chance to answer, he moved suddenly, and while I thought I trusted him, I jerked involuntarily, pushing myself even farther against the sharp edges of the stacked stone behind me. After all, the man had just deposited me on a bed. But John only reached out to pick up a heavy length of plaid from the end of the bed, which he laid over my legs. I wasn’t particularly cold, but I appreciated the gesture.

  I grabbed the blanket and bunched it up to my chest, wrapping my arms around the blanket and my legs.

  “I came with Dylan this morning,” I finally answered. “Before that, Williamsburg, Virginia.”

  I noticed that John continued to stare at the blanket with a frown. What was his obsession with the thing? Had he heard me?

  “If ye please,” he said. He reached toward me to tug at the blanket, and in surprise, I loosened my arms and released it. What on earth? He spread the tartan over my legs again.

  “Please cover yerself.”

  My jaw dropped. While my first instinct was to jump up, incensed at the backward, outdated, outmoded, impossibly old-fashioned idea that I was somehow “uncovered,” I paused at the odd expression of embarrassment on John’s face. I did rise from the bed, but I wrapped the blanket tightly around me.

  “Look, I know we’re pretty remote here in the Outer Hebrides,” I said, “but there’s nothing particularly objectionable about my clothing. I’ve seen other young women dressed as I am, and especially the women on the dig. I know the older gals tend to wear dresses out here, but my jeans are pretty normal. I take it you’re objecting to the jeans? At least I’m not a man wearing a skirt.”

  My own jaw dropped at the childish rudeness of my comment. In fact, I loved to see men in kilts and had been disappointed on seeing none since I arrived on the Isle of Lewis, when I had expected to see many.

  John surprised me by laughing, the sort of deep guffaw that comes from deep within one’s chest. He sobered quickly, but his laugh still filled the empty spaces in the narrow keep.

  “Nonsense, mistress. My plaid has naethin to do with yer trews. I apologize for nagging ye about yer clothing, but it is actually quite objectionable. No to me, ye ken, but ye will certainly shock the womenfolk when they see ye.”

  I hunched into my blanket, the faded-red pattern similar to his kilt, and I pulled it more tightly around me. Nope. Whatever was happening was not working for me.

  “Listen, I don’t want to do this anymore. I just want to see Dylan. This is all way too weird for me. I’m done.”

  John tilted his head, as if he didn’t understand my words.

  “I’m done! Finished! I want to see Professor Dylan MacElroy or the other students or somebody.” I tried for an imperious tone.

  “Mistress, I dinna ken any MacElroys, nor have I heard of this Virginia. I am concerned for the soundness of yer mind. Have ye been ill? Did ye bump yer head?”

  I wanted to continue to stand, to stay on my feet, confronting this odd man, confronting my fear that something was horribly wrong, but my knees wobbled and weakened. I sank down onto the bed, eyeing the stone walls of the tower that had not been there a half hour before.

  In an odd flash of archaeological reflection, I noted that the stones were set with a clay-like material, not mortar. Of course not. Dylan had said the tower was at least sixteenth century, perhaps earlier, and they didn’t use mortar then.

  The sixteenth century... I looked at John Morrison again. Impossibly Nordic appearing with his blond hair and beard, my racing pulse thumped erratically, and I felt like I was about to pass out again.

  “What year is it?” I eked out through a throat closed over with dread.

  “Year, mistress?”

  “Year. What is the year? The century?”

  “The year of our lord fifteen hundred and ninety.”

  I almost sighed with relief when John’s response told me that this was not the thick of the medieval era but the tail end. Almost. A strange part of my brain struggled to understand why I would cheer that information. Fourteenth century. Sixteenth century. What did it matter?

  I had traveled through time. I could no longer pretend that I was dreaming. I hadn’t been ill, and I hadn’t hit my head. I didn’t think I’d lost my mind, but I almost wished I had. Even the man before me could possibly be explained away as some sort of historical reenactor, maybe even a local man who simply liked to wear a great kilt.

  But not the tower. I had seen it from the outside, and now from the inside. There was no explaining away the tower. No one had rebuilt the keep in the last half hour. One moment, I had been digging at its base, the next, awakening from an unconscious state at its base. Holding a dagger.

  Sweat broke out on my upper lip, my forehead. My hands, wrapped inside the thick tartan, were clammy. My stomach threatened to heave.

  I eyed the dagger hanging from John’s belt.

  “Can I see the dagger again?”

  John looked down at the sheathed dagger.

  “Nay, I dinna think that would be a good idea. Ye look as if ye might want to use it. But whether upon yerself or me, I canna say.”

  “Probably on myself,” I whispered. “No, see, the thing is...I think I need to touch it again. Please let me have the dagger.”

  I reached for it, dropping my blanket in the process. John took a step back and thrust out a hand to stop me. He grabbed my right arm and twisted me around, surprisingly gently, before reaching down to grab the tartan, which he wrapped around me again.

  “Ye shall no have the dagger, and ye must stay covered.”

  He rotated me around to face him like a puppet. I seemed to have no will of my own. Grasping both of my shoulders in strong hands, he leaned down to peer into my face. I couldn’t have looked away from his eyes if I had wanted to.

  “What ails ye, lass? Who are ye?”

  I opened my mouth to speak, but I had no idea what to say. I swallowed several times, my mind racing. Certainly, in Colonial America, they would have locked me up as a lunatic possessed by the devil. I had no reason to believe that sixteenth-century Scotland would be any different.

  I looked up into John’s eyes, once again mesmerized by their beautiful deep-blue color with silvery-white flecks. I couldn’t fake this. I couldn’t possibly bluster my way through the next few moments, hours, even days. I needed his help, and I hoped I wasn’t about to make a huge mistake.

  “My name is Ann Borodell. I live in Virginia in the New World. In the twenty-first century. I’ve traveled through time, and I have no idea how. I just know I want to go home.”

  Chapter Three

  John’s eyes narrowed and hardened, and his hands involuntarily tightened on my shoulders. I winced, and he blinked and dropped his hands. Taking a step back, he stared at me. I had no idea what was going through his mind, but I desperately hoped he was trying to understand my words, not figure out how best to tie me up and drop me into the ravine to see if I floated in the choppy water or simply drowned.

  I had nothing more to offer, nothing more I could say...not until I knew what he was thinking. I waited, huddling once again into the folds of the blanket. I was tempted to run outside, to see the rest of Dun Eistean in the sixteenth century, but my life was virtually in John’s hands at the moment, so I waited.

  I discovered him to be a quick thinker, able to grasp new concepts in pretty short order.

  “The twenty-first century?” he asked. His voice was husky, the only thing that betrayed his astonishment, because he schooled his face into an impassive expression.

  I nodded wordlessly.

  “And ye say ye dinna ken how ye traveled through time?�
��

  “I found the dagger, and that was it. Which is why if you give me the dagger now, I could probably reverse this whole thing and skedaddle out of here.” I tried a weak smile, which fooled no one.

  In a move that suggested how things were going to go, John slid the dagger sheath farther around his belt, hiding it behind his back.

  “You’re not going to give me the dagger, are you?” I asked. “It probably won’t travel with me. The one I picked up was very aged, dull, not at all shiny like it is now. So you still get to keep your dagger.”

  “I dinna fash about the dagger.”

  “Then why won’t you give it to me? I’m not going to try to stab you with it!”

  The right corner of his lips lifted in a wry smile.

  “I dinna fash about my safety. Ye are but a wee thing.”

  Compared to his six foot plus, I was short. My head didn’t even reach the top of his shoulders.

  “Then please give me the dagger. Please.” The walls of the keep closed in on me. I couldn’t bear to have him stare at me any longer.

  When John made no move to give me the knife, I bolted. I dropped the blanket and ran through the door of the room and out of the keep. Rare Scottish sunshine shone down on me as I ran toward where I remembered the remnants of the gate to be.

  I heard him call out to me, which made me run all the faster. The grass, still emerald green, was shorter than I remembered. A few sheep grazed near the center, explaining the cropped lawn. A group of turf-roofed stone-walled buildings to my left caught my eye as I ran toward what appeared to be a six-foot stone wall. Six feet? Had the mounded hump of thick grass in the twenty-first century really been that high?

  As I raced toward a wooden gate set between the stone walls, two men, wearing great kilts like John’s, jumped up and reached for basket-hilted broadswords at their hips, crisscrossing them and effectively barring my exit. The pistols tucked into the front of their belts and dirks hanging from their waists suggested they meant business.