Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

C astle MacKinnon, November 1298

“Ava, dae ye really think a woman who claims tae be able to see intae the future will help ye seduce a man?”

Ava halted in the middle of the castle corridor. She turned abruptly to face her little sister, swinging the burning torch around with her as she moved. Lyla, startled, jumped away from her.

“Careful, sister! I ken ye are a warrior but dae me the favor of nae giving me the wounds yer other opponents bear.”

“I’m sorry,” Ava muttered hurriedly, “but ye ken we dinnae have time fer this argument now. Me mind is made up. Ye can either stay here or come with me, but I am going, Lyla.”

Lyla sighed, her dark blonde hair becoming a curtain as it fell across her face. Ava pushed back the wisps of her own blonde hair, that had fallen out of the customary braid she wore. Tonight, she would not be distracted by fear or the serious nature of her sister’s conversation.

I have a mission tae accomplish.

“I am going,” Ava whispered. She turned, carrying the burning torch high as she slipped down a narrow spiral staircase with Lyla hurrying behind her. More than once her little sister nearly slipped on the stones. The cold air was so strong that night that even inside the castle there was moisture and growing frost on the stone steps. When they reached the bottom, Ava tiptoed toward the kitchens and the servants’ stairwell, knowing it was the best way out of the castle when they didn’t want to be glimpsed by the guards. By the doorway, she latched the burning torch onto an iron hook in the wall, knowing she couldn’t take it with them.

A guard would spot the burning fire from a mile away and come to investigate.

“I dinnae ken about this,” Lyla muttered seriously again.

Ava gave her no answer. Halting by the door for a second, she checked beneath her thick woolen cloak. She carried a dirk at her right hip, her customary basilard at her left hip, all latched into a belt. Ordinarily, she would have liked to have taken her crossbow with her when walking the clan lands alone, but tonight, she had to travel fast, and the crossbow with the bolts would have only weighed her down.

“This castle holds shadows fer us now, I ken that,” Lyla whispered hurriedly as Ava checked her weapons. “But dae ye honestly think ye will find answers by talking tae a mad woman?”

“And ye think a seer is a mad woman, dae ye? Sister, I dinnae pretend tae understand all the secrets of this world. I dinnae ken how it works, what magic and mystery lies beneath the veil of what I can see. Maybe she does,” Ava added, fiercely, but quietly. “If she can help me at all, then I need tae take this chance.”

“Aye, aye, I ken.” Lyla sighed once again as Ava reached for the door.

“Now come, before we are seen.” Ava slipped the key into the door that she had stolen from the castle steward’s chamber earlier that day and slipped it into the lock. It clunked rather heavily, making the two of them halt and look around. When no sound followed, Ava opened the door.

The moment they both stepped outside, they shivered. The wind was bitterly cold, the clouds heavy with snow, threatening to open their icy treasure any second now, adding to the already rich covering of white snow on the ground. The moon, a mere crescent in the sky, was only just visible peeking through those heavy clouds.

“Lovely night, isnae it?” Lyla whispered to Ava with irony in her tone.

“Charming,” Ava agreed. She pressed her lips into the fur lining of her cloak and walked forward through the grounds, with the shorter Lyla racing to keep up with her.

As they crossed through the snowy courtyard toward the curtain wall, Lyla hopped between clumps of snow as Ava walked purposefully, her hand constantly gripping the hilt of her basilard beneath her cloak.

“Dae ye think –”

“Shh,” Ava pleaded. “We dinnae want a guard tae hear us now.”

As if he had been summoned by her words, Ava saw movement atop the nearest curtain wall. She reached for Lyla’s shoulder and pushed her down beneath the well in the middle of the courtyard, out of use thanks to the thick layer of ice which had formed at the bottom. Lyla yelped in surprise, forcing Ava to dart down too.

She held her finger to her lips, warning Lyla not to make another sound. If we’re discovered Faither will be fumin’.”

The guard’s loud footsteps on the curtain wall had stopped, suggesting he had heard Lyla’s noise and had whipped around, staring into the courtyard to investigate. Ava didn’t dare sneak a peek, but waited, holding her breath, until she heard his footsteps again. Peering around the edge of the well, she looked to his place atop the wall. He had returned to his patrol, no longer looking their way.

Ava grabbed Lyla’s hand and ran with her. Her younger sister, much slenderer and not so athletic in build, struggled to keep up as Ava ran to the nearest door. They pressed themselves against the stone wall as Ava pressed a second key, she had taken into a door hidden in the stone wall.

It was a secret door, barely used by any. If the rumors were to be believed, the guards had this door installed years ago to bring in their mistresses and wives at night when no one was looking. Ava wasn’t sure if she believed the tales, though she knew men’s appetites would warrant it.

She shuddered at the thought of men’s appetites when it came to the bedchamber and opened the door, inching it carefully across the snow on the ground to stay as quiet as possible.

As they slipped through, the snow was now thick on the ground thanks to the skeletal branches of the trees above, though their journey became suddenly darker.

Ava followed a path through the forest she knew all too well, for it had been her training ground for years for hunting and fighting. Lyla, on the other hand, gripped to the back of her cloak, following every step she took.

“If I dinnae dae this, ye would be forced tae marry that man,” Ava shuddered.

She had seen him. The very man that their father also feared giving Lyla too.

A warrior, a soldier, and a brutal leader, he had fixated his desires on Lyla. Known for his cruel and insatiable appetites, Ava could not countenance the thought of handing her little sweet sister to a man like him.

“Ye ken I cannae let that happen.”

“But then that means…”

“I ken. I ken what it means.” Ava and her father had talked for hours about the alternatives. Her father, Laird Finley MacKinnon, had drank himself into a stupor with enough whisky to drown a horse.

Lyla’s suitor was adamant in his pursuit of her. Finley’s greatest fear was that he wouldn’t be able to turn the man down. The MacKinnon clan was in debt. For so long they had fought for the Scottish cause against the English. They had lost men, had poor harvests due to bad winters, and now, Finley was running out of options as to how to protect his clan. Lyla’s suitor offered him money. This would ruin Ava, as she was the older sister, and having Lyla marry first was unthinkable. Yet, it would save their clan at the expense of them both.

“Then we must find another way tae get money,” Ava had said in the early hours of the morning.

Her father had looked up from his whisky, staring at her, eyes wide.

“There’s another laird. One so rich that if ye were tae marry him, all our troubles would be gone. Lyla would be safe.”

“Who?” Ava had asked sharply.

“Laird Blair Grant,” Ava now murmured aloud, remembering the way her father had said it sharply that night. He was not known for being a man of soft heart, but he did not have the same reputation of cruelty as Lyla’s suitor.

“Ye dinnae have tae dae this,” Lyla pleaded again behind her, repeatedly slipping in the snow.

“I must.” Ava had at first been dismayed to see that her father hadn’t given up on the idea come morning when he was sober and nursing a bad head. He had urged her to seduce Laird Blair Grant. If she could catch such a wealthy laird’s eye and secure a proposal, Lyla would indeed be safe.

As time had gone on, and as Lyla’s suitor kept reappearing, Ava had become more determined.

He is right. Aye, I must dae this.

Ever since they had lost their mother many years before, Ava had felt it was her responsibility to care for Lyla, to look after her, to teach her how to fare in the world, and above all, to protect her. More than once, she had run headlong into danger in order to keep her sister safe, and now was no different.

Without their mother there to protect her, Ava would happily take her place and do what she could. She certainly wasn’t going to feed Lyla to a cruel man, the way a fox would be fed to the wolves.

A memory flickered across Ava’s mind. It was of a night she always tried to forget, when a man had grabbed her wrist, pinned her down. She remembered his breath on her neck, the way he stank, the fear coiling in her stomach like a viper –

“Where dae we go now?” Lyla’s question broke through the memory.

Ava came to a stop at a fork in the path, then led Lyla down a snowy track. She knew where she was going. How many times had she come across the seer’s hut in this wood? She been told never to go there, yet she had always been curious. Today, she had a need of this woman.

“I’m nay temptress,” Ava muttered as they made their way toward the hut, fighting through the snow as the bitter wind whipped their hair and their cloaks. “If I am going tae dae this, and I will, then I need direction. The seer will help me.”

Ava could feel from the way Lyla’s hands gripped the back of her cloak that she was ready to argue again, but her sister said nothing. Instead, she gasped. The sound brought Ava to a halt, she gripped the hilt of the basilard hard, ready to use it, only to see it was no man or creature that had frightened her. They had found the seer’s cabin.

Now they were here, the air felt different, somehow even icier than before, as if the snow hung in the air, invisible around them. The hut itself was almost completely swamped by snow, the roof sagging under its weight, the old croft windows mere circles of pebbles.

Ava took a small step forward, the snow crunching beneath her boots. In the windows, she saw something glitter. A string of shiny stones and beads had been hung there, which now swayed in the wind, rather ominously clicking against the stones around it. She supposed it was some charm to ward off demons.

“They say she doesnae let people in anymore,” Lyla hissed as Ava moved forward, with her sister staying close behind her.

“Then I pray she changes her mind tonight.” As Ava neared the croft, her boot crunched icy snow loudly. It was so noisy that a light was struck inside the croft.

Ava and Lyla froze, staring at the window. Was it a candle? Maybe a fire light? It burned a deep amber hue.

Ava raised her hand from her basilard, ready to knock when she hesitated. Her first doubts creeped in. She wondered if the seer would tell her anything useful at all? What if the seer only confirmed that Lyla would have to marry her cruel suitor in the end, that anything Ava could do wouldn’t avoid it? What if –

“Dinnae stand there dithering on my doorstep all night.” A sharp voice called from within the croft.

Lyla covered her mouth and jumped back three paces as Ava stood stock still, staring at the door with its carved witch symbols in the wood in amazement.

“Come, lass. Leave yer poor sister outside. Me fire would warm her, but she’ll be happier out there.”

Ava looked at Lyla, who was already nodding eagerly, clearly in no hurry to be inside the seer’s croft, for confirmation.

Ava turned the door handle and pushed it open. The door creaked ominously and loudly as she moved into the room.

“Close that door. Ye want an old woman tae die from the cold? Aye, aye, old bones decay quickly ye ken. I kenned a lass once who died from her bones turning tae ice. They didnae believe me. They never believe me, but I ken what I see.”

Ava closed the door sharply, turning to face the woman who was speaking so fast, she had to strain to listen to the individual words.

Sat before the fire was the seer, dressed in a thick woolen gown, a heavy wolf’s fur on her shoulders and dark hair around her face that was streaked with grey. She was chewing something, some sort of root, though she only chewed with one side of her jaw. One eye was wider than the other, as if the other caused her pain, and she didn’t once blink those eyes, giving her the impression of being a gargoyle that had sprung to life.

Jerkily, the woman gestured to the stool opposite her.

“Come, come. Nay time. Ye think guards dinnae ken when the daughter of a laird sneaks out of the castle?”

“They’ve never spotted it before,” Ava murmured as she sat on the stool, listening to it creak and whine behind her. She had snuck out many times in the night, just for the challenge of it… and the freedom.

“Hmm,” the seer grunted. “Speak. Why did ye come? Tell me.” The woman waved impatiently as she reached for a bundle of burning herbs and inhaled the rich scent of drive lavender and lemon thyme sharply, her nostrils flaring.

Ava spoke fast, obeying, though as she spoke, she couldn’t help staring at all the dried herbs hanging from the ceiling. Rather oddly, there was a rabbit’s foot dangling from between the herbs too, and more witches’ symbols carved across the wooden beams that held up the thatched roof.

“I… I have come fer direction,” Ava forced herself on. “I am trying tae protect me sister. A cruel suitor wants her, and tae avoid it, me faither wishes me tae seduce a laird. He’s a wealthy man, so wealthy it could solve all our clan’s problems, but I am nay temptress. Nay seductress.” She gestured at her gown, the cloak, and the weapons she carried. “How does a woman like me go about this task? And if I dae it… will it work? Can I save Lyla?”

The seer’s wider eye seemed to widen impossibly further, gazing at Ava.

Yet Ava had not come to be messed with. She was here for a task, and she would not fidget and be made uncomfortable by the seer’s spooky ways. She sat taller on the stool, her spine becoming rigid.

“I have asked ye questions. Please, answer me,” she said with strength.

“Hmm. Aye, aye, got a heart, got a conscience, got fire in ye too.” The seer grunted with a chuckle. “Yet all ken that already.” She reached into the fire suddenly.

Ava leaped back in amazement, only to see that the seer took hold of another bundle of herbs and dropped them into a bowl on a small, crooked table beside her. The blackened leaves and flower heads fell off the stems and the woman picked up the bowl, spinning it round and round for a moment before she set it down, gazing at the flower heads as if they held the answers of the world. Eventually, she looked up, staring straight at Ava with that eerie stare once again.

“Yer future will depend on a choice ye make. That choice will be whether tae follow yer duty. Or yer heart.” It was spoken without passion. In fact, it was said without much interest, almost impassively.

“Me heart?” Ava shifted.

I am doing this because I have a heart. I love me sister and will dae anything tae protect her. Arenae me duty and me heart aligned?

“Either path ye choose will have consequences. Nay way tae ken the right one.”

“How helpful,” Ava muttered under her breath.

The seer leaned forward sharply. It was clear she was not yet done.

“And on either path ye take, there’ll be one there with ye. A man. A man tae steer ye intae yer future. Maybe show ye what seduction is.”

“I dinnae need –”

“As ye say, ye are nae a temptress.” The seer gestured to her with one of the burning bundles that now smelled strongly of lavender and acrid burning wood. “Look at the border between the MacKinnons and the MacLeods. Ye have close ties with their clan. In three days, in a tavern called The Stag’s Rest, there will be a man. He’s a rake. A man who could read emotions with one look and can seduce any lass he likes intae his bed. He’s a man of careless elegance, a man whose confidence is his second skin, and has eyes like a storm over a sea.”

Ava started to fidget uncomfortably. How could the seer possibly see this man in her mind?

“He is dangerous and mischevious, and he commands eyes even without trying. He’ll be wearing a heavy hat. Ungainly thing. Quite ugly. That is how ye’ll ken it’s him. Find him.” She leaned back sharply. “The student will need a master if she is tae learn and change her future.”

“And ye think that is possible?” Ava asked keenly. “Ye think that if I choose this path, I can change the future?”

“I see possible futures, lass. I dinnae see which one will come.” With a flick of her wrist, the seer dismissed her.