Chapter 3

CRàDH PRISON - MARCH 1, 1384

O ne, two, three, four, five, six. Léo stopped at the wall and turned right. One, two, three, four, five. Wall. One, two, three, four, five, six. Wall. One, two, three, four, five. Wall.

The fire in the hearth baked the tiny room but he dared not extinguish the flame. Without it, he would plunge into total darkness. The walls of the tiny chamber inched in on him, and his wound crawled. For hours he'd repeated the perimeter walk, around, and around, and around.

According to the ticks on the wall indicating his daily meals, today marked two months of captivity in Cràdh, and the isolation and confinement was beginning to affect his sanity. Each day he had nothing to do but wait for the guards to bring him a small portion of oats and a new pail of water. He had to get out of here. He needed to see the sun. He needed fresh air. He needed to stretch his legs and run.

No, there was nothing to do in the tiny chamber but wait. Wait to live, wait to die. His only escape was sleep—and the nightly revisitation of the prophecy. The tormenting prophecy that had haunted his dreams each and every night at Cràdh just as it had when he was a lad. In it, Dun Ringill Castle loomed high upon the rocks looking over the harbor, and he, Niall, Fingon, Elspeth, and Malvina, his stepmother, stood upon the battlements. Amid the stormy night, they circled each other, challenging each other for survival.

The first of the siblings to fall was Elspeth. With a scream, the dream would launch into motion as she lost her balance and toppled over the edge, disappearing onto the rocks below. Lightning then streaked across the heavens and struck the rafters, igniting the old castle walls. The building shook with the thunder of heaven as balls of lightning dropped from opened skies, racing around the battlements and consuming everything in their path. From above, an eagle dipped down from heaven—fire erupting from its beak as it dived after Niall, trapping him in the center of the balls of lightning.

To save himself, Léo scrambled upon the parapet, planting his feet firm upon a rock, and watched as one-by-one his brothers and stepmother were consumed by the fire. In the end he stood alone, the only survivor of his father's children, Chief of the MacKinnons.

Beside him, the eagle landed upon the rocky tower, slowly transforming into a breathtaking woman. Her hair was tendrils of burnished gold, her eyes the color of the sea. He should have been afraid of her, but instead she placed her hand in his own, imparting peace and love into his heart. Her voice spoke, and yet her lips did not move, and he realized he could hear her thoughts. You're not alone.

What a stupid dream. At seventeen he'd been foolish enough to share it with Niall and Fingon, believing it to be just that—a dream. But something had been planted in his brothers that day, ripening into a bitter harvest when his father and mother mysteriously fell ill the following week.

Léo's life, from that moment on, was nothing as it was before. He'd been taken to France the evening of his father's death, abandoned in Calais, and forced into his uncle's army, headed straight for the front lines of Pontvallain. Where, had it not been for Hector MacLean, he would have died within the first ten minutes of combat.

For a few years, as the dream had occurred and reoccured to him every few nights, he prayed to God that he would triumph over his brothers and be restored to their clan. He simply wanted peace in his family and time to develop relationships with his brothers as men. It was the one thing he had consistently prayed for, and yet, had never gained.

One, two, three, four… He stopped and walked to the middle of the room, his weakening chest constricting, the endless hours at the mercy of dozens of horrible memories making him feel as if he were about to crack. Holding his hands over his mouth, he bent forward, screaming into them in rage, trying to spend some of his energy.

Tears formed in his eyes and he cried out into the silent chamber to God, unsure if he was listening or if the Lord had ever heard him. "God! Are you listening? Do you think this is funny?"

The silent response made rage snake up his spine. Once again, the Lord had abandoned him to a fate worse than death, and he was sick of it. In anger, he picked up Father Allen's heavy iron cauldron and flung it across the room. "Where are you? Where have you ever been? What have I ever done to you to deserve this?"

The clatter of the cauldron continued to echo around the empty chamber as it rocked on its side, reminding Léo of just how alone he had always been. "Why did I never dream about being locked in prison? Why did your prophecy never reveal to me that I would be locked away for the rest of…" Tears choked his throat but he sucked in a breath, forcing them away. "For the rest of my God-forsaken life? And that's what I am. God-forsaken."

The slat in the door opened. "Are ye all right in there? What was that noise?"

Forgetting his rage for moments, Léo rushed over to the perpetually shut door, drinking in the faint glow of natural light behind the guard, desperate for a hint of the outside. "Oui. I'm fine. It was the cauldron—I—I was just…"

Words failed him. He knew the guard had heard his outburst. The same kind of outburst every prisoner at Cràdh had. Tormented cries echoed down the corridors at all hours of the day and night.

The guard grunted as the door clanked open. "You have a visitor."

"Father Allen?"

The motion of the door admitted a less stale gust of air and he breathed it deeply, catching a faint note of lavender. His heart jumped into his throat at the thought of a few hours to converse with the old man who helped him to cling to the bit of sanity that he had left.

The guard's gruff voice sounded from behind the heavy door. "Father Allen's not here today; it's the girl."

Unable to comprehend, Léo stood wild-eyed, unable to make sense of the visitor who stepped into his room. Spirals of blond hair, eyes the color of the Hebridean Sea, lips that formed a bright and hopeful smile.

"It's you." The door slammed shut behind her. It was the woman from the prophecy, the woman who had visited him the day he'd arrived at Cràdh, the one who transformed from eagle to woman in his dreams each night. He searched his hazy fog of memory from the last time he'd seen her but could not recall much of that first day at Cràdh. "Morag."

A sudden urge to cling to her overwhelmed him, and he took a step closer. For a moment, her bright blue eyes went wide as eggs, and she took a step back. Léo looked down at his beard that nearly reached his dirty, bare chest, his ripped hose, the dirt stuck beneath his nails, and felt for the first time in his life ashamed of his appearance.

Cowed, he stepped away from her and walked toward the opposite wall, resting his back against the stone. Morag sat a large basket upon the hearth and he found himself unable to stop staring as she busied herself with the benevolence meal. She was the most beautiful thing he'd seen in months, and he scavenged the withering recesses of his mind, trying to remember anything he could about her.

"Your father is Father Allen? The disgraced priest who comes once a week to bring an extra portion of porridge and bannocks?"

She nodded and took a jar from the basket, her eyes narrowing as if something was missing. The cauldron. They spotted it at the same time, and he scrambled to help her. "That's my fault." He wrestled the pot from her grip. "Let me help you, Morag. It's heavy."

He hefted the cauldron in his hands, her eyes searching him. Why was she staring? Why did she not speak? All week he felt desperate for these visits, for the conversation that would help him survive. Just the thought of her voice made his stomach knot, and he was desperate to hear it.

"Here." He placed the cauldron onto the hearth. "Is this right? "

Silent, she nodded and poured the contents of the jar into it, then set it on the fire and stirred.

Stomach cramping with hungry anticipation, he craned his neck trying to see over her shoulder, realizing what she made was not the usual oats and bannocks. "What are you preparing?"

Dark lashes fanned across her cheeks for a bare moment before her thick brows lifted, and icy eyes looked up at him. Familiar blue. As if he had known her before, maybe as a lad. Yet surely he would've remembered her.

She opened and closed two fingers beside her mouth, then tapped them into her left palm. He tried to understand the strange gestures, noticing that she made no move to speak.

Awkward silence filled the room and she looked at him with expectation. He raised his eyebrows. "I asked you what I'm having for supper."

She repeated the motions, waving one elbow outward.

Frustrated, Léo felt in no mood for games. "Speak."

Her mouth drew tight and she brought a hand to her hip. Silhouetted by the fire, her tight curls of blond hair affected the look of a halo. She was a tall woman, high-angled cheekbones, plump lips the color of a ripe peach, and desirable of form. Yet soft in the head. What a pity.

Morag tapped her throat, then repeated the hand motions, pinching her fingers together and then tapping them into her palm. She looked at him with the senseless expression of one mentally touched and he cringed, knowing he too would be touched if he had no one to speak to. It was only a matter of time.

Walls closing in on him and awkwardness stealing his air, Léo grunted in frustration. "By the saints. Why couldn't your father come today? The one time a week I get to see another human being and I get you, an uncommon idiot."

Silent, Morag turned back to the fire, uncomprehending. The smell of onion, meat, and broth filled the room and his mouth watered. He hadn't had meat in months.

"Smells good."

She didn't move or give any sign she understood what he said .

"You look familiar. Have we met before? At Dun Ringill?"

She continued to stir.

"Something about your eyes. They're familiar."

Nothing, not even hand gestures. He sighed.

"You're some conversationalist."

She stirred.

"I've had a wife, a mother, a stepmother, and a sister, and none of them could stop talking. I thought even women who are touched in the head would like to talk."

Morag removed the cauldron from the fire and placed it on the hearth with a bang, then swept ash over the stones creating a smooth covering. When she finished, she stuck a pinky into the dust and moved it with swift determination through the ash. She looked over her shoulder, shooting him a coy look, curling her finger up and down at him inviting him closer.

Intrigued, he pushed off the wall. One, two, three, four, five. And looked. She had written something. He read it out loud. "I'm not the idiot…YOU are. I am unable to speak you TOAD…. And the name is Moira … not… Morag." Saints.

Léo turned and found himself nose-to-nose with her, fury masking her delicate features. In shock, he swallowed his apologies, scrambling backward three large paces to get away from her and colliding with the wall. Pinning him against the stone with one firm forearm, she jerked the bandage off his shoulder. Brow creased, she picked the five remaining maggots out of his wound and threw them, and the bandages, into the fire.

Bending over her basket, she removed a bundle and slammed it into his stomach with unexpected force. He grunted, catching the bundle thrust into his hollow gut. Swiftly, she pulled the covering over her basket and stomped to the door, banging her fist against the solid wood.

Desperation overtook him. "Morag—Moira—wait… don't leave me."

The door opened and she disappeared through it without looking back.

Unable to believe what he'd just witnessed, he put a hand to his stomach where she'd pegged him with his benevolence gift, suddenly intrigued. Beautiful, unusually so. And spirited. His heart lurched with a powerful wave of masculine interest in her and he wished she hadn't left.

Recovering himself after a few moments, he followed his nose to the cauldron and palmed a hunk of meat, bringing it to his ravenous mouth. It melted apart, so satisfying that his eyes rolled back in his head. A faint taste of butter lingered on his tongue. Moira could cook. It was the first time in months he'd tasted…

Oh saints. Chicken. She had been making a beak with her fingers and pecking on her palm like the ground, moving her elbow out like a flapping wing.

He talked to himself through his full cheeks. "I am an idiot."

Rolling his shoulder forward and back, he examined the wound. It didn't drain and was almost healed without a stitch. With sudden embarrassment, a feverish memory of her face floating above his and working on his wound staggered to the forefront of his mind. Had it been her all along who had saved his life, and not Father Allen?

His cheeks burned. And there was something else. A kiss. A heated kiss. No, several heated kisses. From what he struggled to remember, she was most definitely not touched in the head; he was.

Shame that he had acted like such a passionate fool saturated him from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet, and he gripped her present to him, afraid to look inside. After long minutes, he licked the food from his fingers and unraveled the bundle. It was the first gift he'd received in many months, and her thoughtfulness overwhelmed him. A dark blue tunic, made for his frame, and a pair of trews that looked his size. A small book unrolled from the leg of the trews and hit the straw mat.

Astonished, he picked it up and opened it. Just inside the front cover, wild handwriting marked it as her own. The Psalter of Moira Allen…M.A. or A—, known only to God, but known fully by Him.

Léo puzzled at the inscription, but flipped the page. Psalm 1. Blessed is the man who hath not walked in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stood in the way of sinners, nor sat in the chair of pestilence…

Unable to believe his eyes, he thumbed the pages, finding all of the one hundred and fifty-one psalms. Tears threatened. Something with which he could fill his hours. Something that would feed his soul.

He flicked frantically through the pages and a paper escaped, floating to the floor. He knelt, then unfolded it, and was struck dumb. Sketched across the rough surface of the paper was an exact rendering of the Cuillin Hills, so lifelike it was as if he were standing before them. He had never before seen anything like it. Not even the illuminations in the Psalter could rival its mastery.

Using only charcoal, the peaks of the mountain glowed from an unseen setting sun. Clouds stretched in puffs and covered the sky in darks and lights. Tall grass sprang up across a field and seemed to ripple with the wind. At the forefront of the sketch, the gentle basin of the sea banked against pebbled shore and reflected the inversion of the mountain. Moira had given him a window.

He noticed more wild-looking script at the bottom of the sketch, and he angled it toward the light of the fire.

Dearest Léo — The Lord who is your leader, He himself will be with thee: He will not leave thee, nor forsake thee: fear not, neither be dismayed. - Yours, Moira.

Again he read, and then reread, the endearment, Dearest Léo. Tears leaked over his eyes and splattered against the charcoal, creating a circular splotch over Moira's name. What had he done? She'd saved his life, fed him, clothed him, and revived him, and he'd paid her cruel insults. He'd not even thought to ask after her father and inquire if he was well or why he had not come this week. For another week he would sit alone, deprived of human company all because he'd indeed acted like an idiot. Was he to be forever doomed by his cruel MacKinnon nature?

Loneliness clamped around him as he ate in silence.

You're not alone, Léo.

Léo stopped chewing and looked around the room. Saints. It was starting. He'd been alone for months and his mind was slipping into madness.

You aren't mad.

He placed the empty cauldron on the fire and settled back on the mat, opening the Psalter, hands shaking. He wasn't prepared to lose his mind, not yet. If he could focus it, perhaps the voice would stop. Thumb brushing over the pages, he flicked the edges of the book. When his finger landed on a random page, he began to read.

Let the poor see and rejoice: seek ye God, and your soul shall live. For the Lord hath heard the poor: and hath not despised his prisoners.

Goosebumps rose up along his arms but he felt no chill before the heat of the fire.

"Mon Dieu?"

I'm here.

Unsure what to say, he spoke back. "Where've you been?"

With you.

Heart pounding, Léo dropped the Psalter—unable to stop the voice, unable to calm his mind. In madness, he found himself arguing with a voice that called itself God. "When? When my father forsook his wife and took Maman? You've forgotten me since the moment I was conceived in sin. I'm cursed."

I've been with you since the moment your mother called out to me in fright. I was with her, and breathed you into life to save her. A blessing.

Léo's voice trembled with disbelief. "And when I was abandoned in France by my own brothers?"

I was there and strengthened you. I sent you a new brother to protect you and watch over you. I gave you my favor in a foreign land.

Defiance burned through him as he asked the most painful of all his questions. "Where were you when Théa held our son and slipped into death? I know you weren't there. I know it."

Even then, I was there as I welcomed her home. I held your heart as you held your firstborn son. Not even for a breath were you forgotten. You are remembered.

Unprepared for the words surrounding him, Léo slid forward across the rough straw mat and rested his head upon the floor, grief for all he'd lost crashing upon him. For years his survival had depended on his ability to avoid thinking of all the things that had made life cruel. Now locked in this cell, his thoughts and memories were all he had—tearing him apart, devouring him, and making him mad.

" I want to be with Théa. Lord, she fills my thoughts every moment. They torment me here with no distraction from my mind. Please, take me home." Sobs racked him, his heart cleaving for the woman who had made him whole.

You will see her again. But there is more for you. Théa didn't make you whole.

"How can there be more for me?"

Great is the inheritance for those who love me.

He clenched the straw mat, the reeds crushing in his fists. "But I do love you."

You don't recognize me. How can you love me?

Hurt and indignation radiated through his soul. "What do you mean? My mother taught me all about you. I have always believed."

I've given you more than belief. I'm making you ready.

"Ready for what?"

The voice was quiet.

"I said, ready for what?"

The voice remained silent.

Frustrated to be cornered by the voice that called itself God, he wanted to keep wrestling."You are making me ready for some unknown…thing. In prison. Doesn't seem like a very good plan. Wouldn't this be easier if you broke open the door to my cell?"

Léo's eyes shot to the door, half expecting it to blow off the hinges. Nothing happened. "Well?"

Far away, he almost heard the sound of laughter.

I'm making you ready, right here.

Aggravated, Léo released a growl. He was going mad. Mad and talking to himself. Mad to believe that God remembered him, madder still to believe God was listening. "You say you won't leave me. Everyone leaves me. My brothers, Maman, Théa…"

I promise to remain with you. Remain in me, and you will learn who I am. Then you will recognize me.

Léo sat in silence, listening to the fire, Moira's food warm in his belly. Every time he'd ever dared hope, those hopes were crushed. Dare he hope that God would deliver him? That there was more to come in life than these four walls? Than death and captivity?

"I don't know what you're preparing me for, but all I want is to see my son. Please, God, if this is you, let me see my son. He is the only thing that matters to me. I want to hold him, to kiss him, to tell him I love him…" Unable to continue, he took the Psalter in his hands, holding on for dear life. "I've endured many things in this life, but please, I cannot lose my son."

The fire popped, shooting a spark across the dark cell and landing beside Moira's sketch of the Cuillin Hills, illuminating her name.

Remain in me. You will see your son.

Still wanting to doubt, Léo took a deep breath and opened the Psalter.