Ceana bobbed a curtsey, which Nathaniel imagined had been the first thing in years to almost bring his uncle to his knees. John cursed a bit in an extremely non-priest-like fashion, then blew out his breath.
“I see. Well, perhaps it’s a good thing I’m where I am.”
“No point in asking you one last time if you’ll come with me?” Nathaniel asked.
John shook his head. “Don’t want to, lad. I’ve almost talked Grudach into marrying me.”
“You’re old enough to be her father,” Nathaniel wheezed.
“It’s a May-December kind of thing,” John said with a shrug. “Besides, Malcolm is begging me to take her. Since Angus is wed and his wife is already pregnant, the line will continue. Grudach can do as she pleases. And she likes my little vicarage there near the hall.”
Nathaniel wondered if he could blame the feeling of faintness over that particular thought on something other than the mental picture of his uncle being married to a girl half his age. Stranger things had happened, he supposed.
“Besides, I’m very well preserved,” John said. “They think I have supernatural powers.”
Nathaniel looked at his uncle and realized the man was staring at him with a clarity that belied his reputation for being endlessly drunk. “I’ll just bet they do.” He glanced at his mother, then at Emma. “Any words of advice for him? Or for Ceana?”
“She’ll want to go see the MacLeod witch,” Emma said very quietly. “I don’t know exactly when, but I imagine it’s soon.”
“I’ll see that she is free to do as she likes,” John said. “Fate balances everything out in the end, you know. One soul dropped here, another dropped there.” He smiled. “Balance.”
“Well, wouldn’t want to clutter up the current day with one too many,” Nathaniel said slowly. He looked at his uncle. “Are you as surprised as I am?”
“Every bit,” John said.
“Grandfather would soil himself.”
John grinned. “Which makes it all the better, doesn’t it? That my father should be so involved in things that would terrify him? I would love even a single day with him here.”
“It wouldn’t be worth it.”
“Nay, but thinking about this will be.” John rattled off three account numbers along with passwords, then looked at Nathaniel. “Get all that?”
“Absolutely.” Nathaniel looked at Emma. “You?”
“Yes.”
John smiled. “Swiss, of course. It’s all siphoned off the main trust, which has likely escaped the notice of anyone who cares. Go drain them, laddie, and do something good with the money. I’m not going to need it. I’m assuming the old miser had me declared dead.”
“Two years ago.”
“What about Gerald? Did he demand my inheritance?”
Nathaniel spared a moment to wish he’d talked to his uncle about that sooner. “He’s fighting Grandfather, but I can’t bring the exact details to mind at the moment.”
“He’s my son,” John said with a sigh, “but he’s not all that clever.”
“He’s also here,” Nathaniel said, because he had no choice. “I don’t think he should stay, but I’m not in any condition to do anything about it at the moment.”
John looked at him seriously. “He’s responsible for your being where you were?”
Nathaniel didn’t dare nod for fear it would send him back to his knees, so he merely looked at his uncle.
John pursed his lips. “Then definitely drain those accounts and give it all away so he doesn’t get his hands on it. Everyone else has more than they need. You have enough for your legal bills?”
“Aye.”
John smiled, embraced him briefly, then pulled back quickly and wrinkled his nose. “Forgot where you’ve been, laddie. Don’t particularly care to wear any of that.” He turned to Ceana and smiled. “Come along, lass, and come home. We’ll take care of you.”
Tears were streaming down her face. “Thank you.” She looked at Nathaniel. “And where will you go?”
“We’re going home,” Nathaniel said, not arguing as Emma drew his arm over her shoulders. “Time to marry this lass here before she gets away.”
“She’s very pretty,” Ceana said with a faint smile. “Good fortune to you both.”
Nathaniel smiled. “John will take care of you,” he said. He looked at his uncle. “Do what you have to, aye?”
“You know I will, Nathaniel.” John looked at Emma. “Lovely to meet you, lass. Grind this one under your heel as often as possible after you wed him. I’ll see that he’s born, which is likely the least I can do for him. Now, off with you both before Nat falls on his arse. Be safe, children.”
Nathaniel nodded to his uncle, refrained from putting his arms around his mother and bawling like a bairn, then decided that perhaps it was best they get on with getting home.
Assuming they could.
He turned away before he couldn’t make himself turn away, then stumbled along with Emma toward where he knew the gate lay.
“Is Gerald still following us?” he asked very quietly.
“I can’t hear him any longer,” she said. “He’s not very careful, but I would have to leave you and go have a look to know for sure.”
“Nay,” he managed, “let’s just keep going. If we can get home, we might find some help there. And to keep my mind off the fact that I wish I were dead, tell me where you learned to do all that.”
“Do what?”
He was truly unhappy with how hard he was leaning on her, but he couldn’t do anything else. “Steal keys and liberate half-dead Highlanders from medieval dungeons.”
She shouldered more of his weight. “Well, it was more theory than practice, if you want the whole truth. Patrick sharpened up my fighting skills while Ian was teaching me Gaelic. Jamie watched with a lairdly frown. They weren’t happy about my going, but I didn’t give them any choice.”
She fell silent and he didn’t have the strength to press her for a reason why. It took him almost all the way to the gate to be able to have the energy to speak again.
“And the lock picking?”
“Bertie, of course,” she said with a faint smile. “I had to have something to do to fill my rebellious teenage days, and he had to have something to do besides polish cars. My father had four drivers, in case you were curious.”
“I was,” he wheezed.
“My parents had to keep up appearances, you know,” she continued. “They live in an enclave within yachting distance of Seattle and routinely use words like exclusive and elite to describe the guest lists created for intimate, extremely important dinner parties.”
“You bluestocking, you,” he managed.
She laughed a little. “You wish I were,” she said. “Unfortunately you know the reality is I’m the dorky middle child who learned to pick locks so I could get out of anything my brothers could lock me into, namely the attic.”
“Cinderella practices unsavory skills, is that it?”
She nodded. “Exactly.”
He found that he couldn’t speak anymore. It was slightly unnerving to him that he had to concentrate so fully on just continuing to walk quickly, but he supposed perhaps he couldn’t have reasonably expected anything else. He managed to take one last decent breath for speaking.
“Thank you, Emma.”
She smiled up at him, then squeezed his arm that was slung over her shoulder. “Almost safe home.”
He almost didn’t dare hope for it.
Chapter 31
Emma had never in her life been so grateful for the sight of a house that didn’t belong to her as she was for the sight of James MacLeod’s little cottage on the edge of the woods. She would have thought she had dreamed the past few days, but the fact that she was filthy suggested otherwise. The fact that she was holding on to a man who looked as if he
’d spent almost two weeks in a medieval dungeon was conclusive proof.
She paused, because she wasn’t sure Nathaniel could move much more. He was shaking badly. She didn’t know why the gate had swung open for them so easily and at the moment, she honestly didn’t care. For all she knew, James MacLeod had been standing there in the shadows, key in one hand and treatise on How to Matchmake Like a Pro in the other, and he’d been responsible. She suspected she would only have the answer over blades.
“Can you make my house?” she asked.
“The saints preserve me if I can’t.”
She smiled at him. “My Gaelic isn’t that good, Nathaniel.”
“I think your Gaelic is amazing,” he managed, in English. “At the moment, I think all I can speak is moan.”
She smiled. “My house or yours?”
“Mine, but let me rest on your porch for a minute or two—actually, nay. We’d best keep going. If I sit, I’ll never get back up.”
“I’ll drive you,” she said.
“Are you mad?” he asked. “I’m not getting in your Audi in my current state.”
“You can sit on the hood.”
He laughed uneasily, then had to stop and cough. He straightened and shook his head. “I need to walk. Just prop me up against that tree there for a minute or two whilst I catch my breath.”
She did, then looked him over. He was filthy and his plaid was disgusting, but he looked more like himself than he had before. She wished she had pockets to put her hands in, but all she could do was hug herself.
They had made it.
She wished she felt more at peace.
“How did you know?” he asked. “Where I was, I mean.”
“Patrick said as much.”
He leaned his head back against the tree and looked up at the sky for a moment or two before he looked at her. “I wonder if you would be open to another brief but fond embrace?”
She nodded. She supposed it would be indiscreet to say anything about how hard he was shaking, or the fact that she’d had to help him put his arms around her, so she simply held on to him and was grateful for it.
He sighed and rested his cheek against her head. “Did you hear my conversation with Jamie?”
“Yes.”
“You wanted to call me a foul name just then, didn’t you?”
“I did,” she agreed. “It’s a testament to how happy I am to see you that I refrained.”
“I wanted to keep you safe.”
“I know.”
“You realize we can’t carry on like this, don’t you?”
She didn’t dare move. “Traveling back and forth in time?”
“Nay, with your chasing me all through the centuries because you simply can’t resist my charming self.”
She laughed a little. “You’re a jerk.”
“Aye, I daresay.” He paused. “You are going to have to marry me, you know.”
She pulled back and looked at his filthy, too-thin face. “Am I?”
“I think you’ll go mad without me, actually.”
“That is the single most unromantic proposal I have ever heard,” she said, fighting her smile, “following hard on the heels of your other proposal, which wasn’t all that great, either. Actually, I think you’ve brought it up more times than that, but obviously your speeches need some work.”
He wheezed out a laugh, but that seemingly cost him. “Lass,” he managed, “if I offer anything more romantic after what we’ve just been through, I’ll weep.” He took a deep, unsteady breath. “I think I need to go home.”
“I’ll drive you.”
He shook his head. “You truly do not want me in your car, and I’m not being fastidious. I can make it home. You’ll have to stay and tend me round the clock for the saints only know how long, but you’re too altruistic to leave me on my own.”
“Especially after I ventured across centuries to rescue you?”
His smile faded. “Exactly that.” He pushed away from the tree, swayed, then nodded. “Let’s hurry.”
She put her arm around him again, drew his arm across her shoulders while ignoring his grunt of pain, and walked with him past her house and down the road toward his. She looked up at him.
“Shall I distract you with mindless chatter?”
“Please,” he said seriously. “Anything to keep me awake.”
“Then I’ll tell you about the visit on the morning I went back to get you.” She looked at him to make sure he was still conscious and not just sleepwalking, then pressed on. “I had made the connection with your mother and 1372—”
“Is that her birth year?”
“Apparently so,” Emma said, “which is why I think it got to you at Cawdor. Anyway, there I was getting ready to come rescue you and who should show up at my door but Thomas Campbell, collector of all things sharp, with your dagger in his hand. He’s off to Florida, you see, and wanted you to babysit it for him. Imagine my surprise to find a substantially younger version of our good curator acting as an apprentice to the Fergusson clan’s blacksmith.”
He paused, breathed raggedly for a moment or two, then shook his head and walked on. “Storyboard material, that.”
She smiled. “I think I might have a few things to add, definitely. So, I dressed in black, grabbed my go bag, and left the house, only to run straight into Patrick MacLeod. He was good enough to walk me to the forest, then watch me shove your dagger into the, well, I guess door is the only thing to call it. The door opened, I hopped through, then turned around to find both Patrick and the dagger gone. Maybe there’s only one of those blades now, which will make Jamie and his plaid of time happy.”
“Sorry?”
“Jamie has a theory about pulling threads out of the fabric of time,” she said. “He says it’s bad. Messes up the pattern.”
He nodded, but his breathing was very ragged. She understood, actually. They walked in silence almost all the way to his house before he stopped, breathed for a moment or two, then looked at her.
“I wonder if the gate is closed.”
She started to answer, then realized that she should have been paying attention to their surroundings, not trying to distract Nathaniel with conversation. She looked at him, then ducked under his arm and drew the dagger from her boot at the same time.
Gerald MacLeod stood there in a worn, medieval plaid, a sword bare in his hand. He looked at her, then laughed shortly.
“You can’t be serious,” he said contemptuously. “You? You think you’re going to fight me? With that pitiful little dagger?”
“Emma.”
Emma looked to her right to find Patrick MacLeod standing there. He flipped a long dirk toward her. She caught it, flung off the sheath, then realized what she was holding.
Nathaniel’s medieval dagger. Well, the incarnation of it that resided most of the time in Thomas Campbell’s glass case. She didn’t feel ill, which she thought might be a good sign.
She glanced at Nathaniel to see if he had a different opinion, only to find him leaning back against the railing of his porch. Leaning was probably the wrong word for it. He was swaying so badly, she thought he might be on the verge of passing out, but he was looking at Patrick MacLeod sternly.
“I need a sword,” he wheezed.
“Of course you don’t,” Patrick said with a snort. He walked over and did Nathaniel the favor of pushing him back upright. He looked at the grime now on his hand, then at Nathaniel. “Don’t expect any more help than that and leave your woman to her work. She’ll see to it well enough.”
She supposed that was enough of a vote of confidence for her. She smiled at Nathaniel, then turned to face his cousin.
“Is this any better,” she asked politely, “or would you like to rest before we end this?”
Gerald looked at her in astonishment. “I can’t b
elieve you expect me—”
That was the last thing he said for quite some time. She supposed all that dirty fighting Patrick MacLeod had taught her wasn’t exactly what Gerald was expecting, but her, er, boyfriend had spent almost two weeks in a medieval dungeon thanks to the idiot standing there, which she supposed disqualified him from any mercy she might have been willing to show. Considering that amount was exactly zero, she supposed he wasn’t going to have a very good morning.
His sword was sharp, though, and he grazed her arm before she decided that any Marquess of Queensbury rules were definitely off the table. She didn’t think it would go very well for her to just stab him, so she spent most of her time just nicking him and verbally getting under his skin. It was almost too easy to set him off, which left her thinking that maybe Poindexter MacLeod was smart not to let Gerald have control over any of his assets. She also was beginning to understand why John wasn’t terribly sad over not getting to see his son on holidays and long weekends.
“This is ridiculous!” Gerald shouted finally. “I don’t want her, I want a real swordsman—”
She took the hilt of Nathaniel’s dirk and smashed it into Gerald’s nose.
Gerald dropped his sword and clutched his face. “She broke my nose!”
Emma kicked him as hard as she could in the gut, sending him sprawling. She flipped his sword up with her foot, then tossed it to Patrick, who reached out and casually caught it by the hilt. She paused for a moment to appreciate that medieval nonchalance, then looked back at her fallen foe, who was rolling around on the ground, howling.
“You tried to kill my—” Emma paused, which was annoying because she quite suddenly lost the rhythm of the diatribe she had been getting ready to let loose.
“Future husband,” Nathaniel called.
Emma looked at Gerald. “My future husband,” she said. “Now, get up and stop being such a baby. It’s no wonder your grandfather doesn’t want you having any of his stuff when you act like this.”
Gerald actually kicked his heels and pounded his hands against the ground. She had never seen anything like it before. She checked him over for other weapons, saw none, then decided she had done all she could do. It was going to be up to Nathaniel to make some decisions—