explained, “who bring harm.”
“The Dark Ones. Granny will tell you. She has such stories.” She looked shyly at Fallon. “She’s told me many of you. This is our cottage. The rest of our family is there, and just a bit farther up the road. But I stay with Granny and help her tend the cottage and the animals.”
She led the way to a pretty little house with magickal charms painted on the door, and others hanging from the eaves to click and clack and chime in the wind.
“You are very welcome here,” Nessa said, and opened the door.
Though the hearth—the heart of the room—was small, the fire roared in it. Candles lit the room with both charm and cheer.
The old woman sat near the fire, a plaid blanket over her lap, a red shawl around her shoulders despite the heat pumping. She had a thin, fluffy bowl of white hair around a face mapped with lines, and eyes as clear and blue as a summer lake.
Those eyes clouded with tears as she held out a hand. “You brought them, my good lassie. We’ll have whiskey, won’t we? And some cake. Please be welcome and sit. Oh, Katie’s babies. How excited your granny was for you to come into the world. A good woman was Angie MacLeod, I hope you know. You have your grandfather’s eyes, girl. Sit, sit.”
“I’m Tonia.” She took the hand offered, then a stool by the chair. “Antonia.”
“For your father. I met Tony more than once. Oh, a handsome one, and a good heart inside him with a sense of fun along with it. So in love was he with your mother, and how he made her smile. Did they live, child? I haven’t been able to see.”
“He died before we were born.”
“I’m sorry for it. Rest his soul. Your mother?”
“She’s well.”
“And that’s a blessing. And you, boy, with your father’s fine looks and your mother’s eyes.”
“Duncan. It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Frazier.”
“Duncan, for the MacLeod end of things. You’ll give your mother my best, won’t you? The best from old Dorcas Frazier, who lived just down the road and used to give her ginger biscuits.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Your family were friends to me. I knew the Duncan you’re named for. Flirted with him when we were younger than young. Sit here now, there’s a lad.”
She drew a breath and, clear again, her eyes met Fallon’s. “I wondered so many times why I would live and live, wake every morning to a new day. So many new days. Some reasons, I thought, were for my Nessa. How could I leave my sweet lassie? Now I know I lived and lived and lived some more so to welcome the MacLeods back home. And to welcome The One into mine. Bright blessings on you, Fallon Swift.”
“And on you, Dorcas Frazier.”
She took Mrs. Frazier’s hand and marveled at how bold and bright the light burned in a body so stiff and bent with age. She took the chair offered as Nessa passed out whiskey and cake.
“The whiskey’s good,” Mrs. Frazier told them. “We still know how to make it around here. And the cake my own Nessa baked just this morning.”
“You said we’d have guests tonight, and to put a little extra love into it.”
Her grandmother cackled. “So I did. My Nessa is full of love. To the love, we’ll drink then, and to the light.”
They lifted glasses, and Fallon learned the whiskey was indeed good.
“You’ll have questions. You sit now, Nessa, for you should hear the questions and what answers I can give.”
“How is it the house hasn’t been touched? There are things inside,” Duncan continued, “that would be of use to you and others.”
“The house is of the MacLeods. Those of us who come from here respect that, and those who’ve come since are told. I think the house itself holds others out. It let you in, you ken. You’re blood, after all. Hugh died within two days after your family left for home and for London on business. Millie, ah, a strong woman was she, lived two more. I nursed her, as when the sickness came, I only became stronger. So I nursed her, and then Jamie, your cousin.”
“You cleaned the house,” Tonia said. “Cleaned it, made their beds.”
“As a friend would do for a friend. My son and my granddaughter, who lived, helped with it. We took the food, but nothing else.”
“Thank you.” Duncan took her hand again and, following his heart, kissed her thin fingers. “For