Page 10 of MacAlister's Hope
Everything went quiet in his head. No one had ever known that about the Winter Stone, except the old woman who had given it to him and taught him its secrets. Everyone thought it was just an interesting bauble that he fiddled with when he was thinking hard, something he often dropped or allowed someone else to hold. No one else had ever figured out that he used it to test people’s intentions. But then he had suspected Fia and Lady Elena had seen the color change that day at Kilmartin Castle, and clearly Fia had seen it change in Annis’s hands. Fia was smart enough to put it all together.
“Aye, it does.” He would not lie to her, ever.
“Where did you get it?” she asked, taking his hand and pulling him away from the bedside back to the brazier. She knelt there and began mixing the poultice, glancing up at him with an air of anticipation.
Kieron settled on the floor facing her, his back to the wall, his long legs stretched out, and the door directly in his line of sight. He glanced over to see if the chief still slept. The gentle rise and fall of his breaths reassured Kieron he did. Kieron did not want anyone else to hear this, for then the stone would be of no use to him. Though as he looked at the bonny lass in front of him he realized ’twas possible it had already done its job.
“There was an auld woman who wandered into the village one day, not long after you and I first met.” He only now realized how close the two events were. “She was hungry, tired, and I offered her comfort with me and my grandmum the only family I have. Fortunately my grandmum was a generous soul and made the woman, Beira was her name, welcome. She was a strange woman—she traveled alone, though she was bent with age, and had only one good eye—but I was not afraid of her as the other lads and lasses of the clan were. She entertained us for several weeks, telling wonderful fanciful stories of the people she’d met and the places she had traveled, describing the landscapes she had traveled through as lovingly as if they were her children, as if she had created them herself. I helped her resupply her medicinal herbs—taking her into the hills for those things I could not beg from the goodwives of the village. One day, as we were searching for something…I cannot remember exactly what…we came upon a standing stone set atop a small hill. I had never seen it before. She stopped and said what I can only guess was a prayer for I did not understand the language she spoke, and as she stopped, the air turned suddenly cold and a bitter wind blew up, bringing the first snow of winter with it.
“I remember she smiled at me then and said, ‘’Tis time for me to leave now.’ I was surprised to find that she had brought her travel sack with her because I had not noticed it until that moment. ‘I would give you a gift before I go, young Kieron,’ she said, ‘but you must promise me to keep it safe until I return for it,’ and then she reached up to the top of her staff, and the stone seemed to leap from its place there into her hand. She told me how to use it and I have had it ever since.” He pulled the stone out of the pouch and held it between his thumb and forefinger as Annis had done before. “’Tis called the Winter Stone.”
“It does remind me of winter’s swirling snows,” Fia said.
“Aye, but Beira said ‘twas a tear from theCailleach Bheur, the mother of winter, and that because it came from her own heartbreak it reflected the hearts of anyone who held it. She also told me it would bring me to my destiny.” He looked up from the stone in his hand to the woman he had never been able to forget.
“So the pink reflects the heart?”
“Aye, if someone who holds it speaks from the heart—the truth, at least as that person believes it to be—pink will flow through the white. And if that person lies—speaks against her heart—”
“It turns a murky, almost black, brown,” Fia said. “That is how you knew Annis lied.”
“It is. ’Tis also how I knew you and Elena both believed you would be able to help the chief.”
“I only believed I would do my best to help him,” she reminded him.
“Aye, but it was spoken from your heart. Elena believed you would heal him.”
“She did. She has always believed I could do whatever I put my mind to.”
“And is she usually right?”
Fia smiled. “Aye, always as far as I can remember.” She stared at the stone as if she tried to see within it. “Have you ever seen other colors?”
“Aye, but I do not ken what they mean. Biera only told me of the pink and brown. I saw blue once, a pale purple a few times. On spring days it sometimes takes on a yellow cast, like fresh butter.”
Fia clasped her hands in her lap and took a deep breath. “May I try something with it?”
Without hesitating, he handed it to her. She quickly rose and held her hand out to him again. “Come with me. I need you to watch the stone in case I cannot see all that you see.” He gladly took her hand, relishing the feel of her palm against his as he scrambled to his feet, not needing her help, but not passing up a chance to touch her.
She led him back to the chief’s bedside and dropped his hand. She held the stone in her palm, closed her eyes and simply stood there, as if she composed herself, though for what he knew not.
When she opened her eyes, she stared down at the stone balanced on her open palm as she began to say the names of herbs, then other things he did not recognize. With each word she spoke she paused and waited as the stone filled with light—pink sometimes, brown others, and then, suddenly a beautiful green infused the white ribbons within the stone while pale pink shadows played along its edges.
“That is the one!” She beamed over at Kieron, her face alight with wonder. “Did you see it?”
“The green and pink, aye, but I do not ken what the green means. I have never seen it before.”
She held the stone out to him. “Take it. I am done.” She bounced up on her toes as he grabbed it and gave him a quick kiss. “I know how to help the chief!”
“You do?” He returned the stone to its pouch.
“Aye. I named the things I thought would help him, along with things I knew would harm him—I needed to test my theory. In every case the herbs that would harm turned the stone that sludgy, murky brown. The herbs I knew would not harm him were pale pink, but when I hit upon a salve with several different components, the green almost overwhelmed the pink. Green is the color of new life in the spring. It is the color of wellbeing, health. It is the color of your eyes, too.” She smiled shyly at him, before her grin lit up her face again. “I am sure that is what green meant in the stone, too. Not your eyes,” she said quickly, her cheeks turning a becoming pink, “wellbeing and health.”
Kieron was stunned. Never would he have thought to use the stone in this manner, nor had he thought she had noticed his eyes. He swept her up in his arms and kissed her soundly, but did not allow either of them to get carried away by the attraction and joy that drew them together. For now they must concentrate on the chief. He could only hope there would be time afterward to explore the growing attraction he knew they shared.
Two days later Kieron quietly pushed open the door to the chief’s chamber and slipped inside, anxious to see Fia. He knew his first concern should be the chief’s recovery, but in the privacy of his own thoughts, he knew he simply yearned to be in Fia’s company.
The chief was lying on his back, snoring loudly, something he hadn’t slept deeply enough to do in at least a fortnight. Fia slept, too, but not on the pallet. She sat on a chair leaning forward, her head cradled in her arms on the edge of the chief’s bed. Kieron stood for a moment, allowing himself to just look at this petite woman who as a lass had taken her place in his affections long ago. In the space of a sennight he had come to know that she still held all the attributes of the girl he had met—a sunny disposition, a quick mind, and a smile that was as warm as the sun on a summer’s day. But he had also learned that she was kind, hard working, and passionate—about her work, and when she kissed him. He could not help but grin at the memory of her kiss. He wanted more of those and if the chief was truly on the mend, then perhaps Fia might have time for Kieron to steal another one or two.
