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irwinwe

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Western Highlands of Scotland

Roughly 1718 at Achnacarry...amidst the fever of the Jacobite rebellion...(the time in which this story is written is an extremely complex one so I don't expect you to understand everything going on...just relax and read it...all characters are actually NON-fictional but two...I've just created the situations that they are facing and that's why I'm calling it fiction)

Atalanta's footsteps were like a feather dance on the stone ground as she walked silently through the old Lochiel castle.  Suddenly it occured to her that if this was the home of the Camerons, it was her home now too.  She was just as entitled to roam freely about as those who lived here.  She wanted to discover every secret door and passage, memorize the unique art of each jagged stone in the corridors, walk with eyes closed to any clandestine lantern in the pitch black shadows that night cast.  She wanted to belong here.  

Curiosity bating her forward, she tiptoed further down the dusk-darkened corridor, impervious to her light cloud of breath on the frigid air and the goose bumps that raised the hair on her arms, until she came to a lighted area.  It was an open door, she noticed, as flickering fire played erratic shadow-dances on the dark stone floor at her feet from within.  She wondered what was inside.  She placed a hand on the frame of the door and peered around it, and her heart slammed into her throat, restricting her air for a pregnant second.  The vision she beheld was nonstandard.  

Standing before the fire was a man who stood well over 6 and a half feet in height, long black-hooded robe enhancing the incredible breadth of his shoulders, making him appear to be some kind of fire-dwelling demon.  Since the hood covered his head and she could not see eyes, which always revealed the existence of a mortal soul, she was even more convinced that he was some sort of odious spirit.  His elbow was propped upon the hearth, and his long ring-laden fingers touched what she imagined was his lip...if he wasn't a formless creature.  He appeared to be deep in thought.  Ha, she thought, a demon plotting his next murderous scheme, his next ill-omen or fated highlands curse.  But suddenly she remembered where she was.  The Lochiel Camerons allowed no demons; they were too fearsome.  Any demon surely had enough sense to know that Ewen Cameron, great Ulysses of the Highlands, was always ten paces ahead of them in cunning and in execution.  So who was this man who dared loom before the fire?  She was sure she had already met everyone here.  Why hadn't she seen him before?  

Or had she?  

She studied him for a moment, absently coming into the room further, and then she realized that if he wore a robe, he could be involved in some sort of religious sept.  Religion?  She thought to herself.  This man?  She doubted that priests and the like looked as fearsome as warriors and protectors.  Yet, she thought again, hadn't John, her father, told her about a 4th son named Alexander, a man who was a Jacobite and a Jesuit priest?  She squinted her eyes as if to sift through his aura for answers.  Could this be the brother she had yet to meet?

Without warning a heavy pounding came on the door to the castle at some distance behind her.  The man jerked around with formidability, immediately vigilant and teeth slightly barred in violence as if he was prepared for onslaught.  When he saw her he jolted, then stared.  For a suspended moment they were both distracted.  As if she had not been frozen in wonderment before, she now became as ice, when eyes as coolly green as hers pierced into hers and shook the deepest chord of courage in her soul.  

Perhaps he is a demon, she thought as an unusual feeling of respect and fear flashed through her, some warrior god or a druid, meant to overpower his subjects with a single penetration.  His hood had fallen as he had wrenched around to face her, and hair as midnight black as hers flowed in bounty over his broad shoulders and down his back and chest; shining as did the loch that mirrored a glittering black sky.  As she followed a long strand she recognized what it was hiding underneath.  A gigantic silver cross hung loosely from his neck by a chain that joined his hair in a cascade; it was like a star peaking out from amongst the darkness.  If he is a priest, she thought, he does not look like one.  His incredible size and breadth, the obvious indentation of lean, powerful muscle underneath the thin black costume, the strong square jaw that hinted at no sign of a soft nature, were enough to make her doubt.  

She looked into his eyes again, eyes that shone beneath furrowed brows that were just as perplexed now as hers.  She knew those eyes.  They were Ewen Cameron's eyes.  And John Cameron's eyes.  And daresay her very own eyes.  They were Cameron green.  This man was kin to the Camerons.  She didn't know how she knew, but she was certain.  He was her own kin.  He was the Alexander that her father had spoken of.  

"Alexander?" she whispered in speculative reverence.

Her question danced among the fire shadows, untouched, and his only response was a raised left brow.