Blue Bells of Scotland: Book One of the Blue Bells Trilogy (20 page)

Young Ian did a friend betray,

A friend he did betray,

He took him to the English King

And he a price did pay

Young Ian with his golden voice

Did have the blackest heart

Young Ian in his crimson cloak

Betrayed his dearest friend.

He rolled another rich chord to end the piece. "A sad tale," he said.

"In England, the same ballad treats him as a hero."

He leaned forward, and lifted his hands to the strings once more, remembering Lord Darnley, William, and Iohn singing with him on many a winter's evening by the great fire. He closed his eyes, smiling as Celine began to sing once more.

With eyes of loch and forest glen,

With eyes of loch and glen,

Young Ian spoke the falsest words,

Pretending he was a friend

But as the battle round him broke,

He raised his voice in song,

Young Ian with his crimson cloak,

Betrayed his dearest friend.

"I don't remember the rest," she said. "I'm sorry." He ran his fingers up the harp strings in a long arpeggio, and struck a low note, finishing off the song.

"Beautiful!" he said in amazement.

She taught him ballads, jigs, and dance pieces. She knew the story behind each, and Niall fascinated to hear this history of his country, things that would not happen until hundreds of years after his own birth. "Enough for one day," he finally said, rising from the stool. "Now we talk." He pulled up a chair, knee to knee with her.

They stared at each other awkwardly. He didn't know where to start. He couldn't tell the truth, of course. He'd be locked up. And even this quiet girl would most likely slap him for such a story. Allene certainly would! He wondered if Shawn had met Allene and earned a slap from her yet. He smiled.

He cleared his throat and met her eyes. "When I wook up in the castle, I dinna know who or where I was." It was almost true. Still, he hated himself for telling stories to this vulnerable girl, as Shawn had most definitely already done more than once. He only hoped she would see the sincerity of his intent in his eyes; hear it in his tone. "I canna say what happened." That was true enough. "But I tell you this: I don't remember you and I. I don't remember what I did, but I think I wasn't nice."

A single tear trailed down her cheek. "You said you loved me when you came to my house that night," she whispered. A sheet of long, honey hair fell over her shoulder, shielding her face. "You brought me a rose and said it was over with Amy. You said you didn't want to hurt her, and we had to be discreet until she accepted the inevitable."

He touched her shoulder awkwardly. Shawn had lied. Even he, stumbling into the situation, could see it had never been over with Amy.

"I'm sorry," he said. Her pain hurt him. She, he could see, would not tread on a rose petal for fear of harming it. "I was wrong. I lied. I...."

She looked up at him, her china blue eyes wet. "You lied?" She looked down at the floor again. She wiped the back of her hand against one eye, and after a few moments said, "I always knew you had. I just...I just didn't want to believe it. I don't lie. I don't understand lying."

"Remember I don't know who I was," Niall said, taking her hand. "Tell me: why did you wait for him—for me—when you knew?"

"I wanted it to be true." She stared at the floor. "I didn't think you'd lie to
me
."

"Why?" he asked. "Why did you want it to be true that he felt something for you?"

She studied his face.

"Look at me." Niall spread his hands. "I'm seeing—myself—as if I had been another pairson, and it seems he was not a verra nice pairson."

"Sometimes you weren't," Celine admitted.

"Then why?"

"Because you were kind and gentle to me."

"Aye," he snapped. "Casting you aside, leave you waiting when I finished with you was kind and gentle?" He wasn't sure if he was more angry with Shawn’s abominable behavior, or with Celine for buying it.

"You're right." She bit her lip. "I was a fool."

"You weren't a fool," he said. "Shawn—I mean, the auld Shawn—was skilled at deceiving. Do not let him do it again. Do not think you're worth so little."

She nodded.

There was a moment's silence, in which Niall's head spun. He'd gone to sleep, only last night, in the fourteenth century. The many events of the day spun through his head, the fresh morning air off the Loch, the revelations in the hospital, the stomach turning car ride, and the bizarre hero's welcome at the castle. It was this scene that ran most strongly through his mind, and he suddenly understood something. "Have you never considered," he said slowly, feeling for the right words, "that there may be someone who would treat you so much better? Someone you'd have seen had you not set your feather for Shawn?"

"You speak like you're someone else," she said.

Yes, Niall thought. He must be careful of that. "I feel as if I am," he said. "I remember nothing. Was there never another?"

She nodded. "You knew I went out with Aaron a few times."

"Aaron? The young one with the black hair?"

Celine nodded. "You said he didn't love me like you did. You said he wouldn't want me anymore. You said if I'd just wait...."

"I'm truly sorry." Niall almost choked on the words, pretending to have been such a foul person. "I'm sorry for who I was, and what I've done. Do you not see the way Aaron looks at you? Do you feel nothing for him?"

"I thought I was in love with him. But then you—you were so important, and you treated me so well. For awhile. It's hard to compare."

"Poor Aaron," Niall said. "He doesn't glitter like Sh...like I do. But perhaps he is the real gold. Did he ever leave you waiting? Did he lie to you? Did he take you away from what was good in your life?"

"No." Her head hung.

"Shawn did. Remember that when you look at me." It occurred to him that the real Shawn might be back. "No matter what I say in the future," he added. He laughed inwardly at the joke. Everything he said was seven hundred years in his future! "No matter what I say," he repeated for emphasis, "remember who treated you well. It was Aaron."

"Yes, I'll remember," she said.

"Now kiss me," he demanded.

Her eyes widened, hopefully. "You mean it? But you just said...."

He slapped his knee angrily. "No, no, no! This is what I'm talking aboot! Do you not learn! This is where you slap me!"

She heaved a sigh. "I don't understand."

"You're an innocent," he said. "You don't understand lying and deception because you dinna do it yerself. Shawn—the auld Shawn—is a liar and a deceiver. I dinna know what happened in the castle, but the pairson I am now—I want never to hurt you again. Ye must understand I may be a liar and deceiver again, in a week, in a day. When I am, you must slap me if I try to take you from the good in your life."

She still looked uncertain.

"All right, you must learn one way or another," Niall said with determination. He offered his cheek to her. "Slap me."

She lifted a limp hand, and grazed his cheek.

"Sad!" he barked. "Think of all the lies!" He rose from his chair. "Think of the days you could have spent with someone who cared aboot ye! Think of the days in your room pining for him while he was having fun with Amy, not carin' a hoot aboot ye!" He'd guessed, from the young lasses he'd seen behaving the same way, and saw in her eyes he'd guessed right. "Did ye see me walking the gairdens hand in hand with Amy," he taunted, "while ye sat in your room?"

Her eyes blazed up at him.

"I wasna even thinkin' o' ye," he mocked.

Her slap stunned him. This time, it stung hard and sent him reeling into the chair behind him. His knees caught it, and he fell, pushing over two more chairs as he went down. He landed in a heap amidst the chairs, his cheek stinging, a chair biting into his back, and the stitches in his posterior burning. He laughed in delight. "Verra guid!" he said. "Now kick me for guid measure!" She did, and he groaned. "Did ye have to get the stitches?" He rubbed hard, hoping she hadn't broken anything open.

"You're right about everything, Shawn." Her china blue eyes spit fire at him. "I'm a fool. I'm even more a fool that you have to convince me yourself how awful you've been. I knew it and I didn't want to see it."

"You're a fool with someone who's verra much in love with ye," Niall said in delight. "Go to Aaron and never, ever look at me again as someone worthy of your time! I beg you!"

* * *

Conrad called the three senior members of the board of directors together. They gathered at the round mahogany table in the luxurious director's suite. "He can't play trombone," he announced.

Dan exploded from his chair, pounding his hand on the table. The water in the glass pitcher trembled. "It's the last straw!" he roared.

"He gets no break this time?" Bill asked. "They're saying he was shot by an arrow, hit in the head, beaten up. Amy did leave him."

Peter, the concertmaster, scoffed. "You're not going to find a single person in this orchestra who will hold that against her." He poured himself water and gulped it.

Bill held up his hands. "I'm not blaming her. I'm just saying it's not his fault this time."

"Most of them are cheering her on for finally sticking it to him," Peter fumed. "He's asked for it, the way he's yanked the poor girl around. I begged her not to get involved with him!"

"Fire him." Dan fished for his cell phone. "This young guy, this trumpet player, Zach, call him right now!"

Conrad held up a hand. "I'd agree except—get this! He offered to play harp instead."

"Shawn doesn't play harp," Peter said in disgust. "Arrows, head injuries, harp! The rumors are ridiculous!"

"You'd be surprised what Shawn can do," Bill said. "There's always been more to him than he lets on."

"But harp?" Dan insisted. He turned back to Conrad. "Do you have any reason to believe he can actually do it?"

"Celine met us at the concert hall." Conrad raked a hand through his hair, making it stand up like white dandelion fluff. "It was the damndest thing. Surreal. He spent a couple minutes feeling the strings, asked about the reds and blacks. It was like he'd never really seen such a thing before. He said how big it was. Then he started playing, like he'd been doing it his whole life!"

"Shawn knows what the red and black strings are." Bill looked perplexed.

"Right," said Dan in disgust. "He had quite an affair with Celine. He was always hanging over her, asking questions, pretending he didn't know, picking out pieces. And it was just another lie. He knew all along what he was doing."

"Maybe he forgot?" Peter said with disdain. "We all know it wasn't the harp he wanted to get his hands on."

"Be that as it may," Conrad said slowly, "I've never heard anything so beautiful in my life. God only knows how, but he can play! I don't know what happened to him out there, but maybe this one really isn't his fault. And he seems to have come back a nicer person. Maybe we can make a go of this, really make a selling point of his versatility."

* * *

Niall spent his brief respite, after playing Celine's harp, in the hotel lobby, picking up the many
brochures
lying around; large, glossy ones like those at the hospital.

The woman with the ruffled-pheasant-feathers hair appeared, touching his sleeve. Close up, Niall saw the sprinkle of freckles across her nose and eyes the color of cinnamon. "Shawn, you should have called me," she said.

"Excuse me?" He lowered the brochure, and tried to keep his eyes off her hair.

"Didn't you have your cell phone with you?"

He closed the brochure, frowning. "My what?"

Her eyebrows furrowed. She looked close to tears. "It's me, Dana. You don't remember me at all?"

"My apologies, no." His mind spun, trying to think what he could ask to get more information about Shawn. But she blinked eyes that pooled like dew on the bluebells, blinked fast and hard, and hastened away, almost running from the hall.

He sighed and turned back to the brochures. It took some searching at first, difficult with the print and spelling so odd to his eyes, but he found what he was looking for. Though the months varied, they all, without fail, were dated well into the twenty-first century. The Sassenach could not possibly set up such an elaborate ruse, with wonders unheard of, with people pretending to know and care for him, with an amazing tale of time travel.

They wouldn't have, when they could have just kidnapped or killed him.

After seeing the date for the ninth time, he went to his room, where he fell on his knees, head bowed, not even knowing what to pray. He clenched his hands, till his knuckles turned white.

When Amy came for him at dinner time, God had still granted him no wisdom or hope. But he'd regained a sense of calm and duty, and saw sense in giving in this time when she insisted he wear the stiff leggings, the jeans, that constrained and clung oddly to his legs, after a lifetime in loose trews and tunics; odd, short hose that came only to his ankles; useless, tight black shoes that bound his feet in and would never do for running or hiking or fighting; a white shirt with small buttons and short sleeves that ended well above his elbows.

She led him to the great hall. She called it a
dining room
.

He stood at the door, when they reached it, needing time to adjust to this unexpected sight. The dining room had no straw on the floor, but the same soft carpeting as the other rooms. It had a fireplace at one end, but no fire was laid. He looked for the head table, where an important man such as Shawn seemed to be, would sit. But all were identical, round and covered in white cloths. Women in short, black skirts served the food; not boys. They did not scurry, but walked placidly. The Laird would bellow at such complacency! There was not a dog in sight.

Heads turned. "There's Shawn, waiting to see who notices his grand entrance!" a man shouted.