Chapter Ten

The rain relinquished its stranglehold on the mountains, and Meredith let go of her last doubts about Ian as the two of them lay on the bed, intermingling discussion of the solicitor's scheme to take Corridan and the castle with lovemaking and talk of what-ifs that only the day before would have seemed impossible. With some effort, she managed to convince him that they should postpone any talk of marriage until the issue of land ownership was clarified and any misunderstandings sorted out between the Macraes and the Sinclairs. "It would just give the clans something else to squabble over," she pointed out. "Neither clan is going to like the idea."

She didn't tell him that her real reason for deferring his proposal was that everything had moved too quickly where her heart was concerned. She knew she'd fallen in love with Ian, but marriage, so hastily… that was something else.

She watched him now as he drove away and missed him immediately. Is that what it feels like to be married? Closing the door to the cottage behind her, she looked around the cozy dwelling. Only days before she had considered how easy it would be to remain here. Now she was trying to talk herself out of it. Why? The answer, she knew, was fear. She thought of Ian's proposal, delivered in a moment of profound intimacy. Had he really meant it? They scarcely knew one another.

Yet, she could not dismiss his proposal out of hand, for Ian Sinclair was unlike any man she had ever met. There was something, some invisible tie, some bond, that had stretched between them the moment they'd met. Had he felt it, too?

Rattled, Meredith changed clothes and made tea, marveling at how her priorities could shift in so short a time. Her gaze came to rest on the chest in the corner containing her Macrae treasures. Could a Sinclair marry a Macrae without creating trouble? She recalled the dark look on Robert Macrae's face and the way she'd been shunned by the villagers simply for having dinner with a Sinclair. What on earth could have caused such a lasting feud in the first place? With a rueful shake of her head, she lifted the chest and brought it to the table. She opened the box and removed the items one by one. She was proud of her heritage but not proud of the continuing involvement of her clan in a feud. Because of it, the treasures in this chest seemed somehow tarnished.

At the bottom of the chest nestled the ancient woolen tablecloth. She eased it out and carried it carefully to the couch where she unfolded it to its full size and draped it gingerly over the sofa. Although it had yellowed with age, after two centuries it was still a piece of great beauty, handwoven and decorated with a wide band of embroidery around the hem.

Meredith held it up to examine the fine stitching but could find no familiar pattern to the work. Extending her arms, she studied the overall effect and suddenly realized that the border wasn't sewn with any ordinary embroidery stitch. The design was created from ancient Gaelic symbols strung together into words, words that were in turn stitched into sentences. Her breath caught in her throat.

Locating the beginning of the embroidery, she slowly began to read the words aloud. The style was foreign to her ears, the words difficult to translate, but as she worked her way around the cloth, she was astounded that she was reading the story of the young cattle thief who avoided hanging by marrying the laird's ugly daughter!

At first she thought the tale must be a well-known folk story that someone had whimsically turned into an embroidery pattern, until she came upon the name of the laird-Duncan Macrae. And that of the thief-Peter Sinclair.

She murmured a quiet expletive and read on. The embroiderer apparently was none other than the ugly bride herself, and she stitched a far less humorous tale into the following lines. According to her account, her father and mother both died shortly after her marriage to the thief. Her new husband then murdered her brother, the legitimate heir, and claimed the land and the castle for his own.

Duneagen Castle.

Meredith's hands began to tremble. Peter Sinclair soon after cleared his newly acquired land that was occupied mainly by Macraes. The towns were sacked and burned and were replaced with huge flocks of sheep.

Dropping the edge of the cloth, she gazed unseeing into the room. So Angus Stewart wasn't lying! If this were the truth, a Sinclair had stolen the castle and land from the Macraes. Maybe Ian did not own the castle after all.

But if Peter Sinclair's clearing had been somehow sanctioned by the government, as many were in those days, then the villagers might have no claim to their land if they couldn't prove it had been purchased from the Sinclair.

Meredith was dumbfounded. No wonder the Macraes hated the Sinclairs. Even she felt indignant. But these events had happened some two hundred years ago, she reminded herself. It was time for both clans to get past them:

Meredith bent her head to translate the remaining short lines. That Peter Sinclair's wife had hated him was evident from what she read next:

May the dark of the night curse the name of Sinclair,

May strife on the land he his penance,

'Til the day comes to pass that a true-blooded heir

Of Macrae returns to the palace.

Strife on the land. The feud. Until recently, continuing bloodshed on both sides. Was the land cursed? Meredith tried to dismiss the thought, but couldn't. What was a curse except something that when believed often came true, like a self-fulfilling prophecy? She recalled the woman at the pub saying it was "th' curse" that had brought Angus Stewart and his threat to their doorsteps. If these people had believed in such a curse for all this time, it would take nothing less than changing the complete mind-set of two clans of very stubborn-headed Scots to make peace between them. It seemed impossible. Her eyes fell on the final two words of the embroidery, the signature of the writer: Megan Macrae. The ugly bride. Meredith could almost feel her pain.

The thought of Megan Macrae, however, also gave her an idea. A Macrae had cast the curse. Could another Macrae dispel it?

Ian left Corridan both encouraged and anxious. It had been three days since he had asked Meredith to marry him and though she had not turned him down, still she had not agreed. He knew she was wary of such a hasty wedding, but he had no doubts in his heart whatsoever that she was the woman destined to be his life's mate.

In addition to her concern about their brief courtship, Meredith had also remained adamant that the feud be resolved before they wed. "How can we expect to live happily ever after if neither of us can be part of our clans?" she asked, and he knew it was a valid concern. At first, uniting the Sinclairs and the Macraes had seemed an impossibility. Then she'd shared with him the archive she'd discovered embroidered into the hem of the tablecloth and with her innate good sense had suggested a plan that might resolve both his and the village's problems with Angus Stewart. It was not a solution to the two-hundred-year-old feud, but it had led to surprising cooperation between the clans.

He accelerated and climbed the steep grade that led out of the village. He had just enough time to drive to Craigmont, pick up his special guest, one that no one, especially Meredith, expected, and return for the meeting that had been called at the church.

An hour and a half later, he pulled into the car park beside the small white chapel, and his heart gave a little lurch. Would it work? Not just Meredith's plan, but his own as well? He turned to the man who sat next to him. "Wish me luck, Reverend."

Inside, Robert Macrae stood at the front of the church. His clansmen had claimed the pews on the right-hand side. On the left, a surprising number of Sinclairs had gathered. Neither group was cordial to the other, and the Macrae wore a skeptical frown. Ian took a deep breath and strode to the front to greet the rival chieftain. Where was Meredith?