Page 2 of The Protector’s Promise

“I don’t know,” he answered honestly. Though he had dozens of questions to ask—Who was this priestess? What was the significance of the stone? Why had he been drawn to this secluded place?—the guard’s expression threw him off. The man looked at him as if he’d just seen him for the first time before averting his eyes and looking around frantically, as if searching for an escape.

“An answer for an answer,” he reminded the guard. “Why do you look at me that way?”

The man’s chin lifted. “You will find out soon enough.”

With that, he turned away once again and ran ahead. If he hoped William would follow, running headlong into some trap, he would be disappointed. Instead, he continued to make his way up the mountain, listening and waiting. This was not his land, and the guard’s knowledge of the terrain would be a profound advantage for him should he decide to make another attack.

William should not have let him live.

The irrepressible urge to come to this place had begun the morning he’d awoken with that odd mark on his hip. Appearing while he’d slept and seemingly in the shape of a small dagger, the mark ushered a new reality into his life, one filled with the visions of his youth. Nothing had made sense since. Though his men were not surprised he’d wanted to travel alone up north, they’d insisted on joining him. And so William had snuck off under the cloak of darkness, driven by fleeting visions of his destination—the renowned pools of Skye. The visions had served him well in the past, and so he trusted them now once again.

William stopped, the sound of a waterfall ahead drowning out everything else. He could be more easily ambushed now, so he forced himself to slow his steps. Turning another corner, his eyes bulged at the sight before him.

Was it from this world?

Though the oak trees that dotted the landscape had become smaller as he ascended the mountain, one in front of him stood tall and proud next to a waterfall, defying logic. The coloring of the pools at the foot of the small falls baffled him—he’d never seen such shades of green and blue in nature—and the moss-covered rocks that cradled the pools appeared almost unnatural in their smoothness.

A woman stood at the center of them.

Her hooded, dark green cape revealed nothing more than the lower portion of her face and narrowed eyes. The guard that had fled earlier stood by her side, eyeing him warily.

William approached them with equal wariness, watching the lady’s back straighten as the guard spoke to her. The waterfall drowned out their words, but he didn’t need to hear them talk to notice the change in her expression. It hard turned almost . . . murderous.

“Stop there,” she called, the lilt of her voice what he imagined a siren’s call would sound like. Oddly, he heeded her bidding.

“Go,” she said over the sound of the water descending into the pools below. “Go back to England. Forget this place.”

Did she really believe he’d traveled this far only to turn back? He needed answers!

“Why did you call me here?”

The words made no sense, even to his own ears. As he said them, memories flashed before him as clearly as if they’d just happened to him. His father introducing him to Sir Richard. The look on Richard’s face when he told William his father had died, leaving him an orphan. The first time he met Lady Sara, the girl who’d been his childhood companion, the girl who was too fine of a lady for a lowly baron’s son to wed. Richard granting him Camburg. His visits to court. His dream of attaining his own title, one not handed to him by an indulgent overlord . . .

The priestess watched as the memories pounded through him, each leaving behind enough emotion to bring him to his knees.

“Tell me what it means,” he demanded, knowing somehow that she would not.

“Go,” she shouted, the word etching itself into his very soul.

Instead, he took a step toward her . . . and then saw it.

Disguised as a regular rock, the gray stone in the center of the shallow pool at her feet gleamed a brighter green than anything found in the natural world. She had not called to him. That stone had summoned him, as mad as that sounded. She did not want him to know it was there, and while it had already turned back to gray, William had seen it for what it was: a relic. One that would help him on a mission that he should be back at Camburg preparing for even now. The king’s regent would not be happy if he learned of William’s journey. But somehow, when he saw the stone, he knew it would help him capture Moordon Castle.

He jumped into the pools, stumbling toward the stone before the priestess or her guard could even realize his intent. Grabbing the stone, William ran faster than he’d ever run in his life. As he navigated roots and pebbles, nearly falling down the steep incline, William did not pause to look for his pursuer, though it did surprise him that the man hadn’t yet caught up. Instead, he made his way as quickly as possible down the mountain, anxious to get away from it all.

The guard . . . the priestess . . . this island. Away from Scotland and the strange forces that had drawn him there.

* * *

“My lady,” one of Marion’s guards called from behind, “there is nothing here but more trees and rocks. We should turn back.”

She’d heard that same refrain for the last hour, and Marion was no more inclined to do so now than she had been earlier despite that she felt the stone’s pull less now than she had earlier in the day.

Since embarking on this journey, the men who had been told to follow her orders had done everything but. She’d invoked her father’s name, her mother’s admonitions, and every other argument she could think to make.

Yet, as men were wont to do, they simply refused to listen. So she had stopped trying to convince them. Forging ahead of each of the men sent to protect her, Marion wound her way around the muddy path leading toward her destiny.

And then it was there before her.