CATRIONA STOOD, STILL shocked at what had become of Gavin, with his sunken chest, withered legs, and mask of pain. But if anything, she was even more determined to make it right in the past—to make everything right.

“You’ll need our help with him, lass,” Ennis said.

She took hold of the older man’s thin hands. “I wish you could come with us.”

“Ah, Moggy,” Ennis said, folding her in his arms and hugging her tightly. “This village, this time, is our place, as much as the island is yours. You’re a woman grown, and you’ve a life with Gavin now. Only think of us, and we’ll be there with you.”

She nodded and let him go but didn’t look back at the cottage that had been her sanctuary for so long. She didn’t want to part with her family for the last time in tears and sorrow.

“You’ll be tempted to cross over again to see us,” Senga said, from where she sat beside Gavin. “But your man willnae want you to come alone. You ken what may happen to him if he returns again.”

Catriona felt sick as she nodded.

“Another crossing would end me,” Gavin ground out between clenched teeth.

“Aye, I think it would. So, for your sake and hers, ’tis good-bye for us.” Senga made sure Gavin could sit up on his own before she stood. She kissed Catriona on both cheeks and held her for a long moment. “I dinnae ken why I’ve dreaded this day. You made me a mother, and Ennis a father, and brought such happiness into our lives. Now I send you to find yours with Gavin, and all our love goes with you both. You are strong, and brave, and you will always be in our hearts.”

Those words gave Catriona the courage to let go. She offered Gavin both her hands, which he instantly grasped. Ennis propped him under the shoulder on one side, while Senga did the same on the other.

“Only a few steps,” Catriona promised Gavin as she walked backwards, leading him.

“I’m with you, Cat,” he wheezed as his arms began to shake.

“All right now, hands about my neck.” With her help, Gavin managed to cling to her. “You’ll have to let go,” she whispered to Ennis and Senga. When they did, Gavin’s full weight bore down on her. But she was able to drag him the last step as she glanced back at the two people who had saved her. They stood together, smiling. She burned their image into her memory as she smiled bravely in return.

“Here we go,” she said.

Gavin dragged in a breath and held on as he shuffled forward with her into the portal.

They fell into the spinning tunnel of oaks, and a cool wind encircled them as Catriona clung to her love. Gavin’s body began to change, his hold tightening as his arms and legs filled out with healthy muscle. The shaking stopped, and his chest expanded with deeper, easier breaths. Catriona felt her feet touch the long grass in the center of the island’s grove, and looked up to see Gavin’s handsome face and clear eyes. Their hair, grown out long and lustrous, flowed and tangled around them.

“Catriona.” He lifted her in his strong arms to give her a long, deep kiss. “We made it.”

“Aye, we did.” To see him fully restored to a great, muscular beast of a man made her laugh with delight. She ran her fingers through his long hair, and then through her own. “We’ll need a trim, though. I’ve scissors back in the village.”

“Really. Have you got any good weapons?” a female voice asked.

Catriona jerked around to see a woman who for a moment she mistook for her mother. Beside the stranger also stood a young druid and a huge Pritani warrior dressed like a laird.

Gavin instantly stepped in front of her. “Are you looking for a fight, lady?”

“Why does everyone think that about me? I mean, I know, I was Air Force, but I rescued people. I didn’t fight them.” The woman turned to the Pritani. “I should get that tattooed somewhere, sweetheart. Maybe on my forehead.”

Catriona peeked around Gavin’s knotted bicep, and saw the dreamy eyes of the younger man. He looked very much like the old druid who had come to bury her people. Immediately she thought of her uncle and shuddered.

Gavin reached back to take her hand. “Why have you come here?”

The fierce-looking Pritani took a step forward and bowed. “I am Lachlan, Laird of the McDonnel Clan. This is my lady wife, Kinley Chandler McDonnel, and our friend, Ovate Cailean Lusk. You I reckon are Gavin McShane.” His gaze shifted to Catriona. “I fear we dinnae ken your name, my lady.”

Her lover curled his hands into huge fists. “You’ve no’ answered my question.”

“You’ve no’ introduced us to your lady,” the laird countered. “As my wife has said, we dinnae seek to fight. We come to rescue a young lad stolen from his family by our enemies, and learn what more has been amiss on this island. Much, I would say from what I see now.”

Catriona heard the steel in his voice, but saw the kindness in his dark eyes. “Gavin, the Pritani are protectors of mortal and druid kind. Permit me speak to him.”

“One move toward her,” he told the laird, “and you’ll get that fight you dinnae want.”

Lachlan nodded, and shifted his gaze to Catriona.

“I am Catriona Haral, the last survivor of the Moon Wake tribe.” She noted the start her name gave the druid, but continued on. “Twenty years ago, the undead massacred my people. My uncle, Daimh Haral, brought the Romans through the barrier that protected our village. Since that night I’ve been hiding from him here, and in another time.”

Cailean gestured at the portal. “You’ve used the grove to cross over to the past, to be with your people when they were alive?”

She shook her head. “The portal took me to a village in the highlands in the twenty-first century.”

“You’ve been living in the future?” Cailean demanded loudly, his gentle face suddenly a strange mixture of fear and anger. “Did you speak of our time, or bring anyone from the future back to the island with you?” When he saw how his companions were looking at him he said, “’Tis strictly forbidden for druid kind to dwell in any forward time. We may visit, briefly, but only with the approval of the conclave.”

“Yet you had no problem with me and the other ladies of the future coming back in time,” Kinley said. “Sounds like a double standard to me.”

“I dinnae make the rules, my lady,” the druid said quickly. “’Tis to prevent druid kind from taking unfair advantage of all the marvels in the future.”

His prattle infuriated Catriona. “Unfair, you say? The grove took me to that future after the undead slaughtered every other living soul on Everbay. If no’ for the kind mortals who found me, and took me in, I would be dead. I was but seven years old, with no help or training. Gods above, until this moment how could I have ken ’twas even forbidden?”

“Forgive me,” Cailean said quickly. “Never has there been such circumstances. Children of the tribes are never abandoned alone as you were.”

“My mother and father didnae leave me by their choice. My uncle had them murdered.” Sniping at him wouldn’t change any of that, so she said, “Gavin and I willnae use the portal again. We have decided to remain in this time on the island. So naught will be amiss. Now what of this boy the laird mentioned? Why would he be here on Everbay?”

“’Tis a longer story,” Lachlan said before the druid could answer her. “One we may discuss at length once we seek a safer place and secure the island.”

“You think I’m still enthralled,” Gavin said suddenly. “That’s why you’re tiptoeing around any mention of the undead. I’m no’. The moment Thora took possession of Fenella, my enslavement ended.”

Kinley nodded. “Then why did you fake your death?”

“’Tis a longer story, my lady.” He eyed the laird. “Thora convinced me that all Pritani were murderous scum. I suppose to her, they were. But I heard the full story during the battle on the skerry, so I ken that your clan isnae what she thought. I would never have left my sister with your men and that Viking if I hadn’t.”

Catriona knew how much it cost Gavin to admit he’d been wrong—and to say the name he had kept from her. He had said he’d been enslaved by the undead, but not that his master had been his lover. It galled her to think of what he’d been through—and now she understood the pain that had brought him to her isle. Catriona also understood the rush of dark clouds coming from the east. The encounter would not go better in the pouring rain.

“Laird McDonnel,” she said, “the storms here can be drenching, and one quickly approaches. Mayhap we should go to my village. You’ll be safe there, and we can talk sensibly.”

“I personally would love a cup of island brew,” Kinley put in.

Lachlan’s mouth hitched, and he nodded. The young druid did the same, although he didn’t look happy about it.

Holding onto Gavin’s hand, Catriona led them through the passage in the cliffs and along the forest trail.

“’Twas a thing I wished to tell you,” he said quietly to her. “Why I came to this place.”

“It doesnae matter,” she said, tucking herself against his side. “And now I ken that it never did. All that matters ’tis that you’re here.”

While the men remained silent, Kinley proved quite congenial and admired everything she saw.

“What a gorgeous place this is,” she told Catriona once they emerged into the glen. “That waterfall was amazing. No wonder you wanted to build a place here, Gavin. It’s like your own personal Garden of Eden. Minus the horrible backstory, of course.” She grimaced at Catriona. “Sorry. I get chatty when I’m nervous.”

“I never expected to meet an American here,” she confessed. “What brought you back to our time, my lady?”

Kinley told her own harrowing tale of crossing over as a soldier grievously wounded in action, and how she had landed whole and healed in the midst of a battle between the clan and the undead. As soon as she mentioned her military service Gavin mentioned his own, and they talked of Afghanistan and their time there.

“I don’t miss it, for obvious reasons,” the laird’s wife said. “But it must have been tough for you to take the medical discharge.”

“’Twas a blow to my pride,” Gavin said. “I’d planned a career in The Black Watch. But Jema kept my spirits up, and looked after me as the ALS progressed.” He hesitated before he asked, “How is she, really?”

“She’s happy, and busy. She and Tormod are excavating a site in the highlands that dates back a couple of millennia. It might belong to the very first Pritani tribe.” Kinley eyed him. “She talks about you all the time with the others. When she finds out you’re still alive, she’s going to kick your ass.”

“The others, my lady?” Catriona asked, trying to keep up with all that she was hearing.

“I’m not the only American time-jumper,” the laird’s wife said. “We’re averaging one new arrival every year. Diana, the detective who was looking for me after I went missing in the future, fell into the same portal that brought me here. Then there’s Rachel, an heiress whose husband tried to bump her off to get at her money. She was buried alive in an oak grove. Took us a while to find her.”

“You were the first, then,” Gavin said, and when Kinley nodded his expression grew thoughtful. “None of you intended to cross over. Like Jema and me, ’twas all accidental.”

The laird’s wife glanced at Cailean. “That’s what it looks like.”

Catriona stopped at the barrier, and said to the laird, “Since you are no’ druid kind, my lord, you must hold your lady’s hand to pass through the boundary.” She turned to Cailean, who looked so woeful she almost felt sorry for him.

On the other side of the barrier the laird, his lady and the druid stopped as they saw the village it had concealed.

“I have been coming back a long time now, since the first year after I crossed over to the future,” Catriona confessed. She smiled as the animals began to emerge from the cottages to peer at the strangers. “I ken it seems strange, but the undead had torn apart the place. I couldnae forget what they did, no matter how many flowers I planted, so I pleased myself and my animal friends.”

Gavin put his arm around her shoulders. “It’s beautiful, Cat.”

The young druid said nothing, as if he hadn’t heard her at all.

“Cailean put in place the spell barrier around your village in his last life,” Kinley said in a low voice. “Seeing it now is likely bringing back bad memories.” She smiled as a pair of the leverets came bouncing over to her. “Aw, baby rabbits. How adorable.”

Catriona could see now the face of the old druid in that of the younger. He kept darting looks at her, too, and twisting his hands in a nervous manner. “Come inside, my lady, and I’ll make up that brew. Gavin?”

“We’ll follow in a moment,” her lover told her.

Inside the cottage she led Kinley to her hearth, where she started a fire and then went to fetch water from the kitchen urn for the brew pot. She had blended several types of herbs and flowers for her brews, and selected a sack with sorrel, red clover blossoms, nettles and dried, slightly-overripe cloudberries for sweetness. To that she added a bit of chamomile, which would help ease tensions.

It surprised her that she didn’t feel more nervous. Gavin had been the only visitor she’d ever welcomed to Everbay, and now she was making brew for three strangers as if nothing were amiss. But she sensed the laird and his wife had spoken the truth, and she already liked Kinley, whose frankness reminded her of Senga. Even if the druid was not to be trusted, he had attended to her tribe. If nothing else, she could be courteous to him.

Catriona made up her brew pot with the blend and carried it and every mug she possessed out on a tray to the table by the hearth. There she saw Kinley with a lap full of leverets. “You’ve made new friends.”

“They kept jumping on me until I picked them up. I am never going to be able to eat Meg’s rabbit stew again.” She stroked one small head as she watched Catriona fill the hearth pot. “The boys will probably stay outside to bicker until the downpour starts, so I hope you put something calming in the brew.”

Catriona nodded. “Chamomile.” She busied herself with adding wood to build up the fire. “I took him back with me today to meet my family. His disease returned as soon as we arrived, and he fell very sick.” She met Kinley’s gaze. “He cannae live in his own time again.”

“Neither can I.” The other woman described the massive injuries and disfigurement she’d suffered during her service, and how she’d been dying just before she’d fallen into the portal. “I was trying to wheel myself over a cliff when I dropped into your time. I had nothing left, and I wasn’t interested in a slow, painful death. After I came here I was completely healthy, but then I had to go back to my time. When I came out of the portal I reverted back to the injured and dying soldier I’d been.”

“So you and Gavin are the same.” It made Catriona’s stomach tighten.

“Yes. There’s more, too. Jema told me Gavin mentioned committing suicide just before they fell through the dig.” Kinley scratched one of the baby hares behind its small ears. “Jema wasn’t sick, but since her twin brother was, she had a very good chance at also developing ALS. It’s also always fatal. Diana happened to be dying of a brain tumor when she came here, and Rachel had been stabbed in the back, paralyzed, and was bleeding to death. You mentioned something about how you would have died if those people hadn’t found you in the future.”

“I’d nearly starved while I hid from Uncle, and waited for my mother,” Catriona admitted.

The mother hare came in and looked up expectantly at Kinley, who gently began placing the leverets one by one on the floor. “We all have druid blood, we were all facing death, and coming here saved our lives. In your case, same thing, just with you going to the future. What am I missing.”

Now she understood. “None of us chose to cross over the first time. ’Twas the sacred oaks that took us. But why? Surely no’ simply because we are druid kind.”

“I think if that were the case, there’d be a lot more of us.” Kinley frowned at the window. “That’s odd. It’s getting dark already.”

“The storm is blocking out the sun.” Catriona filled the brew pot to let it steep as she went to look out at the men. Gavin and the laird had walked to the edge of the village nearest the shore, while the druid stood watching the sky and murmuring something to himself. The sunlight had all but disappeared, but she recalled the rainbow that had stretched over Gavin’s cottage, and how deeply it had moved her.

A circle soon would close, but how?

Kinley joined her. “Don’t mind Cailean. He’s pretty upset. The boy who was stolen is his son.”

And he the druid who had cast the barrier around the village. He, too, was part of the circle, Catriona thought. “Was it Uncle who took the lad?”

“We’re not sure, but Daimh may be involved.” Kinley frowned as the laird and Gavin trotted back and with Cailean hurried for the cottage. “Oh, crap. I think we’ve got new problems.”

The men entered just as the rain began to fall. Catriona saw the grim expressions of her lover and the laird, and the druid’s blanched face, and knew they were in great danger even before Lachlan spoke.

“We spotted four black ships sailing in fast from the west,” he said. “They’ll reach the island within the hour. We cannae fight so many Romans without the clan. Catriona, you and Kinley will come with me back to Dun Aran, where you’ll be safe. Cailean and Gavin will wait here in the village until I bring back my men.”

She shook her head. “I willnae leave Gavin.”

“And I’m sure as hell not going to run back to the castle,” the laird’s wife said, sounding just as firm. “You can use the spring in the glen to go get the guys. It’s closer than the grove. I’ll hold the fort here.” She waited and watched him. “You know it makes sense.”

From the grim expression he wore, Catriona suspected the laird did indeed ken it.

Lachlan seized Kinley, kissed her ruthlessly, and then touched his brow to hers. “Stay alive, Wife.” He gave Gavin a long look before he dashed out into the rain.

“If Daimh is with them, then the barrier willnae hold them off,” Catriona said. “I’ve no weapons I can offer you, and they will be too many for three to stand against them. There is a cave beneath the waterfall where I hid when they last came, and they never found me.” She gasped as Kinley’s hands suddenly burst into flames. “My lady.”

“Forgot to mention, I have a built-in weapon.” She shook out the flames, and her pale, slim hands appeared unmarked. “I can hold them back for a bit. They catch fire and burn pretty easily, but we need a better defensive position.”

“The cliffs,” Gavin said. “They’ll no’ be able to come in from behind us, and if we’re overrun we can go through the tunnel and use the grove to escape.”

“We cannae leave without Danyel,” Cailean said suddenly.

“Lachlan and the clan will do their best to save your son,” Kinley said, and then jumped as the cottage door burst open and her soaking-wet husband came inside. “That was quick, even for you, sweetheart.”

“I couldnae use the spring to leave. The water within has turned to black stone.” He regarded the druid. “’Tis your doing, lad? For we’ll no’ survive this without the clan.”

“No, my lord, I swear to you.” He swayed on his feet as if he were about to collapse, and clutched at Gavin’s arm. “The McDonnels are the hope to save my son. And if Danyel is killed, then your lady and Diana–” As if horrified at what came out of him, Cailean pressed a shaking hand to his mouth.

“If they’d wanted your son dead, they’d have killed him in his crib,” Gavin said to the druid. “Why would they bring him all this way to the island?”

“I don’t know,” Kinley said flatly. “But in a couple of hours the sun is going to set. Then we’ll be up to our ears in undead. So, let’s figure this out. How do we get the clan here before the Romans come for us? What do we do to get Danyel away from them?”

Outside the cottage the rain stopped, and all of the sunlight abruptly vanished, plunging the entire island into complete darkness.

“Freyja’s Eye,” Gavin said, snarling the words.

“No, lad,” the laird said. “The goddess herself took back that cursed gem.”

Catriona felt as if her bones had turned to ice, but she forced herself to walk outside, and look up at the sky. An enormous, seething black disc hung where the sun should have been, and as she stared at it Gavin came to join her.

“We dinnae have until sunset,” she told him in a strained whisper, and pressed her hand against her midriff. “’Twillnae be one. ’Tis Uncle. He’s done this.”