Highland Dream (Book 1)

Chapter 48

AN - Warning some sexual content. Just the epilogue left. Enjoy.

Chapter 48

New years eve would be upon them in the morning. As Aislinn lay curled up on her side, tightly held in the arms of her husband, she could nto help the smile that flitted across her face. She thought of the news that she had had both Isla and Edine confirm for her earlier. She had hoped to tell Cam when they were alone earlier, only he had managed to get his hands upon her naked flesh first. He won that round. And now she lay contently and fully satisfied, but could not impart the news until he was coherant once more.

As she lay awake in the depths of the night she thought back over the events of the last few months. Iona’s death had created a shock among the clan. Most had accpeted the story of an accident that had been told by Cam and those who found her. She knew that the majority of the clan did no believe this, but they did not want to think someone of there clan was capable of that kind of act. She had heard a few whispered conversations where people questioned the story, though they would never spread these rumours around in the open or in a civilised conversation.

                It had been two weeks before the hand fasting could be rearranged. With Iona’s death being treated the way it was she was properly mourned. The celebration of life took the feast and the night that should have been the start of her life with Cam. But she could not be resentful for it. Then there had been Cam being made Laird of clan MacKay. The ceremony being a week after the almost hand fasting. The elders had made sure the clan knew that he was fully supported by them. The mantle he now wore, he did so with pride.

                Not that he had not already being filling in the role before that. But it had taken on a new meaning with it officially coming over to him. She had helped in whatever way she could, but in the first few weeks she had had broken ribs to contended with in the most painful of stages. She learnt to deal with that pain as the time passed and she had more movement. With that movement Isla had decided it was time for her to pass over the mantle she had worn and make Aislinn the true lady of the Keep.

                The week following the Laird ceremony, Aislinn had spent most of it in one place, being stiff and painful to do anything for long. As such Isla had bustled here and there and not let her into a thing about the new hand fasting that was approaching. It was not until the morning of the second hand fasting ceremony that she realised the efforts the clan had gone to, how much they actually wanted to welcome her truly into the clan she had actually been born into.

                After being awoken from a deep sleep at mid-morning, she had not realised she had slept so late, until Isla and Minna had both appeared in her line of vision. A platter of cold cuts and fresh bread had been presented to her as a bath was drawn. The luxury of that morning had beaten the readying for the first ceremony. This time around they had kept her in the Keep, in the room that had become hers since she had arrived here. Not that Cam had taken any head to that in the past days.

                After bathing, in water that had been sprinkled with dried lavender, the clan’s women that had helped her before had come once again to help make sure she was in the perfect condition to marry Cam. Her ribs withstanding of course.

                The seamstresses in the clan, she knew, had been hard at work over the past few days making alterations to a dress. She had believed they were trying their best to fix the one she had been wearing that fateful day. Only the dress they presented her with as Isla and Edine worked on drying her hair before the fire was one she had never expected and yet had seen before in a dream.

                Everything she saw came true and here was one proof of that matter. A dress of the most stunning soft white with the finest of embroidery covering the entire length of the fabric in a floral design of the most brilliant gold. In the dancing light of the fire it shimmered pearlescent. Tying her hair back in a simple ribbon for a moment so it did not get in the way, they lowered the dress over her head and it fell in a swoop around her.