The Lost Treasure of Lorne

Chapter Eleven

The messenger left before noon, carrying the precious missive that would summon Michael's lawyers to begin the steps to have John recognised as his legitimate son and rightful heir. He'd completed one of his tasks for the day. Now for the other, more important, mission.

Last night, Caitlin had been totally absorbed in Lady Morag and her plight, waking three hundred years after falling asleep, with everyone she knew long dead. But this morning, the young lady was showing a marked preference for John's company, and John could not take his eyes off Morag.

"I dreamed," she explained at breakfast. "I saw each of the doomed couples, and the death of each Marquis of Lorne, and I knew that the years were passing, though it seemed to me a single long night." She looked at John from under her lashes. "I saw you, too, sir." And she blushed, which set John blushing.

They were off outside somewhere, the butler said. Lord Kellering was showing Lady Morag around the estate. Michael had to smile at the courtesy title John should have held since Michael himself ascended to the dukedom. Fiona would be pleased, and old Lorne must be screaming with rage in the hottest fires of hell. Which reminded him of his purpose.

"And Lady Lorne? Did she go with the two young people?"

He and Caitlin had argued about that over breakfast, and Michael won. As the last living grandchild of the Marquis of Lorne, Caitlin was his heir. Michael had always intended to petition the Crown to recognise John, heir through his mother, but Caitlin's was the better claim. Marchioness of Lorne, and her first son Marquis to re-establish the house her grandfather and his predecessors had destroyed.

They'd have to prove her birth and her identity, and the House of Lords, Society, and the papers would buzz with arguments for and against for months, but Michael had made a start by instructing his household staff that his former housekeeper was now to be treated with all the dignity due her rank.

"Her ladyship is up on the tower, I believe, Your Grace," the butler said.

Michael didn't have to ask which tower; she had returned to where it all began: the feud, the curse, the centuries' long wait for Michael and Fiona and the son they made.

He hurried up the long curved stair, and she was there, looking down over the battlements, her hair escaping from the cap she wore to blow in the wind that always caressed the upper reaches of the castle, no matter how still the day was below.

He thought he had been quiet, but she spoke without looking around. "Will they make a match of it, do you think?"

"John and Morag?" Yes. There they were, just coming up the hill from the village, her arm through his, he curved as if to hear her better or to protect her, or both. "John wants to ride for the bishop and a special licence," he replied. "He says he'll have none else to wife, and he wants her child born within wedlock."

"He'd make another man's child his heir? Your heir?"

Michael shrugged. "If it is a boy. The ladies said a granddaughter, but John says it does not matter. Morag's lover is three hundred years dead, and a Normington besides. I would rather speak of your heir, Lady Lorne? Will he be half Normington?"

Caitlin turned her head to face him, doubt and hope warring in her eyes.

"Are all the barriers gone, my lass?" He managed to sound calm, but he would beg if he had to. "Or do you hate me for what my family has done to yours."

Shock flared. "No!" She clasped his hands, squeezing as if force would convince him of her earnestness. "No." More quietly this time. "Both families have paid an awful price for the Lorne obsession. But I do not blame you. How could I? I lo– I love John." She turned away again, hiding her blush. Michael relinquished one hand but held on to the other.

"Only John?"

"I thought you would hate me. My grandfather condemned your wife, lied about your marriage, tried to kill your son."

Michael gave her back her own words. "I do not blame you. How could I? I love you."

"You are fond of me, I know. And grateful to me."

"I love you," Michael repeated. "Caitlin, I want you for my wife, my duchess, and if you will not have me, I shall remain single all my life. I love you."

"You love Fiona," Caitlin reminded him.

"I loved Fiona with all the passion of a young man's heart, and when she died I thought I would never love again. But then a young girl grew up in my household. I fell in love with her courage, her loyalty, her intelligence, and her beauty. Bit by bit I discovered that a man grown can love more deeply than a stripling, and that one does not need to throw out the old love to make room for the new. My heart shaped itself to hold you, Caitlin. Don't force it to live empty."

She wouldn't look at him, kept her head turned away. But she did not pull away her hand. Indeed, she pressed his before she spoke. "I wanted to hate you. For being a Normington. For taking Fiona from me. But I had nowhere else to take John, nowhere he would be safe. And from the moment I met you, I knew I could trust you to protect us. Oh Michael, I have loved you since I was a girl."

She was in his arms then, her lips reaching for his, and he lost himself in the warmth and the taste of her. He had no idea how long it was until he withdrew his head enough to speak, dazed but determined. He could not forget that their last kiss, seven years ago, had taken them into bed together, but ended with her withdrawing beneath the protective shield of her housekeeper caps and aprons. "Is that a 'yes', Lady Lorne? Will you do me the honour of being my duchess? Shall I fetch two special licences from the bishop?"

Her answer glowed in her eyes, but she said it anyway. "Three questions, Your Grace, but a single answer. Yes."

In the corner of his vision, Michael sensed a shimmer, and he and Caitlin turned in time to see the ghosts of Lady Lorne and Lady Normington, hovering above the battlements, smiling a blessing on them.

Their voices sounded distant, but without the interference that had made the castle ghosts impossible to understand.

"It is finished, my dear friend," said one.

"Yes," said the other. "Now we can go home."

And with that, they were no more.

THE END

I hope you enjoyed this story, which is one of five in my published box set Lost in the Tale. All of the lost stories are now on Wattpad, as is one of my novels and my novella Gingerbread Bride. You might enjoy my other three novels and my novellas. Check them out any eretailer. Next week, I'll start posting the novella A Suitable Husband. Thank you for reading along with me.