Teresa Medeiros by Whisper of Roses Page A

meadow. To dance and leap across the fire and riskbeing engulfed in its ravenous flames to win a taste of its heat and magic.
    She sank down on the window seat. Morgan should be among his own kind, not buried beneath the same stones that sheltered her. For a week he’d been deprived of the crisp autumn breezes and the precious warmth of the sun that spent the shortening days baking the heather to vibrant purple.
    Several times since she’d visited him she had found herself teetering on the edge of those steep stairs as if on the brink of some momentous decision. Once she had awakened as if from a daze to find Morgan’s pistol hidden in the folds of her skirt.
    His last words still haunted her. He had known her mother’s gun was a bluff, yet he had allowed himself to be taken, to be caged like an animal at her father’s mercy. Why? she wondered. Then she would remember the leering faces of his clansmen. They had been whipped to a lust-crazed frenzy even Morgan might have been hard pressed to dampen. But why would Morgan make a sacrifice as dear as his freedom for a girl he could hardly tolerate—a Cameron no less? Guilt and doubt plagued her, poisoning her dreams until she feared to sleep.
    She laid her cheek against the cool wood of the timbered frame. A lone figure stood silhouetted on the crest of the hill, coaxing a plaintive wail from the ponderous pipes. A cloud gusted across the horizon, then raced on. The moon poured its liquid beams over the player.
    Sabrina blinked in astonishment. She would have almost sworn it was not a man, but the slender figure of a woman playing the pipes, her unbound hair whipping molten silver in the wind.
    The tune was no longer the discordant wheeze that had tormented them for days, but a raw and melodious plea to a goddess older than time itself. Sabrina drew the window shut, but still the song wept on, crying for Angus, crying for Morgan, as only the heart of a woman could.
    She clambered back into bed, surprised to find her own cheeks bathed in tears.
    The next morning a polite tap sounded on Sabrina’s door. She moaned a protest and nestled deeper into the mattress. The sky had melted from black to gray before she had finally cried herself into an exhausted slumber. Pugsley aided in the efforts to rouse her by snagging the comforter with his tooth and dragging it off her upturned rump.
    She sat up, rubbing her eyes. Before the knocking commenced again, another sound assailed her.
    Silence. Pure, blessed silence. Fear and excitement tightened her chest. She plunged from the bed and ran to the window.
    The hillside was deserted. Ribbons of smoke curled from a mass of charred firewood to mingle with the morning mist.
    Her mother poked her head around the door. “Dress with haste, darling. Your father is convening court and he requests your presence.”
    “Court? But why?”
    Elizabeth frowned. “I honestly cannot say. But we should all be there to support him if that is his wish.”
    Sabrina knew better than to disobey that dulcet note of command. Terrified she might miss something of interest, she wasted no time ringing for a maid, but instead buckled the tapes of her own paniers and left off her corset altogether. After sliding a gown of deep lavender silk over her starched petticoats and struggling with the tiny buttons of the bodice, she twisted her hair into a severe knot. Her reflection in the mirror gave her pause. With her dark gown and the matching shadows beneath her eyes, she looked as if she was already in mourning.
    A shiver touched her spine. Her father had never before convened an old-fashioned Highland court of justice. It was surely a slap in the face to the MacDonnells to remind them that as long as they trespassed upon Cameron lands, her father was both lordand master of their fates, his word more sacrosanct than any English magistrate’s could ever hope to be. She could not help but envision her papa accused of murdering Angus and tossed on the mercy of a