Marjorie straightened her shoulders. “I do, too. She’s never been wrong in her life. She knows those things, magic and such.”
“So you didn’t believe me before?”
“Nae. Nae completely.”
“But you believe her?”
“Aye.”
She wanted to add that she was sorry but stopped herself. She didn’t owe him an apology for suspecting he might be a threat. But she loved the glimpse of trust that had emerged between them after he’d saved her from the MacDougalls, and she wanted to keep it.
He sighed and poured more uisge into his cup, a small smile on his lips. “Look, I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t have believed someone talking about time travel, either.”
Relief eased the tension in her chest. “But now I want to ken everything about yer world. Tell me about the future.” Eager to hear his stories, she shifted to the edge of her seat and tangled her hands together on the table.
He chuckled. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything. The words ye mentioned, the hospital, phone, ambulance… How do people live? What do they eat? Drink? How do they dress?”
He leaned closer to her, and she shifted towards him, too.
“I do have something very important to say,” he said and raised the cup. “You Scotsmen make a much better whiskey than this in my time.”
He threw the cup back and groaned.
“Whiskey?”
“Well, it’s not like this moonshine in the future, I can tell you that for sure. The stuff is exquisite. I suppose history needs a couple of hundred years before you guys can catch up.”
“Good. Ye like a Scots drink.” She waved her hand. “What else?”
“There are huge machines”— he leaned closer and his scent reached her— “called airplanes that fly in the air. They transport people across the ocean in a matter of hours.”
Marjorie’s head spun. Machines? Oceans? Airplanes? What were all those things?
“Are ye telling me people can fly?” she said.
“With the help of technology. Yes.”
Goose bumps covered Marjorie’s skin. She imagined something like a dragon from stories and people sitting on its back. Aye, that would be a fast way to travel.
“What else?” she said, moving an inch towards him.
“A hospital is where sick people get treated. They have cured many diseases you guys have now, and people live much longer in the future. Older people get their hips replaced with artificial ones made of metal. Dying in childbirth is not as big a threat as it is in your time. Thankfully. Organs that don’t work can get replaced.”
The noises in the great hall quieted. She stopped seeing anyone else in the room. Only Konnor existed sitting before her, and those images he created in her head. Marjorie listened with an open mouth, her imagination running wild. It all sounded like skilled witchcraft being widely accepted and practiced. Colin would love to see it all.
“Do people in the future develop magic skills?”
Konnor laughed softly and shook his head. Marjorie smiled with him. He had the most beautiful smile. His teeth were so white, and dimples that were invisible on his usually stern face formed on his cheeks.
“I’m sorry, I’m not laughing at you,” he said. “It’s just so adorable you said magic.”
She wasn’t offended. She hadn’t thought he was laughing at her. He reached out and brushed his knuckles against her cheek. The touch sent a current of pleasant tingles through her.
“It does sound like a witchcraft,” he said. “But it’s not. It’s science. Technology. The world has developed so much since all this.”
He looked around, and Marjorie cleared her throat, suddenly aware she was sitting way too close to him. Their heads were practically touching.
She moved farther away from him, sorry the magic spell had to be broken.
“What about houses? Horses? Or do people fly everywhere in your time?”
“No. Instead of horses, we have cars. They’re like your carriages. Like carts with roofs and a steering wheel. They drive fast, sixty to a hundred miles per hour, and they make it easy to move from place to place.”
Marjorie burst out a small laugh. “But is that nae witchcraft? A cart that moves on its own?”
He laughed, too, and she echoed him.
“You need to see it for yourself,” he said.
Marjorie’s smile fell. She would really love to see all this magic. Was that even possible?
“I’d be a very fortunate person to ever get the chance.”
“Well. I’m fortunate to be able to see your time. When I get back…”
Suddenly, the good mood was wiped off his face, too.
“What then?” she said.
“No one will believe me if I tell them.” He chuckled.
She swallowed, her leg shaking under the table. “Do ye have a wife? Children?”
His mouth flattened in a mournful smile, and he looked down. “No.”
“Oh.”
Something within her rejoiced that he didn’t, but there was a tension in his voice that told her there was more to this.
“Why nae? Ye’re a good man… Strong and capable…”
And handsome and stubborn and so sweet.
He looked at her, and she could see his shields were lifted, and longing and endless pain gazed from within his eyes.
“I wouldn’t want to inflict my darkness on any woman or child.”
She inhaled sharply, studying him, trying to understand what darkness he spoke of. He looked away, and when he met her eyes again, the shields were down.
“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “But it might interest you to hear women have equal rights with men. They work, earn money, they can choose whether to have children or not. There’s excellent birth control.”
Marjorie’s cheeks burned. “Ye mean, women may nae get with child after…”
He looked at her, his eyes dark. “Exactly.”
“Ye make it sound so fine, the life in the future.”
“It’s a damn convenient life, but we have problems, too.”
Marjorie fingered an indent in the table. She really wanted to see all that for herself. It was impossible, of course.
“Ye’ve given me much to dream about at night, Konnor,” she said.
He locked his eyes with hers, and her mouth went as dry as sand. “Trust me, you’ve given me plenty to dream about, too.”
She let out a small laugh. He was as relaxed as she’d ever seen him. And she hadn’t felt at ease like this in a very long time. It was as though they were on their own small island, and no one else existed.
“Tell me,” she said softly. “When ye said ye dinna want to inflict yer darkness on a woman, what did ye mean?”
His face fell, and the invisible cocoon around them threatened to break.
“I—”
But she couldn’t back down now. “Please, Konnor, I see this weight on yer shoulders. I’ve told ye the worst thing that has happened to me, the thing I’m ashamed of, the thing that broke me. Almost.” She shifted her hand closer to his but didn’t touch it. “I want to ken yer darkness, too.”
He frowned, anguish on his face. She found the courage, reached out, and covered his hand with hers.