“Nay, Catherine. I brought him here because he asked me to, and because he wants to be with his wife and children and grandbabies. He’s got many good years in him yet and should spend them in the bosom of his family.”

“Do the others know he’s here? Your father and Greylen?”

“I’ll tell them once I get back.”

“He… he didn’t even say good-bye to them?”

“He did. They just didn’t know it. They’ll be happy for Ian, once they think about it.”

“Do they want to come back, too?”

“Nay. Their wives and children and grandbabies are in Pine Creek, and they’ve lived with the fear of being torn from them for the last thirty-five years. That’s why it’s so important I bring back the spells for Daar to stop it.”

“Why can’t Daar get his own spells, if he’s a wizard?”

Robbie shook his head. “There’s anotherdrùidh here, named Cùram de Gairn, who doesn’t want that to happen. He’s younger and more powerful than Daar. That’s why the priest sent me.”

Her eyes clouded with worry in the dancing firelight. “Is he more powerful than you?”

she whispered, leaning closer and clutching the front of his plaid in her fists. “Is he the one who keeps beating you up?”

Robbie laughed and pulled her hands up to his mouth and kissed them. “Nay, little Cat.

Cùram is keeping himself and his tree of spells hidden from me.”

“A tree? I thought spells came from a book or something?”

“Tradition thinks of it as a book, I guess, but it’s really a tree of wisdom. Alldrùidhs have one that they guard and nurture. I’m looking for Cùram’s tree, so that I can steal a piece of its tap root.”

She pulled away, wrapped her arms around her knees again, and silently stared into the fire for several minutes, obviously trying to understand what he was telling her. She looked at him again. “So, if you get this piece of root, you won’t have to keep coming back here?”

“Aye. Daar will use it to grow his own tree of wisdom and cast a new spell to keep the Highlanders in modern time.”

She stood up, her fists clenched at her sides as if she were expecting a fight. “Then I’ll help you. We’ll find this Cùram de… this wizard guy and his tree and steal the root so you won’t ever have to come back.”

Robbie also stood, the tips of his bare toes touching hers.

She didn’t back away but only smiled up at him.

“You can’t help me, Cat. This isn’t a treasure hunt but a dangerous quest. Cùram is dangerous.” He waved at the landscape around them. “Hell, this whole world is dangerous for a woman.”

She snorted, lifting her chin. “It’s apparently dangerous for guardians, too.” She crossed her arms under her breasts, leaned back on her hips, and angled her head at him. “Do your magical powers make you infallible?”

“What? Nay, of course not. I’m a mortal man.”

“Then who watches your back?”

Robbie rubbed a hand over his face. “Haven’t we had this conversation before? I don’t need anyone watching my back.I’m the guardian here,” he growled, thumping his chest.

“It’s my dream,” she growled right back, thumping her own chest. “And I can give myself whatever powers I want. And I think I’ll beyour guardian angel.” She gave him a lopsided smile. “Lord knows you need one.”

Robbie couldn’t decide if he wanted to kiss that sassy smile off her face or shake some sense into her.

“I’m thinking we should say Catherine helped me escape from the English,” Ian said, walking back with an armful of sticks. He dropped them by the fire and turned to Robbie, his eyes shining with excitement. “And I brung her home to reward her. She can stay with Gwyneth and me until ya have to go back. That way, I can keep an eye on her while ya do your business.”

“That sounds like a good plan, Uncle.”

“Aye,” Ian said, puffing out his chest. “I was thinking it would also explain why she can’

t speak Gaelic.” He looked at her and shook his head. “But the plaid’s got to go.

“Nay, wait!” he said before Robbie could speak. “I have a good tale. We can say she was stolen by a MacBain who was wanting a wife and that I stole her back. And I took his plaid as a prize and sent him home bare-assed.” He nodded, his chest puffed even more.

“Aye. What do ya think of that tale?”

From the way Catherine was glaring at Ian, Robbie guessed she didn’t think much of it.

“It’s perfect, Uncle,” he said, patting Ian’s shoulder. “And it’ll ease my mind to know you’re watching out for Cat. She’ll be safe from any other warriors looking for wives.”

Cat sat back down on the rock, and Robbie looked over just in time to see her cover a yawn. Come to think of it, he was quite tired himself. And Ian looked as if his plaid was holding him up rather than his weary old legs.

“I think we should call it a night,” Robbie said, crouching to feed more wood to the fire.

“We’ll bed down on that moss over there,” he added, using a stick to point to the other side of the fire. “Cat, you can sleep between us to stay warm. Ian, you take the side near the fire.”

It looked as if his housekeeper didn’t care for that plan, either. But she picked up her stick, walked around the fire, and stood staring at the moss. She looked over at Robbie.

“Can’t you conjure up a feather bed or something?” she asked, lifting her chin and daring him to try.

“It’s your dream. You do it.”

She looked back down at the moss, gave a sigh that finished in another yawn, sat down, laid her stick on the ground on the side where Robbie would be, and tried to readjust her plaid to cover her shoulders.

“I can show ya how to fix that,” Ian said, crouching beside her. “It’s long enough to wrap over yar arms like a shawl and around your legs. Here,” he said, grabbing one end of the cloth and taking three wraps from around her, which still left her well covered. “That

’s how ya do it,” Ian instructed. “My Gwyneth showed me how women cover themselves differently than men. Tomorrow we’ll get ya a MacKeage plaid and a blouse to wear with it.”

“What about shoes?” she asked, concentrating on what Ian was doing. “What do women wear on their feet?”

“Leathers,” he said. “Tall leggings with double-soled bottoms so ya don’t get stung by sharp rocks. And wool socks to keep ya warm.”

She looked up at him and smiled. “I’ve never had a dream that involved a history lesson.”

“A dream?” Ian asked, his face screwing into a frown. He looked at Robbie. “She thinks she’s dreaming all this?”

Robbie shrugged, picked up his sword, and walked over behind Catherine and sat down just as she yawned again. Ian settled himself between her and the fire so that the two of them made a warm and protective sandwich around Catherine.

Catherine lay back rather stiffly, looked at Robbie, then at Ian, and turned on her side toward the older man, tucking her hands under her head and snuggling into her MacBain plaid.

Robbie reached his arm around her, pulled her back against his chest, and sighed when she went as rigid as a board. “Relax, little Cat,” he whispered, tucking her head under his chin and pulling some of his own plaid over her. “You’re only dreaming that I’m holding you.”

Chapter Nineteen

Catherine woke upexpecting that she was home in her bed, that the breath she felt on her neck… and the weight across her legs… and the hand tucked inside her pajamas between her breasts… all belonged to Nora.

But she opened her eyes and discovered she was still locked in her fantastical dream, that Robbie MacBain was the one taking such intimate liberties with her body, and that Ian MacKeage had nearly rolled into the dying fire and was snoring loudly enough to wake the dead.

So, what would Dorothy do upon finding herself still in Oz—not with a tin man and a lion and a scarecrow but with an owl, an aging warrior, and a handsome knight who wanted her to believe they had traveled through time?