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delay.
    â€œShe won’t take Mam’s potion,” Neilli said, looking at her brother.
    â€œIt would help,” Parlan added. “Mam always adds a tincture of whisky to her medicines to ease the rough parts of any pain.”
    Anice hoped she would not have to explain to each family member individually why she had thanked Aunt Coira last night for her offer but had not taken the medicine. In spite of Neilli’s assumptions, Anice was not entirely certain that the shooter had been solely aiming at Lucais. The shots had been fired at her when Lucais was high on the hill, not far from Dhùin Liath. Mayhap the shooter had been confused by the shadows around the ruins of the castle, but that did not explain why he had shot at her when she and Lucais had been near the cottage.
    â€œI can return MacFarlane’s gun to him,” Parlan said with an abrupt grin.
    â€œThank you, but I wish to send him a note thanking him for bringing me home.” She watched his smile fade.
    Neilli and Parlan exchanged a glance. Anice did not attempt to guess what they were thinking. Within days of her arrival here, she had learned that they had a way of communicating that shut out everyone else.
    â€œParlan could deliver that as well,” Neilli said with another glance at her brother.
    â€œAs soon as I decide what to say, I may ask you to do that.” She hoped her ambiguous answer would persuade them to cease their pestering on this.
    â€œAdd a line or two about how the English road crew would be wise to take their leave posthaste.” Parlan rubbed his hands together. “Or I can simply tell MacFarlane that myself.”
    Anice put Lucais’s gun next to hers and faced her cousins. “You know that everyone in the valley does not hate the idea of a road through here and a bridge over the Abhainn an Uruisg.”
    â€œMost folks do!” Parlan’s eyes narrowed.
    â€œBecause they are against the idea or because they are against the English government suggesting the idea?”
    Neilli crossed her arms over her full breasts. “Anice, you can say that only because you were not raised here. You have not suffered the shame of being subservient to the English, who think themselves better than us.”
    â€œBut you want to go to London!” She would have blamed her bafflement on her bruised skull if she had not heard this before. “You would be surrounded by English there.”
    â€œOther Scots will be among those enjoying the Season.”
    â€œIf you are looking for a match with a Scot, you need only pay calls on your neighbors.”
    Neilli’s nose wrinkled again. “Anice, you will never understand, I fear.”
    â€œShe does not share our traditions,” Parlan continued when his sister paused to scowl. “How can she understand if she has not heard the stories that we have since we were young?”
    â€œAbout what?” Anice asked.
    â€œThis family’s history.” He let his breath slide out past his clenched teeth. “The Kinlochs were nearly betrayed to the last soul by those who sided against us.”
    â€œAt Culloden?”
    When Parlan looked at his sister, who rolled her eyes, he said, “Of course not. Then, friend and foe united against the English. I speak of the events during the war between King Charles and the Covenanters. There were those who sided against Montrose and the Kinlochs.”
    Anice was ready to concede that they might be right after all. She had no comprehension of how they could speak of an event from the English Civil War, nearly two hundred years before, as if it were important now. King Charles had lost his head, but his son had regained his throne. All that seemed so unimportant now, when the Regent ruled England and a road was being built through the glen.
    â€œAnice!” came a shout from the hallway.
    Wanting to put her hands to her head and hide beneath a pillow until this ache disappeared, Anice