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witch’s ball?”
    “Ye could never imagine,” Latharn whispered hoarsely as he turned away from the swirling rag upon the glass.
    Brodie leaned closer to the globe as he spoke, squinting as he peered into the prison. “I wonder if he’s gone mad in there? Latharn MacKay’s been imprisoned for all those years; he’s watched all the people he knew and loved grow old and pass away. He’s witnessed them all pass from this life to the next, leaving him behind. The stories say that even though we canna see within, there’s nothing to keep him from seeing outside of his curved glass walls into the world beyond.”
    Latharn covered his ears, squeezing his eyes shut, trying to block their words as well as six hundred years of memories. All their faces, all their laughter, it all tormented him—and he remembered each and every one.
    Fiona polished the ancient stand, where for centuries the MacKay generations had rested the globe. “At least his mother discovered how to break the curse before she jumped to her death.”
    Brodie scowled as he helped Fiona clean the stand. “Aye, Rachel MacKay found how to break the curse. But I still don’t understand how it will ever come about. If the one woman Latharn MacKay could ever love is supposed to whisper the breaking of the curse…wouldn’t she have existed back in his time? Wouldn’t she have lived in 1410? The legends said he could never give his heart to any of the women he’d ever met. But how’s he to meet this one woman he’s supposed to love if he’s imprisoned within the globe?”
    Latharn waved his hand to seal his words within the sphere. Pacing back and forth within the globe, Latharn roared at them from his side of the walls. “I have already met her! It will happen, Brodie. She comes to us as we speak.” The time wasn’t right to communicate with his descendents even though his frustration level neared explosion. In the past, when he’d spoken to his guardians, they’d sometimes had difficulty trusting their sanity. He had to wait until the proper moment. For now, it was better they think of him as the family legend, the bauble on the shelf requiring a daily dusting.
    Fiona shrugged her shoulders as she returned the orb to its shelf. “I don’t understand it either, Brodie. I’ve heard the stories ever since I was a lass toddling along beside my grandmam’s skirts. She told me how a chosen member of the clan must guard the globe until Latharn found his release. But I never understood how he was supposed to find the love of his life if he was imprisoned inside a tiny crystal cell.”
    Latharn nodded his approval. Fiona was a traditional girl; her lullabies had been the family legends. She would understand in time.
    Brodie dusted the countertop as he mused on his ancient cousin’s fate. “They say he was a powerful sorcerer, trained by his gifted mother and the clan druid. They say he’d only begun to discover just how powerful he was when the dark bana-buidhseach entrapped him within the ball. They say Cousin Latharn scorned the woman after taking her to his bed.”
    “That is not what happened at all.” Latharn groaned. “Why can they never get it right? Every century it gets worse with the telling. At least this century, they got the part about the sorcery right.” Three hundred years ago, they told that he was some sort of mythical ogre.
    Fiona tucked her arms around her husband’s waist and rested her cheek upon his back. “Well, if Cousin Latharn was as good a lover as a certain MacKay lad I know, then I can understand how the woman could be upset and determined for a bit of revenge.”
    With a nod toward the back room, Brodie waggled a suggestive brow. “Ye know, we’ve yet to hang the open sign on the door just yet. And there is a bench in the back room that looks verra promising by the way it is designed.”
    A pang of loneliness tore through his chest. Latharn heaved a weary sigh. This was the part he hated the most, the utter