Highland Portrait by Shelagh Mercedes Read Free Book Online Page A

too, was out of her control.
      She slowly turned around and looked at the painting. 
    “Are you Robbie?” she asked softly.
    “Aye, lass, it is I.  I have waited a long time.”  The sweat on his body glistened and she felt his fear.  An overwhelming fear not of death, but of loss.  A loss so great that even now these centuries past it still lay heavy on him, tormented him and kept him tied to the world, would not give him release. 
    She had an impulse to run but didn’t move, her curiosity a racing train that would not stop to let her off.
    “What have you waited for, Robbie,” she asked.  She looked directly at the canvas but his voice came from beside her, not from across the studio. She could feel his breath at her ear.  She could feel his nearness radiating.
    “Fer ye, lass.  I ha’e waited these long years t’ see ye again.”  She whirled around thinking she might see him, but there was nothing. If he were a ghost shouldn’t she be able to at least see some kind of shadowy specter?    She could hear him, why was he not visible?
    “Again?”  she asked. Robbie’s choice of words puzzled her. “I have no memories of you, Robbie.  Have we met?”
    She felt, rather than heard him chuckle.
    “Aye,” he said, his voice soft as a lovers, his breath warm at her ear. “Aye, we have met, my sweet Faerie Queen.”  She felt a tingling on her head as if he was running his hand gently through her hair. “I’ve missed you so, lass.” 
    She pulled away from him frightened by his nearness. 
    “Ok, Robbie, I’m pretty sure that you’ve gotten lost somehow there’s been some kind of mistake or something.  I don’t know a Robbie.  I don’t know any Scotsmen, or warriors, so if you’d please get on with your business and go back to where you came from.”  She kept looking around her, but she could feel him follow her, he was coming closer, his arm reaching out to her.
    “Don’t be frightened, my sweet Faerie Queen…”
    “I’m not a Faerie Queen, I’m…”
    “Stella.”  A jolt shot through her veins as she heard him call her name.  It was an intimate connection and she could feel cords of longing reach around her, binding her to his voice.  She was suddenly awash in the sweeping feeling of a love so pure in its intent that she ached inside, wanting desperately to touch the source. It was a love she had never experienced and yet was familiar to her.  She wanted to feel this love deeper, but as suddenly as it had come, just as suddenly it vanished and her heart cried out in pain at the abandonment.
    “Who are you, Robbie?  How did you find me?  Why can’t I see you?”
    “Ferghus found ye.  He led me here.”
    “Who is Ferghus?” Stella frowned looking for yet another ghost.
    “Stella, beautiful Stella. Come to me.”  Again she felt his warm breath at her ear, his hand on her arm. She pulled away.
    She stood taller, not wanting to lose control of this magic. “I’m not going anywhere with you.  Can you please tell me who you are?”
    “In three days I will return for ye, Stella, my love.”  The blue lights gradually lightened and the small pulsing noise disappeared.  She no longer felt his presence and she was at once disappointed and relieved.  He was gone, but the warmth of his presence remained and she felt as if a portal had slammed shut leaving her on the outside of some grand adventure.
    “Robbie!  Wait.  I’m not going anywhere, Robbie!”
    As her heart slowed down Stella wondered about the feeling of absolute love she had felt, questioning the source.  Was it Robbie?  Was it her? How could she love someone she had never met, someone that had died hundreds of years before she was even born?  It didn’t seem logical, didn’t make sense.  But more importantly she didn’t want a soul mate that was dead. 
    Magic was such a complex, tangled mess and she was always left wondering, with no answers in sight.
    Stella thought back to the first time