"Never."

Her hands dug hard at his waist, burrowing beneath his fine formal jacket and elegant white linen shirt. "And if you ever, ever say such a thing to me again, I'll-"

"You'll do what?" he whispered, breathless beneath the sweet assault of her hands and the brush of her body.

"I'll bind you with ropes and strip away all your clothes and teach you the true meaning of torment, MacLeod of Glenbrae."

His eyes closed. "It sounds to be paradise, my lass. A grave temptation." He slid his hands into the shining, wayward cap of her curls, at the same time exploring her mouth.

She gave a low, broken sound of pleasure and need, tugging the shirt from his bright, newly fashioned kilt, a gift from the laird of Glenlyle and his American wife. The colors were too bright and the wool too new and stiff, but MacLeod did not tell them so. With time the cloth would soften and fade, more to the manner he was accustomed to wearing. Until then he would endure his velvet jacket and finery because they pleased Hope.

She caught his shoulders and bit at his lip. "Your mouth, MacLeod."

He frowned. "You have some complaint against it?"

"None at all," she said breathlessly. "Except that it drives me wild."

He smiled against her lips. "Then maybe we should go somewhere quiet. Beyond the moat and the roses. This old abbey seems as if it would not resent a pair of lovers who chose a quiet spot among its shadows." MacLeod looked off at the weathered granite walls and the endless climbing roses. "It has only grown finer with age." He nodded, remembering the flattery and the endless deceit, the constant stratagems by Edward and his polished courtiers. But he had liked the seigneur of these lands. MacLeod was certain he would be pleased with all that his abbey had become.

"Of course he would," a voice boomed at his shoulder.

Lace rippled. Velvet shone in the warm spring sunlight.

Adrian Draycott shimmered into view and shot an assessing glance at MacLeod. "And it's rather dashing that you're looking, too. You still see me, I suppose."

MacLeod nodded slightly.

"Not for long, Scotsman. The portal is closed. With it sealed, all contact with your own time will be lost." Already Adrian's voice seemed to fade. "You're sure in your decision to stay?"

Read my heart, MacLeod said in silence to the abbey's imposing guardian ghost. She will be my home and my time. Her friends will be my friends, and her joys, my joys.

A shadow moved beyond the roses. MacLeod recognized that gray shape immediately. Gideon is well?

"As fine as any creature may be. The best and most loyal of friends."

I owe you my thanks. MacLeod touched Hope's cheek. We both do.

"Save your thanks, Scotsman. I believe you are called to make a signal contribution to your country today. That folio would bring you money beyond your dreams, you know."

She is all the dream I need. If it pleases her to make a gift of this folio, then it pleases me also.

"Well said, MacLeod of Glenbrae. And God's peace and blessing follow you both." His black velvet jacket seemed to waver as the smell of his beloved roses filled the air, rich and sweet. "Then it's goodbye, my friend. Once the portal closes completely, there will be no more link for us. I only wanted to be certain of your choice."

Certain beyond all doubt, MacLeod thought. He did not choose to speak of it to Hope. She would only plague him with more choices that he did not want.

Around them the moat rippled and gurgled. Somewhere a curlew trilled from the glade.

And as he stood with his hands cupped on Hope's cheeks, a church bell rang far out over the distant downs-twelve times and then once more.

MacLeod shook his head, feeling the brush of ghostly fingers. But of course, it was only the wind, he told himself, lost in the sight of Hope's blinding smile.

And the words that seemed to echo faintly in his mind?

Imagination, he decided. This powerful old abbey was a place to make men imagine and dream, with the pulse of history beating deep within its halls.

Somewhere beyond the moat and the Witch's Pool, lace fluttered for a moment. A tall shape seemed to stand among the roses, surveying his beloved domain. Then lace and velvet fled. Only a cat lay drowsing in the sun, his amber eyes keen on the abbey.

MacLeod felt an instant of disorientation and loss-but only an instant. "So, lass," he said to the smiling woman in his arms, "do we evade them all and find a quiet glade?"

"Later, Scotsman," Hope whispered. "First you have a queen to meet." She slid his shirt into his kilt, smiling.

"Strange, that. A queen upon the throne." He shook his head.

"And not the first."

"So you tell me." He straightened his shirt and jacket, looking every bit the dashing Highland laird -and not at all the heartsick warrior that he had been.

Hope held out her hand. "You steal my very breath, MacLeod. You always have, from the first moment I saw you riding out of that storm. Will you join me at the abbey?" she asked, formal in spite of her smile. "Jeffrey and Gabrielle will be waiting, along with his father, who seems to like having a French chef in the family."

"Almost as much as he seems to like having his son back," MacLeod murmured. "And the laird and his wife will be there, along with the Draycotts and their charming daughter?"

"All of them."

MacLeod straightened his shoulders. He would ask her hand of them, these braw friends who were all the family she had now. He was a knight trained in all the proper form and ritual, after all, and he must ask her hand of those who loved her most.

"Let us go then, lass of my heart." He guided her forward into the sunlight and the drifting perfume of roses. "There will never be a better time to meet a queen, I warrant."

He did not look back at the last shimmer of lace above the moat, nor at the great cat who watched them from the hedgerow.

"HE'S GONE TO US, Gideon."

Adrian Draycott watched from the glade, a sudden sense of loss in his heart. "He was a friend of real courage."

At his feet the great cat stirred, meowing softly.

"I know well it was for the best, my friend. He's set securely in this time now, by his choice and the love of the woman at his side. In spite of that, I shall miss him. It was pleasant to have someone who could see me."

Gideon's tail flicked once and his keen gaze settled on the far slope.

Gold shimmered beyond the Witch's Pool. Low laughter drifted over the moat.

"Grey?" Adrian turned. "Is that you, my heart?"

Light gathered over a dress of cloth of gold. A woman stood in the dappled shade of an oak, her smile fierce. "And have you forgotten that I can see you, too, my love? That I can touch you?"

"Never," Adrian said. There was a new firmness in his ghostly step. "And now that you're here, we've work to do. The capstone needs to be braced and our roses must be tended." His eyes took on a wicked gleam. "But first I mean to have a closer look at that extraordinary folio." In a heartbeat space shifted and a volume appeared, floating in the afternoon sunshine.

"You mustn't," the woman in gold whispered. "The queen is about to arrive for the viewing, and all the others are already gathered in the library."

"I'll only be a few moments. It was an extraordinary skill the man had, after all. I recall he visited once and gave his finest performance here. He acted himself on occasion. Did you know that?"

The woman in gold took his arm, watching the old, fragile pages turn gently in the air. "It was a stirring play and it will be again, if young Jeffrey has his way. He means to stage a performance outside near the moat. I have every certainty that it will be a great success." Her eyes twinkled.

"With our help, of course."

"Of course," Adrian agreed.

Together they paced along a row of dancing roses, arm in arm and hearts in perfect accord.

INSIDE THE ABBEY came the sound of sudden laughter. In the front hall, flanked by all Hope's friends, MacLeod sank to bended knee and took her hand.

"I would have your hand, Hope O'Hara. To cherish and protect. To encourage and support. For all my mortal days." His eyes darkened. "If you will have me."

She swallowed, wild color filling her cheeks. He was her champion and finest friend. How could she deny him anything? "I will. To cherish and protect as you do. To encourage and support for all my mortal days." Her eyes glinted with a hint of tears. "And even beyond that," she whispered, only for her Scotsman to hear.

LAUGHTER ECHOED.

Clapping exploded through the rich rooms and bright, silent halls.

The sound drifted to the portrait of the eighth viscount high above in the Long Gallery.

"He looks just the same," Morwenna Wishwell mused. "Just as handsome and as arrogant as he always was."

"But he's guarded his abbey well," Perpetua admitted reluctantly. "And he will do so again, I think."

At Morwenna's side, the curtains rippled. As the fragrance of roses filled the room, an image glinted against the leaded windows.

A woman smiled there, having been given her heart's dream and the news of a child to come.

A Scotsman paced there, then turned as the woman whispered in his ear. He nearly stumbled in his shock and joy.

"Three bairns, I think," Perpetua said softly.

"Nay, 'twill be four," Morwenna said. "Three braw sons to make their father's hair turn gray, and a lass who will make the inn ring with her laughter."

"She'll be a singer with a voice like an angel's. She'll bring all the old ballads to life."

"No, she'll be a scientist," Perpetua insisted. "Equations and theorems for her."

"She will do just as her heart wills," Honoria said sagely. "As we all must. And right now we'd better rejoin the others before they discover us gone."

They moved together, their hands joined. Joy filled the air, and even the abbey's shadows seemed to take on light.

Then there was only emptiness and the ring of laughter from the hall where MacLeod began a ring of toasts to his radiant future bride. Sunlight streamed over the moat, and bees droned among the roses.

Up in the Long Gallery the curtains stirred. A gray shape ghosted through the door and padded over the fine Aubusson carpet. Ears pricked, the cat studied the silent room.

Waiting.

The air seemed to stir and hum, and the gray ears pricked forward. Then in one powerful bound, Gideon sailed up, up toward the priceless oil portrait of the abbey's eighth viscount.

Canvas shifted.

Pigment glinted.

And then the gray shape vanished within, met by a ripple of welcoming laughter. As he did, a single rose petal drifted down through a sunbeam, then came to rest on the floor beneath Adrian Draycott's feet.

Author's Note Dear Reader, What fun it has been to watch Hope and Ronan's adventures at magical Glenbrae House. I have been tantalized by Ronan's story for several years now, and it was exhilarating to see this tough, principled warrior in action, fighting for the woman of his heart!

If you're interested in reading more about the kind of life Ronan might have led in his own time, be sure to find Chronicles of the Crusades, edited by Elizabeth Hallam (New York: Weidenfeld Nicolson, 1989), which records the rich sweep of drama, betrayal and danger of those who followed the call to take up the cross on Crusade. For more technical details about the soldiers of Ronan's time, nothing can beat the Osprey Men-at-Arms series, in particular Armies of the Crusades by Terence Wise (London: Reed International Books, 1978).

For those of you curious to learn what a knight wore under his hauberk and chain mail (hey, inquiring minds want to know!), you'll find it all in the Osprey series.

Interested in details of military life in the thirteenth century? Try The Medieval Soldier by A.V.B.

Norman (New York: Barnes and Noble, 1971). For medieval life recorded in all its rich, unforgettable detail, read Life in a Medieval Village by Frances and Joseph Gies (New York: HarperCollins, 1991).

Even today Macbeth remains one of Shakespeare's most hotly contested plays. Likely the work had already been much abbreviated by the time of its first printing in the folio of 1623; worse yet, the additions of another writer were probably already present. A significant number of passages are corrupt and others do not meet the craftsmanship of the master playwright who finished King Lear during that same period. Immediately struck by possibilities, I have explored the theme of "what if": What if a folio prior to the 1623 printing existed? What if that folio contained uncut and unadulterated text approved by Shakespeare himself? But what if that text was stolen and hidden by a very clever thief?

You know the rest.

Just don't ask me where the idea for Banquo came from. Maybe Gideon.

If you have enjoyed Christmas Knight, I hope you'll drop by my Web site at www.christinaskye.com for excerpts of my upcoming books, reader contests, historical recipes and a backstage peek at the heroes and heroines I have come to love like dear friends. While you're at the Web site, take the haunted abbey tour-if you dare. Adrian will be waiting for you! And don't forget to send me e-mail at skye1800@aol.com.

For all those of you who ask about stories for Adrian and Nicholas: yes, they have already been written. Nicholas's story appeared in the Avon anthology Haunting Love Stores. Adrian's magical story appeared in the anthology Bewitching Love Stories. These and all my other Draycott books (Hour of the Rose, Bridge of Dreams, Bride of the Mist, Key to Forever and Season of Wishes) are available. Each book is a haunting mix of danger, romance and otherworldly interference by Adrian and Gideon. Let me know what you think!

Ever since Adrian and Gideon swept into my life seven years ago, nothing has been the same, and Draycott Abbey just seems to grow more beautiful with every passing year. I hope Adrian and Gideon have brought a bit of magic and high adventure into your life, too.

Now it's back to work for me. I've got a brilliant heroine who has completely messed up her life and a man who is sensational at everything except what truly counts: believing in his own heart.

What a roller-coaster ride this Draycott Abbey book will be, I promise you. Watch my Web site for more details.

Meanwhile, as the Wishwell sisters have foretold, "The page is turned, the mystery clear." Enjoy the Highlands and all the magic of Glenbrae. I hope you find every joy during this special and wonderful season.

With warmest wishes, Christina Skye Moonrise

PROLOGUE.

Draycott Abbey Southern England Winter Solstice MOON RISING.