He swept his arm to encompass the ribbons, banners, and all forms of bohemian decoration that ornamented the rather Gypsy-like dwellings which were arranged in a circle stacked about five or so deep. In the center of the large circle was another bonfire. Though not as big as the ones that smoldered next to Ravencroft Keep, the fires were accompanied by strategically placed torches to lend a darker, more intimate glow to the night’s festivities.
“What are they doing?” Mena queried. “What is the in-between?” A brightly played fiddle-and-flute melody reached across the night to her and the accompanying drums called out to her spirit until her feet ached to dance.
Gavin swiped a mask from the table lorded over by Mrs. Grady, and tied it over his handsome features, smiling as he did so. His voice took on a bardish eeriness as he explained. “Before the Christians came, we Scots had two halves to the year, the light half and the dark half. The light half belongs to the living. The dark half belongs to the dead and the denizens of the Other World.”
“Oh?” Mena glanced around her, watching people in black cloaks and painted skin affix dark masks to their faces. Gowns fit for a London ball and simple homespun dresses alike were rendered exotic by hip scarves and outlandish jewelry. “Let me guess, Samhain marks the dark half of the year.”
Strains of strange pipes and drums began a dark rhythmic reel with no distinguishable beginning or end. More ale, Scotch, and other spirits flowed and lent the festival a reckless sort of apocalyptic frenzy. Some ladies had relieved themselves of their bodices altogether and danced around the fire with their chemises hanging from their shoulders, barely covering their unbound breasts.
No one seemed necessarily scandalized, so Mena decided not to be, either. The matching black masks that everyone wore lent a certain amount of anonymity to the occasion, and thereby some sort of wicked consent to such outlandish behavior.
“Clever lass,” Gavin crooned, magically appropriating two more glasses of cider, one of which he traded with the nearly empty one in her hand. “Samhain literally means ‘summer’s end.’ Tomorrow, November first, is our traditional New Year. We’re both leery and respectful of borders and transitions here in the Highlands. Bridges, clan boundaries, crossroads, thresholds, these are our holy places. Places where those of the Other World tend to linger. Likewise twilight, dawn, Samhain, and Beltaine, the hinges of the year, are our most mystical and often most precarious times.”
Mena accepted the mask he handed her, toying with the ribbons. “You celebrate these times because you fear them?” she assessed.
“Exactly that.” He grinned, the effect turned a bit ghoulish by the black mask above his sensual lips. “Come midnight, we turn ourselves into that which we fear and we drink and dance and philander like there is no tomorrow. We do so to welcome the ghosts, the demons, the faerie, and the witches to cavort with us, in hopes they doona turn their magic against us when they are most powerful. This is the time of the in-between.”
A shiver of delicious anticipation slid through Mena as crofters, farmers, ranchers, milkmaids, land owners, and lairds all became black-masked apparitions of the mysterious Scottish “Other World.” That place where all blessing and all misfortune had its genesis, and therefore the devil could take the consequences of this night.
Warm from the dubious contents of her cider, Mena gave in to the giddy, reckless spirit that seemed to ripple through the crowd, and allowed Gavin to help her affix her mask to her eyes.
“Do ye know any reels, lass?” Gavin queried as they reached the edge of the circle of revelers who’d begun to dance around the bonfire.
Mena grinned. “Do I know any reels?” she scoffed, tapping her toes along with the quick and merry music. “Please, I’m from Hampshire. We invented the reel.”
“I thought ye said ye were from Dorset,” a masked merrymaker interceded; the red beard and jowly smile identified him unmistakably as the steward, Russell.
Mena almost dropped her tankard of cider, blanching at her mistake. “That’s right, I did,” she breathed, groping for a way to recover.
A busty young woman twirled from the arms of her overenthusiastic partner, stumbling into Gavin and causing his drink to splash onto his shirt. Giggling a slew of blurry apologies, she ran her hands down the vest covering his muscled torso, and trailed a brazen finger along the belt of his sporran, slung low on his kilted waist.
“All’s forgiven, lass, believe ye me,” Gavin murmured with a silken intonation full of unmistakable innuendo.
“Come find me if ye change yer mind.” She nearly sang the invitation. “I’ll make reparations to ye.” She kissed him full on the mouth just as she accepted the hand of her unsteady partner and let him swing her away, leaving Russell and Gavin chuckling and Mena dumbstruck.
“I do believe she just propositioned you,” Mena marveled.
“I do believe ye’re right.” Russell laughed merrily.
“And kissed you, in front of her husband and everything!” she exclaimed. “I’m astonished that he didn’t call you out.”
Gavin’s laughter mingled with Russell’s, creating a warm, masculine sound. “Och, lass, that’s not her husband, he’s over there.” He gestured with his drink to the edge of the woods, where a short but wide fair-haired man had a tall woman against a tree, feasting upon her neck like a creature out of one of Andrew’s penny dreadfuls.
“Goodness,” was all Mena could think to say.