Ian chuckled softly and looked at the dish.
“I would have gladly skipped the meal, lass, as I am much more famished for something else.” He picked up a burger, while Kate’s face heated even more. “But I canna say nae to yer cooking. Especially since this came from yer home.”
He put the burger on his plate and waited for her to take hers. Then he raised his cup.
“To home,” he said. “’Tis nae the house that makes a home but people…a person.”
Kate’s smile fell as she thought about what he said. Was her apartment in Cape Haute really her home? Did her sister and her nephew make it so? Because it wasn’t the building or the restaurant or the investors. She gazed at Ian.
Despite the short time she’d spent here, and despite the fact that she was a complete stranger in this land and this time, a feeling of home settled in her chest when she looked at him.
“To home,” she echoed.
They clunked their cups and drank. The wine was sourer than what she was used to in her time, and it was probably diluted with water, but it would go nicely with the burgers.
Ian lifted his burger and bit into it, chewed, and nodded. “Aye, lass, ye’ve outdone yerself again. ’Tis delicious.”
Blazing from the compliment, Kate bit into her own burger and chewed. Yes, not bad. The bread was a bit rough and tasted sour as any rye bread, but the meat had good flavor after being grilled over the coals, and the cheese was just the right combination of creamy, sour, and salty.
“These are even better with beef,” she said through a mouthful.
“I will slaughter a cow for ye if ye make these every day,” he said.
She chuckled. “Actually, I do make them every day back home.”
He straightened. “Oh, aye? Nae wonder ye’re so good at it. I swear, since I met ye, I’ve eaten the best meals of my life. Before the caliphate, everything is a blur, as though I didna truly live. In the caliphate, food didna matter. They feed us well, aye. Meat and fruit and bread every day. They needed to keep us strong and healthy for the fights.”
Kate’s chest tightened. “Fights?”
Ian stopped chewing, his face a bitter mask. He looked at the plate, then took his cup and emptied it down his throat, then poured more.
“Aye, Kate. Fights.”
He met her eyes then, and Kate’s heart broke at the pain and shame written on his face.
“Ye asked me to tell ye about hell. I think I can tell ye. But can ye accept me after ye’ve heard what I have to say?”
Of course she would. The real question was, if she told him the whole truth about time travel and everything, would he accept her? Or would he think her a mad woman?
Chapter 19
Ian held his breath as Kate took time to answer him. There was a gentleness in her face, and a kindness.
Would it still be there after he told her how much of a monster he’d been?
“Yes, of course,” she said. “You can tell me anything. I want to know.”
He nodded, then threw back the cup of wine. His hands shook as he poured another one. He was more terrified of reliving all that had happened than he wanted to admit.
“I was wounded eleven years ago, in a battle with the MacDougalls. Got a bad chest wound. My clan thought me dead, but the MacDougalls kent I wasna. They sold me to a slave ship. I dinna remember any of that. Afterward, the other slaves told me I was delirious with fever on the ship and they all thought I’d die right there. But I didna.”
Unfortunately, he added silently.
“When we reached Baghdad, I was already recovering and could stand on my feet. In a slave market, the caliph bought me. My red hair and my size are verra rare and, therefore, valuable there. I’d thought I’d do construction or cut wood or stone. But the caliph had a different plan for me.”
Ian’s fist clenched around the cup uncontrollably, the metal felt like it would bend under his grip. Kate was just listening, her attention like a precious gift he couldn’t repay. He hadn’t realized how much he needed a friendly ear, how much he needed to share the heavy burden of his experience.
“What plan?” she said, her voice just above a whisper.
“The caliph had a secret kind of entertainment,” Ian said. “Inspired by the ancient Romans, as I learned later. Only the richest and most important viziers and noblemen were allowed to participate. They bet their treasure on us. And nae just gold. Their women.” His throat cramped, but he pressed out, “They won by having their best slaves fight each other until death.”
Kate inhaled sharply.
“And you as well?”
“In the beginning, I was just a slave with exotic looks. The caliph had never owned a red-haired man before, not to mention a Highlander. But then, as I continued to bring him victory, killing my opponents one after another, I became his favorite. He even came to talk to me on occasion. I was invincible. Red Death, they called me.”
Ian remembered the square courtyard brightly lit with a burning sun the first time he was sent to fight. The sticky sweat under his iron armor. His tightly clenched fist around the handle of the curved sword. The smell of hot dust and sweat. The other man, on the opposite side of the courtyard. It had been a taller man, brown-haired and heavy-built.
There were dozens of guests sitting along the long balconies on each side of the courtyard walls.
Ian’s right hand shook. He still wasn’t fully recovered from a piercing wound in his shoulder, just below the collarbone, that he’d received a moon ago. It ached constantly. The man was bigger and looked stronger than him, and the deadly threat on his face meant this wasn’t his first fight.
But it wasn’t Ian’s first, either, he reminded
