Aurora shook her head and caressed his stubble-rough cheek with gentle fingertips.
‘I don’t want any riches or treasures, William. I just want you.’
Now William could no longer hold back a gush of tears. In them was distilled all of the sorrow, pain and fear that swirled deep within him, an unadulterated concentrate of the emotions that were churning through his heart and soul. These drops of stinging saltiness ran down his cheeks and merged with the tears that had already dampened his beloved’s face, her cheek pressed against his.
‘And you’re all I’ll ever want, all I’ll ever need,’ he whispered hoarsely.
‘I’m scared William, I’m so scared,’ she sobbed as she held him. ‘What if … what if you’re sent into battle? What if…’
William slipped his fingers through her hair and tilted her head back so that he could press his lips against hers, silencing her. Her mouth was hot, willing and eager, despite her sorrow, and they kissed for a long, intense moment, and the heat of their rapture smouldered and crackled, mirroring the last of the red-glowing coals that remained of the small bonfire in front of them. Eventually they disengaged, and William spoke, brushing Aurora’s cheek with tender touches as he did.
‘There’s nowt tae worry about, my beauty. Britain isnae at war wi’ nobody, an’ I cannae see war acoming neither, so I’ll no’ be sent intae no battles. Even if I am though, why, the spirit ay the River King down there in his cave, he’ll protect me! And surely the Father above could no’ be so heartless as tae part the two ay us so cruelly, could he? We’re meant tae be together, sweet Aurora. I knew it from the moment I first laid eyes on you in tha’ forest.’
‘I knew it too, William. I don’t know how I knew it, but I did.’
‘I’ve ne’er known true love in my life before. Not until I met you. An’ now I understand why it’s what all the greatest poets an’ bards write an’ sing about.’
‘And I’ve never experienced such a depth of feeling, such a fiery, soul-stirring intensity either, William. Not in the most awe-inspiring art galleries of Europe, not in the playhouses with their world-famous actors, not from the orchestras and their conductors who play the greatest works of our age and the ages that came before it … none of these can compare to the beauty I have found in your heart and soul.’
William felt as if his heart would burst right there within his chest as Aurora spoke these words to him, crystallising her sentiments in a gaze that sliced through the tear-glossed grey of his eyes and travelled deep into the core of his being.
‘I’d ne’er imagined anyone could ha’ said such things about me,’ he murmured in a voice that was cracking and hoarse. ‘And tae see them said wi’ such conviction, by the most angelic being I’ve e’er laid my eyes on … it’s almost tae much fir my heart tae take. I’ve said it before, an’ I’ll say it again, Aurora: my heart belongs tae you an’ you alone, an’ until my dying day an’ e’er after, an’ it’ll belong tae no other.’
Again they embraced and kissed with a desperate, ravenous passion, and above them a spread of stars glittered against the dark cloak of the night sky, sprayed across it with the post-mortem violence of a shattered chandelier. When their lips finally parted, William looked up and smiled with wonder-tempered joy.
‘My empress,’ he said, tilting her chin to raise her eyes to the sky. ‘Look.’
The Northern Lights were flaring up on the horizon; neon curtains of green, violet, purple and blue, shimmering and fluttering their ethereal haze against some otherworldly gale that was howling its silent wrath across the dome of the sky.
‘It’s magnificent,’ Aurora murmured, in awe of the glorious spectacle.
‘They’re dancers, immortal beings, I’ve heard the auld folk say,’ William said, his eyes tracing the passage of the flickering dragon tongues of coloured light. ‘It’s a sign, my love. A sign that this is meant tae be. A portent tha’ tells ay the great joy tha’ lies ahead ay us.’
‘I need you to come back to me, William,’ Aurora whispered. ‘Promise me you’ll come back to me as soon as you can. I cannot possibly live my life without you.’
‘That’s a promise I’ll no’ fail tae keep, my lady. My heart an’ soul are yours, forever. No battlefield nor general will keep me from coming back tae you.’
Aurora smiled and retrieved a small item from a pocket in her cloak.
‘Take this. Take this and think of me whenever you look upon it.’
As she said this, she pressed an oval locket of silver into William’s hands.
‘What’s this, m’lady?’
‘Open it.’
William opened the locket and gasped, for inside it was an exquisite portrait of Aurora’s face.
‘Aurora, my love, it’s … it’s you. Looking just as you are in the flesh.’
‘Yes William, just as I am, so that you can remember me like this forever. I painted it myself, looking in a mirror.’
William could not stop staring at the portrait.
‘Your beauty has been captured in a moment of time, frozen in motion like a Highland stream in
