“Why so?” she asked, and her gaze moved across the sea of people. It would take a very good reason for her to lower herself back into that crowd.

“Ye must have the health to stand to be blessed between the fires. If ye ride, ye are sitting. Even a dead man can sit and be carried between the fires.”

She met the man’s fierce stare, her mouth tightening into a thin line. “But a dead man cannot stand,” Ella said, and pulled her feet under her to pluck the ties of her boots, prying them off her feet, along with her tall stockings. A quick knot caught the boots together, stockings stuffed inside, and she handed them down to Hannah.

“What are ye doing?” Hannah asked.

“Not getting trampled.”

Balancing the arches of her feet in the flattest sway of Gilla’s back, Ella stood, bracing her legs apart, the tether still in her hand.

Hannah gasped, stepping back. Hamish shook his head and turned to direct a boy leading a young stallion who kept thrashing his head.

Ella huffed. “There is no sense in this.” But it was better up above everyone. “I will meet you after our turn through,” Ella yelled to Hannah, who held her horse’s lead rope and Ella’s boots, watching her with a look of awe across her pretty face.

Standing atop Gilla, Ella’s head was level with the top of the flames, which undulated as wavering points into the twilight sky. With a slight tug to the right, Ella kept Gilla in line with the others. She used the taut lead lines to steady herself on Gilla’s back. Those around her looked up, some shaking their heads as if she were a fool, but most seemed either awestruck or smiled.

As she rounded the last fire, the people before her parted quickly, leaving a man in the middle. Cain stood alone, his gaze resting on Ella. Larger than everyone else, he looked like someone sent from Heaven or Hell, depending from which clan you hailed.

“Stad,” she called to Gilla, and her horse paused next to Cain. “Hamish said that one must not sit to go between the fires else the blessing does not work, and you said I should avoid being trampled,” she said, raising her eyebrows.

“’Tis dangerous to ride standing, especially without your saddle,” he called up to her, looking at her toes curled into Gilla’s back.

“I have been riding this way since I was a girl of ten.”

“And ye have lost your boots?” Cain asked, his gaze sliding back to her face.