by Alisa Adams
Cenna frowned at the two of them. “Really? Och ye are all bum and parsley ye two. Just like children ye are! Enough! We need Friseal to manage the rat—er, King Georgey. The plan stands as it is.” She stared hard at them, knowing they both wanted to insult each other more. “Fine then. Let’s go, “ she said as she surreptitiously rubbed her shoulders.
16
Cenna, Flori and Ina huddled together, making weeping noises as they walked towards the wagons in the dark camp. They were trying to blend in with the other women huddled together here and there throughout the prison wagon’s camp. The hoods of their cloaks were pulled low over their faces. There were a few fires here and there with soldiers around them. The three women avoided them. Ina carried on relentlessly with her wailing and crying as they walked through the camp towards the wagons.
“Ina,” Cenna said as she knocked her elbow into Ina’s ribs, causing her to howl in the middle of a dramatic weeping, moaning, “Ye are being overly dramatic!”
“Cenna, this calls for us to be dramatic! Our dear, beloved husbands are being carted off to prison wrongfully. Soon to have their heads chopped off, or put on horrid, rat-infested, (no insult to our own little King Georgey of course), rotting ships to sail to the end of the earth, never to be seen again. Never to see their own wee babes that we as their beloved dear wives are carrying at this very moment after our blissful wedding ceremonies where the evil, vile, scunner, mauchit soldiers of Red Munroe jerked them out of our very arms.” With that, Ina started weeping and wailing again.
Cenna and Flori stopped and looked at each other. Flori looked astounded. Cenna was trying hard not to laugh. “Bi crivvens,” Cenna whispered on a laugh. Then she sobered, thinking of Tristan, injured in one of those wagons. She watched out of the corner of her eye as Friseal lumbered toward the main wagon driver who held the key to the cages. Several of the soldiers guarding the wagons watched him, with two men moving toward him. The wagon driver was fast asleep.
She nudged her sisters again. They hurried up to the second wagon, weeping and crying loudly, with Ina calling out to her “beloved husband.” The three women made such a ruckus calling out for their husbands that the two soldiers who had been walking towards Friseal turned to them instead.
“Here now! Get away from the wagons!” one of the soldiers ordered them.
Ina only cried louder.
“But me dear beloved husband is in there. Ripped out of me arms he was. In the middle of the night,” she wailed. “Our wedding night it was!” she cried louder. “He’ll niver see our wee babe. Niver, niver!”
Cenna nudged her. Hard. “Ye have a babe? But they took him on yer wedding night Ina?”
“Oh dear,” Flori whispered, then turned that into a weeping wail.
Cenna cried out loudly when the two soldiers looked at them oddly. “Me poor sister had to marry her beloved for the sake of their babe. They could not hold back their passion for each other until they married, so in love were they. And now their love is to be ended by this cruel Sheriff Munroe. Oh tis wrong, tis wrong!” she cried.
“Very good Cenna!” Ina whispered to her with a big grin showing under her hood. “I am a harlot, but a passionate one!”
“Ina!” Flori scolded her.
“You womon! Step back!” the guard growled at them.
Ina started in again with her wailing and crying. Saying something more about her beloved husband being taken from her and she would follow him all the way to prison and beyond if she could, she loved him that much. The guards were trying to understand what she was saying while at the same time unable to take their eyes off of the delicate, petite beauty.
Cenna was watching Friseal and the rat out of the corner of her eye. King Georgey made quick work of getting the keys out of the sleeping wagon driver’s pocket. Friseal slowly made his way towards the back of the first wagon. His deep voice softly rumbled to the men within. He did the same with the second and third wagons. Then he came slowly towards Cenna and her sisters. Keeping his head low, with the hood of a massive cloak obscuring his bearded face.
Friseal bumped clumsily into Cenna, transferring the key to her hand.
“Pardon me,” Friseal said in a terrible falsetto voice as he continued past. Cenna looked at him in time to see King Georgey’s beady little eyes peering at her from under Friseal’s beard.
The guards moved quickly out of Friseal’s way. “I think I would go to prison to get away from me wife if she looked like that one,” one of the guards said, jostling the other with a mock shudder.
Cenna separated from her sisters, praying that Ina’s wailing and crying would keep the guards occupied. She walked to the far side of the wagon, looking for Tristan.
She heard the guards offering to help Ina find her husband among the wagons. Cenna groaned. Ina had gone too far. Yet she was always one to win over even the vilest of creatures.
“Let’s start in the first wagon,” Ina said cheerfully. Pulling the guards away from the wagon that Cenna was at.
Cenna heard them ask her what her husband looked like and Ina paused. Cenna held her breath. Listening.
“Och he has hair the color of the sun, during sunset,” Ina said in her lilting voice as she stumbled to come up with a description that could apply to any of the men in the cages, “in the autumn. When the sky is just turning to night. His eyes are the color of a storm, a rainstorm. No, wait. More like snow. When the spring snow is changing color as the earth comes through when it melts.”
Cenna heard the soldiers’ voices ask her something else.
“How tall is he?” Ina repeated their question. “Weel noo, he is taller than me.” (Everyone was taller than Ina, Cenna thought.) “How tall would ye say he is?” Ina paused and turned to Flori, at a loss. “He is yer brother after all, how tall is he?” Ina was asking Flori.
Cenna rolled her eyes.
Flori stammered, “Och but I am yer sister—”
“Yes, ye are me dear sister-in-law, and I am so overset that I cannae remember how tall me husband; yer brother, is,” Ina said forcefully.
“Oh dear, but I am so overset as well!” Flori stammered out. But Ina nudged her forcefully. “He is average height!” she said.
Cenna smiled as she heard several of the men in the first wagon shout that they would be her husband if she would have them. Chaos broke out as more men chimed in and the guards tried to quiet them down.
Cenna turned from watching Ina as a hand caught her sleeve. Startled, she looked up at the wagon to see Tristan staring at her. The bruises on his face were evident even in the darkness.
“Och Tristan!” she cried out in a whisper.
“Cenna, what are ye doing here? Tis not safe!” he hissed at her.
“I am rescuing ye Tristan,” she said boldly.
“Mo graidh, ye cannae! Tis not safe!” he hissed furiously at her. “Get out of here while ye can! My men will handle this!”
Cenna leaned into the bars of the cage and stared hard at him. “In case ye hadnae noticed all three of these wagons are filled with yer men!” she whispered back at him. “Not just the one ye are in.”
Tristan pulled back and peered through the darkness at the other wagons. “All my men?” he asked her in shock.
Cenna nodded her head. “ Save for Loughlin. He is with us.”
“Loughlin! Vera good. We’ll be fine. Leave! Get out of here. Get to Fionnaghall!”
Cenna made an exasperated harrumphing noise. “Ye need me help, ye block-headed man!” She started pulling the long length of fabric that made up Friseal’s mother’s dress from under her cloak. “Here, put this on. I am doing as Countess Winnifred did. To rescue her beloved husband,” she said in a rush as she continued to pull the dress out from under her cloak.
Tristan went still and quiet. “Am I yer beloved husband then?” he asked her quietly, his voice husky, breathless, and deep.
There was a vibration of intimate emotion in his voice that caught at Cenna. The intensity of his eyes staring
at her held her.
Cenna stopped, her hand in midair, a swath of dark fabric clutched in her fingers. “If ye put this on and we get out of here alive,” she said lightly. “No time for romance, let’s get ye out now!”
“Och ye are a hard woman Cenna,” Tristan said with a short laugh. He reached through the bars and stroked her cheek lightly with a smile in his eyes. She leaned her cheek briefly into his hand, then shoved the dress at him.
“It’s massive!” he whispered in surprise.
“It belongs to Friseal. A gift for his mither. Stop talking and put it on! I can hear that Ina is struggling to find things to say to keep the guards occupied now that the men in the first wagon have settled down and admitted that none are her husband, much to their dismay.”
“Ina at a loss for words? Niver!” He started pulling the dress over his head. His muffled voice came from under the fabric. “We must meet Friseal’s mither. She is an unusually large woman,” Tristan said as he pulled the dress on down over his wide chest and narrow hips.
Tristan stood there in the cage, hands on his hips. A few of his men that were awake were looking at him with grins on their faces.
“How do I look mo chridhe?” he twisted this way and that.
“Tristan, be serious!” Cenna hissed quietly as she moved to the end. “Come to the door of the cage!”
When Tristan met her there she opened the door that Friseal had unlocked, just enough for him to squeeze through.
“How did ye unlock that padlock?” he said in surprise.
“Friseal’s rat,” she said quickly, motioning to him to hurry.
“Ye will explain that one later,” he said as he squeezed through the door. “My men,” he said, “and there is a pastor in there too,” he added and stopped to turn.
Cenna grabbed his arm. “Little by little!” She pointed to the camp. “There are thirty guards out there. We must wait for them to fall asleep! Ye need yer weapons and we need to form a plan with Loughlin! We are sorely outnumbered!”
Tristan looked out at the camp, then up at his men. He nodded to his men, jerking his head in the direction of the guards scattered around the fires. He held up his hand to tell them to wait for his signal.
Cenna tugged at him. “Put me cloak on and pull the hood up over yer head and face. Stoop over a bit. Lean into me and cry,” she ordered.
Tristan stopped and looked at her, one eyebrow raised.
“Just do it Tristan!” Cenna said quickly.
Tristan looked around the camp and saw the groups of weeping women. They were clustered together in groups, hovering near the wagons and the men within. The cages were not just filled with his men but other Highlanders that Red Munroe had arrested so he could take their lands.
“I willnae,” he said quietly, his deep voice resonating command.
Tristan gritted his teeth in fury as his eyes scanned the wagons and the camp as he followed Cenna. His arm was wrapped around her waist, tightly. Her arm was around his. Neither would let go until they were safely out of the camp. They were both silent. Tristan would not play act. He was too furious at the treatment of the Highlanders at the hands of Red Munroe playing sheriff for his own gains.
Cenna led him into the dark woods at the edge of camp.
They stopped in front of Loughlin and Friseal.
Tristan looked Friseal up and down.
“Nice dress,” Tristan said with a grin.
“Yours as well,” Friseal rumbled.
“Aye ye both look vera pretty,” Loughlin said with a clipped laugh. His massive arms were crossed against his chest as he looked at the two men in dresses.
“Dinnae start this again!” Cenna hissed. “We must plan. We must be ready!”
Ina and Flori came silently through the woods and joined them. Ina looked up at Tristan, her eyes going over the dress he wore.
“Aye, Cenna rescued ye she did!” Ina said softly in the dark, clasping her hands together happily at her breasts. “Just like Countess Winnifred rescued her one true love, her beloved husband. Snatched him from the hands of death! Out of that dark, dire prison. Put him in a gown and walked him out in front of the guards.” She sighed. “Aye, she rescued him from a sure beheading so that the two lovers could spend the rest of their blissful lives together, making babies, and kissing each other every day, every morning, every night…” She sighed happily as she looked between Tristan and Cenna, who were staring at her with bemused grins on their faces.
Tristan leaned towards Cenna. “Is she talking about us spending the rest of our lives blissfully making babies? Or the Countess and her husband?” he whispered.
Cenna leaned towards him and whispered back, “She said blissful lives, not blissfully making babies—”
“Still, ‘twould be blissful making babies with ye Cenna,” Tristan said, his voice vibrating straight to her belly.
Cenna had no words, but could only stare into his eyes, lit as they were by a sliver of the moon, their intense, intimate fire still showed brightly.
“Tis the most romantic gesture ever I think,” Ina crooned, breaking the vibrations in the air between Cenna and Tristan. “A sure sign of love I would say. Aye, a true and strong love where ye risk yer very lives for the other.” Ina sighed again, even more dramatically this time.
Loughlin looked at Flori. “Does eating sea birds for ye count as a sign of love, I wonder?”
“I thought I was already yours Loughlin,” Flori said quietly. “You said you were keeping me after all. I dinnae think I had a choice in the matter.”
“Ye always have a choice,” Loughlin replied softly, his voice husky, unsure. A question hovering in the air.
Flori just stared at him as if waiting for something. After a moment she nodded her head once with a huff of breath and turned away from him towards her sisters.
Loughlin looked desperately at Tristan and then at Friseal The two men just shrugged their shoulders at him and grinned.
Tristan looked over to see Cenna smiling at him, her white teeth almost glowing in the moonlight. “No more dirks in me chest or under me chin?” he asked her as he reached out suddenly and hauled her to him.
“I cannae answer that. What if ye deserve it?” she said with an impish grin.
“What if I tell ye every day that I love ye,” he said to her, his voice vibrating with emotion, with need, with desire, with love.
Tristan gave Cenna no chance to respond but swept her up into a deep, hungry kiss. He did not give her a chance to resist. He did not care if she stuck a dirk into him. She was his. He was keeping her. And she had said she was keeping him.
Tristan kissed her with all the hunger and fear and hope for a blissful life together that was within him.
When he let her go, he whispered, “Thank you for rescuing me,” against her lips. She smiled and kissed him back on the lips.
“Take yer dress off will ye?” she said, then laughed at Tristan’s suggestive look. “I wasnae talking aboot that!” she said, pushing at his chest. “I dinnae want to be kissing ye in Friseal’s mither’s gown, I think. Somehow I doubt Countess Winnifred kissed her rescued husband in a dress.”
“I wager she did,” Tristan whispered as he leaned in close to her. Kissing her again, hungry and fast and full of promise.
Tristan pulled the gown over his head and handed it to Friseal with a hasty thank you. Friseal pulled his gown off as well. The men became serious now that they were in their normal garb.
“Our horses?” Tristan asked Loughlin.
“Deeper in the woods, with yer two aunts.” He grimaced at that. “Saddled and ready,” Loughlin answered. “It was all I could do to keep them there. I told them twas an important job in guarding the horses.”
Tristan nodded at him with a stroke of his chin. He had forgotten the aunts.
“Whins too?” Cenna asked hopefully. “I have missed riding me own horse!”
“Whins is here. When the men disappeared ahead of us, twas Whins that led us to ye,” Loughl
in said with a grunt of respect for the giant Clydesdale horses. “We were held up in the village or we may have been taken as well. Munroe knew Tristan and his men would be following ye, Lady Cenna.”
“Sards!” Tristan hissed. “I was not careful enough, I was too out of my mind with worry!” He pulled Cenna to him and placed his forehead against hers, cradling her face in his hands. Cenna closed her eyes and sighed softly. “We arnae out of the woods yet,” he said in a low tone. “Literally, we are not out of the woods, and we are surrounded on both sides by Munroe’s men.”
“But are we?” Ina’s lilting voice said quietly.
Cenna, Tristan, Flori, Loughlin, and Friseal went silent and looked at her.
“Those guards out there, guarding the prison wagons? They are Highlanders too arnae they? Hired by Red Munroe. I dinnae think they are the ill whilly, naft, numpty, mauchit, scunner of a man that he is,” she said innocently in her soft voice, as she looked at them wide-eyed.
Cenna looked sharply at Tristan. He smiled a small, determined smile back at her.
“She is right Cenna,” Flori added quietly. “We spoke at length to the guards that we were stalling. They are missing their homes. They all said they had not thought that this was what Red Munroe had hired them to do. And he arrested a pastor! They are none too pleased with that.” Flori spoke sincerely. Her voice quiet as usual but strong. She had suffered the most at the Munroe’s hands. Her betrothed, a friend since childhood, had been murdered in front of her on the eve of her wedding by Red Munroe’s uncle, Mungan Munroe.
“They all said?” Cenna asked. “I thought ye only spoke to two guards?” Cenna asked curiously.
“Och no,” Ina said. “More men came to speak with us. They were very pleasant.” Ina was smiling innocently.
“I am sure they were Ina,” Tristan said with a wry grin. Ina was lovely, with delicate, ethereal features and pale blonde hair and light blue eyes. All men were attracted to her. Except for himself, of course. It would always be Cenna for him. Always.
“Perhaps we could get them on our side? Or at least some of them. To help turn the balance?” Cenna suggested.
