by Jackie Ivie
Langston took in the man standing in front of him, and his broadsword dipped until it touched the stone floor with a thud of noise. It was followed by the other two. He turned his head and glared at her for a moment before turning what was probably the same look at Angus.
“They told me a MacHugh was here!” Langston thundered.
“Aye,” Angus whispered.
“This is na’ the MacHugh I requested!” Langston replied.
“I am Angus MacHugh.”
“You canna’ be. Angus MacHugh is a man!”
Lisle couldn’t defend him. She was in shock. Her entire body seemed filled with water colder than a loch-emptying burn, and there wasn’t anything on her that could move…except her eyes. They were wide and watched as Angus actually straightened, and then his eyes narrowed, and he gave Langston back a look that was probably as good as the one he was getting.
“I am Angus MacHugh, you black bastard!”
Monteith handed the sword to one of his men and then crossed his arms.
“You the MacHugh that plays the pipes?” he asked, still in the aggressive tone he’d been using since he first strode into the room.
“Aye.”
“You any good?”
“Angus MacHugh is one of the best, Monteith. Always was.”
“Good. You make pipes, then?”
“None said anything about making pipes.”
“The best pipers always make their own bagpipes. I ask again. You make pipes?”
“I’ve been known to craft a set or two,” Angus replied, and there wasn’t a hint of a warble to his voice or his frame.
“Good. Craft me a set or two. Fifty gold pieces per set.”
“Fifty?” Angus asked, and his eyes were wide.
“You having trouble hearing, auld man?” Langston replied.
Angus’s expression changed to a sneer. “You’re mad. Any man can buy a set of bagpipes for shillings. Less. ’Tis a bane of this Sassenach law. Pipes are so much baggage, anymore. Nae pipes can be played, and owning pipes can get a man imprisoned. They certainly canna’ feed a family. Pipes sell for a pittance, and you want them made for a fortune.”
“Let me tell you a little secret, MacHugh. I am a black bastard, and I am mad. I’m also a devil when it comes to getting my way. I always get it. Always. I put my Monteith mark on pipes, they’ll be the best money can buy, or I’ll na’ do it. I craft pipes, I expect the best. I expect the best pipers to make them. I expect to pay for the best. I ask again, and I pay fifty gold pieces per set.”
“Very well,” Angus replied. “You’ve got your set or two.”
“Good. Now, see to cleaning the whiskey drunk smell from yourself. I doona’ allow a man of mine to smell.”
“You black—!”
“We already went through the names, MacHugh. I’m na’ interested in what you call me. I’m only interested in your skills.”
“You show nae respect for your elders,” Angus replied. He sounded like he was in the same shock Lisle still was.
“You want respect from me, auld man? Earn it.”
Angus sucked in the reaction. He went straighter still.
“Good. We see eye to eye, finally. I hire a man, I expect to get a man,” Langston said, loudly.
“I’ll na’ work for you,” Angus replied.
“Oh. You’re going to do more than work for me. You’re going to wash that smell from yourself; you’re going to get a healthy meal, and a clean place of your own. You’re going to doff that Sassenach attire and get good Monteith plaide on. You’re going to craft me some pipes, and you’re going to make certain they’re good, because you’re going to test each and every one of them with a good, solid, lung full of air. You’re going to get some self-respect back. That’s what you’re going to do. Were you na’ at Culloden?”
“Doona’ let the name cross your black lips!”
“You were, weren’t you?”
“Aye!” Angus was yelling, bulging the cords out of his neck.
“Good! I expect my men clean. I expect my men sober. I expect my men prompt. I request a man, I expect him to report immediately, na’ the next day, wandering into my house, soused in whiskey!”
“Why—you young braggart!”
Angus was still yelling. They were both yelling. Lisle looked from one to the other. Angus no longer looked like he needed a champion, or anything other than his own claymore, so he could challenge the other.
“I expect my men to act like a man, and na’ a sniveling lad. I’ll ask it one more time—and I would na’ waste words with me further, if I were you. Were you at Culloden?”
“Aye!” Angus replied.
“And were you injured?”
“I took a cleaving or two.”
Langston absorbed that information. Then, he strode across the floor to stand directly in front of Angus.
“Allow me to shake your hand, MacHugh.” He said it quietly, with a reverence better suited to the chapel. Then, he put his hand out and waited.
Angus eyed him a bit. Then he put his own hand out.
“Welcome back to the Highlands,” Langston said. “Etheridge? See that he’s put with the others. Get him a horse. Fit him.”
Angus’s look was priceless at that information. His mouth had dropped open. Then he was following one of them, who didn’t resemble the man who was Langston’s personal valet at all, out the door.
Langston turned to her and shook his head. “I was just in time,” he said softly.
“You yelled at him.”
“I had to. You were doing worse.”
“I was na’!”
“You doona’ understand. You canna’ coddle an auld warrior, Lisle. You’ll ruin him.”
“I was na’ coddling him…much,” she replied.
He sighed, and lifted his left shoulder with a grimace. “Come. ’Tis time for my own bath. I believe you owe me one of those.”
Lisle’s eyes were huge. She was very afraid her mouth made the same motion. “’Tis midday,” she replied finally.
He grinned, bringing those laugh lines into play about his eyes. A thunderbolt struck her in place, and Lisle felt the reaction clear to her toes.
“Aye. So ’tis.” He was striding toward her and wrapping his right arm about her, and pulling her close to the healthy, sweaty, raw smell of him. “Saves a bit on torchlight this way,” he whispered. “And you ken how I feel about such waste.”
“Langston—”
“Save it for the chamber, sweet.”
The endearment twisted her tongue into knots, and then he made it worse when he dropped a kiss to her temple.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Invisible hands had been at work on Monteith’s chamber.
Lisle looked about and kept the intake of air to herself. There was a larger tub than she’d ever seen beside his armoire, catching the afternoon light; there was a feast of so many various dishes her eyes couldn’t absorb them all, on three of his four tables; and there was a strange hip-high iron object between the chairs fronting his unlit fireplace. Lisle focused on the iron thing. It had one thin, iron leg atop a footing of four decorated ones. Toward the top was a sheltered area where she could see a small flame flickering through the amber-colored glass, and above that was a bowl shape, full of glowing coals.
“A brazier,” Langston said at her side before she had a chance to ask.
“What’s it for?”
“Cooking things.”
“You’ve a stone-weight of foods lying about, Monteith. There is nae need for cooking that I can tell.”
He smiled down at her. “I brought them from Persia. The desert. There is so much sand and heat and sun, it hurts the eye to contemplate it all. Everything is already roasting in the heat, making fire a useless thing to pursue, as well as nearly impossible to make. Nae wood about, unless you carry it with you.”
“So, why make a fire?”
His smile widened. “To cook. ’Tis also useful for heating things.”
/>
“Things?” Those ale-colored eyes were doing strange things to her heart, making it skip a beat, pump mightily, skip another. Lisle swallowed to keep it to herself, but she couldn’t look away.
“Things like incense, coffee…skeans.”
Lisle’s eyes widened, and her heart decided to pump itself into the area just below her throat, making it difficult to breathe and impossible to swallow. Skeans? she wondered. “What are you planning on using it for?” she asked, with a voice that was almost nonexistent.
He didn’t answer, but he released her gaze to look down at himself. Lisle also watched as he pulled a long, wide blade from his belt and twirled it, catching the light.
“Skeans,” he replied finally.
She gasped. He ignored it to walk over to the brazier and stir the coals a bit before settling his knife underneath them. Then, he reached to start pulling more knives from his belt, dumping them on the chair seat in front of him, and always using his right hand to do so. When he came across another wide, flat blade, he put it in the coals, too.
Lisle watched, mentally storing the information of where not to sit, in the event she got to do so, since he’d had close to twenty blades tucked into his belt. She didn’t know how many for certain. She hadn’t been counting until he already had them jumping about on the padded seat. She was trying to keep the same fear that was clogging her throat from transferring to the rest of her. It was a forlorn idea. Her back was already tight with dread, and her palms clammy with moisture.
He was heating blades…and such a thing was used to brand things like sheep. Sheep were branded. Wives weren’t branded…were they? He wouldn’t dare! She’d fight him! She didn’t fight well, though. She was worse than clay in his hands. Despite her imagination and the cold water that felt like it was filling her veins, replacing the blood that should be there, Lisle colored. She didn’t fight him well, at all.
She should have kept to herself. She knew, without asking, that he knew she’d been in the chapel this morning. She knew his plot. She was going to be punished. Or…she shouldn’t have spoken to Angus. She should have stayed out of it. She should have stayed in ignorance. She should have stayed in her room, and never snuck about his castle.
Langston looked her way and frowned slightly. “Something bother you, sweet?” he asked.
You. She answered it in her mind. And what you’re going to do. She shook her head. Her tongue wasn’t working for anything other than adding to her misery by giving her a mouthful of spittle she couldn’t force her throat to swallow.
His lips twitched, and then he was raising his hand to push the kilt band that was across his left shoulder away, revealing a lot of blood on his shirt. He was cursing, too, softly and viciously. The chest band of his sett dropped to his side, held in place by his belt, and then it wasn’t held at all, as he unclasped the belt and let it fall to the floor with a thud of sound. He didn’t help the plaide fall off. He didn’t need to. Lisle watched as green and gold material unwound itself from his frame and joined the belt at his ankles.
Lisle already had both hands to her mouth. It was to stop the sound at seeing him, and then it was to stop the disappointment. He was wearing a shirt of broadcloth and the ends of it curved to midthigh. He had wonderful, full-muscled thighs, she noted, and they were especially visual as he stepped from the pile of clothing he’d just made. He glanced her way and stalled for a moment, in perfect statue form. It had to be obvious what was on her face, because his lips went into a smile he was trying not to make and he looked away, while two spots of color touched the tops of his cheeks.
Lisle made a strangled noise and turned her back on him. It helped control the burn of her blush and confuse it with anger. He had no right to be so beautiful! None. No man should be as gifted. The black hair was striking enough, especially with the way he kept his jaw clean-shaven of any beard. The ale color of his eyes was another striking feature, as was such handsomeness that women had probably swooned over it well before she almost did. There was no excuse for adding to his handsomeness by creating such a muscled physique. That was totally unfair! And it was unfair of him to show it so easily to any woman…even if she was his wife and watching him with such speechless admiration on her entire frame that he flushed over it!
She heard material ripping and her back clenched. She heard the swish of cloth as it moved, followed by the sound of his movement. Her shoulders and neck joined the fray with her back, stiffening before he could reach her. She knew he was coming. Then, she heard the sound of rocks moving, followed by a hissing noise that was immediately pursued by a sharp intake of breath, one that came with his groan attached. Lisle glanced over her shoulder. He was sitting in the chair he hadn’t peppered with weapons, and he was branding himself!
She wasn’t far away, but the walk took forever. Then, she was at his side and on her knees, her eyes filling with tears as he held the blade to his shoulder. He had unbuttoned his shirt to his waist and peeled it off his left shoulder, proving where the ripping noise had come from since he’d torn the material in the process, and also showing why there was so much blood, and it just kept trickling out as she watched.
“Oh, Lang…ston,” she said, splitting his name into two syllables with a sobbing sound between them.
“Lisle,” he said finally, in a gruff tone.
“Aye?” she asked, lifting her eyes to his.
“You canna’ coddle a young warrior, either,” he told her. He was moving the cooled blade away and dropping it, where it fell soundlessly to the pile he’d already made. He didn’t move his gaze from hers as he did it.
Then he narrowed his eyes, blackening them and shutting her out. Such a thing had her moving her hands, clasping them together, and then plunging them against her breast where her own flesh moved to allow them the space. It didn’t help. Everything was hurting, and it was emanating from the spot her hands were pushing into.
Langston grabbed up another blade and held it against his shoulder, tensing everything along his entire frame to absorb what had to be agony. He didn’t make a sound this time. The tears slid from her eyes, coated her cheeks, and dropped from there to the ball of her conjoined hands.
He dropped the other skean, let go of the tenseness, and allowed himself to fall back against the chair. He didn’t say a thing. He had his eyes closed, his lips pursed as he breathed shallowly, and there was more than one line creasing his forehead.
Lisle dropped her view to his wound. It was black and red and angry-looking, with a line of white flesh encircling it. There wasn’t a sign of fresh bleeding.
“You’re hurt,” Lisle said.
“’Tis but a scratch,” he answered the air, since he hadn’t opened his eyes and would have been looking more toward the beams above them than anywhere else.
“What happened?” she asked.
“I got careless.”
“You fight your own men? Must you be so stupid?”
A smile touched his lips, moving them out of the kissable look he held them in. “Nae, and nae,” he replied.
“I doona’ ken you,” Lisle said to that.
“I’m na’ fighting my own men…or at least, they weren’t at the time, and nae, I am na’ that stupid.”
“You go about with an untended wound, acting like ’tis naught, and call yourself smart?” she asked.
It was definitely a smile. Lisle watched as his lips curved, then went back to a pout.
“I did have it tended when it happened…well, shortly after, anyway. And I had excellent care. I pay the best surgeons, you know.”
“Then why is it you have to tend it yourself now?”
He opened his eyes to slits and moved his jaw down prior to rolling his head toward where she still knelt. “Because they seared the opening, na’ the sides. Such a method requires time to heal. I dinna’ give it time.”
“So you had to seal both sides, which will make a wicked scar.”
He nodded.
“Because both sides were
bleeding too much to keep it secret, and it was getting too painful to do your business without someone knowing you get hurt, too. You bleed. You’re not invincible.”
“You ken this?”
She nodded. “I had brothers.”
He grinned. “I keep forgetting. What else do you ken?”
“That such a wound would need searing to stop the bleeding only if it was deep.”
He shrugged by lifting his right shoulder. “It was deep. Is that what you wish to hear?”
“It was nae scratch, was it?” Lisle replied, innocently.
He shook his head, rolling it along the back of his chair with the motion.
“Then, you lied to me,” she said.
His lips held the smile for a moment, then let it out. “I always lie. I live a lie. Haven’t you listened to a thing I’ve said to you?”
“I’ve listened. I just doona’ believe my ears anymore, though.”
“Truly?”
“Aye. I’ve found something better.”
“And what would that be?” he asked.
She moved her hands away from where they were clasped between her breasts and put them on her knees. “Trust,” she whispered.
“Trust,” he replied. “Good word. Harsh. Full of meaning. That word contains too much, means too much, and can destroy too much. It is too deep. Much like this wound of mine.”
Lisle moved her hands away from where they were holding to her knees and wiped at the residue of tears on her face. “You can trust me,” she replied.
“I know,” he answered.
Those two words sent such a vicious spate of joy running through her, Lisle felt she could easily float about the chamber and wouldn’t need any beam. Then it stopped, crashing about her and making it feel like it hurt her ears with the sound of it—much like breaking glass.
“Then, why doona’ you?” she asked in a little voice.
He sighed heavily. He didn’t move his gaze from hers. “Because you are too full of joy and love and compassion and everything that is light in this world. I’ve never come across one who breathes, eats, sleeps, and exudes such emotion. You’re vivid with all that is light and life and bliss. One can reach out and sense it…” He put out a hand toward her. “One can almost feel it, just by being near you. It drew me the moment I saw you. It still does.”
