My Highland Warrior (Warriors of the Highlands Book 1)

by Miriam Minger

  Richly colored tapestries upon the walls and thick rugs upon the floor.

  Intricately carved furnishings that looked as if fashioned by the finest artisans, including the massive bed where she lay with its goose down pillows and soft blankets.

  Laird Gabriel MacLachlan’s bedchamber on the third floor of the keep, or so those women had told her.

  Not a small dank room in one of the towers at all, a glance at the pair of narrow windows telling her that dusk was falling outside.

  Sighing softly as exhaustion overwhelmed her, Magdalene settled down into the plump mattress, pulled the covers up to her chin and fell blessedly asleep.

  Chapter 7

  “What news of my valiant warrior MacLachlan and his crazed bride?” Seoras demanded of the mud-splattered messenger who bowed deeply before him. “Home again in Argyllshire?”

  “Aye, Earl Seoras, they returned this afternoon.” The young man straightened and shuffled his feet nervously as if fearing some censure. “I would have ridden here faster, but the lashing rain slowed my progress…terrible lightning and thunder the entire way—”

  “Delightful, a storm tae dampen my sister’s screams. No doubt she didna take kindly tae her husband exercising his marital rights—the wretched lunatic. First my mother and then Magdalene, both of them driven mad by grief. Did you ever hear of such a ridiculous thing tae succumb tae insanity over a death? Death is everywhere, day and night!” Seoras leaned forward in his massive chair to glare at the messenger. “You could have slid into a ravine and broken your neck! Leave me and take your feeble excuses with you!”

  The messenger did, his face grown so pale that the mud splotching his forehead and cheeks stood out in stark relief. Seoras waved for serving maids to bring more wine to fill his courtiers’ cups, the rowdy lot of them hurling curses and insults at the young man as he fled from the cavernous hall.

  “Drink up! We’re celebrating a bedding this night—unless MacLachlan grew impatient and took her in the woods on the way home! I’d wager he had tae bind Mad Maggie tae the bedposts before he plowed her—what do you say?”

  Drunken shouts and raucous laughter greeted his coarse query. Och, how he loved the sound of his courtiers’ acclamation!

  The stamping of feet grew louder, brimming cups raised high in the air, which made Seoras drink, too. With one long swallow, wine spilling down his chin and staining his reddish-blond beard, he toasted his successful coup against Gabriel MacLachlan.

  Seoras had brought him to heel, humbled him, and humiliated him by making him wed a madwoman in exchange for gold—Gabriel’s long-expected request having played right into Seoras’s hands.

  He had been surprised that Gabriel had lasted the winter before coming to beg for coin—yet everything had worked together so perfectly! Now Seoras owned him, Gabriel’s allegiance ensured forever by his marriage to Magdalene. A ruler couldn’t risk his barons becoming too powerful…especially when he had never known the respect as that held by Gabriel.

  “Damn him,” Seoras muttered, sickened by that thought, which had haunted him since long before he’d become earl to the MacDougall clan seven months ago. He was puke green with jealousy, he knew it, Gabriel’s captains—Cameron and Conall Campbell, Alun MacSorley, and Finlay MacLachlan—filled with more undying loyalty for Gabriel than Seoras would ever know from his entire people.

  That fact could have made Gabriel extremely dangerous to him, but the problem had been solved. The worrying dilemma overcome by a masterful series of moves—starting with eliminating Malcolm MacLachlan early last autumn in what had appeared an unfortunate tumble from his horse.

  His neck broken, aye, so it had looked, but instead forcefully half twisted from his shoulders by one of Seoras’s henchmen was more the truth of it.

  “You’re a genius,” he muttered, congratulating himself with another long draught of wine.

  The task had been made all the easier by Malcolm being such an incompetent fool. Gabriel would by far have been the better man to inherit MacLachlan Castle upon their father’s death, but such was the destiny of younger sons without title or wealth to fend for themselves by taking up arms or becoming bound to the Church as priests.

  If Gabriel hadn’t been away for so long, fighting other men’s battles, he might have become aware sooner of Malcolm emptying the family’s coffers on extravagant purchases of furnishings, fine clothing and the like, and ignoring his fiscal duties. Upon learning of his brother’s death, he had been granted dismissal from Seoras’s service, no doubt believing himself free of any further obligation so he might tend to all that he’d inherited.

  Instead Gabriel had returned home with his four loyal captains accompanying him to find the castle in disrepair, his people near starving, and little coin left to rectify matters—oh, aye, Seoras couldn’t have set the stage any better!

  “More wine!” he shouted, eying a comely lass with big, bouncing breasts beneath her tight blue tunic who rushed to oblige him. He felt himself grow hard as she bent over his cup, a saucy smile upon her rosy lips that he knew was a blatant invitation.

  Yet he didn’t need any blasted invitations! He was earl of the MacDougalls and could take what he wanted, whenever he wanted! He reached down and grabbed hold of her ample bottom and gave her a good squeeze—

  “I pity Magdalene.”

  Seoras glanced at his wife sitting beside him even as the serving maid squealed and giggled, though with one irritated gesture, he sent her skittering away.

  Cora MacDougall, formerly a Campbell, sat as pale as a nun in her somber black gown and met Seoras’s narrowed gaze with barely concealed disdain—no, not a wife, but a curse!

  “Keep your voice down, woman,” he said tersely, though she merely straightened her narrow shoulders and kept staring at him. “You’ll dampen the festivities with such talk—”

  “And you should be ashamed for what you’ve done tae your sister…and tae me—making me suffer from your constant humiliation. The very least you could do is refrain from your whoring until after I leave the hall.”

  “Then go, will you?” Seoras spat out, wanting so badly to slap her wan cheek but not daring to, never daring to.

  The Campbells were becoming too powerful a clan, even though for years they had been kept subdued by the MacDougalls’ dominance in Argyll. Seoras didn’t want to jeopardize the alliance he had gained by taking Cora as his bride when he’d become earl.

  She was a first cousin to their chief after all, and to Cameron and Conall, Gabriel’s men both younger sons of a younger son—those damned Campbells forever rutting like rabbits!

  No, Seoras must endure her disapproval and contempt, which had dampened his jovial mood like a dousing of ice-cold water that no amount of wine would cure.

  “Magdalene’s lucky tae have found a landed husband instead of rotting away in that convent,” he added, tempering his tone in an attempt to soothe her. “I’ve provided for her welfare as any brother would be expected tae do for an unfortunate sister—”

  “You would have done better tae leave her well enough alone like your father did. Tae think how she must be suffering tonight, and yet here, you’re celebrating it! Not a wedding night in her hapless condition, but an assault—ah, God, it sickens me!”

  “No more than our wedding night sickened me,” Seoras muttered as Cora rose abruptly from the table, the stiffening of her shoulders telling him that she had heard him.

  “I bid you good night, husband.”

  “Good night, wife.”

  His courtiers all rose drunkenly from their benches as Cora hastened from the great hall, clearly affronted, her spine ramrod straight and her chin held high. Seoras couldn’t help thinking that she looked like a scrawny crow with her long black hair and black garb fluttering behind her.

  His beloved wife—ha!

  Their union at Christmas had been nothing more than another step toward his plan to become king of Scotland, for surely the Campbells would support him. How could they not? They
were related by marriage and Gabriel was related by marriage. Too bad Seoras didn’t have more lunatic sisters to further cement his claim to the throne.

  Now all he had to do was slay Robert the Bruce, MacDougall scouts keeping watch all over Argyllshire and further east, deep into the Highlands for the elusive bastard. That false king might have managed thus far to elude his many opponents, harrying them and winning small victories here and there, but with time, he would be crushed.

  By Seoras. He could already feel the crown of Scotland settled upon his brow amid pomp and circumstance and the blessing of the Church. His ascent to the throne was virtually assured!

  “Tae Mad Maggie!” shouted a courtier, the stout fellow climbing atop a table to hold his cup high.

  As the hall erupted in a deafening din of laughter and ribald jokes, Seoras, too, raised his cup, his jubilant mood thankfully returning.

  “Tae my sister, Mad Maggie!”

  “Ah, God!” Magdalene sat bolt upright in the bed at the crash of thunder that seemed to rock the castle.

  Brilliant flashes of lightning illuminated the room. Lashing rain beat at the windows while the sputtering fire sizzled and sparked at the raindrops finding their way down from the chimney.

  For a moment she thought herself back in her room at the convent, as she’d been dreaming when she was awoken so abruptly, but she had only to look around her to shatter that fantasy.

  No modest single bed like the one she had left behind, covered so neatly with blankets and quilts sewn by the nuns—but a monstrosity big enough for six people!

  Aye, the mattress was wondrously comfortable, the rich coverings soft to the touch and the pillows plump, but it wasn’t where she wanted to be—no, not at all.

  It would take eight of her rooms to fill just this one, the bedchamber so large that she felt very small in it, sitting there looking around her. Another crash of thunder made her jump and gasp, but it was nothing to her sharp intake of breath when the door suddenly burst open and a tiny figure in white came running toward her.

  “Mama!”

  Magdalene watched in amazement as Rhona, sobbing, reached out her chubby arms to her, which made her clamber from the bed in alarm. “Och, child, what’s this now?”

  She got no answer other than Rhona flinging her arms around Magdalene’s knees as another clap of thunder made the floor seem to shake, the little girl squealing in terror.

  At once Magdalene swept her up to hold her close, Rhona’s slight body shaking from head to foot. “Where’s your nurse? Where’s your sister, Keira?”

  “I-I dinna know, Mama. I ran here tae find you…”

  “Shh…shh, find me you did,” Magdalene murmured, rubbing Rhona’s back to soothe her. “Come on, it’s warmer in the bed.”

  With the child clinging to her as if she would never let her go, Magdalene climbed back onto the bed and covered both of them with what felt like a mountain of blankets. Only then did she wince at the pain in her ribs; funny, that she wouldn’t have felt a thing until now. She had been so concerned about Rhona, poor wee thing…

  With an innate sense of what must be done to calm her, Magdalene began to rock her gently and coo into her ear.

  “There, there, all is well. It’s only some nasty thunder and some rain…I dinna like it, either, but it will pass soon, I promise.”

  Grateful that Rhona’s trembling had quieted as well as her tears no matter the storm still blustered outside, Magdalene wiped damp curls from the child’s cheek and lowered her head to kiss her forehead. Yet she didn’t stop rocking or cooing, not words so much as soothing sounds, until the tiny body relaxed and went limp against her, Rhona falling asleep.

  Magdalene felt so sleepy again, too, mayhap the warmth of the child in her arms easing her worries that people might be looking for her.

  What was she to do? If she moved, Rhona might wake and start crying again, and she didn’t want that to happen.

  Instead, Magdalene decided to keep her eyes trained across the room, for surely someone would see the door pushed open and come inside to look—

  “Sweet Jesu…” Magdalene had barely whispered the words, so stunned to see a towering shape in the doorway that she knew at once was Gabriel.

  How long had he been standing there? Surely not long! She hadn’t noticed him a moment before. Oh, no, had he heard her speaking to Rhona as any mother might to a frightened child? Was her ruse of lunacy discovered?

  Wide-eyed and scarcely breathing, Magdalene watched as he took a step into the room, and then another, quietly as if he feared waking her…waking the child. Oh, please, may he have just come upon them and thought she and Rhona were both sleeping!

  “Laird Gabriel! Och, forgive me—”

  “Quiet, Grania!”

  Through slitted eyes, Magdalene could see that a stout older woman had appeared in the doorway only to be shushed at once by Gabriel’s fierce whispers.

  “Look there! You can see that Rhona is safe and asleep—”

  “But she’s a madwoman, Laird!” hissed the woman, wringing her hands, though Gabriel stepped backward with her to the door. “I turned my back for only a moment tae stoke the fire and the child slipped like a wraith from the room.”

  “What about Keira?”

  “Still sleeping, storm or no. Nothing wakes that one.”

  “Good, then return tae her. I’ll be right across the hall—”

  “In the storage closet, Laird?”

  “There’s room enough for a cot, Grania, no more questions,” came Gabriel’s impatient aside, and not as low as before. “Go now. You’ve been nurse tae enough bairns all these years, my father, Malcolm and myself, tae know when there’s danger afoot or not—and I’m telling you, they’re sleeping like two babes together.”

  Magdalene could tell from the woman’s heaved sigh that she still wasn’t convinced, but it was impossible to hear anything else as Gabriel and Grania moved further into the hall.

  That left Magdalene to take a deep slow breath to steady herself, her heartbeat so rampant in her breast that she feared Rhona might wake from the thundering against her ear.

  Instead, the child snuggled even closer and sighed so contentedly that Magdalene knew she needn’t have worried.

  She relaxed as best she could against the pillows, keeping her eyes closed and hugging Rhona…though she sensed for a good while until at last she fell sound asleep, too, that Gabriel stood just outside the door.

  Chapter 8

  “Dinna you hear me, Gabriel? It’s nearly noon! Will you waste the day away?”

  “What?” Still groggy from being awoken from so deep a sleep, Gabriel stared through blurred eyes at Finlay, who leaned over him. “Did you say noon?”

  “Aye, the men already training in the mud for much of the morning. The moat’s nearly half full from that fierce rain and all the fresh water barrels filled tae the brim. No excuse now for anyone not tae bathe away the stink of fighting—och, man, you could use a bath yourself! It’s ripe in here! Since when does the baron of the castle sleep in a storage room? That cot’s barely big enough for you—”

  “Enough, Finlay!” Groaning from sore muscles, Gabriel sat up and wiped his hands over his face. “I’ve a bride occupying my room across the hall, in case you’ve forgotten I’m wed now.”

  “Forgotten?” Finlay swore under his breath and shook his shaggy head. “We’ll have tae craft armor tae protect us from that one’s swift kicks—the lass nearly maimed me! It’s no surprise tae me that you wouldna want tae share a room with her after she did the same tae you. I meant, why didna you find yourself another place tae sleep instead of spending the night in here?”

  “It seemed the thing tae do,” Gabriel half muttered to himself, growing somewhat irritated by Finlay’s questions. More awake now, he looked up at his kinsman’s bearded face, Finlay eying him curiously. “What now? You’ve already said I slept too late, I stink, and I’ve taken refuge in a storage room. Is there aught else?”

  “Only t
hat it’s a pity she’s touched in the head. You’re taken with her, aye? Kicks tae the groin or no—”

  “She’s my wife. It’s my duty tae protect her,” Gabriel cut him off, Finlay’s keen observation not surprising from a man who had known him for his entire life. Aye, it was a pity—all of it a pity!

  His bargain with Seoras. The marriage by proxy. The unmistakable stirrings he felt whenever he looked at Magdalene—och, he didn’t have time to think of that now! He held out his hand and Finlay grabbed it, helping Gabriel with a low groan to his feet.

  “Your shoulder still plaguing you?”

  “Aye. Clovis has deemed me unfit for training if it’s ever tae heal properly—mayhap a week or more.”

  “Well, then, you’ll have time tae spend with your bonny bride so you can see if there’s any way tae reach her. She’s not like any lunatic I’ve ever seen before. Have you noticed that, Gabriel? Sometimes she gets a bold look in her eye that would make me swear she has her wits about her the same as you or I…”

  As if musing to himself, Finlay fell silent, which wasn’t like his outspoken cousin at all—and which made Gabriel wonder anew if Magdalene might have more possession of her wits than anyone imagined. How could he not question the depth of her madness after what he had seen last night during the thunderstorm?

  Rhona’s terrified sobbing had sent him lunging from the cot…his body bristling with alarm as she’d cried out “Mama!” and run straight into Magdalene’s arms.

  For tense moments he had feared for the child’s safety, not sure what his new wife would do, but nothing could have prepared him for her lucid inquiry into the whereabouts of Rhona’s nurse and Keira.

  Nothing could have prepared him for Magdalene scooping up the child and climbing with her into bed, where she soothed Rhona with rocking and gentle cooing.