IntoEternity

by Christina James

  Imogen watched him go, knowing they would meet again and not under such civil conditions. He would regret throwing her aside as if she was some used-up old whore riddled with disease and easily dismissed. Her smile was cold and evil as her mind worked on a scheme of revenge. Her dear Bart would soon learn he had made the biggest mistake of his life. Sweet revenge would be hers after all of these years and she was ready to embrace it.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Gusty cursed long and fluently in both Gaelic and English at her bad luck. In fact she hadn’t cursed just once, she cursed every hour of every day she found herself stuck at court without Alexander.

  When she rode away from the Ross keep with the king’s guardsmen, Gusty expected Alexander to follow her to court. But when she arrived she found he had been given no time to come to her but was sent straight into battle by the king’s command. Shocked and filled with disbelief she’d demanded to be escorted to her husband at once. The guard had looked at her as if she had lost her marbles, bowed low and murmured phrases of concern for her poor female disposition. He then instructed her that he was to present her to the king immediately. She did not even have time to clean up from the long ride and she was covered in dirt and smelled of horse sweat.

  Her audience with the king of Scotland did not turn out to be anything like she had imagined. The whole interview was abrupt and over quickly. Edgar was a busy man, after all, and he was in the process of organizing his loyal retainers to join the northern clans so he could only afford her a short audience before leaving.

  When she entered the great hall he was seated on the dais, obviously waiting for her to approach. His piercing blue eyes made her nervous and her knees were literally shaking as she came to stand in front of him. He was indeed a formidable man. Only after she found herself facing him did she remember to make a deep curtsy.

  From his raised chair, Edgar looked down upon her as she bowed low before him. He motioned for her to rise and she did so, a little uncertain of what was expected.

  “You are the image of your mother, dear girl, when she was your age. She is still a very beautiful woman even in her prime. A shame her father cast her into that convent. Perhaps the day will come when your father has more say in the matter of her residency.” He shrugged his shoulders. “In the meantime, you will make a lovely addition to my court. My servants will see to your needs.”

  His familial comparison shocked Gusty to the core. She had thought her parentage unknown to anyone but her immediate family. “You know who my parents are, Sire?”

  “Aye, lass, I know your mother and your father.”

  Edgar surprised her even further by winking at her without noticeably changing his regal expression. He stood and walked down the steps past her and out of the hall to join his entourage of men who awaited his command. Clearly their brief meeting was over but she was left with the distinct impression her life had just been irrevocably altered forever. She had not even had the opportunity to ask him about her husband and their situation.

  She discovered after he had left her that the king had gone to join the Highland lairds who had gathered their clansmen in a call to arms. What had started as a small skirmish between a contingency of Viking traders and local clansmen had escalated into a full-fledged war when the Viking invaders had attacked several coastal settlements, claiming the territory as their own. Messengers were dispatched to all Edgar’s loyal followers and every available man had been recruited to his cause.

  This news left Gusty sick at heart. She hated to think of Alexander fighting in a battle miles away while she was left to wait for any scrap of news that happened to filter back, whether good or bad. In this barbaric time, peace was precious and war was a way of life. The Highlanders were proud warriors and they were not about to stand by and let raiders from the North Sea invade their shores again.

  She had always been fascinated by stories of Viking migration throughout the known world. At her brother’s urgings she had taken several courses in world history while she attended college. Michael had always been obsessed with European history, especially that of medieval England and Scotland. Now she understood why. This was an exciting time, a colorful time, a brutal time.

  She had seen what Hollywood had done to make those stories come to life on the big screen, all the screaming and dying, blood and gore and severed limbs lying everywhere. Those were not images she wanted to dwell upon. If movies were anything to go by, the battle between the Highland clans and the Norsemen would be no picnic in the park. And that thought had her faint with worry. Not only would Alexander be in danger but her father and even Donovan Ross were also fighting the Vikings. And, she thought with a wry smile, even her Grandfather MacKay would be out there. He impressed her as a wily old villain who couldn’t be kept from a good fight.

  As one day followed the next, Gusty came to learn more and more about what life was really like in a medieval court. Their day-to-day activities and customs were in no way what she had expected. She had always thought a royal court would be full of lavishly costumed people, amusing discourse and deep intrigue. But she found little of those things. Edgar’s parents, Margaret and Malcolm III, had tried to implement English dress and customs to the courts of Scotland. But after their deaths—and following the reign of two more kings—things had regressed back to the Celtic traditions and only a hint of the English customs remained.

  The castle itself was small, though well built for the time period, with myriad corridors and dozens of small room on ground level, mostly servants’ quarters, storerooms and kitchens. The second floor housed the great hall and two huge staircases leading up to the third floor where the women’s solar and sleep quarters of the royal family were situated. On the whole, it was elegantly furnished but still not as impressive as her imagination had visualized. Both the Sutherland keep and the Ross keep were just as well appointed even if they were a good deal smaller, evidence Edgar did not hold all the wealth in the land and depended on his loyal subjects for their financial gifts and support.

  Life in the confinement of the everyday court verged on being deathly boring. There were no lavish celebrations and few amusements other than storytelling and singing by the resident troubadour or an occasional traveling minstrel. The ladies spent most days in the solar, gossiping with one another over their embroidery and needlework. Some of the more talented spent their afternoons painting and still others sat in the walled garden just to get out in the fresh air.

  Servants and the castle guard—a large number of fighting men left behind to guard the king’s “treasures”—made up most of the castle’s population. Edgar had never married but he found himself the royal guardian of many young boys and a bevy of females of all ages. Some of the children were orphans but many had been sent to the royal court at King Edgar’s “request”. These young people were in fact royal hostages, the king’s leverage to keep their sires in line to his way of thinking.

  Gusty was such a hostage. She’d been ordered to stay at court until Edgar was satisfied her father had come to terms with her being handfasted to Alexander. Gusty had learned through gossip that her own father had petitioned Edgar to take her in until he was satisfied she had made the best choice. If she’d had Malcolm Sinclair within her grasp when she discovered his deceit, she would have run him through with his own sword. How dare he interfere with her life? Even if she had agreed to do what her father wished and consider another choice for her husband, most of the young candidates had gone off to war so her father’s plotting had come to naught. Nothing was going to happen until the fighting ended and the men came home. Even Alexander was not available to her.

  It was a sobering thought that all the men she had come to care for in this time were away fighting a battle in which every last one of them could easily be killed at any turn. Fortunately she did not have much time to ponder on her misery. With all the young women who lived in the castle there was always someone to keep her company so Gusty was very rarely alone.

&n
bsp; Even so she had a hard time ignoring the aching emptiness in her chest, which grew as the long days turned into long weeks. She missed Alexander more every day but the nights were the hardest for her to bear. She spent most of them sitting in the middle of her big bed, unable to sleep as her thoughts went to her beloved and the short time they’d had together, reliving every detail in her mind. During this time she realized just how much she really loved him.

  When Gusty had first been shown to these rooms she had been duly impressed with the size of the high bed and the large fireplace. Her few belongings were stored away in the chests arranged against one wall and a polished-steel mirror hung above a small dressing table against another.

  When she found out she was also to acquire a new wardrobe by command of the king, she was overwhelmed. It had never occurred to her that as a ward of the court she would be dealt with in such a royal way. The first few days were hectic for her. She found herself being bustled from seamstresses to cobblers as the royal housekeeper ordered bolts of materials to be made into gowns and wraps, and soft, pliant leather be turned into slippers and boots. It took hours of fittings to get the wardrobe finished but they were hours well spent as the activity kept her mind off Alexander’s absence. By the end of her first mouth in the royal residence, Gusty was the owner of a magnificent wardrobe the likes of which she never could have dreamed.

  She was thankful for the new gowns when she made her first appearance in the great hall for an evening meal. She had thought the dresses Alexander had provided for her lovely but she’d left them all behind at Sutherland Keep when Alexander had taken her to the abbey. There she had worn the simple gowns provided by the nuns.

  Those gowns were rags compared to the garments created for her here. She had not appeared in the great hall until her first dress had been sewn and delivered to her. She wasn’t vain but in this new world she needed all the confidence she could gather to face the unknown realities that battered her senses every day. She made it through those first few weeks with her morale intact and she began to feel more at ease in her new environment.

  By the end of the second month Gusty began taking long naps every afternoon. At first she did not understand her exhaustion. She thought maybe the long, tiresome weeks she had spent being dragged about the Highland countryside had finally caught up with her. But it did not take her long to figure out that a different type of exhaustion plagued her. Her body was changing and along with the depression and loneliness she felt, those changes began to take their toll on her.

  Gusty worried constantly about Alexander. She prayed daily for his safe return. But that did not keep the long days and endless nights from turning into longer weeks and those weeks soon turned into months. Her insomnia returned and she fell back into her old habit of walking the floor at night but she made up for it by sleeping for hours during the day.

  The previous day marked the six-month anniversary of her handfasting. Six months since they had made love for the first time, four months since Gusty had kissed Alexander goodbye and rode away, never to see him again. She sat on the window seat in her chamber, dreaming of the day he would walk through the door, take her into his arms and kiss her breathless, promising to never leave her again.

  Via the gossip she acquired through Violet and her trusted little spy, Duncan, Gusty learned a few bits and pieces of news that were not at all encouraging. If the reports were correct, it would be many more months before any of their men returned home from the north.

  Gusty sighed and stared out the window at the mountains in the distance until the sound of the door opening behind her brought her out of her reverie. Clomping footsteps moved briskly across the room and she turned to face her visitor.

  “What shall we do today, Duncan?” Gusty asked from her seat at the window.

  “You promised to teach me a new language.” Duncan fairly danced across the room in his excitement, perching himself upon the seat beside her. He always acted more adult than child when he sought to comfort her. But she had gotten to know him in these many months past and she recognized the lonely little boy in him—one who was in need of a loving hand and caring heart. Duncan missed his mother and father terribly.

  “All right, it is a very simple language to learn,” Gusty began.

  “Is it the language you were speaking when we first met?”

  His question took her by surprise. He’d never before mentioned the first time they had met in the forest on Ross land.

  “Well no, it is not that language but if you would like, I will teach you to speak English better as well.”

  “All right. But what will you teach me now?”

  “It is called Pig Latin.” She suppressed a smile at the little boy’s expression.

  “Pig Latin? Are you going to teach me how to grunt and snort then?” Duncan’s laughter filled the room and he nearly rolled off the bench as he clutched his sides and roared his hilarity, apparently thinking she was joking with him.

  “No, my lad, Pig Latin is a little more complicated than that. I know it sounds ridiculous but it is a language people use when they are trying to disguise what they are saying from others who don’t also know Pig Latin. It is a secret language really.”

  Her words had him sobering up and he leaned toward her. She smiled at his sudden earnestness.

  “Teach me!” he demanded.

  “All right but you must pay attention.”

  At his nod she continued.

  “Take the first letter of each word and put it at the end of the word then add an ay sound.” At his confused expression she demonstrated. “Your name would be uncan-Day, my name would be usty-Gay and Violet would be iolet-Vay.”

  Quick to pick up on new things Duncan nodded and then after a few more practice words he quickly absorbed how this new language worked. His brow furrowed as he ran through a dozen words, changing them into the new tongue. He stopped suddenly and frowned.

  “What if you have a word like aye?”

  “Then you just leave it how it is and put the ay at the end…aye-Ay.”

  They both laughed at how silly the word sounded.

  “en-Whay o-day ou-yay ink-thay lexander-Aay ill-way ome-cay ack-bay?” He asked, slowly stumbling through the words and sounding out each one.

  Gusty’s smile vanished and her heart thumped painfully at his question. She found it hard to swallow past the lump that had formed in her throat.

  “Soon I hope, Duncan. Very soon.” Her gaze dimmed as moisture began to form in her eyes. She opened them wide to keep the tears from spilling and smiled whimsically. “Perhaps you should go practice your new language and then later today we can have a long conversation in Pig Latin.”

  “All right. I will see you later, Gusty.”

  As careful as she was to hide her tears Gusty noticed Duncan glancing back over his shoulder as he paused at the door. She waited until she heard him leave before she raised her hand and wiped the tears that dribbled down her cheek. She heaved a heavy sigh and prayed Alexander would come for them soon. With every passing day she found it harder to believe they would ever see each other again. Perhaps he had changed his mind in his long absence. Perhaps while fighting the Vikings in the north he had found someone new and more appealing and he might never come back for her. The thought made her instantly heartsick and then she realized what she was doing and scolded herself for her foolishness. She placed her hand over her abdomen in a protective manner. How could she even consider something so outrageous? Alexander loved her. She had to keep faith in that if nothing else. He loved her.

  To take her mind off the loneliness of her heart Gusty set about preparing for her descent to take the evening meal in the great hall. A few days had passed since she had last felt well enough to eat in the company of others. She hoped she could make it through this evening without incident. If Black Bart Sutherland was still away on whatever affairs he was about, his bitchy little mistress would most likely keep to her room and remain absent from the hall. The woman di
d her best to wreak as much havoc as she could whenever she appeared below stairs.

  Gusty looked forward to visiting with Katherine and Bernadine, two of the new acquaintances she had made since she arrived. Surprisingly enough the two sisters had turned out to be Black Bart’s daughters. She could not imagine what woman would have the man in her bed. She had heard rumors that the two young women were actually his bastard daughters. It made no difference to her. They were both sweet and had been the first ones to show her true friendship. But then again they had not been raised by their parent. They had been made wards of the court as very young girls and were now betrothed to two of the king’s favorite knights, both of whom had accompanied their liege lord to the northern skirmish.

  Violet entered the bedchamber and began to help Gusty prepare for dinner. It wasn’t a special occasion by any means but still there was a certain amount of decorum and formality they needed to adhere to when invited to eat at the king’s table, even if he wasn’t in residence. As she brushed and tamed Gusty’s wild curls into a long, fat plait that reached to her waist, Violet used now-familiar hand signals to inform Gusty that Maeve and Hagen had returned from their latest secretive excursion. Gusty knew the elderly couple had a few odd quirks and had a tendency to disappear at the strangest times during the years she lived with them but their strangeness had increased in this century. Her “grandparents” had been so quiet and predictable in all her years growing up but they had turned into regular gypsies. They never seemed to have time to stay when they did come to visit her. They would disappear as suddenly as they appeared to pursue one of their covert escapades. It would indeed be good to see them once again. She was anxious to find out if they had taken her suggestion and helped to find a wife for Donovan—a woman who would win his respect and eventually his love. She must remember to ask if they had found a likely candidate.