Highland Hero

by Amanda Scott

  “Did ye see any of your old master’s men, Will?” Jamie asked when Aodán paused for breath.

  “Nary a one,” Will replied. “Mayhap he doesna want me back at all.”

  “A gey good thing that would be,” Jamie said.

  “Aodán, tell the others that we’ll ride to a clachan in the hills that boasts an alehouse,” Ivor said. “And send Sean Dubh to me. I have an errand for him.”

  Aodán hesitated, glancing at Marsi, Jamie, and Will. Then he said in the Gaelic, “Begging your pardon, sir. If you be sending him to Sir Fin, in Perth, do you think it wise to send only the one lad?”

  “Sean can look after himself,” Ivor replied in the same language. “I want to send two of the other lads to Lindores Abbey at Newburgh so they can arrange for a boat to meet us there or nearby, if need be.”

  “We have gey few men as it is,” Aodán said. “Your lord father—”

  “ ’Tis true that we’re a small band, Aodán. But that may aid us in the end, because no one would believe that so few men guard so important a charge. In troth, I can scarcely believe it myself and would feel more secure with an army.”

  “By your own reckoning, that would just call more attention to us,” Aodán said. “Forbye,” he added with a sigh, “Albany would just raise a larger one.”

  “Where are you sending Sean Dubh?” Marsi asked Ivor in Scots.

  “I’ll tell you later, lass,” he said, glancing at the two boys.

  Jamie and Will had moved a little away, but Marsi knew that they might well be listening avidly to all that they could hear and understand. Certainly, she would have done so at their age in like circumstances. In fact, by not telling Aodán and Ivor that she had understood them, she was doing the same thing now. But it served them right. It was rude to speak a language that they thought others did not speak.

  “Does the fact that we’re riding to Hetty’s wee clachan mean that you have changed your mind about going to Kincardine?” she asked Ivor.

  “Not yet,” he said. “If we can spend the night safely at that alehouse of hers, I’ll send Aodán and one of the others back to town in the morning to see if Albany’s men and the tanner’s have moved on. Sithee, to go by way of Kincardine Glen, as steep and narrow as you say it is, will take longer than keeping to the lower straths.”

  She could not argue that point. For all she knew, the glen would be stuffed full of snow. There was little left of the recent snowfall where they were. But the nearby hills still wore lacy caps of the stuff. As sheltered as Kincardine Glen was, all the snow that had fallen might still be just sitting there, blocking their way.

  Ivor told Sean Dubh to ride to MacGillivray House in Perth, relay their plans to Fin Cameron, and arrange for him to meet Ivor in three days’ time on the south side of the river Earn near a great bridge they knew from their days at St. Andrews.

  “Tell Fin to bring as many men as he can,” Ivor added. “He will not have traveled with more than his usual tail of six to house in the town of Perth. But he should gather as many others as he can.”

  He also sent two of their four men-at-arms to Lindores Abbey with a message for the abbot to forward to Jake Maxwell. After that, they had only to pack up the little debris from their meal and find the hill track that Hetty remembered.

  The track was little more than a deer trail wending its way up through the thickly forested hills, and Ivor, well aware that their passage would make the trail more noticeable, told Aodán to have one of his two remaining men-at-arms fall back and do what he could to minimize evidence of their passage.

  Dusk had fallen by the time they reached their destination. The clachan consisted of four thatched cottages and a barn set amidst a scattering of trees in the otherwise dense forest. Much the largest of the four cottages was the alehouse.

  When Ivor wondered aloud how such an establishment could support itself, lying as far as it did from Blackford or any well-traveled road, Hetty explained that the alemaster made his living primarily from late spring through early fall.

  “Fishermen stay with him regularly to fish nearby streams more easily,” she said. “As I recall, he boasts three wee bedchambers at the top of the house. So, if they have anyone else staying here, we will find ourselves in gey close quarters.”

  The alewife bustled out to the tiny yard when they rode into it and exclaimed joyfully at the sight of Hetty and Marsi. Professing herself astonished to see the latter, she added that the two boys could not possibly be the lady Marsi’s.

  Marsi, recognizing the plump, middle-aged woman at once as an erstwhile maidservant at Kincardine, said, “Nay, Martha, the lads are in Sir Ivor’s charge. But it is gey good to see you again! I hope that you and all here are well.”

  “Aye, sure, m’lady. Sir Ivor must be your husband, then,” Martha said.

  Noting Hetty’s wry smile, Marsi was able to think of only one way to keep all of her own options open. Praying that she could trust Sir Ivor not to take base advantage of what she would say, she cautiously slipped her ring from her middle finger to the next one as she said, “Aye, Martha. He is a Highlander, and we are but newly wed. However, since you have so few bedchambers for guests, you must put Hetty and me together in one and let the boys share another with Sir Ivor. That way, you will still keep your third chamber for anyone else who might come.”

  “Bless ye, m’lady, I canna do that!” Martha exclaimed, laughing. “We ha’ nae one here save our own folk. We’ll put Sir Ivor’s men in the barn loft wi’ our three lads, and them boys in a room by themselves if Hetty thinks they can behave so. Then, she can ha’ a room tae herself, whilst ye sleep as ye should wi’ your husband.”

  Marsi wanted to insist that she need do no such thing. But, before she could think of an acceptable way to say so to the beaming alewife, Ivor put an arm around her shoulders and said politely, “You have my thanks, Mistress Martha.”

  “I’m sure I do, sir,” Martha said, twinkling at him. “Folks hereabouts do call me Mistress Muir, though. Me man be Calum Muir.”

  “Then we shall call you so as well,” Ivor said, urging Marsi forward as he did. “If you will just take us to our rooms, I would be privy with my lady.”

  Shouting for someone named Jem, Martha soon had them settled in rooms they entered from a wooden, railed gallery overlooking the common room. The rooms were small but looked more comfortable than Marsi had expected them to be.

  The only one that did not feel comfortable was their own bedchamber when Ivor shut the door and turned to face her. He kept both of his hands behind him, as if he did not trust himself to keep from shaking her.

  Having not known what to expect from him after her second declaration of their marriage but certain that his reaction must range somewhere between stern censure and outright wrath—more likely leaning nearer the latter than the former—she was astonished when he revealed no expression at all.

  Then she heard the bolt on the door snap home behind him.

  Tremors shot through her but whether from fear or excitement, she could not tell. Every nerve in her body began to hum as if in preparation to react strongly, one way or the other. Then, despite her warm, fur-lined cloak, a near chill swept over her and spread inward to her bones.

  “I… mayhap I should not have…” She paused to lick suddenly dry lips.

  “Should not have what?” he said, taking a purposeful step toward her.

  She would have stepped back… She was sure that she wanted to step back. But her feet had stuck to the floor.

  Her skin prickled. She was breathing rapidly, and she could feel her heart pounding in her chest. Sakes, she could hear it!

  He gripped her left shoulder, and she felt herself jump. It was as if she stood outside her body, watching him touch her, watching herself react to his touch.

  Her heart beat faster, sending fiery heat through her. But her face felt numb.

  Demo version limitation

  Chapter 16

  Ivor carried his and Marsi’s things out t
o the barn, where he found Aodán brushing one of the horses. Quickly explaining the situation and learning that neither of their other two men had shown his face, let alone reported riders, Ivor handed the bundles to Aodán for the sumpters and began bridling Marsi’s horse.

  “If Will could see riders,” he said, “surely one of our men would have, too.”

  “Ye’d think so, aye,” Aodán said as he shouted for help to ready their other horses. “Mayhap someone surprised them. Should I send someone to have a look?”

  “Send one of Muir’s lads,” Ivor said. “We must warn them that trouble may come. Marsi and Mistress Hetty will come with us, so I want you to look after Hetty, the baggage, and the other horses. I’ll take Marsi with me and ride on ahead.”

  Dryly, Aodán said, “And if there be riders coming—Albany’s men, say—”

  “Then you abandon the other horses but not Mistress Hetty,” Ivor said dryly.

  He spoke to Aodán’s back, though, because the other man was already saddling Ivor’s horse and issuing orders to the three lads who worked in the barn.

  Seeing Marsi hurrying across the yard with a sack in hand, Ivor finished with her horse, accepted the reins of his from Aodán, and led the pair outside to meet her, adjusting his sword as he did. His bow was strapped to his saddle, his dirk at his side.

  “What did you learn?” he asked as Marsi handed him the sack that she was carrying, which smelled deliciously of baked oatmeal.

  “Those are fresh bannocks,” she said. “The boys said naught to Martha, but she said they came downstairs in a hurry, snatched up some bannocks, and ran outside.”

  “How long ago?” he asked, tucking the free end of the sack under his belt.

  “ ‘Nobbut ten or fifteen minutes,’ Martha said. I told her what to tell your men and also that we feared that the boys might have gone on ahead of us.” She paused there, then added, “Martha said that the woods are boggy and gey dangerous, sir, and… and she hoped they’d have sense enough to follow the fisherman’s trail.”

  “Where is that trail?” he asked, forming a stirrup for her with his hands.

  “The track by the barn will take us to it,” Marsi said as he helped her mount. “But hurry, sir. Martha also said that with the snow melting so quickly, those woods are nearly all bog these days. I’m afraid that something bad may happen and…”

  “We’ll find them both,” he said, mounting his horse. “And something is going to happen to them, lass. I’ll see to that.”

  Hetty was emerging from the alehouse as they rode out of the yard, and Marsi was glad to see her. She knew that Aodán—with their extra horses, Hetty, and all—would soon be close behind them.

  Ivor opened the sack and handed her a bannock, taking another for himself.

  They rode as fast as they dared, but although the track to the nearby woods was clear, as the forest thickened around them, they had to take more care. Marsi followed Ivor, munching her bannock and thinking about the boys.

  There were patches of snow everywhere, a few drifts on the narrow track and others beneath openings in the canopy. The light was dim, although the sun had been peeking through a dip in the hills to the east as they’d left the yard. They were higher than they had been then, but she saw no sign of sunlight now.

  Water gurgled downhill to their left, but they heeded Martha’s warning and kept to the mucky path. Sheen on its boggy surroundings was warning enough of the danger that stepping off the path might bring to a human or a horse.

  As the horses picked their way through an icy, half-melted snowdrift that sprawled across the path, Marsi listened for sounds of movement or talk ahead, although she knew she was unlikely to hear the boys over the horses’ sloshing. She also watched for footprints in the muck and the snow. But everything was watery. Even the horses’ hoofprints vanished almost as soon as she looked back at them.

  Then they came to a snowy patch that sloped upward from the path to their right and then downward along a fallen log. Reining in, Ivor gestured to it.

  Small footprints followed the log, and Marsi knew he was as certain as she was that they were Jamie’s and Will’s, and was as relieved as she was to see them.

  He picked up the pace, and Marsi urged her mount after his, trusting the two horses to avoid the bog. It grew less boggy as they climbed.

  When they crested a hill, despite encroaching shrubbery, the path widened enough on the curving downward slope for her to ease her mount up beside Ivor’s.

  He glanced at her as she did and smiled reassuringly.

  She managed to smile back, and rounding a curve, they almost ran into the boys before they saw them. The two had their backs to them and had hunkered down behind the tall bushes at one side of the path. Beyond them lay a clearing.

  The shrubbery was tall and dense, the ground dryer, and hoofbeats approaching from ahead and to the right suggested that they had reached the Stirling road.

  Ivor motioned for Marsi to stop, and they saw a pair of horsemen ride by at a trot. Neither man as much as glanced their way.

  When the hoofbeats faded away and the boys straightened, preparing to dash across the road, Ivor said, “Stop right there!” When the two startled lads whirled as one to face him, he added, “What the devil do you think you’re doing here?”

  Straightening and meeting Ivor’s gaze, Jamie said, “We’re going tae Kincardine, sir. We couldna wait at the inn, because whoever came would want one of us, and we didna—neither of us—want tae go with them. So we thought we’d hie us tae my uncle at Kincardine instead. Now, belike, we can all go together.”

  The sense of guilt that had plagued Marsi since the moment she had deduced the boys’ plan increased tenfold, stirring her temper as it did. Fighting to suppress both emotions, she said in a carefully even tone, “Jamie, did you and Will do this because I wanted to go to Kincardine?”

  Eyeing her warily, Jamie said, “We did follow your plan, Marsi, but we had tae go somewhere, and we didna ken where else tae go. Ye’ve said yourself, though, that if one wants a thing and others disagree, one must see tae it oneself. Sithee, we did nae more than ye’d said we all should do.”

  Marsi shut her eyes briefly, then forced herself to look at Ivor. He was watching her, but as their gazes met, he cocked his head slightly, listening.

  “Riders,” he said then. “Above us on the trail.”

  “We must cross the road then,” Jamie said. “We’re too close tae it for safety, and it will be easier tae conceal ourselves in yon glen across the way.”

  Ivor glanced at Jamie and said, “Wait, lad.” Then turning back, he gave the piercing birdcall that he and Aodán often used. When an echo of it came back to him, he said, “It is only Aodán and Hetty with the horses. We’ll wait for them.”

  Marsi said, “What if the other riders are right behind them?”

  “Aodán has just come over the crest, lass. He’d have seen or heard them, and if he had, he’d have returned a different signal. We should be safe enough for the moment. However…” He looked at Will. “Tell us about the men you saw, lad.”

  Will’s blue eyes widened at his stern tone, and his cheeks reddened. He glanced at Jamie, but Jamie was watching Ivor.

  “Will?” Ivor said. “Did you see anyone?”

  Redder than ever, Will said, “Aye, sir, and I did go tae look for our two men, but I never saw them.” He drew a breath, then added determinedly, “Them others were no pelting along like I told Mistress Hetty, neither. They had stopped, or mayhap even had camped there for the night and were but breaking their fast. I couldna tell what they were a-doing from where I was on me hilltop.”

  “That doesn’t matter, and we won’t speculate about what they might have been doing,” Ivor said. “How many men were there?”

  “Nigh a dozen or so, like I said. So I hied me back tae tell Jamie.” He paused and then said bluntly, “Are ye going tae leather us for running off as we did?”

  “I have not decided what I will do,” Ivor said, loo
king from Will to Jamie. “Both of you knew better than to leave, and if you believed that danger was approaching the alehouse, you should have warned the rest of us.”

  Jamie said hastily, “We were sure that it was Master Lucken coming for Will or Albany coming for me. Sithee, what we believed was that if we weren’t there, ye could just deny being anyone they might ha’ been seeking.”

  “I see,” Ivor said. More sternly, he added, “I am truly to believe that you ran off for our benefit and not because you want to go to Kincardine. Is that right?”

  Jamie flushed. “You do like tae put words in a chappie’s mouth,” he said.

  “What words should I have used?” Ivor asked him.

  This time Jamie looked down at his feet. When Ivor just waited, he soon looked up again and said, “You are right, sir. We should have told you.”

  “Actions have consequences, my lad. If you learn from those consequences, then the actions will not have been in vain.”

  “I dinna like the sound of that,” Jamie muttered.

  “I don’t suppose you do.”

  Marsi said, “We can hardly turn back now, sir, not knowing who the men are.”

  “Agreed, lass. Nor can we take the Perth road. But if my ears do not deceive me, Aodán, Hetty, and the other horses are about to join us.”

  Moments later, they could see them, Hetty in the lead and Aodán behind her, leading the boys’ horses and the sumpters in a string behind him. No one else.

  His suspicion that something untoward had happened to his other two men grew to a certainty. Unable to do a thing about it then, he checked the road in both directions to be sure that no one would see them, then hurried the others across.

  Although Marsi had expected to see Sir Malcolm’s guards soon after they crossed the road, they saw none. Nor did anyone challenge them as they made their way down the slushy path into the steep-sided depths of Kincardine Glen.

  The path ran dangerously close to Ruthven Water, a burn that had clearly begun as a narrow spring from the hill they had descended to reach the road and, full of snowmelt now, tumbled swiftly over and among icy rocks and boulders. It ran all the way down to the village of Aberuthven, she knew, and beyond to the river Earn.