Sue-Ellen Welfonder - [MacLean 03]

by Wedding for a Knight

  Amicia shook her head, not trusting herself to speak. Something nibbled at her, at the very fringe of her mind—and then she remembered.

  “Magnus wanted to dower you,” she said, her thoughts in a whirl. “He would not have done so if he didn’t believe he’d find a viable husband for you.”

  Another tear leaked from Janet’s eye and she blinked, clearly trying to stop the flow of more. “You do not know him as I do. He is . . . big-hearted. Did you not hear me say so?”

  Turning away, Janet opened the door, but kept her fingers curled around the latch as if she needed its support. “To be sure, he believed he’d find someone who would have me . . . a bastard unable to even lay a firm claim to being a Clan Fingon bastard. My true origins are that obscure.”

  “Magnus looks on you as kin. He’s told me so.”

  “Aye, he does,” Janet agreed. “That truth, and knowing how he’s e’er lusted after tall, well-made lasses with hair the color of midnight should have kept me from being surprised at seeing you set foot here, and as his proxy-wed bride.”

  Amicia swallowed the gasp rising in her throat.

  Her heart lurched.

  And the sharp, little, green-tinged shards returned with a vengeance. Only now, rather than Janet’s delicate-fingered hand, each hurtful jab was aimed and driven by a blowsy, raven-haired rival without a face.

  An endless stream of them.

  A great shudder tore down the length of her and she reached for the door edge, grabbing hold of it just as fiercely as Janet’s fingers curled around the latch.

  “You mustn’t trouble yourself—be glad-hearted he favors stout, dark-haired women,” Janet said, the comment lacking even the slightest hint of a taunt. “His passion for them will make it easier for you to lure him off his bed pallet!”

  Aye, nary a hint of malice tinged Janet’s words.

  Only well-meant if poorly chosen comfort.

  For long moments after Janet took her wee self into the shadowy passage whence she’d come, Amicia remained frozen on the threshold, her fingers clenching and unclenching on the edge of the door.

  And feeling anything but comforted.

  “So-o-o, here we are at last,” Donall MacLean said after tramping up four full stories to the stair-head of Baldoon Castle’s loftiest tower.

  He cast a stern eye on the grizzled old woman cradled in his arms. “I vow you have sound reason for seeking an audience here rather than in the warmth of my solar? Not that I have e’er had cause to doubt any contrivance you’ve tossed at me.”

  That drew an indignant snort from his featherlight, black-garbed burden. But Donall the Bold, proud laird of the great Clan MacLean and doughty holder of their mighty stronghold, Baldoon, ignored the snort.

  He also excused the wee cackle that followed it, and set down the crone with the same great care he’d just put into carrying her up more winding steps than he cared to count.

  Not that Devorgilla’s slight weight would overtax a flea.

  Nonetheless, he took some pains to exhibit a respectable degree of exertion. He also schooled his handsome face into a formidable scowl.

  Stretching his arms, he flexed his fingers and glanced round, let the freshening wind catch and toss his plaid, riffle his dark, shoulder-length hair.

  A fine drizzle misted the air and lowering clouds of deepest gray muted the roar of the sea, even as rough-crashing swells threw white spray high up the tower walls.

  Several guardsmen clustered about a tiny brazier set in the lee of a little gabled cap-house at the far end of the parapet-walk, but a single jerk of his head sent them scurrying off to hold watch over some other corner of the blustery morn.

  Satisfied, he rocked back on his heels and stared up at the dull gray sky. “Aye, old lass, most good men would not venture from their hearthside on such a wet, dreary day. . . .” He let the words tail away, made a bit of a show of his fierce grimace of displeasure.

  Another contrivance, to be sure, but an expected part of old Devorgilla’s pleasure.

  The cailleach would not part with a single glimmer of what troubled or excited her unless she first be paid proper court. And Donall MacLean knew her ways over-well.

  As did his brother, Iain, just now emerging from the torchlit stair tower, his face as black-frowning as Donall’s . . . save that Iain’s glower appeared a mite more authentic than his lairdly brother’s.

  Striding up to them, Iain jammed fisted hands against his hips and looked down at the teensy, bird-like crone. “Sakes, Devorgilla, what foolery are you about this time? Having us hie ourselves up here into this swirling soup?” He emphasized his point by swatting at the thick swathes of chill gray mist drifting across the ramparts.

  Devorgilla clucked her tongue, tilted her cowl-covered head. “For shame, laddie, are you doubting me?” She touched a gnarled finger to the bright-gleaming quartz crystals set into the clasp of his sword belt. “You, of all men?”

  “Och, nay,” Iain assured her, lifting his hands, palms out. “I would ne’er doubt a single word to fall from your lips. Nothing is more sure.” Looking duly contrite, he took her hand and pressed a light kiss to papery-skinned knuckles. “I would but hear what you wish to tell us that could not have been broached below?”

  “Not vain puffing words, I promise you,” she said, her cheeks turning pink from his kiss. “’Tis not so much what I can tell you, but what I would have you see.”

  She cast a shrewd glance at Donall. “Something you both ought see.”

  “Then show us quickly for I’d return to my wife’s side anon—she is feeling poorly this morn,” Iain returned, his grousing earning a swift glare and an elbow in the ribs from his brother.

  Devorgilla sniffed. “Your fair lassie will be suffering through many such a morning afore she finds her peace again,” she prophesied, a mischievous smile playing about her lips.

  Now was not the time or place to tell him what she’d long glimpsed in her cauldron’s rising steam . . . that his lady wife would prove a fine breeder of many healthy sons, the first one already growing sweetly beneath her heart.

  For the nonce, other, more pressing cares required her attention.

  Dire ones.

  Lifting her arm, she pointed at the faint glow of vilest green shimmering through the storm clouds lining the far horizon. There, where MacKinnons’ Isle rose low and dark from the tossing sea.

  “See you that tinge of green?” she prodded, hoping their hearts would be able to see what the rolling curtains of mist hid from mortal view.

  “Green-tinged mist?” Donall’s tone revealed what his heart couldn’t.

  “Aye, green and . . . fiendish.” Devorgilla tried again, this time jabbing her finger in the direction. “O’er Mac-Kinnons’ Isle,” she said, raising her voice above the screaming seabirds wheeling and gliding round the lofty parapet tower. “Look hard—and with more than your eyes.”

  The tight, concentrated line of Iain’s mouth, as he peered through the fog, encouraged her. But not over-long, for his dark brows quickly snapped together.

  “I see naught,” he admitted. “But I’ll trust it to be there. Sakes, I would believe a host of selkie-folk were cavorting across yon waves, if you said it was so, old lass.”

  Pleased for that small mercy, Devorgilla rubbed her hands. “If you have such faith, I would ask a boon of you.”

  “A boon?” That from Donall. He did not attempt to hide his wariness. “What would you have of us?”

  “Naught that would cost you greatly. I would see you send a score of able-armed sworders to strengthen Magnus MacKinnon’s garrison,” she voiced her desire. “Evil lurks o’er his isle and, braw warrior or nay, he will be needing help to safeguard your sister.”

  The brothers exchanged looks.

  Not quite doubtful looks . . . but stubborn.

  Either way, Devorgilla did not care for them.

  She huffed a breath. “Have I e’er led you wrong, laddies?” she asked, seizing her one remaining advantage.
“Either of you?”

  Silence and the screech of the gulls answered her.

  That, and the slide of Donall’s boot sole as, looking down, he poked his toe at a sodden gannet feather sticking to the wet stone flagging of the wall walk.

  Iain spoke first. “Magnus MacKinnon is no hand-wringing bampot. If aught is amiss on his isle, he will see to the trouble with all haste.”

  “He would ne’er let any harm come to Amicia. Of that, I am certain,” Donall put in, leaving the stone-clinging feather for some other fool to prod and worry.

  He patted the crone’s arm, placating her as if she’d only yestereve learned of the power she could wield with a few muttered incantations or a simple brew of liquefied toad spittle.

  “Magnus is a well-seasoned fighter. A great knight. He survived Dupplin, did he not?” he minded her, all laird now.

  And grating sorely on Devorgilla’s patience.

  “But he will be hurting inside, see you? That is why his father wanted Amicia there before his return—so she could comfort him. We—”

  “She will not be doing much soothing at all if she’s cold in her grave!” Devorgilla waggled a finger at him, glared at his brother for holding his silence.

  Donall pulled a hand down over his face. “On my honor, were Amicia in any other’s hands, I would fill our whole fleet of war galleys with my best men and send them speeding to her aid,” he said. “But MacKinnon swings a daunting blade and has a strong arm and good wits to go with it. Whate’er plagues him, he will not look kindly on intervention. Ours or anyone else’s. I ken him that well.”

  “Donall speaks true.” Iain sided with his brother. “Magnus is proud . . . a man apart.”

  Parted from his new wife afore he’s even tasted sweet bliss with her, Devorgilla mumbled beneath her breath.

  The brothers received a scalding stare. Devorgilla’s best.

  “Be that your last word, laddies?”

  Iain nodded, but had the good grace to look unhappy about it.

  The laird blew out a slow breath, and looked . . . resigned.

  “Magnus refused my offer to lend him our most skilled shipwright, preferring to use the aged man who worked for his father. And just recently, he turned away the last galley-load of supplies I sent him. It would be unwise to tread further on his pride.”

  Devorgilla pursed her lips. “So be it,” she said, flicking a raindrop off her sleeve.

  She tamped down the burning urge to transport them both right smack into the middle of a patch of stinging Highland nettles—and send them there full naked!

  But she was wise enough to ken when to concede defeat.

  Or, at least, when to appear to do so.

  Turning away, lest her dark side get the better of her, she stared out across the sea again—or rather, at what little of its rain-pitted surface glimmered through the thick fog.

  “I shan’t darken your door about this matter again,” she murmured, more to herself and the wind than to them. “There are . . . others who ken the danger and would help me.”

  “Others?” the brothers spoke in chorus.

  Little good it did them.

  Devorgilla’s audience had ended.

  Lifting her chin, she pressed her lips together and shuffled to the stair-head door. Iain had promised to carry her down, and vexed or no, she wasn’t about to forgo such a treat.

  Three great strides brought him to her side, and with a bit of a styled flourish surely meant to appease her wrath, he swept her into his arms for the long trek down the winding stairs.

  But at the first landing, he paused to look down at her. “What jabber was that about others?”

  “Never you mind,” Devorgilla evaded, clutching fast to his broad shoulders. “This danger, too, will pass. With or without your help. Sooner or later, all winds fall and every cloud rises.”

  With a good moon and a bit of meddling and magic, we’ll just hope the two of you won’t be caught without your plaids when it happens.

  Chapter Nine

  “PSHAW, LADDIE—are you going to be a great gowk and deny the curse now?”

  His face flushed with triumph, Donald MacKinnon stood behind his laird’s chair at the high table and aimed a victorious, I-told-you-so stare at Magnus.

  “’Tis a belly-turning sight, eh?” Jutting his bristly chin, the old man pointed at the almost-dead adder dangling from his middle son, Dugan’s, dirk blade. “God kens, a limpet would own to the truth—admit what I’ve been telling you. We’ve been set upon by forces darker than the crack o’ the Devil’s own behind!”

  Magnus eyed the writhing creature with distaste. “Belly-turning, to be sure,” he agreed, ignoring the rest.

  His innards churning indeed, he scanned the faces of his fellow clansmen. Surging forward in a great crush, they elbowed their way from every corner of the huge, groin-vaulted hall, pressing near to gape and stare. They crowded the dais, grave-faced to a man, each one stunned into silence.

  Chill gray light slanted in on them through narrow, high-set windows to illuminate their ill ease—their fulsome belief in Donald MacKinnon’s nonsensical ravings about curses and suchlike devilry.

  Magnus frowned.

  The discovery of the adder, and the superstition clouding his kinsmen’s eyes, laid a pall over an afternoon he’d already been dreading for days.

  And now it’d gone from bad to worse.

  Clearing his throat, he eyed his ashen-faced clansmen, forced himself to swallow the bitter taste in his mouth. “My sorrow that our minds run so wide apart,” he said, steely-voiced. “But I say you, the only fiend of hell who had aught to do with bringing yon adder into our midst is a flesh-and-blood man walking amongst us—not some nebulous creature from the hoary realm of the dead or the secret land of the fey!”

  His pronouncement made, he folded his arms and let his gaze rake each man.

  To his relief, he caught a few nods of accord from within the circle of gawking men. But only a few. Most turned away to reach for the nearest ale cup or scratch with furious intent at sudden-appearing itches. A curious affliction that seemed to ripple through the entire ranks of MacKinnons gathered in the hall.

  Bothered by nothing of the sort, Donald MacKinnon all but snorted.

  He flashed a defiant glare at Magnus. “You needn’t glower at the rest of us, laddie,” he said, his tone cantankerous. “I vow you’d be equally loath to doubt had you not been away all these years, if you’d seen the stress and strife we’ve suffered.”

  “I have seen my share of suffering, never you doubt it.” Magnus smothered the images before they could take form, closing his mind’s eye to the sight of mangled bodies and torn flesh, his ears to the soul-splitting screams of men in mortal agony, his nose to the stench of freshly spilled blood.

  Glancing at the smoke-blackened ceiling, he pinched the bridge of his nose until the memories receded.

  “’Tis the goings-on and turmoil on this isle, I meant, and well you know it,” his father groused. “Our trials have been great, our sorrows endless.”

  Loud cries of assent greeted these words. Shouts accompanied by the stamping of not a few booted feet and the jabbing in the air of more than one clenched fist.

  Spurred on by his kinsmen’s support, the aging laird banged the hilt of his dirk on the table, silencing the men he’d just rallied. At the ensuing quiet, he clutched the back of his chair with a white-knuckled grip and fixed a hot blue gaze on Magnus.

  “If you doubt me and these men of your own good blood, ask your lady wife. She has seen enough to fill your ears for days,” he said, his stare a snapping challenge. “’Tis a wonder she hasn’t hied herself straight back to Baldoon and its curse-free, snakeless comforts! Aye, be glad she is abovestairs tending her ablutions or whate’er it is womenfolk are e’er about, and didn’t see . . . this! And on the very day of your wedding celebration revelries.”

  His piece said, he swayed a bit on his feet and, seeming to sink into himself, began mumbling inanities. Ble
ssedly inaudible ones, too low-voiced to be understood.

  Not that Magnus needed to hear them.

  The increased mottling of the old man’s face spoke loudly enough.

  As did the renewed unrest sweeping the length and breadth of the crowded hall.

  “Hear me, good men,” Magnus called out to them. “Such talk serves nothing. Senseless beating of the air brings naught but wasted breath. But, aye, I agree. This”—he jerked his head toward the adder—“reeks of someone choosing the day with care.”

  That last got his father’s attention. “So you admit the snake didn’t slither in here on its own to say us a fine g’day?”

  Magnus hesitated, choked back a groan. “Nay, there, at least, we stand in fullest agreement. I hold that it was indeed deposited here—just not by unworldly powers.”

  “So says he of little faith!” His father threw up his hands. “Faugh and bother! There be more to this world than cold steel, coin, and what we can see with our naked eye,” he railed. “Some things a man just kens with his heart, laddie. You would be wise to learn that.”

  “And how say you, Dugan?” Magnus rounded on his brother, slid another half-fascinated, half-repulsed look at the dangling adder.

  Dugan shrugged. Standing alone, for no one seemed wont to seek his company, he held his arm extended well before him, his swarthy features working with clear distaste.

  “I say it scarce matters how the thing came to be here. Only that we found it before . . .” Dugan let the words trail off, looked across the torchlit hall to where their youngest brother, Hugh, sat on a trestle bench, a knot of cooing womenfolk gathered round him.

  Magnus followed Dugan’s gaze. “Nay, my brother, it matters greatly. Hugh could have been bitten—reaching for his lute and finding an adder coiled beside it!” he said, turning back to eye the snake again.

  “Think you I dinna know that!” came Dugan’s hot rebuttal, but Magnus scarce heeded him, his attention on the snake.

  Skewered through the middle, it twitched and jerked in the last moments of its venomous life. Fire glow caught on the adder’s scales, turning the pale gray skin a bright-gleaming silver, while the black zigzag running down its back and the beady red eyes showed the creature to be a male.