“A cave? That would be a fine place to hide if one was injured.” Uven dismounted and took his mount’s reins in hand. “I think we should walk up to it. Secure the horses at the base.”
“It is a narrow path, true enough,” said Robbie as he also dismounted. “Uneven, too. So watch your step.”
By the time they reached the brush hiding the entrance, it was easy to see what it was. Uven cautiously moved the covering as Robbie and Simon stood beside him with swords at the ready. Then he drew his own sword and stepped inside, needing a moment to see clearly in the dim light. Callum sat next to the wall grinning at him.
“Took ye long enough,” said Callum, laughing as his friends marched over to clap him on the shoulder. “Heard Robbie sniffing around and almost called out but decided I should wait in case ye were fleeing someone.”
“Had no one chasing us. Didnae ken what we would find,” said Simon.
“Ah, aye, they broke my leg, the bastards, but, weel, I am healing now.”
“If we are to stay here for a while, I think we best move the horses,” said Uven.
“I will do it,” said Robbie, and strode out of the cave.
“How did ye find the cave?” asked Callum.
“It wasnae hard once we followed the path. The brush set there is good when ye see it from afar but nay perfect up close.”
“That willnae please Bethoc,” said Callum quietly.
“Ah, a lass.” Uven rolled his eyes. “Why am I nay surprised?”
“’Tis nay what ye think,” protested Callum. “And cease talking like I am a young Payton when we both ken I am not, nay e’en near to being so. She pulled me from the water, dragged me up here and I wasnae in a state to help much, and has worked to fix my leg.”
Uven studied his leg. “Did a good job with what was at hand. Can ye move at all?”
“A little. I begin to be able to put a little weight on my foot but it could be a month or so before I can claim I am healed or go without some sort of bandaging on my leg. The bone is setting but isnae done yet and ye didnae want to cause it more injury by using it too soon.”
“That poses a bit of a problem but I suppose we could spend the time looking for the boy. Ye cannae go anywhere without the lad and he could be in some danger.”
“Nay. Ye dinnae need to. I ken where he is. Bethoc has him. The house is nay the best place for a lad but ’tis better than being stuck here with me and I having no way to protect him.”
“What is wrong with the house?”
“Father has a heavy hand.”
“Should I fetch him? We can protect him,” said Simon.
“Nay, he is safe enough. No one kens where he is and that is the most important thing at the moment. There is naught to cause them to look at that house, either,” Callum said.
Robbie returned and Callum watched him carefully put the brush back. “Hope ye did that right. She will notice and, if ’tis wrong, it will frighten her.”
“Frighten her?” asked Simon.
“She fears the men who did this to me have found me. They were, are, looking for me. She has already confronted them once.”
“They came here again?” asked Robbie.
Callum nodded. “Think the fools suddenly realized they had nay bothered to see if I was actually dead, that they had just assumed I was. Probably suspicioned they might have erred after they lost the boy. Suspicion they think I have taken him again. A logical assumption.”
“How did they lose the boy?” asked Uven as he hefted a jug of cider, took a sip, and filled a tankard with some.
“Her father took him. She doesnae ken how, only that he showed up with the boy. But she did say the mon is acting unstable. Goes out every night. Mayhap he fears they watch him.” He glared at his leg. “I can do naught about it, naught to hunt down the men who threaten Cathan. Naught to make certain she doesnae get caught in the midst of all this and hurt.”
“Then someone needs to find out where these men are.”
“Aye, now give me some of that cider.”
As they drank, they planned how and where to hunt down the men who were such a threat. It was edging toward midafternoon when his friends finally left. Callum found himself relieved. This was about the time of day when Bethoc came round. The anticipation he felt made him both smile and shake his head.
It was not because she had saved him or tended his wounds. He did not believe it was even how she was treated at home. Although his life was dedicated to helping those who suffered such things, that mostly was a concern for children. Bethoc was no child and he had no knowledge of her brothers, nothing to tell him they were in bad need of a protector. Callum had to decide if what he felt was just a lusting or more before too much longer. She was not a lass one idled away a few enjoyable hours with. Bethoc was a lass you either left alone or married.
* * *
Bethoc took a careful look around before hurrying up the path. Half the way up she paused and stared at the ground. For a moment she could not understand what troubled her. Then she gasped. Someone had recently used the path, several someones in fact. Her heart suddenly pounding with fear, she raced up to the cave, tossed aside the brush, and rushed inside. To see Callum sitting there, calmly writing something before he looked up at her in surprise, nearly brought her to the floor.
“What is it, Bethoc?” he asked, and started to get up.
“Nay, no need to stand.” She hurried back to the entrance, looked around carefully, and pulled the brush back against the opening before walking back to him. “Someone had used the path and I feared they had found you.” She was struggling to rid herself of the feeling of panic that had overtaken her.
He reached out, grasped her hand, and pulled her down beside him. “It was my friends.”
“They found you?”
“Aye. Seems Robbie noticed something and came up the path to have a closer look.”
“I wonder what he saw. T’would be good to ken what was odd,” Bethoc said as she began to unpack the food she had brought.
“I will be sure to ask him when he returns. Um, where is wee Margaret?”
Bethoc grimaced. “Colin has her again. He swore he would ne’er leave her alone and made me leave her behind. It still feels odd to nay be carrying her weight. And I am trying to nay think about her. ’Tis best if there is some separation now that she is growing older.”
“But ye probably willnae stay long, either. Like last time.”
Bethoc leaned against him. “Foolish. I ken it. Colin is a good lad and she has obviously decided she likes him. Yet all I can see is those four wee babes and think on how, if I hadnae been there for her birth, there could have been five. I must teach myself nay to cling to her with the idea that I am just keeping her safe.”
He turned her face up to his and brushed a kiss over her mouth. “Ne’er think on what-ifs, lass. What if I turned right instead of left, I might nay have been caught. And beaten. And had my leg broken. For everything that happens there are many what-ifs. They dinnae matter. Ye were there and she has lived to be a fine little lass who demands kisses on her forehead for being a smart lass.”
She laughed and nodded. “True enough.” She lightly patted his broken leg. “I think I have come up with a better way to wrap your leg and will bring the things I need on the morrow if I can.”
“This serves. I can now put some weight on it. Just a wee bit, enough to make moving about a lot easier, but I ken it will get better.”
“Aye, but what I have planned will serve better, I am certain of it. It will hold it more firmly. Although, as ye say, ye are healing nicely.”
“Will it make it easy to ride with?”
“Ah, aye.”
She did not like to think of him leaving, which was foolish. The man could not remain captive in a cave so that she could visit him now and then. He was a laird, after all, and must be eager to get back to his lands and his people. He had a rich life somewhere else he needed to get back to. Now that his friends had foun
d him, he would gather up Cathan and go as soon as he could ride. Knowing that, she settled against him, enjoying the closeness that would soon be gone. She tried not to think on how much she would miss it.
“Ye could come with me,” he said, shocking himself for a moment, then realizing it was what he wanted. “Ye and all the others.”
“Ye cannae take eight others with ye. E’en with your friends, there isnae enough room. And what would ye do with eight strays plus Cathan?”
He idly wondered why he was not relieved that she obviously saw his suggestion as no more than a kindness. He should be. It was a large responsibility to take on and he had enough of those. Nor was he sure of just why he was so reluctant to say thank ye and walk away from her.
“I have a lot of strays at my keep. I collect them,” he added, and smiled.
She leaned back a little and frowned at him. “Ye collect them?”
“Aye. When I was a child I swore I would always protect the wee ones. I was a child of the streets after my mother died. A feral boy, Payton called me, and I was certainly that. Got taken up by an evil mon and, at eleven, was close to being killed because I was getting too old and too rebellious, but the mon’s wee wife saved me. She got me and several others out of there and got Payton to help us even while she was still wet from her husband trying to drown her. Fool forgot she could swim.
“Ye wonder on how I understand what is happening. Weel, I lived it, Bethoc. And so much worse. If not for Payton and Kirstie I would be long dead.” He gave her a quick kiss when he saw the sadness she could not hide. “But I survived and have done verra weel ’til now. I found my true family and my grandfather turned out to be a laird. My father was his only son. It saddens me that my father was killed but at least I ken he had handfasted with my mother first so I wasnae a bastard cast aside like too many are.”
“So ye were legitimate? That must have eased your mind.”
“Nay at first for I didnae ken the worth of it, but, aye, it did. Grandfather and I got along weel and I ended up living with him. He died a few years ago and I was his heir. So, I am now a laird. ’Tis an odd thing to get accustomed to. Cannae forget where I began so am often astounded by it.”
She smiled. “I suspicion ye are a verra good laird and none care where ye began.”
“T’would seem so. I do wonder at where your mother began. She was at court, after all, when she met Brett so she must have come from a good family, one with standing enough to be invited to court.”
Bethoc frowned. “I have little knowledge of her beginnings. There were things said from time to time that implied she had married beneath herself, or wouldnae have if she hadnae been with child. I think my father may have been paid to take her as a wife.”
“What was her maiden name?”
“I dinnae ken.”
“She ne’er told ye?”
“Nay but that may be because she felt her family was lost to her. Also, my mother was nay weel. She could, weel, drift away a lot of the time. Ye could see her eyes go cloudy and then there was no talking to her. Or, if ye tried, her answers made no sense. I used to fear I would become like her but then, weel, I realized she was just broken and I didnae ken how to fix her.”
“Sometimes it cannae be done. The dreams are so much better they cannae leave them to face what life really is. I have seen it happen. Sometimes what is broken stays broken.”
“I ken it and she did, right up until she birthed Margaret and then, for one bright moment, she was clear-eyed and fierce.”
“She had someone she needed to save.”
“Aye, I suppose that was it.” She did not say that she often wondered why her mother had never felt the need to save any of the rest of them, why it was only Margaret who had awakened her enough to fight for the life of her child. “I had best be on my way,” she said as she stood up.
Callum stood up as well, and as quickly as he could, then took her by the arm. “Ye said Colin was a good lad,” he said as he pulled her into his arms, liking the way her hair just lightly brushed the underside of his chin. “There is nay need to run home and ye ken it.”
“Aye, I ken it, but ’tis hard. I have been toting her around, sleeping with her at night, and playing with her most of the day for o’er two years. Ne’er apart. It will be a while before I can do so with ease.”
“I ken it.” He brushed a thumb over her lips and watched her eyes turn a dark blue. “Just a moment more,” he whispered, and kissed her.
Bethoc held him close as she gave herself over to his kiss. The feel of his mouth made her weak. She could feel the heat of him invade her body. The way he was moving his hands over her, stroking her back with his thumbs brushing against the sides of her breasts only added to that heat. When he slid his hands up and over her breasts, she shook from the intensity of the feeling that ripped through her. Then he shifted position and suddenly it was over.
“Ah, damn, I forgot for a wee while that I am, weel, impaired,” he said as he lifted his head and smiled at her. “Sorry, but I turned in a way my leg disagreed with.”
“Oh, is it hurt again?” Bethoc moved, thinking to look at it, when he tightened his hold on her.
“Nay. T’was but my leg warning me I am nay ready.”
“Nay ready for what?”
“For ye, Bethoc.”
She could not think of a thing to say as a blush heated her face, so she hurried out of the cave, taking the time to very carefully put the shrubs back. Then she found something to brush off the path as she went down it. By the time she started walking through the wood to home, she was able to try to understand what he meant.
It was more than kisses. That much she was sure of. Then she thought of the hard ridge she could feel beneath his kilt when he held her close and wondered on it. What she needed was someone to ask but there was no one. She could not ask the boys although she had the feeling they would not know all that much more than she did.
Ignorance was a hard thing, she decided. Then she thought on the horses she had seen once, years ago, and gasped. Callum could not be thinking of mounting her like a horse. The noise the female had been making did not bring her any warm feelings of anticipation. No woman would ever get married if that was how it was done.
Then she shook her head. It could well be the same but she doubted it was exactly the same. She needed to cease wondering about it and just leave it up to him. One thing she was certain of with Callum was, if she protested, he would stop. He would never knowingly hurt her.
Once home she collected Margaret and walked back to the fire to think about the evening meal. She suddenly thought on how often she did that, how many hundreds of times she had come in and fixed a meal. Sitting at the table, she watched Margaret play with the mats she had left there and actually considered not making anything, just putting bread, cheese, and meat out on the table.
It was a lovely thought, but she quickly shook it away. True, she brought that to Callum but he was captive, trapped until his leg healed. Kerr Matheson was not and would not be pleased. He would expect a hot meal, demanded one no matter what the weather.
She still had a little time, however, and decided to go out and see what the boys were doing. Once outside she looked around and sighed. The boys had done a lot of work over the years. Around the house was a very tidy garden and beyond that were fields, full of plantings that were close to being harvested. Anyone would be proud of such a place yet Kerr spent little to no time here.
Bean walked up to her, wiping his sweaty face on his shirt. “Looks good, aye?”
“Aye. I fear I ne’er just stood here and saw what ye had done. ’Tis quite wondrous.”
“Keeps Da in drink and women. And lets him play the dice.”
“And that is so wrong.” She shook her head but he kept talking.
“Weel, we have beds and food. Suspicion he thinks that is enough.”
“It isnae though. He could allow us to go into town now and then or give ye a wee bit of coin to save or spend. Y
e do all the work.”
“Nay, it isnae enough and ne’er has been,” he answered in a hard, angry voice and then he took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “’Tis the way of it though.”
“I think we should make that our words on a shield.” She smiled when he laughed. “One day this will change. It has to.”
Bean nodded and then headed into the house. She did not think he believed her. She had not asked Callum anything, either. It was something she had to consider. This was now two of the boys who had expressed a wish for an end to this, the days of working all day but never gaining any benefit. Bethoc decided she would speak with Callum as soon as she could. She owed the boys that much. If she had to swallow a little of her pride to get them a better life, it was a small price to pay.
Chapter Seven
Laughing at the way Margaret was running through the garden with Cathan at her heels, Bethoc decided it was a beautiful day. The sun shone bright and warm, the sky was blue yet decorated becomingly with white fluffy clouds, and all the boys were in the garden for play, not work. It saddened her briefly that one of the reasons it was so wonderful was because Kerr Matheson was not there. That, she thought, was too sad for words.
So was the fact that she never referred to him as her father any longer, not even in her head. He was either Kerr or, at times, her foster father. She did not even speak with him unless he spoke to her, which he rarely did. If it was not for the boys, she would be like some stranger in her own home.
Kerr was bad, there was no question about that, but he had not been in the beginning, not even with her, a child he knew was not his. She suspected some money had changed hands for him to marry her mother and take her away, take her where no one her family knew well could see her shame. Yet he had not been like he was now. He hit, but rarely. Perhaps some of his anger came from living with a woman who forever dreamed of another man. Her mother had given him no chance to reach her.
Now you never knew when he would strike or why. Now he was silent and cold and they all waited for something to happen. He had not said a word about the stone on the grave next to her mother or the replanted bushes that now thrived. That had surprised all of them. Every night he slipped away and most nights returned drunk. What was he doing? She could think of no reason for him to be disappearing into the village so often.
Highland Chieftain Page 7
