by Border Lass
Carrick’s passage had occasioned much comment. He was thin, stooped, and pale, looked much older than his fifty years, and thanks to a kick from a horse years before, he walked with a limp. Worse, he was a man of peace and a scholar with no interest in politics. Put plainly, he was not what Scots expected their High King to be. They wanted their kings to be warriors who strode boldly and ruled decisively.
Carrick was unlikely to do either.
Movement near the largest of the eastern monastic buildings diverted the crowd’s attention as a group of six splendidly attired young noblewomen emerged.
Cheers erupted when people recognized the princess Isabel Stewart, one of the few popular members of the royal family. Her late husband, James, second Earl of Douglas, had been Scotland’s finest warrior, a great hero, and a man of enormous popularity. His death two years before, while leading a victorious Scottish army against a much larger English force at Otterburn, had shocked the entire country—hence the wild reaction to his tragically widowed countess.
Everyone knew she still grieved his loss and believed that murder, rather than fair battle, had taken him. That belief had strengthened with the undeniable murder in faraway Danzig of Will Douglas of Nithsdale, her sister Gelis’s husband.
Not only had Will been almost as beloved a hero as the second earl, but two sudden deaths by violence of popular Douglases had also raised more suspicions than those of their princess wives. Yet few men dared voice the growing suspicion that someone was efficiently eliminating any threat the royal Stewarts might face from the more powerful Douglases, or from anyone else for that matter.
The crowd had been watching for Isabel, because word had spread that the new sovereign and his wife were staying in Abbots’ House, and lesser members of his family in the eastern monastic buildings. The Austen Canons who normally inhabited those Spartan quarters, and the Abbot of Scone, had moved in with their brethren in the western buildings for the duration of the coronation activities.
Although Scone Abbey was of great importance to the country, it was not as grand as Dunfermline in Fife or Scone’s sister house, Dundrennan, in the Borders. But Scone had served as capital of the ancient Pictish kingdom, and therein lay its importance to the Scottish people and the reason their coronations took place there.
The princess Isabel and her five ladies walked two by two. Isabel walked with seventeen-year-old Lady Amalie Murray, whose neatly coiffed raven tresses, hazel-green eyes, and buxom figure provided a pleasing contrast to the princess’s fair, slender, blue-eyed beauty. Their gowns contrasted well, too, Isabel in pale primrose yellow satin trimmed with ermine, and the lady Amalie in leaf-green and pink silk with wide embroidered bands of edging. Isabel waved occasionally to the cheering crowd, but the other ladies paid them scant heed, chatting instead among themselves.
“ ’Tis a strange business, this, Isabel,” the lady Amalie said as her gaze moved warily over the raucous crowd. “When we arrived two days ago, all was fun and feasting. Then yesterday we attended a state funeral—although his grace, your father, has been dead now for a full three months. Then, more feasting after the funeral, and now, on the third day, we are finally to crown the new King of Scots.”
“In fact, ’tis my brother Fife who crowns him,” Isabel said with familiar bitterness. “As we have seen, all must be as Fife ordains. Even the name the new King must take is Fife’s own Sunday name of Robert. Thus, John Stewart, Earl of Carrick, is to become Robert the Third, because Fife declares that we cannot have a king named John without reminding people that John Balliol tried to steal the crown, even though that event happened years ago. If Carrick were to remain John, Fife says, he would have to be John the Second, which would give too much import to the usurper Balliol. Fife says that would undermine the line of Robert the Bruce.”
“But to make such decisions is the Earl of Fife’s duty, is it not?” Amalie said, still searching the crowd. “He is now Governor of the Realm, after all.”
“Aye, so he still calls himself,” Isabel said. “The truth is that his grace, my father, appointed Fife Governor because Father believed himself too old and infirm to rule properly. But in May, when he died, Fife’s right to the position of Governor died with him. Sithee, he held it only at the King’s pleasure.”
“When others said as much, Fife insisted that the right remained with him until we buried the old King and crowned a new one,” Amalie reminded her. “Moreover, besides being Earl of Fife, he is also Earl of Menteith. So the right to act as coroner today is reserved to him by tradition, is it not?”
“Nay, that is but the way he chooses to interpret that tradition. The right to act as coroner lies with his wife’s family, the MacDuffs, not with the earldom he assumed by marrying her. A MacDuff has placed the crown on the head of every new King of Scots since ancient times—until today.”
That Fife’s version differed from others’ did not surprise Amalie. He was not, in her experience, a man whose word one accepted without corroboration. Nearly everyone she knew distrusted him, save her brother Simon.
Simon admired Fife and had served him loyally for nearly eight years while, in effect, Fife had ruled Scotland. With the King less and less able to rule and Carrick uninterested, Fife had steadily acquired more and more power.
Isabel was frowning, which made her look older than her twenty-four years. With her fair hair and flawless skin, she was strikingly beautiful. But she had once been merry, forthright, and carefree. Since her beloved first husband’s death, she had lost much of the vivacity that had set her apart from other beautiful noblewomen.
As their party passed Abbots’ House to approach the kirk entrance, Amalie’s searching gaze lit at last on an older couple near the stone steps to the kirk porch.
“Faith, Isabel, my parents are waiting for me,” she muttered as she slowed to let the princess walk ahead of her.
A pair of stalwart knights preceded them, and because Amalie had been watching for her parents, she was sure that neither Sir Iagan nor Lady Murray had yet seen her. But they could not miss her if she walked up the steps right past them, as she would have to do to enter the kirk with Isabel.
“You cannot avoid them much longer,” Isabel said over her shoulder with one of her rare smiles. “They mean you no harm, after all.”
“I fear they may have found a husband for me,” Amalie said. “I’ve told them I don’t want one, but now that Buccleuch has succeeded to his father’s title and estates, I’m sure my mother will have persuaded my father that he can make an advantageous alliance for me just as he did for Meg. Faith, but Simon said as much eight months ago at Yuletide. He said that being good-sister to a man as powerful as Buccleuch will make up for all my faults. I’ve avoided seeing any of my family again until now only because, since then, you have rarely stayed anywhere longer than a fortnight.”
“You’ve few faults that I can see,” Isabel said. “I’ve told you myself that I know of more than one eligible young man who’d welcome you as his bride.”
“Well, I don’t want a young man or any other sort,” Amalie said. Isabel had been kind enough to provide a sanctuary when she had needed one. But Isabel did not know all there was to know about her, and Amalie did not intend to tell her.
Instead, she said, “I’d like to slip away for a short time if you will permit it. I’ll rejoin you as soon as they go inside.” When Isabel looked about to protest, she added, “I shan’t be long, truly. Now that Carrick has gone in, they won’t stay outside much longer, because my mother will not want to end up at the back of the kirk.”
“Very well, but don’t let them see you,” Isabel said. “I’d not be amazed if your mother stopped me and demanded to know where I’d sent you.”
Amalie shook her head, letting her amusement show. Although Lady Murray was a controlling woman, she would never behave so improperly as to demand anything of the princess. But Amalie understood why Isabel had suggested she might.
Despite the princess’s own sorrows, she pai
d close heed to the members of her household and could always make a worried or unhappy one smile.
Peeping between the brawny pair that led their party, Amalie saw her mother still looking about. Perhaps, she thought, Lady Murray was only trying to spot one of her other offspring or Buccleuch, but she could not make herself believe it.
Sir Walter Scott of Buccleuch would be with other powerful barons invited to take part in the ceremony. Lady Murray would know that Meg was not there, due to advanced pregnancy, and that Simon was probably with Fife. Nor would her ladyship be looking for her younger son, Tom. She was looking for Amalie.
Shrubbery and tall beech trees surrounded Abbots’ House, and Amalie snatched the first opportunity to slip behind a wide tree trunk. She meant to wait there until the coast was clear, but as she looked nervously about, she saw Tom Murray striding straight toward her with some of his friends.
Although he had not seen her, if she stayed where she was he soon would. Her overskirt and gloves were green and might blend in, but her tunic was pink and boasted wide bands of green trim embroidered with gold and silver thread.
Quickly wending her way through shrubbery and along a gravel path, she came to the steps of Abbots’ House and saw that the front door stood ajar.
Aware that Carrick and his party were staying there, she was sure that some servants must still be inside. But she suspected that if she went around the side of the building, she would look more furtive than if she just walked in.
However, if she went boldly up the steps with her back to the crowd, a chance observer might easily mistake her for one of Carrick’s many sisters. Should anyone challenge her, she could just say she was looking for Isabel or one of the other princesses—not Gelis. Like Meg, Gelis was pregnant and had not come.
Having thus decided her course, Amalie hurried up the steps. Once through the open doorway, she closed the door just enough to conceal herself from view.
The dim entry hall was no more than a spacious anteroom with a stairway at her right to a railed gallery above. Doubtless, service areas lay beyond a door she could discern in the dark corner under the stairs. The walls ahead and to her left revealed three other doors, all shut.
As she hesitated, uncertain where to go and unable to know if any nearby room was unoccupied, heavy footsteps approaching the stair-corner door made the decision for her. Snatching up her skirts, she ran silently up the stairs, hoping to find a window from which she might see if her parents had entered the kirk.
At the landing, she saw that the gallery continued around two more sides of the stairwell, providing access to several more closed doors. Window embrasures at each end of the landing provided light, but neither one would overlook the kirk.
Opposite her, another, narrower flight of stairs led up to the next floor. She would have to open one of two doors on that side to find a suitable window, and when she did, she would be in view of anyone coming down those stairs.
As she considered her choice, to her shock, she heard a male voice inside the room to her left. Something about the voice seemed familiar.
Stepping nearer, she put an ear close to the door and heard a second voice say with perfect clarity, “In troth, if we give him sufficient cause, he is likely enough to cooperate, but one cannot trust the man from one moment to the next. ’Twould suit me better not to have to concern myself with him at all.”
“Sakes, sir,” the first voice muttered. “Is it murder you seek?”
Amalie leaned closer.
“I did not say—”
Without the slightest warning, a large, gloved hand clapped tight across her mouth and nose as a strong arm swept her off her feet and away from the door.
Terrified and disoriented, she could not see her captor’s face, but his grip was like a vise clamping her against a hard, muscular body. Her struggles did no good as he strode around the gallery, bearing her as if she were a featherweight and moving as silently as he had when he’d crept up behind her.
She kicked and squirmed until she realized that if she drew attention, she might find herself in worse trouble. Since she suspected that one of the voices might have been Simon’s, and since Simon was not a man who would look kindly on a sister secretly listening to a private conversation—especially one about murder—she decided that, for the present, she might be safer where she was.
Still, she had no way to know if the man who had caught her was friend or foe. Judging by the ease with which he carried her, he might be as large and strong as Jock’s Wee Tammy, her huge and therefore misnamed friend at Scott’s Hall who often served as Buccleuch’s squire, as well as captain of his fighting tail.
It occurred to her, too, that to have been creeping about Abbots’ House as he had, the man had to be either Carrick’s own attendant on watch for intruders, or an intruder himself. As she was telling herself she hoped he was the latter, she realized that such an intruder might well throttle her to ensure her silence.
Why, she wondered, had she darted into the house at all? How could she do such a silly thing just to avoid a confrontation with her mother? Then a vision of that formidable dame appeared, and she knew she would do it again in an instant.
To her astonishment, her captor headed right to the second flight of stairs and then up the stairs themselves.
She tried to pull her face far enough away from his hand to draw a deep breath, but he only pressed harder. Wondering what he would do if she bit him, she tried kicking again, hit one silk-shod foot against a bruisingly hard wooden railing, and remembered she did not want to attract attention.
Shock and terror had eased to worry and annoyance that now were shifting back to fear, so she told herself sternly that, whoever he was, he would not dare to harm her. Even if he did not know who her father was or that her good-brother was the powerful Scott of Buccleuch, he would have to be daft to harm a member of a royal household at Scone Abbey on Coronation Day.
Slightly reassured, she began to relax just as they reached a tall, heavy, ornately carved door.
Breath tickled her ear as a deep voice murmured, “I’m going to take my hand from your mouth to open this door. If you make a sound, you may endanger both our lives. Nod if you agree to keep silent.”
She nodded, telling herself she would scream Abbots’ House to rubble if she wanted to, that no one could expect her to keep her word under such circumstances.
But when he took his hand away and continued to hold her off her feet with one arm as easily as he had with two, she decided to keep quiet until she got a good look at him and could judge what manner of man he was. All she knew so far was that he was one who could creep up on a person and carry her off as easily as he might a small child—all without making enough noise for anyone else to hear.
The chamber they entered astonished her further, because colorful arras cloths decked the walls, and a thick blue-and-red carpet covered much of the floor. Forest- green velvet curtains with golden ties and tassels draped the windows as well as a large bed in the near corner to their right.
“Faith,” she muttered when he set her on her feet and moved to shut the door, “what is this place? Surely, this is not the lord abbot’s own bedchamber!”
“Aye, although doubtless the abbot does not boast carpets to walk upon,” her captor said. “At present it serves as Carrick’s chamber, which means, in a very short time, it will be that of his grace, the King of Scots.” Then, in a tone harsh enough to raise the hairs on the back of her neck, he added, “Now, Lady Amalie, tell me, if you please, just what the devil you were doing, listening outside that door.”
Turning at last from her fascination with the bed to see his face, she gasped.
Sir Garth Napier, newly a baron and properly styled Lord of Westruther, saw her lips part and heard her gasp, but she did not immediately burst into speech.
She was stunned to see him, though. He could easily tell that much from her expression and the quickening movement of her impressive breasts.
“Who are you?
” she demanded. “And how did you learn my name?”
“As you’d told me your brother’s name, yours was not difficult to come by.”
She was looking past him, doubtless at the door. “We should not be in here.”
“No one will come here for at least an hour,” he said. “But someone is sure to miss you in the kirk. You should be with the princess Isabel, should you not?”
She nodded, saying earnestly, “I must go to her at once.”
“Not until you tell me why you were listening at that door.”
Her gaze met his searchingly, as if she would measure the strength of his resolve. Evidently, she saw that he meant to have an answer, because she gave a soft little sigh of resignation. Her breasts were downright tantalizing.
She said, “I did not mean to listen.”
“Don’t lie to me,” he said, wrenching his gaze back to her face and fixing a stern look on his own. “You had your ear right against that door.”
“Aye, but I came up only to find a window that looked onto the kirk steps.”
Recognizing a diversionary attempt, he said, “Lass, I’m not a patient man.”
“No man is patient,” she retorted. “But I don’t even know you, because you did not tell me your name before. You just walked away.”
His patience had evaporated, and he wanted to shake her. “My name would mean nowt to you. What did you hear?”
She glowered at him like an angry child. He’d have wagered his recent inheritance that she was preparing to lie again.
“You had better tell me the truth,” he warned her.
Shrugging, she said, “I could not hear their words. They spoke too quietly.”
“They?”
“I heard two voices through the door before you snatched me off my feet. I could not hear what they said, though. Nor do I know why I should tell you even if I’d heard every word.”
“I think you did hear every word,” he said. “Just what do you think would have happened if I’d just opened that door and pushed you inside?”
