The Fraser Bride

by Lois Greiman

  The Fraser Bride

  Lois Greiman

  * * *

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Copyright

  * * *

  THE PROPHECY

  He who would take a Fraser bride,

  these few rules he must abide.

  Peaceable yet powerful he must be,

  cunning but kind to me and thee.

  The last rule, but not of less import,

  he’ll be the loving and beloved sort.

  If a Fraser bride he longs to take,

  he’ll remember these rules for his life’s sake.

  For the swain who forgets the things I’ve said,

  will find himself amongst the dead.

  —Meara of the Fold

  * * *

  Chapter One

  Scotland

  In the year of our Lord, 1534

  “We are nearly there. There is no need to fret, Pearl,” Anora whispered, and nudged the mare deeper into the woods.

  In the late night gloaming, mist billowed up in dancing waves of ghostly silver. No sound broke the silence, naught but the soft hiss of dew slipping from bending bracken. High overhead, tattered clouds skittered past a bloated blood red moon, and from an unaccountable distance, an owl called, boding ill. But Anora of the Frasers had no time for age old superstitions. No time for fear.

  “Only a moment ago I saw a tower just past the highest hill. We shall find help there; I am certain of it. Surely once the lord learns of the Munro’s intentions, he shall champion our cause and—”

  A scratch of noise sounded from behind. Anora jerked about in her high backed saddle, but nothing alarming met her gaze though she searched the gloom for some seconds.

  “Truly, Pearl,” she said, turning back, “you are such a nervous ninny sometimes. I told you, there is no one following us.”

  Beneath her, Pearl flicked an ivory ear at her mistress’ trembling tone.

  A rustle of noise sounded again, closer this time. Anora spun about, heart thumping in the tight confines of her chest. “Who comes?” she demanded, but her only answer was the whisper of alder leaves overhead.

  Hard edged seconds ticked by before Anora turned forward and nudged Pearl again. “As I said, we are alone,” she whispered, and shifted her eyes sideways, searching the darkened woods. “All alone. And therefore …” Off to the right, a chipmunk scolded and scampered up the skeletal remains of an ancient oak. Anora’s stomach flipped and righted. “Safe,” she finished, but just at that instant, a horse whickered.

  Pearl stopped of her own accord, head turned, ears pricked forward, and every muscle taut.

  “Who goes there?” Anora called.

  For a moment nothing moved, and then, like a frightful dream, a charger stepped from the shadows. As dark as sin he was, and upon his back sat an armored warrior. Black chain mail covered the rider’s chest and a dark helmet hid his face.

  In the muffled silence, Anora could hear her own breath, harsh in the stillness.

  “Who are you?”

  The shadowy warrior said nothing. Instead, he reached down and with slow deliberation drew a sword from his scabbard. Muted moonlight caressed the curved edge of the blade, gleaming from point to hilt, and for a moment Anora remained frozen, mesmerized by the dancing light. Then the charger bent his great neck and pranced toward her with cadenced steps. The warrior raised his sword and with that movement the glimmering reflection on the blade turned from gold to blood red.

  Jarred from her torpor, Anora rasped a prayer and clapped her heels against the mare’s ivory barrel. Sensing peril, Pearl leapt into a gallop. Trees rushed past like ghostly sentries. They snatched at Anora, snagging her hair as she bent over her mount’s straining neck. Was the warrior still there? Did he follow?

  Curling her fingers into the mare’s mane, she twisted about to peer into the darkness behind.

  Nothing. They were safe, but …

  No! There he was again, bounding around a copse of trees. Silver steam billowed from his charger’s nostrils like smoke from a dragon’s maw. Moonlight gleamed with wicked zeal along his unsheathed blade.

  Terror ripped up Anora’s spine. She twisted forward again, but just as she did, hands reached for her.

  She screamed and jerked away. Pearl plunged at the pull of the reins, whipping her mistress sideways. The clawing hands retreated into nothing more than reaching branches, but Pearl’s sharp movement had unbalanced her rider. Digging in with her knees, Anora grappled for control, and the panicked mare pivoted around another tree and leapt at the last instant to avoid a log.

  For a moment Anora was suspended in nothingness. There was naught beneath her but air, and then she landed, crooked in the saddle but still astride. The reins had been yanked from her grasp, but her fingers tangled again in the mane and she held on for dearest life.

  Where they headed she did not know, but they were racing downhill at a frenetic pace with branches whipping past her face and rocks tripping them at every turn.

  A prayer burned through her soul, but there was no time to finish the frantic plea, for they were twisting again. Her knee struck a tree. She gasped in pain but held on, leaning back now against the speed of their descent, hoping only for continued survival as the world whipped past in a haze of fear and darkness.

  Wind roared in her ears, rushing up from … no, not wind; water. They were nearly at the end of their descent. Once in the river, she would gain control, head upstream, lose her pursuer, and …

  But in that instant of hope, Anora saw the log looming before her. Ordinarily it would have been no great feat to leap the thing, but the woods were dark, the mare panicked, and her take off late. Still, she soared valiantly. Anora’s breath stopped, and for a moment it seemed as if time stood still. A dozen errant memories flitted through her mind like wind chased clouds: Evermyst’s dizzying heights, Isobel’s gentle laughter, Meara’s gruff voice—and then suddenly the world jolted back into motion.

  Pearl’s cannons struck wood, and then they were falling. The earth spun toward them like a falling top. Anora heard her own rasp of fear, felt her head strike the earth, and then, like an odd, distorted dream, blackness settled over her.

  * * * * *

  Ramsay MacGowan was beginning to tire of his younger brothers’ bickering.

  ” ‘Tis raining,” Lachlan said glumly.

  “And I suppose that, too, is me own fault?”

  If Gilmour’s mood was deteriorating with the weather, Ramsay could not tell it by his jovial tone. It was one of the things that annoyed him most about his younger brother. He was always happy.

  “Aye, ‘tis your fault,” Lachlan grumbled, and hunched his brawny shoulders irritably against the rain. He was only slightly older than Gilmour, but their personalities could hardly have been more different. Lachlan’s dour demeanor matched the weather, and suit
ed Ramsay’s own less than jovial mood quite nicely.

  “‘Twas not my idea to chase after some mythical Munros,” Gilmour argued. “As I recall, ‘twas you, brother, who was so eager to find trouble where there was none.”

  “If Munros be creeping about MacGowan land, I want to know of it,” Lachlan said.

  “Yet we searched for a week and a day with naught but blisters on our arses to show for our troubles. Lucky for you I have friends at Beauly Manor.”

  “And had you not dallied so with—”

  “Not again about the fair Agnes,” Gilmour insisted. “Truly, brother, ‘tis not me own fault that she prefers me over—”

  “Prefers you!” Lachlan snarled, turning about to glare past his dripping tam. “She hardly prefers you. ‘Tis simply that she could not be rid of you. ‘Ahh, me Agnes …’ ” he crooned, re-enacting last evening’s performance, ” ‘your eyes are like the brightest star. Your—’ “

  “Eyes!” Ramsay snorted, and huddled deeper inside his woolen high collared cloak. The eldest of the trio, Ram knew better than to become involved in his brothers’ foolish quarrels. But Gilmour had already turned his ungodly smile in his direction.

  “What say you, Ram?”

  ” ‘Tis naught,” Ramsay said. Rain dropped off the ends of his narrow braids, dripping onto his shoulders with drumming regularity.

  “I thought you said ‘eyes.’ “

  “Your hearing has long been suspect,” Ramsay rumbled. Irritation trickled down his neck like the unceasing rain drops.

  “Humph,” Gilmour said. “Yet I was certain you spoke. Did you not hear him speak, Lachlan?”

  “Indeed I did. He said ‘eyes.’ “

  Gilmour nodded. “Just as I suspected. And did he say it with a certain … disdain?”

  “Aye, he did,” Lachlan agreed soberly.

  “You ken why that is, do you not, brother?”

  “I do. He is ruined.”

  Gilmour nodded. “Aye. Ruined. And you know why.”

  “I do indeed. ‘Tis because of a certain maid.”

  “By the name of Lorna.”

  “She broke his heart, you ken.” Lachlan sighed.

  “There was a time she could do no wrong.”

  ” ‘Tis true.” Lachlan stared forward, gazing moodily into the oncoming rain. “I remember well when our worldly brother saw no shame in waxing eloquent on the beauty of a woman’s eyes.”

  “A time when he could take pleasure in the company of a bonny lass.”

  “When he would not ridicule the innocent.”

  “When he—”

  “Innocent, me arse!” Ramsay growled.

  “What say you?” Gilmour asked, wide eyed. His head was bare to the driving rain, but he seemed unaffected.

  “Do you impugn me Agnes’ innocence?” Lachlan asked.

  “Methinks he does,” Gilmour stated. Though there was disbelief in his tone, there was a devilish sparkle in his eye. Even his damned golden haired horse looked happy.

  “Shut up, the both of you,” Ramsay said, looking straight between Gryfon’s black tipped ears. They were unequal in length and pinned in perpetual vexation against his neck.

  There was silence for an entire blessed heartbeat before Gilmour spoke again. “What does he know of innocence, since he has been so horridly burned by his own misjudgment of the fairer sex?”

  “Me Agnes is innocent,” Lachlan said.

  “Certainly she is.”

  “Truly?” Ramsay said, speaking against his better judgment. “Then pray tell, where did she spend the night, Mour?”

  Gilmour’s lips twitched, but he spread his fingers across his chest in a display of abject innocence and said, “However would I know, brother? ‘Twas you who was ogling her bosom.”

  “Ogling—” Lachlan began, outrage already building in his voice.

  “Aye,” Gilmour said, nodding emphatically so that water fell in fat droplets from his golden hair. “Though I meself cannot imagine how he could wrench his gaze from her bonny smile, her beautiful eyes, her innocent—”

  “The lass,” Ramsay said, careful to keep his tone flat, his expression impassive, “is about as innocent as me claymore.”

  Lachlan growled; Gilmour grinned.

  “Why do you imagine she wore such a revealing gown? Might she have been too warm during these damp autumn days? Do you think, mayhap, that she did not realize her bosoms were tucked up under her chin like heaven in the flesh?” Ramsay glowered at his brothers. “Is that what you think, lads?”

  “As for me, I barely noticed,” Gilmour said, lifting an innocuous hand palm up. “But ‘tis the fashion, I suppose. Nothing more.”

  ” ‘Tis seduction!” Ramsay stated. “Nothing less.”

  “Seduction!” Lachlan hissed.

  “Are you about to let him defame your Agnes like—” Gilmour began, but in that instant something snagged Ramsay’s attention. It was just a shadow amidst shadows, but with it came a prickle of unease.

  “Quiet,” he ordered softly, and the others immediately fell silent. “Do not turn yet, but I think we are not alone.”

  “Explain,” Gilmour said, his voice as low as Ramsay’s.

  “Where?” Lachlan asked.

  “To our left and a little ahead.” Ramsay paused, not allowing Gryfon to turn his hirsute head and warn the rider that he had been spotted. “Do you see it?”

  “Aye. A warrior,” Lachlan replied. “Goodly sized. Black mail and ventail astride a dark horse. A stallion, I think. Mayhap a five year old—”

  “Christ, man,” Gilmour groaned. “We do not need to know the steed’s name. Is he alone?”

  There was a moment’s delay, but not the slightest movement of Lachlan’s head. “I see no others.”

  “Are you certain?”

  For the first time in several hours, Lachlan grinned. “We’ll know when we confront him.”

  “Confront him!” Gilmour scoffed. “You know what that means, don’t you, Ram?”

  “Aye,” Ramsay said, and shifted his shoulders ever so slightly to feel the pleasant weight of his claymore against his back. “It means that our wee brother’s spoiling for a fight.”

  “And you know how disagreeable he gets when he does not get his way,” Gilmour said, still watching the road ahead.

  “There is nothing worse than a disagreeable brother,” Ramsay said, and with that, spun Gryfon toward the left. Had Lachlan not done the same they would have collided. Instead, they lunged in unison into the trees.

  For one heart pounding instant the dark shadow stayed where it was, then it turned with the speed of light and leapt away. They charged after like hounds behind their prey, but in a matter of minutes they knew they had failed.

  “Where the devil did he go?” Ramsay growled.

  Lachlan glowered into the distance. “I do not care for this.”

  “I rather dislike it meself when people disappear into nothingness,” Gilmour agreed, steadying his steed.

  “If he wished us no harm, why did he not declare himself?” Lachlan wondered.

  “Mayhap my reputation as a swordsman preceded me,” Gilmour said.

  “And mayhap he was following someone,” Ramsay countered, and cued the bay to the left. Gryfon ground his teeth and irritably flicked his tail as he turned.

  The other brothers urged their taller horses alongside. “Tracks,” Gilmour said. “Two sets. Heading breakneck toward the burn.”

  “Aye, and the second is the warrior’s.”

  “Are you certain?” Gilmour asked, but Lachlan didn’t deign to answer. “So he was following someone. But was he friend or foe?”

  “Foe,” Ramsay answered, moving his green plaid aside to slip a short blade from inside his bull hide boot. “But he lost his quarry. Thus he returned to their tracks to find him.”

  Pulling his own blade from its sheath, Lachlan dismounted and turned to face downhill. ” ‘Tis only right, then, that we find him first.”

  The rain made the
trail difficult to follow, but the brothers were in their element. Lachlan crouched low over the uncertain trail while Ramsay rode to his left and Gilmour to his right. A MacGowan did not grow to manhood without learning to protect his own.

  Never were their eyes still as they wended their way through the misty rain, only to turn back and try again and again.

  A log lay across their trail. They skirted it, wary of everything, for the sound of the water below drowned all else. But soon they were at the bank of the burn, and there the hoofprints halted.

  Gilmour glanced once more to his right, making certain no one watched them. “What now?”

  “We guess which way. Right or left,” Lachlan said, gazing over the rumbling water, but Ramsay was already turning his mount downstream.

  ‘Tis left,” he said. “‘Twas where the warrior came from.”

  “A good thought.”

  “Aye. He is estimably wise,” Gilmour agreed. “What a pity Lorna ruined him so when—”

  “Do not start up—” Ramsay began, but stopped in an instant, for he’d noticed green velvet just visible beneath a scattering of twigs and leaves.

  “What is it?” Gilmour asked as Lachlan drew his dirk.

  “The quarry,” Ramsay said, nodding toward the figure nearly hidden between a fallen log and bending bracken. “It seems we have found him.”

  Spinning his mount about, Gilmour galloped toward the body. Lachlan followed, but Ramsay remained where he was, scanning the woods for any hidden danger. When none presented itself, he kneed his cantankerous steed back up the hill, stopping just as his brothers knelt before the fallen rider.

  Silence filled the woods. Tension cranked his gut tight.

  “Tell me,” he said finally, unable to see for himself. “Is he dead?”

  Lachlan was silent as he checked for a pulse, but finally his voice broke the quiet. “Nay. The lad yet lives. There’s a bump on the back of his head, but no blood that I can see and—”

  “The lad.” Gilmour’s tone was disbelieving as he gently turned the body over. “Bloody hell, brother, ‘tis little wonder Agnes showed you no interest. You’re slow as a skewered turnip.”