Perfect, he thought. Her body was simply perfect, even after the birth of two children. He straddled her and, leaning forward, licked a nipple. Then he kissed it before gathering her into his arms and kissing her as their bodies melted into each other. He ran his tongue along her lips, and she met the touch with her own tongue, which teased at his, playing a game of hide-and-seek within the warmth of his mouth. And all the while his big hand worked its way all over her body, caressing the length of her back, her rounded buttocks.
Cicely loved the hard body against hers. She clung to him, fingers digging into his shoulders as he touched her. But then, as she had come into the habit of doing, she pushed him back and, leaning over him, began to lick his body. Her tongue encircled his nipples. She grazed them lightly with her teeth. Kier lay back, content to be pleasured by his wife. Cicely worked her way across his chest, his torso, his belly with her tongue and lips, kissing, stroking, blowing lightly on the moistened skin. “You are delicious,” she told him, and then, reaching his manhood, she took him into her mouth and sucked upon him.
Kier groaned with delight. He had taught her to love him as he loved her several months after their marriage, when she had become more comfortable sharing her bed with him. To his surprise Cicely had taken easily to sucking his cock. She had shown no reluctance to licking the length of him, or playing with the ruby head of his manhood when she had pushed his foreskin back. Her teeth would graze over the sensitive flesh very lightly until he was actually shivering with his own excitement. Then she would open her lips and take him into her mouth, suckling strongly until he would beg her to stop. He far preferred releasing his juices into her tight sheath. “Enough, sweetheart!” he ground out in a rough voice.
Cicely released him, lying back so that he might pleasure her as she had just done for him. He had explained that it was better for them to both attain the same pinnacle of excitement before coupling, and if the truth were known, she loved having his wicked tongue stroking her love bud until it burst, and then licking it again until she was trembling with her excitement. Tonight he pushed his tongue into her and she sighed. He then pressed two fingers into the wet warmth, moving them back and forth until her juices flowed for him. Finally he mounted her, driving hard and deep while she met his every thrust, arching her body up to meet his. And then she could no longer control herself, for she wanted him so greatly. Her juices flowed copiously again, drenching his cock, while her sheath contracted and spasmed about him.
He was not satisfied. He would be without her for weeks, and he was not such a weakling or a fool that he would use one of the whores who would travel with the king’s army. “I want your ass,” he growled into her ear as he lay atop her. “Did Ian have it?”
“Nay,” Cicely answered him nervously. Jo had said he might want her that way one day. But why now?
“Good! ’Tis one virginity I shall have of you, sweetheart. I want you to do as I tell you, and do it when I tell you,” Kier said. “Roll over onto your belly.” And when she had he pushed several pillows beneath her so that her bottom was elevated for him, and her knees were beneath her. Kier ran his hands over the smooth, plump flesh. Just looking at it tightened his cock more, and it hurt.
“Please,” Cicely said softly, “be gentle, my lord.”
He didn’t answer her. Instead, wetting his first two fingers, he pushed them between the half-moons of her buttocks, inserting them carefully into her forbidden passage.
Cicely wasn’t sure she was breathing.
“Don’t stiffen your body,” he said quietly. “Be easy. I won’t hurt you.” His fingers remained still. “I’m just trying to prepare you, sweetheart.”
Cicely tried to relax.
“That’s it,” he murmured softly in her ear. He withdrew his fingers and, reaching beneath with them, he began to play with her love bud once more. It did not take long for her to react, squirming on his hand, her juices flowing again. He wet his cock with those slick juices, and then, spreading her open, he pressed against her rose hole, applying more and more gentle pressure until it gave way, allowing him entry into her forbidden passage. Slowly, carefully, he inserted himself until he was sheathed.
Beneath him Cicely whimpered. It felt as if she were being impaled, yet he was so gentle that, other than the momentary pinch of his entry, she felt no pain. But she felt the touch of his male pouch against her bottom.
God’s balls! He couldn’t ever remember being enclosed so tightly. He was near to exploding, but he restrained himself, because the sensation was so incredible he wanted to retain it for just a moment or two more. He allowed himself to fuck her three slow and careful strokes, and she squealed a trio of little Ohs! Then, with no instruction being given, her passage seemed to clasp him even more tightly. “Jesu!” Kier gasped, involuntarily releasing his juices, which exploded in tight bursts until he was finally able to pull himself from her. “Madam,” he was finally able to say, “you well and truly unmanned me.” Then, turning her over, he kissed her with slow, hot kisses.
Cicely wasn’t certain that what he had just done was something she wanted to share with him again. But Jo had said husbands sometimes wanted to use their wives in that manner. And he had been gentle, giving her no real pain. And he was going away to war on the morrow, so she had wanted him happy.
“I love you, wife,” he told her, “and so I sense you were not comfortable with what we just did, were you?”
“Nay,” Cicely answered, “but if it made you happy then I am content.”
Kier kissed her on her forehead. “Go to sleep now, and before I leave you I will show you what really makes me happy, sweetheart.” And several hours later he woke her and made tender, passionate love to her that left Cicely breathless, and they were both happy then.
She was up, dressed, and ready to see him off, however. They had gone to Mass together, and then broken their fast with Father Ambrose. And afterwards, with all the men a-horse before the house, almost the entire village gathered, the priest had blessed them, praying aloud for their well-being and a safe return home.
Cicely stood with Johanna by her side, holding Ian in her arms. “Conduct yourself with honor, my lord, and return home to us in one piece, if you please,” she told him.
Orva lifted Johanna up so her stepfather might kiss the child. Then Cicely held Ian out to his father for a kiss and a blessing. They had only just celebrated the child’s first year the week before. She gave her son to his wet nurse, Ella, and, standing on her tiptoes, raised her face up to him, smiling.
Kier bent, lifted her up, and kissed her mouth most thoroughly. “Be a good lass,” he told her with a wicked grin. Then he set her back upon her feet.
“I will try, my lord husband,” she promised him.
The laird of Glengorm raised his hand and, turning his stallion about, signaled his men forward. The lady and her Glengorm folk stood waving and watching until the men disappeared down the road that ran through the glen.
They met Sir William a day and a half later, and the Douglases then rode for Scone to meet up with the king. They were joined along the way by many of the other border lords with their troops, Lord Grey of Ben Duff among them, who came with a small party of his clansmen.
Arriving at Scone, they met up with the king and over a thousand clansmen from the west and the east who had answered the royal summons. Then they headed north to the Highland town of Inverness. Created a royal burgh by King William the Lion in the year 1214, the town sat on the banks of the River Ness just where it flowed into Beauly Firth, and from there into Moray Firth. Inverness, considered the capital of the Highlands, had been in existence as long as anyone could remember. It was said that those who came before the Scots, people known as Picts, had lived there. It was a busy market town with many shops, several churches, and even a Dominican friary that had been founded two hundred years prior by King Alexander III.
The townspeople were loyal to the king, and delighted that he had finally come north to visit them. They
had worked from the moment he had returned to Scotland to repair for his habitation the one part of Inverness Castle that had not been destroyed by Malcolm III, Duncan’s son, after the usurper, Macbeth, had resided there. They knew that eventually James Stewart would come to them, and they wanted a place worthy of him.
The king reached Inverness before the day appointed for the lord of the isles and his clan allies to arrive. He settled himself within the rebuilt Inverness Tower. The majority of those accompanying him set up a tent encampment around the tower house. He invited into the tower’s great hall for a meal those earls and clan chiefs who had accompanied him north, and he made it a point to greet each man there, be he high or low, by name, shaking their hands and thanking them for their support.
“He’s clever,” Sir William said, low, to the laird of Glengorm. “But he is still making enemies. He’s taken several more earldoms, and sent Strathearn down into England, along with others to stand as collateral for his ransom.”
“The land has been lawless,” Kier replied as softly. “He must be hard in order to gain their attention and obedience.”
“One day someone will kill him,” Sir William answered sanguinely. “I hope his English queen has managed to spawn a healthy son by then.”
The next day the MacDonald arrived, setting up a huge encampment with the several thousand clansmen who had accompanied him. His great pavilion was set directly in the center of the camp. The MacDonald had brought with him his three sons, who were accompanied by their retainers. The elder, and his heir, was Ian MacDonald. His brothers were Celestine of Lochalsh and Hugh of Sleate. The four men possessed over four thousand men among them. And they had brought all of their forces with them.
Kier wondered if this great show of magnificence and men was meant to do honor to James Stewart, or to intimidate him. If it was the latter, the lord of the isles had wasted his time, for the king, while admiring, was not in the least cowed, even when all the clans, pipes playing, plaids blowing in the summer breeze, marched down from the hills to Inverness Tower. James stood atop the tower and listened as his kinsman, the Earl of Atholl, identified the colors worn by the clansmen below.
“The dark green-and-blue plaid with the narrow red and white stripes, that’s the MacDonalds. The red with the broad and narrow green stripes is his son, Hugh of Sleate. The Camerons are the red with the broad green and narrow yellow stripes. The Campbells wear the dark blue and green with the narrow yellow stripe. The MacLeods of MacLeod wear the green with the red and yellow stripes, or the yellow and black with the red stripe. The MacArthurs are the green with the yellow stripe.”
“Enough,” the king said. “I’ll not remember in any event. It’s the men among them I’m interested in, not their garments. They have brought their women and bairns with them, I’m told. Good! Let them see my justice for themselves, so they may report it afterwards,” James Stewart said with a grim smile. “Allow the MacDonald, his mother, the Countess of Ross, the clan chieftains, and their women into the hall. The rest are to remain outside. I am ready for them, Atholl, although I doubt they are ready for me.”
The gray stone hall in which the king received the lord of the isles had no windows. At one end of the hall was a raised wooden dais with a gilded wooden canopy, beneath which the king sat upon a throne with carved arms and lion’s-paw feet. He sat unmoving, his face showing no emotion whatsoever as his guests entered the hall.
Escorting his mother, the MacDonald led his chieftains and the other invited members of the Highland contingent into the hall. Alexander MacDonald stopped at the foot of the dais. He offered the king a slow, elegant bow. Next to him the old Countess of Ross curtsied. Her wobble was barely noticeable, and the king could tell her knees hurt her as she rose, but the smile on her face was genuine. He briefly felt regret at what was about to transpire.
“My lord,” the MacDonald said, “I welcome ye to the Highlands. May yer stay be a pleasant one, and may ye return often.”
The king’s reply was a terse one, and Alexander MacDonald, not to be shamed before his clansmen and allies, answered sharply. He was not used to being spoken to in such a manner. He was the king of the north, and resented this Stewart upstart who would attempt to pull him down from his high place.
But James Stewart was not the kind of Stewart he had been used to dealing with in days past. This king was a hard man. Looking first directly at the lord of the isles, and then at the others in the hall, he said, “I am told there are some among you who would have my life.” Signaling his guard, who had been notified in advance of what they would do, he watched as Alexander MacRurie and Ian MacArthur were hauled forth from among the other clan chieftains and dragged before him. “You two spoke of my murder. I cannot trust you. Your deaths will provide an example to your companions.”
Raising his hand, the king signaled his executioners, who stepped forward and swiftly beheaded MacRurie and MacArthur. Neither man had the chance to cry out. Their heads fell from their bodies, rolling a short distance. The women in the hall screamed and began to weep in their fright as blood gushed from the severed necks of the two clan chieftains.
“Seize them all!” the king roared angrily. “They shall be imprisoned in the dungeons prepared for their arrival.” Rising from his throne, he stepped down from the dais, stepping over the river of blood, and offered his hand to the Countess of Ross. “You, madam, will be my guest,” he said, “while your son and his friends contemplate their disobedience to me, to Scotland.”
“Are you not Scotland?” the Countess of Ross replied, taking the hand offered.
James Stewart smiled grimly. “I am, madam,” he agreed. “I am.”
This was the tale Kier Douglas told Cicely when he returned home in early August. “No one, or at least only a very few, knew what he intended,” Kier said.
“What happened afterwards?” Cicely asked.
“The MacDonald’s sister-in-law stepped forward and upbraided the king for his behavior. She asked if this was the king’s justice.”
“Did the king throw her in the dungeon too?” Cicely asked, fascinated.
“Nay. He called her a cattle thief and a whore, and ordered her from his hall,” Kier told his wife. “But she had the last word and she left the king speechless. She told him, ‘Better an honest whore, my liege, than a dishonorable king.’ ”
“The woman must be mad to have spoken to James Stewart like that,” Cicely said. “And he let her go unscathed?”
“A priest stood near his side, his kinsman, I think. He murmured something to the king, and oddly the king refrained from taking any action against her. He said nothing more. The woman left the hall, followed by all the other women.”
“What happened then?” Cicely asked.
“Well,” Kier continued, “a couplet had been making its way about the encampments. ‘To donjon tower let this rude troop be driven, For death they merit, by the cross of Heaven.’ The Highlanders were on edge, as were the rest of us. The king, however, did not keep us waiting long. A week after his first meeting with the MacDonald and his allies, he invited all who had come to gather at Inverness to attend his parliament. He announced he would then render his judgment upon them all. The MacArthurs and the MacRuries had already left to take home their dead chieftains. The Highlanders were very fearful, for the couplet was said to have been written by the king himself.” Kier chuckled.
Cicely was fascinated by his recitation. Kier had kept a very close account of what had happened in Inverness so he might share it with her.
“In an effort to demonstrate to the Highland chieftains that he was showing no favor to any in particular, the king had hanged that same week James Campbell, who had murdered Alexander MacDonald’s cousin, Ian MacDonald. His execution got those in the dungeons talking among themselves. But then, to their great relief, the king fined them and released them back to their clanspeople,” Kier said.
“And the lord of the isles?” Cicely asked.
“A large fine to fatte
n James Stewart’s treasury, and a lengthy lecture. The king said there could be but one king in Scotland, and that king was James Stewart, by the grace of God, and anointed with the holy oil of the Holy Mother Church. He told the MacDonald that he had to stop taking up arms for every offense, real or imagined. He threatened MacDonald that if he did not cease his rude ways, James would come north again, and stop them for good and all. If Alexander MacDonald would keep the peace in the north he would find favor with James Stewart. Then he instructed the lord of the isles to kneel and pledge his fealty. You could tell the MacDonald was angry at being held up to public censure, but he did indeed kneel, and pledged his fealty to the king. After that we were free to go home, and so our Glengorm men and I hurried south again.”
“What an amazing time,” Cicely said. “I wish I had been there to see it. My life hasn’t been as interesting at all, my lord.” Then she went on to tell her husband that the haying had been completed, and the harvest just begun. Summer was coming to an end, and they would need to prepare for the winter ahead.
But Alexander MacDonald had been embarrassed by what had transpired at Inverness. He had lost control of the situation, and on his own ground. He would need to make a public gesture so as not to appear weakened among his own. The king would certainly understand, and then the peace would hold for however long it would hold. Inverness would pay the price for their outspoken loyalty to James Stewart. The MacDonald gathered his clansmen and his allies. Marching upon Inverness, they burned it to the ground. Then, satisfied, Alexander MacDonald returned home to his island kingdom of Islay, and his army of ten thousand men dispersed.
However, James Stewart did not understand. A royal burgh had been burned to the ground, its inhabitants slaughtered, the town looted, the few survivors scattered, desperate to survive the coming winter. Autumn was already in the Highlands. The nights were cold, the days little better. But a party of Inverness’s survivors trekked south to Scone to tell the king what had happened. Reaching him after several weeks, they begged for his justice, and James promised to give it to them.
The Border Lord and the Lady Page 42
