by Jill Barnett
“You have a sister?”
“Aye, she is younger than I. You did not ask about my mother. I am surprised you did not seem shocked I had one,” he said dryly. “Instead of being spawned by the Devil or sired by wolves.”
“Not wolves. Banshees in the dark Caledonian Woods.” She laughed at his mock anger. “And how do your sister and mother tolerate you?”
“They do not.”
“Aye,” she nodded, finishing with one side of the hound. “I find that understandable.”
“They worship me,” he countered.
“Be careful when you walk through that door, Montrose…your fat head might not fit.”
“Beware how you flap that tongue of yours…I might be tempted to cut it out.”
“Such threats against a poor, wee, defenseless woman.”
That made him chuckle and he saw she tried not to smile, but stood instead and studied the hound, gripping him gently by the scruff and moving her face close to his dark, wet snout.
“Look at you, Fergus. You are so handsome. You look like a royal hound.”
“Do not lie to the animal. He still looks like an enormous hairy rat, but with no mud on his fur.”
She fluffed the dog’s big ears. “Ignore him, my sweet hound. I take most of his words with a grain of salt.” She surprised him, the phrases she used, and not for the first time.
“How do you know of Pliny and Pompey?”
“Alastair told me many stories. Of Aesop and Homer, Sophocles’ Antigone and Oedipus, of the great tales of the Greek gods and goddesses. Those myths and poems were the heart of my childhood. My father’s,” she stopped and corrected herself. “Sir Hume’s father was distant kinsman to the duke of Normandy and was educated in his youth by a priest and destined for the church, until some change took place and he was sent to be fostered to a family, where the house bard carried songs and poems and tales for all who dined in the great hall. He passed those stories on to his son, and he to his sons, and Alastair himself was tutored for a short time.”
‘Twas as if a storm cloud had descended over them, so quickly did the lightness between them change. The mere mention of her brothers stole the joy away and some part of him was sorely disappointed.
But his sense returned swiftly, and told him he was being a fool. Better there be distance between them, even rancor, than his strange weak moods of the heart.
“We will leave at sunrise,” he told her.
She stood up, head down as she straightened her clinging wet gown, then opened the purse at her waist, looked inside and dropped in the comb. “Thank you for bathing Fergus, my lord. Come now,” she said to the hound and snapped her fingers. The dog was instantly at her side. “We shall leave you to your…" she paused and looked at him as if she were searching for something in him rather than something to say. “…your business.”
He watched her leave and stared at the empty spot where she had disappeared, unable to shake from his mind’s eye the image of her. He cursed himself for starting this, for washing her hound and bringing to mind his past, one that was long since over, and worse, his future, when he would have to walk away from her, and that was the last thing he wanted to do.
14
Torchlight in her hand, Glenna stood over the sleeping form of Baron Montrose sprawled out on his pallet, studying the slow, even rise and fall of his chest. She took a chance and poked him in the side with her foot.
Not a sound did he make.
“Montrose?” she whispered. Nothing. “Montrose,” she said louder. The man was sleeping like a drunkard. She picked up the half-full tankard and sniffed it. There was no telltale scent, nothing to warn that essence from the bloodbane leaves had laced the beer. Montrose had no warning of what was coming.
For reasons she could not explain, she was not proud of herself, and uncomfortable with her moment of conscience . Still she stood there longer knowing there was no time for regret.
But part of her still wished….
What good were wishes? Bah! She hurried around the room gathering her packs together. Soon after she'd left the stable earlier, she had done as Montrose asked and packed up what she had and changed clothes. Her gown was still wet when she rolled it up, but she sprinkled it with some fragrant dried lavender leaves from that morning, before tucking her green gown and the rest of her things tightly into her saddle roll.
Fergus was eagerly up on his haunches and watching her as she pulled her things into a corner before loading herself up with gear. Over one shoulder she slung the braided leather cord on Montrose’s fat waterskin, then shifted, adjusting it more comfortably next to the thick satchel strap that was already cutting into her slightly from the weight. She also stole his knife and a bag of silver marks.
A woolen cloth filled with food and tied tightly together would have to wait for the second load. She would not be as foolish as before and leave with nothing to eat or drink. Onc quick look at Montrose; he looked to be far, far from awakening. But she had no guarantees he would not wake up soon after she left. She was new to this drugging ploy and had been somewhat afraid to use too much and kill the man.
To Fergus she said, “Stay. Lie down. I shall be back.” He obeyed but rested his ragged snout on his paws. His eyes were big and wide and innocent, still watching her as she slipped quietly out of the room.
With the pack, her satchel, other goods slung about her shoulders and wrists, she moved down the abbey's narrow maze of dark hallways, being careful as she passed the dimly lit corridor that led down towards the front doors.
She looked around the corner.
At the end of the hallway, under wane of a flickering rushlight, Pater Bancho dozed in a niche by the large oak doors while slumped in a heavily carved wooden chair. She tiptoed quietly past the opening and moved swiftly down the halls to the back doors that led to the gardens.
Outside, but for the click of insects and the slight sound of her soft and careful footfalls, it was quiet, being well past the night’s last chiming of the bells. Soon she would be free and away from the threat of her birth, away from her fears, and away from Montrose.
An uneasy feeling ran over her arms like chilblains at the image of him when he awoke and she was not there. She could almost hear the bellow. And this time, she felt no urge to laugh. Somehow, besting him now held little satisfaction for her.
She began to run, heavily with her load, but run she must. She needed to run from his image, from the mere thought of him and the questions that came into her mind, far away from what she was feeling.
Above her, the twinkling of stars scattered as if thrown across the sky, and the thin splinter of a moon stood off toward the southwest where the edges of the horizon were still the late summer color of heather. She crossed the last distance of the garden, heading into the orchards where the fruit ladder was light and easy enough for her to carry to the south outskirts of the abbey garden and pull up after her whilst straddling the lime-washed wall, and then lean down on the other side, where she climbed outside the grounds and ran into a nearby copse of thick rowan trees.
Tied to a tree in the woods, Skye whinnied softly and Glenna pulled out a handful of oats and let her eat from her hand. Her horse had been waiting there most of the night. She secured on her packs and ran back the way she had come. She entered as quietly as she had just left and slipped into the room, where Montrose was slightly snoring in his drug-induced sleep.
No…she was wrong. It was not Montrose who was snoring.
She took down the torch and moved to the dark corner, where Fergus lay on his side, snoring,….next to the over-turned beer tankard. Had it not been half full? Now there was not even a puddle of liquid. She squatted down and whispered harshly, “Fergus!”
No response.
She shoved his body, shook him. “Fergus!”
Her dog was drugged. She groaned miserably and sank her head into her hands, just sitting there, feeling a little lost and defeated.
What had she done?
Lifting her head up, she glanced at him again, the slow rise and fall of his furry chest, lying on the floor as stuporous as was Montrose himself. She sat there for long moments, each one essential to the success of her escape, knowing she had made a muck of things.
This was perhaps her only chance on the journey to run. She stared long and hard at Fergus. She prided herself on out-thinking people, on proving she was smart. The best thing for her own survival would be to grab the bag of food and leave. And break her heart. Running away without her dog was not an option she would consider, no matter what was the best move.
Without another heartless thought, she lifted him into her arms…Lord, but he was heavy, and floppy, and awkward—dead weight—and positioned him over her shoulder like a wheezing sack of oats, dipped her knees slightly to pick up the bundle of food, and she made for the door.
Pausing, she looked back and whispered, “Sweet dreams, Montrose.”
* * *
Lyall’s mouth was as dry as the deserts of Outremer, and tasted oddly sweet and bitter, as if he had drunk bad heather ale. He rolled over--a monumental effort-- and groaned, his body like dead weight and stiff, muscles aching up and down his limbs and back with the merest of his movements, the way one ached after sleeping in one position all night.
His hand and arm were numb; he flexed his fingers, staring up at the blurred beams above him. His head throbbed and was not much better than his numb hand.
Where am I?
He shook his head and blinked several times, adjusting to the dark, and could make out the carving in the thick wooden beam overhead, a familiar psalm for pilgrims: Thy help comes from the Lord, Maker of Heaven and Earth.
He was at the Abbey at Beauly. Under that beam he had knelt by Glenna, held her down during her deliriums and prayed over her to a God he'd had little communication with since he was ten years old.. He sat up and glanced opposite him, where her pallet was empty. Thinking she must have gone out to the privy or taken the hound out, he tried to clear his head, knowing he needed to get up. It must have been near dawn and any moment he expected to hear the bells of Matins.
Today they were facing another long ride, but in the windowless room, he had no idea if it was yet close to sunrise or past it. He stretched, pulling his muscles tight, then relaxing and wiping his face. Odd how he felt as if he could fall back asleep. Even after his most drunken of nights, his head had never pounded like it did now, thundering across his scalp like horse’s hooves.
He pushed himself up and the room swam. He swore then scratched the back of his head. Out of sheer stubbornness he stumbled to the laver, filling it from the ewer and splashing water on his face.
As he toweled off his face, the bells rang…the bells rang the number for Terce, late…midmorning. The towel slipped from his hands, and he glanced over at the empty corner, where last night she had stacked her packed possessions. He was out the door in a heartbeat.
Before long all was clear. Glenna, it turned out, was nowhere to be found. The orchard ladder was left on the ground near the south wall. No horse. No hound. He looked around him and cursed himself a fool. His ‘wife’ had taken off sometime during the night, and he was forced to leave the abbey with great speed and a lighter purse (much lighter considering one bag of marks was missing), less a substantial sum to the abbey to pray for his heartless soul.
On horseback outside the gates, he winced up at the blurred sun, which added to his blinding headache, but all he could see clearly was the vision of her talking to the monk in the herb garden. So much for all his long well-thought stratagems. She had outwitted him, and if he weren’t in a temper at his piss-poor self, he might have paid silent homage to her actions.
There was no doubt in his throbbing head and unlikely sluggishness that the little witch had drugged him. As he knelt by his horse outside the abbey wall and touched her trail marks in the soft wet ground, followed them into the woods and tracked the deep, sunken hoofmarks heading away to the south.
What was that she had said when she was fevered? Applecross, Dingwall, Suddy, Cromarty, Plockton, Garve, Kyle, Avoch, Knockbain, and Wester.
So he knew where she was not, and knew, too, that when he found her—and find her he would—there would be hell for her to pay.
* * *
There would be hell for his stepson to pay when he found him.
Smelling of horse and dust, driven by lack of sleep and anger, Donnald Ramsey took the castle stairs at Rossi two at a time. He crossed the solar, pushed aside the thick brocade curtain to the bower, and stalked into the open room looking for his wife, who was not there. Maids were busy scouring coal smoke from a stone wall and, on hands and knees, cleaning the flagstone floor. One turned from the wall, saw him, and dropped her bucket to the floor with a clatter. The others turned in unison, looked at his face, and quickly curtseyed.
“Where’s Lady Beitris?” His voice sounded like thunder.
One woman paled while another gaped, open-mouthed. He seldom shouted.
“She has gone out to the kitchens, my lord.”
He swore and left the room, ran back down the stairs and across the open bailey to the cook sheds. Inside was absolute chaos, which was appropriate considering his last couple of days. Kitchen lackeys were beating out a spreading fire near the wood larder, leaving him unnoticed, while the cookwas shrieking that whole place would be up in flames and ‘my lord would hang them from the towers and rip off my thumbs.’
Two castle guards came running past with buckets of water from the castle well, so he grabbed one and doused the fire in sizzling burst of smoke and steam. All turned in unison to look at him, and the shed was suddenly silent, while they stood staring at each other, smoke swirling, the taste of burnt wood in the air.
One of the lads averted his wide eyes, but Ramsey caught his expression--so fearful and pale he was on the edge of bursting into tears, probably at the image of hanging from the east tower by his neck.
“No one will hang from my towers,” he said in a suddenly calm and quiet voice. Except perhaps Lyall, he thought, glancing over at the cook, a wiry man with a thick thatch of coal black hair who had cooked at the castle for more years than Donnald cared to count and had the priceless skill to make plain mutton stew taste tender and spicy and like no other. “And were I to cut off your thumbs, man, how in God’s name would you prepare my meals?”
The man set a jug down and then laughed and said, "Thank you, my lord, my thumbs are quite necessary for butchering spring lamb..
“Where is Lady Beitris?”
“In the buttery, milord,” the lad volunteered quickly, his color returning.
Ramsey decided he needed to have harness made for his wife. As he walked across the bailey yard, he realized he was more tired and disappointed than angry. Between the island and Rossie he had stewed in his anger until it turned into a highly cooked rage and he thought his head would blow off by the time he approached the castle gates with a few of his men. Now, he was resigned. Lyall had chosen his path. What was done, was done.
Inside the buttery, barrels of ale and a few hogsheads of wine stamped with winery marks were stacked in straight rows along the freshly limewashed stone walls and Beitris stood inside, directing workmen in the restocking of recently delivered Angevin wines. She demanded precision in all things-- the position of stored goods, the perfectly aligned rows in the castle gardens, the table settings in the great hall, the exact placement of a carpet upon the stone floors, the tapestries on Rossi’s wall, even their clothing on the rods and in the coffers of their bedchamber; and he wondered if that perfection was all there only to compensate for what she felt when she touched her face or looked at her reflection in the polished surface of a metal mirror
“Beitris,” he said quietly, his voice sounding as strained as he felt.
She turned quickly and her hood slipped down. Her hand went to her face and she quickly pulled up the hood, turning away so she stood in profile, the unflawed side of her face all he could see.
Over the years she had learned to judge—also with precision-- the exact angle to hide the scarred side of her face.
But he had known her since she was ten and three and barely betrothed to Ewan, who she had wed three years later. From first sight of her, Donnald was smitten. She became part of him; she haunted his secret dreams and was what made his nightmares. Ewane was his friend, yet that did not stop him from coveting his friend’s wife. Time and their destinies had changed all and she was now his wife, her beauty had naught to do with anything. She was his heart. He cared not about the appearance of her face and would give all he had, including his soul, to take away the shame she felt.
Had he known what their future held could he have controlled his own deep desires? All thought him to be an honorable man, yet he knew the truth.
“I did not expect you for days.” She paused. “What is wrong?”
What was wrong? So much, including the fact that he was her husband and she need not hide from him. He had seen her face despite the darkness she begged for. He turned to the workers. “Leave us.”
When they were alone he sat down on a ale keg, hands hanging down almost uselessly between his legs, him staring at them and searching for the words to tell her what her son had done. His mind found a fine use for his hands…he wished to strangle Lyall. “Tis about Lyall.”
“Is he dead?”
“Nay,” he said, and told her all. His words were crushing her, he knew, for Lyall’s actions were treasonous. Whether Ewane had betrayed the king or not no longer mattered. Because her son had.
