by Amy Jarecki
After she’d reached the pinnacle of calm, the chamber door flew open and in strode Lady Margaret, carrying a voluminous red gown, followed by chambermaids with buckets of steaming water and a groom carrying a wooden tub.
“Put it in front of the hearth.” Lady Margaret pointed. “You must wake, Gyllis.”
“Already?” Gyllis asked with a sleepy voice.
The chambermaids emptied their buckets into the tub and filed in a procession out the door.
Lady Margaret smiled brilliantly. “’Tis good to see you awake, Meg. Are you excited for your wedding day?”
Meg stood and wiped her hands across her face. “Yes, thank you. I had a refreshing night’s sleep, and am ready to take my vows.” Though these were vows she’d never allowed herself to dream she’d be uttering.
“We’ve much to do before you’ll be ready to stand before the priest.” Lady Margaret flicked her wrists. “First into the bath with you, then we need to pluck your eyebrows, rouge your cheeks and lips, then file your nails.” She crossed the room and fingered a lock of Meg’s hair. “And I shall send up my own chambermaid to attend your lovely tresses.”
“Aye, with hair like that, she scarcely needs a headpiece,” Gyllis said.
“Sacrilege!” Lady Margaret strode to the bed and picked up the gown she’d brought in. The velvet overdress was the most brilliant shade of red Meg had ever seen, trimmed with sealskin. “I daresay this is still in fashion after all these years.”
Meg smoothed her hand over the velvet, woven with thread of gold. “’Tis exquisite.”
The lady’s gaze softened. “It was my very own wedding dress.”
Meg clutched her fists under her chin. “Oh my, I cannot wear such an important family heirloom.”
“And why ever not? You are marrying into the family.” Lady Margaret picked up Meg’s hand and held it to the dress. “Besides, it matches the ring Duncan gave you.”
Meg sighed. “Aye, it does.”
“Ooh,” Gyllis said. “Mother, you think of everything.”
“Yes I do, and there is no time to waste. Off with your shift. I shall call in the chambermaid at once.” The matron sounded as giddy as a wee lassie.
Meg complied and slipped into the warm water. She grinned. Soon Lady Margaret would run out of reasons to keep her from Duncan’s arms.
Wearing the ceremonial armor passed down from his father, Duncan paced at the back of the chapel. His inner circle of men all stood patiently, as if this were just another humdrum day. Duncan thumped Eoin on the shoulder. “Say something, would you?”
The knight cleared his throat. “The salmon will be running up the Orchy soon.”
Duncan should have hit him harder. “Fishing?”
“Aye.” Eoin spread his palms to his sides. “Would you rather I challenged you to a wrestling match? You might look a bit unsightly for your bride with a black eye.”
Duncan paced in a circle. “Bloody miserable hell, where is she?”
As if he’d uttered the secret password, the chapel door opened and Lady Margaret slipped inside, followed by Duncan’s sisters. “Oh good, you’re ready,” Mother said.
He looked to the rafters. “I’ve been ready since the cock crowed at first light.”
Mother smiled in her serene way and patted Duncan’s cheek. “A prize as lovely as Lady Meg is worth the wait.” She flicked her wrists toward the altar. “You’d best take your place.”
He’d bloody waited long enough. Mother led the girls to the pew at the front of the chapel. Duncan followed and stood at the rail. He stared at the door thinking it would never open, but then a sliver of sunlight spread into a glowing ray. Through that light, Meg appeared like an apparition sent from heaven. The sunshine first caught the ringlets of hair peeking from under her veil. It wasn’t until Meg stepped farther into the chapel that he could see her face. Her radiant smile ignited the embers of his heart.
Meg looked more regal than the Queen of Scotland, more beautiful than a meadow nymph, and, best of all, this day she would be his.
Arthur escorted her down the aisle of the small chapel.
Meg reached out her hands to Duncan, blessing him with such luminous beauty, his heart thrummed in his chest. “You are stunning, my love.”
Her eyes sparkled. “As are you.”
While the priest chanted the Latin mass, Duncan recalled the first time she’d unveiled her striking cobalt eyes to him. He’d done his best to act like a priest, but she’d seen right though his ruse. From the outset, Meg could gaze into his soul and find the truth. And from that blessed moment in the Alnwick chapel, this remarkable woman had won his heart forever.
Epilogue
Eight months later
Having recently returned from the borders, where he and his men were patrolling for English spies, Duncan paced in front of the hearth. The shrieks coming from the adjoining lady’s chamber had his wits on the ragged edge. God’s bones, he’d rather be fighting an army of MacDonald rogues than listening to Meg suffer through labor.
“I can see the head,” Alana’s matronly voice resounded through the walls. “Bear down with your next pain.”
“I cannot bear to breathe anymore, let alone withstand the pain to push him out!” Meg sounded on the brink of hysterical.
“’Tis nearly over,” Mother soothed. “You shall hold your bairn in your arms soon.”
“The pain is killing me!” After a few sharp gasps, Meg cried out in such agony, Duncan was convinced he’d lose her.
He could take no more. He marched to the door and stopped, holding his hand above the latch. He mustn’t go in there. It was bad luck . . . and work only for womenfolk. But Jesus, he needed to do something. Raking his fingers through his hair, he stared at the sideboard against the far wall. Aye, he could use a stiff drink.
Shrieks and gasps clawed through the walls, creeping up Duncan’s skin. His hands shook as he uncorked the flagon and filled a goblet.
He held it to his lips.
Meg screamed.
Whisky sloshed down the front of his shirt.
“Keep pushing,” Alana yelled.
Duncan picked up the flagon and guzzled.
Something clapped. A wee voice cried. A darling wee voice indeed.
Meg laughed.
Duncan did too.
“’Tis a girl!” Mother said with elation.
Duncan set the flagon down. A girl? He could have crowed from the rafters.
When the door between the chambers opened, Ma walked over, holding a bundle. “Say hello to your daughter.”
Duncan grinned and hastened across the room. “Elizabeth. Meg wanted to name a girl after her sister.”
Mother placed the bairn in his arms. With red fuzz atop her dainty head, she gurgled.
After taking one look at the darling face, Duncan was completely enraptured. “She’s the most beautiful bairn I’ve ever seen.” He then looked up. “How is Meg?”
Ma smiled. “She’s—”
A shrill cry screeched from Meg’s chamber.
Ma grimaced with a look of terror.
“Hold on,” Alana bellowed. “There’s another wee bairn coming!”
The door slammed in Duncan’s face as Meg launched into another bout of nerve-fraying screams. Duncan started for the sideboard and looked down. Elizabeth’s face turned bright red . . . and then she started crying. Duncan froze. What in God’s name was he to do with a bairn in his arms? And she didn’t look quite so adorable with her face all scrunched up and a high-pitched cry rattling about inside his ears.
“Push, push, push!” Alana cried.
Duncan tried to soothe and bounce the bairn, but Elizabeth cried louder.
“I cannot,” Meg shrieked.
“Just once more. You can, m’lady. You. Can!”
After an earsplitting howl, Duncan could take no more. He burst into the chamber to see Alana hold up a gory mass of bloody gook and smack it on the behind. The matron had the audacity to grin while bairn number
two cried loudly, sucking in frantic gasps.
The matron continued to grin as if it were the happiest day of all. “You have a son as well, m’lord.”
“Praises be.” Ma beamed as if Meg weren’t lying sprawled across the bed in a pool of blood.
Duncan’s jaw dropped. “But—”
“Let me hold Elizabeth.” Meg reached up.
Duncan held out the bairn as if he were handling a basket of fragile eggs. “Are you well, my love?”
“I’ve never been better,” Meg hummed, as if she hadn’t been screaming bloody murder for hour upon hour.
Duncan sat beside her and brushed a lock of damp hair from Meg’s forehead.
Alana dunked the boy in the basin, splashing water over him and wiping him down. The wee lad carried on with boisterous cries. Duncan didn’t blame him. The water was most likely ice cold.
Ma spread a plaid over Meg’s lap and hid the mess. Though Meg’s hair was mussed in a tangled mane, she looked like an angel when she glanced up with a radiant smile.
Duncan’s heart melted.
Then Alana placed the lad in Meg’s other arm. “You must make the bond soon.”
Meg looked from one of her breasts to the next. “Both at once?”
“Aye.”
“And what name have you chosen for the lad?” Mother asked.
“Colin,” Duncan said without hesitation. “He shall be named for the founder and patriarch of our clan. The legendary knight who fought in the Crusades. His name will be revered by our family forever.”
As Elizabeth and Colin began to nurse, Duncan kissed Meg’s forehead. “You have given me the greatest gift a man could ever hope for. I love you and our children from the depths of my heart, and I always will.”
Author’s Note
I hope you enjoyed A Highland Knight’s Desire. Though Duncan Campbell, the Second Lord of Glenorchy did exist, and he did marry Lady Meg (Margaret Douglas), their stories are rather obscure. Duncan was a poet and became the Second Lord of Glenorchy after his father’s death (the date of Colin Campbell’s death is a point of contention and is listed differently in the records, with some quoting 1475. The official family record, the Black Book of Taymouth, records his death as being 1480, though no cause is mentioned). Duncan, in subsequent years, did a great deal of building and acquired lands, further increasing the Campbell dynasty.
Aside from Lady Meg being the daughter of the Fourth Earl of Angus (George Douglas), little is known about her life. The Earls of Angus were called the Red Douglases, and at this point in history, kept themselves apart from the Black Douglas renegades who had fallen out of favor with King James III.
Though many of the characters in this book were styled after real people, nearly all of the events involving Meg and Duncan are fictional.
In the coming series, Lord Duncan will continue to rule as the patriarch over the Campbell dynasty. Legends, both factual and imagined, will be laced with sweeping tales of romance. I hope you will join me for the ride.
Excerpt from A Highland Knight to Remember
Chapter One
The Scottish Highlands, Late Fifteenth Century
Gyllis Campbell forgot the pain in her backside when Dunstaffnage Castle came into view. It was all she could do not to dig in her heels, slap her riding crop against her mare’s rump, and overtake their dreary entourage. But Mother would surely admonish such a display of unladylike exuberance.
In the castle foreground, blue-and-white striped tents are festooned with colorful flags flapping in the breeze. The sight made her stomach squeeze. If only she could hop off her horse, she’d be able to walk faster than the guards leading them. Gyllis had been looking forward to the annual Highland fete for ages. At long last they’d arrived and the rain had stopped. It would be Beltane on the morrow—May Day. And it couldn’t possibly rain on the opening day of the games.
Gyllis cast an excited grin toward her sister. “What is the first thing you plan to do?”
Helen licked her lips. “I can already smell the honeyed cryspes.”
Food?
Though only a year younger, Helen could be incredibly dull. She even opted to wear a veil and cover her lovely honey-colored locks, though she was a maid and within her rights to flaunt her beautiful tresses. “Sounds delicious,” Gyllis managed a disinterested reply. She set her sights on more interesting fare and scanned the scene for Highland warriors. Where is he?
“And you?” Helen asked.
“Hmm?” Gyllis focused on a gathering of well-armed knights ahead. No handsome lad with a head of thick dark locks among them. She could picture Sir Sean MacDougall in her mind’s eye as if she’d seen him only yesterday. She adored everything about the knight including his long, athletic legs she’d admired many times when he sparred in the courtyard as one of her brother’s Highland Enforcers. A potent and powerful man, Sir Sean’s face was as equally rugged and handsome as his form. It had been six months since she’d last seen him, but forever burned into her memory was the way his azure eyes had stared at her from across the table during last year’s Beltane festival. No man had ever gazed upon her with such fervent hunger. More so, his stare had awakened a longing deep within Gyllis’s soul that would not be forgotten.
“What will be the first thing you’ll do, silly?” Helen asked again.
Gyllis waggled her brows. “I want to watch the games.”
Helen tsked her tongue. “But they do not start until the morrow. Bless it, you are incorrigible.” She leaned toward Gyllis. “I know what you’re doing.”
“So?” She snorted. “Eoin will be here, too.”
Helen whipped her head around so fast, she nearly fell off her mount. “Wheesht. Ma will hear you.”
Gyllis glanced over her shoulder at her mother and younger twin sisters. Goodness, she and the lassies would all need to find husbands soon. She had already attained the age of twenty. Many highborn lasses were wed by ten and six—the same age as Alice and Marion. Yet her brother, the all-powerful and domineering Lord of Glenorchy, frowned upon every available noble who passed through Kilchurn Castle’s gates. Well, Gyllis had decided it was time to take matters into her own hands, lest she end up a spinster. If her brother deemed no one suitable to place a ring on her finger, she would follow her heart—and pursue a love interest she had harbored for years.
“Gyllis?” The commanding tone in Mother’s voice made her sit straighter. “Have you seen Duncan?”
I’d prefer it if my overbearing brother remained on the borders. “Not as of yet.”
“His missive said he would meet us at the gate.”
Gyllis eyed the barbican and the long pathway leading to Dunstaffnage’s immense grey stone walls. “Perhaps we shall see him when our entourage proceeds closer to the castle.”
“Can we not stop and look at the wares first?” asked Alice, Gyllis’s youngest sister—aside from Marion who was born moments later.
Mother cleared her throat. “No one will be doing any browsing at the fete until we are settled in our rooms.”
Gyllis rolled her eyes to the sky. “The servants will see to that. We’ll be in their way.”
“Oh?” Mother said. “And how will you know where you’ll be sleeping?”
Gyllis grinned at Helen. “You can tell us, Ma.”
“Ungrateful children.” Mother sighed. “It shan’t take long. Together we will proceed to our rooms, and I’ll hear no further argument.”
With a wink, Gyllis leaned toward her sister and whispered, “You’ll have to wait a wee bit longer for those honeyed cryspes.”
“And you must put off ogling Sir Sean.”
Her heart fluttered at the mention of his name. She flicked her riding crop at Helen. “I’ll wager you’ll be dancing with Sir Eoin MacGregor this eve.”
Helen grasped the crop and yanked it from Gyllis’s hand. “You are shameless.”
“And you are ungrateful.” Gyllis snatched the whip back. “Remember, I am the one who intends to keep the Ca
mpbell sisters from spinsterhood.”
Sean MacDougall left his horse with his squire and removed his helm. By God, it felt good to be in the Highlands again. He’d been looking forward to the Beltane games as he did every year and now even more so.
After spending six months patrolling the borders with the Highland Enforcers, he needed clean air and good sport. He scrubbed his knuckles against his scalp and marched from the stables toward the smell of roasting meat.
“Where are you off to in such a hurry, nephew?”
Sean stopped on the path leading to the castle’s main gate and turned. He’d recognize his uncle’s timeworn scowl anywhere. “If it isn’t the Lord of Lorn, himself.” He held out his hand for a firm handshake. “I see you’ve outdone yourself this year. The collection of merchants is grander than ever before.” Indeed, the tents sprawled across Dunstaffnage’s foreground posed an impressive sight.
Lorn chuckled—though not a tall man, he had a deep voice. “We do bring in more tinkers every year.” He rubbed the tips of his fingers together. “And with it comes more coin—as long as they can keep their thieving hands to themselves.”
In the past six months, Sean had endured enough of backstabbers and thieves to last a lifetime. At times he’d reckoned fate must have doled him out a parcel of bad luck. But he aimed to rectify his lot starting now. “I wish you well controlling the roustabouts. I’m here for the games.”
“I would assume no less.” Lorn chuckled and squeezed his arm. “And I expect you to be victorious—I’ve wagered a nicely sum upon it.”
Sean grinned. “I aim to give it my best.”
“Good lad.” Lorn smoothed his fingers down his grey, pointed beard. “I haven’t seen the Laird of Dunollie as of late. Will he be dining at the high table with me this eve?”
“Unfortunately, Da needs rest. He was a wee bit fevered last eve, but I expect him to come round before the end of the games.”
“Very well.”
