By Grace Possessed

by Jennifer Blake

  It was afterward, when the tables had been cleared and their tops and trestles stacked against the wall, that Ross was joined by Lady Marguerite. He glanced behind her for Cate, but his betrothed seemed to be waiting upon the queen at present, holding a bowl of spiced water while the royal lady dabbled her fingers in it to clean them. The younger sister seemed at loose ends without her sibling nearby, with an air about her that said his company was as good as any other.

  Ross was not fooled. The lady had something on her mind, though he wasn’t certain he was ready to hear it.

  “So you have deigned to join us again,” she said as she came to a halt where he leaned against one of the support posts that marched in pairs down the center of the hall. “We were of two minds whether to send a priest for last rites or alert the guard of your escape.”

  “But you did neither.”

  “Both seemed premature, given Gwynne’s report of your ill humor. You threw a boot at her head last evening.”

  “She wanted to bathe me.”

  “If so, I expect you needed it.”

  Cate’s little sister had an intelligent face and large brown eyes dark enough to hide all manner of secrets. Her fine, golden-brown hair was several shades darker than Cate’s fair locks and she was not so tall. She seemed a bit fey, almost mysterious somehow, an impression heightened on this evening by a Christmas gown of sea-blue velvet worn under a tunic of lavender blue that was sewn with tiny suns and moons in gold and silver and drops of jewel-colored glass. She was, in addition, so self-possessed and unaffected by whatever he might say that Ross could not resist the urge to shake her from it.

  “Or just preferred a different female wield the cloth,” he said in his best Scots burr. “Unfortunately, no other was nigh.”

  “My sister, you mean.”

  “If she should be willing.”

  “To resist was a great strain for her, I’ve no doubt,” Cate’s sister said placidly, “but she managed it with aid from the Holy Mother.”

  Ross felt the back of his neck burn at the suggestion that Cate might have wished to be with him. That was before he saw the glint in the eyes of her sister, which told him he was transparent to her. “Little witch.”

  Marguerite paled. “Don’t say that!”

  Surprised at her distress, he put out a calming hand. “I didn’t mean…”

  “Never say it, not even in jest, I beg you,” she said earnestly. “There are those who have no sense of humor at all where such things are concerned.”

  She was right, of course. And he was not glad, after all, to see her so shaken. “I crave pardon.”

  “Truth to tell, I fear Trilborn sees me in that light, just as he does Cate. He is superstitious, you know, otherwise he’d have had my sister long ago. If she is ever forced to marry him, a charge of witchcraft will be a convenient way to be rid of her.”

  “While holding on to her estates, of course.”

  Marguerite gazed at him a long moment, a small frown marring her piquant features. Ross had the uncomfortable feeling that he was being weighed in the balance. Something else hovered there, an odd speculation that he didn’t care for at all.

  “What of you?” she asked, finally. “Would you cherish Cate or be rid of her as soon as she has provided you an heir or two?”

  The rage that hovered inside him rose to the surface with a growl. “What kind of question is that?”

  She didn’t flinch, which suggested courage might be hereditary in their family. “One requiring a simple answer.”

  “If I could marry her, I would not release her, not ever.”

  “And if you came upon her in a rose garden at dusk?”

  She could not be asking what he thought. But what if she was? “We…would brave the thorns together.”

  “So you could be in love with her, if you really tried.”

  He gave a short laugh. “For what purpose, when she is a Sassenach with the title of lady before her name and I a common border reiver?”

  “Not so common.” Marguerite watched him a moment, taking a corner of her veil, biting down on it, then dropping it again before she added, “Your father is the laird, and so will you be when he dies. That is, if you live.”

  “If?”

  “You stand in danger, though it’s interesting that the chance came for you to die and you did not.”

  “Was I meant to?” he asked in blunt suspicion.

  “Most have, those who sought to make brides of us before you.”

  “You’re talking about this ridiculous curse.” He had thought for a moment that she meant the knife slash, and Trilborn’s need to be rid of him.

  “But of course. I’d thought…but no matter.” She heaved a sigh. “It’s really too bad.” Turning, she wandered away from him as if he no longer held her interest.

  Ross, watching Cate’s sister go, feared he had been consigned to an early grave. It was a hasty verdict. He was not so easily done to death.

  A creeping sensation on the back of his neck made him turn then—just in time to avoid the direct jab of an elbow to his injured side. The glancing blow was enough to take his breath, however, and send his senses whirling for an instant.

  “Well, Dunbar,” Trilborn said, as he swung to a halt at much too close a range for comfort, “what a surprise to see you abroad. We were sure your next appearance would be in winding sheets.”

  8

  Cate was aware of Ross the instant he passed through the entrance to the great hall. Though he appeared drawn and pale under the weathered bronze of his skin, no one else had his air of command or ability to dominate his surroundings. No one possessed his casual grace or darkly handsome features. Of course, few others wore a plaid, either, though there were a handful of other Scots at court as pledges for the treaty with Henry.

  Her heart stuttered in her chest, doubling its beat. She tracked him with her gaze until he was lost from view somewhere in the far end of the vast hall. Suddenly, the holiday evening seemed twice as bright.

  The windows and doors of the hall were hung with swags of red-berried holly, bay and ivy interspersed with thick sprigs of mistletoe and other evergreen boughs that released their scent into the warm air. More garlands draped the front edge of the dais where stood the high table, and framed the king’s arms on the wall behind it. Pomanders made of apples stuck with cloves were heaped in bowls along the high table’s length, while wide ribbons made swaths of color between them. Behind these, Henry and his queen, with his attendants to his right and her ladies to her left, sipped their wine and waited to be entertained.

  Cate, along with several of the other ladies invited by the queen, had directed the hanging of the greenery, and made the pomanders. The decorations were meant to remain in place for the six weeks between now and Candlemas. The meal took so long, however, that she began to wonder if they would last out the evening.

  At last the cheese and nuts were removed and lower tables broken down and set against the walls. The pantomime to be presented by a traveling troupe was about to begin. After it would come dancing to harp, lute and vielle, beginning with a carol dance. Other merrymaking would fill the time until the midnight Angel’s or Christ’s Mass, which glorified the arrival of the light of salvation at the darkest hour of the darkest date in the depth of winter.

  Pantomime had never been a favorite of Cate’s; she had not missed it after it was banned following a horrific Danse Macabre put on by Henry’s master of revels at Westminster a few months before. It was surprising that the mummers had been allowed into the palace this evening. She supposed the tradition of their presence during the Christmas season was too strong to be denied, or else the king meant to replace old memories with new. As the men with white powdered faces and rich costumes came forward, she turned away in search of Ross’s tall figure.

  There he was, with one shoulder propped against the support post nearest the entrance. Marguerite must have been talking to him, for she was just walking away. Her shoulders had a defeated dro
op that made Cate frown as she wondered what had been discussed between them. She must ask her sister when they were alone.

  An abrupt movement at the edge of Cate’s vision brought her head around again. Ross had been joined by three men. She took a swift step forward as she saw one of them jab at his side and the Scotsman wrench away. Fury gripped her and she narrowed her gaze upon the black doublet of the man who had tried to prod Ross’s injury. Though he stood with his back to her, she would have known him anywhere.

  What could he hope to gain, unless it was to goad Ross into stepping outside to cross swords while he was less than fit? That was, just possibly, the reason Trilborn had friends with him.

  Cate made no decision to move. One moment she stood in ladylike composure, and the next she was striding toward the trio surrounding Ross. She stepped among them in a flurry of crimson velvet and veiling edged with gold braid, her smile cold as she swept them with contempt.

  Ross rested his hand on his dirk, she saw. He must not be allowed to draw it, for that could be taken as an insult requiring redress.

  “Ross, my dear sir, how laggard you are,” she said, allowing her voice and her gaze to soften as she reached to take his arm. “You promised that we would dance, if you recall. ’Twas at Winchester.”

  “Oh, aye. And?”

  Drollery lurked in the mountain-blue of his eyes. He knew what she was doing and thought it comical in some fashion. So it might be, though she would not give over because of it. “If you will not come to me, then I must come to you, for I intend to hold you to your word. A carol dance will follow the mummery, so you may sing to me as we caper.”

  “But, Lady Catherine,” Trilborn exclaimed.

  “My lord?”

  This was the first time she had seen the earl since the incident in the corridor; he’d apparently nursed his own wounds in solitude this past week. His nose was still discolored and a little crooked from where Ross’s blow had broken it, and he wore a high collar to his chin to cover the site where she had bitten him.

  The anger that leaped to her gaze seemed to give him pause, for he lowered his head with the pretence of a humble bow. “Your pardon, but I’d meant to ask you to step out onto the floor.”

  “I must refuse,” she answered at once.

  “Because of the small misunderstanding between us? I was hasty, I will admit, my feelings too strong. I hoped for an opportunity to beg forgiveness.”

  Cate gave that suggestion the answer it deserved, which was none at all. Turning her back upon Trilborn, settling her gaze on Ross’s face, she asked, “Shall we, sir?”

  “We’re to caper, is it?” The Scotsman smiled down at her, tucking her hand into the crook of his arm so she was aware of the hard bunch of muscles there that showed his readiness for action in case of need.

  “Merrily, as ’tis the season.” Her heart beat a wild tattoo against her ribs and the warmth in her cheeks seemed to heat the air around her. Her greatest fear was that Trilborn would lay hands upon her, or upon Ross. Though she knew the Scotsman would fight like a demon, in either case, she was not certain he could survive it.

  “I was speaking to the lady, Dunbar!”

  “Her wishes must take precedence, Trilborn, especially as she is one of the incomparable Graces of Graydon.”

  “By God’s beard, I’ll not be passed over this way!”

  “You have your friends about you,” Ross said over his shoulder as he led her from among them. “Mayhap one of them will partner you in the dance.”

  The wrath that dawned on Trilborn’s face was most satisfying. Head high, looking neither right nor left at the audience that had gathered, Cate walked with Ross Dunbar to the edge of the cleared space before the high table. And if her heart was attempting to tear its way from under the silk of her bodice, only she knew it.

  “Tit for tat, one rescue for another,” Ross said, his voice deep and low near her ear as they waited for the mummery to end. “We should be equal now.”

  “Hardly, sir. You have rendered two to my one.” She kept a cordial smile upon her face and her gaze on one of the mimes, who seemed in acute distress over the fate of the actor costumed as a white mouse.

  “I count it differently. You not only sewed up my belly, but came of a night to rout my fever.”

  “To tend your wound was the least I could do. For the other, you are mistaken. ’Twas Gwynne.”

  Ross’s smile was wry. “I’ll admit I thought it a dream until now, when I am with you again.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Half-mad with delirium I might have been, but scent and touch do not lie. Nor was I so far gone, now I think back on it, as to miss the rare colors of a most glorious black eye.”

  “Oh!” She clapped a hand to her face, covering where her cheek had indeed been so bruised by Trilborn’s blow that color from it seeped upward to give her eye all the shades of the rainbow. For some few days after the meeting with Trilborn she had resorted to paints of the sort used by Spanish ladies, and had only ceased that morning.

  “Not,” Ross added with great magnanimity, “that it appears so now. No, and I was never so addled in the head as to mistake old for young or plain for fair.”

  “Fie, sir!” Cate railed with heat rising under her skin. “Is that any way to speak of the woman who bathed and dressed you as if—how was that you put it?—oh, yes, as if you were a babe in swaddling?”

  “I cry foul, milady. Words spoken in the heat of the moment should not be used against a man. But if you will not have it even between us, then I’ve no objection to being saved yet again.”

  She glanced up at him, searching his face. “Some men would.”

  “Aye, and some come nigh to slicing their own throats while shaving, but it doesn’t make them wiser for it. Take yon Trilborn, for instance.”

  “You take him, as I have no use for his fine self.” Her answer was stiff in her annoyance at the turn of subject. She would far rather have spoken of what was between the two of them alone.

  The Scotsman ignored her ill humor. “He intends to have you to wife, and minds not at all if he earns your hate in the process.”

  “So you’ve pointed out before, and I told you—”

  “You place your confidence in the protection of your curse, though it’s done little to prevent two attacks so far.”

  “It sent you to stop them, did it not?”

  “You may think so if it pleases you. But I believe you would be wiser to look around you for another husband, as you’ve no wish to warm Trilborn’s bed.”

  “What? Seek out a third prospective husband to fend off, when I have two already? I may as well choose a few more for an even dozen.”

  “Now there’s a thought,” he said with an affable nod, “being there’s safety in a crowd.”

  “I’d sooner go into a nunnery!”

  He scowled down at her. “You never mean it.”

  “At least it would be quiet and free of strife,” she said with a toss of her head. “I’m sure Henry’s mother, half a nun herself, could arrange it.”

  “Mayhap, but would she go against the king’s will?”

  “She might if convinced I have a true vocation.”

  “Ah, well, in that case,” he said, taking her hand and leading her forward as the dance began to form. “But it would still be a tragedy.”

  Cate was barely aware of the circle of dancers or the start of the music for the carol dance, paid scant attention to the first line sung that must be repeated by each pair of dancers as they added their own line to the carol. “Why a tragedy?” she demanded. “Many women dedicate their lives to the service of God.”

  “Those without a prayer otherwise.” He made his bow, his smile irreverent and lacking in apology for the punning quip.

  “You are mistaken. My sisters and I were placed with the nuns for our education, and spent many happy hours tending herbs and vegetables, bees and sheep. Many women had taken refuge there from the ills of marriage.”r />
  “And a fine thing, if they were content. But it might have been better had they chosen a man who’d not use them ill in the first place.”

  “Fine talk, when you must know few choose at all.”

  If she sounded bitter, she could not help it. There had been too many betrothals foisted upon her and her sisters, arrangements that might have ended in tragedy of a different kind had the men involved not died.

  Ross stared down at her averted face a long moment as they circled each other with arms akimbo. When he answered, his voice was abrupt. “I spoke without thought. But I will not be put off by this wandering from where we started. Why will you not admit you came—”

  “Hush,” she said, with a quick glance around her. “And make ready, for it’s almost our turn to sing.”

  It was upon them within the instant, a list of nine items brought from a peddler’s pack as gifts for the New Year, each of them more fanciful than the first. Cate expected that she would be required to carry the burden of remembering their sequence, but it was not so. Ross’s fine baritone rang out in perfect measure and progression, adding ten silver bells as their contribution even as he moved with smooth grace around the circle, turning, twisting, taking her hand and walking around her, then moving down the line.

  She was loath to be separated from him. She followed him with her gaze while she slipped through the intricate winding of couples. Men stepped warily around him, or so it appeared. Women smiled and gave him their hands all too readily, while brushing against him in the turns. Not that Ross noticed any of it, she thought. Features grim, and favoring his left side, he worked his way purposefully from one partner to the next until he was before her once more.

  “Does your wound pain you?” she asked in concern as they swept together and then apart again with a flourishing bow of greeting. “Would you prefer to sit this out?”