The Secret Clan: The Complete Series

by Amanda Scott

  “I often dream about a castle on a hill,” Elspeth said. “It is always the same castle, but it used to be a happy place where people laughed and where the sun was always shining. In those dreams, people used to call me Beth or Bethie, but now I’m always alone and the castle is always distant and mist-shrouded. It still feels right to think of myself as Bethie, though, even in the gloomy dreams.”

  “Aye, it would,” Maggie said.

  “Why?”

  “I canna tell ye that, lass. We ha’ rules in my world, and I shouldna break them, but I can say that we lost ye for a time. We ha’ only just found ye again.”

  “How did you lose me?”

  “Ah, now, that would be telling. But ye’ll be safer now.”

  “Was I not safe before?”

  Maggie shrugged.

  “How did you find me?”

  “Claud found ye. He’s me son. Brown Claud they call him. I sent him here tae the west march in search o’ ye, and he met wi’ a lass. Claud always meets lasses, but this one showed him where tae find ye. Now, o’ course, he ha’ fallen in lust wi’ her, but at least this one be an improvement on the last. Mayhap this time he’ll no come tae grief.”

  “Well, if he has fallen in love with her—”

  “Nay, nay, Claud doesna fall in love. He falls in lust, which means that any pretty lass can lead him around by his… by his nose, as ye say.”

  Elspeth nodded. She had known serving maids capable of leading strong men-at-arms in just such a fashion. Usually, however, it was the maid who came to grief, not the man. A vision of Patrick flitted through her mind’s eye.

  “Why did ye no leave wi’ yon falconer when he asked ye?”

  Elspeth stared. “You know about that?”

  “Aye, I ken much about much, lass. Why did ye no go wi’ him?”

  “Because it would be wicked, and this is my home,” Elspeth said.

  “They’re no your people, though.”

  “Are they not? They are all I know, all I remember.”

  “What o’ your dreams then?”

  “They are but dreams. This is real, and I am obliged to Sir Hector and his family, because my father never paid them for my keep.”

  “Indeed? And what d’ye ken o’ your father?”

  “If you know all about me, you must already know that I was baseborn, that my father is the Earl of Angus, and that he abandoned me here when I was small.”

  Maggie puffed a cloud of white smoke. “Earls’ daughters, even them born wrong side o’ the blanket, dinna end as serving maids—no as a rule, any road.”

  “Mayhap if my mother had been a gentlewoman… but she was not.”

  Maggie’s lips pursed, and her eyes flashed. She seemed to struggle with herself, but when she spoke, her voice was calm. “Mortals admire loyalty but generally offer it only because they want security. D’ye fear risk, lass?”

  Remembering that in many of the stories she had heard about wee folk, they led mortals into mischief or even deadly peril, she said carefully, “Surely you do not suggest that I should follow the falconer. Even if I were so lost to propriety as to fling myself after such a man—one, I might add, who seems, despite his inconsistent attempts to appear otherwise, to be higher born than I, and is most likely in mortal danger himself—”

  “I dinna think he be higher born than ye,” Maggie said thoughtfully.

  “I do not even know what route he will take, and he’s been gone half a day.”

  “Then ye shouldna tarry.”

  “There are Englishmen looking for him, dangerous men who wish him ill.”

  “Nae one follows him at present,” Maggie said.

  “Are you saying that I should?” The thought stirred tremors in her midsection, but whether they represented anxiety or anticipation, she did not know.

  Maggie said firmly, “Your future be for ye tae find, lass. I can do nobbut help ye now and again, but ye’d do a sight better if ye’d stop clinging tae false loyalty and follow your heart. Some’un o’ my world seems tae ha’ given ye certain gifts tae protect ye even whilst he hid ye from us, and I can grant ye others, but ye’ll ha’ tae make your own decisions and discover your own truths.”

  “God’s mercy, what truths?”

  But Maggie was gone.

  “I think your Catriona were a Glaistig,” Lucy Fittletrot said as she and Claud lay entwined on a grassy hill, staring up at scudding white clouds in the azure sky.

  “I dinna ken any Glaistigs,” Claud said. At her request, he had told her about the splendid lass he had left in the Highlands, but it occurred to him that since he had met Lucy thoughts of Catriona no longer stirred his body instantly to mourning her loss. “Catriona were one o’ the Merry Folk, and a lovely lass she was, too.”

  “A Glaistig,” Lucy said firmly. “ ’Tis certain from what ye ha’ said about her. Did she no insist that ye meet wi’ her in a glade wi’ a burn running through it?”

  “Aye, she did, but we met other places, too.”

  “Still, the water be important. Glaistigs be water spirits. I warrant she were hiding her goat’s feet under that long green gown ye say she always wore.”

  “Nay,” Claud said. But as he protested, he realized he could not recall ever seeing Catriona’s feet, which was odd, because he had certainly seen the rest of her.

  “Did she do domestic chores?” Lucy demanded.

  “Nay, she didna even like looking after the man she were supposed tae look after. She were always after me tae be doing things for him.”

  “Then she’s a feckless wench, or mayhap she gave her loyalty tae someone else in his family, his father perhaps.”

  “Aye, the man did ha’ a father.”

  Lucy laughed. “O’ course he had a father, Claud. We all ha’ fathers.”

  “I dinna ha’ one.”

  “Ye must!”

  “Nay, I’ve a mother but nae father.”

  “Well, that’s very odd.”

  “Aye, I suppose it is,” Claud agreed, wondering why it had never struck him as odd before. At all events, he did not want to think about Catriona anymore. He pulled Lucy into his arms, determined to make her forget Catriona, too.

  He had barely begun, however, before he was rudely interrupted.

  “Claud, cease your daffy tail-toddling for once,” his mother commanded, grabbing his shoulder and flinging him upright.

  He never knew how she did that so easily, because he could not do such things himself, but he was in no position now to demand explanations.

  “Who is this person?” Maggie demanded, glaring at Lucy, who was casually rearranging her clothing.

  “Why, that be Lucy Fittlettrot, o’ course. What’s amiss now, Mam?”

  “Our lass will be on the move by morning, or I ken nowt about mortals,” Maggie said. “Ye must be ready tae follow her, because I must attend a council wi’ the Helping Hands tae discuss our negotiations wi’ the Merry Folk. Dinna lose sight o’ our lass for an instant, Claud. We dinna ken what lies ahead.”

  “Aye, I’ll look after her,” he promised.

  “See that ye do,” Maggie said, and was gone.

  Claud reached for Lucy. “Our lass hasna gone yet, me dearling, but when she does, will ye go wi’ me tae keep watch o’er her? Ye did find her for us, and all.”

  “Aye, Claud, I’d hoped ye ask me,” Lucy said, snuggling into his arms. “What were we a-doing when your mother interrupted us? D’ye recall?”

  “Aye, I do,” Claud said, showing her.

  After a nearly sleepless night, Elspeth got up at her usual time Sunday morning, having made her decision, and with less difficulty than she had expected.

  Tidying her chamber and hurrying to the kitchen to break her fast with a few bites of coarse bread, she put the rest of it, along with a slice of cold beef and an apple, in her pocket. Then she went upstairs to open the windows in the hall and make sure the men who slept there had wakened and gone about their duties.

  Next, she returned to the
kitchen to fetch the two ewers she usually filled at the well outside for the ladies of the house. With ewers in hand, she left the kitchen and turned toward the door at the end of the corridor but stopped at her bedchamber on the way. Setting the ewers down, she prepared a bundle to take with her.

  She possessed nothing of value except a tiny gold leaf on a thin gold chain, a baby’s necklace that had been around her neck when Angus left her at Farnsworth Tower. She had worn it until the day they told her she would have to work to earn her keep. Then she had taken it off and put it in a slim wooden box that Sir Hector had given her for the purpose. The chain was too short to wear around her neck, so she doubled it around her wrist as a bracelet.

  The only things in her bundle were a clean smock, a comb, the glove she had worn to help Patrick with Zeus, and the food she had taken from the kitchen. She would take nothing else with her. Except for the necklace, Sir Hector or his lady had given her everything she owned. It was bad enough that she was taking the clothes on her back and the warm, hooded cloak.

  Although she had tossed and turned most of the night, she had dozed from time to time, and she had dreamed of the castle on the hill. There had been a path at last, leading to a tall, arched door. And someone was with her. Usually, when she dreamed of the castle in the distance, she was alone, but this time, she had sensed a presence beside her. She had begun to turn her head but wakened, tangled in her quilt, before she could see who walked with her. Since she had told Maggie Malloch about her dreams, she wondered if the little woman had cast a spell to alter them. It did not matter if she had, because after their talk, little doubt had lingered about what she meant to do. Clearly, she had needed only a nudge to do what she had longed to do from the moment Patrick had asked her to go with him.

  Picking up the ewers, she returned to the kitchen, holding her head as if it ached, and said to the kitchen maid, “My head is pounding, Jenny. Would you be so kind as to tend the young ladies for me this morning?”

  “Aye, I’ll do it,” Jenny said, taking the ewers. “Will ye no be going tae kirk wi’ the family then?”

  “No, I think I’ll just lie down on my bed and try to sleep.”

  “Aye, well I’ll tell them, but like as not Mistress Drusilla will be down in a trice, insisting ye be hardy enough, and worrying ye tae go tae kirk.”

  Well aware of that possibility, Elspeth went to her room and lay on her bed. Realizing then that if Drusilla did not come to see if she was really sick, she had no way to judge passing time, she counted to a hundred for each finger of both hands, then did it again. At last, judging that at least half an hour had passed, she was about to get up when the door opened. To her relief, it was only Jenny.

  “We’re just going, so I peeped in tae see were there aught I could get ye.”

  “No, thank you,” Elspeth said. “I feel better, but I do not think it would be wise to walk into the village until I can be sure it is nothing contagious.”

  “Aye, sure. Then I’ll look in again when we return.”

  “You need not, Jenny. You have your work to do, and I will just sleep.”

  Nodding and smiling, Jenny shut the door.

  Elspeth counted to one hundred again. Then, getting up, she opened the door and listened for voices. All was silent. The servants attended kirk in a nearby village with the family, but there would still be men in the yard and guarding the gate.

  Swiftly, lest her courage fail her, she donned her cloak, tied her bundle under it, then hurried out the postern door and across the yard to the gate.

  “I am going out now,” she said to the guard, certain no one would have bothered to inform him that she was ailing.

  “Aye, lass,” he said, his attitude making it plain that he took no interest in her comings or goings. He swung open the heavy gate and shut it when she had passed through, and the sound of it thudding into place lifted her spirits. She might suffer later for her impulsiveness, but for the moment she was free.

  Walking briskly, she made for the forest, and within the shelter of the trees, her confidence increased. She had walked these woods many times in her lifetime and had done so without incident. A niggling voice at the back of her mind suggested that while she had wandered unmolested in the vicinity of Farnsworth Tower, where nearly everyone knew her and knew, too, that she lived under Sir Hector’s protection, the same would not be true as she traveled farther north. She ignored the unnerving voice, quickening her step.

  Although she had told Maggie she did not know what route Patrick would take, most folks traveled only one road north to Glasgow, and from this part of the west march one typically passed through Glasgow to reach Stirling. But what if Patrick had gone another way? He had taken horses, so he could travel swiftly, and he had revealed more than once that he was unpredictable.

  Suppressing second thoughts that told her she was being foolhardy to follow such a man, that fleeing Farnsworth Tower was more likely to end in disaster than in finding her future, as Maggie had described it, she hurried onward.

  Nell’s little party had made slow progress. She had realized that Angus would quickly hunt them down if they headed directly for Kershopefoot, so when they met a group of some twenty refugees—men, women, and children—seeking a route through Kielder Forest to Carter Bar, she and Jane had decided to join them, although the distance was considerably greater.

  Nell wore her drabbest gown and a simple, black hooded cloak, but she knew that she stood out from the others nonetheless. The group was comfortably large and varied, though, and many of its members were walking, so she and Jane dismounted, making friends by offering to let the women and children take turns riding their horses. Seth, the lad from Midgeholme, led their sumpter pony.

  Nell grew nervous every time a stranger approached the group, for she knew that no matter who was riding her chestnut gelding—a particularly fine one—Angus would recognize it in a flash. They encountered no trouble, however, until Sunday morning when some in their group insisted upon finding a church. Nell had no objection to attending a Sunday service, but she would infinitely have preferred to seek one on the Scottish side of the line, and they were still miles from Carter Bar.

  Accordingly, she ordered Jane and Seth to fall to the rear with their horses, and noted that one other family did the same. When they reached the crest of a hill, heard bells, and saw a spire not far away, the majority of their group surged ahead.

  Nell hesitated, reluctant to enter a hamlet still dangerously near Midgeholme. “Archie’s men will be searching everywhere for us by now,” she murmured to Jane.

  “Aye, madam. ’Tis best we keep going.”

  Just then, the man who had stayed behind with his wife and two children pointed and exclaimed, “Riders! Yonder to the south!”

  Horrified, Nell followed his gesture and saw sunlight glinting on steel. “Quickly,” she said. “Ride along the other side of the hill and head north. Whether ’tis Archie or the King’s soldiers, we do not want to meet them!”

  They were soon deep in the forest, and she plunged ahead, seeking a place of concealment. The little family had followed, so they were too many to hide easily.

  Jane said, “Those soldiers looked more like King Henry’s men than the earl’s, my lady. If they are harassing papist refugees, would they not let us go in peace?”

  “Archie will be riding the line,” Nell said. “So will those soldiers, if they are indeed hunting refugees. We’ll be safer, I think, if we lie low for a time.”

  “Aye,” said the man who had followed them. “The mistress be right. We’ll bide here in these woods today and see how the landscape looks tomorrow. ’Tis safer at present tae keep clear o’ both priests and men-at-arms, I’m thinking.”

  Chafing at the delay but certain that an encounter with soldiers would prove as deadly as one with Angus, Nell bowed to good sense.

  Several miles from Farnsworth, keeping to woodland, Elspeth unwrapped the cold beef she had saved from her breakfast and took a bite, chewing hungr
ily. Just then, a boy, a chestnut pony with a pack strapped to its back, and a large ash-gray dog stepped out of the woodland ahead of her.

  The boy looked a year or two younger than Small Neddy. His curly red hair looked as if it had never seen a comb, but his tattered brown breeks and jerkin looked cleaner than one might expect, and his boots looked stout, albeit large for his feet. He led the pony on a length of rope, but it was the dog that drew her eye and stopped her in her tracks, for it was huge, nearly as tall at the shoulder as the lad was.

  The boy grinned, showing that he was missing his two front teeth. “Dinna be afraid o’ Thunder,” he said. “He willna bite ye.”

  “I am not afraid of him,” she said, “but he is the largest dog I’ve ever seen.”

  “Aye, sure, he’s a big ’un. I be Wee Jock o’ the Wall,” he added, still grinning and eyeing her expectantly.

  She hesitated. She was still too close to Farnsworth Tower to offer her name to just anyone. The lad might tell those who would soon be looking for her which way she had gone. Impulsively she said, “I am Beth.”

  “We can walk along together if ye like, Beth,” Wee Jock said.

  “But you do not even know where I am going.”

  He shrugged. “We dinna care. We’ll go where ye go. Sithee, it be gey better for us tae travel in a group. The reivers be less likely tae set on us, so.”

  “Do you know a great many reivers?” she asked, teasing him, because he seemed so serious and much too sure of himself for one of such tender years.

  “Oh, aye,” he said, surprising her. “There be mortal many o’ them hereabouts, and Jackie here be a fine pony. Ye can see that yourself.”

  “I can,” she said. “He’s a handsome fellow.”

  “Aye, sure, and they’ll be wanting tae take him from me, but Thunder looks fierce enough tae scare any reiver, dinna ye think?”

  “He does,” she said. “But I don’t think even a reiver would steal your pony.”

  “Aye, they would.”

  “Why, what makes you so sure?”

  “ ’Cause I lifted ’im from the reivers,” the boy answered with a cheeky grin.