“Are ye sure this is all ye wish me to do?” It was not a very exacting chore, not something Cecily thought a warrior’s wife should do.
Crooked Cat leaned closer and lightly patted Cecily’s cheek with her somewhat gnarled, calloused hand. “Ye are a new wife, lassie.”
“Aye,” she agreed, unable to hide her confusion, “although I dinnae ken why that matters.”
“It matters. Ye havenae been hardened to the way of it all yet.”
“Oh.” She sighed. “I am nay sure I will e’er be hardened to the fact that men seem compelled to swing swords at each other.”
The old woman laughed. “Aye, fools that they are, but e’en if they set down their swords, some other fools would quickly pick them up and probably take a swing at the ones who put them down. Our men do it to protect Glascreag and us, and that is no small thing, aye?”
“Aye,” Cecily agreed and picked up some of the linen. “I will do this then, but I do have a skill at healing, ye ken. ’Tis the one thing I was taught to do and I am good at it.”
After glancing around to make sure everyone was doing as they had been told, Crooked Cat looked back at Cecily and asked, “What do ye mean it was the only thing ye were taught?”
“My guardians didnae really teach me how to run a household for reasons I am nay sure I will e’er be told or understand. Howbeit, Lady Anabel considered the healing arts a lowly thing, fit only for peasants to learn.”
“Ah, I see. She thought to shame ye.”
Cecily found she could actually smile about it. “Aye, so I was always verra careful to ne’er let her ken how much I enjoyed it all. So, if ye need help tending to any wounds—”
“I will send for ye right quick.”
After the woman hurried away, Cecily began to cut the linen into strips fit for bandages. At the moment, tucked away in the corner of the kitchens was probably the best place for her. It meant she could not see the men preparing for battle or see what force confronted them. She had told Crooked Cat the truth. She doubted she would ever be truly hardened to the fact that Artan would be facing men who sought to kill him, now and all the other times he might have to go to battle. She could only pray that she could hide her fear and thank God that Angus had taught him well.
Artan stood on the walls between Angus and Bennet and scowled down at the men gathered before the walls of Glascreag. He noticed some of the MacIvors arguing vigorously with some of the Ogilveys. The way some of the men kept pointing in the direction of the village told him they were arguing its fate. He suspected the MacIvors were arguing against burning it since it was their hope that they would soon take Glascreag and they would not want to have to rebuild too much. Since all the villagers and a great deal of their livestock were already within Glascreag’s walls, Artan was not terribly concerned. They had rebuilt the village before and could do it again if they needed to.
“I would guess that old MacIvor has left his lands verra lightly guarded,” drawled Angus.
“Mayhap we should try to send out a runner to inform the Duffs,” said Artan.
Angus laughed. “Aye, ’twould serve Old MacIvor weel to stagger home after trying to steal my lands only to find he has lost his own to Ian Duff. Is that fool on the white horse Sir Fergus?”
Looking at the man riding toward them on a big white horse, Artan nodded. “’Tis him, and from what I can see he was in sore need of the MacIvors, as it appears that nearly half of the Donaldsons have deserted him.”
After glaring down at the man reining in near the wall, Angus grumbled. “He has no chin. What fool thought to wed a MacReith lass to a mon whose neck seems to start at his mouth?”
Recalling Cecily saying much the same about Sir Fergus, Artan laughed softly. Angus may have had nothing to do with the raising of Cecily, but there was a strong hint of the man in her. He suspected Angus recognized that strong touch of MacReith blood in her and was heartily pleased.
It pleased Artan, too. Cecily might well have been raised in the Lowlands by a pair of thieving, murdering wretches, but she had the soul and spirit of a true Highland lass. She was also completely untainted by Anabel and Edmund’s complete lack of morals, their selfishness and cruelty. In keeping Cecily so apart from their family and friends, the Donaldsons had actually done Cecily a great service. Recalling the faint scars on Cecily’s slim back, however, Artan still wanted to see them hang.
“I have come to collect my betrothed bride,” Sir Fergus called up to them.
“I dinnae suppose we can just kill him here and have done with it,” muttered Angus.
“Dinnae tempt me.” Artan glared down at the man he so ached to kill. “Ye have no bride here, so I suggest ye turn about and ride on home ere someone hurts ye.”
“Cecily Donaldson is promised to me and ye stole her from me, right on the eve of her wedding!”
“Actually, I believe it was ten days before her wedding. But let us nay quibble o’er such things as how many days and whether or nay ye are the rutting swine your banners proclaim. There is but one truth that should concern us: Cecily is my wife. Ye yourself heard us declare it.”
“I heard no such thing.”
“I feared ye might say that, so we handfasted again in a wee village before three witnesses who have put their mark on a document. So, dry your tears and trot home.”
“Nay, Cecily Donaldson was promised to me and I mean to have her. If ye havenae the sense and honor to send her out to me, her betrothed husband, then we shall kick down these gates and drag her out.”
“Kick away,” called Angus.
“Is that really a rutting swine on those banners?” Bennet asked as he joined Artan in watching an obviously furious Sir Fergus ride away.
“A rampant boar actually,” replied Artan as he wondered if they would have a battle or be trapped for days just staring at each other and occasionally trading insults over the walls.
Artan was abruptly pulled from his dark thoughts about the tediousness of a siege by the sounds of pigs. It took him a moment to realize it was coming from the Glascreag men gathered on the walls. Bennet had obviously spread the word of what was on Sir Fergus’s banner. It was a good taunt, he decided.
It did not take long for Artan to see just what a good taunt it was. An enraged Sir Fergus decided to plunge right into battle. Or, more specifically, order his men to plunge into battle while he sat at a safe distance on his big white horse shouting commands and ordering them to try harder. It soon became clear that Laird MacIvor did not approve of this abrupt attack and had given his men permission to hold back or join in the fight if they chose to. Few chose to fight in what was clearly an ill-planned assault on well-defended walls. As Artan threw himself into the hard work of sheltering from volleys of arrows and defending Glascreag’s walls, he wondered just how long it would be before Sir Fergus’s own men decided their was no honor in dying for a fool and a coward, a man who recklessly wasted their lives, and turned on the man.
“M’lady, Crooked Cat says to come and show her just how good ye are at healing,” called a young girl from the door of the kitchen.
Before Cecily could respond the girl was gone. She set aside the herbs she had been preparing and hurried to the great hall that had already been prepared for tending to whatever wounded there were. Even in the far corner of the kitchen she had heard when the battle began. The cold fear that had flooded her body was still there. It was impossible not to think of how her husband and her uncle were out there on the walls in the way of arrows and swords.
She was horrified when she first stepped into the great hall. There was the scent of blood and sweat in the air, and there were a lot of men already gathered there waiting to have their wounds tended to. By the time she reached Crooked Cat’s side, however, Cecily had begun to see that most of the wounds were small ones caused primarily by protecting oneself from a shower of arrows or being grazed by them. A few men had more serious wounds, but only two of them looked as if they might not recover from their hurts.
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“Just how good at healing are ye, lass?” Crooked Cat asked Cecily.
“The wise woman in our village said I was very good, mayhap e’en better than she,” Cecily replied, blushing for she sounded rather vain.
“And she was good was she?”
“Aye, people would travel miles just to see her.”
“Weel, then, ye best come with me.”
The moment they reached the young man stretched out on one of the tables lining the great hall, Cecily heartily wished she had not boasted of her skills. He had three arrow wounds and one looked to have just missed his heart. One arrow remained in his body, sticking out of his thigh. She recognized the work of the Donaldson fletcher.
“I am a wee bit afeared of taking that one out,” confessed Crooked Cat, speaking quietly so that others nearby could not overhear her. “He could bleed to death, aye?”
Cecily carefully studied the placement of the arrow. It was high up on the youth’s thigh and had gone all the way through. The young man was tall and almost too lean, and she was glad of that even if he probably was not. It meant, however, that she would not have to push the arrow all the way through, a necessity sometimes, but one she hated. It did look as if it was near a place where it could make a man bleed out, as Tall Lorna had called it.
“I would think that if that arrow had struck the place where the blood can flow as swiftly as it does from a cut throat, he would already be dead,” she told Crooked Cat in a soft voice.
“Aye, ye may be right.” Crooked Cat reached for the arrow to pull it out, then looked at Cecily in surprise when the younger woman stopped her. “I thought ye meant that the arrow could come out now.”
“It can, but the head of it needs to be cut off or whate’er damage it did going in will be dangerously added to as it comes out.”
For a moment Crooked Cat leaned over the young man to study the part of the arrow tip sticking out of him. “Aye, I can see it now. Makes sense. Suspicion ye could e’en risk hitting something it missed as it went in. So, now what do we do?”
After hastily washing her hands, Cecily showed her. She had a big, broad-shouldered woman called Mags hold the youth still as she pushed the arrow in until the point was completely clear of the body, then cut it off. Careful to clean the area around the shaft of all cloth and dirt, she then had Crooked Cat yank the shaft back out. To her relief, although the wound bled freely, it was not the pulsing flood that could so quickly drain the life from a man. With Crooked Cat’s help, she stitched and bandaged the wound and then checked his other wounds to be certain that they, too, were clean. As they left him in the care of a young girl who was obviously infatuated with the boy, Cecily paused to wash her hands again before they reached the next man who needed his wounds tended.
“Why do ye keep washing?” Crooked Cat asked.
“Trying to keep your hands and the wounds clean seems to help in the healing.”
“Is that what your wise woman told ye?”
“Aye, she was teaching me that no good healer e’er ignores what others say about healing. She told me that she used to, that she would decide they were all fools and she would do things just as her mother had taught her. Then she heard about how keeping her hands and the wounds clean might help hold back fevers and infections. She scoffed at that; but then something happened to make her think it might just do that e’en if no one could tell her why.
“She was called to aid a woman who was giving birth. ’Twas just after she had had the bath she takes every month.” Cecily ignored the way Crooked Cat shook her head and muttered her astonishment over anyone taking a bath so often. “As she told me, she was oftimes verra concerned about getting dirt on herself for a few days after her bath, and when she arrived at this woman’s house, she carefully scrubbed off the dirt that had gotten on her hands from hurriedly collecting a few herbs. The woman having the bairn was complaining bitterly about the bairn deciding to come right then, right after she had bathed and cleaned her house and all her linens. It seems an important member of her family was about to come to visit.”
“So they were both verra clean; but women have bairns all the time and many dinnae die of the birthing fever.”
“True, but this particular woman proved to be having a verra difficult birth. The bairn needed turning.” She nodded when Crooked Cat gasped. “Tall Lorna said both she and the woman kenned the possibility of the woman getting the birthing fever or worse and dying from what needed to be done, and that there were healers and others who say ye shouldnae try to turn the bairn in the womb, that women arenae sheep or mares, but Tall Lorna says they are fools. She did it and the woman had a fine son.”
“And the woman?”
“Lived. There was ne’er a problem, ne’er a hint of fever. Tall Lorna decided she would try a few more births and healings whilst being careful to keep herself, her hands, the wounds, and all as clean as she could.”
“And?”
“Her fame spread, for her successes increased tenfold or more.”
Crooked Cat stared at her hands and frowned. “Do ye ken those Murray lads are always clean and willnae let me tend their hurts until I have washed my hands. A lot of the women in their clan are gifted healers, too.” She nodded to a big, heavily bearded man sitting on a bench and holding a rag to a wound in his arm. “There is an easy one to tend to. I will be right back.”
By the time Crooked Cat returned to her side Cecily was tying a bandage over the man’s stitched and cleaned wound and Crooked Cat’s hands had been vigorously scrubbed clean. It was not until a little while later that Cecily realized the woman had ordered the other women to keep their hands clean, as well as the wounds they tended to. The men who returned to the walls not only had clean wounds and a clean bandage, but quite often a wide clean patch of skin on an otherwise dirty body.
As the day dragged on, Cecily caught only fleeting glimpses of Artan. Once, she saw her uncle and Artan standing shoulder to shoulder on the wall deep in discussion. The sight eased the last of her hurt over Angus’s bargain with Artan, over how her marriage to Artan would make him Angus’s heir. Artan may have only a little MacReith blood in his veins, but he was Angus’s son in many ways, including in his love for Glascreag. All her marriage did was make him fully acceptable to those who might offer a complaint about Angus’s choice and silence any who might be moved to support Malcolm’s claim. She should have been told of the bargain, but the fact that she had not been was no great crime. In truth, watching Angus and Artan work together to defend Glascreag made her feel that it had righted a wrong and put the right man at Angus’s side as the heir to all he had built.
Something Sir Fergus was trying to destroy, she thought angrily. The fact that this was all happening because Sir Fergus was a greedy man who wanted part of a wealth that he had no rights to made her even angrier at him. The man had no feeling for her. She did not know why Sir Fergus did not just return to Dunburn and use his knowledge to bleed Anabel and Edmund of a fortune. He was acting like a spoiled child who did not really care about what he had been denied, only that someone had said nay.
She went to see how the youth with the three arrow wounds was doing and was pleased to see that he had not yet grown feverish. That was a very good sign. In fact, despite Glascreag being vigorously attacked twice, only two men had died. Cecily moved on to tend to a gash a young boy had gained when shoved against a wall by his father just as another torrent of arrows fell into the bailey. As Crooked Cat fed the boy a sweet, Cecily bathed his wound and prayed that this would all end soon and end with Sir Fergus dead and his men fleeing for home as fast as they could.
“The mon is verra weel supplied,” said Angus as he wiped the sweat from his face with a wet rag.
“I suspicion some of that is due to allying himself with Laird MacIvor, but, aye, he is weel supplied. There is one thing he will soon grow verra short of if he doesnae change his ways, and that is men.”
“And MacIvor willnae give him many of his if the fool refus
es to change the way he fights.”
Frowning down at the people collecting the arrows shot over the walls by Sir Fergus’s army, Artan was surprised that the number of dead was so low. There was, however, a lot of wounded. Soon the spaces upon the walls would be hard to keep filled. The way Sir Fergus was fighting this battle was wasteful of men and supplies, but it could well win the day for him. Artan looked back toward Sir Fergus, Laird MacIvor, and all of their camped men.
“We need to do something about all those supplies he is using against us,” Artan murmured.
“Oh, aye? Such as what? Ask him to share?” Angus scowled toward Sir Fergus’s tent.
“Something like that.”
“Oh, nay. Nay, ye arenae going out there.”
“We cannae keep crouching here hoping he runs out of arrows. ’Tis costing us too much. After the first attack the man does seem have to grown a wee bit more careful with the lives of his men. So now we are the ones losing men to Sir Fergus’s archers. Do we just sit here waiting for who ends up the weakest first?”
Angus cursed and dragged his hands through his hair. “Do ye think ye can destroy his supplies?”
“I have been watching them closely every time I dared stand up and I ken where their supplies are.” He nodded when Angus’s eyes narrowed, knowing he had caught the man’s interest. “Five men to go with me as soon as the sun sets.”
“And ye are back here ere the man can curse over the loss of those supplies.”
“He will ne’er e’en ken I am there ere I am gone,” Artan boasted.
“Ready yourself then.”
By the time Artan was slipping out of Glascreag he was still wondering if he should have told his wife what he planned to do instead of leaving Angus the chore. It was too late to do anything about that now, he told himself firmly. Despite his boasts to Angus, Artan knew this was a very risky thing to do, but he felt he had no choice. He had picked out men he knew could disappear into the smallest shadow and move across the rough ground without making a sound. It was the best he could do to improve their chances of success.
Highland Barbarian Page 18
