by Jackie Ivie
“Edwin Brennon MacGruder! Edwin MacGruder! Ed! Win!”
Dallis had the coverlet down beneath her nose then to peek out. It wasn’t anyone named Edwin that came out of the tent in front of them. It was the servant wench, Bronwyn. The lass hadn’t gained much in strength or courage, for she just stood there, wringing her hands as the five horses approached. Dallis watched as Redmond’s horse passed by Payton’s, Redmond taking the lead and speaking before Payton could.
“Morn, lass. We expected Edwin MacGruder.”
Redmond spoke in a calm voice that Payton wouldn’t have been able to achieve. Not if the heavy breaths he was taking against Dallis’s back were any indicator.
“He—he’s…hunting,” Bronwyn stammered.
“Hunting?”
Redmond was continuing to speak in a moderate, calm tone. He was also dismounting and assisting Lady Evelyn to the ground and holding her shoulders as if waiting for her legs to do it, all of which looked chivalrous and gallant.
“Game…is scarce. He told me of it…when he left. He had to go! He was under orders to have a deer roasting. Or…at the verra least, a hare.”
Her voice had gotten stronger, and accusatory. It was easy to see who she was aiming that emotion at, for she slid a glance to Payton’s form before looking back to the ground. Payton responded with a sigh of disgust and the removal of his arms from Dallis. It was to lift the cloak from atop him and bring it down in front of them, leaving his form free to the elements, and making hers suffer the same. That made her realize just how cold it was. About the only good thing looked to be the snowfall had stopped, although the sky was leaden with a gray color promising more. There was just a slice of space between the cloud cover and the horizon for the weak winter sunlight to peek through, granting light but little in warmth.
“Redmond,” Payton spoke with a warning tone, putting his hands on Dallis’s waist with more force than he needed to. She wasn’t going anywhere.
“When did he leave?” Redmond ignored Payton’s outburst and continued the questioning of Bronwyn.
“Last eve. Just after getting the tent set up.”
“So…he left you all alone. All night?”
The girl nodded.
“And you made gruel for our arrival?”
“A-a-and…bread,” she stammered.
“You have been verra industrious, lass. Verra.”
“Oh, for the love of God!”
Payton launched himself in a twist motion off the side of his horse, using the handholds on Dallis’s waist as his fulcrum. She barely had time to grasp to the horse’s mane in order to hold her seat and keep the stallion from bolting. It was a good thing he was well trained and she knew how to ride a horse, since this was all the regard Payton showed her. Watching him, she was grateful she didn’t have his attention. He was advancing on where Bronwyn had turned back into a pitiful hand-wringing waif again. From the height of a seat on his horse, it was easy to spot how he dwarfed even Redmond.
“I give orders. I give ample time. I expect them followed! Na’ have to deal with a simple-minded lass that I need to placate with soft words!”
“My laird,” Redmond replied in the same evenly modulated tone. “There are ladies about.”
“What?” Payton stopped midstride and pulled himself back.
“Ladies…and they are na’ as strong as you are.”
Payton shoved out another breath and put both hands out. “What are you talking of now? And why must we mill about bandying senseless words when we have shelter at your back? And it better be warm!”
“Because there are ladies accompanying us, and ladies require more clothing than you have left them with, warm gruel to put before them, and a pallet upon which to rest. Especially after the ordeal we have just put them through.”
Redmond gestured to where Dallis probably looked a sight, since she had both fists full of horse mane. That left her unable to hold any of the material that was trailing to the ground, due to Payton’s exit from her. She watched as Payton glared over at her like it was her fault all she had on was a plain shift and was outdoors on a winter morn. Then she returned the look.
“We’d best get the ladies into the tent, then,” Payton responded finally. “And Davey? See to the horses. Get your brother’s assist.” He was advancing on her as he said all of it.
“Perhaps I’d best see to the wife,” Redmond spoke from behind him, and took one step in that direction.
“I doona’ need your assist,” Payton replied.
“You certain?”
“I’ll see to the wife. You see to getting every other lady into the tent.”
Payton sounded like he was talking through closed teeth. It wasn’t hard to imagine why. Hers were chattering enough she had to clench them to keep the sound at bay. She hoped it was the cold, and yet the closer he got the more she knew that was a lie. And then he stopped, directly at the side of his horse, put his hands on his hips and looked up at her.
Dallis didn’t have any way to clasp her hands to wring them and, stupidly, that’s exactly what she felt compelled to do. Which would look weak and frail and too much like Bronwyn’s reaction to him had been. She was probably in luck that her stance atop his horse gave her no option other than to sit upright in order to keep her seat with both hands full of mane to remain that way.
He probably should wear more than a linen shirt and his feile-breacan, since the dawn light was kissing the side of him it touched, while the shadows carved out the rest of him for her to observe.
“You should wear more,” he stated, as if he were reading her mind.
Dallis blinked, felt the cold reaction through her eyes at the frost-filled air, and nodded. “As should you,” she replied.
He grunted. Then, he put his hands out and up toward her. “Will you come nicely with me?” he asked.
“You’re…asking me?” She knew the surprise filled her voice. She didn’t know how to hide it.
“Aye,” he replied.
“Truly?”
He swore, put his hands to his temples to push his hair back, and glared up at her. “I said aye,” he finally said.
Dallis’s eyes flitted to the purplish scar he’d revealed at the edge of his hairline before she could help it. When she returned to his gaze, something looked to have changed about him. All over him.
He looked stern, disgusted, and angered. All at once.
“I near forgot,” he said, as if she’d asked.
“What?”
“My mark. And what it means.”
Dallis couldn’t prevent the shivers that took over. She’d never seen such a look, and since it was coming from the icy blue of his eyes, it seemed worse. She told herself it was the reaction to being in winter conditions with one layer of material on and no way to gain more. Then, she worked at believing it.
“Are you going to come into my arms like a good lass? Or am I going to look like a bear again?”
She smiled slightly and then nodded more to herself than him, and went into a slant in order to slide off. The ground was patched with new snow. It looked cold and wet, and ruinous to satin slippers. She stopped and looked over at him again.
“You’ll catch me?” She asked.
He looked heavenward for a moment and then back at her. “You’re a slip of a thing and I’m the King’s Champion. Does it look as if I canna’ catch you?”
“You swear?”
He didn’t make a reply. He didn’t have to. He reached over and plucked her into his arms, gaining himself a squeal from her, and a few strands of hair pulled loose from his stallion.
“Jesu’, Mary, and Joseph. Everything has to be a fight with you. Everything. I canna’ get you to do the simplest thing. Even when you say you will, ’tis a lie.” He was stomping his way toward the tent, putting emphasis to his words, and then he finished his tirade with another bit of swearing as they reached the door flap.
Dallis giggled then, snuggled a bit closer, and when he moved her to one arm
in order to fuss with lifting the door flap, she did something so unbelievable and horrid, everything on her went board stiff. His reaction wasn’t far behind as he did the same. She’d lifted her chin, put her nose against his throat, and pressed a kiss to the skin there that was throbbing with a pulse.
He pulled his head back, stunned. She probably had the same expression. The door flap landed atop his head, putting them right in the door, blocking the elements somewhat, and yet letting them in at the same time.
There was another fire inside the tent. There had to be, for warmth blessed Dallis’s back, while flickers of firelight touched on his face. That was almost too much to handle since the light showed all too clearly the beautiful blue color of his eyes, especially as wide as he had them.
“What did you do that for?” he asked it softly, but with a rumble of sound that went straight through her.
“I dinna’…ken,” she replied. She didn’t know, either. She was as surprised as he was.
“Wife, you need to pick one reaction to me, and stay with it. You’re perplexing me, and that in turn, annoys me.”
“I…” Her voice stopped.
“I’m na’ certain I like it, either. In fact, I’m fairly certain I dinna’.”
“I—” Dallis tried again. She couldn’t think. She couldn’t even speak if he didn’t move his gaze.
“I already ken you’re the bonniest woman I’ve met. You keep me all twisted inside…and now you add to it?”
“But, I—” She didn’t have an answer. Again.
“You dinna’ have to keep letting me see it. And feel it. Jesu’, Woman. Have a bit of sympathy. We doona’ even have our own tent.”
Dallis gasped. That pushed her bosom fully against him. She watched him glance that way before a tremor ran through him, and then transferred into her. Her increased breasts had been the only change to her body because of his bairn, and her bosom hadn’t been a small size to begin with, anyway.
He’d finished off looking at her body’s increase and returned to her gaze. Dallis would kick herself later for still having it wide and rapt and ready for him. Everything was going wrong, and she couldn’t think if he continued holding her, lifting her with his increased breathing while his arms tightened even further.
“Could you either come in, Payton, or stay out? Either way, allow the door to fall. You’re chilling your own tent and making the ladies suffer.”
It might have been that Redmond speaking again, but there was enough amusement to the voice, it could be anyone. Aside from which, Dallis couldn’t hear much over the hum within her own ears. She knew what caused it, too. Payton’s gaze as he looked into hers. Caught. Held. Enthralled. Stricken.
He was moving forward…a step, then another. The door flap slid off his head and dropped into place. Dallis didn’t move her gaze from his.
“Good. You’ve made a choice.” Someone was still talking. Dallis barely heard it.
“Aye,” Payton replied.
“You should unhand the lady,” the clansman remarked.
“Aye,” Payton said again.
“She probably needs some sustenance,” the man continued.
“Do you?” he asked.
Dallis shook her head slightly.
“She has probably tired of your stench by now, as well.” The disembodied voice said it from somewhere over his right shoulder.
“Are you?” Payton asked her again.
Dallis shook her head again.
“Payton Alexander Dunn-Fadden.”
The name was announced like it was justice being meted out. Dallis watched as Payton shut his eyes tightly, putting little crinkles into existence at the corners, and then he opened them, shook his head as if just awakening, and turned his head toward the voice.
“Unhand the wife. She has a seat set up and a bit of food. All of which she is needful of. And na’ more of your attention.”
“We are wed, Redmond.”
“And we are attempting a breakfast. You are rapidly putting me off my appetite.”
Dallis giggled again. Payton’s arms tightened as if in immediate mindless response to hearing it. And that had her gasping again. All of which got her his glance back to her breasts and then back to her. And then he smiled wryly.
“You make it powerful difficult to remember that I hate you, Wife. Powerful difficult,” he whispered it, which made it worse.
“You…hate…me?” She didn’t even give it voice, but he must have known because he replied, with an even larger smile.
“Oh. Absolutely.”
Payton moved forward the required space, eased his arms loose and lowered her. Dallis didn’t even feel the pile of folded blanket that he set her atop. She wasn’t aware of anything sensory beyond the smell, feel, and sight of her husband…who hated her.
Chapter 11
Dallis couldn’t sleep. Again. She shifted against the body beside her and tried modulating her breathing again. None of the others sleeping in the enclosure seemed to have this problem. Most of the earthen floor was given over to sleeping mats of one kind or another and snoring could be heard from several of the plaid-covered lumps. The men weren’t all sleeping. Two men were posted outside as guards, but that had changed twice in the time she’d been lying, snuggled under a fur and trying to stop her thoughts so she could at least rest.
It wasn’t entirely her fault. It was too hard, too warm, too bright, too loud, too strange…and that was before she added Dunn-Fadden. From across the width of the firepit, she felt the disturbance that came from being in proximity of him…and it just wasn’t fair!
Her presence obviously wasn’t bothering him.
Dallis moved her head slightly to look across at him, the motion rubbing her cheek against the heavy linen weave of the pallet. Payton was on his side facing her, bundled up in his cloak with his head pillowed on a crooked arm. He was sound asleep…on a mat made from coarse hemp resembling the sling they’d used. He didn’t even have the stuffed pallet he’d described to her.
She and Lady Evelyn did, while Bronwyn rested across the bottom.
That bit of gallantry hadn’t needed to be urged. Payton had retrieved the pallet from his horse’s back and unfurled it with an emotion bordering on animosity. She suspected the reason, as did everyone else. He’d fully expected to be sleeping on it, and probably with her.
Dallis grimaced a bit with that memory. She’d never been around so many fighting-aged men before, and never in a tent or on a journey, but she would have thought clansmen obeyed their future laird with more alacrity than this group did. They seemed to act more like a quorum all possessing an equal vote. It was difficult to believe these were the same men that had taken the Caruth keep in such a bloody battle three years ago. It was impossible to believe it planned. Not when observing them now. They argued over every little thing, including where they bedded down to sleep.
Of course, everyone wanted to be near the fire. It was warmer. It was most protected. New snowfall the consistency of powder filtered through the opening in the peak but was melted before it reached the floor. Dallis wouldn’t want to be at the outer edges of the tent, either. That’s where the cold seeped in. So they’d had an argument, a discussion, reached a decision, and it had been Payton’s decree that the men coming in from guard duty could have the spot closest to the fire, while those at the edge would be sent out to patrol. Dallis longed to point out that this wouldn’t prove restful, since they’d be jostling about when anyone returned, but they didn’t ask her opinion, and she wasn’t offering it. They also decided that the man who returned had to bring a bit of the sliced peat and lay it to dry at the door prior to adding it to their fire.
That order came after the first returning men used wet peat and turned the enclosure into a smoke-infested, cough-inducing torment. That had been the youngest one’s fault…the big-eyed one they called Alan.
Dallis blew out the disgust at herself. She really had to get some rest!
Due to their argument, she knew th
e plan. Edinburgh would take a sennight to reach, if they weren’t waylaid by bad direction or another storm. There was also the shelter of Ballilol Castle. It was within four days’ travel, and they’d be safe enough there. Except for Payton. Dallis didn’t know what the jostling and grinning as they chided Payton meant, but if it was worrisome to Payton, Ballilol Keep couldn’t be that much protection.
They were also cursed to travel by night. At least until they reached Ballilol. It was the man, Martin, with that idea. Dallis had a difficult time keeping her tongue during the listen, while she’d pretended to sleep. They weren’t risking the main road. They weren’t a large enough band to protect her should they come upon brigands, pursuing Kilchurnings, or even Caruth clansmen. And they were riding double. Not only did that slow them, but it also gave the appearance of weakness. It was better to be unseen and avoid trouble. At least until they reached Ballilol Castle or Canongate. That was when her husband spoke up that he courted trouble, and he didn’t see the issue, which got him more discussion.
Dallis watched him sleep now. He was getting easier to decipher. That man was primed for battle and seemed to expect one. At any time. As he’d been blessed with a frame guaranteed to bring on a challenge and he’d worked it into strength and brawn and substance that made him nearly omnipotent, it was probably not all his fault that a test of strength always seemed to find him.
She sighed softly and accompanied it with a pursing of her lips as she studied him.
Not only was he the largest male, but he was also gifted with amazing coloring and truly breath-stealing handsomeness. Slumbering as he was, it was even more apparent. Soot-shaded eyelashes grazed his cheeks, and lips that were almost feminine in shape were parted slightly for breath. He had the slightest skiff of whisker coating his jaw and should he cease scraping it off with a skean, his beard would probably come in as dark as his hair was.
She was glad he slept. That way he wouldn’t know how she roamed her eyes where only her imagination had gone. Back when she’d been his wife in name only she’d been tormented with dreams of what might happen when he returned. Now that she’d lain with him and carried his child, the dreams had an eroticism to them nobody had prepared her for. Her tower hadn’t contained it. She’d gone to her knees and tried to pray the images away. She’d bathed in cold water without light to avoid waking Lady Evelyn. She’d tried changing into a clean, fresh, cool night dress when hers clung to her body as if mimicking where his hands had been.
