Highland Charm: First Fantasies

by April Holthaus

  Muriella stood rigid, frozen next to the fire. She heard the ringing of the bell in the courtyard, but suddenly she could not move. She looked away as the coffin passed. When she glanced up again, John was with her, placing her hand in the crook of his elbow. Behind him the torchbearers began to move. The hundred lights dipped and swayed as each man passed, bowing toward the new Earl. At the end of the line came the pipers.

  Just before John guided her into place, Muriella saw that Elizabeth's eyes glittered unnaturally and her face was white as she bowed her head and stepped into the morning sunlight.

  The gate screamed on its hinges and creaked upward, allowing the procession to file out onto the stony spit of land leading to the shore. The hundreds of Campbells who lined the road joined the entourage as it wound its way toward the church where the second Earl of Argyll would lie from this day forward.

  Each man was intent on his own sorrow, and no one seemed to notice that some of those who wore the Campbell plaid had unfamiliar faces. No one was aware that these men did not look at the bier as it was carried down the hill; instead, they glanced furtively over their shoulders, seeking a single man.

  That man smiled at the backs of those who preceded him. Beneath his cloak, he checked his sword again, pleased to feel the icy metal in his hand. He was near the end of the procession that coiled for nearly a mile through the September hills. The wailing of the pipes seemed to rise from the very ground, skirling around his shoulders. To him the music did not weep; it sang, it promised victory. He was swept up for a moment in the sheer jubilation of his inevitable triumph. This time he would not fail.

  He kept his head lowered so no one would see his face and recognize that he did not belong here. That was why, though she passed within three feet of where he stood, Lachlan Maclean did not see his wife move along the road with Colin at her side.

  * * *

  The interior of the church was murky. The torchbearers stood at intervals along the walls, with one man on either side of the gaping hole in the stone where the Earl's coffin would rest. Unconsciously, Muriella clung to her husband's arm. She thought she would fall; her knees felt weak, but somehow she remained standing. As her eyes began to adjust to the gloom, she heard the tolling of the bell overhead: ponderous and grim, it intoned its own monotonous rhythm.

  The six men set the coffin on the cold stone floor, then moved to the rear of the church while Muriella, John, Colin and Elizabeth knelt in a semi-circle, waiting for the priest to begin. Outside, the pipes still raged through the still air. Then the priest spoke.

  Elizabeth was silent while he chanted over the coffin, first in Latin, then in the Gaelic. She was silent when the men on either side of the bier snuffed their torches so the light from behind cast wavering shadows over the mourners' heads. She was silent when the women placed white roses on the lid—white roses in autumn, the sign of early death. She was silent and still while Colin knelt beside the priest, repeating the melancholy Gaelic phrases. But when the men began to lift her father's body and place it inside the hollow stone tunnel at their feet, Elizabeth lunged forward. Falling to her knees, she laid her head against the wood that separated her from the Earl. She screamed once, "Papa!" and clung to the coffin, refusing to move when the men tried to lift her away. The tears came coursing down her cheeks, gathering in a puddle on the lid above her father's feet.

  Releasing her husband's arm, Muriella turned to flee.

  * * *

  The Campbells who were unable to squeeze into the crowded church waited outside, listening to the squeal of the pipes and the tolling of the bell. Some knelt, closing their eyes, while some remained standing, their faces wooden with grief. They did not notice their numbers had dwindled and that slowly, slowly, church and mourners alike were being closed inside a ring of strangers.

  * * *

  Lachlan Maclean watched his men as they crept from among the Campbells, moving back until they stood side-by-side, hands poised above their swords. They only waited for his signal. He smiled. Colin Campbell had thought himself clever, no doubt, sending those men to watch Duart and inform him of Maclean's actions. They were dead now, every one of them. Colin must think him a fool, Maclean thought bitterly. Aye, well, he'd learn the truth soon enough. It occurred to him that he ought to feel guilt at playing this kind of trick on the Campbells. They were helpless, after all, unprepared for anything but grief.

  Grief for the Earl of Argyll—a man who deserved only hatred and derision. He felt again the rush of desperate frustration that had shaken him at the news of the old Earl's death. He had felt cheated; the English had taken Argyll's life and Maclean had nothing to do with it. Now he would never get his revenge against the man who had figured in his nightmares for so long. But if he could not make the Earl pay for what he had done, then his family would have to pay for him. A tiny voice inside warned him that it was not the same, but he did not listen.

  Despite his doubts, Maclean had carefully planned the attack. So long as he knew Elizabeth was safe at Duart, he would feel no twinge of conscience. He still could not bring himself to hurt her, though since her father's death he found her more and more a burden. He shook his head, trying to dislodge thoughts of his wife, but as he raised his hand, ready to give the sign for which his men were watching, he heard a commotion at the door of the church. Squinting through the sunlight, he saw Muriella step outside and stand for a moment looking frantically about her. Then John pushed through the crowd. He was holding a woman who slumped beside him, her head bent.

  Maclean paused with his hand in midair. There was something familiar about the woman, though her face was covered. She looked up and he moaned, choking on his own voice. By God, it was Elizabeth. He glanced at the circle of men who stood waiting. The Campbells would look up and see them in a moment; then it would be hopeless.

  Elizabeth was weeping, pounding her fists against her brother's chest as the wrenching sobs tore at her throat. Damn ye! Maclean wanted to scream. Damn ye to hell! Turning away, he gave the signal for retreat.

  Chapter 23

  "M'lady! What is it?" Megan whispered faintly.

  Muriella stood in her chamber one week after the burial, her eyes moving ceaselessly from one object to another, unable to stay still. Her hands were poised at her throat, her fingers pressing into the tender skin. She had wept no more tears since the eve of the funeral, but now, though she fought against it, the protective numbness had began at last to slip away, leaving her grief exposed to the bright, cold light of day. Her imagination created grisly portraits of the Earl, his chest a mass of wounds, his skull split down the center. Dead at Flodden Field. She had lost him. He had known the cause was hopeless, yet he had followed the King just the same. The Earl had turned his back on Muriella as surely as Lorna and Isabel had done on that long-ago day at Cawdor.

  "Please," Megan cried, "tell me what ails ye."

  Muriella peered at her friend's familiar face and did not know it. The red mist would not leave her; it lingered, shrouding everything with the same scarlet haze. Her mind was full of images of the past: She was kneeling in the river staring at the crimson that covered Lorna's hand. She was standing in the wedding chamber with its deep red hangings. There was blood everywhere—her own blood gushing from her finger, Andrew Calder's blood spilled over the rock, the Earl's blood soaking into the swampy ground. She was falling. She would fall until the earth closed around her and she could fall no more.

  "I can't bear it!" she moaned, covering her ears to shut out the memory of a mournfully tolling bell. She gazed around her at the gold-and-crimson bed curtains, the walls hung with tapestries shot with scarlet threads. She shuddered from head to foot, then went to the nearest hanging, ripping it from the wall. Blindly, she tore down the next and the next. When all were on the floor, she turned to the bed and began gathering the curtains in her arms.

  Megan stood motionless, so frightened by the look in her mistress's eyes that she could not move. For a moment she could not find her voice.
"What are ye doin'? What is it?"

  Muriella laughed without mirth. The Earl had chosen to die for his King and now she was alone. The swirling red mist obsessed her. She must destroy it. Burn it. She dragged the curtains toward the fire.

  Megan stood staring, her hand pressed to her mouth; then she hurried from the chamber, calling for help as she went.

  At the foot of the stairs, John caught her as she started past him. "Megan?"

  She gaped at him, then gasped, "Yer wife! I can't stop her!"

  He asked nothing more, but headed at once for Muriella's room. He had never seen Megan so shaken and it made his own heart beat with dread. When he came to his wife's chamber, he stopped abruptly on the threshold. The tapestries lay among the rushes, some of them torn down the center; the bed curtains were piled near the hearth quite close to the flames, and Muriella stood in the middle of the floor, a red gown in shreds at her feet. "Are ye mad?"

  "Aye, I'm mad," she chanted. "Mad, mad, mad!" She twirled away from him, wrapping her arms about her waist, and watched him as he stepped back, unable to take his eyes from her.

  Then the muscles in his face tensed as his eyes glinted gray blue. "I won't believe it," he declared.

  She could hear the anger in his voice, see it in the way he leaned against a chest, crossing his arms before him. She straightened her body slowly, swinging her auburn hair over her shoulders. She was aware of the way the firelight altered her face, increasing its pale sheen. She could feel his penetrating gaze upon her.

  Muriella leaned forward, her body stiff and unbending. She leaned out so far that John thought she would fall into the tapestries at her feet. But she remained upright, swaying, her green eyes flicking from the fire to his face and back again.

  "What if I lifted my torch from the wall and carried it through the castle, setting all yer tapestries afire, dropping the flames into the rushes? Would ye believe it then?"

  "I'd most certainly beat ye senseless, but I’d no’ believe ye're mad. Do ye intend to try it?" He moved toward her menacingly.

  She stepped back, glowering. She had not frightened him. That was strange. Anyone else would have shrunk away from her, but there he stood, unmoved, looking at her with cold blue eyes. As he took another step forward, she drew herself upright.

  The madness, he noted, had disappeared. Now he saw for the first time how pale she was, how dark were the shadows beneath her eyes. Her face was covered with a fine film of sweat, though the afternoon was chilly. And her eyes glittered with a light he had never seen there before. "Why have ye done this?" he asked, indicating the chaos on the floor between them.

  "They displease me."

  Her tone was cool and imperious, but this time he was not fooled. "Why?"

  "The crimson." She waved her hand toward the scattered fabrics. "It sickens me." She pressed her palm to her forehead as the haze began to cloud her thoughts once more.

  He could see she was sincere. It did sicken her; her eyes were hollow and her cheeks deathly pale. "But why?" he repeated.

  Muriella turned away. "It reminds me of Flodden. There was so much death, so much blood. By the end even the mud was red. Oh, God!" she cried, covering her mouth with her hands.

  "But ye weren't even there!"

  Whirling, Muriella cried, "Don't ye understand yet? I was there! I’m still there. The men who died are gone and don't remember, but I can't escape the battlefield. I live the slaughter over and over, every minute of the day, and even in my dreams at night."

  For a moment, John was too shocked to respond, then he made himself speak calmly. "Ye need to be busy, to keep yer thoughts occupied with other things. 'Twould help ye forget."

  Muriella shook her head in despair. "No," she said. "Mayhap ye can hunt and ride to get away from yer grief and yer anger, but I can't." She closed her eyes, but the mist grew darker, more threatening, and she opened them again. "Don't ye see? That won't work for me, because the horror is here, inside my own head." With a shaking finger, she pointed to her damp forehead. "I can't close my eyes and make it go away; the images only become clearer. I can't run, because they follow." She swallowed with difficulty, then ran her hand down the column of her throat. "And I can't bear it anymore. I can't."

  Before he could stop himself, John took a step backward, to keep her anguish from touching him. For the first time, he began to understand the shadowed world in which his wife lived, and he was appalled. He wanted to turn from her, to make himself forget the tortured look in her eyes, but as his father had pointed out, he had a responsibility to fulfill. Muriella needs ye, whether she admits it or not. Slowly, he forced himself to approach her. Grasping her shoulders, he shook her slightly. "Muriella!"

  She leaned toward him, and in that instant there was no past, no bitterness, no fear. There was only the blinding scarlet mist that was closing more and more closely around her. "Please," she whispered.

  But John did not know what his wife was asking for. He released her while he tried to think.

  "M'lord?"

  John turned to find Megan standing timidly in the doorway, her brown eyes full of concern. "Is she—," the servant began.

  He shook his head. "I think she needs some air. Mayhap a walk in the garden?"

  Megan nodded eagerly. "Aye, I'll go with her."

  Muriella watched the others from the end of a long, silent tunnel. They spoke of her as if she were not there, as if she were an invalid too frail to make her own decisions. Just now she did not have the strength to tell them differently. She was so weary her bones ached and the thought of the clear air of the garden brought with it a kind of relief. She had told John she could not escape her inner sight, but that would never stop her from trying.

  "M'lady?" Megan said tentatively.

  "Aye." Muriella did not look at her husband as she turned to go. She did not wish to see the aversion on his face. Quickly, lifting her gown above the scattered rushes, she left the room.

  John stood where she had left him; he was not yet able to move. Running his hand through his hair, he gazed blankly at the cluttered floor.

  "M'lord?"

  John turned to find Duncan standing with his mouth hanging open in astonishment at the sight of the torn gown and tapestries. "What do ye want?" the older man asked sharply.

  Duncan looked up. "What?" The squire's mind refused to function for several seconds; then he remembered why the new Earl had sent him here. "There's trouble brewing. The clans are rising in favor of Donald of Lachalsh. They've proclaimed him Lord of the Ides, though the title is rightfully Colin's."

  John considered his squire in silence. He believed there was some question he should ask, but he didn't know what it was. "Proclaimed him Lord of the Isles?" he repeated. Then he realized what Duncan was saying. "A rebellion? Now?"

  "Aye. They couldn't have chosen a worse time. We're still weak from our losses at Flodden."

  "Ye can bet they know that. They move quickly, I'll give them that. What have they done?"

  "Taken Urquart and the Castle of Carneburgh."

  John paced the floor, kicking the fabric from under his feet. "Huntly will have to go to Urquart, but Carneburgh—we may be able to gather enough men. Do ye know who holds it now?"

  "Aye, 'tis Lachlan Maclean."

  John stopped his pacing. "Are ye certain?"

  "'Tis certain Maclean holds Carneburgh, and he's had himself named Master of Dunskaich in Sleat as well."

  "Where's Elizabeth? Is she all right?"

  "We don't know, but Colin believes Maclean left her at Duart. Likely she'll be safe enough."

  "She'd best be safe," John hissed, "or by God, this time I'll cut his throat. Do ye hear?"

  "M'lord," Duncan said softly, "Colin awaits ye below. We must move as soon as possible."

  John massaged his forehead absently. "Aye, that we must." This time his voice was calmer. As he started to follow his squire from the room, he stumbled over a tapestry and his expression clouded. Shaking his head, he closed the chamber d
oor behind him.

  When he saw Mary hurrying past, John called her to him and spoke in a low-pitched voice. As she nodded, he heard Colin calling from below and turned to start down the stairs.

  * * *

  Later, Muriella climbed to her chamber, pausing for a moment outside the door. She and Megan had wandered from the garden down to the loch. In the freshening afternoon breeze, the color had gradually returned to Muriella's cheeks. She had stared into the water lapping against the shore and willed the haze of fear and grief to leave her. She had fought against the pain she saw reflected in the green-gray water. With Megan's chatter to help her, she had somehow managed to keep the despair at bay. But now her stomach twisted and her hands tightened on the latch.

  She didn't want to enter this room. She remembered the afternoon too clearly and did not wish to see what she had done. At last, however, she pushed the door open, then stood rigid, the breath gone from her body.

  The floor was covered with fresh rushes. The shredded gown had disappeared, as had the bed curtains and tapestries. She looked up, expecting to find bare walls, but someone had replaced the old hangings with new ones. Her gaze traveled over them in disbelief. They were all worked in yellows and browns and greens. She turned to the bed, where the curtains had been replaced with gold and green ones. She swallowed with difficulty.

  Too stunned to think clearly, she went to the chest that held her gowns. Lifting the lid, she saw that the kirtle for the scarlet gown was gone. She shifted the dresses one at a time, searching through layer after layer, but there was no doubt. She let the lid slip from nerveless fingers, sank onto the chest, her fingers curled on the carved rosewood. She had learned to live with the pain and the emptiness and the fear in the eyes of others when they looked at her, but this single act of kindness was more than she could bear.