“I ken well Lady Coira and the earl will take offense if I’m nae waiting to greet them like an obedient hound,” he replied, casting his eyes up to the blue sky in a bid for peace and patience.
His mother clucked her tongue. “Ye’d nae be in this position if ye had swallowed yer pride and wed Edina as yer father and I had agreed.”
“Again, Mother?” Brice burst out, despite Callum narrowing his eyes at his brother. Brice shrugged, as if to say he was sorry for not listening. “I kinnae imagine that Callum could ever forget why ye believe we are in this position.”
“Why I believe he is in this position?” Their mother’s face purpled with anger. “Why I believe?” she repeated, her voice pitching high.
“Aye, why ye believe,” Brice snapped. “Ye conveniently forget that ye and Father wanted Callum to wed Edina to simply gain allies. And neither of ye seemed to have a care that the lass was nae true to the upcoming union, nor was she pure.”
“Sacrifices had to be made,” their mother barked. “Callum could have taken Edina in hand and controlled her once they were married.”
Their mother was right on that point. Callum also knew his love for Marsaili Campbell had kept him from agreeing to renew his broken vow to marry Edina. Then his grief over losing Marsaili before they’d ever had the chance to start a life together had held him firm in his refusal.
His gut clenched, as it always did, when he thought of Marsaili, of sitting in the great hall of his home arguing with his parents, telling them he would not wed Edina despite their insistence. He recalled acutely the moment one of their servants had handed his mother a sealed letter. Callum could still see her opening it, her gaze flying to him before revealing the contents of the letter: a proclamation that the Campbell’s beloved daughter Marsaili had drowned. Drowned. She had drowned the day after he had left her with the promise that he would return to wed her.
The message had been short and impersonal, but of course, it would have been, as the Campbell had been unaware of Callum’s love for Marsaili. He had been home for a month before the letter arrived, and he had been delayed in returning to Marsaili because of the Gordon’s immediate sieges after Callum had refused to honor the promise to wed Edina. His mother and father had held firm that he must relinquish his foolish infatuation and mend things with Edina, which the Gordon had said would restore peace between the clans, especially since Edina had lied to her father and told him Callum had gotten her with child.
Callum had refuted the claim, but the Gordon refused to believe it. His own parents had claimed to believe him, but they also believed the Campbell would not agree to a marriage alliance with them when he could have one with the powerful Earl of Ulster. And they certainly had not wanted to draw the Campbell’s ire by telling him that Callum had taken his daughter’s innocence. They had robbed Callum of ever knowing if the Campbell would or would not have agreed. But later, when Callum had sent a call out for aid to fight the Gordons and the MacDonalds, the Campbell had shown he was not a friend.
“Look what yer pestering has done, Mother,” Brice growled, bringing Callum back to the present. “Callum looks dazed.”
“I did nae do it! Ye did!” his mother screeched.
“Enough.” Callum looked from his mother to his brother and back again, his patience wearing thin.
His mother sniffed as if he’d injured her feelings. He didn’t know whether he truly had or if she was acting. She was a strong, ambitious woman, yet she had loved his father, and Callum could vividly recall her grief when Father had died. He’d been stabbed through the heart by the Gordon laird during a siege on Urquhart Castle two fortnights after Callum had returned from the Gathering.
The memory of his mother’s wails upon learning of his father’s death made him hold in much of what he wanted to say to her. It was a fact that his refusal to marry Edina had ultimately plunged his clan into war with the Gordons. “Rest assured, Mother. My guilt about Father’s death and at how our clan has been ravaged is nae ever eased.” His mother nodded as if pleased by the confirmation. He took a long breath, searching for the calm that had eluded him all morning. “I ken well we need the Earl of Ainsworth, as he needs us. I will marry the cold Lady Coira—”
“Ye will thaw her once ye’re married,” his mother said in her practical tone.
He held his mother’s stare. Her refusal to believe that he did not care to have Coira’s affection always amazed him. He suspected it was how she avoided feeling any guilt for her own mistakes in life. “I dunnae care to thaw her,” he said, biting out each word. In two months, he would take to wife a woman as cold as the northerly winter winds; yet, that was why he had finally decided he could marry her to save his clan. Her ambivalence toward him actually allowed him to accept the inevitable. He did not have to feel guilty that she would want his heart, when he knew well that Marsaili had taken it with her to her grave. God’s blood, he had not wanted to think of her today, on the day that he would greet his soon-to-be wife. It seemed an utter betrayal to Marsaili’s memory and the love he had held—still held—for her.
“This union benefits both clans, Son,” his mother said, her voice more of a coo now that she was about to get what she wanted.
He nodded, for she spoke the truth. The Earl of Ainsworth had approached Callum a year ago about marrying his daughter. At first Callum had thought to decline, but a ride around his clan’s ravaged castle and a particularly vicious siege by the Gordons, during which Callum had lost twenty good warriors, made him think again. His coffers were so low that he could ill afford to repair Urquhart, and he still needed to gain more warriors. He could no longer delay a marriage union to get an alliance.
He was lucky to have received an offer of an alliance at all. After his father died, he’d sent out a request for an alliance to those his father had considered friends, and not one of them, including the Campbell laird, had answered the call. Callum had then turned to King David, ready to pledge the loyalty his father had taken away and given to the Steward, but it was not that simple. The king did not trust Callum because he was his father’s son, and King David had refused even to hear Callum’s pledge, let alone offer him aid. Only recently had the king agreed to allow Callum to come to Edinburgh to speak with him. It had taken two and a half years of paying a penance fee to the king to achieve. Callum could not be certain what would happen when he saw the king. He may well leave Edinburgh still in disfavor. His clan had no one to turn to—except Ainsworth.
The earl wanted an alliance with Callum, as well, because Urquhart blocked the path that the MacDonalds needed to take to get to Ainsworth’s home, which the laird desired to claim. MacDonald wanted to gain power closer to England. Ainsworth needed someone loyal to help fight off the MacDonald, and someone with a personal stake in keeping MacDonald away, like Callum, would fight the most fiercely against their common enemy.
“I love ye, Son,” his mother said, squeezing his shoulder.
“Aye,” he acknowledged immediately, knowing she did but also realizing her affection had many strings attached to it. And one of them was Callum agreeing to the union with Coira. His mother’s motivation was not only to strengthen the clan but to receive the chest of gold that the earl had promised the Grants upon the marriage, which would bring great wealth to the clan—and to her.
“Ye will nae even think of Marsaili Campbell ever again once ye and Lady Coira have met in the marriage bed.”
He didn’t respond. There was no way he could without starting a quarrel. His mother was wrong; yet, in her heart, she believed she was right. He had no notion why she had mentioned Marsaili, unless she sensed him brooding the past couple of days—or more likely if Brice had said something to her about it. Brice had a problem holding his tongue. For Callum’s part, he rarely talked of Marsaili, and when he did, it was never to his mother. He had loved the woman. In truth, Marsaili was the only woman he had ever loved—would ever love—but she had left this world and was never returning. And as laird, he had an ob
ligation to marry Coira for the well-being of his clan. Besides, he had to atone for choosing his heart’s desire over the good of his people the last time around.
“Callum, we should make our way down,” his mother said.
He wasn’t ready. He wanted another moment, just one, before he walked to the shore and put his past behind him for good.
Brice’s shrewd blue gaze seemed to register Callum’s unspoken thoughts. “We’ll join ye shortly, Mother. Callum wanted to instruct me on which men to have guard his future wife while she is here for the tourney.”
“I hope that is all,” his mother said, giving Callum a pleading look.
“Dunnae fash yerself. I will marry the lass when the time comes.”
She nodded, causing once-shiny black strands of hair, now dulled by age, to slip from behind her ear. She twisted the locks around her finger. “I’m nae fashed,” she replied, her lips puckering for a moment. “I ken ye realize that if ye had nae broken yer first vow to Edina, yer father would still be alive and we would nae be in such dire need.”
“It amazes me how ye always manage to fit that reminder into conversation several times a day,” Brice quipped.
Callum held up a silencing hand to his brother and looked to their mother. “All will be fine,” he said, willing it to be so.
“Ye will follow?” she persisted.
He nodded. “I’ll be at the shore before their birlinn reaches it.”
She offered a triumphant smile before walking away and disappearing down the slope.
“Ye ken,” Brice said, “she has convinced herself ye will fall under Coira’s spell.”
“Does Coira have a spell for me to fall under?” Callum asked, eyeing his brother.
Brice scowled. “How should I ken? She is yer future wife.”
“Aye, but ye just said—”
“I simply referred to her beauty,” Brice interrupted, red-faced.
“Ye always have had an eye for the lovely lasses, but a pretty face will nae make me forget my past.”
“Ye talk as if ye dunnae like Coira. Do ye believe her a bad person? She is simply tart-tongued.”
Callum chuckled, recalling Coira once flaying Brice for flirting openly with her maid when they had visited her home. Tart-tongued was putting Coira Ainsworth’s disposition in a kind light. Still, he understood why she likely behaved as she did. “I dunnae believe she is a bad person, Brother. She is but a game piece moved on a board by her father, and she dunnae care for it. I can hardly berate her for feeling what I myself felt about wedding Edina.”
“Och,” Brice growled. “It infuriates me how ye are accepting this fate.”
Callum smiled at his brother. Being younger had offered Brice a certain freedom that Callum had never had, though he briefly had tried to take it and failed. He was not fated to choose his wife; he had to marry for duty. It was not how he had wanted it—truly, he’d done his best to avoid it—but it was the way of it. Coira had told him she did not wish to wed him, either, because in him, she saw a man who would never love her. And she had been right. He had been unable to deny it, so he could not begrudge the cold way she treated him.
“Ye dunnae have to marry her, Callum,” Brice said.
“Ye ken I do,” Callum replied. A bird soaring through the air caught his attention, and he was struck with a very clear memory of something Marsaili had said not long after he had met her. She had been sitting by the water’s edge, staring up at a bird in the sky with a wistful expression on her face, and said, I wish I could fly away as birds do.
That was how he felt in this moment.
“A pretty face may nae make ye forget the Campbell lass,” Brice said, shifting beside Callum, “but it can make the joining more pleasant.”
“We will join only once, to seal the marriage.”
Brice gaped at Callum. “Ye kinnae mean that. Ye’re nae a monk, Brother. And ye need an heir. What if ye dunnae get her with child during that one joining?”
“She kinnae have bairns,” Callum said, revealing to his brother something he had not told anyone else, including their mother.
Brice’s eyes widened. “How can she ken this?”
“She was married before, and they had nae conceived. After her husband died, she wanted to discover if she was the reason she had nae had children, so the medicine woman who examined her told her that her womb would remain forever empty, and a seer confirmed it.”
“God’s blood,” Brice muttered. “Ye must have bairns. Ye’re laird. Ye need offspring that will one day take yer place.”
“Ye will have bairns, and yer son will be laird.”
“Ye speak nonsense. Surely ye want yer own bairns.”
“I dunnae, Brother. Now leave the subject be.” The softness that had once dwelled in him, the part of him capable of tender emotions for a woman, the part of him that had imagined having bairns with Marsaili—children who would look like her—had died when he’d learned she had. He wanted none of it now.
“Ye’re nae dead, Callum,” Brice said low. “Ye live, like it or nae.”
He glanced sideways and met his brother’s worried gaze. He wanted to snap a command at him to stop speaking. He could—it was his right—but he simply nodded when confronted with the evidence of Brice’s concern. “Aye, I’m well aware that I’m nae dead.”
“It just occurred to me what ye’re doing,” Brice said, making Callum groan.
“Do ye ken,” Callum grumbled, “that ever since the day ye were born, ye have been noisy? Ye came out wailing, and once that stopped, ye started jabbering, and ye have nae ceased.”
Brice grinned. “Dunnae try to sway me from my thoughts with affronts. I’ve seen ye use that deceit enough times to ken what ye are doing. Now, I thought ye were marrying Coira only because of the blame ye place on yerself for Da’s death, and certainly because we need the ally, but I see now ’tis nae so simple.”
“I dunnae care to hear yer views on why I’m doing what I am doing,” Callum growled.
“And I dunnae care that ye dunnae wish to hear it,” Brice shot back. “Ye are marrying Coira because ye ken that with her, ye will nae ever have to risk feeling for a woman again.”
“I dunnae ken any such thing, because I dunnae waste my time thinking upon trivial matters such as my feelings. I plunged our clan into war and cost Da his life when I broke my vow to wed Edina. I have a duty,” he thundered, “and I’ll see it through.”
Brice opened his mouth, but Callum shook his head. “I’d nae if I were ye,” he said, his anger now barely controlled. “Ye have said yer piece, and I let ye, but if ye say one more word, I will hit ye square on that mouth ye kinnae seem to keep shut.”
“Ye ken yer temper has bested ye because I’m right.”
Callum clenched his jaw on retorting. He rarely lost control, but Brice’s words, the day, and the impending arrival of a woman he did not wish to wed had him on edge. His brother was correct that he never again wanted to feel the pain of loss. His grief had nearly drowned him when Marsaili had died. But he didn’t fear that he would feel such pain again, because he would never feel for anyone as he had for her. Loving Marsaili, plunging his clan into strife for her only to lose her before ever truly having her, had left him keenly aware that his choices carried long-lasting, sometimes irrevocable consequences. He felt a thousand summers older than the twenty-seven he was, and he prayed he was wise enough now to never forget that.
Brice clamped a hand on Callum’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, Brother. I see I pushed ye too hard. We can talk more of this when ye are ready to really listen.”
Callum grunted and responded by starting toward the path to the loch. Brice fell into step beside him as he made his way down the jagged embankment. He could have taken the stairs, not far to the west, but he welcomed the burn in his legs from his muscles working to keep him from sliding and the tightness in his lungs from the clipped pace. It took his concentration, which was a welcome reprieve from the thoughts in his head.
&n
bsp; “I ken ye heard me,” Brice said, terseness underlying his tone.
“I heard ye,” Callum snapped. “Now ye hear me. I’ll nae talk more of this. Ye raise the topic again at yer own peril. Do ye ken me?” He stopped and turned to Brice. He could not afford—God’s bones, the clan could not afford—for his brother to ruin the arrangement with Ainsworth. When Brice gave him a stubborn look, Callum’s temper spiked. He knew his brother meant well, but when he looked at his brother, Callum saw the same naive fool he had once been, believing the good of one outweighed the good of many. “If ye push me, Brice, as laird, I will have to punish ye for failing to obey.”
Brice’s lips pressed into a thin line, but after a minute, he smiled. “Ye ken ye sounded just like Da when ye said that.”
“Good,” Callum said, meaning it, as he reached the shore. “Da was a strong laird.”
“Da was ruthless and scheming,” Brice replied. “As is Mother.”
“Be that as it may, if I had relented to their demands to wed Edina, he would be alive and the clan would be much stronger.”
“Ye have shoved how ye felt for the Campbell lass so deep within ye that it seems all ye can recall is yer guilt. Ye have forgotten the feelings that led to yer choices.”
“I do nae forget,” Callum growled. “I only wish I could.” With that, he turned from his brother and made his way down the seagate stairs.
Bright light cracked the darkness of the dungeon. Marsaili scampered up from the cold, slick floor, squeezing her eyes shut against the light. From her stiff limbs and the way she could hardly tolerate the light, she figured she’d been down here at least two days—no more than three. Her stomach growled with gnawing hunger, and she rubbed at it while slowly cracking her eyes open. Oh, how she detested the penance cell.
When a Scot Gives His Heart Page 5
