by Tessa Murran
Will knew the answer. She had changed him, inside and he could not go back to the man he had once been, the careless fool, chasing women and plunder with no thought for tomorrow and with no love in his heart for anything or anyone.
The creak of the door opening had him upright and alert.
Morna entered and closed and barred it behind her. She padded over to the bed, barefoot and shivering, and regarded him sadly.
‘Forgive me, Will. I am sorry for my harsh words,’ she said as she loosed her mantle and let it fall to the floor. The light from the fire shone through the thin fabric of the kirtle she wore, revealing the sweet curve of her hips and the swell of her breasts.
‘There is nothing to forgive Morna.’
‘Yes, there is, I doubted your love for me. That was wrong, so I mean to make it right.’
With that, she climbed onto the bed and sat astride him.
‘Morna, I…’
‘Hush,’ she said, bringing a finger to his lips, ‘let us not talk and squabble. If you are to go away from me, I am come to give you a reason to return.’
Taking his face in cold hands, Morna kissed him deeply, her tongue gently seeking his as she pressed herself against him. She took hold of his shirt and lifted it over his head and then did the same to her kirtle, but slower, revealing her nakedness inch by inch. She flung it aside, and her hair fell down around her shoulders. Will knew full well what she was doing, but his cock stiffened of its own accord, and he moaned and grabbed onto her hips, ripe and round and smooth under his hands.
In the candlelight, she seemed like a dark angel, seductive, unbearably lovely, tempting him from the path he had chosen. Now, at the point of leaving her, Morna had never seemed so beautiful, all white skin against dark hair, her nipples tight, rosy buds of perfection as his tongue found them. She thrust her fingers into his hair and held his mouth to hers as she began to move over his cock - warm, moist womanhood, enslaving him, taking him as much as he was taking her.
Will’s hands followed a silken path from her hips to the slender indent of her waist. God, she had a body to tempt the most resilient of men, soft in places, firm where it mattered, open to him, ready for him, owning him. Will grasped her waist, so sweet and slender, and then downwards, cupping her bottom in his hands. He was not gentle and nor was she. His fingers dug into her soft flesh as she put her hand between his legs and took hold of him. Morna lifted herself up and eased his straining cock inside her, catching her breath and panting into his mouth.
How could he leave her? How could he forsake her bed and her body, so warm and welcoming, so right? Because he would never be worthy of it if he did not go. He must stay true to his purpose and leave in the morning as planned. Until then, he intended to give Morna something to remember him by.
As she moved, he felt need rise up in him, voracious, just on the point of pain. He wanted it to end, and he wanted it to go on forever.
‘Stop Morna, or this will all be over too quickly, for you light such a fire in my loins,’ he said, holding her mouth to his, as he buried his cock deep inside her and the pressure built.
‘It can’t be over soon, for I want this to last all night,’ she panted.
‘Little chance of that with the way you look on top of me, woman.’ His tongue found hers, invading her mouth.
Morna writhed against him in a sensuous rhythm, gasping as his fingers found the soft down of hair between her legs and burrowed further, to stroke her sweet cunny. She arched her back, moving faster and Will felt her tighten around him, pulling him, holding him, until he could delay no longer. His heart was hammering fit to burst.
‘I want you, Will. I want you to put a child in me,’ she whispered into the darkness. Will’s senses exploded into a violent, shuddering ecstasy, a mad explosion of pleasure as every single feeling in his body concentrated on that one part of him. He fell against her, trembling with emotion as she moaned and cried out and dug her fingers into his back.
Still entwined, Will rolled Morna gently onto her back. There were no words he could think of to say, so they lay together in the darkness as their breathing slowed, him stroking her hair and she snuggling her face into his chest as if she couldn’t get close enough.
What had happened to him? All his life making love had been anything but love, just a means to an end. He would get hard, seduce a woman into his bed with soft words, then take what he wanted from her body and leave, without a second thought. But this was nothing like taking. What he had just done with Morna felt only like giving, like passing on all his love, his pleasure, his soul, to someone else.
He had lost his reason for a while there, feeling invincible in a fog of love and lust. Now it all rushed back in, the leaving her, the hurting her, the danger to be faced. However hard it may be to go from Morna, he could not stay abed with his wife and hide from the world.
***
Will threw his pack onto the deck, and it landed with a thump. The dawn was washing the distant horizon with streaks of pink. The rising winds would carry them swiftly around the island to meet with his other ships and then on to the mainland. From there it would be a case of procuring horses and riding to Berwick. Hopefully, the English siege engines would not yet have a strangle-hold on the town.
‘Hurry men, we need to catch the breeze, and I want to be gone,’ he shouted as the last of the provisions were stowed below.
He turned to take a look at Fitheach, perhaps his last and watched in dismay as Morna made her way along the rocks towards him. Will went to meet her so that his men would not overhear them.
‘So, you are sneaking away in the wee hours?’ she said, knuckles white where she clutched her mantle around her.’
‘I did not want to make this difficult for either of us.’
‘After last night you just got up and left?’
‘To lie with you like that was a beautiful thing, Morna and, if I die tomorrow, I will go to my grave feeling blessed because of it, but you must have known you could not seduce me into staying. That was not fair of you.’
‘And what is fair, this, you going to your doom? Will, I love you, so there is nothing I won’t do or say to keep you from going. I’ll even beg. Watch me.’
To his horror, she got down on her knees on the jagged rocks and clasped her hands before her.
‘Get up Morna, don’t do this, not in front of the men.’
‘I am begging you, Will, with everything I have, to change your mind and save your life and mine too, for I will die without you. My pride is yours, my heart is yours, I cannot lose you. Please.’
He grabbed her and hauled her to her feet. ‘You are a Buchanan, Morna. Do not beg.’
There were tears in her eyes. ‘I am a Buchanan no longer, I am a Bain now and they are ruthless aren’t they, taking what they want by fair means or foul?’
‘The time to join Robert is now, Morna. We have this one chance to be on the right side or suffer, maybe not this year or the next, but one day. I have come to realise that a man who is so ruthless as to burn his own people for the sake of Scotland can also unite Scotland, for he far surpasses the English King in war-craft, villainy and resolve. I must be on the right side of such a man if I am to survive, and if the Bains are to survive, else I may see my life in ashes again.’
‘And what if I have a bairn in my belly? Should I tell your son that he is fatherless because you threw your life away on a lost cause?’
‘Tell him that his father died for Scotland and for you.’
‘No Will, you cannot do this in my name.’
‘Then tell him his father was honourable and brave, tell him any lie, but give him pride in who he is, that should suffice and give him this.’ Will took out a brooch and pressed it into her hand - two dragons coiled around each other, joined in a fierce embrace. The sun glinted off the silver and memories flooded back, sweet and painful all at once.
‘Morna, this was my mother’s. It is a Viking jewel, ancient and precious. I took it from my father’s de
ad hand when I buried him. He must have been clutching it when he died, for he loved her to eternity. It is my only remaining part of her, and I want you to keep it safe for me, and for luck until I return.’
‘If you stay, I won’t have to. I love you, your place is here with me.’
‘I am resolved to go Morna.’
She shouted at him. ‘Well go then, but don’t think I will be here when you come back to me for I will never forgive you for this.’
‘You don’t mean that. Can you not send me off to die with one last kiss at least?’
She shook her head, and her face crumpled into tears. Will could not bear it, so he kissed her quickly, wetting his face with her tears and choking back his own. Then he turned his back and walked as quickly as he could to his ship.
Behind him, he heard her cry out, ‘‘Will, Will.’
He turned, and she ran up to him. Her fingers dug into his face as she kissed him in a desperate way. There was a world of pain in it but, still, he wanted it to go on forever.
‘I love you, and I hate you, but God save you, Will,’ she sobbed. He felt her press the brooch back into his hand. ‘You need luck more than I do. I pray it keeps you safe. If this is our final goodbye, then promise me you will not be honourable and brave. Promise me you will do whatever it takes to stay alive, for my sake, if not your own, and Will…farewell.’
Will wrenched himself away and almost ran to his ship. Once he was on deck, he gathered his men around him.
‘You all know where we are going and why, and you all know what awaits you at Berwick. The Scots army is outnumbered by a massive English force sent north, and it is no easy thing to break a siege. We will be far from home, fighting the cause of a man who does not know us, who does not esteem us. But Scotland is our cause now, and Clan Bain too. King Robert the Bruce will never believe in our loyalty if we do not show it to him with some kind of sacrifice. He may not deserve that loyalty, but there is one who does, and that is Scotland, our home, our country. Will we see it once more overrun by English bastards or will we rally and join the fight? That is your choice to make, I force no man to come with me, the sacrifice need only be mine, not yours.
Will looked around at all the stern faces looking to him.
‘If any man wants to leave this ship, do it now, for there is no shame in it. If you wish to fight with me, then stay silent.’
Will waited, to the sound of wind rising over the water, setting the sails to flapping. There was not one murmur of dissent.
‘We are of one mind then. Now let us go and teach these English bastards how a Bain fights.’
A short while later the ship slowly turned from the rocks and slid out of the bay, past the guano covered rock. The wind swelled the sails, and soon Will was leaving behind the cliffs and the pounding surf, and Fitheach’s stark edifice. He was leaving behind the love of his life, and so he dare not look back. It was only when they reached the mouth of the bay, and the ship veered around the headland that he turned. His breath caught in his throat when he saw Morna was still there, still watching, a small, soft thing, in sharp relief against all the jagged darkness around her.
Whatever madness had a grip on him he had better make it mean something, for he knew Morna did not forgive easily and, once he did this, once he abandoned her, there was no surety he would ever get back to her again.
Chapter Twenty-Six
As she crested the hill and looked down at Beharra’s stout palisade, Morna’s eyes filled with tears. They seemed to do that a lot these days - as she had taken her leave of Braya and Fitheach, on the crossing to the mainland, during the long ride to Beharra in the rain. She cried every single time she thought of him.
William Bain had done it, broken her heart, just as she always feared he would. If he died, she would never be able to put it back together again. So Morna had resolved to head for home, to be with her family when the news came, for she had determined that he would die, that the sublime happiness she felt with her rogue of a husband could not last. God was not that kind to people like her.
‘Is this it, Lady?’ asked the stern man at her side. Braya had insisted this man, Gormal, accompany her safely home, as he was the size of an ox and had the kind of belligerent manner that would deter the most determined cutpurse.
‘Aye, Gormal, this is Beharra.’
‘Then I will be gone, Lady.’
‘Will you not stay the night at least? My family will offer you food and shelter, and you can rest.’
‘I’ve no need for rest, Lady. I must return at once to Fitheach and watch out for the Cranstouns. They may not know of my Laird’s departure yet, but they will soon enough. We will not be caught napping.’
‘And if they come?’
‘They will be greeted with traditional Bain hospitality, Lady.’
He smiled for the first time on the whole journey.
‘I thank you for your service in bringing me home, Gormal.’
‘Fitheach is your home,’ he grunted. ‘I trust I will see you back there soon.’
Morna nodded, reading the judgement in his eyes. He thought her weak for forsaking Will, and how could he not?
Hating herself, she kicked her horse onwards and flew down the hill. Within moments, she was at the gates, shouting a greeting to the guards, who smiled in surprise and then waved her through. She skidded to a halt at the doors of Beharra.
Ravenna rushed out. ‘Morna, oh lass, is it really you?’ she said as she fair dragged her down from her horse and hugged her tight enough to crush ribs. ‘I thought not to see you for years. Oh, how we have missed you.’ Morna hung on tight as her tension seeped away in her sister-in-law’s comforting embrace. She closed her eyes, and her heart was calm for the first time in months.
When she opened them, it was to see Owen Sutherland, standing on the steps of Beharra, leaning on a crutch, and with such a look on his face as to make her shrivel up with shame.
Beside him was a woman, blonde and incredibly bonnie.
When Morna pulled free of Ravenna and went towards him, Owen swallowed hard and turned and hobbled back inside the keep, leaning on the woman’s shoulder for support.
***
‘What happened to Owen?’ she said to Ravenna as they stood shoulder to shoulder on the bridge over the river, watching autumn leaves drop from the trees above into the surging water. Ravenna had suggested a walk and Morna suspected it was to prevent her from running into the keep to confront Owen.
‘He fell from his horse and broke his ankle, so he must bide here until it heals, with much vexation on his part,’ she replied, bouncing her infant daughter, Fionn, gently in her arms to lull her off to sleep.
‘He despises me for what I did, Ravenna.’
‘Owen does not, for it is not in his nature, but you must give him a while to get used to the sight of you. It was a shock for him to see you, and he is in a terrible temper most days. It frustrates him that he cannot be gone and join the fighting. Owen came for the muster with his men, to meet with Cormac and Lyall, and, because of his ankle, they have all marched south without him.’
‘They are gone to Berwick. Are they part of the attack?’
‘I’ve heard nothing. There has been no word sent, but I fear the worst. And where is your husband, Morna?’
‘Gone to Berwick, to fight. I warned him that if he left me to go and fight then…’ Words failed her, and the tears came. She bit her lip hard as Ravenna folded her into her arms.
‘Oh, Morna what have you gone and done now, with all your stubbornness.’
Morna blurted it out, the whole sorry tale. When she had finished, she sniffed away her tears. ‘Will is risking his life, and here I am, running away. I told him I would not let him turn me into a weeping widow.’
‘You are no widow yet,’ said Ravenna. ‘Will knows how to save his own skin, and I am sure he is safe, Morna.’
A thought suddenly occurred to her. ‘Where is Drostan?’
‘Oh, that one, who knows?’ said
Ravenna, rolling her eyes. ‘He comes and goes as he pleases and often takes himself off for days. Ever since Cormac offered him a place here, out of gratitude for bringing word of you, that young man has been a scourge on all the low-born girls around Beharra. There is not a farmer’s daughter or a kitchen wench that has not been interfered with, and I am fed up of having to scold him. He may look sickly, but his appetite for women is in rude health, I can tell you. I wish he would be gone as he is a thorn in my side and impossible to control, now Cormac is away fighting. At least he feared your brother. All I get is insolence. I even beat Drostan with a stick once, and it made no difference,’ she said, smiling.
Morna laughed at the thought. ‘I am afraid insolence is the Bain way.’
‘Aye well, I suppose we are stuck with him now, and all for nought, as it seems you wanted to be at Fitheach and not be rescued, which was not how he painted it.’
‘So, tell me Ravenna, who is that woman with Owen?’ said Morna as casually as possible.
‘Her name is Beigis, she is an old friend of mine.’
‘Not that old and very lovely.’
‘Aye, Beigis has always been blessed with beauty and love, for that is what is in her heart. Sadly, God has seen fit to break it. She stood by me and was the only true friend I had when I was growing up under my father’s disdain. She was wed to a good man and has two bairns by him, but, when he died, the Gowans tried to force her to wed another, so she had to flee Mauldsmyre and seek sanctuary here.’
‘Could she not have simply refused this man?’
‘Hardly, for it was Laird Ranulph Gowan who wanted to wed her. Aye, Morna, my half-brother has turned his cruelty on her, just as he did to you.’
