Bride for a Knight (8 page)

His strength, a goat’s arse!

He hooted his scorn, sending a last glance at the iron-bound coffers. Saints, he would’ve smiled were he not so concerned about bogles.

But he was, so he let the bed curtains fall shut again and frowned into his pillow.

Truth was, a whole teetering tower of strongboxes wouldn’t keep out a ghost. But the three heavy chests he’d managed to pile on top of each other at the door did prove he hadn’t lost his muscle.

That he knew the coffers’ contents without peeking inside showed his wits were still with him as well.

If Alan—
fox-brained
—Mor possessed even half his own cunning, the lout would know the Fairmaiden grazing ground was more than enough to satisfy him.

That, and the flap-tongued fool’s precious wee lassie.

And thinking about her brought a smile to his tired, angst-fraught heart, so he snuggled more deeply into his bedcovers, certain that, for once, his sleep would prove untroubled.

Regrettably, instead of dreaming about sitting before the fire, his feet up and a bouncing, red-cheeked grandson on his lap, it was the sound of water that invaded his sleep.

Swift, swirling water plunging wildly over tumbled rocks. A churning cauldron of froth and spume, its thunderous roar echoed inside the confines of Munro’s curtained bed.

A refuge no longer framed by the dark oak of his great bed’s canopy but the wind-tossed branches of the skeletal birches rimming the Rough Waters.

The dread Garbh Uisge.

The cataract-filled gorge where his sons had lost their lives.

Sons he could see now, their broken bodies shooting over the rapids, their death cries carried on the wind. Some of them already bobbed lifelessly in deeper, more quiet pools near the gorge’s end.

But others still suffered, their battered bodies crashing against the rocks, their flailing arms splashing him with icy, deadly water.

Munro groaned in his sleep, his fingers digging into the bedcovers as his heart began to race. Sweat beaded his forehead, damping his pillow.

The tangled sheets and plaiding of his bed.

Mist and spray surrounded him, its chill wetness making him shiver and quake. And then the rushing water surged across him, carrying him ever closer to his sons’ reaching arms. The facedown, floating bodies of the ones already claimed by their watery fates.

“No-o-o!” Munro cried, his eyes snapping open.

He pulled in a great gulp of air, noticing at once the pool of water he’d been wallowing in.

How wet he was.

And that someone had ripped open the bed curtains.

“Of a mercy!” He sat up, dashing his streaming wet hair from his eyes.

He swiped a hand across his water-speckled beard, peering into the gloom and shadows. Sodden or nay, he wasn’t about to throw off the covers. Only a spirit could’ve brought the Garbh Uisge into his room and experience warned him he’d soon see that ghost.

And he did, recognizing Neill despite the dripping wet cloak he wore, the dark cowl pulled low over his white, hollow-eyed face.

An accusing face, filled with recrimination.

“You did this,” his eldest son decried, pointing at him. “You and your insatiable greed.”

Munro scrabbled backward on the bed. “Begone, I beg you!” he wailed, his teeth chattering. “I had naught to do with—”

“Aye, you did naught. But you could have repaired the bridge.” Neill backed into the shadows, his tall form already beginning to waver and fade. “Now it is too late.”

And then the shadows closed around him just as the rushing waters of Munro’s fearing dream had swirled around and over him, pulling him ever deeper into the horrors he couldn’t flee even in sleep.

Trembling uncontrollably, he somehow crawled from his bed and tapped his way across the chamber, making for his chair. Hard-backed and sturdy as befitted a Highland laird’s dignity, the chair was anything but comfortable.

But with a dry plaid draped around him and another spread over his knees, it would suffice as a resting place until his bedding dried.

Loud as he’d roared at Morag the last time she’d poked her grizzled head around his door, she wouldn’t be coming abovestairs to see to his comforts for a while. A good long while, like as not. And his pride kept him from calling out for her.

So he dropped down onto his chair, tucked himself into his plaids as best he could, and frowned, in especial at the pile of Alan Mor’s strongboxes blocking his door. Weak-kneed as he was at the moment, he doubted he could move them even if he did wish to go seeking a sympathetic ear.

Truth be told, there was only one soul he knew whose strength could push open his barricaded door. Munro’s brows snapped together. Och, aye, unnerved as he was just now, he might even be glad to see his youngest son.

Infuriated by the notion, he sat back and turned his face toward the fire.

Then he did his lairdly best to pretend such a fool thought had ne’er entered his mind.

Chapter Four

J
amie stood before the arched windows of Alan Mor’s hall, for all intents and purposes legally bound to the Fairmaiden laird’s faery-like daughter and about to perform his first act as her personal champion.

Once the jostling buffoons crowding around her drew her away from the high table, he’d have words with Alan Mor. Words that needn’t reach her gentle ears.

Some things were best kept between men.

A muscle twitched in Jamie’s jaw and he flexed his fingers, waiting.

Her composure regained, his new lady accepted her father’s men’s well wishes with perfect poise. She joined in their laughter and met their cheers and jesting with a dazzling smile, her sapphire eyes alight and glittering in the glow of the torches.

And the longer Jamie watched her, the more she pleased him.

Her voice carried to him, its low-pitch beguiling, its smoothness flowing over him like honeyed wine. Saints, but he wanted to touch her. Indeed, just looking at her was almost like a physical touching and he burned to cross swiftly to her and pull her into his arms, holding her close and letting her spill soft, sweet words all over him until he fair drowned in them.

But someone had appeared with a generously heaped platter of fried apple fritters and spiced pears, the tempting delicacies drawing enough attention for Jamie to seize his chance.

The time was nigh.

Leaving the shadows of the window embrasure, he strode purposely toward the high table, his plaid thrown back to reveal the many-notched haft of his Norseman’s ax and the leather-wrapped hilt of his steel.

Upon seeing him, Alan Mor grinned and reached for the ale jug, making to pour Jamie a cup of the frothy brew. But Jamie took the cup before his good-father could fill it, setting it deliberately out of reach.

Alan Mor’s smile faded.

“Ho! What’s this?” he queried, one brow arcing. “Refusing my ale? I’d think you’d be after quenching your thirst on such a notable day?”

“Notable, aye,” Jamie allowed. “’Tis also a day for plain speaking.”

Alan Mor eyed him. “My ears are open,” he said, sliding a glance to where Aveline stood in the midst of a crush of apple-fritter-eating clansmen. “Dinna tell me you are displeased with my daughter?”

Jamie took the ale jug and poured himself a portion, not taking his gaze off the other man as he downed the ale.

“Displeased with her?” he echoed at last, returning the cup to the table. “With surety, nay. But I am mightily vexed to have been duped. See that it ne’er happens again.”

To Jamie’s surprise, his words only earned him another smile.

“I would hope to stand higher in your favor, having arranged for you to have such a prize.” Alan Mor cast another quick glance in his daughter’s direction. “She—”

“Is too great a treasure to be publicly shamed,” Jamie cut him off, his voice pitched for Alan Mor alone. “Embarrass her e’er again and be warned that you shall answer to me and there’d be no escaping.” Jamie let his fingers curl demonstrably around his sword hilt. “I would be after you in a thrice, on your heels as relentlessly as yon greyhounds curled before your hearth fire.”

Again to Jamie’s surprise, the older man’s smile deepened and he slapped the table, this time even barking a laugh. “Saints, had I known you’d take such umbrage, lad, I’d have been more subtle,” he vowed, pushing to his feet. “But I am an auld, gruff man, unused to courtly airs and fine ways.”

Unmoved, Jamie plucked a fine-looking morsel of roasted meat off the table and tossed the tidbit to a nearby dog. “Forget what I said about your greyhounds,” he said, wiping his hands. “Cause yon lassie a single moment of grief from this day forward and I shall be your shadow.”

“‘Grief’?” The older man grabbed Jamie’s arm, turning him toward the cluster of revelers mid-hall. “Say me she doesn’t look happier than any maid you’ve e’er seen.”

And she did.

Jamie couldn’t deny it.

“All the same,” he said, shaking off the other’s grasp, “I would that she remains that way. And I’d have a private word with her now. Somewhere away from your hall and where she may speak freely.”

Alan Mor dropped back down into his laird’s chair, then waved a casual hand. “Auld and gruff I may be, but no’ thoughtless. My privy solar has already been readied for you, and with all the comforts of my house.”

Jamie nodded, then turned on his heel. He needed but a few long strides to reach Aveline’s side. When he did, he brought her hand to his lips and kissed it.

A privilege entirely his, but dangerous.

Just breathing in her violet scent stirred him. Feeling the softness of her skin beneath his lips proved a greater temptation than he’d expected.

Or needed.

Especially now, when he wished to speak earnest words with her.

“Come,” she said, twining her fingers with his and leading him from the hall, “I saw you exchange words with my father and understand you’ll wish to speak with me.” She looked up at him then, her sapphire eyes long-lashed and luminous. “I would speak privily with you, too. My father’s solar has been prepared and awaits us.”

And it did indeed, Jamie observed when, a short while later, she led him into the quiet chamber, closing the door soundly behind them.

Little more than a small, low-vaulted chamber just above Fairmaiden’s great hall, the room held all the comforts Alan Mor could boast. As belowstairs, the floor rushes appeared freshly strewn and sweet smelling and the walls were recently limed, their whiteness holding nary a trace of soot from the pleasant little peat fire glowing on the hearth grate.

A settle near the door invited with finely embroidered cushions and a fur-lined coverlet, while a small table held a light repast of green cheese, cold beef slices, and honeyed almonds.

And Jamie knew without sampling, that the beckoning ewer of wine would prove as heady as any he’d e’er sampled.

Above all, it was the room’s smallness that undid him. Close as it was, the tidy little chamber captured and held his bride’s bewitching scent. Even the chill, damp air pouring in through the narrow window arches couldn’t dispel her pleasing essence.

Her perfume swirled around him, its hint of summer sun and violets teasing his senses. Truth tell, everything about her was proving almost more an enchantment than he could bear.

Especially when she rested a hand on his arm and peered up at him with such concern that his heart skittered.

“I know what’s troubling you,” she said, lifting her chin. “But you’ve no cause to harbor such doubts.”

Jamie looked at her. “Doubts?”

She nodded, sure of it. “I told you—I saw you speaking with my father. Your displeasure was plain to see.”

“My displeasure had naught to—”

“Hear me out, please,” she cut in, touching her fingers to his lips. “If it is my size giving you pause, be assured that just because I may look delicate doesn’t mean I cannot run a household.”

She peered up him, well aware at least two past suitors had rejected her because she didn’t appear robust enough. And equally aware she didn’t want such concerns clouding her union with James Macpherson.

But he surprised her by looking at her as if he could hardly believe his ears.

Relief sluiced through her, hot and swift.

Especially when he waved aside her worries. “Sweet lady, nothing is farther from the truth,” he declared, and her heart gave a lurch. “I’ve seen the comforts of your home and know you and your lady sister are responsible. Anyone who’d question your abilities is a fool.”

Pleased as well as a bit nervous beneath the intensity of his gaze, Aveline crossed the little chamber and flicked the edge of a wall hanging. Truly exquisite, the colors were jewel-bright, the hunting scene depicted of a quality Jamie hadn’t seen since leaving Eilean Creag, the isle-girt castle belonging to his first liege laird, Duncan MacKenzie.

“I stitched every thread of this tapestry,” his bride revealed, the touching blend of her pride and vulnerability piercing his heart. “And the pillows piled high on the settle by the door.”

“Lass, you needn’t prove yourself—”

“I can read and Sorcha and I share the task of keeping Father’s household accounts,” she plunged on as if he hadn’t spoken. “Sorcha and I have even run Fairmaiden on our own, in dire times, when my father and his men have been off warring or visiting allies. And”—she fixed him with a level stare—“I am knowledgeable in the healing arts and do not grow faint at the sight of blood and broken limbs. I—”

“You are everything a man could hope for, and more than this one e’er dreamed of making his own,” Jamie vowed, three quick strides taking him to her. “You misread my displeasure in the hall. Your father and I had manly matters to discuss. They had naught to do with your lady skills.”

She blinked. “Then you weren’t speaking of me?”

Jamie pulled a hand down over his chin. “Och, we had other issues to resolve,” he said, hoping she’d leave it at that. “But you were on my mind, aye.”

“If not my abilities, then what were you thinking of?”

“This,” Jamie said, leaning down to kiss her.

A gentle kiss, so soft and light as he could make it. Until she melted into him and sighed with what could only be called pleasure. Clinging to him, she parted her lips—lips every bit as luscious and honeyed as he’d known they’d be.