Amanda Scott (2 page)

The feeling was heady, and as she rode beside her father, Macleod of Glenelg, the silence that enveloped them was pleasant.

Except for the tiny tickle at the back of her mind, all was well.

The small cluster of smiling villagers and friends near the kirk steps stood quietly, waiting. Even her usually talkative aunt, Lady Euphemia Macleod, remained unnaturally silent. She rode just behind them in her boxy, sheepskin-lined sidesaddle between two gillies mounted on ponies as placid as her own. At fifty, the whip-slim Lady Euphemia disliked riding and focused all her energy on keeping the boat-on-waves motion of her cumbersome saddle from tossing her to the ground.

The rest of the party included Adela’s older sister Maura, Maura’s husband and three children, and a few of the castle servants. Others had remained behind to prepare the wedding feast. Guests were few only because MacDonald, Lord of the Isles, having died recently, nearly everyone else in the Highlands and Isles was preparing for the investiture in two days’ time of his successor. Adela did not mind the small ceremony, though. She’d have been happy to marry by simple declaration, but women of her ilk rarely married in such a hasty, scrambling way.

She rode as her aunt did, sitting sideways, but with nothing between her and her favorite bay gelding except a dark-blue velvet caparison to protect her skirts. One of her younger sisters, Kate, had embroidered the caparison with branches of Macleod of Glenelg’s green juniper and had sent it especially for the occasion.

Like all six of her sisters, Adela preferred to ride astride. But she had known better than to suggest doing so in the new sky-blue silk gown her father had given her for her wedding. Blue to keep her true, he had said, citing
from an ancient rhyme. He had refused to allow her favorite color due to his strong belief that if she wore pink, her good fortune would sink.

She saw her two youngest sisters watching from the open, grassy hilltop near the kirk and realized how glad she was that she had sent them ahead to gather blooms for her bouquet and chaplet. She had done it not only because the hilltop produced myriad wildflowers in an otherwise heavily forested area, but also because she had wanted as little fuss as possible while she dressed for her wedding.

Her ever-superstitious father disliked the fact that she had not gathered her own flowers, a task he believed would bring her good luck. When he noted the day’s sunshine, his strictures had ended, but no sooner did he clap eyes on Sorcha and Sidony than he sighed and said, “I hope ye mean to be a good wife to Ardelve, lass.”

“I do, sir,” Adela said. “I have always done my duty.”

“Aye, ’tis true, but I’d feel better if ye’d done all ye could to bring good fortune on yourself today.”

“The day is a perfectly splendid one,” Adela said. Shooting a swift, oblique glance his way, she added gently, “Yesterday was not so beautiful, sir.”

“ ’Tis true,” he agreed. “Cursed wi’ a gey thick mist, it were, from dawn’s light till suppertime. So it be nobbut providential that when Ardelve and I arranged the settlements, I persuaded him to put off the ceremony for the one day.”

“Why do you believe Friday is such a bad day to wed?” she asked. “Aunt Euphemia said many prefer it, because of its being dedicated to the Norse goddess of love. She said the notion that Friday is unlucky arose only during this past century.”

“Aye, well, Euphemia doesna ken everything,” Macleod said. “ ’Twas kind o’ her to journey here from Lochbuie for your wedding, but everyone kens that when a Friday falls on the thirteenth o’ the month, it does bring mortal bad luck. Bless me, lass,” he added, “I’d no let any o’ me daughters marry on such a bleak day!”

“But I don’t think everyone does know,” Adela persisted. “Ardelve did not. At least…” She fell silent, knowing he would not want to recall what Ardelve had said.

“Aye, I ken fine that the man thinks changing the day were nobbut a frippery notion o’ mine,” Macleod said, unabashed. “Still, he agreed, and as ye see, the Almighty ha’ blessed the day I picked wi’ sunshine.”

Adela nodded, and when he fell silent, she made no attempt to continue the conversation. The only sounds until they reached the kirkyard were soft thuds of hooves on the dirt path, cries of seabirds soaring overhead, and scattered twitters and chatters from nearby woodland.

Her sense of peace had not returned, however, and when she realized she was peering intently at each guest, she knew why. Sorcha had made no secret of her hope that Sir Hugo Robison would arrive in time to stop the wedding, and although Adela was certain her younger sister was mistaken in thinking he would come, she could not help wondering if he would, or how she would feel if he did.

Seeing no sign of that large, energetic, not to mention handsome, gentleman, she drew a long breath and released it. If she felt disappointment, she told herself it was only that his dramatic arrival might have added excitement to what was so far, despite the sunshine, a rather dull day.

As a gillie helped her dismount, her two youngest sisters approached to arrange flowers in her chaplet and give her the bouquet they had gathered.

“These flowers are lovely,” Adela said, smiling. “So bright and cheerful.”

“Sorcha set a basket of rose petals yonder, too, for us to strew along the path before you,” Sidony said, hugging her before they took their places and Macleod signed to his piper to begin playing.

Adela sighed, swept another nervous glance over the small group of onlookers, several of whom were looking around just as she was. Firmly dismissing Sir Hugo from her mind, she placed her hand on her father’s forearm.

As pipes skirled and the wedding party made its way up the path to the shallow porch of the kirk, Sorcha scattered her petals and wondered if the piper had mistaken Adela’s wedding for MacDonald’s funeral procession. The tune he had selected seemed more appropriate for the latter rite.

Behind the makeshift altar, double doors stood shut and would not open to admit everyone for the nuptial Mass until the ceremony had ended. The priest, Wee Geordie Macleod of Lewis, stood sternly erect beside the altar with the bridegroom and his chief groomsman to welcome the bride and her maidens.

Calum Tolmie, Baron Ardelve, a close cousin of the widow Macleod intended to marry, held a vast tract of land on the north shore of Loch Alsh. He was both wealthy and amiable, and thus, according to Macleod, an excellent match for Adela.

Sorcha disagreed, thinking Sir Hugo more suitable, although admittedly, she had never laid eyes on him. She still cursed her bad luck in having missed the trip to Orkney to see its prince installed, because that had been when the more fortunate Adela and their sister Isobel, each having met Sir Hugo Robison briefly before, had met him again and come to know him better.

Isobel was now happily married to Sir Hugo’s cousin, Michael St. Clair (or Sinclair, as the family had begun to spell their name), and they lived at Roslin Castle in Lothian. However, Sir Hugo had clearly made an impression on Adela, so Sorcha had made up her mind that Adela should marry him.

Reaching the porch steps, Sorcha turned and walked a few paces to the left, then watched as Sidony went right to make way for Adela and Macleod. He stopped on the lower of the two stone steps and let Adela go on alone to the porch, where Ardelve stepped forward to meet her in front of the altar.

Two low stools sat ready for them to kneel on, but before they did, the priest stepped forward and spread his arms wide.

The piper fell silent.

A gull screamed overhead.

Instead of the blessing that Sorcha expected to hear, Wee Geordie said in tones that carried to everyone, “Afore I pray to the Almighty, begging Him to ha’ the goodness to shine His face upon this couple and bless the union into which they be entering, I’m bound to ask if there be any amongst ye who kens any just cause or impediment to prevent the aforesaid union’s going forward. If ye do, speak now, mind ye, or forever keep silent about it.”

As silence closed in around them, Sorcha turned her head to look at the crowd. Others, likewise, glanced at their neighbors.

A low rumble sounded in the distance, almost, Sorcha thought, as if God had grown impatient and were muttering to the priest to get on with it.

The thought made her smile, but when she saw heads still turning, all in the same direction, she collected her wits and looked that way, too. Joy stirred at the sight of four horsemen galloping toward them from woods to the south.

Neighbor looked at neighbor.

As delight surged through her, Sorcha glanced at Adela, expecting to see her own joy reflected in her sister, but although Adela clearly saw the riders, she showed no sign of delight. Doubtless she was stunned.

Hearing more than one gasp from the gathering, Sorcha grinned. Her neighbors and friends, she knew, would talk of this day for years.

But the riders were coming too fast for safety. Was their leader mad, or just drunk on the hope that he was not too late?

Villagers scattered as the riders bore down on the kirk steps.

Sorcha moved, but she saw that Adela stayed where she was, mouth agape.

Ardelve put his hands on his hips and glowered, but he did not move either. Sorcha decided that he thought no more of the interruption than that tardy wedding guests were making a scene.

Turning back, she saw that all four riders wore masks.

Prickling unease stirred.

Three of the men reined their horses in near villagers, making the animals rear and forcing folks back even farther.

As they did, the leader urged his horse right up the two steps.

Still smiling, Sorcha saw that he had eyes only for Adela, who moved toward him as if she expected him to speak to her.

Instead, he leaned near, stretched out an arm, and as if she weighed no more than a feather pillow, swept her up, and wheeled his mount away from the steps.

Astonished at such a show of strength, Sorcha let her mouth fall open.

One or two people in the crowd cheered, but most looked stupefied as the four horsemen rode off with their prize.

Sorcha had never set foot on the Isle of Eigg before, although she had passed it numerous times, because it lay only thirty miles from her home and just west of the route they followed from Glenelg to the Isle of Mull, where her sister Cristina lived. Moreover, their sister Isobel had lived with Cristina and her husband for years before Isobel’s marriage the previous summer to Sir Michael Sinclair.

Sorcha had not seen Isobel or Cristina since. She had planned to visit both the previous fall, but winter had
swept into the Highlands and Isles earlier than expected, making travel difficult by land to Isobel’s new home at Roslin Castle south of Edinburgh, or by water to Cristina’s on the Isle of Mull.

Therefore, she had not seen Isobel since the previous summer or Cristina for nearly two years. So she eagerly looked forward to seeing both at the upcoming ceremony, because much had happened in the meantime.

Not only had Isobel married Sir Michael, younger brother of the new Prince of Orkney, but John of Isla, the first man known as MacDonald, Lord of the Isles, had died two months before. His burial on the Holy Isle of Iona had come shortly afterward. And since his death, despite his own careful arrangements for the succession, the Kingdom of the Isles had lacked a ruler, because not everyone had agreed with MacDonald as to which of his sons should succeed him.

The judgment and necessary arrangements now made, his eldest son, Ranald of the Isles, had commanded this meeting at Kildonan on Eigg, once a base from which, according to her aunt Euphemia, aristocratic Norse settlers who had replaced the Viking raiders had traded with Iceland and points beyond. Today at high noon, Islesmen would inaugurate their new MacDonald at Kildonan.

Everyone who could manage to witness the grand event would attend, and Sorcha was looking forward to reuniting with many kinsmen besides her sisters. Most eagerly did she look forward to seeing Adela and learning whether she and Sir Hugo had married. If not, she hoped they had made arrangements to do so soon. To protect Adela’s reputation, they must wed as quickly as possible.

As Macleod’s oarsmen rowed his two longboats into the U-shaped harbor at the southeastern end of Eigg and approached the long pier, both helmsmen shouted as one, “Way enough,” to stop their boats and allow three others to offload passengers and portions of their crews. Later arrivals would anchor a short distance offshore near the long, low islet known as Green Island. Other boats already crowded nearby beaches, and towboats scurried back and forth, carrying crews who had anchored their boats offshore to a landing at the head of the harbor.

As Sorcha’s boat awaited its turn, she gazed at the high promontory to her right where the ceremony would take place near the ancient chapel of Kildonan. The chapel was all that remained of an important monastery founded by Donan, the Irish missionary who introduced Christianity to the island. According to seanachies’ tales, Donan, having incurred the wrath of the local queen, was martyred there with his entire monastic community in the year 617. Today’s occasion, Sorcha mused, would doubtless be more felicitous.