Amanda Scott (4 page)

“Then you’ll certainly want to learn his intentions and how he has situated himself before you confront him,” Kin-tail said
firmly.

Thoughtfully, Patrick said, “Did I not also hear that you had become betrothed shortly before your cousins were killed, Kit?”

“Aye, my father wrote some such thing to me,” Kit said, grimacing.

“Ye never told
us
about any lass,” Tam said, clearly surprised.

“Well, I own the matter has been of concern to me, but since I had no chance to reply to my father’s message, I assumed that
other arrangements had been made. Even if they were not, if I’m officially dead now, doubtless she is betrothed to someone
else. In truth, I’m much more concerned about Hawks Rig.”

“But she may still be grieving for you,” Molly protested. “She certainly must wonder what became of you.”

“She may wonder,” Kit said with a wry smile, “but I doubt she has grieved much. We’ve never even met. My father arranged the
match with her mother. As I said, I’d only learned of it just before… ”

“Who is she?” Molly demanded. “Do we know her?”

“Her name is Fiona Carmichael,” Kit said. “As I recall it, her mother is some connection of Armadale’s.”

“Lady Carmichael is Armadale’s sister,” Patrick said. “I’ve been constable here at Dunsithe only a short time, but Armadale’s
name is as well known hereabouts as Scott of Buccleuch or Maxwell of Caerlaverock. In any event, I took interest in Armadale’s
kinsmen because Armadale married a Gordon. Although Molly and Beth never knew her, she was a cousin of theirs.”

“Was?”

“Aye, she died of the fever that swept through the Borders a short time ago. It killed Armadale, too, and since his only son
died last year in a skirmish with English Harry’s lads, the title goes to some unknown cousin from Stirling-shire.”

Molly turned to Patrick. “Did I understand you to say that Kit’s Fiona is a cousin to Beth and me?”

“She’s not my Fiona,” Kit protested. “At least, I’m sure that if I’m supposedly dead, and have been for nigh onto eighteen
months now, the betrothal must have been annulled or whatever one does to overset betrothals.”

“She is not your cousin in any event, sweetheart,” Kintail said. “Fiona’s mother is no kin to the Gordons except through Armadale’s
marriage, so neither is her daughter.”

“Then that’s all right,” Molly said, smiling at Kit. “Perhaps your encroaching uncle will have been kind enough to take her
off your hands along with your titles and estates.”

The others laughed, but Kit said, “He’s welcome to her, although I should think he’d be years too old for her. I’ll choose
my own wife, thank you, but in any event, first I mean to reclaim what is mine.”

His friends understood and sympathized and they discussed the matter at length, with Kintail holding firm that Kit should
proceed with caution.

“Fin’s right about that,” Kit said later when he was alone with Willie and Tam. “I need to learn more before I confront my
uncle, but in truth I scarcely know where to begin, other than to discover who handled my father’s affairs.”

Tam said, “I ken a few folk in these parts. If ye can manage without me for a few days, I’ll nose about some. I’ve matters
o’ me own tae look into, for all that.”

“I should think you must have,” Kit said, clapping him on the shoulder. “You and Willie have been overly patient with me and
my troubles. I should command you both to abandon me and deal with your own long-neglected affairs, but I confess I’ll be
grateful for any information you can glean.”

“I’ve got a better notion than just waiting about for Tam,” Willie said with a twinkle. “My lads will doubtless ken all that’s
happened hereabouts over the past year and longer. Verra little happens wi’out they hear o’ it.”

“Your lads?” Kit exchanged a look with Tam.

The latter frowned heavily, saying, “Ye’ll no be mixing Kit up wi’ that scurvy lot o’ yours if ye ken what’s good for ye,
me lad.”

Willie grinned. “Ye’ll admit I speak true, though. There isna much the reivers dinna ken about who’s doing what in the Borders,
either side o’ the line.”

Kit agreed with Tam that mixing with the reivers might prove foolhardy, particularly since he had been away for so long and
knew little about their activities. Nevertheless, the thought of action, any sort of action, appealed strongly to him.

So it was that when he took fond leave of his friends at Dunsithe, promising to send word as soon as he learned how things
stood, he parted for the first time in a year and a half with Tam as well, to ride off with Willie Armstrong under a gray
sky heavy with spitting clouds, in search of Willie’s reivers.

M
aggie Malloch was in a temper and in a rare quandary as well—rare, because she never found herself in situations she could
not handle, and a quandary because the few choices open to her were choices she wanted to reject out of hand.

Never before had she felt so powerless or so certain that failure must not be considered. Had it been anyone else who needed
her, she believed her mind would be clear, the proper course of action obvious. But her own son was missing, and she was at
a loss to know what, if anything, she could do to find him.

Nearly every other member of the Secret Clan who knew of the situation firmly believed that she wasted her time even thinking
she could do anything.

“He’s dead, and ye’ll no get from that, Maggie,” their high chief told her bluntly. “Ye’ve your own duties tae attend, no
tae mention the wee task the High Circle set for ye long since, about which ye’ve done little that anyone can see.”

“I’ve told ye, the bickering betwixt two feckless tribes be o’ small concern tae me in the face o’ Claud’s disappearance,”
she said.

“Sakes, woman, ’twere no a mere disappearance! Your Claud were blasted tae bits by a lightning bolt flung by the hand o’ the
Clan’s mightiest wizard!”

“Exactly so,” Maggie retorted. “But that shape-shifting villain Jonah Bonewits be as powerful as I be myself—or nearly so,”
she amended.

“But, Maggie, that be just my—”

“Whisst now, will ye whisst? I’m telling ye how it is. Ye ken as well as I do that Jonah never meant tae strike our Claud,
for Claud be his son as well as mine.”

“Aye, I ken that fine, although I’d point out—no tae put a fine point on it—that a sore disappointment the lad were tae Jonah.”

“Nevertheless, and villain though Jonah be, I canna believe he would kill his own son, even an he thinks Claud be nobbut a
witless dobby.”

“Ye’re certain Jonah didna mean tae do it?”

“I were there wi’ that slut Catriona from the Merry Folk,” Maggie reminded him. “Jonah ha’ hoped tae lure Claud tae follow
another feckless wench—that Lucy Fittletrot wi’ the dancing feet—but Claud were sorely smitten wi’ Catriona. I’d venture tae
guess that ye do recall Catriona,” she added sardonically.

“I do,” the chief agreed, his eyes glowing. “She’ll be the poor wee lass from the Merry Folk that ye persist in maligning
every chance ye get.”

Maggie made a rude noise. “Ye men! At least I’ll say this for that Catriona. She cares about what happened tae my Claud!”

“She should. As I recall the matter, ye said yourself that Claud threw himself into the path o’ yon lightning bolt because
it were flung at Catriona.”

“Aye, and had it struck her, I’d ha’ lost little sleep over it, for on that subject Jonah and I be in full agreement.”

“Now, Maggie … ”

“Pish tush, dinna ‘now, Maggie’ me. Ye ken what I think, and I’ll no keep me thoughts behind me teeth now when I ha’ always
spoken me mind afore.”

“Ye have that, but what d’ye aim tae do, woman? Ye’ve power enough for most things, but bringing a member o’ the Clan back
tae life when he’s been blown tae mist be more than even ye can do.”

“Aye, well, if he were only mist, ’twould be easy, but ye’ll agree, will ye no, that Jonah’s fury has nowt tae do with either
Catriona or Claud.”

The chief nodded. ” ’Tis yourself who infuriated the man, as always. Did ye no spoil his plans yet again and cause him tae
lose his place in the High Circle?”

“He lost it through greed and by interfering in mortal affairs!”

“Aye, but ye interfered, too,” the chief reminded her. “It wasna Jonah who took a common serving lass, clad her in a grand
dress, decked her wi’ jewels fit for a queen, and sent her tae a royal ball.”

Maggie dismissed that incident with a gesture. “Nobbut good came o’ that. However, Jonah employed black arts and shape-shifting
tae keep rightful mortals from finding a treasure his own Lord Angus wanted, no tae mention his other, more recent wickedness.”

“Aye, ’tis true,” the chief agreed.

“Still,” Maggie said, ” ’Tis me Jonah blames for what’s happened tae him, and he willna rest till he’s bested me. That be
why I believe he didna kill our Claud.”

“Then who did?”

“Nae one.”

“But Maggie—”

“Jonah be the most powerful wizard in our Clan. Ye said that yourself.”

“Aye.”

“And when we o’ the Secret Clan pass on, ’tis sometimes tae dwell in the mortal world, is it no?”

“Aye, on rare occasions,” the chief said, frowning.

“Then I believe Jonah altered the course o’ that lightning bolt at the last minute and instead o’ sending Claud tae fly wi’
the Evil Host for all time, as he would ha’ done had he struck Catriona, he hurled him into the mortal world.”

The chief was silent, his eyes smoldering as he thought over what she had said. “Tis possible,” he said at last. “But ‘tis
a vast world, that o’ the mortals. How would ye ever find him?”

“I willna rest till I do, that’s all. Ye see—”

“Whisst yourself now,” the chief commanded. “Ye still need tae mediate the troubles between them two tribes ye call feckless,
and afore our next meeting, too. D’ye fail, ye’ll lose your own seat in the High Circle. We ha’ lost Jonah Bonewits, and we
canna seem tae replace him. I dinna want tae lose ye, too.”

“Ye’ll no lose me,” Maggie said confidently. “We’ve had nae trouble from the Merry Folk or the Helping Hands since our last
meeting, and I ha’ the word o’ both their chieftains that they’ll keep this truce until Catriona succeeds or fails tae restore
her mortal tae his proper place and assure his happiness there. I’ll find Claud well afore that, because Catriona still must—”

“Phui, woman, ye needna tell me what Catriona must do. Were I no sitting in me long black robe a cat’s whisker from ye when
ye made the bargain? Surrounded, I’d remind ye, by all ten o’ the others, several o’ whom still be determined tae restore
Jonah tae our midst?”

“Aye, ye were.”

“I was, and ye promised no tae break any rules whilst ye settle the debate betwixt the Merry Folk and the Helping Hands over
who should look after mortal Highland clans that ha’ their ancient roots stuck deep in the Borders.”

“Aye, and I’ll settle it, too, for the Merry Folk will soon see that if we ha’ tae send Border members tae the Highlands whenever
a Highland mortal marries a Border lass and takes her north, we’ll soon be as populous there as they are.”

“But in the meantime, ye’ve set the lovely wee Catriona tae look after a lad from one o’ them Highland clans so rooted in
the Borders that he’s coming home tae roost, whilst your Border-bred Claud were set tae look after a Highland lass.”

“Which he did do, and very well, too.”

“Aye, he did. But, still—”

Interrupting him, Maggie said firmly, “I’m going tae find him and bring him home again. If ye mean tae be obstreperous, I
canna stop ye, but if ye’d like tae help, ye’ll see to it that the Circle doesna meet again too soon.”

The chief grimaced but nodded abruptly as she vanished.

“Turn about slowly, Fiona, and let me see how you look,” Olivia, Lady Carmichael said as she fanned herself with a limp hand.
She was a handsome woman in her late thirties, fashionably if mournfully dressed in dark purple with black lace trimming,
but any onlooker would swiftly see her strong resemblance to the slim, fair-haired girl standing in the center of the elegantly
appointed bower.

Obediently, seventeen-year-old Fiona Anne Carmichael turned, anxiously observing the expressions of her mother and the room’s
two other occupants as all three watched with critical eyes.

Fiona was stunningly beautiful, and the elegant sky-blue brocade gown she wore became her. But then, everything Fiona wore
became her.

Sunlight chose that moment to emerge from the clouds outside and pour through the tall leaded windows flanking the hooded
fireplace, but that sunlight was no more golden than the soft shining curls that tumbled over Fiona’s shoulders to her waist.
Her blue-gray eyes were large and luminous, their thick lashes so dark they looked as if she had blackened them. Her eyebrows
arched delicately. Her rosy lips were full and eminently kissable. Sadly, though, her tip-tilted nose bore a dusting of freckles
across the bridge, a detail that her cousin Anne Ellyson had learned soon after her arrival was one that Lady Carmichael deplored
as the sole flaw in her daughter’s otherwise perfect complexion.

Anne had decided before the end of her first sennight at Mute Hill that she’d have been wiser to remain at Ellyson Towers
despite her father’s decree. Watching narrowly now, she decided that Fiona looked worn to the bone, and considering that the
poor girl had been standing and turning, dressing and undressing, and listening to her mother’s criticism and complaints for
the better part of two hours, Anne could not blame her. For her own part, she wanted only to escape, and she knew exactly
where she would go as soon as she could slip away.

“What do you think?” Olivia asked in the faint tone she affected these days in all but truly private conversations.

Knowing the question was not directed at her, Anne turned her head toward the fourth person in the room.

Her aunt Olivia’s waiting woman, Moira Graham, was short and plump, and looked as if she were made of soft, stuffed pillows.
As she pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes, she reminded Anne of a cloth doll that she had had when she was small. Even
Moira’s frilled white cap was similar to the doll’s.