Forgiving Hearts: Duncurra 1-3 (4 page)

“This is beautiful,” she said, genuinely pleased as she ran her hands over the soft fabric.

“That is called an
airisaidh
,” Niall explained. “It is like the plaid men wear but it is usually made of a lighter wool. It is held on with a brooch and worn over a garment like your kirtle. We call it a
léine
. It is the same word we use for the tunic men wear.”

“It is very thoughtful of Laird Carr,” said Katherine.

“Laird Carr has four daughters. I suspect they had a hand in this,” Niall said.

“Aye, they did,” said Keith, laughing. “His oldest daughter, Anna, insisted on it. Laird Carr gave Stormy to her. She was overjoyed.”

Katherine knew it had been the right thing to do, but the confirmation that her beloved mare would not only be well treated, but loved, lightened her mood a great deal.

“Laird, he also sent a small gift to ye with his congratulations on your wedding,” Keith added.

Niall arched an eyebrow at that. “I’ll bet he did. For the last few years, every time I have seen him, Laird Carr has needled me about marriage. I have always assured him I had no intention of getting married. I am confident he found this new situation very amusing.”

Katherine wondered why Niall was so set against marriage but didn’t ask.

Keith produced two small casks of mead, a jug of excellent whisky, meat pies, cheese, brown bread, and small sugared buns.

After the meal, Tomas curled up beside Katherine with his head in her lap and went to sleep, sugar from the buns still circling his mouth. Niall’s men talked and joked throughout dinner, but Niall remained as quiet as he had been all day. After hearing his comments about marriage, Katherine thought to herself that she really knew nothing about this man, or any of them, really. She had managed to figure out their names over the course of the day, but other than that, the only bits of information she had had came from Tomas the previous evening. She smiled to herself when she remembered how he thought Duncurra was built in a loch.

“What amuses ye?” Niall asked.

She laughed a little. “I was thinking about how little I know of you all. I know these men are your ‘eeleet’ guard,” she said, emphasizing both syllables of the word as Tomas had the previous evening, “and Tomas thought Duncurra was built in the middle of a loch.”

Niall, too, chuckled at that memory, “To be fair, I know very little about ye, either.”

“I’m sure you know most of it.”

“Frankly, everything I thought I knew about you has been wrong.”

Confused, she said, “I don’t understand.”

“Never mind, it isn’t important. Tell me, how long has Ambrose Ruthven acted as your guardian?”

“Five years. He and my father were hunting. Apparently something spooked my father’s horse. He was thrown and killed instantly.”

“Your mother died before him?”

“Aye, she died when I was ten. The plague swept through Scotland that year.” She paused for a moment. “So many people died then, entire families in some cases. At least my father and I had each other.” She sighed, stroking Tomas’ head. “Things changed so much after he died.” She took a deep breath, looking away for a moment before saying, “So, I became an orphan, an heiress, and ward to a cruel uncle at fourteen. There isn’t much more to the story.”

Niall’s expression grew dark at the mention of her uncle’s cruelty.

Fingal broke the silence by saying, “Gentleman, our lady would like to learn a little bit about us. Shall I tell her?”

“Just don’t damn us with faint praise,” said Keith.

“It is much more likely he will simply damn us,” Alan added.

Fingal glared mockingly at Alan, then glanced around. “Hmm, where shall I start?” he considered the other men. “With the three old men at the top, I think. Diarmad is Niall’s second in command. As ye know, he left today with six other men. There are two captains under Diarmad, Cairbre, who remained behind in charge of Duncurra, and Alan here. As we have established, Alan is old,” Fingal teased. Alan did appear to be older than the others, but while lines creased his weathered face, his dark brown hair didn’t have any gray in it.

Alan frowned, “Mind who ye are calling ‘old,’ Fingal. Any of the three of us can still best ye.”

The men laughed and Fingal went on, undaunted.

“Alan is married to the lovely Effie, who is one of the clan’s midwives. She is a very good midwife, probably because she has had a lot of practice.”

Again, the men laughed, and for the first time all day, Niall joined in, explaining, “Alan and Effie have been blessed with eight children. I would ask him to tell ye about them, but he is a very proud father. His children are his favorite topic of conversation. If I give him an opening, he might still be talking about them as the sun rises.”

More laughter erupted, but Alan replied, “I will remind ye of this someday, Laird, when ye are bending my ear about your own brood.”

Katherine blushed, realizing the “brood” to which Alan referred would be hers as well.

Fingal continued, “Then we have Muir.” Shorter than Niall and with a leaner build, Muir had sandy brown hair. “Muir, too, is married, but no one understands how that happened.” It was Muir’s turn to glare as Fingal went on. “His wife, Shona, is one of our finest weavers. They have two sons, one of whom is training with one of our allies, Fearghas Chisholm. The other is now training with Niall’s men.”

“How many men do you have?” Katherine asked.

“There are twenty in my elite guard, who not only guard my back, but are leaders and trainers of my other men. There are roughly one hundred more warriors who see to the clan’s protection full time,” Niall answered. “In addition to Cairbre, six other guardsmen remained at Duncurra.

Ruthven had more than twice that many soldiers, she thought, but if Niall’s elite guard was any indicator, she doubted the Ruthven men were half as well trained.

“Next is Turcuil,” said Fingal. Huge didn’t begin to describe Turcuil.

Katherine suspected people believed in giants because of men like him. At least a head taller than and half again as wide as Niall, he had to be the biggest man she had ever seen. His size, coupled with his black bushy hair and beard, gave him a fearsome appearance.

Fingal’s eyes twinkled with mischief as he continued to introduce the giant. “Ye mustn’t tell anyone, but ye should be warned because once we get to Duncurra, ye are bound to notice,” said Fingal, glancing around as if checking for eavesdroppers. “Turcuil is a changling.”

Confused, Katherine cocked her head to one side.

“Oh, aye, he is,” Niall said dryly.

Deciding to play along, she asked, “What, pray tell, does he change into?”

“A lovesick swain,” answered Niall, and the men chuckled.

“Ye see,” Fingal explained, “Turcuil is rather fond of Edna, who is in charge of the staff at the keep. Edna is a widow and most of us think she has a soft spot for Turcuil, too, although it’s hard to know why.” This elicited more chuckles. “The problem is whenever Turcuil is near Edna, he forgets how to form words, so he has never actually done more than grunt at her. It is no wonder she doesn’t know of his affection.”

The other men roared with laughter.

Katherine suspected the huge man could put the fear of God into anyone, but when she glanced at him, he blushed like a maid.

“Since I am going by age, I have to tell ye about Keith and Keavy together.”

“They are the same age?” Katherine asked, glancing at the two men. Keith had pale blond hair and was shorter and slighter than the other guardsmen. He laughed a lot and looked youthful. But tall and stocky with shaggy brown hair, Keavy appeared quiet, almost sullen.

“I guess technically Keith is older by a few minutes. They are twins, though ye have probably noticed they are not identical. They are, in fact, as different as the night is from the day, but they are as close as two brothers could possibly be.”

“That they are,” said Alan. “If Keith eats too much, Keavy gets the indigestion.”

The men laughed but Fingal interjected, “Alan must have cleaned that joke up out of respect for ye, Lady Katherine. As I recall, it is normally a much bawdier comment.”

The men laughed harder.

When the laughter died, Fingal went on, “Now we come to Rab.” Fingal indicated a tall slender man with a head of shocking red hair. “Most people refer to him as ‘Rab the Red.’ I trust I don’t have to explain why; that isn’t a fire burning on his head.”

Rab grinned and ruffled his own hair. “Fingal, ye know it makes me a fierce warrior.”

“It only makes ye easy to see from a distance,” Fingal countered to the amusement of the other men. “And finally, ye have me, the more charming and handsome of the MacIan brothers.”

“Brothers?” said Katherine.

“Brothers,” answered Niall. “And the one who is going to die young if he doesn’t watch himself,” he added. Although he appeared to be teasing, Katherine thought she heard a serious undertone that surprised her.

Niall rose, offering his hand to her. “Now that ye have been properly introduced, I think it is time ye rested. We have another long day ahead of us.”

Somewhat reluctantly, Katherine kissed Tomas’ cheek and slid his head off her lap before taking Niall’s hand. Moving away from the rest of the men, she lay down with him on a plaid. He wrapped it around them and she fell asleep within the safety of his arms, thinking she could get very used to this.

Their third day of travel went much the same as the first. Niall changed the dressing on Katherine’s back again before they left. The lacerations still looked very angry. He knew no matter how he tried to cushion her as they rode, the constant motion was irritating them. Then, late in the afternoon, the skies grew dark and a wind whipped up, signaling a brewing summer storm. Well into the Highlands now, Niall knew they really must have shelter this evening.

If he pushed their pace once again, they might be able to reach the protection of some caves he knew of. As much as he hated to do it, he reasoned sleeping in the rain would be considerably worse on Katherine than a couple of hours of hard riding. Niall wrapped his plaid around her as the storm hit, but it didn’t prevent her from getting drenched and cold before they reached the shelter of the caves. The previous evenings had not been cold, so Niall had chosen not to risk drawing unwanted attention by starting a fire. Tonight he would have welcomed the warmth of a fire, but there was nothing dry with which to build one.

Looking chilled to the bone and trembling, Katherine stepped deeper into the dark cave. When she returned, she had changed into dry garments. She still shivered slightly, holding a heavy mantle around her shoulders.

“Ye are still cold.”

“Not as cold as I was. Everything is still a bit damp, but I’m a little warmer.”

Niall pulled her close to him, wrapping her in his plaid, hoping that his heat would further banish the chill while they slept. He held her close throughout the night, but she slept fitfully, waking with dark circles under her eyes.

“Katherine, ye don’t look well,” he observed.

“I am just a bit tired and achy. I’m sure I’ll feel better soon.”

“Just a bit?” he asked skeptically. He hadn’t known her very long, but he suspected that if she was admitting to feeling “a bit tired and achy”, she actually felt much worse than that. Still, there wasn’t much he could do, so he didn’t push her. “Come, let me change your dressing.”

Katherine turned her back to him with no argument. Niall opened her kirtle to find her back was not healing and one particularly deep lash showed signs of festering. Following her directions, he cleansed it as best he could. Her clenched teeth and fisted hands told him that it caused her pain, but there was nothing else to be done. When he finished, she looked as pale and drawn as she had the evening before.

Once again they set out with Niall cradling his wife on his lap. The storm had blown itself out during the night. The day grew fine and warm, but by midmorning she was shivering in his arms. Closing her eyes against the bright sun, she snuggled closer to him, seeking his warmth. Her flushed face felt hot and dry to his touch. He realized that, in spite of all his efforts, fever had set in; she was desperately ill. When they stopped at midday, he tried with little success to get her to eat or at least drink something. Instead she curled up on a plaid and slept. He said to his men, “If we ride hard, we can reach Brathanead by this evening.”

Alan asked, “Do ye think she can tolerate traveling any faster?”

“I think if I don’t get her into the hands of a healer soon, I might lose her,” Niall answered, his voice unable to hide the anxiety he felt.

Niall pushed as hard as the horses could tolerate, Katherine burning up in his arms. They reached Laird Malcolm MacLennan’s keep, Brathanead, at dusk. The MacLennans had been staunch allies of the MacIans for as long as Niall could remember. He had trained under Malcolm’s father and he had enormous respect for the old laird.

Malcolm and Niall’s father, Alastair, had been good friends. Niall and Fingal thought of him as an uncle. Now, just as his father had, Niall considered him to be his most trusted ally.

Malcolm met them in the courtyard. A flicker of surprise crossed his face when he saw the limp, feverish lass in Niall’s arms. He issued orders to see to their comfort and sent for the clan’s healer. “Give her to me, lad.” Malcolm reached up to lift Katherine off Niall’s lap.

Niall hesitated.

“Lad, I won’t break her. Ye have to get off that horse.”

Hesitantly, Niall lowered her into Malcolm’s waiting arms and dismounted.

“God’s teeth, lad, where did ye find this waif and what happened to her?”

“She is my wife, Malcolm.” At his shocked expression, Niall added, “It’s a long story.” He took Katherine back into his arms, and they entered the keep.

Fingal followed, carrying a sleepy Tomas.

“Who is the other urchin?” Malcolm asked lightly as he led them up the stairs into one of the towers containing bedchambers.

“A clansman,” answered Fingal, without offering any further information.

Katherine mumbled feverishly. “I promised I wouldn’t hide anything from you.”

“Wheesht, lass.”

“Niall, I’m ill.”

“Aye, lass, I know, but ye will get better now,” Niall answered, willing it to be true.

Then, in a more panicked voice, she asked, “Where is Tomas?”

“Tomas is fine; he’s with Fingal,” Niall assured her.

She still seemed agitated, begging, “Niall, Tomas needs you. I need you, please don’t leave me.”

“I won’t,” he said.

Katherine calmed, slipping back into the oblivion she had been lost in for hours.

Malcolm opened the door to one of the larger chambers on the second floor. Niall entered and laid her on the bed. Two maid servants helped remove her garments. When the MacLennan healer arrived, she turned Katherine on her side before removing the bandage. She sucked a breath in through her teeth and said, “Well, I have some work to do. Lairds, it will be best if ye leave so I can get to it.”

“I’ll stay,” said Niall.

The healer gave an entreating look to her laird and stared at Niall. “I know ye mean well, but there is nothing ye can do here but get in the way.”

Malcolm took the cue and said firmly, “Niall, ye need food and rest, and Agnes doesn’t need a worried husband under foot.”

“I promised her I wouldn’t leave.”

“Lad, she was delirious, and ye aren’t leaving her. She’s unconscious now and ye will be just downstairs. Agnes will call if she needs ye.”

Niall still hesitated.

Malcolm put his hand on the younger man’s shoulder, gently pushing him towards the door. “Ye need food and rest, too, lad. I must insist. Ye will make yourself ill, then what good can ye be to her? I promise ye, she is in good hands.”

Niall gave in and left the chamber, followed by his host.

Descending to the great hall, Malcolm motioned to a screened area behind which servants prepared a bath. “A meal will be served soon. I thought ye might want to have a bath in the meantime.”

Niall ran his hand through his hair distractedly, glancing back at the stairs to the tower.

“At the risk of sounding discourteous, lad, ye smell of sweat and horses. Stop worrying and bathe.”

Niall obliged, taking a quick bath before joining Malcolm and Duncan, Malcolm’s second in command, at the table. Gratefully he accepted the tankard of ale offered by a serving maid, taking a long drink of it.

“Now,” began his host, “tell me how ye, of all people, find yourself married to a lass who looks as if she has been horsewhipped.”

“Ye know the MacIans have never been wealthy. I knew my father worried incessantly about money over the last year or so, but I didn’t know how little we had until after he died in the spring. We literally had nothing left. Even less than nothing. Eithne managed to run up a huge debt while living at court.”

“Yes, your stepmother enjoys her comfort.”

“Her comfort? God’s teeth, Malcolm, her extravagance knows no bounds. She accrued more than half of the total debt in the last year alone. She owed something to practically everyone in Edinburgh. I had no way to cover the debt. To make matters worse, Matheson raided our western border several times just before Da died. I couldn’t afford to lose a chicken, much less cattle and sheep.”

“I’m sorry to hear about your financial problems, Niall, but what has the lass got to do with them?”

“I went to Edinburgh to try to negotiate with my father’s creditors and to put a halt to Eithne’s spending, but nothing could be done. I finally appealed to King David for help.”

“He has financial woes of his own.”

“So I learned. He suggested I marry an heiress. I thought he jested, but he had one in mind. He needed to find someone who would be willing to forfeit her title and lands in exchange for a larger dowry, so he could give everything but her wealth to her uncle.”

“There must be plenty of men who would do that.”

“One would think, but the rumors about her discouraged most men.”

“What rumors?”

“They are lies not worth repeating. I suspect Ruthven started them himself.”

“Ruthven? Ambrose Ruthven?” asked Malcolm.

“Aye, Ambrose Ruthven,” spat Niall.

“That lass is Katherine Ruthven?” Duncan asked.

“That lass is Katherine MacIan now,” said Niall.

Malcolm looked shocked, “Her hand was sought by quite a few men who desired her wealth, but the rumors—”

“All lies,” Niall said irritably. “He clearly intended to avoid a betrothal, hoping to gain everything for himself. He is the bastard who beat her.”

“Perhaps she is willful,” suggested Malcolm.

“She did nothing to earn a beating but protect a lad who was equally innocent,” Niall snapped. “Ye haven’t lived at court for years. How is it ye know the rumors about her?”

Malcolm chuckled. “I haven’t lived there, but I still visit occasionally. There are many would-be matchmakers who would like to see me chained to a bride, but even they discouraged me from pursuing the Lady Ruthven. Ah, what folly it is to listen to rumors.”

“Ye are old enough to be her father,” Niall admonished him. The thought of Katherine married to anyone else, much less a man as old as Malcolm, turned his mood even darker.

“Don’t get your hackles up, lad, I certainly wasn’t the oldest man considering her hand, nor would I be the first old man to take a young, wealthy bride.”

His response didn’t soothe Niall’s temper.

“The lad Fingal toted upstairs,” Duncan asked, “is he the one she was protecting?”

Glad that he was changing the subject, Niall nodded, taking another long pull of ale from his tankard.

“Who is he to her?” Malcolm asked.

“The orphan of one of her clansmen,” Niall said simply. “Katherine is fond of him. She treats him like a little brother. He seems to have attached himself to Fingal.”

~ * ~

When the lairds finally left the chamber where Katherine lay, the old healer turned back to her charge. She knew she had to draw the poison out of the wounds on the lass’s back. She added some salt, a large handful of shredded wych elm root, and several other herbs to a kettle of water before putting it on the fire to bring it to boil. She washed Katherine’s back with a solution of soapwort while the herbs stewed. Then she poured the boiling liquid into a bowl to cool briefly. Tearing strips of linen, she dipped them into the solution. When she could handle them without burning her hands, she wrung most of the liquid out and placed the linen strips on the purulent wounds crisscrossing the lass’s back.

Agnes had hoped the lady would remain unconscious while she worked, but Katherine awakened at the first touch of the hot cloth. The healer knew the solution stung, but it had to be done. Agitated and writhing, the lass cried out, but soon oblivion reclaimed her, releasing her from the agony. Once she had slipped back into her fevered sleep, Agnes concentrated on finishing cleansing her wounds. She worked as quickly as she could, replacing cool strips with hot ones until the cool strips she pulled away had no more yellow drainage on them and the wounds looked clean. She allowed Katherine’s back to dry and cool before applying a soothing balm, which she covered with clean linen.

~ * ~

When Malcolm and Niall stopped at the room on the second floor, where they laid Katherine on the bed and met with the healer, Fingal passed them. He continued up the stairs to a chamber on the third floor. Initially thrilled to see Fingal, the maid who had readied his room pouted when she saw Tomas.

Fingal chuckled, the reason for her chagrin obvious to him. “Another time, lass.” He stayed with Tomas until the lad had eaten and fallen asleep on a pallet. Knowing the exhausted boy wouldn’t awaken until morning, Fingal left the chamber and descended the stairs. As he passed Lady Katherine’s room, he heard her distressed cries. Upon reaching the great hall, Fingal became infuriated when he saw Niall sitting at the long refectory table with his hosts. “What are ye doing down here?” Fingal demanded.

Niall glared at him and asked in a low, menacing voice, “Ye dare address your laird with that tone?”

“I beg your pardon, Laird,” Fingal said mockingly. “I thought I was addressing my brother.”

“Do ye need to be reminded they are one and the same?” asked Niall, rising to his feet.

“Do ye need to be reminded that less than an hour ago, your wife begged ye not to leave her? Now she is crying out for ye, and ye are not there,” Fingal responded, without backing down.