Heaven and the Heather (19 page)

“To the bed,” he ordered her in a harsh whisper. “Now.”

Stunned, trying to assess what he meant to achieve by such a statement, Sabine rose on shaky legs. By the time she stood upright, he was at the door wielding his sword and…a chair?

He dared steal a swift glance over his shoulder.

“Bed,” he mouthed, “Now!”

He turned about. His plaid and cloak dangled down over his body.

Sabine jumped up into bed. She knelt on top of the blankets and peered through a gap in the bed curtains. Niall shoved the chair under the iron plate that held the latch. It rattled again, then stopped abruptly. The door pushed inward only a fraction. The chair skidded an inch on the planks and stopped.

Sabine looked at Niall, a flush of pride warmed her cheeks for his cleverness at giving them a moment before the inevitable. Moments of joy were all she had these days. He ran toward her, toward the bed.

“I will find ye,” he whispered. “On the ’morrow.”

He delivered to her a grin that made her swoon. She gripped the bedpost. Her fingernails dug into the myriad carved fruits and flowers. She would remember that grin as long as she lived—be it a moment or a lifetime.

He disappeared behind the window curtains, just as the door burst inward. The chair skittered across the floor.

Sabine gasped, cinching the strings across her breasts. She boldly slipped out of the bed. A guard stepped inside, glancing about, his pike firm in his fist. He caught sight of Sabine, made a rapid bow, then backed out of the chamber. Sabine waited for Lord Campbell to enter.

But unexpected intrusions were quite normal this evening. She should not have been so shocked when Lady Fleming walked into the chamber.

“’Tis a sorry state this chamber is, girl,” she scolded. “But not as sorry as the state in which you have placed yourself before Her Majesty’s favor.”

“Lady Fleming, I am most disturbed that the queen would think me anything less that her loyal servant,” Sabine said.

“You are most disturbed? You? Well, my girl, I wish you had considered the consequences of abandoning the castle without a by-your-leave. Lord Campbell was kind enough to give Her Majesty’s court accommodation and use of his household for her entertainments of sport, and you show your gratitude by running off on the first childish whim that strikes your fancy.”

Sabine winced. Niall was far from a whim to her, especially after this night. She dared not glance toward the curtain.

“M’Lady, I assure you that I have not…”

“—Been acting the grateful guest of the lord of this house who is also your intended?” Lady Fleming snorted. “Her Majesty’s generosity knows no limits with you, girl, for she has commanded your presence on the morrow’s hunt, at Lord Campbell’s insistence, I might add.”

Lady Fleming bent to pick up the blanket strewn by the hearth, the same blanket Niall had warmed with his body. She lifted it between thumb and forefinger as if it carried the plague. “Why is this bed-covering on the floor?” She held it higher as if doing so Sabine would reply more urgently. Instead, the sketch she had made of Niall fluttered out, wafting to the floor promising disaster should Lady Fleming dare look down. Which, of course, she did. A hawk’s sight would have been no less sharp.

Sabine dove down to retrieve it, but Lady Fleming was closer by a few steps and took the advantage. She crumpled the edge of the paper in her fingers as she stared at it, her eyes perilously wide, her lips colorless with rage.

“’Tis nothing, m’Lady,” Sabine managed, reaching forward for the paper.

“’Tis everything, girl,” Lady Fleming hissed. Her stare seethed. The coals in a thousand hearths did not have as much heat.

“Just a sketch, a mere…whim, m’Lady.” Sabine wanted to slip through the cracks in the floor. This was Chamonix all over again. Except Lady Fleming was in the place of her father.

“An abomination! Is this what passes through your thoughts as of late? Such distraction will mean your end, my girl. Remember your father’s reason for sending you to the Queen’s court? Or has there not been enough blood shed because of your foolishness?”

Sabine shook her head furiously, fighting back hot tears. “
Non
, m’Lady! Do not say such things! My heart guides my hand, always. There is no blood upon it.”

“Such pathetic excuses have brought down one man. Shall you bring down another? Lord Campbell is your intended. He has offered the best possible future for you, with the blessings of the queen. He forgave your infirmity. You will wed him.”

Sabine thrust her right hand under Lady Fleming’s narrowed gaze. “I will not!”

The old Scot took the paper in both fists and tore it into several pieces.

“
Non!
” Sabine cried. “You cannot!”

“For you, I do this. Accept my pity.”

She dropped the pieces to her feet.

“The hunt begins at first light.” Lady Fleming pointed to the torn paper on the floor. “And dispose of that French trash!”

With an abrupt turn on her heel and a turn of the outer latch, Lady Fleming left Sabine alone in the chamber.

She fell to the hearth and gathered up the dozen bits of paper the embittered Scot had so ruthlessly torn. Clasping them to her breast, she raced across the floor to the curtains knowing that Niall was well gone the way in which he came.

She stared out of the open window. All that greeted her was the open blackness of night. Chill wind blew in, circling about her body, threatening to tear the papers from her hand and cast them out over the stone sash.

Sabine held tight to the torn sketch, a most indelible memory of this night. She also held Niall’s hasty Highland vow that he would find her. She wanted to believe him, to know that she was not alone in the world.

She closed the window and the curtains. She took her gown from the chair beside the bed and secreted the pieces inside. She would mend the sketch with a little flour and water paste, or hide glue if such was in the scullery. She tore open a seam at the top secreted the papers and a charcoal stick inside, between the layers of silk and velvet. They would hide over her heart.

Like an obedient royal servant, she took to her bed for a good night’s sleep.

“If I were truly obedient to my queen, if I were my father’s daughter,” she whispered to her pillow in lieu of prayer, “I would burn the sketch in the hearth myself. I shall show my loyalty to Mary in another way. I shall save her life…together with Naill.”

Her throat tightened at the thought, and her right hand ached. She clenched her fingers and shut her eyes. Tomorrow, she feared, would bring a storm down upon her and Niall. Tonight she would dream of him and nothing more. Dreams and the torn sketch were all she knew she could keep of him, no matter what tomorrow brought.

chapter 10

At What Cost Valor?

T
he morning sun broke through the forest and warmed Niall’s face. He squinted at the rays of sun that illuminated the edges of the departing storm clouds. Streaks of light, like God’s veil, escaped from the puffy, violet clouds and spread across the heather that surrounded him. The raw, powerful beauty of the Highlands after a storm strengthened his soul. It always had. But today, he felt as if he looked at the land with new eyes. Sabine had awakened a new confidence in him. He took a deep breath and called it forth.

“I have more than my clan to protect,” he said, to believe it himself. “I have my queen to protect and, God help me, I want to protect Sabine.”

That exceptional moment when he first met her on Leith wharf seemed so long ago instead of little more than a fortnight and five. So much had happened since then. He felt as if he lived on the edge of forever with Sabine at his side. He allowed himself a foolish dream now and then.

He climbed onto his horse. His cloak weighed heavy on his shoulders, the hem dew-dampened.

Niall gripped the reins and waited. He stared at the forest, at the thick stand of pine and ash, at the tangle of undergrowth that grew about the slender trunks. He spied a deer trail, a thin cut through the foliage and nodded to himself. Beyond the forest, several miles away, lay Castle Campbell Dubh. Sabine was the one guest in that vile place who he felt was on his side. And he hoped Rory would return soon and tell him she was just beyond that forest, down the hill, and waiting with the other royals in Glen Fuil—Glen of Blood.

The sound of distant hoofbeats caused him to look north, to Rory on his horse rounding the trees as fast as Beelzebub’s messenger.

Niall straightened his shoulders and waited. Thoughts buzzed about his head. His need to find proof against Campbell last night had failed albeit gloriously with Sabine in his arms. He would not give up until he got the proof he needed to expose Campbell for what he was: offal, shat out into the Highlands by generations of those just like him. The question was when? And how? The
how
vexed him the most.

Rory thundered up to him. He halted his mount sending up a spray of soil and bits of heather.

“A bonny morn to ye,” he gasped. “Glad to see ye arenae Campbell’s prisoner.”

“Where are they?” Niall asked immediately.

Rory pointed to the forest. “The royal hunting party, dozens of them, dressed well enough to shame the rising sun, are coming to Glen Fuil from the east. They left their horses, carriages, and I don’t know what all, on top of the eastern rise. In minutes they should have made their way into the glen. Ye know what bothers me, though?”

“What?” Niall asked. He did not have to ask though. He knew.

“Glen Fuil is a wee glen. There’s an abandoned croft on one end and a stone circle on the other, and not much heath in between. Any farmer Campbell hired to chase deer down into that glen might get slaughtered with their quarry.”

“Aye,” Niall sighed. “I knew Campbell would choose that glen, to insure the queen’s success in the hunt.” His words trailed off. He looked at Rory expectantly.

His friend nodded. “Aye, she’s there. All of the queen’s attendants are there. She’s not with them though. She’s with Campbell.”

The world dropped out from under Niall. He swallowed and asked, “In the glen?”

“Aye. She was beside him…
is
beside him.”

“Beside the Devil himself,” Niall whispered. “Foolish, foolish lass.”

“Why do I think that jealousy isnae the reason for that look in yer eyes?”

“She’s in danger,” Niall said.

“Campbell is the enemy of yer clan,” Rory said. “His influence couldnae go as far as France, to Sabine’s clan, could it?”

Niall managed a smirk. “There are no clans in France.”

“Then why is the lass in danger?”

“She’s beside Campbell, bound to marry him,” he replied. “’Tis much danger, aye?”

“Aye.”

“I’ve got to go,” Niall said.

“To Glen Fuil?”

He looked at his friend. “Ye as well.”

“In Glen Fuil?”

“Aye.”

Rory glanced to the forest, to the sun, to the heather, then back to Niall. He looked as if pondering that question ached his mind. Finally, he asked, “What d’ye want me to do.”

“Go to the south of the glen. Keep hidden. Watch Campbell. Watch the queen. I need yer eyes.”

“Watch for what?”

“Anything unusual.”

“Oh, aye…unusual. That’s helpful,” Rory’s words faded. Then he snapped to life. “D’ye want me to go to the south of the glen, in the direction of the stone circle, thereabouts?”

“Go there, watch. I’ll go to the north end.”

“And if something happens, something
unusual
?”

Niall stared at the forest. “Then just follow my lead.”

“Will ye watch that fine lassie as well?” Rory asked.

He did not reply. Niall had wanted to believe that this morning Sabine would not, by some miracle, be in that glen. He knew, as a loyal subject, he would step in harm’s way for his queen. His heart told him to do no less for Sabine.

S
abine bowed her head toward the dewy ground. The heather with its tiny, delicate, bell-shaped flowers, met her gaze. The color was the exact the blue of Niall’s eyes.

“Rise,” Mary said.

Sabine rose from her curtsy and stood with the many others, including Lord Campbell who was by her side. But not in her thoughts, she reminded herself. She stole a furtive glance at his profile, at the patrician nose and dark, neatly trimmed beard. There was nothing inspiring about him. His uninteresting face did not compel her to flex her gnarled fingers and reach for a charcoal stick and paper. She knew what lay beneath his facade. He was wholly predictable to her now…too predictable. Such knowledge crumpled her soul. There was no art here, only an absorbing darkness named Lord John Campbell. And she was to marry him.

Slowly, she reached down and touched her gown over her heart, over her mended sketch of Niall. She had arisen before the rest of the castle and repaired her precious drawing with a small amount of hide glue she found in the scullery.

“
Bona sera, Signorina.
”

Sabine looked down at Rizzio, the little Italian, at the jaunty way he wore his velvet cap, at his saffron satin cape tied over one shoulder with a gold cord. His garments matched his jovial face.