Highland Hawk: Highland Brides #7 (23 page)

She nodded. "Aye. What I cannot see with the gift I can guess through uncounted years."

"And you think I do not wish to protect her?"

"Oh, aye. You do. But you have other wishes as well."

He leaned back slightly to cross his arms against his chest and hoped to appear casual. "You think I am drawn to her?"

Her gaze smote him like dark fire, though her wrinkled lips quirked slightly with humor. "You would not be the first."

"Then why am I here now, Grandmother? After all, the lass is alone in her room. I could go there and plead my cause."

The old woman grinned. What few teeth she had left were hardly worth mentioning, but that did not impede her drinking, which she proved yet again with an impressive swig. "You are here to get me addled enough to tell you all I know of her," she said, and draining her cup, held it out to be refilled.

He complied readily.

"And why are you here?" he asked.

She scowled. "It might be that I am considering getting you addled enough to take advantage of your person."

He was not a man who was easily surprised, but he was quite certain his brows were firmly ensconced somewhere in his hairline. "Truly?"

"You're a fine specimen, Haydan the Hawk," she said. "But while the spirit is willing..." She sighed and shook her head. “The flesh is damnably tired."

He chuckled. "Hear, hear," he said and raised his mug in an informal toast.

She drank then watched him do the same. "Be warned though, lad, if I get pickled enough, I may yet have the will to drag you under the table and have my way with you."

"If I get pickled enough I may not resist."

She gave him a rusty chuckle. "I fear there are not enough spirits in all Christendom to gain that end."

"You may well be surprised."

"I rarely am, lad." She drank again. "Fill me up."

He did so then leaned his elbows on the table to watch the old woman in the ensuing silence. "She is sad," he said finally, for indeed, there seemed little purpose in skirting the issue. And too, she had already drunk half a keg of ale. Surely it had loosened her tongue by now.

"I assume we speak of my granddaughter again," Marta said, sipping the ale appreciatively, as if it were her first taste.

"Aye," Haydan agreed. "She is sad sometimes. I but wonder why."

"Think on it, Haydan the Hawk. Catriona has seen much hardship. She lost both her mother and her father long before she should have made that parting. 'Tis doubtful she shall ever see the land of her forebears, and the man she once called beloved is..." She sighed and drank again. "He has disappointed her," she ended simply.

"Rory?" Haydan guessed, ignoring the tightening of his gut.

"Aye. Rory."

"Then why is he here?"

"For the same reason you are. He could not stay away. Here." She shoved his horn toward him. "I do not care to drink alone."

He joined her. "If she is disappointed with him why does she not find another? I do not think she would have any great difficulty."

"Difficulties are drawn to the Rom like maggots to a dead ox," she said, scowling into her cup.

A charming analogy. "What kind of difficulties?"

"Have you not been listening, lad?" she asked and nudged his hand with her empty mug.

He filled it dutifully. "Listening to what?"

“To her tales," she said, sounding exasperated.

"Of Durril?"

"Of her kinsmen."

Haydan watched her closely. Surely she wasn't addled enough to believe the old wild tales. Just how intoxicated was she?

"Quite. But not yet intoxicated enough," she said, answering his unspoken question then chuckling at his expression of surprise. "Do not give up hope, lad. I cannot remain lucid forever. As for yourself, Haydan the Hawk, do you think the maid looks as if she were born to Scotland?"

"Nay." She looked as if she was born in heaven, but that seemed unlikely, even in his increasingly foggy state.

"Nay indeed," Marta said and drank deep and long. "Nay indeed." Her thoughts seemed far away, but she spoke finally in a tone so deep he could barely hear her. "Black as midnight were his eyes and when he looked at me 'twas as if I were the only maid in all the world. 'Martuska' he would whisper and I would all but swoon with pleasure."

Haydan had no idea what she spoke of, but there was a soft dreaminess to her tone that entranced him. He drank again, watching her all the while and wondering if she had, in her youth, had the same unearthly allure as her granddaughter.

"She has my eyes and my hands," she answered. Had he asked the question aloud? "Her hair is like her mother's, wild mane that it be. But her smile..." She sighed and drank. "Her smile is his."

His
being her great grandsire, Haydan assumed.

"When were you married?" he asked.

"For three years I was his first." She tipped the horn to her lips, found it empty, and pushed it out for him to fill.

Good saints, she had a hollow leg.

"His first what?"

"His first wife."

His brows, which had recently lowered, shot up again like a missile from a cannon. "He had others?"

"Seven."

Haydan remained silent. "I cannot decide if you are extremely intoxicated or simply jesting."

"You might ask," she suggested and drank again.

"Your husband had seven wives?"

She gave him an expression of disgust. "I would have thought a man such as yourself capable of ciphering. Last I counted, seven plus myself made eight."

Damn. He
was
drunk.

She laughed, supposedly at his expression of surprise then continued with her story. " 'Twas a common practice for a man to take more than one wife. Certainly a prince had that right."

Prince Endorai? She
must
be jesting. And damned if she couldn't drink like a swine herder. "So he took other wives and you had no hard feelings?"

" 'Twas a different place and time." She shrugged and winked. "And since then I have far surpassed his number of... partners."

Haydan sat in silence, trying to quell the question, but it came nevertheless, probably washed up on a wave of ale. "And your great-granddaughter?"

"I have had her share too. Drink up, lad. You're falling behind."

He did as told then lazily considered how to rephrase the question.

"Ah, my Catriona," sighed the old lady. "For many years I thought she might be a changeling, but now..." She eyed him with a narrow gaze. "I now think there may yet be hope."

"What the devil does that mean?"

She stared at him a moment longer, then shrugged. "She has the Rom allure. You could hardly condemn her for accepting a few lovers, could you?"

His gut cramped. Too much ale?

"Could you?" she asked again, her eyes intense as she leaned toward him.

" 'Tis hardly my place to condemn or condone."

"Nay, 'tis not. But most men do. When they themselves are as loyal as hounds on a hot scent."

'Twas true, of course. And yet, thinking of her with another...

"And what of you, Haydan the Hawk?"

Haydan's elbow slipped on the edge of the table, causing his chin to bump down and his eyes to snap open. "Me what?"

"What woman lights your wick at night?"

"Lights my..." Some vague part of him wondered if he should be offended by her terminology. After all, he was a knight of the realm and the king's personal guard. But somehow he could not quite dredge up the appropriate emotion, for all he could think of in his blurry mind was Cat—her laughter, her sadness, her softness, her strength...

"Ah, so you still want her, no matter who she has taken." She nodded.

He raised his brows. Or possibly just one, since the other seemed unreasonably weary. "You are sadly mistaken, old one."

"And you were a poor liar when sober. Pathetic when intoxicated," she said and drank.

"Intoxicated?" he tried to sound shocked, but it may have only come out as groggy. "Nay. I am only..." He was only what? Only too old for her by a score of years and had been ordered by royal decree to guard her? "I only wish to protect her."

The ancient eyes were dead earnest as she leaned forward to gaze into his. "Protect her from what, lad?"

"I do not know." He shook his head. The room swayed. "I do not know. But I feel her sadness and I am certain there is something she is not telling me."

She stared at him long and hard as if judging his very soul. "And what if I told you that you are right, lad? That she needs your help? Would you forsake all to come to her aid?"

"I have already sworn to protect her," he said, baffled by her words.

"Aye, you have sworn. But when the hammer strikes the anvil, will you hold true?" she mused.

"What?" During the enforced inactivity of his childhood it had been
Haydan's
place to speak in riddles, but just now he could not seem to speak at all, and the table kept rising toward his chin.

Then he felt her gnarled fingers grasp his jaw in a firm grip. "What are you made of, Haydan the Hawk?" she asked.

Even if he had known what she spoke of he could not have formed a coherent answer, for the room kept dipping strangely. Nevertheless, she spoke again.

"You may do, lad. You drink like a milk-fed babe, but when the fat hits the fire you may yet do," she said, and pulling away her hand, let his head drop to the table.

Chapter 18

Haydan awoke groggily. His pillow felt hard and strangely damp, his neck stiff and his head woolen.

"Sophie said there was something left over in the kitchens."

He sat up with a start to stare into Kitchen Elsie's amused eyes. For a moment all sense deserted him, and then reality struck. He had spent the night slumped over the table. And Marta? He glanced blearily over at the opposite bench and saw that spot had been vacated.

"Hard night, laddie?"

Good Christmas, he couldn't even outdrink an old crone. And what idiocies had he spewed before he fell into unconsciousness? Get her drunk indeed! Learn Catriona's secrets! More likely the old wench now knew he was having wet dreams over her great-granddaughter. He was lucky she hadn't smacked him over the head with the empty keg of ale. On the other hand, she very well might have, judging by the throbbing in his head. Lifting his hand to his aching cranium, he felt for any gaping wounds.

" 'Tis still there," Elsie assured him.

"What?"

"Your head," she said. Shifting the hollowed wooden bowl that rested on one plump hip, she grinned. " 'Tis still attached."

"I know it's still attached," he said, not daring to scowl at her, lest his skull burst open and spill his dubious brains onto the table. "It hurts like hell."

"Could be you're too old to drink the night through, Sir Hawk. What was wrong with your bed?"

"Besides the fact that it was empty?"

She chuckled low in her throat. "Empty of you or empty of another?"

"Empty," he said flatly.

"I think there might be some who could help you with the latter."

"That an offer, Elsie?"

Her grin was suggestive. "It may be. Didn't know you were interested. But I have a night available now and again."

"I may be too old to fight for the honor."

"Could be I'd do the fighting for you."

" 'Tis good to know since—"

"Elsie, I—"

"James!" Haydan choked and straightened quickly enough to make his head throb and his back creak.

"Sir Hawk!" James came to an abrupt halt, causing the guards behind him to do the same. "Hawk," he repeated, continuing into the kitchen. "You look worse off than you did before. What ails you?"

" 'Tis naught," Haydan assured him, but his voice cracked, so he rose abruptly to his feet and tried again, though his head clanged ominously at such an egregious offense. " 'Tis naught, Your Majesty. Why are you about so early?"

"To break the fast."

"Is there some reason the meal could not be brought to your room this morn?" What kind of luck would bring the lad here when he was in such mind-boggled disarray?

"I am bound for the stables," James said.

"And why so early?"

"Galloway said Lady Cat goes out in the morn to see her mare."

Haydan exchanged a glance with the young guard. "Did he now?”

"Aye," James said and took the hot scones Elsie had already fetched for him. "Galloway knows all about Lady Cat."

The red-haired guard cleared his throat. "I but noticed that the maid tends her steed just after dawn."

Haydan turned toward Galloway just as James turned away. It could very well be that the young guard might know something Haydan did not. "Anything else you have observed?" he asked, focusing all his attention on the guard's freckled face.

Galloway shuffled his feet. "There are a few things, Sir Hawk."

"Such as?"

The young man cleared his throat. "For a Gypsy she seems... quite honorable."

"And?"

The guard squirmed under Haydan's glare. "She has the most bonny eyes in all the world."

Good saints! Yet, if an old reprobate like himself was cast adrift by her slightest attention, how much more would this poor young swain be affected? "I meant have you noticed any of her other—"

But James turned back just then. "Would you like to accompany me to the stables, Sir Hawk?"

For a moment Haydan's heart sped along at a faster clip. All he need do was to walk out to the stable and she would be there for him to see, to speak to, and make certain she was well. But his neck crinked, reminding him of his wrinkled appearance. He could hardly greet her this way. At the very least he would have to rid himself of his beard and...

He was acting like a hang-jaw lackey again. "Nay," he said. "I have... business to tend to. And a swordsmanship lesson to give a young king."

The lad scowled. "Surely it can wait," he said, his tone wheedling.

"I suppose it will not hurt to delay it a bit," Haydan admitted, but in his own traitorous mind he was already hurrying through the list of necessities before he too could rush out to the stables.

God help him, he thought as James exited the hall with his guards close behind him.