Highland Protector (2 page)

Humfrey sat down facing her. “How do ye ken that?”

Ilsabeth told him all she had heard and smiled weakly when Humfrey patted her shoulder in an awkward gesture of comfort even as his handsome face grew hard with anger. “He wants our clan to take the blame, to be the lure the king’s men chase about as he and his fellow plotters rid us of our king.

“I thought I had time to warn everyone, mayhap e’en stop it.”

“Weel, there is still time to fix things.”

“How so? Ye have just told me that the king’s army is pounding on the gates.”

“Aye, and your father is keeping those gates closed tight as everyone else flees. By the time those gates are forced open there will be no one left inside save for a few old men and women who have chosen to stay behind. Old and wee bit infirm, they cannae move quickly enough and refuse to be the ones to slow down all the others.”

“They could be taken, killed, or tortured for information,” she said, worried for those who would have to face the soldiers yet relieved that her family had fled.

“Nay, I doubt much attention will be paid to them.”

“Ye have come to take me to the others then?”

“Nay. I have come to help ye flee elsewhere. Ye see, t’was your dagger in the heart of the dead mon.”

Ilsabeth buried her face in her hands and fought the urge to weep. It was a weak thing to do and she needed to be strong now. “I had wondered where it had disappeared to,” she said, and then looked at Humfrey. “Where am I to flee if nay with my family? I dinnae understand why I cannae just run and hide with them.”

“Your father suspects ‘tis Walter behind this for the bastard’s name was mentioned as the one to lead the soldiers to proof of the Armstrongs’ treachery. And now ye have told me that ye heard the mon say as much himself. Your father needs ye to seek help.”

“From who? Our kinsmen the Murrays?”

“Nay.” He handed Ilsabeth a piece of parchment. “Sir Simon Innes. Those are directions to where he is and a note to him from your father.”

“Why does that name sound familiar?”

“Because the mon has saved two Murrays from hanging for murders they didnae commit. Your father says the mon will listen to ye and then hunt for the truth. And, ye can lead him to it, cannae ye.”

Ilsabeth quickly glanced at it and then tucked the message from her father into a hidden pocket in her skirts. “I suspect neither of those Murrays was accused of treason.”

“I cannae say, but right now all the soldiers have proof of is that the mon was murdered with your dagger.”

“They dinnae need much proof of the other to make life for an Armstrong verra treacherous indeed.”

“True, which is why we need to get yourself to this Innes mon as quickly as we can. He is a king’s mon, too, and one who is widely trusted to find the truth.”

Ilsabeth shook her head. “I am to go to a king’s mon to ask him to help me prove that I didnae kill another of the king’s men? ‘Tis madness. He willnae believe me.”

“Mayhap nay at first, but he
will
look for the truth. ‘Tis why he is so trusted. ‘Tis said that he is near rabid about getting to the truth. And, Two, there is naught much else we can do to save ourselves. We are all going to be hunted now. E’en our kinsmen the Murrays will be watched closely. They probably have soldiers at their gates, too, though nay as we do, nay there to arrest them. None of us will be able to do anything to hunt down the truth. Save ye. Ye are thought to be inside the walls the soldiers are trying to kick down so they will all think that ye are now running and hiding with us.”

“Maman?”

“She and a few other women are taking the youngest bairns to the nunnery and Sister Beatrice. One and her sisters will shield them.”

“Maman willnae stay. She will go to be with Papa.”

“Aye, most like, but ye cannae worry o’er all that.”

Ilsabeth thought her heart would shatter. “This is all my fault, Humfrey. If I hadnae brought Walter so close to our family he wouldnae have had what he needed to use us to hide his own crimes.”

“Nay, ‘tisnae your fault. Your father ne’er suspected the mon of any truly ill intent.” He stood up and held out his hand to her. “Come. Ye had best be on your way.”

“ ‘Tis a long walk I will be taking,” she said as she let him help her to her feet.

“Och, nay, ye will be riding. I have a wee sturdy pony for ye and an old habit One left behind on her last visit home.”

“Sister Beatrice,” she muttered, unthinkingly correcting him in a way that had become almost a tradition. “I am to pretend to be a nun?”

“Only until ye reach this mon Innes. Ye can claim to any who ask that ye are on a pilgrimage.”

Ilsabeth followed him to where a placid Highland pony awaited. While Humfrey turned his back, she changed into the nun’s habit. She knew it was a good disguise. Most people saw the nun’s attire and did not look closely at the woman wearing it. Rolling up her clothes, she moved to put them into one of the saddle packs and was a little surprised at all she found there.

“I have been verra weel supplied,” she murmured.

“Ye ken weel that your father has always been prepared for nigh on anything and everything.”

Recalling the many times her father had made them all practice fleeing some enemy, she nodded. “I had just ne’er thought there would ever be a real need for such practices.”

“Nay. I ne’er did, either, but am sore glad right now that we did them.”

“Do ye go to join my father now?”

“Nay.” Humfrey grinned. “I go to take up my work in Walter’s stables.” He nodded at Ilsabeth’s surprise. “A fortnight ago one of the Murray lasses sent word that she had seen a danger draw near to us, that she was certain there was a threat close at hand. Weel, your father then made certain he had one of his own get as close to all of his neighbors as he could. I have a cousin who is a Hepbourn and he got me work in Walter’s stables. T’was too late though. I had only just begun to suspect something was amiss. Ne’er would have guessed it would be this.”

“Nay, nor I.”

Humfrey kissed her on the cheek. “Go. The soldiers will be busy at our gates for hours yet. Put as many miles as ye can between ye and them.”

Ilsabeth mounted the pony and looked at her cousin. “Be careful, Humfrey. ‘Tis clear to see that Walter doesnae care who he uses or kills to get what he wants.”

“I will be careful. Ye, too. And do your best to see that the bastard pays for this.”

“That I swear to ye, Humfrey.”

Ilsabeth’s mind was full of Walter’s betrayal as she rode away. His betrayal and her own gullibility. She did not understand how she could have been so blinded to the evil in the man. Her mother had told her she had a gift for seeing into the heart of people. It had obviously failed miserably. The man she had thought to marry was a traitor, a killer, and saw her whole family as no more than lowborn thieves, vermin to be rid of. How could she not have seen that?

She also bemoaned the lack of information she had. For all she had overheard there were still more questions than answers. Just how did Walter, David, and whatever allies they had think to kill the king? Why did they even want to? Power? Money? She could not think of anything the king might have done to make Walter want him dead.

The more she thought on the matter the more she realized she did not know Walter at all. The worst she had ever thought of him was that he was a little vain, but she had shrugged aside any concern over that fault. He had a fine, strong body, a handsome face, beautiful hazel green eyes, and thick hair the color of honey. One glance into any looking glass would tell the man he was lovely so she had told herself that a little vanity was to be expected. But vanity could not be enough to drive a man to plot against his liege lord, could it? Did Walter have the mad idea that he should be king?

As the evening darkened into night, she discovered one thing she did not think about was her own heartbreak. Her heart ached but it was for her family, her fear for them so great at times that she could barely catch her breath. It did not, however, ache for the loss of Walter, not even when she looked past the shock of his betrayal and the fury over what he had done to her family.

“I didnae love him,” she said, and the pony twitched an ear as if to hear better. “All this, and I didnae even really love the bastard.
Jesu,
my family is running for their lives and for what? Because foolish Ilsabeth let herself be wooed into idiocy by a pair of beautiful eyes?”

The pony snorted.

“Aye, ‘tis pathetic. All I feel is a pinch of regret o’er the loss of a dream. Nay a dream of that lying bastard, but of having my own home and some bairns to hold. I am one and twenty and I was hungry for that. Too hungry. The greed to fulfill that dream was my weakness, aye?”

With a flick of its tail, the pony slapped her leg.

“Best ye get used to my complaints and my blathering.

We will be together for at least three days. Ye need a name, I am thinking, since ‘tis clear that I will be babbling my troubles into your ears from time to time.”

Ilsabeth considered the names from all the stories Sister Beatrice told so well. Although she preferred horses, good strong animals that could gallop over the moors and give her that heady sense of freedom, she had a lot of respect for the little Highland ponies. She wanted to give this one a good strong name.

“Goliath,” she finally said, and was certain the pony lifted its head a little higher. “We will just make certain Walter’s snake of a cousin, David, doesnae get near ye with a sling and a stone.”

She looked around at the moonlit landscape and tears stung her eyes. Her family was spending the night running, finding places to hide, and keeping watch for soldiers. If any of them got caught they would face pain and humiliation, perhaps even death, before she could save them. It was so unfair. Her father had done his best to return honor to his branch of the Armstrong family tree and it did him no good. One whisper from Walter, one dead body, and everyone believed the worst of them.

Her father’s insistence that everyone knew how to run and hide, speedily and silently, now made sense to her. All those well-supplied hiding places, all the intricate plans for scattering his small clan so far and wide it would take months to find any of them now revealed a foresight she had never seen or understood. Sir Cormac Armstrong had always known that the stain his parents had smeared the clan’s name with and the many less than honest cousins he had could come back to haunt him no matter what he did.

“Oh, I shall make Walter pay dearly for this, Goliath. Verra dearly indeed.”

Elspeth turned from staring out into the dark when Cormac stepped up beside her and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “She is out there all alone,” she whispered. “Alone and weighted with guilt for something that isnae her fault.”

“She will be fine, love. Two is strong and stubborn,” he said, and kissed her cheek. “She is also good with a knife and clever.”

“She hates that name, ye ken.”

“What? Two?”

“Aye. If ye werenae her beloved papa she would punch ye whene’er ye say it just as she does the others.” Elspeth smiled faintly when he chuckled. “Tell me she will be safe, Cormac.”

“Aye, loving, she will be.”

“I want to believe that but she is my child, my Ilsabeth.”

“Ye have two Ilsabeths.”

“Nay, I have a Sister Beatrice and an Ilsabeth. Oh, my firstborn still loves us all and she will hide and protect those now in her care, but she is God’s child now. Her heart and mind and soul belong to him. Ye could see it happen whilst she was still a child; the calling was so strong in her. But this Ilsabeth is all ours and carries a lot of both of us within her. Good and bad. She was still but a toddling bairn when I kenned I had given the name to the wrong lass. Ilsabeth was a name for a fighter, for a lass who grabbed life with both hands and lived it to the fullest.”

“And all that is why our Ilsabeth who used to be Clara will succeed.”

“Ye truly believe that, dinnae ye?”

“Aye, and so do many others. Did ye nay see that none scoffed when told of how we have sent her for aid? They ken the strength in the lass and the stubbornness that will keep her fighting for all of us until she wins.”

“And this mon Innes will listen to her and help her?”

“Aye, I have no doubt of it. I have met the mon and he is one who cannae abide nay kenning the truth, cannae e’en think of letting a person suffer for a crime he, or she, didnae commit. Once she tells her tale, he will see at least the hint that there is something amiss and be on the trail like the best of hunting dogs. Believe me, from all I have heard, no guilty mon wants Simon Innes on his trail. And, aside from the fact that Innes is a mon who will be compelled to find the truth, how could he turn our lass away? Those big blue eyes of hers and all. I almost feel sorry for the mon.”

“Why?”

“Because our Ilsabeth will turn his life inside out.”

“And that is a good thing?”

“It was my salvation when ye did it to me, love. Mayhap it will be his.”

“Sister?”

Ilsabeth looked at the little boy who had just stepped out of the shadows cast by the thick trees at the edge of her small camp. She had known that he was there but had to admit it had been mostly luck that she had. He was obviously accustomed to, and skilled at, hiding from people. What he did not appear to be accustomed to was a full belly. He was all skin and bone covered in dirty rags. She suspected he had been orphaned or cast aside and sighed. She had stopped to prepare herself for the final steps of her journey, to decide just what she should say to Simon Innes when she rapped at his door, and not to have fate present her with yet another problem.

It could be a harsh world for children, especially those no one wanted or who had been left orphaned and alone. If she could, she would take them all in, but the lack of time to find them all and an empty purse made that an impossible dream.

Her family, both the Armstrong and the Murray sides, did their part to help such children and she had to be satisfied with that.

“Aye, laddie, what can I do for ye?” she asked, and immediately felt a stab of guilt for lying to a child, for allowing the boy to think her a nun.