Once Upon a Plaid (19 page)

“I’m not thinking of taking a wife.”

She blinked at him several times, all traces of coquetry gone. “Are ye not?”

“No, who would I marry?”

“Me, o’ course.”

Panic clawed at his belly. A few stories. A few kisses. A poem or two. How had it come to this? “Did I ever say I wanted to marry?”

“Not in so many words, but ye showed me yer secret room—”

“As I recollect, ye found it on yer own,” he corrected. She’d followed him, most like.

Dorcas lifted her chin. “At any rate, ye invited me to come back again.”

If Dorcas was right, his memory on that point was a bit fuzzy. It seemed to him that she’d just assumed she’d be returning to the tower room.

“And ye read me stories—”

“Which ye didna like a bit.” It was still a sore point with him that she couldn’t seem to grasp the wonder of Camelot, where might didn’t make someone right. Perhaps she’d never felt small and powerless and in need of a code of chivalry to balance the scales in her favor.

She cast her gaze down so that her pale lashes lay like feathers on the swell of her cheekbones. “I liked the poem.”

“Not the first one. The one about the bald fellow,” he said. She’d been most emphatic on that point. “Was that poem what put ye in mind to do something about
my
hair?”

She waved the thought away. “No, I havena given that poem a second thought. But I liked the love poem, Nab. I liked it verra, verra much. I can even recite it back to ye.”

Her eyes slid to the right as if the words might be found hovering beside her ear.

 

Her gaze flicked back to him. “’Twas the most beau-timous thing anyone’s ever said to me. Did I remember it aright?”

“I think so. I dinna know for certain without the book in front of me.” He cocked a brow at her. “How did ye do that?”

She shrugged. “We have different gifts, ye and I. Because I canna read, I remember what I hear verra well. I have to, ye see. But ’tis easy to remember if the words please me.”

Nab was good at remembering the gist of stories, but to recite one word for word was an art he’d not mastered. Certainly not after only one hearing. Dorcas really was smart.

Much smarter than he.

That irritated him more than the haircut.

“Ye needn’t have bothered cutting my hair,” he said testily. Thinking he was the smart one in their little whatever this was had made him feel in control for the first time in his life. Now he realized he’d been wrong. Dorcas had managed everything from the very beginning. “I willna be needing to improve my situation because I’ll not be taking a wife.”

“But—”

“Not you. Not anybody. I’ll not marry ever.”

For the first time in his life, he raised his voice at someone. He couldn’t seem to help it. The idea of being shackled to another person for the whole of his life, even someone like Dorcas, whom he tolerated better than anyone, was unthinkable. It made his insides do a jittery reel. All he craved was solitude, safely away from the laughter and snide comments of others. When he was alone, he was in good company.

“Get it out of yer head, woman!” he shouted. “And the next time ye decide to improve a body, ye might try asking do they wish it before ye start.”

Nab expected her to fist her hands at her waist and shout back at him. He was used to people yelling. He could deal with that by ignoring her. She’d give up eventually, figuring he wasn’t intelligent enough to realize the stickiness of the situation.

Sometimes, it was good to be thought a fool.

Instead, her little chin quivered. Her eyes became overbright. A tear trembled on her lashes.

This was far worse than being yelled at. And he couldn’t ignore it.

“Dorcas, dinna cry. Please. I didna mean—”

“Aye, ye did,” she said between sniffles, “else ye’d not have said it.”

Nab pulled a handkerchief from his sleeve and offered it to her. He couldn’t vouch for its cleanliness, so he wasn’t surprised when she didn’t take it. Instead she covered her face with a bit of her arisaid and sobbed into it.

“I take it back, Dorcas. Can ye not forget I said anything?”

“No, I canna. Ye know I canna. Words in my hearing dinna fade away. I store them up, do I wish it or no.”

It was true. She’d just demonstrated how well she’d remember his hatefulness. He felt lower than the icy slush on the bottom of his boots.

“Dorcas, please . . .” He reached a tentative hand to her. It was hard for him to do it. Touching and being touched was not something he enjoyed, but he didn’t mind it so much with Dorcas. Who knew if he’d ever feel that way with anyone else. And he felt if he didn’t touch her now, he never would again.

She jerked away from him as soon as his fingertips brushed her shoulder. “Stay away from me, Nab.”

Swiping at her eyes, Dorcas hurriedly gathered up her things and put them into her satchel. He saw now that she’d spread a blanket for them on the other side of the wellhead near the fire. There was even a jug of something—ale or small beer—they hadn’t opened yet. His haircut was only the beginning of the night she had planned for them.

Part of him wished he’d held his tongue and just let events wash over him. Dorcas was a good planner. He probably would have enjoyed it, whatever it was.

He tried once more to stop her at the door.

“Step aside, Nab,” she said without looking at him.

“Not until ye let me tell ye—”

“Why should I let ye speak when I’m afeared of what ye’ll say?” Tears coursed down her cheeks. “But I’ll say this. I used to stick up for ye, ye know, when some of the others would speak ill of ye. I willna do so anymore. Ye dinna ken when someone truly cares for ye. And ye havena the sense to care for them back.” She met his gaze then. “Ye really are a fool.”

Then she threw the bolt and slipped out the door. After she was gone, he banged his forehead on the hard oak a few times, wishing he could call back the moment that he’d opened his mouth to complain. He should have said he loved his haircut. He loved the idea of improving his lot in life.

He loved her.

Then Nab, who would rather have had his own company than anyone else’s, sank slowly to the stone floor. All his life, he hadn’t minded being alone.

He minded now. And he feared he would for the rest of his days.

—From “Get Thee Hence,
What Dost Thou Here?”

 

 

 

—An observation from Nab,
fool to the Earl of Glengarry

Chapter Twenty-Four

Katherine’s knitting needles clicked in time with Margaret’s plodding around her chamber.

“I wish there was something I could do to hurry this one along,” Margaret said wistfully. “Sometimes, I think I’ll die pregnant.”

“Whist! Dinna tempt the devil,” Katherine said, surreptitiously making the sign against evil. “Are ye sure ye should be out of bed?”

“That’s the one thing I am sure of.” Margaret ground her fists into the small of her back as she walked. “If I lie there another moment, I’ll go dafter than Nab.”

“He does seem a bit more barmy than usual,” Katherine said, comparing the stocking she was working on to the one she’d finished to make sure it wasn’t already longer than its mate. “He told William he’d dreamed the scepter was hidden away where no one would find it for hundreds of years.”

Dorcas, who’d been flitting about the chamber tidying up, began remaking the bed. In silence, for a change.

“I’m surprised Nab would bring the scepter up since he’s the one who lost it in the first place,” Margaret said. “That must be a sore point with William.”

“It is, for all that he’s not complained, but that’s not the least of it. Nab claimed that in his dream
William
was the one who hid it! Wonder what’s gotten into him.” Katherine shook her head, then gaped at the way the maid was pounding the pillows. “Be easy, Dorcas. Ye’ll have feathers everywhere. What do ye think you’re doing?”

The maid stopped flailing away at the bedclothes and folded her hands before her, fig-leaf style. She dropped a reflexive curtsey. “I’m just plumping Lady Margaret’s pillows, m’lady.”

“More like beating them into submission,” Katherine said. “That’ll do. If we need to subdue any of the other linens, ye’ll be the first to know.”

“I’ll be in the nursery then.” Dorcas curtseyed first to Margaret, then to Katherine and padded down the spiral stairs.

“There’s something a bit off with Dorcas of late too.” Margaret stopped before the window and looked out on the loch.

Katherine tied off a row of stitches and laid her knitting aside. “She’s not talking our ears off for one thing.”

“If I were myself instead of two of me, I’d get to the bottom of it. There was a time when nothing passed in this keep without my notice, but my belly preoccupies me. I suspect I’ll not be descending or climbing those stairs again till this bairn comes. Ah, well, I’ll deal with what I can.” She turned and cast Katherine a shrewd glance. “It was good to see ye and William sharing a trencher last night.”

Katherine allowed herself a small smile. “’Tis not all we’ve been sharing of late.”

Margaret waddled over and sat on the stool Katherine had been using for her feet. “Tell me.”

Katherine loved her sister-in-law dearly but she couldn’t reveal the way William had bared his heart and his grief to her. She wouldn’t share that with anyone. It was too private.

Too . . . holy.

In the darkness, amid that deep sorrow, their souls had found each other again.

And then their bodies followed suit.

It was a tender joining because they were both so fragile. Once united, their ascent was slow but steady. Grief mixed with joy. Sorrow with unspeakable gladness. Kisses salted with tears. And at their pinnacle, the rightness of a homecoming, weary and spent but grateful to return to a place where the world made sense again.

Safe in each other’s love.

The next morning, she’d wakened with William’s arms around her, his leg thrown over hers, all tangled up in that vulnerable net of sleep. Even now, she could call up that drowsy, “all’s-right-with-the-world” feeling.

But it still felt so tenuous. As if she danced on a spider’s web. Their days were filled with pleasant moments and speaking glances and their nights with more whispered confessions and sometimes laughter that ended with another heart-stopping joining.

Even so, she feared being too happy. Their problem was only half resolved.

She was still barren.

“Och, that’s all right. Ye don’t have to tell me. I can see on your face how pleased ye are,” Margaret said when the silence between them had stretched past the point of comfort. She grimaced and rubbed her swollen belly. “Besides, once this bairn decides to come, the last thing I’ll be wantin’ to think about is marital bliss. When the pains start, I’ll be imagining myself beaning your brother on the head, not welcoming him back to my bed.”

“Ye’ve had no pain?”

She shook her head. “The little darling is taking her time.”

“Her? Ye think the child is a girl?”

“No, I only hope.” Margie rocked a bit on the stool, a comforting rhythm for her and the child inside her. “I suppose I should set myself to have another boy, but it would be so lovely to have a little girl. Oh, dinna mistake me. I love my boys. But as soon as they’re old enough not to irritate Donald, he’ll have them with him most of the time, lest I spoil them. A girl-child would be mine to dote upon as I please.”

“Till Donald arranges a match for her.”

“My, what a long view ye’re taking this day, and for a bairn not even born yet.”

“I’m trying not to. I dinna want to worry about the future. Sometimes, it just comes upon me.” Katherine took up her knitting again. She’d missed a stitch and had to unravel a row. “’Twould be so fine if all we had to fret about was now.”

“‘Sufficient unto the day,’” Margaret quoted.

“But surely we aren’t meant to ignore our obligations.” She still felt keenly the need to provide Will with an heir. But before she could say more, Fergie appeared with a polite cough at the open doorway.

“Beggin’ yer pardons, m’ladies,” he said, tugging respectfully at his forelock. “Lord William says ye’re to come quick, Lady Katherine.”

“What is it?”

The boy grinned but shook his head. “ ’Tis a surprise. Please, m’lady, he’ll think I’ve not done my job if ye dinna come.”

“Go,” Margaret said, raising her ponderous bulk to her feet and ambling back to the window. “The sooner ye go, the sooner ye can return to tell me what’s afoot.”

Katherine didn’t need to see her sister-in-law’s face to know Margie hoped the surprise was that Donald had ridden back to Glengarry or sailed down the half-frozen loch and was unexpectedly going to be present for the birth of his sixth child. It was why she kept going to the window.

Kat suspected she was destined for disappointment.

After wrapping a warm brat around her shoulders, Katherine followed Fergie down the twisting stairs and through the great hall. It was Hogmanay, the last day of the year, so the yeasty scent of baking spilled out of the kitchen and into the hall. The little ones who called Glengarry home would make their rounds as soon as the sun set, begging for treats.

An old song from her childhood flitted through her mind.

Katherine used to think she was singing away the trolls and other evils that might threaten those she loved through the coming year. If only evil could be turned aside by a song. If only life were that simple....

Still, she hummed the tune to herself as she and Fergie continued outside and across to the bailey.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“To the stables.”

She wondered if a new litter of pups had been born, but she didn’t remember noticing that any of her father’s deerhound bitches were in whelp. Still, if there were puppies, William would want to show her. He knew how she doted on small new things of any stripe. And speaking of small things . . .

“Have ye seen Angus about lately?” she asked Fergie. “The wee fellow has been making himself scarce.”

Once her terrier had gotten the lay of Glengarry Castle, he’d made it his personal hunting grounds. He still stayed clear of the deerhounds, but beyond that, he might be found anywhere—winding around Cook’s ankles, hoping for something delicious to drop to the floor in the kitchen; licking up the drippings in the brewery; looking for a friendly word or an idle pat from the folk who worked in the carpentry and stonemason’s shops.

“Aye, yer wee Angus is part of why we’re going to the stable, m’lady. Ye’ll see.”

William and Nab were waiting for her just inside the big double doors.

“There ye are,” Will said with a wide grin. “Wait till ye see.”

His excitement was infectious and she grinned back. “What is it?”

He took her arm and led her to the slanting haymow ladder that was almost a staircase. Will gave her a gentle push upward and followed closely behind. A few slats of sunlight shafted in through holes in the thatch, setting the dust motes swirling. The air was heavy with the sharp scent of fodder and warm beasts, along with an undernote of the less wholesome smells of a stable.

There, on the topmost mound of hay was Angus, sitting upright, with his ears perked and his eyes bright. As if he were some kind of doggie potentate, he had the Scepter of Badenoch clenched fast between his teeth.

“He’s the one who stole it?” Katherine said.

“Nay, he found it, I should think,” Nab said. “We’re pretty sure the original thieves hid it in the thatch of the chapel roof. Ye mind the low northwest corner”—he waited for her to nod, indicating that indeed she did know of that spot on the chapel roof where goats were wont to roam on occasion—“weel, that’s where the wee beastie found it, I’ll be bound.”

“How could ye know that?” she asked as William took the scepter from the terrier. To Angus’s credit, he didn’t put up much of a fuss beyond a brief whine.

“Because we caught them looking for it there—Ranulf MacNaught and his friends,” William explained as he stooped to give Angus a pat on the head and a scratch behind one ear. “But they were outfoxed by a wee dog.”

“Has the scepter been damaged?” Katherine swallowed back an unworthy knot of disappointment. That scepter and all it represented was why she’d fled Badenoch in the first place. It was a painful reminder that Will had no son to whom the rod could one day pass.

Will ran a finger along its length, pride in the symbol of his family’s line radiating from his face. “A few scratches in the silver, but those can be polished out. All in all, ’tis not much the worse for wear. Here, Nab. Take it back to the great hall to show everyone that it’s been found.”

He scooped up the terrier and held him out to Nab as well. “Ye promised whoever turned up with the scepter would be seated in the laird’s chair. Ye never said it couldna be a dog.”

Nab accepted Angus but drew back from the silver rod. “Nay, William, I canna take it. Ye’ve seen how slippery a thing it is in my keeping. Ye’d do better to trust it to the wee beastie.”

“In a few days, it’ll be Twelfth night.” William pressed it into Nab’s hand. “Ye can give it back to me then.”

Nab relented and took the scepter. Bearing both Angus and the rod, the fool scrambled back down the ladder, missing his footing and nearly tumbling off completely. But when his feet touched the lower level of the stable, he scurried toward the keep. Fergie ran ahead of them, shouting the news that the scepter was found and the “hero” would shortly be seated on the laird’s thronelike chair.

William made no move to follow.

“Ye dinna care to see the spectacle of a wee dog in the laird’s judgment seat?” she asked.

“No, this is Nab’s moment. Let him enjoy it.”

After they climbed down the ladder, she hooked a hand in his elbow. “It doesna bother ye to turn loose of the scepter?”

“Aye, o’ course it does. The fool is like to lose it again.” William shrugged, but she knew he wasn’t as indifferent as he tried to appear. “But if I dinna give him a chance to succeed this time, he’ll always fail.”

That was one of the many things she loved about him. William always gave people another chance, and when he did, they were usually so grateful they’d lop off their right arm rather than disappoint him.

He’d certainly given her plenty of chances.

“I’ve been chosen to be the first-foot for your father’s crofters,” he said as they strolled back toward the hall.

“That doesna surprise me a bit. Ye’re perfect for the job.”

The custom of the first-foot decreed that the first person to cross a threshold after midnight on the first day of the year would determine the luck of the household for the coming twelve months. Since a fair-haired visitor was considered unlucky, a well-favored, dark-haired man was usually chosen to serve as the designated first guest for all the homes in the surrounding area.

“’Twill take a while to ride out to all the crofts, and since there’ll be no moon tonight, I’ll need someone who knows the way,” he said. “Will ye go with me?”

It had been a couple of years since they’d performed this service for their own people. Katherine had started fearing that no matter how fine her tall, dark husband was,
she
was unlucky and her presence might lead to misfortune for their crofters.

But William obviously didn’t think so.

“Aye, I’ll go.” Things had been so good between them, if he wanted her along, she wasn’t about to say him nay. “I’ll need a bit of time to arrange for the gifts.” She’d have to organize the small parcels they were to deliver from the castle’s stores—a coin, bread, salt, coal, and a small flask of whisky for each of their stops.