Scottish Brides (38 page)

“Well, should I dismount and wake them up? You can't go about making off with something that's sound asleep.”

“You lack the proper respect for these doings, lass,” he said, forcing his voice to be stern.

“Then pretend that I'm a fellow raider, Lachlan. What would happen next?”

“It would be a full moon, for one. We would be able to see better. A few men would stand as lookouts, and a few would cull the cows from the herd.”

“We've no moonlight; can we not simply pick out a cow?”

“I've no wish to break my horse's leg, Ealasaid,” he explained, “by riding over a unknown field.”

“Oh.”

“Unless, of course,” he offered, “you wish to examine it. I could stand here while you crisscross the field.”

“And step in dung?”

“Lass, where is your daring?”

“Not in my slippers, Lachlan.”

In truth, he felt more like laughing than reiving.

“Then what shall we do?”

He slid from the horse and held his arms out for her.

“We're more surefooted,” he said, as she lowered herself into his embrace. Again, he was tempted to hold her against him. Instead, he regretfully stepped back. “And we'll walk carefully.”

A few minutes later, he spoke again. “Which one?” he whispered, as they crept up on the herd of cows clustered beneath the tree.

“I'm to pick one?”

“This is your raid, lass. Which beast looks longing for travel?”

“An English cow with a yen for Scotland?”

“There, I knew you would learn the trick of it.”

“The rather large one over by the fence.”

“That one looks to be in the mother way, lass. The journey might be too rough on her.”

“Oh.” A moment later, she spoke again. “How can you tell?”

He could not quite stifle his laughter. “Look at her belly, lass. And her teats.”

“Is that one acceptable?” She pointed stiffly to another cow. He turned and smiled at her even though it was probably too dark for her to see him. She was embarrassed, but weren't such things discussed among farmers? Not, evidently, between the squire and his daughter.

“That one does looks restless. Bored, too, don't you think? Shall we go and invite her for the journey, then?”

“We're just going to walk up to one?”

“We are. Have you a handkerchief, lass?”

She pulled her handkerchief from her pocket and handed it over to him. It was the only thing to be seen in the darkness, a white flag. Lachlan used it to muffle the bell that hung around the cow's neck.

Once that was done, he gripped the bell rope firmly and led the unresisting cow to the edge of the pasture, opening the fence with one hand while Ealasaid followed him.

“It doesn't seem very adventurous, Lachlan.”

“Oh, it's not the cows that mind being raided, lass. It's the people you have to watch for.”

He was just congratulating himself on the success of their venture when a shout was heard from the side of the field. More than one man, by the sound of it.

He pulled her behind the trunk of the tree, looked at the looming shadows of his horse and their soon-to-be-stolen cow on the other side and cursed. Unless those men were blind, they would see them in only moments.

“Who is that?” Ealasaid whispered.

“Guards, no doubt.”

“I'd not thought to look for one.” Her voice sounded horrified.

“That's because you're new to this,” he said. “It's a stupid thing we've done, lass, but I hold myself to blame. They use dogs a bit, and guns.”

“Guns?”

“You sounded like a mouse then, Ealasaid. Is it that you're afraid?”

“I've no wish to be shot for a cow.”

“Ah, then you'd be bored with being a reiver, lass.”

“You don't like it either, do you, Lachlan?”

He thought about it for a moment, considered not answering her. But when he did, it was with the truth. “I've no liking for taking that which doesn't belong to me. I've tallied all that I've borrowed over the years and know to whom I owe it. My ancestors would, no doubt, be cursing me from their stones if they knew I was such a failure at thievery.”

“And you really didn't want to steal this one, did you?”

“As I said, it's easier when my men are with me.”

She gently pulled the bell rope from his hand.

“What are you about, lass?”

“If we leave her behind, then we won't have done anything wrong.”

“Still, I doubt an Englishman truly shies at shooting a Scot, lass.” She had the oddest ability to summon forth his humor.

She peeked out from behind the tree, led the cow to the opening in the fence, and then pulled the handkerchief from the bell and slapped the cow on the rump. She ambled back to her companions without much encouragement, her bell clanking loudly.

Ealasaid closed the fence behind her and raced back to the tree. Lachlan had mounted by that time, and he pulled her up behind him.

“Isn't this about the time you headed for safety?” she asked, her voice breathless.

The journey back to her home was filled with the sound of their laughter.

 

They rode to the side of the house, where the shadows loomed the darkest. He dismounted and held his hands out for her again. When her feet touched the ground, he stepped closer, reached out with his hands and framed her face. “It seems, lass, that I still owe you an adventure.”

Silence, while she looked up at him and framed her question.

“Would you show me Glenlyon?” she finally asked, reaching out to touch his arm with a trembling hand. The request was rash, perhaps, but patience had been burned away by her earlier anger and her present grief. That, and a longing she should not have had, yet could not help but feel. She wanted to see his home, the land he called his. She wanted to see the place she'd dreamed of for two whole nights, and wished for even before that. She wanted, too, with a true feeling of wickedness, for him to kiss her.

“Show you?”

He slowly stepped back, dropped his hands. She missed their presence, their warmth, the feeling his touch gave her.

“The moon is no longer full, but it's light enough to see, is it not?”

He nodded.

“And your horse is strong enough to bear the burden of another rider.”

He smiled. “As well you know. Do you wish to study the color of the curtains, then?”

“No,” she said, smiling. “Only to see it. Is it far?”

“An hour, no more, of fast riding.”

His fingers reached out and touched her face again, brushed back her hair, tucked it behind her ear. It was a gesture of intimacy, one of gentleness. She should have been shocked at it, if not offended. But she turned her head so that her cheek cradled his palm, held herself still in that moment when she heard his indrawn breath.

“I owe you a bit of excitement, don't I, lass? For the bore-dom of stealing cows. You want to see my home?”

She looked up at him, defenseless in that instant of truth. “With all my heart,” she said. For a few hours, to be home in Scotland. To be someone she'd not been for seven years. “If we left when the night was young, could we not return before dawn?”

“There's naught to see at night, Ealasaid.”

“Then you will have to describe the scenery to me,” she said. “Or I can close my eyes and envision it myself.”

“We could do that now, could we not? If you close your eyes, I'll tell you about Glenlyon.”

“Please take me there, Lachlan. You may sling me over your saddle if you wish, and I'll pretend to be booty from your raids.”

He tapped his finger on the tip of her nose. “You'd soften a stone with such pleading, lass. I've but a warning for you: there's more hardship than beauty about my land.”

“I know that well, Lachlan. I need to see it. Will you take me?”

“Yes, lass, I will. Tomorrow.”

 

A feeling he could not identify seemed lodged in his chest. He could not help but grin broadly all the way home. For the first time since he'd known Coinneach MacAuley, he blessed the seer.

His journey was interspersed by a chuckle from time to time. It was happiness; that's what it was. He felt as if all the hardships he'd undergone in the past few years were for a reason, the better to understand the fortune of his future.

She wanted to see his home. She yearned for a sight of Glenlyon. No typical English miss, this. Even her voice was different, acquiring a richness to it. Or maybe that was simply wishful thinking. He felt like a boy again, adrift in memories of the woman he'd left behind him.

Oh, lass, if you only knew. It's more than a sight of my home I've a longing to give you.
He grinned again and leaned into the wind.

Eight

 

 

 

Not even Harriet could spoil her mood. Nor could Jeremy,
although today he seemed even more attentive than usual. The day also seemed to cooperate, not passing with that aching slowness as it was wont to, but sliding from morning to night with gratifying speed. One thought seemed to accentuate its passage.
I am going to Glenlyon. I am going to Glenlyon.

She sat through their evening meal with patience, her mind not on the lecture being delivered by Harriet nor on the long looks from Jeremy, but on the night ahead. She wished she had something daring to wear, something to echo her heart's wish. Something red, perhaps, or startling green. Something blue, to match the sky's tint, or even yellow to act as a harbinger of day. But she'd only her serviceable browns and blacks, and a shawl of ivory that had once been Harriet's. It would have to be enough for this grand adventure.

But she could wish, could she not? Or hope that her hair would behave just this once? An impossibility, it seemed, but even that fact could not destroy her happiness.

Time ticked by on slow, ponderous feet as she waited for the household to quiet. She stood at her door, her hand pressed against the wood of it, heard the ringing of Mrs. Hanson's bell as she summoned her maidservant to her. Harriet's voice came in response to some remark from Jeremy; a murmur from a servant answered someone's question. Then the night seemed to enfold them, pressing down to silence the entire world.

Everything but the beat of her heart.

She waited an hour more, then sped from the house, her leather slippers flying across the night-shaded grass. She did not realize she had passed him until Lachlan's hand reached out and caught her arm, propelling her into his embrace so forcefully that they both landed hard against the trunk of a tree.

“It's eager you are, lass?”

His chuckle warmed her heart, banished any errant thought cautioning her that such actions were improvident and risky. Instead, she looked up at his shadowed face, felt for the edge of his smile with her fingers, and knew herself to be more welcomed here than in any place she'd been these last seven years.

“Aye, Lachlan,” she teased. “I am.”

“Then the night awaits, my border lass.” He pulled her to where he'd tied his horse and helped her mount behind him.

Glenlyon Castle was a mammoth black shadow that guarded a series of valleys and a small loch. A torch here and there marked its boundaries, seemed to accentuate its size. Lachlan called out a greeting, and they rode through a narrow gate and into the courtyard. The sounds of fiddles and flutes colored the air, as did the laughter of those gathered there.

He reached up his hands to help Janet dismount. A faint smile played on her lips; her eyes held questions as she looked about her. The courtyard was crowded with people, and the rich smiles of his clan masked the poverty of his home. There were few things of beauty left at Glenlyon, but there was the castle itself, an old, imposing fortress that loomed gray on the horizon.

“They've been told you were coming,” he explained. “And they play for your arrival.”

Her face seemed to bloom at the idea of that. Her smile became one of true happiness; her cheeks turned pink. She was such a surprise, his Ealasaid. One moment daring, the next almost shy.

He bent his elbow, placed her hand on the bend of his arm, and escorted her into the Great Hall. While it was true that the castle had seen better days, there was none to say a Sinclair could not make a party when the occasion warranted it. At their entrance, the fiddles came to a stop, and a signal to the flute player called forth a trilling note that faded into the distance.

He turned to her, his words silenced by the sight of her. One candle had not done her justice. There was true red in her hair, and her eyes were the blue of Scotland's skies. Her skin was pale but enlivened by the blush that seemed to grow as he watched. She was not a tiny woman; her chin would rest upon his shoulder. Her lips were full and seemed to beckon a kiss. Would he shock or please his clan if he bestowed one upon them here and now?