The Return of Black Douglas (23 page)

Gordon and Alysandir were standing at the window. Gordon said, “I thought ye said Barbara had not met yer visitor.”

Alysandir had his gaze fixed upon Isobella. “Apparently, she has now. I have never known Barbara to make such fast acquaintance with anyone, especially another woman, and to see her arm in arm—’tis hard to believe what my eyes see.”

Gordon laughed. “’Tis a much gentler version of yer sister I see now than during her stay on Iona. I think she began to complain aboot it right after ye left.”

Alysandir barely heard. He was watching Isobella intently. What mischief do they plan?

Isobella saw Alysandir, but she was too occupied with the fact that Barbara liked her. It validated her as a member of the family, for several women smiled at her as they passed by. It was a happy moment, for she caught a glimpse of her future here. But, she reminded herself her future was not hers to plan. At least for now.

Marion and Sybilla left to change their clothes. Isobella and Barbara remained seated on the stone bench, while Isobella told her how Alysandir had rescued her and her twin, and Elisabeth’s fate in the hands of Angus Maclean.

When Barbara asked about her odd speech, Isobella told her that their family had been shipwrecked on an island for several years, during which time her parents taught them and gradually their accent had changed.

“We were rescued eventually.”

“And ye and yer sister were separated again,” Barbara said. “By another ship?”

Isobella nodded, careful to stick to the story as Alysandir had outlined it. “Yes.”

“If I were ye, I wouldna put one dainty slipper on board another ship,” Barbara said, and the two of them laughed, but Isobella’s was more of relief than good humor.

Later, they ended up in Barbara’s room so she could change for dinner. Isobella thought she was on safe ground with Barbara, safe enough to be able to discuss Alysandir, and even if she wasn’t, she had to ask. “I know we’ve just met, and you have a right to refuse me, but I must ask. Will you tell me about Alysandir’s marriage and Bradan?”

Barbara’s brows went up, and she smiled. “Ye have met the lad, then?”

Isobella nodded. “Yes, and I adore him. So much that I intend to see to his education. He is a bright boy, and it is a shame he has been an outcast. I want to know why Alysandir refuses to have anything to do with him, for whatever it is, it is not Bradan’s fault. And there is no way anyone could ever convince me that Bradan isn’t Alysandir’s son. He favors him too much.”

Barbara nodded. “Aye, he does, and Alysandir knows Bradan is his son, but whenever he sees him, he is reminded of the disastrous marriage that produced him.”

“I know he was married, but I do not know anything about the circumstances,” Isobella said, leaning forward with her hands folded in her lap, her gaze attentive upon Barbara’s face.

“Her name was Janet. It was an arranged marriage between the fathers. They were young and Alysandir loved her, but she never wanted to be married and she begged her father to let her join a convent. From an early age, she had her heart set upon becoming a nun. The idea of mating with a man was abhorrent to her.

“After almost a year of marriage, she left to visit her family and never returned. Alysandir learned later that she had fled to France. When she discovered she was expecting a child, she waited until after it was born and then sent the wee bairn to Alysandir. She sought an annulment and the protection of the church.”

Isobella was shocked. “And she got it?”

Barbara nodded. “Aye, it was granted. The church decided a nun was a higher priority than was a wife. The marriage was annulled. Her rejection hit Alysandir particularly hard.”

“Understandably,” Isobella said. “It must have been a terrible shock to him, but the child was his and totally innocent of wrongdoings.”

“Och! What ye say is true, and we all know it, but unfortunately Alysandir did not see it that way. He was away at the time trying to find Janet, and when he returned, he was furious to find another man’s bastard being foisted off as his. Even when it was pointed out that the age of the child coincided with the time that Janet was in residence at Màrrach, Alysandir refused to accept it as the truth and consequently, refused to acknowledge Bradan.”

Isobella was puzzled. Alysandir had shown himself to be compassionate and caring to her, a stranger. How could he be so cruel to his own flesh and blood? “But why?”

Their eyes met and Barbara shook her head. “’Twas twofold. He had no proof that Bradan was his lad, but more important was the annulled marriage. If Bradan was his, then he was conceived when his parents were married, yet the annulment invalidated the marriage.

“We dinna know if Janet told the church about the child. So no one knows if Bradan would be considered a bastard or a legitimate heir. If Alysandir should be forced by the king’s regent to marry again, and if he should have a son, recognizing Bradan could jeopardize the position of a legitimate son.”

“But this could all be worked out, surely. Your uncle is the abbot.”

“Aye, and Alysandir would cut with him if our uncle went around him and tried to settle this. Any recognition of Bradan will have to come from Alysandir’s heart.”

Isobella sat back and thought there had to be a way to soften his hard heart. Although the sort of treatment Bradan received was never justifiable, she was ashamed to think she had been guilty of misjudging Alysandir. She understood him better now.

She realized why he was at war with himself and how he could be a man who yearned for the softness and companionship of a woman, yet feared one bad marriage would only lead to another. It was sad to think how one woman could so damage both father and son. With a sigh, Isobella stared down at the hands folded in her lap before she said softly, “I had no idea he suffered so much pain from such a short marriage.”

“And suffers still. I hope I have no’ said too much,” Barbara said. “Ye have fallen quiet and pensive.”

“No… no, you haven’t said too much. As for pensive, I was thinking of a saying…
Two men look out through the same bars: One sees mud and one the stars.
I am ashamed to admit that when it came to understanding Alysandir, I saw mud.”

Barbara smiled. “’Tis what anyone would have thought if they did not know the entire story. Mayhap ye understand my brother a little better.”

Isobella was about to say it helped a great deal, but the door opened and Sybilla poked her head inside. “We should go down to the hall now or risk Alysandir’s displeasure.”

Isobella soon found herself being escorted to the empty place next to Alysandir, with his sisters to her left. The men were discussing their recent hunt and how the deerhounds, Duff and Malcolm, had brought down the ten-antlered stag.

Drust said, “Duff’s quick eye caught sight of him immediately. He stood still as a stone, with his ears erect and one foot lifted off the ground.”

“And then he looked straight at Alysandir,” Gavin said, “like he was asking whether it was time to give chase. Puir Malcolm, being young and not so well trained, sprang forward pulling Alysandir doon. Had it no’ been for the rope wound around Alysandir’s hand, Malcolm would have taken off after the stag.”

Colin cut in, “Alysandir came close to changing his name from Malcolm to ‘Muckle Fule’ as he kept calling him.”

“By that time, the stag was on his way to Iona,” Drust added.

Everyone laughed. Isobella glanced toward Alysandir and almost overturned her goblet at the smoldering desire in his gaze.

Conversation died down by the time everyone finished. Isobella smoothed the dark green fabric of her skirt and toyed with the goblet of ale she did not touch, hoping all the while that Alysandir had forgotten her promise to play Tafl. She didn’t trust herself alone in the room with him.

The thought had no more than formed in her mind, when he stood and offered her his hand, saying, “And now, Mistress Douglas, ye shall accompany me to the library where ye will demonstrate yer skill at Tafl.”

“Ye play Tafl?” Barbara asked, obviously astonished. “’Tis no’ a game women play.”

Isobella nodded, thinking that she wasn’t going to explain how she became intrigued with medieval games in college and joined an extracurricular group to learn how to play many of them. “My father taught me to play.”

She put her hand to her head and was about to plead a headache when she glanced at Barbara, who gave her a look that said,
I wouldn’t if I were you
…

Well, a bargain was a bargain. She might as well get it over with, so Isobella placed her hand in Alysandir’s extended palm and accompanied him from the hall, relieved to see that Colin, Grim, and Gavin fell in line behind them, with Barbara tagging along.

Hnefatafl was an old Viking game dating to 400 AD. It was played in Scandinavia, Greenland, Britain, and as far eastward as the Ukraine. Its popularity began to wane with the introduction of chess in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, but there were still many, like Alysandir, who enjoyed playing it.

The beautifully carved wooden board was more than a foot square and bore some resemblance to a modern-day chessboard, with a central square in the middle. Alysandir’s pieces looked to be carved from ivory and onyx, with a larger king and smaller pawns and rooks that numbered twelve light pieces and a king facing twenty-four dark pieces.

The white king was placed in the central square, or throne, surrounded by his white men, which Alysandir gave to Isobella. He, appropriately she thought, took the black pieces, which would try to keep her king from reaching a corner square. She won two of the four games they played.

“Hout! She plays like a man,” Colin said. “I doubt any of us could beat her. You were verra fortunate, brother.”

“Aye,” Alysandir grumbled, and everyone laughed.

“I consider myself very fortunate to win two games,” Isobella said.

“Ye play verra, verra well,” Colin said.

“She amazes me on a daily basis,” Grim said.

At that point, everyone looked at Alysandir, who had remained quiet throughout the discussion. He gave her a frank stare and asked, “Is there anything ye canna do?”

“Be quiet,” Isobella said so candidly that everyone fell into fits of laughter, Alysandir included.

Chapter 26

A little rebellion now and then

is a good thing.

—Letter to James Madison, 1787
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
U.S. president, political philosopher, architect, inventor

Alysandir’s brothers began to bid her good evening. Isobella stood and walked beside Barbara. She got as far as the door.

“Mistress Douglas, I would have a word with ye,” he said.

Barbara squeezed her hand, and Isobella glanced quickly at Colin, who gave her a sympathetic look before he ducked through the door, dragging Barbara along with him.

Isobella turned, and her heart began to pound at the dark look of desire she saw gleaming in the depths of his eyes. Her own heartbeat began to escalate. She was held immobile and speechless for a moment, as if caught in the blinding reflection of headlights. Her mouth was dry. Her heart pounded. Her body grew warmer beneath the heat of his gaze.

She felt hypnotized and completely under his power. So much so that she was not aware she made a small moan of distress and suddenly found herself in his arms. Nothing was more treacherous than her own body or so capable of betrayal, and it left her with her defenses down. The warmth of his body penetrated hers and left her weak, and she melted against him.

He pulled her so close her leg was pressed against his knee. She tried to step back, but he caught her, and the next thing she knew, she was in his lap. It was, by her estimation, a rather awkward landing, remindful of the clumsy puffins, but with the heady pull of attraction between them, that did not seem to matter. She felt her body melt into his until it was difficult to discern just where hers ended and his began.

His lips closed over hers tenderly, moving slowly over her mouth, gentle, yet demanding. Without breaking the kiss, his hand slid over her skirts until it reached the hem, where it disappeared. Instinctively, she shuddered and started to pull back, but he sealed her mouth with another hot, impassioned kiss as his hand moved higher until he was at the juncture of her thighs. He found and pulled the drawstring and peeled away her undergarments. While he increased the pressure of the kiss, his hand began to stroke her.

She wanted to cry out from the sheer pleasure of it. He was whispering words in Gaelic against her skin, and her heart began to pound in unison with the tempo of her body. Again… again… and again until she wanted to cry out in agony. Oh, God, she couldn’t stop him even if she wanted to, for she wanted this as much as he. Her breathing was slow and thick, and she found her legs parting of their own accord.

“Yes,” he whispered. “Yes, sweet Isobella, open yerself to me and dinna hold back.”

Hold back? Was he crazy? She couldn’t hold back even if she wanted to. Her body had taken control, and she shamelessly writhed in his arms, moving in rhythm with each stroke of his hand until the intensity, the liquid warmth, the words he whispered against her hot skin were more than she could bear. She began to pant and press against his hand until she cried out and her body collapsed against him.

He tied the drawstring, pulled her skirts back down and held her until her breathing was back to normal. She wasn’t certain if he would let her up, but when she made the attempt to stand, he let her go, saying nothing but keeping his gaze upon her face.

“Is this what you wanted to talk to me about?” she asked weakly, as she strove to control her rapid breathing and still her runaway heart.

“Ye would have preferred to talk?”

“I wanted to know why you detained me.”

“Ye did say ye had trouble sleeping.”

She had an acerbic retort ready when she suddenly burst out laughing.

There was a gleam of wicked delight in his eyes. “Tell me on the morrow if it worked.”

***

It worked. But Isobella did not tell Alysandir that it worked, nor did she tell him that, with the help of his sisters, she found a room in the main part of the castle for Bradan. The room was one floor above Isobella’s room with a small corner fireplace and two windows with a view of both the sea and land. After much pillaging, the girls found a few odds and ends of furniture and a nice feather bed the perfect size for a boy. A small wooden table with two chairs would serve well enough for a desk where Isobella could begin his studies, using three books she had found in Alysandir’s library.

When she brought Bradan to see the room, he was both awed and terribly frightened. “The Mackinnon doesna care if I have this room?” he asked, while turning his head this way and that to survey his new room and its contents.

“He will not bother you about it,” Isobella said, not missing the way Barbara and Sybilla both closed their eyes and crossed themselves, while Marion had her head down and stared at the floor.

“We will start your lessons in the morning after we break our fast,” Isobella said.

***

The lessons were going smoothly that first morning, but Bradan was nervous, so Isobella distracted him by showing him maps. “This is what the world looks like, Bradan. This is Scotland, and if you will look here, this tiny little brown spot is the Isle of Mull.”

While he studied it, she placed a larger map of Mull that she had sketched next to the first. “This is another map of Mull.”

“’Tis bigger.”

“Yes, they are pictures of what Mull looks like, because it is much, much larger than this map, isn’t it? Now watch, and I will put an X where Màrrach is.” She marked the spot, and his eyes widened. “See, this is the Atlantic Ocean and the beach where I met you, and way over here is the island of Iona, where your great uncle, Lachlan Mackinnon is the abbot.”

“’Tis where Barbara was.”

“Yes, and over here where this X is placed is where the Macleans live at Duart Castle, but we dinna want to go there. They are on the ocean, too.” He put his finger on the blue water. “Have you ever heard of the Sound of Mull?”

“Aye. The Duke of Argyll lives across the Sound of Mull.”

“Very, very good, Bradan. How did you know that?”

“I heard the guards talking aboot it. They dinna like Argyll.”

She ruffled his hair. “Observant, lad! Now, this water is the Sound of Mull. Here is Duart Castle, and over here is Argyll. And over here is where the Atlantic and the Sound of Mull come together.”

They spent the rest of the day with her introducing short sessions of learning the alphabet and then letting him try his hand at copying the letters. That afternoon, they went down to the beach and drew letters in the sand and wrote a few words. He wanted to learn how to write her name so she showed him both Isobella and Alysandir.

Then they sat on a boulder and ate a scone and talked about oceans and countries, the sky and stars and constellations. And before they returned to Màrrach, they watched the tide come in and wash away all they had written there, as one would erase a chalkboard at the end of the day.

That night when she lay in bed, she kept seeing the wonderment in Bradan’s eyes and thought it must have been the same expression on the face of the first caveman who made fire. How much we take for granted in the twenty-first century, she thought, and felt blessed to be the one to open this beautiful little boy’s eyes to the universe he was part of.

Several days later, Isobella encountered Alysandir on the stairs, just as she was returning to her room. Before she could greet him, he grabbed her upper arm and escorted her to her room and closed the door behind them.

“You are angry.”

“I am beyond angry, Isobella. Ye have gone too far with this and without my consent.”

“What can it hurt to treat Bradan in the manner he deserves?”

“What do ye mean by that?”

“He is your son, whether you want to accept him as that or not. You only have to look at him to see he has your face, your coloring. He is tall and slender like you. For heaven’s sake, Alysandir, are you blind? Everyone at Màrrach knows he’s your son, but they do not speak of it out of respect or fear.

“I’m not saying you have to claim him, but he is your legitimate issue, your flesh and blood, and because of that, he should be afforded a place to sleep that is better than that of a stable hand. I am appalled that you would let him go uneducated. If you should never marry again and have a son, Bradan could be your heir. Would you have him be an illiterate lout if the mantle of chief is placed upon his shoulders?”

She watched the muscle in his jaw work, but she wasn’t finished. She figured she had already gone this far, so she might as well wade into it with both feet. “If it would make things better in the eyes of your clan, punish me for what I have done, but don’t take it out on Bradan. He has been punished enough for being born.”

“I canna allow ye to disobey me. You will confine yerself to this room and take all yer meals here until I decide what to do with ye.”

She nodded, and before she could speak, he departed.

The next morning, she was up early, and she debated only a moment whether she would disobey him. Soon she was on her way to the beach, where she found Bradan, and they walked together, talking about the ocean and the changes in his life. He wrote their names in the sand, and they finished their morning school lessons and then stopped to share the lunch she brought.

“Have you ever been inland… away from the sea?”

“Aye, I go there when I want to look for birds and nests or to catch a fine troot in the burn.”

“Did you see any big stones that stand straight up like they are pointing to the sky or a cave with drawings?”

“Aye, there is a cave near the kind of stones ye speak of not so verra far away, but ye canna go into the cave except when the tide is oot.”

“Can you take me there?”

“Aye.”

“Would it be better if we went on horseback?”

“I canna ride a horse.”

“I want you to show me where the cave is. We will go to the stable for a horse, and you can ride behind me.”

They returned to the castle, but the grooms refused to give her a horse. She found Colin who not only ordered her a horse saddled but also one for him. “I shall accompany ye so Alysandir willna lop off my heid wi’ a claymore for allowing ye to go.”

He ordered a sidesaddle for her, but Isobella quickly said, “Please give me a saddle like you would ride. I don’t know how to ride sidesaddle, and I don’t have time to learn today.”

If she hadn’t scandalized everyone at Màrrach by now, she soon would, for she not only ordered a horse saddled, but she asked Colin to find her a pair of trews she could wear under her skirts. Once she had climbed onto the saddle, Bradan was boosted up behind her.

The cave was almost an hour away. They were fortunate that Colin brought a torch as Bradan suggested, and he lit it before they entered the cave. Inside, they found two stone slabs covered with ancient markings which Isobella immediately identified as Celtic. Bradan found two flints and a bronze pin, while Colin found a bone-scraping tool. Two pottery vessels were unearthed near a circle of blackened stones that had probably ringed a fire. One of the pottery vessels broke when Colin lifted it.

Upon close examination, the relic showed signs of residue inside, and Isobella wished she had some twenty-first-century tools to date her finds. She would have to find a way to preserve the artifacts and to leave as much information as possible for future archeologists. She didn’t want them to be stolen or damaged by anyone who did not recognize their true value to mankind. However, she knew that finding the artifacts was one thing. Finding the right place to stash them was another.

Time passed quickly, and the sun eventually began to drop toward the horizon. She knew they did not have time to look any longer, for the torch would be out soon and the tide would be coming in. Neither Colin nor Bradan thought their finds were half as remarkable as Isobella did. She, on the other hand, could not contain her excitement as they rode back to Màrrach. She needed to find a way to document the site and preserve the major pieces… that was her first objective.

She was still lost in similar thoughts as they arrived at the castle gates. Bradan abandoned her immediately by saying he needed something from his room. Shortly after Bradan disappeared, Colin said, “Mayhap I will see ye at supper.”

He seemed just as anxious to leave her as Bradan. “Where are you going?” she asked.

Colin rubbed his midsection and replied with charming affability, “I am off to the kitchen to find something to quiet my hunger afore my stomach decides to digest my doublet. Would ye like me to fetch something for ye?”

“Thank you, no,” she said. “I think I can wait until supper.”

They parted ways, and she continued down the hall, passing Alysandir’s library.

“I would have a word with ye, Mistress Douglas,” a voice called out from the room.

Oh, my, she thought, I must have really offended him. She knew she might as well get this over with, so she walked into his library and stopped before his desk. “You wish to discuss something?”

“Aye,” he said, looking her up and down. “Where have ye been dressed like ye are?”

“Digging in a cave some distance from here. It is by the sea and its mouth fills with water when the tide is in.”