The Saint (29 page)

She forced her gaze to his, though the burning in her chest made it feel as if the air had been squeezed from her lungs. “I will come for one month. But after that, any debt I have to you will be paid in full.”

Cool, arrogant eyes met hers. He nodded. “Very well. A month.”

He thought he could change her mind. But he couldn’t. He’d done what she’d thought impossible: he’d made her hate him.

Motte of Dingwall, Cromarty

They’d been at the Earl of Ross’s fortress of Dingwall for a few days before Magnus had the opportunity to speak to Helen alone. His duties on the road, and their natural separation when they arrived, not to mention her brother and Munro’s hovering, had forced Magnus to keep a watch on her from a distance. He was almost—almost—glad for the other men’s presence. Sutherland and Munro’s vigilance was added protection against something happening to her. Of course, they thought
he
was the threat.

He hoped to hell they were right. But he wouldn’t relax his guard until …

He didn’t know when he’d ever be able to relax his guard. The danger would be there as long as there was anyone who sought to uncover the identities of Bruce’s phantom warriors. Helen was connected to the Guard, whether she wanted to be or not.

Magnus felt an unexpected flare of anger at his dead friend. Had Gordon even thought of the danger he was exposing her to when he’d married her?

The potential danger was all Magnus could think about. If their enemies thought Helen knew something …

Hell, he didn’t want to think about what they would do to her to extract it. He’d already thought about it plenty the night she’d been late in returning to the castle.

He never panicked. Never. No matter how dire the situation, he always knew what to do. Even among the cool, unflappable members of the Highland Guard, Magnus was known for his steely nerves and levelheaded thinking in the heat of battle. But for one horrible moment, he’d felt the icy grip of fear close around him to lock him in a mind-numbing state of helplessness. If anything happened to her …

He’d become completely unhinged.

In retrospect he’d overreacted, but at the time all he could think about was Helen in the grasp of some sadistic bastard bent on extracting information from her.

The king was right. There was probably nothing to worry about. But he wouldn’t be able to relax until he was damned sure of it.

Of course, in addition to watching Helen he also had his duty to the king. Like the Sutherlands’, Ross’s fealty had been recently and reluctantly given. Though Bruce had accepted Ross back into the fold for the good of the realm, never far from any of their minds was that Ross had been the man responsible for violating church sanctuary to turn Bruce’s queen, his sisters, his daughter, and the Countess of Buchan over to the English.

The tension in the Hall was understandably thick and the possibility of further treachery never far from their minds. But like the Sutherlands, Bruce had sought to solidify Ross’s pledge with an alliance, this one between Ross’s heir, Sir Hugh, and the king’s sister Maud. It was the agreement to the betrothal that they were celebrating in the Great Hall when Magnus saw Helen slip away.

Since they’d arrived at Dingwall she’d been acting strangely. Especially around the other ladies, she seemed unusually quiet and subdued. It reminded him of when
he’d first seen her at Dunstaffnage—as if there were something missing. He could not fault her appearance. He’d never seen her hair so artfully arranged, and she’d returned to a more modest gown selection—thank God!—but he wondered if something was wrong.

After a quick glance to MacGregor to keep an eye on the king, Magnus slipped outside after her. It was his duty. It wasn’t because he was worried about her.

Though the sky was clear, it was windy, and this close to the sea, cold for a midsummer day. Dingwall, an old Viking fortress garrisoned by the English and recently given to Ross to keep, was situated on a large motte fortified by a stone rampart and a hundred feet below by a wide ditch. The circular tower had been added to over the years, and now the castle was said to be the largest north of Stirling.

Magnus looked around but didn’t see her right away. There were a number of people about: servants rushing back and forth from the kitchens to the Hall, as well as soldiers patrolling the wall and guarding the gates.

He forced his heart to beat and clenched his jaw—he wasn’t going to panic, damn it—and methodically looked around again. He almost missed her. She was half-hidden behind a wall overlooking the ramparts; only a banner of long auburn hair blowing in the wind gave away her location.

With a deeper sigh of relief than he wanted to admit, he headed toward her. When he caught how quickly he was walking, however, he frowned. At Dunrobin he’d been doing his damnedest—without success—to avoid her. But after nearly a week of watching her from afar and speaking only when surrounded by others, if he didn’t know better he’d think he was anxious to see her. That he missed her.

Ah hell
. He knew he was slipping, and there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it. They were together, whether he liked it or not. He might as well make the best of it.

Captivated by the seaside view of the Firth below her, she didn’t hear him approach.

“I thought you liked dancing?”

She jumped at the sound of his voice and spun around with a start. But when she realized who it was, a bright smile turned her lips. Her delight at seeing him shouldn’t make him so happy—but it did. That smile settled right between his ribs and radiated through him. He felt as if he’d inhaled a ray of sunlight.

“Magnus, you surprised me!”

He smiled wryly. “I can see that. You appeared to be lost in thought.” Their eyes met. “Thinking up new cures for rashes, by chance?”

A delicate pink flush bloomed over her sun-kissed cheeks. She glanced up at him uncertainly from under long, dark lashes. “Are you very angry?”

Their gazes held for a long pause, the memories of what had happened hanging thick and hot in the air between them. A primal kick of awareness that hit right in the groin. Angry? He should be. But he wasn’t. He’d touched her. Had his hands in places he’d only dreamed of. Felt her body move against his. Tasted passion unlike anything he’d ever imagined. She’d tricked him into doing what honor would never have allowed him to do. Given him excuse. He wasn’t hypocritical enough to regret it.

But he didn’t want to encourage her. He wasn’t sure he would be strong enough to pull back again. “I was.”

“But you aren’t any longer?”

She looked up at him with such wide-eyed hopefulness, he had to force a stern expression. “I might be persuaded to forgive you,
if
you give me your word you will never do something like that again.”

She pursed her mouth distastefully. “I was provoked. And it isn’t my fault she jumped to the wrong conclusion. ‘Strange rash’ could have meant anything.”

The defiant little minx. “Helen …”

From the way she tossed up her chin, he assumed she didn’t like his tone.

“Very well, as long as you promise not to do something like that again as well.” Her face fell, and she lost some of her bravado. “It was wrong of you to do that in front of me.”

“You weren’t the only one feeling provoked.” He glanced down at her dress. “I noticed you aren’t wearing any more of those ‘modest’ gowns.”

She blushed and turned away.

Content to simply stand beside her, he followed the direction of her gaze and watched the fishing boats going in and out of the port of Dingwall below.

Finally, she broke the silence. “Does the king have need of me?”

He frowned. “Nay, why do you ask?”

She lifted a brow wryly. “I figured you must have a reason to seek me out.”

The wryness of her tone bothered him. He felt a twinge of guilt. But he could no longer avoid her—even if he wanted to, which he realized he didn’t. “I thought there might be something wrong. You didn’t appear to be enjoying yourself at the meal, and you left before the dancing started. Munro didn’t look very pleased to see you go.”

He frowned, thinking how possessively the other man had been watching her. Had Sutherland not prevented him, Magnus suspected Munro would have followed her out of the Hall. It shouldn’t bother him so damned much.

She tilted her head, studying him with a contemplative look on her face. “I didn’t realize you were watching me so closely.” When he didn’t react, she gave him a rueful smile. “I just felt like I needed a breath of fresh air.”

“I saw you with Ross’s sisters. It must be nice to have ladies near your own age to talk to.”

“It is.”

He frowned again, realizing he was missing something. “But …?”

She shrugged. “I just don’t always know what to say.”

“You? I’ve never known you to be at a loss for words.”

She laughed. “You say it as if you wished otherwise.”

His mouth twitched. “I used to sit there listening to you, wondering how a young lass could have so much to talk about. I fell asleep in the sun more than once listening to you.”

She gave him a playful shove. “You were supposed to be fishing.”

“How could I, when your chattering was chasing all the fish away?”

“I never chattered,” she said indignantly.

With her hands on her hips, her hair blowing around her head in a blaze of sunlight, big blue eyes staring up at him from out of that elfin face, it was so reminiscent of one of those days that a fierce wave of longing hit him square in the chest. He wanted to go back. He wanted to catch her against him and never let her go.

How could he have thought he could forget her? She was a part of him. It was his own bloody tragedy.

“Magnus?” Her brows furrowed.

He shook off the memories and gave her a sheepish smile. “Aye, you did, but I didn’t mind. I liked listening to you. So why now have you run out of things to say?”

She shrugged. “You were always different. You never made me feel like I was saying the wrong thing. I was always comfortable around you. Well, not always, but that was later.”

He wasn’t following her, but he knew there was something important in what she was saying.

She saw his confused expression and tried to explain. “I haven’t run out of things to say, I just say the wrong thing.” When he looked at her disbelievingly, she gave him a wry smile. “Earlier today I was in the solar with the other
women and they were discussing the pig they were roasting for the feast, and before I knew it I was going on about the first time I’d seen a piglet born and how incredible it was—needless to say, not something they wanted to think about before our meal.” She pointed down to a large rock on the edge of the water. “I’m like that baby gannet down there—see the black one in the midst of all the yellow-headed ones?—a little odd.”

He frowned. “Nonsense.”

But as he thought back on it, he realized he had noticed that she’d rarely interacted with the other young girls when they were at the Games. “What about Muriel?”

“Muriel’s different. We have things in common.”

“Don’t you have things in common with the others?”

“Some things.” She shrugged. “I don’t know, it’s hard to explain. I want things that they don’t.”

“Like what?”

She thought about it a minute and said simply, “More.”

Helen could see from his expression that he didn’t understand, which wasn’t surprising, as she didn’t know how to put words to the “wayward” part of her that wanted to follow her heart, and to the vague sense of guilt and unease that came over her when she listened to the other ladies who were content to do what was expected of them.

“It’s nothing,” she said, suddenly embarrassed. “I’m just being silly.”

He took her arm and turned her to face him. “Nay. Tell me. I want to understand.”

That’s what had always made him so different: the willingness to try. “I want to live a life beyond a castle gate. I want to have what you have.”

“What’s that?”

“Freedom. Choice. The ability to travel beyond a gate without someone sending out a search party.”

He gave her a sharp look, but then smiled ruefully, seeming
to understand what she meant. “We are all bound by convention, Helen. I have my duty to the king—and to my clan.”

“But you like what you do and must take satisfaction out of being good at it. You wouldn’t wish to be a scholar or a prelate rather than a warrior?”

“Good God, no!”

His expression made her laugh. “What if there was but one path before you? One road that you had to take? Sometimes when I listen to the other women talk, I start to feel this weight coming down on me, and I get so antsy I have to move, I have to
do
something.”

He studied her, perhaps seeing her more clearly than she did herself. “I should think being healer to a king is doing something.”

She smiled. “Making sure he eats his vegetables hardly qualifies. You and I both know I’m here as more of a precaution. I don’t know what I want, but it’s more than living behind a ten-foot-thick wall like this one.” One corner of her mouth lifted wryly. “And definitely more than a woman in my position should want.” She felt a prickle of shame for her selfishness. “I’ve a good lot in life; I should be content with it.”