Bride of Dunloch

Volume I of the Highland Loyalties Trilogy

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Copyright © 2012 by Veronica Bale

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For my Christopher

May you, too, find the courage to reach for your star

Chapter 1

In the watery grey light of a late spring dawn, two forces met to oppose one another at the main gate of Dunloch Castle, an imposing structure nestled deep in the Scottish Highlands.

On the side that attacked that day were the MacGillivrays—a clan dispossessed of its ancestral lands and home because its members would not swear loyalty to the English King Edward the First. Dunloch was theirs, and they would take it back—by any means necessary—from the hold of the English baron who had usurped it with the king’s blessing.

What the MacGillivrays did not know was that a good portion of the English garrison stationed at the nearby Fort Invercleugh waited to meet them. Soldiers hid behind the castle’s seven-foot-thick curtain wall, aimed their arrows through the many arrow loops, and concealed themselves behind the merlons which protected the wall walk.

The clan had been betrayed by its own people—villagers inhabiting what had previously been MacGillivray land. When the clan had been stripped of its home, the villagers had had no choice but to pledge their loyalty to England else they be thrown from their dwellings. It was they who, in fear of retribution from their new English lord, had divulged a plan formed by the MacGillivray chief and his warriors to retake the castle.

Under cover of darkness, the English troops had been ushered into the fortress to oppose them. They now stood guard, outnumbering the MacGillivrays by almost three to one, and prepared to lay carnage to the unsuspecting Scottish rebels.

“Lord Reginald ain’t about to thank this lot for attacking the day before his wedding I reckon,” said one soldier to another as they surveyed the force advancing on their position.

“If it weren’t my ass on the line, I’d be rooting for them Scots,” agreed his comrade. “Lord knows they ain’t got a hope in hell his Lordship will show mercy when they lose.”

The English soldiers, together with Lord Reginald D’Aubrey’s own force of Dunloch men, watched the approaching army with a mix of apprehension and confidence. Their opponents were fierce to behold, but his Lordship had numbers on his side.

The fearsome warriors halted at the top of the ridge nearest the fortress, and their chief lifted his claymore high above his head in a majestic arc. With a mighty roar, he shouted the MacGillivray battle cry:

“Garg’n Uair Duisgear!”

At this command, the rage-fuelled men of clan Gillivray charged down the slope of the ridge towards the defensive gates of Dunloch castle.

The Scots had come prepared—a crude battering ram, wielded by five men on each side of its width, slammed into the heavy oak gate with crushing force. The thick, stone curtain wall trembled violently underneath the feet of the English soldiers.

Sheltered behind the crenellated battlement, Baron D’Aubrey, accompanied by the commanding officer of the English troops, peered down at the invading force below.

“My Lord, we must engage our archers,” protested the officer.

“No—hold,” commanded Lord Reginald. “They must be allowed to break through to the bailey.”

“But my Lord, we have the element of surprise—they do not suspect our presence. If we reveal our numbers we will surely frighten these Scottish bastards away with very little force.”

“I said hold,” Lord Reginald repeated, his usually regal voice distorted in a vicious snarl.

“My Lord, I must insist we attack now. There is no need for any one of my men to die in an unnecessary fight.”

The baron turned his chin to the commanding officer, and the look with which he regarded the man was one of pure disdain.

“And what do you think they are going to do when they run away—leave us all in peace?” he argued. “Think again! You spare your men’s lives now or you spare them later. Either way there will be bloodshed.” When the commanding officer showed signs of relenting, he added, “When they break through to the bailey, your archers may turn around and have at them from the wall walk if they can get a clear shot. But I want those filthy Scot savages cut down. All of them!”

Both Lord Reginald and the English officer turned their attention back to the main gate as one final heave of the ram splintered the last of the wooden door. A horde of MacGillivray clansmen dressed in their tartans of red, green and blue poured through the shattered gate into the bailey with their claymores and battle axes drawn ... and were met with an English force far greater in size than they.

The battle was as bloody as it was fierce. The MacGillivrays fought with great courage and determination—even as it became more and more obvious that they were losing.

Lord Reginald watched with macabre relish as the MacGillivray men fell one after another; the anguished screams of the dying were as music to his ears. With a self-satisfied smirk, he turned to the commanding officer.

“Finish them off,” he ordered. “I don’t want a single one of those barbarians left alive to return to his people. I want them all wiped out.”

“Yes, my Lord,” the officer said as the baron left the wall walk to return to the keep.

Below, the clashing of metal against metal—and the grisly cries of the wounded men—rang out, shattering the silence of the misty Highland morning.

Jane Sewell stared out the window of the fine coach as it rolled through the unfamiliar and foreboding landscape. The thick mist, which they’d never seemed to be able to escape since crossing into Scotland, clung to the tops of the emerald mountains; the leaden sky threatened rain.

Rain or no rain, she wished she could run across those emerald hills—just for a short while. Her legs ached from sitting so long, and she craved the breathlessness of exercise.

But today she was dressed in her finest—far too fine to go tearing over the rough and wild terrain through which they travelled. A gown of silk the colour and sheen of pearls fitted her bodice snugly and hung loose from her waist, the fabric puddling at her feet. The sleeves, finely embroidered from the elbow, were so long and full that they fell almost as far as her skirts and had to be knotted at the ends to preserve them for the ceremony. In addition to her gown, her glossy, chestnut coloured hair was also at its finest—it was elaborately plaited, and tumbled over her left shoulder to the peak of her waist.

Whatever her appearance may have been on the outside, inwardly she felt sick, for today was her wedding day. Today she would complete the last part of her journey from her home in Sussex, England. In too short a time she would arrive at Dunloch castle where her future husband waited to marry her.

Lord Reginald D’Aubrey—an English baron granted Scottish lands by King Edward for his loyalty to the Crown. An influential man, with great power and wealth.

He was also more than three times Jane’s senior.

That fact was one part of the reason why her stomach churned relentlessly—fear of her wedding to this man who was as old as her father ... fear of the coupling which she’d have to endure afterward.

The other part was fear of the people of this dreadful land.

Scots. Barbarians. Brutes. All of the ladies in Sussex said so. Scotland was a warrior land, infested with men the size and density of boulders. Their arms and legs were the thickness of tree trunks, it was said, and but for the snout, a Scot’s skull could easily be mistaken for that of a bull. And sometimes even the snout did not indicate one way or the other, for they were an ugly race ... or so she’d been told.

Her sister Amelia had informed her that the reason they wore kilts was so their rape of innocent English girls—an act widely practiced and condoned due to their hatred of all things English—could be conducted without hindrance to their thick and monstrous nether parts.

Jane didn’t know whether to believe all that she heard or not ... but it frightened her nonetheless.

Tears spilled from her wide, blue eyes and over her pale cheeks as the coach rolled onward. She was homesick already though she had only been gone for a fortnight and a half. She missed her mother. She missed her bedchamber and all the things she’d kept within as she’d grown from a child to a woman ... though she’d never felt the change and was rather sceptical that it had taken place at all.

She especially missed Hugg, her family’s Mastiff. Her Mastiff, really—if the fact that he loved her best counted for anything. She missed his great, wet muzzle nudging at her elbow in search of affection, missed his funny little paws with the middle toes clipped off to prevent him from outrunning the king’s deer. But her father would not let her take Hugg away with her; the beast was needed to protect the family’s estate.

She sniffled at the thought of having to leave Hugg behind; at the thought of having to leave at all. Why had Lord Reginald negotiated so persistently for her hand? Amelia was the beautiful one. It was the eldest Sewell sister who had all the men competing for her attention; it was for Amelia’s hand that Lord Sewell had already received several offers of marriage—though he had deemed them all unworthy.

Amelia; not Jane.

Yet Lord Reginald had made it very clear, when she was just a girl of fourteen, that he wanted her and not her more beautiful sister. With no other offers at hand, her father had been glad to accept and had relented only to his wife’s insistence that Lord Reginald must wait until Jane had reached her eighteenth birthday.

Though that stay of sentencing held little comfort now, on the very morning of her wedding day. More tears spilled from her eyelids, which were already hopelessly bloodshot and swollen from hours, days, weeks of crying.

“Please, my Lady, don’t cry,” implored Ruth, Jane’s beloved, middle-aged maid. She reached across the coach and patted her mistress’ clenched hand reassuringly. “What will his Lordship think when he beholds you—your eyes are the colour of a smacked backside.”

Jane smiled begrudgingly. “I am sorry,” she offered. “I know I must not cry. I have known of my betrothal to Lord Reginald for years; it is not as if I’ve been handed my fate without warning. And I do forget that you, too, have left your home, your family, and everyone you know to journey with me. I must not be selfish.”

“Yes, that is true,” Ruth agreed. “Though I am twice your age and am not about to meet my husband at the altar. But that is not what I meant. I meant only that it will do you no good to cry; tears will not change anything.”

“I know that in my head ... but I cannot seem to convince my heart of it.”

Ruth looked at Jane, her flat, brown eyes pooling with sympathy. “My Lady, I have raised you since you were a babe. I have watched you grow and blossom into the strong, independent woman I see before me now. You are a woman of discerning judgement and tremendous compassion. You are courageous and generous and patient. All of these, and many more qualities besides, will see you through this time of upheaval, I am sure. This is not a death sentence, it is but a test of your character—and because it is I that have raised you, I am confident you shall see it through with naught but the fortitude of which I know you to be capable.”

Jane nodded, unconvinced. “I shall certainly try, my Ruth—for your sake, at least.” Then, turning back to the carriage window, she was momentarily distracted by an odd site in the distance.

“What is that?” she wondered, leaning beyond the frame of the window.

Ruth slid across the bench on her side of the carriage to peer out beside her. There, distorted by the shifting mist, was a lone English soldier. The man, armed with a claymore and dressed in the familiar orange tunic and chainmail, stood vigilant in what appeared to be the middle of nowhere. It was as if he was standing guard—but what was he guarding? All that Jane could see behind him was a number of crows and buzzards flocking about and shrieking wildly.

“What on earth could he be doing?” she mused. Leaning out farther so that her head rounded the corner of the carriage box, she called to the driver. “Sir, might you stop the coach that we may see what is yonder?”

“My Lady,” protested Ruth, “you’ve no idea what’s out there. It is not safe!”

The driver, a man who had been specially hired to make the entirety of the journey with the bride-to-be, spoke without turning. “I’m to take you direct to the baron, my Lady. No unplanned stops.”

“Brute,” Jane muttered, drawing herself back into the carriage and slumping against the seat.

“My Lady, your curiosity will get the better of you one of these days, you mark my words.”

Jane shrugged, ignoring Ruth’s admonishment. “Father has ordered no stopping because he thinks I shall run away,” she said instead. “I suppose that is why he has paid handsomely for my safe delivery.”

“I think not,” countered Ruth. “Your father has raised you to obey, and knows full well you would not dare defy him. I believe it was the baron who arranged and paid for your travel; it was he that thought you might run. I cannot blame him for thinking it—a man as aged as he taking a wife of eighteen years ...” Realizing the callousness of her words, her brown eyes widened. “I’m sorry, my Lady. That was thoughtless of me.”

Jane chuckled without humour. “Think nothing of it. It’s not anything I don’t already know.”

She returned to staring helplessly out the coach window, but her eyes shed no more tears. Her mind was instead riveted on the sight she had just witnessed. There was something about it that she found very unsettling; very haunting.

And very intriguing.

A wedding took place at Dunloch castle that afternoon. Legions of nobles and wealthy landowners had flocked from far and wide to attend the ceremony. To Lord Reginald’s satisfaction, the blushing bride had been delivered—intact and without a struggle. And but for her hysterical sobbing through the entire service, it might even have been a beautiful wedding.

Jane knew she was letting her Ruth down by failing to hold back the racking sobs that consumed her. But try as she might, she simply couldn’t help it.

Chapter 2

“My Lady, may I present Laird Brian MacGregor, chief of Clan Gregor,” announced Tearlach, Dunloch’s steward, as he approached the dais. The elderly man gestured with a sweep of his arm, introducing yet another Scottish noble.

Jane, seated at the head table beside her new husband, turned her eyes from the magnificent tapestries displayed in the great hall which she’d been examining intently—not because she was particularly fascinated by tapestries, but rather to distract herself from the mire of her thoughts. Upon beholding the menacing looking MacGregor chief, however, her eyes widened and she reined in her natural inclination to recoil in terror.

The MacGregor chief, like all the Scots to whom she had been introduced thus far, was as large and fearsome as had been suggested by the ladies in Sussex. The man’s pale legs, bristling with copper coloured hair beneath his kilt of red and black, looked as though they had been chiselled from granite; thick bands of muscle wrapped the bones of his shins and protruded boldly above his knees as if they were sacks of grain anchored there. His shoulders were as broad as a bull’s and his neck was of similar thickness. The carnage this man could wreak on a battlefield ... she fought back a visible shudder at the thought.

“Baroness, the Highlands welcome ye,” the clan Gregor chief declared warmly.

He stepped forwards and held out his immense hand for her to take. Timidly, Jane reached her own hand across her untouched platter of food and laid it atop his. Alarm flitted through her as the slightest pressure of his fingers caused his ropes of forearm muscles to flex powerfully. Nevertheless, she held her expression of polite interest—a skill borne of her rigorous upbringing.

“Thank you sir,” she returned, her countenance demure. “I am sure I shall be very happy here.”

The MacGregor chief nodded. Then, turning to her husband, he said, “My Lord, have ye had any ken of MacGillivray?”

“I have not. And I must say, I am rather vexed at the fact,” Lord Reginald answered.

“No pulp of a corpse turn up then? Well, we’re keeping a lookout for the lad to be sure.”

“Pray that you do. I’ll not have him escape justice.”

The MagGregor chief, noticing Jane’s inquisitive expression at their exchange, took it upon himself to explain. “Yer lord husband has just snuffed out a wee uprising, didna ye ken, yer Ladyship?”

“An uprising?” she exclaimed, tensing in her seat.

“Oh, aye. The MacGillivrays. Tried to take the castle by force. Be no’ afraid, though, lass. His Lordship gave them a right walloping.”

“Oh dear,” she answered. “Let up hope it serves as a lesson to them that they shall think twice before acting so foolishly again. I do hope there were not too many killed.”

The MacGregor chief raised his eyebrows, struck by the girl’s naivety. “Aye, well, his Lordship’s side fared the better. No’ too many casualties.”

“Now, now, Brian. My bride need not be regaled with such gruesome tales,” Lord Reginald interrupted with a good-natured wink. “Far too burdensome for the female sensibility, is that not right my dear?”

Jane swallowed the insult and nodded complacently. “Indeed, my Lord.”

Though the conversation ended there, the MacGregor chief’s words piqued her interest. When the man moved away from the dais, she risked her husband’s displeasure and inquired further.

“My Lord—forgive me, but might I ask a further question on the subject? For if I am to be the mistress of this castle and of these lands I confess I would like to know as much as I can about its people—and also its enemies.”

Much to her relief, her persistence did not seem to anger her husband. Lord Reginald considered for a brief moment, shrugging finally.

“I suppose if you are going to be travelling to the village and interacting with its people, you might be better off to know whom you can trust and whom you cannot,” he reasoned. “The MacGillivrays lost their hold of these lands because they refused to swear their loyalty to King Edward. Since Dunloch and its people require rule, the king awarded them to me. These people need a fair and steady lord to guide them in the king’s name, you must understand, not a pack of slovenly, warring savages.”

Jane, who knew very little about politics, accepted the baron’s logic. “Well then, if they would not swear loyalty and then attacked the castle, I suppose you acted as you needed to in order to protect what is now rightfully yours.”

“That I did, my dear,” he agreed. “But be you warned—many MacGillivrays still live in the village and even in the castle itself, as do a great many more who were once loyal to the clan. They have been allowed to remain as they have pledged their allegiance to England and to the Crown, but there is no telling whether they harbour secret animosity or design, so do be careful.”

“Are there MacGillivrays here now?” she asked, her blood chilling at the possibility.

“Indeed there are,” he confirmed. “Most of the servants—with the exception of the kitchen staff, for I’d rather not suffer a death by poisoning if I can help it. And Tearlach over there—he was the MacGillivray steward before he became a turncoat to his clan and swore loyalty to England. I’ve got my eye on him—I do not trust that man. But he is good with the books, turns me a handsome profit, and so I retain him.”

Lord Reginald’s attention was diverted then by a guest who wished to speak with him. Jane was glad of the interruption, and used it to study the man who had once been a fearsome MacGillivray clansman.

Though fearsome was definitely not the appropriate word to apply to this particular Scot—or at least not anymore. It was clear that he had once been a man of great strength, and though he held the position of steward, she thought he must once have been a warrior as well. But the years had taken their toll on him—his face was terribly weathered, and his hands gnarled and arthritic. He walked with a bit of a limp as well, though not enough of one to hinder his movements.

There was something else that had taken its toll on the man, though, something which Jane was unable to identify. She could detect no visible hunch, yet the man walked with a stooped gait as if there was a great weight pressing down upon his shoulders. And his face, though very kind in appearance, looked disappointed somehow.

Or perhaps ... sad.

She was frightened by the burly specimens of virile Scottish men present in the great hall that evening. This one, however, for reasons unknown to her, stirred within her a small pang of sympathy.

As the night wore on the merriment grew significantly uninhibited—as did the accompanying drinking. By the time the festivities came to a close, far beyond the midnight hour, more than a few guests in the great hall were clearly in their cups.

For Jane, though, the end of the celebration arrived much too soon. She was not ready for the duty which lay ahead of her this night. She knew that what happened between a man and a woman behind closed doors was supposed to be highly pleasurable. Amelia told her so, and Jane believed her for Amelia had experienced it more times—and with more men—than any of the unmarried girls she’d known in Sussex.

With the hour drawing ever nearer to that when she would be expected to couple for the first time in her life, she could not imagine such an act being at all pleasurable with a man as old as Lord Reginald. But as much as she would have wished it, the moment could not be delayed forever. At her husband’s bidding she was shown to her quarters by one of the female servants where she was washed, undressed, and prepared for her deflowering by a tearful Ruth.

“Now you be a good girl,” she said when she was finished brushing out Jane’s long, russet hair at the ornately carved vanity. “Lie still, and try not to cry. If his Lordship has not had too much to drink, I imagine it will be over fairly quickly.”

“Why would it not be over quickly if he has had too much to drink?” Jane asked, her voice unsteady.

“The drink, you see, it tends to ... interfere with the men folk’s ability to—well, never you mind that,” she broke off in haste when Jane paled. “It will be fine.”

With a warm kiss on her forehead, Ruth left the room. Jane watched through the glass in the mirror as her beloved maid shut the door behind her, leaving her entirely alone in a bedchamber that did not at all feel like it was hers.

She gazed at her reflection. Her tears had long ago run dry, but her eyes were still visibly red and swollen. A sense of numbness had overtaken her, reflecting itself in her face. Her usually alabaster skin looked waxy, and her blue eyes—which normally sparkled with vivacity and were generally considered the only redeeming feature of her otherwise plain appearance—were dull, lack-lustre.

In fact, with her sallow face illuminated as it was by the flicker of her lantern, she thought she might well be mistaken for a corpse. There was no help for it, though. And even if there was, she was not entirely sure she would bother. She had not an ounce of desire to render herself more attractive for Lord Reginald.

Resigned, she stood from the dressing table and crossed the room to the bed. Drawing her shift up to her knees so she could climb the high frame, she crawled into the middle of the straw mattress and pulled the many covers up to pool loosely around her waist. She then drew her knees to her chin, wrapping her arms tightly around them as if they were a barrier—a barrier through which no man could cross to violate her.

In the hallway beyond her closed chamber door, heavy footsteps resounded on the stone floor. Shortly after, a second pair of footsteps joined them.

“Night then, Reg,” she heard a gruff voice call in a northern English accent. “We’ll be off in the morning. Enjoy your bride. She’s a bonnie one, isn’t she?”

“I suppose so,” Lord Reginald’s voice responded. “Though her sister is by far the prettier of the pair. I daresay next to that lass, the girl is rather unappealing.”

“Why did you not negotiate for the sister’s hand then?” inquired his companion.

Lord Reginald snorted. “Not a chance. That one’s been plucked and plucked again. Besides, I’ve no time for a beautiful and silly wife. I require a serious and dutiful girl I can shape and mould as I see fit. Between the two sisters their looks were the only differing factor—the dowry was equally as large, and a marriage to either one brought the same familial alliance.”

“Oh, I think she’s pretty enough,” responded the unidentified voice. “She’s a fine figure, to be sure. And let us be honest, Reg, that’s all that truly matters when you’re between her legs, is it not?”

Lord Reginald guffawed appreciatively, and Jane listened to their footsteps as the two men parted company.

Ah—now it was perfectly clear why the baron had pursued her hand and not Amelia’s. He had been after a practical wife, one with connections and a sizeable dowry. And one who was not spoiled ... in more than one sense of the word.

Her sensibilities told her she should be affronted by this revelation. And yet ... and yet she could not bring herself to care one way or another. Even as Lord Reginald entered the bedchamber and saw her watching him—even as he regarded her without apology though it was obvious his exchange had been overheard—she couldn’t find it within herself to feel the slightest of offense. At least now she had her answer to the enigma of his pursuit of her.

With this new understanding, she watched nervously, assessing his appearance, as Lord Reginald undressed himself and laid his finery on her dressing table. His hair was a deep grey with streaks of silver through it; much of what had been on top in his youth was gone, but what remained was neatly trimmed. He wore a closely cropped beard, and though his features were rather non-descript, they were far from ugly. From what outline she could see beneath his fine linen shirt, his body was not repulsive—neither too slim nor too fat. He had been strong once, she thought, and likely still was to a degree, but his belly did show signs of his advancing age; a small protrusion was visible beneath his shirt and his hips looked a little wider than would have been attractive.

Her assessment of him was cut short when, dressed only in his shirt, he approached the side of the bed. Evidence of his arousal immediately snared her attention—his rigid member tented the loose fabric that hung to his knees. She recoiled at the thought of it, for she had never before seen a naked man—much less one afflicted by the heat of his desire for a woman.

As if reading her virgin naivety like words on parchment, Lord Reginald suppressed a grin. With his eyes riveted on her, he pulled his shirt up and over his head, dropping it carelessly to the braided rug beneath his bare feet.

Jane’s hands moved automatically, pulling the covers closer to her chin, and her eyes widened in horror at what she saw. His member was much larger, much thicker, than she’d ever imagined a man’s member could be. It jutted boldly, like a weapon, from beneath the curling mass of silver hair between his thighs. She stifled a cry of terror—surely such a protuberance would tear her apart.

Her terror seemed only to excite him further. His eyes held hers intently as he crawled naked into the bed beside her and slipped himself under the covers. Moving his face closer to hers, he pressed a hand to her shoulder, urging her to lie back. Jane complied, though every muscle in her body trembled uncontrollably.

Her frame as rigid as a plank, she pressed herself into the mattress. She wished it would swallow her. She wished that angry, vengeful MacGillivrays would burst through the door and skewer the pair of them to it. Anything to spare her this awful moment.

But the mattress remained firm; the door remained closed.

Lord Reginald propped himself on his elbow beside her and stroked the length of her jaw with a bejewelled forefinger. The way he looked at her, as if she was a morsel to eat, made her skin crawl. But before she could protest, before she could beg him for a moment’s pause ... before she could even breathe once more—his mouth was on hers.

Jane did not know how to respond. She’d dreamed of being kissed all her life—but not like this. Not by a man three times her age who was not at all concerned about her inexperience, her feelings. Lord Reginald’s tongue roamed her stiff lips, probing, urging them to part. She forced herself to obey the silent command and opened her mouth to his. The moment her lips parted, he plunged his tongue deep inside, swirling it around and around in a frenzied manner. She kept her lips still, for the taste of the wine and the meat on his tongue, which he’d consumed at the meal, threatened to make her gag.

Relief flooded her when he withdrew his invading tongue from between her lips—only to be replaced by a more gripping panic as he reached to the hem of her shift. She lay still, recalling Ruth’s advice and praying that it would soon be over. He tugged the fabric up past her hips, and then up farther to expose her naked, young breasts. With little effort despite her lack of assistance, Lord Reginald pulled the gown over her head and tossed it to the floor just as carelessly as he’d tossed his own fine shirt.

His eager hands caressed her naked skin, roving her curves and hillocks as they traced the contours of her slender shape. The experience was humiliating, and Jane pressed her lips together into a thin line to stifle the whimpers that threatened to escape her throat.

When he brought his lips to her breast, her breath drew inwards sharply. Amelia and her companions in Sussex had provided her with all the unspeakable details of this moment, yet she could not overcome the shock of having a grown man’s tongue flickering about her nipple. Her heart hammered at her ribs and her breathing turned to gasping from her rising panic. Mistaking her reaction as a sign of her arousal, Lord Reginald tongued more wildly.

There was no mistaking the look in his eyes when he released her breast from his mouth and gazed at her face again. Jane stared back, her fright evident in the cast of her features—wide eyed and tight lipped.

“Are you wet for me, girl?” he inquired, his voice raspy.

“I-I have been w-washed, sir, b-but my m-maid d-dried me,” she stuttered pathetically.

Lord Reginald chuckled. “That is not what I meant,” he said gently.

She had hardly a moment to wonder what it was he had meant before he reached his hand between her thighs. She cringed as his fingers pressed to her sensitive flesh, massaging and probing her seam with firm pressure.

“Bone dry,” he declared with a wicked grin. “You must be wet if I am to enter you with ease, else it shall be uncomfortable for both of us.”

His meaning eluded her—until he shifted down her length and positioned his mouth at the peak of her thighs. Stunned, she felt him lick the flesh between with one long stroke of his tongue, then press his hands to her knees, encouraging her to part her legs. The humiliation she’d felt when his hands had been on her was nothing to this. She was mortified. She clenched her eyes shut, though no force could hold back the tears that escaped the corners of her lids. His beard chafed at her tender crevice as he suckled and probed her.

When she had been sufficiently moistened, he slipped a forefinger between the crease of her flesh, sliding it deep within her.

“That’s better,” he whispered.

With her eyelids clasped tightly shut, she could see nothing but the flicker of the candlelight from across the room. However, the moment she felt Lord Reginald shift himself back up her length and onto of her, her eyes flew open again. With his left hand, he gripped the back of her right knee and hitched her leg up over his naked hip. When the plump tip of his turgid erection grazed the flesh between her thighs, Jane lost the last bit of control she had over her panic.

“W-wait, no—please ...” she stammered frantically.

“Shhh,” he responded gently, as though he were calming a babe. He placed his hand at the side of her face and stilled her trembling lips with a press of his thumb. Even as her head shook back and forth in denial and pleading, Lord Reginald drove himself mercilessly into her cavity.

She cried out at the pain of his invasion. Within her she could feel there was a barrier which opposed his invading manhood. Encountering it he pressed deliberately, sending waves of pain out from her pelvic bone through her limbs. The sensation was excruciating as she felt a sharp pop, then a tearing, inside of her, and she barely managed to bite back a blood-curdling scream.

He was too large for her; her young, untouched cavity could not accommodate him. Her hands clutched fiercely at the bed sheets and she whimpered at the pain he was causing her.

None of it seemed to bother Lord Reginald—in fact, it appeared only to heighten his arousal. He moved inside his new, young wife, grunting heavily with each thrust of his hips. He held himself up by his right arm and kept his left hand under her knee, trapping her leg against his body, forcing her to remain open for him.

Her tender flesh burned and throbbed. Jane had no choice but to clamp her teeth and her eyelids together, and suffer through her husband’s claim of her body. With an inner fervour, she willed it to be over soon, willed him to hurry up and satisfy himself.

She knew when the moment was drawing close. His movements became quicker and more urgent; his grunts of effort turned to moans of ecstasy.

Soon, she chanted inwardly. It will be over soon ...

And then finally the moment arrived. Lord Reginald threw his head back and let his jaw drop like a dead fish. With one long and ugly roar, the baron released himself into her, pounding her bruised flesh wildly as his climax surged.

When it had ebbed and disappeared, he collapsed onto her, crushing her with his weight. His breath was hot and heavy on her neck, and his naked skin slick with perspiration. Jane did not move. She simply allowed him to lie atop of her, and prayed that he would soon move so that she could breathe. His manhood, which had been so rigid and unyielding only minutes ago, withered, slipping flaccidly from between her thighs.

After several long moments Lord Reginald raised himself. He kissed Jane’s cheek gently, ignoring the fat tears that met his lips.

“Good night, my love,” he said simply.

Then he stood from the bed, and without bothering to collect his clothes from her dressing table, he departed his young wife’s bedchamber. Naked and satiated.

Once the door had closed behind him, Jane turned onto her side and curled her knees to her belly. Her womanhood throbbed painfully, and the inside of her thighs were sticky with the fruits of Lord Reginald’s climax and with her own blood.

Quietly, in the flickering candlelight, she cried herself to sleep. Never in her life had she felt so alone.

Chapter 3

The activity in the great hall the next morning was nearly as high as it had been the night before. Minstrels weaved in and out of the guests at leisure as the fashionably dressed men and women broke their fast. Servants ferried silver trays of bread, meat and fish, and offered pewter jugs of wine and ale. It was as if the laughter and merriment that had echoed through the hall the previous night had been merely suspended, and resumed again at sunrise with fervour.

Joining her husband at the head table, Jane could not help but feel that every pair of eyes in the hall was surreptitiously watching her, aware of the humiliation she had suffered the night before as if the evidence of her shame had been transcribed onto her body.

Perhaps it had been, she thought dully. The flesh between her thighs was so tender and bruised that she was forced to walk stiffly and sit with care. But if Lord Reginald noticed her discomfort, he said nothing.

“What do you think you shall do this day, my dear?” he queried amiably once he’d finished his meal.

She swallowed the mouthful of cheese she’d taken, and smiled gracefully. “I think I should like to see the spinning room. Then perhaps I shall stroll about the grounds and become familiar with the landscape.”

“That is well, but I must insist you do not venture too far. For though my men patrol the borders of Dunloch with vigilance, there is no guarantee that a crafty MacGillivray straggler may slip past them. You do not want to be on your own should you run into one of them.” Then, considering, he added, “Shall I fetch you an escort?”

“I pray you do not,” she replied hastily. “In truth I desire the time alone to reflect and to enjoy the peace of the day. I assure you I shall not venture far.”

“Alright,” he relented. “Mind you be very careful, though.”

“I shall,” she promised.

“Well then, my love,” Lord Reginald said, placing his hands on the wooden table top on either side of his trencher, “I’m afraid I must leave you now. I have much to do.”

He stood from the sturdy table, and with an obligatory kiss to the top of his bride’s head, he left the great hall to begin his day’s tasks.

Jane watched him go, followed by half a dozen of his attendants. She was anxious that he might realize there had been a note of deceit in her voice, for in truth, she had lied. She had no intention of staying close to the castle—her plan, spun almost as soon as she had passed by the place, was to return to the site of the lone English soldier.

She hastened through the remainder of her meal, eager to excuse herself from the great hall and the curious eyes of the castle inhabitants within. Returning to her bedchamber, she donned a sturdy wool gown and matching cloak with a wide hood. Then, without seeking out Ruth to inform her maid of where she was headed, she stole through the castle and escaped the outer curtain wall through the rear gate house. A short time later she had crossed over the rolling, green hills and was travelling contentedly along the main road under a low, grey sky.

Her contentment did not last long, however; the journey to the mysterious site of the lone soldier was nearly an hour on foot. She arrived at the site, flushed and agitated, and exhaled with relief when finally she spotted a figure dressed in the distinct English mail and orange tunic—though the man wearing it was not the one she’d seen previously. Where yesterday it was a tall and broad-shouldered young man, today it was a rather withered man of well advanced years.

No matter. It was not the soldier that had interested her. It was the mystery of what he was guarding.

Lifting her chin in a show of confidence befitting her new station, Jane marched off the road and approached the spot where the old soldier stood.

“Good morning, sir,” she ventured.

The soldier beheld her warily, suspicious of her presence. The corners of his watery eyes crinkled as he measured her through narrowed lids.

“Madam,” he replied.

“I am the Baroness D’Aubrey,” she revealed. “I wonder if you might let me see what is beyond that ridge. My carriage passed by this spot yesterday morn, and I confess the posting of a guard here, in what appears to be an uninhabited area, sparked my interest.”

“Beyond that there ridge, at the bottom of the little valley, lie traitors to the Crown, Baroness,” the soldier answered in a thick, Lancashire accent. “Them Scots what were cut down by the baron’s forces in the attack.”

Her blood chilled, and she shuddered at the man’s revelation. She had not considered that such a macabre possibility would be the answer to her mystery. Images of frightening and monstrous Scottish corpses lying at the bottom of the valley floated through her mind.

But Jane had never been fanciful; she was by nature a level-headed and compassionate girl, and her thoughts turned from the gruesome images of corpses to the faces of those left waiting for them to return home—savage Scots though they were.

“Then sir, surely you agree these men must be returned to their families and buried.”

She made to step around the old soldier, intending to peer over the top of the ridge, but the man held his arm out, barring her way.

“Nay, my Lady,” he answered. “These bodies are to be left here to feed the crows. Families are not permitted to claim ‘em. It’s a lesson to be learned, ye see.”

“I am certain the baron would object to such cruelty if he were to be made aware,” she returned, indignant.

The soldier stifled a snort of derision. “My Lady, it were the baron what ordered the families be prevented from claiming their dead.”

Jane stared dumbly at the ridgeline, stunned by the soldier’s admission. Surely the baron was not capable of such cruelty. Regardless of what these men had done, such a thing was not right. A peculiar mix of emotions warred within her at the thought: horror, fear, sorrow ...

And adventure. Stronger than any other emotion at that moment was a sense of adventure, an intense desire to disobey the soldier and see for herself what lay beyond the ridge.

But it was unlikely that he would let her pass. Looking thoughtfully to the horizon, she noticed that the landscape rose upwards again after the dip of the ridge to the unseen valley below; a dense wood covered the rising hill—a wood beyond which nothing was visible.

Jane smiled secretively to herself as an idea formed in her mind.

‘Thank you, sir,” she said, turning her eyes back to the old soldier. “I suppose if it was the baron’s will that those men be left there to rot, then it is right.”

Without waiting for his response, she pivoted on her heels and headed back down the road the way she’d come.

As soon as she was out of the soldier’s line of sight, she darted from the main road into the surrounding hills and made for the forest she’d spied from the ridgeline. She persevered, her stubbornness to unlock the mystery propelling her forwards like sails on a ship, though the journey was rough and her shoes far too flimsy for this type of walking. Several times her ankles overturned on unseen rocks and divots in the earth. But onwards she pressed. From boulder to bush and up and down the heaving green hills Jane crossed the rugged terrain.

The route she’d chosen brought her around and behind the curving ridgeline to the edge of the forest. Entering the dense stand of pines, she picked her way through a tangled web of low, sharp branches that wove together as if even the Scottish trees were defending the territory that belonged to them. The ground under her feet was a spongy and fragrant carpet of amber needles.

The voyage through the trees was slow and, at times, painful, and a good part of it was spent fretting that’d gotten herself lost. A cry of triumph escaped her lips the moment she spied daylight announcing a clearing. She prayed it was the one she’d been aiming for.

Luck was with her. Through the last of the pines she spotted the back of the ridge as it dropped into a deep, but narrow valley on the other side of the road.

And heaped unceremoniously at the bottom of the valley bowl were the warriors.

She covered her nose and recoiled fiercely as a gust of wind picked up the stench from the bodies—a vile blend of excrement and blood and death. They had not been dead long, though, perhaps a day or two. It was obvious that this was not the place where these warriors had fallen, that the bodies had been dumped here, thrown atop one another in a pile two or three deep with little care. As though this place were no more than a midden, and the bodies of the men mere rubbish. Insignificant.

She stared at the sight before her, her mouth working silently in her shock. An unexpected sense of pity settled over her. She would have thought the sight of such grisly death would cause her to flee such a scene, screaming in terror as she went. But faced with it here, like this, she felt nothing but sadness.

Not all of the men lying dead in the valley were fearsome Scot warriors like she’d imagined, though several of them were. Many of the lifeless members of their bloodied and butchered ranks were older men; a number of younger men were there also, barely older than boys, really.

Crouching to the forest floor, Jane stared pityingly at the face of the young man lying closest to the trees. If she put her hands to her eyes to shield them from the sight of the other dead men, she might think he was merely sleeping, for he was positioned on his side as if at rest; his face, handsome and youthful, was at peace. The blood-soaked linen of his tunic disrupted the illusion, however, and her heart ached for the life that had been cut down so early.

But ... he had attacked Dunloch with the rest of his vicious kinsmen. So he had to be killed ... did he not?

Jane contemplated the matter briefly. Then, with her curiosity satisfied and replaced by a hollow throb in the pit of her stomach, she stood.

Just as she turned, there was a powerful thrust at her shoulder. Startled rather than frightened at first, she staggered backwards, and her back and shoulders slammed forcibly into the trunk of the tree around which she had been peering. It was several seconds before she could focus her eyes on the object that had assaulted her.

Glaring back at her with immeasurable rage were the green eyes of a Scot. A MacGillivray—she was certain. His distinct Highland sgian-dubh was raised to her throat and his powerful hand gripped her shoulder with iron strength, the fingers digging painfully into her flesh.

For a moment she was too terrified to comprehend much more than that. She and the MacGillivray rebel stared at each other, locked in place by the force of their eyes alone.

And then her mind began to move again—swiftly and uncontrollably. She took in the sight of the Scot and trembled at the picture painted by his appearance. Dried blood trailed from a gash in his temple and caked thickly in his long, dark strands of hair. He was young, and well muscled; she had no doubt that with one twist of his forearm the sgian-dubh clutched in his hand could cut through the bone of her neck, severing her head from her body. The horrific stories perpetuated by the ladies of Sussex, and even by Amelia, careened through her brain, and Jane feared she were on the verge of being raped and killed.

For reasons incomprehensible to her, the former possibility terrified her more—it was the tender, bruised flesh between her legs that throbbed in anticipation of being further damaged, and not her throat that seared with the anticipation of his blade slicing across her skin.

As Jane’s terrified expression registered on him, the look on the Scot’s face changed, softened. She realized then that he had not meant to attack her, that he thought she had been a threat to him. After all, she considered, seen from behind, crouched down and concealed entirely by a grey woollen cloak, she might easily have been mistaken for a raider.

“I mean no harm, sir,” she offered carefully, testing her theory.

The Scot said nothing, merely held her eyes with his own. The hand which gripped her shoulder began to tremble, as did the blade held to her neck. And then his eyes seemed to lose their focus. With a groan, he slouched forward, lowering his head. On unsteady legs, he wavered where he stood, and staggered slightly, his hand still clamped on her shoulder. With a cry of astonishment, Jane gripped the Scotsman to steady him, her arms moving automatically and without thought as the man’s knees buckled and he sank to the ground.

He had been seriously wounded—that much was immediately clear. A spectrum of dried and fresh blood soaked the linen of his shirt, and from the delirious look she recognized in his eyes, she thought that whatever wound might be under his clothes must be infected and fuelling a raging fever. It was very little effort for her to convince the man to lie down, but when she moved to lift the tartan draped across his flank to better inspect his wound, he fought her instinctively.

“Shhh,” she soothed. “I only want to judge its severity. I shall not touch it, I can imagine it hurts.”

The Scotsman relented, and allowed her to shift his tartan and lift the hem of his shirt. Across his right flank was a nasty gash that, as she suspected, had indeed become infected. The flesh surrounding the open wound was an angry blend of scarlet and purple, and thick, yellow fluids had begun to collect and seep from inside the deep slice.

The direness of his situation sat heavily with her. She searched his face which, despite a fierce expression, could not hide the terror that broiled just below the surface. In truth, he looked like a scared, little boy trying to play big, brave soldier.

So he should be scared, she thought, for it was very likely that he would die from the severity of his infection ...

That was, of course, if she did not help him.

As it happened, this particular Scot was fortunate that it was Jane Sewell of Sussex whom he had found lurking amongst the trees. She was not only a compassionate and caring girl by nature, a trait which allowed her to overcome her initial fear of the man—but she also new medicine. It had been a talent and a discipline of her grandmother, carried through the generations and passed down to the young by the old. It was a discipline which the lady had insisted on sharing with her granddaughters. Though Amelia had never held much interest or patience in learning the craft, Jane had absorbed everything her grandmother had to show her. Because of her attentiveness, she knew that the bark of a willow could cure a headache, that thyme could reduce a fever and prevent infection ... and that a poultice of honey could cure it.

But was she too late? By the look of the man, she thought she most certainly was; her chances of curing him were slim. Then again, leaving him here and doing nothing at all would amount to the same thing. Only then her conscience would be permanently blackened.

The man was a MacGillivray. Of that she was certain, for the colours of his torn and blood-soaked tartan declared it so. He, along with his clansmen, had attacked her husband’s lands, his home, with brutal force and murderous intentions. Should he live through this ordeal—which she very much doubted he would—who was she to say that he would not do the same again?

But he was also a man; a creation of God, fragile and in need. Whatever conflict existed on this earth, she knew that her duty to at least try to help was not between her and this man, nor her and Lord Reginald D’Aubrey, Baron of Dunloch, nor even her and King Edward himself.

It was between her, Jane Sewell ... and God.

“Sir, I shall do my best to heal you,” she stated resolutely, though her heart was still hammering away at her ribs. “I do not know if I can, but I will surely try. But we cannot stay here. There is a sentry posted to guard this valley, and he is just on the other side of that ridge.”

“I ken a place, if ye can help me to walk,” the Scot answered. The words strained through teeth clenched tight against the pain of his wound.

Carefully, she weaved her arm underneath the man so that his wounded flank was between them. Gripping his waist on the opposite side, she coaxed him to drape his arm over her shoulder. He cried out in anguish when she helped him to stand, and for a terrifying moment she feared the noise would alert the guard to their presence. But as the seconds passed, there was no movement or sound save for the crows. With an exhaled breath of relief, Jane moved on with the Scot.

The man led them farther into the forest, though in which direction she could hardly guess. After only a few minutes he began to weaken, and the pace with which he deteriorated from there was frighteningly rapid. To keep him moving, she took to offering words of encouragement through the slow and laborious journey. Twice he stumbled—the second time so badly that his scream of agony made her wince as if she herself were suffering his pain. Somehow, with much patience and effort, she convinced him to stand and continue.

They walked for what seemed like an hour, perhaps two. The changing light of the sky that filtered down through the trees signalled the advancing day. From the distance they’d gone she thought it might not be more than a half-hour’s brisk walk on her own, but the wounded man’s pace was so very slow. As they ventured farther and farther into the woods, she began to worry that the man, in his state of oncoming delirium, did not actually have a destination, and she feared that they were terribly lost.

But then, she saw it, and at first she had to blink for she did not quite believe her eyes. A forest stream wended its way through the dense growth. On its banks, in a small clearing ... was a hut.

An abandoned hut, by the looks of it, but still in good enough repair that the wattle and daub walls would likely not collapse upon them. With as much haste as her wounded companion could allow, Jane guided him to the crude door of woven reeds. Inside, the rotting rushes which had been long ago laid gave off a rich, earthy smell. The thickness of the odour, though itself not entirely unpleasant, overwhelmed her nostrils, and instinctively she covered her face with her hand until she had grown accustomed to it.

A stone fireplace, still in very good condition unlike the walls and roof surrounding it, was built into the opposite wall from the door. Leading him to it, she helped the Scot lie down on the rotting rushes. He panted heavily from his effort to walk, and his entire body was slick with perspiration.

“I must remove your shirt, sir,” she warned first so that he would not instinctively fight her again.

When he made no move to stop her, Jane raised the hem, pulling it up his torso and over his head. He tried to assist her, but his weakness and his pain limited his movements. She managed nonetheless, and a more clear view of the wound confirmed what she already knew—that his fever and his infection would kill him.

She watched his face as he flinched and battled through his pain. His was a pleasant face—one that looked like it might light up with a laugh or grow tender at the sight of a babe. A handsome face, the eyes wide and a vivid green beneath dark brows and rugged, well-defined features. A sense of pity and of loss overcame her. It was a shame such a handsome young man would die.

She gave herself a stern mental shake, astonished that so ridiculous a thought would come to her at such a moment. Handsome or not, he was a savage Scot. A MacGillivray. An enemy to her husband’s people. Besides, his handsomeness was for naught, since she was fairly certain that she could do nothing for him.

Though she would try.

“I shall just step outside to the river,” she informed the man with a light touch to his hand. “That wound needs cleaning.”

When he did not answer, she took the only vessel she could find—the deerskin sporran fastened beside his belt to the wool of his kilt—and carried it out to the stream. The water was crisp and clear as she dipped the age-softened leather below the ripples. It really should be hot water, she thought to herself, but what were the odds that the MacGillivray man had brought a tinder box with flint and steel with him into battle? And besides, what would she boil the water in?

Bringing the full sporran back inside the hut, she sat down next to the man. Using his sgian-dubh to tear a strip of linen from his shirt, she dipped the strip into the water. Then, with a touch no lighter than a mayfly, she gingerly dabbed at the dried blood and dirt that had accumulated, clearing it from the wound. Even still, her feather-light touch was unbearable to him, and she winced sympathetically as she dabbed. She then re-wet the linen and dabbed at his face in an attempt to take some of the heat from his head.

Beyond this, there was not much she could do for the man—at least not unequipped as she was now. She felt powerless, and overcome by her sympathy for him, she placed her hand alongside his face. His features, she was sadly sure, would soon rest peacefully in death.

“Sir? Listen to me, sir,” she urged. “I must return now. I will be missed. Besides, if you have any chance of overcoming your fever and surviving this, I shall need a great deal of provisions.”

Though the Scot made no acknowledgement that he’d heard her, she continued. “I cannot come back until everyone has gone to bed. But I pray you can hold on to life for that long, sir, because I promise you that I will be back, and I will do all I can to help you.”

The urge to touch his face once more was powerful, and Jane yielded to it. Then she stood, convinced that she would not see the young man alive again.

“Now all I have to do is remember the path we took through the forest to get here,” she mumbled to herself.

“Turn to yer right and follow the brae,” answered the man in a voice that was barely above a whisper.

She snapped her head around to the prostrate form laid on the rotting rushes. His eyes remained closed, but his head was turned towards her.

“The brae will take ye back to the castle.”

“Thank you, sir. I shall,” she answered. And before she departed the dilapidated hut she added for good measure, “Try to stay alive.”

She followed the young Scot’s advice and turned right outside the hut, walking along the bank of the brook that bubbled and gurgled its way through the dense forest. The going this way was much easier than the route they’d taken from the valley—the river’s edge made a natural path upon which obstructive foliage did not encroach. In a fraction of the time it took to reach the hut, she found herself at the edge of the wood on the other side. Peering into the distance she could see that, indeed, Dunloch was a speck on the horizon, and to the west of it she could see the cluster of dwellings which made up the village.

She would have liked to visit the village, but now was not the time. She would need a proper escort if she were to do so—now that she knew the truth in Lord Reginald’s warning that MacGillivrays were out there lurking, many of whom were likely much more dangerous and vengeful than the poor, wounded wraith upon which she’d accidentally stumbled.

The sun, in her time away, had moved across the sky in its morning, noon and afternoon positions, and was now contemplating setting for the evening. Realizing that the hour was much later than she’d first thought, Jane quickened her pace, worried that her long absence would cause panic at the castle. But as she passed through the main gate into the bailey, no one seemed particularly concerned one way or the other that she had returned.

She was on the verge of breathing a sigh of relief as she made her way through the passageways and halls to her chamber, when a voice stopped her.

“My Lady?”

Jane turned warily. Standing behind her was Tearlach, the MacGillivray steward.

“Yes, Tearlach?” she answered casually despite the nerves that fluttered about in her belly.

“His Lordship were looking for ye. Ye’ve been gone a long while, if ye dinna mind me saying—only it were his Lordship that thought so.”

“Oh, I was only out walking and lost track of time,” she lied smoothly. “I’ve never been to Scotland before, and I confess I was quite taken by the landscape.”

There was a hint of scepticism in the elderly man’s countenance. Unnerved by his scrutiny, she added, “Shall I see his Lordship now then? Pray, tell me where he is.”

“Actually, my Lady, it were only that the Lady D’Aubrey, the dowager baroness, were wishing to meet ye.”

“The dowager baroness?” Jane said, startled by the revelation. “I had no idea his mother had arrived at the castle. I wonder why she did not come yesterday for the wedding.”

Tearlach raised his eyebrows questioningly. “The Lady D’Aubrey lives here at Dunloch, my Lady. I am given to understand that she has lived wi’ his Lordship ever since the late Baron D’Aubrey passed. I believe her Ladyship is still in the solar, if ye dinna mind going to her.”

“I shall, yes,” she answered, feeling foolish that she had not known such a significant detail. “Thank you, Tearlach.”

She turned, glad to hurry away. But stopping suddenly, she turned back to the old man with a sheepish expression on her face. “I have forgotten myself ... how would one find the solar?”

“Follow this hallway to that wall yonder, and then turn ye right. Ye’ll be wanting to go up the stairs. When ye reach the top, turn ye right again. Ye’ll find the solar about half way down this wing of the castle.”

“Thank you,” she said again hastily, and dashed down the hallway.

She found the solar with little difficulty. The heavy wooden door was slightly ajar, just wide enough that she could peer inside without being seen by whoever was within. The room was neither small nor large, but a moderate size—a comfortable place to where the reigning family could retreat from the hustle and bustle of the great hall. A long wooden table dominated the centre of the space around which armchairs, constructed of dark oak and fitted with heavy, red velvet padding, were placed. The windows were high and arched, and the stained glass set intermittently among them threw magnificent patterns and colours in the setting sunlight across all that lay below. Above the wide hearth with its wooden mantle, in which a cheerful fire blazed, the outline still remained of a crest recently removed.

The MacGillivray family crest, no doubt.

One of the chairs from the table had been turned towards the hearth, but because it faced away from the door Jane could not make out the figure seated within. Taking a deep breath to steady herself, she stepped into the solar, expecting that the figure in the chair would be a woman of similar appearance to Lord Reginald. Quite to her surprise the lady, who sat with a blanket draped over her frail lap, was rather delicate looking, with a childlike face despite her advanced age. Her countenance was serene as she looked her son’s new bride up and down, and Jane could easily discern that the lady had once been a great beauty.

“My Lady,” she said, acknowledging the baroness. She curtseyed low in front of the lady with the respect that her station commanded.

“Please, stand up girl,” Lady D’Aubrey answered, encouraging her with a touch to the crown of her head. “It is you who is the reigning baroness now, not I. Please, sit with me a while.”

Jane did as Lady D’Aubrey bade. “I am truly sorry, my Lady. I fear I have been told little about my new situation. I was unaware of your residence at Dunloch, else I would have endeavoured to come to your sooner.”

The old lady laughed delicately. “Do not trouble yourself, child. It is as much my fault, for I was too ill to attend the ceremony yesterday.”

“I hope it is nothing serious,” Jane ventured.

“Oh, it is naught but age, girl,” the lady answered with a dismissive wave of her fragile hand. “Nothing you shall not experience yourself one day, I imagine. Now pray tell me, how are you liking Dunloch so far?”

“I like it very much, thank you.”

“Is that the truth?” Lady D’Aubrey pressed, sensing by the tone of her voice the lie that Jane could not hide.

“Perhaps not the entire truth,” she admitted. “Do not mistake me, my Lady, it is a magnificent fortress, and the rolling hills and emerald mountains hold a majesty I have never before seen equalled. It’s just ...”

“You are homesick,” Lady D’Aubrey finished for her when she fell silent. “I understand. We are very much the same, you and I. Our hands given away in marriage without our say, our lives uprooted, packed off to husbands far older than we, about whom we know very little ... and towards whom we feel very little attraction. I know that is a secret you harbour,” she added when Jane began to protest, wide-eyed. “And I can see by your countenance that you are a dutiful girl who is determined to keep that secret locked tight in your heart. It is just as well; things are the way they are for us women. We cannot rigidly resist the winds of our fate, else we shall break. We must bend if we are to withstand them.”

Jane recognized a great wisdom in the old woman’s words, and a tender respect for the dowager baroness rooted within her.

“It is not only that I long for home,” she said, neither agreeing nor disagreeing with Lady D’Aubrey’s assessment. “I confess I am also frightened of this land, for I have heard much about these vicious warrior Scots. I am beginning to realize how very close to the violent struggle I am here, and that is a terrifying thought.”

“Yes, that is a constant concern,” Lady D’Aubrey allowed.

“Even in the castle there are MacGillivrays about. Why, even the castle steward is a MacGillivray.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t worry about Tearlach.”

Jane paused, and eyed Lady D’Aubrey curiously. “But his Lordship said he does not trust the man.”

“Of course he doesn’t,” she answered dismissively. “Just as it is your duty to obey your husband, it’s his duty to be mistrustful of everything—for the sake of his wife’s safety, and of the safety of the people he rules. But I am not obliged to make the difficult decisions that go along with holding power, so I can afford to be more lenient in my judgement of people. I do not believe Tearlach is a threat to our peace at Dunloch.”

“You believe, then, that he has truly changed his allegiance and now supports the king?”

Lady D’Aubrey eyed Jane critically. “Heavens no, child. I think he is very much a MacGillivray at heart. Even now that my son rules his ancestral home.”

“Then how can you be assured of his design? He has sworn allegiance to the Crown in order to be allowed to remain at Dunloch. He may very well intend to slaughter us as we sleep out of vengeance.”

“My dear girl, I very much doubt that. I believe Tearlach swore allegiance because he had no choice. He was only trying to make the best of a bad situation.”

“But it was a situation of his own making,” Jane countered. “These Scots have caused their own trouble by defying the king. Surely you can see that.”

Lady D’Aubrey gazed at Jane, saddened by her girlish naivety; a hint of disappointment creased the corners of her eyes.

“Jane,” she said with gravity, “you have come to a very troubled place, a very stormy place. If you are to weather this storm then you must bend. And to bend, you must open your eyes and see the whole truth. For there is much about Scotland and its people you do not know.”

Chapter 4

With what little time she had before the evening meal, Jane busied herself by preparing for her return to the wounded Scot. She had brought a few herbs and medicines with her from Sussex, but there were a great deal of items she still needed—thyme, for instance. In her experience, an infusion of thyme worked best to bring down a fever by causing the body to sweat. And she needed honey—if she could find it; sugar if she could not.

She spent her time loitering about the kitchens, pilfering bits and pieces of necessities where she could—clean linens, a pair of thin woollen quilts and, to her satisfaction, a small but full pot of honey from the pantry which she managed to slip under her skirts and spirit away before any of the servants caught her.

By the time night fell she was ready. A pack of her stolen goods, fashioned from one of the two quilts and wrapped with twine so that she could carry it on her back, was hidden away in her wardrobe.

Her nerves were on edge. It was not that she had never done anything like this before; many times had she ventured out into the wilderness of her father’s Sussex estates, at night and alone, for no more than the exhilaration of being disobedient and free. In that respect, she was very much the opposite of her sister—where Amelia would stamp her foot and throw a fit if those around her did not bend to her will, Jane would meekly accept being told she could not have or do something. As soon as she was out of sight of prying eyes, however, she would simply find a way to achieve what it was she wanted without anyone knowing. And, she argued to herself, she only disobeyed when she knew there was no sound reason she’d been told no in the first place. Or when there was a greater good at stake. And her mission tonight certainly was for a greater good—even if the wounded man was a MacGillivray.

The reason her nerves were on edge this night was because she would be venturing out, at night and alone, in an unknown and foreboding land teeming with barbarian Scots. She breathed deeply to steady herself. There were no second thoughts, no doubt in her mind about whether or not she should be doing this—it was not her place to question by what design God had placed her and the wounded man together. Her place was simply to do what she could to help, regardless of whether or not her own fears demanded that she leave well enough alone.

After suffering her husband’s attentions for only the second of many more times to come, she donned her plainest wool dress, laced up a sturdy pair of shoes, and pulled her pack from the wardrobe. Then from under the bed she pulled out a large, iron pot which sported a convenient handle that she had stolen from the kitchen hearth. Though it was heavy, she was determined to carry it since she would need something in which to boil water. Adding to the weight of her burden, she’d placed several further items she would need inside: a stone cup, a pair of tongs, a ladle and a porcelain bowl. As a last measure, she fished a dying piece of charcoal from the fire and tucked it away in a porcelain box with a lid so that she would have something with which to start a fire once she arrived. The porcelain box she then placed inside her chamber pot—another necessary vessel in which to gather and prepare water ... despite its intended design.

Loaded with her goods, Jane crept through the darkened castle. With more stealth than she would have thought herself capable, she slipped through the entrance at the rear gate house and past the sentries that stood guard atop the wall walk. Concealed by the darkness she ventured into the open landscape in the direction she thought the river would be.

Luck was both for and against her. There was no moon that night—it lay hidden behind a dense layer of cloud. The absence of moonlight made her form impossible for the sentries to detect from atop the wall walk, but it also made it difficult for her to see anything herself as she progressed. The vague outline of the horizon, jagged and darker even than the ground, indicated that the forest was ahead. The way was slow-going, and after a short while her arms began to ache from the weight of her load. Several times she stumbled over divots and uneven patches of ground, spilling the contents of her heavily laden cooking pot. Eventually, though, the sound of the brook ahead of her encouraged her to continue on her current course, and once she’d found the stream, the way was easier.

After what seemed like an eternity the outline of the ruined hut slowly came into focus, and she quickened her pace in order to begin her ministrations to the wounded Scot inside. Standing in front of the woven-reed door, she steadied herself in preparation to meet what was likely by now a corpse. A moment’s panic seized her, rising in her throat, at the thought of the MacGillivray ghost lurking on the other side of the crumbling walls, waiting to take his revenge on the first English thing that happened upon him.

“Silly girl,” she muttered to herself with a firm shake of her head. If he was dead, it would only mean the end of her responsibility to him.

Upon entering the darkened hut, a series of muted sounds confirmed for her that the man was indeed alive, though just barely. She could hear the restless movement of his head and his laboured breathing through the near blackness ahead of her.

“I am here,” she said to the man, though in his state of feverish delirium, she doubted whether he heard her.

Fumbling blindly in the darkness, she set her things down on the rotting rushes strewn about the ground, and then gathered her cooking pot and returned outside to fetch water from the stream and to collect kindling for her fire. When she thought she had enough, she returned inside, dumped her collection in the long-unused fireplace, and pulled the porcelain box from her chamber pot. Removing the small lid from the box, she was relieved to see the piece of charcoal within was still glowing soundly. When her eyes had adjusted enough to the darkness, she set the charcoal to her pile of kindling, and soon had a small but effective fire established. Darting quickly back outside once more, she fetched an armload of large stones which she would set directly in the flames so there would be something with which to boil the water.

Once she had the stones set, she allowed herself a moment to survey her situation. The dim light of the fire illuminated the form of the dying Scot for her eyes. He had grown much worse, she saw, though it was a fact which brought no great surprise. Even distorted by the flickering orange light, the grey pallor which his skin had taken on was visible, and a sickly sheen of perspiration coated the flesh of his muscular torso, exposed to the night air. In the places where clothing covered his body, the fabric was saturated with it.

She watched with sympathy as he writhed weakly where he lay, overwhelmed by the disorientation of his fever. An occasional moan, soft as a whisper, would escape his parched lips. The set of his features tugged at her chest in a strange way—far different from that of the menacing Scot she had first encountered, his face was now truly pitiful. Her heart went out to the sorry, helpless creature she saw before her, and an innate urge to cradle his head to her breast stirred in her belly. She longed to offer him empty promises that everything would be alright, that she would somehow find a way to save him—if only to make his transition from life to death more peaceful.

Such useless urges she forced from her mind. If there was even a chance it would be alright—which, of course, it would not—then she had work to do.

She pulled her items of medicine and healing from her pack and arranged them neatly on the flat stones that comprised the hearth of the fireplace. When they were organized and ready for her use, she fished one of the heated stones from the fire with the tongs and submerged it carefully into the cooking pot to boil the water. While she waited, she stripped a full twig of thyme, and shaking the needles into the stone cup she crushed them with the handle of the ladle she’d brought. Their juices gave off a sharp, fragrant aroma that mixed pleasantly with the scent of the burning wood.

Once the water was steaming, she ladled a small amount into the cup to allow the needles to steep.  As the infusion strengthened, Jane pulled the clean linens she had managed to scrounge from the kitchens out of her pack and wet them in the cooking pot. She dipped the fabric carefully to avoid scalding her hands with the water, and gingerly began dabbing at the wound across the man’s flank. Even in his barely conscious state, the poor Scot batted feebly at her hand with what little strength he had left.

“Now, now,” she shushed him, pausing to dab at his brow. “The wound must be cleaned.”

The man continued to protest, shoving ineffectually at her hands. But he was too weak, and Jane easily pressed on. Once the wound was free of dried blood, congealed fluids and dirt, she poured a generous measure of honey onto a clean strip of linen, and pressed it tightly to the gash. To wrap him with cloth so that her salve would remain in place, she tugged at his arm to encourage him into a sitting position—a task which yielded little result.

“Sir, I cannot pass the bandage beneath you if you do not raise yourself,” she begged.

The man seemed briefly to understand, and struggled to sit up. But he could not raise himself enough, and she was able only to pass the bandage beneath him once before he collapsed again. With a sigh, Jane knotted the bandage in place; it would have to do as it was. The honey would clean the wound, drawing away the toxins that had taken hold and begun to fester within. That was, of course, if the man wasn’t already too far gone.

The infusion was still a while away from being ready, so she busied herself with tidying what she could within the hut. She gathered the rushes and pitched them outside the door, leaving the dirt floor bare. She then unwrapped her pack and laid the second blanket which she’d stowed inside next to the man and close to the fire. With difficulty, she nudged and pulled him onto it—carefully so that he would not disturb the salve of honey. When she could only get him half-way onto it, she gave up trying. It was not important.

Furrowing her brow, she eyed his clothing critically. Everything would need to be washed. But it was best to leave him dressed until he was well enough to move—if he would ever be, that was. And though she’d already managed to get him out of his shirt, she might as well wait to see if he was going to live. If by some miracle he did, then she’d do all of his articles of clothing together in one go to save herself the extra labour. They would need mending as well, but that too was a task which could be saved until she knew whether or not he would make it through the night.

With nothing else to do, she checked her infusion of thyme once more—at last, it was ready. Picking up the cup with both hands, she knelt down beside the feverish man.

“Here,” she said, cradling one hand behind his head. “Drink this. It will help cool your body of the fever.”

She raised the man’s head carefully to help him drink. He took a few sips at first, but soon clamped his lips shut, refusing to drink any more.

“No, you must drink it all,” she insisted. “Come now, sir. That’s it.”

With her encouragement, the Scot parted his lips once more, and at a frustratingly slow pace he managed to finish the infusion. When he was done, Jane lowered his head and immediately set about making a larger batch. He would need a good, hearty dose every few hours if it were to make any difference.

Though she did not know the exact hour, she knew it must be very late. Despite this, she was not at all tired. A sense of purpose had revived her energy and spurred in her a heady determination, foolish though it was to allow such hope to take hold. Not only would her efforts likely be futile, but he was a savage, warring Scot. A MacGillivray. One of the beasts who had attacked Lord Reginald’s lands—now her lands.

But gazing at his face, which looked no older than five and twenty, she rather thought he did not look much like the savage brutes she’d been imagining before leaving Sussex.

Conflict warred within her. She should be a good and loyal wife, and turn this injured MacGillivray man—who happened to be at death’s door anyway—over to her husband. Her head told her so. Her heart, though ... her heart told her something very different. It told her that she could not let this helpless young man die. It told her ... what?

She stroked the dark hair that was pasted to his brow off his forehead and began to clean the dried blood and dirt from his face. A head wound, it appeared, accounted for much of it, but the wound there did not look infected like the more critical one he’d sustained on his side; it had already begun to heal, in fact.

As she dabbed his face, she sang. She did it not for his sake, but for her own. She sang the only song that came to her mind, one which her mother used to sing when she was small. The words left her lips no louder than a soft murmur.

If I were an eagle and I had wings to fly

I would fly to my love's castle and there I would lie

On a bed of green ivy I would lay myself down

And with my two fond wings I would my love surround

The words of the song had never meant much to her as a child. But now, so soon past her own wedding day to a man she did not love, could not love, the words triggered a budding sorrow deep in her heart. She would never know the love of which the song told. Tears escaped her lids as she sang and dabbed tenderly at the man’s forehead.

Unexpectedly, her lullaby seemed to do the man some good—he appeared to be a bit more peaceful under the spell of her voice. His restless fidgeting, fuelled by his delirium, subsided. For his benefit, she continued to sing. If this was all she could do for him in the end, she would do it to the best of her abilities.

And so she sang until the dying Scot had passed into a state of deep slumber.

A long and restless night ensued. Jane, lying on her own quilt which, for good measure, she’d spread the distance of the hearth away from the man, found she could not sleep but for an hour or two at a time. It was just as well, for that was how often she needed to administer the infusion of thyme and to force him to drink water.

Even as she slept, she was mindful of the night sky, vigilant in monitoring the changing indigo canvass. She would need to return to the castle when it was still dark if she hoped to slip past the sentries that kept guard on the wall walk again.

By the time she had to leave, the Scot was sleeping much more peacefully. The fire flickered low in the hearth, and though it was probably not the wisest idea to leave it burning unattended, she thought it unlikely that the flames would flare up and burn the rotting hut down.

Besides, she was not the man’s keeper, she reminded herself. She could not be entirely responsible for his life. He had been the one who had gone charging into battle, attacking a castle that no longer belonged to his chieftain and his clan. He had been the one who had gotten himself into the condition he was presently suffering in. Her help did not oblige her to become his guardian.

She told herself these things—and yet they did little to alleviate her worry as she stood to leave the hut.

Squatting over the man’s sleeping form Jane pressed the back of her hand to his forehead to check his fever. It was still burning intensely, but not quite as intensely as it had been. The thyme infusion must have been doing him some good.

Without thinking, she allowed her hand to travel down his temple to caress his smooth cheek, which still retained a measure of boyishness in his youth. His face was serene now, much different from the face she had seen contorted with pain, distress and fever. A curious ache settled into her belly and tugged at her breast as she watched the man sleep so peacefully.

“I shall return,” she promised, and then stood to exit the hut.

What she did not see as she left was a pair of clear, green eyes flicker open momentarily. Disoriented and groggy, the Scot gazed upon the source of the song heard in disjointed fragments through dying moments. To him, it was the voice of an angel come to take him to heaven, away from the burning pain of his wound. And of his soul.

Chapter 5

Through the pre-dawn darkness, Jane made her way along the banks of the forest brook and hurried across the open lands surrounding the castle. The sky was just beginning to show promise of lightening into day by the time she reached the curtain wall. Undetected, she slipped through the castle to her bedchamber where she hurriedly changed from her dress to her shift. Grateful for the softness of her bed, she slipped under the covers for a few more hours of sleep.

The moment she laid her head on the pillow, there was a rough shaking at her shoulder.

“My Lady,” Ruth’s voice said with urgency.

What was it? Had she been spotted? Did Lord Reginald know she’d left the castle?

“My Lady, wake up,” Ruth prodded, shaking more insistently. “You’ve slept late.”

Angry words of admonishment formed in Jane’s head towards Ruth for having wakened her before dawn. But when she opened her eyes, she was surprised to see that the light outside her window was the mottled grey of a morning well underway. Bleary-eyed, she pushed herself into a sitting position and looked about herself in confusion.

“Come now, my Lady. Out of bed,” Ruth repeated. “The morning meal is about to be served, and I doubt very highly your lord husband will not mind his new bride’s absence.”

“Yes, I agree,” Jane answered, her voice thick and gravelly from her interrupted slumber.

She rose from the bed and staggered to the vanity where she allowed Ruth to bind her hair.

“I do say, I dislike having to wear a kirtle all the time now,” she grumbled, scratching at the delicate cap. “It itches.”

“We could bind it in a net if you’d prefer,” Ruth suggested.

“Nay, the pins pull my hair.”

“Well, you know very well you cannot wear it loose now that you’re wed, so I’m afraid you’ll simply have to suffer through it.”

Once Ruth had finished with her hair and had dressed her, Jane made her way down to the great hall where the servants were already bustling about dishing out the meal. She took her place at Lord Reginald’s side, and when her trencher was filled by an attentive servant, she ate her pottage mechanically. It may have been delicious—from the way the other diners ate, it probably was. But she was too tired to taste anything, and with each lift of her soaked chunk of bread to her mouth, she fought against a series of yawns.

“Look at what you’ve done, Reg. You’ve worn the poor girl out,” quipped one of the castle’s visiting English nobles as he passed the head table.

Jane blushed furiously at the remark; Lord Reginald, on the other hand, chuckled appreciatively.

“I reckon I’ve got another twenty years left in me if I’m lucky,” he jested in return.

The noble barked a laugh at his response; neither man seemed particularly sympathetic to Jane’s obvious discomfort. When the noble had gone, Lord Reginald turned to his bride in concern.

“Truly, my dear, you do look terribly tired,” he noted tenderly. “Are you alright?”

Jane forced an overly bright smile onto her face and nodded energetically. “Oh, yes. I am very well, my Lord, thank you. It’s just that I am unaccustomed to this castle—it is so new to me. I do not sleep very well in unfamiliar places. It is nothing to worry over.”

“Dunloch is your home now,” he responded, patting her knee reassuringly. “You must make yourself comfortable here.”

“Indeed, my Lord. I am trying, and I do think I shall be quite comfortable in time.”

“I had hoped to take you to the village,” he continued, “and introduce you to some of the local craftsmen and prominent inhabitants to help you blend in to your new surroundings. But I fear that journey shall have to be postponed.”

“I understand, my Lord,” she answered, hiding her pleasure behind a mask of disappointment. “You must have so much to do in such a grand place as Dunloch.”

“The least of which is finding MacGillivray,” he agreed. “We think he may have gone south into the Grampians, but there is no word of him in any of the towns or villages beyond Invercleugh. We fear there is a possibility that he’s hanging around, waiting to attack again.”

Jane blanched at his assessment. Was it possible that the fearsome MacGillivray chief was running loose through the mountains at the same time that she was sneaking off from the castle? What if she were to encounter him on her way to the abandoned hut—would he know who she was to Dunloch? To Lord Reginald?

“But ... but he has no force,” she countered. “How can he hope to attack the castle when it is so well defended?”

“There is no telling what the man is capable of,” Lord Reginald answered enigmatically. “He knows Dunloch very well, and I’ve no doubt that were he of a mind to, he could easily slip past our guards and pick our unsuspecting nobles off one by one. Perhaps our women and children, too, for he is a beastly one.”

“That is a frightening prospect,” she answered, considering the likelihood that she might encounter the man.

“Not to worry,” he assured her when he registered her pale visage. “My men and I shall seek him out before it comes to that. He shall not harm a hair on your head, I promise you that. By the way,” he added, changing the subject, “I have spoken with my lady mother. She likes you a great deal, I daresay. How did you find her?”

“I liked her very much,” she answered truthfully. “Now that I know her better, I am sorry she could not attend her son’s wedding.”

“My Lord, the horses are ready,” announced Dunloch’s horsemaster as he approached the dais.

“You’ll excuse me, my dear,” Lord Reginald said in Jane’s direction.

He stood from the wooden trestle table and held his hand out to her. With a smile, Jane placed her own hand in his, and he kissed it affectionately.

Watching him as he stepped down off the dais and departed the great hall with several of his nobles in tow, she decided that perhaps the match was not a bad one after all—it certainly could have been worse. She harboured no illusions that Lord Reginald was in love with her, but perhaps that was just as well. So far he had been kind, and seemed genuinely concerned for her safety and well-being. Perhaps that was all she needed to be happy ... right?

She did not have long to consider the matter, however. As soon as the baron was out of sight, she sopped the remainder of her pottage with the last of her bread and stuffed it hastily into her mouth. Still chewing as she stood from the head table, she scurried back to her chamber to don her cloak; within minutes, she was on the main road.

Her stroll along the bank of the forest brook was peaceful. She absorbed the sounds of the spring birds in the trees with reverence, and was comforted by the melody of the rippling water. The scent of the new pine needles was fragrant, and she breathed deeply as she walked, allowing the aroma to fill her soul and soothe her.

When the hut came into view, her first thought was that she was relieved it had not burned down in the hours she’d been gone. A thin column of smoke rose from the short chimney, indicating that the fire had not died completely.

She pushed the reed door open and entered the small hut. Indeed the fire had not died. The embers did burn quite low, but with a bit of attention they could be revived. Next to the fireplace, exactly where she’d left him, was the Scot. Initially, she was afraid that he had expired after all—he had not moved even minutely from the position in which she’d left him. But as her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she detected that his chest was rising and falling with his shallow but regular breaths. She moved closer and bent to check his forehead again. His fever still persisted, and he would need another dose of thyme infusion.

Immediately she set to work. She gathered fresh wood and kindling from the forest outside to revive the fire, and fresh water from the stream. Once the stones underneath the burning logs were hot enough, she placed one in the cooking pot to heat the water. And finally she crushed fresh thyme leaves in the bottom of the cup to prepare more of the infusion.

While she waited for the water to boil, she checked the Scot’s wound. The honey had largely been absorbed into the gash, and the poultice was due to be changed. It was not urgent, however. It could wait until he was awake.

Her lack of sleep soon took a toll on her, and despite the work she still had ahead of her, she was forced to lay her head down. She intended only to close her eyes for a brief moment, but so strong was her fatigue that she soon fell asleep.

Jane awoke several hours later, groggy and thick-mouthed. The first thing she noticed as she ground the sleep from her eyes was that the water was not steaming like it should be. Peering into her cooking pot she dipped a forefinger in to test the temperature. Cool; the stone had boiled the water and then lost its heat in the time she’d been asleep.

With an annoyed sigh, she fished another stone from the fire and replaced the one in the pot. Then, clenching her eyes shut and giving her head a firm shake to revive her senses, she glanced towards the Scot where he lay a short distance from her.

A pair of wide, green eyes gazed back at her, curious and amused.

“Oh,” she cried, startled.

The eyes continued to stare, unmoving but for a blink or two.

“S-sir, I, um ...” she searched for words to say, unnerved by the Scot’s silence. Finally managing to gather her wits she asked, “How are you feeling?”

“I feel like I’m burning wi’ fever from the gash in my side,” the Scot answered. His voice was raspy and weak, but there was a note of humour in it that brought a smile to Jane’s lips.

“I daresay you are,” she agreed. “You were very close to death when first we met. I cannot say you are clear of danger now, but you do look much improved.”

“That canna be saying much. I feel like I have the hand o’ the reaper on my back right now,” the Scot replied.

“That may be, but rest assured that I shall do my best to prevent him from claiming your life—this time, at any rate.”

She had meant nothing by her off-handed statement, but in response, the Scot held her gaze with a mixture of surprise and confusion. There was a tenderness in the set of his features that provoked a curious flutter in her belly. She lowered her eyes to the floor nervously, suddenly self-conscious.

“Why would ye help me?” she heard him say weakly.

“What do you mean?” she answered, glancing up again. “You were in desperate need of it.”

“Ye’re an English lass.”

“I am, yes.”

“I’m Scottish,” the man persisted, his brows drawing together.

“You say that as if the mere fact of it is an explanation,” she noted, confused herself by what point he was trying to make.

He closed his eyes. “Around here it is, love.”

The Scot was silent for a long moment, and Jane thought he may have fallen asleep again, but then he spoke.

“May I ask yer name?”

“Jane,” she answered simply, offering no more. “And yours, sir?”

“I’m Robbie,” he returned. “I thank ye, Jane. I dinna deserve yer kindness, but I am grateful all the same.”

The strange fluttering intensified in her belly as he opened his green eyes again and fixed them on her. She swallowed thickly, her mouth suddenly dry.

“Well ... do not thank me yet. We must still change your salve, and I assure you, you shall not thank me for the pain—now that you’re awake.”

“I’ll do my best to keep my mouth shut,” he answered with a faint grin.

With great care, Jane untied the knot in the bandage. It turned out to be an advantage to them both that she’d only managed to wrap it once—now that she had to remove it. When she lifted the salve to clean the wound, the man winced as the honey, stickier now that it had begun to dry, pulled at the flesh around the gash. His stomach muscles contracted against the unpleasant sensation, and Jane felt a blush stain her cheeks at the intimacy of his unguarded reaction.

“Is it bad?” he enquired through clenched teeth.

“Yes, it is,” she answered truthfully. “I shall need to clean it again.”

The man closed his eyes, preparing for the pain as Jane filled the bowl she’d brought with the warming water from the cooking pot. She took a clean strip of linen, dabbed it in the water, and pressed it to the angry, red wound. The man hissed sharply with indrawn breath, and instinctively his hand clamped down on her free hand. She grasped it back, squeezing in sympathy.

“I’m sorry, sir, I know it hurts,” she said.

“Will ye do something for me?” he panted as she dabbed.

“If I can, sir,” she responded.

“Will ye no’ call me ‘sir’? I’ve told ye, my name’s Robbie.”

Even through his obvious discomfort, there was a hint of a grin on his shapely mouth, and Jane found herself grinning back.

“Robbie,” she repeated.

She worked fast, removing the crusted honey and fresh blood from the infected gash. Only when she’d finished did she realize she’d been holding Robbie’s hand the entire time. Suddenly shy, she let go, and rinsed the linen in the bowl with both hands. She then turned to her neatly laid row of supplies. Selecting a fresh strip of linen, she folded it into a square, and poured a fresh dollop of honey onto it.

“What is that?” he inquired.

“Honey,” she answered. “It will draw the infection from your wound.”

“I havena heard of that. Where’d ye learn such a thing?”

She shrugged indifferently as she placed the fresh salve on his wound. “My grandmother taught me healing.”

“Is that why ye’ve been forcing that wretched drink down my neck all night?”

“Yes,” she said with a laugh. “The thyme brings on the sweats to cool your body. Now that you are more aware and will need help to sleep through the night, I shall add willow bark to the infusion to dull the ache.”

“And the chamber pot?” he added. “What might ye be using that for?”

Jane paused and bit back a sheepish smile. “Two pots missing from the kitchen would have been missed ... it has been thoroughly washed, I promise you.”

“Right,” he answered, grimacing.

“Just be grateful I’m trying to help at all,” she returned, a touch defensive. “At least I’m not asking you to drink anything that’s been in here.”

She tried to hold a stern expression, but the quiver of laughter on his lips diminished her incense.

“I am grateful ... for all ye’ve done.”

“It’s nothing,” she said modestly. “Now help me to lift you up so that I can wrap your bandage properly this time.”

Jane bent over Robbie and wedged her hand beneath his bare back and the dirt floor; his powerful arm reached across himself and gripped her shoulder. With a grunt, she helped him to pull himself into a sitting position. The strain was evident on his face as he held himself up by leaning back on his free hand.

She worked quickly, securing the bandage snugly around his stomach. Then, with just as much effort as it took to raise him, she helped to lower him again. All the while she was keenly aware of the proximity of his face to her own. His mouth was so close to her throat that she could feel his hot breath on her skin as he panted with exhaustion. Her hands encircled him, gripping his bare, feverish flesh. How different he was from Lord Reginald, she thought. His skin was so much smoother, sculpted over well-defined muscles, and there was not a hint of a paunch at his stomach, unlike the baron.

She flushed, angry with herself for having even entertained the idea at such an inappropriate time; at having entertained it at all, in fact. With renewed focus, she let him go and ladled the heated water into the cup of crushed needles. The exercise had taken a toll on him—his eyes drooped with fatigue.

“You must drink some more of the infusion before you sleep,” she said.

“If ye insist,” he answered, closing his eyelids.

When the infusion had steeped enough, Jane picked up the cup. Raising his head and cradling it in the crook of her arm, she helped him to drink. Weak and feverish though he was, it was far less of a challenge to get him to drink the liquid in its entirety than it had been the night before.

“Before you sleep, sir,” Jane began.

“Robbie,” he interjected softly.

“I am sorry. Before you sleep, Robbie, may I ask you something?”

He tipped his chin once, on the brink of sleep.

She took a breath, nervous. “You ... knew the men in the valley, did you not?”

Robbie said nothing for a long moment. When he answered, the tone of his voice was flat, devoid of emotion. Nonetheless there was a quality to it, a sadness that prompted a hollow ache in her chest.

“I did, aye.”

“The young man, the one lying on his side closest to the trees with the fair hair ... I cannot rid my thoughts of his face. Who was he?”

“He were my cousin,” he answered after another sad pause. “Connall. Twenty-three years he were, wi’ a loving wife—a bonnie lass by the name of Margaret—a young son, and a wee babe on the way.”

He said no more, though she wished he would. But at that point she thought it best to let him sleep. Not only did he need the rest, he also needed the release—a reprieve from the reality of what had happened, what he’d lost so very recently. The sadness which had weighted his voice affected her, and her heart went out to him. It was a strange sensation—feeling sympathy for a man whom she knew to be an enemy to her husband.

Though she no longer considered him a savage Scot as she had when she first encountered him. Perhaps she had been wrong to be frightened by all of the stories she’d been fed by the ladies in Sussex. And if she had been wrong about that ...

To bend, you must open your eyes and see the whole truth. For there is much about Scotland and its people that you do not know ...

Jane collected the soiled linens and, taking up her cake of soap, she ladled water into the chamber pot to wash them. She scrubbed with fervour, determined to still the thoughts that tumbled in her head. There had been nothing like this in her world in Sussex, no conflicts, no warring obligations—nothing to spoil her simple life of privilege. Things had been so peaceful in England.

Lady D’Aubrey’s words taunted her, echoing fiercely in her mind as if to mock her naivety.

Open your eyes ...

Chapter 6

The dowager baroness’ words haunted Jane all afternoon, and she found herself dwelling on them as Ruth bathed her that evening after supper.

“I daresay, mistress, I have not seen you so distracted in a long while. Even before your wedding day you were not this distant, so I know something must be bothering you. Pray, tell me. What is it?”

Jane chewed her lip, contemplating. “Do you ever feel as though the course of your life has suddenly been altered?” she mused. “Like it has been travelling along one path as it should, but then  ... oh, I don’t know ... then of a sudden the fates have stepped in to redirect it?”

“Can’t say as I have, my Lady. I’ve always known my life would be spent in service.”

“But you started service in Sussex, and now you’re in Scotland. Does that not seem like an alteration to you?”

“It makes no difference where I spend my life; it’s all the same service to me. And I still have you, so nothing has changed for me really. Nothing important, anyway. But you obviously feel as though your life has changed, and I am interested to know what it is in particular you’re thinking.”

“It is nothing,” Jane insisted with a dismissive wave of her hand. “Take no notice of me, my Ruth. I am blathering.”

Ruth eyed her doubtfully. Self-conscious under her silent scrutiny, Jane sank farther under the water, submerging herself to the top of her lip. She wanted so much to tell Ruth her secret, but she dared not. It was not some special hiding place she’d found, or some trinket. It was a wounded enemy Scot. Jane was naive—she was only beginning to get a sense of just how naive she truly was. But she was not so thick she didn’t know full well that were Robbie discovered, he would be hanged for treason. Perhaps she, too, would face justice for her part in helping him, for keeping him concealed. He was an enemy to the Crown, after all, not just to Lord Reginald D’Aubrey.

She could not think of such things. Not now, at any rate. At Ruth’s silent urging, she sat up again and let her maid wash her hair. She closed her eyes, revelling in the comforting sensation of Ruth’s strong hands stroking her wet locks. Down the length of her back they caressed as she poured a cascade of water from a pitcher to rinse the soap. It was a sensation in which Jane had taken comfort all her life; she held onto it especially hard now—now that she was so far from her home, her family, everything she’d ever known.

Her eyes snapped open at the sound of her chamber door as it was thrust wide and banged against the wall. Instinctively, she wrapped her arms around her bare breasts and drew her knees up to hide her nakedness. Ruth’s hands pulled away from Jane’s hair, as surprised as her mistress by the intrusion.

Lord Reginald stood at the door, wavering back and forth slightly as he squinted not at Jane, but in her general direction.

“Don’t bother to cover up, girl,” he slurred with a teasing grin. “I’ve seen all there is to see.”

“What is it, my Lord?” Jane asked pleasantly despite the unease that fluttered about in her stomach.

Lord Reginald eyed Ruth. “Away with you, woman. I’ve a need of my wife at the moment.”

“As you wish, my Lord,” Ruth answered with a squeeze of Jane’s shoulder. “Only, I have not finished my mistress’ bath. I beg you should return in an hour.”

He laughed, his voice low and throaty. “No need. I’ll only dirty her up again.”

Ruth paused, searching for a way to prolong her presence for Jane’s sake without being insubordinate.

“It is alright, my Ruth,” Jane allowed, suppressing her panic as best she could. “I pray you go.”

“My Lady,” Ruth acknowledged with a curtsey. She glanced sidelong at Jane as she stepped around Lord Reginald. Jane heard the unspoken sympathy in her glance, the apology and the encouragement.

When she’d gone, Lord Reginald stepped close to the tub.

“Stand up for me,” he commanded playfully.

Jane swallowed the fury that began to bubble in her chest and her throat, and did as her husband bade.

“Mmm,” he murmured, and reached forwards to massage her nipple between his thumb and forefinger. “Walter was right—you do have a fine figure.”

“Thank you, my Lord,” she mumbled, lowering her chin so that he would not notice the scowl she could not contain.

“You were well worth the trouble to negotiate for,” he added.

Lord Reginald reached forwards abruptly and gripped her under the arms. His intention was clearly to lift her out of the tub as if she were a mere child, however, in his drunken state he lost his balance the moment he tried to raise her. Alarmed, Jane instinctively stepped back to keep herself from falling over him, but the lip of the tub prevented her, and she fell backwards, bouncing painfully onto the stone floor. She gasped as her ankle slammed off the lip of the tub—a sharp ache reverberated up her leg.

“Oh, s-sorry ‘bout that,” Lord Reginald offered, hiccupping.

“It is fine, my Lord,” Jane answered, fighting to stay calm against the throbbing in her leg. Her panic rose as she recalled Ruth’s words about what the drink did to men.

“Ah, you’re alright, aren’t you,” he grinned.

He pulled her awkwardly off the floor and ushered her to the bed. She knew he didn’t mean to be rough, only to assist her, but in his inebriated state Jane wound up being half-dragged across the room. She hobbled against the pain in her leg before Lord Reginald tossed her, still dripping wet, onto the sheets. She landed on her stomach, and her right thigh collided with the bed frame, sending another wave of pain through her leg.

“You’re certainly wet for me now, girl,” he quipped, and when Jane made to crawl into the centre of the mattress he added, “No, no. Stay where you are.”

She was unaccustomed with the methods by which a man and a woman could be intimate, and feared what his intentions were this time. Standing behind her, he hastened to undo the laces of his breeks, and then clumsily pressed himself, already fully erect, to her unprepared flesh. She whimpered pathetically as he thrust himself roughly inside.

Jane clenched her eyes shut, and pressing her face into the mattress, she tried to imagine she was elsewhere. She pictured home, pictured running down the vicarage lane with Hugg, her beloved Mastiff. She pictured the balls and dances in Sussex—the cool night air floating through the open windows of the manor houses, carrying music and laughter with it on the breeze.

But Lord Reginald’s grotesque grunting forced its way into her tentatively held illusions, shattering the images she desperately tried to conjure.

When his awkward thrusting was getting him nowhere in the position he had her, he urged Jane to turn over, gripping her thigh in indication of what he wanted her to do. Her injured leg knocked against his hip, and the ache, which had begun to subside, roared back to life, wrenching a choked sob from her chest.

“Oh, bollocks. Are you alright?” Lord Reginald inquired again, his eyes glassy.

She nodded, biting back a fit of snivelling and shut her eyes once more. Still standing over her, he lifted her legs and tossed them roughly one over each shoulder. Then, barely positioning himself properly, he re-entered her, grunting loudly as he thrust.

His pitiful attempt to satisfy himself carried on far beyond what was tolerable, and by the time he finally did reach his satisfaction, she felt as though she had been rubbed raw.

Relieved and exhausted, Lord Reginald removed himself from between her raised legs, tossing them aside carelessly, and collapsed onto the bed beside her. His arm, clammy with perspiration, he tossed over her midsection—whether it was a gesture of affection or that he’d simply forgotten she was there, Jane didn’t know.

She waited patiently for him to move, but soon there was the sound of soft snoring rising from his motionless form.

“Wonderful,” she muttered to herself, scrubbing the tears from her eyes with the back of her wrist.

Carefully so as not to wake him, she disentangled herself from under his arm and slid off the bed. The evidence of his release slid sickeningly from her cavity and down the inside of her thighs. She shuddered and crossed the room to the bath which, by now, had grown tepid. Stepping into the water, she scrubbed herself clean of Lord Reginald’s seed. Her womanhood stung from the chafing he’d given her, but she did not care; she scrubbed furiously—as if she could wash away the humiliation along with the physical evidence.

Sneaking about the room, she dressed herself and wove her hair into a simple plait. The hour was not too late; there was still time to visit the kitchens in order to gather some food to bring with her. The Scotsman would likely be hungry—if not tonight, then soon.

Robbie—she corrected herself—the Scotsman’s name was Robbie.

Desperate to escape Lord Reginald’s offensive, ale-driven snores, Jane opened the door and shut it quietly behind herself. Ruth waited for her on the other side.

“Oh, Mistress,” she lamented. “I hope it was not too terrible.”

“I’ve endured it, as you can see,” she assured her maid, affecting a smile. “Now, I wonder if you might try and see if you can coerce his Lordship back to his own bedchamber, for he has fallen asleep in mine.”

“I will try, my Lady,” she said with a pat on Jane’s arm.

Jane turned and began to walk stiffly away, but as she did, Ruth let out a gasp. “My Lady, what has happened to your leg—are you injured? Why do you walk so?”

“It is nothing,” she lied. “I’ve only tripped over the side of the tub. It is my own clumsiness that is to blame.”

Ruth eyed her sceptically, but said nothing. Lowering her face to hide the telltale colouring of her cheeks, Jane hurried off down the hall as naturally as she could, trying for Ruth’s sake to hide her limp. She dared not look back over her shoulder to judge her maid’s reaction.

The cook and a handful of servants were still puttering about the kitchens when she entered.

“My Lady, how can I help ye?” the cook queried, stooping in a low curtsey.

Jane withheld a grimace of pity at the way the elderly woman lowered her withered frame.

“I wonder if I might have some bread, or perhaps some oatcakes to take back to my chamber,” she inquired pleasantly. “I found that I have not been very hungry at the evening meals, for the company in the great hall is so unfamiliar to me. But I have awakened these past few nights with a fierce hunger as a result.”

“Certainly, your Ladyship,” the cook nodded. “Mairi, will ye assemble a tray for the baroness?”

Mairi, a slip of a girl who had been scrubbing pots in a large, wooden basin, nodded. With a quick curtsey and downcast eyes, she swiftly collected an assortment of items—half a loaf of cheat, a handful of gingerbread squares and some oatcakes, with a bit of black crowdie in a small pot to go on top. When she reached for the manchet, the fine bread made only in limited quantities for the expensive white flour, Jane interjected.

“Please, may I have the bannock instead?” she said, afraid that its absence would be brought to Lord Reginald’s attention.

Mairi stared at her, surprised. “Ye want the bannock, my Lady? Ye being a noblewoman, surely ye want the manchet instead.”

“No, the bannock will be fine, thank you,” she responded.

Mairi nodded her acquiescence, and without further question, placed the items onto a silver tray and brought them to the head cook.

“I shall bring these to your chamber,” the cook said, taking the tray from Mairi—reverently, as though it carried a priceless treasure.

“Oh, please, let me help you with that,” Jane offered. “Or let one of the other servants carry it.”

The cook lifted her chin proudly. “No need, yer ladyship. I can do it gae fine.”

“Yes, I’m sure you can,” Jane agreed, regretting that she’d offended the woman. “Then I shall follow you up.”

“Very well, yer Ladyship.”

She followed, limping after the old cook who was herself hobbling along awkwardly. She laughed quietly to herself, thinking about the picture the two of them must make as they stumbled along the passageways of the castle together.

A light in the ale room caught her attention as they passed, and peering in she saw a solitary figure hunched over a battered wooden table.

“I’ll be along shortly,” she informed the cook.

The cook nodded over her shoulder and continued to hobble onward.

Jane backed up a few steps to the door of the ale room. The figure hunched over the table was Tearlach, and he was very clearly in his cups. Despite this—or perhaps because of it—there was an air about him that exuded even more sadness and defeat than usual. His head hung even lower between his drooping shoulders than usual, and she felt an especially strong twinge of pity just watching him.

“Tearlach?” she called from the doorway.

Except for a slight tensing of his shoulders, the man gave no indication that he’d heard her; she entered the room anyway. The musky scent of the mould-covered mortar and of ages old oak barrels wrapped her like a sheet, for the air within was still—so still that if Tearlach’s obvious despair had had a scent, it too would have enveloped her.

“Are you alright, Tearlach?” she asked, though she already knew the answer.

Tearlach raised his eyes, red and bleary, and regarded her oddly. He seemed confused, as if trying to place her. Then, recognition smoothed the crease in his forehead.

“Oh aye, yer Ladyship. Why shouldna I be? I’ve got a roof over my head, a belly full of ale, and a prestigious position as steward to his Lordship’s castle. I’ve nothing to be bothered over, have I?” Then, to himself, he mumbled, “And all I had to do for it was play the part of Judas.”

Jane frowned in sympathy. “You wished to spare your life. There is nothing wrong in that.”

Though she’d meant only to be friendly, her words angered Tearlach. He raised his head to her, meeting her eyes in a challenge.

“That isna why I did it, ye wee silly lass.” When Jane’s eyebrows flew up in shock at his outburst, he hung his head again. “I am sorry, my Lady. I didna mean to speak so to ye.”

“Why did you do it then?” Jane pressed when she’d regained her composure. “Swear your loyalty to the king, I mean, if it wasn’t what you wanted? You were not under threat of death.”

Tearlach scoffed and gazed at her incredulously. “Dinna ye ken anything, lass?”

Jane paused. “No,” she answered honestly. “I’m starting to realize that I do not.’

He held her eyes, as if to consider some great matter. She could see the muscles in his jaw working as he decided whether or not he would speak. She held perfectly still, not wanting to say or do anything that might deter him.

“Ye ken, yer lord husband could have me hanged as a traitor for what I’m about to tell ye. Ye might go scurrying off to him and repeat all that I’ve said. And ye ken, I dinna care a whit at this moment. Let him hang me. I did it; I betrayed my laird and my people to protect what’s theirs. To safeguard it in their absence.”

Jane gasped. “Do you mean to say that you expect them to reclaim it?”

Tearlach shook his head sadly. “I dinna expect that at all. Certainly no’ after ... no’ after what happened. I couldna have joined them in their banishment. Dinna get me wrong, if I could have fought wi’ their ranks, I would have. But I am too old to be fighting. These bones are no longer of any use in battle. Nay, I stayed—I swore loyalty to that beast of a man ye call king ... because it were the only thing I could do to help.”

“Help how?” she prompted when Tearlach fell silent.

“Dunloch will always belong to MacGillivray, even if it is in the hands of a Sassenach lord. That means that the gold and the riches of Dunloch belong to MacGillivray. Now I am no fool as to think they’ll ever come back. But if they do—one day—they will find the books in order. They will find that old Tearlach protected and maintained what was always theirs. It is all I can do now.”

Jane watched, heart stricken, as a tear slid from the corner of the Dunloch steward’s glassy eye. The man took another swallow of ale from the goblet he held clasped in his fist and said no more.

With a reassuring hand on his hunched shoulder as she passed by him, she left the room. Her thoughts were in turmoil. What had Lady D’Aubrey meant when she’d said Jane didn’t know anything about Scotland or its people? What was it that she needed to know? She was always aware that there was strife in this land, but it had always seemed to her the solutions was simple—if those heathen Scots wanted peace, then they had better stop warring with England and simply accept Edward as their king.

But the heartache in Tearlach’s voice shed a new light on a situation she had always considered simple. She realized then that there was so much she did not understand, much she had to learn. Wanted to learn.

And she knew just the person to ask—the one person in all of this strange and foreboding land who owed it to her to provide answers.

Chapter 7

By the time Jane reached the hut through the blackened wilderness, her ankle was throbbing. The rough terrain over which she’d travelled had not helped.

Robbie was sleeping soundly when she arrived, but the fire was still crackling away gently—he must have been awake at one point and added the kindling and wood she’d brought in. That was a good sign.

She set stones to heating. The thyme infusion was running low—he’d been at that too, she thought with satisfaction—so she would need to brew more of it. Gently, so as not to wake him, she pressed the back of her hand to his forehead. The fever still burned, but it was significantly reduced. She resisted the urge to stroke the length of his face as she had done before. With his fever declining, he might not be as oblivious to her touch as he had been then, and what on earth would she say if he woke up and caught her?

Her throbbing ankle was showing no signs of abating. With no work left to be done at the moment, she moved to her own blanket across from Robbie and gingerly lowered herself onto it. Her sore ankle made simple movements as that awkward, and the ache between her thighs made her flesh tender—not only had Lord Reginald rubbed her raw, but she thought he must also have bruised the flesh at her tailbone with his unbridled bucking and thrusting.

Adjusting herself into a comfortable sitting position, she unlaced her boot and removed it. Then pulling her skirt up to her thigh, she stripped off her stocking. Her ankle, she could easily see, would likely bear a bruise and was a trifle swollen; though that might be due in part to the aggravation the walking had done it.

Moving her knee to the side, she examined the inside of her ankle where she’d noticed a stinging sensation—the flesh above her ankle bone had received an awful scrape which she had not noticed before from the lip of the tub.

Sighing, Jane moved closer to the fire where the remains of the afternoon’s thyme infusion stagnated in the bowl. It would be of use to her now—in addition to its ability to cause a body to sweat and thus reduce a fever, thyme was also a wonderful preventative of infection. She resettled herself onto her sore bottom and reached for a strip of linen. Dipping it into the cool infusion, she dabbed delicately at the scrape, pulling back the hem of her skirt to her hip.

“Does it hurt?”

With a gasp, she yanked the hem of her dress back down, and pulled her bare foot underneath its cover.

“I thought you were asleep,” she accused, more flustered than angry.

“I figured as much,” Robbie answered with a wry grin. “What happened?”

“I ... er, I tripped on the tub—on the stairs,” she amended, embarrassed at having revealed such a personal detail.

Robbie chuckled. “Well, which was it—the tub or the stairs?” When Jane glanced down, Robbie added, “And what has happened to yer backside? Hurt that in yer wee fall did ye?”

Jane flushed a deep scarlet. Tears stung behind her eyelids at the fresh memory of how roughly she’d been used by Lord Reginald. She’d not realized how much it bothered her.

He noticed the change in her expression, and his own face hardened—his mouth pressed into a tight line and his eyes grew dark.

“Jane—what has happened?”

Jane shook her head miserably, swiping with the heel of her palm at the moisture which had collected beneath her lower lids with the back of her hand.

“Jane, have ye ... have ye been defiled?” His voice shook with repressed rage. He shoved himself into some semblance of a sitting position with effort, and braced his hands behind himself for support.

“No!” she exclaimed, shocked and angry at his assumption. “And would you please lie back down before you set your fever off again?”

She moved to his side, and with one hand beneath his head and the other supporting his back, she assisted him in lying down again.

“You’ve got quite the imagination on you, sir,” she reprimanded tersely. “I am a respectable, married woman.”

“Even respectable women can fall victim to a man wi’ defiling on his mind. Was it your respectable husband that used ye so boorishly then?”

Jane furrowed her brows, offended by his blunt manner. “This is an entirely inappropriate conversation, sir,” she insisted.

“I’ll take that as a yes then,” Robbie concluded, his green eyes fixed intently on her. “That’s a horrible way of treating a woman ye’re meant to love, dinna ye think?”

Jane shrugged casually. “In that, you assume too much. He does not love me; my marriage was arranged and my husband is thrice my age.”

“Surely he must love ye—or at least he must be terribly smitten wi’ ye, a lass so young and pleasing.”

Jane glanced ruefully at Robbie. “My, you do have quite an imagination—or the fever must be acting up.”

“I dinna understand. What are ye on about?”

“My husband thinks me plain, and I know full well that I am,” she answered simply.

“By God, ye are not,” Robbie insisted. When Jane snorted in disbelief he continued, “I mean that. Ye’ve got yerself beautiful dark hair and a lovely pair of blue eyes. I dinna remember much about the first time I encountered ye, but I surely do remember those eyes staring back at me.”

He fell silent then, and lowered his gaze rather shyly. She had not considered he might ever be shy, and her stomach fluttered in that curious way again. She lowered her eyes, feeling rather shy herself.

“Well, I thank you for such a compliment, though I confess I find it difficult to believe. But it is all irrelevant. Right now, you should be taking another dose of infusion, not wasting your breath in flattery.”

“Ye didna brew it in the chamber pot, did ye?” he quipped, attempting to add some levity to the conversation.

“Don’t start,” she admonished, though a grin tugged at her lips despite her effort to remain stern.

Fishing two hot stones from the fire with the iron tongs, Jane submerged them in the water to boil.

“Will you turn your head that I may replace my stocking and my boot?” she asked politely.

Robbie grinned, his clear eyes glowing with mischief in the firelight, but did as she asked. She rather liked the way his lips pulled up at the corners when he was amused. He had an impish look about him when he did that.

Quickly, she pulled her stocking over her foot and relaced her boot. Then in the intervening silence she chewed her lip, wondering how best to bring up the subject that was on her mind.

“I ... I had a brief chat with the steward of Dunloch this evening after the meal,” she ventured. “Did you know him?”

“Tearlach? Aye, I ken him.”

“He seems quite upset about everything. I think crushed might be a better turn of phrase.”

“Aye, I imagine he is. I imagine a lot of people are.” Robbie’s words were guarded as he waited for Jane to come around to what it was she wanted to say.

“He has sworn his loyalty to England and to the king, and yet he admits that he remains steward to Dunloch to protect what rightfully belongs to the MacGillivray chief.”

Robbie narrowed his eyes, suspicious. “He told ye this?”

“He had gotten into the ale when I found him,” she admitted sheepishly, glancing at him from under her lashes.

“That were very foolish of him, to go spouting off to an English lass of all people. Ye could very well repeat everything he’s said to the English. D’Aubrey would have every occasion to hang him from the castle walls for admitting such a thing.”

Jane was silent for a moment, her brow furrowed in concentration.

“I don’t understand,” she said finally.

“What dinna ye understand? That Tearlach could be hanged?”

“I don’t understand,” she repeated more forcefully. “I don’t understand why the Scottish are warring against the king.”

Robbie stared at her, baffled and angry. “He forces us to pay him duties and taxes and when we willna, he steals our land and gives it to someone who will.”

“But the English must do the same. They have not rebelled against their king as the Scottish have.”

“He is no’ our king,” he shouted in return, and then immediately winced from the pain his outburst caused his wound.

“But the Scottish throne was vacant,” Jane interjected.

The look on Robbie’s face made her stomach plummet. He regarded her as if she was an utter fool, and she was starting to feel very much like she was one.

“Ye silly wee lass—dinna ye ken anything? It were no’ his throne to take. He has taken advantage of our confusion over the royal succession, and has used it to usurp power in a land that doesna belong to him.”

“I-Is that true?” she stammered.

“How can ye doubt it?”

Jane hung her head, suddenly feeling very naive and silly. “Nobody ever talked of it in Sussex except to claim ... well, to claim some very unbecoming things about the Scottish people. I never knew what this war was about, and ...”

Robbie scrutinized her as she fell silent, chewing her lip in an attempt to fend of bitter tears.

“D’ye ken why we Scots hate the English so much?” he said slowly.

“I understand now,” she answered, nodding. “Your land has been stolen, and you are forced to pay taxes to a king and to lords that are not yours.”

“I can see ye’ve been listening, but still ye dinna ken why, so I’ll tell ye. Yer king is a villain on his own, sure enough. But the English lords, and the English soldiers that have moved in on Scotland in his name, are the ones who fuel our hatred. They kidnap our people to demand ransom, and when we canna pay, they hang them. Dinna think I mean only men, for they hang innocent women and children as well. They invent crimes to justify hangings, too—for a number of reasons, none of which are just. The soldiers stir up trouble so that we’ll fight to protect ourselves, our women and children, and when we fight, we are breaking the peace and we are slaughtered.

“And do ye ken,” Robbie continued, his voice growing low and pained, “why I thought ye’d been defiled? Why that were my first thought?”

Jane shook her head. Her eyes were wide, and her stomach heaved sickly at what he was telling her.

“I’ve seen it happen—to women and girls I’ve kent all my life. I’ve seen the pain that comes from being used rough; more than just bodily pain—I’ve seen it in their eyes. And I’ve seen the same pain in the eyes of the men that couldna do anything to protect them, nor to avenge them. We hate the English for what they do to us day after day. And we hate yer king for not only allowing it to happen, but for condoning it. Encouraging it.”

“And you hate me because I’m English,” she surmised dejectedly.

She felt Robbie’s hand grasp hers.

“No,” he said, his voice almost a whisper. “I didna say that. How could I hate the woman that has saved my life? Ye kent I were the enemy—ye must have, wi’ me bloodied up and skulking around a pile of dead Scotsmen. And yet ye still helped me. But if this land is to be yer new home, Jane from Sussex, ye must know the way things are. Ye canna remain blind to it as ye were. For it will be around ye every day. Ye canna turn away from it, even if ye wanted to. Ye’re a brave lass; a brave and kind lass. Ye must ken what yer people are really like.”

Robbie’s passion died away, and Jane was suddenly quite conscious of his hand grasping hers. The heat of his fingers tingled up her arm, and set her belly aflutter once again. She expected his shyness to return, but when she lifted her gaze to his, his green eyes held her intently.

For a moment she felt as if a force was pulling her gaze to his and she could not look away. Her eyes dropped to his lips, and at that moment she had never before felt such an intense desire to be kissed. The desire flooded her, provoking a yearning to feel his lips pressed against hers. She had revolted at the experience of having Lord Reginald’s tongue twining with hers ... but if it were Robbie’s tongue, Robbie’s mouth ...

Shocked at herself for the unexpected turn of her thoughts, she pulled her hand away from his.

“The water is boiling,” she said, clearing her throat.

A warm heat rose up her neck as she felt the force of his eyes still on her. She turned away, busying herself with tidying her already tidied items. Under the intensity of his gaze her movements grew clumsy, and she nearly burned her hand as she worked on the cooking pot.

“I’ve brought you a few things to eat,” she added to break the tension.

Avoiding his eyes, she passed Robbie the parcel of food.

“I thank ye,” he said softly.

“It’s nothing special; just some bannock and oatcakes—but I did manage to get some black crowdie to go on top.”

“That’s no’ what I mean, Jane.”

Her heartbeat quickened at the way he said her name—softly, as if he knew the effect he was having on her and sought to elevate it.

“It’s nothing,” she said again, stuffing the sensation down into her gut to ignore it.

“So ye’ve said.”

When he’d eaten a small chunk of the cheat and drank the fresh thyme infusion, she changed his bandage. Never had she felt so awkward, her fingers so stiff and uncoordinated. His skin under her hands felt smooth, and a longing to trace the planes of his stomach blossomed inside her. She wanted so much to place her cheek against his broad chest and feel his powerful arms wrap around her ...

And she fought every one of these absurd longings, for she was certain that he could hear, or at least sense her thoughts with mortifying clarity.

Besides, such thoughts were wholly inappropriate. Not only was he a Scot, an enemy to the king and to her new home, but she was also a married woman, the wife of the wealthy and powerful Baron of Dunloch.

But as true as these things were in her head, she knew she could not convince her heart of them.

The next morning at breakfast, tired and uncomfortable from an intermittent sleep on the dirt floor of the hut, Jane watched the castle inhabitants. There were lords and ladies, kin and friends of D’Aubrey. There were guardsmen, and there were higher ranking soldiers from the garrison at Fort Invercleugh.

And they were all English.

Robbie’s words swirled around in her mind, the things he had told her painting a grisly picture to which she could not turn a blind eye even if she wished to.

Bribery.

Rape.

Murder.

He could be lying to gain her sympathy, and the sickening churning in her stomach wanted to believe that possibility. But she knew he was not; the pain in his eyes and in his voice was too raw, too real.

He had chosen to follow his MacGillivray chief into battle against the English lord that took Dunloch from him and his people, and at first she’d thought it was for the sake of land. She’d never truly understood why land and castles and territory were so important before. But Robbie had thrown a new light onto what she understood and what she didn’t, and now she watched the English men and women before her, laughing and chatting as they broke their fast in the great hall of the MacGillivrays’ ancestral home, and felt truly wretched.

The loss of their home to the English had been a last and final slap in the face. It had been the insult tacked to the end of a long list of grievous and unforgiveable injuries.

She turned her eyes to Tearlach, who sat in a corner at a trestle table by himself, and regarded him with a new and heavy clarity. She understood the stoop in his shoulders, and the bitter disappointment that seemed stained on his face and in his soul.

She locked eyes with Lady D’Aubrey, who’d seemed so wise from the moment Jane had met her. The baroness must have recognized the ill and bewildered look on her face, the lady’s nod seemed an acknowledgement of her dark thoughts.

It dawned on Jane then, just how sheltered her life in Sussex had been, how truly naive she was. What else was happening in the world that she had never been permitted to know?

Chapter 8

Over the next several days a pattern developed in Jane’s life in which she took a sort of solace. Feigning alert and interest in the goings on at the castle, she would preside at the head table beside her husband over the morning meal. The moment Lord Reginald left to go about whatever duties occupied his day, she would sneak off to spend the rest of the morning and the afternoon caring for Robbie. Returning to the castle before evening set in, she would spend some time with Lady D’Aubrey before rejoining her husband at the head table to preside over the evening meal. And finally, after suffering the unpleasant chore of allowing Lord Reginald to slake his lust with her body, she was off again to watch over her fugitive Scot until just before dawn.

Daily, Robbie improved. His festering wound began to heal thanks to her persistent administering of the poultices of honey, and his fever decreased steadily.

“If I never taste that vile thyme water again, it will be too soon,” he declared when she informed him it was no longer necessary.

In fact, much of her care was no longer necessary—or at least not such diligent care. But in the short time she’d known him, she’d grown to like Robbie very much; he had a wit and a natural charm that would make him likeable to just about anyone. He could have her laughing uncontrollably one minute, and in the next he could turn the power of his green eyes on her and send her stomach somersaulting dangerously.

Perhaps she liked him a little too much. She tried not to think about where her growing feelings towards him came from, nor where they were going. For the time being she was needed by his side to bring him back to health—or so she was content to pretend. And Robbie, for his part, was content to pretend to need her.

“You’ll ... er ... you’ll need your garments washed and mended,” she managed awkwardly one morning after she’d changed his salve and bandage.

Robbie, propped up with Jane’s rolled up blanket behind his head, grinned devilishly at her, enjoying her prim discomfort.

“I havena got anything else to wear,” he pointed out.

Her cheeks flared pink. “Yes, I realize that. You shall have to stay with a blanket covering you. But your clothes are still crusted with blood and dirt, and your shirt and kilt are torn and shall need to be repaired.”

“I am at yer mercy,” he answered, amused. “Take my feileadh, if ye will.”

She helped him to sit, and aided him at his weak attempts to undress himself. If changing the bandage on the wound around his flank did odd things to her stomach, removing his kilt was another matter entirely. She tried not to look as she unbelted the fabric at his waist and stripped his legs of his hose—especially not at his manhood which, as she removed his garments, was utterly exposed. But as much as she tried, she could not shut her eyes to everything—a glimpse of strong, well muscled thigh, a sleek and etched slope of a calf, a wisp of smooth alabaster hip. Jane swallowed thickly, fighting to beat down the mad hammering of her heart ... and also to suppress a strange wave of something she’d never experienced before spreading low in her stomach—lower than her stomach ...

“Ye move as though ye’ve never seen a man before,” she heard Robbie say, her eyes still riveted on the dirt floor as she collected his garments in a bundle. “But then again, married to a man so much older than ye, perhaps ye havena ... no’ really, no’ as a man should be.”

There was a teasing note in his voice, but his words stung like nettles nonetheless.

He could have no idea how deeply his words cut her. Would suffering Lord Reginald’s attentions truly be suffering if his waist was as trim and narrow as Robbie’s? Would she clench her fists and grit her teeth in her humiliation if it were a young and attractive body, and not an aging one like Lord Reginald’s, which claimed her each night? Would she feel a desire to wrap her arms around Lord Reginald’s shoulders and run her hands up his back if they were sleek and strong and smooth with youth?

Her sister Amelia loved to partake in carnal activity. Her eyes would light up, or would grow heavy with the spell of remembering, every time she divulged in great detail the tastes and sounds and sensations of the act. And once, Jane had happened to see it for herself, quite by accident, when she’d happened upon her sister and a boy from the village at it in the cellar of her father’s home. Amelia’s face had been contorted in what looked like pain but was instead, Jane knew, a pleasure so exquisite that no words could express her satisfaction.

She didn’t know then why such an act should be so unbearably wonderful. She did not understand it even now that she’d been subjected to that act herself. And as Robbie had pointed out ... she never would.

“Behave yourself,” she managed, forcing a jesting tone she didn’t feel. Taking up her cake of soap and gathering his garments, she stood. “I’ll take these to the stream to wash them,” she added.

Outside, she breathed deeply to collect her thoughts. But try as she might to control her mind, images cropped up over and over again—images of Robbie’s body atop hers, of her wrapping her legs around his waist as she’d heard Amelia tell of doing so many times, of pressing her face into the crook of his neck ...

“Silly, silly girl,” she chided herself, scrubbing harder.

To rid herself of such immodest thoughts, she imposed upon herself a stern countenance. Her effort was for naught—within seconds, the thoughts returned and a secretive smile played at her lips as she gave in and indulged helplessly in them. Well ... why should she not—what harm could it do?

Once his clothes had been washed, she brought them back inside to dry in front of the hearth.

“I am sorry if I offended ye,” Robbie said gently as she took a seat a short distance away from him.

“You did not,” she answered, picking up the needlecase she’d brought and pulling his damp wrung shirt onto her lap. She measured out a length of thread, strung it, and then assessed the size of the tear in the fabric.

“I’ve hurt ye, though,” he persisted.

“It’s nothing.”

“I think it is.”

Exasperated—more with herself than with him—she dropped his shirt into her lap and exhaled sharply.

“Whether it is or not, I hardly think it’s appropriate to be discussing such a thing with you.”

Robbie lowered his eyes to his naked form, covered from the waist down with the quilt she’d been sleeping on, and eyed her wryly.

“Dinna ye think it’s also inappropriate for ye to be spending yer time wi’ a naked man that is no’ yer husband?”

The pull of his lips in a grin softened Jane’s exasperation. “I suppose not.”

“Tell me then. Why did my words hurt ye?”

“Is it not obvious?” she evaded, returning to her mending.

“Yes, but I want to hear ye say it all the same.”

“Fine. Because what you said is true, and it hurts to hear.” She paused and then added, “Why is it so important to you that I admit such things aloud?”

Robbie did not respond immediately. In the silence, she raised her eyes to his curiously. His green eyes held her with a gaze that was both compassionate and pitying. And ... and something else ...

“Because I kent it in ye almost from the first moment I met ye—the way ye speak, the way ye move ... ye’re no’ happy. Ye dinna ken how easy it is to see in ye.”

Jane shrugged, annoyed that he’d read her so easily. “I have no cause to complain. I knew my marriage was settled many years ago. A comfortable situation was all I could ever hope for in a match, given that I am plain and would never be sought for my beauty.”

“Surely ye canna believe that,” Robbie insisted. “Jane, look at me.”

Reluctantly, she raised her head to meet his eyes—her heart began flapping wildly in her breast when she met the intensity of his gaze.

“I dinna ken who has put it in yer head that ye’re plain, but ye are no such thing. Truly,” he insisted when she shrugged dismissively. “Ye have a gae pretty and pleasing face. Thoughtful it is. Eyes as blue as the heavens. Had ye grown up at Dunloch, ye’d have had half the village lads mad wi’ want of ye. Including me ...”

She swallowed thickly when Robbie trailed off.

“Yes, well, speaking of growing up at Dunloch, how is it you came to know about this place?” she said, changing the topic of discussion.

He grinned, not fooled for a moment by her diversion, but conceded. “I kent of it because it were me that built it.”

“You?”

“Aye, well—me and the lads. When we were young, we thought we were men and needed a place—a fort, ye ken—where we could go to get away from all the lasses and just be men.” Robbie chuckled. “Get away from the lasses, can ye imagine it? That changed wi’in a year or two, ye can be sure.”

“Do you think you might all come back and rebuild it one day?” Jane said, smiling at the picture in her head.

Her eyes widened at what she had just said—how could she have forgotten? She watched, regretful, as Robbie’s face fell, and his eyes grew serious.

“Nay, I dinna think so, lass,” he answered mournfully. “They’re all dead. Diarmad were hanged a year ago by the English, and Aidan a year before that.”

“Hanged?” Jane heard herself whisper, though she was not at all sure she had spoken. “For what?”

“Stealing, they said. Though I kent full well they didna. Aidan got into a scrap wi’ Montrose’s forces at Invercleugh over a horse, and it were nobbut petty revenge. Diarmad had arranged to move his family away from Dunloch village after it were taken from us, but they said he were stealing Dunloch property—peasants to work the land, ye ken.”

“No,” Jane gasped, her hand flying to her throat.

“Aye,” Robbie insisted. And then pointedly, he added, “It were that D’Aubrey came up wi’ that solution. Many MacGillivrays remain in the village even now—if they dinna, if they leave, they’ll be hanged for some ridiculous charge as Diarmad was. And to stay they must swear their loyalty to the English king. So ye see, they didna have a choice, did they? The rest, they died in battle and now lay heaped atop one another rotting away at the bottom of that there valley.”

Jane’s stomach turned sickeningly at Robbie was telling her. The baron—her husband—had partaken in the injustices done.

“Ye ken,” Robbie continued, his voice growing thoughtful, “I spent some of the best days here in this hut. I liked it best when it were just me and Connall here. We all got along so well, us lads, but me and Connall ... we were close. Always were, ever since we were wee bairns. We always said we’d bring our boys here, show them the place where their fathers spent all their time before they discovered the lasses. But now ... now there will be no one to take Connall’s wee lad, or his babe that Margaret carries.”

Jane watched as Robbie’s face crumpled against the anguish of his memories; her heart ached for him. He raised his arm and covered his eyes with the crook of his elbow, and his shoulders shook with repressed sobs.

“Oh god, what have I done?” he moaned.

Instinctively, she rushed to his side to soothe and comfort him. She stroked his hair, shushing him. And when he moved into her, burying his head in her lap and wrapping his arms around her waist in an almost childlike posture, she embraced him in return, bending her head low and rocking him slightly.

“It’s not your fault,” she crooned, shedding her own tears for his loss. “You were only following your clan and its chief. You are not responsible for their deaths.”

Her assurances only seemed to fuel his misery, and he sobbed harder.

The memory of Connall surfaced in her mind, a man barely emerged from youth. His face had been so peaceful in death. She thought of the wife made a widow too young, and the children that would never know their father.

Jane allowed Robbie the time he needed to grieve, and grieved alongside him herself. She grieved for all the things which made her own troubles seemed so trivial in comparison, for the world she had been thrown into. Grieved for the men who died at her husband’s hands.

At the next morning meal, Jane could barely touch the food placed in her trencher. She could not meet the eyes of the servants—men and women who were little better than prisoners, chained to Dunloch by fear of Lord Reginald’s retribution—as they scurried about the great hall serving bannock, oatcakes, pottage, meat and ale. Fruits of their serfdom.

She saw them now for what they were—not servants, not Scots, not enemies ... but victims.

She felt sick.

“And what do you intend to do with your day, my love?” Lord Reginald inquired as he slopped the last of his pottage with a chunk of cheat bread.

Jane, so mired in her thoughts, did not hear the guarded tone of his voice, nor did she notice the suspicious set of his features.

“I thought perhaps I might bring my needlework to a lovely little place I’ve discovered in the hills,” she answered. “I find I can while away the hours there quite pleasantly.”

“You spend much time away from the castle. Some of the ladies have asked when they might have a chance to enjoy your company, and people are beginning to talk about where you might go every day.”

Jane’s mouth went dry, and the blood drained from her face. Did Lord Reginald know something?

He sighed, his countenance softening at her panicked expression. “My dear, I do not pretend you are a mature woman fit to take over the running of a fortress as grand as Dunloch. I know full well that I have poached you from the home of your father at too young an age to live up to the station to which I have elevated you. And I have known you since you were a young girl. I know you have always been a solitary and independent creature, content to spend your time traipsing through the hills and splashing about in the streams. I am not a cruel man—”

“Oh no, sir, you certainly are not,” Jane agreed enthusiastically. But the words caught in her throat at the recollection of poor Diarmad MacGillivray and who was responsible for his death.

Lord Reginald did not appear to notice her sudden hesitation. “I would never seek to prevent you from finding enjoyment where you will, regardless of what nattering might be going on, whispered and shielded by hands. As long as you behave properly in society I shall tolerate other people’s remarks. But do not forget that you have an image to uphold. You are the reigning Baroness D’Aubrey, and I would expect you to put in an appearance at least once in a while for the sake of that image.”

Jane nodded demurely. “You are right, my Lord. It is only that I am unaccustomed to being the Lady of a fine castle such as Dunloch. And I confess I am homesick—escaping by myself into the hills offers me solace from the fact that I am so far from home. But I do wish to be a good Lady. Shall I spend my day visiting the ladies of the castle then?”

Lord Reginald chuckled, amused. “Nay, that is not necessary. But I had planned to take a rest from my duties today. I thought that perhaps I might accompany you to the village to observe and greet the locals. It would do much to still those wagging tongues to see you by my side at a time other than meals.”

Jane offered him a wide smile, feigning enthusiasm despite her disappointment that she would not be spending the afternoon with Robbie.

“That is an excellent idea, my Lord,” she agreed.

Leaning closer to her, Lord Reginald added in a lowered voice, “And I would that you accompany me to my chamber after the meal. I’ve a want of you before we’re off.”

Discreetly, his hand slipped from the table and slid up the inside of her thigh to prod at the concealed crevice between her closed legs; she resisted the urge to clamp her knees shut and bat his hand away.

“As you wish, my Lord,” she answered obediently.

Chapter 9

Though Lord Reginald’s desire was slaked rather forcefully, he was at least quick. He did not even attempt to undress her, but merely pulled the bodice of her dress over her breasts and raised her skirts to help himself to her. No less than twenty minutes later, they were mounted atop a pair of geldings and were on their way to the village.

Jane had only seen it from afar until now, but the village she encountered when they arrived was very different than what she was accustomed to in Sussex. The dwellings were primarily huts like the one Robbie and his young friends had constructed, with walls of wattle and daub or stone, and low roofs of thatch. Few dwellings were made of timber; those that were appeared to be the shops of craftsmen and merchants—if they could be called “shops” at all, for their crude construction was similar to the peasant huts surrounding them.

However, it was not the buildings that most interested her, but rather the people. Other than the plaid and the kilts, almost all of which were MacGillivray pattern and colour, they looked no different than the peasants she’d known in Sussex—similar of stature and countenance they were. These were not the beastly specimens she’d feared all this time.

The people of the village, recognizing Jane as Baron D’Aubrey’s new bride, bowed and curtseyed as they passed her by but regarded her warily and, she happened to notice on one or two occasions, with masked hostility. She tried not to take any of it to heart; their grief, she reminded herself, was still fresh in their souls as was their fear and hatred of Lord Reginald.

“Take no notice of them,” he soothed when he noticed his bride cringing from the villagers’ unwelcoming looks. “They are only bitter at having lost Dunloch.”

A sense of injustice rose in her throat at his lie and at the casual way he offered it. She longed to answer back, to tersely inform him that she was not stupid, nor was she blind. That she knew exactly why the villagers were angry and sorrowful and afraid. That she knew about Diarmad, and Connall and Robbie, and that Lord Reginald was wrong.

She said nothing, for she was a girl who, despite her inner wilfulness, had been bred to hold her tongue. Instead, she stuffed her anger down within her as far as it would go, and kept her seething to herself.

She followed as Lord Reginald led her around the village, and smiled politely as she was introduced to some of the more prominent citizens—a meagre handful of merchants and craftsmen.

When at the cobbler’s shop Lord Reginald became engaged in a discussion about the wool supplied to the castle, Jane excused herself from her husband’s company and slipped back outside.

“Pardon me, sir,” she said, catching the attention of the first passerby she crossed. “Might you tell me where I can find Margaret, wife of Connall MacGillivray?”

The man, an elderly but robust figure, passed a hand over his chin which was thick with stubble. His grey eyes scanned her with uncertainty, as if he were considering whether or not he would divulge the widow’s whereabouts.

“Well now, Lady D’Aubrey, our Margaret and her wee bairn live in the hut behind the smith’s shop. If ye just follow that there laneway, then turn ye right and ye’ll find them.”

Jane peered in the direction the man pointed. “Yes, I see. Thank you, sir. I pray you, would you mind terribly finding the baron and informing him of my whereabouts? He is at the cobbler’s shop.”

“Yes, Baroness,” the man replied, nodding.

For a moment he held his arm out as if to stop her. But then, apparently thinking better of it, he shook his head and hurried away. Jane watched the man go, intrigued by his reaction. Pursing her lips, she dismissed the thought and turned in the direction the man had indicated. The way was muddy, for it had rained that morning, and by the time she spied the smith’s shop the hem of her fine silk gown was saturated with the filth.

She knew Margaret MacGillivray at first glance; the woman, not much older than herself and heavily pregnant, sat on a weathered bench at the entrance to her home. A young boy of about three years played at her feet, taking a child’s delight at wreaking havoc on a gathering of hens which persisted in pecking at the ground outside the stone hut.

She certainly was a rare beauty, Jane thought as she took in the sight of the woman. Her long, sleek hair, the colour of a spring foal, was loosely plaited and hung over her left shoulder. Her sloping, almond eyes were a light, translucent gold, and were arched with graceful, winged brows and heavily fringed with long lashes.

But they were red; the pale, smooth skin beneath was puffy and blotched. Every hour that the woman had spent crying over her slain husband was written there in her eyes and on her beautiful face. Jane’s heart went out to the lady and her little boy as she took in the evidence of their grief.

“Margaret MacGillivray?” she inquired.

The young woman raised her head from her son and regarded her visitor. The expression with which she fixed Jane was initially one of surprise, but recognizing her as the new baroness, it quickly grew wary.

“Are you Margaret MacGillivray?” she repeated.

“Aye, my Lady. I am,” Margaret responded, her tone carefully non-committal. “How may I help ye?”

Jane glanced furtively at the nearby villagers. Some of the onlookers had slowed their pace, curious about the baroness’ reasons for visiting the young widow. They peered inquisitively in their direction as they went about their.

“I wonder if we might step inside your home that we may chat more privately,” she suggested.

Margaret glanced at her gathering neighbours and quickly nodded her assent. “Alright, if ye wish.”

She heaved herself up from the bench belly first, her left hand pushing on the seat behind her. When Jane lurched forwards to assist, Margaret put up a hand to deter her.

“I’m alright, my Lady,” she insisted. Then to her little boy she called, “Connall, ye’ll come in now.”

Jane followed Margaret into the modest but tidy hut. The inside was sparsely furnished compared to the relative luxury to which she was accustomed, and a carpet of fresh rushes and straw had been spread. The family’s meagre possessions, largely cookingware and a trunk or two, were stacked neatly in corners and by the fire ready for use.

“Well, my Lady, what is it ye’d like to speak wi’ me on?” Margaret said, sitting heavily in a simple, unadorned hawthorn chair by the fire.

Jane noticed that another chair, larger than Margaret’s but similar in its simple design, sat empty. She needed not guess to whom that chair belonged. Her eyes trailed to the little boy who had nestled himself at his mother’s feet, clasping a small toy tightly in his fist. His was, without a doubt, the face of the man she’d seen lying dead among his clansmen. She had no trouble tracing the high brow, the blonde locks, the aquiline nose. And where his mother’s eyes were a startling gold, the little boy’s were a clear green. Like Robbie’s. It must have been a MacGillivray trait.

“In truth I had no particular reason for coming to you today,” she admitted.

“Oh?” Margaret’s fine eyebrows rose in confusion and, Jane thought, a touch of mistrust.

She lowered her eyes to her lap, and her shoulders sank. “I feel a strong urge to assure you that I did not know about the ... well, the tragic event which occurred the morn before my wedding day. I know now, however, and I wanted to tell you that I am truly sorry for your loss. I know of your husband, Connall, and ... and I am sorry.”

At the mention of her husband’s name, fresh tears sprang to Margaret’s eyes. She spent many long moments fighting to regain her composure, and when she had, she fixed Jane with an unreadable gaze.

“I’ll wager yer lord husband doesna ken of yer visit wi’ me—or of yer sympathy over my loss.”

Jane shook her head. “He does not.”

“But ye’re an English lass. Surely ye think the MacGillivrays’ fates were just.”

Jane recognized the hard edge in Margaret’s voice and the challenge in her words despite her impassive expression. In return she fixed the widow with an expression of simple honesty.

“I was raised to have utter and unquestioning faith in God and in the king. And I was raised in a manner in which politics were never discussed in my sphere of existence. I knew only that Scots were barbarians and brutes, and that they needed a firm English hand to rule them. I knew that because it was what I was taught. But now I am grown and am faced with a world that is not what I was led to believe. Now ... now I do not know anything anymore.”

Her sincere admission softened Margaret’s countenance. “If ye’d but seen my Connall, if ye’d kent him, ye’d ken that he’s no more a barbarian than his wee lad here.”

Jane did know, but she kept the fact that she had seen Connall to herself—there was no use in upsetting Margaret any further. Instead, she said, “I do not understand why the MacGillivray chief attacked, though. I mean, from the way it had been explained to me, they were far outnumbered. Why would he sacrifice the lives of his men so carelessly when it was obvious he would not win?”

“He didna ken,” Margaret answered with a resigned sigh. “The clan were betrayed by the villagers, and his forces were surprised by the garrison at Invercleugh waiting alongside D’Aubrey’s men.”

“So you do not blame him for your husband’s death, or for the deaths of your clansmen?”

“Nay, my Lady, I dinna blame him. Ye’d have to have kent MacGillivray. He were a peaceable one, he were. It were the clansmen what wanted to attack, and he had no choice but to bow to their pressure. It were either step aside and let them take matters into their own hands, or stay and lead them, and hopefully increase their chances through planning rather than hot-headed action. My Connall loved that man dearly. MacGillivray did not want him in the fight but the stubborn amadan would not be swayed ...”

She waited as Margaret covered her eyes against a fresh wave of grief; she wondered briefly if she might console the woman but Margaret quickly regained control of herself.

“They say MacGillivray is not among the dead,” she said cautiously.

“That is correct,” Jane confirmed. “Lord Reginald rides daily in search of him. I fear he will not be lenient if he finds him.”

“So the baron believes he is alive then?”

“He does, yes. Though why he is so intent on catching the man, I know not. He’s hardly a danger to Dunloch now. Do you reckon he’s found shelter somewhere, or allies, perhaps?”

“Our Robbie were always resourceful. I’ve no doubt he’s out there taking care of himself.”

Jane started. “Robbie?”

“Aye. Robert MacGillivray.”

“Pray, tell me—did he happen to have a son by the same name, and did he bring his son into battle with him?”

“Robbie, a son?” Margaret scoffed at the notion. “He’s barely more than a lad himself. Oh, he could have settled down wi’ a nice girl from the village had he wanted to, or negotiated for a bride among the daughters of the neighbouring lairds I suppose—his betrothed died in childhood, ye see. But he had no’ shown much interest in ... Baroness, are ye alright? Ye look a bit peaky.”

Jane felt more than peaky, she felt downright sick. It was as if the ground had fallen out from under her feet and she were spinning in empty air.

Robbie was MacGillivray. Her Robbie. All the pieces she had not thought to wonder about before fell into place with this revelation. That was why he’d been hovering around the dead. That was why he’d lamented, crying “What have I done?” MacGillivray was not among the dead and was nowhere to be found, despite Lord Reginald’s exhaustive efforts far and wide to locate him, and yet she’d managed to stumble upon the lone survivor of the attack. A wounded survivor no less.

Good God. Robbie was MacGillivray!

“I ... er, I fear I must depart,” Jane said rather woodenly, and stood on numb legs. “Thank you for speaking with me, I am very sorry for your loss.”

Margaret regarded her with wide, startled eyes. She made to raise herself from the chair in which she sat, but Jane halted her.

“Nay, please you, remain seated. I can show myself out.”

With a sharp turn, she departed the small hut. Her head was reeling as she stepped outside into the moist afternoon air.

“I want to speak wi’ her,” she heard a small voice insist as she began to walk away.

Warily, she turned back to the door to see the little boy, Connall, come bounding towards her. His blonde locks swayed vigorously as he trotted forwards with the determination of youth.

“My Lady,” he said in his child’s voice.

Jane bent down to the little boy’s level, focusing her efforts on maintaining her composure in front of him.

“Yes, little one, what is it?”

“You are the baron’s lady?”

“I am, yes.”

“D’ye ken where my da is? Mam says he isna coming home, and when I asked her if he’d died and gone up to heaven, she started crying. But if he’s died, then he must be buried and we can visit him. D’ye ken where he is?”

The innocence in his clear, green eyes as he waited expectantly for her answer broke her resolve, and her face crumpled. Bitter tears sprang to her eyes, and she put a hand on his little shoulder. Pulling him close, she placed a remorseful kiss atop his forehead.

“Sweet boy. I’m sorry, I do not know,” she lied. Then, before despair completely overwhelmed her, she stood and fled his presence.

Once she’d rounded the corner of the smith’s shop, she pressed herself against the timber wall. She breathed deeply and with purpose, willing her thoughts to calm and her trembling limbs to still. In Sussex, the plight of the people of Scotland had been to her stories of brutal wars and savage men. Sheltered within the walls of Dunloch, it had been closer to her, but still no more than a concept, a vague notion. Now however, that small, innocent boy Connall put an irreversible human quality on the fight. The MacGillivrays of Dunloch had lost their rightful land, and as a result, that beautiful little boy had lost his father. What a cruel, cruel thing, she thought angrily, swiping at tears that refused to be contained.

When she had reclaimed some semblance of composure, she resumed walking. A short distance later she encountered Lord Reginald, followed by his retinue, on his way to meet her.

“There you are, my dear. We were just coming to collect you from the widow Margaret’s home.”

Jane swallowed the chafe at the casual way he’d spoken of Margaret’s loss, and plastered a demure, if somewhat unconvincing, smile on her face.

“I have finished, my Lord, and was returning.”

“Why were you visiting the widow?” his eyes narrowed slightly.

“I only wished to extend my condolences. She is so young, and with a young boy and a babe on the way it cannot be easy for her so soon after her loss.”

“Her loss?” Lord Reginald spoke carefully, but Jane sensed a darkening in his voice, a warning that she was treading on dangerous ground. “She lost a husband who laid siege to a castle that was not his. His death was of his own making. Is that a loss for which you should express sympathy?”

“Forgive me, my Lord, but these are the people you now lead. I only meant my visit to be a gesture of good will. Perhaps it will be easier to lead your people if an attempt to mend bridges was made.”

The baron studied her for a moment as if judging her sincerity. She felt as if his gaze was penetrating her very soul, and for a moment she feared he might be able to divine her true heart. But then, he smiled.

“An excellent idea. Quite a keen young mind you have, my dear. I hope your efforts were fruitful. Now please, let us continue our visit.”

She allowed him to drape his arm over her shoulder protectively. Possessively. She accepted the gesture outwardly—what choice did she have?

Inwardly, she was seething.

Chapter 10

Jane was practically hopping from foot to foot for the rest of the evening. She was eager to confront Robbie with the knowledge she’d inadvertently gleaned from Margaret MacGillivray, and waiting for that time was proving to be torturous.

Her agitation was not lost on Ruth. Her maid watched her with suspicion as she was readied for bed that night.

“Where is it you’ve been going every night, my Lady,” she enquired finally as she let Jane’s hair down at the vanity.

Jane met Ruth’s gaze through the glass, her eyebrows rising with surprise.

“I know not what you mean,” she insisted.

“I am not daft, my Lady,” Ruth persisted. “I know you sneak out each night after you’ve been visited by Lord Reginald. I suspect you are going to the same place where you spend your days, thought I confess I know not where that is ... or with whom you spend your time.”

Jane’s cheeks warmed. “And you disapprove?” she challenged.

Ruth’s suspicion faded from her face, and her hands came to rest on Jane’s shoulders. “My Lady, I do want very much to disapprove, but for your sake I cannot. I see every day that you are discontented with Lord Reginald, and I do not blame you—I only want for you to be happy. But take care you do your duty by your husband; give him your body when he desires it and make sure you give him an heir. Whatever else you do to fill the remainder of your time, you shall hear no criticism from me. I only ask in return that you take care you are not found out.”

Jane read the sincerity on Ruth’s face, and patted her maid’s hand lovingly. “My Ruth, it is not like that.”

“Perhaps not yet,” Ruth answered knowingly. “But I suspect from the blush on your cheek and the sparkle in your eye that it very soon will be.”

“I am not like Amelia.”

Ruth chuckled gently, and squeezed Jane’s shoulders. “I think you shall find there is a vast difference between married and unmarried women who seek the pleasures of men. Amelia, beautiful though she may be, is a fool girl. Men know when a maid is no longer a maid. Whoever takes your sister for a bride will have to be made aware from the off that she’s impure, for he’ll not believe otherwise when it’s his turn at the gauntlet. With married women,” she continued when Jane laughed in astonishment at her bluntness, “there’s no way to tell. And I think you’ll be surprised at how often it goes on. Oh, my dear girl. Take your pleasures where you can. I could not bear the thought of you living life without happiness.”

Jane pondered Ruth’s words long after she left her chamber. She wondered if her maid, the woman who had been a second mother to her for the whole of her life, would be so sympathetic if she knew who it was she was visiting each day. Somehow she doubted it.

Her thoughts hopelessly snared, she waited impatiently for Lord Reginald to come. He’d claimed her body every night since she’d wed him, but this night he was significantly delayed. An hour passed, and then another, and still he did not come.

Finally, desperate to have her nightly duty be done with, she slipped from her chamber to enquire after him.

“Excuse me,” she said to a passing ghillie, “but have you seen the baron this night?”

“In the great hall, my Lady,” the boy said with a gangly bob of his knees. His voice cracked comically with the onset of manhood.

She thanked the boy and continued through the castle. Stopping at the door to the great hall she saw that the ghillie was right. Lord Reginald sat at the head table on the dais with two companions—all three men were sound asleep. Their heads rested on the wood tabletop in front of them, and empty ale goblets were scattered close by.

The reprieve of her wifely duties came to Jane as a great relief. With no further prompting needed, she hurried through the halls of the castle to escape. So eager to get away was she that she did not even bother to return to her chamber to change from her shift.

Robbie did not mention her state of undress when she burst through the door of the hut a short time later. Indeed he looked rather glad simply to have her there.

“I thought something terrible had happened to ye,” he said with a breath of relief. “Or that ye’d decided not to come anymore.”

Jane shook her head, slightly out of breath herself from the speed with which she’d travelled. She pressed herself against the door, leaning on it with her hands behind her, and regarded him with a note of amazement.

“Nay, I am fine, but I fear I cannot come as often anymore. My husband has begun to notice my absence during the day.”

“Has he forbidden ye to go out then?”

“Oh, no. It is nothing like that. But I do not wish to push his leniency, so I think it best I only come when everyone is asleep.”

She paused, observing Robbie’s image in the firelight. It was an odd sensation—reconciling in her mind the Robbie she’d discovered him to be with the face that had become so familiar to her in the time she’d known him. His face flickered in the mellow light, the same—and yet so much changed.

“What is it?” he asked, sensing her hesitation.

“You did not tell me you were the chief of clan Gillivray,” she accused.

He raised an eyebrow quizzically. “And ye did not tell me that ye were the Baroness D’Aubrey. So I reckon we’re on an even keel wi’ each other.”

Jane gasped. “Have you known all this time who I was?”

“Of course I kent.”

“How?”

Robbie gave her a look as though the answer was obvious. “Old Reggie is preparing to wed his bride, a young English lass from Sussex, and next day ye turn up, a young English lass from Sussex? Ye’d have to be a bloody amadan not to figure that one out.”

She blushed and lowered her head. “I did not realize.”

Robbie examined her intently a few moments before speaking. “And how is it, Jane Sewell, that ye learned who I am?”

She pushed herself off the door of the hut and came to sit beside him. Pulling the hem of his shirt up, she checked his bandage.

“How does it feel?” she asked, lifting the salve to view the wound.

“Aye, much better,” he acknowledged. “I can get up and move about some, though it itches like mad.”

“Yes, the healing does that. But it looks very good. I’d say you’ll soon be clear of danger that the infection will return.”

“Jane, ye didna answer my question,” Robbie pursued.

“I visited Margaret MacGillivray in the village. I never knew what the MacGillivray laird’s name was until she called him ‘our Robbie.’ From there ... well, I suppose I could say one would have to be a bloody amadan not to figure that one out.”

Robbie laughed at her imitation of his accent. But then, sobering, he fixed his eyes on hers intently.

“And now that ye ken who I am, what do ye intend to do?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, will ye be telling yer husband where I am?”

“I hardly think so, considering how much effort and personal risk it was for me to heal you in the first place.”

Noting the grin on her face, he relaxed a bit, and raised himself up on his elbows.

“I certainly will not tell him,” she continued, “and I think there is little risk that he will find you on his own. He thinks you have left Dunloch to rally forces in surrounding lands, and is concentrating his efforts far from here. Now lay back and rest. You are better, but you are not yet well.”

“Nay, I am alright. I’ve been lying for too long; I must sit up. So ... how is Margaret bearing up?”

“She is grieving,” Jane admitted. “And I’d venture to say she does not have long before her babe joins us in this world.”

“Does she hate me? Does she curse my name to hell?”

“She does not,” she assured him. “She seems to think that Connall would have followed you to the ends of the earth if there was a reason for it.”

“I tried to keep him out of it; I tried to keep them all out of it, but they werena having any of it. They wanted Dunloch, and they wanted D’Aubrey’s blood.” When Jane grimaced at the mention of Lord Reginald, Robbie softened. “I am sorry if that offends ye, but that’s the way of it.”

“It does not offend me,” she answered. “I just find it difficult to reconcile the picture of the beast you paint for me with the one of the man I know myself.”

“And what kind of a man is he behind closed doors?” Robbie enquired, his voice carefully guarded.

“He is not cruel, not to me. He is kind—if a little distant. I have been made aware that I was a practical choice for a wife; my dowry and connections were favourable and I am in a position to bear him an heir. It is not the love of which every young girl dreams, but I find I cannot complain. He allows me my freedom to do what I will. Many women end up in worse situations that mine.”

“And was it kind of him to use ye so roughly like he did? Jane, ye could barely sit down.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” she said, reddening.

“I dinna believe ye.”

“Well, it is what it is, and this is an inappropriate discussion.”

“Ye deserve better,” Robbie persisted. “Why canna ye admit that?”

Jane exhaled sharply, frustrated. “Deserve? Robbie, do not speak to me of what I do or do not deserve. There are scores of men rotting at the bottom of that ridge who did not deserve to die, and there are wives and children left behind who did not deserve to lose their men. I see a clan chieftain before me who did not deserve to lose his lands, his home, or his clansmen, and there is a small boy in the village yonder that does not deserve to grow up without his father. What I deserve is irrelevant in comparison.”

Robbie listened through her outburst in rapt silence. When the force of her unexpected passion died away, he reached for her hand, and pressed gently with his fingers.

“D’ye mean that Jane? Or are ye just saying it to appease me?”

“I mean it,” she answered. “You know, you have more sympathy at Dunloch than you realize—not much, mind, but at least a small measure.”

“That so?” Robbie scoffed. “No one English, I’d wager.”

“The dowager baroness, actually. It was she who first urged me to open my eyes to the plight of the Scots. When Lord Reginald informed me that he did not trust Tearlach a whit, it was Lady D’Aubrey who came to his defence. You see—not all English are bad.”

“No,” Robbie said, squeezing her fingers again. “No, they are not.”

The heat of his hand on hers spread up her arm and set her stomach fluttering again. Ruth’s words echoed in her ears as she met his eyes: take your pleasures where you can. She wanted to move closer to him, wanted to take his face in her hands and press her lips to his. She wanted to feel the heat of his body, not just his hand, pressed to her own. And by the soft way he held her gaze, she thought he might want all these things, too. Perhaps more ...

Then why was her mouth as dry as parchment? Why could she not seem to unlock her muscles and force herself to move? To breathe?

“You should have something to drink,” she said instead, pulling her hand from his and sliding over to the fire.

“Ye’re not thinking more of that awful thyme, are ye? Ye said I were done wi’ that.”

“No, not thyme,” she said, fishing a hot stone from the fire and submerging it in the cooking pot. “But you could do with some willow bark to help you sleep through the night.”

“What about ale? Give me enough ale and I’ll no’ only sleep through the night but into part of the next day as well.”

Jane laughed at his quip. “No ale. And eat something more. I see you’ve hardly touched what I’ve brought you.”

She busied herself with tending the fire and preparing a dose of willow bark tea. All the while, she could feel his eyes on her—she could not decipher whether it was a disconcerting sensation ... or a pleasing one.

By the time he dropped off, Jane was tired too. Her blanket, which she’d first spread out on the ground an appropriate distance from his, seemed now to be much too far away. She knew it was entirely improper, but she wanted desperately to be close to him, even if it was in slumber. Furtively, she dragged her blanket to his side and smoothed it out. Lying next to him, she closed her eyes and fell easily asleep.

But her dreams were not restful. Quite the opposite, in fact. They were fraught with memories of Lord Reginald in her bedchamber, taking what lawfully belonged to him, of Robbie’s voice echoing a sentiment she knew to be true but unalterable: ye deserve better. Of Robbie’s naked hip, his chest, his stomach, his hand holding hers ... of Ruth’s words: take your pleasures where you can.

She awoke with a start, her heart hammering away behind her ribs. Beside her, Robbie slept on. The low light from the dying fire played at his features, lending an air of innocence to his peaceful face. His finely shaped lips were slightly parted, his jaw relaxed. The pain and misery that seemed permanently etched into his brow were erased for a few blissful hours.

She studied his lips—that curious longing she’d never known before, but which seemed to be a constant since she’d first encountered him, flared once more. What would it be like to kiss those lips? To feel their softness crushed beneath hers?

“Robbie?” she whispered. “Robbie, are you awake?”

Robbie slumbered on. His chest rose and fell evenly as he breathed, and his lips remained slightly parted.

Silently, she slid closer to him on her stomach until her face was mere inches away from his—so close that his warm breath caressed her skin as he exhaled gently. Eyeing him one last time to ensure that he truly was asleep, she leaned forward, propped on her elbows, and tenderly placed her lips atop his.

A thrill ran through her at his touch. His lips were as soft as she imagined they would be, and the warm blush which always bloomed when she thought about kissing him spread in her stomach, intense and heady.

She released him, and he remained asleep. But having known the touch of his lips to hers, one kiss was not enough. She longed to nurture the odd thrill she’d experienced which still vibrated in her very soul. Leaning in once more, she pressed her lips to his again, longer this time, to savour the intense and wonderful fluttering in her belly.

From beneath her touch, Robbie gave a start and opened his eyes. Jane gasped and scuttled backwards. Her eyes were wide with shock and humiliation as she stared at him, mouth slightly agape. Her mind careened with possibilities of what she might say to explain herself—none of them plausible. But no words passed her frozen lips. So shocked and mortified was she at being caught that her muscles locked in place, defying her mental order to sit up, to look away. To move.

Before her mind could wrap itself around what she could say or do, Robbie reached across himself and propped himself up on his elbow. Twisting towards her he placed his hand behind her head at the nape of her neck.

She drew in a breath as he pressed his lips to hers, crushing them softly, but with an urgency and desperation that stilled her heart. Every fibre in her being tingled as his lips moved over hers, urging her to kiss him back.

This kiss was nothing like the one she’d suffered through with Lord Reginald. When Robbie’s tongue slipped inside her mouth to entwine with hers, she willingly accepted it, eager to feel and taste and experience him in a much deeper sense than she’d ever dreamed. When he rolled farther over, encouraging her to lie back, she welcomed his weight as he shifted on top of her, trapping her beneath him, safe and secure.

She was once more being claimed by a man ... but this time she desperately wanted to be claimed, to belong to him entirely. But when his hand trailed from the back of her neck, down her throat and to the laces of her shift, her proper, chaste upbringing reared itself to protest vehemently.

Improper. Sinful. Dirty.

“Wait—stop,” she pleaded, suddenly struck by a wave of panic. She put her hand to Robbie’s, pushing it away, and turned her face from his.

Robbie lifted himself off of her a fraction and looked into her bewildered face. His breath was hot and rapid with his evident desire, and his expression was tortured with lust.

“Jane, I am sorry. I didna mean to—”

“No, it’s not that, it’s—”

“Ye didna want this.”

“I—I didn’t say that,” she hedged nervously.

He held her gaze, searching her face as if to read her thoughts. “Do ye want this?”

“I don’t know—I ... do you?”

“Jane,” he breathed, exasperated. “Ye canna have any ken how badly I’ve wanted this almost since the first moment I met ye. Truly, lass, ye’ve bewitched every conscious thought I have, and ye’ve possessed my dreams every night. How could ye no’—a creature as beautiful as ye? Though I ken well enough ye dinna believe it. Jane, I want this terribly. But if ye dinna ...”

Robbie trailed off, waiting for her answer. The echo of Ruth’s words warred with the voice in her head: Improper. Sinful ... Take your pleasures where you can.

Her life was mapped out before her—years of submitting to Lord Reginald’s urges, duty to bear his children, decades of standing at his side, playing the silent role of the Lady of Dunloch. And little pleasure.

Take your pleasures where you can.

“I want this,” she said, her voice breathy and her lips trembling.

Robbie needed no further invitation. The moment she uttered the words, his lips were on hers again, sensual and demanding. His kiss lulled her under a spell, so much so that she only found her voice when his hand began roving down to the laces of her shift again.

“Robbie, wait—please,” she urged. When he raised himself up again and gazed at her quizzically, she didn’t seem to know what it was she was going to say.

Though he did—the set of her frightened features communicated more than her words could.

“I willna be like him,” he promised. “I swear, I willna. I couldna do that to ye.”

Jane nodded, and he lowered his head to hers once more. This time, though, he kissed her slowly so he would not further frighten her. His lips trailed lightly over hers, and brushed across her jaw from ear to ear. Gently, he slid down her throat, skimming her clavicle with the lightness of a butterfly’s wing. Then with a more deliberate firmness, he pressed his mouth into the crook of her neck, allowing his warm, moist breath to wash over her sensitive flesh.

His constant changes of position and pressure sent shivers up her spine and quickened her pulse. The delicious warmth that had started to blossom in the pit of her stomach intensified and crept downwards, stirring a longing for him. When his hand trailed down her shift this time, she did not stop him, and when his hand moved to her back to slide the fabric over her shoulders, she raised herself to assist him. Once the gown was off her shoulders, he pulled it lower, exposing her breasts.

The recollection of Lord Reginald’s assault on her naked breasts surfaced unpleasantly at the back of her mind, and she winced involuntarily at the expectation of another humiliating round of groping and nipping with teeth. Instead, Robbie cupped her in his palm, and traced his thumb lightly over her nipple.

“Whoever said ye were plain must have been gae blind,” he whispered.

Jane lay in a trancelike state as he lowered his mouth to her breast. Instead of devouring her young flesh as Lord Reginald had done, Robbie was slow and artful, tracing around the circumference of her breast and across her sternum. He covered every inch of her, from shoulders to ribs, with his lips until she was trembling with desire. Only then did he pull her dress down lower to expose her flat, smooth belly.

“Plain,” he scoffed again in a voice barely above a whisper.

She wanted so much to feel the warmth of his skin pressed against hers, wanted to claim Robbie’s flesh with her hands as he was doing to her, but she was unsure of how to proceed. Having never before experienced such intense pleasure from the closeness of a man, she was self-conscious, sorely lacking confidence in her ability to return those pleasures. Nervously, she twined her fingers at the hem of his shirt and debated whether she should pull it up, worried that it might be too forward.

Robbie noted her hesitation. Slowly, he clasped her hand so that the fabric was trapped between them. Then he lifted, guiding her hand to raise his shirt up and over his head. He let go of her hand then, and let her toss his shirt to the dirt floor under her own power.

“Touch me, Jane,” he whispered. It was both an urgent demand, and a desperate plea.

When Jane raised her fingertips to his well-muscled chest and traced lightly as he had done, Robbie closed his eyes and shuddered with desire. That simple reaction bolstered her confidence and heightened her own want of him. Growing bolder, she urged him back and raised herself so that it was she that leaned over him. Following his example, she brushed her lips and her fingers over his torso, from stomach to collarbone, from neck to jaw.

Each sigh, each tortured whisper made Jane heady with the awareness of her own power over him. He brought his hands to her shoulders and twined his fingers into her loose locks. Enveloped in his firm grasp, she drove his yearning higher and higher with the roving caress of her hands, her lips, her tongue.

“Good God, lass. Ye’ll drive me mad wi’ wanting ye,” he declared finally.

He clutched her restless hands in his, and twisted again so that he was once more on top of her. So overwhelmed by his desire for her, he moved a little too enthusiastically, and cried out in pain as his hasty twisting disturbed his wound.

“Are you alright?” she gasped. Her hands flew to the salve to check for fresh damage.

Robbie nodded, gritting his teeth as the pain subsided. “Aye, I’m alright. It’ll take more than a wee bit of pain to stop me. Ye’ve no idea how ye’ve tortured me this past sennight—yer hands on me, checking my wound, bandaging me.”

“Really?” she whispered, both surprised and flattered by his revelation.

“Did ye really no’ ken? I thought for sure I’d given myself away, what wi’ my kilt rising wi’ my thoughts and all.”

Jane giggled, but his comment brought her attention to that part of him which she’d not yet explored. Suddenly she was nervous again.

Robbie understood why that was. Carefully, as if to honour the trust she’d placed in him, he unhinged the buckle of his kilt. The pleated fabric of his MacGillivray tartan fell from his hip; his eyes did not leave hers the whole time.

Hesitantly, she glanced down to where his torso, which hovered over her, sloped downwards. The narrow waist, the smooth hip, and the muscular thigh which she’d seen only once before were now illuminated by the firelight. And indeed, as he had indicated, his manhood extended from between his thighs, straining under the influence of his desire for her.

But instead of recoiling from him as she did every time she was faced with Lord Reginald in a state of lust, the evidence of Robbie’s need of her set the blossoming in her loins surging with anticipation. She wanted him—she wanted to be filled by him, to take him inside herself and willingly give him the pleasure which Lord Reginald took of her without her consent.

Leisurely, he lowered her shift the rest of the way off her hip, and Jane raised her knees slightly so that the fabric would slide away from her. She lay, her back pressed into the cloth of the blanket, and gazed up at Robbie. A delightful mixture of desire, anticipation and fear wrestled deep within her, sending her heart into a wild gallop.

Cautiously, so as not to aggravate his wound further, Robbie shifted himself onto her. His rigid erection pressed at the junction between her thighs. She parted her knees invitingly, offering to him the soft flesh protected there that would accommodate him.

“Oh Jane,” he sighed as he slid himself inside her with ease.

She had not understood what Lord Reginald meant when he’d asked if she were “wet” for him. But she understood it now—her desire for Robbie had caused the tender, inner flesh of her womanhood to grow moist and slick. When he entered her, it was with little difficulty; indeed to her surprise, she found the sensation rather enjoyable. He moved slowly within her, the soft, moist walls of her cavern allowing his turgid erection to glide uninhibited.

At first she laid still, unsure of what to do, and simply allowed herself to enjoy the weight of him on top of her, the feel of his warm body pressed to her. The voice in her head railed against the sin to which she was succumbing, but she ignored it. Instead, she focused on the complexity of the sensations and pleasures that overwhelmed her inexperienced body until the voice was silenced. She thrilled as he moaned and sighed, and shivered with delight at the gust of his breath on her neck as he pressed his wet mouth to her shoulder.

But very soon, simply lying still for him was not enough. She wanted more—though what that might be she was uncertain. She raised her hands to him and gripped his back—gently at first, and then with more force as he responded to her, driving into her with more urgency. She pressed her own face to his shoulder, breathing in the musk of his skin, and her knees drew up slightly to hug his thrusting hips.

It was a thoroughly pleasing experience—by no means the tortured ecstasy which Amelia described, but wonderful nonetheless. A stirring of emotions pooled in her breast and in her belly—triumph at defying her father and her husband, joy at wanting Robbie so much, and at being wanted by him. And something ... something protective towards him, this man who needed her so desperately. It was as if in this one act she could shield him from the world, cloak him for just a few moments from the horrors and sorrow he’d suffered.

For that brief moment in time, he was hers. He belonged to her and she to him. Whatever else happened, whatever else was to come, things were as they should be at this very moment in time.

Clutching his trembling body to her, she encouraged him by rocking and bucking her own hips underneath him. His moans grew bolder, more uncontrolled, signalling that he was drawing close to his fulfillment.

When he reached his climax, it was rather sweet. No crude or grotesque utterances did he offer, no abhorrent grunts or open mouth like a dead fish. He merely clasped her to him, burying his face in her hair, and exhaled deeply. She welcomed him as he released himself into her, and when his climax had faded, she held him to her, listening to his beating heart as it slowed and his panting as it stilled.

Chapter 11

She did not remember falling asleep in his arms, nor did she notice when Robbie nodded off himself. When she awoke the next morning, still snuggled safely in his warm embrace, Jane felt for the first time in her life a sense of completeness.

“What are ye grinning so secretively to yerself for?” Robbie whispered into her ear.

“How long have you been awake?” she answered, slightly startled.

“Long enough to catch ye grinning to yerself like a cat wi’ a canary.”

“I did not look that way,” she admonished playfully, nudging at him with her bare shoulder.

He chuckled and tightened his arms around her. “So will ye tell me what ye were thinking on?”

“Just ... just last night,” she evaded.

“Oh?” he said, his voice carefully neutral. “Did I no’ meet yer expectations? Perhaps yer Lord Fancy Britches is a bigger man than I?”

But for the jesting tone of his voice, she might have worried that she’d offended him.

“It’s nothing like that,” she assured him nonetheless, nuzzling his neck.

Robbie sighed and lifted his chin in response. “Dinna distract me lass,” he teased. “I’ll be having an answer from ye.”

Jane sighed, and dropped her chin, pressing her lips to his chest. Then she propped herself up on her elbow so that she could look into his eyes.

“It’s only ... and mind I find it wholly improper to be discussing this with you—”

“It’s a bit late for that, dinna ye think?” he interjected.

“Perhaps,” she answered, a guilty grin settling on her lips. “You see, with Lord Reginald, I think of it as suffering through my duty to him as his wife. Not only do I find it not the least bit pleasurable, I find the whole experience somewhat ... repulsive.”

“And wi’ me?”

“With you, it was ... truly wonderful. Sweet, tender; my heart was full—I’ve never experienced that before.”

“But ...” he persisted, sensing there was more she was not saying.

“But ... I was led to believe that somehow it would be more.” When he regarded her patiently, she continued. “My sister, Amelia, she’s ... well, she’s experienced in this sort of thing. She’s always talked about an overwhelming, incomprehensible sensation that leaves her weak in the knees. And judging by your response to—you know—what we did, and by Lord Reginald’s for that matter ...”

When Jane fell silent, embarrassed, Robbie closed his eyes, suppressing a grin.

“Ye’ve wounded my pride, lass. Ye mean to say that I’ve left ye unsatisfied.”

“No, no. I did not mean that,” she argued, shaking her head emphatically.

He opened his eyes again, and gazed tenderly at her. “But ye were unsatisfied, lass. And by the looks of things, I’d say ye’d never had satisfaction of that kind ever, so ye didna ken what to expect, what ye were entitled to. It were my own fault. I didna consider yer pleasure—I was too desperate for my own.”

“That’s alright,” she offered lamely, unsure if that was the right response to his self-deprecation. “It did not seem that way to me ... at any rate.”

“As I said, ye didna ken what it is ye had a right to,” he insisted. Then, with an impish grin, he added, “I can put that to right, though.”

He raised himself up on his elbow, moving slowly for the sake of his wound, and urged her to lie back.

“What do you mean?” she said nervously.

His responding grin only turned more wicked before he ducked his head to kiss down the length of her neck. With his hands, his lips, his tongue, Robbie explored every inch of Jane’s naked body. He moved over her slowly, drifting ever downward, past her breasts, over her flat, trembling belly, skimming her hips and travelling over the outside of her thighs to her knees. Then he moved to the inside of her thighs, and slowly began drifting back up.

“What are you doing?” she gasped, pressing her legs together and shoving his head away with her hands.

“No, no,” he said playfully, clasping her wrists. “I must give to ye what pleasure ye’d given to me last night.”

“But ... but I—”

“I promise I willna be like him,” he reassured her.

A wave of humiliation swept over her as she parted her knees obediently. But when Robbie’s soft, wet mouth reached the crevice between her legs, her humiliation subsided, replaced by a sensation more intense than she’d imagined was possible. She gasped and arched her back at the exquisite pleasure his handling brought to her. Where Lord Reginald’s onslaught had been more functional in order to prepare her to accommodate him, Robbie’s was calculated and measured. One moment he would flick his tongue against the soft nub at the crest of her opening and cause her to convulse with the intensity of the sensation, the next he would apply pressure to the flesh surrounding it, driving a deeper pleasure, one that spread upwards through her belly.

Her breathing turned laboured and her heels dug futilely at the dirt floor beneath her. Her hands gripped the blanket at her sides, restless, and when Robbie noticed, he directed her hands to his head. Jane twined her fingers through his hair, holding onto him as if her life were hanging in the balance as the unbearable sensation he was causing her began to build and lead somewhere.

“Som-something is h-happening,” she gasped, her panting on the verge of frenzy.

Her words only spurred Robbie on. His tongue moved faster, applying more and more pressure and swirling around and around her tender flesh which, by now, ached with need.

When she thought she could stand no more, the building sensation reached its peak. Jane cried out at the unexpected burst of pleasure, arching her back fiercely and clenching her eyes shut. The sensation surged and then ebbed, leaving her convulsing and trembling.

His work done, Robbie returned to her side and gazed longingly at her. In her stupefied state, she was marginally aware that his efforts had caused him to become aroused again. As an invitation for him to have her, she pulled his face to hers and kissed him with an inner fervour so intense she’d never known its like before.

Accepting her invitation, he rolled onto her with a groan. He entered her with a desperation and need that was rougher than before, and Jane found, to her surprise, that she liked him rough at this moment. In fact, she’d like it a whole lot better if he were even rougher with her. To encourage him, she kicked her legs up and wrapped them around his waist, clinging to him with all the strength she had.

As if his efforts with his tongue had been the preparation she needed, the building sensation in her loins began to increase again. This time, she knew what to do to nurture it. She moved with him, heightening her own pleasure at the same time that she drove his.

At the moment that her second climax came, Robbie let out an uninhibited groan.

“Good God, lass, ye’ll be the death of me,” he cried, and then with a powerful thrust and a moan of pleasure, he released himself into her.

Satisfied and panting, he rolled off of her, lying at her side with his face pressed into her hair and his arm draped across her bosom.

“I didn’t understand before,” she said when her breathing had slowed and her heart had stopped hammering in her chest.

“What’s that now?” Robbie said, unmoving.

“Well—it made no sense to me before, why Amelia was so prepared to give up her maiden purity and risk her chances of making a match. I couldn’t imagine what could be worth that ... I understand now.”

Robbie chuckled and tightened his arm around her frame. “I am honoured to be the one ye trusted yerself wi’ to learn.”

Jane chewed her lip, thinking. Noting her deep state of thought, he nudged her with the tip of his nose.

“What are ye thinking on?”

“I’m not thinking, I’m regretting,” she answered wistfully.

“Regretting?”

She turned her head to him, and noticed a hurt look in his green eyes. She laughed when she realized what her admission must have sounded like.

“I don’t regret what we did,” she clarified.

“Then what?”

She breathed deeply, pressing her lips together. “I regret that I cannot bring you back to the castle with me. The moment I leave here—every time I leave here—the memories grow dim, and immediately begin to fade. I don’t want any of them to fade, but I especially don’t want this memory to fade. This is the most important memory I think I shall ever have, and I cannot bear the thought of it not always being crystal clear in my mind.”

“I wish I could give ye something ye could take wi’ ye to remember me by each time yer gone.”

“I think that might be very foolish.”

“Aye, it would. If ye were caught wi’ anything of mine, it might be recognized ... and yet I still want to give ye something to remember me by. I canna help it.”

Jane smiled ruefully. “And I cannot help but want to have something of yours.”

Robbie thought for a moment. Then, reaching to his abandoned heap of garments, he fished through the tangle of items for his sgian-dubh. Pressing the blade to the edge of his kilt, he cut a notch into the fabric and tore away a small strip.

“Here,” he said, handing it to her tentatively. “Whatever else I may be, I am still MacGillivray. This is the plaid of my family, my people. Please, take it. Only take care ye dinna let anyone find ye wi’ it. Hide it where no one will think to look.”

“I will,” she said thickly, taking the plaid from him and clutching it in her hand.

“I wish I could give ye more,” he added regretfully.

“I wish I could give you something in return.”

“Ye have, Jane,” he argued. “Ye’ve given me so much already. How can I ever repay ye for all ye’ve done?”

She shrugged. “It’s nothing.”

Robbie tipped her chin to his face and pressed a tender kiss to her lips.

“So ye’ve said.”

No matter how much she might have wanted it to be so, dawn could not be wished away. The morning light slowly stole into the cracks of the dilapidated hut, reminding Jane that she had to leave if she did not want to be caught sneaking back into the castle.

Robbie was still asleep when she left, and she reached the rear gatehouse just as the translucent, pre-dawn sky was beginning to give way to another grey morning. She was nearly spotted by an unusually alert sentry as she approached the curtain wall, but she managed to slip back inside and to her chamber without incident.

She thought about much on her journey back to the castle, but one thought in particular played on her conscience: she was the Baroness of Dunloch; she knew of the grave injustices done to the MacGillivray clan by her own English countrymen. As such she could not shake the notion—that she was meant to do something.

But what could she do? She could hardly restore Dunloch to the MacGillivrays; such a thing was a physical impossibility. But if it were not ... would she? Would she betray her country? Her king? Her family and everything she’d been raised to believe? Would she betray her husband?

That notion in turn made her shake her head in derision, for not only had she betrayed him last night—and again this morning, less than an hour ago—she’d betrayed him with his primary enemy in this land, a man he was hell-bent on bringing to his idea of “justice.”

Oh, her mind was an inescapable jumble. And yet she still couldn’t seem to shake the thought that there was something she might do to help—however small.

She was no closer to a resolution by the time she laid her head on her pillow for a few precious hours of sleep than she’d been the night before. But though her brief slumber was dreamless, two distinct memories, fragments really, surfaced in that period of unconsciousness; when she awoke, she was left with an idea.

In the darkness of her slumber, she saw Connall—husband, father, cousin and loyal MacGillivray—lying dead at the bottom of the ridge along with his fallen clansmen. And she saw his young son’s face as he peered expectantly up at her.

He must be buried and we can visit him.

The next morning, Jane waited anxiously as the castle inhabitants trickled in and out of the great hall, scouring their faces for one member in particular. Finally she spied who she wanted, but was forced to remain in her seat until Lord Reginald departed with his noblemen for the day.

The moment he’d gone, she rushed to the trestle table in the corner where Tearlach sat, alone, chewing his plate of meat with little enthusiasm.

“Tearlach, I must speak with you,” she said urgently, sitting down on the bench across from him.

“Yes, my Lady, what is it?”

“Are you still loyal to the MacGillivrays? Answer truthfully. This is not a trick; I do not intend to betray you to the English if your answer is yes.”

“My Lady,” he whispered harshly. “This is no’ the place to be saying such a thing. People may hear.”

“Yes, I know,” she replied, whispering also. “But I’ve started it, and what do you think is worse—continuing to talk about it here as if there is nothing wrong in it, or rushing off secretively and practically admitting our disloyalty? I rather think the latter would attract more attention, don’t you?”

Tearlach said nothing, but nodded his large head and shrugged his stooped shoulders.

“Alright, do not answer my question. But I need you to do something for me which, it will turn out, is something you will do for your clan as well. It is nothing large, but it is a risk, for if Lord Reginald discovers what I have in mind—though I doubt highly that he will—he may find a reason to hang you for it. I wish I could say the risk is mine also, but I fear it is not for my family connections lend me a measure of protection. If they did not, though, rest assured I would proceed as I intend to nonetheless. So I shall need to know if you will take that risk also.”

The steward studied her for a moment, torn by indecision.

“What is the risk then?” he allowed finally.

“Are you fit?”

“Fit? Oh, aye. I canna swing a claymore in battle anymore, but I am no invalid.”

“Can you dig?”

Chapter 12

An hour later, Jane waited on the main road mounted atop her gelding. Around the bend and ahead of her was the ridge where the English sentry was still posted to stand guard, preventing the MacGillivrays from claiming the remains of their dead.

And in the forest, concealed among the pines somewhere behind the ridge in roughly the same spot where she had first happened upon Robbie, Tearlach was creeping ever closer to the men.

She waited the agreed-upon length of time, hoping fervently that Tearlach had encountered no difficulty. Then she stepped off her gelding and led him off the road and into the surrounding heather. She peered through the dense foliage, looking for some distinguishable feature like a rock or a log she might recognize again later. Spying a small pile of stones that jutted up from the heather, she headed towards it.

From the pocket of her cloak, Jane withdrew a large and ornately crafted necklace of gold from which hung a magnificent sapphire. The piece had been part of her dowry, and it was one which Lord Reginald had allowed her to keep to wear on fine occasions. She was not allowed to handle it unless he said so—he’d made that very clear. She placed the necklace underneath the stones and prayed she’d be able to find it again, for though Lord Reginald had never laid a hand on her before now, she did not doubt for a moment that he’d flay her something grand if she did.

The next part of their plan made Jane’s palms sweat, for she was not accustomed to handling horses other than to ride them, and then at no more than a canter. Heading her gelding back to the road, she wound the reins around her left forearm and gripped them tightly. With one deep breath for courage, she raised her right hand and swung it in an arc, slapping the gelding in the flank as hard as she could.

Her hand stung like fire from the force, and the gelding reared up on his hind legs and whinnied loudly in protest Jane darted to the side, narrowly missing a clip on her shoulder with his hoof when he came down. She hung onto the reins, struggling with the skittish horse. The heels of her shoes ploughed the trodden dirt underneath her as she fought for traction against the gelding’s force.

“Shhh, shhh. I’m sorry boy, I’m so sorry,” she soothed, trying to calm the beast. Her hands shook as she stroked his thick, ropy neck.

The gelding stomped his hooves in the dirt and snorted his displeasure, but eventually he accepted her apology and settled down.

And the poor, startled animal had done exactly what she’d hoped: his protesting whinny had rung loud and clear over the highland landscape—signalling to Tearlach that she was in position and would now intervene to distract the guarding sentry.

She wasted no time. Hopping back onto the horse, she trotted him around the bend.

The soldier—a different one still from the two she’d seen previously—eyed her warily as she approached.

“Excuse me sir, I wonder if you might be of assistance.”

“What is the trouble, Baroness?” he returned with an obligatory bow.

Jane cursed inwardly—he recognized her. She hoped he would not have occasion to mention this encounter to anyone who might bring it to Lord Reginald’s attention.

“My horse became spooked by a vole and, strangely, when he reared, my necklace became unclasped and flew off my neck into the heather.” She laughed nervously as the soldier narrowed his eyes in response. She added, “I am fearful of tearing my fine dress. It was a present from the baron, you understand, and he shall certainly be disappointed if I damage it. Would you be so kind as to help me find my necklace?”

The soldier pursed his lips, considering. Then with a shrug of his shoulders, he trudged forward, his chainmail swishing lightly as he walked. Jane turned her gelding, and with one backwards glance to the vast, surrounding forest, she led the soldier away.

“It landed somewhere over there,” she said, pointing in the general direction where she’d hidden the piece.

She watched, on edge, as the soldier lumbered unenthusiastically into the brush and began foraging through the dense foliage. Several times he popped his helmeted head up, indicating his exasperation, but Jane nodded her encouragement. Reluctantly, the soldier returned to his foraging.

After much time had passed, she could delay no longer. Several times the sentry had suggested that Invercleugh’s commanding officer would put him in the stocks for abandoning his post.

“I think I see a glistening—there by that pile of stones,” she called.

The soldier looked up at her, breathing heavily from his exertion, and followed the line of her arm to where she pointed. Groaning, he stalked through the heather to the rocks and, easily finding the necklace, retrieved it and brought it to her.

“Will you be alright from ‘ere, Baroness? Only I best return t’ me post,” he said, walking with backwards steps as he spoke.

“Yes, of course. Thank you for your help, sir,” she answered, smiling gratefully.

The soldier turned and trudged back to the ridge, and Jane led her gelding onto the road and took him back the way she’d come. It was with effort that she did not kick him into a gallop in order reach Tearlach—anxious was she to learn whether or not he’d managed to complete his objective.

When she made it through the forest to the rear of the valley, Tearlach was waiting for her. At his feet was what she presumed to be the body of Connall, draped in the steward’s cloak. Tears streamed from Tearlach’s eyes and down his weathered cheeks; he made no attempt to hide his sorrow or to wipe his tears away.

“I didna think it wise that ye should see him as he is now,” he explained. “The lad has begun to decompose somewhat. They all have.”

She knew that Tearlach spoke the truth, for a thick stench wafted on the air from the horde of dead men beyond the trees. It was such a strong and offensive odour that she was forced to breathe through her mouth to keep from retching.

“Yes, thank you,” she agreed. “Come, let us put him on the gelding. Have you any idea where we might bury him?”

“Aye,” Tearlach answered. “I ken a place.”

He bent and lifted the body of Connall up as tenderly as if he was a sleeping child. The cloak mercifully covered Connall’s face from Jane’s view, but she could still see his arms and his hands as Tearlach moved him. Though the flesh was discoloured, it did not frighten her. Rather, it heightened her sorrow, and strengthened her conviction that what she and Tearlach were doing could not be wrong, whatever Lord Reginald might decree.

She followed Tearlach as he led the gelding through the forest along an overgrown trail. As it wended its way through the pines, the ground rose beneath them, slowly but steadily.

“Where are we going?” she inquired after they’d covered some distance.

“A special place, my Lady. I used to take wee Connall and the rest of the MacGillivray lads this way when they were boys. It gave them a sense of what was theirs ... what was theirs,” he repeated sadly, more to himself than to her.

When they reached their destination, Tearlach’s words became clear. The sloping forest floor finally levelled at the edge of the trees, and she stared, wide-eyed, at the sight before her. He had led them to a plateau that overlooked the broad expanse of Dunloch land. Far in the distance she could see the castle, and to the west of it the village.

Somewhere in that village, she thought, Margaret MacGillivray watched over her small son, and had no idea her husband had been retrieved and would receive a proper burial.

“Tearlach, it’s perfect,” she whispered reverently, surveying the majesty before her.

“Aye,” he agreed. “Connall would have liked to know this were his final resting place.”

“He does,” she said, glancing sideways at him. “I am certain—he is watching. Now, you know what to do from here? Scrape out a grave, and when you are finished, return to the village. Take the gelding with you, and fetch Margaret and young Connall and bring them here this afternoon. I must show my face about the castle, but send word when you are ready. I shall bring a surprise with me when I return here.”

“Aye, Baroness.” Tearlach’s interest was evident as he looked at her, but he did not enquire about her intentions.

Jane hurried back to Dunloch, running in places where the uneven ground would allow. Having made the trip to the hut through the wild hills so often, she was growing rather accustomed to the rough, craggy and, in some places, treacherous ground.

Once in her chamber, she changed into a finer dress, one more appropriate to her station. Then dashing from the room, she scurried off to make her obligatory appearance in the solar.

She greeted the ladies seated within warmly, if a little breathlessly, when she arrived. She was heartily delighted to see the dowager baroness among their numbers, seated in her usual chair closest to the fire with a thick wool quilt spread over her lap. The lady did look quite well—all things considered.

But as Jane sat and listened to the ladies’ chatter—which now seemed to her rather inane and tiresome—she found herself distracted. Her hands fidgeted with the hems of her sleeves, her toes tapped impatiently, and every now and then her eyes darted to the door in anticipation of Tearlach’s message.

“Are you alright, my Lady?” inquired one of the more popular ladies of the group.

Jane stilled her bouncing knees. “Yes, thank you. I apologize; I am unaccustomed to such fine company and am nervous.”

The ladies laughed appreciatively at her obvious flattery and continued on with their twittering. From across the circle, she caught Lady D’Aubrey’s eye. The lady regarded her quizzically, her expression concerned. Guilt crept over her conscience at deceiving the kind old woman, but before the feeling had a chance to warm her cheeks and give her away, a knock at the door to the solar interrupted the conversation.

“Excuse me, Ladies,” said a voice, “but the widow MacGillivray is asking for the Baroness D’Aubrey.”

Jane turned in her seat to see a young ghillie shifting nervously from foot to foot.

“Which widow might that be?” scoffed one of the ladies.

Outrage bubbled up in her breast at the cruel sentiment, and she repressed an urge to cross the room and slap the woman across the cheek. Glancing at the dowager baroness, Jane saw that she, too, pressed her lips together in displeasure.

“It be the widow Margaret,” the boy explained, obviously stung by the heartless words of the English woman.

“Yes, I shall come directly,” Jane answered, hopping up from her seat.

She quickly crossed the room to kiss Lady D’Aubrey on the cheek, eager to escape the ladies’ company. But when she bent down, the dowager caught her hand.

“You’ll come visit me this evening, yes?” she murmured in a low voice so she would not be heard by the others.

Jane nodded her assent, and the old lady gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. The rest of the ladies in the group stood and offered her a courtesy as she left the room.

The occurrence with the lady’s callous words had upset her, and Lady D’Aubrey’s intuition at her agitation had put her on edge. But Jane forced both worries from her mind as she made her way back to the hut to collect Robbie. She was far too anxious over revealing to him and to Margaret what she had orchestrated with Tearlach’s help.  And as if God Himself condoned her actions, a rare break in the clouds allowed a ray of afternoon sunshine to filter down to the land below, setting the emerald hills off as if they were truly bejewelled.

Robbie smiled brightly as she burst through the door of the hut. He looked significantly better, and was sitting by the fire with the blanket wrapped around his broad shoulders. She smiled at the half-eaten oatcake he held in his hand, happy that his appetite was improving.

“I were not expecting ye till nightfall,” he said.

“I can leave and come back later if you’d prefer,” she quipped.

Robbie chuckled. “Dinna be daft.”

He reached his arm to her, and when she came to him and knelt at his side he wrapped his hand around the back of her neck and pulled her close, kissing her warmly in welcome. His moist lips on hers liquefied her mind along with her limbs, and she had to concentrate on the reason she’d come to him this day if she wanted to make it out of the hut and to the plateau at all.

“Robbie, I need you to come with me. I have something I’d like to show you.”

Robbie raised his eyebrows enquiringly. “What might that be now?”

“It’s a surprise. Can you walk? You shall need to walk to get there.”

He studied her a moment longer. “I have half a mind to ask ye if ye’d decided to betray me to the English after all.”

“I swear I would not,” she gasped.

“I was only jesting,” he laughed at her horrified expression. “I figure if ye were bent on betraying me to the English, ye’d have just brought them here.”

“What are you like?” she admonished playfully, shaking her head as she helped him to stand.

The journey to the plateau was long and arduous, for although Robbie could in fact walk, his wound had not yet healed entirely and the constant motion caused him pain. Jane assisted him as best she could, keeping herself tucked firmly under his arm to take some of his weight. As they progressed, Robbie quickly guessed where she was taking him.

“D’ye ken this place as well?” he enquired.

“I did not know of it at first,” she admitted. “I had some help finding it.”

“By whom?”

“You’ll see.”

When at last they broke through the trees, Robbie immediately spotted the freshly dug grave ringed with stones and the cloaked body laid carefully beside.

“Jane, what is this?” he demanded warily, his voice breaking with both emotion and fear.

She opened her mouth to answer him, but a rustling in the trees to their right silenced her.

“Get back,” Robbie ordered. He pulled his sgian-dubh from his kilt hose and, ushering her behind him for her protection, he aimed the blade in the direction of the sound.

“No, Robbie, it’s okay, it’s—” she tried to assure him, but he would not listen.

The rustling sound grew closer and closer, and Robbie shifted his stance, preparing to attack or defend depending on what the situation called for. Jane said nothing, both amused and touched by his determination to be her protector.

At last, Tearlach broke through to the plateau, leading the gelding atop which Margret was seated with little Connall. When they laid eyes on Robbie their jaws dropped, and they simultaneously uttered exclamations of shock.

“Master Rob?” gasped Tearlach.

“Robbie!” breathed Margaret.

Tearlach hastened to help Margaret and the little boy down off the gelding, and the pair of them rushed forwards to embrace Robbie. Jane stepped back to allow the tearful reunion, and when a bewildered young Connall came to her side, clutching a simple, wooden toy in his little fist, she put her arm around the boy’s shoulder. Watching the emotional meeting of the three MacGillivrays, Jane shed a few tears of her own.

“We heard ye hadna been found among the dead,” Tearlach sobbed, leaning back and clasping his face between his large hands. He looked Robbie up and down like a father would his son.

“I very nearly was,” Robbie answered, swiping at his moist cheeks with the back of his hand. “But I was saved by an angel. Jane’s spent countless hours bringing me back to health.”

He gazed warmly at her as he spoke, and she blushed humbly when Margaret and Tearlach turned their astonished eyes to her. But then, Margaret’s eyes alighted on the covered body at the side of the grave. She gasped, and her shaking hand rose to her throat.

“Is ... is that my Connall?” she asked. More tears brimmed at her eyelids and her voice trembled.

Robbie’s eyes widened as he turned to peer at the covered figure again with fresh sight.

“How did ye do it Tearlach?” he asked. “They’d had a guard.”

“Aye,” agreed Margaret. “We were forbidden from claiming the dead.”

“Well, that there were the baroness, too,” he informed them. “It were she who came to me wi’ the idea that she would distract the guard while I fetched Connall from the valley.”

“Ye did this, Jane?” Robbie said, turning his eyes to her.

The peculiar mix of awe and tenderness with which he regarded her tugged at her heart.

“It really wasn’t much,” she mumbled, uncomfortable under their gazes of gratitude and admiration.

“No’ much?” Robbie argued. “It were braver than any of the remaining MacGillivrays.”

She shrugged, falling silent as Margaret stepped forward. Bending to her knees awkwardly from the weight of her belly, she took Connall’s hand in her own. Jane’s heart ached as she watched the woman cry quietly for her love. Young Connall gripped her leg harder, upset by his mother’s weeping, and Jane squeezed his small shoulder reassuringly. After a moment, Robbie moved forward, urging Margaret to stand again. When she did, she turned her face into Robbie’s shoulder and wept fiercely.

From the side of the grave, Tearlach spoke. Jane did not understand the words, for they were in Gaelic, but their meaning was clear. They were words of reverence. Of loss and grief. And of love—love of a wife, of a cousin, of a clansman. Love for the land that was rightfully theirs.

Jane watched on, an outsider, as the three MacGillivray survivors said their farewells to one of their own. Then, Tearlach fell silent. After a few moments, she stepped to Robbie’s side.

“I must return to the castle,” she murmured. “Will you be alright to get back to the hut on your own?”

“Aye,” he nodded. “Please come back to me tonight.”

Both Margaret and Tearlach passed looks between themselves, but remained silent. Jane untangled herself from young Connall’s embrace and directed the boy to join his mother. Approaching her side, he stood solemnly at the side of his father’s grave. A heart wrenching sob escaped Margaret’s lips as the little boy laid his small, wooden toy atop the cloaked breast.

Turning away from the sorrowful farewell, Jane left the plateau, left the three highlanders to their long overdue time of mourning.

Chapter 13

“You certainly are distracted this evening,” Lady D’Aubrey noted that night as she and Jane sat alone together in the dowager’s private apartments.

“Hmmm?” Jane uttered. She glanced up from the spot on the floor at which she’d been staring blindly to find Lady D’Aubrey staring at her inquisitively.

The lady chuckled, her eyes warm. “You did not eat much at the meal, either. Are you well?”

“Oh, yes, I am well,” Jane sighed. “And I am certain it is not what you are thinking.”

“You are astute,” Lady D’Aubrey laughed. “But I know it cannot be that. It would be too early to tell. There is something that is occupying you, though.”

Jane sighed, chewing on her bottom lip. “You are right.”

“But you do not wish to tell me.”

“No,” she disagreed. “I rather think that I do wish to tell you, but fear that to do so would be unwise.”

The old baroness studied Jane, sensing something in the words she did not say.

“Then perhaps it is best you say nothing. I would advise you, young Jane, to be wary of whom you do trust with your secrets. As much as I would like you to trust me, I fear I cannot promise you of it. Oh, do not take my words to mean that I intend on betraying whatever confidences you may place in my trust, for I do not. What I mean is that in these Scottish Highlands, loyalties can turn as fast as the weather. Be it your husband, your maid, or whatever friends you may make, you’d be best to withhold your trust as often as possible, and offer it only when it is absolutely necessary. I would hate to think of a sweet girl such as you suffering an unthinkable fate because she was too trusting and naive.”

For a moment, as Jane listened to the baroness’ warning, she worried the lady might somehow be privy to each and every one of her secrets. She was about to inquire what specifically Lady D’Aubrey meant when their conversation was interrupted by the appearance of a servant at the baroness’ door.

“My Lady,” said the man addressing Jane with a curt bow. “Er ... forgive me, but the baron requires yer ... ah ... company in his bedchamber. He bids ye go to him now.”

Jane nodded, her cheeks reddening.

“I apologize for my son,” Lady D’Aubrey offered when the servant had gone. “That was inappropriate and inexcusable.”

“It is not for you to apologize,” she assured the woman. “And it is the least of things he has to apologize for.”

She had not meant for her last comment to be said aloud. Her eyes widened and she raised them to Lady D’Aubrey. The eyes that met hers in return held her with an odd expression which she could not decipher.

“I think, young Jane, you are learning to bend. I am intrigued to see how your turn develops.”

“I-I know not what you mean,” Jane stammered.

Lady D’Aubrey smiled, and patted Jane’s hand affectionately. “We shall see.”

Upon returning to her chamber direct from Lord Reginald’s attentions, Jane insisted that Ruth draw her a bath. For the first time she was not only repulsed by the way Lord Reginald used her ... she was also angry. It was her body to give as she saw fit, not his to take whenever the urge came upon him. She felt dirty, and needed to scrub herself clean of his seed and his sweat and his smell.

This was not the way it was supposed to be. She was entitled to more. She deserved more. Robbie had taught her that, and against her better judgement, she was beginning to believe it.

As she sat in the water, taking what little comfort she could in the sensation of the water cascading down her back, she longed to tell Ruth of her secret romance. But the baroness’ warning halted the words in her throat. She had been warned to trust not even Ruth. Even as Ruth begged her to unburden herself, Jane kept silent, fighting against an overwhelming desperation to simply tell someone.

When Ruth had gone, Jane prepared for her nocturnal journey over the Scottish countryside. She donned her customary wool dress and laced up her sturdy shoes; her hair she left unbound. If Lord Reginald was not about to respect her rights over her own body, she was not about to respect the customs of married women ... even if her defiance would be seen by no one other than her lover.

As she waited for the castle to fall silent, she knelt beside her bed and retrieved Robbie’s scrap of plaid from where she’d hidden it between the frame and the mattress. She traced the pattern of the red and green squares with a fingertip, memorizing the individual stitches, the hues, the fraying edges. A host of complicated and dangerous emotions warred within her. She knew now that she loved Robbie with her entire being—and that was a very dangerous thing. For what good could come of a married English woman loving the Scottish enemy of her husband?

At least that was what her head told her. Her heart, however—her heart revelled in the joy she felt in this, her first real love. And her heart raged at being deprived the opportunity to have fallen in love the proper way. She should have been married to a man with whom she could fall in love, a man to whom she could be attracted. She should have been married to ...

Robbie.

Angrily, she stuffed the scrap of fabric back into the frame of the bed. Such thoughts served no purpose; they were only sure to drive her mad. She’d be best to put them out of her head, and focus on one day at a time.

Nevertheless she revisited those thoughts over and over again on her way to Robbie.

She had half a mind to tell him what the baroness had said, but the moment she entered the hut, her thoughts stilled, replaced by a swelling of her heart as she beheld him, curled on his side like a lost child.

He’d cried—she could see that immediately, even in the dim light of the fire. His eyes were red and puffy from it. But he smiled when he saw her, relieved at having her near once more. He raised himself carefully into a sitting position, bidding her to sit next to him. She did so, willingly and wordlessly.

“I canna tell ye what it meant to me to bury Connall,” he said, enveloping her in his strong arms. “Ye astound me, d’ye ken?”

“I confess I have astounded myself in this past fortnight or so. I did not believe myself capable of half the things I have done since I have come here.”

“Ye ken what I wish ...” Robbie began, and then faltered.

“What?” she pressed.

“I ken it’s daft, but ... I wish there were nothing out there waiting for us. Or that there were no day, only the night. There were no Longshanks, no D’Aubrey, even no Dunloch. D’ye ken what I mean?”

Jane turned her face into his shoulder. “I do. It’s like there are two different worlds—one of duty, and one of ...”

She pressed her lips tightly together. Had she really been about to say “love”? Though it was entirely, overwhelmingly true for her, she couldn’t admit such a thing to him ... could she?

“What is it? What were ye about to say?”

“Nothing,” she lied, shaking her head with a rueful smile. “I do not recall.”

Robbie glanced at her sceptically, but let it go. Instead, he pulled her with him to lie down, and when she laid her head on his chest, he stroked her hair tenderly. As he did, she let her gaze travel around the small hut. She was tempted to let herself imagine, just for a moment, that this hut truly belonged to her and Robbie, that it was their home. Perhaps a trunk was nestled into the corner with their garments neatly stored. Perhaps a small babe slept in the corner in a basket Robbie had fashioned. Maybe Connall had helped him ...

“What are ye thinking, Jane?”

Robbie’s murmured words filtered into her flimsy reverie, strengthening it, making it seem more real. She had to remind herself it was monumentally stupid to want such a thing.

“I’m trying not to think actually,” she evaded, offering him a half-truth. “If I allow myself to think, I remember that there is a D’Aubrey, and a Dunloch, and a war just outside this door.”

“Aye,” he agreed. “That is how I feel also. In truth, I have felt that way since I met ye.”

Jane raised herself up on her elbow so that she could look into his clear, green eyes. The eyes that gazed back at her glowed warmly in the firelight, rich with some emotion she dared not try to name but which sent her stomach and her heart into a tumult of longing nonetheless.

“I don’t want to think,” she repeated in a whisper.

No, what she wanted was Robbie—in so many more ways than just physically. She wanted his devotion; his very soul. She wanted what she could not have and dared not admit.

He heard her thoughts anyway, as though she’d spoken them aloud. He reached a hand up and nestled his fingers into her hair. Pulling her face to his he kissed her long and tenderly. His mouth on hers was a language of its own, communicating feelings and emotions so much better than any spoken words could. Jane wanted to believe desperately that his kiss could be conveyed into promises, could offer security and safety. She wanted desperately to believe that his kiss could make the world around them and everyone in it disappear.

And this night, she was prepared to let herself believe it all—if only for a short while. She responded to his kisses with ardent desire, with passion, and with love. Yes, love. She would never tell him, but this night, this moment, she would allow herself to admit it inwardly.

She loved Robbie.

She loved him as she gripped him to her, as she slid his shirt off him and ran her hands up his thighs and under his kilt with a boldness she had not felt the first time she’d been with him. She loved him as she cradled his head to her breasts, her stomach, and every inch of her that his heated lips found. And when he entered her, desperate for the warmth and satisfaction that only she could provide him, she loved Robbie with a fierceness which ached so strongly it threatened to burst her heart.

She sheathed him as he moved inside her, and wrapped her legs around his narrow waist in a way that was both provocative and protective. His moans of ecstasy and sighs of pleasure were as music to her soul, stirring notes of longing that drove her own ecstasy higher and higher. And when he reached his climax, his desperate thrusts could not be deep enough, could not claim her enough. They broke her own climax which radiated through her like an unbearable energy.

She held him close as he collapsed onto her, trembling and panting heavily. His moist, hot breath caressed her sternum as he exhaled; his cheek nuzzled her breast, and in return she allowed her own cheek to nuzzle the top of his head.

She loved Robbie, and as desperately as she wanted to tell him, she knew she could not. It was not fear that he would not return her love that stopped her. It was the recognition that to love him was both foolish and dangerous.

And to tell him she loved him would serve no purpose.

Chapter 14

Jane left the small hut early—the light of a new day was just beginning to brighten the sky. Robbie, in his slumber, did not seem to want to let her go. The moment she stirred, his arms automatically tightened to prevent her from leaving him. With gentle coaxing and a promise that she would return as soon as she could, she placed a warm and tender kiss to his forehead and departed. A sense of sadness settled over her as she walked the bank of the forest brook, sadness at the return of day, at having to leave the man she loved for one she did not.

The moment she was in view of the castle, she saw that some sort of upheaval was going on. Riders galloped swiftly towards her—many riders, she saw; at least ten, and led by none other than Lord Reginald himself.

She halted in her tracks, and her blood froze in her veins; she felt as if she were outside her body, watching from afar.

“Jane, where have you been?” Lord Reginald demanded thunderously, slowing his destrier and his retinue as he approached.

Jane swallowed thickly. Her panic intensified as she took in his murderous expression. The noblemen and soldiers who rode with him glanced at each other furtively, their suspicion as clear as Lord Reginald’s.

“I-I could not sleep my Lord. I left a short while ago only to walk and to take in some air.”

“You left to walk in the dark, and none of the tower guards saw you?” he accused.

He did not believe her, nor did his accompanying riders. She would be a fool to think otherwise. Her stomach plummeted as he bent down from his destrier, speaking low so that he would not be heard by the others.

“I will deal with you later, girl. But for now, get you to the castle and stay there. MacGillivray has been about. A scrap of his plaid has been found—in your room, no less. I’ve an inkling that he’s broken into the castle intending to do you harm in order to strike his revenge at me.”

“The chief of clan Gillivray? H-How can you be sure it was he? Could it not have been a MacGillivray clansman?” Jane was wild with desperation, and her voice shook as she spoke.

“It was him,” Lord Reginald said, nodding his head in his conviction. “And he left his plaid as a warning to me. Now I’ll have no more from you; get yourself back to the castle. I’ll have my turn at you when I’ve caught the beast and hanged him from the castle walls.”

Jane felt as if her knees had turned to liquid. She watched, stunned and horrified, as the party rode off in search of Robbie. Her Robbie—the Robbie that she loved beyond any doubt or reason. They knew he was close. It would only be a matter of time before they found him.

And killed him.

She had to stop that from happening. She had to warn him. A surge of adrenaline shot through her body, jolting her muscles into action. She turned to the castle and ran like she had not run since she was a child, since she’d chased after Hugg in the open fields of her father’s estate, determined to catch him. Her legs pumped over the dirt road as Hugg’s would have, with blinding speed of which no man was capable.

Breathless and cold with fear, she tore through the main gatehouse, and through the bailey. Sprinting through the castle hallways and passages she burst through the door of her room where Ruth was there waiting for her, frantically pacing the floor and wringing her hands.

“Oh, my Lady,” she exclaimed upon beholding her mistress. “Thank the heavens you are safe. I’d thought for sure that MacGillivray beast had stolen you and harmed you. Oh, thank the Lord you are alright.”

Tears shone in the woman’s eyes as she embraced Jane, holding her close. Frantically, she pushed Ruth away.

“Ruth, what has happened?” she demanded. “How did his Lordship find the MacGillivray plaid in my chamber?”

“It was I who found it,” Ruth corrected, a note of triumph colouring her tone. “I saw it—it had been tucked into the bed frame with the corner sticking out. Lord Reginald believes it was a warning, and I daresay I think he’s right. That devil Scot wanted Dunloch to know he’d been here. He wished to frighten us.”

Ruth’s words were like a splash of ice water over her body as Jane realized what had happened. She’d been too hasty. She’d shoved Robbie’s plaid into its hiding place and had rushed from the room without ensuring it was properly concealed.

Oh dear God, it was her fault. Robbie would be found and killed for her carelessness.

“No,” she wailed in despair, and covered her face with her hands.

“My Lady, it is alright. You are safe now.”

“You do not understand,” she protested, shaking her head vehemently. “You were right about me, about where I go at night. That scrap of fabric being in my chamber was no accident. It was I that hid it here because it was he who gave it to me.”

Ruth gasped, shaking her head in disbelief. “My Lady, what are you saying? Do you mean—”

“Yes, my Ruth. It was I who found Robbie MacGillivray, chief of clan Gillivray and true Laird of Dunloch. I healed a nasty wound that he suffered at the hands of Lord Reginald’s soldiers and I saved his life. Oh Ruth, there is so much about this conflict we don’t understand, but I speak true when I say that he is not a savage or a devil.”

Ruth hands were clasped to her cheeks as Jane spoke, and her eyes were wide with shock. “Oh, my Lady, how was I to know? Why did you not tell me any of this? Had I but known, I would not have brought what I found to Lord Reginald.”

“I did not want to involve you,” she answered vaguely. “Oh Ruth, I am a wretched creature, for I love Robbie. If they find him, they will surely kill him, and I cannot let that happen.”

“My Lady, I am truly sorry,” Ruth said firmly, taking hold of Jane’s arm, “but you are going nowhere. You have risked your life enough; indeed I cannot bear the fact that you’ve risked it at all. I will not allow you to involve yourself any further than you already are. You could be hanged as a traitor if your involvement is discovered, do you know that?”

“Yes. I do know, and I do not care, Ruth. Robbie will be hanged as a traitor if I do not warn him, and that thought terrifies me far more. I love you, my Ruth, truly, I do. But I must go. I must warn him.”

She wrenched her arm from Ruth’s grip, and followed by the woman’s cries for her to come back, she darted out the door and fled the castle in the direction of the stables.

Reaching them, she scared the wits out of the groomsmen on duty when she burst through the doors and mounted the nearest gelding, though he was not saddled. With a cry and a heel to the gelding’s side, she rode him bareback out of the stables and through the gates of Dunloch.

If the situation had not been so desperate, she would have been terrified of the animal moving beneath her and of the rough, hard ground beneath them both. But as the Scottish countryside flew past her at death-defying speed, she was so determined to get to Robbie first that she hardly noticed. Her heart pounded against her ribs as she scanned the landscape for Lord Reginald and his party. And when finally she reached the hut, she fully expected to be met by horses, their riders having discovered Robbie’s hiding place before she could reach it.

But there were none.

“Robbie,” she cried, bursting through the door of the hut.

Startled, he stood from where he sat by the fire, wincing in pain and gripping his side at having moved so hastily.

“They know you’re close,” she exclaimed, panting. “They’re out looking for you, and will surely find you if you do not make your escape now.”

Robbie’s eyes grew dark, and his visage hardened. “I want ye to tell me, Jane—do they ken ye’ve helped me? Do I put ye in danger if I leave ye here and dinna take ye wi’ me? Because I will, if ye are.”

“I am in no danger,” she lied. “But you are, so you must go now. I’ve a horse for you. Take him and make good your escape.”

Robbie needed no further prodding. With a nod, he limped awkwardly out of the hut, but before he mounted the gelding, he stopped and turned to Jane. Pulling her close, he kissed her. It was a swift kiss, rough and urgent. But in it, she felt a world of unspoken words, of unspoken emotion.

“I promise ye, as long as I live—which may not be very long at all—I’ll never forget ye.”

Then he mounted the gelding, and with a fierce, warrior’s cry and one tortured, backwards glance at her, he spurred the animal forward, hunched over awkwardly for his wound.

“Nor I you,” Jane echoed as she watched him ride away.

Alone, she breathed in the fragrant scent of the pine and of the wood smoke that still rose from the chimney of the hut. Their hut—hers and Robbie’s. She felt hollow, a shell of herself; a dull ache throbbed in the pit of her stomach. It begged her to cry, to wail, to scream in anguish. But she could not. She was numb everywhere.

She could not return to the castle—she would eventually, but not yet. Instead, she turned from the hut, from the scene of so much happiness and love that would be forever seared into the tissues of her brain, and walked in the direction of the plateau where they had buried Connall just the day before.

The grave was just as they’d left it, the body covered with fresh dirt. The small toy that had been clutched in little Connall’s hand when he’d stood by his father’s grave had been placed atop the dirt as a token.

Jane sank to the ground and picked the toy up. Clutching it to her throbbing heart she gazed, dry-eyed, over the landscape below.

Dunloch stretched endlessly before her, a carpet of rolling emerald hills. It was the land that Robbie loved. That Tearlach loved. That Connall had loved enough to die for. And now it was hers—whether rightly or wrongly, it was hers.

As she gazed at the distant castle, she knew. She knew that, just as Tearlach had done, she would protect it in whatever way she could, even if it meant she had to sell her soul to do so. She would happily bargain it away for Robbie not only because she loved him, but because it was right. She knew it was unlikely the MacGillivrays would ever return to rule it, but that did not matter.

If ever, by some miracle, they did return—if Robbie ever returned—Dunloch would be here, unchanged, waiting.

Jane made him a silent promise there on that plateau, beside the grave of his loyal clansman and cousin ... Dunloch would always be ready to welcome the return of its true laird.

She would make sure of it.

To be continued in Volume II of the Highland Loyalties trilogy: Uniting the Clans.