by Fiona Faris
"Mind you," he observed, "the brick-work does need re-pointing. I reckon we could work some of the stones loose."
"And the bars are only sunk into the earth in the bed of the drain," Gillespie added, running his hand over the brick-work too. "It could be done."
"Then what are we waiting for?" Uilleam said and began scraping at the crumbling cement between the bricks in the culvert arch with the point of his dirk.
In no time at all, the clansmen had succeeded in removing one of the bricks and pulling it away, along with one of the iron bars. Uilleam squeezed his shoulder and chest through the gap.
"It is a tight fit, but it will let us pass through," he reported. "Unless, of course, Gillespie has been eating too many mutton pies."
Gillespie made a face, and Lewis sniggered.
"I have had to forgo Flora's mutton pies since I broke my teeth on her crusts," Gillespie retorted.
"Wheesht, now!" Uilleam hissed. "And follow me."
He disappeared into the culvert, and his two companions followed.
Uilleam was thankful that the culvert was dry. He reflected on how much more ugsome it would have been had the low channel been active as a scullery drain or, worse still, a sewer.
He pressed on, his hands sifting through the drifts of dry leaves that lay in front of him. His progress stirred up the earthy scent of a forest floor. He found the scent reassuring. He closed his eyes and imagined he was crawling through open woodland rather than a dark, narrow tunnel with the weight of a castle poised to crush him above his head.
A thrill of excitement also coursed through his veins. He pushed on into the unknown darkness, eager to win the prize that, hopefully, lay at its far end.
After what seemed like an eternity, Uilleam sensed a slight easing of the darkness. He raised his head and strained his eyes. Hope flourished in his breast. He thought he could detect a dim grayness ahead of them.
He increased his pace and scrambled more urgently through the dry litter. He felt the mustiness of the enclosed air freshen slightly and the weakest of cool breaths against his sweating brow. He felt both excitement and relief. His heart began to beat more easily. There was definitely an opening up ahead.
"We're nearly there, lads," he whispered to his companions behind him.
“Thank God for that!” Lewis quipped. “I am getting a fine view of your backside here, and it is not a pretty sight.”
Soon, they came to an iron grating, set into the culvert ceiling. Through the bars, they could make out a long narrow room, dimly lit by the moonlight that seeped through a small barred window, which was barely a thing horizontal slit, set high in one of the shorter walls. Racks of wine bottles ranged along both of the longer walls.
A wine cellar, he thought. A former laundry or brew-house, given the existence of the drain through which they had just crawled along, that had been converted into a wine cellar.
He strained his ears, listening for any sound of a human presence, but the room was as silent as the grave. He wrapped his fingers around the bars of the grating and gave it a push and a shake. The grating shook slightly but did not budge.
Uilleam growled with angry frustration. It had clearly been some time since the grating had been removed. It was jammed shut with grit and dust.
He tried again. He dislodged some of the dust and grit from the recess in which the grating sat. He closed his eyes and sneezed.
"Bless you!" Lewis sniggered behind him.
"Shut up," Uilleam shot back, irritated by the dust in his eyes and throat, "and come around her and give me a hand."
He rose onto his hunkers, bringing his powerful legs into a deep squat beneath him and bracing his broad back against the grating, and began to push. Gillespie joined him, and together they heaved upwards with grunts and curses.
All at once, the grating loosened and gave. They slid it aside onto the cellar floor with a worryingly loud clang, and all three of them hauled themselves up in the room.
The room was indeed a wine cellar. A deep gutter ran the length of the room, down the middle of the floor, bisecting the drain through which they had just emerged, suggesting indeed that the room had once been a laundry. A small barred window sat high in one of the end walls and let out into the night air. In the end wall opposite there was a heavy wooden door, reinforced with iron strapping.
Uilleam smiled with satisfaction. They were in. Now, they just had to find where Siusan was being held.
"Let's hope that door isn't locked," he said. "Otherwise, we've just broken into our own prison cell.”
The air was heavy with the syrupy aroma of wine. Uilleam licked his lips. It would be nice to sample Iain Campbell's cellar, he thought, but be realized that then was not the time for carousing.
They were still surrounded by silence. Nothing seemed astir in the entire castle. But Uilleam was under no illusion; he knew that they were somewhere deep in the bowels of the castle, far from the nocturnal activity of a closely-guarded stronghold. There would be sentries around, and sentries aplenty. They would have to proceed with extreme caution, now that they had entered the lion's den.
"Come," he beckoned his companions, “let's go and find the lassie."
His spirits were bobbing like a fisherman's float. They had made it thus far, and he made a wager with himself that, if the cellar door was unlocked, their mission was destined for success.
He went over to the door and tried the heavy ring-handle. The latch clicked open. He turned to his companions, raised his eyebrows, and beamed.
They stepped through the door and found themselves in the narrow passageway of what looked in the darkness to be an undercroft. They hurried along the passageway, their bare feet silent on the flagstones.
At the end of the passageway, they came to an open stairway. Cautiously, they climbed the stairs and found themselves looking out into pend that entered off the main courtyard and led to a smaller yard and what looked like stables.
Uilleam felt happier, now that he was out in the open air again. Beyond the mouth of the pend, torches fixed in sconces along the castle wall and the facades of the towers and ranges illuminated the main courtyard with dancing yellow light. The air felt fresh and clear and carried the salty tang of the sea-loch to his nostrils. The watches called our their 'all's well' to one another regularly, as they reached the end of their beats, before turning and retracing their steps and calling out to their neighbor at the other end.
Now, he thought, where in this vast citadel of place could Siusan Gunn be? Signaling to Lewis and Gillespie to maintain silence, he started towards the mouth of the pend.
He pulled up abruptly. There, just inside the mouth of the pend, a figure stood silhouetted, taking a piss, one hand supporting itself against the pend wall.
Uilleam grinned and suppressed a chuckle of amusement. He could not believe his luck. There was the source that would inform him as to where the Gunn wench was lodged. Pulling his dirk from his belt, he started along the wall opposite that against which the sentry was relieving himself and slunk up upon him from behind.
He clamped his hand over the man's mouth and pressed the point of his dirk against his windpipe.
"Not a peep out of you, my friend, or it will be your last," Uilleam murmured in his ear. "Now, tell me: where will I find the Gunn lass that your master, Cailean, lately brought to Inveraray?"
The man's eyes rolled wide with terror. He held his hands up in a gesture of surrender
Uilleam removed his hand from his mouth and grabbed his hair, to keep his head tipped back and his throat exposed.
"Mercy, maister!" the man gasped. "She has apairtments on the tap flair o' the range." He nodded his head at the tall facade on the far side of the courtyard. "That's it yonder. Dinna kill me, maister!"
Uilleam smiled sadly, regretfully. He could not risk the man, who would almost certainly raise the alarm as soon as he was released. He Brought the hilt of his dirk down sharply on the crown of the poor man’s head.
The m
an jerked convulsively against his grip, then fell limp. Uilleam let the man slide softly the ground.
This was all going more smoothly than he had even hoped. He slid his dirk back into his belt, before beckoning his two clansmen forward.
Leaving the pend, they skirted the courtyard until they reach the door to the range.
Chapter Thirteen
Inveraray Castle
The same night
Siusan was awakened by a loud splintering noise. Her bedchamber was bathed in darkness, eased only by a faint glow from the banked coals in the fireplace. She heard the squeal of metal being wrenched from wood.
She sat up in bed, clutching the bedclothes to her breast. Her heart was racing, her eyes wide with fright and bewilderment. What on earth was happening?
By the light of the glowing embers in the fireplace, she discerned a swift movement by the door. She saw three shadows slip silently into her bedchamber. She heard a soft rustle of cloth and the padding of bare feet on the floorboards, deep and heavy breathing.
"Who is there?" she cried out, her heart leaping into her throat.
Was she about to be murdered, or worse, in her bed?
The nearest shadow spoke.
"Shh!" it replied. "Not so loud. You'll wake the entire castle. It's me, Uilleam MacGregor, here to rescue you - again!"
It was the MacGregor brute! She gave a little cry of alarm.
Uilleam darted towards her, menacingly.
"Wheesht, I tell you, or I'll be forced to gag you. We're not here to do you any harm. Now, get dressed. We don't have much time. We'll wait in your sitting room to spare your blushes."
She worried the lace trim at the neck of her undershirt with her fingertips. She was still half-befuddled by sleep. Was she dreaming, perhaps?
"But what...? What is going on? Where are you taking me?"
Uilleam grinned. She saw the whiteness of his teeth gleam in the gloom.
"Out of the damned clutches of the Campbells. Back to your father. Angus Mor has commissioned us to fetch you."
She shook her head in confusion. She still did not understand.
"But this is the home of my betrothed. I am here by every right. What if I don't want to go? Why would my father want me back?"
Uilleam reached out and seized her by the forearm.
"Then I'll put you over my shoulder and carry you, whether you want to go or not. Now, come on, lassie, and do as you are told. I'll carry you out in your night-clothes if I have to."
She felt the roughness of his calloused palm and the tightness of his grip.
She bridled at his manner. Who was he to tell her what to do and to lay hands on her to make her do it? At the same time, she had no wish to be gagged and trussed and slung, half-naked, over the red-headed brute's shoulder. Should she cry for help? She had still less desire to have her throat cut.
"I'll come, then," she said quietly.
The men left, and she slipped from the bed and began to dress. From the wooden closet she retrieved the gown she had divested the previous evening and pulled it over her head. She sat on the edge of the bed and drew on her stockings and fastened her garter ribbons above her knees, then slipped her feet into her leather shoes. She picked a hooded shawl from a press in the wall and swirled it over her shoulders.
She left her bedchamber and found the men waiting in her private sitting room.
Uilleam and one of the others were pacing about the room, evidently eager to leave. The third was standing by the door, keeping watch for any comings or goings in the passageway.
The floorboards creaked softly beneath the men's tread. A mantle-clock ticked slowly and steadily as if to remind them that time was passing and that it would not be long until their presence was discovered.
Siusan's eyes still felt gritty with sleep, though she was by now wide awake. She wished she had splashed some water over her face before she had left her bedchamber.
She did not know why she was going with them. She had no idea what designs they had on her. Yet she was thrilled by the impropriety and the danger of it all. She had no great desire to remain there, especially after Cailean had shown himself in his true colors, yet she feared what might lie in store for her at the hands of those fierce MacGregors. She was suddenly possessed by a reckless desire to expose herself to the danger those men represented, to entrust herself to them totally and completely. The revulsion she felt towards Cailean and the prospect of being married to him outweighed the trepidation she felt at the prospect of leaving with these men, under those risky circumstances; she also found that feeling of trepidation delicious, like forbidden fruit.
They set out along the passageway and descended the first flight of stairs. Away from the fire-glow, they were immediately plunged into utter darkness. Siusan had to feel her way along the walls, the stone rough on her soft palm and fingertips. In the confined space of the narrow low-ceilinged passageways and staircases, she could smell the musky scent of the men, their sweat and the earthy dampness that clung to their clothes. Every sound from their shuffling feet and the brush of their clothes against the walls was magnified. The quiver of her own breathing mingled with the hoarse rasp of her abductors'.
"Do we leave by the way we came in?" Lewis asked.
"Aye, unless you fancy a fight at the gatehouse, and that would just raise the alarm and bring the Campbells hot on our tails."
"It will mean chancing the courtyard again," Gillespie observed. “We were lucky enough not to be seen by the sentries on the walls on the way in. I doubt we will have the same luck twice, especially with a wench in tow."
She bridled again at the term of disparagement and also at the attitude that spoke of her as a burden.
"This 'wench' you have 'in tow' just happens to know of a postern gate, near the back door of the range," Siusan offered pointedly as if to spite them. "She could show you if you like."
Uilleam beamed at her. He was pleased that she had chosen to throw in her lot with them. He also admired her smeddum.
"Then lead us there, m'dear. We are in your hands."
She found herself blushing with pleasure at his approbation and was glad he could not see her in the darkness.
"Then do not patronize me," she warned him, "or I might just lead you straight to the guardhouse."
She led them down the warren of staircases and passageways until they reached a small door.
The door was not locked. Uilleam opened it a crack and peered out. A long sliver of moonlight pierced a wedge across the dark passageway, illuminating his broad virile figure.
He quickly withdrew his head again.
"I see the gate. Two men are guarding it."
"What are two men?" Gillespie scoffed, cracking his knuckles.
"They are two men with loud voices," Uilleam replied. "They could easily raise the alarm before we reach them. They have a brazier lit to keep themselves cozy. They would see us by its light before we were halfway across the close."
Siusan felt a rush of excitement.
"I'll go," she suddenly offered, though she didn't know why. Perhaps she wanted to please Uilleam again. "I can distract them."
Uilleam turned his head towards her. She could see his grin in the moonlight, and she felt another little thrill of pleasure.
"You make a pretty distraction," he grinned, then grew serious again. "Be careful, then. Keep their backs facing the door. We'll do the rest."
She blushed and nodded, glad that Uilleam would still not be able to see her in the darkness. She took a deep breath and slipped through the door.
She blinked as her eyes became accustomed to the meager light. She saw the two sentries by the postern gate, about a dozen yards away, further along on the other side of the narrow close, warming their hands over a black iron brazier.
The two sentries spied her straight away. They turned from the brazier and stepped towards her, their faces brightening with surprise and interest.
"Halt! Who goes there?"
Her heart ros
e and stuck in her gullet. Her legs began to tremble.
"Peace!" she squeaked, her voice almost failing her. "Don't raise an alarm for my sake. It is just me, Siusan Gunn, Cailean's betrothed. I could not sleep... Is there room for me to warm myself at your fire?"
The sentries stood as if struck dumb with amazement. If they were surprised to find that she was not locked in her apartments, they did not show it. They leaned on their pikes and stared at her in silence, as if unsure how they should receive her.
"You shouldna be out here, Mistress," one of them observed.