Brides of the North: A Medieval Scottish Romance Bundle

by Kathryn Le Veque

  “ ’Tis good to see you, too,” she murmured, touching his exposed cheek. “I am so sorry, Eldon. Allow me to look at your wound; mayhap it is not as bad as it seems.”

  Feebly, Eldon shook his head. “Nay, lady, it is indeed mortal. In fact, I cannot feel my legs any longer.”

  Alicia whimpered, weeping softly into Eldon’s mailed hands. Turning his attention from Gaithlin, he gently shushed his distraught lover. “No tears, Alicia. This is not our ending. We shall undoubtedly meet again in the fields of Paradise.”

  Removing her face from his hands, she moved to unlatch his helm. As the protection fell away and Gaithlin carefully pulled it free, Alicia kissed her dying lover with infinite tenderness, sobbing pitifully as he responded weakly.

  “Forgive me, Eldon,” she whispered, feeling the last of his heated breath on her face. “I… I was so foolish. I have loved you ever so long but I have been too frightened to tell you.”

  He smiled faintly, the numbness in his legs moving up his torso. “I know,” he murmured thickly. “Alex never returned your love and you were too fearful to expose your heart to rejection again, even though you were fully aware of my love for you. Truly, my love, there is nothing to forgive.”

  Alicia’s sobs were calming as she kissed him repeatedly, touching him gently with shaking hands while he still possessed life. “I should have married you long ago. Now I shall forever curse my stupidity.”

  Drawing a long breath, Eldon’s eyes closed as he slowly succumbed to the advancing paralysis. “Mayhap it is better this way. I should not like for you to have been widowed twice in a lifetime.”

  “I am already widowed twice in my heart,” Alicia breathed as she stared into his ghostly face. “Open your eyes, Eldon. Open your eyes and tell me that you love me one last time. I shall live on it the rest of my life.”

  Weakly, Eldon’s brown eyes emerged from his heavy lids. Staring into Alicia’s lovely face, his lips tugged with a final smile. “I love you, my darling Alicia. For always will I love you.”

  As Gaithlin watched with tears in her eyes, Eldon slipped silently into the realm of death with Alicia collapsed against his chest. Listening to the sobs of her mother, she rose to unsteady feet and turned to Quinton. Her expression, the depths of her sorrow and turmoil, stabbed him through the heart, feeding his own sense of grief. Grief that his brother would soon be facing the very same circumstance.

  “I had no choice, my lady,” he whispered, feeling no guilt that he had killed the knight in order to preserve his own life. “He was intent on killing me. I had to defend myself.”

  Gaithlin nodded, wiping at the tears coating her cheek. “I know,” she murmured, turning one last time to gaze upon Eldon’s still form and listening to her mother’s sobs. “Merciful Heavens, Quinton, I refuse to be reduced to a grieving, quivering wreck at my husband’s demise. We must move immediately to save him; surely there is no time to waste.”

  Quinton could feel her gravity mingling with her own. Moving to sheath his bloodied sword, he found himself distracted from his urgency as Alicia struggled to her feet, glaring malevolently into his guarded eyes. Even in the moonlight, he could see the hatred.

  “Are you satisfied, Demon?” she seethed wildly. “You have killed my beloved and for that you shall surely perish!”

  “I am not the Demon, madam,” Quinton replied calmly.

  Shaking with fury and grief-fed confusion, Alicia retrieved her sword and stepped carefully over Eldon’s prostrate form. “Then if you are not the Demon, I would have the pleasure of knowing the man who I am about to kill.”

  As Gaithlin put herself between her advancing mother and Quinton, the St. John knight put his hand gently on her arm to reassure her that he could well handle the situation.

  “I am Quinton St. John,” he said quietly. “And I would not have had to kill your… knight had he not attacked me first. What I did, I accomplished in self-defense only.”

  Pale and quaking, Alicia momentarily halted her advance. Confusion mingled with her sorrow-stricken expression as she pondered the knight’s calm words. But it did not deter her sense of justice, her need to kill that man that had killed her lover; unsheathing her weapon, she lifted the blade in his direction.

  “Raise your weapon,” she said, her voice trembling. “If you do not, I will kill you where you stand. Know that I have no sense of mercy this day.”

  “Mother,” Gaithlin admonished softly. “Please… hasn’t there been enough death today? I am desperately sorry for Eldon’s death; you know I am. But I need your help. Please.”

  Alicia was still focused on Quinton. “I am helping you,” she assured her. “I will do away with your St. John captor and obtain vengeance for Eldon in the process.”

  “Mother, listen to me,” Gaithlin thrust herself between her mother and Quinton once again. “This killing must end, do you hear? This knight killed Eldon in self-defense but what you are doing is pure vengeance, just as father would have done. Is that what you have truly become now? My father, killing simply because you know of no other way to express your grief? The knight has explained to you that he was defending himself. If he had not defended himself, Eldon would have surely killed him first.”

  Alicia was all but ignoring her daughter. “Then he would have saved me the trouble.”

  Gaithlin took the risk of grabbing her mother, trying not to get stabbed in the process. “Mother, no!” she snapped. “This knight must live. I need him if I am going to save my husband!”

  It took Alicia a moment to realize what her daughter had said. When her words dawned, she looked at Gaithlin with a huge degree of shock. “Husband?” she repeated, lowering her weapon. “What on earth are you talking about?”

  Gaithlin swallowed hard. She gazed down at the woman who had spent the past ten years of her life fighting in her husband’s stead. Gaithlin knew that wasn’t her mother’s true nature; the woman did it because it had been expected of her, because she thought it was what Alex would have wanted. But it wasn’t her true nature. Alicia was inherently peaceful, a woman who would rather raise her rabbits or tend a garden than wield a sword. That was the mother that Gaithlin knew. She put her hand on her mother’s forearm.

  “Please listen to me, because it is very important,” she said softly. “It is true that Christian St. John violated St. Esk to abduct me. It is true that his father told him to hold me captive so that he could blackmail Winding Cross. I am assuming you know all of this already ’else you would not be here.”

  Alicia was gazing at her daughter with unsteady eyes. “Jean sent a missive informing us of such things,” she said. “Then a woman came to us – her name was the Lady Margaret du Bois – who told us that the Demon had abducted you. She offered to find out where he had taken you so that we could rescue you.”

  Gaithlin’s brow furrowed. “Margaret du Bois?” she repeated, confused. When she glanced at Quinton to see if he knew what her mother was talking about, the man nodded faintly.

  “Maggie,” he told Gaithlin. “She was Christian’s betrothed. Was.”

  The light of recognition went on in Gaithlin’s mind as she turned back to her mother. “Maggie,” she hissed. “We saw her at Kelvin Howard’s manse. I met her only briefly but Christian told me who she was. Merciful Heavens… she went to Winding Cross to offer to help you find me?”

  Alicia still wasn’t clear on any of this but she nodded her head. “She did,” she confirmed. “She finally told us that Christian St. John had taken you to Galloway. When our spies saw a war party ride from Eden with Quinton and Jasper St. John at the head of it, we assumed they were riding for Sir Christian so we followed them.”

  “And that is why you are here,” Gaithlin finished for her. Now, things were starting to make sense. “You followed the party from Eden and they brought you here?”

  Alicia nodded wearily; the sword in her hand was becoming too heavy and she lowered it completely. “Eldon was determined to save you,” she said, tears forming in her e
yes again. “He wanted to save you from the Demon of Eden. See what his valor has brought him.”

  Gaithlin didn’t want her mother losing sight of the situation, falling back into the throes of grief for her dead knight. She put her hands on the woman’s shoulders and shook gently.

  “Mother, you must listen to me,” she said softly. “All of this… well, it simply does not matter any longer. Something much more important has happened, something that will change all of our lives. When Christian brought me to Scotland, it was with the intention of ransoming me. It is just as you were told. But as the days passed, Christian and I… Mother, he doesn’t want to fight any longer. He is tired of the Feud. He wants peace and he wants his children to know peace. I want peace, too, as I know you do. Aren’t you tired of seeing men die?”

  Alicia sighed heavily, daring to glance over her shoulder at Eldon, who lay peacefully in the moonlit grass. “I am,” she muttered, looking away. “But peace comes too late for Eldon.”

  “But it does not come too late for us,” Gaithlin had her hands on her mother. “Mother, I married Christian yesterday. Together, we are going to cement peace between Winding Cross and Eden. Through us, our families and future generations will now know peace, not fighting and dying for a cause no one cares about any longer. We will end the Feud once and for all.”

  Alicia looked at her daughter, shocked. In fact, she felt rather faint at the thought, adding to her already-surging emotions. “You married the Demon of Eden?” she hissed. “I cannot believe my ears. Gaithlin, how could you do this?”

  Gaithlin wouldn’t back down. “I told you why,” she said. “I love him, Mother. He is the most wonderful man in the world and I will never regret my decision. We did it for peace and we did it for love. I suppose it really does not matter why we did it, only that we have. But his army has come to take him back to Eden to face his father with what he has done and if we do not stop him, Jean will kill him for marrying me. I will not let that happen.”

  Alicia stared at her daughter, struggling to digest everything she was being told. Her mind was still fractured with grief over Eldon and it was all she wanted to focus on, but gazing into Gaithlin’s young and panicked face, she was coming to see that her daughter had a serious issue. Something about marriage to the Demon of Eden and… oh, God, it was so hard for her to comprehend all of it.

  “How can we possibly stop it?” Alicia was at a loss. “Gaithlin, whatever is occurring in the House of St. John, let it occur. Mayhap it will implode upon itself once and for all, and we will be finished with the disease that has weakened us for the past seventy years.”

  Gaithlin could see that her mother didn’t grasp the seriousness of what was going to happen. She began to feel a great deal of panic.

  “They will not destroy themselves,” she murmured emotionally. “Jean will kill the one chance he has for peace because he thinks his son has betrayed him. Don’t you understand? He will kill Christian for marrying me and if that happens, I can promise you that I will present myself to Jean St. John and pray that he kills me as well. I will not live without my husband. With him dies not only my heart and soul, but the only chance our family has for peace. If you would allow him to die, then you would allow me to die as well.”

  Alicia gazed at her daughter, seeing the utter sincerity on her face. She meant what she said and at that moment, Alicia began to grasp a little of what the woman had been trying to tell her. She struggled with her grief, her angst, and her horrid sense of loss, but above all, she could see love in her daughter’s eyes when she spoke of Christian St. John. Alicia knew that look well; she had it herself, once. Despondency swept her.

  “What would you have me do?” she whispered.

  Gaithlin grasped her mother, her expression beseeching. “Ride with me to Eden,” she whispered fervently. “Ride with me and tell Jean that you will surrender Winding Cross in exchange for Christian’s life. You have no more reason to hang on to that crumbling old fortress; let him have it and deal with the fallout. Christian and I will take you with us and we will all start a new life somewhere, far away from battles and feuds. We must do this, Mother, for all of our sakes. Jean’s only true goal is to see Winding Cross surrender; let us offer it to him in exchange for his son. It does not mean anything to us, anyway. It is not our home but a prison. Give Jean the prison and let us be done with this, once and for all.”

  So much of what she was saying made sense. Alicia gazed at her daughter with an expression wrought with reserve and hope. She was uncertain, yet Gaithlin’s words rang true; Winding Cross was a prison. The memories there were not good ones. What was she holding on to? Memories of a husband who did not love her, of poverty and warfare? If Jean wanted the trophy of a broken down castle so badly, then what was stopping her from giving it to him in exchange for Gaithlin’s husband? The truth was that there was nothing left to hold on to. Gaithlin was utterly correct.

  She was also trying to do something to establish peace for her children and for future generations. Alicia could not fault her that, not in the least. She was still dubious about the man her child married, the hated the Demon of Eden, but Alicia was not beyond trusting her only child. In truth, she had no choice. She wanted to be done with this as well. As evidenced by Eldon’s cooling corpse, the price was already too high. His death was the last straw. Her gaze moved to the knight standing behind her daughter.

  “You have heard all of this,” she said to Quinton. “Will your father accept Winding Cross’ surrender in exchange for your brother’s life?”

  Quinton sighed faintly, glancing at Gaithlin when she turned around to look at him. “I would hope so,” he said. “Your daughter is correct; all he wants is the complete surrender of Winding Cross. If he is able to get that, there is no reason for him to kill my brother.”

  “Would he truly kill the Demon?” Alicia wanted to know.

  Quinton lifted his shoulders. “My father considers betrayal the worst of all sins,” he muttered, his gaze finding Gaithlin. “By marrying your daughter, he has committed the ultimate sin.”

  “And what of you?” Alicia asked. “Do you believe he sinned by marrying my daughter to cement an alliance?”

  Quinton held the woman’s gaze a moment before shaking his head. “Peace is never a sin,” he said. “My brother had good reason for what he did. He said that he wanted to raise his children without the constant threat of war and I suppose if I think on it, that is what I would wish for as well. Mayhap this Feud has gone on long enough.”

  Gaithlin smiled at Quinton. “Then you will ride with us?” she asked. “Will you stand with us as we make the proposal to your father? Winding Cross for Christian’s life?”

  Quinton sighed heavily; it was time for him to stand on his own convictions and make his own decisions. He was tired of death and destruction, too. Aye, he felt fortified and strong enough to stand on his own. After a moment, he nodded. “For my brother, I will do this.”

  Gaithlin reached out to touch his arm but before she could say a word, thunder from the forest caught their attention. They all turned to see men in tartan barreling through the bramble, astride big hairy horses with swords and clubs in their hands. Even in the moon light, they could see that there were several dozen of them and probably more hidden by the dark and spooky trees. They could hear the voices back in the forest, hidden from view.

  Gaithlin gasped as Alicia, Quinton, and the armed de Gare men lifted their swords and prepared for a battle. Quinton grasped Gaithlin by the arm and thrust her in the direction of the sod hut.

  “Go,” he hissed. “Get inside and bolt the door.”

  Gaithlin didn’t hesitate; she made a break for the hut, nearly crashing into Malcolm as the young boy hovered just inside the doorway. The child had been there for some time, listening to the voices of unfamiliar people as they spoke with the tall, blond lady. She was begging them for help; he could hear it clearly, and he was very frightened. Men had taken Sir Christian away and there was much upheava
l in his small world.

  “Scots!” he cried at the sight of all of the tartan. “Th’ Scots have come!”

  Gaithlin was trying to wrestle him back into the hut but he didn’t want to go. In fact, he pulled away from her and ran out into the clearing, waving his skinny arms around frantically and jumping up and down. Gaithlin ran after him, terrified that he was going to be cut down, but by the time she reached him, she ended up tripping on over her feet and falling to her knees. Malcolm ran to her and put his little arms around her and Gaithlin scooped him up, struggling to stand up as the Scots from the forest surrounded her.

  Separated from her mother and Quinton and the rest of the de Gare forces, Gaithlin held Malcolm tightly, backing away from the men in rough tartan on horseback. One man in particular seemed to be very interested in her; he was big and blond, and he reined his horse towards her.

  “What’s yer name, lass?” he asked.

  Malcolm burst out. “She doesna have tae tell ye!” he said. “Ye dunna want tae hurt her, do ye hear? I’ll kill ye if ye try!”

  The men on horseback laughed at the brave young lad. Even the man with the blond hair grinned. “I dunna want tae hurt her, laddie,” he said. “I just want tae know her name.”

  “I am Lady St. John,” Gaithlin said, clutching Malcolm against her fearfully. “Who are you? What do you want?”

  “St. John,” the big blond Scotsman turned to the man next to him. “Did ye hear, Macky? She’s a St. John.”

  “I am also a de Gare,” Gaithlin said, with more courage. “My heritage is de Gare. Who are you and why do you ask such things?”

  The big blond man climbed off his horse, looking over at Alicia and the rest of the de Gare soldiers, now surrounded by a host of burly Scotsmen. He approached Gaithlin, throwing a finger at Malcolm as he came close.

  “Ye’re a brave lad,” he said. “What are ye doin’ with her? She’s not Scots.”

  Malcolm was confused by the question. He looked at Gaithlin as if she could clarify what, in fact, he was doing with her. But Gaithlin looked just as perplexed as he did.