by The Captive
His head was slightly tilted and lowered so that she got a glimpse of his queue, tied at his muscular nape by a leather thong. His hair was the color of hot tea marbled with cream.
He took a momentary breath, releasing the blow-pipe, and lifted his head. In that instant, she saw that, while not handsome, his face was arresting.
She couldn’t take her eyes from it. The brow was broad, the light-colored eyes impassioned. High, craggy cheekbones created steep, bronzed walls into which a pleat had been carved at either side of a mouth etched with purpose.
There was nothing soft about his countenance. Shrewdness, determination, and a certain recklessness glinted there.
For a moment his gaze clashed with hers. Beneath the sharply angled brows, his eyes challenged her. She realized he wanted her to try to escape. He wanted an excuse to make her life more difficult than it already was.
His gaze relinquished hers, and she let out a breath she had not known she had been holding. He replaced his mouth over the blow-pipe. Nearby, his uncle leaned his head back against the great chair and closed his eyes. The tormented expression of his old-prophet’s face eased into repose.
Between Ian and Ranald Kincairn’s empty chair sat a young woman Enya had not noticed in the great hall the first time. Clad in men’s trews and a too-large cambric shirt, she appeared to be approximately the same age as herself but of a diminutive build. The young woman’s hair, unbound in the style of a maiden, reminded Enya of a lioness’s tawny mane. In the heart-shaped face, her blue eyes had that look of the wild. She was definitely striking, but too gaunt to be considered attractive.
Enya realized the young woman was staring back at her. Such hate filled those ice-blue eyes that Enya had to steel herself against flinching. At last, the woman looked away, but not without first flicking her a smile that promised pain.
"The young woman there," she said to Jamie, “is she the laird’s?”
"Ranald’s wife? No, he has none. Mhorag is his sister."
Enya could almost have sworn she had heard the young woman snarl at her. Perhaps it was the final drone of the bagpipe.
Ranald Kincairn passed his sheepskin bag to a waiting lackey and resumed his seat at the head table. She watched him prop his high leather boots on the table and light his pipe. Such was her desire to smoke, that for one mad moment she thought about stealing his pipe the next time he deserted the table to play his bagpipe.
A fiddler put an end to the lull in music, if the screeching noise could be called such. Several couples in rustic homespun, most likely from the hamlet of Lochaber, forsook their tankards to dance to a reel. Entertained, she watched while her foot tapped—until she realized the name of the song, "Old Stewart’s Back Again."
The elbow at her ribs recalled her attention. She followed Jamie’s nod. Ranald Kincairn, pipe stem between his lips, curled a finger in her direction, beckoning her to come to him.
All conversation in the great hall ceased, as did the old fiddler his reel. The dancers eased back onto their benches.
She could feel all eyes upon her. She did not move. Irritation, indignation, and resentment threatened to undermine her attempt at civility, composure, and control. Badly, she wanted to tell the Highland heathen where he could put his pipe.
His expression never changed. He simply waited. The tension in the room was as thick as the steak-and-kidney pudding.
Her nerves tingled, but she remained seated. Behind his hand, Ian murmured something to his nephew.
"You had best comply with Ranald,” Jamie said to her. "He is the laird, you know."
She managed a shrug. "And if I don’t?"
"His patience is not infinite."
"I’ll worry when that time comes.”
"Well, you have a point there. I’ve only seen him lose it once.”
For all her insouciant facade, she blurted beneath her breath, "What happened?"
“One of the grooms forgot to rub down Ranald’s horse after a particularly hard ride. It was the second time the groom had forgotten. Ranald ordered the armorer to forge a permanent saddle on the back of the groom.”
“You jest.”
He shook his head solemnly, and his lustrous auburn curls rustled across the tortoiseshell brooch clasping his plaid to one shoulder.
"No.”
"How cruel!"
"If it was just Ranald, the groom’s laxity wouldn’t have required so great a penalty. But the safety of an entire clan was at stake. A chief without a horse canna lead his men effectively.”
The finger curled again. In the light of a wax-sputtering candelabrum, the chief’s mouth, clamped about his pipe stem, had a hard, relentless cast.
She drew a fortifying breath and chose her own safety above pride. Rising, she gathered her skirts and sauntered toward Ranald Kincairn. It seemed a collective sigh issued from the room’s occupants.
She stood before him. She was so angry, she could not speak. That close, she saw that his eyes were more green than blue. And very light. Like the center of bright-burning fires. His unwavering gaze held none of the friendliness of his collie, which eyed her with curiosity. His gaze was more that of a predatory animal. A wolf, a lynx, a falcon.
He set aside his pipe. “As you are now residing with the Cameron clan, you will be required to take an oath to me, its laird and chief.”
In the silence of the great hall, she found her voice. “Even though I reside here not by my own will?”
“You reside here by my will.”
His eyes had not flashed with fury, his mouth had not compressed in ire, his voice had not changed timbre. Nevertheless, it was obvious that she would be unwise to argue the point now. She shrugged her shoulders. "As you will.”
"Aye, as I will. Tomorrow you swear your oath of allegiance in the Justice Room.”
Justice? If there were such a thing as justice, she thought, you would be drawn and quartered.
"Ye . . . are prepared for . . . what happens . . .”
Enya glanced back over her shoulder. “The ties are too binding, Mary Laurie. And say what it is you are thinking."
Mary Laurie loosened the stays’ ties somewhat, and Enya let out her breath. She knew she would never be willowy, nor ravishingly beautiful. Nor did she care any longer; that way there would be no longing for the years of youthful good looks that time stole.
“Tis just that I was speaking with my lord Jamie Cameron, and he said that—’’
She turned around completely this time. Perhaps there was, after all, hope for the maid’s reticence with men after all. "You are interested in Jamie?’’
Mary Laurie blushed. "Oh, nae. The mon is much too worldly for the likes of me. He merely asked me how long I had been in yer service, m'lady.” She paused. "Then he said that yer service with the laird would begin after the oath-taking.”
"I see.” So the time of reckoning was drawing near. Well, she would not go to her fate with the compliancy of a lackey.
“Ye don’t see at all," Elspeth said, entering Enya’s room with a pair of freshly washed silk stockings. "Or else ye’d not treat this Ranald for a simple coof. That he is not.”
"I never thought him a fool,” she said, and took one of the proffered stockings. Spreading her skirts, she sat on the low stool and began easing the stocking’s white silk up one bare leg. “But he is a warrior, ruled by aggressive tendencies. Give him no battle and he is lost.”
She had had enough time to think through her predicament, and this course seemed the wisest. Delay would be to her advantage. Besides, she needed to find out what had become of Duncan. He appeared to have vanished once they reached the castle.
"Hhmp!” Elspeth said, and passed her a green satin garter. "That’s a wheen o’blethers. I canna imagine ye bypassing a challenge anymore than ye could give up smoking.”
Her head jerked up. "How did you find out?"
"I’m na coof either. Ye didna really think I believed the pipe or smoke was Duncan’s all these years?”
“Well, the pipes were." She reached for another stocking and garter. "The smoke was mine. I could use one now.”
"Ye could use some good sense. This man is nae Duncan or any coxcomb struttin’ in yer mother’s court. He will break yer will.”
“That he canna—cannot—do.” She pinned a saucer-sized lace cap atop her carefully coiffed hair, then picked up her red woolen shawl. The old castle’s three-foot-thick stone walls might be hard to breech, but they also retained the autumn chill.
Or maybe it was just that her heart was chilled.
The Justice Room was warmed by a fire and the bodies of perhaps a hundred or so people. Enya listened to the men and women who presented petitions, lodged complaints, and complied with the justice dispensed. It was that time of year when, among other annual transactions, clan members paid their tithes to their laird. Crofters and burghers, caps in hand, girded walls made somber by their dark-colored arras.
Her eyes traveled to where Ranald sat in the Justice Chair. The collie lay beside the chair, guarding Ranald like Cerberus guarding the gates to the underworld. The chair’s high-paneled wheel back supported an improvised canopy of the same Cameron plaid Ranald wore.
His tartan slanted across a broad chest clothed in a white linen shirt with ruffling at the wrist. An odd contrast with the scarred and sun-browned hands, she thought. Tight knee breeches accentuated his heavily muscled thighs, and an unruly forelock tumbled across his forehead as he scanned parchments Jamie had passed to him.
Her glance shifted to where Ian sat, slightly behind Ranald, a pair of crutches propped against the arm of his chair. Whatever his thoughts, Ian’s expression was buried beneath the full gray beard and thick, hood-like brows. A veritable patriarch overviewing the scion, she mused wryly.
"There you are," Jamie said.
Enya turned. She had stationed herself, and Mary Laurie and Elspeth, in the seclusion of a window embrasure where she could watch the proceedings. She found it difficult to be put out with the man who had assisted in her abduction when he possessed such an elfin smile.
"Aye, Jamie?”
"I’m to be your escort for today’s ceremony.”
She inclined her head and raised a cynical brow. "Ceremony—or exhibition?"
That high forehead furrowed, and the astute eyes reproached her. "It won’t be such a difficult thing to do, my lady, to swear allegiance to Ranald as your laird. Do you nae see, Ranald could make it much more difficult for you? He would have to imprison you. All he’s asking is your word of obedience."
She sighed. With every turn, it seemed she was becoming more enmeshed in the gossamer chains of her captivity. "What does this ceremony involve?”
"Tis a formal contract between a vassal and a noble by which the vassal agrees to become part of the noble’s household.”
"Why would me bairn want to do that?” Elspeth snapped with about as much ferociousness as a tiny terrier.
“Common sense,” Jamie said. "I could tell you that by becoming part of the household a vassal is guaranteed a job for life, a homestead, and personal protection. But I think you know whereof I speak.”
“And what does Ranald Kincairn proffer by this?" Enya asked.
"The earl’s half of the bargain is called—’’
"Ranald is an earl?”
"Aye. In his own right. The seventh Earl of Fife."
Her scornful gaze scanned the room. “And this heap is now his castle.”
Mary Laurie touched her arm. "M’lady, careful."
Enya saw the patient pleading in the young woman’s eyes. “Let’s get this sideshow over with."
The next hour proved to be most interesting. Many of the transactions were conducted in Gaelic, which Jamie occasionally interpreted for her.
Later, his knowledge of French was demonstrated. Ranald called upon him to translate for a Parisian artillery expert who had been smuggled in by Captain Knox. The man displayed his gunworks, and Jamie conversed with him in fluent French.
She could not help but compare the cosmopolitan Jamie with his primitive cousin and think how much better suited Jamie was for the title of laird of the Clan Cameron.
A local would-be alchemist approached Ranald about financing a project to turn base metals into gold. A widower, a village merchant, requested permission to marry his stepdaughter, and a shepherd accused a crofter of stealing an ewe.
Puffing occasionally on his pipe, Ranald listened to the various supplicants. Every so often he scratched the collie behind its ears. Several times he motioned to a one-eared man to make certain notes in a record book and twice conferred with Ian, but he said little himself. A veritable King Solomon.
Enya’s attention was distracted by the entrance of Duncan, his hands bound in chains, as were his ankles. A scruffy growth of beard shadowed a mouth that normally laughed at the world.
Ranald called a wayward sheriff to hell before turning his attention to Duncan. “Ye are ready to take the Bond of Manrent? Or do ye wish to languish another fortnight in the gaol?”
Duncan flashed a lopsided grin. "What I wish, sire, is to take leave of yer hospitality. Tis not that I find yer accommodations appalling. ’Tis that my legs ache to stretch free.”
A pleat just below one cheekbone twitched. "I’m certain we could find something to take the kink out of your leg muscles. Robert?”
The one-eared man, Robert of Macintosh, peeled off a rolled parchment and began reading in a polished though heavily accented voice: "Be it known to all men by these present letters I, Duncan of Ayrshire and the Clan Afton, to be bound and obliged, and by these my letters and the faith and truth in my body bind and oblige me to a noble and potent lord Ranald, Earl of Fife, Laird of the Camerons of Scotland, and to his male heirs, that I shall be loyal, true, and faithful to them and to him because my said good laird and master has enfeifed me in his lands of Cameron for all the days of my service foresaid and all the days of my life.”
Duncan grinned and held forth his bound hands. "A pen, me lord? To sign me name.” Pipe aglow, Ranald leaned a jaw on one fist. "Ye give your allegiance easily, Duncan of Ayrshire.”
"More easily than I do me life."
When the quill pen was presented by Robert, Duncan said, "Alas, I canna write. Ye have a scribe whereby I can sign me X?”
"I shall write his name," a female voice said. All eyes swiveled slightly to one side and behind the Justice Chair. Mhorag stepped forward. Beneath a soiled leather tunic she wore a man’s smock shirt over baggy sailors’ trews. Her wild, sun-scorched mane mocked feminine propriety.
Her brother eyed her askance. "You will be responsible for the vagrant?"
Her remote manner eased. "I shall see that he does me bidding, brother.”
"Then you may take the Bond of Maintenance in me place,” Ranald told his sister.
In a calm, cool voice, she recited the pledge read aloud by Robert. “Be it known to all men by these present letters . . . I, Lady Mhorag Ranald of the Clan Cameron . . . to be bound by these our letters and the faith and truth that binds and oblige me . . . to my loved vassal Duncan of Ayrshire and the Clan Afton . . . for as much as he is become special man to me . . . herefore I bind and oblige myself . . . that I shall supply and defend the said Duncan in all and sundry his rights.”
When she finished reciting she motioned for him to follow her. Hands still chained, he tugged at his forelock and fell in step behind her. As they walked down the aisle cleared by the spectators, he passed Enya and darted her a mischievous grin. "They found me strolling back down Hidden Valley Trail.”
Ranald’s sister jerked on his chained hands. He staggered on and followed her out of the great hall.
“M’Lady Murdock,” Robert of Macintosh announced, summoning her before the Justice Chair.
Her breath quickened and she lifted the hem of her skirts and walked toward Ranald Kincairn. Her heavily embroidered underskirts rustled in the suddenly quiet hall. Closer to him, she could see that the plaid was pinned at his shoulder by a broo
ch in the form of a black dagger—and that the blue-green of his pupils were rimmed with black.
“You witnessed the exchange of Bonds, mistress.”
He was patently ignoring her rank or title and addressing her as a common maid. Her mouth compressed. "I did.”
‘"Tis a lifetime guarantee from both parties on behalf of one another,” he continued. "Do ye wish to submit your will in this?"
Disdain curled her lips. “Do I have any alternative?"
"Aye." He fixed her with those oddly colored eyes that were fringed by black lashes longer than a woman’s. "Ye will be treated with the same courtesy as Edward I of England treated one of our countesses. Ye will be imprisoned in a cage suspended over the city walls, wherein ye will be given your meals and wherein ye will perform all bodily functions without the benefit of privacy.”
Her breath hissed out. "What?”
“Ye heard me, mistress."
She stood as stiff as Lot’s wife. Behind Ranald, a sober Jamie nodded, encouraging her to comply. Her captor was not to be trusted, despite Jamie’s assurance that integrity was central to the code of the Highlander, that a written contract was not needed when he gave his word. Had her captor not warned her he kept her alive only to witness her degradation? Yet, her best recourse—her only recourse—was to delay. "Very well. Since the alternative is not to my liking, I agree to the Bond of Manrent.”
He leaned forward, one forearm braced on a muscle-striated length of thigh, pipe bowl in hand. "Ye understand this is a lifetime guarantee on both your part and that of your ruler?”
She could barely keep from spitting. Her teeth ground together. “Aye, I do.”
" ‘Aye, I do, me laird,’ ” he prompted.
Her hands knotted. The image of looking out from between bars upon gawkers staring up at her goaded from her an “Aye, I do, my laird.”
He blew an ever-widening circle of smoke. "Well said. I think some time spent in honest work would benefit thy temperament. What say ye, Ian?”
The uncle hobbled forward a step, one arm propped on his crutch. "What had you in mind? Something not too harsh for a lady, me lad."