A Wallflower at the Highland Court: A Slow Burn Highlander Romance

by Barclay, Celeste

  Maude felt more comfortable sitting with her clan members during meals, and ate until she was full rather than leaving the table still hungry. She gathered her cloak and said goodbye to her father as he prepared to head to the lists. She spotted Kieran still engrossed in conversation with the two lairds who waylaid him after Mass. She sighed, but straightened her spin and lifted her chin. She wouldn’t allow her disappointment to show. As she glided past Kieran’s table with the other ladies, Maude watched Kieran stand while Laird Gordan talked to him. He shook his head at something the Grant said and stepped over the bench. Both men called after him, but he stalked across the gathering hall with a singular purpose.

  Kieran wasn’t interested in listening to the two lairds ramble on about crops and herds. He agreed that they were important topics, but they weren’t in line with his plans for the day. He stepped next to Maude and slid her arm around his and placed her hand on his forearm.

  “Good morning, lass.”

  “Good morning, Kier.” Maude cast her gaze over her shoulder and saw the two lairds watching Kieran depart. “Should you have left that conversation so abruptly?”

  “Mayhap not, but they shouldn’t have demanded a conversation so abruptly. A conversation aboot coos and crop rotation.”

  “Was that what they wanted to talk aboot?”

  “More aboot trade in spring when the weather is reliable once again.”

  “When is the weather ever reliable in Scotland?” Maude chortled.

  “Nearly never, but when the roads are clear, they’ll want more of our Highland coos, and they know my clan would benefit from their grain. I’ll speak to them at another time.”

  “Kier, I don’t want to come between you and clan business. If this is something that you need to attend to, the garden will be there tomorrow.”

  “Unless you tell me you don’t want to walk with me, naught is keeping me from accompanying you.”

  Maude searched Kieran’s steely eyes before nodding. She didn’t push the issue, and allowed Kieran to escort her outside. There’d been a dusting of snow during the night, and the steps were slippery. She was glad to have his sturdy frame to lean upon while the other ladies gripped one another, and windmilled their arms to keep themselves upright. The slick ground didn’t faze Kieran, who walked surefooted toward the garden’s entrance. He stopped Maude where it was possible for him to stand and block the wind from her.

  “I like the pink in your cheeks and the tip of your nose. It’s a shade that reminds me of your raspberry nipples,” Kieran whispered as his hands rested at her elbows while she rubbed her gloved hands together.

  “Wheesht. Someone will hear you.” Maude attempted to make her words stern, but the giggle that bubbled forth reassured Kieran that she enjoyed his randy comments. She made a sound of disappointment when Kieran stepped away when the other ladies and the queen approached.

  “Maude!” Arabella called out to her, holding up Maude’s scarf. Maude shuffled to retrieve it from her friend. “I rushed back to our chamber to nab mine when I realized the poor weather and guessed you might want---”

  Maude turned to see what was happening behind her that made her friend trail off. A group of matrons and widows had joined the ladies-in-waiting. Several stared at Kieran, but when Lady Bevan stepped in front of Kieran, her heart felt pinched like a vice grabbing hold. Kieran watched her and barely glanced down at Lady Bevan’s upturned face. Maude saw Kieran’s lip moved in what looked like the words “pardon me” before he stepped around his former lover. He walked toward her and Arabella.

  “Thank you, Lady Arabella,” Kieran said as a greeting. “It’s a wee brisk this morning. Lady Maude will benefit from an extra layer.” He took the scarf dangling from Arabella’s hand. They had quickly forgotten it as the two women watched with bated breath to see what would pass between Kieran and Lady Bevan. Arabella nodded before muttering “you’re welcome.” Kieran stepped before Maude and wrapped the scarf around her neck, leaving enough slack for her to pull it up over her mouth and nose. The act of intimacy seemed even more forward than when they walked out to their first dance holding hands.

  “Kieran, you’re drawing attention to us.”

  “Didn’t we assume my presence would?”

  “Aye, but I didn’t imagine you’d be so bold. You might as well run through the streets announcing it to all and sundry.”

  Kieran adjusted her hood to better cover Maude’s ears, but dropped his hands when he realized that he’d done it without thinking about it. It seemed natural to take care of Maude as though she were already his wife. He turned them to join the others, and she wrapped her arm through his once more.

  “It makes you uncomfortable?” He asked.

  “I’ve spent my time here attempting to blend in and go unnoticed. I’ve gone from enduring an angry tirade to being the prey of the worst lechers at court to now openly receiving attention from one of the most eligible bachelors in the country. All in the space of two days. So much for being inconspicuous.”

  “I’m sorry, buttercup. I didn’t think before I acted. I saw the scarf and didn’t want you to grow too chilled. It seemed natural to wrap it around you, but even I remember a betrothed wouldn’t take such liberties. I tried to be thoughtful and rather ended up being thoughtless.”

  “I appreciate it. I like your concern and feeling important to you, but it makes me anxious having so many people looking at us. Lady Bevan wanted to speak to you, and you ignored her. I don’t want people to think ill of your manners.”

  “There is only one reason for her to speak to me. Two, actually. One to see if I’ll bed her again, and the other to prove she can take my attention from you. Neither will happen. There was little point in engaging in mindless chatter when I couldn’t be bothered. I came to be with you, not anyone else.”

  Maude nodded but fell silent. They walked through the gardens as the queen led the way with the matrons who accompanied her. The ladies-in-waiting paired off or gathered in small groups as they followed the queen’s leisurely pace. The cold never seemed to bother the woman, and her morning walks, unless it rained or sleeted, lasted at least an hour. She insisted upon her morning constitutional, even when it snowed. The Lowlanders complained when out of earshot, but the Highland ladies pulled their hoods up, tucked their chins, and grinned and bore it. The weather remained milder than most were accustomed to on their clan’s land. Maude’s home, Dunrobin, sat on the North Sea’s coast. It remained one of the most northern keeps, with her Sinclair cousins’ home of Dunbeath being a day’s ride further up the coast. While she didn’t enjoy the cold, even in the dead of winter the weather in Stirling seemed balmy compared to her home. She picked her way along the path, shuffling her feet when she sensed a patch of ice would appear underfoot. She clenched Kieran’s sleeve more than once when she feared slipping. His sturdy presence kept her anchored even when her heart dropped, then raced with the gut clenching moment of fear that she would fall.

  “How was the weather while you returned home?” Maude realized Kieran sacrificed his morning in the lists to walk with her so they might become better acquainted with one another. Sulking in silence wouldn’t further her cause if she wanted to learn whether they suited.

  “Rather mild considering the season. It snowed thrice and rained every other day, but the wind didn’t chill me to the bone like it often does.”

  Maude had never been to the Outer Hebrides, but was familiar with their geography and clan territories. She remembered an interesting connection that hadn’t come to mind even when the incident in Assynt increased tensions in the north.

  “We’re distantly related, but not by blood,” Maude blurted out.

  “I don’t know aboot that. I’ve never learned of such a connection to the Sutherlands. At least not within the past several generations.”

  “It’s in a rather roundabout way. My cousin, Callum, who’s the son of my late aunt who was my father’s sister, married a woman who was a Mackenzie, but her mother w
as a MacLeod of Assynt. So, we’re related of a sort but indirectly through marriage.”

  “Aye, the chieftain there is a distant cousin. His grandson is near my age.”

  “He’s Siùsan’s cousin. Her mother was the chieftain’s daughter. She’s a wonderful woman, but her childhood was atrocious.” Maude peered up at Kieran, unsure if he wanted to listen to her story.

  “Tell me, buttercup. I would learn aboot your family.”

  “Siùsan’s father handfasted with her mother against his father’s wishes. They were traveling to be wed by a priest when approaching riders spooked her horse. The riders were from the Gunns and included the woman Siùsan’s father was supposed to marry, the one Siùsan’s grandfather arranged. Siùsan’s mother was thrown, and she went into labor, delivering Siùsan before dying. Her father took her mother’s body home on his own horse but refused to look at his newborn daughter. He even suggested they leave her in the woods. One of the guardsmen brought Siùsan back to Mackenzie land, and they placed her in the care of a village woman where she spent the first ten years of her life living with this other family. She was aware of her position as the laird’s daughter but didn’t understand what that meant until he summoned her to live in the keep. Her father still refused to have aught to do with her, and her stepmother—for her father married his Gunn bride—used Siùsan as a servant. She made Siùsan clean and serve in the keep and gave her a servant’s chamber rather than one that befitted the laird’s daughter. Her stepmother gave her the responsibility of being governess to her two younger brothers.”

  “That’s reprehensible. I suppose Siùsan’s grandfather wasn’t any better if he allowed his son to abandon Siùsan to a villager.”

  Kieran’s shocked expression was a replica of her own when she learned of Siùsan’s past. She was a gentle woman who was too forgiving in Maude’s opinion. But she had a backbone of steel and made Callum come to heel. He was a better man and better tánaiste for it. They loved each other beyond measure. That was the way of all her Sinclair cousins and their spouses.

  “It turns out that Siùsan’s mother was best friends with my aunt Kyla. My father’s sister didn’t have much of a better upbringing that Siùsan. From what I’ve been told, my grandfather was a tyrant who abused all his children. Kyla would visit Siùsan’s mother, Rose, whenever possible. When my Uncle Liam discovered how Siùsan lived, his conscience wouldn’t allow the daughter of his wife’s best friend to continue suffering. The Mackenzie laird led him and Aunt Kyla to believe Siùsan died at birth alongside her mother. Uncle Liam investigated and learned what he could with members of his own clan going to live amongst the Mackenzies to report back to him. When he decided the timing was right, he arranged a betrothal between Siùsan and Callum. A much longer story short, after a rocky start, Siùsan and Callum are in love with their own growing family. Siùsan is the model of a perfect mother, and Callum dotes on his bairn. There’s another on the way already. I suspect all of my cousins shall follow their parents lead and have large broods. Uncle Liam and Aunt Kyla were an arranged marriage but fell in love before they wed. Theirs is a love story well known throughout the northern Highlands.”

  “Aye. The story’s made its way to even the Hebrides. What of your parents?”

  Maude’s smile softened and reflected her deep affection for her parents. She pictured her mother, who she hadn’t seen in months. She’d last breathed in her mother’s familiar lavender scent and experienced the embrace of her soft body pressed against her several moons earlier when her parents brought her to court to begin her service. Maude’s eyes threatened to water as she pictured her and her own parents’ love story.

  “My parents were a love match from the start. My father was never meant to be laird. He was the third son, but Rosses killed his father and two older brothers during a hot-trot. They’d regained their rustled cattle and even won a skirmish against the Rosses, but they counted their victory too soon. The Rosses ambushed them within sight of Dunrobin. By the time my father and our warriors joined the fight, my uncles and grandfather had already fallen. Da and his own uncle beat back the Rosses and kept the keep from being attacked. Both of my uncles married but had no bairns. Their wives returned to their own clans after they buried their husbands. My father rode into the Sinclair keep asking for help on the day of Uncle Liam and Aunt Kyla’s wedding. He and my aunt had been close, but their relationship became strained because of their father’s abuse and their brothers’ animosity. My father struggled, out of his depths and all of a sudden responsible for the clan. Aunt Kyla and Uncle Liam returned with Da and stayed a moon while they assisted with getting the clan back on their feet now that they had a caring and wise laird. Shortly after my aunt and uncle left, the king summoned Da to court to recount what happened with the Rosses. The story the Rosses spun differed from the one he’d detailed in his missive to the king.”

  “It was a powerful enmity; the Earl of Sutherland and the Earl of Ross edging toward a blood feud,” Kieran ruminated aloud. He’d been told of the battle and how Hamish came to be laird, but it interested him to listen to it from the Sutherland’s daughter rather than a rehashed story from his father. “What happened when your father arrived at court? From what I remember, the dispute ended before a feud took root.”

  “It did. At the time, politics were too fraught with the threat of the English invasion. Balliol had just ascended to the throne and was in the midst of submitting Scotland to English rule. Arguing over cattle seemed petty with our county’s independence at stake. My clan and the Rosses didn’t reconcile or even agree to a truce. They put the disagreement aside because, while they disliked one another, they disliked Balliol far more. They both supported King Robert and always have. My father met Lady Amelia Ross, the earl’s daughter and lady-in-waiting to Isabella de Warrene, while at court. He wasn’t aware of who my mother was when he first saw her, just as she didn’t know who he was either. He asked her to dance that night, and they struck up a conversation. Somehow their clan names didn’t come up despite discussing politics. It was dangerous ground to tread, speaking of supporting Robert the Bruce while dancing in King John’s great hall. My mother’s intelligence struck my father, and my mother appreciated that he respected her and listened to her opinions. She’d never experienced it before.”

  “It’s hard to conceive that neither revealed their clan name. I can’t imagine how the Earl of Sutherland danced with the Earl of Ross’s daughter, and neither was aware of its significance. Didn’t people stare? Didn’t they catch the whispers that must have been buzzing?”

  “They did, but my parents are both strikingly good looking. They each assumed people spoke of their partner. It wasn’t until the next morning when Da and the Ross accompanied the king on a walk much like this one. Da grew excited to see Mama and offered to walk with her until my grandfather lunged at Da and got his hands around Da’s throat. It took six guardsmen to pull them apart. Da didn’t understand why Grandfather attacked, and he said he was halfway through the brawl before he realized who he fought. He wasn’t prepared to lose to anyone, let alone the mon responsible for the deaths of his father and brothers. That was a matter of honor. But what enraged him most was that whoever attacked him did it while he stood close to Mama. It made him livid that someone would risk injuring her. It wasn’t until the guards restrained them that Grandfather accused Da of being too forward with Mama, who was in tears watching her father and the mon she’d hoped would become a suitor fight one another. Da ignored Grandfather and hurried to Mama to make sure they hadn’t injured her. When she reassured him that she hadn’t been hurt, he unleashed on Grandfather for being so selfish, arrogant, and vengeful that he risked his own daughter’s safety. The very daughter he was huffing and puffing aboot protecting. That brought Grandfather to a spluttering stop from what I’ve heard.”

  “I’d be livid too if someone attempted to draw me into a fight with you too nearby. I can’t imagine coming to blows with your father, even though I worry we mig
ht meet on the battlefield. He is a very different mon than your grandfather. He took me to task when he discovered my interest, but rather than beat me senseless, or at least try to, he talked to me. He’s given me a chance to prove myself.” Kieran realized how fortunate he was as he listened to the story about the couple he wished would soon be his parents-by-marriage. “Obviously something went right. Your father and grandfather lived, and your parents married.”

  “Aye, my father refused to put Mama in the middle. He escorted Mama back to the keep, then demanded an audience with my grandfather. He made a case for being allowed to court Mama. Grandfather gave Mama one moon to decide whether she wanted to marry Da. They became inseparable the entire time. They walked together, danced every evening, attended chapel together even though they sat apart. Da brought Mama along on a hunt when he learned she enjoyed it and bragged to anyone willing to listen when Mama brought down the largest stag that day. Within the moon, they’d told each other everything they could think of from their past. The good and the bad.”