Knight Everlasting

by Jackie Ivie

  The last was directed at Alpin, who’d entered the chamber and was staring at Juliana with a thunderstruck look. She hadn’t realized until then that he hadn’t seen her uncloaked and with her hair unbound, in a riot of curls that happened whenever her hair was wet . . . especially around steam. Not many of them had. She blushed as she turned away.

  “There’s only one man for you, Juliana lass.” Lady Reina’s voice lowered to a hypnotic level as she walked around Juliana, circling her over and over and making her dizzy with watching until she gave up and looked instead at the tub and fire. “One man. And ’tis na’ Alpin MacKetryck. Poor lad.”

  “Who is it then?” Juliana asked.

  The lady responded with a fit of laughter and then she sobered again. “Ah, lass . . . you question that which you already ken, and ken naught what you must question.”

  “What?” She might as well have drunk too much ale, Juliana decided, wrinkling her forehead with confusion.

  “Your fate. ’Tis already foretold . . . as I’ve been saying.”

  “Are you a . . . seer?” Juliana asked.

  Lady Reina found that totally amusing, too, with laughter stronger than before. It was so merry, Juliana found herself smiling.

  “Nae, lass. Dame Lileth Fallaine-Dumphat is the clan seer. A wiser, more fey woman you’ll na’ meet. She was my teacher. My mentor. Me? I . . . am but a novice.”

  As superstitious as he was, why would Aidan put her in the hands of an understudy?

  “Because he trusts me, lass,” the woman replied, as if Juliana had spoken aloud. “Aside of which, I ply the fastest needle. You’d never be finished in time if anyone else attended you. Or if you were . . . faeries would have to assist. Now . . . cease this worry. ’Twill line your face afore you’ve aged. And hand over your shift.”

  “What . . . of Arran?” she asked, already reaching for the hem to pull it off.

  “He’ll na’ see you, lass. I’d na’ give him the chance. Nae man sees what belongs to my laird, Aidan.”

  Juliana’s hands froze on the shift hem. She felt stewed, dizzy . . . light-headed. She nearly stumbled. No. Somewhere in Lady Reina’s words there was a hint of sin and pain and blackness. Something about fouled pleasure. Juliana shook her head to clear it and to dispel her foolishness. She couldn’t decipher the thought enough to ponder and worry over it.

  A knock heralded Arran’s reentry. He had three clansmen with him, each burdened with a trunk nearly the size of the porter. They scattered rushes with the passage of their boots and added grunting and heat to the room with their efforts. Juliana watched as they set each trunk down in perfect line with what looked to be immense caution. All of it happening under the watchful eye of Lady Reina. Juliana stood mutely observing, with her hands still clutching her shift, raised to her knee level.

  “Now, unfasten them. And open . . .”

  The most amazing aroma of lavender and heather and field flowers filled the air, emanating from the trunks and adding to the room scents.

  “Now go. And doona’ bother us again. You, too, Arran. I’ll be calling for you when I’ve a need. Come, Juliana.”

  Lady Reina didn’t look to see if her orders had been followed. She probably didn’t need to. Juliana heard the door closing behind her as she approached the open trunks.

  “Fresh heather. Sprigs of lavender. Oil of rose . . . oil of rose?” The woman wrinkled her nose and shoved the wax plug back into it. “Nae. Rose is for old loves . . . na’ for the enjoyment of fresh ones. Lavender . . . now that is what we need . . . and look here. You see? Green linen. Just as I foresaw.”

  She was holding up a rolled span of linen that looked the shade of old lace in Juliana’s eyes, but as the woman unfolded and rolled it in the light, darker shinier threads caught the torchlight from all about them, rendering a hue that resembled night-lit fog. Juliana looked at it with awe, and then moved her eyes to Lady Reina’s unveiled one, and then looked farther about, at torches lit in their sconces, and all about the room.

  She hadn’t seen them getting lit.

  Juliana blinked several times, counting to more than twenty as she looked about the room. She was worse than stewed and drunker than when she’d partaken of Killoran ale. She had to be. She was seeing and experiencing and feeling things that couldn’t be.

  She was tired. Overcome.

  Juliana blinked again and then shrugged. She’d missed the lighting of the torches and the men who’d done it because she’d been caught up in the pleasure of sensation wrapping all about her; the scent of lavender and savory; the heavy vapor of her warm bath; the crack and smell of burning wood; the feel of the linen Lady Reina was placing right in her hands where the material draped as if poured atop them.

  “Oh . . . my,” Juliana breathed.

  Lady Reina laughed again, and clapped her hands. And then she was up and dancing and twirling and making everything rotate and getting Juliana dizzy. Juliana sat down, realized it was on his bed, and immediately stood back up. Then she grabbed for one of the end posts, connected at the top to a wooden canopy and two other sides, making an enclosure that looked erotic, sensuous . . . and wicked.

  Lady Reina was back at her chests, pulling sprigs of what looked like freshly plucked heather from them . . . but that couldn’t be. Juliana swayed in place, holding to the post for stability, and watched as white satin was pulled from another trunk. From her vantage she could see the blue-cast shimmer of the material, and that was just improbable, too. The woman had already planned what she’d say and what she’d design well before she’d walked through the door. There wasn’t another explanation.

  “You need to undress, lass, and you need to do it afore too long. We’ve lavender oil to soak you in, hair to oil and comb and arrange, and I can’t see to everything. I’ve got a dress to craft.”

  The woman was planning on sewing a dress while Juliana bathed? The idea was absurd. Impossible. Unfathomable.

  “Go on, lass. Undress. Sink below the water. It’s heavenly. I’ve added oils and potions to the water to guarantee it.”

  When had she done that?

  Juliana stumbled slightly when she released the bedpost and that was just a harbinger of the rest of her walk as she neared the tub, crossing one way and then the other as if the room were moving and she had to compensate. She’d never felt as odd. Otherworldly. Rapt.

  She had the shift pulled over her head and tossed aside before she reached the tub, and then she dangled her hand in liquid warmth that promised heaven. She lifted a palm filled with the substance, and saw little flower petals stirring about with the motion. There was something wrong about that. Juliana lifted her hand to her nose and sniffed of windswept freshness, dew-filled morns, and oiled heat . . . and decided she didn’t care. She peeled off her underdress, which felt crusted and stiff with wear.

  There was a sigh of sound behind her. She didn’t look to see what it was.

  “Slip beneath the water now, Juliana. Step in. I’ll be there in a bit for your hair. Go on, lass. Doona’ fret. ’Tis na’ harmful.”

  Not harmful? No. It was totally pleasant, and intoxicating, and luxurious, akin to being wrapped in the softest of fur and snuggled into the warmest of soft beds. And then it began exceeding that.

  Juliana lay back, resting her head on the tub rim, and ran her hands over limbs that felt silken to the touch and warmed clear through. She couldn’t remember when she’d ever felt such comfort. She had nothing to compare it to. Aidan’s embrace perhaps . . .

  Right then.

  That was what this feeling was closest to.

  She heard a noise behind her that sounded like choked laughter. She ignored it. The Lady Reina was too vast and strange to ponder. It would take more time than the span of a bath to try it.

  Juliana lifted an arm, studied it before running her hand along it, touching the light spots of bruising that were Aidan’s grip when he’d moved her to carry while kidnapping her. He probably hadn’t even known it.

  Behind
her she heard Lady Reina chuckling, and then the woman was humming. That might make sewing go quicker. Juliana didn’t know much of sewing and needlework. She hadn’t the patience for it and hadn’t attempted it. Her father hadn’t objected. He had a vast estate to run and no son and that disappointment was so vast, he hadn’t spared much emotion or care on what his only heir did with her time.

  Juliana sighed and lifted the other arm and did the exact same maneuver down this one, running her fingernail along the flesh and loving the silken feel, the heated flesh, the sinful stir . . .

  Hands appeared beside her, guiding her head into the water, and then fingers worked at her hair, soothing away the dirt of days, the neglect of sennights, and the worry of months. Until the only thing she felt was an underlying vibration that turned into her heartbeat if she thought long and hard enough about it.

  Before she knew it, she was sitting on a cloud of MacKetryck plaid coverlet before the fire, wrapped in more of the material and watching the flames as Lady Reina worked her fingers through coiled locks that needed plaiting to make them behave. Juliana tipped her head to look at where the other woman sat.

  “Are you a . . . witch?” she asked, lowering her tone to a whisper at the last word.

  “Dugald MacKetryck thinks so,” Lady Reina replied.

  “I’ve na’ . . . met the man,” Juliana replied.

  “’Twas a great day when Aidan MacKetryck won back his legacy. A great day.”

  “Won?”

  “Dugald was guardian and regent during Aidan’s minority. He grew fond of the position. He dinna’ wish to pass it on. The Black MacKetryck was a bad choice. Dame Lileth Fallaine-Dumphat tried to warn the auld laird. To nae avail.”

  “Black?” Juliana asked.

  “Aye. Black. It suits the man’s soul. Aidan’s suits him as well.”

  “What is Aidan?”

  “Aidan is called the Red MacKetryck. For a reason.”

  “Red?”

  “The color of rage. Fury. Anger. He wears it well.”

  Red...

  Aye, Aidan did wear red well, Juliana decided. She watched as Lady Reina’s one unveiled eye softened.

  “He’s a beast when challenged. Verra angry. Verra furious. ’Twas a great battle. Took half a day to fight, but he won. He wrested the castle and his birthright from Dugald.”

  “When?”

  “Near . . . seven years past.” Lady Reina frowned just slightly as if in pain.

  “That would have made him younger than Alpin. How is that possible?”

  Lady Reina smiled. “You ask the oddest things when you already have the answers.”

  Juliana wrinkled her forehead. “I do?”

  “Oh . . . aye. You do. But just look here. It’s time for your rest.”

  “Now?”

  “You’ve time, and I’m na’ quite finished with your attire. You doona’ wish to shame me in front of Dugald MacKetryck and the household, do you?”

  Juliana shook her head. She was beginning to see why Aidan had placed her in Lady Reina’s care. The woman always got her way.

  Chapter 19

  Nothing killed it. Nothing silenced it, tempered it, or even made it waver. Nothing.

  Aidan crawled onto Buchyn Loch’s shoreline expending every bit of what strength he had left, and then lay there panting and heaving for breath, while his heart still beat ache through every part of him. He’d thought the worst heart pain had been burying his parents three months apart. Now he knew better.

  He was sitting on his buttocks, with his arms wrapped about his lifted knees, awaiting the return of his men from the water. Not one had kept up with him. And rather than making them finish the swim across, Aidan had started back and turned them all back around. They probably thought it punishment. He’d gathered that from their groans as he’d passed them.

  It should have exhausted him beyond all reason, taking any want for pondering and thinking away. Physical challenge had always worked before. The sense of death and the thrill of cheating it always left him with a heart-pounding newness of spirit. Now all each heartbeat brought him was pain. Unmitigated. Massive. Increasing. The water blurred before him, and Aidan blinked rapidly to still it. He had to. He wasn’t in the water anymore. He hadn’t donned his plaid yet. There was no way to hide anymore.

  He knew what he had to do. He knew he had to do it quickly, before anyone could dissent, or argue, or change it. And discover how much it cost. And before the hurt encompassed everything and made him sacrifice the very thing he’d nearly died for. He’d known when he gained the title of laird of Clan MacKetryck that it came with responsibility. Great responsibility. And it came with great honor . . . centuries of clan honor . . . that he’d sworn to uphold.

  At all costs.

  He blinked more. The view cleared. Blurred. Aidan kept blinking, shuddering through another breath that burned. Blinked again. Tavish was the first to join him, lying flat out on his belly, in a lean eel shape, and breathing hard enough to displace earth.

  “Where’s Heck?” Aidan asked.

  Tavish pointed backward. Aidan grunted. Watched the loch surface glint with fading sun as it blurred again. He blinked again. Rapidly. Tightened his arms about his knees and breathed as shallowly as possible before bowing his forehead and shuddering until the dirt beneath him cleared enough that he could go back to looking out at the loch and waiting for his men without anyone being the wiser.

  Nothing killed it. Nothing even muted it.

  Heck was the next to crawl out of the water. Tavish had gained his breath back, although he was still stretched out, putting a lean frame on display that could use not only more meat to it, but more sun. Aidan nodded at Heck.

  “Where’s Stefan?”

  Heck did the same motion Tavish had, pointing back out to the water. Aidan grunted and went back to watching. Blinking. Watching the lines delineating water from land from sky blur and mesh. Blinking faster. Breathing shallowly and evenly and with a modulated rhythm that was vicious with inflexibility.

  Kerr pulled himself out next, although he just lay there, half in and half out of the water.

  “Go fetch him,” Aidan told Tavish.

  The man rolled, did a somersault motion, gripped Kerr’s arms, and without looking like he expended any strength, hauled the rest of him onto shore. Then he crawled back to sit beside Aidan and look out over the same view.

  “You want to tell us what this is all about?” he asked.

  “I’ll be . . . useless to the lasses . . . thanks to this.”

  Kerr panted the words from just beyond Aidan’s feet. He dropped a glance to him and then looked back to the waves.

  Heck snorted. “You’re always useless, lad,” he replied.

  “When I get some strength back, you’ll regret those words, Heck Blaine.”

  “Ooh. I’m shaking here,” Heck replied.

  Kerr was straightening and attempting a push-up. He decided it was easier to flop back on shore, however, and did it, making a groan of sound at the effort. Aidan’s lips lifted slightly at the man. Stefan was next from the waves, crawling amid churning water and huffing breath and cursing soundly at Ewan, who was right with him.

  “There! I’ve won . . . whelp! And you’ll . . . pay up. Soundly.” The words might have sounded more threatening if they hadn’t been panted amid gulps for breath. It would also have helped if Ewan wasn’t churning earth with pumps of his arms before collapsing a half-length farther than Stefan.

  “Tie! ’Twas . . . a . . . tie!”

  “Now wait here. If anyone wins, ’tis me. I was first,” Tavish announced, getting to his knees.

  “The laird was first,” Heck replied. “And he went clean across and back.”

  “Aidan’s part fish. He does na’ count,” Tavish replied.

  Aidan barely heard it through what he recognized as more ache. His heart just kept sending it. He blinked again and turned back to the waves. Cleared his throat to make certain the emotion stayed hidden. “Where
’s Gregor?” he asked.

  They all pointed out at the water. Even the two who’d fresh come from the swim. Aidan squinted and could just make out the head of his last man, bobbing about without any sign of swimming. He looked more to be floating on his back. “Go fetch him, Tavish,” he ordered.

  “He’ll have my skin if I mount a rescue.”

  “And I’ll take it if you don’t,” Aidan replied.

  Tavish grinned. “True,” he replied, and walked back to the water before putting lean white buttocks into the air in a dive.

  “You want to tell us what this is about yet?” Heck asked at his side.

  Aidan looked sidelong at his senior honor guardsman and then looked back out to where Tavish had reached Gregor. From the looks of it, there was a challenge getting made and another race started. It was all well and good. Entertaining. Almost took his mind off what he had to do. But nothing stopped the reminders coming with each beat of his heart. Aidan blinked on the sight of churning water where the two competitors were. And then sighed heavily.

  “Fetch Alpin,” he replied. “Get him to his rooms. I’ll meet with him there.”

  “He’s na’ in his rooms already? Perchance . . . with a wench or two?” Kerr asked.

  Aidan kept the wince inside, but kept his attention on the swimmers nearing shore. “He’s guarding my chambers,” he replied.

  “Oh,” Kerr replied.

  “Can I don my plaid first?” Heck asked.

  Kerr spoke up. “As little as you possess a-tween your legs, it’d be a pure shame na’ to.”

  “You’ll be regretting every word, MacGorrick. Every single one.” Heck was tossing his sett atop his shoulder and wrapping it as he spoke.

  “Just name the place. And time, my man.”

  “In the hour,” Aidan said. “At the list. With poles.”

  “The hour?” someone asked.