Highland Tides

by Anna Markland

  CONTENTS

  TITLE PAGE

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Part One BRADEN

  PLACE O'DESPAIR

  MORAL FORTITUDE

  INTERVIEW WITH THE DUKE

  A BRIGHT SPOT

  GET THEE GONE

  BODILY NEEDS

  SHORN

  RESTLESS NIGHTS

  THE WIG

  IN A NUTSHELL

  VESUVIUS ERUPTS

  LUNCHEON

  THE VISION

  A HIGHER PLANE

  AGONY

  MARGARET'S DREAM

  THE RETURN JOURNEY

  KNIGHT OF INBHIR NIS

  Part Two CALLUM

  A HEAVENLY BED

  AINSLIE TAVERN

  SWIRLING EMOTIONS

  DROWNING IS THIRSTY WORK

  HERE COMES THE BRIDE

  FOR BETTER OR FOR WORSE

  AN INCREDIBLE TALE

  THE BIGGEST SCOUNDREL IN CHRISTENDOM

  OLD FASHIONED LEGGINGS

  OATS

  IF WE HADNA DROWNED

  THE SHATTERED EWER

  A SLEEPLESS NIGHT

  DYN BARR

  ANTS

  THE SPIDER'S STICKY TRAP

  RETURN TO HOLYROOD

  HOUSE OF FINE REPUTE

  INVITATION TO A WEDDING

  THE ANGEL AND THE DEVIL

  THE ENDS OF THE EARTH

  NO ESCAPING DESTINY

  Part Three REUNION

  I'M NAY A THIEF

  CANONMILLS

  ENGRAVED ON HER HEART

  A FIT OF GIGGLES

  EPILOGUE

  ABOUT ANNA

  MORE ANNA MARKLAND

  FACT OR FICTION?

  HIGHLAND TIDES

  By

  ANNA MARKLAND

  CALEDONIA CHRONICLES BOOK II

  Copyright © Anna Markland 2015

  Cover Art by Steven Novak

  COPYRIGHT

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. It may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the author.

  All fictional characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author and all incidents are pure invention.

  I would like to acknowledge the help of my critique partners in polishing this manuscript. Thank you Reggi Allder, Jacquie Biggar and Sylvie Grayson.

  ISBN 978-1-927619-38-4

  For my brilliant grandson, Matthew Gerard,

  and for Time Travelers Everywhere

  "There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. We must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures."

  ~William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar

  PART ONE

  BRADEN

  PLACE O'DESPAIR

  Braden awoke in chains.

  His last memory was a frantic awareness he was drowning in Brecan’s Cauldron, saltwater filling his lungs, his flailing arms and legs buffeted by pieces of his shattered boat. Seagulls high above danced at his demise.

  He’d died and must now be in Hell, lying on a damp stone floor, his wrists and ankles shackled in rusted manacles. He gagged on the stench of human filth and blood and fear.

  He closed his eyes, the specter of never-ending pain and torment tightening his gut. He was a young man with an eye for pretty lasses and hadn’t lived a life without sin, but eternal damnation seemed harsh. It wasn’t his fault if women pursued him. Mayhap this was his punishment for causing the deaths of his brothers who’d been sucked into the maelstrom with him.

  The narrow straits between Jura and Scarba were the fastest way home to Oban. Too cocksure of his ability to master the Cauldron at Corryvreckan, he’d dismissed Callum’s worries that the flood tide was running high on that fateful day. The roar of the inflow from the Firth of Lorne deafened them before they sighted the swirling waters. The tidal bore had quickly swallowed their boat, and them. Now they’d never go home. His mother and father must be devastated, his sister, Margaret, bereft. Three sons lost thanks to him.

  He opened his eyes slowly, praying with all his heart he hadn’t dragged Callum and Donal into Hades. Only muffled coughs broke the silence. When he became accustomed to the gloom, his heart leaped into his throat. He was surrounded by at least a hundred men, some sitting, others lying, packed together like maggots on the stone floor.

  Many looked like they’d been in this black hole for a long while. They were bruised and battered. Filthy, bloodied bandages covered arms, legs, heads and eyes. Most were swathed in some kind of plaid, leading him to surmise this must be a part of Hell reserved for wicked Scotsmen. Their plaids had seen better days, but had more reds and greens than his own brown and grey.

  To a man they stared into nothingness, as though they’d lost the will to live.

  He chuckled at the absurd notion. “Dead men who’ve lost the will to live!”

  “What’s funny, laddie?”

  At first he thought Satan taunted him, but the sharp elbow prodding his ribs was flesh and bone. “Naught,” he rasped to the grey bearded wretch who lay beside him. “I was remembering the day I died.”

  “Aye,” his companion agreed. “That fateful day was a death sentence fer us all.”

  Their exchange was barely a whisper, yet every unseeing eye in the fetid place turned to them. What did the auld man mean? Had these men died the same day as he? Sweat trickled down his spine. “I’m nay sure how long I’ve been here,” he whispered.

  “Nor I. They musta brought ye in during the night. Ye did well to stay out o’ their clutches for sae long. ’Tis a fortnight since our Bonnie Prince fled, abandoning us to our fate, but who can blame him?”

  Braden had no notion of who this prince might be or whose clutches he’d avoided. “Ye mean the King, James?” he asked, wondering what his monarch had to do with men condemned for eternity, and where and why had he fled.

  His neighbor eyed him curiously. “Nay, James was the Auld Pretender. Did ye suffer a blow to yer ‘ed during the battle? I’m speakin’ o’ the Young Pretender, his heir, Charles.”

  It seemed Hell consisted of men in their dotage speaking in tormenting riddles. Braden resolved to sharpen his wits and not let madness overtake him. “As I recall, King James of Scotland’s heir is named James, nay Charles. And what battle are ye referring to?”

  His tormentor spat. “Ye’re dafter than I thought, laddie. Culloden o’ course. A place o’ despair and defeat for the clans on the sixteenth day of April in the Year of Our Lord Seventeen Hundred and Forty-six.”

  The auld fool had obviously been tortured into lunacy. It was impossible for Braden to have languished in hell for over three hundred years and been none the wiser. “I ne’er heard o’ this Culloden. Is it near Oban? That’s where I hail from. Braden Ogilvie’s my name, James is my king.”

  His cell mate struggled to sit up. “Nay lad, Culloden’s close to Inbhir Nis, which is where we are now. �
��Tis a good way from Oban. If ye’re from Argyll I hope ye didna fight for the English with the cursed Duke, John Campbell and his Loudon Highlanders?”

  If this sorry soul was to be believed, Scotland was at war with the English. Surely Braden would have been aware of it. “Nay, I’m a loyal Scot and an obedient subject o’ King James Stewart and his Queen Joan.” He puffed out his chest. “My sister, Margaret, is betrothed to the king’s cousin, Robert Stewart.”

  “Bollocks,” came the hoarse retort.

  Braden laughed out loud, earning more sullen stares. “Margaret scolds me when I say that. It’s one of my favorite oaths.”

  “Still bollocks. King James was assassinated more than three hundred years ago by the self same cousin ye boast of, and two accomplices.”

  The hell-hole had become an inferno. “It canna be true,” Braden rasped.

  “What’s the lad goin’ on aboot, George?” another condemned soul shouted from nearby, his chains dancing as he scratched his armpit.

  “Naught that makes any sense,” his companion replied gruffly. “Livin’ in the past.” He tapped his forehead. “A blow to the noggin’.”

  MORAL FORTITUDE

  Inbhir Nis Castle, May 1746

  “I pride myself on being a person of moral fortitude,” Lady Charlotte Tremayne insisted to her older sister.

  Augusta yawned, leaned back in the upholstered sofa and put her feet up on the footstool in their uncle’s solar. “You mean a do-gooder,” she smirked.

  “What’s the point of this,” Charlotte replied, gesturing to the paintings and tapestries adorning the walls, “if we don’t use our wealth and position as the nieces of the Duke of Argyll to help others?”

  Her sister grimaced. “It sounds ghastly, Char. Why would you want to help the wretches who fought for the Jacobite cause? Uncle is right. They deserve whatever punishment the Duke of Cumberland metes out. I don’t like being in this wretched castle with hundreds of prisoners in the cells below us. I wish we’d stayed home.”

  Charlotte wondered why she bothered trying to reason with her selfish sister. Next would come the incessant whining about the inconvenience of damage done to the castle by the defeated Jacobites. “The point is they weren’t fighting for money or glory or land. They believed Charles Stuart should be king, exactly as their forebears believed his father James was the rightful King of Scotland thirty years ago.”

  Augusta rolled her eyes. “Best not let Uncle hear you utter such treacherous thoughts. Besides, the Stuarts are Papists.”

  Charlotte bristled. “I’m not saying I agree with them. I’m loyal to King George and a staunch Protestant. But they are Scots, as are we, and if we don’t do something to heal the rift, our country is lost.”

  Augusta stuck out her little finger and took a sip of her Vespetrò liqueur. “So you’re claiming that if you help these prisoners, all will be well.”

  Charlotte disliked the smell of the Italian concoction her sister loved. Too much anise. And Augusta wrinkled up her nose when she drank, as if it tasted terrible. She retreated to the sideboard and poured a glass of Royal Usquebaugh. She held the liqueur up to the light. “I love the flecks of gold leaf, like the sun’s rays.”

  She’d made the remark to annoy Augusta, and it had the desired effect. “You say that every time you drink the stuff.”

  Satisfied, Charlotte sank into the mahogany winged-back armchair. “I believe compassion is our duty and that it will achieve more than brutality. I’ve heard horror stories of some of the atrocities Cumberland is perpetrating.”

  Augusta made a moue. “You won’t have much opportunity for compassion. It’s rumored the prisoners are being transported to Tilbury Prison.”

  “Tilbury? But how?”

  She closed her mouth abruptly when her Uncle entered the solar.

  He had evidently overheard something of their conversation. “Some have already gone. First by ship to London, then to the Fort at Tilbury,” he explained.

  “What will happen to them?” Charlotte asked, fearing the answer.

  “Execution for the leaders,” he replied grimly. “Transportation for the rank and file, I expect. Release for a few who can prove themselves blameless, which I doubt. I’m interviewing them one by one before they’re shipped out.”

  “Then you’ve already decided their fate,” Charlotte murmured, “before they reach Tilbury.”

  Her uncle’s shoulders stiffened. “Their testimony is written down and perused carefully before a final decision is made. If they’re sent south they’ll still be granted a trial.”

  “May I help with the perusal?” she ventured. “We must ensure justice is done.”

  “Out of the question,” he huffed. “These are military matters.”

  Charlotte had learned much from games of Ruff and Honors and now played her trump card. John Campbell, Duke of Argyll, had thought the world of his pious older sister, taken from her family too soon. “Mama would have approved of my determination to make sure these men are treated fairly.”

  Her uncle glared. “Augusta, can you not use your influence over your sister to temper her crusading?”

  Augusta scoffed. “My influence? I have none over her, I assure you. She’s your niece.”

  “Please, Uncle,” Charlotte cajoled, knowing he’d never deny her anything. “It is the right thing to do.”

  He strode to the door. “Very well, miss. You’ve got your way, as usual. I’m off to change for dinner.”

  The door slammed behind him.

  “You’ve let yourself in for some sorry tales,” Augusta remarked, easing off her shoes. “Now be a dear and call for Simone to rub my feet before we’re summoned to table.”

  Charlotte sipped her liqueur, savoring the taste of the saffron. “Go find her yourself.”

  Pouting mightily, Augusta drained her glass then flounced off in search of Simone, her nose in the air, leaving Charlotte alone with her thoughts. She pulled the footstool over with her feet. Deceiving her frivolous sister didn’t bother her one iota. Indeed she relished the pleasure. However, misleading their uncle who’d welcomed them into his home when their parents were killed—that was a concern. He would not agree to her examination of the depositions of the prisoners if he was aware of the real motive for her interest.

  A wisp of dread shivered up her spine when she contemplated her uncle’s wrath if he found out his niece was a widely-read published author.

  However, her true identity was buried so deeply she doubted he would ever discover it. Her publisher didn’t know the popular novelist, Charles Tobias, was in truth Lady Charlotte Tremayne. Plato’s Head would never have published her novel had they been aware she was a woman. As it was, they touted the success of the widely read Picaresque Adventures of Pilgrim Peter, rumored to be the most discussed publication in the famous London coffee houses run by Mrs. Rochford and Moll King. Even the members of the highly secretive Beggar’s Benison club were reported to have recommended it. She chuckled, wondering why wealthy Scottish gentlemen would choose such a name for their club. But men were strange creatures in any event. Some women batted their eyelashes when they spoke of males in hushed tones as if they were a gift from God. Charlotte didn’t understand the appeal.

  She chuckled at the delicious irony of men wandering through Covent Garden and Charing Cross reading her story because they believed a man wrote it.

  Now historic events had taken place right on her doorstep. Beneath her in the cells of Inbhir Nis lay the seeds of real life stories that might germinate into a novel with greater potential than Pilgrim Peter.

  An exciting premonition that she was about to meet the hero of her next successful book danced in her heart.

  INTERVIEW WITH THE DUKE

  Braden lost track of how long he’d been confined in the peculiar waiting room to Hell. He lined up twice daily with the other lost souls for the grey slop ladled out as food. He gradually got used to squatting over a drain in full view of the others to take care of his needs. H
e became inured to the stink of his own body. George Robertson, his companion, was too weak to stay on his feet for long, so Braden fetched him food and helped him to the drain. The soul-destroying boredom was the worst torment. Or mayhap it was the lice.

  Some men were taken away and never came back. The word tilbury was murmured, but Braden didn’t understand what it meant. Others did return from wherever they’d been taken, so he assumed they hadn’t gone to tilbury. Mayhap it was the next stage on the descent into the depths of Hell.

  George told him they would be brought before the Duke of Argyll, John Campbell, to be interviewed. He would decide their guilt or innocence. The mention of his native Argyll heartened him, but he had no doubt this Campbell would judge him guilty of responsibility for his brothers’ deaths.

  As time dragged on, George became weaker. He talked of his parents and grandparents. Braden worried the auld man might die. But that didn’t make sense. He was already dead, wasn’t he?

  One day, George abruptly sat bolt upright. “What was it ye said concernin’ yer sister and Robert Stewart?”

  “Margaret is betrothed to him,” Braden replied.

  George scratched his beard, seemingly deep in thought. “Did I tell ye ’twas my forebears captured Stewart and his accomplices after the assassination of King James?”

  He decided to humor the wretch. “Robertsons?”

  “Aye. Tannoch Robertson was Chieftain then and he swore to capture the regicides, but legend has it his brothers Rheade and Logan were the ones who apprehended Stewart at Blair Castle, along with his uncle, the Earl of Atholl. History reports their executions were gruesome. Queen Joan was vengeful.”

  Braden’s thoughts flew to Margaret. If her betrothed had been arrested and executed, what had become of her? But to ponder on such questions was to fall into the Devil’s trap. Still he had to ask. “Stewart never married?”