by Lauren Royal
Their footfalls echoed off the wooden floor as they entered. A few torches on the walls did little in the way of brightening the place, and the room gave off a musty scent that spoke of long disuse.
Kendra stared up at the gloomy vaulted stone ceiling. “It’s spooky.”
Niall gave her a wan smile. “Cromwell garrisoned his soldiers in here when he commandeered the castle near the end of the war. A hundred of them, lying foot-to-head on the floor, with a second hundred on another level that rested on those posts you see protruding from the wall.” He pressed a key into Trick’s hand. “Your staff has moved your things up here already. Shall I have them sent up to attend you? You’ve a valet, do you not, and a ladies’ maid?”
“Aye, my man goes by Cavanaugh, and Jane sees to her grace.” Trick’s gaze met Kendra’s. “But I think we can fend for ourselves tonight.”
Though she didn’t know if he’d intended to remind her, Kendra’s skin prickled as she recalled what she’d promised would happen this evening. Then he looked away, pensively moving off, and she knew that he was no more thinking of such things than she had been.
After all the upheaval today, last night seemed so very long ago.
“Good night, then,” Niall said.
“Good night,” she returned softly.
Listening to the young man’s footsteps fade, she shivered. The candle in her hand wavered, throwing shadows on the gray stone walls. “I dislike to think of Cromwell visiting this place, let alone using it as a headquarters.” Oliver Cromwell had been indirectly responsible for the deaths of her parents and her own exile that followed.
“It was against my father’s wishes, to say the least. He was a Royalist, through and through.” When Trick wandered to one of the deep-set windows, his voice echoed back out from it. “My mother talked him into leaving.”
“Did she, really?” Squeezing into the niche, Kendra joined him at the window. In the small space he felt warm and near, yet cold and distant, too. By moonlight, she could barely make out the village below, surrounded by acres of wild pasture and tended fields. “This was her family’s ancestral home, wasn’t it? Why would she willingly surrender it?”
“She was a Covenanter,” he said shortly, stepping back into the room. “Come, our chamber is this way.”
He ducked through an arch in the wall and pushed open a thick oak door. On her way inside, she shot one last look at the empty vaulted chamber. The garrison. She wondered if it was haunted by ghosts of dead soldiers.
Not that she believed in anything like that.
The bedchamber was enormous. A four-poster bed in its center looked dwarfed, and after the din of the wake below, the room seemed deathly quiet.
She moved to set the candle on a bedside table, the dull wooden floor sounding gritty beneath her shoes. A fire burned on the hearth, and she wondered who had built it. Jane or Cavanaugh? One of Duncraven’s servants? “Are we the only ones up here?”
“Aye. The towers are mirror images. One great room and one bedchamber on each top level.” With a rueful smile, he locked the door behind them. “As a child, I was terrified to come up here alone.”
“I’m rather terrified now,” Kendra admitted. She sat gingerly on the edge of the bed. “After you left the place to Cromwell, how long was it before you returned?”
“Until now.” Trick shrugged out of his surcoat, folding it over the back of a chair that sat before an immense carved oak desk. “My father settled my mother with relations and spirited me away to France. I was five.” Abruptly he dropped to the chair. “I never saw my mother again.” His voice cracked. “And now I never will.”
Kendra rose to wind her arms around his neck from behind. “Surely she knows that you cared, that you came for her.”
“Maybe.” Sighing, he absently slid open the top desk drawer and riffled through some papers. Dust flew out, tickling her nose. She felt him stiffen. “Losh, would you look at this.”
She straightened. “What is it?”
“A letter. From Oliver Cromwell himself.”
A chill ran up her spine. “We were just talking about him. How odd.” Irrationally afraid to touch the evil man’s writings, she kept her distance while Trick scanned the page. “When was it written?”
“Eighteenth November, 1650.”
“So long ago. Nearly eighteen years.”
“Other than my father, I rarely remember anyone coming up here.” His gaze swept the chamber. “Nothing’s changed in the interim. The same bed, the same desk. This letter probably sat here all this time.”
“What does it say?”
He looked back down to the yellowed parchment. “‘I thought fit to send this trumpet to you, to let you know that, if you please to walk away with your company, and deliver the house to such as I shall send to receive it, you shall have liberty to carry off your arms and goods, and such other necessaries as you have. You have harbored such parties in your house as have basely and inhumanly murdered our men; if you necessitate me to bend my cannon against you, you may expect what I doubt you will not be pleased with. I expect your present answer, and rest your servant, O. Cromwell.’”
“Dear heavens.” Kendra released the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. “Words from the devil himself. Can you blame your mother for wanting to walk away?”
He shrugged uncomfortably. “Father refused at first. He’d fought well and bravely in support of Charles, but when Cromwell opened fire…well, I was inside.” He drew a sharp, shuddering breath, obviously remembering.
Kendra was horrified. “He opened fire with a child inside?”
“Aye. The bombardment destroyed the east parapet and tore a large cavity in the stonework—did you not see it as we came in?”
“I wasn’t looking.”
“At my mother’s behest, Father sent word to the Lord Protector that he saw the point, and he walked away, taking me with him and never looking back.”
She folded the bed’s simple white coverlet back and lowered herself to the plain sheets below. “She wanted to save you.”
“She wanted to save her family’s castle.” He turned in the chair to face her. “If she’d cared for me, she would have come along with us.”
“Maybe your father wouldn’t allow her.”
“Maybe,” Trick conceded. “He was certainly mum on the subject.” He shoved the paper into the desk and slammed the drawer. “And I wouldn’t blame him if he did leave her that coldly. She was no mother or wife to be proud of. Besides being a Covenanter, she was an adulteress, and—”
“You judge her harshly.”
A momentary look of self-doubt crossed his face, then disappeared so fast, she wondered if she’d imagined it. “I’ve told you how I feel about infidelity.”
She’d told him how she felt about infidelity as well, but she knew better than to bring that up. Living with three brothers had taught her how to deal with male moods. Gingerly. “Do you remember her as being that terrible?”
“Nay, but I was only a child.”
Kendra glanced down and smoothed her cranberry-colored skirts, then lifted her head to meet his gaze. “If your father and she were at odds, why do you believe everything he told you about her?”
“For the longest time, I didn’t want to,” he admitted. “But then so much time passed and she never, ever came for me…”
“There are two sides to every story, Trick.”
If his sudden silence wasn’t agreement, at least he was man enough to consider she had a point. The only sound in the chamber was that of the flames that danced in the fireplace, until at last he said, “But I’ll never hear her side of it, will I?”
Pain radiated off him in waves, but she knew that now was not the time to talk about that. It was too fresh. “What is a Covenanter?” she asked instead. “I know English history by rote, and Greek and Roman, but I’m afraid I was never taught much of Scotland’s past.”
“I cannot say that I’m surprised,” Trick said dryly, but the
remark didn’t sound at all disparaging, merely resigned. He leaned back in the chair and began untying his cravat. “Many men, including my mother’s father, signed a document known as the National Covenant. When the Civil War broke out, the Covenanters sided with the English Parliament against the king, in return for Cromwell’s promise of a religious reformation in England and Ireland, based on the Scottish Kirk.”
“And Cromwell never followed through.”
“Nay, he did not. But it took a long time for the Scots to realize they’d been duped.”
“They’d thrown their lot in with the devil.”
With a grimace, he nodded and slowly drew off the cravat. “I’m afraid this castle was instrumental in Cromwell’s victory. My father never forgave my mother for that.”
With a flick of his wrist, the cravat landed on the desk in a flurry of frothy white. She stared at it. He was undressing. Whether or not he’d spent the whole day thinking about it, she was sure he expected her to share his bed—really share his bed—tonight.
A little ball of anxiety lodged in her middle.
She tore her gaze from the lace-trimmed linen. “My father fought with King Charles, too. And died, along with my mother. He would have sympathized with your father’s stance.”
His expression hardened. “Father was no saint, believe me. I liked him no more than I did my mother. I’m well rid of them both.”
“Trick—” She bit her tongue, reminding herself his parents had both hurt him terribly—and both were dead. Perhaps this harshness helped him to cope with the loss.
She forced a gentle smile. “How does it feel having a brother?”
He smiled in return—perhaps the first smile she’d seen from him today that wasn’t tainted with cynicism. “He’s quite pleasant, isn’t he?” His eyes softened as his fingers worked to loosen the laces on his shirt. “I find it hard to believe he came from my mother, and—and that man.”
She wasn’t surprised to find he didn’t care for Hamish, either. “Niall looks just like you.”
“I know. It’s amazing.” Leaning forward, he pulled off a boot. “I wish I could stay longer and get to know him. Maybe he’ll come visit us at Amberley.”
“That would be nice.” The more of Trick’s clothes that came off, the more her insides turned to jelly. Too nervous to just sit there and watch, she pulled her own shoes and stockings off, then stood and wandered over to a small arched door. “Where does this lead?”
“To another staircase, if I remember right.” In bare feet, he padded over and unlatched the iron bar that secured the door, poking his head into the darkness beyond. His voice echoed back. “Aye, another winding stairwell. To the roof above. Prisoner’s Leap.”
“Prisoner’s what?”
“Prisoner’s Leap.” He turned to her, the stairwell gaping blackly behind him. “In the old days, prisoners were brought up from the dungeons once a year and allowed a chance to gain their freedom by successfully jumping from one tower to the other. Twelve feet, with their hands tied behind their backs and a hundred-foot drop to the bottom. And no running start.”
“My heavens. Did any of them make it?”
“I expect not.” His lips turned up in a half-smile. “Maybe that’s why the villagers were practicing their long jumps today.”
A little shiver ran through her. “I’m not sure I like this place, Trick.”
“Why? Because I had barbaric ancestors?” Although reserved, his grin did seem to lighten the room somewhat. “There’s no one in the dungeons today, so far as I know.”
“So far as—”
“I’m jesting.” He shut the door to the stairwell, and she relaxed a little. “Come here.”
“Not until you bar that door.”
With a strangled laugh, he did so. “There, we’re safe. Come here, Kendra. I need you tonight.”
No one had ever said anything like that to her before, and they were certainly words to melt a girl’s heart. Frightened as she was, she walked to him.
When his mouth met hers, an unfamiliar emotion welled up inside her, one that washed away her doubts, soothed her nerves, relaxed her tense muscles. She was a warm puddle of contentment, wanted and cared for and safe.
That’s what it is, she realized. For the first time, she felt completely safe in her husband’s arms. Tonight he wasn’t some distant, imposing stranger. He was a boy who had been afraid of the dark, a son who missed his mother.
A man who needed her, Kendra.
Her body humming in anticipation, she wrapped her arms around his neck and threaded her fingers in his short, silky hair. His kisses were soft and sweet, flavored with the faintest trace of the whisky he’d sipped downstairs. He planted little kisses on her cheeks, her nose, her forehead, and finally the sensitive hollow of her neck. He lingered there while his hands went to work unlacing her gown. Her own hands tugged the bottom of his shirt from his breeches.
He pushed her dress down and off, leaving her in only her chemise. She yanked the shirt over his head, and he gave a frustrated laugh when his arms tangled in the full-blown sleeves.
When he ran his hands down her sides and around to pull her closer, she felt a jolt of excitement. He smelled of soap and sandalwood, and the sight of his bare, golden torso made her unsteady on her feet. Thank goodness he was holding her up.
Slowly he backed her across the room and eased her down to the bed. Settling beside her, he hesitated, propping himself on an elbow, his head hovering above hers. Beneath the ends of his hair, his eyes caught and held hers. The faint stubble on his chin glistened in the candlelight.
Her heart pounding in her ears, she gazed steadily back. She was ready. Her arms reached to pull him close.
The air was rent by a strangled groan.
“I cannot do this,” he gritted out and rolled away. “I cannot do this. I cannot do this with my mother lying in a box downstairs.”
She felt an instant of stunned disappointment before her head cleared and her arms went around him anyway. She squeezed tight. “It’s all right. I understand.”
And though she wouldn’t tell him so, almost as strong as her disappointment was her relief.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I just cannot—”
“Hush,” she said. Slowly she drew air into her lungs, giving herself time to adjust. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”
She sat and pulled the coverlet over them both, then lay back down. With a regretful sigh, he turned to face her and gathered her close, his head heavy against her shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he whispered once more.
And long minutes later, when her heart had calmed, for the second night in a row she fell asleep in his arms.
THIRTY-SEVEN
STILL WIDE awake an hour later, Trick eased away from Kendra and slid from the bed. Quietly he pulled his shirt back over his head, then lit a candle and slipped from the bedchamber, closing the door softly behind him.
The stone steps felt cold and rough beneath his bare feet as he trod carefully down them. A low murmur of voices drifted up the stairwell. Arriving on the ground floor, he stopped and stared.
Annag and Niall sat before his mother’s coffin. Behind it, Duncan hid, manipulating a clever arrangement of twine and twigs. A deep, unearthly “Oooooooooh” issued from his throat as he twisted his hands. Elspeth’s body jumped and twitched, and Annag jumped and screeched. Rising to his feet, Duncan burst into laughter and lifted a glass of whisky in a clearly drunken toast.
Trick couldn’t believe his eyes.
Niall caught his gaze and offered a small smile. He rose and came to meet him at the bottom of the stairs. “Couldn’t you sleep?”
“I kept thinking of her lying down here. Cold, in a box.” Trick ran a shaky hand back through his hair. “It seems so unreal. I thought I could just sneak down here and…convince myself, maybe. Sit here a while.”
Niall nodded slowly, then turned to his half-siblings and raised his voice. “Give us peace, will you? Go on to bed. We’ll sit
with Mam alone.”
Still laughing, they staggered out, taking a bottle of spirits and their glasses along with them.
The candles surrounding Elspeth’s casket flickered in their wake. “Why were they sitting with her?” Trick asked after they’d stumbled out of earshot. “It’s plain as anything they held her in no esteem.”
“Da wouldn’t like to hear they’ve been shirking their duty. Mam must never be left alone—they say that a corpse left alone will find the road to hell.”
Knowing his mother’s history, Trick imagined Hamish and Niall would worry about her finding such a road. He went to the coffin and set the candle he was carrying beside the others, averting his gaze from his mother’s waxen face. “I feel like I should be able to talk to her. I came all the way from England to talk to her.”
“Then talk to her,” Niall said.
Trick sighed, wishing he had some of his brother’s calm confidence—wishing he knew where to start. Owing to Duncan’s prank, Elspeth’s hands were no longer neatly crossed on her chest. Wincing at the sight of the twine still attached, he began to reach, then stopped.
“Fix her, will you?” he asked in a voice rough with frustration. “Get that off her.”
While Niall gently did as he asked, Trick dropped onto a chair, staring blindly ahead. “I would think you’d rather sit by yourself than with those two. Especially considering they accord her no respect. I cannot believe what I saw when I walked in here.”
“I cannot sit alone—there must always be two on guard.” Niall took the seat beside him. “And a good prank at a wake is often enjoyed, even encouraged. You don’t know our ways here, Patrick. For all you were born within these walls.”
“You’ve the right of it there.” Trick sighed. He’d never felt very English, but he didn’t feel Scottish, either. He only felt confused.
“What did you want to say to her?” Niall asked. “You can say it, aye? Out loud, or in your head. Either way, she’ll hear you.”
“Do you think so?” Trick turned to gaze at his brother. “You seem a fine lad.”