Devil's Moon

by Amanda Scott

  “Or she thought you’d make a fine husband for Robina.”

  “Aye,” Dev said. “But by my troth, sir, I feel as if I’m the fortunate one. I thought first that I was just doing the honorable thing, because I knew the news would spread no matter what I said or could persuade Rosalie to admit.”

  “You were right,” Ormiston agreed. “Even someone claiming an error would just be adding fuel to the rumor. By the time it passed from one mouth to two ears, it had become a proposal of marriage, will-ye-nil-ye.”

  “What I don’t know is if Robby agreed to it so she could stay here at Coklaw until Benjy is of age or because she truly cares for me.”

  Ormiston shrugged. “That’s of no import now.”

  “It’s important to me.”

  “Then you must make her care, lad, as any husband must who wants his wife to think well of him.”

  They chatted desultorily after that until a rap on the door announced that supper was ready. Adjourning to the dais in complete amity with his father, Dev hoped only that Ormiston would come to like Robby as much as he did.

  She soon arrived, leading the other ladies with Fiona. While they went around to the ladies’ end of the table, Dev’s gaze followed Robby until she and Fiona paused to let Meg and Rosalie pass them and take their places next to his.

  Stepping back so Ormiston could greet Lady Meg and let her present Rosalie to him, Dev saw his father’s gaze fix on Rosalie in a startled and unexpectedly intrigued way.

  Rosalie smiled, and her eyes twinkled. However, she swiftly lowered her lashes, behaving, Dev thought sourly, more like a simpering miss than a woman of her years and experience. The fur-trimmed rose-pink damask gown she wore boasted a deep décolletage, he noted, revealing her plump, inviting breasts.

  Shifting his gaze back to Ormiston, only to meet Wat’s grin and raised eyebrows instead, Dev recollected himself. People in the lower hall were nearly all in their places. The shuffling ended, silence fell, and he asked Father Hubert to say the grace.

  After the meal, Wat stood when Lady Meg did but kept Dev in his seat with a firm hand on his shoulder. Then, in clarion tones, he said, “All who would aid in washing the bridegroom’s feet, as tradition demands, step forward without disturbing the ladies as they leave the hall. Geordie, did you fetch the basin?”

  “Aye, laird,” Wat’s Geordie shouted from the rear of the hall.

  Trying to stand, only to have Wat clamp steely hands on each of his shoulders, Dev saw Ormiston assisting Rosalie from the dais to follow the other ladies. Two serving lads moved to escort her from the hall, and Ormiston returned to the dais, beaming at Dev.

  “ ’Tis been years since I aided a foot-washing,” he said with a boyish grin. “Methinks you’ll have the cleanest feet in Scotland if they don’t drown you in the process.”

  “Help me turn him and his chair around,” Wat said.

  Ormiston happily obeyed, while six men carried a huge tub to the dais.

  Dev saw that it held little water and a great deal of mud. A cheering, ever-increasing crowd surrounded them until he began to fear that they would drown him.

  Just as he thought they’d finished, Wat ordered a second bathing with soap and water, declaring that Dev’s feet were still filthy. Hilarity, many riotous wagers, and much wine, whisky, and ribaldry followed. By the end of the night, while those who could still walk aided each other in seeing him “safely” upstairs, the—by then—drink-sodden Dev wondered if he’d survive to see his bedchamber, let alone his wedding day.

  He knew no more until the bed curtains rattled noisily open at what he was sure must be hours before sunrise. Coll greeted him then with a too-hearty, nearly deafening “Good day to ye, sir! ’Tis a grand day for a wedding!”

  “Doucely, man, doucely,” Dev protested, but it came out in a croak. His mouth was dry. Some imp of Satan was playing drums in his head, and his eyes objected to even the gray light from a nearby unshuttered window.

  “Ye’ll want this,” Coll said, handing him a small towel-wrapped bundle. “Sym Elliot brung it from the ice house.”

  Gratefully leaning against the pillows and placing the cold, damp bundle over his eyes, Dev groaned. “How long till my wedding?”

  “Nobbut an hour or so,” Coll said, startling him so that he nearly bolted upright before his head reminded him of how foolhardy such abruptness was.

  “Fetch me some water, will you?”

  Coll handed him a mug. “Sym said t’ gi’e ye this, instead. It’ll aid ye more than water, he said.”

  The smell nearly did Dev in. However, he sipped manfully and discovered that the taste was better than the smell. When he’d finished it all, he said, “What was in that?”

  “Sym said not to ask,” Coll said.

  Deciding it would either cure him or kill him, and if it killed him, he’d neither know nor care, Dev lay back again and held the ice-filled towel to his head.

  At nearly the same time, Corinne woke Robina, who had gone to bed much earlier than Dev had. The other women had assured her that she’d be wiser to sleep than to fret about what the men were doing to Dev.

  When Robina protested, Lady Meg had said firmly, “You have naught left to do, love. Thanks to Mistress Geddes’s skill and efficiency, your dress will be finished by the time we put it on you in the morning.”

  “But what if it doesn’t fit?”

  “You cannot try it on without risking the happiness of your marriage, Robby,” Janet reminded her. “So leave everything to us now and go to sleep. I’ll sleep with Bella in one of the wee rooms upstairs, so you’ll have your bedchamber to yourself tonight.”

  “Aye, dearling; sleep well,” Rosalie said. Then, with a knowing smile, she added, “You may not get another chance for some time.”

  Robina did not know how tired she was until she lay under the covers, but that was the last thought she had until morning.

  “I’m famished, Corinne,” she said then, sitting up and stretching. “I feel as if I’ve not eaten for days.”

  “Ye slept longer than usual, aye,” Corinne said. “But ye canna go down yet. Sir David mustna see ye till the wedding, and ye’ve nae time to eat, anyway. Since ye washed your hair and bathed yesterday and ye’ll wear your hair doon yer back today, Lady Meg said I wasna t’ wake ye till it were time t’ dress.”

  “The wedding is to be shortly before our midday meal. It cannot be that late!”

  “Aye, it is, though. It doesna look it because o’ the clouds. It looks like rain, m’lady, and that be bad luck on a wedding day.”

  “Not hereabouts,” Robina said. “People in Hawick say, ‘Happy be the bride gits a shower on her side.’ ”

  “Perhaps, but ye’ll no chance fastening buttons or tying your laces, or looking back as ye walk from the altar wi’ Sir David. ’Twould be tempting the devil to do such things. Everyone kens that.”

  Robina wondered about tempting the devil. Mayhap she would start calling Dev “Davy” as his sister and Wat did. She dismissed the thought as soon as it occurred, though. She couldn’t think of him as “Davy.” To her, he was and always would be Dev.

  The other ladies arrived to help her dress, and shortly afterward, Lady Meg and Rosalie went downstairs. Leading Janet, Bella, and Fiona down more slowly, in her sleek saffron-silk gown, Robina stopped at the hall archway, amazed at the size of the crowd. She prayed that no part of her gown would open to embarrass her before so many.

  The ladies had slipped loose white ribbons through the aglets in back where her bodice lacing should be, ribbons that audience members would snatch away when she passed by afterward. The eight silk-covered buttons on each sleeve were undone. And, beneath the gown, the ribbon that gathered it close to keep it on was untied.

  Tradition also forbade sashes, belts, or buckles, so she had not worn a girdle round her hips. She had never felt so vulnerable.

  All anyone need do, she thought uneasily, was to reach out, grab a sleeve as she passed, and give it a good yank. That would
bare her to everyone.

  Her silk-shod feet had rooted to the archway’s flagstone floor.

  Fiona, Bella, and Janet kept silent, but Robina sensed their impatience.

  Dev stood on the dais by the makeshift altar, next to the priest, murmuring to Benjy, who stood beside him. Ormiston was next to Benjy, gazing on the lower hall. The men were tall, dwarfing the young laird.

  A touch to Robina’s shoulder startled her. Turning, she found Wat beside her.

  “I’ll take you to the dais, Robby,” he said with his warm smile. “After all, someone in the family must give you to that devil, so I’ve appointed myself. Hope you don’t mind.”

  “Only if giving me away means you’ll feel obliged to ignore my shouts for aid if he brutalizes me,” she replied lightly. Wat’s very presence had eased her tension.

  With a direct look and no sign of humor, he said firmly, “You know you can rely on me if ever you need me, lass.”

  “I do, sir, and I thank you. You don’t think he’s a devil, either, I know.”

  His grin flashed then. “Whether he is, is not, or may become so, I’ll back you against him anytime, cousin.”

  Noting that Dev watched them with a frown, she felt deep satisfaction rather than concern to see it. She smiled at Wat and said, “I think we’d best begin, sir, don’t you?”

  Hearing his soft chuckle, knowing he’d also seen Dev’s frown, she rested a hand on Wat’s extended forearm and went with him happily to meet her fate.

  Dev watched Robby and Wat approach the dais with her three bride-maidens behind them. Bella walked alone. Jannie and Fiona followed her, side by side.

  Although he’d never thought that he was capable of jealousy or understood exactly how the emotion manifested itself, he’d recognized it the instant Wat touched Robby’s shoulder with only that beautiful, doubtless sensuous, golden silk between his flesh and hers. To touch her in such a way before Dev could was practically a hanging offense. He wanted to give Wat all he deserved for taking such a liberty.

  “A groom usually greets his bride with a smile, my son,” the priest said dulcetly.

  “Ye should smile at her, Dev,” Benjy muttered. “Our Beany is gey beautiful, I think. I ha’ never seen her in such a splendid gown before.”

  “Nor have I,” Dev said. Catching Robby’s eye and detecting a distinct twinkle, he collected his wits. The last thing he wanted on this day of days was to hear her tease him for jealousy that she must easily have perceived.

  Nevertheless, having recognized it, he knew he would likely feel it often, because Benjy was right. With her tawny waves unbound, flowing over her shoulders to her waist as they did, she was more than beautiful, and she was about to be his. A wave of masculine pride and responsibility surged through him.

  Ormiston, shifting weight, made a slight sound with his shoe. That it drew Dev’s notice told him how quiet the hall was. The sea of visitors, servants, tenants, and other guests seemed to hold its breath as Robby and her attendants stepped onto the dais.

  Eyes downcast, she approached Dev, watching her step and managing her skirt. The priest stepped forward when she reached her place. Her long, dark lashes flickered then. When she looked up at Dev, his breath stopped in his throat.

  Her cheeks were rosy, her mossy eyes limpid. When her lips parted invitingly, he felt his body stir.

  “Face me now, my son,” Father Hubert murmured.

  Dev obeyed and, seconds later, gave thanks that he had only to repeat what the priest said. His wits had abandoned him. His single thought was that Robby was nearly his, in a loose silken gown that blatantly invited sex.

  His body stirred again, and he prayed that he wouldn’t spend himself before the ceremony ended. The words were a mere buzz, because under the silky golden surface that screamed for his touch, his bride wore at most a thin shift and, irrelevantly, a pair of flimsy silk slippers.

  “Have you a ring, my son?”

  Startled, Dev took from Benjy’s sweaty hand the ring that Lady Meg had given him the previous day and handed it to the priest. Then, warily, he watched Robby’s reaction.

  While the priest blessed the ring and then slipped it onto her ring finger, she looked at it and then at Dev, her eyes wide and sparkling. “Where—?”

  The priest interrupted her. “Prithee, my children, face your guests.”

  Hearing him through echoes of Robby’s delight and his own gratitude to Lady Meg for her gift, Dev obeyed, tucking Robby’s left hand into the crook of his right elbow.

  “My lords, my ladies, and all who bless this wedding by your presence, I present Sir David and Lady Ormiston. You may now express your approval and prepare to feast their happiness. And you, Sir David, may kiss your lady bride.”

  Dev heard that plainly and willingly obeyed.

  “Take care that you don’t have this dress off me,” Robby protested, her lips moving warmly against his. “I’ve feared it might fall off ever since I put it on.”

  “I don’t want that either, my love,” he murmured.

  “What did you call me?”

  “You heard me.”

  He hugged her closer and saw that some of the ribbons so flimsily linking the aglets at the back of her bodice had nearly freed themselves.

  Tugging gently at the worst offender until he could grasp both ends between his first finger and thumb, he managed to tighten it a bit. He saw then that he’d guessed right about her shift being thin. It looked as if it, too, were silk.

  His fingers itched to stroke the gown and all that it concealed.

  Sitting beside Dev for the wedding feast, Robina waited for the servers to move to others at the table before she said, “How did you come by my mother’s wedding ring?”

  “You remember it, then. Lady Meg didn’t know if you would.”

  She held out her hand to look at the narrow gold band and the round amethyst nestled in it, feeling again her joy at recognizing the ring when the priest had taken it from Dev. Memories of her mother flooded through her when the priest touched it to her left thumb, index finger, and middle finger, saying, “In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit…” Then, slipping it onto her ring finger, he’d said, “Amen.”

  It had felt as if her mother were blessing their marriage.

  “Of course, I remember it,” she said. “Before Mam, it was my Granddame Gledstanes’s ring and her granddame’s before her. But what had Lady Meg to do with it?”

  “Your father gave it to her before he died and said that, although it is a Gledstanes ring, your mother wanted you to have it on your wedding day. Rab had agreed, too.”

  A wary look in his eyes suggested something left unsaid, but she smiled. “Thank you for letting me have it as my wedding ring. It was a wonderful surprise.”

  “What else are you thinking, lass?” he asked. “I keep expecting you to add ‘but.’ ”

  Searching his expression and finding only curiosity, she said frankly, “I did wonder if you’d liefer have given me one that marked me as your possession.”

  To her relief, he chuckled. “And I worried that you’d expect a ring of mine. I’ll think of many ways to demonstrate that you’re mine, sweetheart, I promise you.”

  That promise, the endearment that accompanied it, and the warm way he looked at her sent unfamiliar heat pulsing through her. She felt it from her head, to her heart, to her toes, in places and ways that she had never known before Dev came into her life.

  Men who had brought instruments began to play them. Others sang, and in no time, the lower hall became increasingly rowdy.

  She saw Dev turn to Wat and Wat gesture to Sym Elliot. Sym got up and gestured to Benjy, who followed him from the dais with a grin. Soon, Jock and other Coklaw and Rankilburn men began quietly moving through the hall forming a path of sorts from the dais to the archway.

  “Time to go upstairs, lass,” Dev murmured in her ear. “Whilst our men can still maintain control.”

  “Nay, my lad,” Wat said sternly and lo
udly enough for Robina to hear him as he put a hand to Dev’s shoulder. “Her ladyship’s bride-maidens and the other ladies will attend her. You will stay with us until she’s ready for you.”

  “Just who is in charge of this place?” Dev demanded.

  Grinning, Wat said, “You are, just as soon as the ladies have had time to prepare your bride for you. Meantime, we’ll keep you busy. Have some more wine, laddie, but don’t overdo it. You’re joining my family, so you must perform well tonight.”

  Since Dev’s own men had joined them and showed no sign of aiding him, he submitted to the inevitable, wistfully watching Robby leave the hall.

  Even with men lining the pathway, she’d already lost most of the ribbons from her gown. He saw her clap a hand to her bodice as if fearing that it, too, would vanish. However, she escaped without further embarrassment.

  The singing and music continued, and the songs grew rowdier and more profane until Dev laughed as loudly as anyone.

  Then Wat drew his attention to Sym in the archway, gesturing.

  “Time to claim your bride,” Wat said cheerfully. “We’ll come along to see you suitably prepared for her.”

  “I’d rather prepare myself, thanks,” Dev growled.

  “Aye, sure, but ’tis our ancient duty to serve you.”

  “You’re enjoying this too much. I missed your wedding, so…”

  “Nearly everyone missed it,” Wat said. “I’d have recommended something similar to you, too, had you given me warning.”

  Given no say in his doom from then on, Dev reached his bedchamber wearing no more than a grimace. He’d retained a grip on only a tattered shirt that he thought was his.

  A grinning Sym stood guard at the door.

  When Wat raised his eyebrows, Sym nodded. “The other ladies ha’ gone up, sir, and Father Hubert blessed the bed. Herself told him God would forgive his doing it afore her ladyship undressed. I needna tell ye that he said the blessing right quick after that.”

  “Wise man,” Wat said. After a brisk double rap on the door, he lifted the latch and pushed it open. “In you go,” he said to Dev. “See that you do credit to your sex, or reap the cost forevermore.”