by Tommie Lyn
“Yes, Ma. I do,” she said, her voice almost inaudible.
“Then, young man, go build the house,” Dearshul said.
“Thank you,” Ailean said. He smiled and looked at Mùirne, wishing they could be alone so he could hold her, kiss her and be reassured of her love for him.
“You can go home now,” Dearshul said. “And tell your father I’ll speak to the parson, and I’ll plan the wedding. When will he come here so we can meet him?”
“I…I’ll bring him soon.”
“You can go now,” Dearshul repeated, with a smile.
Ailean hesitated, smiled at Dearshul and glanced at Mùirne once more. She looked up at that moment and their eyes met. Mùirne smiled at him and all his doubt and pain and turmoil caused by Grandma MacPhàrlain’s words melted away as though they had never been.
Ailean left the MacNeachdainn’s cottage, and he wanted to run all the way home. The faster everything happened, the sooner Mùirne would be his, safe from any claim of Latharn Cambeul’s.
____________
Aodh and Brìghde met with Dearshul to finalize the wedding plans. They decided to hold the wedding at the church near the MacLachlainns’ home.
Although many of his clan were Catholic, Aodh and Brìghde, like Dearshul and her family, had converted and become Presbyterian. The church where they worshipped was a mile from their home. The wedding ceremony would be performed there, and Ailean’s parents would host the wedding festivities at their home afterward.
Aodh and Bridghe agreed with Dearshul that in addition to the Christian ceremony, the couple’s wedding should include traditional Celtic rites, like jumping the broom, rites handed down through countless generations from their Celtic ancestors.
Dearshul liked Ailean’s parents and was thankful that Mùirne would be marrying into a family of decent, honorable people. The MacLachlainns were, like her own family, like the people of most Highland clans, poor and hard working, eking out a precarious existence on the beautiful but harsh Highland hills. She watched them as they made their way along the path from Elasaid’s home.
By marrying this MacLachlainn boy instead of a rich man like Latharn Cambeul, my little Mùirne will have a life of hard work ahead of her. As I have had, and my mother, and her mother before her. But maybe, being married to a good man, she may find some happiness. Lord knows she’s had so little happiness in her short life.
Her brow creased and a tightness bound her chest as she thought back over the years. But she dismissed the unwelcome memories and looked for chores to do, using work to keep her heartaches and worries at a distance.
____________
Latharn sat alone at the table with his head in his hands. His parents had left that morning for Edinburgh. Catriona, the cleaning woman, worked as silently as possible as she completed her morning chores. Catriona knew well Latharn’s black moods and aimed to avoid calling any notice to herself when he was in what she called “one of his states.” She didn’t know what had brought this one on and didn’t care to know.
“Hello, the house,” called someone from outside.
She hurried to the door. “Who is it?”
“Odhran Cambeul.”
____________
Latharn heard Odhran’s voice and called out, “Let him in.”
Catriona opened the door, and Odhran entered.
“What is it?” Latharn asked when Odhran approached him.
“It’s something I thought you’d want to know.” Odhran shuffled his feet, nervous and tense.
He didn’t want to be the one to tell Latharn what he’d learned. But he dreaded even more Latharn’s fury if he found out Odhran had known about it and hadn’t told him.
“Speak up, man. What is it?”
“It’s about Mùirne MacPhàrlain.”
Better to tell it a piece at a time than to pour it out all at once. Odhran clasped his hands, released them.
“Well, what about her?”
“I heard something today.”
“Then tell me!” Latharn shouted.
Odhran took a deep breath and blurted, “She’s going to marry the MacLachlainn boy.”
“No!” Latharn shouted. He jumped up, knocking his chair over. It clattered onto the stone floor. “No! That can’t be!”
Odhran backed away from Latharn, tried to stay out of his reach. He knew from experience it was not safe to be within arm’s length of Latharn when he was in a rage. Latharn’s violence could, and often did, spill out onto whomever was nearby. And whether or not Odhran himself was the cause, he would likely bear the brunt of it.
Latharn glared at him. “Where did you hear this?”
“Her mother spoke to the parson, and the parson’s wife is my aunt. She told my mother.”
“Where is Mùirne? Did she tell you that?”
“She’s staying with her sister. The one who married Raibeart MacNeachdainn.”
“The marriage will not happen! I won’t allow it!” Latharn shouted. He began pacing, trying to decide what to do, while Odhran used the opportunity to slip out the door.
Since childhood, Latharn had almost always gotten his way, using charm, or by using wild tantrums when his charm didn’t work. He decided to retake the woman he loved. He would use his grace and charisma to win her, to capture her heart, to steal her away from MacLachlainn.
She will listen to reason, he told himself. What woman wouldn’t prefer a life of ease with a polished, educated and handsome man instead of a life of drudgery in a poor hovel with an ignorant young crofter like MacLachlainn? She just doesn’t understand what’s at stake.
TEN
Dearshul frowned when she opened the door and saw Latharn standing there, smiling, looking handsome and poised, arrayed in his finery. An attendant stood at his elbow.
“I’m here to see Mùirne,” he said, his voice smooth and cultured. “I need to talk to her.”
“She doesn’t want to talk to you.”
Latharn’s courteous demeanor changed in an instant.
“She’d better talk to me.” A scowl pulled Latharn’s finely drawn brows together. “And she’d better not go ahead with this foolish plan to marry MacLachlainn. I’ve come to warn her.”
Dearshul had never seen Latharn belligerent, and she recoiled before his piercing stare. He seemed like a different person. His gracious smile transformed into a surly frown, and his deferential manner of speaking became an angry, petulant whine.
Mùirne made the right choice. A wave of revulsion, followed by cold apprehension, washed over Dearshul. What would my poor Mùirne’s life have been if I’d forced her to marry this man?
She swallowed and took a deep breath. “Her decision has been made. I think you’d better go.”
____________
Latharn hesitated. He had rarely been denied anything he wanted. He didn’t know how to deal with her mother’s refusal to allow him to see Mùirne.
He rubbed a hand across his chin, tried to calm himself, tried to stifle his impulse to lash out at Mùirne’s mother. He saw the way she was looking at him, saw fear in her eyes and something else—what was it?—loathing? It had been a mistake, coming to the house when he still harbored angry feelings. He should have waited, calmed down more. He forced himself to paste an affable smile on his lips, bowed and took his leave.
As he mounted his horse and rode away, he told himself surely Mùirne would come to her senses. She couldn’t want the hard life of a poor crofter’s wife when she could enjoy ease and plenty with him. He had to think of a way to get her to see that, before it was too late, before she was married.
Over the next three weeks, Latharn alternately descended into a dark depression or flew into a fury. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t think of a way to convince Mùirne to marry him instead of MacLachlainn. He schemed and planned, looked for an approach to win Mùirne.
I could lie in wait with my men and capture her. I could hold her at my house until she agrees to marry me.
No. That
wouldn’t work. He discarded each idea which occurred to him.
As the date of the wedding grew nearer, he sank into a morass of melancholy from which he couldn’t extract himself. Sometimes, an acute awareness of loss pierced him like a sharp spike, and he drank whisky to dull the pain.
Latharn didn’t know what to do with himself. He had no one to talk to. His parents were away, but even if they had been at home, he wouldn’t have confided in them about his deep sorrow. His father believed in presenting a forceful, confident façade to the world, and he insisted his son do the same. Latharn’s sadness and self-doubt over losing Mùirne would be unacceptable to Eachann Cambeul.
If Latharn had been a different sort of man, he might have had friends to help him deal with the blow of losing the woman he wanted. But he’d never felt the need of friends. He only wanted obedience or admiration from others, not love and friendship. His thoughts and cares were for himself, his father and his mother. No one else.
Until he met Mùirne.
Her loveliness was so exquisite and ethereal, the essence of fraility that hung about her was so touching that Latharn began to care about her, began to care about someone besides himself and his parents.
____________
Ailean built a cottage near his father’s house, on the opposite side from Coinneach’s. He gathered and stacked the stones with his own hands. Coinneach gave Ailean help and advice, particularly about placing the rafters and thatching the roof.
“Be sure to get those rafters up high enough. Wouldn’t want you bumping your head.” Coinneach grinned and slapped Ailean’s shoulder.
Ailean usually found himself at a disadvantage when faced with Coinneach’s teasing. He didn’t often respond with a witty reply because, most of the time, any retort that came to mind seemed unkind instead of funny. And he’d rather be thought dull and boring than to hurt someone’s feelings. So Ailean merely smiled and continued with his work on the house he was building for Mùirne.
The cottage was small, only one room, but he constructed a byre at one end. Ailean hung a curtain, made of an old féileadh-mòr, to separate the sleeping area from the living area. It would be a crude but snug home for the woman he loved.
I can add more to it later.
With the help of his father and brothers, Ailean built a rough worktable, two low stools and a bed. There were no other pieces of furniture, no chests or cabinets for storing household items, so they built shelves against one wall. When it was all finished, Ailean surveyed his handiwork with his arms folded across his chest, smiling and filled with pride. He couldn’t wait to bring Mùirne here.
He stole away to his favorite mountaintop the day after the cottage was finished. He sat on the rock, looking down on the glen at the home where he would live forever with his beloved.
Contentment and exhilaration blended, separated, mingled again, with first one, then the other swirling to the surface of his agitated emotions. In his daydream, he could see far into the future, to the days and weeks and years that he and Mùirne would dwell in the stone cottage he’d built with his own hands. They would be surrounded by all his loved ones, happy, content, secure and fulfilled.
A small voice whispered in the back of his mind, “And what of the grand exploits you dreamed of? What of the great adventures you wanted to experience?”
He squeezed his eyes shut. That doesn’t matter anymore. Mùirne is all I need, all I want. Those were the plans of a boy, and I’ve become a man now.
But a tiny, wistful yearning remained that would not be pushed aside, would not be silenced.
Ailean had not seen Mùirne in more than a week. Although building the cottage took less time than he expected, making the few pieces of furniture had been time-consuming. One morning, he awoke before daybreak and hurried out of the house before his father could awaken and think of some chore Ailean needed to do. He had to see Mùirne, was hungering to be with her.
____________
Latharn alternately raged or planned revenge with cold intensity. He realized the only thing he could do to stop the wedding was to intimidate MacLachlainn. Or kill him.
He first thought of going to MacLachlainn’s home to confront him. But it would be too dangerous to do it alone. He would have to gather his crofters and cottars, take them along to keep MacLachlainn’s family at bay while Latharn dealt with him.
But such an action would get him into trouble with the Duke of Argyll. The Duke would not tolerate an incident which upset the uneasy peace between Clan Cambeul and Clan MacLachlainn.
Latharn would have to face MacLachlainn alone, away from his family.
He rode each morning to the trail leading from Clan MacLachlainn lands and hid beside it. If MacLachlainn visited Mùirne at her sister’s home, he would travel this path.
Latharn sat on his horse for hours each day and watched for the man who had stolen Mùirne’s heart from him. On the fifth morning, he was ready to give up and leave when he saw a man moving rapidly on foot along the path.
It was MacLachlainn.
____________
When the track crossed a cleared glen, Ailean heard hoof beats of a running horse behind him. He glanced over his shoulder and saw a man riding toward him. A brief moment later, he realized the man was Latharn. Ailean pivoted to face the oncoming horse and stepped off the path to be out of its way. Latharn guided the horse toward Ailean, and he knew Latharn intended to ride over him, to trample him beneath the churning hoofs of the horse.
Ailean crouched and turned to his right as the horse neared, as though he planned to jump in that direction. Latharn reined the horse to the right. At the last moment, Ailean jumped backward, to the left, out of the horse’s path.
“You dastard!” he shouted as Latharn rode past. “Trying to have a horse trample me instead of fighting me like a man!”
Ailean started running toward the MacNeachdainns’. No. That wouldn’t do. Mùirne would be there. He didn’t want to endanger her or anyone else. He turned and sprinted up the hill away from the path. He had to get away from Latharn and the horse.
He heard the horse pounding up the hill behind him, heard Latharn shout, “Running again, coward?”
Latharn’s words poured over him like hot water. Ailean ground his teeth and turned, half-crouched, facing Latharn. When the horse drew near, Ailean jumped behind a tree, let it pass, and moved into the open again. Latharn swung the horse around and headed for Ailean. When the horse reached him, Ailean sidestepped it and grabbed Latharn’s foot as the animal streaked by. He yanked hard and toppled Latharn from the saddle.
Latharn hit the ground on his back with a grunt. He lay still for a moment, gasping, trying to get his breath. He rolled over and tried to stand. On his second attempt, he managed to get to his feet, and he stood hunched over in obvious pain, glaring at Ailean.
“I heard about your plans to marry Mùirne. I’m warning you, don’t go through with it. I’ll kill you if you do.”
ELEVEN
The day of the wedding dawned clear and cold. A steady breeze off Loch Fyne rustled the entwined branches of the rowan trees which stood on either side of the door to Aodh and Brìghde’s cottage and formed an archway over it. Ailean bathed and dressed early and was pacing, his stomach unsettled and his muscles tight, wishing for the hours to pass.
“Aren’t you ready yet?” he said to Niall for the fifth time.
“Ma, tell him to leave me alone,” Niall said.
“I’ll leave you alone when you get ready. You’ll make me late for my wedding. If you don’t care enough about it to get yourself ready, I don’t care if you don’t come at all.”
“Ailean! What an unkind thing to say to your brother,” Brìghde said. “Apologize to him.”
Ailean said nothing. He lowered his head, his chin jutting out and his brows drawn together in a frown and stared at Niall.
The door opened. Coinneach and Raghnall entered. They were to escort Ailean to the church. Ailean swallowed hard and took several quick, sha
llow breaths. His stomach churned, and his hands felt damp. He rubbed them dry on his féileadh-mòr .
“Ready to go?” Coinneach asked.
“Yes,” Ailean said, and started out the door ahead of them. “Since you’re not ready, you can wait and come with Ma and Da,” he said to Niall over his shoulder.
“Ailean!” Aodh called out. Ailean stopped and looked back.
“Yes, Da?”
“Where’s your sword? How many times have I told you, never go about anywhere without your sword.”
“But, Da, it’s my wedding day—” Ailean began.
“Put it on.”
“But—”
“Put it on.”
Ailean grabbed his sheathed sword from the peg where it hung, impatiently strapped it on and hurried out the door.
____________
Coinneach laughed at Ailean’s reply to one of his barbed remarks as they emerged from the woods into a cleared area. But the smile left his face when he saw three men with swords drawn, standing on the path facing them. One of them was Latharn Cambeul.
“My quarrel is not with you other men. It’s with MacLachlainn,” Latharn said. “Stay out of the way. My men will make sure you do.”
“Stay back,” Ailean told Coinneach and Raghnall. “I’ll take care of this.”
The two exchanged looks. There was no doubt he would take care of it. All the young men on the croft trained together regularly with their swords and knew Ailean was the best. Coinneach and Raghnall backed away, leaving him to face Latharn alone.
“I warned you not to go through with this wedding, MacLachlainn,” Latharn said, and he lunged forward, the point of his sword aimed at Ailean’s heart.
Ailean moved out of reach of the blade and drew his own. Latharn advanced again and swung his sword at Ailean’s stomach, but Ailean stopped the swing with his own blade. Latharn ground his teeth and glared at Ailean, brought his sword up and slashed down toward Ailean’s head. But Ailean brought his sword around and up, the two blades met with a resounding clang, and with a deft maneuver, Ailean pushed Latharn’s weapon away.