by Amanda Scott
Wat paid only a brief visit to Kirkurd. Having sent word of his father’s death and his own new status to his steward there immediately after Rankilburn’s death, he stayed long enough only to be sure that all was well with his people and to lend verisimilitude to any later suggestion that he might move kine south from Kirkurd.
His burly steward, who had served the Scotts for nearly thirty years, assured him that all was well, adding, “Ye’ll do well, looking after all your new estates, m’lord. We ken fine that your da had every faith in ye, but we here at Kirkurd ken better than most that ye make a good master.”
“Sakes, Jock, I’ve been away with the Douglas more than I’ve been here,” Wat protested. “If all is well, it is due more to your skills than to mine.”
“Aye, sure,” the older man replied, nodding. “But many of us here ha’ known ye since birth, laird, so we know we can trust ye. We’d no let ye down.”
Wat swallowed hard, thanked the older man, and clapped him on the back.
Riding away with his men afterward, he felt strangely mixed emotions. His people’s trust reassured him and boosted his confidence. But it humbled him, too.
He sent a brief prayer aloft that he would not let them down.
Kirkurd lay some miles northwest of Henderland, so darkness began closing in long before he and his men reached Scott’s Hall. However, they had prepared for that likelihood and had already lit torches.
Wat was tired by then but grateful that, other than its miserable weather, the day had passed without further incident.
To be sure, Cockburn’s menacing smile had given him pause, but the man was more of a nuisance than a menace and did not frighten him. Had Cockburn’s sons been at his side, the meeting might have taken a more dangerous turn.
But his sons were not there, which meant that their men were away, too. Their absence had left their father and thus Henderland with a much reduced force.
Moreover, the Borders were relatively peaceful, the English not having attacked across the line for months. Reivers remained plentiful, to be sure. But they were not an army, and Borderers took what precautions they could against them.
He knew that his own reputation and that of Clan Scott had afforded him protection at Henderland, too. He had kept his temper with surprising ease, feeling confident that Cockburn would not dare try to keep him at Henderland. Nor had he.
Satisfied that he had honored his duty to Molly’s father and had done so without rising to the man’s baiting, Wat realized that the Cockburns would not let the matter rest. Now that they knew Molly was at Scott’s Hall, he would have to double his guard there.
They had ridden silently for some time more when Geordie said, “I did learn summat at Henderland, laird. Leastwise, I been pondering, and I think I did.”
Aware of how easily voices carried through the still night air, Wat said, “Let us ride a short distance ahead before you tell me.”
“Ye can trust our lads, sir.”
“I know that,” Wat said. “But I’d liefer give them no cause to gossip, even amongst themselves. We barely know Lady Rosalie’s people yet, after all. One of them might still be loyal to the Percies or even to the English king.”
Geordie nodded, took a torch from Kip Graham, and motioned for the others to fall back a bit more.
When Wat was satisfied that no one else would hear them, he said, “Tell me now, Geordie. What did you glean?”
Instead of answering directly, Geordie said, “D’ye ken aught o’ what this grievous Rutherford chappie looks like?”
“Nay, just that he’s a ruffian who discards all civility when he raids.”
“Aye, but we hear that about Will Cockburn and his lot, too,” Geordie said with a straight look. “I were thinking this Rutherford chap must have size to ’im, and muscle. But whilst I were a-drying our horses and seein’ they got feed and water, I heard two lads talking o’ someone they called Wee Gilly.”
“Such a name could refer to almost anyone, male or female,” Wat said.
“Aye, sure, ’cept the one lad said this Wee Gilly wouldna like summat. Then t’other one said he wouldna want tae be nearby did Gilly fly into a tirrivee again, like he did after the Redesdale raid. The first man told the second tae hold his wheesht, and I went on about me chores like I didna hear nowt.”
Wat considered the image that Geordie’s description suggested.
Geordie kept silent, evidently having said all he meant to say.
At last, Wat said, “You’ve been pondering that since we left Henderland, Geordie. Why did you not tell me at once, or when we stopped at Kirkurd?”
“We was later than we’d meant t’ be, sir,” Geordie said. “I could see ye was impatient t’ be away again. Then, too, I were none so sure o’ me thinkin’. See you, I’d thought o’ this Rutherford as a great, fiery fiend on horseback. The notion that he might be a puny one just didna set right wi’ me until I bethought me of our own Jock’s Wee Tammy. Could be, I thought, that the brute be a brute and the name be nobbut one as ha’ stuck wi’ him since he were a bairn.”
Wat nodded. “That could be, aye. Men at Henderland might call him so because they’ve known him since then—or their masters have. Or those two you overheard might have been talking about some other chap altogether.”
Geordie did not reply, but Wat could tell that he was thinking. His own gut told him that Rutherford was just the sort of villain Will Cockburn might know and would follow. And Ned would go where Will went. As for Thomas…
Recalling Molly’s assurance that Thomas loathed violence, Wat dismissed Thomas but continued to consider Will and Ned as Rutherford’s possible allies.
The rain had stopped an hour later when they reached the Hall, although clouds still blackened the sky. Wat dismounted, turned his horse and his oilskin over to Geordie, and went straight inside, looking forward to his bed.
Heading upstairs, he rounded the curve in the stairway below the cresset-lit landing outside Lady Meg’s sitting room and came to an abrupt halt.
Molly, fast asleep, leaned sideways against the wall by the door with her knees bent up under her skirt. Her left cheek rested on her knees, and her arms were wrapped round her shins. Her rosy lips had slightly parted.
He stood looking down at her. A slight, if weary, smile curved his lips.
She resembled a child who had slipped downstairs after being sent to bed, to listen to or even peek at what the grownups were doing. He suspected that she had been listening for his return, wanting to know what had happened with her father.
The orange-gold cresset flame made her skin look softly gilded and lit golden highlights in her hair. Her eyelids had a bluish cast, as if they were too thin to do their job properly.
Gently, he touched her shoulder, hoping to avoid startling her into crying out and waking Lady Meg.
Her thick, dark lashes fluttered. Nothing else moved.
“Molly-lass, wake up,” he murmured.
Her lashes fluttered again, and her rosy lips twitched, reminding him of how they had tasted, soft and a bit salty. Her body stiffened then, as if it had just become aware of his hand on her shoulder.
Molly, waking from a dream of Wat’s voice to the reality of hearing it, opened one eye. Meeting his slightly amused gaze, she sat bolt upright and looked around, trying to recall where she was and just how she came to be there.
“You’re sitting in front of Gram’s sitting-room door,” he said quietly. “You should be in bed.”
She wanted to tell him that she was perfectly capable of deciding when she should go to bed. But since she had no idea what time it was, she muttered instead, “I… I got worried. I thought you would return before sundown.”
What, she wondered, would he think of that? Will would tell her that his business was none of hers and that a man returned when a man returned.
“I rode on to Kirkurd, to see to things there before turning back southward.”
“I didn’t know,” she said, stretching her legs and arms out slowly t
o see if everything moved normally. When a cramp erupted in her right calf, she shifted both hands hastily to massage it.
“I’m sorry, I ought to have known you’d worry,” Wat said then. Those simple words, spoken in that soft, rather sensuous murmur, seemed to float on the air.
She gathered her wits. “What happened? Was Will there? Was Tuedy?”
But he was watching her rub her leg. He said bluntly, “What’s amiss, lass?”
“Just a wee cramp. I don’t know how long I’ve been sitting here.”
“Let me,” he said, dropping to a knee.
Gently, he touched her hand and eased it out of his way. Then, cupping the still skirt-covered calf, he hooked his long fingers over her shin and pressed the heel of his hand into the calf muscle, kneading it.
Silently, she stared at that hand for a time before she relaxed and said, “Do you not want to tell me what happened, sir?”
“I saw only your father. He said Will and Ned were away. He also insists that your marriage was legal and that Tuedy has every right to have his wife back. I told him to talk to Father Jonathan about that and, if necessary, to Father Abbot.”
“He must be furious with me,” she said, wincing.
“Did I hurt you?” Wat asked sharply, releasing her calf.
“Nay, don’t stop,” she pleaded. “That feels good. I winced, just thinking of Father’s anger and Will’s, not to mention Tuedy’s.”
“Forget Tuedy, lass,” he said, returning his attention to kneading her calf. “That marriage is as if it never happened. The abbot said he would speak for the Kirk. Recall, too, that his grace was at Melrose and likely still is.”
“I doubt that the King knows who I am or cares a whit about my marriage.”
“I don’t know if Father Abbot told him why I’d come,” Wat admitted. “But he cares about Scottish law. He has exerted himself to learn what laws are good and which are bad, so the abbot may have told him about you. If he did, Jamie might take an interest. Sakes, if I can lay this reiver he wants by the heels, I’ll ask him.”
“You have mentioned that reiver before,” Molly said. “But you have not told me his name. Who is he?”
Realizing only then that he had omitted Rutherford’s name on purpose, Wat hesitated to tell Molly more without thinking first about whether he dared trust her.
His men knew enough to ask their questions without noising it about that he sought to bring the reiver to justice. But Molly was still new to him. He did not know her well enough to be sure she would keep such news to herself.
Swiftly deciding that they would be wiser to talk elsewhere and after they’d slept, he said, “We’ll talk in the morning. I’ll tell you then what your dad and I said to each other but not on these stairs. Do you think you can stand on this leg now?”
“Aye, sure, the cramp was just reminding me of how foolish I was to sit for so long in one position.”
“Come then, and I’ll see you safely upstairs.” Extending a hand, he helped her to her feet.
Her hair was tousled. She blinked sleepily. The impulse to offer her a hug was strong, but he resisted, reminding himself that she was his guest.
He had no right to behave so in any event, he told himself firmly. Moreover, the always alert Sym might be sleeping in the tower again and be wakeful.
When they reached her door, Wat opened it for her. However, when she turned toward him, standing much too close, he stepped back a pace.
“Good night, Molly,” he murmured. “Sleep well. We’ll talk in the morning.”
She nodded, met his gaze one last time, and slipped inside the dark room, shutting the door quietly behind her.
Wat stood there, wondering at his own feelings and recalling his talk with his grandmother. He had never contemplated marriage before, not with serious intent. And heaven knew he had more than enough to do without thinking about it now.
Molly stared into the blackness around her. She had dismissed Emma hours before, meaning to go right to sleep. But her imagination had immediately begun sending a stream of pictures through her mind, suggesting horrid things that might have happened at Henderland if her father had lost his temper or if Will had.
When a fear struck her that Will had locked Wat in the tower dungeon and meant to leave him there to starve, she had scrambled out of bed again, put her kirtle back on, and crept downstairs.
She had meant to listen for his return and then, reassured of his safety, to steal swiftly back to her chamber. Instead, like a dafty, she had fallen asleep.
Having failed to light a candle before leaving her chamber, and too sleepy to find her tinderbox and light one now, she padded in darkness to her bed. Pulling off her kirtle, she laid it at the foot of the bed and climbed back in, in her shift.
She was asleep before she gave a thought to sleeping and awoke when a shaft of sunlight through a crack in the shutter touched her face, telling her she had slept longer than usual. That meant either that Emma had peeked in and decided to let her sleep, or that Wat had told the maidservant to leave her be.
Fearful, but nonetheless eager to hear what had transpired between Wat and her father, and to ask Wat what he thought Tuedy might do next, she washed her face with cold water and donned the pink kirtle. Reattaching her tinderbox to her leather girdle, she adjusted the girdle around her hips and buckled it in place.
Then, draping the pink and gray shawl across her shoulders, she flipped one end over the other in a loose knot at her breast, slid her feet into woolen slippers, and hurried down to the hall.
To her disappointment, only Bella and Lady Scott remained at the high table.
Edwin met her as she stepped onto the dais.
“I’ll have my usual boiled egg and a slice of cold beef, please,” she said.
“And toast, m’lady?”
“Aye, thank you, Edwin.”
“You are gey late, Molly,” Bella said. “Could you not sleep last night?”
“I must have been more tired than I knew,” Molly replied with a smile.
Lady Scott said quietly, “When one is tired, one must sleep.”
“Aye, madam,” Molly said, turning her smile toward her ladyship. “In troth, I am used to having so many chores at home that I am often up late and again with the dawn. Having much less to do here, I fear I am becoming lazy, so if I can do aught to aid you, prithee tell me so.”
Bella said cheerfully, “I have been learning to milk cows, Molly. You could help me with that.”
“I’d like that,” Molly said. “I’m a good milkmaid.”
Bella giggled.
“Not today, however,” Wat said from the far end of the great hall, his voice carrying easily over Bella’s giggles. “If you have broken your fast, Lady Molly, I would speak with you.”
“She has only just told Edwin what she wants to eat,” Bella said.
“I’ll wait, then,” Wat replied, approaching the dais. “I had meant to ask you to walk in the courtyard,” he said to Molly. “However, despite the sun, it is icy cold out there, and my men are practicing their skills, so ’tis noisy, too.”
As he stepped onto the dais, Lady Scott said, “If you would have speech with our guest, Walter, you may do so in the solar. Bella is going to help milk the cows, and Janet is sitting with Rosalie and your grandame in Meg’s sitting room. I mean to join them when I have finished here.”
Edwin served Molly’s breakfast then, and she gazed down at it, expecting someone to mention the impropriety of leaving her alone with his lordship. No one did, and she did not want to mention it herself, so she focused on her food.
While she ate, Wat chatted amiably with his mother and sister. But Molly had barely set down her spoon when he said, “Art finished, lass?”
Meeting his gaze and finding it more intense than usual, she wiped off her eating knife and slid it into its leather sheath on her girdle.
“Aye, sir,” she said then, feeling suddenly shy.
Wat watched color flood into Molly’s cheeks
but made no comment.
His mother’s suggestion that they talk in the solar had surprised him, but he knew it was his responsibility as master of Rankilburn never to discomfit a guest.
Moreover, the topic they had to discuss was more personal for Molly than it was for him. Believing that he understood her vulnerability, he reminded himself to choose his words carefully when he described his visit to Henderland.
“We’ll take the privy stair,” he said, gesturing toward it.
She preceded him, and when they reached the solar, she walked across it to the window embrasure and turned to face him.
“We can sit if you like,” he said, thinking she might be nervous with him.
“Prithee, just tell me what happened, sir. I spent yesterday imagining all manner of horrors befalling you. You said, though, that Will and Ned were away.”
“They were, and I saw no sign of Ringan Tuedy. Nor did your father mention his whereabouts. He said only that Tuedy believes the marriage was legal. Won’t you sit down, lass?” he added when she frowned. “You will be more comfortable on that cushioned window seat. I promise I’ll keep my distance.”
A twinkle lit her eyes, surprising him. “Do you think I fear you, sir?”
“I think you are unaccustomed to being alone with a man you barely know,” he said. Reaching for a back-stool, he turned it around so he might straddle it. “I would like to sit, too, but I must not unless you do.”
“Aye, sure, then,” she said, sitting obediently on the window seat.
Wat sat, too, and rested his forearms on the stool’s back. “Now,” he said, “I’ll tell you what happened yesterday.” He went on to describe his conversation with Cockburn but did not mention the menacing smile at the end of it.
“He disliked the fact of your being here,” he added. “But he did not demand your return. Instead, he wanted to know why the abbot had involved himself.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That he should ask his reverence, of course,” Wat said with a smile. “I meant only to assure him that you are safe, but we may have learned something helpful, nevertheless. It has to do with that reiver I mentioned last night.”