“I wondered when this would happen.”
“It has crossed my mind as well, Father.”
He walked to the window and looked across to the harbor. Fewer boats and ships now as autumn was preparing to give way to winter. Soon, the sea would be completely inhospitable to travelers. His father approached holding out a cup of wine.
“I would accept your good wishes, Rurik.”
“And I would give them, if I knew why.” He waited for his father to reveal the cause, but his father paused and met his gaze for a minute before speaking of the cause for celebration.
“Agnes will bear a child in the spring.”
Rurik smiled and held the cup up in a salute.
“I was not certain how you would take the news.”
How far they’d come in the last seven months, for now his father worried over his reactions instead of the other way round. How far they still had to go, he thought.
“I am pleased for both of you. Agnes must be happy?”
“Aye. This is her first child and she is worrying already over the smallest things.”
“There are many months to go and many more things to worry on,” he added. Now, with this news, mayhap his would not be so bad.
His father got the pitcher of wine and poured them both more. Sitting down again, Erengisl spoke first. “So, when do you leave?”
“How did you know?”
“I did not know, Rurik, I only suspected.” His father drank deeply and then put the cup down. “You have dragged your feet on approving each one of the provisions for your marriage contract. You have not built the house you talked about in Birsay. You have not set up your own council yet. All signs of someone not yet convinced of his place here.”
“I do not belong here, Father. In spite of your welcome and your offer, this is not my life.”
“Has she agreed to marry you?”
He paused, surprised by his father’s ability to discern what it had taken him months to realize. He’d done nothing in these months except mourn the missed opportunity to claim the woman he loved. It did not take him long to realize his mistake, but it was only recently that a solution was possible.
“I have not asked her yet. She will not see me.”
“Do you blame her?” His father watched him closely as he asked that question and even more closely as he waited for an answer.
“Nay. ’Twas my mistake that drove her into his grasp. But, I will not give up until she has forgiven me my stupidity.”
“So you will learn from your father’s mistakes then?”
Rurik looked at the man he never thought to call father again and remembered the question he’d challenged him with on his arrival. A question about the things Erengisl had done in the past and the question of whether he’d made the correct decision. “Do you admit it was a mistake?”
His father laughed as he met question with question. He smiled then and nodded. “You asked if losing her was worth all I gained. My answer to you is that love lost or given up is never worth what you gain in its stead.”
“Are you angry that I will upset all you put into place now?”
“Nay, Rurik. I am not that old yet and have many years yet to make arrangements. And with an heir on the way, there will be other sons to give my lands and wealth to.” His father then grew serious. “So, when do you leave?”
“I have some arrangements to work out and a bride to ask and then I hope to be back in Lairig Dubh before the winter sets in.” He could think of nothing he’d like more than spending the long, cold winter nights in his cottage, wrapped around Margriet. “If she’ll have me.”
His father stood and offered his hand. Rurik took hold of it and then pulled his father close.
“There will always be a place for you here, Rurik, if you decide you want to return.”
His throat tightened with unshed tears so he simply nodded and walked away. Just as he reached the door, his father added a comment.
“I would appreciate it, man to man, if you did not tell your mother I admitted that she was right.”
“Mother? Is she here?”
“Nay. But Margriet left for Scotland two weeks ago. Gunnar said she returned to the convent in Caithness.”
“And Mother?” he asked, dreading the answer he knew would come. “Please tell me it is not so. Tell me she is not the person who has been raising Margriet for all these years.”
His father cleared his throat and nodded. “She is known now to those at the convent as Reverend Mother Ingrid.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Convent of the Blessed Virgin
Caithness, Scotland
“If she does not come out in one hour, I will burn this convent to the ground and take her by force.”
The sound of his threat rang hollow, but what else was he to do?
He’d arrived here three days ago and neither Margriet or his mother would speak to him. He pleaded, he begged, he promised, he bribed and still she would not speak to him about his offer of marriage. He was running out of time and options.
Sven snorted from behind him, reminding him that Elspeth had also taken refuge within the convent’s walls with Margriet. And Sven was not happy. Rurik placed himself squarely in front of the gates and screamed her name out again.
Finally, the sound of whispering from above gained his attention. He moved back so he could see who stood there.
“Margriet,” he said through clenched teeth. “I am trying to respect the sanctity of this convent, but you are making it difficult.”
“I need more time,” she said.
“The betrothal agreements have been signed by my father and yours, Margriet.”
“But I have not given my consent, Rurik.”
“Open the gates, so that we might discuss this privately.”
“Do you swear not to force me from the convent?”
“Rurik!” Sven yelled. “Swear to anything, just get those damned gates open and get my wife!”
In spite of the hurried marriage after a nonexistent courtship, Sven had taken to married life like a pig in s…mud. Now, separated from Elspeth for these last three weeks, he was not in good humor. Surrendering to defeat, Rurik leaned his head against the gate and gave her the words she wanted.
“Yes, Margriet, I swear it. Now, please open the gates!”
He heard the bar lifted from the gates and stepped away as they swung open. He waited for Margriet to climb down from the tower and arrive there. Once there, he walked up to her and kissed her, as he’d been itching to do for all the months he could or dared not. And then he kissed her again. After the third time, Sven swept past him to claim his wife for the same kind of passionate reunion.
“Rurik?”
Another voice intruded into his wooing but he really did not want to stop for this one.
“Rurik?”
He lifted his mouth from hers only long enough to let her breathe and then he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her breathless again.
“Rurik!”
He stopped for a moment and answered the call now. If he knew his mother, and he did even though several years had passed since their last meeting, she would continue until she had his attention.
“’Tis the custom to gain the bride’s consent before the next steps are taken.”
“Yes, Mother,” he answered, knowing it would do no good to argue at this point.
Rurik released Margriet, being careful not to let her fall. He looked at the woman he loved, the woman who was worth giving up everything he’d ever wanted in his life, for he’d gained more than he lost in loving her. Now, if she would only consent to marrying him, they could proceed with all the good parts.
“Margriet, would you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”
Although most of the trouble she’d put him through by fleeing back to the convent and using his mother as a guard were not really trouble at all, he did not want her to think this was not the most serious thing he’d done in his life.
“I know t
hat I did not live up to your trust. And that I should have protected you against…” He hesitated to even speak the name. “But I promise that I will never…”
She reached up and covered his mouth with her hand then, stopping him from rattling on about his mistakes.
“Will you love me, Rurik?” she asked in a soft voice.
“I do love you.”
“Will you trust me?”
“I do trust you, Margriet.”
“Will you do all the things that Elspeth has told me about when we spend our long winter nights together?”
He lifted her from the ground and twirled around with her in his arms. “I will.”
“Then I will marry you, Rurik.”
The cheers began inside and soon, all the inhabitants of the convent—religious and lay alike—were offering their good wishes to the couple. Rurik heard a deeper voice behind him and turned to see a portly priest walking up to the gate. He frowned as the priest greeted him.
“I sent for Father as soon as we knew you were on your way,” his mother said. “I knew that once you got hold of her, you would not let her go.”
He had not, he realized as he looked down to where he held on to her hand, entwining their fingers together.
“With your reputation, I also knew you want the consummation as soon as possible and that means a wedding first.”
“Mother!” Rurik said, shocked at the way his mother understood his thinking.
But later, as he wrapped himself around his new wife and spent the night in her arms, he was glad his mother knew him enough to plan ahead.
He built a tent for her, one not too different from the one he built on their journey north, but with many layers of furs and woolen blankets for her comfort. The heat he would provide. Since men were not welcome in the convent overnight and since there was no way he would let Margriet out of his sight or grasp now that he had her to wife, he spent a good part of the day finding just the right location for their first night together as man and wife. The sisters did offer their version of a wedding feast and Rurik accepted it with all their good wishes. Now, Sven and Elspeth camped near the gates and he’d led Margriet deeper into the forest for privacy. Once there, he lifted the flap of the tent and helped her inside.
He knew she was uncomfortable with the shape and size of her body now that her pregnancy moved into its last months, but Rurik loved the way she blossomed with life. Any concerns about how he felt about her melted at his first touch. Margriet trusted him in this, too. And the reverend mother’s advice, shocking though it was, eased any fears she had.
The last time he’d touched her had been in such anger, but this time he slid his hands over her, gently removing her tunic and gown and even her chemise, until she lay naked in his arms. Somehow, and she did not remember how, his clothes disappeared and the touch of his skin to hers made her sigh.
Her breasts were heavier now and the nipples sensitive to his touch, and she watched as he drew circles around them with one finger and then he leaned his head down and kissed them. The ache grew deep within her and she pressed herself against him, wanting more.
Rurik drew in the tip of one breast and laved it with his tongue. Just as she felt the tension grow inside her, he moved to the other and continued there, moving back and forth, licking and sucking, until she slid her hand through his hair and held him there. He laughed and it was a wondrous sound to her.
He moved then so that he did not press too heavily on her, but lay at her side. He kissed her mouth in the way she liked it and Margriet felt her toes curl at the sensation he created in her. Their tongues touched and he suckled there as well, sending more waves of pleasure through her. His hand crept down to rest on the curls between her legs and she found it caused a different kind of feeling there. When she writhed against him, seeking more of his touch, he granted it, dipping one finger, then another into the moisture he’d caused there and drawing it out.
The tension within her built, ever tighter, ever stronger, as he created a new ache, a new need, a new pleasure with every touch. Margriet reached out to touch his hardness, hoping to give him some pleasure, too, but he shook his head.
“Nay, love, or your wedding night will be a short one.”
“Let me touch you, Rurik,” she said softly.
His eyes were filled with love as he relented and leaned away so she could touch him there. She had thought he would stop his attentions, but he did not and instead he returned every touch, every stroke with one of his own. “Margriet, stop now,” he asked on a moan a few minutes later. She rested her hand there, and allowed him to continue to touch her as he had a mind to. Soon though she knew it would not last much longer, for his touches inflamed her, made her cry out for more.
“Come, love,” he said, reaching for what used to be her waist and lifting her up. He guided her over him and when she slid down the hard length of him, his moans matched hers. Without delay, he slipped his hand between them and stroked her there, enticing even more wetness and aching.
Everything within her tightened then, every muscle contracted, and she felt the length of him deep within her as they reached the edge together and fell over it. He thrust deeper and deeper until she gasped and fell over on his chest. Wrapping his arms around her, he held her close for several minutes until their breaths came back.
The sounds of night surrounded them, but the sound she loved the most was that of his heartbeat, strong and steady, against her ear as she rested against his chest. Margriet was nearly asleep when he spoke.
“And that is what happens when you surrender to a highlander.”
She laughed as the thought of spending countless nights with him, paying his price, filled her thoughts. And she paid that price willingly several more times before the light of morning waked them to a new day.
Epilogue
The weather had turned colder much sooner than he’d planned, so their travel took more time. There was a threat of snow in the air as they rode up through the village to the Broch Dubh castle. Margriet sat on his lap, wrapped in the heavy woolen tartan and warmed by his body. She’d fallen asleep several miles back and he did not wish to wake her yet.
He watched her sleep and thanked God for bringing her to him. He watched her when she walked and talked and ate, and every time she did anything and marveled that she was—after so many trials—his alone. He watched her when she put her hand on the growing bairn and frowned and knew she worried about what was to come. Now he watched her as she came to wakefulness in his arms as they passed through the gate.
“You should have woken me, Rurik. I would not want to greet your laird like a bairn asleep in your arms.”
“I liked you asleep like a bairn in my arms.”
She straightened them and moved the plaid from her face so she could see the castle. He told her of it so much she probably knew each stone and each crevice of it. He’d never realized how much he missed living here until he did not, nor did he realize how much he missed the people of Lairig Dubh until he’d almost given them up. Now, he could see Connor standing high on the walls in his favorite place, with Jocelyn at his side.
He waved to several people as they passed, but did not stop, for he wanted her to meet the laird and his lady before anyone else there. When he reached the steps of the keep, he stopped and handed her down to one of the MacLerie soldiers standing guard. Taking her from him, he helped her to stand, giving her time to adjust after riding for so long.
By the time her legs steadied under her, Connor and Jocelyn came through the doors and walked down to greet them. With his plaid draped around her, it was hard to see more than the top of her head, but he could not wait for their reaction when they discovered the rest.
“Laird, lady,” he said in formal greeting, “may I present you to my wife, Margriet Gunnarsdottir.”
Jocelyn, soft-hearted as she was, burst into tears and pulled both Margriet and him to her in a hug that threatened to stop his breath. Then, when she felt the shape beneath t
he plaid, she simply screamed. Her embrace then, without Margriet between them, warmed his heart as no other woman could.
“You have been a busy man, Rurik Erengislsson,” Connor teased as he held out his hand in greeting. “I thought you went to take her home, not bring her home.”
They decided not to reveal the babe’s origins to anyone else, so he held his tongue and let them believe what they wanted. He would be father to the child, so it mattered little to him how it all started out. Rurik would be the last one to love and care for Margriet and their child…and any more that God granted them.
Rurik laughed then, realizing that sometimes you had to move away to learn how important people and places were to you. Looking down at Margriet chattering happily now to Jocelyn and watching as Connor looked with love at his wife, he was surprised at how much you could give up to keep the most important thing in life.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-1266-8
SURRENDER TO THE HIGHLANDER
Copyright © 2008 by Theresa S. Brisbin
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Surrender to the Highlander Page 21