Highlander Betrayed (Guardians of the Targe)

by Wittig, Laurin

  “Another wall falling? Not the curtain wall. I cannot say where or when. And grief—devastating grief. And fear. And guilt.”

  Elspet was quiet for a long time and Rowan was almost afraid to ask her anything else. She wasn’t sure she really wanted to know what had happened to her. Eventually, when her breath had calmed and her hands no longer shook, she looked over her shoulder at Elspet sitting in the gloom, her fingers plucking at the blanket in her lap, her brow furrowed in deep thought. Rowan filled a small earthen bowl with the tepid broth and brought it to her.

  “Auntie, what does it mean—falling walls, pressure beyond comprehension, searching for a way out of me, and blinding panic?” The question was out of her mouth before she could stop it, as if it would not be suppressed.

  Elspet reached out for the broth, taking the bowl with trembling hands. “I do not understand,” she mumbled, as if to herself. “How?”

  “What?” Rowan asked, not understanding.

  Elspet waved one hand and soup sloshed from the bowl over her lap but she didn’t seem to notice. “Fetch Jeanette. I need to speak to Jeanette.” Her words grew more agitated as Rowan tried to steady the bowl. Elspet shoved the bowl at her, sloshing the rest of the broth over the edge of the bed where it dripped to the floor. Rowan grabbed the bowl, setting it on the table, then began to pull the wet blankets from her aunt’s lap.

  “Nay, leave that. It is not important. Get Jeanette!” she said, her voice forceful even as it trembled. “Please, get my daughter!”

  The words sliced through Rowan. Never had Elspet made such a clear distinction between her niece and her daughters as she did in that moment. She struggled to swallow the lump that clogged her throat, hating that whatever had overtaken her during the blessing, whatever a falling wall meant, had caused her aunt such turmoil. How could it be anything but evil?

  “I’ll fetch her immediately, aunt.” Rowan set the bowl down on the foot of the bed and left the chamber in a rush.

  CHAPTER SIX

  ROWAN CROUCHED BY the side of a rushing burn, her body so tense she ached everywhere. She crushed her hands against her ears and she hummed loudly to herself trying to drown out…

  Yelling. Angry, hurtful yelling.

  She hummed louder, a tuneless effort to keep the words from getting into her head. She must keep them out of her head.

  But she couldn’t. They grew louder and louder until, with a shriek, they took form, pummeling her with wind, with noise like the world was ending. She looked up to find huge stones hurtling toward her. Fear shattered inside her—

  “NAY!”

  A crash woke Rowan suddenly from the nightmare. She was sitting straight up in her narrow bed, her arms flung forward as if she’d pushed something away from her. The ewer that usually sat on a small table near the door lay shattered on the floor.

  The chamber door flew open and Jeanette stood there, her blue eyes wide as she took in the room. She moved quickly to Rowan’s side, and perched next to her.

  “What happened?” she asked, gently pressing Rowan’s arms down from their outstretched position.

  Rowan shook her head. “A dream. A dream.” Panic still gripped her hard and she dared not even blink for fear whatever she had dreamed of would return as it had each night over and over again since the blessing.

  “Do you remember anything of it?” Jeanette asked.

  Rowan tried to grab hold of the wisps of dream that lingered. “I was afraid. So afraid. And then…” She tried to find words to describe the feeling, for that was all that remained of the dream, the fear so much greater than anything else she had ever experienced. She shook her head again. “It is gone.”

  “Perhaps for good,” Jeanette said, rising and moving to the shattered ewer. She picked up the largest pieces, looking at them, then at the table. “Curious.”

  Rowan rose from her bed and began to dress, pulling her gown over her kirtle as she tried to shake off the remains of the dream.

  “How fares my aunt this day?”

  Jeanette collected the rest of the ewer pieces, setting them on the table. “She is agitated.” She dusted her hands off. “I was on my way to my still room to get more of the herbs for her sleeping draught when I heard you cry out, and the crash of the ewer. How do you think it fell?” she asked, once more pondering the broken crockery.

  “Fell? Scotia probably left it too close to the edge of the table, as she is wont to do.”

  “Aye, that is the likely answer, but I heard you cry out almost at the same moment I heard it crash. I was sure you had hurt yourself and dropped something.”

  “Nay. I was abed, dreaming of…” The dream was like that elusive memory that had plagued her all her waking hours since she’d questioned Elspet about the blessing two days past—disturbing but always slipping through her grasp before she could see it clearly. “Has Auntie asked for me?” She belted her arisaid in place and drew the ends up over her shoulders, pinning them securely with her mother’s ancient broach.

  “In a way.”

  Rowan whirled to face her cousin. “What does that mean?”

  Jeanette paused for a long moment, chewing her bottom lip, a sure sign she was worrying. “She wants us to take her to the wellspring, Rowan.”

  At the word us, hope surged, but she quickly damped it down. “She has not been there since this illness overtook her.”

  “She has not had the strength. She has been fretting about it for a while, but for the last two days it has become an obsession. She does not seem to think she will overcome this illness, Rowan. She says it will set her mind at ease if she knows one of us has taken her place.”

  “You.”

  “Or Scotia.”

  “It will surely be you. Scotia is too…” She could not find the word to explain, but Jeanette didn’t need her to. They both knew that Scotia was not the one.

  “Mum wants you to come, too.”

  The knot in Rowan’s chest loosened. “Of course. And Uncle Kenneth?”

  “She does not think he will let her go so we are not to say anything to him.”

  The knot tightened again. “She is that determined?”

  “Aye. She is adamant that we must go immediately.” Jeanette’s breath hitched. “I do not think she believes she will be with us much longer.”

  “Nothing is sure.” Rowan grabbed Jeanette’s icy hands in hers, squeezing them and wishing she could keep the impending grief from her cousin, from all of them. “It never is.”

  Jeanette closed her eyes, and squeezed Rowan’s hands.

  “When does Auntie wish to go?” Rowan asked quietly.

  “Soon. She is making an effort to eat, though I think she truly does not have much appetite. She sips on broth all day and when she is awake in the night. It has helped strengthen her. As long as the weather holds she should be able to travel very soon.”

  “Truly?”

  Jeanette was the one with the healer’s touch but Rowan knew she had been unable to find any infusion, anything of any sort, to aid Elspet, and neither had Morven. She could not believe something as simple as sipping on broth had helped her aunt so much. She did not think it could, but she would not tell Jeanette that.

  Rowan knew that what had happened during the blessing had shaken her aunt. That was what drove her in this quest. She was sure of it. Elspet knew something that she was not telling her, and Rowan was determined to learn the truth.

  “So she has not asked for me.” She swallowed a lump in her throat that wanted to block not just her voice, but her breath, too.

  Jeanette sighed. “Nay, she has not, and I find that very odd. She was quite agitated when you fetched me the other night.” She looked at her cousin with determination in her eyes such as Rowan had never seen before. “What passed between you?”

  “She did not tell you?” Was that possible?

  “Rowan? What happened?”

  “I asked her a question she either could not, or would not, answer.”

  Jeanette’s
lips flattened at the lengthening silence. She put her clenched hands on her hips and cocked her head. “Well? Are you going to tell me what you asked her?”

  “How is it that she did not tell you?” Hope that Jeanette might have some answers drained away. “Jeanette, I never would have asked if I thought it would upset her so.”

  “I ken that. You love her as if she were your own mother.”

  “I do, and I thought she loved me as a daughter.”

  Concern flashed across Jeanette’s features and she closed the small distance between them, laying her hands on Rowan’s forearms. “She does, Rowan. You ken that. This is but a temporary rift between you. Can you not tell me what caused it? Perhaps I can help?”

  Jeanette’s caring dulled the pain of Elspet’s distance a little and Rowan suddenly found herself unwilling to chance Jeanette reacting the same way.

  “ ’Twas nothing important, Jeanette. I think I must have caught her when she was too tired and she did not have the strength to deal with my impertinence in her usual gentle way. ’Twill pass and all will be well.”

  “Are you sure?” Jeanette asked.

  Rowan smoothed the scowl she could feel on her face. “Do not fash over me. Let us get Auntie as strong as we can and take her to the wellspring. If that can be resolved ’twill ease her mind and she will rest easier, regardless of what the future holds.” And if Rowan’s question was the thing that spurred her aunt to want to get to the wellspring as fast as possible, then perhaps, if she were lucky, the answer to it lay in that sacred place.

  NICHOLAS STOOD UNDER the shelter of an overhanging outbuilding roof near the ruined wall. He watched Rowan dash across the bailey from the tower to the great hall, her arisaid pulled up over her head as protection against the sudden downpour of cold heavy rain. Nicholas let out a frustrated sigh.

  He’d been watching Rowan for two days, but she would only glance at him, then hurry away the minute he moved in her direction. The urge to hear her husky laugh again was chafing at him, never mind the need that surged through him every time he thought of the kiss they’d shared.

  He pulled the old plaid he’d acquired when first he arrived in the Highlands more firmly about him, using it as a cloak to shut out the bone-deep chill that came with the torrential rain, but the only thing that seemed to warm him was remembering the slide of her palm against his chest and the faint honey taste of her lips. It was daft. He was no besotted lad untutored in the effect a pretty young woman could have upon him, yet he could not remember the last time he’d been as taken with a woman, as distracted by her. He’d found himself looking for Rowan again and again as he moved through the last two days of endless toil.

  But he couldn’t let her distract him any longer or he’d never complete this assignment—and that was not an option.

  Duncan, of course, stood next to him, seemingly unaffected by the weather except that he leaned against the wall of the outbuilding in the shelter of the overhanging thatched roof.

  “The rain is different here than in the borders,” Nicholas said when the silence began to grate on him. “ ’Tis harder, like the land itself.”

  “Is it?”

  “Aye.” There was a long silence between them until Nicholas asked, “Do all of the women go up to the shielings for the summer pasturage?”

  “You mean will Rowan go?” Duncan slanted a grin at Nicholas. “I’ve seen the two of you watching each other. Perhaps.” He looked back out at the rain, his expression sobering. “I suppose ’twill depend upon Lady Elspet’s health.”

  “She looked very frail the night of the blessing.”

  Duncan nodded his head slowly. “She must be very ill. I had not seen her in nigh on a month before that. She did not even leave her chamber for the Beltain festival, nor the blessing of the beasts. I cannot remember a time she did not attend those.” The man’s whole countenance fell and his shoulders drooped when he talked about Lady Elspet.

  “Her lasses must be very concerned about her. Kenneth, too.”

  Duncan nodded slowly, casting his gaze toward the rubble or what was beyond it.

  Nicholas took a long, deep breath, taking in the rich earthy smell of mud, the fresh scent of the rain, and the tang of wet granite, savoring them. This was what his home had smelled like. Here, a person could breathe. For the space between one heartbeat and the next he let himself imagine what his life would have been like had he never left the Highlands. He scraped his fingers through his hair, and shoved the thought away, though the image of a sweet-faced woman with riotous coppery-brown hair and eyes of palest green would not be banished.

  He glanced toward the dark doorway where Rowan had disappeared a few minutes ago. “Duncan, it looks as if it will rain for a long time yet. Do you not want to get inside?” Nicholas pointed at the open door to the great hall’s undercroft, forty feet away from them.

  Duncan leaned out from his place against the wall far enough to observe the sky beyond the eaves. “ ’Tis settled in, to be sure.” He leaned back against the building. “There shall be no more work on the wall this day.”

  Nicholas quirked an eyebrow at the man who had yet to answer his question.

  “You wish to see Rowan.”

  It was true, though Nicholas could not account for why this lass had so captured his attention.

  “We shall get drenched,” Duncan grumbled as he pushed off the wall, “but at least there is ale and a fire to be had.”

  “And more bonny company than you, lad.” Nicholas grinned and took off at a careful trot across the muddy bailey.

  ROWAN SETTLED HERSELF on a bench along the wall opposite the great hall’s hearth, a basket of wool by her side and plenty of room to work her spindle as Scotia arrived, quickly followed by Duncan and Nicholas. Scotia made her way past the older men, before pausing to banter with the younger men. Nicholas nodded at the gathering as he passed them, but made his way directly across the large chamber to where Rowan sat. She was vaguely aware that Duncan followed Nicholas and that Scotia followed them both like a duckling followed its mother.

  “May I join you, Mistress Rowan?” Nicholas said as he took the seat next to her. Duncan waited for Scotia to sit, then sat beside her some little way down the bench.

  “I am glad you did not leave before I could say good day,” Nicholas said.

  She grabbed another tuft of wool and sent her spindle spinning as she slanted a glance at him. A smile creased his cheeks, not quite deep enough to make dimples, but creating a striking sharpness to his face that was handsomely set off by the soft waves of his hair. She could not help smiling back at him before turning back to her thread.

  He leaned toward her, their shoulders touching, and studied the spindle as it spun between her knees. “Do you ever just sit, or are you always busy at some task?”

  “There is always work needs doing,” she replied, grabbing another handful of wool and feeding it into the lengthening thread.

  Nicholas was quiet but he did not lean away. Rowan sighed and leaned into his warmth and weight. The contact was both comforting and disturbing, sending flutterings through her stomach and heat and restlessness to places lower.

  “Do you have nothing to do but watch Rowan spin?” Scotia leaned forward so she could see around Rowan.

  “Nay, mistress, I do not. There are stones to be moved, but it is not safe work in such a downpour.”

  Scotia looked at him for a moment and Rowan knew the lass was considering the best way to catch Nicholas’s attention.

  “Then you must earn your keep another way,” Scotia said, mischief clear in both her voice and the glint in her vivid blue eyes. “Tell us about yourself. Why do you not ken where your home is?”

  “Scotia, ’tis rude—”

  Nicholas laid a hand on her arm, stopping her admonishment. “Do not fash yourself, Rowan. Scotia is right. I must earn my keep and this rain is not showing signs of letting up.” He gave her arm a slight squeeze before releasing her. He leaned forward again, elbows br
aced on his knees, angled a little toward the prying Scotia and the silent Duncan.

  “There is not much to tell. I was raised amongst my mother’s kin until I was nearly ten and two. My mother was not well so I went to my father at that point, near the border. I did not wish to leave for, I dearly loved my life in the Highlands, but ’twas for the best.”

  Rowan watched as he told this tale, held still by the wistfulness in his words.

  “Why did you not return to Achnamara when you were old enough to?” Scotia asked, taking the question directly from Rowan’s own thoughts.

  Nicholas smiled. “ ’Tis not as easy as that, lass. I had a life in the borders—”

  “A wife maybe?” Scotia asked.

  Rowan’s spindle dangled in her hands, slowly unwinding her thread. She could not look at Nicholas.

  “Nay, I have never been wed.”

  Rowan let out a breath she had not realized she was holding.

  “Just a life that kept me busy.”

  “So why are you here?” Rowan asked, her eyes on her spindle but her attention on his response.

  “That life was not enough anymore.”

  Silence hung between them.

  “I wanted to see where I came from,” he finally added. “See who my mother’s people were.”

  “You have not seen your mum in all these years?” Scotia asked.

  Nicholas shook his head and leaned back against the wall, his hands clenching his knees. Rowan scowled at Scotia, who did not seem to notice the strain her questions had caused. She leaned her shoulder against his this time and was gratified to see his hands relax.

  “I have not seen my mum in more than ten years,” Rowan said quietly. She probed the memories like a sore tooth, happy in an odd way that there was still pain there, that she hadn’t become so accustomed to her parents being gone that she didn’t feel the loss anymore. “She died when I was ten, along with my da. I still miss them very much.” She set the spindle in motion again. “You must miss your mum.”