“Those few days on your journey were the only carefree times she has ever had. She gloried in it.” Bleddyn smiled.
Rare laughter burst from Mereck. “Gloried is the right word. You should have seen her face the day she believed she had fed me wormy stew. It was almost gleeful, until I pretended something moved in my mouth. She turned greener than the pines in the forest. Her hand twitched and started to rise and stop me, but she didna.”
He rubbed the back of his neck, hesitated, then frowned at Damron. “Brother, I dinna want to give her the time you gave your own wee wife. Yet I also dinna want her frightened and unwilling.
“Never has she had something to love and call her own. That is why I gave her the kitten. Bleddyn, if you will allow Cloud Dancer to aid me, we’ll search for a young kestrel. If she trains an eyas fresh from the nest, it will teach her independence comes with discipline. Though the raptor flies free, it returns to the falconer for its main food supply.”
“Aye. On the morrow, I’ll send Cloud Dancer to search. Once he has found what we seek, he will lead you to it.” Mischief tilted Bleddyn’s lips at the corners. “Even now Netta dreams of you. Do you wish me to ensure her dreams are favorable?”
“Nay. Dinna. I want her to come to me on her own, not by another’s will.”
His answer pleased Bleddyn. The mystic would not have offered, had he believed Mereck would stoop to such tactics.
Mereck crossed his arms beneath his head and stared at the ceiling over his bed. He thought of his bride. When he had made known the betrothal contract, he noted the fear in her eyes. He didna wish her to come to him looking such.
Her face, as she watched Mither and her brood, had jolted his senses. As if begging for a kiss, her lips softened and pursed. Her eyes were dreamy. He wanted that expression for himself. His tarse awoke and stirred like a sleeping beast. As he imagined kissing those lips until she clutched his shoulders and cried out his name, his tarse bucked.
“Christ’s blood, Mereck.” Connor’s laugh sounded sleepy. “Cease thrashing about on your pallet and go to sleep. Tell Netta on the morrow that, if she would be a virgin the night she weds, she had best see the vows are soon spoken. Do ye take my drift?”
“I would not force her, and well you know it.”
“Aye. But does she?”
Flap! Slap! Netta’s flying arms struck her bed partners.
“Ow, Netta.” Elise winced and grabbed the arm that had cracked her across her chest.
“By the saints, lass. Do ye always awaken yer bed mates with bruises?” Meghan removed the elbow pressed against her throat and sat upright. “When ye wed Mereck, ye must needs be more careful of where yer fists fly. After enjoyin’ a night of ridin’, he would not take kindly to yer pummelin’ his manly parts.
“I’m sorry, Meghan. I forgot to warn you. When Netta sleeps, she flops around like a fish on dry ground. If you are not careful, you will find yourself on the floor come sunrise.”
“Hmm. No wonder Mereck claims she accosted him.”
Netta did not need the sun’s rise to know she grinned. It was there in her voice.
“We should put her on the edge, not the middle of the bed. Then she can bruise only one of us,” Meghan decided.
“Forgive me. Now I have woken you. I’ll dress and see to the little ones.” Netta scrambled to the foot of the bed. Her feet hit the cold floor, and she hastened to grab her clothes and leap back onto the bed. Meghan and Elise bounced around as she dressed. Once she pulled on her stockings and shoes, she leapt down again.
Drawing the plaid Mereck had given her around her shoulders, she pinned it with the brooch. She sniffed and savored her breath, for it held his heady scent. The material’s warmth amazed her. It was far more comfortable than a cloak for wearing indoors.
She found Mither feeding her brood. The stronger babes pushed the littlest away. Netta sat on the floor and placed her kit at the teat closest to Mither’s front legs. The little one was kept warmer there, for the mother cat snuggled it close while it drank its fill.
The smell of baking bread started Netta’s stomach rumbling like approaching thunder. A rotund helper turned, looking around to search out the sound. When Netta’s stomach again protested, the woman laughed and placed a cold cup of milk near her hand.
“Here ye be, lass. If’n yer guts bark any louder, Mither will attack ye, thinkin’ ye be a dangerous beastie.” She slathered a hot scone with honey and handed it to Netta.
Netta blushed. “The sound is most unseemly. I can never stop the dreadful noise. You would think I had not eaten in days.”
Meghan and Elise joined her, and both regaled the servants on how Netta had near knocked them out of bed. Elise saw her kitten fed, and when Netta returned her kit to Mither’s care, they went into the great hall to break their fast. Mereck was nowhere in sight. She prayed he had forgotten the impending meeting. She should have saved her prayers. She was finishing her porridge when he and Connor sauntered into the room, exuding satisfaction from every pore. Their tunics were damp. So were their faces and hair.
“Broadswords? Battle axes? Which, brither?” Meghan pushed a milk pitcher close to Mereck’s steaming bowl of porridge.
“Mereck was spoiling for exercise. Damron obliged with the battle-ax, I with the broadsword.” Connor grimaced. “I’m not such a fool to be near Mereck when he grips an ax.”
“Do you not practice with wooden weapons, sirs?” Elise eyed them, clearly looking for wounds.
“Wood?” Connor nudged Meghan so he could sit beside Elise. “Nay, lady. Not since we were nine summers old. If ’twas wood, we would soon grow careless. A nick now and again is a good reminder to keep eyes and mind on the weapons.”
Never having witnessed warriors at their practice, Netta was about to ask Meghan if they might watch them. Before she could, the laird’s squire arrived to tell Mereck that Damron was becoming impatient.
“Come, wife. Damron’s temper doesna improve with waiting.” Mereck gently grasped her elbow to help her rise.
Netta’s chin lifted. She spoke slowly and distinctly. “Do not call me wife.”
“You became my wife from the time your father and I signed the contract, and wife you will remain.” His jaws snapped together.
“Aye, Netta. You wear his badge. All who see it know you belong to him.” Connor ignored Mereck’s cold glare that clearly bid him to shut his mouth.
“What do you mean?” Twisting her head, she studied the brooch on her shoulder, but still didn’t understand. Except for the single bar dividing it, it was the same as Connor’s.
“’Tis the bar that proclaims you Mereck’s. When we were but halfin’s, young boys,” Connor explained, seeing her questioning look, “still training with wooden weapons, he insisted his shield be divided. He declared himself part Scot, part Welsh. When we saw you wearing it, we knew he claimed you for his own.”
“Haud yer wheesht if ye dinna want yer pretty face out o’shape,” Mereck ordered, giving Connor a baleful look. It did not intimidate his cousin.
Mereck seized Netta’s wrist and tugged her from the room. She dashed two steps to each of his one, with an occasional skip to catch up.
“Rats, sir. Must you run?” Breathless, she hauled back on her hand.
“If you dinna wish me to throttle the gowk, the fool, you willna mind a little hastening.”
Mereck grimaced. Connor’s teasing could muddle things more with Netta. She wouldna take kindly to knowing he had set his mark on her, declaring her his possession. He sighed. A fortnight should be ample time for her to adjust to becoming his bride.
During that time, he would rein in her quest for independence, for therein would lie disaster. The Highlands was a harsh place, filled with men who would think nothing of plucking away a woman who strayed but a few steps from protection.
At the door of Damron’s solar, he spied the stubborn tilt of Netta’s jaw. She aimed to defy him. He would have to be merciless, else she would attempt to get the uppe
r hand.
Netta greeted the laird, Brianna and Bleddyn. She pulled from Mereck and marched over to Bleddyn.
“Lord Bleddyn, please tell Mereck my father’s contract does not bind me to him. Father neither asked my consent, nor did I sign that I promised to marry this man.”
“The document states you were unavailable at the time. Your stepmother signed in your stead. The family priest and the castle steward witnessed it. Since you are reluctant to accept Mereck of Blackthorn, I would hear your objections. Did he force you to come with him?”
He leaned back, and his gaze pierced hers. It was compelling. Magnetic. He fixed her mind solely on him.
“Nay, he did not.”
“During your travels, did he mistreat or threaten you in any way?”
He had not. Other than having her ride the swaybacked Lightning, he had treated her well. Even his insistence she tend to her duties as a maid had been done politely.
“Nay.” Her voice dropped lower.
“Ah, then. While under his protection, he took advantage of you?”
“Nay!” Her voice rose. He had forced her to sleep on a pallet close to his side, but he had not taken advantage of her person. Remembering the mornings she had awakened to find her arm or her head snuggled against his warm and wonderfully scented skin, she blinked. Why, one dark night she had thrown her leg across him. Fortunately, he knew nothing about it, for he had continued to snore.
She blinked. Her face heated. Why, she had taken advantage of him!
Of his warmth, of course.
“So. Mereck has neither forced, mistreated nor taken advantage of you. Then ’tis his appearance that revolts you?”
Blessed saints! Surprise swept her. How could any woman object to his appearance? He was by far the most comely man she had ever seen. His forehead was strong, with well-defined expressive eyebrows arched above eyes that fascinated her with the way they changed from the faintest green to dark emerald. His cheekbones were high and prominent, beside a nose set just right above his lips. His beautiful lips, she amended, sighing.
And his form? His massive shoulders and chest rippled with muscles, his stomach a hard slab. She recalled his hardness. She had likened his body to a tree trunk. His hips were lean, and his legs long and muscled. He had just the right amount of enticing hair over all to make her want to trail her fingers through it.
The only reason a woman could object to his body was his size. Though it no longer alarmed her. She had become used to it.
She could not protest that she wanted to do the choosing. Although she had oft used that reason, she knew a woman had not the right. Saints! She remembered a most valid objection.
“Baresark. He is Baresark,” she near shouted. “I would feel unsafe to dispute the smallest point with a man deserving of such a name.”
“In your travels, did you say or do anything to stoke his anger? Did he unleash his temper on you?”
Netta scuffed the toe of her shoe on the fur rug. She had called him “sirrah” the first day on leaving Ridley. He had not struck out but calmly rested his back against a tree. Why, Roger of Mortain would have backhanded her face for the disrespect. She plucked at the girdle around her waist. She thought of her mean prank with Mereck’s food. Any other man would have upended the stew on her head.
Bleddyn smiled and nodded.
Her chin bobbed against her chest, and she studied the tips of her shoes that peeked beneath the hem of her yellow tunic. If Bleddyn approved of Mereck, she knew of no truthful reason to refuse him.
She studied Bleddyn, noting the contrast between his physical and inner being. He was large and powerful like Mereck and Damron. Black and shaggy hair framed his disfigured face. He had nearly lost his eye from the sword that caused the horrific scar that stretched from his forehead down across his right eye, ending at his lip. Even so, his face was beautiful. Men kept their distance from this strange man who caused a mixture of fear and awe. Fear of his savage being. Awe of his mystic powers.
He wanted Mereck for her husband. Perchance he had known her father would give her to Mereck. The same as Meghan had hinted Bleddyn had known about Damron before they had ever met.
“Nay, Lord Bleddyn.” She sighed and looked at his compelling dark eyes. “Mereck has neither done nor said naught to me I did not deserve. I would learn more of him, for I know not who his mother was, only that she was Welsh.” She listened closely.
“You should know more about the man you are to marry. Before I placed your mother’s family in Caer Cad-well, Mereck’s mother, Aeneid, and her husband, Rhys, resided there. She was the great-granddaughter of Gruffyd ap Tewdwr, and the only daughter of Aenias and Kyrie.
“Men from across their northern border raided where Aeneid, Rhys and her parents were traveling. They killed her husband and family and took her into the Gunn family territory. Donald Morgan and his men came that evening to take back cattle the Gunns had raided from them. After the skirmish, he found Aeneid bound to a tree and brought her back to Blackthorn. Mereck is the son of Aeneid and Donald Morgan. Both are honorable families.
Remembering all the tales her father and stepmother had woven about Mereck’s ancestors, new waves of panic swept over her. Though he had been gentle with her, might he be as they predicted if she should anger him? She clapped her hands over her mouth to keep from crying out. Her shoulders began to quake.
“Your father should not have repeated the foolish legends about the ap Tewdwr wives,” Bleddyn said softly. “The first wife, Elgin, became despondent after birthing her child. Losing touch with reality sometimes happens in such cases. Both Fallon and Lienid died because they refused the aid of an old midwife, claiming she was too ugly and scared them. They preferred a young woman who knew nothing of cleanliness during childbirth.
“Mereck’s mother, Aeneid, though having far better care, had a different tragedy. She deeply loved Donald of Blackthorn, but she had become a very close friend to Lady Phillipa. I believe Aeneid grieved over their situation, and she succumbed from a broken heart.”
“But what of the ap Tewdwr gift?” Of a sudden, she gasped, wary now. “I forgot. You also are an ap Tewdwr.”
“Do you feel any harm has come to you from my knowing your thoughts?” His melodious voice soothed her.
She mulled over his question. Her mind flew from one remembrance to another, when Bleddyn had been at Wycliffe. She could not note any elements missing. Surely if he had stolen them, she would note the gap? She sighed and shook her head. Feeling overwhelmed, she sank down into the chair Mereck brought over to her. She had forgotten he and the laird were in the room.
“Well now that we have the problem settled, what say ye to speakin’ the vows in a sennight?” Damron walked over and leaned his hip against the table, his arms folded. “Bleddyn tells me Cloud Dancer has spotted Father Matthew leavin’ the MacLaren’s. He will be here in plenty of time.”
Brianna laughed. “Blessed saints, love. Give the lass a while to learn all our names. A sennight? It will take her longer than that to find her way around this drafty place. And the ladies must have time to sew proper clothing for her.”
“What is the matter with what she has on? She looks finely attired to me.” Damron’s gaze scanned Netta. He nodded his approval. “She wears the Morgan tartan. And Mereck’s badge.”
“A lady cannot be married with naught but the clothes on her back. Now, you must show Netta the contract her father and Mereck signed.”
“Why, my heart? ’Tis a wedding contract like all others. It states Netta no longer belongs to Baron Wycliffe. He has turned over his authority to Mereck of Blackthorn.”
Brianna rolled her eyes at him. “For the same reason I wanted to read our own, you great ox. Why must men treat women like so much money and property?”
Brianna’s eyes flashed fire at Damron. Mereck hooked his thumbs in his massive belt and spread his legs for balance and comfort, knowing they were in for one of his brother and his lady wife’s rousing arguments.
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“Aye? Do ye not come with dowries and lands? If ye had none, we would ha’e no cause to marry ye.” Laughter lurked in Damron’s eyes.
Connor was not the only Morgan who liked to tease.
“No cause to marry us?” Brianna spluttered, slapped her hands on his chest and tried to shove him. He didn’t budge. “If men did not marry, who would care for them and oversee their castles.”
“Why, our stewards and a vast array of servants. Not to mention squires who see to our personal belongin’s.”
“Heirs. What of sons to carry on your name?” Of a sudden, her face crumbled. It must have struck her that she had provided no heir for Damron.
“Oh, my love, I was but ’pullin’ yer leg’ as ye are so wont to accuse me. I would marry ye again and again, fer I could not live without yer sweet self. And well ye know it.” Damron ignored everyone but his wife. He scooped her up in his arms and sat on a chair with her. He kissed her soundly and rubbed her back. She gave an exasperated snort. Finally, she smiled back at him.
“Nathaniel, what do you think of the contract?” Brianna’s gaze switched to Bleddyn.
“Everything is as it should be. Netta’s mother, Kyrie, and I drew it up after Kyrie’s marriage to Baron Wycliffe. I kept it at Caer Cad-well until Netta reached an age to wed.”
“Now that everyone else knows what is in the papers, do you not think I should have the same knowledge?” Netta began to think she was invisible the way conversation flowed around her.
“You can read?” Damron asked skeptically.
“Nay, I cannot. I hoped Lord Bleddyn would read it to me.”
Mereck’s heavy hand fell on her shoulder. She felt displeasure radiating from it. She looked up at him and tried to pull away.
“Release me. You do not have to have a snizzy-fit about my learning the terms of the contracts.”
“Snizzy-fit? What is this snizzy thing?” Damron asked. “Wife, is it one o’yer strange words ye have taught the girl?” Damron’s frown became gigantic. “Dinna tell me ’tis like that ‘patoot’ word ye used last Beltane.” He looked appalled.
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