The night was incredibly calm. The lady, whoever she might be, could sit and fume on the water for hours.
He might have been a bit more understanding, he chided himself, sobering. Having spent time, if brief, with Eleanora after the skirmishing, he should have had a greater sympathy for a lass with an aversion to an arranged marriage—especially to a man she would consider an invading monster.
But arranged marriages were the way of the world for young noblewomen, and she should have learned that fact from a very young age. Not to mention the small matter of his own loyalty. He was the king’s man—and in her present course of action, she was the king’s enemy.
The Norse were her kind, so perhaps she didn’t realize that the Vikings were dangerous no matter how many alliances and treaties were made. They were a proud, fierce people, and fond of ruling in their own way. The king ruled a united Scotland, but David was aware that he was never really safe on his throne, that they lived in violent times. Maintaining his united Scotland was always a battle.
Still …
He felt a moment’s pity for the girl out in the boat. She was young, he thought, and he had known from the moment he seized her that she was of noble birth—and in a dangerous position. She had been lovely, despite her temper and determination. Exceptional, in truth, regally tall, young, and beautiful, tender, ripe—magic. He had thought so, listening to her tale, watching her dance. She was a prize, certainly, and David was a king to recognize any asset he might control—and he was in debt to many of the Norman knights who had ridden with him and helped put down the small insurrections against him when he had first ridden north to take the crown of Scotland. Waryk could well imagine the girl’s aversion to becoming the wife of an old decrepit Norman—a man perhaps two or three times her age whom she would still consider a foreigner.
Ah, but if the king discovered her treachery, she would be sorrier still. And no matter what Waryk’s sympathy for her, there was little that could be done if David had made up his mind. When the king discovered her escape, he would be furious.
He was glad once again that he had been the one sent to fight the madmen and that Sir Harry had been given the task of watching the heiress. Still …
He would retrieve her from the boat himself, Waryk decided, in due time, without saying a word to the king. He could try to make her understand that kings often had no choice in their course of action. He could try—yes. He doubted that he would be successful.
He looked up at the sky. She might have played havoc with his dreams, and he knew that she and her party had considered him part of the king’s Norman contingent last night, but still, tonight, the lady on the lake had caused him a great deal of amusement. Thanks to Eleanora, he was certain. Remembering her ways always soothed his temper. She was an Englishwoman, loyal to England, but that loyalty was such a part of her exquisite making that he had to forgive it. She spoke her mind, but paid heed to his every thought and opinion. She was aware and discreet; passionate and adventurous. She was both his friend and his mistress, a companion to entertain him, a vixen to stir his senses. Marriage to Eleanora, however, had never actually occurred to him until recently, not because she’d been widowed but because she was an Englishwoman—and because he’d known that his fortune and future would most probably be made through marriage to a landed heiress. However, he wasn’t poor, nor was Eleanora. He had lands of his own, left through his mother, a Strathearn heiress. Eleanora had a fair amount of wealth in jewels and coin from the incomes granted her after her husband’s death.
Marriage just might make sense. The king had grown up among the English, surely meant to stretch his borders with the English civil unrest, and Waryk had begun to muse that David might see a match between Eleanora and Waryk as advantageous.
Eleanora had not spoken so bluntly, but Waryk knew that marriage would please her. She’d served Henry of England as she had been ordered, and now she was free to marry where she wished. He’d almost mentioned the possibility to her when they had last lain together, yet he’d refrained, disturbed about the battle he had just fought and aware that he would need to do some convincing with David of Scotland. Still, the more he thought about it, the more convinced he became that David would surely realize that she would make him the perfect wife.
Waryk looked to the water and spoke softly aloud. “Ah, yes, lass on the lake, whoever you may be. Thanks to Eleanora, I will return you to the safety of the king’s court as quietly as I am able. I will see that your difficulties grow no more serious than they already are!”
What she planned was damned close to treason, no matter how she tried to word her intentions. He wondered if she was aware of just how serious her actions were, that she could lose her head for conspiring against the king.
He stood and whistled softly, and his ebony warhorse, Mercury, came trotting toward him along the shoreline, startling the poor old fisherman who was wandering along the embankment. Waryk realized that the old fellow was looking for his boat. It was pure happenstance that Waryk had paused by the boat on the riverbank that the lady had chosen for her night journey. He had always loved the water. Lying on the embankment, studying the stars, the sky, and feeling cool breezes—untainted by the scent of blood—always seemed to soothe his soul. This area of the river just outside Stirling had always been his favorite place. Quiet, with none to disturb him except the occasional fisherman.
The fellow here now was grizzled beyond belief, and sadly confused. “’Tis here I left her, of that I am sure,” he muttered to himself. He looked at Waryk. “Now, I am not daft, m’laird. I do converse with meself now and agin’, but that merely for some form of company since the fish do not talk much. Great sir, have ya nae seen a boat about, perhaps rowing itself out on the river?”
“Indeed, I’m afraid I have seen such a vessel,” Waryk said. He produced a silver piece—with King David’s image upon it—and presented it to the fisherman. “Take this for your boat, my good fellow. And come tomorrow, I’ll see that your boat is back.”
The old man’s eyes widened and glazed. “Great God, but I care not if ye make kindling of that rat trap fer a silver piece such as this!”
“Go spend it then,” Waryk said, leaping atop Mercury’s back. “Ah, but wait. If you would be so good. Do me a service as well, and I’ll see you receive another coin. Your boat is there—you can just see it downriver. Keep your eyes trained on the water, and see to it that the boat does not somehow reappear here on the shore. There’s a lady upon it, and I will be back for her.”
“Aye, sir! As ye wish it!” the fellow cried delightedly. “I’ll keep my eyes hard upon the water, that I will!”
“Have you a name, man?”
“Aye, sir, I am Milford. Who may y’be, me fine, great young laird?”
“I am Waryk—”
“Laird Lion!” the man cried with pleased approval.
Waryk arched a brow. “I’d not imagined I might be so readily known.”
Milford laughed happily, the sound of his voice a wheezing cackle.
“Laird Lion—ye be known far and wide. Every Scotsman loves a warrior who bests his enemies—if he not be one of the enemies himself. ’Tis glad I am to make your acquaintance, good sir! Believe it or not, in me younger days I rode with a man named William who served the king. I admired your sire, young Graham. And ye’ve my loyalty yerself this night.”
Waryk nodded with a wry smile in response to Milford’s accolade to his father’s memory.
“Thank you. My father was a great man, and glad I am of your loyalty, Milford. I will return as soon as I’m able.”
Waryk nudged Mercury and rode the short distance to the fortress, the heart of Stirling. He was hailed by the guard at the gate, identified himself, and entered the courtyard. There, he turned Mercury over to a young groom and hurried to reach his own chambers at the fortress.
The hour had grown very late, or very early. He hadn’t planned on spending so much time with the lady on the lake. Alan of Ayr, manse
rvant to the king, caught him when he had barely entered the long hallway that led to the knights’ quarters.
“Laird Lion, the king would see you now.”
“I know that I must see him, Alan. But if you’ll note, I’m dripping wet. Give me leave, and I’ll wash and change before coming to see the king. I had not meant to keep him waiting awake through the night.”
“Laird Waryk, the king did not stay awake—he has risen again since it is almost dawn. The king would see you now.”
Waryk shrugged. “Aye, then. I will come.”
His shoes squished upon the floor as he walked the distance to the great hall. David was there, pacing. It looked as if this might be a long discussion, Waryk thought with dismay. He’d meant to leave the unwilling heiress for some time to consider the error of her ways, but he had not meant to desert her entirely. It might take some time before he could go back for her, and under those circumstances, he’d have to mention the lady to the king after giving him a report of the battle in which he’d rather too easily managed to keep hold of the king’s domains.
Daylight was coming, and too quickly, Waryk thought.
She might be in greater danger, for the river would fill, and the Vikings she longed to reach might be ever closer, moving about by day …
He would have to reach her quickly. He would keep her escape secret if he could, but if he could not …
She would have to meet the king’s wrath. There was no other way.
Or else she might well make good her bid for freedom, and they’d both be in danger of charges of treason.
Of being hanged, or beheaded.
Or even drawn and quartered.
Vikings could be very dangerous, he had never deceived himself on that issue. Vikings, in all sizes, and all shapes. Even a Viking’s beautiful daughter.
Perhaps, he thought, a strange foreboding sending a tremor of heat along his spine, especially a Viking’s beautiful and wayward daughter …
CHAPTER 5
“Sire,” he said, entering the king’s great hall, bowing briefly upon a single knee before rising. “I can report—”
“Nay, you don’t need to report a word of your deeds, for many great words have preceded your arrival.”
“I’m sure that Angus exaggerated my deeds.”
“Messengers reached me before Angus came to give a report. You’re dripping, by the way, Laird Lion.”
“I stopped by the river.”
“Aye, you’ve had a fondness for water all your life.”
“And the stars. Your pardon, perhaps I should have come straight here, but—”
“The leisure time was yours, well deserved. But tell me, did you fall in the water?”
“I went for a swim.”
“How curious, it was a rather chill night. Were you chasing water nymphs or the like?”
Waryk grinned. “I’m afraid I ventured too near the water and, thereby, wound up wet.”
“Umm,” the king murmured, aware there was more to the story, but not persisting at the moment. “Whatever your recent adventures, you have returned home triumphant. You gave chase to the rascals, left men in attendance to build new fortifications, and have done us all proud. Perhaps most important is the fact that you have ably and loyally supported me, and no shift in the political wind has ever steered you from that course.”
Waryk lifted a hand in gracious acknowledgment of the king’s words. “Well, you see, sire, I learned my loyalty as a boy,” he said lightly, but then added on a serious note, “This new action has disturbed me, David. It was much like that which we fought westward a few months before, and farther to the north and east on the border a few months before that. It’s as if there is some unseen, unknown enemy creating dissension where there should be none.”
“Angus told me that you battled a group of ruffians, none of them ably trained.”
“Aye, that’s what’s so strange. We fought freemen with little language or education, and perhaps serfs from some of the new Norman domains. Men pushed to battle, more afraid to live than to die. To a man, they escaped into the woods, or died. We’ve tried to take men alive, but they fight us as if we are demons, and I can’t make sense of anything they ramble as yet. It has been the same again and again.”
“There has always been minor insurrection. And now, with Henry dead, men are easily swayed to fight for his daughter Mathilda against his nephew Stephen, or to fight for Stephen against Mathilda, and to cause trouble simply for whatever power might be seized in the midst of it.”
“Men must fight for some belief. Warriors would declare for Mathilda, or for Stephen. As far as Scotland goes, my lord, there are few Lowland Scots who do not recognize you as their king and overlord. I believe there is an enemy we have yet to unearth, someone more powerful than those poor fools we are forced to slay, and I am puzzled and angry that such an enemy doesn’t show his face.”
“Vikings?” the king inquired dourly.
“Vikings are men who believe that their gods honor them for fighting with boldness and courage. I’ve yet to meet a Viking who chose to hide in battle.”
“In the end, Waryk, it’s our strength that keeps us victorious, whatever enemy we fight. Don’t dwell on questions when you haven’t the resources for the answers.”
“But we can’t ignore—”
“I ignore nothing, Waryk, you know that. I’ll be all the more wary. And that is the heart of the matter, Waryk, leading to the arrangements we’ll now discuss.”
“As you wish, but—”
“There’s recently been a death that leaves a vast property open for the taking, Laird Lyon. I am pleased, at last, to have found the right holding for you. I knew, when I found you battling against all odds as a boy, that you would be a great champion for me. You have never disappointed me, Laird Lion. I will honor you, and you will serve me well to become overlord of that property.”
Curious, intrigued, and wary, Waryk realized that he had been gone several weeks and was out of touch with events that had been occurring in the king’s realm. He didn’t know what great holding had become available, but though the king had promised him rich rewards for a long time, he had never allowed himself to dwell on what the rewards might be, or why it took the king so long to find them. There had been times when he’d wondered if his “great rewards” had been words and nothing more, but not even that had mattered. Since the night his father and other kin had died, he’d followed the king.
Eleanora … he thought.
A vast property, the king had said. Now, after the king had told him what property, he could bring up the subject of marriage to his English lady. He felt a strange trembling inside. Time had come. Here, tonight, was his reward. Land. Home. And soon, his family. What he had wanted, what he had craved. “Sire, I am naturally curious, and of course grateful, especially since I have found a woman I would call my wife—”
“Wife?” David interrupted, arching a brow.
“Aye, David, a good match, I think. I’ve given the matter a great deal of thought, and I think that I’ve found a proper lady, a wife whom you’ll approve—”
“Nay, Waryk, I fear not,” the king said impatiently. “The lands come with an heiress.”
“What?” Waryk said, startled. Uneasy, and as yet, not sure why.
The king shook his head with impatience. “An heiress brings the land and the reward, Waryk. A great warrior has died. The laird is dead, but he left a daughter. With her marriage to you, she remains the lady there, and I keep the peace with those who will honor her house. The property I am talking about is coastal property along a fine inlet, an island and mainland, and they create a gateway to the Hebrides, and you know the old chieftains, and their sense of loyalty. Her mother was from one of the most ancient Scottish houses. The land, I promise you, is rich. Waryk, I believe you’ve learned that little in life comes without a price, but a price, I think, that will be painless. You’ve yet to see this heiress. And imagine this, a stone castle nearly as old as the
land, where the foundation was built by the Romans out of a natural rock formation, where the first Normans built upon the old foundations, and created a solid fortress against marauders from land and sea. The surf may be tempestuous, but trade between the isles, England, Ireland, more, is constant. Goods arrive on a daily basis, crops grow in abundance, and sheep and cattle thrive. Many a man would kill for these riches, and many men have died to protect the land. Its position is advantageous, and it’s imperative that the laird in power be a Scotsman, loyal to the crown of Scotsmen, and to no other. Vikings rule an area far too near.”
David had spoken lightly at first, then grown serious and Waryk answered in kind. “I’m grateful, of course. But—”
“Waryk, if ever you have served me, serve me now. There is nothing to protest. I told you, men would kill for what I am offering you, and I’m afraid that many will die if it is not seized and held with an iron fist. Great care must be taken that Lady Mellyora’s lands be kept securely within my grasp, for though the great fortress lies upon an isle, the property stretches onto the mainland as I said, and there are trails there that lead directly to the Highlands. The lands are a connection with the chieftains, and with the sea, and they command vast, strategic stretches, should any of our Nordic neighbors see fit to raid again. You’ll see it soon enough. The fields are rich, the artisans there are some of the most gifted in the country, the armorers are surely the finest in all the isles.”
“Again, I’m honored, but—”
The king came before him again, interrupting sharply, “You’ve not dishonored this woman you would have made your wife?”
“It’s not a matter of honor or dishonor. The lady has been my mistress for some time. I’d not, I’ll admit, thought of marriage until recently.”
“Mistress!” the king exclaimed, frowning. “Then what of her birth? What man—what father, brother, uncle—would allow this without challenging you—”
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