The Highland Secret Agent

by Emilia Ferguson

  “Yes, milady?”

  “I was wondering...if I upset someone, do you think that I would know?” She shook her head. “That question makes no sense. Sorry.”

  “No, milady,” Bronna said soothingly. “It likely does.”

  Ambeal cleared her throat. “What I meant to ask was: If someone starts acting unpredictably all of a sudden, do you think it might be because I upset him without meaning to?”

  Bronna frowned, rummaging around in the box where they kept their embroidery silk. “I think if you'd upset someone, you would know, milady,” she supplied. “You're not the sort to step on people without knowing you did it.”

  Ambeal let out a sigh of relief. She passed Bronna the linen for the tapestry and frowned. “Well, then. Why is Alf being so strange?” No harm in just asking.

  “Oh, milady,” Bronna sighed. She came and sat down on the stool in the corner, frowning. “Whate'er has affected him, 'tis not you. I promise you that.”

  Ambeal sighed. Her friend was comforting. Was she telling the truth or just soothing her feelings though?

  “He was so happy this morning,” she began sadly. “And then, later, after talking to my father...” she trailed off. “Maybe my father upset him!”

  Bronna gave a grin. “Now that, my lady, seems more likely. We know he has a talent for it.”

  Ambeal chuckled. “That's true.”

  When Bronna laid a comforting hand over hers, she squeezed her fingers. It felt good to be soothed and safe. Bronna was the closest she had to a sibling, the closest thing to having a mother she could remember.

  “Thank you, Bronna,” she said, sniffing. “You're a good friend.”

  “Now, then,” Bronna said, sniffing too. “Let's go down to the solar with these silks. We can get started on drawing up the design. Great big stags, it'll have, and wee tiny boars in the corners.”

  Ambeal giggled. The boar, rising on hind legs, was the crest of her father. By diminishing it, Bronna was directly insulting his position and elevating Alf to head of the household. She knew it, as well, and her eyes sparkled when she looked at Ambeal, making them both chuckle.

  “Yes!” Ambeal nodded, feeling naughty. “Let's do it! I'd love to see his face when we hang it...right in the middle of the rear wall.”

  Bronna giggled. “Oh, you are wicked, my lady.”

  “We are wicked,” she corrected with a grin. Bronna nodded.

  “Indeed.”

  When they were down in the solar, Ambeal suddenly had a thought.

  “Bronna?”

  “Mm?” Her friend had a few pins held in her teeth, busy stretching out the canvas over the table top.

  “I just remembered. I said I'd go riding with Alf today. I think it would be a good idea if I did.”

  “Certainly, milady,” Bronna nodded. “Leave me to it. I'll stretch out the canvas and dig out our threads and then we'll draw the design tomorrow. I look forward to it.”

  Ambeal nodded. “Me, too!”

  She went off to find Alf, to ask him if he would like to join her for a ride. Mayhap Bronna was right. Mayhap all that was needed was to talk to him, and find out what, exactly, her father had said to him earlier.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  A DISCOVERY

  A DISCOVERY

  Alf was in the turret room, trying to decipher the defense plans for Bronley that the chief guardsman, Lewis, had given him. So far they made no sense to him.

  “I'm distracted,” he said with a sigh. If he could focus on anything, it would help. However, he couldn't. His mind was everywhere – anywhere that was not the worry starting to dawn on his mind.

  His lordship told me Ambeal has always loved her childhood sweetheart, Beiste McGormond. What must I think of that?

  He sighed. The man, Beiste, had been the one the thane wished for a successor. He had told Alf he accepted the thane's demands for the succession. Ambeal, he felt, would have other ideas though.

  He said on the recent visit Beiste paid them, Ambeal regretted her marriage to me. Said she wished for an annulment so she could fulfill the first plan. Marriage to Beiste.

  The merest thought of it twisted painfully in his heart like a wound. How could she do this to him? He loved her. He had loved her from the moment he saw her. Yet she said she wanted someone else? It was cruel. It was unbearable. It was also entirely likely, given her mercurial nature.

  Her father said she was always one to change her mind. He knows her better than anyone. Why would he lie?

  Alf hit his fist into his palm, feeling rage fill him like the hot blast from a furnace. He had believed Ambeal, had trusted her. Now this!

  “I don't have her word on this,” he told himself. She hadn't ever so much as even mentioned her father's ward or how she felt about him. Her father had suggested she had adored him from the moment they laid eyes on each other. If that were true, surely he would at least have heard about him before?

  He shook his head. How was he supposed to know what Ambeal thought? All he could do, he decided, was ask her. He set aside the map and ran a hand through his red hair, worrying.

  “Alf?”

  He heard a voice in the doorway and turned round. He realized he must look about as worried as he felt when he heard Ambeal give a little in drawn breath. He sighed.

  “Ambeal,” he said, voice weary. “A surprise to see you. Were you looking for me?”

  “Yes,” she said hesitantly. “I wanted to ask you if...if you would ride with me this afternoon?”

  Alf nodded slowly. It would, he thought, be the perfect opportunity to ask her about the matter. “Yes. Thank you, Ambeal.”

  He saw her eyes light up brightly and then the brightness clouded. “Now?” she asked timidly. She seemed almost afraid of him. Why?

  “I don't see why not,” Alf said cautiously. Why was she being so distant? Why, if not for the fact that her father was right. She wished to back out of their arrangement.

  She gave a small laugh. “No. I suppose there's no reason why not.”

  “Yes.”

  “I'll fetch my cloak and dress. We shall meet at the stables in half an hour?”

  “Agreed.”

  As he went off up to his chamber to get ready, he wondered what was happening. Why had Ambeal suddenly withdrawn so, gone so cold? Why was she so hesitant and distant? What had he done?

  Or rather, what did she wish to say to him?

  “I don't wish to know,” Alf said sadly as he shrugged on his outdoor cloak, a big green-tartan cloak that showed the colors of Dunkeld. “I wish I could remain ignorant forever.”

  He wished also that he could blur out the memories of their wedding night, of the way her body had yielded to his so sweetly, the feel of her lips under his kisses. If he could forget those things...he sighed.

  There is no medication in all the worlds for that.

  Feeling miserable, sure he was about to hear the worst news imaginable, he went down.

  The wind caught his cloak as he walked to the stables. It had sprung up hard during the afternoon, and it was now almost a gale, whispering around the stables, ruffling his hair.

  He saw the dark red velvet cloak in the stables ahead of him, a velvet hood pulled back to show red hair. He felt his loins tighten at the sight of her, as they always did, and he shook his head, willing his body to be silent.

  “Windy day, eh?” he said neutrally as he took his the reins of his horse from the stable hand. He saw her take the reins of a massive black stallion, tall and skittish, and raised a brow.

  “It is,” she said. She saw where he was looking and narrowed her eyes at him.

  “That's...your horse?” he asked.

  “I'm riding him,” she said succinctly. “No reason why I shouldn't.”

  “No,” Alf agreed nervously. “No, there isn't.”

  “Quite.”

  As they mounted and rode out, Alf felt his heart sinking lower still. He seemed to be able to get nothing right. Ambeal was so cold, so reserved, that he had n
o words to break the shell of distant silence walling her in.

  “Ambeal, I...”

  “Alf, I wanted to...”

  He nodded. “You go first, my lady. Lady's privilege.”

  She made a face at him. “Alf, you're vexed with me,” she said slowly. “I have noticed it all day. I understand I am...perhaps the price of being here with me is too high for you.”

  Alf brindled. Did she mean he was not sufficiently capable to manage the tasks her father set for him? “I assure you I am suited to the task,” he said frostily. “If you find me inadequate, it is yourself who is expecting more than I am capable of.”

  Her face fell. “Alf! I...” she shook her head. “Mayhap I am,” she said sadly.

  That was too much for Alf. They were riding in thick forest, every word a hammer blow, loud, clear and incisive in the shadowed silence.

  “Mayhap you are,” Alf spat. “In which case, I should not be here, should I?”

  Ambeal stared at him, her face icy calm. “No,” she said after a long moment. “Mayhap I am the one that should not be here. I have come to the wrong place. It is not the place I thought it was, after all.”

  With that, she turned and rode away.

  “Ambeal!” Alf shouted. “Wait!” However, she was already gone. Her horse was taller and faster than his, and she knew this forest. She rode off the path, heading through the bracken at a speed insane for such close confines, but fast enough to keep ahead of him.

  After a few minutes of chasing her, Alf stopped. He slumped forward on the saddle, forearms resting on the pommel before him. He heard a harsh cry escape him, frustration, regret and misery all woven into it.

  “Ambeal!” he shouted. “Why are you doing this?”

  The afternoon was darkening fast, early sunset combined with the fitful clouds, blowing in on a stiff wind. He felt his misery turn to a real fear. It was cold out here, and getting dark fast. She could be lost. He shivered.

  Already, on the thin wind, he could hear the sound of wolves. They were distant, barely audible, but they were there. He shuddered.

  “Ambeal!” he shouted. No reply. Of course, there wasn't, he told himself angrily. She was already far away.

  Feeling real fear creep down his spine, Alf spurred his horse on along the path that she had followed.

  Ambeal, he thought, his mind focused on her and the danger she faced. How could I have been so stupid? All of the things they had argued about were so petty, now. How could he have made such assumptions? Even if he was right, it wouldn't matter. Why did it matter if she loved someone else? He loved her. All that mattered to him was to find her, and bring her back. Alive, safe, and whole.

  “Why did I think anything else mattered?” he asked aloud. His horse was the only one there to hear him and he snorted. Fair enough response, Alf thought, to his stupidity. How could he have put his own need for assurance ahead of her very life?

  “Why didn't I just talk to her?” he asked aloud. It was too late for that though. Too late, now, to know what he should have done. All that was left for him to do, now, was to ride. Ride and seek. To find her, before it was too late.

  Urging on his horse, grimacing as they shot ahead through the trees, narrowly missing tree trunks that could kill them if ridden into, they went on. In to the fast falling night. To find Ambeal.

  CHAPTER NINE

  CLOSER THAN BEFORE

  CLOSER THAN BEFORE

  Ambeal could barely breathe, barely hear, barely see. Eyes blinded with tears, ears deaf to anything but the sound of the wind, whispering past her as they rode, fingers numb and frozen to the reins, she rode. On and on and on, into the growing night.

  “I can't believe he said that,” she said aloud. She sobbed. Each pace seemed to multiply the sadness in her, so that, as she reached a place where the trees were thinner, the light gleaming through the closely growing tree trunks, she was hopeless with grieving.

  “Alf,” she whispered. She could not forget how she had loved him, how they had been together. How close they seemed, until this moment. Now, they were irredeemably irreconcilable, or so it seemed.

  “I have been so stupid,” she whispered. The silence in the woods gave no answer – misty and waiting, it seemed to sense her tiredness, sense the trauma in her soul. Come to me, it whispered. Just sit down here awhile, in the cold. Let go. In the morning you will have frozen, and all your troubles will be over. Sit down awhile.

  Ambeal shook her head. “No,” she said loudly. She would not give in to that temptation. She would ride on. She would not sit down and die. Not now.

  “I cannot believe I was so stupid,” she sighed.

  She had really thought that she loved Alf, and he loved her. It seemed he thought her a burden, something he had ended up shackled to. He should never have volunteered to help Brodgar out of his betrothal. He should have let his friend either extricate himself, or marry her.

  “At least Brodgar would have the satisfaction of doing his duty,” she said bitterly. “Alf, it seems, cannot wait to get away.”

  She set her horse moving at a walk and, together, they headed out of the trees. On the moorland beyond, the cold cut through her velvet cloak like a knife. The wind whistled over the scrubby landscape, no protection and no shelter from it to speak of.

  “We should go back,” she whispered to her horse.

  It was then that she heard it. The distant howl of wolves. Her blood froze. Usually dwelling in the deeper woods, of late with the cold of winter they had become desperate, sating their wild hunger on the sheepfolds of the valley farmers. Any traveler out in the woods at night was prey to them.

  “We should go back,” she said again. Her horse gave a low snort. He had heard them too, she knew. His ears swiveled as he took in the sound and he stamped again, eager to be off.

  “I agree,” Ambeal said, patting his neck. It helped her to calm herself, too, the shared contact. “We should go.”

  They set back along the path down which they came.

  Or they thought they did. As they ventured on into the dense, tangled woodlands, Ambeal felt her blood run cold. All the trees looked the same. How was she going to find her way back? By day, direction was easier to fathom. At night, she could be facing North, or East, or...she turned, looking behind her. The trees there were, to all intents and purposes, the same as those facing her, an impenetrable wall of chalk gray tree trunks, drawn on a background of ink-black night. She felt her heart thump as the desperation of her plight sank in.

  “What must we do?” she whispered as again, that terrible howling echoed through the trees, rising and insistent, keening of hunger dissatisfied and the long-lasting cold. “What can we do?”

  Her horse snorted, his ears twitching back and forth again. She leaned forward on the pommel of the saddle, feeling real fear numb her. What could she do? They had two choices. They could search for the way back or they could stay, try and find a place to hole up for the night. She had no idea which to choose.

  Another howl shivered through the silence, making all her hair stand on end. This time, her trusty horse chose for her, walking solidly forward on a path through the treeline. She nodded.

  “We'll go home. Or try.” How?

  The sound of distant wolves filling her with numbness, the silence of the forest unnerving and misleading, Ambeal let her horse walk himself back between the trees, hoping against hope that he had some uncanny instinct that she lacked, and would know the way in the utter black of night.

  “When I was sad and frightened as a girl, I would sing,” she reminded herself. It had raised her spirits and given her hope. She cleared her throat.

  “As I wa-alked on the bridge, o'er the bonny, bonny, burn...” she sang, an old local song about a farmer's daughter who fell for a tradesman, “I sa-aw his handsome smile...”

  She was focused on the words now, the lilting melody, warm and comforting, totally at odds with the place she found herself. Her horse seemed to settle, too. His ears still flicked b
ack and forth, but he walked evenly on, seeming to like to listen to her singing.

  “And the fa-armer, did say...on that long and fateful da-ay...”

  Her voice wavered as she reached the point in the ballad where the father refuses to grant his daughter the right to marry her love. In some ways, it is my story. She couldn't remember what happened next.

  She cleared her throat and sang on. “He said...go, you knave, and he turned away...”

  Footsteps. There was someone moving through the woodlands. She tensed. Outlaws? It was a small possibility. If they had found some way to keep away the wolves – mayhap with lighting a fire – then they would surely thrive in these woods, where the verderers themselves seldom ventured from a path.

  What should I do? Carry on, or stay still?

  She stopped, and waited. The footsteps had stopped.

  Probably a deer, she told herself. Moving through the brush. I likely disturbed it. Count to ten and carry on.

  She forced herself to stay where she was and count to ten. If the noise were a person, they would start to move again, seeking her position.

  Nobody moved. She sighed. It must be a deer.

  “Come on,” she said to her horse gently. “Let's sing some more. I want to see what happens next...”

  Chatting to her horse made her calmer and it calmed him, too. They proceeded on in the direction they thought was home.

  “And the water sang its song as it washed across the stones...” she sang, getting to the chorus again. “It sang merrily and clear, hey-o, hey-o...”

  She tensed. There was the sound again. Something moving. It was definitely feet. Horse, or man? She had no idea. All she knew was that, as she moved, it moved. Whatever it was, it was tracking her.

  “What if it's a wolf?” she said aloud. Her horse seemed unconcerned and she hoped that, were it a wolf, he would know and recognize the scent. Even so.

  “And a hey derry day, and a very merry day...” she sang.