Highland Master

by Howell, Hannah

  Shaking away that sad memory, he washed up and put on some clean clothes. It would have been better if Triona were actually Arianna’s blood cousin, for he could have placed that familial connection firm in his mind and seen her only as another member of his large family. It was something he could still try to do, however, even if he doubted it would be successful. He had never been very good at lying to himself, no matter how much he sometimes wanted to.

  Just as he moved to stand beside Harcourt, who was staring out of the window again, Callum, Uven, and Tamhas entered the room. “Ready to find out a bit more about who and where we have delivered Arianna?” he asked them.

  “Aye,” replied Callum as he sat on the end of the bed. “Something isnae quite right here.”

  “That is what Harcourt says.”

  “Though it fair chokes me to say so, he is right.” Callum grinned when Harcourt just laughed. “The first odd thing I noticed was the many children running about, many actually working without an adult about to direct them. Also a great many women with a welcoming eye.”

  “That should not seem strange to you,” Harcourt said. “Ye get that look a lot.”

  Callum just shrugged. “This welcome appears to come because we are some of the very few adult men here. There are older men, some nay too hale. And a lot of verra young lads, some of whom could be considered men, but much too young for the lasses looking at us as if we were a rich slab of roasted venison and they were starving.”

  “I, too, wondered at the lack of armed, and trained, men to greet us,” said Tamhas, leaning against the bedpost and crossing his arms over his chest. “We may have been a small party approaching, giving no sign of a threat, but there still should have been men of equal strength to greet us and ask our business with the lady. I dinnae think the sight of Arianna was all that made the difference in how we were met at the gates. No one builds such strong walls and then leaves the gates so weakly defended.”

  “Verra true,” agreed Brett. “We need to look around, gather what information we can. I dinnae like Arianna staying in a place where the defenses are so weak. Harcourt has already decided to look round and discover what he can, but I think it would be best if we all do. We will gather what truths we need so we will ken a lot faster that way.”

  “Agreed,” said Callum, and the rest nodded.

  “Then let us go down to the great hall and see what food has been set out for us. We can start our watching and listening right there. Do we need to collect Arianna?”

  “Nay,” replied Uven. “I went to ask, and she said she would have that maid take her down to the hall.”

  Brett nodded and led the men out of his bedchamber. Banuilt appeared to be a fine fortified manor home, its people friendly enough, but he remained uneasy. His instincts told him there were some secrets to be uncovered, and he was determined to unveil every one.

  “Such fine men, m’lady,” said Nessa, one of the few older women who had survived the time of the fever. “All the lassies are sighing o’er them.”

  “I am nay surprised,” Triona muttered as she carefully checked that the meal for her guests was all it should be, and reminded herself that she needed to have that stern talk with the women about not needing any more fatherless children at Banuilt. “It has been too long since we have had any true warriors here. Knights, too. Big, strong, weel-armed, and, I believe, skilled knights.”

  “Are ye thinking they could help us fight that bastard Grant?”

  “They could, but should we ask them to? I did wonder if I could get them to train our men but hesitate to ask that, either. It doesnae seem, weel, courteous to have someone come to visit and then usurp their guard for your own purposes.”

  “Weel, mayhap nay, but something needs to be done about that mon. He is killing us all slowly, is what he is doing. That is all one can think when he tries to end our ability to feed everyone. ’Tis only because his own men dinnae have their hearts in the business that we have survived for so long.”

  “Sadly true, and we cannae be sure that reluctance will last much longer. If naught else, Sir John Grant has to be becoming suspicious of how little damage all his plans have done to us. Once he sees that his own men are nay helping him much, that they are at fault for his lack of success, he will make certain that they do things right the next time. ’Tis said he has a fierce temper.”

  “Aye, and then the burying will begin again, only it will be our own allies who set us in the ground.” Nessa sighed and shook her head, a sadness clouding her brown eyes, for she had lost her husband and a daughter to the fever.

  “Nay, I shall nay let that happen. If it begins to cost us lives, I will bow to what he wants. I just dinnae do it now because I dinnae think he has any right to force me to it, but also because I dinnae believe any of ye would find life beneath his boot all that comfortable.”

  “Nay, we wouldnae, but we wouldnae ask that sacrifice of ye, either.”

  “No need to ask. I willnae hold firm if the blood starts to flow, as nothing is worth the lives of the people of Banuilt. We have lost too many already to an enemy we couldnae fight. Now, let us finish this, as I am certain our guests will come down soon. So, no more talk about Sir John Grant. I wish to just enjoy a time with some guests for now, and listen to whatever news my cousin may have brought with her, news that will undoubtedly entertain me, if I recall Arianna as well as I think I do. She was always verra skilled in the telling of a tale.”

  “Aye, ye deserve that. Ye work verra hard for all of us.”

  “’Tis for me and Ella, too, Nessa. But tonight I wish to nay think about what work needs to be done, and I certainly dinnae want to think about Sir John.”

  “Ye do that, lass. Just wish it was as easy to be completely rid of that bastard,” Nessa muttered and hurried back toward the kitchens.

  So do I, thought Triona, and sighed. Sir John would not be shrugged off so easily, however. He had been a dark cloud in her sky from the moment she had buried her husband, one of the first victims of the fever that had taken so many of Banuilt’s people. Sir John did not wish to heed her refusal. Why the man would think she would want another husband, she did not know, but he had even been uncivilized enough to ask her for her hand when her first husband was barely cold in his grave. Something was going to have to be done, something more than just fixing the problems he caused. But, she thought, for tonight, Sir John Grant would be forgotten and she would take pleasure in new faces and whatever news they had of the world outside the walls of Banuilt.

  When a little voice in her mind whispered that she would also take some pleasure in looking at Sir Brett Murray for awhile, she cursed. That was a danger she had not expected. The biggest danger was not just that he was a true pleasure for the eyes, which he most certainly was, but she had seen handsome men before. There had even been ones at Banuilt before the fever killed some and the rest went to France to try to gain enough coin to help restore Banuilt to the comfortable, pleasant place it had once been. Not one of those men had caused her heart to flutter or her pulse to race.

  Then she took one look into a pair of dark green eyes and she went all soft and silly, she thought crossly. It could be just that she saw in him a chance to taste a true passion, something she had never gained in her marriage but had heard other women speak of. She had been willing to find it with Boyd, but, as she had discovered, he had been a rather passionless man. Bedding down with him had been quick and obviously only for the promise of producing a child. He had been kind enough when, after two years of such effort, she had given him a daughter and not the son he craved, and then he had returned to the duty of trying to breed with her. She still felt guilty about the many times when she had dreaded climbing into her marriage bed.

  She smiled as she thought of her little Ella with her too-curly red hair and her big blue eyes. Everything else about her marriage may have been a sad disappointment, but never her Ella. For her child she could only be grateful she had spent her youth in a marriage that had brought
her no real happiness. She had even endured Boyd’s attempts to breed with her again after Ella’s birth, for the simple reason that she, too, had wanted another child.

  And Ella was one of the reasons she would have nothing to do with Sir John Grant. The man had seen her child only a few times and his disregard for the little girl had ended all thought of him as any more than a nuisance. She had even sensed that he would not welcome her child if she had been fool enough to think marrying him would solve her problems. That chilled her to the bone. Not only would Ella get no love or guidance from the man, but she could not shake the feeling that Sir John could even be a threat to Ella, who could claim a right to Banuilt. Banuilt was, after all, no more than Boyd’s first wife’s dower property, one deeded over to him on the day of their marriage, when he took the McKee name to please her aging father. And it could go to his child if Ella was suddenly orphaned; or, if Ella herself was gone, it would leave the lands free to go to whatever other child Triona might bear.

  Realizing that she was standing by the table, scowling at the floor and drumming her fingers on the top of the table, Triona straightened up and fought to clear her mind of such thoughts. The past was the past and nothing could change it. Thinking on it so much was akin to brooding, and she did not want to fall into that mood. She had guests coming down the stairs even now, could hear the sound of the men’s boots on the stairs, and would soon share a meal with them.

  She looked over the table set for her guests and smiled. Banuilt may have faltered, so much of what Boyd had planned to do left unfinished, but she could still present guests with a fine feast. She refused to think of the large hole it had to have left in the larder. It had been years since any guests had come to Banuilt, far too long since she had heard any news of what was happening outside the borders of her lands, except that brought by the occasional trader or drover. They could make up this loss and, if Arianna and her men planned to stay for any length of time, she would face the problem of an empty larder when it arose. If nothing else, the men could do some hunting to help feed themselves.

  Turning toward the door of the great hall, she smiled a welcome when the men walked in. She could hear Arianna talking to the maid as she, too, came to join them. Tonight was to find out Arianna’s reason for visiting, and to enjoy a fine meal. Nothing else, she told herself firmly, pushing aside every concern that never let her mind rest. The first thing she wanted to know, she decided as they all took their seats, was why Arianna, a woman carrying a child, had decided that she just had to visit her long unseen cousin-by-marriage, several times removed, now.

  Chapter Two

  “My husband was married!”

  Triona blinked and carefully ate a piece of bread as she studied her cousin. That was not quite what she had expected when she asked why her cousin had come to visit. Nor was the high emotion behind the statement. She was happy to hear that Arianna was actually married, but the fear of an angry husband banging at her gates returned.

  The Arianna she recalled from her childhood had always been sweet, calm, obedient, and very learned in all the ways of a well-mannered lady, at least when presented to their elders. When lecturing Triona on how to behave, Triona’s mother had often pointed to Arianna as the perfect example of a lady. Once out of sight of the adults, however, Arianna had revealed a bit more love of fun, a hint of spirit, but even then she had still been far more of a lady than Triona had been or had ever hoped to be. It occasionally still surprised Triona that the very rigid, proper, and pious Boyd had chosen her for his wife. Arianna, on the other hand, had always appeared to be the perfect choice for a gentleman’s wife.

  There was little sign of that sweet, even-tempered, genteel lady now, however. Arianna was scowling at the food on her plate even as she stabbed at it and shoved it into her mouth. During the time since they had seen each other last, Arianna had grasped a firm hold on all of that spirit she had tried so hard to bury beneath courtly manners.

  “Arianna, if he was already married, then how could he have married you?” Triona asked. “Are ye telling me that ye are nay truly married to the mon?” It was difficult to believe that Arianna’s Murray kin would accept such an insult, or allow the man who delivered it to live for long.

  “Oh, nay, Brian and I are truly married. But my husband, the lying swine, neglected to tell me that he had been married before, that I am his second wife.”

  “Why does that matter? Many men have more than one wife in their lifetimes. Mine was wed before me. Sad to say, many a mon loses his wife in childbed, if naught else. So do women often have more than one husband in a lifetime. Ye were married before him, were ye nay?”

  “Aye, I was, but at least I told him about that, and at least I recall my first marriage. All too weel for my liking,” Arianna muttered.

  There was such heavy meaning behind those muttered words that Triona had to fight the urge to ask her cousin just what she meant by them, and remain fixed upon the matter at hand. “Then why does it matter if Sir Brian was wed once ere he married ye?”

  “Because he didnae tell me about it. Nary a word. I had to hear about his first wife from someone else.”

  Triona opened her mouth to begin a scold, to tell Arianna not to be so foolish, and quickly shoved a piece of bread into her mouth before she could say a word. The first thought that had entered her head was to tell her cousin that she was being silly and should just go home to her husband. Yet the more she thought on the matter, the more she had to wonder why the man would hide the fact that he had once been married. She could think of no good reason for doing so.

  “Why would he hide the fact that he was once married?” she finally asked.

  “He says he forgot about her,” Arianna replied, and nodded at the shocked reaction Triona could not hide.

  “He forgot he had a wife?”

  It was difficult for Triona to understand, but she found that she trusted her cousin enough, despite how long it had been since seeing her, to trust her word on it. Arianna’s word had always been good, and despite how her cousin appeared to have changed, Triona doubted that had. A glance toward the men revealed them torn between disgust and amusement. It was either just a strange manly twist of humor that would make them think that such a thing could ever be funny, or they knew something about Arianna’s husband that she did not.

  “Aye,” said Arianna. “When his father said something about Brian’s wife and I kenned he was nay speaking about me, I demanded to ken what he was talking about. He said that Brian had wed a lass five years past. I didnae believe it, but Fingal, my husband’s father, was adamant about it. Then his wife, Mab, assured me that it was true, that Brian had had a wife before me. It seems my husband ran off with this lass and wed her, but she died within a month or two.”

  “Mayhap that is why he forgot. Such a short marriage could easily slip a mon’s mind after so many years.” Triona ignored the soft snorts of amusement from the men over what even she saw as a weak excuse for such an omission. “There would be so few good memories that they wouldnae linger in his mind.”

  It was hard not to wince at the gently disgusted look Arianna gave her, her response only adding to the derisive sounds the men had made. Even a short, dull, loveless marriage should linger in a man’s mind, if only as a lesson well learned. There had to be some reason, some explanation for it that Arianna had not yet revealed or simply did not know. If not, then her cousin had wed herself to either a very heartless man or a very odd one.

  “A mon doesnae forget that he ran off with the bride that had been intended for his own brother,” Arianna said.

  “He stole his brother’s bride?”

  “Aye. He did. Slipped off with her in the dark of night.”

  “And his brother did naught about it?”

  “Nay. In truth, Gregor was pleased that the matter of wedding Mavis was no longer his concern. He had fallen in love with my cousin Alanna and wanted her as his wife. So Brian running away with Mavis was accepted by all, including her fathe
r, as he was but looking for a good strong mon to give him a grandson. The MacFingals are somewhat renowned for bearing many sons. Sad to say, poor Mavis died but a month or two after they were wed and Brian didnae gain anything, land or coin, from the short marriage, so he came back to Scarglas.”

  Triona frowned when the men laughed at Arianna’s remark about the MacFingals’ ability to breed sons but decided now was not the time to ask what was so funny about that. “And promptly forgot all about her?”

  “There, now ye begin to see how ridiculous that is. Nay only did he care enough about the lass to take her from his own brother, but she died young, their life together barely begun. How does a mon forget that?”

  Triona had no real answer for her cousin. How did a man forget such a thing? There had to have been sorrow and loss to mar his heart. No one forgot such things that easily, nor should they do so. Even if it was not the love match Arianna evidently thought it to have been, the loss of someone you had exchanged vows with should stick in your memory. She prayed her cousin was not trapped in a marriage as cold as hers had been.

  “Mayhap he just didnae think it was of any importance,” she finally said. “It was all in the past and of no concern to what he had with you, and so short-lived a part of the past that he had naught to say about it.”

  “I am nay sure that is any better,” muttered Arianna.

  Triona did not think so, either, but she had little else to say. It was hard to offer comfort and advice when she thoroughly agreed with Arianna’s upset. Yet she was not sure that it had been wise to just run away. It was evident that Arianna had no trouble telling all of them what had her so angry with her husband, so why had she been unable to stay and tell the man himself?