Plaid to the Bone

by Mia Marlowe

  “Father wanted an accident.” Cait straightened. Accidental deaths were not so easy to arrange, she’d discovered, for which she was becoming grateful. “No one will believe Adam tripped and fell on a knife.”

  “It doesna signify. This knife belongs to Mr. Shaw, your husband’s former steward.”

  “Former?”

  “Aye, Lord Bonniebroch relieved him of his duties this morning. Something about his mishandling of the estate. The trouble with the mill was the last straw, I gather. But the point is Mr. Shaw stormed out of the keep, fighting mad and swearing a blue streak. He has reason to harm the laird.” MacRath forced the knife into Cait’s hand. “If this dirk is found sticking out of your husband’s chest, there’s enough folk hereabouts who heard Mr. Shaw making threats that none will doubt he did for Lord Bonniebroch.”

  “But—”

  “No buts, Cait. Ye swore an oath upon your own blood to end Adam Cameron.”

  Cait’s spine straightened. “If I must choose between Adam and myself, the choice is an easy one.”

  “I’d think twice if I were you. Failing to honor your word will cost ye.” MacRath leaned toward her menacingly.

  “What about my word to be a good and faithful wife?” Surely words spoken in a kirk held more force than those said in some weird rite she didn’t really understand.

  Morgan’s face flushed purplish with anger. “Ye canna bargain with the Powers and expect to trip away unscathed. Tomorrow makes one month since ye wed Bonniebroch. Either ye fulfill your vow, or I’ll have your father’s head. Aye, ye forgot about that part of the arrangement, did ye no’?”

  Oh, God, she had. That dark ceremony had all seemed so surreal, so like a night phantom, she’d tried to put the particulars out of her mind. All she really remembered was that for once, Wallace Grant had seemed genuinely pleased with her.

  “Do ye doubt my abilities, Cait? Even at this distance, all I need do is speak a word of power and one way or another Wallace Grant will find himself headless.”

  Dread curled in her belly like a coiled adder.

  “But, what if I canna do it? Morgan, dinna harm my father.” Cait overcame her revulsion and laid a slim hand on his forearm in entreaty. “Please.”

  The corners of Morgan’s mouth curled upward, but no one would mistake the expression for a smile. “Very well, ye beg so prettily, I’m inclined to keep things simple. Either ye do for Lord Bonniebroch with Mr. Shaw’s dirk or ye present yourself to me in the dungeon at midnight tomorrow.”

  “I dinna even know how to get to the dungeon.”

  “Simple. Tip the statue of Kenneth MacAlpin on the fireplace mantel in the laird’s chamber and a secret passage will open. Take the staircase going down when ye come to it. Or ye can kill Adam Cameron in his bed and cry holy havoc. Do either of those things and I’ll let Wallace Grant live. Now, put that dirk away before someone sees ye with it and let’s ride.” He laced his fingers together and stooped forward to give her a leg up.

  Cait’s hands were so clammy the dirk slipped from her grip at the last moment as she was secreting it in the deep pocket of her skirt. It dropped heavily, the sharp point penetrating the layers of her skirts and nicking her thigh. A thin ribbon of warmth trickled down her leg. “I’ve changed my mind about riding. It looks like the weather’s turned.”

  Cait turned and strode out of the stable. She wished she could sprout wings and fly till she was no longer breathing the same air as Morgan MacRath.

  Callum Farquhar peered over the edge of the haymow, careful to make certain he was unobserved. As she went, Cait left scarlet drops in the straw.

  Sworn by her own blood indeed.

  There was some grunting and rustling in the stall beneath him and presently, Morgan MacRath appeared, bearing a saddle. He deposited it on the rack and stalked toward the doorway, his aura writhing and red.

  Then he stopped short and turned around. Farquhar jerked back so MacRath couldn’t see him, hoping the sorcerer would think the rustling in the hay above him was just a rat or two. Farquhar didn’t even draw breath until he heard MacRath’s heavy tread retreating into the rain that had begun to fall.

  Well, there’s a fine kettle of pickled herring.

  The morning had dawned exceptionally fine. Farquhar had evaded anything resembling work and settled into the haymow with a couple of apples and the rare copy of Plutarch he’d pilfered from Lord Bonniebroch’s surprisingly well-stocked library. He’d planned to while away the day in the company of crisp fruit and the nimble mind of that ancient philosopher.

  But he couldn’t retreat into the book any longer.

  He’d sworn his life to Cait Grant. He retraced the incident with the wolf ’s bane in his mind and saw it now in a very different light. But even if she wished her husband ill, he owed the lady his fealty and there was no taking it back.

  However, he owed the laird of Bonniebroch as well. If Adam Cameron hadn’t backed the lady’s mercy with some of his own, Farquhar might have ended up with much worse than an ear that sported a gaping hole.

  From what he could tell, magic bound Lady Bonniebroch in this wicked circle, and magic was the only thing that could hope to undo it. He sighed as he tucked Plutarch back into his doublet, shinnied down the ladder and out of the loft. He’d spend the rest of the day closeted with Elymas’s grimoire.

  Farquhar hoped the old sorcerer had recorded an incantation there that would unmake a spell of making. If his virulent aura was any indication, Morgan MacRath was far more powerful than Farquhar in magical realms.

  But magic is a bit like swordplay. The one who wins isna always the strongest. ’Tis the one who knows the most tricks.

  Adam didn’t come home in time for supper. He didn’t return to sleep in his own bed that night. The next morning a messenger came with word that the mill wheel still wasn’t turning and his lordship wouldn’t leave the work till it was made right.

  Cait breathed a sigh of relief and hoped the mill would take a week to fix.

  That evening she retreated to their chamber with a basket of sewing and a spool of black thread. She planned to embroider the life out of a pair of detachable cuffs and hoped the intricate black-work pattern would distract her from the coming deadline at midnight. All it did was strain her eyes and make them burn.

  The bell in the castle chapel chimed eleven times. She knew serious trouble for the estate was keeping her husband away, but whatever had disabled the mill, she blessed it. So long as he wasn’t in Bonniebroch, Morgan couldn’t very well hold her to account, even after midnight came and went.

  “Stay away, Adam,” she murmured as she rose to stretch after sitting so long. Mr. Shaw’s dirk was still in her pocket though she’d wrapped it in a length of linen to keep from cutting herself on it again. She knew it was only her imagination, but the blade seemed ponderously heavy on her thigh. Perhaps it was merely the weight the dirk added to her soul.

  Footsteps sounded in the corridor outside the laird’s chamber and the door swung open. Bedraggled and bleary-eyed with two days’ growth of beard on his cheeks, her husband sagged on the threshold.

  “Adam.” Her heart dipped suddenly to her toes. “I thought perhaps ye wouldna come home again since it’s so late.”

  “I was tempted. We worked on that mill wheel for the last two days and nights without stopping for anything but an occasional heel of bread.” He dragged a hand over his face. “There’ll be more to do yet. Shaw neglected its maintenance something fierce, but at least ’tis turning now.” He stretched hugely as he covered the distance between them and gathered her into his arms. “The miller and his good wife asked would I stay, but I told them I had my own good wife to get back to.”

  He kissed her and the sweetness of his mouth on hers made the back of her throat ache.

  She slipped out of his arms and made for the bell pull. “Shall I ring for a bath for ye?”

  “Dinna bother. I was under water more than I was out of it these past days.” He crossed to the washba
sin and pitcher and splashed his face. It didn’t keep him from yawning. “Besides, tired as I am, I’m like to fall asleep and drown in the tub.”

  “Would ye care for a bite?”

  He unwound his plaid and pulled his shirt over his head. Then he sat on the bed and flopped back, his feet still on the floor. “Maybe later. Just let me close my eyes for . . . a wee while . . . Cait, did I . . .”

  He was breathing so heavily, she was sure he’d drifted off between one word and the next. Cait knelt by the bedside, unbuckled his boots, and tugged off his stockings. Then she lifted his legs onto the bed. He jerked in his sleep and his eyes opened. He looked down at his bare feet and smiled drowsily.

  “I wouldna have thought it, proud and cold as ye were at the start, but ye’ve become a bountiful wife to me, Cait,” he said slowly, clearly working at putting the words together with exhaustion pulling at him. He reached toward her and she settled a hip on the bed beside him so he could wrap his arm around her waist. “We’ve been acting as if we loved each other this past month, we two, and do ye remember I promised I’d tell ye when the action turned to feeling?”

  She nodded, holding her breath.

  “It’s happened. For me at least. I realized it as I was riding home to ye. I couldna wait to be with ye. To feel ye close and sink into the rest of simply being beside ye. Ah, wife, ye do me good just by being yourself.” He traced the hollow of her cheekbone with his fingertip. “I love ye fine, Cait. With all my blood. With all my bones. Everything I am. I love you . . .”

  His arm dropped and his hand came to rest on his chest as he lost the battle with fatigue and slipped back beneath the surface of sleep. Cait watched as his chest rose and fell and the pulse point at his throat throbbed.

  She pulled the dirk from her pocket and unwound the linen. If ever she was going to do it, now was the time. Adam was so deeply asleep, he’d die before he had time to open his eyes and see the betrayal on her face.

  Her hand shook.

  Her father’s face rose accusingly in her mind. She’d sworn. He’d never forgive her for failing. She lifted the dirk, held it poised to bring down hard on the pulsing vein in Adam’s neck.

  But that damnable lump of caring began to glow warm inside her. It filled her chest and radiated outward until she was overflowing with inconvenient tenderness. She couldn’t help it. She couldn’t change it. It simply was.

  I love him, too, she realized.

  Cait let her arm sink. The dirk slipped from her grasp and clattered harmlessly to the floor. A muscle in Adam’s cheek twitched at the noise, but then relaxed and he slept on.

  It would be midnight soon. She rose, picked up the dirk, and crossed to the fireplace to tilt the statuette of Scotland’s first king that rested on the mantel. There was no sound, but the tapestry on the wall wavered a bit. Cait peeked behind it and found the secret corridor Morgan had told her about.

  She struck steel to flint and lit the candle in the wall sconce just inside the opening. Then she lifted the candle to light her way. Her other hand was buried in her pocket, her fingers still wrapped around the dirk’s hilt.

  Determination straightened her spine. If she had her way, she knew exactly whose chest Mr. Shaw’s blade would rest in by midnight.

  Chapter 11

  “When a troubadour sings for his supper, the finale may not be his finest song, but ’tis always his last.”

  From the journal of Callum Farquhar,

  lover of music, writer of songs, but, to my

  everlasting sorrow, slightly tone deaf.

  Farquhar peered from the dark stairwell into the dimly lit dungeon. Morgan MacRath had set up an altar on the north wall of the chamber before the open, and still blessedly empty, barred cells. By the light of a ritual candle, Farquhar could make out a pentacle propped against the wall along with other symbols he didn’t recognize. Incense burned, a stinging sweetness hovering in the musty air. There was probably a bowl of salt and an athame—a black-handled double-edged iron blade—resting on the altar as well, but Farquhar couldn’t tell for certain from this angle.

  What he could tell was that Morgan MacRath was an adept. The sorcerer was standing before the altar, deeply entranced by a shallow scrying bowl. Morgan frowned at the images he was seeing in the shallow water, then his head jerked in surprise and he gave an evil-sounding chuckle that reverberated around the room.

  He’d already cast a magic circle by gouging the sandstone floor around the odd looking glass hanging in the middle of the room. Whatever spell MacRath was preparing to cast must be a powerful one and since the mirror would only amplify his malevolent purpose, Farquhar couldn’t suppress a shiver.

  Nothing in Elymas’s grimoire had prepared him for this. When he couldn’t find a magical answer for MacRath’s plans, he did the only other thing he could think of and that was to station himself in this dark place and watch for Lady Bonniebroch to appear.

  Farquhar was no warrior. And he couldn’t meet MacRath on fantastical terms, but perhaps a way to help her would yet present itself. Trusting to luck didn’t seem the best course, but Lady Bonniebroch had been lucky for him. He only hoped he could return the favor.

  MacRath began chanting, a guttural rhythmic sound, but the soft swish of kid soles on stone crept into Farquhar’s ear as well. Someone was coming. Farquhar stole into the dungeon and scuttled to hide behind the iron maiden in the corner. From that vantage point, he had a clear view of both the stairwell and MacRath.

  Lady Bonniebroch appeared in the spot he’d just vacated. He read fear on her lovely features, but then she squared her shoulders and schooled her expression into a bland mask.

  “’Tis settled, MacRath,” she said in a loud voice as she began walking toward him with her hand in her pocket.

  Morgan turned, not the least surprised to see her. “Show me his blood on the blade.”

  “I left the dirk where it lies,” she said. “How else will anyone connect the deed with Mr. Shaw?”

  “How indeed? I only ask because I’m sensitive to metals, you see, and I perceive there is a blade on your person.”

  “Oh, you must mean this,” she said as she continued to advance toward him. She reached into her bodice and drew a slim four-inch dirk from the busk. “Only for protection. A lady can never be too careful.”

  “Neither can a magus.”

  MacRath extended his hand toward her and sparks flew from his fingertips as he quickly intoned an obscure Latin phrase. The blade was ripped from Lady Bonniebroch’s hand and flew, turning end over end in the air. It finally stuck fast to the ornate iron filigree that framed the long looking glass. Then her skirt jerked toward the glass as well, until the hand in her pocket was pinned between her body and the ornate frame.

  A giant lodestone. That explained the faint hum Farquhar had heard when he stood before the mirror for the first time.

  “Ye’ve a second knife, milady.” MacRath made a “tsking” sound. “Ye havena been entirely truthful with me. That will cost ye.”

  He made a sign in the air before his body, his fingertips leaving a shower of golden shimmers to form a charm. Lady Bonniebroch cried out as her body was jerked by an unseen hand. It flipped her around till her spine was held flat against the mirror, her arms pinioned at the wrists against the iron filigree as if she’d been manacled. She struggled and the looking glass swayed on its chains, but she remained stuck fast.

  “Let me go!”

  MacRath shook his head. “I’m no’ holding ye. ’Tis your oath as does that. Ye swore on your own blood and now the iron in that blood has bound ye to the mirror’s frame.” He patted her cheek. “I have a few preparations to make before midnight, but I’ll come back to ye directly. Should ye wish to scream, please feel free. No one but me will hear ye, but I assure ye, I’ll enjoy it enough for a multitude.”

  He turned and walked back toward his altar, chanting a bastardized version of the “Dies Irae,” the dirge of final judgment.

  Farquhar seized his momen
t. He crept back to the stairwell and dashed up the dark stone steps.

  A scream caught at the back of her throat. Cait bit her lip until she tasted blood, but she wouldn’t give Morgan the satisfaction of hearing her fear. She’d sworn a foolish oath and now she’d pay for her folly.

  Why had she thought she could sneak up on a sorcerer and dispatch him with a dirk as if he were as insensible as that practice sack of meal?

  She hadn’t been thinking clearly. She only knew she couldn’t kill Adam. And she couldn’t let her father pay for her unwillingness to live up to her evil bargain.

  The mirror’s hold on her grew by the moment. It was as if a fist squeezed Cait’s heart and she struggled to draw a breath. Choking clouds of incense rose from Morgan’s altar. Her vision tunneled briefly, but then she pushed herself up on her toes and was able to gulp a lungful of the bitter air.

  Tears streamed down her cheeks. She wept for the days of loving she’d miss with Adam. She wept for their unborn children. She wept for her all too short life.

  Then Morgan’s head lifted, cocked like a hunting hound who hears his master’s whistled command. “’Tis time.”

  He pushed the sleeves of his robe up to bare his arms and advanced toward her, his athame in his hand.

  “Hold!” It was Adam’s voice coming from the stairwell.

  Hope surged in Cait’s heart, but fear for him overwhelmed it. Before she could warn Adam away, he pounded across the chamber at a dead run toward MacRath, a wicked claymore raised to strike.

  Almost as if he were bored, Morgan lifted a hand at the last moment and a shower of sparks flew from his palm. Adam lost his double-handed grip on the claymore’s hilt and it flew toward the mirror, narrowly missing Cait’s left arm as it attached itself to the magnetic frame.