by Amanda Scott
“Aye,” Patrick said.
“And with animals?”
“Aye, she can ride any horse she’s ever thrown her leg across.”
“Is it your belief that she killed Donald the Grim?”
“She did. She shot him with an arrow when he attacked Eilean Donan.”
“Then you will doubtless think me demented when I tell you that things did not happen the way you and everyone else thinks. Molly had help, just as I have help whenever I beat you at chess.”
Patrick’s patience was spent. “What the devil has chess to do with this?”
“When Molly lived with Mackinnon, he was said to be unbeatable at chess. Now, I have that same reputation, and he no longer does. Think about that.”
“Damnation, Fin, I’m ripe for murder, so if you are trying to tell me that wee people help you win at chess, I must tell you th—”
“Just one wee person,” Fin said. “I’ll not tell you her name, because that is forbidden and at the moment, I cannot recall it, anyway. But she and her son have watched over Molly since Angus abducted her from Dunsithe when she was a child. I believe they watch over Bessie, too.”
“Nonsense. If they were watching Beth, Beaton would not have her.”
“I don’t think they work that way,” Fin said. “I’ve little notion of how they do work, mind you, but Bessie’s… Beth’s… skill with hawks, her knowledge of Gaelic, and other things you have said, would suggest that unnatural forces are at work. I can see them when they are near me, you know.”
“See who?”
“The wee people.”
“You’re daft!”
“I thought so,” Fin said with a chuckle. “I don’t know if I’ll lose the gift by speaking of it, but she did say that the more we speak about our experience, the more quickly we’ll forget the details. Nevertheless, you need to know that they exist, and that somehow Molly’s protectors lost Bessie after Angus took the girls away. They’ve been searching for her, though, and if they’ve found her…”
He let the silence linger suggestively, but although certain images were flashing through Patrick’s mind, he did not speak.
Fin said, “There’s something you did not tell us, something you held back.”
“What makes you think so?”
“I know you as I know myself, Patrick. You are protecting her somehow, or trying to protect her. But we need to know what you left out.”
Patrick hesitated only a moment. “I’ll tell you,” he said, “but you must not tell Molly or Nell, because I do not yet know if it is true. Beth swears it is not, and I believe her, but I must know the truth before we tell anyone else.”
“Agreed,” Fin said. “Now, tell me.”
“When Beth appeared at the ball, she wore a gown more splendid than any I have ever seen,” Patrick said. “Jewelry, too. One of the biggest diamonds I’ve ever seen on a solid gold leaf pendant, a jeweled hood, belt, and pomander, even jewels on the heels of her shoes. And Jock… do you remember young Jock?”
“Aye, what of him?”
“He was dressed like her page, but when I walked toward her, he melted into the crowd, just disappeared, and he was not in my chamber when we went there after I declared our marriage.”
“Just as well he wasn’t,” Fin said dryly. “I warrant the clothing and jewelry had as much to do with Lady Farnsworth’s insistence that Beth had bewitched you as anything else did. If she had noticed Jock, the fat would really be in the fire.”
“Aye,” Patrick admitted, pushing away thoughts of witches and fire. “Beth swore she did not steal anything, Fin, and the cardinal’s men did not accuse her of theft, so I’d venture to guess that no one reported anything missing.”
“No one will,” Fin said. “Unless I miss my guess, what you just said does more to prove her identity than all you said before. I believe the wee folk provided her finery. Indeed, for all I know, she may have been wearing her own jewelry.”
“Her own—”
“Aye, because Nell said that Bessie’s inheritance consists mostly of jewelry. We discovered Molly’s inheritance but not Bessie’s, so we’ve never seen it.”
“Discovered? She was the Maid of Dunsithe. Everyone knew of her wealth.”
“Aye, but its whereabouts was a mystery, and I cannot tell you the details, because I promised I never would,” Fin said. “But unless I forget everything as a result of telling you what little I have, perhaps I can help you find Beth’s treasure after we win her freedom. If not, then perhaps Molly can.” He hesitated. “Now that I think about it, though, Molly had to find hers, so likely Beth will, too.”
Patrick was still trying to cope with the idea that wee folk might be involved. “If wee people got Beth into this mess, they should get her out,” he said.
“I don’t know if they can,” Fin said. “They tend to keep away from any doings of the Kirk, and they have rules of their own, or so I was told.”
“You have truly talked with this… this creature.”
“Aye.”
“Sakes, Fin, if I did not know you as well as I do—”
“I know.”
Patrick fell silent, thinking, and Fin did not interrupt him, which was as odd as all the rest, he thought. Fin’s patience was even more limited than his.
That thought drew another.
“I expected you to be annoyed about my marriage,” he said bluntly.
The rueful smile reappeared as Fin said, “In a sense I bear responsibility for both of you. I should have had a say in who Bessie marries, since there is no one other than Molly, Nell, and me to claim kinship with her. As for you…” He paused, adding, “You owe me fealty, my friend, so you should have apprised me of your intentions beforehand.”
“Aye, and I would have, had there been time,” Patrick admitted.
Fin chuckled. “I’ll agree your time was short.”
Patrick was grateful for Fin’s good mood, but he saw no humor in the situation, so he said nothing.
With a wry look, Fin said, “Have you given any thought to what we can do?”
“I mean to speak with Beaton first thing in the morning.”
“I’ll go with you,” Molly said from the doorway. With a glance at her husband, she added, “I trust you two have finished your private talk, because Mother and I have been going mad waiting to learn how we can help.”
“You will not go with Patrick,” Fin said flatly.
“Yes, I must,” she said. “Beth is my sister, and the cardinal has always been courteous to me. If I tell him who she is—”
“He will simply believe you are doing all you can to help Patrick,” Fin said. “Since you cannot tell his eminence that you can identify her absolutely—”
“Why should I not tell him that?” Molly demanded.
“Would you lie to the man who stands in the Pope’s place in Scotland?”
She bit her lower lip.
“Just so,” Fin said. “You will remain here—you and Nell both,” he added as Nell appeared beside her.
“I shall speak to James,” Nell said. “He has a tenderness for me, and it cannot hurt us to have his ear. He feels little love for Davy Beaton.”
“Perhaps,” Patrick said. “But neither does he dare to thwart Beaton.”
“Faith, sir, Jamie is still King, and if he could stand against Angus and defeat him at the age of sixteen, he can stand against Beaton now. See if he does not.”
Patrick looked at Fin, but for once, that gentleman declined to take the lead, saying, “Until Jamie releases me, I can do little to help, so Beth’s fate lies in your hands, but I am at your service if you need to discuss any tactics or strategies.”
Patrick nodded, feeling a chill at the thought that Beth’s future, if she was to have one, lay primarily in his hands. He did not know if she was safe, even now.
“Patrick,” Molly said gently.
He looked at her blindly.
“Where is Bab?”
“Bab?”
“A
ye, your sister. Where is she?”
He shook his head. He had not spared a thought for her in hours.
“We’ll find her,” Nell said. “Come, Molly, and put on some clothes. You’ll have to come with me, for I do not know her.”
“I’ll come straightaway,” Molly said, turning to her husband. “Don’t say that I must not, Fin. This is something that I can do.”
“Aye, lass, and tell that baggage that if she’s done anything she should not have done, she will answer to me.”
Patrick felt only relief that he would not have to deal with Bab, too, and he remembered then where he had last seen her. “She was with Alex Chisholm, Molly, so she is still with him, because he would not abandon her until he had restored her to me or to you. You’ll find her in the great hall, dancing her shoes to shreds.”
Chapter 21
Beth struggled to retain her wits and her composure, but it was not easy.
Her jeweled, silk slippers were made for dancing, not for walking on cobblestones, and the cardinal’s men had made her walk halfway down the steep hill to the Tolbooth. Inside that bleak stone building, they locked her in a drab cell furnished only with a bench along one wall and a bucket to which they pointed when she gathered enough courage to ask where she was to relieve herself.
At first, because total darkness enveloped her after they took their torch away, she thought she was alone. Her body and mind ached for Patrick, and she wondered how soon he would come. Then a female voice said, “Who be ye, then?”
Startled, she replied, “My name is Beth. Who are you?”
“Och, she be one o’ the gentry,” another voice sneered.
She nearly told them she was no gentlewoman, only a commoner like themselves, but remembering she was supposedly married to Patrick, and thus a lady, she said bluntly, “I am accused of witchcraft and treason.”
“Aye, well, they say we all be witches, too,” the first voice said. “I’m Ellen, and I be here ’cause me husband’s mother says I’ve bewitched him and made him unable tae get sons. The fool thinks he be Henry o’ England and can cast off any wife wha’ doesna get lads for him.”
“Will we all be tried together?” Beth asked.
“Sakes, mistress, we been tried and found guilty already,” Ellen said. “Ye’ll ha’ your trial in the morning, soon as his eminence drags hisself out o’ bed. Least, he seemed tae be still half asleep when they tried me.”
“Me, too,” a new voice declared.
“How many of you are there?” Beth asked.
“There be six o’ us.”
Beth sighed. It should have given her comfort to have companions, she thought, but having them seemed to be creating the opposite effect.
After a silence, one of them said, “D’ye ken anyone wi’ power, mistress?”
“Dinna be daft,” another said sharply. “There be none so powerful as Davy Beaton, and he wants a grand show, does Davy.”
“What sort of a grand show?” Beth asked, knowing even as she asked that she did not want to know.
“A great witch burning,” Ellen said. “He means tae do it the day afore Easter, tae cleanse his precious Kirk for the grand day.”
Beth’s throat seemed to close. She could scarcely breathe. “Oh, Patrick, I need you,” she murmured, hugging herself. “Come to me soon.”
Perched together on the stone sill of the little arched window, Claud and Lucy stared at each other in helpless dismay.
“What will me mam say o’ this? I dinna want tae think about it!”
“I think ye mun find her, though,” Lucy said in a worried tone. “They did say the cardinal will try the lass tomorrow.”
“Aye,” Claud said, “but our lot doesna muck about wi’ the Kirk or the cardinal. Theirs be a world we dinna enter, and since they has the lass… Och, but the Circle will ha’ much tae say about this, and I dinna want tae hear it.”
“Find your mam, Claud,” Lucy said firmly.
With a heavy sigh, he agreed.
She was inside the castle, although she did not know how she had managed to get in. And he was with her, right beside her, as they walked down a long carpeted corridor. There were no doors, but as they reached the wall at the end, it disappeared, and a chest stood before her. But the corridor was cold now and sounded as if rats ran hither and yon, and when she reached for her key…
Chilled to the bone, Beth awoke to noisy sniffing and snuffling above her. Everything else was still, and she could make out the dull gray light of dawn in the high, arched, heavily barred window. Standing, she looked up, listening, stiff from lying in the only position the narrow bench allowed.
The snuffling sound came again, followed by a low woof.
“Thunder!”
The dog’s furry gray snout and black nose poked through the bars.
“Oh, Thunder, fetch Patrick. Go! Find him!”
The dog’s nose disappeared, and she heard rapid foot-steps. Keeping her voice low, so only he would hear, she called, “Patrick! I’m down here!”
“Mistress Beth!”
Disappointment surged through her. “Jock?”
“Aye, it be me,” the boy said. “What be ye a-doing down there?”
“The cardinal’s men arrested me last night. How did you find me?”
“Thunder must ha’ followed ye, ’cause he come and fetched me afore the sky got light. He wouldna leave me be till I followed him.”
“I’m glad you came,” Beth said, trying hard to suppress her disappointment. “You must find Patrick and bring him here to me.”
“I’ll find him, mistress, but I dinna think they’ll let him in. When I were at the gate, a man asked tae see his wife, and they said nae one sees prisoners now.”
“Then how did you and Thunder get in?”
“I could see it wouldna be wise tae say me dog brung me, so I asked m’self what Sir Patrick would do, and it come tae me tae say me dad were a guard and I needed tae find him. They let me and Thunder in staightaway.”
“That was clever,” she said. “Jock, tell Patrick I think they mean to try me straightaway.”
“Aye, I’ll tell ’im,” he said. “Ha’ fortitude, mistress.”
Hearing Patrick’s watchword on the boy’s lips comforted her briefly, but when he had gone, she felt bereft again, and terrified.
A golden glow at the edge of the eastern hills showed that the sun would soon be up as Patrick rode across the castle’s timber bridge. Although he was preoccupied with thoughts of what he would say to the cardinal, he recognized Jock running up the hill toward him with Thunder loping alongside.
“Where the devil have you been?” Patrick demanded when the boy was close enough to hear him.
“I might ask the same,” Jock retorted. “Did ye nae go back tae your room last night after ye flung your pretty clothes about?”
“My actions are no concern of yours,” Patrick informed him harshly. “Yours, on the other hand, if you want to continue serving me, are very much my concern.”
“Aye, sure,” the boy said, brushing a hand across his brow to push his hair out of his eyes. “Mistress Beth says ye’re tae come and get her straightaway, but she’s in the Tolbooth, so I dinna think they’ll let ye.”
“How did you learn where she is?”
“Thunder came and pulled me out o’ me bed and took me tae her window, and she said I should tell ye they mean tae try her straightaway.”
“We’ll see about that,” Patrick said, fighting a wave of chilling fear. “I am going to the abbey now to see his eminence and arrange her release.”
“D’ye think the cardinal gets up afore the sun shows its face?”
“I do not care when he gets up,” Patrick said curtly. “I will be there.”
“Aye, I’ll go wi’ ye then,” Jock said. “Thunder, too.”
“I don’t know if that’s wise,” Patrick said, tousling his hair, “but I own, I’ll be grateful for your company.”
“Aye, for we ha’ fortitude and tae spa
re, the both o’ us.”
A full hour passed after Patrick and his companions arrived at the abbey before the porter showed Patrick to his eminence’s audience chamber.
As Patrick knelt to kiss the ring, Beaton said, “I have urged Kintail’s release, but Oliver Sinclair still insists that the hostages are less troublesome here than they would be if allowed to return home.”
“I know you will do all you can,” Patrick said quietly. “I have come on another matter—one even more urgent to me.”
“You need only tell me what it is,” Beaton said. “I am greatly in your debt, for Henry’s armies are gathering now in the English east march, but thanks to you, our men will be in place to thwart his intended invasion. So, how can I help you?”
“Last night your men arrested my wife.”
“I know of only one arrest last night,” Beaton said. “Surely, you cannot have married a traitorous witch, Sir Patrick.”
Grimly, Patrick said, “I did no such thing. A spiteful woman and her equally spiteful daughters lodged those spurious charges, my lord. Lady MacRae had the misfortune to grow up in their home, and they are displeased that she married me without their approval, but it was she who protected me when the English were searching for me—at the risk of her own life, I might add.”
“Then perhaps you were not aware that she is the daughter of the traitorous Earl of Angus, and like many of that wicked tribe, dabbles in the occult.”
“I am aware of no such dabbling,” Patrick declared, striving to control his temper. “I do know that Angus told them she was his baseborn daughter, but in fact, he abducted her from Dunsithe Castle. In truth, she is Lady Mackenzie’s sister, Elizabeth Gordon, the younger daughter of Lord Gordon of Dunsithe, so you see how imperative it is that she be released. She is kin to the Earl of Huntly, your staunch ally, and to Mackenzie of Kintail. And, I—And she is my lady, sir.”
“I would like to help, Sir Patrick,” Beaton said, “But you must realize the charges are ones I cannot overlook. I have worked too hard to rid the Scottish Kirk of such evils. You yourself are suspicious of Farnsworth, and the woman helped you train that hawk he gave to his grace, did she not?”