The King's Mistress

by Sandy Blair

  Shaking his head at the woman’s stubbornness, Britt secured his mount, gathered deadwood, then cleared a spot in the grass to lay a fire, all while Lady Armstrong slept. Accustomed to sleeping in the elements, he needed no fire, but from what he’d observed, Lady Armstrong enjoyed her creature comforts. And God forbid she should grow ill.

  When the fire caught, he spread his breachen feile on the ground at a safe distance from it, then lifted Lady Armstrong from the gray. As she settled on his plaid, she mumbled something incoherent about love and castration—a decidedly unsettling thought—then, sighing, curled like an exhausted kitten before the fire.

  He pulled his whetstone from his sporran, then freed his blades from their sheaths. As he ran a finger over his broadsword’s edges, testing the sharpness, he watched her by the glow of the fire. Aye, his king was a lucky man but had no clue to what extent. His Majesty had been blessed first with a fertile and sensible wife, then been granted a second wife, one half his age, and still his eye wandered.

  Shaking his head at the sad waste of blessings, he sheathed his broadsword and began honing his more oft used sgian duhb.

  And what on earth was this woman, now tossing in restless sleep, thinking? She’d been gifted with incredible beauty and a voice that could make songbirds weep with shame, yet she too squandered her gifts. Was she such a rustic, such an innocent, that she did not know she’d ruined all hope of her ever making a good match by acquiescing to Alexander?

  She could just as easily have said, “Thank you, but no.” His Majesty was lusty—no denying that—but he was also chivalrous. Oh, he would have sulked and made everyone’s life miserable for a day or so, but then he’d have shrugged it off and sought out one of his other paramours…or the queen.

  Women. Be they fair or foul, royal or not, he would never understand them.

  Lady Armstrong, brow furrowed, flipped onto her stomach and cocked a leg. Looking at her well-turned ankle and calf, at the lovely swell of her rump, he sighed. At least he well understood what his liege was thinking.

  “No lie lives long.” ~ Old Scottish Proverb

  Chapter Six

  Midway through their second day, MacKinnon asked, “What think you of the new rooms in the Constable’s Tower?”

  St. Bride preserve her! How many more questions did this man have, and how much more could Greer have neglected to mention?

  First MacKinnon had asked her about her new songs, then fables, and then what she thought of their new queen’s habits, cooks, ladies-in-waiting and confidant, and now he wanted her opinion on some ominously named tower? She had no notion of its construction, much less whether this tower was large or small. Greer had never mentioned it. And why should she care about its rooms? Having no means by which to even imagine it, Genny kept her gaze on the rushing burn to their right and murmured, “Most lovely.”

  MacKinnon made a thick, decidedly masculine sound at the back of his throat. “The coins would have been better spent on cannon.”

  She’d heard Smithy’s tales of cannon but had never seen one. She wanted to ask this handsome hulk if they truly were as fierce and thunderous as she feared, if there were many at Edinburgh, but didn’t dare. Greer would likely already know.

  Hoping to distract MacKinnon from his questions, she asked, “How often have you been in battle?”

  Her father had never tired of recounting his bloody encounters, all of which grew more gruesome and grandiose with each telling.

  “My lady, war, like bread and sleep, is a necessity of life. One’s exploits are not something one denigrates or brags upon.”

  Hmmm, MacKinnon was not only modest but held convictions. Interesting.

  “Are you in discomfort, m’lady? Need we stop?”

  Had she been frowning? “Nay, I’m quite comfortable, thank you.”

  She truly was, riding for the first time on a horse that suited her, not astride but with her legs draped properly to the side as they should be instead of sticking out like a scarecrow’s arms. Her hips and thighs no longer ached as they had on her long ride to and from Annan.

  She patted her mount’s smooth withers. “Who owns this palfrey, and does he have a name?”

  “He’s just one of many in the Edinburgh stable.”

  Ah. ’Twould be lovely if she could have use of him while in Edinburgh. If so, then she would have the privilege of naming him. She studied MacKinnon’s glossy black destrier prancing beside her. “And your stallion? What do you call him?”

  “Horse.”

  “He’s a new acquisition, then?”

  MacKinnon’s wide brow furrowed. “Nay, I’ve had him more than a decade, since earning my spurs.”

  Genny gaped at him. “And you’ve yet to name him? No wonder he’s always prancing and tossing his head.”

  “He prances and tosses because I’m making him keep pace with your palfrey.”

  “Oh.” She warily eyed the stallion. He did look impatient, slobbering on the bit. “Well, you should still give him a name.”

  MacKinnon looked at her as if she were daft. “You name all your cattle?”

  “Of course. How else will they know to come when I call?” She started ticking off names on her fingertips. “Toby, our father’s destrier, is now my mount and plow horse. Then there’s Bess our cow and Sam the ox. Mittens is the cat whom you’ve met, and MacDuff is my lovely auld ram.”

  “And your sumpter?” When she frowned, he said, “The second horse you had in the barn.”

  Oh merciful saints! He meant Greer’s mount. How could he know there were two? “Ah, you mean Mother’s mare, Maisey. She’s with the smithy now.”

  “Odd, I would never have thought you so sentimental…that you’d name beasts.”

  Genny arched an eyebrow. “Well, I would never have thought you so unsentimental that you would not name them.”

  MacKinnon’s laughing bark, deep and rich, echoed through the canopy, startling not only her but a pair of mourning doves from their perch. “Touché, m’lady.”

  The forest abruptly ended, and they entered a glen awash in sunshine, every frost-coated blade and branch gleaming as if coated in glass. Enchanted by the sight, Genny murmured, “How lovely.”

  “Aye. Reminds me of a glen at home.”

  Not knowing if she should already know of his home, she said, “Do tell me more.”

  He eyed her in speculative fashion for a moment, then took off his helm and ran a hand through his black mane. “I was born on Skye, a lovelier place you’re unlikely to find. I was the youngest of four sons but am now the only one. My eldest brother was called…”

  As he spoke, he often gestured and occasionally laughed. She suspected his tale was of a time and place he rarely spoke of, and felt privileged that he’d chosen to share his memories with her. When he spoke of his lost siblings, her thoughts turned to Greer and their awkward parting. How often they’d hugged and laughed in play, and now her twin was gone, mayhap forever. The thought brought burning to the back of her eyes.

  Hoping to distract herself, she again focused her attention on MacKinnon and the threat he posed.

  His hair, now flowing free in thick waves across his armor-clad shoulders, flashed blue like raven feathers with the simple turn of his head. And his eyes, framed by thick black lashes, weren’t black as she’d first thought in the shadows of her home but were, in truth, a dark sable brown. She smiled, wondering if MacKinnon knew that he and his stallion had the same coloring.

  His features, which she’d first thought too sharp and found menacing, appeared somehow softer in sunlight, or mayhap it was only the faint stubble that now lined his square jaw. Nay, ’twas the fact that he was no longer scowling but appeared relaxed. And look at that… His nose had been broken. She decided the slight crook only added character to his handsome countenance.

  “A bodle for your thoughts, m’lady.”

  “I find you—” Genny coughed to cover her near blunder. The saint’s preserve her! Cursed with frank speech since inf
ancy, she’d nearly blurted that she thought him most handsome. Bad enough she spoke her mind too often at home. To do so now would mean her death.

  She really had to pay more heed.

  Genny cleared her throat and tried again. “I was thinking you’d make a fine bard.”

  The armor plates on his shoulders clinked with his chuckle. “You’re the first to think such.”

  Praying she remembered Greer’s information correctly, she said, “Sir Lyle likely thinks so as well.”

  “Ah, mayhap, since he instigated most of our mayhem.”

  She grinned. Another hurdle crossed.

  At the end of the glen, they entered a copse of thick pine where the land dropped off sharply and the path they’d been travelling split into two. MacKinnon took the lead and turned left. Frowning, Genny brought her palfrey to a halt and studied the short shadows cast betwixt trees and the rolling hills in the distance. Shielding her eyes, she then glanced at the sun. “MacKinnon?”

  Riding a several yards ahead, he pulled up and turned in his saddle to look back at her. “Aye?”

  “You’ve turned the wrong way, m’lord. The sun moves to the west, so we must take that path”—she pointed to her right—“in order to reach Edinburgh.”

  “I’ve matters to attend in Glasgow, so we must go there first.”

  Panic bloomed in her chest. “Nay, I fear that will not do, sir.”

  “I fear it must.”

  “Then you must go on without me.” Traveling alone, she would have to push her mount in order to limit her nights on the road, to minimize the possibility of her being set upon by thieves, but there was no hope for it. Her courses were due on the full moon. She had to be in Edinburgh before they started if her plan to protect her sister’s child—and herself from the king—were to succeed.

  “M’lady, I am not leaving you to your own devices. Come.” With that he turned in his saddle and kicked his horse into a trot going in the wrong direction.

  Well, of all the bollocks!

  Fine. He could go to Glasgow if he was so inclined, but he’d be going without her.

  As MacKinnon disappeared behind a huge boulder and began clattering down the ravine, Genny reined right. Her gelding, reluctant to leave the stallion, pranced sideways, fighting the bit. Having manhandled lazy auld Toby for years, she heaved a sigh and kept the gray’s head turned. The palfrey finally gave up the battle and trotted with his ears pinned back down the path to Edinburgh.

  Only yards down the slippery shale, Britt realized the only sounds he heard were those made by his mount. No shale clattered down the mountainside behind him. He reined in, looked over his shoulder and found the path behind him empty. Where the hell was she? Knowing the dangers, surely she wouldn’t have been so foolhardy as to go off on her own? But she obviously had.

  “Damn the woman!”

  The path was too narrow to turn the stallion. They’d fall to their deaths if he tried. Worse, the wall of granite on his left continued for as far as the eye could see, while the sheer drop to his right continued for twice the distance. He had no choice but to continue on at a snail’s pace until the path widened.

  Cursing, he nudged his destrier forward.

  He never should have let his guard down. Had Lady Armstrong been a man, he would have ridden behind, not ahead. This was what he got for being chivalrous, for ruminating over her direct gaze, the way she cocked her head as if she truly cared about what he thought or said. Asinine, truly. She must think him an idiot. Aye, and when he caught up with her, she’d rue this day.

  A torturous half mile later, he found a hollow where a tree had lost its hold on the cliff, and turned his mount about.

  A mile down the trail leading to Edinburgh, he finally spied her riding along at a brisk trot as if she hadn’t a care in the world. “Lady Armstrong! Halt!”

  To his surprise, she glanced over her shoulder, waved, and then, ignoring his order, continued trotting north.

  “Bloody hell!”

  He kicked the destrier into a full gallop, not caring that his thundering steed would startle her mount and thus toss Lady Armstrong’s fine hurdies into the air. He’d had enough of her foolishness.

  As expected, her palfrey shied, then spun as he came up behind it. That she managed to keep her seat when he grabbed her reins and pulled the panicked gelding to a stop he found remarkable…and annoying.

  “What, pray tell,” he shouted, “were you thinking riding off like that?”

  Rather than wither beneath his fury, Lady Armstrong blinked like an owl. “Why, I was thinking to keep you safe from the king’s wrath, m’lord.”

  “What?”

  “His Majesty must be most anxious to see me, else he wouldn’t have sent you to fetch me. Our going to Glasgow would have added a week or more onto our trip, and I’m sure His Majesty would have been most angry with you.” She then took a deep breath and looked about. “Lovely day, don’t you think?”

  Jaw muscles working with pent-up fury, Britt could only stare at Greer Armstrong in disbelief.

  She’d issued a threat as artful as it was insidious.

  She’d not defied him. Oh no. She’d just taken it upon herself to keep him out of trouble. And if he thought to insist upon them going to Glasgow, she’d taken pains to remind him that she too had the king’s ear. The conniving wench. And she’d done it all while cloaking the threat beneath a flighty woman’s illogical logic. Aye, that’s what she’d done, and it wouldn’t work.

  “Lady Armstrong, you risked life and limb by running—”

  “Please address me as Greer.” She smiled up at him, and the elusive dimple he’d spied in her parlor again made its appearance. “Lady Armstrong sounds silly out here in the middle of nowhere, don’t you think?”

  Britt ground his teeth. “Greer, you risked life—”

  “You truly are most accommodating. And I shall address you as Britt if you’ve no objection…so long as we are alone. To do so at court would appear most unseemly. I provide the gossips with fodder enough as it is.”

  “Since when has gossip ever concerned you?”

  She blinked, and then with hurt obvious in her eyes, she heaved a weary-sounding sigh and looked away. “You’re quite right, of course.” She tugged on her reins. Reluctantly, he let them slip from his control. As she adjusted the leathers in her hands, she murmured, “Now that we have all that settled, shall we go? Our king awaits.”

  Seething, he waved her ahead. “After you.”

  Riding in her wake, he took what pleasure he could in staring daggers into her lithe back. Which woman was the real Lady Greer Armstrong? This determined conundrum, who would not be denied…or the flirtatious and thoughtless songbird he better knew from Edinburgh?

  He had no idea but would find out.

  Scotland’s security could well rest on him doing so.

  An hour later, Lady Greer twisted in her saddle to look back at him. “Britt?”

  “Aye?”

  “Why do you ride so far behind? The trail is wide enough for two now.”

  Why indeed. He’d learn nothing more about her by glaring at her bonnie arse. Coming abreast of her, he asked, “Content?”

  She slid a sidelong glance at him from beneath thick lowered lashes. “Aye, and I wish to apologize.”

  “Oh?” This was likely the first time she’d ever done such.

  Turning her attention to the forest surrounding them, she murmured, “I understand that you’re in an untenable position. You’re obviously an honorable man, and I suspect my…words have made your task all the more unpleasant for you. If it helps ease your mind, please know that the mistress loves her king as he loves her.”

  Humph! He hadn’t expected her to hold out so large an olive branch. “Lady Armstrong, my liking for a king’s order is never a consideration. I do my duty, like it or not. As for your relationship with the king, I do not challenge that you love him. He can be most charming when he’s of a mind.”

  But the lady was very m
uch mistaken if she thought her feelings were reciprocated. She might be the king’s favorite—not only was she most lovely on the eye but could prove most disarming—but she was also one of six women the king regularly bedded, including the consort.

  She cocked her head and studied him in that earnest way she had. “Do you wish to say something else?”

  Aye, he wanted to say he found her confession and demeanor to be at odds with the self-serving female he knew but then thought better of it and shook his head.

  She heaved a resigned sigh. “As you lust. I just wanted to be sure you understood that I hold no ill will toward you, that there are simply times when—like it or not—we have to do and say what we must.”

  “If that be so, then why bother to issue a threat?” The woman was driving him mad.

  “Mayhap someday you’ll come to understand.”

  The path split before them, and without a word, he pointed to the right, and she obediently eased her palfrey down the deep boulder-strewn glack cut into the land by the rushing burn before them, dividing glen from forest. Reaching the far embankment, her palfrey stumbled, then limped to a stop. Suspecting the gray had picked up a stone, Britt charged through the water and up the embankment. Before he could dismount, however, Lady Greer sprang from the palfrey, tucked the gray’s injured hoof neatly betwixt her skirted knees and, with blade in hand, expertly extricated a stone.

  Shocked a lady-in-waiting would think to do such, much less know how, he waited until she dropped the hoof to grab her wrist. Her wee smile of satisfaction at a job well done instantly dissolved when he tightened his hold. Her fingers unfurled, and the short-bladed sgian duhb she’d secreted in her pocket fell to the ground.

  “What have we here?” He ran his thumb over a surprising number of calluses crossing her right palm and fingers. “Been hard at work, have we?”

  “Nay, just a few tasks, country life you know…” Blushing, she laughed in dismissive fashion, and the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.