“This is madness, Catherine. And you are not helping me in any way that you should.”
“I know.” She felt him pull back slightly and glance down the corridor. They were standing in a dark and empty hall. Only the flickering of the taper in the sconce beside her door shed any light. The household had been asleep long before she’d dared to leave her room. But still, the inappropriateness of what she was letting him do to her started creeping into her head.
But then, as if reading her mind, he lowered his head and kissed her again. As if he could read her desire, the magical touch of his fingers against her flesh began anew.
She gasped and stifled a cry against his neck as she suddenly found herself lifted effortlessly and carried across to the opposite wall. There he lowered her onto the ledge that ran beneath the windows.
“Not exactly a window seat, lass, but it’ll have to do!”
She tightened her hold around his neck. “I’ll fall!”
“Aye. Right into the courtyard.” He pushed her skirts up, and she shuddered as he slid his hands along her thighs and over her hips. Stepping forward, he pressed himself between her knees. “But you won’t fall. I won’t let that happen, Cat.”
She’d never done this. She’d never dreamed of really doing this. But still, as he pressed his hard body ever closer, she knew that she wanted this to happen. She knew that she trusted him.
“Wrap your legs around me, Cat.”
She did what he asked as he reached between their bodies, pulling up his kilt.
There would be pain. She knew there would be pain. But when he touched her so gently with his fingertips--first probing and parting the folds of her womanhood--she lost the last shred of her control. Her release was sudden and explosive, and she buried her cries against his shoulder.
Her mind had not yet cleared when he entered her. Vaguely, she felt the tearing, but the pain was dulled by the waves of pleasure that continued to roll through her. He was deep within her, and she began to feel him. Slowly, at first, and then with gathering speed, he began to move. Catherine’s mind began to take flight once again. To have him fit so perfectly inside her body. To feel his breaths so warm on her neck, in her ear. To hear his heart drumming so solidly in his chest. His thrusts were long and powerful, driving both of them to near madness. This was indeed rapture, she thought, as the bliss once again enveloped her.
Catherine held on. His shirt grew damp beneath her palm. She kissed his cheek, and tasted the sweat there.
Ever higher they rose, Catherine matching the driving beat of his body with her own, until once again, as ecstasy obliterated all thought within her, she felt his straining body go suddenly rigid, and she knew, somehow, that they soared in the same brilliant sky.
Moments later, as he placed his forehead against her cheek and softly kissed her damp skin, Catherine felt the first flicker of hope brighten her spirit.
Perhaps marriage to John Stewart would not be so bad, after all.
CHAPTER 7
Standing motionless against the wall, Susan wished that she could cease breathing altogether. The two of them had no suspicion of her presence, and that was just the way she wanted to keep it. She was simply a lost soul, hidden and desperate amid the shadows of an ancient keep. And she would remain silent.
What she had come upon had shocked her; that was true enough. In fact, Susan’s surprise had quickly turned to envy as her understanding of what she was witnessing became clear. Now, to see the two of them gathered so peacefully in each other’s arms after the wild abandon of their lovemaking, made her all the more resentful of the two.
The mewing of a cat behind her, by the entrance to the circular stairwell at the end of the corridor, startled Susan. But it also attracted the attention of the Englishwoman. She watched as Catherine Percy lifted her head off John’s shoulder and peered into the darkness. Susan stepped back farther into the shadows when she realized the other woman’s eyes had detected her there.
Expecting a cry of alarm at the discovery, Susan was stunned when Catherine quickly pulled herself out of John’s embrace. With only a murmur inaudible to Susan--and without so much as another glance in her direction--the Percy woman went around him, quickly disappearing inside her room.
Taking yet another step back toward the stairwell, Susan watched the look of disappointment steal over the earl’s face as he stared at his wife’s closed door.
Very well! she thought. Now perhaps you will know how I feel!
******
The bright sunlight poured in through the two windows of the earl’s Great Chamber. Sitting behind a large work desk, John Stewart dismissed his warrior before turning his attention to the three monks standing before him. Their gray robes were covered with the evidence of long, hard miles.
“And you claim to know my wife,” he said abruptly.
The clerics glanced confusedly at each other before answering.
“Your wife? Perhaps there has been some misunderstanding, m’lord.” The most heavyset of the three, Brother Bartholomew, appeared to speak for the other two. “We are here in search of Catherine Percy. And we were told that Balvenie Castle...”
“By whom?” Athol put in sharply. “Who told you the whereabouts of Catherine Percy?”
“She did herself, m’lord. Mistress Catherine told us she was coming here!” The man dabbed at his sweating upper lip with his filthy cuff. “As we told your men, m’lord, we are from Jervaulx Abbey, in Yorkshire. About the same time as Mistress Catherine and her sisters left the abbey, many of us fled, as well. We had word that the king’s men were almost upon us. The king’s Deputy Lieutenant had already looted an abbey to the south. We were next. We had no choice but to run, m’lord.”
“So you left with Mistress Catherine and her sisters?”
“Aye, very nearly, m’lord. We have only our feet to carry us, though. We couldn’t keep pace. But still she had insisted that we join her at Balvenie Castle. With her hopes of opening a school--under your direction and close to Elgin Cathedral--she thought that the three of us could prove a great advantage.”
Athol’s expression clearly conveyed his doubt. “What do three English monks have that could possibly be of value to us here?”
Again, Bartholomew spoke for the others. “We have a long and traditional connection with the bishops at Elgin Cathedral. Why, I was myself a pupil of Sir Andrew Forman--bless his soul--when he was the Commendator of the Abbey of Cottingham in England. I also was privileged to have known Bishop Schaw and Sir Alexander Stewart, too. Aye, we were all greatly saddened to hear of his passing this summer.”
“Is that so? And your connections to the Percys?”
“All three of us have served as tutors to Mistress Catherine and her sisters, m’lord. Of course, teaching those girls was something which we did out of respect to Lord Edmund Percy, their father...a great patron to our abbey. Naturally, the rest of our pupils at the abbey were the sons of our gentry.”
Athol sat back in his chair. “No doubt a spoiled and undeserving throng of young jackals!”
“Ah...well...” The man obviously growing more nervous, again wiped his lip and then his brow with his sleeve.
“And what marvelous secrets do you three teach? That the Scots eat their young? That the heavens only smile on English soil?”
“Nay, m’lord!” Bartholomew gasped, as the others shook their heads in support. “Nay, of course not. Well, out with it! I care naught that you can throw the names of the Elgin bishops at me! What are your special areas of expertise, and why should I allow you stay here, living off of me and my people when I can use any priest from Elgin to do the same damned thing?”
The heavyset man began to nod at the man on his right. “Well, Brother Egbert here teaches elementary and advanced arithmetic, m’lord.”
“This had better include map drawing if you wish to spend so much as a night on my land. By the devil, now that I think of it, there are two tutors at least that I know of at the cathedral quite profi
cient in arithmetic!”
Brother Bartholomew started to address his concern, but Athol raised a hand to silence and glanced fiercely at the pale, silent man half hiding behind his more corpulent companion.
“I was speaking to Brother Egbert,” the earl snapped. “Can you not speak for yourself, monk?”
“Aye.” The man nodded slowly. “I do teach map drawing also, m’lord. Though you’ll have no need of me teaching that subject.”
“Nay?”
“Nay, m’lord. Mistress Catherine is very proficient in the topic herself, and her hand’s as steady as Vespucci’s ever was.”
“So you’re telling me I won’t be needing you?”
Brother Egbert nodded somberly.
“Probably none of you are worth my...”
Brother Bartholomew was quick to jump in again. “I, myself, teach geography, m’lord!”
“And I suppose you are one of those to mix fact and fiction, delving into astronomy and philosophy, while you’re at it!”
The clergyman nodded cheerfully. “Aye! And Mistress Catherine complements my expertise, covering astrology and even navigation. She has always been an excellent student. At the abbey, she would often tutor those lads who would listen to a...”
“And is there any reason why Lady Catherine cannot teach anything you can teach?”
“Well, I...ah...” Brother Bartholomew’s face turned a deep shade of red. “Nay, m’lord.”
“I thought not.” Athol turned to the tall, lanky man who had separated himself from the others, and now stood by one of the windows. “And what is it that you do? ‘Twas Brother Paul, if my memory serves?”
The man nodded. “I teach Greek...and modern languages, as well.”
Athol leaned on his elbows and stared blankly at the man. “Hardly important, wouldn’t you say?”
“To a humanist’s way of thinking, the languages are crucial, m’lord.”
Brother Paul’s gaze swung to the doorway, toward the woman who had just spoken the words.
John Stewart’s eyes followed. He’d wanted to see her since long before sunrise, and now he let his eyes drink her in. She was so beautiful standing there, her furrowed brow clearly conveying the gravity with which she held this subject. But her deep blue dress, so prim and unassuming, could not hide from his mind’s eye the perfection of her breasts or the silky skin of her long, firm thighs. As he gazed at her, his mind was flooded with other memories of last night.
Damn! She’d bewitched him! After returning to his chamber last night, all he’d been able to think about was Catherine Percy, and how her passion had--like the molten rock of the Vesuvian Mount--burst through that “old crone” facade the moment he’d touched her.
Scowling at the thought of the three interlopers in the chamber, Athol tore his eyes away from his wife and redirected his attention to the clerics. He wondered briefly how long she’d been there, listening to him question the monks. Again today, she’d refused to join him for the morning meal in the Great Hall, but at least now he knew she was aware of the events outside her chamber. And she had seen fit to leave her sanctuary to rescue her friends.
Her friends! She wasn’t here to see him, but to protect these cowering English dogs. Feeling his anger begin to smolder at the thought, John Stewart turned his darkening gaze back on her. “I’m certain that our crofters’ lads are all lying awake dreaming of a profession in the king’s service abroad. But aside from them, would you explain to me what use something as difficult as Greek would be here in the Highlands?”
The monk named Paul opened his mouth to explain, but Athol’s raised hand quickly silenced him.
“You had your chance. I directed this question to my wife.”
“To read the Scriptures in their original form!” She took a step into the room. “To enable us to clarify the corrupted Latin texts that have come down to us. To understand the ancient philosophers who have been lost to us for ages, and are now just beginning to be found in the Greek manuscripts. To help us study the ancient geography and the natural history and the mathematics as the ancients wrote it.”
“But this is much more than one needs to learn at such an elementary level!”
She took another step, and he noticed the dark circles beneath her eyes. He wondered if she’d been crying, or had simply suffered through the same restless night he himself had.
“But my plans, if you are willing to hear them at last, are not only to open an elementary, but a grammar school for older ones, as well. Between the tutors from Elgin Cathedral and the four of us, we can prepare many students--from your lands and from those nearby--for higher education, perhaps even for the university, if you wish it.”
“And are you so naive that you actually believe many of my people or even those of the neighboring lairds will have such lofty goals? How many damned priests do you think the Highlands can hold?”
“Clearly, it could use a few more, m’lord, but that’s beside the point. I might be lacking in knowledge of your people, but I’m not a simpleton. What we can offer here does not limit a student to a life as a cleric. Those days are passing, m’lord. A well-rounded education here would deepen one’s understanding of life.”
Athol stifled his urge to laugh, and forced himself to frown into her openly challenging expression. Her intelligence might be a wee bit deficient, but the weariness in her face had now evaporated, and he could not help but think how stunningly beautiful she was in daylight. The midnight blue eyes that he’d considered engaging by candlelight, now had become irresistible. But for a court-educated Englishwoman, her ideas about fashion in both dress and coiffure were decidedly old-fashioned.
Athol shook off the thought and turned abruptly to the three clerics, who were staring hopefully at his wife. “Out, you three!”
Catherine was quick to come to their rescue. “Do they have your permission to remain here at Balvenie Castle?”
“That depends.” He looked suggestively in her direction, which in turn brought immediate color to the flawless ivory of her cheek. “Aye, that depends on how well you and I can negotiate our differences over this potential school.”
John Stewart knew he was being a villain, but he had every intention of using this school to conquer his new wife’s resistance to him. Starving her out of her chamber had worked better than he’d expected, but he was far from through. And looking at the rebellion blazing now in the blue of her eyes, Athol could see that she was not yet ready to give up the battle.
However Catherine wanted to play this, he was willing to accommodate her and eager to begin. The quick tumble in the corridor last night--as momentous as it might have been to her--had only served to whet his appetite.
He was now ready for full engagement.
CHAPTER 8
With a startling speed, the black cat’s claw tore at the flesh of the outstretched hand. The Deputy Lieutenant roared in anger as he brought the bleeding flesh to his mouth.
“The devil take them! Where did this fiend came from?”
The cloaked figure moved confidently to the hay pile and picked up the perched cat by the scuff of the neck. Lifting it up until they were face to face, he boldly stared into the animal’s eyes. With a loud hiss, the cat twisted and tried to free itself of the man’s grip.
“‘Tis a new mother!” He threw the animal on the dirt floor of the stable.
“I don’t see it!” The Deputy Lieutenant, nursing his injured hand, used his other to pull at the bundles of straw against the wall. “I’m starting to think this was all a bloody lie...just a tactic by them to buy themselves some time. That blasted map was nothing more than a hoax. Here we’ve combed two counties and searched five abbeys, just to finally find ourselves in a crumbling old barn with a she-devil of a cat. We look like dolts, I tell you. They’ve played us for fools.”
“‘Tis here!”
“Bloody hell, I say! Where is the cursed thing?”
The cloaked man waded farther into the straw, then knelt and reached
into a hole in the floor. An instant later, he withdrew his hand with round balls of mewling black fur. “Kittens!”
“Damn you! Are you telling me that this is another one of these women’s pranks? Kittens instead of the treasure we’ve been tearing up the countryside looking f...”
“Here. I knew it would be here.”
Laying the kittens back in the straw, the cloaked man pulled a leather package out of the hole.
“We have another map!” he said, drawing out a rolled parchment.
****
Catherine hadn’t expected to be totally left alone with him.
Glancing over her shoulder as the door of the outer chamber was closed behind the last departing monk, she tried to gather her courage before turning and facing her husband.
It had been a long and difficult night, lying there numb and isolated in her small bed. Her mind had continually drifted back to the image of Susan standing in the darkness of the corridor. Surprisingly, the shame of being caught had not been so much the tormenting factor as the knowledge that, by giving herself so freely to Athol, she had completely broken another woman’s heart. It was obvious Susan MacIntyre was still in love with John Stewart. What else would drive a woman to take shelter in the darkness?
Later, when she’d been able to push past her guilt over Susan’s future, the thoughts of her own weakness had driven her to tears. What she had felt in his embrace had been incredible, but how could it be that she had been so willing? How could she have allowed herself to be so easily seduced? Her life would never be the same now; she knew that.
A marriage was consummated. She was now his wife and beyond all hope of annulment. And as much as she had wanted to turn her back and flee Balvenie Castle, the possibility that she might already be carrying Athol’s child made such an escape unthinkable.
By the break of dawn, Catherine had finally cried herself to sleep, convinced that she was ruined forever. But by midday, Jean had brought up the news of the three monks’ arrival at the castle. Then Catherine’s spirits had begun to rise. And as she had been getting herself ready to come down here, she found that she’d even given herself the permission to hope.
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