by Carol Arens
First, Athdar was going to face a father’s wrath when Rurik arrived on MacCallum lands.
And second, Rurik had a new son-by-marriage and did not know it yet.
God help them both!
* * *
Isobel felt better after she had slammed the door in his face and even better once she had slept for a couple of hours undisturbed. Knowing that Athdar was working somewhere and with others, she knew he was safe. Not that she did not want to hit him with something hard herself...
When she went downstairs, the hall was filled with people and it all felt good. The new brother arrived sooner than expected and Broc was showing him around. He would begin taking over clerking for the estate.
The spinning wheels were now in place and the winter would be a productive and safe one for everyone who worked on spinning thread and weaving cloth.
Broc walked back in without Brother...Angus and went into Athdar’s private chamber. This would be a perfect time to speak to him and in a perfect place. Retrieving an item she’d hidden deep in one of the trunks of threads and weights, she tucked it inside the small purse she wore on her gown and then followed him inside. He put a package on the table.
‘Lady Isobel,’ he said with a nod. ‘A packet came along with the good brother from the abbot for your husband.’
Isobel pushed the door closed. She turned and faced the man who was loyal to her husband, all the while feeling guilty as though asking him to betray his laird.
‘I need your help, Broc.’ She sat down at the table and found a piece of parchment to use. The quill and ink sat on the shelf next to her so she opened the bottle, dipped the quill and stared at him.
‘I thought that Athdar has taken on a clerk now.’
‘I pray you to be serious. I know he counts you as his friend and I need your help.’
The lively, womanising steward grew more serious than she’d ever seen and nodded. ‘Tell me what you need.’
‘Have you always lived here?’ she asked first. She needed to know if he would have been here when this terrible accident happened.
‘Aye, lady. From my birth.’
‘First,’ she said, lowering her voice so they were not overheard, ‘do you have any memories about the accident?’
He frowned and shook his head. ‘Accident?’ He glanced across the chamber as though thinking about it. ‘Nay. When would this have been?’
‘Around the time Athdar and Robbie were seven years of age.’
‘Oh.’ He shook his head again and though he denied it once more, she saw something flash in his eyes that told otherwise. ‘He, they, are two years old than I. I would not have been old enough to remember events then.’
He was lying. She did not know why or what, but he did not speak the truth. Dare she continue to ask questions or should she stop now and hope he would not reveal her interest to Athdar? Athdar needed her in this, so she went on.
‘How long had Athdar been married to Mairi when she died?’
‘Is that not something you should speak to him about, lady?’
‘Broc, I believe he is in danger. I need to know more about how many have died here and how.’ He studied her intently for more than a minute, then, just when she believed he would refuse, he answered.
‘They were married for more than a year. She died within days of giving birth to their son.’ Sadness at his friend’s loss weighed heavy in his voice.
‘Had she problems during her carrying? Bleeding? Pains?’ she asked. From what his sister had said, there had been no sign of trouble.
‘Nay, she was healthy and happy until the day she died. She bled to death. Laria could do nothing to stop it.’
Isobel was about to write down the details until he mentioned Laria’s name. ‘Did she try?’
‘Oh, aye, she did. Stayed with Mairi for days at the end. Helping with the delivery. Tried to save both of them,’ he said, his voice now a whisper and filled with remembered grief.
She scribbled some notes, in Norn, on the parchment. Something her grandmother had taught her long ago. A number of people here might read and write Gaelic, even English, Latin or French, but none would read or write the native language of her father and mother’s people. It was useful to know at times...especially when she wanted to keep something private.
‘And tell me of Seonag?’
‘Seonag and Athdar were married almost four years when she passed. A fever. It was a year when several villagers perished from it.’
‘Did anyone survive it?’ she asked.
Broc stood and went to one of the shelves, searching through the record rolls until he found the one he wanted. He frowned and read further. ‘I thought that others had died. It was only Seonag.’
‘Athdar was with her?’ He nodded. ‘And did not catch it?’ He shook his head, his eyes wide as he perceived the line of her suspicions. Before he could ask her anything, she posed her question to him. ‘And Laria?’
‘Treated her for days without success.’ He narrowed his gaze and studied her own expression for a moment. ‘You think that Laria caused their deaths?’
Did she reveal the rest of it to him? There was the matter of his earlier lie.
‘Why did you lie before? You know of the accident, do you not?’
He let out a breath and looked away for a minute, as though deciding whether or not to trust her. His head nodded slowly before he met her gaze. For a moment, she saw the same desolation there that she’d witnessed in Athdar’s gaze when he was lost to himself.
‘Aye. But not about the accident as much as about what the laird did to make it all go away.’ She was right then and had not made incorrect assumptions based on what Muireall had told her.
‘I was younger than Athdar and his friend and they chased me away from following them that day. But I did,’ he said, staring off again as though seeing it all again. ‘I followed them far enough to know that they did not go anywhere near a bridge. They went in the direction of the old mill.’
‘The old mill?’ She’d been to the current one only and had no idea there had been another.
‘Aye. The river changed directions after some storms about ten-and-five years ago. The old mill ran dry and so the laird had the new one built farther downstream where the currents were still strong. But there was no bridge up on that part of the river that could have failed and killed those boys.’
The sounds of scuffling footsteps outside the door gave them pause. It moved on, but Isobel wondered if someone had been listening. She still needed to know so many things.
‘Tell me, from that time on, what happened to the families of the boys. Duff and Kennan and Jamie and Robbie?’
‘Laria yet lives here. You know that. And Robbie so recently died.’
‘Her husband?’
Broc shook his head. ‘Passed about the time that the other families left the village.’ Broc sat down once more and did not look comfortable as he thought about her questions. ‘Robbie. Ailis said his heart just gave out. He was complaining of chest pains for some days before it happened.’
He leaned over and put his head in his hands. The colour had left his face and she knew he followed the path she was pointing out. Every death they spoke of could be caused by one or more of the decoctions, potions and medicaments that Laria produced or used. Broc then began to pull out certain rolls and check names and the years when other people died. By the time they finished, Isobel had a list of more than a dozen suspicious deaths, all of which involved Laria.
‘I still cannot believe that she did this all. All these deaths? What made you suspicious of her?’
Isobel reached into the small purse and took out the green glass bottle and placed it on the table between them.
‘That is one of the bottles Laria uses. I ordered them for her from the glassmaker i
n the next village. She used different colours for different potions.’
‘How many of each does she have?’ Isobel asked, although from working with Laria, she knew exactly how many of the costly items there were.
‘Two of each.’
‘I will tell you that if you searched her workroom and her supplies, you will find only one green one there. This one—’ she picked it up ‘—I found in old Iain’s cottage when I discovered him dead. He had been talking to Athdar about his sleep disturbances. I went to ask him some questions and he was dead. And this sleeping elixir was full when last I saw it.’
His shock was clear on his face and in the way his hands trembled. ‘Have you added him to your list?’
Isobel nodded.
‘What should we do now?’
She leaned back and it was her time to shrug. ‘There is still more to this than I know and I worry about Athdar’s reaction to any of it. He has been...having these spells. They are happening more frequently, more so now since Robbie’s death.’
‘They have happened before, too. With Mairi’s passing and Seonag’s, and a number of those on your list.’ He shook his head then, glancing at the list though he could not read it. ‘At each of those. Most times no one notices. Sometimes the bad dreams strike him. Other times, it’s what you witnessed in the stables.’
‘And you keep watch over him? Why?’ she asked.
Broc stood and walked to the door before turning back for a moment and she witnessed the terrible sadness in his eyes.
‘Because, though he could not save the others, he saved me that day. In not taking me along, I survived when all the others died.’ He lifted the latch, but she shook her head to stop him. A terrible thought entered her mind then and he needed to be warned.
‘Does anyone know what you just told me? That you were supposed to be with the boys? That you know which path they took?’
‘Nay. I have never spoken of it to anyone until this moment, until you.’
‘I would keep it that way, Broc. I think Laria is going to kill again and Athdar will be her target. Do not give her another one,’ she warned.
‘And you, lady. Have a care for your own safety while watching out for your husband’s.’
He left first and she replaced the bottle in the purse—she would dispose of it when she could—and made certain all the rolls and records were placed back where they’d been. It was only when she reached for the latch that she noticed how badly her hands shook.
She still had to work out how to prove any of this to Athdar. He would not or could not let himself find the truth of the past and until he did he was in danger. As she went to the kitchens, she finally pinpointed the one thing that yet bothered her—why? Why all these people and not Athdar himself?
* * *
The time is almost here.
He’s fallen in love with her.
It only matters if it causes him pain.
The anguish of losing someone he loves.
She thinks she knows the truth.
I struggle not to laugh at her efforts.
She loves him.
Which should die first and which should watch?
Chapter Twenty-Three
He slept alone and decided he did not like it. At least he thought he slept without her. He got up several times to see if she sat at her loom trying to sort him out, but always turned back at the last moment.
Athdar let Isobel sleep in her own chamber because he could not figure out how to take the first step back towards her. He did not understand what was happening to him and her questions just reminded him that he had no answers or explanations.
He thought that by doing some of the things she’d asked him to do, it would ease things between them. Such as bringing Brother Angus to work for him. And though she did not know it, her mention about the lack of regular masses being said had caused him to discuss building a chapel and having a priest in residence instead of calling one to see to funerals and baptisms...and weddings.
He’d spoken to Broc about having a builder and stonemason plan for a new, larger tower on the north corner of the keep—one like Jocelyn and Connor had with their large, private chambers at the top and their children’s nursery beneath them.
He’d even come up with a name for it all—something simple, something his, theirs—Caisteil Chaluim—Callum’s Castle.
All plans that he thought would please her.
He’d kept busy yesterday, working in the village once more.
The worst thing was not being able to tell her the whole of why her questions bothered him so much. He had not figured it out right away, not until the dark of night when he could not listen to her breathing next to him.
She thought him a good man. She thought him a good laird to his people. She thought him a caring and strong man.
All lies.
For deep within that churning darkness or madness that rose when he thought of the past, shame lived. He did not remember why or how it was part of him. He only knew that terrible shame was part of his past—and remembering it all would remember that, too.
He had failed Mairi. He had failed Seonag. And somewhere in his past, he had failed grievously and others, many, had paid some price for it. He understood that the dreams and the strange spells he suffered were part of it. He did not want to look too deeply or closely at his past, for he knew that by doing so he would fail Isobel.
And he knew he could not bear to do so.
He wanted to be the man, and the husband, she thought him to be, but he lacked the courage to do that.
When word came that day that the pass was open, Athdar knew his time was running out. Her parents would arrive and convince her of all the reasons why she should leave him behind and the only reason he could come up with for her to stay was love.
But, if secrets of his past came crashing out, would that be enough? He prayed it would be, but feared he would find out soon.
* * *
Laria was nowhere to be found. Isobel had contrived a number of reasons to seek her out, but she was never in her workroom or in the keep or in the village. Isobel decided to only have dealings with her with others around until she could either prove or disprove her suspicions. She would not purposely put herself in danger when she believed the woman to be using her talents for healing in the most diabolical way and causing death instead.
Standing in the workroom she’d helped to set up, Isobel studied the various plants and herbs, some dried, some ground, some steeped and so on. And, because of what Laria had taught her, she could explain how each one could be used to bring about death—how to kill someone.
How she wished she had her parents to discuss this with. Or Jocelyn. But most of all she wished she could approach Athdar.
Unfortunately, though they had pursued many philosophical and logical discussions during their many hours together and during their chess games, this conversation would be neither calm nor detached. There was, she understood now after speaking to Broc, something dark and horrifying that had wrapped around Athdar’s memories of the accident, or event, that had cost three boys their lives.
Bringing up the subject, even if it was his idea, would lead to that emotional and physical reaction she’d seen already—either the benign spell or the vitriolic reaction. Like the wild boar that became more deadly when cornered, this fear deep within him would not be dispossessed easily and she worried that exposing it would harm him more than help him.
So, how could she handle this wisely?
Thinking back about his objections or reservations about marriage, she remembered how he thought himself cursed by God or fate. He’d told her that plainly, giving Mairi and Seonag and Tavia as examples of how she might come to an end if they married. Now, if her suspicions proved out, she knew that what he’d thought was a
curse of fate, damning any woman who married him or was planning to do so, was almost certainly the work of a woman driven mad by inconceivable grief.
The one thing that lay behind all of her worrying and all of her efforts to relieve him of the burden of guilt under which he’d lived for years was that she loved him. She wanted to love him. But freeing himself from his past was something she could not do for him.
Once she laid out all of her information and thoughts about how Laria had managed to do this, it would be up to him.
And that was what had her hands shaking when he summoned her to his chambers. She loved him, but did he love her enough to try to break from the prison he might have created?
* * *
He’d only intended to tell her two things: that the road was open and he expected her parents within days and that Laria had been called to assist a birth in a neighbouring village. One of the village girls had brought the news, saying that Laria had left immediately and would return in a few days.
Now, he had a third, more pressing thing to ask her about, one that crowded out the others.
When showing Brother Angus his system of organising his records and rolls, a scrap of parchment covered with strange words fell out from between two of them. To his surprise, the good brother recognised the words—Norn, he said, because he’d been raised north of Caithness where the Norse inhabited much of the area.
It was a list of names beginning with the names she’d asked him about, continuing on to his wives, his betrothed, Robbie and old Iain and others. He could make no sense of it, but it made his stomach churn and his head hurt. Part of him wanted to put it back where he’d found it. Part of him wanted to burn it. But seeing it, he knew that she was pursuing something that could be dangerous for both of them.
Her soft knock distracted him, as the sight of her always did. He missed her. He wanted her.
Always.
‘Come.’
She opened the door and entered. ‘You wanted to see me?’
‘I wanted to talk to you.’ Her eyes brightened—a good sign, he thought—but how would she react to what he’d found? ‘Sit. Please.’ She fidgeted in the chair, so he walked over and sat at the table with her, the chessboard a reminder of so many things.