It felt awkward addressing each other with such formality. Then again, it had been many a year since she had shadowed her cousins around to all the fairgrounds in the hopes of wagering a penny or two on MacGillivray's wrestling skills. In fact, it had been after one arousingly successful day when he won all five bouts he had entered that he had taken Anne out behind one of the booths and kissed her for the first time. It had been a hot day and he had been stripped to the waist, his muscles oiled and gleaming in the sunlight….
“Come,” Fearchar said, startling Anne as he dragged an empty chair closer to the fire. “Set yersel' doon, lassie. Ye must be chilled frae the long ride. Ye'll take a dram tae warm yer bones?”
Anne smiled. “Aye, Granda'. A bit of warmth would not go amiss.”
The old warrior chuckled and waved a hand by way of a signal to James, who produced a stoneware jug of uisque baugh. Fearchar removed the bung and tipped the crock to his lips, taking two deep swallows before he passed it to Anne.
She accepted it warily, hesitating when she saw the bright and entirely involuntary film of water sparkle in his eyes. “Your own, then, is it?” she asked in a wry murmur.
“Aye.” He sucked at a large mouthful of air to cool his throat. “An' I'll thank ye tae notice I've no' lost ma touch.”
Anne braced herself and raised the jug. She matched the two hearty swallows her grandfather had taken, determined not to choke as the fiery Highland spirits slid over her tongue and scorched a path through her chest into her stomach. Once there, though, a fireball exploded, searing through her veins, boiling into her extremities, where it scalded the nerve endings and left the flesh numb with shock.
When she could, she followed Fearchar's example and took an enormous mouthful of ale from the tankard that had appeared magically at her elbow, swallowing in broken gulps that set her cousins, Gillies, and even the stone-faced MacGillivray laughing.
“Mary Mother of Christ,” she gasped. “'Tis a wonder you've not burned a hole clear through your bellies!”
Fearchar smacked his lap and gave a gleeful cackle. “Blew up three stillmen, but, when they thought tae take a pipe afterward.”
“I'm not surprised.” She took another cooling mouthful of ale and wiped the foam on the back of her hand. “Though I'm sure you've not brought me all the way out here tonight just to prove you can still brew up the barley with the best. What has happened? Why are you here in Inverness when you know full well every soldier in Fort George would trade their firstborn sons to collect the reward the Sassenachs have put on your head?”
Fearchar's happy expression faded and he glanced quickly at the other men in the room before gathering a rattled breath to speak.
“Ye've no' heard, then.”
It was not a question so much as a painful wrench of emotion, and Anne's first thought was that someone must have died. Someone close to her. Someone whose death her grandfather did not want her hearing from a stranger.
“Has something happened to Angus?” she asked in a whisper.
Fearchar scowled and cursed under his breath. “Yer husband is as fine an' fit as he were when he left yer bed two days ago. Fitter than he has a right tae be, ye ask me.”
“Then what—?”
“The prince has turned his army around. They're in retreat.”
“Retreat!” Her mouth dropped open in surprise. “But… but that's not possible! They were only a few days' march out of London—you sent me word of it yourself.”
“Aye, an' now we're here tae tell ye the army is turned away,” Robbie said quietly. “We're tellin' ye that General Wade is closin' in on their right flank wi' five thousan' men; General Ligonier is on their left wi' another seven thousan'; an' comin' straight up their backsides is the Duke o' Christ-less Cumberland wi' a few thousan' troops he's brought wi' him off the battlefield in Flanders. That puts about twenty thousan' in all between the prince an' London, an' the chiefs decided it were just askin' too much f'ae our brave lads tae try tae fight their way through. Not when they've had no support frae either end—none frae here, none in England. Two hundred men, we were told, is all that joined up since they crossed the River Esk, where they were promised bluidy thousands.”
“They should have known better than to trust promises,” MacGillivray said from the shadows. “The king of France promised thousands o' troops, an' how many did he send? None. He promised guns an' ammunition an' money as well to pay the men for the crops we'll not be able to plant come the spring. What did we get? More o' nothin'.”
“Crops?” Fearchar glared angrily over his shoulder. “How can a man think o' crops when his king an' country need him?”
“When his family is starvin' an' his children are dyin' from the cold, that is all he thinks about,” MacGillivray answered flatly. “He worries if they have a roof over their heads an' if they have enough meat to tide them over the winter. Why do ye suppose so many men on both sides slip away in the night? It's no' because they're afraid to fight or to die in battle. It's because they want to take a coin or a bit o' bread back to their wives. That's all a simple man cares about.”
“An' you?” Eneas asked. “What dae you care about, MacGillivray?”
“Me?” Someone moved and an errant shaft of lamplight cut across the Highlander's face, revealing a disdainful curve at the corner of his mouth. “I care about what ma chief orders me to care about. Just like the rest o' ye. That's why we're here debatin' the whys an' wherefores o' battles fought an' not fought instead o' bein' out in the fields fightin' them.” His eyes glittered like two chips of black ice as he looked in Anne's direction. “Because we've all been forbidden to do much else, have we not?”
Anne endured the derision in his eyes as long as she could before faltering and turning away. She was reminded, every single hour of every single day, that men like MacGillivray and Gillies and her cousins would be in Derby now with the prince's army if Angus had not bound them to their oaths. She also knew that if not for so many other lairds like Angus who had chosen caution over passion, the Jacobite army would have been equal to anything the English could muster against them. The five thousand brave men who had followed the Stuart prince to Derby would be ten, fifteen thousand strong and would not now be enduring the humiliation of a retreat.
“They've not been defeated yet, have they?” Anne whispered. “Just because they are being prudent and returning home to Scotland, that does not mean they do so in defeat.”
Fearchar rallied somewhat. “No one has said aught about a defeat! As it happens, the prince has sent word tae all the clans that he only plans tae wait out the winter before he strikes south again, an' he's already proved he has the heart an' courage tae dae it. All he needs tae dae is come home an' build up the strength o' his army. He needs tae hold the throne o' Scotland f'ae his father an' drive these Sassenach basthards out o' Inverness an' Perth. He needs”—Fearchar leaned forward for emphasis—“all o' his lairds an' chiefs tae believe in him enough tae want tae make Scotland their own again.”
“Angus wants an independent Scotland as much as the next man,” she insisted calmly.
“Then why is he no' in Derby wi' his prince? Why is he wearin' a captain's uniform f'ae a company o' the king's Black Watch, an' why is he in Inverness this very night sup-pin' at the bluidy table of Duncan bluidy Forbes?”
“He is only trying to keep the peace—”
“Peace?” Fearchar straightened. “Aye, I've nae doubt they all want a piece o' the spoils! Him an' MacLeod an' Argyle. Och! Argyle wants a piece o' Lochaber so badly there's no need f'ae Forbes tae pay him wi' Judas gold.”
Gillies MacBean arched an eyebrow and ventured gingerly into the fray. “Argyle never needed a bribe tae fight the Camerons, especially after he heard the Camshroinaich Dubh was back in Lochaber.”
“Ewen Cameron?” Fearchar's eyes rounded out of their creases. “He's risen up out o' his grave?”
“No' the auld Dark Cameron,” Eneas said gently. “The young one. Lochiel's brither, Al
exander.”
“Oh. Och, aye. I ken'd that,” Fearchar grumbled, and waved his hand to dismiss his own lapse of memory. “I ken'd wee Alasdair were who ye meant all the while.”
With almost the next breath, his shoulders slumped forward and his head bowed over the support of his walking stick. Like a bladder losing air he seemed to collapse in on himself until he was just a rounded bundle of rags and wispy gray hair.
“Granda'!” Anne started to reach out, but Robbie waylaid her hand.
“He does that now an' then. Just drops off, has a wee nap, then sits up like as nothin' has happened. He'll be right as rain in a few minutes, mark my words.”
“I dinna have to mark your words, Robbie. I can mark how thin and tired he is. He is far too old to be hiding in the hills and living out of caves!”
Jamie came to his brother's defense. “Aye, well, ye can be the one tae tell him so, then, cousin. I'm certain he'll listen tae you, where he just clouts the rest o' us wi' his stick an' ignores aught we say. He were determined tae come here tonight an' here he came, a pox on the snow, a pox on the wind, a pox on the thousand militia swarmin' around Inverness.”
“Two,” Annie said softly, stroking a fold of her grandfather's tartan. “It will be two thousand by week's end. The MacLeod and The MacKenzie of Seaforth have pledged to send more men to reinforce Loudoun's defenses around Fort George.”
“How do ye know this?” MacGillivray asked sharply.
“I hear things. I see things.” She shrugged and looked over. “Sometimes Forbes will send a message to Angus and … and sometimes he might be careless and leave his desk unlocked.”
“I didna think Angus Moy was a careless man.”
“He is not,” she admitted. “It sometimes requires a hairpin to make it seem so.”
Jamie and Robbie grinned. Eneas only frowned. “If he catches ye tamperin' wi' his locks, he'll no' look on it too kindly, lass.”
“He would hardly be overjoyed to know I was here, either. He is sick to death of all this, Eneas. He is sick to death at the thought of more bloodshed, of Highlanders killing Highlanders.”
“Aye. That's why he's raised a regiment of MacKintoshes to fight f'ae Hanover. That's why he spends a treat o' time at Culloden House drinking claret wi' Duncan Forbes.”
“Moy Hall is less than ten miles from Culloden House! How could he possibly avoid contact with Duncan Forbes?”
“I do,” MacGillivray said easily. “An' Dunmaglass is closer.”
“Own up to it, Annie,” Eneas said. “He's been away too long an' he's simply no' willin' tae risk his lands an' fortune on anither war. It's in his bluid anyway tae lay back an' see which way the wind blows. His grandfather was one o' the first lairds tae disarm the clans after The Fifteen. His father was one o' the first tae swear the oath of allegiance tae the Hanover king so his lands an' titles wouldna be forfeit. There were many a clansman who cursed him f'ae that; many who have long memories an' will never fight under the Hanover flag regardless if yer husband drives them barefoot out intae the snow an' burns the roof down o'er their heads.”
“He would not do that,” Anne countered angrily.
“Nor would a true Scot question his rightful king,” Robbie said heatedly. “When The Stuart called f'ae his sword, he would give it. Simple as that.”
“Are you saying Angus is not a true Scot?”
“Wheesht, Annie. Calm yerself.” Eneas glared ominously at Robbie before continuing. “No one is sayin' any such thing about The MacKintosh. He's a good man, a fair man; he must be, or ye would have run a dirk across his throat long ago.”
The demand to hear the unspoken reservation came through clenched teeth. “But?”
“But… he hasna proved he's the leader this clan needs him tae be. Oh, aye, he can tally sheep an' count rents, an' he can hold a pretty audience when two crofters are fightin' over the boundaries o' their land. But he disna listen tae the hearts o' the men. They want tae fight, Annie. They would fight the devil himself if they had a leader willin' tae take them intae battle. And if he's no' the one tae do it, they'll look elsewhere f'ae a sword tae follow.”
She looked slowly from one cousin to the next, then from Gillies MacBean—who studiously avoided making eye contact—to The MacGillivray. By then, all the fine hairs across her nape had prickled to attention and the skin along her spine felt as if spiders were skittering up and down it.
“That's why you've called this meeting, isn't it? You're planning to break from the clan,” she whispered. “You're planning to break your oath to Angus and you're going to join the prince.”
“I'll no' lie by sayin' we havna been thinkin' about it,” Eneas admitted. “Trouble is, three or four men willna make a lick o' difference. On the other hand, if we had three or four thousand—”
“You'll not get three hundred clansmen to follow you, Eneas Farquharson! You may be able to frighten and bully them into holding secret meetings and sticking a sprig of thistle in their bonnets, but asking them to break clan laws is another matter altogether. They would lose their homes. They would be men without a badge, without honor.”
“They would be fightin' f'ae their king, f'ae their faith, f'ae their pride.”
“Their pride would be fleeting. The glory would pass and they would be looked on as men who could not be trusted to uphold their word. Oh, not right away perhaps, for in victory there is always benevolence. But there would come a time when it would be remembered that they broke their oaths when so many stayed firm, and it would be held against them.”
“There are some willin' tae take that chance.”
“Are you one of them? Are you willing to forfeit your home? To lose everything your family has fought so hard to build? Are you willing to have your names struck from the kirk registry, and your children denied their birthrights?”
“Better ye should ask me could I bear tae look in ma wife's eyes if I kept ma sword buried under the thatch instead o' raisin' it by the prince's side,” Eneas said quietly. “Some things are worth fightin' an' dyin' f'ae, Annie. Mayhap ye would understand that better if ye were a man.”
She shot to her feet with enough vehemence to nearly tip the chair into the fire. “My not being a man has nothing to do with what I feel in my heart. I would walk onto the battlefield beside the lot of you if that was what my laird commanded. I would fight as hard and kill as many Sassenachs as the rest of you, and I would spill their blood just as proudly, never dare say that I would not!”
“We dinna doubt yer loyalty f'ae a moment, Annie,” Fearchar said, having been startled awake by the crash of the chair against the iron grate. “In fact, it's the fire in yer eyes an' the courage in yer heart that we want.”
“You have always had my heart, Granda'. You have never needed to ask for it.”
“This time we do. Too many o' the lairds willna break their oath f'ae the very reasons ye said, but they might if they had a leader. Nay, nay”—he scrubbed his hand in the air as if erasing words from a slate—“that's no' right either. They blessed all want tae be leaders, an' tae that end, they'll fight themselves bluidy before they're ever out o' the glen. What they need is someone who is as cunning as Forbes, as shameless as Loudoun when he offers rewards o' land an' gold to any man who signs the roster, someone they can trust who has the power tae bring them back intae the clan again regardless who wins an' who loses.”
Anne could think of no one who could fill such an overwhelming charter, but then she frowned and looked at MacGillivray, the tall golden lion of the Highlands, and once again her breath left her lungs on a gust. “You, John? They've asked you to do this?”
Before he answered he drew his legs in and sat straight in the chair. He rose slowly, the top of his head seeming to stretch forever into the shadows near the ceiling before he walked into the brighter circle of firelight. The creamy wool of his shirt took on a luminous glow, the radiance spreading upward to touch the strands of his hair. The blackness of his eyes reflected a sudden wily glint that could v
ery well have come from Lucifer himself.
“Ye give me too much credit, lass. It's not me they're after askin',” he said quietly. “It's you.”
Chapter Two
At that same moment, at almost the exact spot in the narrow pass between Garbhal Beg and Garbhal Mor where Anne had stopped to take in the beauty of the glen below, one of MacGillivray's sentries cocked the hammer on his flintlock and aimed at a shadowy figure walking up the hill. The other man must have heard the faint click of the ratchet, for he stopped and held up his hand while he whistled a low trill to identify himself. He was warm, his tunic and kilt dry, his senses keen after a hot meal and couple of hours in front of a crackling fire. The sentry was happy enough to welcome the relief. His beard and eyebrows were caked with crystals of frost and his toes were numb despite the nest he had made for himself in the bracken.
Releasing the hammer again, he shrugged the snow off his plaid and stretched his legs with exaggerated motions to ease the stiffness that had locked them with cramps after several hours in the cold. There would be broth and ale waiting for him in the sheltered heat of the stables—him and the others who stood watch over the snowy silence of the glen.
None of them actually expected any trouble, for it was an ugly night and the English were not known for their eagerness to leave the protected garrison at Inverness after dark. Truth be told, most of the sentries had pulled their plaids over their heads to seek what comfort they could until it was their turn to be relieved.
The two men said a few words, cursed the thickening snow in hearty Gaelic, then parted company with a wave. Neither one of them was aware of the two other shadowy figures who had crept stealthily to the edge of the fir trees and watched the exchange with narrow-eyed surprise.
Unlike MacGillivray's sentries, they had anticipated no relief whatsoever and were dressed for the cold, each in his own manner. The Highlander wore his breacan belted into pleats around his waist with the ends of the wool wound warmly around his shoulders. His bonnet was pulled low over his forehead; his beard shielded everything below the beaklike nose, leaving only a narrow strip free for his eyes.
Midnight Honor Page 3