Highland Master

by Amanda Scott

  “I was sad to learn of your father’s death,” Mackintosh said. “I met him several times at Tor Castle. But ye say your brother be head of the family now.”

  “He is, aye,” Fin said, hoping he was giving no hint of his discomfort with the direction their conversation had taken.

  The old man smiled. “I see that I have touched a nerve with my questions, lad, but I’m curious withal. I ken fine that I can trust ye with her, and I like ye.”

  Fin said nothing to that. If the old man trusted him with Catriona, it was more than Fin himself did. The lass was too enticing for any man to resist for long.

  Catriona had gone to her favorite place, a tiny clearing just inside the woods at the north end of the island. A boulder there, perfectly shaped for sitting and leaning against, gave a splendid view of the north expanse of the loch and the lush green forest of pine, alder, and birch that covered the steep hills surrounding it.

  Boreas lay curled at her feet, the clouds had gone, and the sunshine felt warm on her face. She loved to sit and rest her gaze on the water, turned dark green today where the woods reflected on its surface. She closed her eyes, opening them only when she heard Fin’s approaching footsteps.

  He had come quietly, so he was nearly upon her when she heard them. He stopped when she opened her eyes.

  “I hope I did not wake you,” he said with a smile that warmed her through.

  Smiling back, she said, “Nay, I was just being lazy. I brought food, though.”

  “So the lad, Tadhg, did tell me. Does he truly run everywhere?”

  “Aye, to build his wind, he says. He told me that someone important is coming here from Perth. He did not know who it is, but I warrant you do. Tell me.”

  He frowned, obviously disturbed by her knowledge. “I cannot tell you who it is,” he said. “Your grandfather knows, though, and approves. I was just with him.”

  “Did he mention our walk?” she asked as she opened the sack that the cook had given her and handed him one of the manchets.

  “He repeated his low opinion of the Comyns,” he said, accepting the bread.

  “I have beef, too,” she said, handing him some and watching as he rolled two slices together. “Was that all he said about our meeting them?” she asked a moment later when he took a seat on a flat-topped boulder and began to eat hungrily.

  Pausing to swallow, he looked thoughtful. “He said more, but it meant much the same. We also talked some about trusting. He said he trusted me with you.”

  “God-a-mercy, did someone see you kiss me?”

  “Nay, lass. He said nowt to make me think any such thing.” As he said it, though, he looked as if he’d had a second thought.

  “What?” she asked.

  Added color in his cheeks made her even more curious, but he said, “ ’Tis just… He may have heard about it, but if he did, he doesn’t mind.”

  “Even if someone did see us, I think we were too far away for him to be sure of what he saw,” she said firmly. Still, she wondered if her grandfather might be thinking that Fin would suit her. If the Mackintosh thought so, and if he said as much to James or Ivor, or even to her father, she would never hear the end of it.

  Dismissing the thought, she said, “What else did he say about trusting?”

  “It was just a subject that came up, but it does remind me of that impulsive kiss earlier. I don’t know why, since nowt more came of it, and he can trust—”

  “Before you kissed me, you had been saying that men sometimes obey blindly… such as when they obey a superior officer giving an order or agree to something simply because they respect and trust the one asking them to agree.”

  “Especially when they lack time enough to think the matter through, aye,” he said, remembering. “I… I do know a chap who got himself into just such a position amidst a battle. Sithee, he found his… his kinsman amongst the fallen, dying.”

  “How dreadful!”

  “Aye, so when the kinsmen demanded that my friend swear vengeance against his killers, my friend was sorely grieving, as you might imagine.”

  “Aye, sure, and he was exhausted, too, I’d warrant.”

  “He was, aye,” Fin said. Her sympathy made telling the tale harder than he had expected it to be. His intent had been to relate just the barest details. Not only was he reluctant to admit yet that the battle had been the one at Perth between her clan and the “wretched Camerons,” but he also wanted her objective opinion rather than one colored by their growing friendship or their clans’ longstanding feud.

  “What manner of vengeance did your kinsman demand?”

  “The usual sort,” he said. “But everyone had sworn an oath at the outset to seek no vengeance afterward against any opponent. In his grief… aye, and in his exhaustion, as you suggest… my friend forgot about that first oath and swore to the second just before his kinsman died.”

  “But he could not have kept either oath without breaking the other, could he?”

  “Nay, so what do you think he should have done?”

  “For a woman, that question is easy to answer, sir. However, from knowing my father, my grandfather, and my two brothers as I do, I am well aware that men do not think as women do. Their daft sense of honor too often gets in the way.”

  “Honor is not daft,” he said, more sternly than he had intended. “Honor is everything, lass, because without it, men could never trust each another. If a man sacrifices his honor, he loses his self-respect and everything else worth having.”

  “I know that men think that way,” she said, nodding. “But I still think that your friend’s dilemma is easily resolved. Life must always be more important than death, sir. And surely, a man of honor kills only in self-defense or defense of others, never out of spite or anger. An honorable man cannot kill just to protect his honor.”

  “All Highlanders do hold any such bequeathed duty of vengeance sacred, Catriona. Surely, you know that.”

  “I do, aye. But God-a-mercy, sir, in a civilized world, surely killing another human has naught of honor in it, whatever the reason.”

  “Suppose that Rory Comyn had killed the two of us this morning,” he said. “What do you suppose the Mackintosh, your father, and your brothers would do?”

  She shuddered. “They would kill him, of course, and likely kill off whatever is left of his clan as well. But that does not make it right.”

  “Does it not? Would not his clan do the same if you or I had killed him? You know that they would. And, before you say that you would look down from heaven and condemn your men for avenging you, tell me how you’d feel if they did not.”

  “Sakes, I’d be dead, would I not? How would I know what they did?”

  “We don’t know what happens on the other side. I like to think that my father watches over me. At times, I vow, I have felt his hand on my sword hand in the pitch of battle, guiding it.”

  “Have you?” Her eyes widened, and then she smiled and looked into his eyes. “How comforting that must be.”

  He had not thought of it as comforting, just welcome. It had happened at least twice since Teàrlach MacGillony had died, each time at just the moment that Fin had feared he would collapse from exhaustion. Each time, the sense of his father’s hand aiding his had kept him fighting on to victory.

  “You have not answered my question, lass. How would you feel? I’d wager that you’d expect someone to want to avenge you.”

  “Good sakes, I’m as quick as any to defend my family. We all are, so in my first feelings of rage at the person who killed me, I might well expect my father and brothers to avenge me. But if I had time to think on the matter, I hope I would be wiser. I do believe that life is preferable to death in any event.”

  Deciding that she simply did not understand about a man’s honor, Fin was tempted to try to explain it more clearly. She did have a point about thinking first, though. Moreover, a chilly breeze had come up.

  “Shall we walk to that point yonder and back again?” he asked her.
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br />   She agreed, and they strolled to the tip of the island. On the way, she showed him a log raft tilted on end against a tree and tied to it with a long rope.

  “Ivor and James made that when they were young,” she said. “We paddled often from here to the west shore and back, especially in summer, when we even took it out on calm nights. Calm produces a fine echo here, so we’d hoot to wake it up.”

  “Sakes, did that thing hold all three of you?”

  She chuckled. “Usually, one or two of us would end up swimming one way or the other, because if anyone fell in, those on the raft would refuse to let him or her climb back on, lest all fall in. That is one reason we all learned to swim well.”

  They talked and laughed together as they walked. When it was time to go in again, Fin tried to recall the last time he had spent most of a day just walking and talking with a lass in such a casual way. He was not sure that he ever had.

  Catriona watched Fin as they walked back into the castle to change for supper. He seemed to be deep in thought, and she was loath to disturb him. She had a notion that his friend was apocryphal. Ivor had often mentioned “friends” who had particular problems when the problem in question was his own.

  She suspected that Fin had done the same thing, but she did not know him well enough yet to be sure. In any event, she did wonder what his “friend” had done in the end. Doubtless, she decided, he would tell her in his own good time.

  Parting from him on the landing outside his door, she went up to find Ailvie ready to help her change her dress for supper.

  “I were beginning to think that I ought to send someone to see if ye fell in,” the maidservant said.

  “I was with Sir Finlagh,” Catriona said.

  “Aye, sure, and who doesna ken that?” Ailvie said as she urged Catriona toward the stool so she could brush her hair. “I’ll plait it and twist it up under your veil, shall I? What did ye talk about for so long?”

  “Everything,” Catriona said. “We seemed just to move from one topic to another as if we had known each other all our lives. He is an interesting man.”

  “Hoots, ye ought to ken all there is about him by now,” Ailvie said.

  “I’m sure I still know little at all. He likes to discuss things. That I do know, and he likes to debate things, even one’s thoughts. He often contradicts me.”

  “Ay-de-mi, that sounds most discourteous, m’lady.”

  “I suppose, but it did not seem so at the time. It is as if he cannot hear an idea without hearing contradictions in his head. If I say the grass is green, he will say, ‘Yonder, it seems yellow, but mayhap that is just new barley, turning early.’ ”

  “He sounds a wee bit peculiar like,” Ailvie said with a frown.

  Catriona laughed. “I suppose he does, at that. I don’t want that gray gown, Ailvie. Prithee, fetch out the pink one with the red braid on its sleeves instead.”

  Fin enjoyed a peaceful sennight while he waited to hear from Rothesay. He swam nearly every morning, often with Tadhg, who had flung himself in on the third morning and demanded to know if Fin could teach him to swim as well as he did.

  Fin also walked several times with Catriona, albeit only on the island. They talked of many things, and comfortably, because to his surprise, she forbore to quiz him when he felt reluctance to explore a particular subject. He knew that she was curious, but she seemed to sense his reluctance and to respect it.

  Oddly, her ability to do so increased his feeling that he ought to tell her everything. Believing she would no longer respect him if he did kept him silent but also created a new dilemma. His need for her to think well of him increased daily.

  Word arrived on the ninth day of his visit, a Tuesday, that a large force from Perth had reached the Cairngorms to the east. Some said that must be the Lord of the North because he preferred the higher route to the less demanding one through Glen Garry, knowing well that the formidable, icy passes discouraged pursuit from the south. Others suggested that the army might be that of the King of Scots.

  Fin was sure that it was Rothesay, and that the Mackintosh was aware of the approaching army. But the old man had not expressed the irritation, if not outright anger, that he would surely feel to learn that Rothesay had ignored his wishes.

  In an area where most people traveled afoot or on small Highland ponies, it surprised him that news of the army had reached them so far ahead of the army itself until he recalled how fiercely all Highlanders thirsted for news. Mendicant friars were welcomed everywhere simply because they brought news from elsewhere.

  On Friday afternoon, Fin walked with Catriona to the north end of the island, which had become their favorite stroll. When they turned back, Boreas ranged ahead of them as usual until they emerged from the woods. Then, halting suddenly, the dog fixed its gaze on a point some distance out in the loch.

  Fin stopped what he was saying midsentence. “What does he see, lass?”

  Before she could answer, Boreas dashed into the water and swam toward whatever had caught his eye. Fin could see that something was out there, roiling the surface, but it was not large enough for him to guess what it might be.

  When Boreas plunged his head underwater and flung it back upward, he had something in his mouth.

  Catriona said, “It looks as if he found clothing or—Sakes, what can it be?”

  When the dog emerged from the water, Fin saw that what it carried was a cloth sack that writhed furiously and emitted frantic squeaks.

  Boreas set the sack gently on the ground and began to nose it, as if hoping it would open, only to rear back abruptly with a surprised yelp when it did.

  Loudly hissing, a small feline head pushed through the opening of the sack.

  Catriona knelt and jerked the sack open. Three gray kittens spilled out, the one still hissing angrily. The others scampered toward the open gate, and Fin grinned when both of them darted away to avoid a man-at-arms running toward them.

  “Stop, Aodán!” Catriona shouted. “What are you doing?”

  “I thought I were drowning kittens for the cook, m’lady. I dinna ken how them wee rascals got ashore again.”

  In a blink, Catriona was on her feet, and watching her, Fin decided that she needed only a lightning bolt in each hand to match any mythical Fury.

  “That was cruel!” she said, confronting Aodán. “If the kittens cannot lap and no one wants them, you must drown them, to be sure. But not by flinging them into the loch to drown in terror. Use a pail next time, sirrah, and bury them decently.”

  “I’ll have to catch them first, m’lady,” Aodán said, turning away.

  Boreas stepped in front of him, growling.

  “Nay, let them be,” Catriona said. “Those three will not suffer again. They do look big enough to lap, so tell Tadhg to find people willing to take them, but do not ever do such a thing again. Just imagine how terrified they must have been!”

  Aodán looked at Fin, the look of one helpless male to another. But Fin was struggling to conceal his amusement and shifted his gaze back to Boreas.

  The dog continued to take stern interest in the hapless man-at-arms.

  Fin had never had to drown kittens, but he did know how easily a few could turn into hundreds of hungry cats on any estate, let alone on an island. The lass would not thank him for any comment he might make, however, so he held his peace.

  Catriona, still angry, said, “Go now, Aodán, and tell Tadhg he must put out food for them until he finds good homes for them. He can ask amongst our people in the hills. Tell him to say that I will count such adoption as a boon to me.”

  “Aye, m’lady, I’ll see to it,” Aodán said, hastily making good his escape.

  Catriona turned toward Fin then, her eyes still afire. “You!”

  “Nay, now, don’t fly at me,” he said. “I had nowt to do with any of that.”

  “You thought it was funny!”

  “Nay, now…” Seeing her lips tighten, he said, “Aye, well, in troth I did. The dog stepping forward
to halt the man nearly did finish me off. Look yonder now,” he added with a grin, gesturing toward the gateway.

  Evidently pleased with the outcome, Boreas headed for the kitchen with the third kitten hurling itself at and between his legs in scrambling leaps and bounds.

  When she laughed, Fin said, “That’s better.” He turned away long enough to pick up the wet sack, which still lay where she had left it after freeing the kittens.

  “We should go in,” she said. “Our visitors will arrive soon, whoever they are.”

  “You still have not learned who is coming?”

  “Nay, although I did hear that it might be the Lord of the North returning to Lochindorb. But you do know who is coming.” When he did not reply, she added, “I heard that they show no banner, sir. But no one seems to be alarmed.”

  “I told you, your grandfather is content to let them come.”

  “Aye, you did say that,” she said, frowning thoughtfully at him.

  Catriona knew that those her grandfather would most readily welcome were her father and brothers, but they would fly the Mackintosh banner, just as Alex Stewart would fly his own as Lord of the Isles. She was certain that Fin knew them, whoever they were, and that he had persuaded her grandfather to let them come.

  After she parted from him, she found Ailvie and said, “I want a bath before supper, Ailvie, so prithee, order hot water for me.”

  “Aye, sure, m’lady. Then, I’ll come up straightaway to help ye.”

  With Ailvie’s help, Catriona washed her hair, bathed, and donned the air-freshened yellow camlet gown. When she went back downstairs, her hair still damp but neatly plaited under her veil, she learned that the Mackintosh, despite his usual punctuality, had ordered supper set back an hour in expectation of guests.

  Deciding to dry her hair by the hall fire, she drew a stool up by the hearth, took off her veil, and undid her plaits. She was still running fingers through her hair to let the heat of the fire dry it when Fin found her there.