I leaned back. “You must have thought you’d lost him.”
She nodded. “And there’s none here worth half his salt. Replacing Laird Bern would not be an easy task.” She turned, and her eyes found mine. “He’s mighty handsome, too,” she whispered. “All the lassies think so.”
I smiled and nodded.
Still leaning in close to my ear, she said, “Laird Bern claims ye were attacked because someone wrongly thought ye were Norse, but I have my doubts. I think ye were walloped as a warning to keep away from Laird Bern, from his bed. All the unwed lassies here have their heart set on him.”
“Oh, I see.” Ada’s theory was worse and possibly more dangerous for me. Bern might be able to convince everyone that I wasn’t a dreaded Viking but deflecting a jealous woman’s scorn was another matter. I’d slept with Bern last night. That did not make him my partner, of course. For all I knew, he might have no desire to ever do it again.
“I’ll be leaving soon,” I reassured Ada. “Perhaps you could spread that news around? If there is a jealous lass, a possessive and dangerous Scottish girl floating around, one intent on marrying Bern, then I want her to know that I’ll be leaving Tor soon.”
Again, Ada appeared unconvinced. “Mayhap,” she said.
“Oh, I’m leaving, I assure you. I have an important job waiting for me at home, a job I have worked very hard for and don’t intend to lose.”
“Aye?”
“Yes. I’m a teacher, you see. In the place I come from, it is my job to teach our children the ways of the past.”
She raised her brow. “You teach the children songs, and tell them stories from the past, like an elder?”
“Sort of,” I said, drinking a spoonful of thick venison broth.
Ada chose a wedge of cheese. “And what country is that, what country do ye call home?”
“I’d love to tell you Ada, but Bern should be the first one to learn all about my homeland.” I was beginning to realize that the magic word around here was “Bern.” By mentioning his name, I was able to get myself out of almost every situation. They held him in that much regard.
My stomach was filling rapidly. I pushed my bowl away and stretched, then looked around summing up my surroundings. The warriors were not as ferocious looking today. I noticed even more injuries though: men wearing eye patches, warriors sporting angry slash marks, men doubled over, and still in pain. They looked bone weary, too. And dirty. Bern should order them all into the loch with soap. The women fared better, but they too were scarred and pockmarked. Whenever I spoke to someone, or they’d smile my way, I’d notice their teeth. Nearly everyone had a tooth or two missing.
“Ada, where are all the children? Don’t they eat their meals in the great hall with the adults?”
“Many of our bairns are sickly at the moment,” she whispered. “’Tis the bloody flux. You know how it is. The children are the hardest hit. Most are nay able to sit up, and certainly no’ eat this rich noon-day meal.”
The bloody flux. That was the old term for dysentery. I remembered reading that dysentery was a dangerous illness in medieval times. They had no idea what caused it so the children and those with weakened immunity like the sick and old, got the illness again and again. Dysentery killed in those times. In these times. It was still hard to believe that I was really here. But here I was, eating a meal in a feasting hall in a Scottish castle, eight hundred years in the past. And I’d made love to an eight-hundred-year-old warrior, too. I knew that once I was home again, in my own century, I’d be desperate, positively busting to tell everyone where I’d been. My story was going to be impossible to hold onto but equally impossible to share.
People began drifting away from the hall. Many had jobs to do: the smithy had horseshoes and weapons to make, the brewer had his ale to ferment, and the spinners must spend the afternoon turning coarse sheep’s wool into yearn for the weavers’ looms.
Ada stood and smoothed down her kirtle. “Would ye like a tour of the castle? We can call on my friend, Jean. She’s in charge o’ the pantry and her husband controls the gate house.”
“Yes, I’d love that, Ada.” I looked over at Nelly but she was shaking her head. “Nelly helps the chandler after the noon meal. A castle this size goes through a great many candles.” Before I turned to follow Ada, I looked back at Bern. He was still sitting at the high table, supposedly listening to one of his men-at-arms chatting away. Only, I don’t think he was paying much attention to what was being said because he was facing my way. We locked eyes, and then he gave me the smallest of nods and of course I nodded back. We smiled. I have no idea what all that nodding and smiling meant, only that I enjoyed it.
During lunch, the great fireplace in the center of the hall roared away keeping us toasty, but as soon as we stepped outside into the muddy bailey, I needed to pull my woolen wrap tightly around me. It was summer still, but it felt like autumn. Even though it was still early afternoon, the air outside was angry enough to bite. We poked our noses into the great kitchen and waved to the cooks and cleaners dashing about. I could have stood there for hours noticing everything: the array of plucked birds hanging upside down over the coals, the huge bunches of herbs tied together and left to dry, and the old forged pots swinging from chains, dangling over the hearth. There was a huge roasting fire over on the far wall, too. A deer had been skewered right through the middle and then hung over gentle flames, the fat dripping below into pails to be put aside for candle and soap making.
Ada pulled me away. “They’ve too much to do to stomach the likes of us snooping around. Let’s go see Jean instead.”
Jean and her family lived in two small rooms at the end of the pantry. Jean was sitting on a stool in the corner, with a bowl on her knee. I smiled but she looked back at me with fear rather than with friendship. “This is Caitlin,” Ada said.
I offered my hand but she didn’t take it. Instead her brow knotted in confusion. Maybe women didn’t shake hands in medieval Scotland.
“What are ye making now?” Ada asked her friend, pulling a stool over for herself and one for me, too.
“Willow bark tea for wee Hamish. He’s poorly.”
“Oh dear. He’s got the bloody flux?”
Jean looked down and continued stirring. Everywhere in the castle was dark because there were so few windows. And the occasional window openings they had, were not covered in glass so the cold winds blew right in. Most windows had shutters that were often closed to keep the room warm. Because of the lack of light, candles were needed, even in the day. Jean had just one candle burning so I couldn’t see much detail, but I could hear and smell. The sounds of someone tossing and rolling in pain were unmistakable.
“Are you giving Hamish anything else for his flux?” I asked.
“A weak, plain broth,” she mumbled.
I nodded. “It’s good to keep him hydrated. He needs to drink. Do you have apple cider vinegar? If you do, you could mix a few spoons of that in a mug of boiled water. Hamish should drink the mixture three times a day and it will help.” I’d read somewhere that vinegar soothed an inflamed colon.
Jean looked at me, utterly bewildered. I wasn’t sure how much she understood, or knew already, but if I could help, I would. “Aye, thank ye. We have apple vinegar in the big kitchen. I’ll give it a try.”
Then I got my first smile from Jean. It didn’t last long though because Hamish cried out and Jean went running. I tried not to notice the smell or hear the pain the poor lad was obviously in. Ada looked far less distressed, as if the bloody flux was commonplace and nothing to think much of. Eventually Jean came back in and wiped her hands on a kitchen cloth before pouring a measure of willow bark for the boy.
I moved uncomfortably on my stool, my eye on the kitchen cloth. When Jean returned, she offered us a warm drink of chamomile but I declined. She’d helped her son, the
n wiped her hands on a cloth used to dry her wooden bowls and mugs. I knew that I should keep my mouth shut, but if I said nothing, the cycle of dysentery would never stop. Sometimes I don’t know when to keep my nose out of things, but then, I’m a natural teacher so it’s hard for me to stay silent when I know I can help.
“Where I come from, everyone washes their hands all the time. In my homeland, most people don’t know how to make soap or candles, or how to start a fire without matches, a fire from scratch. We don’t know the things you know. But we do know other things. We know that if you don’t wash your hands all the time, especially after tending to the sick, then the sickness will not go away. It will spread. We always wash our hands before preparing food or eating or doing anything at all in the kitchen.” I could have gone on and on but could tell that I’d already shocked them.
“Ye don’t know how to make candles?” Ada asked.
“Ye can’t start a fire?” Jean butted in.
“Not from scratch, no. But we do know a lot about disease and keeping ourselves well.”
Jean rose from her stool and her hands flew to her hips. “But surely all that washing is ungodly?”
“No. We know that’s not true. If anything, God rewards us for keeping ourselves clean and healthy. He rewards us with even better health.” I was trying to get my point across and hoped I’d managed it without rubbishing their beliefs.
I pushed on. “If you and your family wash your hands before eating and preparing food and are careful not to eat and drink anything too old or untreated, then Hamish shouldn’t get the bloody flux anymore.” I could hear myself sounding like a know-all but Hamish’s health was more important than my need to be liked and accepted.
A messenger popped through the doorway and saved me from weathering their suspicions. “Lady Caitlin. Laird Bern wishes ye to join him in his solar.”
I nodded and rose. I was rather looking forward to seeing Bern again, not that I had a choice in the matter because when Laird wanted something, he got it.
Chapter 8
Bern
I strode across the rug, back and forth like a randy wolfhound. Where was the lassie? She was naught to me but a welcomed distraction, at least that’s all she should have been—that, and no more. But I’d taken a real shine to her, more than I cared to admit. Anything that made me forget King Alexander and his eagerness for bloodshed, had to be a good thing.
I bit my knuckles and stood at my window, looking out for the girl. Already, my king was spreading word of another skirmish to come. He had yet another battle in mind! My frustration with the man was like a dry crust lodged in my throat. Hadn’t my clan already suffered enough? Hadn’t we wared with our enemies unrelentingly? Our king asked too much. Even worse, he refused to see how weakened we were, how fatigued by his constant battles. If Alexander kept this up, soon my whole clan would be wiped out.
I’d love to rant with my men about the king, yell and toss ale about the hall, and throw my goblet into the fireplace as they all did. But, as Laird, I didn’t have that luxury. It was my job to protect my clan and uphold the wishes of the king, even when both duties opposed themselves. Something had to give. I needed an advantage of some sort. If I didn’t find some way to better the Northmen soon, then I feared that my country would change its name. My beloved Scotland would soon be renamed Norseland.
Caitlin, what an interesting lass she was. She claimed to have come here from a faraway land but that was ridiculous. What land? No one had come to me or any other Laird around these parts, sighting a strange ship in the firth. The lass could no’ even ride a horse.
I moved toward the door and pulled it wide letting in another draft. The lass was no’ in the hallway yet. I slammed the door closed again. Malcolm believes her to be a sorceress but Luc insists that she’s a seer because she speaks strange words and has an all-knowing manner. I like the way she is. Caitlin is brave, knowledgeable, and unwavering in her beliefs. She stands with a strong back. The girl doesn’t cower in the face of my men-at-arms or myself.
I smiled and then quickly wiped all traces of pleasure from my face. She was mighty pleasing to gaze upon, too. I paced across my rug some more. Why couldn’t I shake the feeling that Caitlin has something I need? When I closed my eyes late in the eve, I saw her bonnie face and knew with a strange certainty that she’d been sent here to help us. ’Tis crazy.
The girl kept her secrets close. I fear that it will take me time to hear them all because she will dribble them out with all the speed of a soused snail. I am a patient man. I will find out what she is trying so hard to keep from me. I pray that when she finally tells all she will say what I most need to hear.
I heard the timber slider move in the door. “Come in, Caitlin,” I yelled, as eager as a rutting rooster, my mouth dry and my quickened breaths refusing to calm.
Chapter 9
Caitlin
I pushed the heavy oak door wide open and looked up at him. Bern was standing in the middle of his solar, shining brighter than Christmas lights. He stole the words from my tongue.
“How is your head?” he asked with a mischievous smile. Did he realize how attractive he was?
“Um, oh, fine.” I shrugged, showing him that I barely remembered the attack. Way more significant things had happened to me since then, like our passionate lovemaking last night. How was I ever going to meet another man like Bern in my own time? I sighed, openly appraising him, trying to commit his muscles, his shoulders, and his rounded butt to memory. There was so much to remember.
“I thought we might take a walk around my castle and have a talk at the same time.” I noted that he was keeping his distance.
My face must have showed my disappointment because he laughed. “I suppose we could talk under the skins on my mattress, if that is what ye prefer.”
“It is cold in here,” I said, bolting to his bed, climbing up, and then pulling the fur over my legs.
He stood where he was, somewhat puzzled. Why was he looking at me like I was the dangerous one? Surely he knew his own size and strength.
“You’re a clever lassie, aren’t ye, Caitlin? Ye get my blood running, on purpose I fear. I think ye tempt me, so as t’ stop me from asking awkward questions.” He’d moved over to the bed but hesitated. I held the fur up, inviting him in. Yet still, he lingered so I patted the mattress beside me.
It was only a matter of time before all those male hormones coursing through his veins would get the better of him. Just recalling last night, made the heat in my cheeks rise. My lips felt swollen as if readying themselves for his kiss.
I sighed, knowing that one kiss wouldn’t cut it. As soon as his warm, inviting mouth was pressed against mine, I’d want more. Already, I wanted more. What was happening to me? I never carried on like this at home. But then, I hadn’t met anyone like him before.
He inched closer, close enough to touch and I could tell that he really did want to join me on the bed, but thought it best if he stayed standing, kept his distance. Just to encourage him that wee bit more, I slipped my hand under his plaid. I never did that sort of thing at home. I wouldn’t have felt confident enough or sure of the man’s reaction. Anyway, there was no one at home I felt like being brazen with. Here, I was different. I smiled, knowing I was right about Bern’s eagerness. The man was as ready and as passion-addled as I.
“Caitlin,” he groaned, his body swaying.
My own hormones responded to his calling, my thighs already slick. How did he do that? So quickly and effortlessly, too. Back in my own time, I had to work for my pleasure. There was none of this instant arousal stuff. Was it this slower pace of life or perhaps the style of living that was closer to nature that make the difference? Don’t question so much, Caitlin, just savor this delicious man while you can.
He loosened my dress, cursing again over the many ties, just as he had last
night. “Can you no’ wear something easier to get off?”
“Like?”
He fought with my kirtle next. “I’ll have to go into the forest and kill something if this dress does no’ come off soon.”
I offered to lift my skirt, but he shook his head. “I want more skin,” he said.
Eventually we had my dress off and his mouth found my breasts, my shoulders, my neck, and of course my lips. I loved being kissed this this, like I was the only woman on earth, or the only desirable one. When his fingers slid across my sex, the rush of desire I felt had me gasping. It was hot under my skin, lava running in my blood. He moved so confidently, knowing how to touch me, when to use a light touch and when I’d want more pressure. He acted like my body belonged to him and, despite my forward twenty-first-century thinking and my fancy education, I still wanted him to claim me. I wanted him to take me, to make me his.
He growled my name and I bit him on his neck, trying to be tender but struggling to keep my surging passion, and my new primitive nature under control.
The nip of pain I gave only fired him more, stirring his need to dominate. I wanted him aggressive; I wanted to be over powered and taken with greed. His slick fingers slipped over my core before burying deep.
“Lie on the bed,” he growled, as he discarded his plaid. But instead my fingers slid over his length and pulled him to me. He stood still, breathing heavily, quite unable to do anything other than take what I gave. His head rolled back, his eyes closed, and he swayed. I wanted him to enjoy our lovemaking, make it as special for him as he made it for me.
I coaxed him onto the bed at last. He straddled me, controlling the situation, using his length for my own pleasure. I sensed that my waves of contraction were not far off. He reached for my face and turned my head so that I was forced to look at him, to meet his eye, to witness the pleasure I gave. “You’re mine, only mine,” he said, his voice thick.
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