Turning to his uncle, Ethan followed him back into the great hall and sat at the nearest table. He felt as if the few more steps to the high table were going to take a toll on him and he needed answers now. His uncle—though shooting a look to the dais—did not object and sat near him.
“First,” his uncle smiled. “Welcome back. I’m glad to see yer well and second, ye might have noticed a little change around here with the servants.”
“Aye, that did cross me mind,” Ethan’s reply was wry as he twisted his head to look around. “What happened?”
“Mister O’Cain’s words came to me recollection, about the enemy being closer to us than we realized. I kent that could be anyone from the lowest scullery-girl and page-boy to the head cook and commander of the troops. So I took matters into me hands and removed all of them. I sourced more servants from the city, mainly from me house at Perth.” his uncle replied, “I also have a contact in the capital and he is sending me a centurion of royal soldiers to take over the missing posts.”
The words sliced through his mind with the power of a lightning strike. All the servants he knew and had grown with were gone and so were the guards he had trusted. He knew his uncle had acted on what might have been the smartest move, but he felt decidedly uncomfortable in a house of strangers.
“Oh…” he squirmed. “On better news, I found Mister O’Cain, he was in Ackwell, searching for another lead. There was nay sign of Faither though. Speaking of, where is Violet? I havenae seen her at all.”
His uncle gave a negligent wave, “I’m sure she is around here somewhere. This morning I was told she wasnae feeling well,” he leaned in with a conspiratorial look in his eye. “I believe she was feeling the horrible effects of her flux.”
The mental picture only had him being more concerned for Violet. But until she came to find him, he would not disturb her. Rubbing the back of his neck, he felt the stiffness there and grimaced. “I suppose I should eat something.”
“And where is Mister O’Cain?” he was asked.
Shrugging, Ethan replied, “I cannae say.”
As expected, his uncle did not push but only gestured for a servant-woman to bring them some food. Ethan felt a growing disquiet in his chest. The surroundings were very peaceful but he felt not all was right and he could not figure what it was or how to place it. And Violet, how was she doing?
The best he could liken it to was what happened before a storm came in: all was still and quiet without any trouble in the air. Then, when the tempest did hit—pure, unmitigated destruction. A headache was beginning to bloom at his temples and he felt inordinately tired.
A bowl of soup was placed before him and sluggishly, he ate. He barely tasted the spiced broth as he kept worrying about Violet and wondering if he would have to bolt his door that night. “Have ye sent servants to Violet with her meals?”
“Aye,” his uncle replied, “I made sure to arrange that.”
Somewhat mollified he finished the meal, pushed the bowl away and stood, “I ken I’m going to retire tonight. I’ll see ye in the morn, Uncle.”
Nodding, his uncle said, “Good night, nephew.”
He traipsed to the room but paused to rest his hand on the doorway while his head canted over his shoulder in the direction of Violet’s room. But though his instinct pushed him to go there, he knew she needed to rest. Reluctantly, he went inside to rest.
* * *
A little after dawn had him entering the great hall with heavy unease. Violet was still missing and he did not know any one of the servants around him. Seated at the high table, he rubbed his eyes and face to remove all the lingering sleep, then braced his arms on the table to cradle his head.
“Are ye all right, nephew?” his uncle asked while entering.
Propping his jaw on a fist, he shook his head, “Dinnae get much sleep last night. I keep worrying about Faither and Violet. Have ye seen her at all?”
His uncle took the head seat—the place his father always sat—and gave Ethan a sympathetic look. “Aye, I have seen her, but about yer faither—” and just as Ethan was about to press for more, he continued, “— I dae ken there is someone who can answer the question about his whereabouts.”
“And who might that be?” He asked quizzically.
“The man who is coming into the room right now,” his uncle said. “It was something I should have done yesterday but I did not have the men we needed. They, fortunately, arrived last night.”
Ethan lifted his head to see Mister O’Cain coming in the room just as his uncle gestured for some men, lingering at the sides, to come forward. He sat in shock as the men grabbed Mister O’Cain and hauled him towards them. Ethan felt his heart leap and he was on his feet in a moment.
“Uncle,” he asked frantically. “What is this?”
“Aye!” O’Cain blurted with a futile attempt at yanking his arms from the men. “What is this?”
“I happen to believe Mister O’Cain here kens more about me brother than he is saying,” his uncle replied to him. “These brilliant men are versed in…various modes of interrogation and they will be finding out what Mister O’Cain is nae telling us.”
“…Various modes of interrogation—” Ethan suddenly realized what his uncle meant and his gut threatened to revolt. He spun to the inordinately calm man and asked, “Are ye saying torture? Uncle! Ye cannae dae this!”
“I’ll dae what needs to be done,” his uncle replied, “Take him away to his chambers and bind him without food or water. Let’s give him a while to reflect on if his actions are worth the consequences that will follow.”
“Uncle!” Ethan protested frantically. “Please, nay!”
“It's out of yer hands, nephew,” was his cold reply. “There is naything ye can dae at the point. Let justice takes its course.”
“What justice?” Ethan asked as the men escorted the protesting man out of the room with quiet stares following him. “Did he kill anyone?”
“That is to be seen,” his uncle replied while calmly reaching for his goblet.
Dumbfounded at how his uncle could act so calm in such a crises, Ethan knew there was no possible way he could stomach anything if he even tried to eat or drink what was placed before him. Worried, he ran to Violet’s door and banged on it.
“Violet, love, let me in! I need—”
“Master MacFerson,” a deep, rumbling voice cut his words off and Ethan spun to see a burly man, dressed like the other new guards, coming towards him. “By orders of Mister MacFerson, nay one is to have any contact with any of the O’Cain’s. Please step aside.”
“Like hell, will I!” he snapped. “The woman inside is me betrothed. Ye have nay right to stop me from seeing her.”
“I dae have rights, under the orders of yer Uncle,” the man said. “Please step away. I’d wouldnae like to have to remove ye bodily.”
“This is me home,” Ethan’s voice dipped to territorial growl, “Me faither’s the Laird, I have more rights to order ye than me Uncle does.”
“Nae according to the rules laid down by the Clan’s elders,” the man rebutted. “Mister MacFerson showed me the written record of the rules and it says that the older MacFerson in line from the Laird is the one who had the authority. Again, Master MacFerson, please step away.”
Firming his jaw, Ethan went back to the door and pushed his hand on the door, “Violet, mo ghràdh, let me in. Tell me yer all right—” a rough hand grabbed him and hauled him away and incensed, Ethan spun, angered to the point he would do some damage.
He yanked his arm away, “Dae nae dare touch me.”
When the man inserted himself between him and the door, Ethan dared consider a fight but the man had all the make-up of a bull with iron horns and there was a distinct possibility he would be walking away with a broken limb.
Dropping his hand, Ethan did not dignify the man with a look, but only spun on his heel and walked away. He was bristling with anger against his uncle but knew he would not get anywhere if he tried to g
et the man to change his mind. He seemed set with what he had ordered and no amount of negotiation would ever change him. He felt like escaping to the stables but changed direction and went to his father’s study.
His uncle was not there so he began to search the room, looking for that so-called set of rules laid down by the elders that he had never heard his father mention even once. He rifled through the drawers and trunks and even searched for hidden compartments around the room. He came up empty.
Slamming his fist on the desk only had pain ricocheting up and down his arm rather than get him anywhere sensible. The best he could do at that juncture was to ask his uncle for that document, but he had to reel his temper in first.
He sank into his father’s chair and stared at the table, his eyes following the faded whirls and twirls in the wood.
How have things gotten to this turn?
Finley was dead, his father was being undermined by his uncle and the only persons who could help them find the murderer were now under guard and soon to be tortured. Mix in the fact he was about to marry the daughter of that man, Ethan doubted that his uncle would let him see her much less carry her to the village kirk.
What had gone wrong? Where had they gone wrong? Where had they strayed off the path and ended up in this malaise?
The answers did not come from the table or the walls of even from deep within himself. Without any solution forthcoming, he heaved himself up. His body felt heavy, almost three times his weight, and he made it to the outside. Sucking in a deep lungful of the fresh air, he headed over to the stables and entered, to see, another set of stable-boys.
Curtly, he introduced himself and asked, “How long have ye boys been here?”
“From morning, Master MacFerson,” one said with a tiny frown. “Why?”
“Did ye see a lass, slender with curly dark hair come in at any time?” He asked, begging internally for any shred of evidence that Violet had been seen by anyone at all.
His answer came in a shake of a head—two heads actually, but only one spoke, “Nay, Master, I—we—never saw anyone like that.”
A vile suspicion began to grow in his mind—what if Violet was not there at all? Had his uncle done something to her? Before he went to question his uncle, he had to find out more. If he did question him and left, who knows what his uncle would demand be done to her. He needed to be armed with facts first before staring his uncle in the eyes and demanding the truth.
Anger was bubbling inside his chest like a pot in fire while he rode out. A gallop at breakneck speed might match the fury inside him and probably calm him. With the horse saddled, he turned to the field and let loose.
Violet, hold on, wherever ye are, I’ll find ye.
24
Huddled into a corner of the dungeon, Violet tried to breathe out the stale air from her lungs through her mouth. She had a bare assumption of time as the pitiful daylight that came through the tiny square above was barely different from the same light that came out at dusk.
The guard that had taken her down to the dank depths that night had come through on his words and had taken her a dry dress, not one of hers as the hem had barely gone to her shin but she had been happy and dry. When her water-logged dress had dried out the next day, she had changed into it before he had arrived and handed the borrowed frock back to the man with deep gratitude.
From there, he had carried water and bread to her for a midday meal and a bucket for her bodily needs. Violet still could not believe that Mister MacFerson, the genial, mild-mannered academic had killed his nephew, but the reality of it was a cold block on her chest.
Logically, many others could have committed the act but the more she thought about it, put the pieces together and followed the timing, she was sure the man had killed not only Finley, but also Miss O’Bachnon.
His convenient disappearance to Perth that day, where her brother had told her she had lived days before her death, was incredibly suspicious and then, forcing the boy to write that damning note was even more so.
But why?
The words kept circling her mind in unending loops. She could understand why he would poison Miss O’Bachnon; she was the only person who knew exactly what had happened the night before Finely had died and could tell why she had done it. What would the man have to gain from his killing his nephew?
To get back at his brother?
No, they might have arguments in the past and even current—the one about Laird MacFerson being drunk sprung to mind—but she did not see that as cause to kill the man’s son.
To teach him a lesson?
But what lesson? Mister MacFerson had ranted that his brother and nephew knew little on how to make their home and its land prosperous, but how could bloodshed resolve that?
As she leaned on the cold wall, Violet felt that she was nearing on the solution but the pangs in her stomach overrode her thoughts. Hunger was chased and overridden by fatigue and as she slipped off to an uneasy rest, she could only pray that someone—Ethan, his father, Mister MacTyre, anyone—would come and find her before MacFerson decided to harm her or remove her.
When she woke again, it was in the dead of night. Her sleep rhythm had been thrown off from the night arriving at the castle worrying about her father, and sleeping on an uncomfortable, cold, gritty rock made everything worse. She closed her eyes as it made no sense to look around as it was all various shades of black.
“Ethan…where are ye?”
Surely, he must have come back by then and have realized she was missing. She knew that nothing much slipped past Ethan. She appreciated that he had an eye for the minutia. He saw the barest shifts in a horse’s actions, the flow of a river’s tide and the shift in the wind. How could he not see her absence? It was either that he was not there or that he was being stymied from finding her.
She only had her body to rely on for warmth as the guards—new ones she realized— had been forbidden from giving her a blanket or a simple sheet. Violet could only assume that Mister MacFerson had ordered a continuous change in the guards to not have any of them give her some sympathy or do her any favors.
She lived in constant fear of what would come next. Was she imprisoned, only to wait for when MacFerson found her father, and then, both of them would be shipped off to some desolated work camp or, worse, executed? The charge of harming a Laird’s son was a heavy one and would carry with it, grave consequences. If MacFerson’s allegation of her father killing the Laird was added to her ‘crime’ and if the people believed him without any contradiction from the Laird himself—a man who could not be found—the noose was inescapable.
She wanted to get out of this place and quickly. But how? The door at the mouth of the dungeon was locked with a key from the outside and she was not nearly strong enough to overpower any of the guards who came to give her food and sweet-talking was not her forte.
No one was going to let her go against the MacFerson’s orders and, if by any miracle she was set free, she would be laughed to scorn if she dared accuse the man of killing his nephew without anyone to back her up. Her only hope was Ethan and he was absent as well. Sighing through her nose, she pressed her head on the smoothest part of the wall and tried to think. Why would he do all those heinous acts?
A thought ran through her mind— Finley is dead and buried, which one of ye is going to be next, ye or yer younger son?
Finley was the heir apparent; his father was the Laird and Ethan was— the ear-jerking grate of the door had that thought breaking in half and she sat up, expecting a guard to come, only to see Callum MacFerson coming closer. Dread filled her chest with ice and she clutched at her bosom in fear.
“What dae ye want?” she asked.
“Oh, humor me, Miss O’Cain,” he said with humor in his voice, “I came to see how ye were doing. Three days late but what does that matter?”
“It matters because ye’ve framed me for a crime,” she replied, “One that nay one with a speck of sense would believe.”
“And wh
y would they nay believe it?” he asked.
“All I’ve done—all me faither and I have done—was to aid ye and Laird MacFerson in the mystery of who killed his son,” she swallowed and braced herself on the wall. With a calm voice and steady tone, she dropped her winning card, “But ye kent all that already as ye were the snake we were looking for, hiding in plain sight.”
“I ken I should take offense to those unfounded accusations,” he said simply. “If I had the faintest inkling of what ye mean.”
“Are ye going to force me to say it?” she asked incredulously.
“Since I havenae the powers of an oracle and tell what ye have in yer mind, aye,” MacFerson replied, “But I havenae doubt, that just like ye’ve proven so far, ye might be right. Let me remind ye, little girl, that though whatever ye have contrived might be accurate, nae one is going to believe ye. That is if ye get the chance to speak it at all. It’s me word against yers and who dae ye ken others will believe? A man with multiple honors to his name and an unbroken record of fealty to his country or a little girl, desperate for attention and greedy for the wealth and prestige that comes from being the wife of a Laird?”
The Highlander's Captured Bride (Steamy Scottish Historical Romance) Page 24