Amanda Scott - [Border Trilogy 2] (35 page)

Still, she had no way to know if the man who had caught her was a friend or a foe. Judging by the ease with which he carried her, he might be as large and strong as Jock’s Wee Tammy, the huge and therefore misnamed man at Scott’s Hall who often served as Buccleuch’s squire, as well as captain of his fighting tail.

It occurred to her, too, that to have been creeping about Abbot’s House as he had, the man had to be either Carrick’s own attendant on watch for intruders, or an intruder himself. As she was telling herself she hoped he was the latter, she realized that such an intruder might well throttle her to ensure her silence.

Why, she wondered, had she darted into the house at all? How could she do such a silly thing just to avoid a confrontation with her own mother? Then a vision of that formidable dame appeared, and she knew she would do it again in an instant.

To her astonishment, her captor headed straight for the second flight of stairs and then up the stairs themselves.

She tried to pull her face far enough away from his hand to draw a deep breath, but he only pressed harder. Wondering what he would do if she bit him, she tried kicking again, hit one silk-shod foot against a bruisingly hard wooden railing, and remembered that she did not want to attract attention.

Shock and terror had eased to worry and annoyance that now were shifting back to stark fear, so she told herself sternly that, whoever he was, he would not dare to harm her. Even if he did not know who she was, who her father was, or that her good-brother was Scott of Buccleuch, whose connection to the powerful third Earl of Douglas was one of the strongest in the Scottish Borders, he would have to be daft to harm a member of a royal household at Scone Abbey on Coronation Day.

Slightly reassured by these thoughts, she began to relax, and shortly thereafter, they reached a tall, heavy, ornately carved door.

Breath tickled her ear as a deep voice murmured, “I’m going to take my hand from your mouth to open this door. If you make a sound, you may endanger both our lives. Nod if you agree to keep silent.”

She nodded, telling herself she would scream Abbot’s House to rubble if she wanted to, that no one could expect her to keep her word under such circumstances.

But when he took his hand away and continued to hold her off her feet with one arm as easily as he had with two, she decided to keep quiet until she could get a good look at him and judge what manner of man he was. All she knew so far was that he was one who could creep up on a person and carry her off as easily as he might a small child—all without allowing enough noise for anyone else to hear.

The chamber they entered astonished her further, for it was quite splendid. Colorful arras cloths decked the walls, a thick green-and-red carpet covered much of the floor, and forest-green velvet curtains with golden ties and tassels draped the windows as well as a large bed in the near corner to their right.

“Faith,” she muttered when he set her on her feet and moved to shut the door, “what is this place? Surely, we are not in my lord abbot’s own bedchamber.”

“Aye, but presently it serves as Carrick’s chamber, which is to say, in a matter of an hour or so, it will be that of his grace, the King of Scots,” her captor said. Then, in a tone harsh enough to raise the hairs on the back of her neck, he added, “Now, Lady Amalie, tell me, if you please, just what the devil you were doing, listening outside that door.”

Turning abruptly from the bed to see his face at last, she stifled a gasp.

Sir Garth Napier saw her lips part and heard the gasp, but she made no audible exclamation. Nor did she answer him. He had certainly surprised her, though. He could see as much in her expression and the quickening movement of her breasts.

“Who are you?” she demanded. “How do you know my name?”

“Your name was not difficult to discover, lass.”

She was looking past him at the door. “We should
not
be in here.”

“No one will come in for at least an hour, if then,” he said. “But someone will doubtless miss you in the kirk. You should be with the princess, should you not?”

She nodded, saying earnestly, “I should go to her at once.”

“Not until you tell me why you were listening at that door.”

Her gaze met his, searchingly, as if she would measure the strength of his resolve. Evidently, she saw that he meant to have an answer before he would let her go, because she gave a soft little sigh of resignation.

She said, “I did not mean to listen.”

“Don’t lie to me,” he said. “You had your ear right against that door.”

“Aye, but I came up only to find a window overlooking the kirk steps.”

Recognizing a diversionary attempt, he said, “Lass, I’m not a patient man.”

“No man is patient,” she retorted. “But I don’t even know you. You should at least tell me your name.”

His patience was evaporating. He wanted to shake her. “My name is of no concern to you. Now, what did you hear?”

She shrugged, glowering. He’d have wagered his inheritance that she was preparing to lie again.

“Tell me the truth,” he said more sternly.

“I could not hear the words. They spoke too quietly.”

“They?”

“I heard only voices through the door before you snatched me off my feet, but, even so, there had to have been at least two people. I could not hear what they said, though. Nor do I know why I should tell you even if I’d heard every word.”

“I think you did hear every word,” he said. “Just what do you think would have happened if I’d simply opened the door and pushed you inside?”

She bit her lower lip but rallied swiftly. “Why did you not?”

He was in no more hurry to explain his actions than she was to explain hers, and he was not about to give her the satisfaction of hearing that he had followed her into Abbot’s House out of no more than the curiosity she had stirred in him from the moment he’d first laid eyes on her. No man of sense would knowingly hand a woman a weapon of such magnitude.

He had followed her without heeding the likely consequences, and had stepped across the threshold to see her skirts whisking out of sight up the stairway. Voices from beyond a door under the stairs suggested that others were nearby—doubtless Carrick’s servants or some of the abbot’s assisting Carrick’s people. At all events, they seemed to be staying put for the moment, so he had not hesitated more than that second or two before hurrying after her.

He had taken care not to announce his presence by being heavy footed, but neither had he taken particular care to remain silent. He knew that he would have heard such an approach as his, had he been sneaking about as she was.

But so intent had she been on those murmurs supposedly too slight to be intelligible that she had not noticed him at all until he’d grabbed her. Even then, she had had enough sense not to draw the attention of the men in that chamber.

Had she seen them go into the house? Had she followed them, intending to hear whatever they said to each other? That last thought gave him chills.

The most likely people to have been talking in such a room—doubtless one of the reception rooms if not the abbot’s own receiving chamber—were servants.

Anyone else entering such a room for privy conversation would have to be of equal rank to the chief resident of the house to dare usurp one of his privy chambers for such a purpose. And the present chief resident was not the Abbot of Scone.

Moreover, everyone had seen Carrick and his attendants making their slow progress to the abbey kirk. And most who had seen them could thereby deduce that the private chambers in Abbot’s House would remain empty for at least an hour or two until the new sovereign’s chamberlain returned to assure that all was still in order there for his grace’s comfort.

The fact was that only one man would consider himself equal to that newly crowned King and rightfully entitled to usurp his grace’s chamber to his own use. And if the lass had purposefully listened to the Earl of Fife speaking with a minion—or, worse, to another noble—she ought to be well skelped for such folly.

The thought of the consequences to her, had Fife caught her in the act, sent new fears racing through him. But instead of chilling him, they ignited his temper.

He said grimly, “Do you know the penalty you’d face if I did report what you were doing? Had the people in that room been only two of the abbot’s servants, it would be bad enough—”

“They were not servants,” she interjected. Then, clearly realizing that silence would have been wiser, she clapped a hand over her mouth.

“How do you know they were not?” he demanded.

“I . . . I don’t,” she said. “They . . . they just didn’t sound like servants.”

“Then you must have heard words, lass. You could not otherwise be so sure of such a thing. Since they were not servants, you’d best pray they never learn of your presence outside that door. Consider, if you will, who else is likely to enter a room relegated to the use of the man who, when he returns to it, will be King of Scots. I can think of few who would be so daring.”

The roses in her cheeks paled so quickly that he feared she would faint. Again he had to restrain himself, this time to avoid putting a hand out to steady her.

The same instinct that had served him so well in battle and in tiltyard warned him not to touch her again—not yet. Whether it stemmed from a sense of self-preservation or sensing that her stubbornness would only increase if she recognized his concern did not matter. When that instinct stirred, he obeyed it.

“I will accept that you did not recognize their voices,” he said. “But you did hear at least something of what they were saying. If you are wise, you will tell me what that was.” Putting steel in his voice, he added, “Right now, lass. For your own safety. If they learn that you were there—”

“How would they?”

“Anyone might have seen you come in. I did.”

Still, she hesitated.

His hands were fairly itching to shake the truth out of her when, out of the silence, he heard a dull thud.

He held up a hand to warn her to keep silent.

“What?”

“Hush.” He moved silently to the door, putting his ear near it. A moment later, he turned back and said in his normal voice, “Two men, going downstairs.”

“There are windows that overlook the front. We can see who they are.”

“Don’t be daft,” he snapped. “Someone—servant or otherwise—could be watching from those windows now. We’ve both taken too much risk just by coming into this house. The sooner we are outside again, the better I shall like it.”

“Coward. If you really wanted to know, you’d go and look.”

Narrowing his eyes, letting his temper show, he said, “And if you know what’s good for you, you will keep such opinions to yourself. I’ve a good mind to tell your brother Simon that I found you in here, listening at doors.”

What color was left in her face drained away. “You . . . you wouldn’t!”

“You’d do better to believe it,” he said, praying she would believe him. “I’ll be here all day and for the Queen’s Coronation tomorrow. Truly, you’ll be much safer if you come to your senses and tell me the truth before we leave Scone.”

He waited, hoping she would decide to tell him at once. But he had taken her measure, whether he liked it or not, and was not surprised when she kept silent.

“Just one thing more,” he said. “If you won’t tell me, then pray have the good sense not to tell anyone else. You cannot possibly know whom to trust.”

“I trust no one,” she said bluntly. “Are we just going to walk out together?”

“We are.”

“Then you had better tell me your name, sir, lest someone see us together. It would hardly redound to my credit, or yours, if I cannot name you to anyone in my family or the princess’s household who chances to see us.”

“I suspect that anyone who might wonder at seeing us has already gone into the kirk,” he said.

“Are you so ashamed of your name then?” she asked. “I should think you’d be proud of it. I do recognize a knightly girdle when I see one, and yours is very similar to the one my good-brother, Buccleuch, wears.”

“If you hoped to startle me by announcing your kinship to Buccleuch, you’d have done better to consider what his opinion of your recent escapade would be. I warrant I can describe it clearly to you if you cannot imagine it for yourself.”

When she nibbled her lower lip again, he knew he had made his point, but she said, “So you know Buccleuch. Must I ask
him
to tell me your name?”

Recognizing defeat, in that he did not want to explain himself to Buccleuch any more than she did, he said, “My name is Garth Napier.”

“I hope,
Sir
Garth, that you don’t mean to escort me right into the kirk and all the way to the princess Isabel in front of everyone there.”

“Nay, lass,” he said, suppressing a smile at the likely reaction that would stir. “You’ll have to walk that path by yourself.”

She wouldn’t like that any better, but he knew she had no choice.

THE DISH

Where authors give you the inside scoop!

From the desk of Amanda Scott

Dear Reader,

The idea for BORDER WEDDING (on sale now)—which is about a Scottish Border reiver, who is captured and forced to choose between marriage and hanging—stemmed from an ancient Scott family anecdote that has also inspired authors such as James Hogg, Sir Walter Scott, and Lady Louisa Stuart, among others. Most authors include the capture, the threat of the hanging, and the captor’s demand that the wedding take place at once. Then, optimistically, the authors simply declare that the pair lived happily ever after.

I decided to tell the rest of the story.

Since the reiver of that ancient tale was a nobleman and the bride a lady, one might like to understand something about the nature and identity of Border reivers. They existed on both sides of the ever-shifting line between Scotland and England and were, by definition, “raiders” or “marauders.” But reiving was also, for nearly 350 years, the basis of the Borderers’ economy. And, since the landowners were nobles, it was not rare for the leader of such a raid to be a nobleman.

The minor seventeenth-century poet/historian Walter Scot [
sic
] of Satchells, who published the first known history of the Scott family in 1688, said of the reivers,

I would have none think that I call them thieves. . .

The freebooter ventures both life and limb,

Goodwife, and bairn, and every other thing;

He must do so, or else must starve and die,

For all his livelihood comes of the enemie.

Mind you, that enemy might be anyone other than his own family, Scot or Englishman, a neighbor, or someone fifty miles away.

In the case of Sir Walter “Wat” Scott of Rankil-burn and Lady Margaret “Meg” Murray in BORDER WEDDING, the reiving began with Meg’s father taking Wat’s cattle. Wat is just taking them back (along with a few of Murray’s for good measure). Nevertheless, on both sides of the line, the penalty for capture was hanging. That was simply the way of the fascinating Scottish and English Borderers, who feuded and married among each other, and who accepted such a life and its risks as normal.

I do hope you enjoyed BORDER WEDDING.

Suas Alba!
Amanda Scott
http://home.att.net/~amandascott

From the desk of Andrea Pickens

Dear Reader,

I learn many interesting things whenever I visit Mrs. Merlin’s Academy for Select Young Ladies. As you may know, the school does not teach an ordinary curriculum of study. Oh, to be sure, there are lessons in dancing and deportment. But swordplay and seduction are by far the most important classes, along with basic training in yoga and Eastern martial arts.

Needless to say, the students are not your usual Regency debutantes. They are, well, the truth is, they are swashbuckling secret agents, trained to defend England from its most dangerous enemies. And as proof, I offer the following snippet of conversation between two “Merlins,” overheard outside the headmistress’s office as I was researching their exploits for my latest book, SEDUCED BY A SPY (on sale now).

Sofia:
“Bloody hell, you are really in trouble now.”

Shannon:
“To the devil with rules. If Lord Lynsley and Mrs. Merlin wish to expel me for riding to Siena’s rescue, so be it. I believed her to be in dire trouble, and though it turns out I was wrong, I would do it again in a heartbeat.”

Sofia:
“I know, I know, but do try to keep a rein on your temper during the meeting. Remember our lessons in discipline and duty.”

Shannon:
[
Expletive deleted.
]

Sofia:
“If you are going to ask for a second chance, I would suggest a different choice of words.”

Shannon:
“Never fear—I will be a paragon of reason and restraint.”

Sofia:
“Ha! And pigs may fly.”

Shannon:
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Fifi.” [
A long pause.
] “I’m awfully good with blades and bullets. Shouldn’t that be a mark in my favor?”

Sofia:
“Hmmm.”

Shannon:
“Perhaps I could offer to go after the Russian rogue, who eluded Lord Lynsley’s forces at Marquand Castle. The dratted man is a menace to our country—not to speak of every woman within its borders.”

Sofia:
“Nonnie, I am getting a bad feeling about this.”

Shannon (blithely ignoring her friend):
Oh, what I wouldn’t give to get my hands on Mr. Orlov.”

Sofia (rolling her eyes):
“Be careful what you wish for . . .”

Unfortunately, the door fell shut at that moment and I heard no more. However, be sure to visit
www.andreapickensonline.com
, just in case I discover further news about Shannon and the mysterious Mr. Orlov.

Enjoy!
Andrea Pickens