Amanda Scott (8 page)

“Pray, sir,” she said, raising her chin, “stand aside and let me dismount. I have much to do, and Lady Mackinnon is doubtless
awaiting my return.”

“I don’t doubt that you have much to do,” he said evenly. “What I do not understand is why you were careering about the countryside
all morning instead of attending to your preparations for our departure.”

“Because it is a magnificent day,” she said airily, avoiding his intense, disturbing gaze. “The storm washed everything fresh,
and I wanted to hunt.”

“Do you always do as you want, mistress?”

“Always,” she replied.

“You will find life at Eilean Donan rather different, I’m afraid,” he said as he clasped her firmly around the waist and lifted
her from the saddle.

To her surprise, he did not set her down at once but held her with her feet dangling. The position was undignified, and she
felt her temper stir. His expression challenged her to protest, and she had a feeling that he was spoiling for a fight. When
she did not respond at once, his eyes narrowed and he frowned.

She was sharply aware of him physically. In her present position, she looked him eye to eye. His hands at her waist were warm
and strong. His body was large—huge compared to hers—and she realized that until he chose to set her down, she was powerless
to make him do so. That helpless feeling was unlike any she had experienced since early childhood. Her nerves tingled and
her breathing quickened.

She swallowed, hoping she could control her voice long enough to insist that he set her down, without revealing the disturbing
effect he had on her.

Before she could speak, he said, “Eilean Donan is an islet, mistress, much smaller than the Isle of Skye. If one had such
power, one could pick up our islet and Loch Duich—the entrance to which it guards—and put them both down anywhere on Skye
without disturbing much of this island’s present landscape.”

“Have you a point to make, sir, before dinnertime?” she asked.

“I do,” he replied, his strength apparently unstressed by her weight. He was still gazing steadily at her, and briefly meeting
that gaze, she saw that his eyes were not dark brown, as she had thought the night before, but a deep blue so dark as to look
nearly black. In an area where many men revealed the coloring of Viking forbears, his was unusual.

“The point,” he said, giving her a shake as if to be certain that he held her attention, “is that once we reach Eilean Donan,
you will go nowhere without my permission. It is clear to me that Mackinnon has allowed you far more liberty than simple good
sense would dictate. That will change.”

“You take your new authority much too seriously, sir,” she said, hoping that she sounded as determined as he did. “I am quite
capable of looking after myself, and I would ask you to put me down now. You have shown off your splendid strength to everyone
in the stable yard. I warrant that they are much impressed by it, but in truth, such a display is unseemly.”

He looked around and his rueful expression revealed that he had forgotten their surroundings. To her relief, he set her gently
on her feet. When he shifted his hands to her shoulders, holding her, relief turned to apprehension.

She realized then that the top of her head did not even reach his shoulder. Thus, he seemed larger than ever when he put a
finger under her chin and raised it, making her look at him again as he said quietly, “Hear me well, mistress. You no longer
answer to Mackinnon but to me, and you would be wise to remember that. Not only am I not a man you can safely cross, but I
am now your legal guardian, and by the King’s authority I hold the right to marry you myself or to arrange a marriage between
you and any other man I choose. Do not stir my temper.”

A mixture of fear and something less easily identified shot through her, but she repressed the feeling, licked dry lips, and
said with careful calm, “Am I to have naught to say to such plans, sir? I tell you now that I will not willingly marry you.
Nor will I marry any man simply because you say that I must. I tell you also—nay, warn you—that if you believe Donald of Sleat
will ignore this… this usurpation of his authority, he will soon make you see your error.”

His eyes gleamed. “I hope that Sleat comes to Eilean Donan to debate the matter with me, lass, for he will meet a warm reception.
If he dares to set foot anywhere in Kintail, my men and I will be ready for him.”

He seemed suddenly like a different man. Although he had scarcely been gentle before, by comparison to the violence she sensed
now just below the surface, his previous demeanor had been lamblike.

Abandoning her airs, she said quietly, “Why do you hate him so?”

“He killed my father.”

“Men kill other men frequently,” she said, struggling to conceal the instant sympathy she felt. To that same end, she added
hastily, “For years now, ever since the Crown took unto itself the Lordship of the Isles, the Macdonalds have had to fight
to keep what they hold. Other clans, clans the King chooses to set against them, have taken their land by trickery. Indeed,
I believe the Mackenzies…”

“Aye, we had Lewis from them.”

“Well, if your father—”

“You know not of such matters,” he snapped. “Hold your tongue.”

Fearing that he might become violent if she pressed him too hard, Molly fell silent, although she burned to inform him that
she knew a great deal about the history of the Isles. But if Donald was responsible for the death of Kintail’s father, she
was sure Kintail would not willingly discuss that with her. Objectivity in such a discussion would be difficult for him if
not impossible.

He waited, as if to be certain that she would not compound her impertinence, and then said quietly, “My father was leading
men to Kinlochewe, to help fight off an attack there, when men told him a boat was foundering on the north shore of the loch.
When he and his men ran to assist the boatmen, the Macdonalds ambushed them. Sleat is a scoundrel without honor, and he wants
to rule the Isles as his ancestors did. Indeed, he would be King of Scots if he could.”

She could think of nothing to say. She did not like Donald the Grim. The only thing that had made his guardianship acceptable
to her was his continued absence, for the few times she had met him he had both irritated and frightened her with his fierce
looks and abrupt manners.

“Go inside now,” Kintail said curtly. “You will want to change your dress for dinner, and it cannot be long now before we
dine.”

“That is true,” she said, wishing she could think of something to say that would bring a smile to his face. Glancing at the
bright, cloudless sky to find the sun directly overhead, she said only, “Someone will be ringing the bell shortly.”

“Go then,” he said again. “And, lass…”

She had turned away—gratefully—but at these words, she glanced back over her shoulder at him. “Aye, sir?”

“Wear a blue dress. I would see how well blue becomes you.”

All desire to cheer him vanished.

“Arrogant knave,” she muttered under her breath as she turned away again. Despite the undeniable attractiveness of his person
and the irritatingly seductive quality of his voice, his forcefulness annoyed her. She immediately began a mental survey of
her wardrobe, trying to decide which of her dresses would declare most loudly to him that she refused to obey his absurd,
arbitrary commands.

Fin drew a deep, steadying breath as he watched her walk away, her round little backside twitching in such a way that he wanted
to run after her and either paddle her or make love to her until she agreed to submit to his will or he surrendered to hers.
The unexpected rider to his thought made him want to smile, but he did not, fearing she might look back and see it and think
she had already vanquished him.

For the past fifteen hours or so, he had felt disoriented. Doubtless much of that was due to the swiftness with which he had
acted after receiving the King’s messenger, and then his fall from the horse, but for that fall and for much of the rest he
had no hesitation in blaming Mistress Gordon. The exasperating fact was that the lass did not know her place. She behaved
more like a spoiled princess than the foster daughter of a Highland chieftain.

He had not behaved well either, though, and admitted as much to himself as he walked toward the keep’s postern door, where
a narrow service stairway led to the chamber allotted to him. It irked him that the lass could throw his own behavior in his
face if he found cause—as he was sure he would—to take her to task again. He had never known anyone so impertinent, or so
tauntingly fascinating.

She was different from any woman he had ever met. Border-bred, she was smaller and more slightly built than the Highland women
he knew, who tended to be built along the larger, more robust lines of their Norse ancestors.

Clearly, serving as Mistress Gordon’s guardian was not going to be as easy as he had thought, and just as it now seemed absurd
that he had not once thought about what she might look like, that he had not thought about how she might act was an equally
foolish oversight. If he had, of course, he would have assumed that she would simply obey him. Now he feared that she would
not.

He sighed. She would learn, one way or another. He would not allow a mere lass whose head barely reached his armpit to make
trouble at Eilean Donan. She would have chores to tend just like everyone else, and she would do as she was bid or she would
answer to him. How difficult could it be?

Trying hard to ignore the lingering itch of doubt in his mind and an equally disturbing sensation much lower down, he reached
his chamber and, finding Patrick within, demanded that gentleman’s aid in finding a suitable change of clothing.

Molly reached her bedchamber still contemplating how best to show Kintail that domineering males did not impress her. Irritated
by the constant echoing in her mind of his command that she wear blue, she pushed open the door hard enough to send it banging
against the wall. Then she stopped at the threshold, stunned at the sight of one of the largest wildcats she had ever beheld,
curled up on her bed.

Golden eyes gleaming wickedly, the beast growled at her.

“Mercy,” she murmured, too stunned even to be afraid. When the first prickling of fear stirred, she decided that she could
jump back and slam the door before it could attack, but even as that thought flitted through her mind, she noticed something
even odder than the presence of a wildcat in her bedchamber. At first, it was as if a swirl of mist formed in front of the
cat. Then, slowly, a solid-looking outline took shape.

The hair stood up on the back of her neck as, before her eyes, where no one had been before, a little woman appeared. Molly
shut her eyes and opened them again, but the woman was still there. About two-thirds the size of the wildcat, she was leaning
comfortably against its furry side, her legs stretched out before her, primly crossed at the ankles. In her right hand, she
held an odd-looking implement like a stick with a small white bowl at one end from which a narrow stream of whitish gray smoke
wafted upward.

“Good day to ye,” the little woman said. “Did ye enjoy your hunt?”

“I did, thank you,” Molly said, responding automatically to the woman’s matter-of-fact tone. Then, still finding it hard to
believe that the woman and cat had simply appeared out of thin air, she said warily, “Who are you?”

“Why, I be Maggie Malloch, that’s who.”

“I am afraid that name means naught to me,” Molly said. “Aye, sure, and I expected as much,” Maggie Malloch said, “but we’ve
nae time tae discuss me name now. It takes a deal of effort for me tae remain visible, ye see. I must speak quickly, so if
ye’ll be so kind as no tae interrupt me—”

“Remain visible!”

“Whisst now, I told ye, ye mustna interrupt,” Maggie said impatiently. “I declare, mortals be as rude as any o’ the wee people,
for all that many in both worlds would say different.”

“Wee people!” Molly’s voice went up on the words in a thready shriek, although she had begun to suspect as much when Maggie’s
figure formed out of the swirling mist.