Frontier Highlander Vow of Love (American Wilderness Series Romance Book 4) (3 page)

When they’d all settled inside by the fire, and Ambrose sipped on his coffee, Bear spoke up. “Well, I was plannin’ to leave in the mornin’ anyway so yer timin’ is ideal, Mister Ambrose.”

“Ye can sleep in the nice quarters we built above the barn for our workers when we finally hire some,” Sam offered.

“It’s considerably quieter there,” Catherine added with a side glance at Little John.

“With Bear leaving, we’ll need to hire those workers soon,” Sam told Catherine. “I’ll have to hire three men to do the work Bear accomplished in a day.”

“Perhaps Mister Ambrose could spread the word at the fort that we are looking for dependable workers,” Catherine suggested.

“They should be single men with a strong back and references,” Sam added.

“I will be pleased to do so,” Ambrose responded.

“And with yer bairn coming, perhaps ye should consider hirin’ a cook too,” Bear suggested, lifting his eyebrows at Sam.

“Oh that won’t be necessary just yet,” Catherine said quickly. “I love to cook. I’m learning more and more every day.”

Bear glanced at Sam who grimaced slightly. Catherine couldn’t see Sam’s face from where she sat, but his brother clearly shared Bear’s poor opinion of Catherine’s cooking skills.

“We’ll leave at first light,” Bear told Ambrose. “Sam, will ye keep Mister Ambrose’s company while I go pack up me things?”

“Indeed, I’m anxious to hear about everything going on at Fort Logan these days,” Sam said. “What news do you have? And do you know anything of Fort Boonesborough? My brother William is sheriff there.”

Bear waited until Ambrose said he had no news of Fort Boonesborough. Then he walked toward his room located on the other side of the house from Sam and Catherine’s quarters and next to Little John’s room. He glanced behind him to see Little John tagging along. He took the boy’s hand in his.

When they reached Bear’s bedroom, Little John pouted his lips and his eyes watered. “I don’t want you to go, Bear.”

“Ahh lad, I do na want to go. But I must. I’ll miss ye fiercely. But I promise I’ll visit soon and bring ye a fine surprise.”

“A surprise?”

“Aye.”

“I like surprises. So do Martha and Polly.”

“Then I will find a surprise for yer cousins as well.”

He gave Little John an affectionate hug. He loved the boy dearly and it would sadden him to leave. Little John sat on the floor and watched him pack. It wouldn’t take long. His few things, mostly an assortment of various types of weapons and an extra buckskin shirt and leather breeches, would fit into one bag. He retrieved his hidden stash of coins—money he’d earned helping Sam raise and sell horses—and stashed it in the bag’s hidden pocket.

Kentuckians prized horses, not only using them for transportation through the vast wilderness, but also for sources of farm power, hauling, and racing. He counted the funds. It would take all he’d earned to build a home of his own.

Now all he needed was a bonnie lass who could put up with him.

Bear knew that woman was out there. He just had to find her.

Chapter 2

Roanoke, Virginia, September 1799

A
rtis started the new day with hope in her heart for the first time since she left her home in Scotland.

She smiled as she brushed her hair and afterward tied it at the base of her neck. She splashed cool water on her face and removed the sleep from her eyes. As she dried off, she wondered what freedom would feel like.

The last time she was free was the day she arrived in the colonies.

But today she would complete the final day of her seven-year indentured servitude. Her mother’s coin had bought her an accommodating passage to the colonies on board the ship Ulysses, but upon arrival in Wilmington, North Carolina, she had no choice but to either sell her body or sell her labor. She would rather have jumped ship and drowned herself before selling herself into prostitution. That left her only one choice—becoming a servant. A slave really. Except, unlike slaves, indentured servants could see an end to their plight.

Along with the others from the ship to be indentured, the ship Captain and several members of his crew took her to the auction taking place in the Cape Fear area known as the Argyll Colony, about an hour from Wilmington. She learned later that the Argyll Colony was named for the
shire in western Scotland from which its first residents came. They were the first trickle of what grew into a virtual flood of Highland immigrants. Highland Scots, thought to be at least a third of the Argyll population, earned the bustling colony its nickname—Valley of the Scots.

But she was not to remain there.

The auction, run by a Wilmington company that specialized in selling indentured servants, drew numerous wealthy planters and merchants. She’d signed a contract with a Virginia plantation owner, named Morgan Roberts, whose face and manner seemed kinder to her than the others seeking to indenture servants that day. She sold her labor in exchange for room, board, and what they called freedom dues—what she would receive at the end of seven years. In her case, a land grant of fifty acres in the new state of Kentucky.

That afternoon, she’d bid farewell to the few friends she’d made on the voyage, each of them following separate paths into bondage, scattered like autumn leaves in a hearty gale.

Artis found the long voyage getting to the colonies difficult, but it was of little consequence to her whether she travelled three miles or three thousand. The loss was the same, the pain as great.

Boarding a ship for a foreign shore was for some a new start to life, a grand adventure. But Artis saw it only as being forced to move from a land she loved all her life, a land where she had once lived with a loving mother and father and a large extended family. She’d been born and bred in the Highlands, held for centuries by generations of her ancestors, common folk who fought and, when necessary, died to hold their clan’s precious land.

Now, her mother too had died for their land.

Unprepared for the loss and the change in her life, she held on to the bitterness that chaffed against her heart like an iron shackle on delicate skin. A chafing caused by the indelible hatred in her memory for the factor named Steller and his ruthless oppression and extortion of the Highland people. He and the other sheep farmers would forever be minions of the devil in her mind.

That bitterness and hatred often made Artis a spitfire when men neared her. Quick-tempered and sometimes highly excitable, she wanted nothing to do with men. Someday, her mother’s murder would be avenged. Until then, all she wanted was to be left alone.

Even now, after seven long years, she could not erase the vivid image of her mother suffering a cruel death right before her eyes. She slapped the towel down on the worn table by her small bed and dressed quickly. The last piece of clothing she donned was her long tartan shawl, which she only wore on special occasions. She pinned it together with a very old family brooch, once belonging to her dear Uncle. He too had died because of Steller and his hard-hearted men.

She hurried from the female servant’s quarters over to the landowner’s home and, being the first to arrive, a servant ushered her inside. She laid her hand upon the brooch, embellished with a fist tightly clutching a dagger pointed heavenward. The brooch also bore the clan motto—
Manu Forti
—with a strong hand.

As she took the quill to sign her freedom papers, Artis glanced down at her own hands, calloused from the farm work she’d done day after day for seven years. Because she was tall for a woman and appeared well-built, Roberts had assigned her to work the fields and barn instead of inside the main house.

At first, her duties caused painful blisters to form on her hands, particularly the hoeing she’d done, alongside the other servants and slaves, to the seemingly endless rows of tobacco and corn crops on the large western Virginia plantation. The farm owner used the corn crop to feed hogs and to distill whiskey and the tobacco crop brought him substantial income. The blisters finally turned to callouses and protected her hands from further damage.

Artis had learned numerous skills working on the plantation, including how to care for and exercise the plantation horses and how to spin and weave hemp used for cotton bale bagging and rope making.

It had been so long since she held a quill and signed her name, her heart
raced for a moment wondering if she could remember how. But for the last few months, she’d dreamed of this moment daily and she wasn’t going to spoil it with self-doubt. She gripped the quill a little tighter and with a confident hand and a bit of flourish wrote ‘Artis MacKay’ on the document.

“Thank you Miss MacKay,” Roberts said, “you have been a faithful and hard-working servant. You are now a free woman. My wife and I wish you the best of fortune in your future. Here is the deed to your land, located near Boonesborough, Kentucky. It is part of a larger tract of land that I have divided into several acreages. As soon as you arrive, take this document to the Land Office there, and register it with the Land Commissioner Mister Simmons. He should be able to direct you to its location. I have not seen it, as I acquired it in payment of a man’s debt to me, but Simmons has assured me that it has good timber and water and will make a fine homestead. Simmons is also selling the remaining small tracts of land for me.”

“Aye, thank ye Mister Roberts. I’ll be sure to find Mister Simmons.”

“A group of settlers in town are leaving tomorrow morning from the inn for the new state of Kentucky. I suggest you travel with them for your protection. Perhaps there will be a wagon you can ride in.”

“Thank ye Mister Roberts. Yer kindness over the term of my indenture was most appreciated. I have heard from others that some landowners are na as benevolent as ye and yer wife have been.”

“We are compelled by Christian charity to kind-heartedness. I regret that I am also compelled by necessity to employ the use of servants and slaves on a plantation of this size.”

“Perhaps ye could start payin’ the workers a fair wage,” Artis suggested.

“Maybe someday, when I’ve paid off my debts,” Roberts said, leaning back in his leather chair and sighing. “Until then though, I must travel to North Carolina this week for a new group of servants.” He rested his clasped hands on his ample belly.

Artis lowered her head and looked at her well-worn boots, solemnly thinking about the men and women who would soon arrive here. No doubt, many would be her fellow countrymen, forced to give away seven years of their life. At least they would be working for a fair man who treated his servants and slaves with compassion.

“I regret that circumstance forced a young woman of your obvious education and charming appearance to spend the first years of her womanhood in servitude.”

“I am not a servant anymore,” Artis said adamantly. “I never was really. I was just forced by circumstance to work here in exchange for a chance at finding a new home and a future.”

“You are right, of course. And at twenty-two, you are still young and lovely enough to marry and bear children. If you can just learn to control your outbursts of temper, I know you will find happiness in Kentucky.”

“If I get angry, it’s because someone has given me good reason to be,” Artis said, setting her jaw and tossing her hair behind her back. “I’ll na hold my tongue when someone deserves to be set straight.”

“I know, I know. And men especially, often say and do foolish things,” he counseled like her father had long ago. “And, some men will do and say cruel things. Like that evil man you spoke of who murdered your poor mother.”

Artis peered down at her feet, unwilling to let him see the pain that still made her eyes burn with tears she refused to release.

“But remember this, not all men are like that man. Now, I don’t often give my coin away, but time and again, you worked as hard as two servants. And did a better job of it too. I want you to accept these coins as a bonus toward your new life. I wish it were more, but perhaps it will be enough to give you a new start.”

Artis glanced up, liking the sound of his words. A new start. “My thanks to ye, Sir.” She reached out for the coins, surprised at the weight of the pouch. “You are too generous.” She wondered if it would be enough to
buy a pistol, lead, and powder. She would need a weapon if she were going to survive in Kentucky by herself.

“You’ve earned every penny of that Artis.”

She couldn’t quarrel with the man about that. Her parents had taught her to do a job well and without complaining and, unlike some of the other surly servants, she’d made a point to do just that ever since her arrival at the Robert’s plantation.

“Now if you would be kind enough to send the next servant in line into my office, I will leave you to the good guidance of the Almighty and bid you farewell.”

“Goodbye, Mister Roberts. And thank ye,” Artis said. She would almost miss the man.

Artis’ chest swelled with elation and she smiled at the realization that she was now a free woman. Free to find her own happiness, and as Roberts called it, a new start.

With a full heart, she turned toward the door, opened it, and breathed in the smell of freedom.

As she stepped out, a dazzling shaft of morning sunlight fell on her. But its radiance couldn’t compete with the joy on her own beaming face.

Chapter 3

Fort Logan, St. Asaph’s, Kentucky

A
fter covering the near seventy mile distance to Fort Logan over a full day of hard riding to the north, Bear arrived with Ambrose. The two dismounted and led their mounts through the fort’s gates.

The fort, an imposing structure impenetrable to arrows and rifles, had never fallen during an attack. Although not nearly as large as the settlement at Fort Boonesborough, numerous homes and a few businesses sprouted out from the fort in all directions.

Several men waved their welcome toward Ambrose and he returned their greeting. Bear knew few men here besides the Colonel. Both he and Sam had visited the fort when they returned from their trip to Boonesborough for building supplies, but they only stayed overnight. Sam had been anxious to pick up Catherine and Little John—who had been staying with their brother Stephen, his wife, daughters, and new son Samuel—and get his own family back home.