The Chieftain Needs an Heir - a Highland ménage novella (Clan MacKrannan's Secret Traditions) (6 page)

H
ilde and Cecily's last stop on their cleansing round was a big cottage seldom occupied, although the reek from the chimney now declared its owner in residence.  This time the Wisewomen carried a large bundle of drying cloths, for an especially pervasive kind of cleansing was needed for a man who dwelled amongst the sullying auras of the royal court.  Hilde deliberately lagged behind so that it was Cecily who knocked on the door, sure that her heart's thudding was as loud as her knuckles.

Cecily
was surprised she had to knock at all.  A man didn't get to be Captain of the Queen's Bodyguard by letting anyone sneak up on him, and especially no' when the sun was nearing its set.  She shuffled from foot to foot, waiting on the door to open.  He couldn't be out.  The Bard had told him to expect the Wisewomen.

She was about to knock again when
Hilde's hand came by her ear to hit the door in a patterned series of loud and soft taps.

"
For pity's sake, Cecily… if ye want to impress Hector, get yer entry codes right," she whispered, giving her a playful nudge just as the door opened and the man himself came out.

The two girls had just begun their curtsies when
he raised his hand and said, "None o' that, lassies.  Let us get this done."

He gathered every bit of their supplies into his own arms
and strode so far ahead on the path that Hilde called for him to slow down.  He stilled without turning round until they'd nearly caught him up, then began striding out again.

"Hector, wait, if ye please!" Hilde called again.

This time he turned to face them. 
"What is it?"

The girls glanced at each other and then back at him
, more than a bit wary of his tetchiness.

"Ye canna start without us,
" said Hilde.  "It is more than washing."

With a
n impatient sigh, he motioned for them to walk ahead of him.  And he kept his gaze on the far distance as both passed.

At the waterfall the girls busied themselves gathering wood, refusing his help even with the lighting of the th
ree small fires around the pool.

Hector sat on a rock
watching them light candles and scatter acorns and leaves and god- knows-what in the pool.  His suspicions were aroused.  Keeping his senses alert was ingrained, and all knew that, so when the Bard had been far too eager for him to drink Oona's honeymead he'd left it untouched and took the springwater only.  Her bees had as much to do with the water as the mead, and his misgivings had mounted even then.

The Bard
would say only that the Wisewomen must give him a cleansing – and
aye,
he would need to strip, or did he usually bathe with his clothes on?  And it
had
to be Cecily and Hilde.  And
of course
his attendance was compulsory for the Tradition – or did he think a Summons would be sent across Scotland to fetch him home for his supper?

The Bard
was on the defensive about the whole thing, whatever it was, and that was well out of character.  In fact, he had divulged very little under close questioning.  Either Hector was losing his touch, which was doubtful, or the Bard had something very big to hide.  Hector had watched his face all through.  There was no guile.  Just a withholding, and an embarrassed one at that.  Whatever the Tradition was that required Hector's presence, the Bard believed himself justified in keeping the detail quiet until the last minute.  The odd bit was that he would no' just come out and say that's what he was doing.

"Hector? 
All is ready for ye now."

He knew the pool to be a lot colder than it looked, and for once he was thankful for it.  Keeping his back firmly to the lassies, he stripped himself of
his garments and jumped in to full immersion.  And he stayed under a while until his body's reaction to seeing Cecily again had cooled itself down enough to abide being viewed when he climbed out to stand naked under the waterfall.

The cascading water from this MacKrannan mountain had its intended effect.  Hector had been fretting about work left undone
– guard rotas, wagonloads of arrows for the archers, security for the queen's visit to Edinburgh and all manner of things he knew his Lieutenant could manage fine well.  He let the torrent thrash him with its icy needles until none of that mattered, and emerged from the waterfall as the man instead of his job.

Cecily and Hilde thought his teeth were chattering as they dried him
thoroughly, one on each side, doing their chantings and invocations as they worked in tandem from his mop of black hair down and along his outstretched arms to his fingertips.  But Hector was saying his own form of incantation, hoping Cecily would no' dry his front, and beseeching the stars in the heavens above to keep his cock unrisen until his kilt was safely back on to cover it.

By the time he reached the Vault, accompanied by the lassies in the light of the rising moon, all to do with his work at court was
well and truly forgot.

Sorcha thought the floating candles in her steaming hot bath a particularly
delightful idea.  The acorns and pine cones were not too much of a nuisance, as long as ye didna sit on one that had gotten waterlogged and sunk, and the unidentifiable mess of fresh leaves filling the spaces kept the water's heat in.  Closing her eyes, she felt as if Mother Nature herself had come a-visiting to renew her vitality.  Oona's singing and chanting and humming were as soothing as the clarsach.  The sounds seemed to go beyond her normal hearing to make her spirit dance.

She
lay a long time in the water, wondering when her husband would be brought to her, and the feelings gathering within her made her glad when it came time to be dried.  She stood meekly as Oona dabbed the cloth over all her skin from top to bottom, and then down her legs.  A tingling had been upon her since late this morn and even the innocent touch of a woman fired her longing for Niall.

The ceremonial robe was much like the ones the Wisewomen had donned after the green pennant was put in the window.  Quite plain, and soft and voluminous, and with Celtic knotwork around its edges and all down the front.  It gave no hint of what lay underneath and she wondered aloud to Oona if
she should stay naked in bed for Niall's arrival.

"
It is yerself will go to him, milady," said Oona with a smile that lit the room.

A rhythmic knocking came,
so reminiscent of a clarsach tune that it lingered in Sorcha's mind even after the knocking had stopped, stirring her blood like a drumbeat.

Oona
unlocked the door.  "Come wi' us now, milady," said Oona.  "It is time."

Hilde and Cecily curtsied to the chieftain's wife and turned to
lead the small procession to a room deep beneath the castle.

In the Vault sat the Bard in the middle
of a half-circle of five chairs facing the fire.  To his right sat Niall and Hector, their heads high, seeing nothing in the fire save the needs of the clan, keeping their minds' focus on their part in helping by whatever way they would each be called to do.

To the Bard's left
sat Ruaridh, who had entered the Vault in a decent enough state of mind but had since been disturbed by his wife Mirren's inability to stop talking. 

None had been allowed to speak since being fetched here by the Wisewomen.
  All but one had taken heed of the rule and obeyed the Bard.  That same one had yet another complaint.

"
And I have an bellyache also.  Have ye a remedy to hand for that, at the least?"

The Bard looked to Mirren
in warning yet again, and looked away again without reply.

"I said
…
have ye a remedy for my bellyache?"

This time
the Bard looked to Ruaridh.

This time
Ruaridh took his wife outside none too gently by the arm, and a minor altercation was heard in the corridor before a pattern of knocks came upon the door.

"Ruaridh MacKrannan and wife – enter,"
called the Bard.

The couple resumed their seats and silence reigned.  But Ru
aridh's face was hot with anger.  It did not bode well for his part in this Tradition if he could not regain his focus.

The Bard heard a distant humming, and was thankful for it.  He put three applewood logs on the fire, passed round the mead he'd held back for the moment, and
had just sat back in his chair by the time the humming came close and he heard one of the entrances to the Chamber of the Green Man giving way.  The company stirred around him in curiosity though their eyes stayed on the fire.

It was time to tell
the clan's history of Fertility Traditions, and what part each would have in this one, and what qualified each of them to be here.  But just in case Mirren started up with her nonsense again, he thought it better to rearrange his speeches.

"M
IRREN, wife of Ruaridh MacKrannan the son of the Chief of the Name of MacKrannan – I address ye."

Mirren preened in self-importance, oblivious to the Bard's intention to shut her up by giving her the first attention.

"Ye are here only by privilege as the wife of Ruaridh to witness his deed.  Ye are forbidden to speak again until the Tradition is complete before the sunrise.  This Tradition can be enacted without yer presence.  This Tradition
will
be enacted without yer presence if ye disobey the rules and conventions, and a penalty incurred for yer disturbance."

Her face turned from dropped-jaw
outrage to sour attacking mode and finally to the blankness of incredulity when none present, not even her husband, made the slightest change to their own to defend her.

"
RUARIDH MACKRANNAN, son of the Chief of the Name of MacKrannan and brother of the chieftain Niall – I address ye.  Ye are here to do deed in the Tradition called the
'Remedie For Wyfes Too Talle'."

The Bard was about to
explain some things, such as the fundamentals, but decided he'd given quite enough information for the moment and let the silence descend.  Oona could do it later.

Ru
aridh would have preferred to hear more, such as a vague idea of the deed expected, but was distracted by Mirren's audible seething beside him.  They would no' be going to the kirkyard to bond wi' spirits o' the ancestors at all.  An active part in this Tradition?  That required focus.  'Wives too tall' had to refer to Sorcha.  He stared at the fire and closed his mind to his misbehaving wife, searching for the composure he had known after the Wisewomen's cleansing.

"
HECTOR MACKRANNAN, carnal son of Lucinda the daughter of the deceased Michiel, once Chief of the Name of MacKrannan – I address ye.  By calculation of genealogy, ye are the nearest surviving kinsman of the chieftain Niall beyond his brother Ruaridh.  Also, ye do fall within the age range preferred for this Tradition.  As such, ye are here to do deed in the aforementioned Tradition."

Hector had already worked
out the kinsmanship for himself, for he'd had a few Summonses over the years because of it.  What in hell's name was this all about?  What deed could himself and Ruaridh be asked to perform that his age would matter?

T
raining in the king's army should have made him let the need for reasoning go, for he was so accustomed to carrying out bizarre royal orders that he had learned not to question his superiors' decisions.  This was different.  His forebodings had served him well since his return and it took work to suppress their rising within him now.