The Scotsman (6 page)

“He is a stripling, younger by near fifteen years, but old enough to be taken hostage by English brigands.”

Catherine stiffened. “My brother is no brigand.”

“Your brother?” He looked startled, and reined in his mount by a flight of stone steps leading up to the towering keep. “I was told the earl is your father.”

“Yea, he is, but ’twas not my father who captured the prisoners you want. Twas my brother.”

“Then mayhap I should conduct my negotiations with him instead of the earl.”

“’Twill do you no good. My father is his overlord and
has the final word in the matter. It is he who holds their lives in the balance.”

Catherine’s hard-won control wavered, but her voice was steady. It was true. The two Scottish captives were plum prizes, Nicholas had told her, and King Edward would be most pleased by their capture. For her father to release them would be a miracle that she did not expect.

The Scot gave her a thoughtful glance as he dismounted and pulled her down from the saddle to set her on her feet. Immediately, her knees crumpled and she would have sprawled gracelessly on the ground had he not caught her. A faint smile crooked one corner of his mouth as he held her up with his hands beneath her elbows.

Embarrassed, Catherine snapped, “’Tis difficult to stand after so many hours spent on horseback.”

“Yet I manage it well enough.” Before she could form another retort, Alex bent slightly and scooped her into his arms, cradling her against his chest as if she weighed no more than a child as he mounted the steep stairs with irritating energy.

Catherine bit her lower lip to hold back sharp words. It would never do to be dropped on a staircase this steep, and she certainly did not trust this Scot not to do it if she angered him. When they reached the top of the stairs, he strode through wide double doors and into a great hall that smelled of stale smoke, foul rushes, and the residue of a hundred past meals. Gnawed bones were scattered atop tables and benches were overturned. Empty ale pitchers lent a pungent scent to air already befouled with the taint of unruly hounds and spilled ale, ample evidence of the lack of a goodwife to oversee the servants’ duties.

Alex muttered under his breath, then swung her to her feet again, this time keeping one hand on her arm in
a clasp that was light but firm. “Hold, my lady. I shall rouse the servants to ready a chamber for you.”

Sweeping the hall with a derisive glance, Catherine asked caustically, “Do you mean for me to sleep in this uncivilized hovel? It has the stench of a stable.”

His jaw tightened, and a muscle leaped beneath the beard-shadow. “Aye, my fine lady, I do indeed mean for you to sleep in my home. If ’tis not civilized enough for you, take comfort in the fact that you may soon be back where you find the lodgings more to your liking. Unless, of course, your father replies with typical English civility, and then you may well end your days in this hovel.”

A veiled threat lurked beneath his words. Catherine said nothing as he stalked away from her, calling in Gaelic for his servants. She stood where he’d left her, gazing in dismay at her surroundings. Torn banners hung awry on the smoke-blackened walls, and in the rafters overhead perched birds of prey. Droppings added to the foul mess of filthy straw on the stone floor, and there was an air of general disorder about the hall that would have sent Lady Warfield into a swoon.

A little stiffly, she moved to stand beside a tall candle rack, where the tallow tapers had guttered. Her hands knotted into painful fists, and she stared blindly at the congealed tallow wax lumped on the candle stand. For the first time, she truly feared that she would never see her home again. Shuddering, she murmured the first words that came to mind:
“Júdica me, Deus, et discérne causum meam de gente non sancta
—”

“…
ab hómine iniquo et dolóso érue me”
a rough male voice finished behind her, and she turned sharply to look up at her captor. His mouth quirked into a mocking smile that did not reach his eyes.

“Do you think the English are the only men who pray in Latin? I know that prayer as well, my lady—‘Give
judgment for me, O God, and decide my cause against an unholy people—from unjust and deceitful men deliver me.’ Fitting, I think, that I should give voice to those last words, do you not agree?”

“I … I do not know what you mean,” she managed to get out weakly.

“Yea, lady, I think you do. When next you pray, mayhap you had best ask God to deliver us all from deceitful men, for if your father fails me, he fails you as well.”

Catherine could not reply. All hope that she might find mercy in this man dwindled away, leaving only rising despair. If her father did not agree to his terms, she was doomed to end her days in the barbaric land of the Scots.…

It did not sweeten Alex’s mood to find his hall in turmoil. It should not matter to him what the maid thought of his home, and it rankled that it did. A few well-placed kicks and curses were enough to rouse the servants from drunken stupors into clumsy efforts to right benches and tables, mop up spilled ale, and scoop fallen food from the stale rushes. Yet he had seen reflected in violet-blue eyes the image of his home from a stranger’s perspective, and it was not a pleasing vision.

Nor was it pleasing to have her offering prayers for deliverance from unholy men—meaning, of course, him.

Curtly, he beckoned a servant to his side and spoke to her in Gaelic. “Take the lady to a chamber, Mairi, and see that she is given all she needs. But do not let her out of your sight, or give her a moment’s freedom.”

Mairi, an older woman with wise eyes and a tart tongue, gave him an appraising stare before nodding. “It is a black day when I am sent to guard an English prisoner.”

“She is hostage against Jamie’s return.” Alex lifted a
brow when Main stood silently studying the young woman. “Do you have a quarrel with her presence, Main?”

“I have a quarrel with the presence of any Sassenach in Scotland.”

Alex did not respond. Main’s husband and only son had been killed by the English years before, and she still harbored hatred against them. Understandable, and one of the reasons she was so suitable to guard the fair English flower who still stood with silent dignity by a rack of guttered candles. Alex frowned. In the thin light that trickled through the tiny windows, he saw the utter weariness etched in the girl’s face. Her eyes resembled nothing so much as huge purple bruises, dark against her ashen pallor. Such a fragile, well-defined face, her bone structure delicate and strong at the same time, with determination in the set of her jaw and the limpid gaze she lifted to him.

“You are to go with Main,” he said to her in gruff English. “She will tend your needs.”

The girl’s eyes flicked to Main’s resentful face. “’Tis doubtful either of us will enjoy the alliance. Does she speak any English?”

“Enough. She is not meant to be a companion.”

“Nay, I did not think so.” Straightening her slender shoulders, she added quietly, “I would like to request the comfort of a priest.”

“A priest! Do you think I intend to execute you, girl? I do not. You are far too valuable to me alive.”

“Then you refuse my request?” Velvety soft eyes stared at him with steady contempt, and he shook his head angrily.

“Nay, I do not. If ’twill comfort you, I will send Father Michael to you when he returns.”

Her cool nod of acceptance was reserved and relieved at the same time, and Alex felt another one of those irritating twinges of compassion that he tried to ignore. It was maddening, this feeling that he had erred when he knew he had not.

Pivoting, he stalked across the hall without glancing back at her. She was a hostage and no more. Once Jamie was returned to him, he would never see her again, nor would he want to. It would be enough just to have his brother back safe and alive.

He found Robbie in the bailey near the stables, leaning casually against a heavy oaken beam and chewing on a straw stalk. As he drew near him, Robbie lifted a tawny brow and grinned. “You look fit to kill, Alex lad. Has the wee lass got you vexed? She did not prick you with a blade, did she, or mayhap her claws again?”

Alex drew the back of one finger over the raw scratches on his cheek, wincing a little. “No more than seems usual for her. I vow, she swings like a pendulum between hissing cat and frightened kitten.”

Robbie shrugged and spit out the straw stalk. “Like most females, I warrant. What do you intend to do?”

“Send a message to the earl offering an exchange of hostages. She can make her mark on’t to convince him we have her.”

“Aye, but will she?”

Alex scowled. “She will not be given a choice, Robbie. She will sign whatever she is told to sign, and I will send Warfield a lock of her hair to prove my intent.”

“And would you, then?”

“Would I what?”

“Harm her if Warfield does not yield us Jamie.”

Startled, Alex did not reply for a moment. It had not really occurred to him that Warfield would refuse. Rail
and counter, perhaps, but not refuse. What man in his right mind would refuse to retrieve his own daughter from the enemy?

But even as the thought flitted through his head, Robbie reminded him in soft Gaelic, “Do not forget how the Sassenach bastards have treated the Bruce’s womenfolk, Alex lad.”

“Yea, ’tis true enough. And a bitter draught to swallow that Bruce’s wife is still held prisoner, though her plight is better than that of his sister.”

“Only a bloody Sassenach would hang women outside castle walls in wooden cages for nigh onto four years.” Robbie drew in a deep breath, his face creased with harsh lines. “He did not even spare Bruce’s twelve-year-old daughter until his own people grew outraged.”

Alex sighed. “When Bruce’s sister was caged on the castle walls of Berwick, no ransom offer he made swayed the English. While Edward yet holds Bruce’s queen, her father is the Earl of Ulster and one of Edward’s staunchest lieutenants. He is too powerful for Edward to risk offending him by treating her harshly. Will Warfield be as obstinate as King Edward?”

Robbie pushed away from the oak beam and put a hand on Alex’s shoulder. “You may well have the lass for a long time, Alex. She is our only bargaining point. Do not forget what Bruce told you….”

“How could I forget.” Alex frowned. “Not that I blame him for it. He has lost so many to this bloody war that the fate of one rebellious lad cannot be allowed to matter.”

“Aye, but the Bruce should be pleased that you have snatched the earl’s daughter from under his very nose. But be forewarned—he might well want to hold her as security for the return of his own women.”

Alex met Robbie’s clear gaze steadily. “I do not think
Robert Bruce will begrudge me exchanging an English maid for my brother. He knows Jamie is my only family now.”

Robbie shrugged. “I hope you are right. Now, I think we have earned a bit of hot food and pitchers of ale to wash away the taste of English dust from our throats.”

“’Twill take more than ale to wash away the bitter taste that haunts me.”

Robbie’s tawny brows lifted. “How can you be bitter when you have the earl’s own daughter locked in yon tower chamber to await his reply? Few Sassenachs are willing to allow the hand of a Scotsman to sully their daughter. And ’tis a notion you had best plant firmly in Warfield’s mind along with your offer to exchange for Jamie.”

Amused, Alex agreed. “You have the torturous mind of a fiend, Robbie, but I commend you for it. ’Tis too bad you are not consulted as one of Bruce’s advisers. We might well win back Scotland without a drop of bloodshed.”

“Nay, lad, not if I was consulted.” Robbie closed a fist around the hilt of the sword hanging at his side. “I find fighting the English far too entertaining to give it up for blather.”

Alex accompanied Robbie to the hall and called for a pitcher of ale to be brought. It was several pitchers and much later when he thought of Lady Catherine again, ensconced in a chamber in the east tower and safely under lock and key. On the morrow, he would have her make her mark on a letter for Warfield.

A fire blazed in the central hearth, huge logs sending up showers of sparks and emanating warmth in a small circle beyond the blaze. He stretched out his long legs toward the heat, eyes half-closed, a bit bemused with ale and a heavy heart. Jamie … far too young to be at the
mercy of the English, though his own impulsiveness had caused his plight. But he was the only family left to Alex now. All the others had gone through the years, most slain in battle—save his mother, who had succumbed to childbed fever.

Frowning into his cup, Alex tried to summon his mother’s face from memory. It was so vague, a blur of red-gold hair and light eyes that evoked feelings of warmth without solid image. He had not been much older than Jamie was now when she had borne the babe, dying of it before Alex returned from a skirmish with English border troops. So long ago, yet he still felt the emptiness and anguish at her loss, still recalled the mix of emotions at the birth that had claimed his mother and left behind a healthy, squalling infant. His first resentment of Jamie had long since faded, replaced by a fierce desire to keep alive and safe the last reminder of Catriona Fraser.