Chapter 27 #2
She was pretty sure they had all kinds of beer. She wasn’t sure if slugs were attracted to whiskey, and she was even surer that Scotland produced all kinds of whiskey. Had they initially produced it just to drink, or to keep their gardens pest-free?
Hard to say.
It had been sometime during the slug speculation that she’d begun to fear for her sanity.
So for the next day she’d done nothing but listen, try to ignore what few scraps she had to eat, and not think much at all.
But thinking about nothing had led her to thoughts of death, and that’s where she was at present. Looking at the marks in the rust of her cage and praying she wouldn’t make so many of them that she’d have to scratch over the first set.
Please, let death come first and let it be swift
.
She had no hope of escape.
None, but that sweet release.
She shook herself sharply. Good grief, what was she doing?
Giving up? Letting herself be beaten down by lousy food and crappy water?
She wasn’t a MacLeod, but she was a Phillips and that was good British stock, wasn’t it?
There was a MacKenzie sitting in her family tree as well, which might count for something.
She had a stiff upper lip and she could certainly use it.
She might be hunched over, but she was still alive.
And where there was life, there was hope.
Hope for what she didn’t know.
That an entire platoon of MacLeods would come rushing through that door to rescue their piper and she would get rescued right alongside him?
It could happen.
Laird Fergusson could also choke on a bone and his brother would take over, the brother who called her a whore with more venom than the rest of the crew.
That could happen, too.
She could also grow thin enough to slip through the bars, but that would probably take a while. It wasn’t that she didn’t have time on her hands. She could wait herself out. Wouldn’t Bentley be surprised to see the lack of flesh on her bones.
Nah, he would still think she was too fat. There was a man who would call the sky red and the grass purple just to be contrary.
Too bad he hadn’t gotten sucked back in time with her. He could have used a few humbling years in a cage. It was very tempting to wish for that, but she knew it was futile. He would continue to thrive, continue to lie his way to success, continue in his quest to replace Dean Anderson.
It probably bugged the hell out of him that she’d gone to Harvard. Succeeded at Harvard. Gotten the kind of grades he could only dream about.
And where were they now?
She was in a cage and he was driving a Jaguar.
Somehow, it just figured.
She took a few hours to contemplate the irony of that.
He was sliding around on fine Corinthian leather seats; she was sliding around on a layer of slime.
He had legroom; she had none. He was driving over pedestrians; she was driving away all sensible souls with her smell alone.
He had lied, cheated, and probably stolen to get to the top; she’d been honest, hardworking, and thrifty on her way to the bottom.
All right, so she hadn’t been that thrifty.
She was probably going to regret that corporate wardrobe to the end of her days.
If she’d just been frugal, she would have had extra money to replace the clothes Bentley had stolen from her, she never would have had to rely on Patrick’s charity, and she wouldn’t be sitting in a cage seven hundred years in the past wondering why in the hell she was there when her former fiancé was sitting in the lap of luxury, treating everyone around him like complete crap.
The thought of that was almost more than she could bear.
And so she snoozed. She never really slept. Every time she tried during the day, some noble soul or other seemed to find it his duty to come wake her up in an unpleasant manner. At least they didn’t poke at her with their swords. She was grateful for small favors.
So she closed her eyes briefly and tried to look as if she were merely thinking on her suffering, not trying to catch twenty winks.
And she marveled that she still was able to maintain such a cheerful outlook.
She should have been bawling her eyes out.
But that drew attention to her as well, and drawing attention to herself was something she had learned to avoid at all costs.
The tears leaked out and ran down her face just the same.
She realized she had slept only because she woke up—and that on her own, miracle of all miracles. She looked next to her to find Robert sitting with his back against the wall, his posture quite casual, but his eyes very alert. She’d learned to judge the mood of the hall by his eyes alone.
Something was up.
She looked for herself to judge what that something might be.
Apparently, they were having a guest for dinner. Madelyn watched with interest. They’d never had anyone over for dinner, and she wondered if the Fergussons would pull out the good china.
Well, apparently not the good china, but they did pull a couple of the tables back from the fire pit.
Just enough room to give the guest and the laird’s brother, who happened to be the clan’s fiercest fighter—she knew this because he was the one who tended to bang on her cage the loudest with his sword to wake her up—a chance to have a little light exercise before dinner.
She looked with faint interest at the newcomer.
She was far enough away that his precise details were hard to discern.
His plaid was less ratty than anyone else in the hall’s, his hair was a good deal shorter, and he didn’t have a beard.
Maybe where he came from, they actually shaved more than once every ten years.
Well, whatever his grooming habits, the man knew how to wield a sword.
He held his own quite well against the laird’s brother, succumbing just barely to the other man’s quite impressive attack after long enough that Madelyn had grown quite bored.
It was dinnertime and she could hardly wait to see what kinds of things she’d get.
Rats’ heads? Gristle? Gnawed-on bones? Hard to say and not worth speculating about.
The laird clapped the newcomer on the back and drew him past the high table.
“Come,” he boomed. “Come and see the whore of my enemy. As a McKinnon, you will appreciate the sight.”
Madelyn didn’t bother to raise her eyes. The Fergusson didn’t like it, so she didn’t do it. She kept her eyes down and didn’t lift her hand to wipe her face when he urinated on her. She would later, when he wasn’t looking.
“She doesn’t speak much,” the Fergusson said. “Not a very intelligent whore, apparently.”
“Interesting,” was the comment.
Madelyn had to clutch her hands in her skirts to keep from looking up in surprise at that voice.
“And see the piper? No accompaniment to battle from that one ever again, eh?”
“Well done,” came the accolade. “Your justice is swift and quite terrible. Surely all MacLeods will think many times before raising a sword against you.”
“So I daresay,” chuckled the laird. “So I daresay. Now, come, my friend McKinnon, and give me tidings of your clan.”
She didn’t dare look. The tears that fell from her eyes mingled with the other liquid on her face, so there was no danger of the Fergusson or his men noticing anything untoward.
She sat in her cage and cried.
The newcomer was Patrick.
He had come for her.