Chapter 23
“By the hounds, Donall!” Gavin MacFie scrambled to his feet and launched himself as far forward as his ankle chain would allow. “Gods be praised!” He grinned, pulling Donall into a rough, bear-like embrace.
“The bastards wouldn’t give me word of you.” He released Donall and slapped his back, a broad smile lighting his bearded face. “I thought you were dead.”
I should be. Donall stifled the truth.
He also couched the pain of his friend’s well-meant and hardy greeting. Gavin wasn’t aware of his stretched and achy muscles, his hours dangling from a chain.
“At least I knew they hadn’t served you up to their swords.” He returned Gavin’s grin. “They’d just as soon see me swing from a gibbet.” He glanced at Niels and Rory who were fastening his chain to an iron ring on the wall of Gavin’s cell. “Either that or have me drowned.
“They failed,” he added, hooking his thumbs in his belt. “I refused to die so easily.”
“Poxy windbag,” Rory snarled and jerked on the chain, testing the ring’s hold. Satisfied, he strode to the door. “Were it not for our misguided ladyship, I’d smash my fist into your mouth until you spit out every last one of your teeth.”
“Have done.” Niels gave him a dark look, then stepped aside to admit a stream of wide-eyed kitchen lads, each carrying a bundle of some sort.
“Make his pallet in the corner,” he ordered them, then turned again to Rory. “Summer Solstice is fast upon us. You can spit on his bones soon enough, after the crows pick them clean.”
“Oh, aye?” Gavin fisted his hands. “Give us our swords and we’ll see who ends as carrion fodder.”
“We needn’t bother.” Donall laid a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “You ken what they say. A dog who barks overmuch does so because he cannae bite.”
“Ah, well.” Gavin cracked his knuckles. “If I dinnae punch him now, ’tis only because the men who live longest are those who keep their temper.”
“Indeed.” Donall’s smile returned.
To his amazement, even Niels looked ready to chuckle before he caught himself. Rory sputtered, his eyes blazing with such fury it wouldn’t have surprised him to see steam shoot from his ears.
“Breathe your last, you bastards,” Rory seethed, whipping out his dirk.
He raised his arm, preparing to rush at Donall and Gavin. But just as he lunged, the older knight Lorne entered the cell, his brows drawn together in a frown.
“Becalm yourself, lest you wish to muck out the cesspit.” He aimed a fierce look at Rory, then jerked his beard at the double-edged dirk in the guardsman’s hand. “Sheathe it.”
“Ram it down his gullet is what I’d like to do,” Rory groused. With a last glower at Donall and Gavin, he jammed his blade into the leather holder at his belt, and stomped out the door.
“See he cools his blood,” Lorne ordered Niels, and then nodded toward the door in a gesture for him go after Rory.
The giant obliged, ducking beneath the door’s low lintel to disappear into the poorly lit passage beyond. The kitchen lads scurried after him, looking relieved to be gone.
The moment their footsteps faded, Donall leaned against the cell’s cold stone wall. If the stony-faced graybeard didn’t soon hie himself away as well, he might not be able to keep up his pretense of hardiness.
Every bluidy inch of him ached so bad he could almost understand why some men, when battle-wounded, plead for the mercy of death. The pain even sat his bone marrow. But he wouldn’t give Lorne the satisfaction of seeing his agony.
He also didn’t want to worry Gavin.
So he struggled against a grimace and glanced at the pallet the kitchen lads had assembled for him.
Made of a coarse linen sack stuffed with straw and dried bracken, then topped with a worn tartan blanket, the pallet’s dubious comforts beckoned more than his magnificent four-postered bed at Baldoon.
Gods, but he was weary.
“You should be comfortable enough here,” Lorne said then, looking at him strangely.
“More so than in the Otherworld,” Donall owned, biting back a groan. “Though I wouldn’t mind the crackling fires, saucy wenches, and mead said to found there.”
“Humph.” Lorne’s gaze flicked over him. “A good warm meal will arrive shortly, and later a bath.”
Gesturing to the cloth bundles against the far wall, he added, “Your clothes. Everything is there. Untouched, save your weapons. I can do nothing else for you.”
“You can let us-” Gavin broke off at Donall’s warning glance.
Ignoring Gavin’s surprise, Donall returned the graybeard’s nod. “It is enough, and appreciated,” he said, glad his voice no longer sounded like a croak.
His words might have been grudgingly spoken, but they weren’t without respect. The older knight had kept his promise, abiding by the ancient rules of chivalry between men who’d knelt to take the blow of honor.
“Then, sirs, I bid you a good night.” Lorne made a stiff bow, then left, closing and barring the door behind him.
Gavin glanced at Donall. “Who the hell was that?”
“A friend.” The answer came from someplace so deep inside Donall even he couldn’t explain its reasoning. “Dinnae ask me why, but I believe he is a friend.”
“But he’s no’ willing to free us?” Gavin sank onto his pallet.
“So it seems.” Donall closed his eyes and drew a breath against his achy bones. “We can try to reason with him.”
“These fools cannae tell the truth from an eel’s arse.”
“Eels dinnae have arses.”
“Exactly.” Gavin smiled.
Donall groaned. “Captivity hasn’t dimmed your wits.”
“Praise the gods.” Gavin settled back on his pallet, his smile deepening as he looked at Donall. “Who is the ‘misguided ladyship’ the angry lout mentioned? The fetching MacInnes chieftain perchance?”
“How would I know?”
Gavin chuckled. “Because you do.”
“Say you?”
“I am no fool.” Gavin’s eyes glinted. “The oaf wouldn’t have named her otherwise.”
“He didn’t.”
“You’re splitting hairs, my friend.”
Donall frowned.
Gavin was a font of good cheer. A loyal friend and fierce warrior, but also blessed with more uncanny insight than the most gifted henwife.
At times, anyway.
Donall hoped this was not one of them.
In case it was, he busied himself by shifting on his pallet. Deflection sometimes staved off Gavin’s observations and rambles. So Donall flicked out the woolen blanket Lorne had provided, and smoothed its scratchy warmth over his legs.
Gavin cleared his throat.
Donall waited for the good-natured jab he knew was about to come.
“Plucking your fingers on that moth-eaten rag gives you away.” Gavin pushed up on an elbow, grinning. “So she is Lady Isolde.”
“Aye, the lairdess herself.” Donall wouldn’t lie to his friend.
He did glance at the cell’s one window slit, though nothing could be seen there except silvery rain. Sheeting rain that blew sideways past the narrow opening cut into the thick stone wall. Thankfully, this cell’s walls were not dank and slime-coated.
Nor did a layer of soiled and smelly rushes cover the stone-flagged floor. A slant of torchlight fell through the cell’s other air slit, a hole carved high in the wood of the door. That bit of light, coming from a torch in the passageway, showed that the cell was well-swept and clean.
Gavin had been shown some courtesy.
Glad for that mercy, Donall glanced again at his friend. “What do you know of her?”
“Lady Isolde?” Gavin turned on his side and propped his head on his fist. “I haven’t met her. She must be of good heart, courageous, and intelligent. She held her father’s trust or he wouldn’t have left his people in her hands.”
Donall wasn’t so sure.
“She could’ve charmed him,” he said. “Fathers dote on their daughters. My own sire thought the sun rose and set in my sister Amicia, as well you know.”
“That I do.” Gavin chuckled. “You may be right. Some say Lady Isolde is the fairest maid in these isles.”
“Dinnae tell that to Amicia.” Donall smiled and leaned his head against the wall. “Lady Isolde is passable.”
She is a flame-haired siren with luminous amber-flecked eyes and I wouldn’t be surprised if bards didn’t sing of her in all the halls of the land.
“Tut, man! You’ve seen her?” Gavin sat up, interest sparking in his eyes.
“Aye, so I have.”
“But the tales are untrue? She isn’t a beauty?”
“She is,” Donall admitted. “I just haven’t seen the best of her. If she set out to charm a man, I am sure she’d bewitch him so thoroughly, he’d upend the world to claim her.”
“Ahhh…” Gavin grinned. “Sakes, but you are e’er so blessed. I’ve had nothing to gaze at but these miserable walls.”
“I haven’t been gazing at her.” Donall glanced again at the window, inhaled deeply of the cold, rain-thick air. He needed to clear his head for Gavin’s word choice was unfortunate. He burned to gaze at the lass. And not just in the ways he already had.
He wanted to see her stretched out naked on her bed, eager for his perusal.
His delectation, the gods help him.
Even now, with every inch of him aching and sore, he felt a tug at his loins.
“Bluidy hell…” He tipped his head back to stare at the water-stained ceiling.
“Hah! I should have known…” Gavin’s laugh echoed in the tiny chamber.
“You know nothing.” Donall whipped his head around to scowl at him.
“I know you’re smitten.” Gavin gave him a crooked smile. “That is the way of it.”
“The way of it is far beyond the bounds of anything even you could dream up.” Donall pinched the bridge of his nose, then pressed his fingers against the middle of his forehead. Damned if he didn’t feel as if he’d downed a barrel of soured ale. “You would no’ believe me if I told you.”
“Tell me anyway.” Gavin rested his arms on his up-drawn knees. “My ears demand it.”
“Have done, you fiend. I am exhausted and only wish to sleep.” Donall closed his eyes. “You’ll soon learn the nature of my involvement with the lady.”
“Involvement?” Gavin leaned sideways and poked his fingers into Donall’s ribs. “Dinnae think of sleep after such an admission. What are you about? Dallying with her?”
Donall’s eyes snapped open. “By the devil’s arse, MacFie. Do I look like I’ve been enjoying myself?”