Chapter 18
“Da says ye are going to join the games,” Keira said, looking up at her in wonder, as if to confirm that her father was being serious and not pulling a prank on her.
Violet wouldn’t blame her; it was relatively unheard of for a lady to join the Highland games. After all, the events themselves were designed for the brute strength of men: caber tossing, weight throw, sparring, wrestling, swordplay, and the occasional archery.
Of course, there were rare cases of very bold ladies who decided to join the games, but these were usually ladies of nobility who had very remarkable skills in archery or perhaps homemaking skills like dyeing cloths and spinning yarns for knitting.
After all, those skills require very high precision.
She would know this, since she had very silently come to the conclusion that she lacked that precision.
She was an Englishwoman who was only bred to one day make her debut in the ton, perform well in ballrooms, and snag a high-standing gentleman in marriage. It was a marvel that Ruaridh had agreed to marry her so readily when she was lacking in so many ways.
That role required a different set of skills, so that meant comportment lessons, dress fittings, and playing the pianoforte. While those skills were deemed valuable within those glided rooms the ton inhabited, they were useless here in the wild hills of the Scottish Highlands.
She could just imagine suggesting a watercolor or a dancing competition here.
The men would most likely have a seizure and injure themselves laughing her into oblivion, and she might very well discover that she had a new talent that could fit in anywhere—being a clown even more ridiculous than a court jester.
Perhaps she might even give it a try. Perhaps then she would not feel quite as stupid as she had the last few days. It was one of the items on her list after all, and now that she was no longer doing it to stall her wedding, she could enjoy it more.
While she had enjoyed the frustrated look on Ruaridh’s face when she had proposed the idea, that feeling of triumph was short-lived when she realized that she did not have a clue what games exactly she was going to participate in.
In her panic, she had gone to meet Grannie Ava, and while the older woman did her best to stifle her mirth, she did offer her options.
“It is very rare that a lass decides to join the Highland games,” she said with a smile. “But me Maggie was different. She didnae believe that such events should only be for men.”
Apparently, she was not the only crazy woman who had existed in these parts in recent years. Great. At least that was a mild relief.
“Who is Maggie?” Violet asked.
“Me sister,” Grannie Ava said with a sad smile.
Well, not so recent then.
“She must have been very remarkable.”
“Aye, she was,” Grannie Ava agreed, her gaze growing distant as she journeyed to the past right in front of Violet’s eyes.
“She was a very good markswoman, kent her way around a bow and arrow. She had always had an interest in it, right from when we were just wee lassies. She always snuck to watch the archers practice early in the morning and returned before it was time to break our fast.”
“And they didn’t say anything?”
“Nay. They didnae seem to mind. She would always go, and when she returned, she would tell me about the archers, the ones that always hit a perfect bullseye, and how she wanted to be able to produce such magic with her own fingers. While I allowed her the excitement, I didnae like archery. It didnae feel interesting. I preferred to join our maither in making tonics for the injured people in the castle, and I was content, but Maggie was different.”
Violet could understand Maggie’s sentiments on wanting to pursue her passions, and she admired her bravery in pursuing them.
“Soon, she was nay longer content just to watch. She wanted to shoot as well. So, she nagged our faither for months. He refused; he thought such a weapon very dangerous for a wee lass. Well, me sister took matters into her own hands. When he wasnae looking, she took his bow and disappeared into the forest. I can never forget just how afraid our faither was that day. The whole castle went to look for her,” Grannie Ava continued.
“The archers she loved to watch so much didnae ken her whereabouts, as they hadnae seen her that day.
Our faither was so sure that she was taken by an enemy.
After all, the bow was too heavy and valuable for a child to carry.
Our maither was inconsolable, and her friends and maids tried to comfort her.
“I remember crying because I thought I had lost me sister.
Just when everyone was about to give up, she walked in, dragging the bow behind her.
Her hands were bleeding from blisters, and the bow was missing its string, but she was smiling, uncaring for all the panic she had caused.
She was just happy that she got to use a bow, even though the results were not pretty.
“Our faither gathered her into a tight hug before proceeding to scold her. Nae that she cared. She still had that satisfied smile on her face even while he scolded her. I suspect nothing could have taken away her joy at that moment.” She chuckled.
“Eventually, our faither had to make a bow for her.
It was smaller and light enough for her to carry.
He used very fine wood to make it himself.
The day he gave Maggie her new bow, she was so excited that she made sure to tell everyone about it.
It became her most cherished possession.
She used to hug it to her chest in her sleep for fear of someone thieving it in the night.
“Soon, having a bow became nae enough. She needed to ken how to use it, so our faither told Alan, his right-hand man, to teach her.
Alan was a good swordsman and archer. He was happy to take her under his wing, and Maggie applied herself most diligently to the skill.
Nay day passed without her practicing, and in nay time, she was pestering our faither to let her participate in the Highland games, even though he told her several times that the event was mostly for men.
“Eventually, when it was his turn to host the Highland games, he reluctantly allowed her to participate, and to everyone’s surprise, she participated and won prizes for our clan.
She was so good that Alan declared he had nothing else to teach her.
She even followed me sometimes when I went to the forest to search for herbs.
She saved me from many a wolf attack. She was truly a great lass,” Grannie Ava recounted fondly, before falling into a heavy silence.
Violet already knew the answer, even before she asked the question. “What happened to Maggie?”
There was a long pause.
“She died,” Grannie Ava replied with a sorrowful sigh.
“She fell in love with a laird from the Lowlands. Their marriage was swift, and soon she was pregnant with their first child. All was well until it was time for her to give birth. Her labor was long and difficult, and eventually exhaustion and excessive bleeding caused her death. The poor bairn died as well. Her husband was inconsolable.”
Grannie Ava was as well. Violet suspected that something in the woman had died with her sister.
What a tragic end. A strong woman able to defend herself from a threat, felled by childbirth.
“Daenae mind me,” Grannie Ava added with a dark chuckle. “I am maudlin these days. Must be old age.” Then, her face brightened. “Tell me, are ye any good with a bow and arrow?”
Violet could feel the laugh bubbling up her throat, and she did her best to stifle it.
It was the irony of it all. The fact that Grannie Ava ever thought that an Englishwoman like her would have experience in archery.
The ton frowned upon young ladies who had the temerity to have a love for reading, branding them bluestockings and banishing them to the edges of ballrooms. It was safe to say that they would probably foam at the mouth if they ever found a fragile miss with an interest in archery, perhaps because it disrupted the image of fragility and innocence that they were so eager to paint many young ladies in.
“I am sorry. I have scarcely held a bow and arrow in my hand.”
If she ever attempted to, Violet predicted that she might return missing an eye and several fingers.
“I wish there were other ladies here to teach ye, and Ruaridh is busy these days preparing for the competition.”
Even if he was, Violet was never going to learn from him, not now when their desire for each other seemed to be climbing higher. There was a high chance that she might cause him and herself injury with how distracted she was sure to be.
In all her life, she had never had to deal with such an addiction. A heat that seemed to envelop her senses whenever she caught sight of him, worsening when he came close and drowned her in his scent.
If precautions were not taken, she might ruin the bow and every chance at learning archery in favor of climbing up his body and surrendering to the pleasure she was sure to find in his arms.
There was also the fact that with every moment she spent in his arms, she could feel her heart warming in a way that begged caution.
She liked him, that much she knew, but some of the feelings she had for him scared her.
It made no sense that with only one touch, her mind began to travel down forbidden paths.
So, no, Ruaridh could not be her teacher, at least if she had no plans to be found in a sweaty, naked heap with him.
“You don’t need to worry anyone on my account. I am sure that between the two of us, we can figure out something I might enjoy doing,” she told Grannie Ava, in reassurance.
Unfortunately, luck was not on her side. For in the next few days, she tried her hand at other household “talents,” only to realize that she was useless at cloth making, cooking, and even spinning yarns.