Chapter 3
The door of their bedchamber suddenly opened, jarring Catrìona from sleep.
“Arise! The queen departs!” a raspy voice shouted.
Catrìona heard the command in her mind, instantly aware the harsh voice was not Fia’s.
Since the attack on the vale, Catrìona slept lightly.
A whisper could bring her awake, but the servant who had hissed the command could not know that.
“I am awake,” Catrìona mumbled, knowing Fia was not, for her cousin slept like a rock.
The door thumped closed. She opened her eyes and sat up in bed. Darkness surrounded her, the only light in the chamber a soft glow from the brazier’s banked fire. Edgar’s warning had not been an idle threat. They were summoned before first light to pray.
God must be fond of the dark.
She fumbled on the small bedside table to find the candle, knocking it over at her first try. Finding it with her fingers, she righted the small tallow column in its stand. Once she was certain the flame had caught, she turned to see her cousin still asleep.
“Fia! Wake up. Else we will be late for the queen. One of the servants already shouted as much.”
Fia groaned and tried to cover her face.
Catrìona pushed herself off the bed and crossed the few feet to her cousin, shaking Fia’s shoulder. “Hurry. ’Twill get easier once we are used to the unholy hour.” The irony of praying at an “unholy” hour made her smile.
Leaving her cousin, she reached for the water in the bowl on the side table and splashed it onto her face. The cold water brought her alert as the servant’s shout had not. She dried her face and lifted the clothes she would wear today from the peg where she had hung them the night before.
Slipping her gown over her linen undertunic, she darted a glance at Fia, who, she was pleased to see, was finally stumbling out of bed.
As quickly as they could, they made themselves presentable, donned their cloaks and descended the stairs to the hall.
Torches set in sconces along the walls lighted the large space and a fire blazed in the hearth set in the middle of the cavernous room.
The servants were obviously well trained to their mistress’ odd habits.
Catrìona stifled a yawn as she spotted one of the queen’s ladies waiting near the front door, a candle in her hand.
“I am Audra,” the woman reminded them. “The queen bid me stay to show you the way to our place of morning prayer.”
Catrìona was tempted to tell the woman it was not yet morning, but she refrained. She was now in the queen’s service and at Margaret’s disposal. Moreover, Audra’s pleasant manner at so early an hour told her that this one might become a friend. “Thank you,” she said.
They passed through the open door, Catrìona and Fia following Audra as she hurried along.
“Where are you taking us?” Catrìona asked. In the predawn light, she could see little.
“To the new chapel,” said Audra. “ ’Twas where the king and queen were wed. Margaret had it made larger. Now ’tis a fine place to pray. Some afternoons the queen goes away to a cave to pray alone but in the mornings we attend her here.”
“A queen who prays in a cave like a hermit,” Catrìona mumbled under her breath as she stepped carefully over the rocks and tree roots she felt through her leather shoes.
Fia was having the same trouble making her way and reached for Catrìona’s hand to steady herself.
Eventually, they came to a small building on the other side of the tower. Inside, Catrìona glimpsed the queen on her knees before an altar lit by a single candle. The three other ladies were beside her, their heads bent in prayer.
Audra knelt next to the queen and, not wishing to disturb the queen’s prayers with an apology for being late, Catrìona took her place next to Audra. Fia quickly joined her.
The small chapel was silent except for the women’s whispers as they prayed, the smell of stone and dirt strong, the stillness nearly tangible. It was not unlike the chapel at her home in the vale, only larger.
Catrìona hesitated. Should she say something to God before beginning the ritual Latin prayers?
She had not spoken to Him since the day her parents had been killed.
When Angus and Niall had laid them in the ground, she had prayed for their souls.
But even then, she had questioned how a God who cared about His children could permit something so horrible to happen.
How could He allow pagan savages to rampage unchecked and unpunished?
What kind of God lets innocents suffer while evil triumphs?
When she had asked the priest at Dunkeld, he offered only pious platitudes.
“We are visitors here on earth, my child. Heaven is our eternal home. Your parents are in a better place now, with the holy saints and angels.” His words brought scant comfort.
The Northmen who had murdered her parents and her people still roamed free.
The cry for justice burned in her heart like coals stirred to a fierce blaze by her memories.
But now, she served a devout queen, one who apparently lived like a nun when she was not with her husband.
Catrìona knew she must find a way to pray.
And so she began by reminding God who she was until the absurdity of it gripped her.
Of course, He knew who she was. But it was the only way she could think to reestablish some kind of a connection with a God she had dismissed as uncaring.
Unwilling to say the old Latin prayers and unable to find words of her own, she remembered the Psalter.
Domini pascit me… The Lord is my shepherd…
She had only finished the last line, et ut inhabitem in domo Domini in longitudinem dierum. …in God’s house forevermore my dwelling place shall be, when she heard the queen rise.
Even in the faint light, Catrìona could see the face of her mistress shining with an inner light and she felt ashamed of the turmoil within her.
The queen’s ladies stood as one.
Margaret turned to Catrìona and Fia. “ ’Tis your first day among us and so you do not know our practice. We begin each day with prayer. Then we feed the orphans and those in need before breaking our fast.”
“Yea, My Lady,” Catrìona said, bowing her head, hearing the command in the queen’s voice and wondering how they were to feed the orphans. “Please forgive us for being late.”
“As I said, ’tis your first day.”
“If I may ask, My Lady…” began Catrìona. She heard the sudden intake of breath from the other women at her effrontery, but she genuinely wanted to know. “Why do we pray before the sun rises?”
The queen gave her a look as if indulging a young child.
“Have you never heard that when it was still dark, our Lord got up and left the house and went away to a secluded place to pray? Before He chose the twelve, He prayed all night. There is much to be gained from His example if we would have our prayers answered.”
“Surely He will answer yours, My Lady,” said Catrìona. “You are so… good.”
“Nay, not good, just a woman.”
The queen turned and left the chapel, her ladies following, leaving Catrìona and her cousin alone.
In the light of the candle, she saw Fia roll her eyes. “Now you are questioning the queen herself?”
“I suppose I am. ’Tis hard to think of a woman who rises in the middle of the night to pray as ‘just a woman’ no matter what she says. But if she is just a woman, surely she can answer another woman’s questions.”
As they left the chapel, dawn made its glorious appearance, lighting the sky in shades of blue and heather.
Catrìona paused to admire the colors in the clouds, deep rose with the bright color of foxglove flowers in the center.
Below the clouds, the sky was streaked in gold.
Mayhap the beauty of the dawn was worth the early rising.
Her stomach rumbled, reminding her she had eaten little the night before. She whispered to Fia, “I cannot fault the queen for her devotion to God and the orphans, but my stomach objects to so much activity before breaking my fast.”
“The priest would say serving others before ourselves is a virtue,” said Fia.
“Aye,” Catrìona agreed, knowing Fia was right and the queen a model of devotion. “We serve a queen who shames us all.”
They arrived back at the tower and stepped through the door to find the queen and the other ladies standing inside. Wafting through the air was the smell of fresh-baked bread. Catrìona’s mouth watered.
A woman wearing a headcloth and carrying a babe came toward Margaret. Handing the babe to the queen, she said, “Good morning, My Lady.”
Margaret cradled the sleepy child in her arms. “Did Edward sleep well?”
“Yea, My Lady, ’tis a sweet lad ye have.”
Margaret kissed the babe—who Catrìona realized was the queen’s young son—before releasing him back to his nurse.
An older man with gray hair, who had been standing to one side, approached. Catrìona assumed he was the king’s steward.
“My Lady, the orphans await you and your ladies.”
“Thank you, Nechtan,” said the queen.
Audra leaned in to Catrìona and Fia. “Before she takes any food for herself, Margaret will see the orphans fed. They come to the tower door each morning, usually nine or ten of them. ’Tis her way and we do the same.”
Just then, the king stomped down the stairs, his heavy feet sounding like drum beats on the wooden planks.
Frustration emanated from his grunts as he struggled to pin a large brooch to his scarlet cloak.
His dark hair, thrown back from his face, fell to his shoulders in wild abandon.
A golden-handled sword hung in a sheath at his side.
A man of great height and presence, his entry drew the attention of all. Catrìona could not help but stare.
Spotting his queen, Malcolm went straight to her.
“ ’Twould seem I am in need of your deft hand, mo cridhe.” He grinned mischievously at his wife.