Chapter 11 #3
Bowing his head to the queen, he bid Catrìona to follow as he kneed his horse toward the front of the score of riders. Soon, they left the tower behind and took the path leading northeast from Dunfermline.
Above him, the sky was a cloudless blue. The path took them through green meadows edged with wood sorrel and butter-colored flowers. On either side of the meadow tall pines rose high above them. In the distance he could see low hills.
“Where will we lodge tonight?” she asked, her eyes sweeping over the grass-covered hills stretching before them bounded by the deep woods.
“Would you be disappointed if I said in an open field?”
She laughed. “Would you be surprised if I said, ‘Nay’?”
“My lady, after your jaunt in the woods and dip in the burn, nothing you do would surprise me. But lest you worry, the king maintains a manor house in Ballingry. ’Tis only a few miles southeast of Loch Leven.
From the sketch I looked at of where we were headed, ’twill bring us about a third of the way into our journey. ”
“I have not had such a long ride since coming to Dunfermline,” she said wistfully. “I am enjoying it.”
“Then you have no complaints?”
“Quite the opposite, sir. I am pleased beyond measure to be outside, free of the tower’s small chambers and, dare I add, free of my needlework.”
He smiled. “You do not love your stitching as the other ladies do?”
“Rarely. But recently I have found a new interest in embroidery, a design of my own.”
Immediately he pictured the copper-colored cloth she had presented to Colbán.
He had seen the captain wearing a tunic of the same color that evening in the hall, embroidered with what looked like falcons.
Only she would have stitched such a design.
The thought she might have enjoyed sewing for Colbán made him regret having asked the question.
A short while later, his mood darkening, Steinar called a halt to the procession. “We break here for a short while. The queen will be weary and we’ve the horses to water.” Gesturing to a nearby stand of oak, he said, “There is shade among the trees, my lady.”
* * *
Catrìona could not imagine what had come over Steinar.
Without another word, he abruptly turned his horse and swept back toward the queen’s cart.
The shade of the trees could wait. She would not be directed to the woods when her mistress might need her.
Following the moody scribe, Catrìona urged her horse back to where the main group had stopped.
“Allow me to help you,” said the king’s captain turning to her, having just helped the queen down from the cart. While Colbán reached to help her down, Steinar assisted Audra. Catrìona fought the feeling of jealousy that washed over her.
Reaching her hands toward the captain’s shoulders, she felt his powerful hands circling her waist as he lowered her to the ground. “Thank you, sir. You are most gracious.”
“Why not ride in the cart with the queen for the rest of the day, my lady? ’Tis likely more comfortable and you might enjoy the company of the other women. Riding all day on a horse is not for a lady such as you.”
She let out an exasperated sigh as she handed the horse’s reins to a waiting servant. “Nay, sir. I prefer to ride. I am quite used to it and I daresay, Audra can keep the queen well entertained.”
He frowned, his displeasure clear, but he did not challenge her further as they walked together to join the others.
A short time later, a cloth was spread beneath the nearby trees and they sat in the shade enjoying a bit of food.
’Twas a small meal but welcome and Catrìona was happy to see the queen ate the bits of cooked game, cheese and berries.
Margaret often ate little but mayhap for the sake of the babe she carried, Audra had convinced her to eat.
Beneath the trees, sunlight filtered through the branches, falling onto the small party sitting with the queen.
Robins, flitting about in the trees and foraging on the ground, tittered and chirped, making their presence known.
Catrìona leaned back on one arm admiring the beautiful afternoon, a breeze wafting through the air.
Several members of the guard had joined them as well as the queen’s maidservant, an older Saxon woman whose brown plaits were laced with gray. She was very attentive to Margaret, leaving Audra and Catrìona free to converse with the men.
Colbán eased himself down beside her. “I would sit with you, my lady, if you would allow it.”
“Aye, your company is welcome.” As long as Steinar was in a mood, she might as well enjoy Colbán’s company.
He offered her more ale.
“I will fall off my horse do I drink any more of that heady ale, good sir,” she said, declining. “But I thank you for the offer.”
He entertained her with stories of his early days with the king.
She was not disinterested, but what held her attention even more was the way Audra, sitting a few feet away, stared adoringly at the man.
’Twas the same way Fia stared at the bard.
Did Audra hold a tendre for the brash captain?
As she listened to the warrior with the red beard and warm brown eyes, who regaled her with tales of his early battles, she pictured a bear, dangerous and cunning, but potentially soft with the right woman. Could Audra be that woman?
Out of the corner of her eye, Catrìona glimpsed Steinar snatching glances at her while conversing with Audra.
The twinge of jealousy she had felt earlier returned for he appeared to be enjoying Audra’s company.
She chided herself for it. Audra was kind to everyone, not like Isla of Blackwell.
Besides, Catrìona might wish it otherwise, but she had no claim on Steinar.
Still, she watched him, thinking how unlike the other warriors he was.
His manners were elegant, he was lettered and he treated her as an equal.
She had responded willingly to his kisses, but it was more than attraction she felt for him.
She respected him above other men. Few warriors would grant her the freedom to speak her mind as he did.
Fewer still cared to hear what she had to say.
If Colbán was a great bear, Steinar of Talisand was a sleek golden panther, both creatures of mythical proportion and neither easily tamed.
* * *
Margaret watched her two ladies as they sat eating beneath the trees, drawing the approving glances of the king’s guard sitting around them. Each woman was lovely and each had qualities a husband would treasure.
But they are so different.
Catrìona was a spirited beauty, willful, intelligent and courageous, who harbored deep hurts from the loss of her family and betrayal by the man she had thought to wed.
Like a fast-moving river, obstacles were nothing to her.
She went over them, like water over rocks.
Catrìona needed a strong man with a tender heart to love and protect her, but who would not stifle her spirit.
One who, after Domnall, would be ever faithful.
In contrast, Audra was a sweet woman, amenable to all, a placid loch that ignored obstacles, consigning the rocks to her deep waters. She would expect less and tolerate more than the fiery Catrìona. But she needed a man who would hold her in high regard.
One would challenge a man; one would bend to a man’s demands with never a contrary word.
Would Audra make a better companion for the English thegn’s son who had been exiled to a country not his own?
A man who harbored his own ghosts of the past?
Though Catrìona and Steinar had worked well together on the plans to build the inn, only this morning Margaret had observed the two exchanging words that made her think they did not suit.
And now Steinar sat with Audra and Catrìona with Colbán.
The king’s captain was strong enough to handle a woman like Catrìona.
Both she and Colbán were Gaels, children of Malcolm’s beloved Alba.
And she had not forgotten that Audra’s mother and younger brothers had been killed on the order of Mac Bethad of Moray, the land of Colbán’s people.
Mayhap she had been wrong in thinking the king’s captain might be better served by the gentle Audra.
Margaret vowed to carefully observe them to determine if this new thought was correct. She cared about each of the ladies placed in her charge and she knew from her own experience that the crown of happiness in a woman’s life, absent taking the veil, arose from a happy marriage.