Chapter 13 #3
“It has been my privilege to host you and your lady, My Lord,” said the bishop, bowing. “You and Queen Margaret are welcome any time you can be with us.”
“Before we go,” said the queen “there is something I have for the chapel.” A servant, who had been standing behind Margaret, brought forward a carved wooden chest and set it on the table before the queen.
She opened it to reveal a jewel-encrusted gold cross.
Gasps sounded from those gathered around.
Steinar, too, thought it a splendid piece of great beauty, certainly worthy of the simple chapel that housed the apostle’s bones.
He wondered if the cross had come from Hungary, a part of the queen’s dowry.
The bishop was quick to accept the ornate cross Margaret laid in his hands. “My Lady, ’tis a magnificent gift. We are humbled by your generosity.”
“The Lord’s house should reflect His glory,” she said in reply.
Steinar anticipated Malcolm’s next words.
“I am for Dunfermline!” the king proclaimed. “Master shipman,” he said to the steersman, “make ready my ship.” Then to Colbán, “Select those guards you need and send the rest home by land. You and Steinar will sail with me. You, too, Rhodri. And the ladies.”
Eager to be away, the men set off to accomplish their assigned tasks.
“What about me?” Giric piped up.
Steinar reached his hand to cover the lad’s mouth. “Please excuse him, My Lord.”
The king chuckled. “You can see to the pup, Scribe.” Then Malcolm paused. “But now that I think of it, I have a missive I need you to draft so it can be dispatched immediately upon our arrival in Dunfermline. Mayhap you’d best leave the boy to the ladies.”
Before he left the abbey, Steinar penned the message the king had dictated to him for Matad, Mormaer of Atholl, summoning him to court.
No subject was given, only the demand for the mormaer’s presence.
Steinar broke out in a sweat, his hand that held the quill trembling over the parchment as he forced himself to write, knowing with certainty the mormaer was summoned for his niece’s betrothal to the captain of the king’s guard.
He had known this day was coming, but that did not help him to accept it.
Once Steinar was free of the king, with a heavy heart, he headed to the shore. Some of Malcolm’s men were loading the women’s chests, along with food for the voyage home. Those who were to travel with the king waited on shore while the ship was made ready.
He looked for Catrìona and found her standing amidst the golden gorse blooming between rocky outcroppings above the shore. Strands of her auburn hair blew about her face, rendering her achingly beautiful in the morning light as she stood talking with her cousin, the lad and Audra.
She must have sensed his regard because she broke away from the others and came toward him.
Just as she reached him, a white-tailed sea eagle soared across the sky, its huge wings, as long as a man was tall, casting a shadow over the water as it glided close to the surface, then reached its talons beneath the water and snatched a fish.
They paused to stare open-mouthed at the magnificent bird and the beauty of the sea.
“I have not seen one of those since I lived in the vale,” she remarked, watching the eagle as it disappeared into the distance with its prize. “I have missed them.”
“And your home?” he asked. “Have you missed it, too?”
“Aye. Not at first, you understand, but now I do. When I left, I felt only sadness. But now I remember the happier times and the beauty of the vale.”
“You seem different today,” he said, noting her calm demeanor. Her green eyes, typically flashing like emeralds, were quiet pools. “Has something changed?” He did not like to think she was resigned to Colbán’s suit, but mayhap she was. As for him, he could only accept it if it meant her happiness.
She surprised him when she said, “ ’Twas a conversation I had with one of the monks.
He helped me to see that good can come from loss if we but trust God.
The queen had told me something similar and, since then, the truth has settled within me.
” She laughed then, again surprising him, given the subject.
“I have not been on very good terms with the Almighty for the last year.”
“I think I understand.” And he did. “Edgar and I have shared many a conversation about being forever exiled. But to be angry with God is like shouting at the sky. And revenge is lean fare on which to sustain a man’s life.”
“What you say is true, yet I long for justice.” She gripped the hilt of the knife sheathed at her hip. “And I have learned to carry a knife should I need it.”
Trying to lighten her mood, he said, “I would expect no less with fierce wildcats lurking among the trees.”
She tossed him a smile. “Aye, dangerous beasts are everywhere.”
The king’s captain approached just then to escort her to where the queen and the other ladies were climbing up the ramp to the ship. Steinar stepped aside.
Once all was loaded, the queen and her maidservant and Audra retired to the small tent erected midship.
Catrìona and Fia joined Rhodri to sit on a fixed bench.
The rest of the men scrambled aboard, took up the oars and rowed the ship to deeper waters.
Once there, they stowed the oars and raised the huge square sail to catch the wind.
“The wind is from the north!” shouted the master shipman to the king. “We will be quickly home.”
They sailed from St. Andrews, heading into the North Sea and then south around Fife toward the Firth of Forth. It was nearly August and the weather was fair. Still, when the wind picked up, it was chill and the waters splashed against the ship’s hull, the spray misting over them.
Steinar leaned against the hull, his eyes darting to where Catrìona sat next to her cousin. The two women had drawn their cloaks tightly around them. Rhodri and Giric sat near them, Giric pressed against Catrìona, as if for warmth.
The king prowled the deck like a lion confined to a cage. Malcolm was unused to being in a small space, albeit the deck of his ship was larger than most. Eventually, Colbán drew Malcolm aside for a word and the two stood in the prow talking, their words swept away by the wind.
From time to time, the master seaman would shout a command to come about and the lines connected to the sails were loosened and the huge square sail brought around to catch the wind.
The seamen then hauled on the ropes to pull the sail taut and keep them sailing into the blustery wind.
He admired the ease with which they handled the ship.
When they were not needed to change the sail, the seamen sat on chests next to the oar holes or leaned against the hull as Steinar did.
It was not long before they reached the wide estuary that was the Firth of Forth. Though the waters were not as rough as the North Sea, it was still difficult for one who was used to land to move around the deck, especially if, like Steinar, one had a troublesome leg.
Watching Catrìona laughing at something Rhodri had said, he decided to join them, avoiding Colbán’s harsh gaze following him as he made his way to the bench occupied by the small group.
Catrìona and Fia were listening to Giric’s questions about sailing and ships.
To Steinar’s surprise, it was Rhodri who answered them.
The bard, as it turned out, had sailed the waters off Wales as a lad.
Rhodri explained, “You cannot grow up in a small country surrounded on three sides by water without learning to sail. And Dublin is only a few hours by boat from Gwynedd.”
“If ’tis true,” Steinar interjected, “why does the color of your face match your tunic?”
“I said I learned to sail,” replied his friend, who did, indeed, appear a bit green, “I did not say I liked it overmuch. My preferred habitation is the forest of which there are many in Gwynedd and Powys.”
Ignoring the sharp glances from Colbán, who remained in the prow with the king, Steinar took a seat next to Catrìona with Giric nestled between them for shelter from the biting wind.
Rhodri talked on about the small wooden ships his countrymen used to sail the coasts of Gwynedd, holding Giric in rapt attention.
Fia, Steinar noted, sat very close to the bard on his other side and not for the chill air, he was certain.
Her eyes were fixed on Rhodri and, as he spoke, she listened with the same expression as the boy.
Giric might be between them, but Steinar felt the nearness of Catrìona like a strong pull.
The wind brought her scent to him as well as her laughter.
Green eyes glistening, she listened to one of Rhodri’s tales and said to Giric, “Do not believe all the bard tells you. Fairies do not live in the woods of Wales.”
“Are you so certain?” Steinar questioned, for he did love to stir her to argue.
“Not you, too!” she cried.
“Mayhap they only live in Wales,” said Giric.
Catrìona rolled her eyes to the heavens and, giving him a side-glance, said to her cousin, “I give up. Mayhap they do have fairies in Wales.”
“Mayhap we do,” said Rhodri with a wink at Giric.
The sun was high in the sky when Audra emerged from the queen’s shelter with the maidservant in tow. Expressing concern that the queen needed to keep up her strength, Audra suggested it was time they ate.
The king took up his wife’s cause. “Aye, let’s have some food for Margaret and her ladies.”
Steinar had no doubt the king, too, was hungry and, since the waters of the Forth were calm enough to allow them to eat before they made port, he thought the suggestion a good idea.
Colbán directed the men to assist and soon a bench was laid with bread, cheese and fruit.
“I expect you are not interested in food,” Steinar said to Rhodri.
The bard gave him an uncharacteristic smirk. “I will wait for land ere I dine, thank you.” Fia patted his hand and the two exchanged a smile.
“In Malcolm’s hall, you will not starve,” Steinar tossed back before following Catrìona and Giric to the food.