Chapter 30 #2
What had Magnus said? Reasons…reason.
There was no wrong reason for Lyall to go after Glenna.
He had never set out to make her his and prove or avenge something.
But what would their being together do to her?
There was the true issue. Who would be most hurt?
Ramsey was certain something dire would happen.
Would she look at him someday with regret?
As he left her chamber and moved down the hall toward his, he knew one certain thing: with her, he would never have a single regret.
The next morning was filled with busyness that started barely after the cock crowed.
Prayers in the chapel, where Glenna knelt quietly between Lyall’s mother and sister until her knees were sore and her quiet words ran together in her head, then off to break fast with the women in the solar over bowls of stone fruit, a platter of crispy fried trout and hot pepper bread with warm honey and crunchy, oat cakes fried and dusted with cinnamon.
Mairi’s boys joined them, romping like spring colts, while they asked Glenna enough questions to fill a coffer, and eventually their nurse took them off to run wild outside rather than in. The room felt the sudden quiet.
“They are a handful,” Lady Beitris said as she rose from her tapestry stand and placed a hand on her low back. “Enough stitchery.”
“Not for me,” Mairi said looking up. She bit off a thread and rummaged through a basket of spools. “I want to finish this today.”
Lady Beitris took Glenna’s arm and slid it through her own, patting her hand. “Come along with me, Lady Glenna. ‘Tis a lovely day. I will show you about Rossi.”
And that was when the day took a different turn.
As the women walked the castle gardens, moving from the rows of roses and bellflowers, past the great cabbages and root vegetables, to a large, flat herb patch with clumps of marjoram, thyme, thick, sharp rosemary tuffets, and the wide frosted colored leaves of the sage plants, chatting, a wide brown leather ball flew behind Glenna and crushed a corner of the herb garden.
Lyall came running around a wall, laughing and teasing, with one of his nephews in his wake, until they came face to face with the women. He stopped, his eyes on Glenna.
“Ladies,” he bowed and said, “Make your bow to the ladies, Duncan. That’s a good lad.”
“Look at my herbs!” Lady Beitris scolded, but there was no anger in her tone.
Lyall picked up the ball and tucked it under his arm. “Fluff your grandmother’s prized weeds, Duncan.”
“Weeds!” Lyall’s mother gasped. “You are incorrigible, Lyall. These weeds are what make your winter mutton palatable.
But Lyall was still staring at Glenna, until she finally looked away from all the feeling she saw in his eyes, and she flushed when she realized Lyall’s mother caught their exchange. The pensive expression on the face of Lady Beitris was telling.
“Come along, lad. Your brothers are waiting.” Lyall nudged his nephew into a race and they disappeared behind the wall.
By afternoon Glenna had a few moments to herself, and for the first time since morn she was alone. She went down to the stables to see Skye.
“Hallo, you worthless nag,” she said, stroking Skye’s muzzle as she fed her a summer apple.
When Skye was done nibbling, Glenna started to wipe her hand on her clothing by rote, but stopped.
She was in a gown, the plainest of the lot and made of finely-woven, thin violet wool, with simple sleeves and shoes of calf that fit her feet like gloves.
She squatted down and wiped her hand on the clean straw then straightened, looking around her, liking the familiar scents of the stables. She had missed this.
Leaning her head against Skye’s neck, she thought back to days on the island, when her life was simpler and all about horses and feed and manure. She closed her eyes as her mind drifted back over time.
“Thinking of me, love?”
Her eyes flew open and she stepped back. “Lyall!” Was he everywhere?
Handsome as the Devil himself, hair golden, eyes the color of cornflowers, grinning wide enough to show a rare dimple in his cheek, he stood there, arms resting on the stall gate, intent on watching her.
“Thinking of you?” she repeated sweetly. “The baron might have to enlarge the castle arches so you might manage to get your head through. And if you must know,” she lied, “I was thinking of how to scrape the manure off my shoe.” She pulled up the hem of her gown and showed him her shoe.
“And a fine shoe it is, as is your lovely ankle. But I was recently warned that a fine ankle is trouble.”
“What do you want, Lyall?” she asked in a flat tone, feeling mixed up and annoyed, happy to see him, yet confused, and wanting to throw her arms around his neck and cover his face in kisses.
His look changed, the joy in his expression vanished. “Want? Something I cannot have,” he said seriously and the moment died. “Good day, Lady Glenna,” he added curtly and walked away.
Her heart sank, and she cursed herself for dousing their fire.
But they were not done and the afternoon and evening continued to play cruel tricks on her.
They crossed paths repeatedly, almost as if they were dice in hand of God.
When Glenna took Mairi’s lads to the kitchen for a sweet, rewards for napping quietly, Lyall was standing with his arm resting atop Cook’s head as the short woman who ran the castle kitchens looked way up, waving a wooden spoon under his nose as she pretended to scold him for sticking his fingers in the plum sauce, both of them laughing, until Glenna and the boys interrupted.
Later, as she raced from her chamber to go to meet Lady Beitris in the solar, she and Lyall came out of their doors at the same time, both froze in place looking down the long hallway at the other.
Later still, when she was speaking with Mairi in her chamber, Lyall came in without knocking, asking his sister a question before he looked up just as Glenna dropped her wine goblet on the carpet.
And when night had fallen and the moon began to rise, when the stars overhead blinked in the darkening sky, when the castle was just beginning to quiet, they met on the dark narrow staircase, each heading in a different direction, and they stared, startled, frustrated, then turned to edge by each other.
But quarters were too close and her breasts brushed his ribs, making her breath catch.
He looked down, their mouths were almost level, with her on a higher step and him on a lower.
His breath was warm on her cheek, and she could smell the scent of cinnamon and allspice from the stew served earlier, and feel the intense heat coming from his body.
His hands touched hers, and something glinted in his eyes, before he pulled away as if burned and continued down the stairs without looking back, his voice quietly saying, “I cannot do this. I am done.”
And as she watched him walk away, shocked by his words, she vowed, “You might think we are done, but I am not done.”