Chapter Eight #2
hear the truth, lass.” His gaze bored deep. “ ’Tis no’ too late for you to return with us. Your uncle and I —”
“Ho, indeed!” Valdar’s bearlike figure stepped out of the shadows. “I told you fine that all went well with them.” He hooked
his hands around his sword belt, looking pleased. “I saw the lad racing up the stairs to join her late last night — saw him
with my own two eyes.”
Sir Marmaduke lifted a brow, his doubt only increasing the old man’s mirth.
Valdar wriggled his own brows in Sir Marmaduke’s general direction. He hooted heartily, his great barrel-bellied girth jigging
with merriment.
“Och, suffering saints save me!” he burst out, eyes dancing. “I saw it all, I did.”
“You have a crafty tongue in that head of yours, MacRuari.” The Black Stag eyed him, clearly rankled. “Many sets of feet tramped
up those stairs last night. That two of those feet belonged to your grandson means naught.”
Gelis felt her face warm.
The Raven was still watching her, his gaze sharp.
“Means naught, eh?” Valdar rocked back on his heels. “Mayhap not that he ran up the stairs, I’ll agree. ’Twas how he was running up them that makes the difference!”
His point made — leastways to him — he looked round as if awaiting accolades.
“Och, aye, Kintail,” he announced, “hills rocked and the moon wept when that boy reached his bonnie bride’s door last night!”
The heat staining Gelis’s cheeks slid around to scald the back of her neck.
Her father’s brows snapped together.
“Have done with such gabble, MacRuari.” His tone was thunderous. “You’re no’ making sense. Dinna make me call you a blethering
old fool.”
Valdar laughed and slapped his thigh.
“Fool I may be,” he boomed, his bearded face splitting into a grin, “but I’m man enough to ken that a young stirk doesn’t
go tearing up stairs nekkid unless he —”
“Naked?” Duncan MacKenzie roared with all his lung power. His hand flew to his sword hilt. “Saints, Maria, and Joseph! I’d have expected
more of—”
“Caution, my friend.” Sir Marmaduke’s voice cut in. “They are handfasted — good as wed.”
The Black Stag scowled, fixing his long-time friend with his most formidable stare.
“Hell’s afire!” He flung back his plaid, his eyes blazing. “Why I have a brain in my head when I have you to constantly remind
me of things that canna be changed, is beyond me! Besides, running naked up stairs, and on his way to greet a lady, is just
—”
“He was naked save his plaid.” Gelis raised her own voice. She just omitted that he’d held the plaid in his hand. “Valdar
must not have gotten a good look at him. The stair tower isn’t well lit.”
Her father mumbled, cursing under his breath at no one in particular.
Valdar rubbed his hands together, beaming still. “A spirited gell, did I no’ say so already?”
Ignoring him, Gelis gripped her father’s arm. “Now who is being a blethering old fool?”
She leaned close, her voice low. “Or would you claim it isn’t custom for men of these hills to go bare-bottomed beneath their
plaids? Especially when within their own good walls and heading to their own bedchamber.”
The Black Stag looked down at her, his mouth clamped tightly shut.
“And” — she lifted on her toes, speaking into his ear — “he had every right to enter that bedchamber — as well you know!”
“I’d know what riled you so greatly, you’d come hallooing down here with your hair undone and no shoes on your feet.” He jammed
his hands on his hips, took in her dishevelment. “If he —”
“He had naught to do with my appearance this morn — you did.” Gelis tossed her head, flipping her hair over one shoulder.
“I heard our clan battle cry and thought you were leaving —”
“Havers, lass.” He grabbed her, pulling her against him for a swift embrace. “You should ken I’d ne’er have left without seeing
you. I knew you’d be down —”
“But the war cry — I heard it.”
“To be sure, you did.” He released her, his expression lighter.
Almost as if he was going to laugh.
But he caught himself, lowering his voice instead, “I only bellowed the war cry to put the fear o’ God in this pack of cloven-footed
MacRuaris!”
Gelis stared at him, not knowing whether she should laugh or scold him.
“You never change, do you?” She spoke the words lightly, knowing her love for him shone in her eyes.
“My girl.” His voice was rough, deep, and only for her. “Have a care with yourself, you hear?”
She nodded.
He said nothing else.
A muscle jerked beneath his left eye and she touched the place with her fingers, pressing gently until it stilled. A common
trait shared by many MacKenzie males, the twitch made her breath seize, the sight of it reminding her of kith and kin she
might not see again for many days.
Her beloved Loch Duich and the great hills guarding its shores; a land dressed in clouds, mist, and heather.
But Dare was her home now, so she swallowed against the lump in her throat, squared her shoulders, and prepared to bend the
truth one more time.
“My night was good,” she lied, lifting her voice so everyone present could not fail to hear her. “There is no reason for you
to leave in anger or in doubt of my happiness.”
“She speaks true, Kintail.” The Raven appeared beside her. “Her night was a peaceful one.”
No longer mounted, he looked between her father and his druid. That one, too, had dismounted and now hovered at the Raven’s
elbow. The ancient’s long flowing mane glowed white in the bailey’s torchlight, and he clutched his tall walking stick in
a gnarled fist.
Her father glowered at them. “Then see you that all her nights are that, just!”
“I shall.” The Raven took her father’s hand in both of his, the gesture seeming to startle the older man. “I desire naught
more than to know her well.”
“Harrumph!” Valdar whacked his thigh again. “ ’Tis more to desire than —”
“And I suggest we be on our way,” a deep voice interrupted him.
Sir Marmaduke again.
Mindful of her father as always, he’d surely recognized the telltale brightness beginning to show in the Black Stag’s eyes,
and no doubt, too, the way he’d started blinking more than was usual. For all his scowls and bluster, no one was worse at
suffering farewells.
Proving it, he arched a contrary brow. “We’ll leave when I am ready.”
“ ’Tis best to be away anon.” The Raven lost no time in siding with her uncle. “The mist through the glen will be at its lightest
if we ride now,” he said, casting a glance at the hovering druid. “If we dally —”
“Since when did a bit o’ mist hinder a Heilander?” The Black Stag drew himself up, adjusting his plaid with a great flourish.
“But I’ll no’ stand about saying soppy good-byes like a woman!”
The words spoken, he reached for Gelis, crushing her so hard against him she feared he’d cracked her ribs. But he released
her as quickly, his misty eyes explaining the lack of a verbal farewell. Then he whipped around, vaulting up into his saddle
before she could even catch her breath.
“We’re off!” he shouted, already kicking his heels into his mount’s sides, sending the beast racing for the yawning gatehouse
pend. “Cuidich N’ Righ!”
Gelis pressed a hand to her mouth, her throat too thick to call out to him.
Not that he would have heard her.
The Black Stag was already gone, the echoing thunder of his horse’s hooves all that was left of him.
“He’ll be fine.” Her uncle slung an arm around her, pulling her close. “See that you are. It would break your father if aught
happened to you.”
“Nothing will.”
Nothing except happiness, she added in silence, willing it so.
He gave her a quick nod. Something in his eyes made her think he’d heard the unspoken words. But before she could decide,
he, too, was striding away.
Swinging up on his horse with no less style than her father, he whipped out his sword, raising it high. “Cuidich N’ Righ!” he yelled, charging after her father, his cry loud in the mist-hung morning.
“Save the king,” Gelis returned, her voice catching.
She blinked hard and swiped a hand beneath her eyes, somehow unable to see her uncle’s receding back as he rode away. Drifting
wet mist dampened her cheeks, stinging her eyes and spoiling her view.
“They are good men. My sorrow, lady, that the parting is difficult for you.”
Gelis started, whirled around.
He was at her side again.
Magnificent in his black cloak, he towered over her, his midnight gaze much too intense and his proximity more than disturbing.
Gelis swallowed, any words she might have said lodging firmly in her throat.
So greatly did he affect her.
Something flickered in his eyes then, and he lifted a hand, bringing it almost to her cheek as if to dash away the dampness
she was trying to so hard to ignore.
But before his fingers touched her, he lowered his hand, turning away so swiftly she wondered if he’d even reached for her
at all.
Indeed, she blinked and found herself alone.
From somewhere, she heard the hollow clatter of hooves on cobbles, the sound moving away from her and into the mist and dark
beyond Dare’s walls.
Even Valdar was nowhere to be seen, though she couldn’t blame him for seeking the comforts of his hall on such a chill, damp
morn.
Not now that all the excitement was over.
But then, as she turned to make her own way back into the keep, she did spy another soul remaining.
Buckie.
And the sight of him caused her heart to wrench.
The dog sat in the lee of the gatehouse wall, staring fixedly into the shadows of the tunnel-like pend. His head was lowered,
his ears hanging, and his great plumed tail flat and unmoving against the wet cobbles.
“Buckie!” Gelis called to him, but his only response was a single twitch of one tatty-looking ear.
“Come, old boy,” she tried again, crossing over to him. She stroked his head, laid on her most coaxing tone. “I’ll give you
a fine meat-bone to chew beside the fire.”
He looked up at her then, his milky eyes sad.
“Och, Buckie, please . . .”
But the dog refused to budge. With a pitiful groan, he returned his attention to the empty gatehouse pend, once more ignoring
her.