Chapter Seven
Luar tossed her glossy black mane and pawed at the stone floor of the stable.
Hamish reached up to stroke her neck, crooning words of comfort, but his charger was not so easily soothed.
She snorted with impatience and pranced to one side, jerking her head up and down as if to tell him that enough was enough.
“I ken ye dinna want ter be here,” he murmured.
Luar was not alone. If Alaric had a mane, he would be tossing it as well. Hamish’s small band of horses and men had endured more than enough of these hostile lands, but even if Hamish wished it, they could not return to Scotland yet.
“The ground is frozen underfoot and treacherous,” he said to Luar, as if she understood every word. “’Tis not safe for ye to leave this barn. Believe me. I would take ye out if I could. A gallop o’er the moors would do us both a power of good.”
He thought of the wind in his hair and the sense of perspective he would gain both through physical exertion and in putting distance between himself and Isabella.
Alas, the snow that had begun to thaw two days prior had since frozen hard.
And with the temperature showing no signs of lifting, it could be many days more before it was safe to contemplate leaving Ember Hall.
Hamish ran a hand over Luar’s withers and sighed. ’Twas one thing to choose to stay here. Quite another to have no choice in the matter.
Luar flinched as a side door banged open and a dark shape shuffled through.
Alaric was obliged to bend almost double to pass through the low door from the haybarn, but that was far preferable to risking his step on the slippery ice outside.
He dragged a sack of hay behind him, which he wordlessly emptied into the horses’ empty racks.
Soon, the sound of munching filled the stables.
Hamish had ordered that Isabella’s destrier be kept fed and watered.
Along with an old grey pony they had discovered in the paddocks.
“Thank ye, Alaric.” Hamish attempted to keep the mood between them light.
The warrior merely grunted.
“Has Siegfried returned from the well?”
Alaric gave a minute shake of his head, his expression settling into a scowl. Hamish lifted his palms in a gesture of peace.
“I shall go,” he said.
They both knew that Alaric had an easy job with the hay. Filling the pails with water and ensuring none slopped on the ground—to freeze overnight—was a much more challenging task.
Hamish crossed to the big arched doorway and looked out into the courtyard.
The cobbles were fringed with white but other than that, appeared innocuous.
However, each was coated with a sheer layer of ice, meaning that any movement across the yard cost supreme effort.
Opposite stood the hall, shutters and doors all fastened tight to retain what little heat remained inside the thick stone walls.
Hamish allowed his gaze to rest briefly on the first-floor windows, but there was no sign of any life therein.
His heart beat hollowly in his chest. Isabella had refused to leave her chamber for two whole days now.
What is she doing up there?
And more importantly, is she well?
Siegfried appeared around the corner of the barn and paused to rest, placing two large buckets down beside him. His lined face was flushed with exertion and Hamish silently berated himself.
The old Seneschal had insisted upon undertaking this task himself. But ’twas one that a younger man would struggle with. Hamish should not have allowed him to attempt it alone.
He struck out across the courtyard, keeping as close to the barn wall as possible and using his arms for balance.
“Is the well still frozen?” he asked somewhat breathlessly as he reached his comrade’s side.
Siegfried’s mouth set into a grim line. “’Tis frozen solid and I could not break it,” he said tensely. He clenched his hands together and blew over them.
Hamish noticed with alarm that Siegfried’s fingers were white and bloodless. Puzzled, he looked into the buckets and saw that they were not filled with water, but with ice.
“From the river,” Siegfried explained.
“God’s bones, ye must be half frozen yerself.”
The Seneschal gave a slight shake of his head. “I will warm up soon enough.” But he swayed on his feet as if dizzy.
“Nay, ye need to get in front of a fire. And quickly.” Hamish put a hand on the man’s shoulders, further alarmed to feel a tremor passing through his body. “Leave the buckets here.” He guided Siegfried toward the hall and sent up a silent prayer that neither of them would slip and fall.
They had a brazier in the barn, which they moved to their sleeping quarters at night, but Hamish wanted to ensure that Siegfried was thoroughly warmed. He had known younger men die after prolonged exposure to below freezing conditions.
They had survived sieges and family betrayal, but this black ice may be the death of them.
Siegfried’s leather boots scrambled for purchase on the treacherous cobbles. Hamish braced himself and supported him as best he could. Aging he may be, but Siegfried was still muscular and broad. Both were breathing hard by the time they reached the arched front door of the hall.
Hamish mopped his brow and positioned his arm more firmly about his comrade’s shoulder.
“Almost there,” he declared.
“Aye.”
Siegfried had accepted his help with little complaint and this, more than anything, caused alarm to prickle down Hamish’s spine.
He half hoped to meet Isabella coming out of the kitchen—he nursed a fancy that she fed herself quite sensibly in his absence—but all was still and quiet inside.
They stumbled around the corner into the feasting hall and Hamish breathed a deep sigh of relief that the fire still flickered in the grate.
He had built the fire at first light; more in hope than expectation that Isabella would come down and avail herself of the warmth and cheer. It would not take much to get a good blaze going again. But first, he settled Siegfried into an armchair and heaped him high with blankets from the trunk.
“Ye dinna have to wait on me, lad,” he protested weakly.
“Happen I’ll be needing your sword arm for many years yet,” Hamish retorted. “Father always taught me to take care of aught I shall depend upon in battle.”
Siegfried shook his head, but a spark had returned to his watery blue eyes.
Hamish banked up the fire and then fetched a pitcher of wine from the kitchen. He poured some for Siegfried and held it out. “Drink this,” he ordered.
“Ye have made yerself quite at home,” Siegfried remarked mildly.
“I have found what needs to be found.” Hamish was calm. “Is feeling returning to yer limbs?”
“Like a hundred ants crawling upon me. Each one dragging a blade.” Siegfried drained the goblet.
Hamish grinned. “Then I reckon ye shall live.”
Siegfried rested his head on the back of the chair and gazed into the flames. “I am counting upon it. When I breathe my last, it shall be in Scotland.”
“In Greenock Castle,” Hamish confirmed. “In yer own bed. In yer own chamber. I swear upon it.”
Siegfried reached out and clasped his forearm with a grip of iron. “I dinna ask ye to swear to it.”
“I do anyway.” Hamish poured some wine for himself and drank with relish. Until now, some murkily defined code of honor had prevented him from breaking into the family’s wine store.
But Siegfried needed something stronger than ale.
Hamish put down his goblet and folded his arms across his chest. The hall was growing too warm for his heavy cloak, but he did not want to make himself comfortable whilst there was still work to be done outside.
“I am sorry for how this has turned out,” he said.
“Ye have naught to be sorry for.” Siegfried’s reply was instantaneous.
“I didna expect us to have to stay so long across the border. In another man’s house.” Hamish gazed bleakly into the fire, which had begun to smoke.
“None of us know what the good Lord has planned. But methinks ’tis a blessing we remained here.”
Hamish’s eyebrows shot up beneath his hair. “How so?”
“The roads are not fit to travel upon. ’Tis near certain we would have perished if we slept out in the open.”
Hamish inclined his head. “Mayhap ye are right.”
For certain, Isabella could not have withstood such freezing temperatures.
He glanced up toward the smoke-blackened rafters.
She was somewhere above them, though he had never ventured up the winding wooden staircase—heeding her warning not to follow.
He had left food at the foot of the stairs, but it had not been touched.
What did I say to offend her so?
And how long will she persevere with this?
As if reading his thoughts, Siegfried asked, “Where is the Lady?”
Hamish snorted. “She has taken refuge in the family bedchambers above and forbidden me from following.”
“And you accept her orders?”
“My father was quite insistent that I should ne’er follow a lady to her bedchamber if she expressly told me not to.”
Siegfried spluttered into his wine. “Wise words indeed.”
“Aye.” Hanish eyed the wine pitcher, but common sense stayed his hand. “But they do not help me ascertain the lady’s health, especially in these cold conditions. If she becomes sick, ’twill be my doing.”
Siegfried waved away a plume of smoke from the fire. “The lady has not forbidden me from venturing upstairs.”
It took a moment for Hamish to make sense of the Seneschal’s words. His instincts were to defend Isabella’s honor, then understanding prevailed. “You could check on her? Perchance light a fire?”
“She doesna have a fire?”
Hamish opened his arms, feeling the claustrophobic heat of his heavy cloak. “Not unless she has made it herself.”
“The lass will be perished.”
“Aye.” Hamish took a few paces away from the flames, glad of the cooler air. Fresh worry pricked at him. “But ye should rest, Siegfried.”