Chapter 12 #3
Alina gave him a sideways grin and ran her
hand up and down the sleeve of the dove-grey tunic he was wearing
along with dark grey linen breeches hugging his muscular thighs.
“Grey is definitely your color,” she said. “It brings out your rain
eyes.”
“Speaking of eyes.” Roark stopped at the top
of the stairs and smiled into hers. “I told you once they saw
yours, they’d know you were a MacLeod.”
Alina laughed as light and free as she hadn’t
been since the first day of spring. “I didn’t even have to sing
‘Somebody’ for them.”
“Good.” The smile in Roark’s eyes went from
teasing to scorching. “I find I don’t want you singing ‘Somebody’
to anyone but me, my lady owl.”
He glanced around the hallway and cupped her
chin and kissed her, soft and tender, the feel of his lips
lingering on hers as they descended the stairs and walked into the
dining hall arm in arm, where at least thirty people were seated
and every single one of them stopped talking and watched them
enter.
Alina knew their presence had already been
explained to the household. The story was she was a distant cousin
of the laird’s from the northern Highlands who, with Roark’s help,
fled an arranged marriage to a man she despised. Laird Owen and
Lady Siusan had agreed to mediate between them and the family
involved. The question of Roark’s and Alina’s relationship hadn’t
been broached by the laird and lady, though they’d all agreed it’d
be best to present themselves as childhood friends.
Laird Owen stood. “Our honored guests have
arrived,” he announced, and indicated the two empty seats to his
right. “Please, join us.”
Alina gripped Roark’s arm as they passed the
roomful of curious faces and took their seats, Roark beside Owen
and Alina between Roark and a boy who was the spitting image of
Owen.
“Roark, Alina,” Owen said, “this is our son,
Cullen. And this,” he turned to indicate a young woman sitting to
Lady Siusan’s left, “is our daughter, Rose.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Cullen,” Alina
told the boy, who looked to be about ten.
“And you, Lady Alina,” he said, his green
eyes smiling.
“Please, call me Alina,” she told the lad.
She leaned forward so she could see the daughter and introduced
herself. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Rose. I only have brothers
and male cousins, so it’s a treat to meet a female relative.”
Rose, who looked to be about ten and four,
and was as blonde and blue eyed as her mother, smiled prettily.
“And you, cousin,” she said to Alina.
Roark turned his smile on the poor girl and
her jaw dropped. Her mother gently cupped her chin and closed her
gaping mouth amidst much laughter from the rest of the table.
Blushing furiously, Rose stared straight ahead as her father
introduced his sister, Agnes, her husband, Gavin, and their three
young children.
The servants carried out platters of mutton
roasted with carrots, turnips, and onions along with bowls of new
spring greens and loaves of fresh baked ryes that had Alina’s belly
grumbling loud enough to raise the laird’s brows.
“My apologies,” she said. “It’s been a while
since I’ve sat before such a succulent feast.”
“How long were you on the road?” Lady Siusan
asked.
Alina glanced at Roark. “Ten days?”
Roark nodded. “Sounds right. We got caught in
a storm and had to shelter in a cave for two days and nights,” he
explained to the table at large. “So that stretched the journey out
a bit.”
“What did you eat?” Cullen asked.
“We left in such a hurry,” Roark told him,
“all we packed were some dried field beans, stale bread, and salted
meat, so we ate those along with whatever small game and salmon we
caught, and greens, fruit, and mushrooms we foraged.”
“Ten days camping out in the wilds,” Cullen
said, his expression lit with excitement. “Sounds fun.”
“It would’ve been more fun if half our camps
hadn’t been cold camps,” Roark said, his hand covering Alina’s in
her lap. “A warm fire in the wilds is a wonderful comfort.”
“What was the man's name?” Rose asked Alina.
“The man you ran away from marrying.”
“I’d, ah, rather not say,” Alina demurred.
“At least not until everything is settled.”
“How kind and brave of you to help her
escape,” Rose said to Roark with a pretty smile. “He must be a very
bad man.”
Roark squeezed Alina’s hand. “He is, as it
turns out.”
Lady Siusan whispered something into Rose’s
ear that caused the girl to turn her attention back to her meal
with a pretty pout, and Alina tucked into her meal.
“I saw your mare in the stables,” Cullen told
her as the main course was being cleared and the cheeses and fruits
brought out. “Is she as fast as she looks?”
“She’s faster,” Alina said, eliciting a huge
grin from the lad. “Her name is Etain and she can fly fast as a
winged faerie.”
“Truly?”
“Truly.”
“What’s the gelding’s name?”
“Beasty,” she said. “He’s surprisingly fast
on those gangly, knobby-kneed legs of his as well.”
“Is that why you chose them to run away?”
Alina met Roark's somber gaze, and knew he
was thinking of Artur. “It is,” she lied.
“Would you like to meet my yearling colt,
Damon?” Cullen asked her. “My parents gave him to me for my
birthday last spring when he was a newborn. Kirk, the stablemaster,
is going to help me train him this summer. I have my old gelding,
Godfrey, too. He’s a good old horse, but Damon’s going to grow up
to be a stallion.”
Alina laughed lightly, feeling an instant
kinship with this boy. “I’d love to meet both horses,” she
said.
“I can take you tonight,” he offered.
“You can take her tomorrow after breakfast,”
his father told him with an indulgent grin. “Alina and Roark and I
have some things to discuss tonight.”
“Yes, Father.”
“I look forward to tomorrow,” Alina told the
lad. She leaned in close and whispered. “Maybe we can take the
horses a special treat?”
Cullen grinned. “I’ll ask cook for some
carrots,” he whispered back. “They’re Damon’s favorites.”
“Etain’s too,” Alina said with a
conspiratorial wink.
***
Roark sat beside Alina in the laird’s private
meeting chambers, putting him in mind of their meeting with Roger
and Leif the day they’d arrived at North Shore Keep. But where
Roger had sat behind his big, imposing table looking down on them,
Owen sat on a couch beside his wife with his sister and
brother-in-law sitting on another couch together, Roark and Alina
on yet another so they all sat facing each other. Niels and another
man-at-arms, a burly Green Isler with deep-set brown eyes, curly
brown hair, and forearms the size of oak branches, took two chairs
to complete the circle. A maidservant carried in a tray laden with
cups and two pitchers, set it down on the small, round table around
which the couches were arranged, and then left.
Owen poured his own cup of what looked like a
dark gold ale and one of wine that he handed to his wife, and then
Gavin did the same for himself and Agnes. Yet another difference
between the lairds. Roger would never have poured his own drink in
front of others.
Taking his cue from Owen and Gavin, Roark
asked Alina what she’d like to drink.
“Half a cup of wine, thank you.”
He poured her wine and a cup of the golden
ale for himself, and took a hearty swallow, choking on the bitter
spirits. “What,” he sputtered, his eyes watering, “is this?”
Owen and the other men in the room chuckled
as Roark swiped at his eyes.
“It’s called whisky,” Owen said. “The water
of life.”
“Whisky,” Roark repeated. He sniffed at the
drink in his cup and took a small sip, letting the dark gold liquid
sit on his tongue for a moment, then letting it slide down his
throat, savoring the strong, oaken aftertaste. “It’s quite tasty,”
he said. “In small sips.”
The men laughed out right, though not
unkindly.
“Which is how it’s meant to be drank,” Owen
informed him after having had his chuckle.
He lifted his cup to Roark, as did Gavin and
Niels and the brown-haired oak. Roark lifted his to Owen in return,
and they all took a sip and set their cups down while the women
sipped their wine with amused grins on their faces.
“Now, down to business,” Owen said. “Gavin
and I know your real story,” he told Roark and Alina. “As do Niels
and Grant. So, we can all speak freely.”
“Good,” Roark said. He’d been living with and
amongst lies for too many years now and he was heartily sick of
them, though he understood they’d still have to maintain several
once they left this room. At least until Alina was safely away.
“We’ve decided to help you two,” Owen
declared, and Roark and Alina let their breaths out in unison.
“Thank you,” Roark said.
“So much,” Alina added.
Owen nodded graciously. “Tomorrow, Niels and
Grant will ride into the port towns and find out what they can
about your situation, as well as search out a ship for Alina to
sail home on.” He met Roark’s gaze and answered his unspoken
question. “We’ll find a ship. This Roger’s arms aren’t as long as
he thinks, he doesn’t have as much sway here as at his home
port.”
Alina pulled the pearl from her bodice,
unclasped the necklace, and laid it on the table. “This should be
payment enough for my passage,” she said. She turned to Roark with
a tremulous smile. “You did it.”
“We did it,” he said. So why did he feel like
his heart had been ripped out of his chest, leaving him an empty,
hollowed-out husk? “I’m so glad,” he told her. “And so damned
sad.”
Her big, beautiful, green eyes welled with
tears and her lips quivered. She tried to smile, but her face
crumpled and she threw her arms around Roark’s neck and buried her
face into his neck. “I want to go home so badly,” she sniffed. “But