Chapter 2
ONE WEEK LATER
The competition so far hadn’t been very exciting. Archers had come and gone, their arrows hitting the targets and leaving holes behind. So far, there had been no clear winner. Still, Laird MacCulloch was expected to applaud and smile after each one, regardless of how poorly the performance was.
Ryder smothered a yawn behind his hand. Ewan, standing at attention beside Ryder’s chair, clucked his tongue disapprovingly.
“Daenae let the people see ye yawn, me Laird,” he murmured. “Ye are the Laird of Clan MacCulloch, and people look to ye.”
“They arenae lookin’ at me, Ewan,” Ryder answered, hooking his leg over the side of his chair. “They’re lookin’ at the archery competition.”
Ewan clucked again. “Sit up straight, me Laird. Daenae lounge.”
“Forgive me, Ewan, I was nae aware that ye were me maither.”
“I am just tellin’ ye that it will look a wee bit slovenly. Being a laird is half about presentation. Presentation and reputation. Ye ken that better than I do.”
Ryder sighed and unhooked his leg. It wasn’t a comfortable position in any case. There was no comfortable position on the MacCulloch throne, which seemed to be an apt metaphor.
The chair was ridiculously large. It was a throne, in fact, taken from the feasting hall and set out for Ryder to use. He hated it. Ridiculous, showy thing. And it was plain wood, which meant it was very uncomfortable.
He couldn’t get rid of the throne, of course.
It was Laird MacCulloch’s throne and had cradled countless MacCulloch buttocks through the centuries.
Sometimes Ryder felt that the chair was working to keep the laird, whoever he might be, alert, awake, and focused.
One couldn’t nod off during an important council meeting if one’s chair felt like a torture method.
The competition was happening in front of Keep MacCulloch, of course, and Ewan had insisted on building a low platform for Ryder and his sisters so the crowd could see them. The archers performed in front of the platform. There was a long green field with targets set at the other end.
Each archer took their turn standing before the mark.
They had three arrows for the three targets, and already the targets were riddled with tears and holes.
The last archer hit the bullseye in the dead center.
It was the best shot yet. There was another round of applause, and the fellow turned to look hopefully at Ryder.
Others looked at Ryder, too, members of the audience, hands poised to clap.
Ewan’s right, as usual, Ryder thought miserably. I am bein’ watched. There is nothin’ so restrainin’ as being a leader.
He nodded and smiled graciously, and the man’s face lit up. He was herded away, and the last archer would take his place in just a moment.
Pattering feet echoed on the platform, and Ryder turned with a smile as his youngest sister came scurrying over.
She had been set on a low stool beside her sister, Alaina, with the idea that they would form a nice familial tableau. It wasn’t working, of course.
“I’m bored, Ry!” Sophie exclaimed. “And I’m cold. Can we go inside?”
“Of course ye are bored, lassie,” Ryder chuckled. “Ye are seven. Everythin’ bored me when I was seven, too.”
He glanced up at Sophie’s nurse, the woman who also doubled as Alaina’s maid.
Flora, tall, thin, and blonde, was not looking at Ryder. She was looking over his head at Ewan, with a soft smile on her face.
“Stop makin’ cows’ eyes at yer husband, Flora,” Ryder commented wryly. “Ye can take Alaina and Sophie inside, if they want to go.”
“Aye, me Laird,” Flora answered, dropping a neat curtsey. She threw one last smile at Ewan before taking Sophie’s hand and drawing her away. Ryder glanced up and found Ewan staring after her, his eyes equally misty.
“God save us from romance,” Ryder snorted.
Before he could say anything further, the archer, now taking their position, threw back their hood.
Her hood, in fact. She had a torrent of hair, a vivid red mane flowing back over her back.
Braids ran back from her temples and were tied at the back, which made a rather pathetic attempt to restrain her endless hair.
Ryder could only see her profile, of course, but he could see that she was beautiful. She shrugged back her cloak, letting it fall altogether, revealing a dull green wool gown wrapped around what appeared to be a firm, athletic body.
Ryder felt his throat tighten. He cleared it and rolled his shoulders. A sharp ache shot up his back as he shifted in his seat, helping him clear his mind.
Thank heavens for the uncomfortable MacCulloch throne.
“Ah, she came,” Ewan remarked, a smile in his voice. “A fiery one, she is. Megan Blackwood. Ye were right to choose her. I thought she was goin’ to kill me, ye ken.”
Ryder clenched his jaw, watching her every move. “There’s still time.”
Megan did not glance to the left or right. She nocked an arrow, pulling it back deftly. The arrow left the bow, thudding into the exact center of the bullseye. She didn’t wait for applause but moved straight on to the next target.
Thunk. Bullseye.
Now for the third target. The previous archer’s arrow still stuck out of the bullseye, which could easily throw Megan’s aim off. Ryder leaned forward, finding himself interested.
She hesitated only for a second, maybe two. Then the arrow flew.
Ryder blinked, trying to understand what he was seeing.
“She shot straight through the other arrow,” Ewan breathed, leaning forward. “She split it in two, straight down the middle. I’ve nae seen that before.”
There was a pause, then the crowd broke into applause, people standing up and craning their necks to get a look at the impossible shot.
Amidst the chaos, Megan stood calm and cool, seemingly unaffected by the applause. There were a few hastily smothered accusations of cheating, mainly from the archer whose arrow she’d split.
“She’s perfect,” Ryder muttered. “She’s exactly what I need.”
Ewan glanced down at him, brow knitting together. “Aye, but she still has to accept yer proposal. And from what I saw of her, she’s a wee bit stubborn for that.”
Ryder got up from his deeply uncomfortable throne, adding his applause to the mix.
“Well done!” he cried, pitching his voice over the chatter. “Well done! I think it’s fair to say that we have our winner.”
Cheers broke out at that. He stepped carefully down from the platform and strode up toward the targets. Arrows prickled out from them, mostly around the midpoints and edges. Apparently, a good many of the archers who’d come to compete weren’t actually as good as they thought they were.
Nae her, though, Ryder thought, inspecting the third and final arrow.
The male archer’s arrow was split down the middle, the wood splintering and twisting, reducing a proud arrow to nothing more than kindling and a few fletching feathers.
Megan’s arrow stood straight and proud, seeming almost as if it had sprung up from the target itself and exploded through the arrow already there.
“Fascinating,” he murmured.
“I won, then?” she called, her voice carrying easily across the green field.
Ryder glanced thoughtfully over at her. She had her arms crossed tightly, one hand clutching her bow.
There were more arrows in her quiver, he noticed.
Most archers had only brought three, one for each target.
Megan, however, had brought a full quiver. Interesting.
He strode toward her, coming close enough that nobody could overhear them. She blinked a little at his proximity, but clearly would not allow herself to back away.
Clever lass, he thought approvingly. She kens what it means to project strength.
“Looks like ye have,” he said, smiling.
She didn’t smile back. She glanced around at the others. “What if I hadnae come? What if somebody else had won?”
“Ye ken, strangely enough, I never imagined that would happen,” he responded thoughtfully.
She shot him a glare of pure dislike. Ryder met her eyes squarely, tilting his head. The eyes were a good way to get the measure of a person, but in her case, he found himself distracted by the color of her eyes. She had blue eyes, a true sky blue.
The clear, blue color of the sky that they rarely saw up in the Highlands. His experience of the sky was usually a gray one, heavy with rain, or white with snow, or at best, a cold, dark blue. Every now and then, however, the clouds would pull back, the sun would come out, and the sky would glow.
That was the color of Megan’s eyes.
This took him aback a little.
Enough, lad, he scolded himself. Ye have seen pretty lassies before. Ye are thinking with yer manhood and nae yer head. I can assure ye that she wants nothin’ to do with yer manhood or ye. So stick to the plan, eh?
“Ye daenae have the treasure, do ye?” Megan stated at last, her voice slow and a little contemptuous.
Ryder cleared his throat, trying to will down the tingling rush of arousal. It went away, thankfully. Being observed by one’s whole clan would do that to a man.
“Nay,” he confessed. “I daenae. How did ye guess?”
She didn’t furnish his response with an answer. “So, why the lies?”
“Why did ye come, if ye already kent it was lies?”
She flushed. “None of yer concern.”
He snorted. “Ye cannae say that, nae if ye want yer question answered.”
She glowered up at him, jaw clenched. Ryder stared straight back. It was hard to say how long they might have stood there, eyes narrowed and glaring at each other, if the rain hadn’t begun to fall.
It was a gentle patter at first, but anybody who knew Scottish rain knew that it would soon grow heavier.
There was general grumbling among the crowd, and people began to take themselves off toward the Keep.
There was food out in the Keep courtyard for the common folk, carefully sheltered under awnings, so they could eat there and find some shelter.
Megan glanced around, suddenly uncertain.