Chapter 2
The sketch on the pamphlet was pretty accurate.
Callum had seen various depictions of himself in various papers and pamphlets.
His least favorite was a version of himself as a tall, lank, hunched-over goblin clutching a knife, with bodies littered around his feet.
The goblin had a huge nose, badly kinked at the bridge, sticking-out ears, and a truly grotesque grin.
He did have a large nose, and there was a kink at the bridge, a remnant of an old fight. Still, that picture smarted a little. The English girl’s pamphlet was oddly flattering. True, he was depicted as a beast, but there was undeniable power in that image.
“Where are you taking me?” she yelped, trying and failing to unhook his fingers from around her wrist.
“Stop strugglin’,” he snapped. “Ye willnae be harmed, but if ye think I’ll let ye wander off, ye have another thing comin’. I told me grandmother to leave off sendin’ women.”
She gave a growl of despair. “I am nae sent by anyone!”
He ignored her. The lass obviously had a good turn of phrase, and there was a spark in her eyes which intrigued him, but he had no leisure to be intrigued by anything right now.
He stopped by a tapestry and used his free hand to flick back the material to reveal a narrow door set into the wall behind it.
He unlocked it and pushed the door open.
As always, a gust of cold, fetid air gushed out.
He clenched his jaw, trying not to breathe.
The woman, of course, did not know that she should have held her breath and coughed pathetically.
“These are the dungeons,” she said, once she’d regained her breath. “You are taking me to the dungeons!”
He sighed. “Daenae fret, lass. Ye willnae be harmed.”
“Well, forgive me if I do not believe you!”
There was a short flight of stairs down into the first level of the dungeon.
The air down here reeked, but some light filtered in through narrow windows set high in the walls.
The damp wasn’t too bad, and the guards patrolled regularly.
It was not comfortable, but nor was it like the lower floors, all darkness and slime.
“Ye can stay in here, and have a wee think about the choices ye have made with yer life,” Callum snapped, hauling open the barred door to the nearest empty cell.
Shoving the girl inside, he paused, peering in to make sure it really was unoccupied.
A mound of straw piled up in the corner, and by the smell of it, the slop bucket was clean at least.
The girl staggered into the cell with a gasp and peered around herself with mounting horror.
“You can’t leave me here!” she gasped.
He lifted his eyebrows. “Oh, nay? I’m Laird MacDean. I can do as I like.”
“You are a terrible laird.”
“Aye, and ye are a bad seducer,” he shot back.
Perhaps that wasn’t the fairest retort. She hadn’t tried to seduce him, to her credit, although maybe she’d worked out early on that it wasn’t going to work. It was almost a pity, as she was much more attractive than the devilish little waifs his grandmother had set previously.
“You can’t leave me here,” she began, clasping her hands in front of herself. “There has been a terrible misundersta—”
Clang. He closed the door before she could finish, and turned the key in the lock. The prison guard materialized behind him, eyebrows raised questioningly.
“There’s a lass in there,” Callum explained, jerking his head toward the cell. “I daresay she’ll nae be here long. She’s to be treated gently. Fetch her some blankets, will ye?”
The guard bowed, and Callum hurried back up the steps. It was a relief, as always, to leave the heavy air of the dungeons behind. He didn’t stop to enjoy it, however. There was work to do.
Anger mounted inside him with each step. His grandmother’s rooms were in the west wing. She’d once occupied the west tower, but now her legs would not manage all those stairs, or the drafts which whistled through the towers in winter.
The doors to her study were half-open, and the guards leapt aside, nervous, when Callum strode past. He didn’t spare them a glance.
His grandmother sat in a high-backed armchair before the fire, with pillows tucked behind her back, and a footstool at her feet. She had an old-fashioned cap jammed on her head, and tendrils of wispy white hair escaped.
With all of her layers of blankets and scarves, only her face itself and her knobby, thin hands were visible. Her lady’s maid, a ferocious woman of about fifty, was kneeling before her, tucking a blanket around her legs.
“Ye sent another one, Grandmother,” Callum snapped. “Jane, get out. I want to talk to me grandmother alone.”
Jane leveled a baleful glare at him, then glanced questioningly at his grandmother.
“Is that what ye want, Sophie?” she asked pointedly.
Sophie heaved a sigh, gingerly laying down her book and marking her place with a strip of ribbon.
“Aye, Jane, away with ye and have yer supper. I’ll have a wee chat with me grandson. I cannae wait to discover what’s fillin’ him with fury today.”
“Have a care. I wouldnae tolerate this disrespect from anyone else, Grandmother!” he growled.
Sophie rolled rheumy blue eyes at him. “When ye get to me age, lad, ye will find that nothin’ much scares ye, certainly nae the rages of the Laird.
Certainly not the rages of a laird whose scraped knees I bandaged.
Why, I recall ye comin’ to me in tears because one of the kitchen cats had scratched ye. ”
Callum let out a long, slow sigh. “A fine story, Grandmother.”
“I thought so,” she agreed. “Bank up the fire, lad. I cannae seem to get warm in me old age.”
Jane slipped noiselessly out of the room, closing the door behind her. Callum swallowed his anger and moved over to the hearth. A few more logs, and the fire was blazing furiously. His skin prickled with the heat, but his grandmother still clutched her blankets around her.
“I’ll get ye another fur,” he muttered. “Ye should nae be cold.”
“I’m fine for now. Now, what’s all this business about another one, eh?”
“Daenae play the fool, Grandmother. It doesnae suit ye and it’s nae convincin’. Do ye deny that ye have been sendin’ women to try and seduce me?”
“Of course nae,” Sophie responded blandly. “I picked the loveliest lassies I could find, in hopes that ye would take a likin’ to one and marry her. There was nay deceit about it, lad. I have nay idea why ye are bein’ so picky.”
“Sendin’ an English girl was a step too far.”
Sophie’s papery brow knitted. She leaned forward, frowning at him.
“Well, I sent nay English girl.”
This was not entirely surprising. The woman herself had insisted she was not sent by anyone, and Callum had not felt she was lying. The most obvious solution was that his grandmother had sent her, but Sophie did not lie.
And neither, apparently, did the woman.
“Well, that creates a few good questions,” he muttered, rising to his feet and stepping away from the fire. “Daenae worry about it, Grandmother. I’ll manage this.”
“Nay, I want to meet this English lass.”
He gave a short laugh. “Ye willnae be meetin’ her. She’ll stay in the dungeons until tomorrow, and then she’ll be sent on her way.”
Sophie glared at him. “A woman in the dungeons? For shame, lad.”
“One night willnae hurt her,” he responded tartly.
“That,” Sophie snapped, “is nae the point. Did ye nae like her, then?”
“What?” Callum managed, halfway to the door.
“The English girl. Was she pretty?”
“I didnae notice,” he lied.
Sophie narrowed her eyes at him. “Oh, I think ye did. Come on, let me have a wee look at her. Bring her up here. I bet she has good, young eyes. Jane and I struggle to read small print these days. She can read to us.”
“Nay. She’s goin’ tomorrow. And every lass ye send to try and seduce me will spend a night in the dungeons from now on, ye hear? I’ll nae have it, Grandmother.”
“I only want…”
“Aye, aye, ye only want what’s best for me,” he sighed. “I am nae angry, I only want ye to stop, do ye understand?”
Sophie sniffed, tugging at her blankets. “Ye need an heir, Callum. Ye must marry. Ye need a wife.”
He clenched his jaw, striding toward the door.
“I had a wife, Grandmother. Remember?”
She said nothing, and he slipped out into the hallway, closing the door behind him.