Chapter One #2
Ismay shook her head slightly and lifted her gaze to his. “Nae, Chief. Everything I touch dies.”
His smile faded a bit but there was no possible way that he knew who and what she was.
“Fear no’, my dear Ismay, I willna allow anything to die in yer care.”
Ismay breathed. What did he mean? Her belly flipped, making her feel ill. He was a cruel man so she didn’t believe he meant anything that benefited her.
She would climb out her window tonight and be a memory by morning. She had to fight to stop herself from revealing her slightest smile.
“Chief,” Marjorie said, resting her hand on the chief’s arm. “When did ye want to take her?”
Ismay closed her eyes as a knife pierced her heart. They didn’t have a good relationship but her words still hurt. Her mother couldn’t wait to be rid of her.
“Can ye have everything ready in two days?” he asked.
Ismay reached up to touch her shoulder, bare for the first time in four years.
“I am certain I can,” Marjorie let him know.
“Very well then, I will take my leave after a walk with my quiet bride.”
Ismay clenched her teeth. She wasn’t his wife yet.
When he stood up and offered his arm, she reluctantly took it. She must not arouse their suspicions of her intentions.
During their stroll, the chief closed his much larger hand over hers, still set in the crook of his elbow, and didn’t let her go.
He chose their time in her mother’s garden to tell her what he expected of her as his wife.
She would be obedient, dutiful, submissive.
She would always present herself as acceptable, and she must have a strong body in order to bear all his children.
She was surprised he didn’t mention her inheritance bequeathed by her father.
Is that why Marjorie hated her? Her mother could have everything as long as she left Ismay alone and didn’t try to marry her off.
Her feet burned to run. Every step taken at his side felt as if she were stepping over nails.
Finally, he announced that he would leave and bent to kiss her farewell.
She took a step back. “I hope ye dinna mind a shy wife.” She cast him a coy smile that almost made her double over.
His snarl faded and a smile of naked male intent replaced it. “I dinna mind,” he told her. “But I willna be patient if she continues to be shy.”
When he left, Ismay fought the urge to kick him in the backside on the way out.
Without waiting for Marjorie to call for her, Ismay hurried up the stairs to her room.
She packed a small bag with a pair of hose and things her father had given her, gifts for his beloved daughter; ribbons for decorating her hair or dresses, a small, polished mirror that must have been quite costly for him, a carved wooden comb, and various jeweled pins and brooches.
She would not use them to sell, they were far too precious to her.
For coin, she would take something less meaningful.
She hid her bag in a trunk against the wall.
She couldn’t be happier that the chief had left.
By the time word would reach him that she’d gone, she would be on a ferry heading toward Kiliwhimin.
She skipped her evening meal, claiming to be feeling ill.
When her mother sent Murran, her chambermaid to check up on her, Ismay lay under her blankets in bed.
Knowing Marjorie would send someone, Ismay had knelt before the roaring hearth until her skin felt burned, then she had rubbed some water from her basin over her face and leaped into her bed moments before the door opened and Murran stepped inside.
“Oh, lady, ye are burning with fever. I best tell yer mother right away!”
“Nae!” Ismay sat up and grabbed Murran’s wrist. “Dinna worry her. It has been a trying day. I just need some rest.”
“Aye, of course, lady.” Murran looked at Ismay’s shorn hair and sniffed. “I asked yer mother if I could go to Beauly with ye. I canna fathom how difficult ’twill be living with an ogre like him.”
Ismay smiled and slipped her hand around the chambermaid’s hand.
Murran had always been kind to her. Ismay would miss her.
She couldn’t bid the maid farewell or let her know she was leaving.
Though she liked Murran, she didn’t trust anyone.
People who had treated her kindly while she lived with the MacDonald chief were some of the first to pick up stones when her death sentence was to be carried out.
“There now, Murran,” Ismay said gently. “I will be alright. Dinna fret. Yer kin are here. I could never ask ye to part with them.”
“But lady, ye are like my own kin.”
Ismay pulled Murran’s knuckles to her cheek. She said nothing but closed her eyes, aching to cry but not allowing herself the luxury.
Later, alone in her bed, she wept. She wept for her father, who had saved her life and her soul.
She wept for herself and her uncertain future.
Wherever her path led, it would be difficult.
She would be a runaway bride, a woman alone in a world ruled by men.
She didn’t know how to survive on her own, to hunt, or to fight.
But dying out there alone was still better than living with another chief.
She reached her fingers to her hair. It was a good thing he cut off her hair. Now, pretending to be a boy while she traveled would be less difficult.
She left her bed and hurried to pack a bonnet that once belonged to her father. After waiting another hour, she climbed out the window and descended the thick vine trellis against the stone wall.
And ran for her life. She ran for days—weeks, until she reached the ferry in Dores.
She only stopped to drink from a stream or cook what she trapped, like a chipmunk or a deer mouse.
She was starving, but she kept going. Twice, some older men tried to take her and force her into servitude.
They hadn’t tried to touch her. Her disguise worked well.
She escaped them and ran. Younger than the men, she managed to lose them quickly.
She had thought she could steal a horse somewhere and make quicker time, but there were none to be had.
So, she traveled on foot, which was considerably slower, affording her no extra time to relax or rest comfortably.
Chief MacRae, and even her mother would have their men out searching for her by now. She could not stop yet.
In the weeks it took her to reach the ferry, she felt as if she’d aged a decade.
She had been chased by a bear—a most harrowing event, but less terrifying than when a man in Traslorr chased her.
There was also a woman, as frightening as the bear when, after leaving her freshly baked peach pie on her window-ledge to cool, she lost it to Ismay’s hunger.
Ismay had been robbed and then smacked around when the thief discovered she had nothing to take. With her hair tucked under her bonnet, the thief thought she was a lad and thankfully did not check for her riches under her clothes.
All the running was a blessing in disguise. It kept her warm on the cool nights.
Traveling by ferry wasn’t any better. Since she had to stowaway or hand over Marjorie’s marriage ring (that Marjorie had removed from her finger two days after her husband died), she couldn’t leave her hiding spot to even stretch her legs.
As they were anchoring in the harbor, she was discovered but managed to escape her captor and leap overboard.
She didn’t consider herself a braw lass.
She did things to survive. Like killing the MacDonald chief long ago.
Aye, she’d killed him. She had been sold to him and became his slave.
He had always beat her, but one night he tried to have his way with her.
She hadn’t meant to kill him. She didn’t even know what it was to kill a man.
She wanted him off her, and grew desperate for a weapon to help.
Knowing where men kept their daggers, she reached for his in his belt.
Without hesitation, she slashed it at him.
She cut an artery in his neck and he bled to death in his bed.
She screamed, alerting his men. She had been taken before the council and declared guilty, punishable by death. Immediately.
Dragged outside, they tossed her into the dirt and picked up stones to hurl at the murderess.
She was eight summers old at the time.
She’d heard from the priest at May Hall that murder would not be forgiven by God. If she lived out the rest of her days as a nun, mayhap then God would forgive her.
But the church in Kiliwhimin had no room to take her for more than a night. They advised her to travel to Aberchalder at the northern end of Loch Oich and visit the abbey there.
She set out the next morning and after getting lost for several hours, arrived in Aberchalder two days later, but the abbey there was closed. She couldn’t stop. Chief MacRae could be in a village close by searching for her.
She reached Laggan, a small village in the Great Glen along the Caledonian Canal and remained there for another two days. By then, her feet were swollen and blistered. She was exhausted and starving.
Since leaving her home, she had learned how to read a compass, how to steal, lie, disappear, and survive without softness.
Her life had changed. She was alone again the way she was when she was a child—and so far, she had kept herself alive.
That was something to be proud of, wasn’t it?
She could do it. She could live on her own.
But where? There were no vacant houses to inhabit, no abbeys to join.
She had no idea where to go. She only knew that hunger plagued her.
Catching squirrels or trapping a quail now and then was not enough.
She longed for a full meal. Hunger drove her onward to a small hamlet on the southern shores of Loch Lochy.
There were no taverns or inns where she could eat, but one of the fishermen from a nearby crofting settlement, gave her three of the fish he’d caught that day and he wouldn’t take a pence for them.
“A lad must eat to grow strong,” he said and gave her a friendly whack on the back.
She laughed and nodded, remembering that she was supposed to be a lad.
She didn’t stay in the hamlet, or with the fisherman for longer than she needed to. She wasn’t far enough away from Raigmore or Beauly. She had to keep moving until she found an abbey that would take her.
She didn’t stop again, climbing up hills and walking through glens only to reach more hills and more glens.
Her body had grown stronger during her escape with all the uphill terrain—and she quickly remembered how to swing a weapon without hesitating, when a ruffian leaped out from the trees and tried to grab her.
She’d been using her stick as a cane for her tired legs, but when it hit the attacker in the head, it knocked him out cold.
She decided to keep the stick with her.
She kept going until she could see Ben Nevis jutting upward in the distance, with gossamer mist swirling over its high crest. She would love to hide beneath the protective shadow of a mountain—just for a few days.
Making Ben Nevis her destination, she pushed herself farther along until a large castle loomed ahead, just beyond a field of heather, and in the midst of smaller, thatched-roof cottages and other structures.
A chief’s residence most likely. Of which clan she had no idea.
She didn’t know where she was yet, but she spotted an inn and as she moved closer, she smelled the salivating aromas of seasoned meats and honeyed bread wafting through the air.
Reaching into a pocket hanging from her breeches, she felt for the last trinket she could sell for food and a bed.
Despite its name, the Doomsday Inn & Tavern looked like any other inn and tavern in any other town or village. But, perhaps its name was a warning about staying in a place such as this, with its band of deadly looking ruffians sprinkled throughout.
With exhaustion slipping over her, Ismay decided that, rather than be molested by one of these men, she would turn around and leave.
Safer to sleep behind someone’s house than in a house full of men.
Stepping back outside, the sound of roaring thunder broke the silence of the night.
She looked up. Would she have to go back inside because of rain?
But the sky was clear. The sound vibrated through her feet this time.
Closer. She turned toward the loud sound and saw a herd of cattle running by about a hundred feet away.
She pulled her cloak closer around herself and walked away from the inn. There was likely someone’s barn close by. She would sleep there. She was hungry, but the stale bread in her bag would have to do.
It was better than becoming wife to a chief.