Chapter 15 #2
"I am telling ye I will not leave this inn without Una. Bella will have my head otherwise. And if it comes to it, I'll fight ye and every man ye have to take her home."
They stood for a moment, the two of them, measuring each other the way they had measured each other for ten years.
Then Cormac said, "I'm calling in my favor."
"What favor?"
"Remember when ye were a love-sick-prick riding about the countryside trying to avoid yer own wife and I intercepted her daft brother's letters."
Boyd scowled. "Aye," he said carefully. "How could I forget, ye smug bastard."
"Ye thanked me and said ye owed me. And remember what I told ye?"
"Ye said ye would collect some day and it would not be cheap." Boyd closed his eyes briefly. "Bloody hell."
"That day has come, Monk. Stand down. Una remains with me after we're wed. And ye'll make sure Bella does not interfere."
Boyd stared at him, looking seriously unhappy. "I'll be kicked out of my own bed over this."
"The reason yer wife is even in yer bed in the first place is because of me," Cormac replied.
Boyd was quiet a long moment. Then the hard line of his mouth shifted. "Aye," he said. "Don't I know it." He shook his head slowly. "If ye harm Una in any way I will kill ye myself."
"I ken it. Now, tell me a little about my bride-to-be."
"What do ye need to ken?"
"She's a seamstress?"
"Aye, one of the finest. She has a shop and creates garments fit for a queen and for court. Highly skilled, and she earns good coin from her trade."
Cormac studied Boyd's reaction. It pleased him to know that Boyd thought highly of his bride-to-be. The man rarely spoke at length, but in that one sentence he had shown admiration and respect, and that said a great deal about Una’s character.
"And who provides for her? Any man? A husband, father, brothers?" Cormac asked.
"No, her parents were never married. Her father left when she was very young and her ma passed several years ago.
She has always provided for herself. Her gowns are highly sought after and she is resourceful and clever.
Ye'll do well to remember that. Just because she marries ye does not mean she will give it all up. "
Cormac thought back to the kirtle and matching embroidered garments he had first seen her in, possibly another reason she had been mistaken for Lady Fenella. "I dinnae intend for her to give up anything she loves."
"Good."
"Boyd?"
"Aye."
"Go fetch a priest."
"I was about to, ye ass." Boyd turned toward the door, then stopped. He looked back at Cormac with a shrewd expression, then smiled. "Well, I'll be damned. Ye actually want to marry the lass," he said.
Cormac said nothing, which was answer enough.
Boyd shook his head one final time and left the room.
***
"MARRIED! WHAT DO YE mean Cormac and I are getting married today?"
Una had come downstairs to find the common room occupied by Boyd, Cormac, Seumas, Ros, and most of the company.
"The priest will arrive shortly," Boyd said. "Cormac is going to make an honest woman of ye before my men and I take our leave."
"No. He does not want to marry me. Ye cannot force him to do this. And ye are not leaving me behind!"
"He is not being forced," Boyd said. "Once ye are married, yer place is by his side."
"But I did not ask for this and none of it was Cormac’s fault and ye cannot do this. Let's just leave right now, please. I dinnae have much – we can walk right out those doors and return home and everyone will be none the wiser."
"Una." Cormac's voice was quiet. "Stop."
She stopped.
"No one is forcing my hand," he said. "Least of all Boyd MacKinnon." He glanced at Boyd. "Though he tried."
Boyd shrugged without apology.
"But we did not do anything wrong," Una pressed, turning back to Boyd. "I swear it. And if no one kens what happened at this inn then there is no harm done."
"Oh, but everyone at this inn kens what happened," Boyd replied.
"But all these men are lawless raiders," Una said, looking at the assembled men. "Surely their word counts for little in this matter."
"Now there, Miss Murray." Seumas straightened from where he had been leaning against the wall and pressed a hand to his chest. "I am deeply offended."
"Aye," said Ros from the bench by the fire, shaking his head with great sorrow. "We may be thieves. But we still have feelings."
"I ... I did not mean—" Una looked between them and realized they were smirking. "Oh, stop it, the both of ye."
Seumas grinned. Ros chuckled and went back to his ale.
Una turned to Cormac, who had moved from the far wall and now stood closer. "Ye dinnae need to do this. I have nothing to offer ye in marriage."
"That makes us even," he said.
"I am a nobody," Una said. "A seamstress from a small village. Days ago ye thought me a wealthy thane's daughter. Ye cannot want to marry me now that ye ken the truth."
"Can I not." He said it plainly. Cormac stepped forward and took her hand between both of his.
"I was going to find a way to this before Boyd arrived.
I did not ken how and I was making a poor job of working it out.
But I was going to." He held her gaze. "Boyd finding us this morning made it simpler. That is all."
Una looked down at her hand in his and then back up at him.
"I dinnae care that ye are not Fenella Lockhart.
I care that ye are the woman who sewed my men's garments without being asked and saw to their wounds.
Ye trusted me when we were in danger and fell asleep when ye were supposed to be escaping.
" His expression softened with his next words.
"I care that ye are Una, the lass I wish to marry. That is all."
Her eyes were stinging. She was not going to cry in front of the entire company.
"But what about my work?" she tried. "I have orders to fulfil. Young charges. People who rely on me."
"I'm sure they'll not begrudge ye getting married. Yer home will remain waiting for ye," Boyd said from behind her.
She turned to face him properly. "Boyd, are ye really going to let me marry a notorious raider?"
Boyd met her eyes without flinching. "There is not a man alive I trust more with yer care and yer life, and I have known him for many years." He held her gaze until she believed it. "I give ye my word on that."
Una was quiet.
"Marry me, Una Murray," Cormac said. "Not because Boyd says so. Because I am asking ye to."
She took a long breath. "Aye," she said. "All right. But dinnae blame me when ye begin to regret it."
"I'll never regret it," he replied.
***
MAISIE APPEARED WITHIN moments and dispatched two maids upstairs with Una before she could change her mind. Boyd pressed a large leather boist into Una's hands at the foot of the stairs.
"From Bella," he said. "She was not sure what state I'd find ye in, so she packed everything she thought ye might need for the journey home."
Una thanked him and carried it upstairs. She set it on the bed and opened it.
She stood very still for a moment.
Inside, folded with care and wrapped in linen, were two gowns.
She lifted the first one out and felt the fabric between her fingers before she even looked at it properly and knew it immediately.
She had spent four months on this one. The embroidery at the cuffs alone had taken six weeks – tiny flowers worked in gold and deep blue thread, each one no larger than her thumbnail, running the full length of both sleeves.
She had made this gown for Bella. She had made both for Bella, for wearing at court, fit for a noblewoman.
She set it down on the bed and pressed both hands flat against it.
Una had spent years making beautiful garments for wealthy patrons who could afford to wear them. It was not lost on her that, without her knowing it, she had lovingly sewn her own wedding dress.
She looked at the gown for a long moment until Maisie's girls came in with a large tub of hot water. Only then did she focus on readying herself for her wedding.
Cormac, meanwhile, had gone to the scullery to wash and change. He had clean garments set aside and a polished sword. Word spread through his men quickly and the mood in the common room lifted at once. He took it as a good sign of their acceptance of his choice of bride.
For the first time in his life, the thought of marriage did not trouble him. In fact, he looked forward to it. Deep in his heart, he knew he was exactly where he was meant to be.
***