Chapter 5
Anders fought to keep his expression unconcerned while he sparred with the lovely Ailsa.
Sinclair! Of all places to wash up onto shore, injured and out of his right mind, he had to do it in Sinclair territory.
He didn't know why, but being in the Sinclair keep seemed wrong to him. He hated that he didn’t know what kind of wrong.
Dangerous? A clan rivalry? Or was there a lass here whom he should remember?
He didn’t know, and not knowing could get him into even deeper trouble.
He could find himself in the Sinclair dungeon long before his wounds healed, and likely without his clothes.
He wouldn’t last long there, but he could tell from the look on the guard’s face visible behind Ailsa in the doorway that one wrong move and he’d be taken there whether Ailsa or the healer objected or not.
His condition when he arrived had been unexpectedly fortunate.
He’d passed out and had been unable to answer any questions.
He still couldn’t answer more than one. His name was Anders.
He felt confident of that much. But it might take more time than he had for the rest of his memories to return to him. “When will I meet yer da, the laird?”
She hesitated. “In a few days when ye are feeling better.” She seemed reluctant to answer that question.
Was the laird away? Was that why he’d been interrogated at the gate by his daughter?
Was she the heir? Something about that idea made his heart beat faster and his belly clench.
Was it from the idea of a lass being a laird?
Had he seen that done somewhere else in his travels?
What travels? How had he gotten here? And why?
The questions were piling up and making him frustrated and angry. Why couldn’t he remember?
Despite having just woken up, he suddenly felt tired again, and the more he tried to force memories, the more his head ached. “Where is the healer?”
“I dinna ken. Do ye need her?”
“Aye, if I’m to have something to drink and a bath. Could ye find her, please?” Might as well be polite. He couldn’t do much else. “And maybe some clothes for me, too?”
“I’ll try,” Ailsa promised and left him to wallow in his misery.
He didn’t believe he usually did that. If he recalled anything real about himself, he wasn’t a wallower.
He took action. Frustrated by his inability to do so now, he lay down and arranged his covers as best he could to keep him warm.
Why didn’t the healer have a fire burning in here? He was freezing, damn it.
On some level, he knew that wasn’t right. He shouldn’t be this cold, but he had started to shiver. Where was the healer with a sleeping potion? Surely he’d feel better when he woke up. He might remember more then, too.
His teeth were chattering when he felt a warm hand on his forehead. He hadn’t heard anyone enter the herbal, or worse, approach him. How long had he been out?
“He’s taken a fever,” the healer said to someone else.
Anders didn’t want to open his eyes to see who was there.
“How bad? He wanted a bath and something to drink.”
Ailsa?
“I dinna ken, but I’ll do all I can to help him. Some willow bark tea to start, and watered ale will help him. Then let him sleep. The bath will have to wait.”
“Shall I have the lads build a fire for ye? I brought clothes that might fit him, too.”
“Fetch the lads. A fire will help. I’ll need more plaids, furs, anything to keep him warm for the now. But we’ll no’ dress him yet. He’s going to sweat this out or die trying.”
Die trying? Anders didn’t like the sound of that.
Later that afternoon, Ailsa knew the minute her brother Boden returned from the hunt and got the news about the man she’d brought into the keep.
She heard him stomping down the hall, ranting about an outsider in their midst. She gave Maighread, who was chopping herbs at one of her work tables, an apologetic shrug.
In seconds, Boden burst into the herbal.
“What the hell were ye thinking bringing a stranger inside the walls?” He glared at her, then turned his frown on the man sleeping on one of Maighread’s cots. “That’s him? God’s teeth, he’s big. Have ye lost yer mind? Raghnall, too. He should have forbidden this.”
“Ye werena here,” Ailsa answered much more calmly than she felt.
Her brother had worked himself into a fine sense of outrage, his prerogative to make decisions as heir and, as he saw it, man in charge while their father was away, had been ignored, and his ego was suffering.
Answering him in kind would get her nowhere.
“He collapsed in front of our gate. What was I to do? Let him die on our doorstep?”
Boden turned to the door and beckoned to the guard who’d moved into view, watching the argument. “Go get a few more men. I want him moved to the dungeon. Now!” Boden ordered.
“Nay!” Maighread’s shout echoed around the room, loud enough to be heard out in the great hall.
“Ye’ll kill him for sure,” she said more softly, but with as much conviction.
“He’s fine where he is. I can keep an eye on him.
Raghnall put a guard on the door, so he’s nay going anywhere.
Especially off that cot for the foreseeable future.
He’s fevered, wounded, and canna recall who he is or where he’s from.
Ye put him below ground and he’ll be dead before the laird returns.
When someone comes looking for him and finds out Sinclair let him perish rather than care for him, how well do ye think yer da will react to that? ”
Ailsa wanted to cheer. Maighread determined was Maighread unstoppable. Boden knew that, too. Thank goodness their visitor was sleeping under one of her potions. He didn’t awaken, despite the noise and frayed tempers, to hear how close he was to being allowed to die.
“I’ll toss him back into the sea first,” Boden muttered. Clearly frustrated, he turned on Ailsa. “What are ye doing in here? He’s a stranger, ye are an unwed lass. He could be dangerous. Da will kill him, and ye—and me—if he does anything to ye.”
“Really, Brother? Look at him. How do ye think he’s going to manage that? He canna lift his head.”
“For today. What about tomorrow, or the next? Nay. This is madness. Ye are forbidden to come in here.”
Ailsa planted her fists on her hips. “Ye canna stop me.”
“I’m in charge while Da is gone. Ye must do as I say, or I’ll lock ye in yer chamber.”
Ailsa smothered a laugh behind her lips. “Ye can try. I willna stand for it. He’s harmless, and until he isna, he will be cared for to the best of Sinclair’s ability.”
"Maighread’s, aye, no yers, Sister. One of the serving wenches can help Maighread.”
“Boden, ye ken better than that. If Mother were here, she’d help Maighread. I can do nay less.”
Stymied, he swore and stomped out, his voice echoing as he berated the poor guard at the door.
“That man will go to the dungeon as soon as he’s well enough.
” He turned and looked back into the herbal, his frown sweeping from their visitor to Maighread and landing on Ailsa. “Or sooner if he causes any trouble.”
The man’s fever lasted another day and a half.
Ailsa fretted the entire time and left his side only when Maighread shooed her out to get some sleep.
He was restless during that time, muttering and mumbling in his sleep, mostly incomprehensible sounds, but occasionally a word—or a name—would come through, such as storm or crate.
Once he said marry, which stopped her heart.
Had he meant marry or Mary, a woman’s name? Did it mean he had a wife at home?
Once he started talking in his sleep, she had hoped his dreams would help him remember, or would give her clues about who he was.
The fact that he recognized the Sinclair name made her certain that at the very least, he had recalled his own name and perhaps more.
Sinclair looked to the Norse king and had poor relations with the clans all around them.
No matter which clan he came from, there was a good chance her father would consider him an enemy.
“’Tis good to have yer help watching over this man,” Maighread told Ailsa after the first day.
“I feel I owe it to him,” Ailsa confided, “since I turned him away before he collapsed at our gate. I was afraid of what Da would say or do when he returns to find a stranger inside our walls.”
“Yer da will have naught to say once yer mother hears of this, so dinna fash. I ken what ye are thinking lass, but ye did the right thing in caring for him, no matter where he is from.”
“I still worry that Da will agree with Boden and want to put him in the dungeon.”
“I willna allow that, no’ yet. Nor will yer mother. If we’re to find out who he is, he must heal and get strong again. That willna happen in the dank and dark down there.”
Maighread’s reassurance made Ailsa feel better, as did seeing how much better the wounds on the man’s head, hands, and leg now appeared under Maighread’s care.
He seemed cooler and fretted less often, his sleep seeming to become deeper and more peaceful.
Did he still dream? Of home? Of a lass named Mary?
Maighread looked down at him and sighed. “How can one man be so handsome? Shouldn’t some of his beauty have been shared with other men who have little or none?”
Ailsa joined her. “I ken it doesna seem fair, but think on this. Why dilute such handsomeness among many men when we can enjoy it here, in this one?” Her fingers curled into the folds of her skirt. She might only be able to look and never touch.
Maighread put a hand over her mouth to muffle her laugh.
“I like the way ye think,” she said, stepping away from her patient.
She picked up a bunch of herbs and several pieces of willow bark from a shelf.
“I’m going to be here for a few hours making more of the potions I’ve used on our lad.
That’s enough time for ye to get a hot meal and a wee sleep, aye? ”