Chapter Five
“I dinnae suppose ye will believe me if I say I found this growing wild in the field.”
Moira looked at the bread Tavig held, then at him. “Nay, I dinnae think I would.”
After two days of trudging north over the rougher, emptier parts of Scotland, Moira had begun to believe she had convinced the man not to steal anything.
The bread he tempted her with was solid proof that she had been na?ve.
What she hated most about it was how it forced her to face conflicting emotions within herself.
She knew Tavig MacAlpin was a good man yet he could obviously steal with ease and success.
The idea of stealing anything was repugnant to her, yet she knew she wanted and would heartily enjoy, some of that bread. Hunger was rapidly blurring her morals.
Tavig sighed, sitting down beside her, taking out his knife and cutting off a piece of bread. “Ye wouldnae believe it was a miracle either, would ye? That it just appeared in my hands because God understood our need?”
“Ye blaspheme. I had hoped we could make this journey without stealing anything.”
“Weel, dearling, I regret dashing your hopes, but they were unreasonable ones. Even if we continue to each eat just two small bowls of porridge a day, we will be without food by the week’s end.
” He smiled faintly when she crossly snatched up the piece of bread he held out to her.
“Neither of us is accustomed to such a long, arduous march, either.”
The bread was delicious, which irritated Moira. “And that makes a difference, does it?”
“Oh, aye. ’Twill be a struggle requiring all of our strength. One must needs eat weel when enduring such a trial.”
“Ye make some verra pretty excuses.”
“Not excuses—facts.”
“Mayhap, but whilst we fill our bellies, the owner of this bread goes hungry.”
“Nay. I couldnae and wouldnae take food from those who might starve without it.”
“And how can ye be so sure that they didnae need it?”
“Because I took it from the kitchens of a verra fine house a few miles to the west of us. ’Twas one of five loaves, and the meal being prepared showed me that there was no lack of food in the place.”
Moira frowned when he put his arm around her, but she was too curious to waste time scolding him over his familiarity. “Are ye saying that ye just ambled into some wealthy laird’s kitchens, helped yourself to a loaf of his bread and sauntered away?” She absently accepted a second piece of bread.
“It wasnae that easy. I didnae have to do much creeping about or lying, though.” He shook his head.
“When my troubles are at an end, I shall have to tell that laird how weak his guard is. He must be a good mon, for his people are a happy, trusting lot. Too trusting. I could easily have been some enemy surveying the mon’s strengths and weaknesses.
I shall repay him for this bread by letting him ken how easily he could be taken.
Sad to say, a mon cannae allow himself or his people to be too welcoming.
Aye, hospitality is the mark of a good knight, but this mon’s keep was as open and vulnerable as a monastery. ”
“Ye are right. ’Tis sad that he could be hurt because he lives so openly and trustingly.”
“Aye, and ’twill come, for ’tis clear to anyone who takes a moment to look that he also lives weel.”
“And eventually someone will come along who wishes to take that away.” She frowned up at the sky. “’Tis growing late, only a few hours of light remaining.”
“True. We will travel on in a moment.”
He tucked the remaining bread into his sack, then, smiling faintly, pulled her into his arms. Moira tried to look stern, but it grew more difficult to resist him with each hour she spent in his company.
She placed her hands against his chest, intending to push him away.
That intention was swiftly banished by the touch of his lips on hers.
His mouth was gentle and warm. Good sense and morality told her to resist the temptation they represented, but, as with the bread, she found she was too weak to refuse something she wanted so badly.
She curled her arms around his neck as he teased her lips with small, nibbling kisses.
After a moment she pressed closer, silently requesting the fuller kiss he held back.
A soft groan escaped her when he readily answered her plea.
The heat that both frightened and enthralled her raced through her body, its strength centering low in her abdomen.
On occasion Moira had heard one of the maids speak of how she burned for a particular man.
Now Moira knew what that maid had been talking about.
She knew that she burned for Tavig MacAlpin, ached for him.
It was the worst and the best thing that had ever happened to her.
“Ah, lass, ye have the sweetest mouth I have e’er tasted,” he murmured against her throat, tracing her frantic pulse with little kisses.
“Yours isnae so bad, either.” She grimaced when he laughed softly.
“Such flattery.”
His long fingers brushed over the curve of her breast, and Moira shuddered from the force of the desire ripping through her body.
Gritting her teeth, she squirmed out of his hold.
She hastily stood up, silently praying he could not see how unsteady she was.
Somehow she was going to have to find the strength to fight his allure, much more strength than she was showing now.
“We had better be on our way,” she said, inwardly cursing the huskiness infecting her voice.
“Ye cannae keep running away.” Tavig picked up their supplies and began to walk.
“I dinnae ken what ye are talking about,” Moira protested, hurrying after him.
“Aye, ye do. We are fated, Moira. Ye feel that each time I touch you. Ye feel it in your blood, in how it heats with desire.”
“What arrogance.”
Tavig ignored her muttered interruption. “Ye have been so sheltered ye dinnae understand what your body and your heart are telling you, so ye fight it, pushing me away. I am a patient mon, though. I can wait until ye do see the truth.”
Moira glared at his back, wondering how she could ache to tumble about in the heather with him one minute and desperately want to kick him in his too attractive backside the next.
She knew what irritated her the most was his knowledge of how she felt.
As she grudgingly accepted his help over some moss-covered rocks, she briefly feared he could read her mind.
She easily shrugged away that fear. If Tavig could read minds, right now he would either be laughing at her or getting out of the reach of her foot.
He just knows me too well or has a knack for reading the expressions on my face, she mused.
If she was to retain any emotional secrets from the man, she was going to have to learn a few new tricks.
She had learned to hide her fear and anger from Sir Bearnard.
Now she would learn how to hide her feelings, thoughts, and emotional turmoil from Tavig.
“I suppose it had to rain at some time during our journey,” Moira grumbled, trying to huddle farther back beneath the crude branch-and-blanket shelter Tavig had made for them.
“Aye. ’Tis a shame it does so during our resting time, though. We willnae have a comfortable sleep.” He cut her a slice of bread from the dwindling loaf he had stolen that afternoon. “This is all we shall have for food tonight as I cannae light a fire without dry wood and kindling.”
“Do ye think that will make me less concerned that ye stole this?” She wrapped her blanket more tightly around herself as she nibbled on the bread.
“Nay. I ken that ye have the strength to cling tightly to your disapproval.”
“But not so tightly that I refuse to eat this ill-gotten bounty. Ye need not keep that thought to yourself. I swear I can hear ye thinking the words.” She sighed, rubbing her aching feet.
“Why dinnae ye unwrap the rags from your feet and stick them out in the rain for a wee while?”
“But they will get wet. Most likely cold as weel.”
“’Twill soothe that aching ye are trying so hard to hide.
” He met her disbelieving look with a smile.
“Trust me, dearling. There was a time or two when I had to walk long miles in ill-made boots or bare feet. I ken weel that hot aching that can afflict one’s feet.
I found naught that was as soothing as bathing them in cool water.
There isnae a stream or pool about, only what falls from the sky. Try it. It cannae hurt.”
“Nay, mayhap not.”
With his help she unwrapped her feet. Cautiously she edged closer to the opening of their shelter until her feet protruded beyond its somewhat weak protection.
Moira hated to admit it, but the cool spray did feel good.
Just exposing her tender feet to the cooler night air had felt good.
The rain washing over her feet made her sigh with relief.
She scowled at a grinning Tavig. The man did not have to look so smug.
“Aye, it helps some,” she muttered.
Tavig laughed and shook his head. “Ye are a stubborn lass, Moira Robertson.”
Moira knew her sudden, instinctive flash of fear had been seen by him, for his laughter abruptly faded, and he scowled at her.
In her years with Bearnard Robertson, being called a stubborn lass had always been followed by a beating or one of Sir Bearnard’s many other cruel punishments.
Although she had been with Tavig only a short while, she knew he would never treat her as her guardian had.
Her fears could not yet make that distinction, however.
“I wish I kenned what I must do to get ye to cease fearing me,” Tavig said, cutting her another slice of bread.
“I dinnae fear you, Tavig,” she said quietly.
“Nay? ’Twas stark fear I just saw in your face, loving.”
“Aye, ye probably did see that. Howbeit, it wasnae a fear of you. ’Twas fear of a memory.”
“A memory?”
“Aye, a memory. Ye called me a stubborn lass, and the words stirred a harsh, frightening memory. That was what my fear was born of, not ye or anything ye have done.”