Chapter 7
When Ailsa returned to the cottage to fetch the moody-looking and muddy blacksmith, Oona waylaid her in the kitchen.
“I would nae go around the back to fetch the man back to Gudrun’s house just yet, Ailsa,” Oona said with a wink and a grin. “Yon braw Highlander takes his bathing seriously! Give the man some time to dress himself before ye go back there.”
“Och, Aunt. I bathe all the men up at the castle when they are bedridden, ye ken? Ask all the page boys, menservants, an’ grooms. Lady Meria always tries to heal them using the ingredients inside her apothecary box afore she calls for the physician.”
Privately, Oona thought the sight of an ailing manservant who needed his face sponged down with lavender water was so far away from the sight of the third blacksmith pouring buckets of water over his naked body by the water pump that she was lost for words to say.
Instead, she shook her head, taking Ailsa to the kitchen to give her a basket of bannocks she had made fresh that evening.
“For Gudrun an’ her guests to break their fast,” she told Ailsa, “because the blacksmiths are likely to leave at the crack o’ dawn to get the fires blazing. Now, Gudrun does nae have to wake to feed them.”
Ailsa gave her aunt a kiss and went to the backyard to call Will. He had just finished belting the plaid around himself, and his torso still gleamed with water droplets running down his chest. Ailsa pulled up short and was about to turn heel and go back to the kitchen, but he hailed her.
“Mistress Ailsa!” He pulled the shirt over his head, not bothering to fasten the cotton ties tight around his neck, so the shirt gaped open; the lawn fabric stuck to his chest where it was damp.
“Thank ye for comin’ back to lead me to Gudrun’s cottage.
” He shook his wet hair back off his face and smoothed his beard stubble down with his fingers.
“All I lack is a razor an’ I would feel like new. ”
She smiled. “I cannae help ye out there, Master—”
He interrupted. “Call me Will. Did we no’ agree?”
She curtsied. “Aye, Will then. Please call me Ailsa. I have nay razor, but I can put the word out for one o’ the men to bring one to ye on the morrow if ye like?”
He sat down on an upended log stump to pull on a pair of short woolen stockings, then tied his leather boots over them.
“Nay, lass, dinnae fash yerself. I’ll borrow young Master Logan’s razor if I have to.”
Ailsa opened her mouth to say that with Master Logan Galbraith being so young and blond, it might be that he did not need to carry a razor around with him yet, but mentioning this might be seen as speaking badly about one of the blacksmiths behind his back.
So she just waited for Will to finish tying his boots under his knees.
He came to walk next to her, taking the basket from her hands without remark. He gave the contents under the cloth a sniff.
“Bannocks for breakfast?”
Ailsa was pleased to find him so acute. “Mmm, Oona uses honey an’ oats in the makin’ o’ them, Will, so consider yerself a fortunate man.” They walked back to Gudrun's cottage together in companionable silence.
“Are ye no’ comin’ in?” he asked her as she made to leave at the door.
She shook her head. “I sleep up at the castle.”
She looked at the orange sunset and then around at the twilight sky, the stone walls of the village cottages turning gray in the gloaming.
“The midnight bell will be sounding in a while. I have left a pitcher o’ small ale for ye both by the fire. The stew is ready an’ waitin’ for ye. Please tell Mither the bannocks come from Aunt Oona, so she need no’ worry about wakin’ to prepare food for ye in the morn.”
“Aye, lass. I will. I bid ye goodnight.”
She gave a small laugh as she began to tramp back up the hill to the castle, saying to him over her shoulder, “’Tis almost time to bid me a good morning, Will.”
The following three days were busy ones for Ailsa.
There was a feast to prepare, not an ordinary midsummer celebration, but the anniversary of when Laird Callum arrived at Castle Gray, no less.
Behind Laird Callum’s back, a competition was being held to see who could craft the best sword for the laird.
Each morning she woke, Ailsa felt as if her chores had been doubled while her body had been torn in twain as she bustled from one side of the castle to the other!
Keeping the whereabouts of the three blacksmiths a secret was madness.
“Whither do ye go, Mistress Housekeeper?” Callum asked her when she came into the dining hall to whisper something into Meria’s ear before preparing to run out again. “Come an’ dine with us at the dais. Tell me how goes the midsummer feast preparations.” He pulled out a chair for her to join them.
Ailsa, who had been whispering to Lady Meria that the bailey blacksmith urgently required more logs, hated to dissemble to her laird and master but had no choice.
“I cannae, Laird… I must be off to the nursery to check on Wee Master William. Nurse tells me he does nae like his turnips. P’raps I will take up some butter?”
Laird Callum MacNair gave his wife a grin. “Och, the wee rascal must eat his neeps. It’s no’ natural for a Highlander to no’ like the taste o’ their earthy sharpness.”
Lady Meria looked down at her platter and said, “Take the bairn some butter, Ailsa.”
Ailsa ran out of the dining hall as fast as her legs could carry her, hoping that the laird did not leave to visit the nursery right away. She would have to trust Lady Meria to inform Wee William’s nurse about the turnips.
A quick visit to the kitchen allowed Ailsa to tell Freida that Lady Meria was content for just one chicken to be cooked inside the new stove.
“She bids ye make sure the chimney is pulling first, so start the fire now, an’ I’ll be back anon to see how the contraption is functioning.”
She ran out again before Freida could begin complaining about the superiority of her fire pits.
Dithering about whether to ask the groom to saddle her a pony, Ailsa decided her legs would last her as far as the blacksmith’s, but then she would have to sit for a while.
Her morning had been spent preparing the bedchambers for the host of MacNairs and Grays who were about to start arriving at the castle.
It would be midsummer tomorrow. Even Father Adams, the clergyman, was excited about the forthcoming feast.
The smithy was a sight to behold. Master Creel and Logan Galbraith were each busy at an anvil, arms poised like statues for a brief moment before bringing the hammer down onto the blades with ferocious force.
The clang of the hammer head against metal was like thunder.
There was no sign of Will. Logan lifted up his head long enough to spy her arrival.
He was sweating so much, it looked like he had dipped his head in a pail of water.
“He’s down by the burn,” was all he said before bringing his hammer down again.
Ailsa left the village and went down to the burn that wended itself around the northern hillside, making its way to the sea in slow stages. Maybe Will had the same idea as she—to rest his head awhile on the soft green summer grass.
He was there, by the riverbanks, fast asleep under the canopy of a willow tree.
Ailsa thought there was nothing wrong with creeping up to where the blacksmith lay and then sitting down beside him.
It seemed like a good idea in her mind, but then again, she knew nothing about the tall stranger who lay resting on the ground.
The moment her shadow cast its outline over his face, Will woke.
But that was not all he did. As if it were the most natural thing in the world, the blacksmith withdrew a dirk from the side of his boot, grasped her forearm to pull her down to him, and placed the knife point to her throat.
What was happening was so unexpected and horrifying, Ailsa burst into tears. Her mother had sent her all the way to Inverness so that she would never have to experience nonsense like this. Did he mean to kill her?
It was over in the blink of an eye. He released her arm at the same time he slid the dirk back into his boot.
“Och, lass. Forgive me. Did I no’ tell ye that smithing is nae the only thing I like to do?”
All Ailsa could do for a moment or two was lie on the grass next to him, panting, hiccuping, and clutching her throat to make sure it was still whole. When she was somewhat recovered, Ailsa’s anger knew no bounds. She sat up.
“Ye over-hasty, murderin’, stab-happy wretch! How dare ye lay a hand on me!”
He seemed to take her wrathful words in his stride.
“Aye, aye. That I am. But it has often saved me in battle and whenever I find meself sleeping in less than salubrious circumstances, so that’s why I have done naught to rid meself o’ the habit.
I trained to be a soldier, ye ken. Blacksmithing is the best trade to learn if ye want to make yer own weapons.
Please forgive me, Ailsa. I was nae even aware o’ doin’ it, I swear. ”
Ailsa managed to calm down a little bit at his regretful words, but she was not ready to forgive him completely yet.
She moved closer to him slightly, but not because she wanted to; a piercing ray of sunlight was darting into her eyes from above the tree canopy.
Will seemed to accept this and made room for her in the tree shade.
She straightened out the creases in her skirt panels and tucked a stray strand of hair behind her cap.
“I came here to find out how yer dinner went. Master Creel and Logan are still hard at it up at the smithy.”
He grunted. “I am finished. I was too hot to eat. I came down here to bathe, but I guess sleep proved more important. D’ye recommend the water?” He glanced up to the bailey perched on the side of the hill below the castle. “I see the village and castle cast out their waste further downstream.”
There was something about the noonday summer heat, the way the water sparkled under the sun, that lured Ailsa into saying, “I have never bathed here before, Will. Mither was used to draw me a bath, and I used a washstand in Inverness.” She suppressed a wee giggle.
“The road runs past this way, ye see, so I suppose I was too afeared of being caught in me shift.”
He nodded understandingly. “I’ll see ye back up at the smithy then, shall I?” and promptly began pulling off his shirt.
This was going both too fast and too slowly for Ailsa. She stared, mesmerized, as Will began removing his boots and stockings. She had never met a man who so adored standing naked in the water before—only he made the thought of doing it so tempting to her, Ailsa wanted to do it too.
“Hold on!” She raised her hand to make him stop, then pulled off her cap. “Go down by the rushes an’ do it there, an’ I’ll join ye!”
Will grinned and sauntered down to the riverbank. Ailsa waited; she knew what Will planned on doing. He had not gone far when he turned around to look over his shoulder.
“And nay keekin’!” Ailsa commanded.
They both laughed when he said, “Same to ye then!”
It felt so good when her stays, skirt, petticoats, and bum roll fell to the ground, leaving her standing in just her shift. After peeking around the tree trunk to check on Will, Ailsa skipped down to the burn and waded in. The water chill took her breath away, but then it refreshed her.
Keeping her distance because she saw his plaid lying discarded on the riverbank, Ailsa shouted up to Will, “Now that I’ve seen how good it is, I want to do this every day!”
He disappeared under the water and then reemerged only a few feet away from her. She had seen the outline of his body under the water, knifing its way toward her, and could tell from the tone of his skin that Will spent a lot of his time in the sun during the summer.
“Can ye swim?” he wanted to know.
She shook her head. “Nay. Me mither scared the starch out o’ me when I was a wee yin with her tales of Kelpies an’ Green Jennies. But I am enjoying it all the same; the burn is nae deep where I am standin’.”
Will held out his hand to her. “Come. I will show ye how.”
He was smiling in such a friendly way that Ailsa did not have the heart to shrink away from him and act the prude.
When she moved closer, he scooped his arms under her body, raising her feet off the riverbed.
It felt wild and exhilarating, but she was not sure if it was because of the sensation of flying or because his hands held her so close to her womanly parts.
Her shift was transparent; Ailsa knew the blacksmith would be able to see the peaks of her nipples pressing against the fabric and the tufting triangle of fair hair covering her cranny if he bothered turning her over.
“There ye go… Ye’re good at this.”
His voice was so close, Ailsa got a shock. If she turned her face to the side, their lips would be only inches apart.
“Now, paddle yer hands like a dog looking for a bone it buried and kick yer feet from the knees.”
His hands began sliding away from underneath her, forcing her to float on her own. For one magical moment, Ailsa thought she had it, then she gave a little scream.
“Will! I’m goin’ under!”
His hands were back under her in an instant, and he was laughing.
“Ye’re in the shallows, lass! All ye have to do is put yer feet back on the ground.”
But for some strange reason, Ailsa felt as if keeping the firm ground under her feet would be the hardest thing in the world to accomplish.