Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
The fire in the study had not been lit properly, and the room smelled of old parchment, damp wool, and the bitter tang of stale ink. Alpin stood by the high desk, his fingers tracing the jagged edge of a brass inkwell.
The knock came at exactly the hour he'd named, which didn't surprise him.
"Enter."
The door opened only far enough to let her through, and she closed it behind her. She wore the same green wool from the road, her hair pinned up badly enough that a curl had already worked loose over one ear, and she crossed to the chair across his desk and sat without being asked.
"You sent for me."
"I did."
Grisselle did not sit in the leather chair opposite him. She stood beside the heavy bookshelf, her hands tucked into the deep pockets of her wool skirt. Her hair was still a wild, copper cloud, only partially tamed by a single dark ribbon at the base of her neck.
"The agreement needs to be plain," Alpin said, his deep voice scraping through the small room.
He did not look at her face; he kept his eyes on the blank ledger sheet between them.
"We are bound by the contract signed in London.
Me council will see a betrothal, and the parish will see a wedding. But that is the extent of the matter."
"A wedding of convenience," Grisselle repeated. Her voice was steady. "No grand words. No expectations."
"None," Alpin said, his jaw tightening until the scar on his neck went white.
"Ye will have yer horse, yer freedom on the braes, and the security of me name.
In return, I require a lady who stands at the high table when the clan gathers, so the old men will stop looking toward Edinburgh for a bride. "
Grisselle stepped closer to the desk, her green eyes fixed on his. Her chest rose and fell in a quick, shallow rhythm, the knuckles of her right hand turning white against the polished oak.
"How generous," Grisselle said. "A husband who wants nothing from his wife."
"I want the council satisfied. That's the whole of it."
"And when they ask for an heir? Does 'nothing real' extend to the nursery, or only to conversation at supper?"
His jaw worked once before he answered. He hadn't let himself land on that particular question yet, and he wasn't about to land on it now, in front of her, with the rain making the room feel smaller than it was. "We'll cross that when we come to it."
"How reassuring." She rose before he could say anything else, smoothing her skirts with a briskness that dared him to read something into it.
"A contract, then. I hope you keep a scribe, Laird Herston, because I intend to have every clause of my freedom written down where you can't later claim you never said it. "
"Ye have me word."
"I have your word." She said it flat, and made herself hold his eyes to say it.
She looked away first, down at the ledger between them, and found something to do with her hands, smoothing a wrinkle out of her sleeve that wasn't there. When she looked up again, her chin came up too, a beat too deliberate.
"It is a fair trade, Laird Herston. It beats the wagers at White's, and it beats the smell of lavender water." A pause, shorter than she meant it to be. "I agree."
"Good," Alpin muttered, turning his back to her to stare out the narrow window at the grey mist rolling over the cliffs. "The matter is settled, then."
The heavy oak door opened and shut as she left, the latch dropping.
Alpin did not move from the window. He picked up a goose-quill pen, dipped it into the black ink, and held it over the ledger for ten full minutes until a heavy, dark drop fell onto the paper, blotting out the first line completely.
He cursed under his breath, threw the pen into the grate, and unhooked his leather belt just to buckle it tight again. He could not focus on the numbers; every time the wind rattled the glass, his fingers twitched as if they were still tangled in her thick, wild curls.
By three in the afternoon, the great hall was thick with the grey smoke of damp peat and the heavy, sour breath of six old men who had been drinking ale since noon.
The council sat along the long trestle table, their grey heads leaned together in a tight, whispering knot. Old Dougal was absent, but Eachann and Ranald were already hammering their wooden mugs against the timber as Alpin strode into the room, his heavy plaid snapping against his boots.
"The clan is breathing easier today, me Laird,” Eachann called out, his old face creasing into a web of deep wrinkles as he grinned. "The mail-rider brought the news before yer horses even cleared the gatehouse. A viscount's daughter! The Hunter line!"
"We need the date, Laird," Ranald joined in, leaning his broad chest over the table, his knuckles white against the wood. "The MacCarrons are already asking when the banns will be read at the kirk. The people want to see the lady at the high table. When do we call the pipes?"
Alpin dropped into his heavy oak chair at the head of the board, his arms crossing over his chest. His expression remained as flat and unyielding as the stone walls behind him. "There is no date."
Eachann’s grin faltered, his hand freezing on the handle of his mug. "No date? But the contract is signed, is it nae? The girl is in the East Tower this very hour."
"She is adjusting to the weather," Alpin said, his voice dropping into a low, dangerous rumble that made the kitchen maid stop by the butter-press.
"The wedding will happen when the keep is ready, and nae an hour before.
I will nae have me hall managed by a committee of grey-beards who cannot even keep the damp out of their own boots. "
Ranald let out a sharp, frustrated breath, exchanging a dark look with the man next to him. "If ye have no date to give the people, they will think the English girl is nothing but a shadow."
"Let them think what they like," Alpin said, standing up so fast his chair screeched against the flagstones. "The contract stands. Now clear the hall; the smoke in here is thick enough to choke a hound."
The air in the armory was cooler, smelling of whale-oil, cold iron, and old leather.
Old Dougal sat on a low three-legged stool beneath a rack of rusty broadswords, a grease-stained linen rag in his hand. He was slowly rubbing the length of a heavy iron pike that had belonged to Alpin’s grandfather, the steady shhh-shhh of the cloth the only sound in the narrow stone room.
Alpin leaned his shoulder against the rough masonry of the doorway, his arms tucked into his plaid. He watched the old man’s scarred fingers move over the metal for several minutes before speaking. "The council is in a hanging mood today."
Dougal did not look up from the pike. "The old men want to see a child in the cradle before they go into the churchyard, me Laird. It makes them feel as though the walls willnae tumble when they're gone."
Dougal flipped the pike over, inspecting the point against the dim light of the tallow dip. He didn't ask about the marriage date, nor did he mention the contract. He paused, his milky eyes finally lifting to Alpin’s face. "What do ye think of the girl from the south, then? Is she small?"
"She is small enough," Alpin said, his jaw tightening as the image of Grisselle standing on the muddy cliff-edge rushed back into his mind.
"But she has a tongue that could slice a salmon clean in two. She’s the most stubborn, unmanaged woman I have ever laid eyes on.
She caked her skirts in black mud before the noon-bell and laughed in me face when I told her to get off the rocks. "
Dougal’s old, weathered face softened, a slow, genuine smile breaking through his grey beard as he looked down at his large hands. He went back to rubbing the iron with his grease-rag, his shoulders loosening for the first time all day.
"Aye," the old man whispered, the rag moving in a steady, comfortable circle against the metal.
"That sounds about right for her mother's line, then.
Her grandsire was a Laird himself once, before he gave it up and went south.
Yer grandfather always claimed that blood breeds true, born with the wind in their teeth, the lot of them. "
Alpin didn't answer. He turned his eyes toward the rack of old weapons, his fingers clenching into tight fists inside his plaid.
The great hall was so loud the rafters seemed to vibrate with the din.
For ten years, supper at Herston Castle had been a silent, dismal affair, with Alpin chewing his salt-beef in the dark while the servants hovered like ghosts in the shadows.
Tonight, the trestle tables had been pushed together, and the entire household sat shoulder to shoulder under the yellow blaze of a dozen fresh tallow dips.
Alpin sat at the head of the board, his arms crossed over his chest, his trencher of mutton completely untouched. He didn't say a word. He simply watched.
At the center of the table, Grisselle had tucked her green skirts tight around her stool to make room for Senga, who was tentatively holding a platter of roasted roots.
"You did the crust on the mutton pie, didn't you?" Grisselle asked, her voice carrying easily over the clatter of pewter mugs.
Senga’s red elbows went stiff, her face turning the color of a beet. "I... I helped Mistress Greer with the lard, me Lady."
"It’s proper pastry," Grisselle said, taking a hefty piece with her fingers and biting into it without a single thought for southern manners. "In London, they make the crust look like a little castle, but it tastes of nothing but dust and old butter. This is real food."
Senga’s jaw dropped, a massive, brilliant grin breaking through her fright as she looked over at Cait. "Hear that? She says the London pastry tastes like dust!"
Across the table, Isobel let out a loud, delighted snort into her ale cup, coughing as the liquid went down the wrong way. "I told ye, Greer! I told ye she had sense."