Charming the Shrew (28 page)

C
ATRIONA LED THE
horses back up the deer trail. It had taken her longer than she had expected to find them; somehow she’d passed them in her concentration on keeping the river on her left and had to double back. But she had found them, and she was proud of herself for it.

“Cat!” Tayg’s voice came from somewhere off to her left. Had she missed the clearing?

“Cat!” he called again, and she saw him loping toward her through the trees. “I moved Broc to where I left Duff. Follow me,” he said, untying the rein that linked the second and third horse and taking the first two from her.

He turned back the way he had come and she followed, silently fuming that he had said nothing about her finding the horses, though perhaps his confidence in her was such that he had no doubt she would fetch them. That thought pushed the momentary hurt from her, but she did not dwell on it long, lest she let the warm feeling it created soften her toward Tayg of Culrain.

“Well, lads, your mounts have arrived, and ’tis up to you how you shall ride,” Tayg said.

Catriona stared at the two men trussed and sitting, arms behind them, knees bent from the tether connecting their hands and feet, leaning against separate trees far enough apart that they could not speak quietly with each other.

“We ride nowhere with you, Culrain,” Broc said, a sneer darkening his voice.

“You shall ride with me, then,” Catriona said. “And you shall explain to the king that ’twas you behind this plot. You shall explain that ’twas none of the rest of us.” She looked at Dogface…Duff. He looked a pitiful shell of a man at this moment, resentful and angry, but no longer a threat. “And you shall explain that Duff’s part in this arose out of need. Mind you I shall never wed him, but perhaps the king can find some way to win the fealty of Clan Donell if he knows the truth behind Duff’s part in this.”

“Aye, I shall be pleased to explain the circumstances to the king,” Duff said. “I shall be pleased to explain how Broc lied and manipulated until my clan was so desperate I would agree even to take the Shrew of Assynt into my house in order to assure the survival of my people.”

“Watch your tongue, MacDonell,” Tayg growled.

“Aye, mind your tongue, Duff, or I shall be required to cut it out,” Broc said.

“Fine words from a man trussed like a fine fat cow,” Catriona said.

“Sister mine, do not provoke me.”

“I shall provoke you all I like. ’Tis what I have done my whole life, is it not?”

“Aye, you were ever a thorn in my side, Triona.”

“My name is Cat.”

Tayg grinned, and she grinned back before she could stop herself. She realized with a start that she was Cat now, no longer Triona the Shrew. She had changed, and except for the fact ’twas her weakness for Tayg that had led her here, she liked who she had become.

“From the moment you could speak you have gainsaid me,” Broc snarled at her. “From the moment you could form a sentence you have done all you could to thwart my authority over you or anyone else. ’Tis so even now when I am so close to fixing our place in history, our place in the Highlands. When I have accomplished this feat, all will seek our support. The MacDonells are just the start.”

“Nay, we shall never more seek anything from the treacherous, untrustworthy MacLeods,” Duff said. “I would not trust you in my own house, and I would not trust your integrity even were I offered your hospitality. I would rather see my clan starve than to submit to such as you.”

“I am the salvation of your clan.” Broc spat in Duff’s direction. “The MacDonells are nothing without the support my clan will bring to you.”

“
Nothing
is a better fate than to be saddled with you.” Duff turned his attention to Tayg, who stood, a small smile on his lips, arms crossed across his broad chest, watching the exchange.

“Take me to King Robert. I shall tell him all that Broc plans…all.”

“You will not!” Broc said, suddenly surging up from his place by the tree. He charged across the open space, a dagger held over his head. He launched himself at the trussed Duff, who rolled to his side just as Tayg smashed into Broc, knocking him aside. Broc landed in a heap a few feet away.

Duff struggled to sit up again, his eyes wide. “Untie me! Untie me now before the man comes at me again!”

Cat walked slowly over to her brother, who lay facedown, unmoving. She looked at Tayg as he came closer, reached down, and shook Broc’s shoulder. The other man did not move. Tayg grabbed his shoulder and rolled him onto his back. The dagger stuck up to the hilt from between Broc’s ribs.

“’Tis sorry I am, Cat.”

She shook her head, still trying to take in the vision of her brother, the man who had made life one long trial, lying dead at her feet. A small part of her mourned the loss—he was her brother, no matter how little good there was between them—but a larger part just felt cold and distant, as if the man at her feet were a stranger.

“You had no part in this except to defend a man who could not defend himself,” she said.

“I did. ’Tis my dagger. I lost it in the fight with Duff.”

“Aye, and Broc found it when you sat him by that tree,” Duff said.

Tayg glared at the man. “You knew he was armed and yet you goaded him?”

“No one ever said Duff was smart,” Cat said, her voice oddly hollow, even to her own ears.

“I should have let him at you,” Tayg said to Duff. He took a blanket from his bags and spread it out on the snow next to Broc. He pulled the blade from the man and cleaned the blood off in the snow. Carefully he rolled the body into the blanket, tied it, and at last loaded it over the saddle of Broc’s horse.

Swiftly he released Duff’s feet long enough to sling the man into his saddle, then he quickly tied his feet again under the horse’s belly. Cat mounted, and Tayg swung up behind her. It was comforting to be there in the circle of his arms, but she would not let herself lean back against him, would not take that solace. He tied the reins of Duff’s horse to the saddle, as he had tied Broc’s to Duff’s, then silently they left the bloodstained scene behind them.

Surely Ailig was almost to Culrain by now. They must get there as soon as possible, for she feared Gair would not command the king’s attention as Tayg would. The king would not heed Ailig’s tale. Ailig needed Tayg, trusted warrior of the king, to vouch for him lest he and their clan be blamed for Broc’s ill-conceived plan. The king would throw Ailig into the gaol or worse, and Catriona had no wish to lose another brother this day.

I
T WAS DUSK
before Tayg led the way into the village of Culrain and through the cottages to the hallhouse. No shouts of welcome greeted him this time; indeed, the village seemed deserted, which meant that everyone was gathered in the hall awaiting the king’s response to Ailig’s tale—if he had listened to Ailig at all.

He glanced back over his shoulder to make sure Duff was still there, as he had done so many times on this journey. Cat had said nothing to him since they left the clearing. Duff had tried to explain himself as they rode through the wood, but Tayg’s quiet promise to follow through on Broc’s threat to cut out the man’s tongue—in spite of any useful information he might bring to the king—finally seemed to dampen Duff’s need for conversation.

Tayg stopped near the steps and tied his horse to a post there. He went back to help Cat down, but she seemed to be in a daze, not noticing him standing at her knee.

“Lass?” he said, touching her calf lightly.

“We must tell Ailig about Broc.”

“Aye, there is much we need to tell Ailig, and the king, but we cannot do so out here.” He reached up, grasped her about the waist, and helped her down.

She stood, still as stone. He tipped her face up though she did not raise her eyes to his. He ran a finger lightly over the vivid bruise on her cheek. “I am sorry for what happened.”

She shook her head. “Nay, do not be. Broc brought his fate upon himself.” She looked up into his eyes. “I find little sorrow in my heart for him. I am truly the coldhearted shrew he always said I was.”

Tayg folded her into his arms and was relieved when she wrapped her arms about his waist and burrowed into his embrace. “Nay, lass. You are softhearted when given half a chance to be. You have warmed my heart as no one has ever done before.” He kissed the top of her head, then laid his cheek against her soft hair. “You have little sorrow for him because he never gave you reason to care. Do not let him win by making you doubt yourself.”

He pulled back and cupped her face in his hands. “I love you, lass. You have made me love you with your warmth and your humor and your stubbornness.” He grinned at her. “And your way of winning friends—your way of winning me.”

He kissed her then, letting all that he felt for her pour into that moment. She kissed him back, quite desperately, and he pulled her close.

“We have much to do,” he said, resting his forehead against hers. “But I would finish this…conversation…as soon as we may, for there is much to discuss, much to explain.”

“Nay.”

“Aye, there is, but first we must see the king and see that Ailig and your other brothers are safe.”

She stepped out of his arms and pulled her cloak about her. “To the king, then.”

Tayg released Duff’s feet and helped him to the ground too. “What, no tender words for me?” Duff asked. “She was to be mine, despite her sharp tongue. She was always meant for me.”

“You wanted only what the lass could bring with her.”

“And you want less?”

“Nay, I want more,” Tayg said, shoving the man toward the steps. He looked at Cat, capturing her startled gaze. “I will have her heart for my own. Nothing less.”

She took a shuddering breath, and he glimpsed a crack in the wall she had built around her heart. Perhaps there was hope for the two of them yet.

He shoved Duff through the doorway into the noisy hall, yet no one seemed to notice their entrance. He looked around, noting that his parents and the king were nowhere in evidence, yet the door to the “bear’s den” was closed and Duncan stood guard there. He pushed Duff, his hands still bound behind his back, in that direction. He grabbed Cat’s hand and pulled her along. As they moved through the hall silence puddled around them until the ripples of their movement quieted the entire gathering. Duncan nodded at Tayg, then knocked on the door and opened it, stepping out of the way to let the three enter.

The king sat in his father’s accustomed chair, his richly embroidered crimson mantle pooled about him. His dark hair and close-cut beard framed steely eyes cold with barely controlled fury. Angus Dubh, chief of Culrain, Gair, and Friar John ranged behind the king. Ailig and the other brothers stood opposite, facing the king like pawns on a chessboard, and soldiers ringed the room. Ailig was mid-sentence but stopped at their entrance.

“Sire, here is Tayg,” Ailig said. “Let him tell you in his own words all that he has discovered.”

The king rose and accepted Tayg’s and Cat’s hasty bows.

“This is the lass who has caused so much chasing about?” the king growled.

Catriona flinched but stood her ground. Tayg wrapped his arm about her waist and pulled her close. “Aye, sire. This is she, and were it not for her, your life would be in grave danger…”

S
EVERAL HOURS LATER
Cat lay on the bed in the chamber that had been given to her. ’Twas a large chamber, and the bed was broad and stuffed with feathers. She was tired, sore from days of traveling and Broc’s toppling of her from her horse. She wanted to sleep, to escape all that she had heard in the last few hours, all that she had witnessed, to escape the knowledge that Tayg was not the person she had imagined him to be.

For she was sure she had imagined the bard. How else could she explain how the man she had watched eloquently argue for her clan could ever have been mistaken for a charming, bumbling bard? He had been every inch a warrior, clearly in the king’s favor, when he presented his case to save her clan, to save Ailig, the sheep, and, she had realized belatedly, herself, from the king’s all too evident wrath. Ailig had stood silent, allowing first Tayg, then, when questioned, Duff, to verify the tale he had already told the king before their arrival.

At last the king had sent all but Tayg away, placing Duff, Ailig, and the others under guard. Only when Tayg whispered something to the king did he release her to Tayg’s mother’s care with Cat’s promise she would keep to her chamber until summoned back to the king’s presence. She gladly gave it. The woman who led her away from the crowded chamber to this comfortable one had looked at her oddly, but she said little beyond pointing out the tub and the clothing that had been provided for her comfort.

Cat had sat in the tub until the water was too cool to be comfortable. She had dressed, first donning a beautifully made linen shift, then a gown more beautiful than any she had worn before. It was made of finely woven woad-blue wool, like the gown Isobel had offered her, and it was soft and warm, with an intricately embroidered decoration in a line down the length of each sleeve. The embroidered trim was studded with tiny gray and white freshwater pearls. A similar decoration edged the neckline. The rest flowed simply and gracefully over her hips, nearly but not quite reaching the floor, as if it had been made specifically for her. A plaid in shades of crimson shot through with saffron and black served as a wrap.

She had combed out her hair and dried it in front of the fire. She had left it loose, braiding only the front sections, then looping them back and fastening them together with a bit of leather. Now she waited, wondering if she had dressed thusly for her execution.

A soft knock came at the door. Her breath caught as she sat up. Would she learn the destiny of her clan now? Would she learn her own destiny?

“Come in,” she said.

The door swung open, and Tayg stepped into the chamber. He had not changed his clothing…Broc’s blood still stained his tunic. Cat stood. Sitting on the bed was too intimate, reminding her of things she wanted and things she could not have.

Tayg stared at her. He licked his lips and looked about to say something but stood silent. He shook his head and took a step toward her.

“You are even bonnier than I knew,” he said.

Cat looked at her feet, unable to answer the question in his eyes. “’Tis the gown.”

“Nay,” he said, lifting her chin with his finger. “Nay, ’tis you.”

“Am I summoned to the king?” she asked, afraid to ask more.

“Soon. He wishes us to attend him at the evening meal.”

She nodded and lifted her chin to release herself from his touch, for it was meddling with her mind, as was the look of need in his eyes.

“You need not worry, lass. The king is fair. He has not yet decided the fate of the MacLeods and the MacDonells, but I do not think harm will come to any save those who knowingly went against him.”

“And the rest of us will be exiled from our lands and our homes?”

“You shall always have a home, lass, if you will but marry me.”

Tears burned her eyes and clogged her throat. “I cannot abandon my clan to secure myself a soft future.”

“I do not ask you to abandon them. I ask you to join with me.”

“’Tis the same thing. I do not know you anyway. You are so much more than my bard.”

“Cat, I—”

“Wheesht, let me finish,” she said, laying her finger on his lips. ’Twas a mistake, that, for all she wanted to do was to place her own lips there and forget everything in the sweetness of his embrace. She wanted the forgetfulness and the total focus that had come in the same moment when she had lain in his arms. She wanted the feelings of love and acceptance, of safety and sweet good humor. She wanted that and so much more. But she would not have any of it. Could not, thanks to Broc.

“I cannot marry you, Tayg. Were you but a bard ’twould be different, for then the black stain upon my clan’s name would matter little, but I cannot ask Tayg of Culrain to do the same. I do promise to do whatever I may to ensure my clan does naught against the king. Indeed, if Ailig and I can do so, we will sway the clan to declare fealty to King Robert—though whether they will listen to either of us after this remains to be seen. They may banish us all and choose another to lead the clan. My father will be mortified, as well he should be, and there is little I may do to change any of that.”

Tayg stood silent, devouring her with his gaze. At last he asked, “Will you do as the king bids you?”

“I can do no less.”

Tayg nodded and turned to leave. He stopped, his hand on the latch, and turned back. “Do you love me?” he asked. “The truth, Cat. You owe me that much.”

Tears filled her eyes, but she would not let them fall. “I do love you, Tayg, with all my heart. I understand now why ’twas necessary to keep your identity hidden—and all the rest. But the rest is why I cannot saddle you with the taint of my clan. You are bound for great things, ’tis clear. ’Twould break my heart to see you fall because of me.”

His eyes were dark and determined, but he said nothing as the door closed behind him.

A
N EXTRA TABLE
had been added on the dais in the hall to serve the king’s folk, and Tayg found himself seated near the end of it, Duncan to his left and his parents on his right, nearer the king’s still empty seat. The bard played near the fire, just as he had a fortnight before. How could everything change so quickly?

Just a fortnight past he was unwilling to consider marriage. Now he was ridiculously morose because a difficult, bonny lass had declined his proposal with an all-too-logical argument. ’Twas an argument worthy of Robbie, but he wasn’t Robbie, and neither was Cat. The lass wasn’t culpable in her brother’s plot. She had done all she could to stop it. Did that not make her a worthy bride for a warrior of the king and the future chief of the Munros of Culrain?

“Daft lass.”

“Aye, they all are,” Duncan said, considering Tayg in a way that reminded him of his mum when he was a wee lad and had gotten into the sweets. “But no more daft than a lad in love. Is there one in particular you are brooding over?” he asked with a smirk.

Tayg glared at him. “You know there is. She will not have me.”

His mother chuckled from his right. “’Tis somehow just that you should finally find a lass you want and she will not have you.”

“It has little to do with justice,” he said. “She thinks her brother’s treason makes her unworthy.”

“And does it?” she asked quietly.

Tayg looked at his mother, considering his answer carefully. “Nay. She is a most worthy lass. She is loyal, and I would trust her with my life—indeed I have trusted her with my life. ’Tis not her doing that her brother is a fool.”