Elizabeth English - The Borderlands 02 (5 page)

T
he hall at Cranston Keep was a small place, usually
dark and cheerless. Tonight it blazed with torch and candle while many voices
echoed from the bare stone walls. Knights and squires, men-at-arms, and hired
soldiers sat at trestles or walked about the hall. It was a crowd such as
Deirdre Maxwell had never seen in all her time in Scotland.

Brodie strode among his men, stopping here and there
to talk to the small groups that had gathered. He was in a good humor tonight,
for which all the gods be thanked. Tomorrow the men would march forth to meet
Johnson and settle for good and all the disputed lands between their borders. The
talk of battle was thirsty work.

Deirdre cast a practiced eye over the hall. Varlets
scurried about, bearing trays of mugs and pitchers of ale, all of which were
disappearing as fast as they could bring them. She turned back to the kitchens
to order another cask be opened. As she left the hall, she heard the voices
roar out a startled greeting. Another one, she thought with a sigh, and where
were they to put him?  Well, he'd just have to crowd in somehow with the others
in the hall.

A
listair smiled as Kinnon Maxwell came forward and took
his hand.

"Alistair, where have ye been, man?  There have
been the strangest tales told about ye lately—"

"Aye, I imagine that there have," Alistair
answered with a grin. "And with luck, maybe half of them are true."

Kinnon laughed a little nervously, toying with the
fringes of his beard. "Later on, when we've the time, perhaps you'll tell
me the truth of it."

"I'll do my best," Alistair promised. "But
I've heard tales as well. Is it true Brodie needs men against Johnson?"

"Oh, aye, as ye can see," Kinnon said,
gesturing about the crowded hall. "Why, is your sword for hire?"

"That it is."

"Well, that's a bit of luck for us! Sit down and
eat—ye look as if ye could use a good hot meal." His small dark eyes moved
over Alistair in a quick, assessing glance, taking in the patched cloak and
plain leather tunic, devoid of identifying colors. His face was filled with
questions, which Alistair supposed was only natural, but good manners kept him
from voicing them.

"Alistair! Alistair Kirallen, is that really
you?"

Kinnon's sister, Jennie, ran lightly through the hall.
Alistair smiled and caught her hands. "Why Jennie, lass, you're just as
fair as ever!"

She dimpled, her brown eyes dancing. "Och, go on,
and me a mother three times over!"

"Impossible!" Alistair exclaimed. "Ye
look just the same as the day we danced at Ian's wedding."

"Such blether!" Jennie said with an
unconvincing frown. "But, oh, 'tis good to see ye, Alistair."

It was good to see Jennie and Kinnon as well. Though
the Kirallens and Maxwells had never been more than lukewarm allies, Alistair
had visited this place many times before. The last occasion had been four or
five years ago, with Ian. They had stayed a night, and then, their business
done, had ridden back to Ravenspur.

Now everything was different. Alistair wouldn't be
given the second finest guest chamber on this visit. He wouldn't be offered a
place at the high table. And when he left, he wouldn't be going back to
Ravenspur.

He was a banished man, an outlaw, cut off from home
and kin forever. His mind had known that all along, but the agonizing burden of
guilt he carried had blocked out every other pain. If he thought of it at all,
it was with a bitter sense of justice. What right had he to warmth or happiness
when his foster brother and the men whose safety was his responsibility, all
lay moldering in cold clay? But tonight his sight had cleared and he saw that
in the madness of his grief, he had thrown away everything that still had
meaning for him.

He braced himself against the shattering wave of
homesickness that threatened to overwhelm him. His choices had been made and
there was no turning back. All he could do was go on, living one day to the
next, taking each moment as it came.

"Tell me about these bairns of yours," he
said to Jennie, trying hard to return her smile, then broke off as a crash
resounded through the hall.

A tray of wooden mazers lay scattered on the stone
floor in a puddle of spilled ale. Above stood a woman, her face bone white
beneath her coif. The smile faded from Alistair's lips as their eyes met.

It was her. Oh, it couldn't be, not here and now, and
yet it was. "I am but a mortal woman," she had said, but he hadn't
quite believed her. It seemed completely incongruous to see such a woman in
Maxwell's dingy hall, dressed in the common clothing that ordinary women wore. But
it was her. He knew her with a flash of certainty too deep to doubt.

Yet a moment later he
did
doubt it, for this
woman was very different than the young lass he had met on Beltane Eve. She
looked at least ten years older—close to his own age, thirty, he guessed. Her
gown was a hideous high-necked thing that hung loosely on her gaunt frame. A
plain linen coif covered every bit of her hair and framed a face too pale and
thin for beauty. Her cheeks were sharp, her mouth a taut thin line, so
different from the full and lovely lips he had touched so briefly with his own.

But her eyes—ah, once he looked into her eyes he knew
her once again. Even at this distance he could see them shining like sapphires.
And beneath that ugly coif was hair as black as midnight. But who was she? A
servant? Impossible! This was some sort of trick, or a disguise...the whole
thing made no sense. His heart began to pound and shake within his breast as
they faced each other across the crowded hall.

"Clumsy bitch!"

Brodie Maxwell grabbed her by the arm and drew his
hand back. Alistair was across the floor before the motion was complete.

Brodie rounded on him, scowling, and tried to shake
Alistair's hand from his wrist. "She's my wife, Kirallen, and I'll thank
ye to stay out of it."

Wife?
  Oh,
no, she couldn't be his wife! Not Brodie Maxwell! The eldest of the brood was a
blunt and surly man, with a slow wit and fearsome temper. Oh, Brodie could not
be wed to this faerie woman. The very thought was sickening! Alistair looked at
her and she bowed her head, a muscle twitching at the corner of her mouth.

"Well, wife or no, she's but a wee bit of a
thing," Alistair said, keeping his tone light and friendly. "Hitting
her won't mend matters. Instead why don't ye come and tell me what you're
paying."

Brodie' hand fell from his wife's arm and he gave a
short bark of laughter. "Dinna tell me you've come to fight for us! It
must be true then, all I've heard. Banished, were ye? Banished wi' a price upon
your head?"

"That is my own affair," Alistair said,
resisting the temptation to smash his fist squarely into Brodie's face.

"Not if ye fight for me, it's not."

"'Tis my sword for hire, not my past. Are ye
interested or no'?"

Lady Maxwell slipped away back toward the kitchen. She
stopped at the doorway and looked over her shoulder with a fleeting smile that
stopped Alistair's breath.

"God's blood, ye always were a touchy bastard,
Kirallen," Brodie said. "Too proud by half—at least while Ian was
alive. Come down a bit, haven't ye, now that he's gone?"

Alistair would have given anything to spin on his heel
and walk away. Or almost anything. What he would not give was his hope of seeing
the woman once again. He would suffer even Brodie for that chance.

"I've sunk low, indeed, to be seeking work from
the likes of you," he answered, but he forced himself to smile as he said
it. "Now get your long nose out of my business and give me a drink while
we settle things between us."

He waited, every muscle tensed. Brodie could go either
way. But Maxwell's heir was in a good humor tonight. He roared with laughter
and slung an arm across Alistair's shoulder.

"All right, all right! Kirallen's loss will be my
gain and we'll say no more about it! Come and get yourself a mug."

Alistair allowed himself to be led off to a corner. There
they bickered back and forth, but he was careful to let Brodie get the better
of the bargain. God forbid he'd be the one to put the man into one of his
tempers. Not now that he knew who would suffer for it.

O
nce the singing began Deirdre crept into the hallway
leading to the kitchens, keeping close against the wall. She spied Brodie
seated at the corner of the long table, deep in conversation with the
golden-haired stranger.

Back in the kitchens Jennie and the other women were
all in a flutter, chattering like magpies about the man. Deirdre had felt a
cold shock run through her when they named him. She had heard of him, of course.
No one could live on this particular stretch of border and not know of Sir
Alistair Kirallen, a name shrouded in treachery and scandal.

While no one was quite sure what had happened at
Ravenspur Manor last year, one on point the rumors all agreed. Alistair
Kirallen had turned traitor to his clan. His own foster father, who it was said
had loved him well, had been driven to cast him out.

He was a banished man. An outlaw. A man with no home,
no kin, no claim to honor. A bitter smile twisted Deirdre's lips. Well, at
least she was consistent. When it came to men, she had no judgment, as she had
proven yet again.

He looked different than he had seemed to her on
Beltane Eve; older, harder, with an almost tangible aura of command shimmering
about him. Even his plain leather jerkin and old cloak could not disguise the
fact that this was a man accustomed to be giving orders, not taking them.

As Brodie talked on, Sir Alistair's eyes moved over
the hall, taking the measure of the men he was to fight with. Deirdre noted the
keen intelligence in his glance and imagined he had already summed up their
strengths and weaknesses, labeled and divided them into fighting units.

They said that when he was just twenty, Sir Alistair
had been chief among Kirallen's legendary band of knights. His extraordinary
rise to power had made his sudden disgrace all the more fascinating to his
neighbors.

Even sitting still, he was filled with a restless
energy that showed in the drumming of his fingers on the trestle, the tapping
of one booted foot on the rush-strewn floor. His fine light hair had come loose
from its braid and caught the torchlight, making a halo around his face. Yet
there was little of the angel about this man, unless it was a fallen one.

His eyes were just as Deirdre remembered, large and
brilliant, set wide above broad flat cheekbones. For the first time she noticed
that his high-bridged nose was slightly crooked, as though it had been broken.

It was a strong face, undeniably attractive. Certain
it was that every other man vanished once he walked into the hall. And from the
talk she'd heard in the kitchens, she wasn't the only woman he affected in that
way.

Whatever had he been doing last Beltane Eve? Deirdre
could not begin to imagine what strange ritual had set his soul to wandering
through the night. But it had been him. Of that she had no doubt. And he had
recognized her as well, though God be thanked he'd held his tongue about it. At
least so far.

She remembered now the things they'd said and done
that night and felt the blood drain from her face. What had she been thinking?
Who would have thought the man was real—and known to her husband! But how well
known? What was he saying to Brodie now? One careless word, one chance remark,
and Brodie would fly into a killing rage.

Brodie held out his hand and Alistair took it. From
the smile on her husband's face, Deirdre could tell he'd made a bargain to his
liking. She breathed again, her knees shaking with relief. It was all right, at
least for now. But whatever must Alistair Kirallen think of her? How deep did
his friendship for Brodie run?

As Brodie strode off Alistair frowned and wiped his
palm on his jerkin, then turned and looked straight into Deirdre's eyes, as
though he understood her fears and was trying without words to reassure her.

Before she could decide whether to acknowledge his
gesture, his head whipped around toward the bard seated in the center of the
hall. Puzzled, Deirdre followed his gaze, then the words of the bard's song
reached her.

"As I was walking all alone,
I heard twa corbies making a moan;
The ane unto the t'other say-o,
'Where shall we gang and dine to-day-o?'"

Twa corbies. That's what he had
said that night when she spoke of the two ravens behind him.

The talk and laughter of the crowded hall faded into
silence. There was nothing but the bard's song, and by the pricking of the
tender skin of her neck, Deirdre recognized the presence of strong magic in the
room. How could they not feel it? she thought, looking at the laughing faces
around her. But they did not.

"In
behint yon auld fail dyke,
I wot there lies a new slain knight;
Naebody kens that he lies there-o,
But his hawk, his hound, and lady fair-o."